Arrogance really makes me want to try something cute like Akroan Horse. You can keep your horse, and your horse.
I don't think that's very good, but Ephara being two major types really gives you a lot of flexibility with arrogance. I think it's going to be an amazing card.
You're probably right on angel. The body is often relevant though I think in this deck. Thankfully I think my meta is evolved to the point where I am not always the only target so cards like Muse are less desirable for me, and the ability to polish people off in one go with elesh norned team seems strong (because of the blocker tax). I've used Venser's -1 a bunch of times to make the team unblockable for the win.
I think I am going to try Arrogance next time we play EDH and hold off on the angel. I'm picking up some more snapcasters, so maybe able to slot that guy back in too, pretty excited about that.
I do not see what the big deal with Tragic Arrogance is. I mean in Ephara, you will probably be picking Ephara a good part of the time I would think. Your creatures each one are probably going to be as small as the opponents' smallest ones, and you're probably able to refuel very well. So given that, I don't know why you just wouldn't run Akroma's Vengeance or Oblivion Stone. I mean, Treachery probably puts you in a better spot, on average, and it doesn't work nearly the same way.
I think it's once more the case, and it seems to happen often, that a card gets the kind of exposure in Standard that convinces everyone it's good everywhere. So soon, you start to see it being run where it shouldn't be. Reminds me of when Thragtusk, Bloodbraid Elf and Baneslayer Angel were considered "EDH staples". We will probably start to see a bunch of Hangarback Walker in EDH also. Case in point, this bozo who Flashes in O-Stone in response. That play is strictly worse than Flashing in O-Stone after resolution. I don't want to be a downer, but I am on this card.
A scenario that is pretty common for me:
I have Ephara and Sacred Mesa and creatures to turn Ephara online, but enemies have a strong board. If I wrath here, I've gotten rid of creatures, but if Omnath has Mana Reflection and Asceticism I am not going to come back as fast as he is. If I Akroma's Vengeance, I get rid of my Sacred Mesa, which is immensely strong. Being able to take everyone's worst cards, sometimes double screwing them by taking artifact creatures or enchantment creatures, while leaving myself with Mesa + Ephara + a sword is going to win a lot of games.
There've been a lot of times where I'd love to keep my best equipment, an enchantment and Ephara, or similar but wipe the board of all the other threatening stuff.
I wanted to report back on one more thing that's completely unrelated:
Reality Shift has been pretty good in the few games I got to try it in. Being able to kill prot white stuff is more relevant than you'd think. And the bear they get is usually meaningless. Definitely more satisfying for me than Path.
Bottom line, this set is miserable garbage for me. Awaken is a mechanic that does nothing for me, and it's the only thing even remotely neat.
I'll definitely be adding Prairie Stream but that's about it.
Some cards I'm sorta thinking about: Gideon, Ally of Zendikar - He doesn't do double duty like Elspeth as a sweeper, but his anthem effect is quite strong in this deck. It's nice having things that can't be destroyed in games that go long. So maybe. But probably not. Retreat to Emeria - This is probably the best potential card in the set. I'd need to run more fetchy type lands and possibly Crucible to make it sick. It's one mana more expensive than I'd like it to be, but with a little tweaking it could be good enough. Crucible+Fetchland+this will almost for sure run away with any game.
I didnt think you ran Hushwing Gryff / Torpor Orb. Is it that you want to see more of that to run it or did you since move to running it?
EDIT: ohhhh interesting... you run Hushwing Gryff but not Torpor Orb. That seems like an odd / interesting choice.
Gryff's a dude and has flash. I wish I could run 3-4 of him. Card is bonkers good, almost always a big blowout. I don't actually run that many ETB dudes that I'm dependent on them, but enough that I prefer to be able to deploy it at instant speed (or bounce it with Sakashima's student or hide it for a turn with Venser).
Other issue with torpor orb is it rarely lets me "get" someone, and I love doing that doing things like shutting off people's Cloudstone Curio shenanigans at instant speed vs. them knowing they have to kill my torpor orb is big.
10/13/2015 Update
First changes in a while!
Removed Island for Prairie Stream - this is forever!
Removed Austere Command for Tragic Arrogance - This is probably just for testing. I feel like I'd like to lower my sweeper curve a little and this one lets me politically screw over a table and turn it on its side. Going to try it out.
