Wow, that's a fantastic result, congrats! Can you please give us some feeback on Shalai, and explain in which matchups the Sun Titan is brought in out of the sideboard?
4c Saheeli also got 7th place in the 4/28 Modern Challenge with a unique build direction featuring Coiling Oracle instead of Voices, doubling up on Kiki and Thalia's Lancers for maximum Saheeli tutoring, and an enchantment-heavy sideboard:
That Modern Challenge list really shows where the format is at right now. To me its pretty clear that his games were won via comboing off and not much else..besides some mediocre beats that list doesnt have really any other ways to win besides comboing. Not necessarilly a bad thing but all signs seem to be pointing towards more aggresively comboing. I would be interested in knowing the player's matchups for sure.
• I'm having a hard time winning against Jund. What's your plan on beating them? Best card mainboard & sideboard. What do you board out and why? Will really appreciate if you give some tips or tricks
• Does the deck really needs non-creature removal? Path to Exile Fiery temper,etc., Why do you think so? Are there creatures we're having a hard time 2ith?
I'm having a hard time winning against Jund. What's your plan on beating them? Best card mainboard & sideboard. What do you board out and why? Will really appreciate if you give some tips or tricks
Your MB looks really solid against Jund -- pretty much all of your payoff cards are good against BGx from your 3-drops all the way up to Sun Titan.
My best advice vs Jund is to mostly ignore the combo and keep value hands that can survive T1 discard. A good Jund hand will disrupt you with a couple pieces of discard or removal early and then back it up with a T2-T3 Goyf for pressure. These starts are really hard to come back from unless you draw especially well or can recover some of the lost tempo with Rallier (Rallier + Voice wins games) -- don't get too beat up about your list or play choices if you get run over by one of these starts, that's just what a good Jund hand does against most decks. Also, the haste on Saheeli's -2 can also help you win games with a big crack back. Be careful to play around Engineered Explosives and/or Anger of the Gods game 2 if possible.
Quote from Evil69dot »
Does the deck really needs non-creature removal? Path to Exile Fiery Temper,etc., Why do you think so? Are there creatures we're having a hard time with?
1 CMC Spot removal is best vs opposing combo decks like Storm and Devoted Druid lists. However we've seen that you can build your list without 1 CMC spot removal *if* you run enough 1 CMC Dorks, 3-4x Evos, and SB hate creatures, like Eidolon and Phyrexian Revoker (which is probably better against Devoted Druid decks if you're not running spot removal to get you to 4 mana for Linvala). I think you want some kind of answer against any aggressive deck that's also evasive -- Worship covers some of these matchups but not all. What you choose depends on your meta... Path is best for midrange while also hitting combo and aggro (though it accelerates these decks), Justice and Engineered Explosives are best against wide aggro and midrange (though midrange threats can sometimes out-grow Justice), and Abrade is a comfy middle ground vs aggro and combo with some neat extra utility as well. My personal choice right now would be 1x Fiery Justice / 1x Engineered Explosives if possible, but as I said it depends on what you expect to play against.
• I'm having a hard time winning against Jund. What's your plan on beating them? Best card mainboard & sideboard. What do you board out and why? Will really appreciate if you give some tips or tricks
• Does the deck really needs non-creature removal? Path to Exile Fiery temper,etc., Why do you think so? Are there creatures we're having a hard time 2ith?
1) Voice of Resurgence + Renegade Rallier get you there in this matchup. I also main Tireless Trackers which help a lot (not sure if this is correct going forward due to the speed of the format). I board in Thrunn, Glen Elendra, Engineered Explosives, basically anything that they have to use more than one removal against or anything you can two for one them with. I haven't had any issues with Jund personally.
2) It doesn't. For me Counters Company would be the main reason for removal if you did want to main it - we are never maining enough to be truly effective against humans so just dont try and play that game, Baral could be something else you might want to hit but things like Path ramp them into more mana anyway. Dark Confidant can get out of hand but in my opinion the Jund matchup is fairly good anyway especially when you get to sideboard out your mana dorks that are not great in the matchup.
Round 1 : Storm 2-1
Round 2 : Counters company 2-0
Round 3 : Storm 0-2 (dead turn 3 both games with a turn 2 Shalai or Eidolon)
Round 4 : No show
Round 5 : Merfolk 2-0
Round 6 : Affinity 2-0
Round 7 : Abzan 2-0 (finalist of this challenge)
Quarter : Human 1-2 (dead turn 4 after casting worship )
I think all my wins were combo, 50% Saheeli - 50 % Kiki-Jiki
Great job and thanks for sharing.
What was your plan for the Counters Company matchup / how did the games go? Mull for a T3 combo on the play or T2 Fiery Justice?
Round 3 vs Storm sounds tilt-inducing :(. How do you feel about the Storm matchup overall?
It looks like you're not planning on boarding much in vs Tron. Were you expecting less Tron for the event, or is the all-in ramp + combo plan enough to reliably get you there against Tron?
