MTG Salvation

Thinking about cutting down on a land with opt back in the format.....Lot's of changes to consider. I think we would need 5 cards shifted around to get +1 snap +4 opt

I'm playing 3 snap almost religiously, Tuesday I played -1 snap +1 Gideon Jura MB and he definitely put me in a lot of games I normally have trouble with - eldrazi Tron 2-0 and Valakut 2-0, which very rarely happened for me in days gone by. (Obviously isn't "the" card to play, but one of my snaps was loaned out to a buddy who couldn't make it Tuesday so I had to make due)

Moving into the future wit Opt: does it really help us enough to be Instant speed that the extra card look from Serum just isn't great? I've never played with Opt but it seems like a subpar Serum (and I don't like Serum)

Quote from kodieyost »

Moving into the future wit Opt: does it really help us enough to be Instant speed that the extra card look from Serum just isn't great? I've never played with Opt but it seems like a subpar Serum (and I don't like Serum)

Long story short, yes. The instant speed matters that much to me. Not playing at Sorcery speed opens up far more sucfessful lines of play. I don't necessarily expect Opt to be gamebreaking but you'd be remiss not to at least try it.

I am not sure the full playset of opts will be correct but I would try to start there and cut back if/when it seems appropriate based on what the card does. What I expect it to do is help me find the thing I'm looking for at the time that I want to look (opponents end step), and to give me something I can snapcaster for value that isn't as expensive as snap-charm or as horribly awkward as snap-serum.

I've lost a lot of games because I couldn't get to the verdict or cryptic/negate fast enough and opt should help there. I've also had problems against other controlly decks as I'm stuck sitting around waiting for a charm to appear so I can do something proactive rather than just draw more cards. Being able to snap-opt is cheaper and forces them to do something about the goblin piker 10-turn clock which can push the game state forward.

Let's also not forget that Opt is Scry-Draw, not Draw-Scry like Serum is.

In this deck, playing an instant instead of a sorcery is really big.
The major question is not "is opt better than serum?", IMO, its still "is it worth playing 1mana cantrips in this deck?"

Maybe its just me here, but every game I find myself just drawing, playing a land, and passing against a control deck, if nothing else is happening, I always feel great. Thats the situation this deck loves, trying to find a snapcaster for pressure or anything is not necessary.


For teachings:
Did you play consume the meek pre-settle? Do you no longer think its worth running?
As I see it, a lot of utility kind of creatures settle might miss are swept up by consume, so playing 1-2 verdicts, 1 consume, 1 settle could actually be pretty good.
If you have so many boardwipes, and tutors to find them, you can trim down some of the spot removal in the main (I'd maybe play like 4 path, 1 blessed alliance), and put some more in the board if you feel its needed. That being said, I think any white teachings deck should play atleast 1 copy of blessed alliance main. The opportunity cost is low, and having a maindeck tutorable edict/lifegain spell is nice.
How have the dispel and spell snares worked out for you? As much as I love snare, it ends up getting cut in most of the teachings decks I brew simply for deck space.
You also seem kind of low on card advantage. Think twice is pretty important, IMO, when you're trying to hit so many land drops.
Did you ever play torrential gearhulk? I feel its probably worse in esper than grixis/sultai, but do you think there is any merit? Or simply not worth the deck space? (I'm inclined to think the latter for this deck, but what are your thoughts?)
Do you miss cryptic commands? When I played sultai teachings, I didn't play cryptics, and while it was a defensible choice, I won't lie, I did miss them sometimes.
I'm also a fan of teachings bullets like pact of negation/slaughter pact and spell burst. In particular, I think pact of negation is pretty important in teachings.
Lack of surgical in the board is also surprising to me. Atleast 1 is quite nice.
Do you want anguished unmaking? Or do celestial purge + castout handle that well enough?
Do you not own a marsh flats? Do you think 9 fetches is too many? You do want to hit a lot of land drops, and you'll need enough actual lands in some games.
Darkslick shores seems terrible to me. You very much hinge on a lot of t4 plays, which shores doesn't help with.
I'm guessing you want a land to cast early opts off of, but you have nothing to take advantage of the early black, and finding a tap land when you need to cast teachings/wrath/etc feels terrible. I'd highly suggest playing a river of tears instead. Definitely can be awkward sometimes, and you might be inclined to cast more fatal pushes on your own turn, but for your black sideboard cards (ee and night) it works just fine.
Final thoughts, I feel like you're a bit too light on countermagic. Spell snare and dispel are rather narrow, and logic knot, for all its pros, isn't a 100% hard counter. You have dispel/disdainful stroke in the board, but something like negate, cryptic command, pact of negation, spell burst, hell even disallow might want to make their way in here somewhere.

Very Rough draft with opt being available
Land (25)
4x Celestial Colonnade
2x Drowned Catacomb
4x Flooded Strand
1x Ghost Quarter
2x Hallowed Fountain
3x Island
1x Mystic Gate
2x Plains
3x Polluted Delta
1x Swamp
2x Watery Grave
Instant (28)
4x Cryptic Command
3x Esper Charm
1x Blessed Alliance
2x Fatal Push
2x Logic Knot
2x Negate
4x Opt
4x Path to Exile
1x Sphinx's Revelation
4x Think Twice
1x White Sun's Zenith
Sorcery (4)
4x Supreme Verdict
Creature (3)
3x Snapcaster Mage

Never play less than four Charm EVER. Cut a TT for a Charm if you're running 4 Opt.

Since Opt gives us additional looks, is it now viable to drop to 3 Cryptics and Verdicts to free up space for more niche answers?

I don't like going below 4 Cryptic. This is my list after incorporating Opt

Quote from tlhunter07 »

Never play less than four Charm EVER. Cut a TT for a Charm if you're running 4 Opt.

I figure going down the land it might be beneficial to have the flexibility of 5 mana over 2 turns instead of the 3 casting cost and all specific sources. That's just my opinion on it.

Cut a TT for a Charm. I agree that it'd be beneficial, but Charm is just too good.

Here's where I'll start with Opt:

Were I to go all-in on an opt/snapcaster list, I'd play something like this:

Maybe tweaking some things around, but pretty heavy on the important cards, minus verdict. Perhaps cutting something (a snap, a rev, or something else) for another one might be right.
I like the shadow of doubts here because if we're ever just sitting with 2 or 3 mana up, there are so many things we're representing; path/push, logic knot, shadow, and opt all at 2 mana, and snap + 1cmc spell, esper charm, shadow + path, etc, all at 3.

Just gonna edit my post to include this link:
https://snapcardster.com/blog/counterspell-in-modern/
I don't love it, but of all the lingering souls esper decks I've seen, this is significantly more our speed than anything else I've seen.

This is where I plan to start with my list and go from there.

Quote from PimpDonny »

This is where I plan to start with my list and go from there.

This seems fine. When will you stream again? Or am I just missing it because you stream at 4 in East Coast time?

EDIT: Also, if you could play Surgical in the board, where would it fit in?

Quote from PimpDonny »

This is where I plan to start with my list and go from there.

Your MB is pretty close to mine after making room for Opt except mine has the following differences:

-2 Drowned Catacomb
-1 Glacial Fortress
-1 Logic Knot

+1 Godless Shrine
+1 Ghost Quarter
+1 Celestial Colonnade
+1 Torrential Gearhulk

And yes, I know Gearhulk probably shouldn't be in the deck but I like the card so I included it as a 1-of. It has been decent so far.

Your sideboard has about half the same cards as mine. I am still trying to find out what I want there. I haven't played Modern in a few weeks, but I plan on starting up again next week so I should be able to nail that down a little more going forward. I have been following the thread and I have seen Elspeth, Sun's Champion come up a couple times, but I didn't really see a clear answer on what matchups she is normally brought in from the side? Is she more of a haymaker against other controls decks? Is there anything else she is good against?

Your sideboard has about half the same cards as mine. I am still trying to find out what I want there. I haven't played Modern in a few weeks, but I plan on starting up again next week so I should be able to nail that down a little more going forward. I have been following the thread and I have seen Elspeth, Sun's Champion come up a couple times, but I didn't really see a clear answer on what matchups she is normally brought in from the side? Is she more of a haymaker against other controls decks? Is there anything else she is good against?

Elspeth has typically been a bomb in creature matchups like AbCo and BGx. I wouldn't even bring it in against blue decks since they're all playing some combination of Stubborn Denial, Negate, Spell Pierce, Unified Will, etc., and Elspeth is just begging to be countered.

Quote from TheAnnihilator0798 »

Your sideboard has about half the same cards as mine. I am still trying to find out what I want there. I haven't played Modern in a few weeks, but I plan on starting up again next week so I should be able to nail that down a little more going forward. I have been following the thread and I have seen Elspeth, Sun's Champion come up a couple times, but I didn't really see a clear answer on what matchups she is normally brought in from the side? Is she more of a haymaker against other controls decks? Is there anything else she is good against?

Elspeth has typically been a bomb in creature matchups like AbCo and BGx. I wouldn't even bring it in against blue decks since they're all playing some combination of Stubborn Denial, Negate, Spell Pierce, Unified Will, etc., and Elspeth is just begging to be countered.

Good point. I wasn't sure about the speed of Elspeth vs those decks, but I suppose our other removal slows them down where we can stabilize with her on board. I will keep that in mind.

I'll be streaming this weekend, I might try and do an earlier stream Saturday perhaps in the morning if I skip my normal late night stream, perhaps even fit in the modern challenge for once? We shall see.