the deck has a learning curve with regards to the hidden (pun intended) workings with Hidden Stockpile. if you have 2 in play, the tokens generated become exponential.
Sorry for the necro reply, but what did you mean here by "exponential"? As far as I can tell if you have 2 stockpiles in play they make 2 tokens per turn, 3 stockpiles make 3 tokens, and 4 stockpiles make 4 tokens. The fact that these effects stack linearly is good, but not truly exponential -- exponential growth would be if every token produced two tokens, and those two tokens each produced two tokens etc so that after three turns 2 tokens have become 16... my point isn't to ding you for scientific semantics, I just want to make sure I'm not misunderstanding the full power of this card if there is some truly exponential function to it. Thank you.
This deck is very well positioned right now IMO. It is strong against Tron/Eldrazi, has disruption for scapeshift and can grind against the midrange decks, albeit at a slight disadvantage. here is my current list. Let me know what you think
Just wanted to share some thoughts on the build.
I attempt to create a version of Crack the Earth/Smallpox deck that tries to keep the game in a early state and that could play with only 2 lands. That, in part, because every 3cmc spell I tested did not seemed to perform well or didn't seemed to do enough. Just to mention, some of the 3casting cost spells I tried was Stone Rain, Molten Rain, Lingering Souls, Crackling Doom, Pia Nalaar to name a few. Some problems raise with aggro match ups like Burn, so I started a draft of the deck that would have a good win percentage against Burn, since it's one of the aggro decks that can basically play with even 1 land. So, the most successful draft that I manage to build was the list below:
Thoughts on some card choices:
I think the card I should justify the inclusion are Dunes of the Dead and Trial of Ambition.
In many games I was able to get control of the board and keep the opponent from winning, but the lack of clock made it made it possible for the opponent to regain board presence and in the case of burn, draw into enough Burn spells to finish the game. So Dunes of the Dead has helped me a lot to keep some pressure and even hold some turn by blocking which was relevant to gain some time to find the correct answer or the next clock of the deck. Dunes of the Dead also works well with Smallpox, since the token is created after the spell resolves.
Another point that was delaying my game was the lack of permanents to sac with Crack the Earth, which made me hold it in my hand until it was not as relevant as on the previous turns, not only that but I usually would rather my opponent to sac their land or another non creature permanent so the other removals in the deck be more relevant. Trial of Ambition does basically what was missing, in the draft, because it's a permanent with a removal trigger, keeping a more fluid amount of removal and allowing the casting Crack the Earth to be more natural and care free.
The other match up I consider to be difficult is against affinity, because not only it's a fast deck but it also is capable of deploy a large amount of permanents on the battlefield early.
So I thought about build the last part of the deck with that in mind. find a way to clear the board form some permanents allowing the main part of the deck to function, but haven't tested much so far.
I'm still testing versions of the list, Abrade could be Rakdos Charm. When you don't get much presence on the field Lightning Bolt fells off in the deck, since it won't help much closing the game without a clock, so it would need a better setup of creatures to include Bolt properly. Faithless Looting seems to be right to add in this deck, but almost every time I tried it, I rather it be something else, it works better with Young Pyromancer. Lingering Souls is good to discard with Smallpox, but tend to be hard for me to cast otherwise, at least when I test it. I would rather play Anger of the Gods or Slagstorm instead of Pyroclasm, but I would have to remove spells to add +2 lands to reliably cast those 3 cmc spells, which would be better with Faithless Looting to filter and discard land excess in case of flooding and it would be good with Young Pyromancer, as mentioned before, which would lead to substitution of another 8 or so cards to fit them in. Grim Lavamancer seemed like a nice idea, but haven't tested much, maybe with pyromancer to have something else to bait for Smallpox. I tried Hidden Stockpile, but it seemed quite slow, but the scry was nice.
The list I'm testing now runs Young Pyromancer to keep creatures on board, but it comes with the coast of removing Trial of Ambition since it doesn't trigger the Pyromancer, but would still keep permanents to sac, but I'm missing the Trials almost every game and Pyromancer would be better considered as a 3cmc spell at least, because it feels a bit of a lackluster when it's the only spell of the turn.
I think the deck still needs 1 other card with an effect similar to Crack the Earth or Smallpox, so I was considering Not Forgotten to retrieve some spell or to be certain my opponent won't draw into something relevant next turn and make a Token.
I know that the Mardu Pyromancer is the most common for of BRW decks in modern, but I still rather play this strategy.
I would like to know what do you think of those ideas, the good points, the flaws or other constructive criticism that you might have, they are all welcomed.
I've been playing Myth Realized in BW Smallpox and it's been really good for me. I haven't added the red because I think the mana base is already strained with just two colors, but that's just me.
I think with a 3 color deck and 11 ways to destroy your own lands you need to have one color be a very light splash and white is probably not the color for that. Your deck should have 4 Flagstones and a good number of plains dual lands, like you said, so I think white should be a more primary color in the deck (even if BR is a powerful color combination). Just an observation.
I like the idea behind playing a lower curve and more land destruction, but you probably want more than 19 lands. Most of your land destruction is symmetrical so without flagstones you will probably need a lot more lands.
I've been playing Myth Realized in BW Smallpox and it's been really good for me. I haven't added the red because I think the mana base is already strained with just two colors, but that's just me.
I think with a 3 color deck and 11 ways to destroy your own lands you need to have one color be a very light splash and white is probably not the color for that. Your deck should have 4 Flagstones and a good number of plains dual lands, like you said, so I think white should be a more primary color in the deck (even if BR is a powerful color combination). Just an observation.
How curious you should say that, I played against a Tron player another day and he told me to cut one of the colors too.