Any thoughts on the list overall after playing the event? I'd imagine everyone's curious about your choices compared to stock lists, such as Coiling Oracle vs Voice, running both Lancers and Kiki, and the enchantment-heavy board. Also, how did Shalai do beyond the Storm game?
Thanks for the fast response!
After reading your answers my matchup against Jund is now favorable.
Thoughts on Eternal Witness? I never liked her. She's a good card but i think she doesn't belong in the deck. She's good when your combo got discarded but i think she loses her value since we don't have removals.
I'm always having a hard time dealing with flying creatures (Nexus, Vault Skirge, Queller etc). How do you deal with them?
I'm always having a hard time dealing with flying creatures (Nexus, Vault Skirge, Queller etc). How do you deal with them?
We've recently seen some good results of players with Qasali Ambusher in the sideboard. I haven't tested that myself yet, but it seems like a solid way to combat flying attackers that also enables some very powerful early Eldritch Evolutions (because Ambusher can come into play for free on turns 1 or 2).
Team Channel Fireball played 4c Saheeli as one of their 6 decks in the Team Modern Super League Finals last night. Nice for the deck to get some more attention. I'm not through with watching the replay yet, so can't really comment on how it performed.
It looks like they were playing the list that topped the last Modern challenge, interesting! Like was mentioned earlier that build definitely leans more into the combo than a lot of other versions of the deck. The reason I've shyed away from going too all in and leaving myself no realistic way of beats getting me the win was because I felt at that point, why not just play counters company? They are both creature based combo decks and counters company just can combo quicker more consistently. I may very well be wrong about this assumption though. For anyone who has experience with this build - how would you respond to that? What role in the meta does this fill that counters company doesnt/cant? I suppose our combo has creatures that, by themselves, are better overall than the counters company deck but thats about the only reasoning I can come up with right now. I would love to hear what others have to say about this though.
It looks like they were playing the list that topped the last Modern challenge, interesting! Like was mentioned earlier that build definitely leans more into the combo than a lot of other versions of the deck. The reason I've shyed away from going too all in and leaving myself no realistic way of beats getting me the win was because I felt at that point, why not just play counters company? They are both creature based combo decks and counters company just can combo quicker more consistently. I may very well be wrong about this assumption though. For anyone who has experience with this build - how would you respond to that? What role in the meta does this fill that counters company doesnt/cant? I suppose our combo has creatures that, by themselves, are better overall than the counters company deck but thats about the only reasoning I can come up with right now. I would love to hear what others have to say about this though.
I was on counters company for awhile and the deck felt much more fragile. There are games where you untap T3 with a devoted Druid and just win (chord/witness in hand, 3 lands go grab vizier, wit gets chord to get the rest of the combo you're missing). The problem is untapping with it. This deck threatens combo on an empty board and that is a great feeling honestly. So even if I'm running out dudes and chumping, my opponent has to have interaction up for when I hit 6 mana (which can be as early). Saheeli decks feel softish to discard, but an ewit in the main and inevitability of sun Titan make that less of an issue. You still have T1 dork, t2 saheeli, T3 cat kill you. Counters company feels more redundant and can rebuild easier, but the deck telegraphs it's plays much more. You have to have a devoted Druid without summoning sickness. If I'm on burn, I just pocket a spell for whenever I see one for example.
Yeah, I think our card quality is just slightly higher. One of the biggest improvements is that our combo pieces can work in both fast and grindy matchups, which really helps during a blind game 1. A Company hand with Druid, Vizier, and Ballista is perfect against a linear deck but it’s a bad keep against a grindy one.
Further comparing the Devoted Druid combo to the Copycat combo I've found that the summoning sickness on Druid and the need for a 3rd card (infinite mana outlet) are bigger deals than I originally expected. The summoning sickness means you pretty much *have* to play Druid T2 against fast decks, and if it gets removed that sets you back a couple turns. As for the third combo card, in ~10% of my (Bant) Counters Company games I've had infinite mana but died before finding an outlet. The fact that the Copycat combo requires only two cards that can be played in any order and are ready to go immediately shouldn't be underestimated. As mapccu pointed out, untapping and playing both combo pieces on the same turn for the win can be really powerful.
Counters Company sorta makes up for its lower average card quality by leaning on CoCo, and recycling CoCo with E-Wit. Unfortunately this means the deck has significantly more trouble with Grafdigger's Cage (Humans, Jund, Affinity, Tron, GR Eldrazi) since it shuts down CoCo, Chord, parts of E-Wit, Finks and therefore Finks combo, hitting both their combo plan A and value plan B. This leaves the Abzan player durdling until they top deck the Druid combo or an Abrupt Decay. But even without Cage around CoCo is high variance and losing a game to a total whiff is really disheartening. In terms of troublesome cards Collective Brutality also gives Druid lists more problems since its -2/-2 mode actually kills Druid’s combo pieces and they have more Instants to get hit by the discard mode. While Brutality can still kill our dorks and strip our Evos, it can’t do anything to keep us from curving Saheeli into Felidar.