First changes I've made in a while. I am really, really tempted to try out the Riptide Laboratory I recently procured as well but I can't quite get myself over the hump of cutting another colored land - and High market has been too good to me with all the theft effects.
I have mentally played tragic arrogance a few times in my head and it's always been stronger than austere command, but we will see how it plays out in practice. I may find myself wanting to make some design shifts to more land hate, as ramp has gotten out of hand in my group lately.
Prairie Stream - seems good. I need to get one of these ordered as it seems like a good change in a 2 color deck.
Austere Command for Tragic Arrogance - its hard to comment too much here because I personally run Tragic and not Austere Command in my list. I really really like Tragic so far though as I haven't come up with many situations where it hasn't worked out. It can be a bit troublesome if you run into sac outlets or voltron decks (tend to not run a lot of other creatures).
Personally... I have actually been thinking about adding Curse of the Swine to my list. Too often I have a hard time blowing up my creatures but it would be nice to have a way to blow out several creatures for good. Its just something I am sort of throwing arround but I too often dont like blowing up all my stuff.
I was playing my list last night and we had a Grixus player overload a Cyclonic Rift, following that he cast a Magister Sphinx targeting me and ran 10 damage in to follow it up. It was probably the most lame loss I had had in some time. I could have lived technically with creature spot removal or a counterspell but it was a lame death. The guy got a lot of negative feedback from the table for using said tactics though and I think he is going to take the effect out. God I hate Oloro decks.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Prairie Stream - seems good. I need to get one of these ordered as it seems like a good change in a 2 color deck.
Austere Command for Tragic Arrogance - its hard to comment too much here because I personally run Tragic and not Austere Command in my list. I really really like Tragic so far though as I haven't come up with many situations where it hasn't worked out. It can be a bit troublesome if you run into sac outlets or voltron decks (tend to not run a lot of other creatures).
Personally... I have actually been thinking about adding Curse of the Swine to my list. Too often I have a hard time blowing up my creatures but it would be nice to have a way to blow out several creatures for good. Its just something I am sort of throwing arround but I too often dont like blowing up all my stuff.
I was playing my list last night and we had a Grixus player overload a Cyclonic Rift, following that he cast a Magister Sphinx targeting me and ran 10 damage in to follow it up. It was probably the most lame loss I had had in some time. I could have lived technically with creature spot removal or a counterspell but it was a lame death. The guy got a lot of negative feedback from the table for using said tactics though and I think he is going to take the effect out. God I hate Oloro decks.
The best luck I have had with dealing repeatedly with troublesome creatures is Helm of Possession.
Is Lightning Greaves really needed? Am I just lucky? I saw that both you and ISBPathfinder are running this equipment. One of the biggest advantages of running an indestructible enchantment as a commander is that I don't have to protect her that much. Even when Ephara get's to be a creature opponents have problems dealing with her. Maybe their threat evaluation isn't correct as ephara is running somehow under the radar. There are always threats on the table, they have to deal with asap. In most of the games I cast ephare only once. I am not sure if this deck needs such a defensive card. I know there are other creatures that need protection, but if an player really tries against ephara with spot removal, he will lose due the insane card advantage she provides and the cheap threats in this deck.
The biggest problem I have with this deck is finishing the game. Often i can maintain control even 3v1 for some time without building up enough pressure until my opponents team up and take me off the table. At one time they even actively supported a player, so that he can set up an infinite combo, that would not have worked without teamplay. That's on reason why I have included Luminarch Ascension, easy to tutor (muddle the mixture), easy to cast, protect myself for a little while, finish them off with angels one by one.
In short: Why Lightning Greaves and not Luminarch Ascension? It's an honest question, i don't want to sound like I know anything better, because I definately lack experience with this commander (only 4-5 games with her) as I don't have much time playing EDH (+having too many decks). I actually spend more time building decks than playing them, unfortunately.
For reference, here is my deck EPHARA - EDH. It's pretty similar to your deck now as I adopted more and more ideas from this thread. I upped the graveyard hate because in my meta graveyard based strategies are very common.
I dont run Lightning Greaves for Ephara. Its for my most relevant utility bear as I have issues with some of them just vanishing at key moments. Its also there to give haste to a few of them. I also run a very high amount of flash enabling in my list to also enable a shorter turn arround for the tap to use creatures like say Mangara of Corondor and Dominating Licid. If you can get into a situation of putting Lightning Greaves on Avacyn, Angel of Hope you get into a very good position too because its INCREDIBLY hard to take that board state apart. Avacyn in that situation also gives you attack + defense.