I agree, despite the fact that BR is generally a powerful color combination, Flagstones of Trokair has the type of ability that I think would make the deck much more stable and other spell effects less symmetric. I wouldn't mind making white a more primary color in the deck, but the main spells that follow this deck strategy seems to be printed in BR mainly so far. I considered, during the first sketches I've made of this deck, including cards like Undercity Plague, Catch // Release and Renounce the Guilds, the later being very interesting for when Nahiri, the Harbinger was seen more play, but the high cost of those spells and the narrow amount of multicolored relevant permanents in modern made it's inclusion, ambitious, that's to say. Within games, I realized my play style was better suited for a low cost type of deck, maybe making this deck have a more Tempo oriented approach. This line of thought brought me to consider Not Forgottenfor recursion or a one-turn lock and maybe Ghostly Prison or Norn's Annex, but I didn't wanted to go too keep in grind control, just drop say, Gurmag and go for beatdown, a bit like RUG Delver, but proactive instead of reactive. Maybe I'm just not sure what I would include from white into the build, I had even considered Marrow Shards time ago, but it only works, at times, against elves and affinity.
I like the idea behind playing a lower curve and more land destruction, but you probably want more than 19 lands. Most of your land destruction is symmetrical so without flagstones you will probably need a lot more lands.
I initially considered that and originally my version of this deck had 23 lands, but constant flooding made me drop it to 21 and finally to 19 which tends to work fine, given a certain point in the game, I usually have just one land which I use to cast Gurmag Angler, around turn 3, and only drop the second land for Smallpox or Boom // Bust if needed.
The recent inclusion of Young Pyromancer made me start needing 3 lands, so, with this version, a higher land count should be correct, but I still would rather keep the game state in a spot where my beaters are still relevant. Also, I might not had played enough games, statistically speaking (probably I had played less than 200 games), for the correct numbers of lands, but if I really keeping those Pyromancers, I agree I should raise the land count.
I only we had a red Flagstones that allowed to search say, a basic mountain, and put on the battlefield tapped. it would make casting Crack the Earth very easy turn 1, could do it with Tormod's Crypt, but I think that's too much to expect.
I would like to include the last Boom // Bust and a set of another Smallpox type effect and probably some fetches to cast Gurmag Angler, most of he time I can't drop it a turn earlier because of the lack of 1 mana.
I still struggle with the general deck building for this list, usually I don't have problems with that, I mean, I found it hard to figure the right amount of types of effects within the deck. For example, it seems that for Crack the Earth to work, it requires a set and a half of permanents in the deck, Smallpox tend to work fine with 4 lands that I can sac and 4 cards that I can discard profitably(which would be Lingering Souls if they were in my build), Boom // Bust needs around a set and a half of lands that works with it at least. I'm partially using Kanaoka Yoshihiko decklist in the attachment and play test as this reference.
I think I would need around 15 creatures in the deck to have a clock quite early every game, and so on. I could try to mirror it with another deck that plays a similar strategy and make suitable adjustments, RUG Delver is the one I could think of.
So, following this idea, that deck usually has:
12-15 creatures, 6-11 counters, 4-8 cantrips, 4-9 removals and 17-19 lands.
Then I could try to keep part of that proportion, where counters and removal would be sac and destruction effects:
12-15 creatures, 6-11 sac effects, 4-8 cantrips, 4-9 removals and 19-23 lands.
Do you or anyone else have a different approach to accomplish this?
I think the primary issue with land destruction in modern is how symmetrical the good cards are. Looking at Ponza, BW Pox, Mardu Pyromancer, land hate is generally only in two color decks (Mardu Pyromancer is very close to a two color deck) because of the symmetrical nature of cards like Blood Moon and Smallpox. These cards hurt you as much as your opponent so you need a super resilient mana base.
In your deck the same thing is true when looking at Boom // Bust, Crack the Earth, and smallpox, your only three land destruction spells. Even with a Flagstones if you cast two of these spells (which is very likely since you have 12 of them), you're going to need to draw at least 3 lands in the first three turns to play the deck. I'm not convinced 19 lands can get you there but if you've played close to 200 games then you are way more qualified than I am to comment on the land base.
Again, comparing to Ponza or BW Pox, Ponza plays something like 22 lands (with ramp spells) and BW Pox plays 24-25 (with 4 flagstones). The issue with symmetrical cards like smallpox is the amount of attrition it causes on both sides of the table. This means both decks go into "top deck" mode more often. Our opponents may be trying to draw into land or a threat and we are also trying to draw into a threat. So our decks need to have a high density of "good top decks", basically cards that are good on their own with however many (and whatever type of (think color)) remaining lands we have on the field.
Besides lands, discard spells, and Myth Realized every card in my deck is a great top deck. And often I don't mind drawing lands because 6 of them and creature lands. I could reduce the number of lands and discard spells but those are pretty important to the deck. Myth is a card that I would be OK with cutting only because of how bad of a top deck it is. Other than that it's a great card.
Ponza plays out a similar way but with worse top decks because they play straight up stone rain. But their pay offs are much bigger than mine with things like thragtusk that they can support with the ramp.
In your deck I see a lot more bad top decks. All of your land destruction gets a little worse when you realize at 19 lands you will be able to cast them way less than you would like. Smallpox can be a good top deck but something like crack the earth looks pretty bad if your opponent can generate a few tokens. Then you have Terrarion, discard spells, Myth, Faithless looting, and no creature lands at all. Also, most of your threats are pretty bad top decks. Myth and Young Pyro are bad since you are likely empty handed. Gurmag angler is quite good off the top though.
Now, I'm only giving you one example of how to play land destruction: midrangey decks like BW Pox and Ponza. This has historically been the best way to play land destruction in modern but other ways exist like Legacy Delver decks which use stifle and wasteland to keep their opponents from playing their big spells. But the problem with trying to port that to modern is the lack of wastelands and stifles. So like you said, a more tempo oriented list may be better for your deck. I think Myth does a decent job of acting like a delver: early game card that becomes a late game threat. But the main issue is it requires mana to activate when your whole plan is to destroy both players mana bases.
About the 200 games I mentioned, it is just me trying to say that I'm not really into the statistics of how good or bad that land setup would be and wasn't sure if someone who reads that would be, so it was just a random parameter, pardon me.
I agree that I lacking with the 20+ lands test, so I played some games testing with 25 lands, the only thing I sure, as of now, is that I wasn't missing lands, that Faithless Looting looked better and the mana flooding was more constant.
Initially a wasn't thinking on the Legacy RUG Delver, but rather the Modern RUG Delver. The legacy one actually makes more sense to compare.
