one thing I did notice is that there are 8 plains for emeria. Is that enough? The deck needs to be low to the ground, so as few etb tapped as possible.
thanks for the help
edit - forgot to mention that it’s the curving from t1 G into t2 WW/WG that’s been problematic. Sometimes, I start with a W source and no green in the opener, but more often than not, it’s the turn 2 that I lack W. Not entirely sure what the problem is, nor how to fix it.
also, so y’all know, it’s a saffi deck. The deck itself isn’t actually as hardcore as it probably looks on the outside, but i would much rather lose cuz of the business cards rather than bad mana.
it’s probably also worth mentioning that I’ve never gotten emeria AND 7 plains in play.
What is the goal of the deck? How much mana do you need before you're in stage 2 (stage 1 is being throttled by mana, stage 2 is being throttled by card/action availability)?
Why aren't you using more of the mana dorks or ramp spells?
Do you really need City of Brass in a two-color deck?
Emeria needs far more plains.
Why is Flooded Strand in the list?
Krosan Verge is a trap, imho. You've got Mox Diamond suggesting that your turns 1-3 are important, but then why have tapped lands?
I think that you need to sit back and evaluate what your goals are with your deck and then how your mana base can supplement it. With a two-color deck you don't really need a lot of mana fixing, so you can easily cut out half of your non-basic lands. Maybe just keeping lands dropping on curve is enough for your deck and you need to focus more on card draw? What about Sylvan Library and/or Land Tax?
birds of paradise?
razorverge thicket?
sunpetal grove?
bountiful promenade?
mana confluence?
if you just need ww or wg on t2 there's also tithe
i mean, you've got a ****ton of ways to fetch for both types, are you shuffling properly? are you keeping the right hands? not sure why you'd be running into that issue with the mana base you have going
Honestly, I would try gold-fishing the deck with 20 forests and 20 plains to get a benchmark, before backing that off to 15 plains and 15 forests to add some of the non-basic lands and then goldfish that again. I think the problem is that you're building a mana base that's over-complicated. One of the benefits of a two-color deck over a three to five color deck is a simplified mana base, so you really don't need to bend your back for color fixing like a 5 color deck.
What is the goal of the deck? How much mana do you need before you're in stage 2 (stage 1 is being throttled by mana, stage 2 is being throttled by card/action availability)?
Why aren't you using more of the mana dorks or ramp spells?
Do you really need City of Brass in a two-color deck?
Emeria needs far more plains.
Why is Flooded Strand in the list?
Krosan Verge is a trap, imho. You've got Mox Diamond suggesting that your turns 1-3 are important, but then why have tapped lands?
I think that you need to sit back and evaluate what your goals are with your deck and then how your mana base can supplement it. With a two-color deck you don't really need a lot of mana fixing, so you can easily cut out half of your non-basic lands. Maybe just keeping lands dropping on curve is enough for your deck and you need to focus more on card draw? What about Sylvan Library and/or Land Tax?
the goal of the deck is to be able to answer opposing combo pieces while trying to use saffi as a value-generator. the deck is some sort of GW reanimator-ish grinding deck, with Jorael (the new one) as a finisher (with concordant crossroads). aside from land-fetching/tutoring, there is no tutor effects, so the wincon will have to come up naturally.
Yea, im gonna take out krosan verge. Seemed like a good idea since it fetches for plains and a forest, not necessarily basics, but the etb tapped is bad.
City of brass helps me get the colours i need. Maybe it's not as good as it seems, but the deck feels very colour-intensive. So all the colour-fixing is used.
Mana dorks are a thing that i use to help get the extra coloured pips in. The problem ive found are some of them, like the llanowar elves-like dorks tap only for G, which means that I need to lean on the first landdrop to also tap for W if at all possible. The dorks also add this weird tension, where the deck itself is white-heavy, cuz there are early threats that need answering, but wants to have G on turn 1 for the dorks. which is why the land base leans heavier on green sources.
Flooded strand (and the other off-colour fetches) finds me forests and/or plains. also, since the deck doesn't have much in the way of actual card draw, i lean a lot on sylvian library, sensei's divining top, and the green vizier (that lets you play creatures from the top of the library) so extra shuffle effects to clear the topdeck is useful.
I guess i'll have to remove emeria then. It was sort of a very very long term grind plan in case my other wincons end up being unusable for whatever reason.