Its possible to run Darksteel Plate also if you are just looking for defense. I like the mixture that Lightning Greaves gives here which is impressive as I can tell you in the last 15-20 decks I have made this is probably the first deck I actually like Lightning Greaves in enough to run it.
EDIT: my cares about haste or Lightning Greaves in general creatures in my list are:
Keep in mind, I focus on Torpor Orb effects which means I am trying not to run much for ETB effects which means I have immediate status effects from my hatebears as well as tap for utility / attack for value based creatures as most of my setup. ETB tactics put less priority on the creatures themselves and keeping them but I feel that its a very normal tactic to use ETB so I hate on ETB and use other tactics personally.
Yea, I use it to protect an Ethersworn Canonist or Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite or haste a dude wearing a sword of feast and famine a lot. It'll also give Ephara haste late game and protect her from theft effects which have gotten much more common in my meta after the tuck rule. Sometimes I go on the voltron plan against one person and damage plan against another person.
On a totally fringe note, it value combos with phantasmal image in a lot of durdly ways (reveillark+image+greaves = value village).
Conceptually, greaves lets you do so many things annnnnd you can tutor for it with stoneforge, so I find it to be very flexible and powerful even without needing it to protect our general.
I could absolutely see cutting greaves if your meta was light on targeted removal and theft effects--in mine, both of those things are very common. It is possible that something like Kira or 8.5 tails would suit you more too--8.5 is pretty mana intensive and kira's a little of a nonbo with equipment, but both provide similar effects that're very strong.
I absolutely consider greaves a flex slot, like all of the equipment except SOLAS (and even that if grave hate is a huge thing).
Luminarch Ascension is really strong at closing out the game. The reason I don't play it is because it's not very strong early game in my meta--if played early it virtually guarantees you are the target - people just start swinging with their wood elves and such. In many decks an early LA wins the game, because you have a lot of instant speed ways to protect it and sweepers. This deck does not excel at protecting individual cards because we don't run a lot of counter magic or targeted removal or even very many sweepers.
It also doesn't provide incremental advantage by drawing cards off of Ephara until you're already in winning mode.
It is really strong that you can tutor for it with Muddle and Enlightened Tutor as a late game finisher, so maybe when thought of as a way to close the game out it's good enough. It's very good with Tragic Arrogance for sure.
The fundamental issue for me is that it only meets our gameplan at one stage of the game - winning. There are tons of cards you can play that will both close out the game and draw you an Ephara card (Elesh Norn, Mirror Entity, for example), or that can be played at any stage of the game for advantage (Sacred Mesa). I tend to like to play mostly cards that will replace themselves off of Ephara immediately.
This deck really struggles with that, period. It's a style of play that's going to make it hard to close out. You've usually got to focus fire and eliminate people one at a time, which often gives people the feelbads, but I find if you just do it you win more games.
I'd try more dual purpose anthems if you struggle too much to close out - try new Gideon, Thistledown Liege, Crovax, Odric, etc.
You can also explore some infinite combos - there are some relatively low cost infinite combos available in our colors (Thraben Doomsayer/Intruder Alarm is probably the easiest, but Reveillark nonsense also works).
I guess I will chime in on the other things as well as I sort of addressed the Greaves but not the others. I think Pokken did a good job but I will just run through them for kicks as well.
Luminarch Ascension - I actually view it as a stronger early game card but my issue is that I would say something like 80+% of the time it never makes a single token and draws tons of hate to you. Later in the game I actually find that it falls off more in part because its easier to shift attackers towards you. In some regards I play my deck as a little bit of a pillowfort deck because people dont care to attack into random tokens. If I give them a reason to though they will kill my guys and slap me to keep it from going active. Overall I haven't had very good results with the card as a whole.
Closing out Games - I actually tend to do that with Akroma's Memorial or Eldrazi Monument often. Sometimes its just random beaters too but these two effects give me and my creatures protection. Again, I play heavier on the mass flash so flashing an Eldrazi Monument feels so satisfying as its usually a very big combat trick. I play with some token tactics so that often helps me maintain the Monument as well. Akroma's Memorial is really nice because it enables you to attack and defend. Both of the cards give me some protections that help keep my creatures alive as well as allow me to play offense and defense better. I considered something a bit more traditional on pumping but in practice it all felt like I was diluting my deck for something that just far too rarely did anything for me.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
My group's actually been playing some EDH lately so figured I'd report out a little.