I would like some manlands in the deck, but all manlands that I remember are not suited for low cost strategy, except for Mutavault. If I was going to put more lands that tap for C, I think I would try Ghost Quarter, but adding more colorless lands in the deck would hurt it's already shaky mana base. Again, I still would have to find me some Flagstones of Trokair to confirm this.
I agree with you that my deck have more bad topdecks than yours. Discards, Young Pyromancer, Myth Realized and Faithless Looting are bad when on top deck mode, which makes me hold Looting in hand for too long at times or want the third land to flash it back, but wouldn't Bitterblossom and Collective Brutality be just as bad in such situation? I mean, this is how I see it at least, haven't tested those.
I would have played BW Smallpox if it was closer to that low curve strategy I wanted, I just think that Shambling Vent and planeswalker cost too much mana.
My idea before testing with Young Pyromancer, was to put some numbers of global burn, like Anger of the Gods, main deck so I could control the board more easily and cards like Smallpox and Crack the Earth would keep their relevance through out the game.
I considered making it monored, as if blending the version I've made with a Burn list, so I could just burn some permanents up, and crack the rest.
Just brainstorming the idea:
I noticed I mentioned Myth Realized, but not how it performed to me. When it comes early it growths quite fast, but late in the game I usually discard it to Looting, because I wouldn't be able to control the board for long enough for it to become relevant.
I think that maybe there just aren't the cards to build the deck the way I think it should be or I'm looking in the wrong direction.
No problem, I'm happy to help. I love Smallpox as a card so I'm always happy to see it in different decks.
Yes, my deck is much better suited for man lands and the 25 land strategy. I don't think 25 is the best number for your deck since it has a low curve and like you said you really can't support man lands very effectively but without testing I can't help you much. Without a long test at every number you won't know the best amount but maybe just try 5-10 games at each number between 19-24 and record either "land screwed", "good on lands", "land flood". Then pick the number you liked the best and test a bunch more games with that number, again keeping track of how your land count looks. After a good 50 games or so you can adjust again. You may also look back through this thread and try to copy other people with a similar spell set-up that you have.
So Bitterblossom and Collective Brutality aren't great top decks by any means but it's really match up dependent. If the early game went well and neither player has much of a board state a Bitterblossom is one of the best cards I could draw. If my opponent is ahead and has a couple creatures out Bitterblossom looks much worse, but it's still a stream of blockers. Bitterblossom is best on turn 2 but it's good as long as you are at parity with your opponent. Collective Brutality could probably go in the bad top deck pile but -2/-2 can kill some creatures late game or I can always drain life so it's not the worst card but far from good.
Yep, BW Pox is a midrange deck so it needs big finishers. You could cut the 4 drops and some creature lands and rely more on Dark Confidant and Bitterblossom. It's an idea but it has some draw backs too.
I think the mono red deck looks cool. Can't comment too much as I've never played anything like it. I think Young Pyro might be just a little slow for that deck though. I think you need some sort of 1 mana Myth Realized type card and I'm not sure what that would be in Red. I really like the ramunap ruins too. Good combo with Dunes.
I completely agree on Myth. It needs to come down turn 1 or 2 for it to really be relevant. This has made me want to play fewer so that I draw so many late game but on the other hand I need a lot so it shows up in my opening hand. It's a sweet card and very powerful but it has drawbacks too.
Crack the Earth and Smallpox are still the main cards in this deck for me and is being nice to play with them both in the same list.
Duress is very nice on the first turns as I can see rather I can follow an land destruction plan of should go another path and discarding removal that could be used against my creatures or delaying some faster decks.
Forked Bolt is in the place of Lightning Bolt because I thought it could be interesting alternative in a meta with lots of small creatures like Elves, some D&T Affinity and other decks that might appear. This could be a mistake in the long run, but I liked the change so far, more tests required.
Faithless Looting is quite amazing as it helps filter the right sequence of spells which allows spells like Smallpox and Crack the Earth to take the permanents needed away from the board.
Terrarion is nice bait for Crack the Earth, but the mana fixing helps when you got to play mana intensive spells in sequence while filling the grave for Gurmag Angler. Also is a way to try to avoid a complete Blood Moon lock against this deck.
Boom // Bust is back in the main as I wanted another cheap spell, mana wise, to destroy lands reinforcing the Crack the Earth and Smallpox plan.
Lingering Souls is a good way to help put some clock into the game or buy time to find an answer.
Mycosynth WellSpring is probably an odd choice, but it helps me find lands when I need and not be set back for too long by Boom // Bust or Smallpox and is another bait for Crack the Earth, 1 set and a half of baits seems to be the right number so far. As I have 5 basics so far, this have being working fine. I also tried changing Mycosynth Wellspring with Ichor Wellspring and even Servo Schematic, but the first have helped me more than the others.
Abrade is versatile for removing threats and helps against Affinity too, which is one of the match ups I focus on being able to at least have a "even score" along with Burn. Also it allows the deck to have an answer for Chalice of the Void set to 1 which can be tough if I'm not able to start removing lands early enough.
Young Pyromancer helps out clock in the game, have permanents to sacrifice for both Crack the Earth and Smallpox, and even though the artifacts in the deck does not trigger it, it can still help against Affinity and other decks when a need to buy some time.
Gurmag Angler helps close games faster. I tried Myth Realized which also is capable of closing games earlier, but the times it come into my hand too late to put counters and grow it, outnumber the times that I kept a Smallpox in hand because Gurmag was on the battlefield, but I still try to fit 1 Myth main at times as I don't like the vulnerability that this built is getting with cards that interact with the graveyard.
Dunes of the Dead has helped with the clock of the deck quite nicely helping choose permanents for both Crack the Earth and Smallpox, the fact it comes untapped has helped to play Boom // Bust on second turn and put a threat in play. The nuance of only adding C have not being much of an issue as Mycosynth Wellspring and Terrarion helps in this aspect, even along with Graven Cairns
Would like to know if there are other good creatures for this deck. I was thinking of a 2 or 3 Evershrikes with a set of Cartouche of Solidarity, but it still depends on the graveyard.
Went to a small tournament, with around 9-12 players, on my LGS with Mardu Smallpox because I thought that there wound be a lot of Tron and Combo decks and I feel more confidant to play with this list against those decks and to test my build a bit.