Eldritch Evolution gives Copycat much faster access to silver bullet creatures relative to Chord and CoCo. Conversely, Abzan makes up for this somewhat by jamming two T3 combos. Copycat also has access to some incredible SB cards like Gaddock Teeg, sweepers, Stony Silence, RIP, and can be built around a Blood Moon / Magus of the Moon mana denial plan if that's effective in the meta. Oath and Evo are also less restrictive on your creature count than CoCo is, so you can board more non-creature spells without diluting your engine quite as much.
When you trade Druid, Witness, and Finks for Cobras, Ralliers, and Voice Evolved into Rallier/P&K/Shalai it means your early beat pressure is generally better, although still a little flimsy. Late game both decks can eventually set up some silly board states with Rallier/Voice loops + Sun Titan or CoCo + Gavony.
The last advantage is that Copycat is still a lesser known deck with wildly varying flex slots, so you can keep your opponents on their toes a bit more.
Company's biggest advantages are the two redundant combos and its ability to play more at instant speed. Having two different combos is a double edged sword -- it's harder to completely hate out the combo plan and increase the odds of going off T3. However, other than Vizier being in both combos the pieces don't interact or synergize with many other pieces of the deck so a starting hand with Druid, Finks, and E-wit is awkward, for instance. Having CoCo, Chord, Recruiter's activated ability, plus other SB instants (and in the Bant version Queller/Clique) to use at instant speed can sometimes make it a little easier to out-tempo blue decks with counterspells, but more importantly not having to worry about Evo getting blown out by a counter is really nice.
Overall I think the two decks are close in terms of raw power but they each have unique weaknesses and slightly different matchup spreads. Right now for me blue decks are low and Cage is high so I'm here playing Copycat.
Gearhulk has been in sideboards of lists every now and then, and it's a solid card, but I don't think it's versatile enough to deserve a slot in the maindeck. Too many matchups where its trigger does nothing (or even hinders our own development) and the body alone is okay, but not great. Unless you expect to run into Humans, Affinity and similar decks every round, I would recommend putting the Gearhulk in your sideboard. (I don't even think it's all that useful against Hollow One, since they have artifact creatures and recursive creatures.)
As Emzed pointed out Gearhulk runs the risk of failing to stabilize when your opponent is running artifact creatures (Hollow One, Affinity), tall / evasive creatures (moderate sized Champion or Mantis Rider in Humans, various flyers in Taxes, most midrange threats), or recursive creatures (Hollow One, Dredge). It's usually too slow to be effective against fast creature-combo decks (GW Elves, Devoted Company, Infect) so it's competing for SB space with Path/Bolt and even Reflector Mage/Fiery Justice there. On the plus side it's decent against Merfolk and Mardu and it can still randomly win games vs most Aggro decks. Gearhulk is a creature so we can find it with Oath/Evo, or if we hardcast it from hand it can't get blocked by Thalia/Freebooter/Negate.
Running Gearhulk in the side still makes sense for certain builds, but I think the current all-in combo build is less interested in a 5 CMC Evo target for fighting fair against aggro decks and is more interested in 3 CMC creatures that stabilize early before being Evolved into Kiki or Felidar to combo out. For this reason I've swapped Gearhulk to another Reflector Mage in my SB.
Having played my 5c list with Rhinos in >10 tournaments, I am still very happy with it, but after the recent success of all the combo-centric Cobra lists I decided to give that approach a try for FNM. I went 1-3 with hotshot's list with a couple of small changes to the maindeck and an adjusted sideboard:
The explosiveness of Cobra and Rallier was fun and powerful, and the number of different lines leading to a turn 3 combo win are surpising. When it worked, the deck felt very good. Unfortunately, variance wasn't always on my side tonight, and I lost several games after great opening turns when I found no combo or couldn't recover from interaction fast enough. ***** happens, and I still think I'm gonna give this list at least 1-2 more chances. Instead of recounting details about my matches, which were mostly decided by mana screw or flood, I will give you some impressions on the card choices:
Coiling Oracle performed well, and I missed Voice of Resurgence less than I expected. It's another card that plays into the explosive aspect of the deck, because it can hit a land to accelerate, while also increasing consistency. However, having multiple blue 2-drops makes the basic Island kind of mandatory, and that was pretty awkward more than once tonight when I was looking at cards like Kiki Jiki and Fiery Justice in my hand.
Shalai - never drew her, never wanted to draw her, was in the sideboard for most of my games 2&3. Her time will come at some point, but I don't think she is a big upgrade for the archetype, just another role player.
Kiki-Jiki was very good in multiple instances (Evolution really gets a boost with the goblin in the deck to find), but also uncastable once. I might want a basic Mountain or a second Stomping Ground in the future. The card definitely seems worth some extra effort.
Acidic Slime was truly bad in the matches that I played, but I dodged the Titanshift, Tron and control players. It can swing those matchups, although I'm not 100% sure a 5-drop will always be fast enough against those. Decent, but there are alternatives. Reveillark was a last minute change I made to hotspot's original list, since he wrote that he didn't think Thalias Lancers were really necessary. It could be a great way to grind out games while also returning combo pieces. I didn't really get to play with the card, so the jury is still out.