So I'm 0/4 in my last bunch of games, haven't seen nearly enough control cards. Our group plays a lot of stuff that just goes over the top of me - and I tend to get focus fired early because people don't want to get ground out. Either I get nailed by confusion in the ranks from Norin or Omnath going over the top with genesis waves. Think I'm going to give it a few more games, but my gut feeling is I need to be playing more control cards in my group with the way things are going. No one is running control cards anymore, they just try to go over the top of everyone with combos or beats.
Skullbriar is still doing very well in my meta, but mostly due to combos or living death (which amounts to a combo most of the time). So it could be that I need to be focusing on comboing out instead of controlling the board, but tough to say for sure. I'd say 3 of the 4 recent losses were due to genesis wave (one game someone g-waved 3 times before winning haha).
Peacekeeper was almost really good the one time I drew him, but died to an Elesh Norn immediately.
Most likely will make some pretty large changes soon to evolve with the meta, but a bit torn between some traditional control spells (mass bounce, wraths, etc.), trying to ramp harder to play faster, or trying some more anti-ramp tactics. Since my deck runs on so little mana pretty well, it's possible I could support some additional armageddon-type effects. Dunno.
Its interesting to see how much the local meta impacts what to run with Ephara. I had a good game last night. I almost got rolled by a Rakdos, Lord of Riots last night. He started out with a Goblin Diplomats and dropped his commander on curve. From there he dropped Deathbringer Thoctar (ehhhhh super bad for my deck). I dropped a Martyr's Cause + Phyrexian Revoker (on his Deathbringer Thoctar). He is constantly harrassing me by using his Goblin Diplomats on me. He drops a Olivia Voldaren (again...... super bad for my deck) but I can sort... of live through it using my Martyr's Cause + tokens from Thraben Doomsayer. I drop Alexi, Zephyr Mage and manage to untap with her in play. He uses his Goblin Diplomats on me again and I get super annoyed and bounce four of his creatures back to his hand and swing at him.
It was a grueling game as it went two hours. I ended up winning in the end. When it got down to me and the mono black control deck I ended up getting Sacred Mesa + Opposition out and locking his lands out while I slow beat him to death while making like 7 pegasi a turn. Right before one of the mono blue players died they did a Reins of Power on me and swung to kill the other mono blue player and then activated his Boseiju, Who Shelters All to die (which... I dont know if he can do since its paying lethal life but he can concede with my crap either way which is lame). That brought the game down to a two player game though which I did end up winning eventually but it put me back a lot.
I managed to see Emeria Angel and Thraben Doomsayer in my games. I will say that both of them have been doing good work so far.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Wow, yeah, my group has gotten way faster lately. Our games rarely go over 30-45 minutes anymore. I think it was a reaction to my Skullbriar deck--I built this monstrosity that craps Skullbriar out on turn 1 half the time and just starts wailing on people's faces, so the logical reaction is either "play more answers" or "play faster" - everyone seems to have gone with "play faster and focus fire on Skullbriar." So kinda bleeds into the overall approach, which is everyone ramping hard and swinging for the fences. Not the best for Ephara unless I focus on sticking a Canonist early.
Re: Boseiju - so far as I know you can pay exactly lethal but not more than lethal. Life is a resource you can pay what you have, so if he was at 2 he can die if he was at 1 he can't hehe.
Alright, I'm pretty confirmed on needing to retool this deck a little. People are just mashing big threats now and swinging away, so I need to either get bigger (probably combo out) or play more control (or some mix of those things).
If anyone has any thoughts on a good mix of targeted removal and sweepers to look for in traditional Azorius control, I'd be interested. Getting the balance right has always been tough for me.
Thinking the most straightforward combo finish to add is:
Palinchron + Image + Sacred Mesa
Since it only involves adding one piece. But it's possible something else makes sense.
Mirror Match feels like a nice sweeper alternative (that can be fetched with merchant scroll, and replaces itself if Ephara is on board). Potentially generates an insane amount of value or insane blowouts.
I'm going to start slow in transitioning to a little more controlly role in this deck, and Eidolon has been underperforming for a bit because my meta has gotten so bomby. Going to try this out for a while.