And back to your first point, which ramp spells do you mean? i have nature's lore. I have some number of mana dorks in the deck already (i believe i have them all listed above). Are there some major ones im missing?
birds of paradise?
razorverge thicket?
sunpetal grove?
bountiful promenade?
mana confluence?
if you just need ww or wg on t2 there's also tithe
i mean, you've got a ****ton of ways to fetch for both types, are you shuffling properly? are you keeping the right hands? not sure why you'd be running into that issue with the mana base you have going
Razorverge thicket was teetering on the edge for me, but as a non-fetchable land that most likely will etb tapped, i'm not super convinced. Ill proxy one up for a test before i knock it off though.
Sunpetal grove on the other hand, should etb untapped 99% of the time. The deck does, however, want a starting hand of 2 lands, so there are (unlikely) situations where i start the game with ancient tomb/city of brass/some other non-land-type-land and grove. Ill have to also proxy a copy up to test opening hands before i can tell whether or not it'd work though.
pountiful promenade seems like a shoo-in. when it does etb tapped, it doesn't really matter too much by that point late-game.
Mana confluence as well. City of brass has the upside of it being a triggered damage, but 99% of the time, it is the same land. I'll have to find a copy somewhere. it can be said that in other mtg formats, i have seen games with the city of brass damage trigger on the stack as the combo went off in response to it. Not sure my deck can do that though.
I have considered tithe, but i'd end up with the situation where it'd be either win-more (as in it'd be mid-late game where i probably don't need the extra lands) or blowing it off early and losing tempo (at which time my opponent/s might be threatening a combo-piece or some other form of hate that needs answering). I'll probably have to actually test it before i know for sure though.
thanks for the heads up! i keep forgetting some of the land cycles like the ones you've mentioned.
And also, you're probably right that i gotta shuffle better. Maybe i gotta resleeve the whole deck, since theres a good chance the sleeves are getting a tad gunky/makes shuffling tricky.
Honestly, I would try gold-fishing the deck with 20 forests and 20 plains to get a benchmark, before backing that off to 15 plains and 15 forests to add some of the non-basic lands and then goldfish that again. I think the problem is that you're building a mana base that's over-complicated. One of the benefits of a two-color deck over a three to five color deck is a simplified mana base, so you really don't need to bend your back for color fixing like a 5 color deck.
Yea, i get what you mean. I started from 8 fetches (1 on-colour, 6 off-colour, prismatic vista), 10-ish basics, command tower, and some duals, then made it more complicated from there. There are some weird choices now that i looked over the list again to the last time i ran it in a 3-player pod, in that there are 2 cards in the deck that need C, and those sources of mana are actually few and far between, with little fetching/tutoring to find them. Now it's ended up here at least.
Thing is though, the 20/20 only basics manabase means that i'm not gonna be able to answer early-game threats/hate pieces that hit the board consistently enough while allowing me to ramp up/keep up the tempo. It's why it looks as complicated as it is. I don't mean to demean your comment, but normally, I would concur that a 2-colour manabase shouldn't need to be this complicated. I just mean that the evolution of the land base and the needs for the deck has led me down this path.
I don't mean to say that you should play the deck with 20/20 basics in games but to solitaire the deck while watching Netflix or something. Does it go through the first few turns more smoothly? Less smoothly? Evaluate why and then correct the specific problem from there. As a deck matures you need to bring it back to square one and re-evaluate everything in it and give the deck a refresh; sometimes our original ideas don't pan out, or recent changes lead to new lines of play and synergies.
Honestly, I think that you have too few lands in total. The Altars arent ramp pieces, but combo pieces. Mox Diamond requires a land pitch, and Mox Amber is collecting dust until your commander is out. What about Rampant Growth, Farseek, Birds of Paradise, or Search for Tomorrow? What in your deck are you willing to exile for Chrome Mox (and then why are you playing that card in your deck)? Cut out the gimmick/tapped lands and replace them with basics.
Emeria, the Sky Ruin
Flagstones of Trokair
Flooded Strand
Krosan Verge
Vesuva
Emeria, flagstones and krosan verge have been replaced by mana confluence and 2 basics. I’ve been having a hard time finding a canopy vista.
You know what though, 34 lands have not felt too bad. I still start games with 2 lands often enough, and a turn 0-1 accelerator. I might’ve forgotten to mention, but the average cmc for the deck is 2, or thereabouts.
Flooded strand, vesuva are still pulling their weight. Mostly from shuffle effects (which I don’t have many of), and vesuva is pretty flexible.
the goldfishing of the deck is what I’ve been doing for a while. The colour requirements for curving isn’t perfect yet still, but maybe it’s something I’m gonna have to just accept that isn’t solvable yet.