Gaddock Teeg and Selfless Spirit seemed like fantastic sideboard choices in a list with so many Renegade Ralliers. I did actually get to return a Teeg this way, and that bought me a ton of time against Counters Company. Selfless Spirit can protect Shalai, who in turn protects everyone else, which is probably close to unbeatable for decks like Mardu Pyromancer, Titanshift or Burn.
Going forward, I think the mana base could be improved. As I wrote earlier, the basic Island underperformed, and the red cards (Kiki, Justice) were tough to cast. I'm gonna experiment a little and see if I find a configuration I like more. Maybe the Coiling Oracles will have to be sacrificed to improve the mana.
R1 - B/W Eldrazi & Taxes
Game 1 was an absolute grind. We both clogged up the ground and went into a stale mate. There was always a Leonin Arbiter and Thalia in play which really inhibited my Evolutions. Every time I went for the combo he had an answer like path or flickerwisp. I eventually lost to flickerwisp beats. After the match I realised there was an opportunity to evolve into Kiki Jiki, through the arbiter tax but I was in the mindset that Evo was just a brick.
Game 2 was a huge blow out, T2 Thought Knot followed by T3 Thought Knot. GGs
R2 - Ad Nauseum
Game 1 I landed an early magus of the moon but the lotus bloom was enough for my opponent to combo off.
Game 2 was won off the back of a well timed evolution into Eidolon which completely shut off her next few turns.
Game 3 my opponent mulled to 5 and was stuck with 2 awkward lands and wasn't able to interact with a quick combo from my side.
R3 - G/W Taxes
Game 1 I was completely locked out by an arbiter and multiple ghost quarters thanks to my boi Renegade rallier. Over quick smart
Game 2 began in a very similar fashion but I made sure I always could pay the tax when my opponent went for ghost quarter & path. I played very slowly and was particularly lucky when fetching while Aven Mindscesor was in play. After an explosive start my opponent began to flood and I was able to stabilize with Thragtusk and flickering him multiple times. Insanely close game but got there in the end.
Game 3 I had a great combo hand and my opponent had no interaction. GGs
R4 - U/R Moon
I think this matchup is close to unwinnable. If anyone has beaten it consistently I'd love to know how.
Game 1 I was remanded multiple times but managed to land a saheeli when my opponent tapped out for an anger of the gods. She stuck around for multiple turns and I really fought for her to stick around. Although when it came time to combo my opponent had an array of interaction to fizzle going off.
Game 2 my opponent made a huge mistake and bolted my Voice in my turn forgetting the trigger. Even with this huge advantage I still quickly lost. Opponent slammed Young Pyro and eventually overwhelmed me with snap bolts and tokens. Voice of Resurgence was the MVP and created some difficult decisions for my opponent but in the end I could never cross the line.
Overall the deck felt solid and consistent but I ran into some pretty hateful matchups which made it exceedingly difficult to combo. I'm torn between going for a grindier build next week with Tireless Tracker's or the faster version that HotShot has been having such success with.
I definitely will be cutting scavenging ooze, he felt terrible. Unified will and Glen Elendra also underperfomed.
Hey all. I just wanted to quickly post this mock-up decklist. I've been having a blast in Standard with History of Benalia and realized how sad I was that I can't use our bestboy Felidar Guardian to blink Sagas. I thought about doing it in modern which probably isnt competitive but still loads of fun. I assumed the Saheeli deck would be the best shell.
I've played 10 games so far with this list going 7-3, mostly because I've had sweet mulligans resulting in un-interrupted Turn 3 wins. However there were two specific games History shined bright. Somehow turned the tides for me against burn, and my opponent even brought in Revelrys, which to me was questionable.
Also had a blast with Mirran Crusaders + Historys and Felidars vs a Jund deck.
I guess I just wanted to ask if people have thought about putting in more ETB effects on non-creatures for Felidar to blink. Oath is probably the best because it can be bought back with Rallier and finds like everything in our deck, but I feel like this deck is FAR from solved.
Just 5-0 a league with the same list I played in the challenge. I played against UW flash, merfolk, hollow one, humans and burn.
Enchantments in sideboard give me some games.
Once again, Coiling Oracle looked really better than Voice of Resurgence, even against UW flash
I just picked up your list. First time playing this archetype. I'm not new to value decks like this as I played knightfall for over a year. But I went back and read 20 pages of posts and I'm still confused about how to sideboard with this deck.
Using the version from hotshot can people clue me into how to sb properly with this combo deck? It's super fun I just know I'm spewing value by not sb correctly.
Using the version from hotshot can people clue me into how to sb properly with this combo deck?
In general against fast matchups you want to shave your unessential top end -- Titan, Slime, Shalai (exceptions for Burn, Storm, Mill, etc), maybe Lancers -- but keep Kiki. If the fast match involves attacking on the ground then keep Voice/Oracle to block (Humans), otherwise these can be shaved (Merfolk, Elves, Affinity, Storm). Renegade Rallier is also somewhat flexible if your opponent isn't interacting with you much to put stuff in your graveyard. However, Rallier retains more value in fast matchups where you're trying to get a 2 CMC hate permanent to stick (Stony vs Tron).