Also, moved Eidolon of Rhetoric into the non-core section since I'm not playing it for the moment. I think Muddle and Canonist should do the job here.
My first game of EDH in quite some time, got in a win with Ephara vs. Ghave combo and Ezuri claw +1/+1 shenanigans.
Everyone was a little bit rusty and durdling from not having played in a while, but I managed to get some serious shenanigans online relatively early after starting the game with an enlightened tutor for land tax which kept my hand stocked. Finally landed the Containment Priest + Flickerwisp + cloudstone curio "interaction," with one of my white cost reducers online making it rather efficient.
Finally had one go how it's designed for once I drew maybe 5 cards off of Ephara and 12 off of Land Tax, which gave me a nearly insurmountable lead combined with 2 Stoneforge triggers.
Keep your eyes peeled here for a set review, there look to be quite a few spicy cards in the upcoming set. Pretty excited about Mirrorpool possibly giving me a reason to put a Crucible in this deck
Edit: There's a piece of commentary I remembered I wanted to share. That's that this deck should really value mana cost reducers (especially for white spells) like Stormscape familiar and Pearl Medallion) much more highly than most ramp spells. It's really common to want to cast 4-5 spells per untap step, making a -1 generic cost reduction add up ridiculously fast. Casting stoneforge mystic and containment priest for W is ridiculous.
Well hell, I think we might have a winner. It's a massive flavor fail for my deck but Eldrazi Displacer is a much cheaper mistmeadow witch that survives a lot of stuff (opposing elesh norn in particular). I'll need to look over my manabase pretty closely and see if I can play it or not, but another combo with gilded drake might be good enough.
So it's distantly possible I could play the displacer. Odds are pretty high of having a colorless source. Probably feasible to play a singleton wastes so we can tutor for it with bauble/land tax.
Generally I think it's too slow, but man is it good with containment priest.
That would probably pay off a bit more if you ran more land fetch though. I dont know if the difference between 3 and 4 mana is so much that it makes it amazing though. I think its a cool card but I dont know where I stand on it yet.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
The more I think about it the more I think it's probably slightly too slow and clunky for my version of this deck but it is a very, very powerful effect. A different take on the deck that used this in place of Sacred Mesa but focused a bit more on mana generation and ETB abilities might be stronger.
Just doesn't compare to Sacred Mesa on the power spectrum in my particular build.
I don't think that's very good, but Ephara being two major types really gives you a lot of flexibility with arrogance. I think it's going to be an amazing card.
You're probably right on angel. The body is often relevant though I think in this deck. Thankfully I think my meta is evolved to the point where I am not always the only target so cards like Muse are less desirable for me, and the ability to polish people off in one go with elesh norned team seems strong (because of the blocker tax). I've used Venser's -1 a bunch of times to make the team unblockable for the win.
I think I am going to try Arrogance next time we play EDH and hold off on the angel. I'm picking up some more snapcasters, so maybe able to slot that guy back in too, pretty excited about that.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
A scenario that is pretty common for me:
I have Ephara and Sacred Mesa and creatures to turn Ephara online, but enemies have a strong board. If I wrath here, I've gotten rid of creatures, but if Omnath has Mana Reflection and Asceticism I am not going to come back as fast as he is. If I Akroma's Vengeance, I get rid of my Sacred Mesa, which is immensely strong. Being able to take everyone's worst cards, sometimes double screwing them by taking artifact creatures or enchantment creatures, while leaving myself with Mesa + Ephara + a sword is going to win a lot of games.
There've been a lot of times where I'd love to keep my best equipment, an enchantment and Ephara, or similar but wipe the board of all the other threatening stuff.
I'll try it out and report back.
You're almost certainly right. I can't think of a 4 drop I'd pull for it yet
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
Reality Shift has been pretty good in the few games I got to try it in. Being able to kill prot white stuff is more relevant than you'd think. And the bear they get is usually meaningless. Definitely more satisfying for me than Path.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
Bottom line, this set is miserable garbage for me. Awaken is a mechanic that does nothing for me, and it's the only thing even remotely neat.
I'll definitely be adding Prairie Stream but that's about it.
Some cards I'm sorta thinking about:
Gideon, Ally of Zendikar - He doesn't do double duty like Elspeth as a sweeper, but his anthem effect is quite strong in this deck. It's nice having things that can't be destroyed in games that go long. So maybe. But probably not.