I found out that in the store there were 3 Hardened Affinity, 1 Boros Prison, 1 Elf Combo, 1 Pili-Pala/Grand Architect Combo, 1 Izzet Mages and 1 Boros Humans.
t2: I played Mycosynth Wellspring on second turn, he cast a Jace, I Abraded it and Crack the Earth for Wellspring and his land, he passed I played a land and Lingering Souls he Remanded it and I passed, he Lightning Bolted me and passed, I played Souls again and passedhe played Grim Lavamancer and passed, I played Pyromancer and Crack the Earth sacing a land from both sides and generating a token from Pyromancer, he killed Pyromancer with Lavamancer and passed, I attacked with the tokens he cast Snapcaster for Bolt on me and I Forked Bolt the Snapcaster and Lavamancer and passed, he draw a card and passed, I play Dunes of the Dead and Boom//Bust it and one of his lands and he conceded.
As I remember he needed 3 lands to play and was struggling to find lands both games. I remember casting a Duress and he had Magus of the Moon, 2 Ionize and another 3 drop.
t3: He started slow, I Erased one Hardened Scales, he played another and a Arcbound Worker followed by a second Worker, I casted Smallpox he sacrificed a Worker and transfered the counters to the other making it a 5/5, he attacked me for 5, I casted Gurmag and passed, he draw a card and did not attacked, I Abraded the Worker and attacked with Gurmag, he cast a Steel Overseer I casted a Zealous Persecution on his turn to kill the Oversir, I attacked and passed, he casted a Sparring Construct and passed, I played Faithless Looting kept a Forked Bolt and a Anger of the Gods, used Forked Bolt on the Construct and 1 point on him, attacked and passed, he casted 2 artifact creatures (can't remember which) and passed, I played Anger of the Gods and attack again.
Game 3 - Boros Humans
1-2
t1: I casted Smallpox followed by a Boom // Bust on next turn and he conceded.
t2 and t3: on game 2 I had a Anger of the Gods on hand and felt like I should hold it in my hand a bit because he could have some answer to it, I fail to followed my instinct, casted Anger which was answer with a Boros Charm making his permanents indestructible and it was downhill from there. Both games I was not sure if should remove his creatures first, or his lands, or dropping Pyromancer, tried to remove his lands and but he had plenty and lost.
Game 4 - Pili-Pala Combo
1-2
t1:Didn't know what I was playing against, started with Crack the Earth on Dunes of the Dead and a land of his making a Zombie Token, he played Pili-Pala and I remembered there was a combo with that card so I Forked Bolt it, cast Faithless Looting, Gurmag Angler and managed to win before he stablishes the combo.
t2: I've made a mistake tried to cast Gurmag earlier and instead of removing his permanents with a Pyromancer in play, lost my own resources and the game right after.
t3: I felt I should have had a mulligan, but kept a hand with Forked Bolt, Crack the Earth, Lingering Souls, Faithless Looting and lands, I couldn't keep him out of resources, I had one Erase on hand thinking that he would cast something like a Rest in Peace, draw lands for 5 turns and lost to my own Gurmag which he manages to take control of.
I've made a couple of mistakes like not playing the land of the turn and not casting Terrarion when had mana left, and I need more practice playing with Young Pyromancer, timing is very important in this build and spending a turn to cast Pyromancer instead of removing permanents or holding Crack the Earth or Smallpox to cast Pyromancer with 3 lands in play may cause a game loss, but playing those spells early may not be as meaningful as if you had the Pyromancer already in play, causing a game loss too.
For sideboard I usually remove a Faithless Loting, a Duress and some Boom // Bust depending on what I'm against. And I should replace that Erase for something else.
I really liked playing Mardu Smallpox, I'll try to play it better next time or with less misplays at least and I hope to see more cards for this strategy in the upcoming sets and that more people give this deck a try and have as much fun as I have playing it.
By the way, what do you think about Mayhem Devil, Angrath's Rampage and Liliana's Triumph from the spoilers of War of the Spark? seems like it could be interesting addition to the deck or at least to some version of this deck.
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How Crack the Earth is performing? It seems pretty bad late game. I love the card but feels so underperformed to me.
Cheers.
crack the earth is always good. it triggers revolt, cycles flagstones of trokair, it forces reaction from your opponent.
my usual play is turn 1 chromatic star, turn 2 crack the earth.
depending on the deck i am playing against, my turn 1 might be open mana for mana tithe.
the deck is very tuned at this stage, feel free to test it on xmage or on paper if you happen to have the cards.
Active thread contributor of Jeskai Prowess Tempo
Sorry for the necro reply, but what did you mean here by "exponential"? As far as I can tell if you have 2 stockpiles in play they make 2 tokens per turn, 3 stockpiles make 3 tokens, and 4 stockpiles make 4 tokens. The fact that these effects stack linearly is good, but not truly exponential -- exponential growth would be if every token produced two tokens, and those two tokens each produced two tokens etc so that after three turns 2 tokens have become 16... my point isn't to ding you for scientific semantics, I just want to make sure I'm not misunderstanding the full power of this card if there is some truly exponential function to it. Thank you.
Anyone else still playing Mardu Pox lately?
Just wanted to share some thoughts on the build.
I attempt to create a version of Crack the Earth/Smallpox deck that tries to keep the game in a early state and that could play with only 2 lands. That, in part, because every 3cmc spell I tested did not seemed to perform well or didn't seemed to do enough. Just to mention, some of the 3casting cost spells I tried was Stone Rain, Molten Rain, Lingering Souls, Crackling Doom, Pia Nalaar to name a few. Some problems raise with aggro match ups like Burn, so I started a draft of the deck that would have a good win percentage against Burn, since it's one of the aggro decks that can basically play with even 1 land. So, the most successful draft that I manage to build was the list below:
~Draft (45):
4 Smallpox
4 Trial of Ambition
4 Terrarion
4 Duress
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Boom // Bust
4 Dunes of the Dead
6 Swamp
4 Mountain
2 Plains
Thoughts on some card choices:
I think the card I should justify the inclusion are Dunes of the Dead and Trial of Ambition.
