MTG Salvation

I tried Tribute but it wasnt that good.

Considering either a Negate or Scarab Feast now in that slot.

Ive been using Negate and it is ok. Id like to see Counterspell in the new Modern Horizons set, that would make things better for us.

Plus in the meantime I will see how I canmake the deck better against graveyard stategies without watering down the core plan of the deck.

counterspell would be nice, but it doesn't really address the problem with this deck, which is why play black over white? Imo, Path and Teferi are better than Push and Assassin's Trophy. I think the only way UBx starts to see some real play is if Baleful Strix is in Horizons. Strix is powerful enough to carry the archetype I think. I would love to be playing a deck with Snappy, Strix and Clique with Liliana the Last hope.

Hey guys, long time reader but this thread made me make an account and everything an upload the list I run.


So as you blue mages probably know, a good philosophy to have with control is that there isn't a decklist that you can shove in a particular meta and it'll work. Control needs to be tuned for the meta because it's a responsive deck so you have to have the right and best responses. For example: at my LGS there is an abundance of creature based decks and combo. Several bant (spirits and knight) players, a couple graveyard reanimator style, izzet wizard tribal, and some valakut action... you get the idea! My nightmare scenarios include but are not limited to a bant spirits players casting CoCo while holding up 1WU and having a mausoleum wanderer on the battlefield lol. So how do you make a control deck fast enough to survive but resilient enough to be able to grind the long long game? Thats the puzzle everyones trying to figure out lol.

I've been trying to find a place for cards like Growth Spiral, or Tasigur, The Golden Fang... Delve threats are great but only with thought scour, and if you don't play thought scour you won't get there fast enough. Growth spiral is good but getting black black early helps us stay alive (See Kalitas and LiLi). Search for Azcanta is one of my favorite cards in Blue thanks to it doing something on turn 3 and turn 10.
This deck mainboard functions very well vs. fair decks because the value is intense with Snaps, Cliques, Kalitas, Search, and Expertise mainboard, not to mention the excellent removal suite. Post sideboard vs. phoenix agro just imagine a turn 1 grafsdiggers cage into an abrupt decay T2 on a Thing in the Ice into a T3Unmoored Ego on your phoenix. Flashing a Vendillion Clique into attacks on next turn, then 2nd main phase Yahenni's Expertise naming Pulse of Murasa to get your clique back to use it again (BTW draw a card and gain 6) is offensive on turn 4, and we didn't even talk about how many of their spirits you just wiped... sorry it doesn't matter that you sac'd your spirit to give them indestructible.

I've found the more a control deck can flex to fill a certain hole when it needs to the better, and I find this list does that quite well. Keep tuning the Blue magic because it always needs to be.

Serum Visions...Opt....thought scour... Try playing some control cantrips and see if you like them. Remand or Repeal are very nice, repeal I would recommend only if your meta is fast enough to need to bounce one or zero drops, but hey it's an easy way to bounce a pesky enchantment. If you can Time Walk your opponents with Remand on turns 2-4, thats when UBx control starts to fire on all cylinders. Against control mirrors Remand turns into a soft negate + get your cryptic back + draw a card.
I really think UBx control has a solid footing in tier 2 maybe even 1.5 with a skilled player.

Some side thoughts on this deck... Batterskull is findable with Search for Azcanta, a solid choice to grind against UW miracles since Terminus and Path to Exile are laughable with it on the battle field, trades with a colonnade if they want to block, then stays on the BF. Liliana, the Last Hope can be a 3 of, she's a wincon in herself and you can usually protect her reasonably if she survives T3.

I definitely think you need to be incorporating growth spiral or some other draw to green; decay, trophy and pulse don't seem like good enough reasons to be green over white. Detention sphere, path to exile and timely reinforcements will almost always be better versions of the green cards in your list. You would also get access to teferi and excellent sideboard cards.

Spiral on the other hand is an effect that Esper and grixis can't replicate if you want to be base UB with a splash

JayJay,

I think you’re right; I am originally a Grixis player but a fan of all control schemes. Right now I think Teferi is king but kings should be dethroned.

I would add that Black sideboard cards are also very powerful these days with Leyline, Surgical Extraction, nihil spellbomb.

Growth Spiral is a great sultai cantrip, probably top 3, but the question is what is the pay off? I’ve seen Sultai Reclamation Control and it’s too slow for this format I think. It’s possible someone could tune reclamation to be faster... maybe I’ll work on that this week and make a list; ramp + cantrip in a control deck seems excellent.

Hey guys! So I've been reading trough this thread and some great lists have been floating around. However, these didn't really satisfy where I personally want to be with Sultai, or UBg for that matter. So I'd like your feedback on my main configuration. I think it's pretty solid but I torn about whether Tireless Tracker is something to include. The card is fantastic but can be really slow. The planeswalker package could be virtually anything, but I like this setup as it works well with the deck. Ob Nixilis is "our" Teferi, so I feel. Anyway, I would love some deck critique. Thanks :).

Somebody named 1ougabouga1 on Reddit just posted a Sultai Control list they used to win a Face to Face Games Open in London, Ontario.

https://www.reddit.com/r/ModernMagic/comments/bo5a2l/bug_control_2019_tournament_report/

Looks like a pretty standard list, with a few odd choices from my perspective.

But gives hope we can tune BUG control to fit in this meta.

Hello Velth,

Looks like no one has responde to you yet.

I see you have partial creature/partial planeswalker wincons. I would choose one or the other. Jeff Hoogland posted some lists last year based on creatures you might like to look at. I prefer Planeswalkers so we can dodge removal. The only creatures I play are Snapcaster Mage and Creeping Tar Pit.

My only other question is why you have Ancestral Vision instead of Opt. You can cast Opt turn 1 to help hit your land drops and then Snap it back if you need to. The AV to me seems out of place in this kind of list.

Other than that, looks good. Let us know how your playtesting goes!

I've been testing a spicy list for the upcoming Face to Face Games Open in Hamilton on June 22.

It is basically UBg Control with a small red splash for everybody's favourite tyrant: Nicol Bolas, Dragon God.

Here's the list:



The list is pretty standard but has been tweaked to fit the current meta that I've been encountering. I'm not sure what Modern Horizons will bring, but this is what I will be taking to the Open probably.

Baleful Strix equivilent in MH1 confirmed!!

Ice-Fang Coatl
UG 1/1
Flash
Flying
When enters the battlefield you draw a card.
If you have at least 3 other snow covered permanents it gains deathtouch

This thing sadly is far from Baleful Strix.
If we get some sort of 2 colored Snow lands, it may be great.
Otherwise not having deathtouch makes it awkward in a lot of MU's.

Quote from PhobosLobos »

This thing sadly is far from Baleful Strix.
If we get some sort of 2 colored Snow lands, it may be great.
Otherwise not having deathtouch makes it awkward in a lot of MU's.

Doesn't look like we are getting snow duals but Waterlogged Grove and Nurturing Peatland look pretty awesome and presumably until MH2 when the horizon lands come to Ally colors they are decent reasons to choose non-white blue based control decks. Maybe not though, the lifeloss is always a problem for control decks.

No Counterspell in MH1, just Force of Negation.

Since the forums will be closing in July I wanted to post my current decklist before it switches over into archive mode.




You can get the full deck guide - including decklist, an explanation of why I chose each card, a mana-base discussion and a sideboarding guide on my blog.