Retreat to Emeria - This is probably the best potential card in the set. I'd need to run more fetchy type lands and possibly Crucible to make it sick. It's one mana more expensive than I'd like it to be, but with a little tweaking it could be good enough. Crucible+Fetchland+this will almost for sure run away with any game.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
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UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
I didnt think you ran Hushwing Gryff / Torpor Orb. Is it that you want to see more of that to run it or did you since move to running it?
EDIT: ohhhh interesting... you run Hushwing Gryff but not Torpor Orb. That seems like an odd / interesting choice.
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Gryff's a dude and has flash. I wish I could run 3-4 of him. Card is bonkers good, almost always a big blowout. I don't actually run that many ETB dudes that I'm dependent on them, but enough that I prefer to be able to deploy it at instant speed (or bounce it with Sakashima's student or hide it for a turn with Venser).
Other issue with torpor orb is it rarely lets me "get" someone, and I love doing that doing things like shutting off people's Cloudstone Curio shenanigans at instant speed vs. them knowing they have to kill my torpor orb is big.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
First changes in a while!
Removed Island for Prairie Stream - this is forever!
Removed Austere Command for Tragic Arrogance - This is probably just for testing. I feel like I'd like to lower my sweeper curve a little and this one lets me politically screw over a table and turn it on its side. Going to try it out.
First changes I've made in a while. I am really, really tempted to try out the Riptide Laboratory I recently procured as well but I can't quite get myself over the hump of cutting another colored land - and High market has been too good to me with all the theft effects.
I have mentally played tragic arrogance a few times in my head and it's always been stronger than austere command, but we will see how it plays out in practice. I may find myself wanting to make some design shifts to more land hate, as ramp has gotten out of hand in my group lately.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
Austere Command for Tragic Arrogance - its hard to comment too much here because I personally run Tragic and not Austere Command in my list. I really really like Tragic so far though as I haven't come up with many situations where it hasn't worked out. It can be a bit troublesome if you run into sac outlets or voltron decks (tend to not run a lot of other creatures).
Personally... I have actually been thinking about adding Curse of the Swine to my list. Too often I have a hard time blowing up my creatures but it would be nice to have a way to blow out several creatures for good. Its just something I am sort of throwing arround but I too often dont like blowing up all my stuff.
I was playing my list last night and we had a Grixus player overload a Cyclonic Rift, following that he cast a Magister Sphinx targeting me and ran 10 damage in to follow it up. It was probably the most lame loss I had had in some time. I could have lived technically with creature spot removal or a counterspell but it was a lame death. The guy got a lot of negative feedback from the table for using said tactics though and I think he is going to take the effect out. God I hate Oloro decks.
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The best luck I have had with dealing repeatedly with troublesome creatures is Helm of Possession.
Magister Sphinx effects are dumb, agreed.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
I dont run Lightning Greaves for Ephara. Its for my most relevant utility bear as I have issues with some of them just vanishing at key moments. Its also there to give haste to a few of them. I also run a very high amount of flash enabling in my list to also enable a shorter turn arround for the tap to use creatures like say Mangara of Corondor and Dominating Licid. If you can get into a situation of putting Lightning Greaves on Avacyn, Angel of Hope you get into a very good position too because its INCREDIBLY hard to take that board state apart. Avacyn in that situation also gives you attack + defense.
So... I guess its not ever really to put on Ephara as for me she never has an issue. I do however have a lot of people who gun for my Haazda Shield Mate / Hushwing Gryff / Containment Priest / Linvala, Keeper of Silence depending on what they are playing.
Its possible to run Darksteel Plate also if you are just looking for defense. I like the mixture that Lightning Greaves gives here which is impressive as I can tell you in the last 15-20 decks I have made this is probably the first deck I actually like Lightning Greaves in enough to run it.
EDIT: my cares about haste or Lightning Greaves in general creatures in my list are:
Keep in mind, I focus on Torpor Orb effects which means I am trying not to run much for ETB effects which means I have immediate status effects from my hatebears as well as tap for utility / attack for value based creatures as most of my setup. ETB tactics put less priority on the creatures themselves and keeping them but I feel that its a very normal tactic to use ETB so I hate on ETB and use other tactics personally.