Exiling for chrome Mox is somewhat easy. Not every card in the deck is vital to the wincon, and not every removal spell is relevant at that moment in time. There are always easy picks.
Search for tomorrow, rampant growth and farswek makes lands etb tapped/cost 2G. It’s kinda a huge tempo sink when the deck wants to be dropping blockers or threats. The Mox amber isn’t great, but there are 2 1cmc coloured legendary creatures and the general is 2cmc, which allows me to turn 2 throw down saffi and hold up path to exile/swords/nature’s claim. Like you say, not the best, but it works well enough.
the deck has a somewhat specific curve, needing to go turn 1 G (mana dork) into turn 2 WW or WG (hatebear/removal).
1 Avacyn's Pilgrim
1 Fyndhorn Elves
1 Llanowar Elves
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Sylvan Caryatid
1 Fertilid
1 Yavimaya Elder
1 Chrome Mox
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mox Amber
1 Mox Diamond
1 Sol Ring
1 Ashnod's Altar
1 Phyrexian altar
1 Ancient Tomb
1 Arid Mesa
1 Brushland
1 Buried Ruin
1 City of Brass
1 Command Tower
1 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
1 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Flooded Strand
4 Forest
1 Gaea's Cradle
1 hall of heliod’s generosity
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Krosan Verge
1 Marsh Flats
1 Misty Rainforest
5 Plains
1 Prismatic Vista
1 Savannah
1 Scattered Groves
1 Strip Mine
1 Temple Garden
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Vesuva
1 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Bastion
1 Wooded Foothills
one thing I did notice is that there are 8 plains for emeria. Is that enough? The deck needs to be low to the ground, so as few etb tapped as possible.
thanks for the help
edit - forgot to mention that it’s the curving from t1 G into t2 WW/WG that’s been problematic. Sometimes, I start with a W source and no green in the opener, but more often than not, it’s the turn 2 that I lack W. Not entirely sure what the problem is, nor how to fix it.
also, so y’all know, it’s a saffi deck. The deck itself isn’t actually as hardcore as it probably looks on the outside, but i would much rather lose cuz of the business cards rather than bad mana.
it’s probably also worth mentioning that I’ve never gotten emeria AND 7 plains in play.
Legacy - Solidarity - mono U aggro - burn - Imperial Painter - Strawberry Shortcake - Bluuzards - bom
Why aren't you using more of the mana dorks or ramp spells?
Do you really need City of Brass in a two-color deck?
Emeria needs far more plains.
Why is Flooded Strand in the list?
Krosan Verge is a trap, imho. You've got Mox Diamond suggesting that your turns 1-3 are important, but then why have tapped lands?
I think that you need to sit back and evaluate what your goals are with your deck and then how your mana base can supplement it. With a two-color deck you don't really need a lot of mana fixing, so you can easily cut out half of your non-basic lands. Maybe just keeping lands dropping on curve is enough for your deck and you need to focus more on card draw? What about Sylvan Library and/or Land Tax?
razorverge thicket?
sunpetal grove?
bountiful promenade?
mana confluence?
if you just need ww or wg on t2 there's also tithe
i mean, you've got a ****ton of ways to fetch for both types, are you shuffling properly? are you keeping the right hands? not sure why you'd be running into that issue with the mana base you have going
the goal of the deck is to be able to answer opposing combo pieces while trying to use saffi as a value-generator. the deck is some sort of GW reanimator-ish grinding deck, with Jorael (the new one) as a finisher (with concordant crossroads). aside from land-fetching/tutoring, there is no tutor effects, so the wincon will have to come up naturally.
Yea, im gonna take out krosan verge. Seemed like a good idea since it fetches for plains and a forest, not necessarily basics, but the etb tapped is bad.
City of brass helps me get the colours i need. Maybe it's not as good as it seems, but the deck feels very colour-intensive. So all the colour-fixing is used.
Mana dorks are a thing that i use to help get the extra coloured pips in. The problem ive found are some of them, like the llanowar elves-like dorks tap only for G, which means that I need to lean on the first landdrop to also tap for W if at all possible. The dorks also add this weird tension, where the deck itself is white-heavy, cuz there are early threats that need answering, but wants to have G on turn 1 for the dorks. which is why the land base leans heavier on green sources.
Flooded strand (and the other off-colour fetches) finds me forests and/or plains. also, since the deck doesn't have much in the way of actual card draw, i lean a lot on sylvian library, sensei's divining top, and the green vizier (that lets you play creatures from the top of the library) so extra shuffle effects to clear the topdeck is useful.