In many games I was able to get control of the board and keep the opponent from winning, but the lack of clock made it made it possible for the opponent to regain board presence and in the case of burn, draw into enough Burn spells to finish the game. So Dunes of the Dead has helped me a lot to keep some pressure and even hold some turn by blocking which was relevant to gain some time to find the correct answer or the next clock of the deck.
Dunes of the Dead also works well with Smallpox, since the token is created after the spell resolves.
Another point that was delaying my game was the lack of permanents to sac with Crack the Earth, which made me hold it in my hand until it was not as relevant as on the previous turns, not only that but I usually would rather my opponent to sac their land or another non creature permanent so the other removals in the deck be more relevant. Trial of Ambition does basically what was missing, in the draft, because it's a permanent with a removal trigger, keeping a more fluid amount of removal and allowing the casting Crack the Earth to be more natural and care free.
The other match up I consider to be difficult is against affinity, because not only it's a fast deck but it also is capable of deploy a large amount of permanents on the battlefield early.
So I thought about build the last part of the deck with that in mind. find a way to clear the board form some permanents allowing the main part of the deck to function, but haven't tested much so far.
with the other part of the deck it would be:
4 Smallpox
4 Trial of Ambition
4 Terrarion
4 Duress
3 Boom // Bust
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Pyroclasm
2 Abrade
3 Myth Realized
1 Terminate
1 Dreadbore
2 Not Forgotten
4 Dunes of the Dead
7 Swamp
5 Mountain
3 Plains
I'm still testing versions of the list, Abrade could be Rakdos Charm. When you don't get much presence on the field Lightning Bolt fells off in the deck, since it won't help much closing the game without a clock, so it would need a better setup of creatures to include Bolt properly. Faithless Looting seems to be right to add in this deck, but almost every time I tried it, I rather it be something else, it works better with Young Pyromancer. Lingering Souls is good to discard with Smallpox, but tend to be hard for me to cast otherwise, at least when I test it. I would rather play Anger of the Gods or Slagstorm instead of Pyroclasm, but I would have to remove spells to add +2 lands to reliably cast those 3 cmc spells, which would be better with Faithless Looting to filter and discard land excess in case of flooding and it would be good with Young Pyromancer, as mentioned before, which would lead to substitution of another 8 or so cards to fit them in. Grim Lavamancer seemed like a nice idea, but haven't tested much, maybe with pyromancer to have something else to bait for Smallpox. I tried Hidden Stockpile, but it seemed quite slow, but the scry was nice.
The list I'm testing now runs Young Pyromancer to keep creatures on board, but it comes with the coast of removing Trial of Ambition since it doesn't trigger the Pyromancer, but would still keep permanents to sac, but I'm missing the Trials almost every game and Pyromancer would be better considered as a 3cmc spell at least, because it feels a bit of a lackluster when it's the only spell of the turn.
Deck as of now:
4 Smallpox
4 Terrarion
4 Duress
4 Faithless Looting
4 Lightning Bolt
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Terminate
1 Ruinous Path
3 Boom // Bust
3 Myth Realized
3 Gurmag Angler
4 Dunes of the Dead
3 Dragonskull Summit
2 Graven Cairns
1 Caves of Koilos
4 Nomad Outpost
3 Mountain
2 Swamp
1 Crumble to Dust
3 Hide // Seek
2 Pyroclasm
2 Tormod's Crypt
2 Trial of Ambition
1 Ratched Bomb
2 Sorcerous Spyglass
2 Damping Sphere
This list is quite budget, so no Flagstones of Trokair as of now, but would add 2 copies plus some amount of Sacred Foundry and Godless Shrine. Ruinous Path should be Dreadbore and the sideboard is a sketch.
I think the deck still needs 1 other card with an effect similar to Crack the Earth or Smallpox, so I was considering Not Forgotten to retrieve some spell or to be certain my opponent won't draw into something relevant next turn and make a Token.
I know that the Mardu Pyromancer is the most common for of BRW decks in modern, but I still rather play this strategy.
I would like to know what do you think of those ideas, the good points, the flaws or other constructive criticism that you might have, they are all welcomed.
I think with a 3 color deck and 11 ways to destroy your own lands you need to have one color be a very light splash and white is probably not the color for that. Your deck should have 4 Flagstones and a good number of plains dual lands, like you said, so I think white should be a more primary color in the deck (even if BR is a powerful color combination). Just an observation.
I like the idea behind playing a lower curve and more land destruction, but you probably want more than 19 lands. Most of your land destruction is symmetrical so without flagstones you will probably need a lot more lands.
How curious you should say that, I played against a Tron player another day and he told me to cut one of the colors too.
I agree, despite the fact that BR is generally a powerful color combination, Flagstones of Trokair has the type of ability that I think would make the deck much more stable and other spell effects less symmetric. I wouldn't mind making white a more primary color in the deck, but the main spells that follow this deck strategy seems to be printed in BR mainly so far. I considered, during the first sketches I've made of this deck, including cards like Undercity Plague, Catch // Release and Renounce the Guilds, the later being very interesting for when Nahiri, the Harbinger was seen more play, but the high cost of those spells and the narrow amount of multicolored relevant permanents in modern made it's inclusion, ambitious, that's to say. Within games, I realized my play style was better suited for a low cost type of deck, maybe making this deck have a more Tempo oriented approach. This line of thought brought me to consider Not Forgottenfor recursion or a one-turn lock and maybe Ghostly Prison or Norn's Annex, but I didn't wanted to go too keep in grind control, just drop say, Gurmag and go for beatdown, a bit like RUG Delver, but proactive instead of reactive. Maybe I'm just not sure what I would include from white into the build, I had even considered Marrow Shards time ago, but it only works, at times, against elves and affinity.
I initially considered that and originally my version of this deck had 23 lands, but constant flooding made me drop it to 21 and finally to 19 which tends to work fine, given a certain point in the game, I usually have just one land which I use to cast Gurmag Angler, around turn 3, and only drop the second land for Smallpox or Boom // Bust if needed.
The recent inclusion of Young Pyromancer made me start needing 3 lands, so, with this version, a higher land count should be correct, but I still would rather keep the game state in a spot where my beaters are still relevant. Also, I might not had played enough games, statistically speaking (probably I had played less than 200 games), for the correct numbers of lands, but if I really keeping those Pyromancers, I agree I should raise the land count.
I only we had a red Flagstones that allowed to search say, a basic mountain, and put on the battlefield tapped. it would make casting Crack the Earth very easy turn 1, could do it with Tormod's Crypt, but I think that's too much to expect.
I would like to include the last Boom // Bust and a set of another Smallpox type effect and probably some fetches to cast Gurmag Angler, most of he time I can't drop it a turn earlier because of the lack of 1 mana.
I still struggle with the general deck building for this list, usually I don't have problems with that, I mean, I found it hard to figure the right amount of types of effects within the deck. For example, it seems that for Crack the Earth to work, it requires a set and a half of permanents in the deck, Smallpox tend to work fine with 4 lands that I can sac and 4 cards that I can discard profitably(which would be Lingering Souls if they were in my build), Boom // Bust needs around a set and a half of lands that works with it at least. I'm partially using Kanaoka Yoshihiko decklist in the attachment and play test as this reference.
I think I would need around 15 creatures in the deck to have a clock quite early every game, and so on. I could try to mirror it with another deck that plays a similar strategy and make suitable adjustments, RUG Delver is the one I could think of.
(Link for reference: https://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/established-modern/aggro-tempo/511933-monkey-grow-rug-temur-delver)
So, following this idea, that deck usually has:
12-15 creatures, 6-11 counters, 4-8 cantrips, 4-9 removals and 17-19 lands.
Then I could try to keep part of that proportion, where counters and removal would be sac and destruction effects:
12-15 creatures, 6-11 sac effects, 4-8 cantrips, 4-9 removals and 19-23 lands.
Do you or anyone else have a different approach to accomplish this?
In your deck the same thing is true when looking at Boom // Bust, Crack the Earth, and smallpox, your only three land destruction spells. Even with a Flagstones if you cast two of these spells (which is very likely since you have 12 of them), you're going to need to draw at least 3 lands in the first three turns to play the deck. I'm not convinced 19 lands can get you there but if you've played close to 200 games then you are way more qualified than I am to comment on the land base.
Again, comparing to Ponza or BW Pox, Ponza plays something like 22 lands (with ramp spells) and BW Pox plays 24-25 (with 4 flagstones). The issue with symmetrical cards like smallpox is the amount of attrition it causes on both sides of the table. This means both decks go into "top deck" mode more often. Our opponents may be trying to draw into land or a threat and we are also trying to draw into a threat. So our decks need to have a high density of "good top decks", basically cards that are good on their own with however many (and whatever type of (think color)) remaining lands we have on the field.
Here's my list of BW Smallpox (not trying to convert you, just showing an example): http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/04-09-18-pox-control/
Besides lands, discard spells, and Myth Realized every card in my deck is a great top deck. And often I don't mind drawing lands because 6 of them and creature lands. I could reduce the number of lands and discard spells but those are pretty important to the deck. Myth is a card that I would be OK with cutting only because of how bad of a top deck it is. Other than that it's a great card.
Ponza plays out a similar way but with worse top decks because they play straight up stone rain. But their pay offs are much bigger than mine with things like thragtusk that they can support with the ramp.
In your deck I see a lot more bad top decks. All of your land destruction gets a little worse when you realize at 19 lands you will be able to cast them way less than you would like. Smallpox can be a good top deck but something like crack the earth looks pretty bad if your opponent can generate a few tokens. Then you have Terrarion, discard spells, Myth, Faithless looting, and no creature lands at all. Also, most of your threats are pretty bad top decks. Myth and Young Pyro are bad since you are likely empty handed. Gurmag angler is quite good off the top though.
Now, I'm only giving you one example of how to play land destruction: midrangey decks like BW Pox and Ponza. This has historically been the best way to play land destruction in modern but other ways exist like Legacy Delver decks which use stifle and wasteland to keep their opponents from playing their big spells. But the problem with trying to port that to modern is the lack of wastelands and stifles. So like you said, a more tempo oriented list may be better for your deck. I think Myth does a decent job of acting like a delver: early game card that becomes a late game threat. But the main issue is it requires mana to activate when your whole plan is to destroy both players mana bases.
About the 200 games I mentioned, it is just me trying to say that I'm not really into the statistics of how good or bad that land setup would be and wasn't sure if someone who reads that would be, so it was just a random parameter, pardon me.
I agree that I lacking with the 20+ lands test, so I played some games testing with 25 lands, the only thing I sure, as of now, is that I wasn't missing lands, that Faithless Looting looked better and the mana flooding was more constant.
Initially a wasn't thinking on the Legacy RUG Delver, but rather the Modern RUG Delver. The legacy one actually makes more sense to compare.
I would like some manlands in the deck, but all manlands that I remember are not suited for low cost strategy, except for Mutavault. If I was going to put more lands that tap for C, I think I would try Ghost Quarter, but adding more colorless lands in the deck would hurt it's already shaky mana base. Again, I still would have to find me some Flagstones of Trokair to confirm this.
I agree with you that my deck have more bad topdecks than yours. Discards, Young Pyromancer, Myth Realized and Faithless Looting are bad when on top deck mode, which makes me hold Looting in hand for too long at times or want the third land to flash it back, but wouldn't Bitterblossom and Collective Brutality be just as bad in such situation? I mean, this is how I see it at least, haven't tested those.
I would have played BW Smallpox if it was closer to that low curve strategy I wanted, I just think that Shambling Vent and planeswalker cost too much mana.
My idea before testing with Young Pyromancer, was to put some numbers of global burn, like Anger of the Gods, main deck so I could control the board more easily and cards like Smallpox and Crack the Earth would keep their relevance through out the game.
I considered making it monored, as if blending the version I've made with a Burn list, so I could just burn some permanents up, and crack the rest.
Just brainstorming the idea:
4 Forked Bolt
4 Stone Rain
3 Boom // Bust
4 Crack the Earth
4 Desperate Ritual
4 Faithless Looting
4 Young Pyromancer
2 Grim Lavamancer
4 Ghost Quarter
4 Dunes of the Dead
4 Ramunap Ruins
11 Mountain
I noticed I mentioned Myth Realized, but not how it performed to me. When it comes early it growths quite fast, but late in the game I usually discard it to Looting, because I wouldn't be able to control the board for long enough for it to become relevant.
I think that maybe there just aren't the cards to build the deck the way I think it should be or I'm looking in the wrong direction.
thanks again for the help so far.
Yes, my deck is much better suited for man lands and the 25 land strategy. I don't think 25 is the best number for your deck since it has a low curve and like you said you really can't support man lands very effectively but without testing I can't help you much. Without a long test at every number you won't know the best amount but maybe just try 5-10 games at each number between 19-24 and record either "land screwed", "good on lands", "land flood". Then pick the number you liked the best and test a bunch more games with that number, again keeping track of how your land count looks. After a good 50 games or so you can adjust again. You may also look back through this thread and try to copy other people with a similar spell set-up that you have.
So Bitterblossom and Collective Brutality aren't great top decks by any means but it's really match up dependent. If the early game went well and neither player has much of a board state a Bitterblossom is one of the best cards I could draw. If my opponent is ahead and has a couple creatures out Bitterblossom looks much worse, but it's still a stream of blockers. Bitterblossom is best on turn 2 but it's good as long as you are at parity with your opponent. Collective Brutality could probably go in the bad top deck pile but -2/-2 can kill some creatures late game or I can always drain life so it's not the worst card but far from good.
Yep, BW Pox is a midrange deck so it needs big finishers. You could cut the 4 drops and some creature lands and rely more on Dark Confidant and Bitterblossom. It's an idea but it has some draw backs too.
I think the mono red deck looks cool. Can't comment too much as I've never played anything like it. I think Young Pyro might be just a little slow for that deck though. I think you need some sort of 1 mana Myth Realized type card and I'm not sure what that would be in Red. I really like the ramunap ruins too. Good combo with Dunes.
I completely agree on Myth. It needs to come down turn 1 or 2 for it to really be relevant. This has made me want to play fewer so that I draw so many late game but on the other hand I need a lot so it shows up in my opening hand. It's a sweet card and very powerful but it has drawbacks too.
4 Smallpox
4 Duress
4 Forked Bolt
4 Faithless Looting
4 Terrarion
3 Boom // Bust
3 Lingering Souls
2 Mycosynth Wellspring
2 Abrade
3 Gurmag Angler
3 Dragonskull Summit
2 Graven Cairns
1 Godless Shrine
1 Caves of Koilos
4 Dunes of the Dead
2 Mountain
1 Plains
2 Swamp
3 Nomad Outpost
1 Curse of Death's Hold
3 Crumble to Dust
2 Kor Firewalker
1 Ruinous Path
1 Terminate
2 Rakdos Charm
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Anger of the Gods
1 Slagstorm
1 Sweltering Suns
1 Erase
Crack the Earth and Smallpox are still the main cards in this deck for me and is being nice to play with them both in the same list.
Duress is very nice on the first turns as I can see rather I can follow an land destruction plan of should go another path and discarding removal that could be used against my creatures or delaying some faster decks.
Forked Bolt is in the place of Lightning Bolt because I thought it could be interesting alternative in a meta with lots of small creatures like Elves, some D&T Affinity and other decks that might appear. This could be a mistake in the long run, but I liked the change so far, more tests required.
Faithless Looting is quite amazing as it helps filter the right sequence of spells which allows spells like Smallpox and Crack the Earth to take the permanents needed away from the board.
Terrarion is nice bait for Crack the Earth, but the mana fixing helps when you got to play mana intensive spells in sequence while filling the grave for Gurmag Angler. Also is a way to try to avoid a complete Blood Moon lock against this deck.
Boom // Bust is back in the main as I wanted another cheap spell, mana wise, to destroy lands reinforcing the Crack the Earth and Smallpox plan.
Lingering Souls is a good way to help put some clock into the game or buy time to find an answer.
Mycosynth WellSpring is probably an odd choice, but it helps me find lands when I need and not be set back for too long by Boom // Bust or Smallpox and is another bait for Crack the Earth, 1 set and a half of baits seems to be the right number so far. As I have 5 basics so far, this have being working fine. I also tried changing Mycosynth Wellspring with Ichor Wellspring and even Servo Schematic, but the first have helped me more than the others.
Abrade is versatile for removing threats and helps against Affinity too, which is one of the match ups I focus on being able to at least have a "even score" along with Burn. Also it allows the deck to have an answer for Chalice of the Void set to 1 which can be tough if I'm not able to start removing lands early enough.
Young Pyromancer helps out clock in the game, have permanents to sacrifice for both Crack the Earth and Smallpox, and even though the artifacts in the deck does not trigger it, it can still help against Affinity and other decks when a need to buy some time.
Gurmag Angler helps close games faster. I tried Myth Realized which also is capable of closing games earlier, but the times it come into my hand too late to put counters and grow it, outnumber the times that I kept a Smallpox in hand because Gurmag was on the battlefield, but I still try to fit 1 Myth main at times as I don't like the vulnerability that this built is getting with cards that interact with the graveyard.
Dunes of the Dead has helped with the clock of the deck quite nicely helping choose permanents for both Crack the Earth and Smallpox, the fact it comes untapped has helped to play Boom // Bust on second turn and put a threat in play. The nuance of only adding C have not being much of an issue as Mycosynth Wellspring and Terrarion helps in this aspect, even along with Graven Cairns
The rest of the mana base is waiting for me to find a pair ofFlagstones of Trokair and at least 1 Sacred Foundry to substitude the Nomad Outposts
The sideboard is a bit specific against creatures and some strategies
Curse of Death's Hold, Anger of the Gods, Slagstorm and Sweltering Suns against creature decks.
Crumble to Dust mostly against Tron Decks.
Kor Firewalker mostly against Burn Decks.
Ruinous Path and Terminate to help against decks with fewer but bigger creatures.
Rakdos Charm and Nihil Spellbomb against Graveyard Based strategies. Rakdos Charm is also more artifact removal and can be good against Storm after combo on G2 at times as they use Empty the Warrens
Erase to be tested agaisnt Leyline of the Void entering on turn 0, as the 5th Crack the Earth as it shuts down Gurmag and mess with both Lingering Souls and Faithless Looting. I should probably change for anythin else like Hazoret the Fervent or Damping Sphere maybe even a Pia Nalaar could be more interesting here. Hazoret seems nice as I tend to empty my hand quite fast, but I'm still trying to keep the deck with on a low mana cost to help with me keep playing as the symmetric effects take place.
Could be more generic withRatched Bomb, Pithing Needle, Tormod's Crypt, Damping Sphere and something like Crumble to Dust as I prefer.
Would like to know if there are other good creatures for this deck. I was thinking of a 2 or 3 Evershrikes with a set of Cartouche of Solidarity, but it still depends on the graveyard.
Maybe I'm lacking on card advantage. Maybe Bomat Courier and Lightning Helix or even Ajani Vengeant and Chandra, the Firebrand should have place in the list.
Anyone else still playing the deck?
4 Smallpox
4 Duress
4 Forked Bolt
4 Faithless Looting
4 Terrarion
3 Boom // Bust
3 Lingering Souls
2 Mycosynth Wellspring
2 Abrade
3 Gurmag Angler
3 Dragonskull Summit
2 Graven Cairns
1 Godless Shrine
1 Caves of Koilos
4 Dunes of the Dead
2 Mountain
1 Plains
2 Swamp
3 Nomad Outpost
1 Curse of Death's Hold
3 Crumble to Dust
2 Kor Firewalker
1 Ruinous Path
1 Terminate
2 Rakdos Charm
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Anger of the Gods
1 Slagstorm
1 Sweltering Suns
1 Erase
Game 1 - Izzet Mages
2-0
Roughly it's a deck that uses Jace, Vryn's Prodigy and Magus of the Moon and Snapcaster Mageto lock the opponents game and gain advantage. There was a Silumgar Sorcerer and Delver of Secrets too, but I can't remember clearly this game.
t1: I cast Boom // Bust on his steam vents on second turn, Forked Bolt his Jace and Crack the Earth another land and Smallpox his Lavamancer and last land, he conceded.
t2: I played Mycosynth Wellspring on second turn, he cast a Jace, I Abraded it and Crack the Earth for Wellspring and his land, he passed I played a land and Lingering Souls he Remanded it and I passed, he Lightning Bolted me and passed, I played Souls again and passedhe played Grim Lavamancer and passed, I played Pyromancer and Crack the Earth sacing a land from both sides and generating a token from Pyromancer, he killed Pyromancer with Lavamancer and passed, I attacked with the tokens he cast Snapcaster for Bolt on me and I Forked Bolt the Snapcaster and Lavamancer and passed, he draw a card and passed, I play Dunes of the Dead and Boom//Bust it and one of his lands and he conceded.
As I remember he needed 3 lands to play and was struggling to find lands both games. I remember casting a Duress and he had Magus of the Moon, 2 Ionize and another 3 drop.
Game 2 - Hardened Affinity
2-1
t1: I lost to a Etched Champion with counters from 3 Arcbound Ravagers as I couldn't find Smallpox.
t2: I Duress his Springleaf Drum he played a land and casted a Arcbound Worker, I Smallpoxed them both, he struggle to find another land, I cast Gurmag Angler and won with it before he could have board presence.
t3: He started slow, I Erased one Hardened Scales, he played another and a Arcbound Worker followed by a second Worker, I casted Smallpox he sacrificed a Worker and transfered the counters to the other making it a 5/5, he attacked me for 5, I casted Gurmag and passed, he draw a card and did not attacked, I Abraded the Worker and attacked with Gurmag, he cast a Steel Overseer I casted a Zealous Persecution on his turn to kill the Oversir, I attacked and passed, he casted a Sparring Construct and passed, I played Faithless Looting kept a Forked Bolt and a Anger of the Gods, used Forked Bolt on the Construct and 1 point on him, attacked and passed, he casted 2 artifact creatures (can't remember which) and passed, I played Anger of the Gods and attack again.
Game 3 - Boros Humans
1-2
t1: I casted Smallpox followed by a Boom // Bust on next turn and he conceded.
t2 and t3: on game 2 I had a Anger of the Gods on hand and felt like I should hold it in my hand a bit because he could have some answer to it, I fail to followed my instinct, casted Anger which was answer with a Boros Charm making his permanents indestructible and it was downhill from there. Both games I was not sure if should remove his creatures first, or his lands, or dropping Pyromancer, tried to remove his lands and but he had plenty and lost.
Game 4 - Pili-Pala Combo
1-2
t1:Didn't know what I was playing against, started with Crack the Earth on Dunes of the Dead and a land of his making a Zombie Token, he played Pili-Pala and I remembered there was a combo with that card so I Forked Bolt it, cast Faithless Looting, Gurmag Angler and managed to win before he stablishes the combo.
t2: I've made a mistake tried to cast Gurmag earlier and instead of removing his permanents with a Pyromancer in play, lost my own resources and the game right after.
t3: I felt I should have had a mulligan, but kept a hand with Forked Bolt, Crack the Earth, Lingering Souls, Faithless Looting and lands, I couldn't keep him out of resources, I had one Erase on hand thinking that he would cast something like a Rest in Peace, draw lands for 5 turns and lost to my own Gurmag which he manages to take control of.
I've made a couple of mistakes like not playing the land of the turn and not casting Terrarion when had mana left, and I need more practice playing with Young Pyromancer, timing is very important in this build and spending a turn to cast Pyromancer instead of removing permanents or holding Crack the Earth or Smallpox to cast Pyromancer with 3 lands in play may cause a game loss, but playing those spells early may not be as meaningful as if you had the Pyromancer already in play, causing a game loss too.
For sideboard I usually remove a Faithless Loting, a Duress and some Boom // Bust depending on what I'm against. And I should replace that Erase for something else.
I really liked playing Mardu Smallpox, I'll try to play it better next time or with less misplays at least and I hope to see more cards for this strategy in the upcoming sets and that more people give this deck a try and have as much fun as I have playing it.
By the way, what do you think about Mayhem Devil, Angrath's Rampage and Liliana's Triumph from the spoilers of War of the Spark? seems like it could be interesting addition to the deck or at least to some version of this deck.