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[Modern] Allies
Yea, I use it to protect an Ethersworn Canonist or Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite or haste a dude wearing a sword of feast and famine a lot. It'll also give Ephara haste late game and protect her from theft effects which have gotten much more common in my meta after the tuck rule. Sometimes I go on the voltron plan against one person and damage plan against another person.
On a totally fringe note, it value combos with phantasmal image in a lot of durdly ways (reveillark+image+greaves = value village).
Conceptually, greaves lets you do so many things annnnnd you can tutor for it with stoneforge, so I find it to be very flexible and powerful even without needing it to protect our general.
I could absolutely see cutting greaves if your meta was light on targeted removal and theft effects--in mine, both of those things are very common. It is possible that something like Kira or 8.5 tails would suit you more too--8.5 is pretty mana intensive and kira's a little of a nonbo with equipment, but both provide similar effects that're very strong.
I absolutely consider greaves a flex slot, like all of the equipment except SOLAS (and even that if grave hate is a huge thing).
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Q2 Why not Luminarch Ascension?
Luminarch Ascension is really strong at closing out the game. The reason I don't play it is because it's not very strong early game in my meta--if played early it virtually guarantees you are the target - people just start swinging with their wood elves and such. In many decks an early LA wins the game, because you have a lot of instant speed ways to protect it and sweepers. This deck does not excel at protecting individual cards because we don't run a lot of counter magic or targeted removal or even very many sweepers.
It also doesn't provide incremental advantage by drawing cards off of Ephara until you're already in winning mode.
It is really strong that you can tutor for it with Muddle and Enlightened Tutor as a late game finisher, so maybe when thought of as a way to close the game out it's good enough. It's very good with Tragic Arrogance for sure.
The fundamental issue for me is that it only meets our gameplan at one stage of the game - winning. There are tons of cards you can play that will both close out the game and draw you an Ephara card (Elesh Norn, Mirror Entity, for example), or that can be played at any stage of the game for advantage (Sacred Mesa). I tend to like to play mostly cards that will replace themselves off of Ephara immediately.
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Q3: Closing out the game
This deck really struggles with that, period. It's a style of play that's going to make it hard to close out. You've usually got to focus fire and eliminate people one at a time, which often gives people the feelbads, but I find if you just do it you win more games.
You can play things that explosively win games (combos, luminarch ascension, cathars' crusade, dictate of heliod, etc.) but they dilute your overall gameplan enough that I don't tend to like them.
I'd try more dual purpose anthems if you struggle too much to close out - try new Gideon, Thistledown Liege, Crovax, Odric, etc.
You can also explore some infinite combos - there are some relatively low cost infinite combos available in our colors (Thraben Doomsayer/Intruder Alarm is probably the easiest, but Reveillark nonsense also works).
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
Luminarch Ascension - I actually view it as a stronger early game card but my issue is that I would say something like 80+% of the time it never makes a single token and draws tons of hate to you. Later in the game I actually find that it falls off more in part because its easier to shift attackers towards you. In some regards I play my deck as a little bit of a pillowfort deck because people dont care to attack into random tokens. If I give them a reason to though they will kill my guys and slap me to keep it from going active. Overall I haven't had very good results with the card as a whole.
Closing out Games - I actually tend to do that with Akroma's Memorial or Eldrazi Monument often. Sometimes its just random beaters too but these two effects give me and my creatures protection. Again, I play heavier on the mass flash so flashing an Eldrazi Monument feels so satisfying as its usually a very big combat trick. I play with some token tactics so that often helps me maintain the Monument as well. Akroma's Memorial is really nice because it enables you to attack and defend. Both of the cards give me some protections that help keep my creatures alive as well as allow me to play offense and defense better. I considered something a bit more traditional on pumping but in practice it all felt like I was diluting my deck for something that just far too rarely did anything for me.
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[Modern] Allies
So I'm 0/4 in my last bunch of games, haven't seen nearly enough control cards. Our group plays a lot of stuff that just goes over the top of me - and I tend to get focus fired early because people don't want to get ground out. Either I get nailed by confusion in the ranks from Norin or Omnath going over the top with genesis waves. Think I'm going to give it a few more games, but my gut feeling is I need to be playing more control cards in my group with the way things are going. No one is running control cards anymore, they just try to go over the top of everyone with combos or beats.