I guess i'll have to remove emeria then. It was sort of a very very long term grind plan in case my other wincons end up being unusable for whatever reason.
And back to your first point, which ramp spells do you mean? i have nature's lore. I have some number of mana dorks in the deck already (i believe i have them all listed above). Are there some major ones im missing?
Razorverge thicket was teetering on the edge for me, but as a non-fetchable land that most likely will etb tapped, i'm not super convinced. Ill proxy one up for a test before i knock it off though.
Sunpetal grove on the other hand, should etb untapped 99% of the time. The deck does, however, want a starting hand of 2 lands, so there are (unlikely) situations where i start the game with ancient tomb/city of brass/some other non-land-type-land and grove. Ill have to also proxy a copy up to test opening hands before i can tell whether or not it'd work though.
pountiful promenade seems like a shoo-in. when it does etb tapped, it doesn't really matter too much by that point late-game.
Mana confluence as well. City of brass has the upside of it being a triggered damage, but 99% of the time, it is the same land. I'll have to find a copy somewhere. it can be said that in other mtg formats, i have seen games with the city of brass damage trigger on the stack as the combo went off in response to it. Not sure my deck can do that though.
I have considered tithe, but i'd end up with the situation where it'd be either win-more (as in it'd be mid-late game where i probably don't need the extra lands) or blowing it off early and losing tempo (at which time my opponent/s might be threatening a combo-piece or some other form of hate that needs answering). I'll probably have to actually test it before i know for sure though.
thanks for the heads up! i keep forgetting some of the land cycles like the ones you've mentioned.
And also, you're probably right that i gotta shuffle better. Maybe i gotta resleeve the whole deck, since theres a good chance the sleeves are getting a tad gunky/makes shuffling tricky.
Yea, i get what you mean. I started from 8 fetches (1 on-colour, 6 off-colour, prismatic vista), 10-ish basics, command tower, and some duals, then made it more complicated from there. There are some weird choices now that i looked over the list again to the last time i ran it in a 3-player pod, in that there are 2 cards in the deck that need C, and those sources of mana are actually few and far between, with little fetching/tutoring to find them. Now it's ended up here at least.
Thing is though, the 20/20 only basics manabase means that i'm not gonna be able to answer early-game threats/hate pieces that hit the board consistently enough while allowing me to ramp up/keep up the tempo. It's why it looks as complicated as it is. I don't mean to demean your comment, but normally, I would concur that a 2-colour manabase shouldn't need to be this complicated. I just mean that the evolution of the land base and the needs for the deck has led me down this path.
Legacy - Solidarity - mono U aggro - burn - Imperial Painter - Strawberry Shortcake - Bluuzards - bom
Honestly, I think that you have too few lands in total. The Altars arent ramp pieces, but combo pieces. Mox Diamond requires a land pitch, and Mox Amber is collecting dust until your commander is out. What about Rampant Growth, Farseek, Birds of Paradise, or Search for Tomorrow? What in your deck are you willing to exile for Chrome Mox (and then why are you playing that card in your deck)? Cut out the gimmick/tapped lands and replace them with basics.
Emeria, the Sky Ruin
Flagstones of Trokair
Flooded Strand
Krosan Verge
Vesuva
You know what though, 34 lands have not felt too bad. I still start games with 2 lands often enough, and a turn 0-1 accelerator. I might’ve forgotten to mention, but the average cmc for the deck is 2, or thereabouts.
Flooded strand, vesuva are still pulling their weight. Mostly from shuffle effects (which I don’t have many of), and vesuva is pretty flexible.
the goldfishing of the deck is what I’ve been doing for a while. The colour requirements for curving isn’t perfect yet still, but maybe it’s something I’m gonna have to just accept that isn’t solvable yet.
Exiling for chrome Mox is somewhat easy. Not every card in the deck is vital to the wincon, and not every removal spell is relevant at that moment in time. There are always easy picks.
Search for tomorrow, rampant growth and farswek makes lands etb tapped/cost 2G. It’s kinda a huge tempo sink when the deck wants to be dropping blockers or threats. The Mox amber isn’t great, but there are 2 1cmc coloured legendary creatures and the general is 2cmc, which allows me to turn 2 throw down saffi and hold up path to exile/swords/nature’s claim. Like you say, not the best, but it works well enough.
Legacy - Solidarity - mono U aggro - burn - Imperial Painter - Strawberry Shortcake - Bluuzards - bom