Against grindy decks I often shave 2-4x 1-CMC dorks (less if the grindy matchup involves Blood Moons, like Mardu, or if you need to out-tempo them, like Ux control), 1-4x Evo (higher vs Cage decks and especially counterspell decks), and 0-2x Felidar Guardian if you still need room.
As you're taking cards out try to replace them in a way that keeps your deck composition similar enough to still function: in general you don't want to go below ~21 creatures if possible, with 4+ 2-CMC creatures and ~4 3-CMC creatures if Evoing into Kiki quickly is important to the matchup. What you bring in should be fairly straightforward, but if you have questions about specific matchups let us know.
Yeah, I'd love specific ideas. Sorry just asking for a guide but between work and school I don't get much time to test and would like a better shot at a tournament. So jeskai, hollow one, dredge, tron, humans. Stuff like that
1 Breeding Pool
4 Eldritch Evolution
2 Felidar Guardian
3 Flooded Strand
2 Forest
1 Hallowed Fountain
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Huntmaster of the Fells
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
4 Lotus Cobra
1 Magus of the Moon
1 Noble Hierarch
4 Oath of Nissa
2 Plains
2 Reflector Mage
4 Renegade Rallier
1 Sacred Foundry
4 Saheeli Rai
1 Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
1 Thragtusk
4 Voice of Resurgence
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
1 Lone Missionary
1 Obstinate Baloth
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Reflector Mage
2 Stony Silence
1 Sun Titan
2 Unified Will
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Lotus Cobra
3 Coiling Oracle
4 Renegade Rallier
1 Eternal Witness
1 Reflector Mage
4 Felidar Guardian
1 Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
1 Thalia's Lancers
1 Acidic Slime
1 Sun Titan
Spells (12)
4 Oath of Nissa
4 Eldritch Evolution
4 Saheeli Rai
4 Windswept Heath
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Flooded Strand
1 Breeding Pool
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
2 Forest
1 Island
1 Plains
1 Horizon Canopy
2 Rest in Peace
3 Fiery Justice
3 Leyline of Sanctity
2 Worship
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Keranos, God of Storms
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
• Does the deck really needs non-creature removal? Path to Exile Fiery temper,etc., Why do you think so? Are there creatures we're having a hard time 2ith?
3x Birds of Paradise
2x Noble Hierarch
4x Voice of Resurgence
4x Lotus Cobra
4x Renegade Rallier
2x Reflector Mage
1x Eternal Witness
2x Felidar Guardian
1x Shalai Voice of Plenty
1x Thragtusk
1x Acidic Slime
1x Suntitan
4x Oath of Nissa
4x Eldritch Evolution
4x Saheeli Rai
4x Windawept Heath
3x Flooded Strand
2x Wooded Foothills
2x Misty Rainforest
1x Temple Garden
1x Stomping Grounds
1x Breeding Pool
1x Sacred Foundry
1x Hallowed Fountain
2x Horizon Canopy
2x Forest
2x Plains
-----
2x Gaddock Teeg
2x Unified Will
2x Worship
2x Stony Silence
1x Magus of the Moon
1x Eidolon of Rhetoric
1x Izzet Staticaster
1x Linvala,Keeper of Silence
1x Rec Sage
1x Obstinate Baloth
1x Fiery Justice
My best advice vs Jund is to mostly ignore the combo and keep value hands that can survive T1 discard. A good Jund hand will disrupt you with a couple pieces of discard or removal early and then back it up with a T2-T3 Goyf for pressure. These starts are really hard to come back from unless you draw especially well or can recover some of the lost tempo with Rallier (Rallier + Voice wins games) -- don't get too beat up about your list or play choices if you get run over by one of these starts, that's just what a good Jund hand does against most decks. Also, the haste on Saheeli's -2 can also help you win games with a big crack back. Be careful to play around Engineered Explosives and/or Anger of the Gods game 2 if possible.
1 CMC Spot removal is best vs opposing combo decks like Storm and Devoted Druid lists. However we've seen that you can build your list without 1 CMC spot removal *if* you run enough 1 CMC Dorks, 3-4x Evos, and SB hate creatures, like Eidolon and Phyrexian Revoker (which is probably better against Devoted Druid decks if you're not running spot removal to get you to 4 mana for Linvala). I think you want some kind of answer against any aggressive deck that's also evasive -- Worship covers some of these matchups but not all. What you choose depends on your meta... Path is best for midrange while also hitting combo and aggro (though it accelerates these decks), Justice and Engineered Explosives are best against wide aggro and midrange (though midrange threats can sometimes out-grow Justice), and Abrade is a comfy middle ground vs aggro and combo with some neat extra utility as well. My personal choice right now would be 1x Fiery Justice / 1x Engineered Explosives if possible, but as I said it depends on what you expect to play against.
1) Voice of Resurgence + Renegade Rallier get you there in this matchup. I also main Tireless Trackers which help a lot (not sure if this is correct going forward due to the speed of the format). I board in Thrunn, Glen Elendra, Engineered Explosives, basically anything that they have to use more than one removal against or anything you can two for one them with. I haven't had any issues with Jund personally.
2) It doesn't. For me Counters Company would be the main reason for removal if you did want to main it - we are never maining enough to be truly effective against humans so just dont try and play that game, Baral could be something else you might want to hit but things like Path ramp them into more mana anyway. Dark Confidant can get out of hand but in my opinion the Jund matchup is fairly good anyway especially when you get to sideboard out your mana dorks that are not great in the matchup.
What was your plan for the Counters Company matchup / how did the games go? Mull for a T3 combo on the play or T2 Fiery Justice?
Round 3 vs Storm sounds tilt-inducing :(. How do you feel about the Storm matchup overall?
It looks like you're not planning on boarding much in vs Tron. Were you expecting less Tron for the event, or is the all-in ramp + combo plan enough to reliably get you there against Tron?
Any thoughts on the list overall after playing the event? I'd imagine everyone's curious about your choices compared to stock lists, such as Coiling Oracle vs Voice, running both Lancers and Kiki, and the enchantment-heavy board. Also, how did Shalai do beyond the Storm game?
Cheers!
After reading your answers my matchup against Jund is now favorable.
Thoughts on Eternal Witness? I never liked her. She's a good card but i think she doesn't belong in the deck. She's good when your combo got discarded but i think she loses her value since we don't have removals.
I'm always having a hard time dealing with flying creatures (Nexus, Vault Skirge, Queller etc). How do you deal with them?
We've recently seen some good results of players with Qasali Ambusher in the sideboard. I haven't tested that myself yet, but it seems like a solid way to combat flying attackers that also enables some very powerful early Eldritch Evolutions (because Ambusher can come into play for free on turns 1 or 2).
I was on counters company for awhile and the deck felt much more fragile. There are games where you untap T3 with a devoted Druid and just win (chord/witness in hand, 3 lands go grab vizier, wit gets chord to get the rest of the combo you're missing). The problem is untapping with it. This deck threatens combo on an empty board and that is a great feeling honestly. So even if I'm running out dudes and chumping, my opponent has to have interaction up for when I hit 6 mana (which can be as early). Saheeli decks feel softish to discard, but an ewit in the main and inevitability of sun Titan make that less of an issue. You still have T1 dork, t2 saheeli, T3 cat kill you. Counters company feels more redundant and can rebuild easier, but the deck telegraphs it's plays much more. You have to have a devoted Druid without summoning sickness. If I'm on burn, I just pocket a spell for whenever I see one for example.
Further comparing the Devoted Druid combo to the Copycat combo I've found that the summoning sickness on Druid and the need for a 3rd card (infinite mana outlet) are bigger deals than I originally expected. The summoning sickness means you pretty much *have* to play Druid T2 against fast decks, and if it gets removed that sets you back a couple turns. As for the third combo card, in ~10% of my (Bant) Counters Company games I've had infinite mana but died before finding an outlet. The fact that the Copycat combo requires only two cards that can be played in any order and are ready to go immediately shouldn't be underestimated. As mapccu pointed out, untapping and playing both combo pieces on the same turn for the win can be really powerful.
Counters Company sorta makes up for its lower average card quality by leaning on CoCo, and recycling CoCo with E-Wit. Unfortunately this means the deck has significantly more trouble with Grafdigger's Cage (Humans, Jund, Affinity, Tron, GR Eldrazi) since it shuts down CoCo, Chord, parts of E-Wit, Finks and therefore Finks combo, hitting both their combo plan A and value plan B. This leaves the Abzan player durdling until they top deck the Druid combo or an Abrupt Decay. But even without Cage around CoCo is high variance and losing a game to a total whiff is really disheartening. In terms of troublesome cards Collective Brutality also gives Druid lists more problems since its -2/-2 mode actually kills Druid’s combo pieces and they have more Instants to get hit by the discard mode. While Brutality can still kill our dorks and strip our Evos, it can’t do anything to keep us from curving Saheeli into Felidar.
Eldritch Evolution gives Copycat much faster access to silver bullet creatures relative to Chord and CoCo. Conversely, Abzan makes up for this somewhat by jamming two T3 combos. Copycat also has access to some incredible SB cards like Gaddock Teeg, sweepers, Stony Silence, RIP, and can be built around a Blood Moon / Magus of the Moon mana denial plan if that's effective in the meta. Oath and Evo are also less restrictive on your creature count than CoCo is, so you can board more non-creature spells without diluting your engine quite as much.
When you trade Druid, Witness, and Finks for Cobras, Ralliers, and Voice Evolved into Rallier/P&K/Shalai it means your early beat pressure is generally better, although still a little flimsy. Late game both decks can eventually set up some silly board states with Rallier/Voice loops + Sun Titan or CoCo + Gavony.
The last advantage is that Copycat is still a lesser known deck with wildly varying flex slots, so you can keep your opponents on their toes a bit more.
Company's biggest advantages are the two redundant combos and its ability to play more at instant speed. Having two different combos is a double edged sword -- it's harder to completely hate out the combo plan and increase the odds of going off T3. However, other than Vizier being in both combos the pieces don't interact or synergize with many other pieces of the deck so a starting hand with Druid, Finks, and E-wit is awkward, for instance. Having CoCo, Chord, Recruiter's activated ability, plus other SB instants (and in the Bant version Queller/Clique) to use at instant speed can sometimes make it a little easier to out-tempo blue decks with counterspells, but more importantly not having to worry about Evo getting blown out by a counter is really nice.
Overall I think the two decks are close in terms of raw power but they each have unique weaknesses and slightly different matchup spreads. Right now for me blue decks are low and Cage is high so I'm here playing Copycat.
Running Gearhulk in the side still makes sense for certain builds, but I think the current all-in combo build is less interested in a 5 CMC Evo target for fighting fair against aggro decks and is more interested in 3 CMC creatures that stabilize early before being Evolved into Kiki or Felidar to combo out. For this reason I've swapped Gearhulk to another Reflector Mage in my SB.
4x Birds of Paradise
4x Lotus Cobra
3x Coiling Oracle
4x Renegade Rallier
1x Eternal Witness
1x Reflector Mage
4x Felidar Guardian
1x Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1x Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
1x Acidic Slime
1x Reveillark
1x Sun Titan
Other Spells 12
4x Oath of Nissa
4x Saheeli Rai
4x Eldritch Evolution
4x Windswept Heath
4x Misty Rainforest
3x Flooded Strand
1x Wooded Foothills
1x Breeding Pool
1x Hallowed Fountain
1x Stomping Ground
1x Sacred Foundry
1x Temple Garden
2x Forest
1x Plains
1x Island
1x Horizon Canopy
2x Gaddock Teeg
1x Selfless Spirit
1x Glen Elendra Archmage
3x Fiery Justice
2x Stony Silence
2x Rest in Peace
2x Blood Moon
2x Worship
The explosiveness of Cobra and Rallier was fun and powerful, and the number of different lines leading to a turn 3 combo win are surpising. When it worked, the deck felt very good. Unfortunately, variance wasn't always on my side tonight, and I lost several games after great opening turns when I found no combo or couldn't recover from interaction fast enough. ***** happens, and I still think I'm gonna give this list at least 1-2 more chances. Instead of recounting details about my matches, which were mostly decided by mana screw or flood, I will give you some impressions on the card choices:
Coiling Oracle performed well, and I missed Voice of Resurgence less than I expected. It's another card that plays into the explosive aspect of the deck, because it can hit a land to accelerate, while also increasing consistency. However, having multiple blue 2-drops makes the basic Island kind of mandatory, and that was pretty awkward more than once tonight when I was looking at cards like Kiki Jiki and Fiery Justice in my hand.
Shalai - never drew her, never wanted to draw her, was in the sideboard for most of my games 2&3. Her time will come at some point, but I don't think she is a big upgrade for the archetype, just another role player.
Kiki-Jiki was very good in multiple instances (Evolution really gets a boost with the goblin in the deck to find), but also uncastable once. I might want a basic Mountain or a second Stomping Ground in the future. The card definitely seems worth some extra effort.
Acidic Slime was truly bad in the matches that I played, but I dodged the Titanshift, Tron and control players. It can swing those matchups, although I'm not 100% sure a 5-drop will always be fast enough against those. Decent, but there are alternatives.
Reveillark was a last minute change I made to hotspot's original list, since he wrote that he didn't think Thalias Lancers were really necessary. It could be a great way to grind out games while also returning combo pieces. I didn't really get to play with the card, so the jury is still out.
Gaddock Teeg and Selfless Spirit seemed like fantastic sideboard choices in a list with so many Renegade Ralliers. I did actually get to return a Teeg this way, and that bought me a ton of time against Counters Company. Selfless Spirit can protect Shalai, who in turn protects everyone else, which is probably close to unbeatable for decks like Mardu Pyromancer, Titanshift or Burn.
Going forward, I think the mana base could be improved. As I wrote earlier, the basic Island underperformed, and the red cards (Kiki, Justice) were tough to cast. I'm gonna experiment a little and see if I find a configuration I like more. Maybe the Coiling Oracles will have to be sacrificed to improve the mana.
3x Birds of Paradise
4x Felidar Guardian
1x Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
4x Lotus Cobra
1x Magus of the Moon
1x Noble Hierarch
2x Reflector Mage
3x Renegade Rallier
1x Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1x Sun Titan
1x Thragtusk
4x Voice of Resurgence
1x Breeding Pool
2x Flooded Strand
2x Forest
1x Hallowed Fountain
2x Horizon Canopy
2x Plains
1x Sacred Foundry
1x Steam Vents
1x Stomping Ground
1x Temple Garden
4x Windswept Heath
4x Wooded Foothills
4x Saheeli Rai
1x Eidolon of Rhetoric
2x Gaddock Teeg
1x Glen Elendra Archmage
1x Izzet Staticaster
1x Kataki, War's Wage
2x Qasali Ambusher
1x Reclamation Sage
1x Scavenging Ooze
1x Spellskite
2x Stony Silence
2x Unified Will
R1 - B/W Eldrazi & Taxes
Game 1 was an absolute grind. We both clogged up the ground and went into a stale mate. There was always a Leonin Arbiter and Thalia in play which really inhibited my Evolutions. Every time I went for the combo he had an answer like path or flickerwisp. I eventually lost to flickerwisp beats. After the match I realised there was an opportunity to evolve into Kiki Jiki, through the arbiter tax but I was in the mindset that Evo was just a brick.
Game 2 was a huge blow out, T2 Thought Knot followed by T3 Thought Knot. GGs
R2 - Ad Nauseum
Game 1 I landed an early magus of the moon but the lotus bloom was enough for my opponent to combo off.
Game 2 was won off the back of a well timed evolution into Eidolon which completely shut off her next few turns.
Game 3 my opponent mulled to 5 and was stuck with 2 awkward lands and wasn't able to interact with a quick combo from my side.
R3 - G/W Taxes
Game 1 I was completely locked out by an arbiter and multiple ghost quarters thanks to my boi Renegade rallier. Over quick smart
Game 2 began in a very similar fashion but I made sure I always could pay the tax when my opponent went for ghost quarter & path. I played very slowly and was particularly lucky when fetching while Aven Mindscesor was in play. After an explosive start my opponent began to flood and I was able to stabilize with Thragtusk and flickering him multiple times. Insanely close game but got there in the end.
Game 3 I had a great combo hand and my opponent had no interaction. GGs
R4 - U/R Moon
I think this matchup is close to unwinnable. If anyone has beaten it consistently I'd love to know how.
Game 1 I was remanded multiple times but managed to land a saheeli when my opponent tapped out for an anger of the gods. She stuck around for multiple turns and I really fought for her to stick around. Although when it came time to combo my opponent had an array of interaction to fizzle going off.
Game 2 my opponent made a huge mistake and bolted my Voice in my turn forgetting the trigger. Even with this huge advantage I still quickly lost. Opponent slammed Young Pyro and eventually overwhelmed me with snap bolts and tokens. Voice of Resurgence was the MVP and created some difficult decisions for my opponent but in the end I could never cross the line.
Overall the deck felt solid and consistent but I ran into some pretty hateful matchups which made it exceedingly difficult to combo. I'm torn between going for a grindier build next week with Tireless Tracker's or the faster version that HotShot has been having such success with.
I definitely will be cutting scavenging ooze, he felt terrible. Unified will and Glen Elendra also underperfomed.
3x Birds of Paradise
4x Noble Hierarch
3x Coiling Oracle
3x Lotus Cobra
3x Renegade Rallier
4x Felidar Guardian
1x Ravenous Chupacabra
1x Thragtusk
1x Sun Titan
Spells
4x Oath of Nissa
4x Saheeli Rai
4x History of Benalia
3x Eldritch Evolution
4x Windswept Heath
3x Wooded Foothills
2x Flooded Strand
2x Temple Garden
1x Breeding Pool
1x Stomping Ground
3x Forest
3x Plains
2x Horizon Canopy
1x Eldritch Evolution
1x Harmonic Sliver
2x Gaddock Teeg
1x Magus of the Moon
1x Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1x Eternal Witness
2x Mirran Crusader
3x Fiery Justice
1x Blood Moon
2x Stony Silence
Hey all. I just wanted to quickly post this mock-up decklist. I've been having a blast in Standard with History of Benalia and realized how sad I was that I can't use our bestboy Felidar Guardian to blink Sagas. I thought about doing it in modern which probably isnt competitive but still loads of fun. I assumed the Saheeli deck would be the best shell.
I've played 10 games so far with this list going 7-3, mostly because I've had sweet mulligans resulting in un-interrupted Turn 3 wins. However there were two specific games History shined bright. Somehow turned the tides for me against burn, and my opponent even brought in Revelrys, which to me was questionable.
Also had a blast with Mirran Crusaders + Historys and Felidars vs a Jund deck.
I guess I just wanted to ask if people have thought about putting in more ETB effects on non-creatures for Felidar to blink. Oath is probably the best because it can be bought back with Rallier and finds like everything in our deck, but I feel like this deck is FAR from solved.
I just picked up your list. First time playing this archetype. I'm not new to value decks like this as I played knightfall for over a year. But I went back and read 20 pages of posts and I'm still confused about how to sideboard with this deck.
Using the version from hotshot can people clue me into how to sb properly with this combo deck? It's super fun I just know I'm spewing value by not sb correctly.
Against grindy decks I often shave 2-4x 1-CMC dorks (less if the grindy matchup involves Blood Moons, like Mardu, or if you need to out-tempo them, like Ux control), 1-4x Evo (higher vs Cage decks and especially counterspell decks), and 0-2x Felidar Guardian if you still need room.
As you're taking cards out try to replace them in a way that keeps your deck composition similar enough to still function: in general you don't want to go below ~21 creatures if possible, with 4+ 2-CMC creatures and ~4 3-CMC creatures if Evoing into Kiki quickly is important to the matchup. What you bring in should be fairly straightforward, but if you have questions about specific matchups let us know.