Skullbriar is still doing very well in my meta, but mostly due to combos or living death (which amounts to a combo most of the time). So it could be that I need to be focusing on comboing out instead of controlling the board, but tough to say for sure. I'd say 3 of the 4 recent losses were due to genesis wave (one game someone g-waved 3 times before winning haha).
Peacekeeper was almost really good the one time I drew him, but died to an Elesh Norn immediately.
Most likely will make some pretty large changes soon to evolve with the meta, but a bit torn between some traditional control spells (mass bounce, wraths, etc.), trying to ramp harder to play faster, or trying some more anti-ramp tactics. Since my deck runs on so little mana pretty well, it's possible I could support some additional armageddon-type effects. Dunno.
First thing's first:
10/19/2015 update
* Walking Atlas goes in for Gold Myr
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
It was a grueling game as it went two hours. I ended up winning in the end. When it got down to me and the mono black control deck I ended up getting Sacred Mesa + Opposition out and locking his lands out while I slow beat him to death while making like 7 pegasi a turn. Right before one of the mono blue players died they did a Reins of Power on me and swung to kill the other mono blue player and then activated his Boseiju, Who Shelters All to die (which... I dont know if he can do since its paying lethal life but he can concede with my crap either way which is lame). That brought the game down to a two player game though which I did end up winning eventually but it put me back a lot.
I managed to see Emeria Angel and Thraben Doomsayer in my games. I will say that both of them have been doing good work so far.
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[Modern] Allies
Re: Boseiju - so far as I know you can pay exactly lethal but not more than lethal. Life is a resource you can pay what you have, so if he was at 2 he can die if he was at 1 he can't hehe.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
If anyone has any thoughts on a good mix of targeted removal and sweepers to look for in traditional Azorius control, I'd be interested. Getting the balance right has always been tough for me.
Thinking the most straightforward combo finish to add is:
Palinchron + Image + Sacred Mesa
Since it only involves adding one piece. But it's possible something else makes sense.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
Mirror Match feels like a nice sweeper alternative (that can be fetched with merchant scroll, and replaces itself if Ephara is on board). Potentially generates an insane amount of value or insane blowouts.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
1) Remove high market and eidolon of rhetoric
2) Add Oblivion Stone and Academy Ruins
I'm going to start slow in transitioning to a little more controlly role in this deck, and Eidolon has been underperforming for a bit because my meta has gotten so bomby. Going to try this out for a while.
Also, moved Eidolon of Rhetoric into the non-core section since I'm not playing it for the moment. I think Muddle and Canonist should do the job here.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
Everyone was a little bit rusty and durdling from not having played in a while, but I managed to get some serious shenanigans online relatively early after starting the game with an enlightened tutor for land tax which kept my hand stocked. Finally landed the Containment Priest + Flickerwisp + cloudstone curio "interaction," with one of my white cost reducers online making it rather efficient.
Ended the game with Ghave about to combo out, me with the Flickerwisp engine of death + serra ascendant suited up with sword of feast and famine and lightning greaves, Ephara, and a Catastrophe for lands (while holding a grip of lands and with Stormscape Familiar on board).
Finally had one go how it's designed for once I drew maybe 5 cards off of Ephara and 12 off of Land Tax, which gave me a nearly insurmountable lead combined with 2 Stoneforge triggers.
Keep your eyes peeled here for a set review, there look to be quite a few spicy cards in the upcoming set. Pretty excited about Mirrorpool possibly giving me a reason to put a Crucible in this deck
Edit: There's a piece of commentary I remembered I wanted to share. That's that this deck should really value mana cost reducers (especially for white spells) like Stormscape familiar and Pearl Medallion) much more highly than most ramp spells. It's really common to want to cast 4-5 spells per untap step, making a -1 generic cost reduction add up ridiculously fast. Casting stoneforge mystic and containment priest for W is ridiculous.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
From a first look I have:
So it's distantly possible I could play the displacer. Odds are pretty high of having a colorless source. Probably feasible to play a singleton wastes so we can tutor for it with bauble/land tax.
Generally I think it's too slow, but man is it good with containment priest.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
That would probably pay off a bit more if you ran more land fetch though. I dont know if the difference between 3 and 4 mana is so much that it makes it amazing though. I think its a cool card but I dont know where I stand on it yet.
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[Modern] Allies
Just doesn't compare to Sacred Mesa on the power spectrum in my particular build.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall