I played a bunch of testing games against Jund and UW control with my Knightfall + Molten Vortex / Life from the Loam deck. It didn't go well, I won about half the games, the deck is powerful, but its trying to do too many things and doesn't have enough interaction to either defend my board or interact with the opponent.
I really missed Simic Charm, and the games I won were almost all either Vortex or straight beatdown. The threat of the combo did some work for me, but I rarely won games directly with it. Most of the time I just didn't have enough pressure against the control deck, he was too comfortable unless I had Vortex on the board. I'm going back to the drawing board.
Molten Vortex / Life from the Loam does a lot of work cleaning up creature matchups like Elves, Abzan Company and Merfolk, or even Affinity and Infect if you can get it online quickly.
The decision to give up Lightning Bolt was very difficult and may be wrong; like all of these decks it needs a lot of testing.
The Communes and Insights are there to find combo pieces, find Loams to leave in the graveyard and make Tarmogoyf's bigger; five of that type of effect has seemed right. The manabase has worked for me in informal games within reason, but I need a lot more practice with it before really advocating for it.
I don't like leak, pierce probably better? But damn we are on the same page
For sure, me either, haha Its one of those 8 slots. Theyve been remands, and negates and peirces and coiling oracles and wall of omens and scoozes. Ill probably try familiars ruse and deprive (at least it helps land fall) but those are the last 8 spots i dont know what i want to fill with yet
I really like Negate in those spots personally. Dead against creatures is less annoying than (mostly) dead late game and vs big mana at the moment I think.
I've been holding on to Knight of the Reliquary waiting for a deck to play it in. Sadly, I'm missing most of the really expensive cards in the deck. Looking at you, Tarmogoyf.
Fwiw, I think the best version of these decks includes Tarmogoyf, but a playable version likely exists without it. If you search for replacements, look for something that doesn't get diminished by graveyard hate if possible; might as well diversify the threat base some. Leaning more heavily on Voice and/or Geist or other options could still end up being a very competitive deck.
They're different based on what you're trying to accomplish. Dromoka's is better versus burn, red decks in general and when the fight mode is valuable.
Simic Charm is better against Delve creatures, Path to Exile, anything trying to kill your permanents that aren't creatures. I've been choosing Simic main deck in decks that support both typically lately.
Molten Vortex/Life from the Loam gives great reach and board control; it doesn't win on the spot, but fits very naturally into the deck. It also gives you a heavy LD gameplan recurring Ghost Quarter if the opponent is right and you either find the Ghost Quarter or get a Knight to stick.
I am using the new dual lands for several reasons. One, I think this is how our future manabases are going to get made; mine might not be exactly right, but I think the new duals are going to get used. Another reason is presuming I have 2 basics in play, my 5 Mountain/(Plains or Forest) can generate R to be used with land already in hand for Vortex activations when comboing off.
Skarrg, the Rage Pits over the other options discussed might be wrong. I like that Skarrg is useable in other situations for less mana. I'm almost always mana starved, but two mana to make my Goyfs trample and bigger than opposing Goys is nice.
For man-lands, I prefer Treetop Village because of its light activation cost and I don't really care if it gets killed typically because it can be recurred. I might talk myself in Stirring Wildwood; Raging Ravine is a lot of mana but I can see the case for it also.
My durdle-package might have too many cards devoted to it between Commune with the Gods / Magmatic Insight / Serum Visions. Magmatic Insight is amazing but I don't like seeing a bunch of them in my opening hand. Serum Visions is the best general selection spell in the format and Commune sees a lot of cards that might be one of either combo package. I haven't found this mix to be too slow, but it needs testing. The goal is to see enough cards to have a strong gameplan each game without knowing exactly which gameplan will apply at the start.
frontend hundreds of dollars or backend hundreds of dollars because you have them? The group of havenot's far exceeds the group of have's; egalitarian doctrine. The action to be performed should be performed by the fewest people possible. If you have goyf's and would like to run them instead of a card that synergizes with the stratagem, do so.
I'm not sure how this has devolved into The Man keeping down The Masses. Tarmogoyf is legal in the format, it shouldn't be shocking people include it in decks. If you don't want to use him, throw in Flinthoof Boar of Beater X of your choice. Whether Goyf is affordable or not isn't the purpose of the thread.
@Lootsmith I agree Simic Charm is very good. I also think Lotus Cobra is a consideration. As for accessibility because of Tarmogoyf, I just don't see it being relevant. The object is to make the best deck, from there it can be tinkered with if some cards aren't available, but there's no reason to do so at the front end of the process. Some people on the board own Goyfs.
why play Tarmogoyf, the wallet-muncher, when you could play undergrowth champion with its landfall? Notice the counters are permanent and not UEoT.
Tarmogoyf is resilient (typically doesn't die to Bolt) in ways Undergrowth Champion isn't. I honestly really like the UC, its my kind of card, but the problem is it is very similar to Knight of the Reliquary and Countryside Crusher in that its 3 mana invested in a card that its very possible will be removed for 1-2 mana. That doesn't make them bad, but I do feel like there are a limited number of those cards you can play in one deck unless you're going to cheat ala Collected Company.
Its why I like Molten Vortex, it hits from a completely different angle and is a one mana spell to try to resolve.
I agree you could make this deck without Goyf. My first take on this deck, and my preferred playing style, is aggression with counters/disruption for answers so I am reaching for the best beaters in the colors which are Nacatl and Goyf; there are certainly other shells this could be successful in.
Its pretty straightforward, Zoo creatures, the LotL/Vortex end game and board control package with a chance at the combo win. Stubborn Denial might make sense in the Spell Snare slot. Courser could be a one of instead of two.
Probably 24 Land because there are a number of utility lands I want to play, though I have made a very similar deck to this work on 22 before. The ideal manabase is going to need the new dual lands in some number I believe and I need to work on it; I'd like to make it work on 22 land.
The last few slots I haven't decided on; some combination of charms, commands and Qasali Pridemage maybe. I like decks that attack from multiple angles in formats like Modern and I like Negate a lot at the moment. I'm a little distressed that almost everything in the deck is graveyard dependent; I'd really look at evasive non-graveyard dependent threats as part of the sideboard plan.
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I really missed Simic Charm, and the games I won were almost all either Vortex or straight beatdown. The threat of the combo did some work for me, but I rarely won games directly with it. Most of the time I just didn't have enough pressure against the control deck, he was too comfortable unless I had Vortex on the board. I'm going back to the drawing board.
The decision to give up Lightning Bolt was very difficult and may be wrong; like all of these decks it needs a lot of testing.
1 Breeding Pool
3 Cinder Glade
4 Flooded Strand
2 Forest
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Steam Vents
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
1 Treetop Village
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Commune with the Gods
4 Life from the Loam
2 Magmatic Insight
4 Molten Vortex
3 Negate
2 Retreat to Coralhelm
//Creatures
2 Courser of Kruphix
4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Noble Hierarch
2 Plated Geopede
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Rhox War Monk
3 Anger of the Gods
3 Ancient Grudge
2 Loxodon Smiter
2 Rending Volley
2 Wipe Away
1 Scavenging Ooze
The deck has multiple lines of attack:
Knight / Retreat
Vortex / Loam
Geopede / Loam --> Fetchland recursion
Ghost Quarter / Loam mana denial
Straightforward Beatdown
The Communes and Insights are there to find combo pieces, find Loams to leave in the graveyard and make Tarmogoyf's bigger; five of that type of effect has seemed right. The manabase has worked for me in informal games within reason, but I need a lot more practice with it before really advocating for it.
I really like Negate in those spots personally. Dead against creatures is less annoying than (mostly) dead late game and vs big mana at the moment I think.
Fwiw, I think the best version of these decks includes Tarmogoyf, but a playable version likely exists without it. If you search for replacements, look for something that doesn't get diminished by graveyard hate if possible; might as well diversify the threat base some. Leaning more heavily on Voice and/or Geist or other options could still end up being a very competitive deck.
They're different based on what you're trying to accomplish. Dromoka's is better versus burn, red decks in general and when the fight mode is valuable.
Simic Charm is better against Delve creatures, Path to Exile, anything trying to kill your permanents that aren't creatures. I've been choosing Simic main deck in decks that support both typically lately.
1 Breeding Pool
1 Canopy Vista
2 Cinder Glade
2 Flooded Strand
1 Forest
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Skarrg, the Rage Pits
1 Steam Vents
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
1 Treetop Village
3 Windswept Heath
3 Wooded Foothills
2 Commune with the Gods
4 Life from the Loam
2 Magmatic Insight
4 Molten Vortex
3 Negate
2 Retreat to Coralhelm
3 Serum Visions
2 Simic Charm
//Creatures
1 Courser of Kruphix
4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
4 Tarmogoyf
Some thoughts:
Molten Vortex/Life from the Loam gives great reach and board control; it doesn't win on the spot, but fits very naturally into the deck. It also gives you a heavy LD gameplan recurring Ghost Quarter if the opponent is right and you either find the Ghost Quarter or get a Knight to stick.
I am using the new dual lands for several reasons. One, I think this is how our future manabases are going to get made; mine might not be exactly right, but I think the new duals are going to get used. Another reason is presuming I have 2 basics in play, my 5 Mountain/(Plains or Forest) can generate R to be used with land already in hand for Vortex activations when comboing off.
Skarrg, the Rage Pits over the other options discussed might be wrong. I like that Skarrg is useable in other situations for less mana. I'm almost always mana starved, but two mana to make my Goyfs trample and bigger than opposing Goys is nice.
For man-lands, I prefer Treetop Village because of its light activation cost and I don't really care if it gets killed typically because it can be recurred. I might talk myself in Stirring Wildwood; Raging Ravine is a lot of mana but I can see the case for it also.
My durdle-package might have too many cards devoted to it between Commune with the Gods / Magmatic Insight / Serum Visions. Magmatic Insight is amazing but I don't like seeing a bunch of them in my opening hand. Serum Visions is the best general selection spell in the format and Commune sees a lot of cards that might be one of either combo package. I haven't found this mix to be too slow, but it needs testing. The goal is to see enough cards to have a strong gameplan each game without knowing exactly which gameplan will apply at the start.
I'm not sure how this has devolved into The Man keeping down The Masses. Tarmogoyf is legal in the format, it shouldn't be shocking people include it in decks. If you don't want to use him, throw in Flinthoof Boar of Beater X of your choice. Whether Goyf is affordable or not isn't the purpose of the thread.
Tarmogoyf is resilient (typically doesn't die to Bolt) in ways Undergrowth Champion isn't. I honestly really like the UC, its my kind of card, but the problem is it is very similar to Knight of the Reliquary and Countryside Crusher in that its 3 mana invested in a card that its very possible will be removed for 1-2 mana. That doesn't make them bad, but I do feel like there are a limited number of those cards you can play in one deck unless you're going to cheat ala Collected Company.
Its why I like Molten Vortex, it hits from a completely different angle and is a one mana spell to try to resolve.
I agree you could make this deck without Goyf. My first take on this deck, and my preferred playing style, is aggression with counters/disruption for answers so I am reaching for the best beaters in the colors which are Nacatl and Goyf; there are certainly other shells this could be successful in.
2 Commune with the Gods
4 Life from the Loam
3 Magmatic Insight
4 Molten Vortex
2 Retreat to Coralhelm
3 Negate
2 Spell Snare
2 Courser of Kruphix
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Wild Nacatl
Its pretty straightforward, Zoo creatures, the LotL/Vortex end game and board control package with a chance at the combo win. Stubborn Denial might make sense in the Spell Snare slot. Courser could be a one of instead of two.
Probably 24 Land because there are a number of utility lands I want to play, though I have made a very similar deck to this work on 22 before. The ideal manabase is going to need the new dual lands in some number I believe and I need to work on it; I'd like to make it work on 22 land.
The last few slots I haven't decided on; some combination of charms, commands and Qasali Pridemage maybe. I like decks that attack from multiple angles in formats like Modern and I like Negate a lot at the moment. I'm a little distressed that almost everything in the deck is graveyard dependent; I'd really look at evasive non-graveyard dependent threats as part of the sideboard plan.