Just wanted to share my experience with RUG Delver at Modern State Championships this weekend. I ended up at 7th place and really felt like the deck performed really well. Here was the list that I ran:
I went 4-0 and then decided to draw 2 games in row into the top 8. I would have been guaranteed a top 8 spot anyway, but I wanted to go out and get lunch. Haha. I think I could have went 6-0 if I would have played it out. Sadly I lost first round in the top 8 to infect. Here's a breakdown of the matchups.
Match 1: (2-1)
UR Splinter Twin
The first game I never saw a Delver of Secrets or a Tarmogoyf, thus I never put much pressure on the field. After 15 or so turns the Twin player combed off. It was simply badluck on my part. I won games 2 and 3 after getting a turn 1 Delver of Secrets on the field and simply countered my way to victory.
Match 2: (2-0)
Bloom Titan/Hive Mind
He had a pretty god hand, however he wasn't able to go off fast enough. I mana leaked his turn 2 Summer Bloom. Since I was on the play I was able to Cryptic Command his dual land back to his hand. Then 2 turns later I snapped Cryptic Command. He never really caught back up after that and my 2 tarmogoyfs finished him off. Game 2 I got a Blood Moon down and it was game over at that point. Done and done.
This matchup is incredibly hard for a lot of decks at the moment. I barely managed to win games 1 and 3. Just make sure to clear their board on your turn, so that they either feel obligated to waste Giant Growth type spells or their creature dies. If they get a Wild Defiance on the field, then you're likely going to lose to their Inkmoth Nexus. That's how I lost in the top 8. I can't stress enough how devastating Spellskite is against this deck.
Top 8, Match 7: (0-2)
UG Infect (Same Deck)
I got a bit of game 1 testing in with Figure of Destiny against BW Deadguy Ale (discard, Lingering Souls, Pack Rat, etc - pretty close to what Craig Wescoe has been writing about). I was playing my PTQ list from upthread with Figures in for Goblin Guide and his BW list also ran Darkblast so Figure was pretty awful. It's probably one of the worst possible matchups for Figure just because of Darkblast, but it still didn't feel like Figure would very good in general. I never made Figure a 4/4 and it was often hard to even set that up because of my opponent's Tectonic Edge's. They felt worse than Goblin Guide, all things considered. Hard to say if I would hate them more than Guide against, say, Pod or Jund, but it didn't look good.
On the other hand, I played some game 1's against Scapeshift w/ Prismatic Omen like the list Gerry Thompson recently wrote about, and this time I had 2 Scavenging Ooze, a Grim Lavamancer and an island instead of the Guides. This is one of the matchups where I most wanted a one drop and, predictably, I won the couple of games where I cast a turn 1 Delver of Secrets and lost the games where I didn't. In particular being on the draw without a turn 1 threat was awful, mostly because Prismatic Omen is basically just game if resolved early. Against the more common versions of Scapeshift, this problem doesn't exist. Flame Slash was particularly nice against this list though because of Courser of Kruphix.
Conclusion: mostly what I expected, but now a little bit more certain about it.
A list I plan on testing out (mostly want to test out gut shot in a pure tempo build since it can hit so many targets in modern, especially since DRS is banned):
Hey Guys, how do you feel about adding Goblin Guide to the deck?
I could see something along the lines of 16 creatures (Goyf, Snapcaster, Delver and Guide), 20 land, and 24 instants/sorceries.
Is 24 spells too low to flip Delver somewhat consistently? I just feel like by adding Goblin Guide, you can use your delvers a bit later to deliver the finishing blows, backed up by (snapcaster) bolts Also, being stuck with a bunch of Tempo cards and not having a threat to back them up sucks hard. Not saying you can get there solely with Guide, but those two points of damage add up...
Hey Guys, how do you feel about adding Goblin Guide to the deck?
I could see something along the lines of 16 creatures (Goyf, Snapcaster, Delver and Guide), 20 land, and 24 instants/sorceries.
Is 24 spells too low to flip Delver somewhat consistently? I just feel like by adding Goblin Guide, you can use your delvers a bit later to deliver the finishing blows, backed up by (snapcaster) bolts Also, being stuck with a bunch of Tempo cards and not having a threat to back them up sucks hard. Not saying you can get there solely with Guide, but those two points of damage add up...
I'll be testing it for sure.
There have been folks who have tested it. It's good sometimes and not good others. The problem with it is that it's unreliable and easily blanked.
Hey Guys, how do you feel about adding Goblin Guide to the deck?
I could see something along the lines of 16 creatures (Goyf, Snapcaster, Delver and Guide), 20 land, and 24 instants/sorceries.
Is 24 spells too low to flip Delver somewhat consistently? I just feel like by adding Goblin Guide, you can use your delvers a bit later to deliver the finishing blows, backed up by (snapcaster) bolts Also, being stuck with a bunch of Tempo cards and not having a threat to back them up sucks hard. Not saying you can get there solely with Guide, but those two points of damage add up...
I'll be testing it for sure.
I've played it extensively in UR and RUG - search the most recent few pages of both threads for details of what I've found. The long and short of it is that Guide is fantastic vs. Scapeshift, Tron and combo generally, but (at least in RUG Delver) you always side him out vs. BGx Rock (Jund, Junk, etc), BW Tokens/Deadguy Ale, UWR Control, Affinity, Pod, RUG Twin and basically any grindy matchup. Some of this is ok because game 1 you're simply a different deck than game 2 and you're reacting to their SB plans, but if you expect a lot of grindy matchups (particularly BGx and UWR), I'd suggest playing Cliques, Oozes, and/or Lavamancers instead so that you have a better plan if they kill your first threat or two. If you expect a lot of Scapeshift, Tron and combo, Guide looks fantastic. Vs the most recent metagames I've played it, guide has been mopey. But Scapeshift and Tron are likely on the rise as a response to all this midrange nonsense, so perhaps it makes sense as a metagame prediction / trying to beat the top tables rather than the entire field. But of course your local meta may be completely different given the diversity in modern.
How does my sideboard look? I think I might have a few too many cards for the grindier match-ups (the Huntmaster/Keranos/Batterskull package). I would like to find room for another Combust.
Main deck changes I am considering are finding room for a Spell Pierce or two and perhaps another Simic Charm as that card has significantly overperformed versus my expectations.
Surgical extraction seems pretty bad - we already have solid game against the combo decks anyway. The third Ancient Grudge should probably be a Shatterstorm - you only ever bring the 3rd one in against affinity anyway. The 2nd combust is nice but not all that important I think.I think the biggest thing you're missing is SB cards that are good against lingering souls and generic aggressive creature decks. Grim Lavamancer and Izzet Staticaster come to mind. Given that your build is slower, Thundermaw Hellkite might be a nice SB card for grindier matchups and vs Lingering Souls. Scavenging Ooze is also a decent creature in a wide variety of matchups that may be worth sbing. I'd try cutting a Grudge, Surgical, and Keranos for Grim, Staticaster, and either Hellkite or Ooze. Nor sure about cutting the Keranos but I think Hellkite/Ooze/something completely different is worth trying in that slot. I also like Counterflux over Negate but your mileage may vary.
Edit: one reason I don't like Keranos much is that we typically get out-landed by UWR so resolving our Keranos is difficult, but I'm not sure how that plays out in your list with more lands. Also note Ooze's natural strength against Lingering Souls.
I tested a bunch of game 1's vs BW Deadguy Ale (Think Junk, except just BW and w/ Pack Rat + Mutavault) and UR Delver, and pre and post board vs. UR Twin. The Cliques were fantastic... except vs. a resolved Lingering Souls out of BW. The Ooze could have been a Lavamancer instead to help deal with Souls, but against Delver and Twin I definitely liked Ooze better. Simic Charm was... fine. It was almost always just a counterspell that only saves my creatures, though once or twice the bounce mode was relevant. I did use it as a giant growth one game to finish off my oppoenent, but I was at like 90% to win if it was any other card anyway. I get the reasoning - it saves your guys from removal spells like nothing else can while also helping win Goy wars or just being a great tempo play, but it still feels pretty low impact - like a restrictive counterspell that can do a couple other marginal things. Out of the board, I tried Huntmaster vs. Twin and it was pretty mediocre. He brought in Anger of the Gods, which made Huntmaster pretty mopey, plus 4 mana is kind of a lot. By the end of our testing session, I was running the Oozes instead and liked them a lot more.
The only card in the MD I'm unsure of is Simic Charm. I'm leaning towards a Forked Bolt or another Electrolyze because Lingering Souls is such a problem. Against many of the matchups where Simic Charm shines - vs. Abrupt Decay primarily, but removal heavy decks in general - the bigger problem is actually Lingering Souls. I'm much less scared of Jund than Junk, for example. I'm also considering the 20th land in that spot - probably a Breeding Pool - but I think I'd rather have a spell. Right now I'm most likely to play Forked Bolt, but we'll see how I feel tomorrow. In the SB I'm a little skeptical of the Huntmasters right now, but they still seem pretty good vs. UWR, Jund, Junk, BW, and BG - basically the grindy matchups. Maybe against RUG Twin as well, but I lean toward the Oozes there. I would like another Threads in the SB, but I just don't see room. Maybe the Ooze in the board is extraneous or the Izzet Staticaster is too narrow, I'm not sure. The PTQ is tomorrow so I don't have much time, but I'll probably check the thread in the morning if anyone has any thoughts.
Here's my tournament report from the ptq using the list above with Forked Bolt instead of Simic Charm. (Sorry for the triple post, but it really was 3 different things!)
I went 6-2 (again), this time picking up my second loss in the 2nd to last round. Had I won that round, there was a small chance I could have drawn in, but my tiebreakers were awful so probably not - one 6-1-1 missed the cut.
Round 1 vs Jund: lost 1-2
Game 1 was very tight. Between Probe and Clique, I knew most of the contents of his hand throughout the game and was finally in a spot with Goyf + Ooze in hand and Snapcaster Mage in play vs. a Goyf in play and a Liliana in his hand with him at 3 life. But he topdecks a bolt so he can kill the mage and make me discard a creature. This puts me dead to animate Raging Ravine and attack with it + Goyf unless I draw another creature to protect the Goyf I'm about to play or a Bolt or a Snapcaster to flashback Bolt for the win. I draw a land and don't play it, so instead of animating the Ravine he casts Inquisition, which gives me one for turn to find a bolt or Snapcaster. I draw another land, but a Snapcaster was the next card on top of my deck. Game 2 is another tight one that I don't remember the details of, but I think I just drew more threats than he drew answers, and had a couple of timely counterspells. Game 3 I keep a hand with a Clique, 2 Snapcasters, a Spell Snare, and 3 land. It gets decimated by hand disruption, and I only ever draw a Snapcaster and more land. We discussed after the match that maybe the hand wasn't keepable because it was so susceptible to hand disruption. I'm not sure, but I lean towards a mulligan.
Round 2: Win 2-1 vs. Melira Pod.
Game 1 I'm able to kill several mana dorks to mana screw him for a couple turns while Goyf applies the beats. Once he finally hits his third land, I just counter his next couple of plays and it's academic. Game 2 he doesn't stumble on mana, and uses Entomber Exarch to recur Nekrataal to kill two of my threats. I'm able to stay in the game with Snapcasters and Electrolyze, and we get to topdeck mode. He has an Abrupt Decay in his hand when he topdecks his Scavenging Oooze, so when I topdeck mine on my next turn, he's able to run away with the game. Game 3 I'm able to mana screw him again and the tempo loss is too much.
Round 3: Win 2-0 vs. UR Delver
Game 1 I keep an opener on the draw with Breeding Pool, Probe, 2 Bolt, Flame Slash, and a Clique. Kind of loose, but very good against creature decks. I draw the Steam Vents on first turn to kill his turn 1 Delver, and draw a Forked Bolt before his turn 3 Young Pyromancer + Serum Visions. I eventually find a turn too Clique and have to Clique away a Keranos, leaving an Electrolyze in his hand. We get into a weird spot where he has 2 Vapor Snag and a Snapcaster Mage along with that Electrolyze in hand and an Snapcaster in play and I have a couple Mana Leaks which are dead because he's flooded out. He goes to kill my Clique and I try to bolt his Snapcaster, he Snags his Snapcaster, and I'm able to counter the Electrolyze. I'm left with a Bolt and a Snapcaster in hand but he's taken a fair amount of damage at this point and I get one more attack in with my Clique before he has another chance to kill it. He's at 12 so this isn't lethal unless I can get a couple of attacks in with a Snapcaster or another attack in with the Clique. Ultimately, I draw another Snapcaster and am able to bolt him out. Game 2 I side out the Delvers and go more midrangey with a ton of removal, and he doesn't ever stand a chance.
Round 4: Win 2-0 vs. Blue Moon
This match is actually vs. a friend. Game 1 is long and slow. He resolves a Blood Moon, but I knew what he was playing so I'm prepared. We get into a long protracted fight over several turns over a Vedalken Shackles while I steadily hit him with a Delver that refuses to flip for 1 damage per turn. I literally take him from 20 to 10 in 1 damage increments, though his fetchlands help out. He finally bolts the Delver, but not after a fight which say me get a Snapcaster in play, so I hit him for 2, putting him to 8. He finally sticks a Shackles, which is fine because now I'm on the bolt him out plan. I play a a Tarmogoyf just to distract him and do 6 damage with Bolt + Snapcaster, Bolt. A topdecked burn spell (I forget which) seals it. Game 2 I bring in 2 Grudges, but unbeknowst to me he sides out the Shackles for Threads of Disloyalty, but also brings in a Batterskull. We get into a similar slugfest with him resolving a mostly irrlevant Blood Moon, but this time I have a Clique applying the beats. It puts him to 13 before he finally deals with it, and he goes to 11 from a couple lands while I'm able to stick a Goyf. He resolves a Batterskull, but I have the Grudge and am able to get a big attack in with a Tarmogoyf + Snapcaster, putting him to 4. From here, he's able to use Cryptic to buy time, but he never draws an answer.
Round 5: Win 2-1 vs. UWR Kiki Control
Game 1: I keep a slow hand without much pressure, and we get into a long slugfest. At some point I tap out and he's able to combo me out. I noticed he had MD Shadow of Doubt. Game 2: It's another slugfest, and at some point he's at 17 life and I have two bolts, a Snapcaster, a Spell Pierce and a Huntmaster in my hand while I know he has a Cryptic. He attacks me with Colonnade to put me to 8 and leave him with 4 untapped lands. I bolt, it resolves. Second Bolt gets Cryptic Commanded, but I have the Spell Pierce. Untap, resolve Huntmaster, and we have a completely different game. We spend a couple of turns with me not being able to attack and him casting spells to prevent Huntmaster from flipping, but I'm able to hit him with Electrolyze a couple times and eventually he's forced to let Huntmaster flip to deal the last points of damage. We have 10 minutes for game 3, so we play quickly. I resolve an early Huntmaster but he sticks a Restoration Angel and gets a big attack for 7 with that and his Colonnade, puting me to 9. But he doesn't play a spell that turn, allowing me to flip my Huntmaster and use an Electrolyze to kill the Angel. I get an attack for 8 in because I had a Snapcaster in play, and play another Snapcaster to flip my Huntmaster again on his next turn - which is turn 1 of turns. He gets in an attack with the Colonnade to put me to 6 (I lost a life from a fetchland in there somewhere) and has an Electrolyze to kill two Snapcasters, leaving me with 2 tokens and a Huntmaster. But I get a free attack in for 6 to put him to 1 and can just pass to let the Huntmaster flip to kill him, so he concedes without making me go through the motions.
Round 6: Win 2-1 vs. Amulet of Vigor combo.
Game 1 he has the turn 2 Amulet while I have a Delver that won't flip. He draws Cavern of Souls, so my counterspells just don't matter. He misses an Amulet trigger at some point, so I call a judge and ask him away from the table if I have to remind my opponent about that trigger - I don't, but I just wanted to be sure. I sit down and immediately take my turn, not thinking about the Delver trigger, and I draw an Electrolyze. Ooops. The Delver flips next turn, and with a Vapor Snag, I'm able to delay his Primeval Titan from Killing me for one more turn to put him to 8. Next turn, I draw Pillar of Flame, attack for 3 and Pillar is his Azusa. He untaps and kills me. Had I remembered my Delver trigger, I would have won that game. Game 2, I mulligan to 5. I Mana Leak his first Amulet, then Ancient Grudge the second, but I have no pressure. Then I topdeck a Blood Moon on my third turn, and that's that. Game 3 I keep hand with Blood Moon, but he has an Engineered Explosives which he casts for 3 before I can resolve my Moon. I never cast my Moon, waiting to either force him to blow his EE on the worst possible turn or to find a Grudge. I counter a couple of things and kill a couple of Azusas while getting some beats in with several creatures. Eventually I EOT Clique and he has a Slaughter Pact, 2 Summoner's Pact, and a card I can't make out from my notes. He has the mana to cast Primeval Titan, but no Cavern and I have counter backup, so I leave his hand. He doesn't topdeck Cavern, so I counter the Titan and he dies on my next turn.
Round 7: lose 0-2 vs. RG Tron.
Game 1: I kept a somewhat slow hand with lots of interaction. I have a Clique to take a Karn, but he has two and an O stone. I counter the 2nd Karn, but the O stone kills Clique and Snapcaster. We end up in topdeck mode, except he has the big Emrakul end game that I can't beat. Game 2: I keep a more aggressive hand, but make a key mistake. I clique him on his drawstep and he has Karn, Pyroclasm and some other stuff, but won't have tron assembled on this turn. I knew all but 1 card in his hand and had planned to take the Clasm, then have counter backup for the Karn after than. When I actually cast Clique, I snap take the Karn without thinking because I'm an idiot, so I have no pressure for several turns while I'm countering random things. Eventually, again, the big Emrakul endgame kills me.
Round 8: win 2-0 vs. Melira Pod
Game 1: Turn 1 Delver, turn 2 kill your mana dork, turn 3 flip and counter a Kitchen Finks in the next two turns. His third one resolves, but I have a Goyf. He Shriekmaws the Goyf after I get one big attack in, but Delver is too much. He was also on a mulligan to 6. Game 2: he casts a dork on turn 1, I cast a Delver. He Inquisitions on turn 2 to take my bolt with another Delver and 2 mana spells in my hand, and he doesn't have a 2nd land. Delver flips off bolt and I bolt his birds. He finds a land and I cast a 2nd Delver. I find a land and get a hit in for 4 and counter something random. Next turn, the 2nd Delver flips and I put him to 2. At this point, he can't really come back.
Notes:
I tried siding Delver out vs Jund, the first time vs Pod, and UR Delver. It was definitely correct vs. UR Delver, probably not vs. Jund, and definitely not vs. Pod.
If you play around Blood Moon early vs. Blue Moon, all the card really does is make it hard for them to cast their Cryptic Commands and maybe make Snapcaster and/or Deprive worse. I think it helped me more than it helped my opponent in both games because of his Cryptics.
Huntmaster was FANTASTIC vs. UWR control. 10/10 would play again. I was really surprised by how well it performed. They don't have that much hard countermagic, so it's not too hard to resolve him. Then they have to cast spells on their turn, which is a nice benefit. Even if they have the removal spell, Huntmaster is still a 2-1.
I think I played too conservatively vs. removal spells. I kept trying to save my Goyfs and Oozes vs. Jund and Pod until they've used their Abrupt Decay or Dismember on something else, but this slowed me down a bit and sometimes they were able to find a better way to deal with my worse threats so it didn't matter. I think game 1 vs. Jund in particular, things would have went differently had I just played out my threats.
It sucks that I've learned this right at the end of the modern PTQ season, but I think I have a pretty good feel for how most of the matchups go now and where the various options for the "other" creature are best - Goblin Guide, Scavenging Ooze, Vendillion Clique or Young Pyromancer - to go along with the core of Delver, Goyf and Snapcaster. Here's what I think - all %'s are a range because it depends on the builds of both decks, and some are fairly speculative:
Rock - e.g. BG Obliterator, BW Deadguy Ale (Pack Rat), Jund, Junk: 30-50%.
They had decent threats, a ton of removal, and discard spells. The versions with Lingering Souls are the best vs. you while Jund is the worse since you can Blood Moon them and they don't have Lingering Souls. Goblin Guide is bad pretty much all around. Young Pryomancer does leave behind a creature to attack most of the time, but vs. Lingering Souls it's mostly irrelevant and vs. all but BW it's often hard to force damage through on the ground. Clique does interact nicely, but is pretty bad vs. Lingering Souls and out of mostly BW, Darkblast. Scanging Ooze is a large threat that can control Tarmogoyf and is pretty good against Lingering Souls, but it will often just die and not gain you any value. Ooze is probably the best while Pyromancer and Clique can both do some work in the right context while Goblin Guide is awful.
Pod - Melira, Angel, and Kiki: 50-60%. Attacking their mana dorks or countering their early plays while attacking with early pressure works very well. Guide is good as long as you can kill Wall of Roots or at least bounce it a lot. Pyromancer is similar but also really bad vs. Orzhov Pontiff or Izzet Staticaster. Ooze is fantastic vs the non-Kiki versions while Clique is dcent against all of them, though against Pontiff and Staticaster it's still pretty awkward. Goblin guide is better against Kikipod than the other variants.
UWR Control/Geist variants: 25-45%. The control variants are a nightmare matchup while the Geist variants you can beat as long as you're able to counter the Geist. Ooze is ok vs. Snapcaster and helps overload path while Guide is awful and Young Pyro is just another card that Electrolyze blows out. Clique is ok, but still bad vs. Electrolyze. If they're on the Geist plan, it's better for us because they have less removal, but I'm not sure it changes relative value of the various creatures. Ooze is easily the best of the bunch here mainly because you need to make as much of their usual removal blank as possible.
Delver, UR and RUG: 50-60%. Ooze is decent vs. Snapcaster Mage and Young Pryo is good vs. Young Pyro. Clique is great mostly because of instant speed, though the weakness vs. Electrolyze is pretty bad. Goblin Guide is awful vs UR since you want to play the control role. I favor Ooze and Clique vs UR while against RUG, I could see a stronger argument for Young Pyro.
Tron, RG, U and UW: 40-60%. Goblin guide is hands down the best while Young Pryo is pretty good, though most of the upside is bad vs. Pyrocrasm and wrath effects. Clique is pretty bad, especially vs. RG - they see way too many cards for it to disrupt them that much, while Ooze is pretty bad because it's so slow, though against UW they're often also on the Gifts plan so it gains some additional utility.
Storm: 50-70%. Goblin Guide is king, but Young Pyro is pretty good. Clique and Ooze aren't too bad because their abilities are relevant, but you'd much rather have one of the other two for the early pressure.
Twin, UR, UWR and RUG: 45-60%. Young Pyro is pretty awkward vs Deceiver Exarch and so is Goblin Guide, though the issue is less bad. Clique is probably the best one because it avoids that and also disrupts. Ooze is mediocre unless they're RUG, in which case another threat that stands up to Goyf is pretty good. Huntmaster out of RUG also makes Guide and Young Pyro look even worse. RUG is by far the harder matchup, but it's still really close. UWR makes Guide look pretty bad because of Wall of Omens, and now overloading Path to Exile is a thing w/ more Oozes.
Burn: 30-50%. Being 3 colors sucks, but we do have a lot of lifegain out of the board - especially with Huntmaster. Ooze is obviously the best. After that it's not clear to me - Guide seems pretty bad and Clique's disruption doesn't do much vs such a linear deck, while Young Pyro's ability isn't that relevant but maybe is good for racing.
Affinity: 40-60%. Ooze's lifegain is pretty relevant while Guide and Young Pyro often can't attack or block the relevant things. Clique is too slow for the disruption to do much against them. Ooze seems like the clear winner. Side note: build your SB right and this is easily a 60% matchup - just play 2 Ancient Grudge and an Engineered Explosives in your board and don't question it. Add a Shatterstorm if you're really worried or a Destructive Revelry is you also want more interaction for Ensoul Artifact on Darksteel Citadel that has applications elsewhere.
Scapeshift: 40-60%. Goblin Guide is the best since you just want early pressure, though Young Pyro doesn't a pretty good job as well. Clique's disruption is pretty decent as well while Ooze is mostly slow and irrelevant. We're much better vs the standard version than against the GerryT Omen version - in the latter case, the early pressure is that much more important because a turn 2 Omen can cause some major problems.
My big picture takeaway is that you can't be favored in the Bxy Rock or UWR Matchups, so don't try too hard and instead just beat Pod, Twin, combo and Tron. This makes Scavenging Ooze look the worst since we can be favored against Pod without it, and probably Goblin Guide and Young Pryomancer look the best. Perhaps a mix of Clique and Young Pyro is worth trying to hedge against the twin variants. In any case, I'm trying Young Pyro in that slot next.
I'm definitely not 100% sure, but this is the rough picture of RUG Delver's place in the metagame that I'm beginning to see after playing it for some time.
Love the reports, Spooly. Do you miss Vedalken Shackles at all?
I keep wanting to make room for G Probe but I am afraid.
Thanks!
I haven't tried Vedalken Shackles - I came close to putting it in the SB right before one ptq but decided to stick with Threads. It just doesn't seem like the sort of card that fits into a deck based on Delver of Secrets. It's an awful early tempo play because it costs 5 mana over two turns, it doesn't flip Delver, and it requires you to play more land to be effective. In Delver, you really want to be able to keep 1 land hands and to be able to operate effectively on 2-3 mana for several turns. If you aren't hitting your 4th land drop to steal Goyf, Shackles looks a lot worse. If you're at the point where you really want Shackles, you probably don't want to play Delver anymore, so cut the Delvers and play RUG Midrange/Control. It's an idea I've seriously considered. Reid Duke has a pretty interesting list in that direction here: http://www.channelfireball.com/videos/channel-reiderrabbit-modern-rug-control/ but the next question you have to ask yourself is, why aren't you playing Tarmo-Twin? Not that RUG midrange isn't a viable option, but if you can't answer that question you might just be playing a bad version of something else.
Hi guys. I've been talking with Spooly a bit and the following are our thoughts thus far.
Me:
4x Delver of Secrets
4x Snapcaster Mage
4x Young Pyromancer
4x Tarmogoyf
I've played UR Delver and RUG Delver combined for over the last several months. I felt for a long time that RUG was superior, with the resilience of Goyf and SB options (Ancient Grudge). I was following the RUG Delver thread, but my list was definitely more "tempo" oriented with 19 lands and no Cryptics, but it was neither fast nor particularly great in attrition. After seeing results for UR Delver, I decided to try the deck out again, and realized that it has a much better tempo/aggro plan than RUG does. But, here's my question: does the deck benefit from running both Pyro and Goyf, and in return, no Cliques or Lavamancers? Goyf certainly feels more high impact than either, and it seems like a nice compliment to Young Pyro, adding addition pressure to the ground that can't be Bolted, Angered, Electrolyzed, or Pyroclasmed away.
Spooly:
I don't know if I agree that UR has the best tempo or aggro plan - in my experience, RUG with a creature suite of 4 Delver, 4 Goblin Guide, 4 Goyf, 4 Snapcaster has the best version of that plan. The problem is that vs some decks, that tempo plan is pretty bad and you need to be able to play a longer game, so Goblin Guide just has to go. Though if BGx and UWR start disappearing from the metagame and combo comes to the forefront, I'll be sleeving up my Goblin Guides. Even the non guide RUG lists with the same creature suite as the UR lists except Goyf instead of Young Pyro seems slightly better at the aggro/tempo plan to me just because Goyf is more resilient, though Young Pyro has it's upsides and combined with the relatively painless manabase of UR it's close.
I don't know if Young Pyromancer is the right card to replace Goblin Guide, but that's what I'm leaning towards as of yesterday. It's almost as good as Guide as an aggressive creature, and is a much better mid-late game card. I haven't tested them together in the same deck yet, but in the lists that I've been running I'm leaning towards a creature suite of 4 Delver, 4 Goyf, 4 Snapcaster, 3 Young Pyro, and maybe the 4th Young Pryo, but in that slot I'm also considering: Grim Lavamancer, Vendillion Clique, Scavenging Ooze, Forked Bolt, and the 2nd Spell Snare. I'm leaning toward toward Spell Snare at the moment, but I see good reasons for all of them.
Me:
I agree with everything you've said, especially with the fact that Delver is by far the worst card in RUG decks. I have tested variations of RUG control, but frankly, Jund/Junk does it better. I tested Guide a fair bit, and it's a very
good card; unfortunately, this is not the meta for it! Maybe one day...
I think that the UR shell is roughly what we want to be looking at in terms of the best home for a Delver deck. When I ran UR, I liked a high count of 1CMC counters. After reading the SCG article about a PTQ that was taken down by UR Delver, I'm less convinced of their necessity. I think we want more 2 mana counters-- between 6 and 8. The 1 mana counters tend to be weak draws later in the game and situational (don't get me wrong though-- I like Snare quite a bit!). Another issue is that they are still 1 for 1 trades, and most decks have better card advantage engines to pull ahead if we try to play that game.
When I played either version of the deck, my main issue was balancing aggression and control playstyle elements. For example, on the draw, I would be more or less forced to play control because I couldn't afford for them to resolve something powerful that I couldn't later answer, and would thus fall too far behind to get ahead (thinking Birthing Pod, Liliana on an empty board, Courser of Kruphix). To this end, I find Vapor Snag to be a godsend; I can tap out in the early turns and apply pressure because I know I can deal with any of their powerful creatures in a snap (Wurmcoil, an opposing Goyf, Courser, a big Ooze, Linvala, etc). The card also has further uses, such as clearing blockers and saving our own creatures (which is not to be underestimated). Yes, such cards can often present card disadvantage, but with Young Pyro, we can generate a lot of value by simply snagging our own Pyro in response to removal.
Running Pyro with Goyf also increases our threat density. Lavamancer is excellent, but slow. There have been many games where I have hesitated to play it for need of doing something with a greater immediate impact. Clique is a favourite of mine, but 3 mana is hefty and I would prefer a threat that didn't die to Bolt, since that is already a weakness of UR Delver. Goyf also helps us deal with opposing Goyfs, and really helps our interaction on the ground with other creature based decks.
Before I recap my thoughts, I'd like to add that Runechanter's Pike did shine very brightly the few games I tested it, but it may be unnecessary with the heavy hitting Goyf does for us.
Overall, I like Young Pyro for his ability to let us play more proactively (with mana up for a response, it is generally unprofitable for the opponent to attempt to trade 1 for 1 to remove him) and as another source of CA, something the deck needs when games go longer. To this end as well, I think that a higher Remand count is in order, to keep cards flowing (which has many benefits for us, especially if we can delay our opponents from dealing with a threat on the board). 18 lands is plenty with a cantrip suite consisting of 4 Visions, 4 Probe, 1-2 Electrolyze (I like 2), and 3-4 Remand. I like a Keranos and Batterskull in the side and I think our land and cantrip base supports a few 5 drops just fine. Vapor Snag type effects are a good way of letting us play pro actively while still having the ability to manage the opponent's threats without holding Mana up every turn, and thus, deprecating our own ability to deploy threats. Void Snare interests me as a cheap catch all, but the sorcery-speed keeps me hesitant.
I, like you, took an interest in Simic Charm. It has been somewhat underwhelming in my testing. I'm not sure about running 3 Snag or 2 Snag and 2 Charm, which amounts to 4 bounce-effects + some versatility for protecting our threats and pushing damage through. Gut Shot is another card that seems decent in a list running 4x Pyro; it deals with a lot of things that we'd usually waste a Bolt on. It's also another free spell, which has obvious merits outside of Young Pyro interactions. If not Gut Shot, however, then I would definitely consider some number of Forked Bolt and Burst Lightning. I ran Forked Bolt a few months ago when everyone was on the Pillar plan, and I think Forked Bolt is superior. Both bother me for being sorceries, which really makes a difference in game.
Edit: Spooly said he would chime in later, so stay tuned!
I have the cards but I am currently not running it because I got tired of RUG Delver (played it for 8 months or so) and am now playing Death & Taxes/Ad Nauseam. But, I may go back to it before the end of the year. If I were to play it today, this is the list I would run (maybe cut a remand and a spell snare for 2x mana leak). I played this deck with Snapcaster Mage and/or Vendilion Clique for months but I don't think this deck wants to be playing 3 mana spells (Snapcaster is a 3 mana spell 95% of the time).
Delver is fragile but aggressive and pyro/goyf are both resilient/generate value. You also have a bunch of cheap counters and vapor snag to keep them alive. You honestly don't need more than 12 threats, especially with both pyro and goyf.
Hi guys. I've been talking with Spooly a bit and the following are our thoughts thus far.
Me:
4x Delver of Secrets
4x Snapcaster Mage
4x Young Pyromancer
4x Tarmogoyf
<snip>
I think that the UR shell is roughly what we want to be looking at in terms of the best home for a Delver deck. When I ran UR, I liked a high count of 1CMC counters. After reading the SCG article about a PTQ that was taken down by UR Delver, I'm less convinced of their necessity. I think we want more 2 mana counters-- between 6 and 8. The 1 mana counters tend to be weak draws later in the game and situational (don't get me wrong though-- I like Snare quite a bit!). Another issue is that they are still 1 for 1 trades, and most decks have better card advantage engines to pull ahead if we try to play that game.
I roughly agree. I've been happy with 6 two mana counters for some time to go along with 1 Spell Pierce and 1 Spell Snare. I've been wanting another counterspell and have been leaning toward the second Spell Snare, but I could easily see playing a second Remand instead for the reasons you list.
When I played either version of the deck, my main issue was balancing aggression and control playstyle elements. For example, on the draw, I would be more or less forced to play control because I couldn't afford for them to resolve something powerful that I couldn't later answer, and would thus fall too far behind to get ahead (thinking Birthing Pod, Liliana on an empty board, Courser of Kruphix). To this end, I find Vapor Snag to be a godsend; I can tap out in the early turns and apply pressure because I know I can deal with any of their powerful creatures in a snap (Wurmcoil, an opposing Goyf, Courser, a big Ooze, Linvala, etc). The card also has further uses, such as clearing blockers and saving our own creatures (which is not to be underestimated). Yes, such cards can often present card disadvantage, but with Young Pyro, we can generate a lot of value by simply snagging our own Pyro in response to removal.
I like Vapor Snag, but against decks like Jund/Junk/BG, Pod and sometimes UWR, I often just want to permanently remove something like a Tarmogoyf, a Courser of Kruphix, a Wall of Roots, or a Restoration Angel so that I can keep the ground pounders pushing damage through. To this end, I only run 1 Vapor Snag and instead run 1Flame Slash and 1 Dismember. I've tried 2 Dismembers and that's definitely too much life loss, but the ability to permanently deal with some of the bigger blockers is crucial to making sure that the ground pounders keep the damage flowing. I was especially happy with this configuration when I was playing UR with Goblin Guide and Young Pyromancer because it's crucial to make sure the ground is clear for the little guys to get damage in. In the RUG lists I played that still had Goblin Guide, this was still true. Arguably the last build I ran with no Guides and no Pyros didn't need so many permanent removal spells for the bigger-butted creatures, but I get the feeling that with Young Pyromancer back in the deck, the hard removal for bigger butted dudes will be well worth it.
Before I recap my thoughts, I'd like to add that Runechanter's Pike did shine very brightly the few games I tested it, but it may be unnecessary with the heavy hitting Goyf does for us.
I tried Runechanter's Pike for a bit online in a UR build with no fetches (not willing to invest that much on MTGO). I've only played a few matches, but every time I drew Pike it was awful. I really only want it in some matchups - Jund/Junk and UWR are main ones. I could see it in the SB, especially with Pyromancer in the deck, but at that point there's a good argument for just running a Sword instead since you'll only bring it in against certain decks. Maybe 2 Swords so you can bring in the one that is best suited for a given matchup. Sword of War and Peace vs UWR in particular seems brutal and probably a better option than Keranos given the aggressive stance we want to take.
Overall, I like Young Pyro for his ability to let us play more proactively (with mana up for a response, it is generally unprofitable for the opponent to attempt to trade 1 for 1 to remove him) and as another source of CA, something the deck needs when games go longer. To this end as well, I think that a higher Remand count is in order, to keep cards flowing (which has many benefits for us, especially if we can delay our opponents from dealing with a threat on the board). 18 lands is plenty with a cantrip suite consisting of 4 Visions, 4 Probe, 1-2 Electrolyze (I like 2), and 3-4 Remand. I like a Keranos and Batterskull in the side and I think our land and cantrip base supports a few 5 drops just fine. Vapor Snag type effects are a good way of letting us play pro actively while still having the ability to manage the opponent's threats without holding Mana up every turn, and thus, deprecating our own ability to deploy threats. Void Snare interests me as a cheap catch all, but the sorcery-speed keeps me hesitant.
18 lands seems ambitious to me, but I also play slightly fewer cantrips so maybe it can work. I don't like Remand as much you - my biggest problem is that in the grindy matchups against nonblue decks, it doesn't deal with the problem cards. We often need to actually counter that Goyf or Liliana, not just delay it for a turn. I play 2 Deprive for this reason. In the spots where Remand is at its best as a Time Walk, Deprive is nearly as good - it generates the same amount of tempo, but it doesn't replace itself. The biggest downside is that Remand is just bonkers in counter wars and Deprive is just another counterspell in that spot. Deprive is better vs Jund/Junk and Remand is better vs. some variants of UWR and Tarmo-Twin, so you can definitely choose the split based on what you expect. I definitely don't like more than 2 Deprive because of diminishing returns - it's easy to pick your spots with Deprive so that returning a land isn't a problem (and sometimes is a benefit!) when you only have 1 or 2 in the deck, but as you get more you're forced more and more to cast Deprive on turn 2 and miss a land drop.
I'm a little skeptical of Keranos out of Delver. It's a fantastic grindy card, but 5 mana is a fairly high number. I've had some success with Huntmaster vs. UWR, but I haven't really gotten to try it vs Jund/Junk. My fear about Keranos vs. Jund/Junk is that it's pretty ineffective vs. Lingering Souls and manlands, which can be crucial when we're trying to race at the end. But this is all theoretical - I haven't really tested it yet, so I'm pretty uncertain.
I, like you, took an interest in Simic Charm. It has been somewhat underwhelming in my testing. I'm not sure about running 3 Snag or 2 Snag and 2 Charm, which amounts to 4 bounce-effects + some versatility for protecting our threats and pushing damage through. Gut Shot is another card that seems decent in a list running 4x Pyro; it deals with a lot of things that we'd usually waste a Bolt on. It's also another free spell, which has obvious merits outside of Young Pyro interactions. If not Gut Shot, however, then I would definitely consider some number of Forked Bolt and Burst Lightning. I ran Forked Bolt a few months ago when everyone was on the Pillar plan, and I think Forked Bolt is superior. Both bother me for being sorceries, which really makes a difference in game.
I didn't really like Simic Charm that much when I tried it. It usually fine, never fantastic, and occasionally downright awful. Gut Shot seems pretty bad to me. In so many matchups it will do basically nothing unless you draw a Pyromancer. I'd rather play a card that is more relevant on its own. I'm not a huge fan of Burst Lightning either because as a removal spell, it can't kill anything Bolt can't kill without costing a million mana. Boltable things are already easy to deal with; I'd rather my other removal spells efficiently deal with things that Bolt has trouble with. The extra damage to the dome is nice, but 5 mana is a lot. Forked Bolt, on the other hand, I like. I originally went with Pillar of Flame in that spot because I was worried about Kitchen Finks and Voice of Resurgence out of Pod, but Forked Bolt is still pretty good against them and way better against Lingering Souls and, incidentally, the (pseudo) mirror. I had both cards in my last build, but I could see cutting the Pillar for something else.
I have the cards but I am currently not running it because I got tired of RUG Delver (played it for 8 months or so) and am now playing Death & Taxes/Ad Nauseam. But, I may go back to it before the end of the year. If I were to play it today, this is the list I would run (maybe cut a remand and a spell snare for 2x mana leak). I played this deck with Snapcaster Mage and/or Vendilion Clique for months but I don't think this deck wants to be playing 3 mana spells (Snapcaster is a 3 mana spell 95% of the time).
Delver is fragile but aggressive and pyro/goyf are both resilient/generate value. You also have a bunch of cheap counters and vapor snag to keep them alive. You honestly don't need more than 12 threats, especially with both pyro and goyf.
0 Snapcasters is a very small number. I could see shaving one since you don't want to be Snapcaster flooded and he is a bit mana intensive, but Snapcaster is one of the key reasons we can stand toe to toe against the midrange and control decks in the mid-late game - it's a Demonic Tutor that also generates card advantage and in particular, gives you a lot more bolts to burn out your opponents with. Sure, Snapcaster is a little slower than we would like in an ideal world, but the trade off is worth it.
Spooly, thank you for time. With regards to Vapor Snag and Remand, the issue is clear: do we want to delay threats, or permanently answer them? A control deck wants to answer threats indefinitely, but we are not a control deck. Trading 1-for-1 is fine for UWR control, because they have numerous ways of generating card advantage, thus putting them ahead in a game based on equal trades. Our card advantage is largely limited to Snapcaster Mage, Electrolyze, and Young Pyromancer tokens (which are easily negated). Most other top tier decks have more ways of generating card advantage than we do, so it is better to avoid direct trades when possible.
The games we win are the ones where we are able to establish an aggressive board position and protect it, while simultaneously sabotaging the efforts of our opponents to drop a significant threat. We don't win games by answering slews of threats and then dropping a bomb; we need to be the aggressors whilst disrupting our opponents. While I support Mana Leak and Deprive in lists as answers to the things we need dead, I don't feel that they directly compete with Remand. An effect as powerful as a counterspell stapled to a cantrip is perfect for us. Remand buys us a turn against most relevant blowout spells (sweeper, Liliana, Electrolyze, Cryptic, Sphinx's, Splinter Twin combo piece, Scapeshift, etc.), which is really two draws; the cantrip, and the turn we survive to untap with.
Our plan is to clock our opponent with one of our threats. If Remand buys us a turn, that's one less turn on the clock. It's one more token for Young Pyro. It's two more cards we get to see-- another threat, another answer for the next threat our opponent attempts to deploy, another land drop, another burn spell to close out the game. Tempo decks live and die by having the right card at the right time to maintain the advantage they've created. We don't run many individually powerful cards, so topdecking is something we don't generally want to do. Remand ensures we dig deeper to hit what we need, and to slow our opponents down to buy our threats more time.
Vapor Snag is often worth more than the potential 1-for-1 trade we get with regular removal by being an instant (a distinct advantage over Flame Slash, since it hits manlands, Twin combo pieces, and extra utility to save our own threats). Also notable is the extra reach it lends us through the tacked on life loss. It's not a perfect card, but it answers nearly anything, which, outside of Dismember, is as good as we can hope for. The ability to save our dudes and the fact that we can flash it back without paying 8 life makes it the best option (IMO) available to us for the deck at this time.
Spooly, thank you for time. With regards to Vapor Snag and Remand, the issue is clear: do we want to delay threats, or permanently answer them? A control deck wants to answer threats indefinitely, but we are not a control deck. Trading 1-for-1 is fine for UWR control, because they have numerous ways of generating card advantage, thus putting them ahead in a game based on equal trades. Our card advantage is largely limited to Snapcaster Mage, Electrolyze, and Young Pyromancer tokens (which are easily negated). Most other top tier decks have more ways of generating card advantage than we do, so it is better to avoid direct trades when possible.
The games we win are the ones where we are able to establish an aggressive board position and protect it, while simultaneously sabotaging the efforts of our opponents to drop a significant threat. We don't win games by answering slews of threats and then dropping a bomb; we need to be the aggressors whilst disrupting our opponents. While I support Mana Leak and Deprive in lists as answers to the things we need dead, I don't feel that they directly compete with Remand. An effect as powerful as a counterspell stapled to a cantrip is perfect for us. Remand buys us a turn against most relevant blowout spells (sweeper, Liliana, Electrolyze, Cryptic, Sphinx's, Splinter Twin combo piece, Scapeshift, etc.), which is really two draws; the cantrip, and the turn we survive to untap with.
Our plan is to clock our opponent with one of our threats. If Remand buys us a turn, that's one less turn on the clock. It's one more token for Young Pyro. It's two more cards we get to see-- another threat, another answer for the next threat our opponent attempts to deploy, another land drop, another burn spell to close out the game. Tempo decks live and die by having the right card at the right time to maintain the advantage they've created. We don't run many individually powerful cards, so topdecking is something we don't generally want to do. Remand ensures we dig deeper to hit what we need, and to slow our opponents down to buy our threats more time.
Vapor Snag is often worth more than the potential 1-for-1 trade we get with regular removal by being an instant (a distinct advantage over Flame Slash, since it hits manlands, Twin combo pieces, and extra utility to save our own threats). Also notable is the extra reach it lends us through the tacked on life loss. It's not a perfect card, but it answers nearly anything, which, outside of Dismember, is as good as we can hope for. The ability to save our dudes and the fact that we can flash it back without paying 8 life makes it the best option (IMO) available to us for the deck at this time.
My main point of contention to your reasoning for both sets of cards is that often I find that delaying for a turn is not enough primarily because it's hard to reliably keep the pressure up against some decks. If you go turn 1 Delver and it survives, then turn 2 Remand or EOT Snag for their Goyf or w/e is generally fantastic. If they kill your Delver though, then it's drastically different because you're not getting damage in while you're delaying. There are a bunch of other situations that are similar to this and that I find myself in all the time.
That being said, I've been wanting another counterspell in the MD, and another Remand is on the short list along with Spell Snare and maybe Spell Pierce. The fact that Remand draws you a card when you're delaying does help a lot, and the upside vs. blue decks is just insane. In addition, Flame Slash hasn't been that good for me. It doesn't kill a Tarmogoyf much more often than Lightning Bolt does, and sorcery speed is a big problem. I could see putting the 2nd Vapor Snag back in for that slot. Ideally I'd want another Dismember, but the life loss is just too much.
What are your thoughts on Keranos though? I haven't tried him out yet, so I'm working purely on theory.
You're right, Remand is distinctly worse when we're behind than a hard counter would be. However, considering that turn 1 Delver into turn 2 Remand is our ideal scenario, and the fact that it cantrips, as well its utility in blue mirrors, I strongly advocate running 3. Of course, I supplement 3-4 Remand with a 3-4 Mana Leak/Deprive split, because we do need a way to stop things cold sometimes. Remand also tends to be a better top deck than Leak.
Keranos is great vs GBx. Probably the best card in the mirror as well, which extends well to the Twin matchup because they side out the combo. It's also very strong against UWR and Pod. Pretty much a blowout in grindy matchups, and gives us reasonable scaling power. I tend to like it more than Batterskull since the token is so easily answered, whereas Keranos is not. Batterskull is good for stabilising, whereas Keranos puts you very far ahead as long as you're not terribly behind.
Keranos is great vs GBx. Probably the best card in the mirror as well, which extends well to the Twin matchup because they side out the combo. It's also very strong against UWR and Pod. Pretty much a blowout in grindy matchups, and gives us reasonable scaling power. I tend to like it more than Batterskull since the token is so easily answered, whereas Keranos is not. Batterskull is good for stabilising, whereas Keranos puts you very far ahead as long as you're not terribly behind.
I'm mainly worried about 2 things with respect to Keranos - 1) vs. BGx he doesn't impact the board, so you might just die to the manlands + Goyf or w/e without having the chance to grind them out, and 2) vs. UWR resolving a Keranos gives them an opportunity to resolve their own Keranos / Batterskull / something big and annoying. Have you had any issues with either of these?
Basically, Young Pyromancer comes in alongside Tarmogoyf for the reasons discussed upthread. Pillar of Flame is cut and Forked Bolt stays because while both Pillar is slightly better vs. Pod, Forked Bolt has far wider application. I cut a land and added a cantrip in order to see how well it works, but I'm a bit skeptical 18 is the correct number. Worth testing though! The cantrip I added was almost Remand, but then I listened to a modern enthusiast podcast that criticized Remand for the same reasons I've been complaining about it, and went with a second Electrolyze instead. I cut the Flame Slash for a Vapor Snag mainly for the reasons Ectomark gave up thread - Flame Slash rarely is able to kill a creature Lightning Bolt could have killed before that creature does real damage anyway (Goyf is still typically too big, Restoration Angel has flash, etc), so why not something more versatile? You could argue for a 2nd Dismember, but this deck is already packing a metric ton of life loss, so I want to stay away.
The Sideboard I'm much less sure about. With 18 land, the 5 drops seem way too expensive. I also feel like I've been oversbing for midrange decks - I barely had anything to bring in against Tron, for example. Counterflux wasn't enough because Emrakul was coming eventually, though hopefully with the Young Pryos the deck is aggressive enough that the Counterfluxes work better as a tempo play. Here's what I'm currently thinking:
This SB is definitely not what I want to play, but I don't know what to do with it. I like having access to an Ooze as graveyard hate for various things and lifegain when it's warranted. I'm still gunshy on Keranos because it's a 5 drop and is slow, but am willing to be convinced (I plan to test it eventually). Batterskull is good enough in a wide variety of places that I'm less concerned about it costing 5. Threads is fantastic vs. BGx and its variants, and I'm happy to go back up to 2. But I don't have many cards to bring in vs. things like Tron or Scapeshift. I could add another Blood Moon, but both decks can deal with that without much problem (Chromatic Star into Nature's Claim or EOT Cryptic, untap kill you). Maybe a Negate is the card I want, since it counters Karn, Scapeshift, and most combo cards. The creatures Tron lists play are effectively dealt with by Grudge for the most part anyway. On the other hand, I could put the second Counterflux back in, but with only 18 land, 3 mana counters look pretty sketchy.
I suppose I'm really looking for two things that I can't seem to find - 1) A widely applicable high impact SB card that can come in vs. Tron, Scapeshift, and other combo / over the top decks, and 2) A removal spell for 1-2 mana that is preferably instant speed and can kill 4/5 Goyfs and Restoration Angel. Here's to hoping Khans delivers something, I guess.
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Tarmogoyf
Artifacts (2)
2 Vedalken Shackles
Instants (16)
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Spell Pierce
2 Spell Snare
2 Mana Leak
2 Electrolyze
2 Cryptic Command
2 Remand
1 Twisted Image
4 Serum Visions
2 Pillar of Flame
2 Gitaxian Probe
Lands (21)
3 Breeding Pool
1 Forest
6 Island
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Mountain
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Steam Vents
2 Blood Moon
2 Ancient Grudge
2 Spellskite
2 Flame Slash
2 Damping Matrix
2 Combust
1 Counterflux
2 Mizzium Skin
I went 4-0 and then decided to draw 2 games in row into the top 8. I would have been guaranteed a top 8 spot anyway, but I wanted to go out and get lunch. Haha. I think I could have went 6-0 if I would have played it out. Sadly I lost first round in the top 8 to infect. Here's a breakdown of the matchups.
Match 1: (2-1)
UR Splinter Twin
The first game I never saw a Delver of Secrets or a Tarmogoyf, thus I never put much pressure on the field. After 15 or so turns the Twin player combed off. It was simply badluck on my part. I won games 2 and 3 after getting a turn 1 Delver of Secrets on the field and simply countered my way to victory.
Match 2: (2-0)
Bloom Titan/Hive Mind
He had a pretty god hand, however he wasn't able to go off fast enough. I mana leaked his turn 2 Summer Bloom. Since I was on the play I was able to Cryptic Command his dual land back to his hand. Then 2 turns later I snapped Cryptic Command. He never really caught back up after that and my 2 tarmogoyfs finished him off. Game 2 I got a Blood Moon down and it was game over at that point. Done and done.
Match 3: (2-0)
Naya Zoo
This matchup wasn't even close. I simply bolted and countered everything he did. Only think that stuck around was a Loxodon Smiter, which was promptly Pillar of Flamed and then Snapcaster Mage, then Pillar of Flamed again.
Match 4: (2-1)
UG Infect
This matchup is incredibly hard for a lot of decks at the moment. I barely managed to win games 1 and 3. Just make sure to clear their board on your turn, so that they either feel obligated to waste Giant Growth type spells or their creature dies. If they get a Wild Defiance on the field, then you're likely going to lose to their Inkmoth Nexus. That's how I lost in the top 8. I can't stress enough how devastating Spellskite is against this deck.
Top 8, Match 7: (0-2)
UG Infect (Same Deck)
This time around I simply didn't draw the removal that I needed and his Blighted Agent killed me game 1 and Inkmoth Nexus killed me game 2 with a Wild Defiance on the field. Twisted Image killed a Noble Hierarch on turn 1 both games, which is incredibly powerful. Inkmoth Nexus is simply too powerful in this matchup, especially with Apostle's Blessing to back it up. Looking back on this hard matchup, I'm considering adding 2 Vapor Snags to the sideboard, seeing as it's a soft answer to removing any Inkmoth Nexus or pumped Blighted Agent/Glistener Elf
On the other hand, I played some game 1's against Scapeshift w/ Prismatic Omen like the list Gerry Thompson recently wrote about, and this time I had 2 Scavenging Ooze, a Grim Lavamancer and an island instead of the Guides. This is one of the matchups where I most wanted a one drop and, predictably, I won the couple of games where I cast a turn 1 Delver of Secrets and lost the games where I didn't. In particular being on the draw without a turn 1 threat was awful, mostly because Prismatic Omen is basically just game if resolved early. Against the more common versions of Scapeshift, this problem doesn't exist. Flame Slash was particularly nice against this list though because of Courser of Kruphix.
Conclusion: mostly what I expected, but now a little bit more certain about it.
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Young Pyromancer
4 Tarmogoyf
Sorceries (10)
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Serum Visions
2 Pillar of Flame
2 Gut Shot
4 Vapor Snag
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Spell Snare
2 Spell Pierce
4 Remand
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Steam Vents
3 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
1 Island
1 Mountain
2 Flame Slash
2 Negate
2 Ancient Grudge
1 Destructive Revelry
1 Spell Pierce
2 Dispel
2 Combust
2 Forked Bolt
1 Pillar of Flame
Read the rest of the thread.
I've played it extensively in UR and RUG - search the most recent few pages of both threads for details of what I've found. The long and short of it is that Guide is fantastic vs. Scapeshift, Tron and combo generally, but (at least in RUG Delver) you always side him out vs. BGx Rock (Jund, Junk, etc), BW Tokens/Deadguy Ale, UWR Control, Affinity, Pod, RUG Twin and basically any grindy matchup. Some of this is ok because game 1 you're simply a different deck than game 2 and you're reacting to their SB plans, but if you expect a lot of grindy matchups (particularly BGx and UWR), I'd suggest playing Cliques, Oozes, and/or Lavamancers instead so that you have a better plan if they kill your first threat or two. If you expect a lot of Scapeshift, Tron and combo, Guide looks fantastic. Vs the most recent metagames I've played it, guide has been mopey. But Scapeshift and Tron are likely on the rise as a response to all this midrange nonsense, so perhaps it makes sense as a metagame prediction / trying to beat the top tables rather than the entire field. But of course your local meta may be completely different given the diversity in modern.
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Snapcaster Mage
2 Vendilion Clique
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Spell Snare
3 Mana Leak
3 Remand
1 Izzet Charm
1 Simic Charm
1 Dismember
2 Electrolyze
3 Cryptic Command
4 Serum Visions
2 Vedalken Shackles
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Breeding Pool
2 Steam Vents
1 Sulfur Falls
5 Island
1 Mountain
1 Forest
1 Surgical Extraction
3 Ancient Grudge
1 Combust
2 Negate
2 Blood Moon
2 Threads of Disloyalty
2 Huntmaster of the Fells
1 Batterskull
1 Keranos, God of Storms
How does my sideboard look? I think I might have a few too many cards for the grindier match-ups (the Huntmaster/Keranos/Batterskull package). I would like to find room for another Combust.
Main deck changes I am considering are finding room for a Spell Pierce or two and perhaps another Simic Charm as that card has significantly overperformed versus my expectations.
Edit: one reason I don't like Keranos much is that we typically get out-landed by UWR so resolving our Keranos is difficult, but I'm not sure how that plays out in your list with more lands. Also note Ooze's natural strength against Lingering Souls.
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Steam Vents
2 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
3 Island
1 Mountain
1 Forest
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Vendillion Clique
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Pillar of Flame
1 Flame Slash
1 Dismember
1 Electrolyze
1 Vapor Snag
1 Simic Charm
4 Serum Visions
4 Gitaxian Probe
3 Mana Leak
2 Deprive
1 Remand
1 Spell Snare
1 Spell Pierce
2 Huntmaster of the Fells
1 Combust
1 Grim Lavamancer
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Blood Moon
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Threads of Disloyalty
2 Ancient Grudge
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Counterflux
1 Batterskull
I tested a bunch of game 1's vs BW Deadguy Ale (Think Junk, except just BW and w/ Pack Rat + Mutavault) and UR Delver, and pre and post board vs. UR Twin. The Cliques were fantastic... except vs. a resolved Lingering Souls out of BW. The Ooze could have been a Lavamancer instead to help deal with Souls, but against Delver and Twin I definitely liked Ooze better. Simic Charm was... fine. It was almost always just a counterspell that only saves my creatures, though once or twice the bounce mode was relevant. I did use it as a giant growth one game to finish off my oppoenent, but I was at like 90% to win if it was any other card anyway. I get the reasoning - it saves your guys from removal spells like nothing else can while also helping win Goy wars or just being a great tempo play, but it still feels pretty low impact - like a restrictive counterspell that can do a couple other marginal things. Out of the board, I tried Huntmaster vs. Twin and it was pretty mediocre. He brought in Anger of the Gods, which made Huntmaster pretty mopey, plus 4 mana is kind of a lot. By the end of our testing session, I was running the Oozes instead and liked them a lot more.
The only card in the MD I'm unsure of is Simic Charm. I'm leaning towards a Forked Bolt or another Electrolyze because Lingering Souls is such a problem. Against many of the matchups where Simic Charm shines - vs. Abrupt Decay primarily, but removal heavy decks in general - the bigger problem is actually Lingering Souls. I'm much less scared of Jund than Junk, for example. I'm also considering the 20th land in that spot - probably a Breeding Pool - but I think I'd rather have a spell. Right now I'm most likely to play Forked Bolt, but we'll see how I feel tomorrow. In the SB I'm a little skeptical of the Huntmasters right now, but they still seem pretty good vs. UWR, Jund, Junk, BW, and BG - basically the grindy matchups. Maybe against RUG Twin as well, but I lean toward the Oozes there. I would like another Threads in the SB, but I just don't see room. Maybe the Ooze in the board is extraneous or the Izzet Staticaster is too narrow, I'm not sure. The PTQ is tomorrow so I don't have much time, but I'll probably check the thread in the morning if anyone has any thoughts.
I went 6-2 (again), this time picking up my second loss in the 2nd to last round. Had I won that round, there was a small chance I could have drawn in, but my tiebreakers were awful so probably not - one 6-1-1 missed the cut.
Round 1 vs Jund: lost 1-2
Game 1 was very tight. Between Probe and Clique, I knew most of the contents of his hand throughout the game and was finally in a spot with Goyf + Ooze in hand and Snapcaster Mage in play vs. a Goyf in play and a Liliana in his hand with him at 3 life. But he topdecks a bolt so he can kill the mage and make me discard a creature. This puts me dead to animate Raging Ravine and attack with it + Goyf unless I draw another creature to protect the Goyf I'm about to play or a Bolt or a Snapcaster to flashback Bolt for the win. I draw a land and don't play it, so instead of animating the Ravine he casts Inquisition, which gives me one for turn to find a bolt or Snapcaster. I draw another land, but a Snapcaster was the next card on top of my deck. Game 2 is another tight one that I don't remember the details of, but I think I just drew more threats than he drew answers, and had a couple of timely counterspells. Game 3 I keep a hand with a Clique, 2 Snapcasters, a Spell Snare, and 3 land. It gets decimated by hand disruption, and I only ever draw a Snapcaster and more land. We discussed after the match that maybe the hand wasn't keepable because it was so susceptible to hand disruption. I'm not sure, but I lean towards a mulligan.
Round 2: Win 2-1 vs. Melira Pod.
Game 1 I'm able to kill several mana dorks to mana screw him for a couple turns while Goyf applies the beats. Once he finally hits his third land, I just counter his next couple of plays and it's academic. Game 2 he doesn't stumble on mana, and uses Entomber Exarch to recur Nekrataal to kill two of my threats. I'm able to stay in the game with Snapcasters and Electrolyze, and we get to topdeck mode. He has an Abrupt Decay in his hand when he topdecks his Scavenging Oooze, so when I topdeck mine on my next turn, he's able to run away with the game. Game 3 I'm able to mana screw him again and the tempo loss is too much.
Round 3: Win 2-0 vs. UR Delver
Game 1 I keep an opener on the draw with Breeding Pool, Probe, 2 Bolt, Flame Slash, and a Clique. Kind of loose, but very good against creature decks. I draw the Steam Vents on first turn to kill his turn 1 Delver, and draw a Forked Bolt before his turn 3 Young Pyromancer + Serum Visions. I eventually find a turn too Clique and have to Clique away a Keranos, leaving an Electrolyze in his hand. We get into a weird spot where he has 2 Vapor Snag and a Snapcaster Mage along with that Electrolyze in hand and an Snapcaster in play and I have a couple Mana Leaks which are dead because he's flooded out. He goes to kill my Clique and I try to bolt his Snapcaster, he Snags his Snapcaster, and I'm able to counter the Electrolyze. I'm left with a Bolt and a Snapcaster in hand but he's taken a fair amount of damage at this point and I get one more attack in with my Clique before he has another chance to kill it. He's at 12 so this isn't lethal unless I can get a couple of attacks in with a Snapcaster or another attack in with the Clique. Ultimately, I draw another Snapcaster and am able to bolt him out. Game 2 I side out the Delvers and go more midrangey with a ton of removal, and he doesn't ever stand a chance.
Round 4: Win 2-0 vs. Blue Moon
This match is actually vs. a friend. Game 1 is long and slow. He resolves a Blood Moon, but I knew what he was playing so I'm prepared. We get into a long protracted fight over several turns over a Vedalken Shackles while I steadily hit him with a Delver that refuses to flip for 1 damage per turn. I literally take him from 20 to 10 in 1 damage increments, though his fetchlands help out. He finally bolts the Delver, but not after a fight which say me get a Snapcaster in play, so I hit him for 2, putting him to 8. He finally sticks a Shackles, which is fine because now I'm on the bolt him out plan. I play a a Tarmogoyf just to distract him and do 6 damage with Bolt + Snapcaster, Bolt. A topdecked burn spell (I forget which) seals it. Game 2 I bring in 2 Grudges, but unbeknowst to me he sides out the Shackles for Threads of Disloyalty, but also brings in a Batterskull. We get into a similar slugfest with him resolving a mostly irrlevant Blood Moon, but this time I have a Clique applying the beats. It puts him to 13 before he finally deals with it, and he goes to 11 from a couple lands while I'm able to stick a Goyf. He resolves a Batterskull, but I have the Grudge and am able to get a big attack in with a Tarmogoyf + Snapcaster, putting him to 4. From here, he's able to use Cryptic to buy time, but he never draws an answer.
Round 5: Win 2-1 vs. UWR Kiki Control
Game 1: I keep a slow hand without much pressure, and we get into a long slugfest. At some point I tap out and he's able to combo me out. I noticed he had MD Shadow of Doubt. Game 2: It's another slugfest, and at some point he's at 17 life and I have two bolts, a Snapcaster, a Spell Pierce and a Huntmaster in my hand while I know he has a Cryptic. He attacks me with Colonnade to put me to 8 and leave him with 4 untapped lands. I bolt, it resolves. Second Bolt gets Cryptic Commanded, but I have the Spell Pierce. Untap, resolve Huntmaster, and we have a completely different game. We spend a couple of turns with me not being able to attack and him casting spells to prevent Huntmaster from flipping, but I'm able to hit him with Electrolyze a couple times and eventually he's forced to let Huntmaster flip to deal the last points of damage. We have 10 minutes for game 3, so we play quickly. I resolve an early Huntmaster but he sticks a Restoration Angel and gets a big attack for 7 with that and his Colonnade, puting me to 9. But he doesn't play a spell that turn, allowing me to flip my Huntmaster and use an Electrolyze to kill the Angel. I get an attack for 8 in because I had a Snapcaster in play, and play another Snapcaster to flip my Huntmaster again on his next turn - which is turn 1 of turns. He gets in an attack with the Colonnade to put me to 6 (I lost a life from a fetchland in there somewhere) and has an Electrolyze to kill two Snapcasters, leaving me with 2 tokens and a Huntmaster. But I get a free attack in for 6 to put him to 1 and can just pass to let the Huntmaster flip to kill him, so he concedes without making me go through the motions.
Round 6: Win 2-1 vs. Amulet of Vigor combo.
Game 1 he has the turn 2 Amulet while I have a Delver that won't flip. He draws Cavern of Souls, so my counterspells just don't matter. He misses an Amulet trigger at some point, so I call a judge and ask him away from the table if I have to remind my opponent about that trigger - I don't, but I just wanted to be sure. I sit down and immediately take my turn, not thinking about the Delver trigger, and I draw an Electrolyze. Ooops. The Delver flips next turn, and with a Vapor Snag, I'm able to delay his Primeval Titan from Killing me for one more turn to put him to 8. Next turn, I draw Pillar of Flame, attack for 3 and Pillar is his Azusa. He untaps and kills me. Had I remembered my Delver trigger, I would have won that game. Game 2, I mulligan to 5. I Mana Leak his first Amulet, then Ancient Grudge the second, but I have no pressure. Then I topdeck a Blood Moon on my third turn, and that's that. Game 3 I keep hand with Blood Moon, but he has an Engineered Explosives which he casts for 3 before I can resolve my Moon. I never cast my Moon, waiting to either force him to blow his EE on the worst possible turn or to find a Grudge. I counter a couple of things and kill a couple of Azusas while getting some beats in with several creatures. Eventually I EOT Clique and he has a Slaughter Pact, 2 Summoner's Pact, and a card I can't make out from my notes. He has the mana to cast Primeval Titan, but no Cavern and I have counter backup, so I leave his hand. He doesn't topdeck Cavern, so I counter the Titan and he dies on my next turn.
Round 7: lose 0-2 vs. RG Tron.
Game 1: I kept a somewhat slow hand with lots of interaction. I have a Clique to take a Karn, but he has two and an O stone. I counter the 2nd Karn, but the O stone kills Clique and Snapcaster. We end up in topdeck mode, except he has the big Emrakul end game that I can't beat. Game 2: I keep a more aggressive hand, but make a key mistake. I clique him on his drawstep and he has Karn, Pyroclasm and some other stuff, but won't have tron assembled on this turn. I knew all but 1 card in his hand and had planned to take the Clasm, then have counter backup for the Karn after than. When I actually cast Clique, I snap take the Karn without thinking because I'm an idiot, so I have no pressure for several turns while I'm countering random things. Eventually, again, the big Emrakul endgame kills me.
Round 8: win 2-0 vs. Melira Pod
Game 1: Turn 1 Delver, turn 2 kill your mana dork, turn 3 flip and counter a Kitchen Finks in the next two turns. His third one resolves, but I have a Goyf. He Shriekmaws the Goyf after I get one big attack in, but Delver is too much. He was also on a mulligan to 6. Game 2: he casts a dork on turn 1, I cast a Delver. He Inquisitions on turn 2 to take my bolt with another Delver and 2 mana spells in my hand, and he doesn't have a 2nd land. Delver flips off bolt and I bolt his birds. He finds a land and I cast a 2nd Delver. I find a land and get a hit in for 4 and counter something random. Next turn, the 2nd Delver flips and I put him to 2. At this point, he can't really come back.
Notes:
I tried siding Delver out vs Jund, the first time vs Pod, and UR Delver. It was definitely correct vs. UR Delver, probably not vs. Jund, and definitely not vs. Pod.
If you play around Blood Moon early vs. Blue Moon, all the card really does is make it hard for them to cast their Cryptic Commands and maybe make Snapcaster and/or Deprive worse. I think it helped me more than it helped my opponent in both games because of his Cryptics.
Huntmaster was FANTASTIC vs. UWR control. 10/10 would play again. I was really surprised by how well it performed. They don't have that much hard countermagic, so it's not too hard to resolve him. Then they have to cast spells on their turn, which is a nice benefit. Even if they have the removal spell, Huntmaster is still a 2-1.
I think I played too conservatively vs. removal spells. I kept trying to save my Goyfs and Oozes vs. Jund and Pod until they've used their Abrupt Decay or Dismember on something else, but this slowed me down a bit and sometimes they were able to find a better way to deal with my worse threats so it didn't matter. I think game 1 vs. Jund in particular, things would have went differently had I just played out my threats.
It sucks that I've learned this right at the end of the modern PTQ season, but I think I have a pretty good feel for how most of the matchups go now and where the various options for the "other" creature are best - Goblin Guide, Scavenging Ooze, Vendillion Clique or Young Pyromancer - to go along with the core of Delver, Goyf and Snapcaster. Here's what I think - all %'s are a range because it depends on the builds of both decks, and some are fairly speculative:
Rock - e.g. BG Obliterator, BW Deadguy Ale (Pack Rat), Jund, Junk: 30-50%.
They had decent threats, a ton of removal, and discard spells. The versions with Lingering Souls are the best vs. you while Jund is the worse since you can Blood Moon them and they don't have Lingering Souls. Goblin Guide is bad pretty much all around. Young Pryomancer does leave behind a creature to attack most of the time, but vs. Lingering Souls it's mostly irrelevant and vs. all but BW it's often hard to force damage through on the ground. Clique does interact nicely, but is pretty bad vs. Lingering Souls and out of mostly BW, Darkblast. Scanging Ooze is a large threat that can control Tarmogoyf and is pretty good against Lingering Souls, but it will often just die and not gain you any value. Ooze is probably the best while Pyromancer and Clique can both do some work in the right context while Goblin Guide is awful.
Pod - Melira, Angel, and Kiki: 50-60%. Attacking their mana dorks or countering their early plays while attacking with early pressure works very well. Guide is good as long as you can kill Wall of Roots or at least bounce it a lot. Pyromancer is similar but also really bad vs. Orzhov Pontiff or Izzet Staticaster. Ooze is fantastic vs the non-Kiki versions while Clique is dcent against all of them, though against Pontiff and Staticaster it's still pretty awkward. Goblin guide is better against Kikipod than the other variants.
UWR Control/Geist variants: 25-45%. The control variants are a nightmare matchup while the Geist variants you can beat as long as you're able to counter the Geist. Ooze is ok vs. Snapcaster and helps overload path while Guide is awful and Young Pyro is just another card that Electrolyze blows out. Clique is ok, but still bad vs. Electrolyze. If they're on the Geist plan, it's better for us because they have less removal, but I'm not sure it changes relative value of the various creatures. Ooze is easily the best of the bunch here mainly because you need to make as much of their usual removal blank as possible.
Delver, UR and RUG: 50-60%. Ooze is decent vs. Snapcaster Mage and Young Pryo is good vs. Young Pyro. Clique is great mostly because of instant speed, though the weakness vs. Electrolyze is pretty bad. Goblin Guide is awful vs UR since you want to play the control role. I favor Ooze and Clique vs UR while against RUG, I could see a stronger argument for Young Pyro.
Tron, RG, U and UW: 40-60%. Goblin guide is hands down the best while Young Pryo is pretty good, though most of the upside is bad vs. Pyrocrasm and wrath effects. Clique is pretty bad, especially vs. RG - they see way too many cards for it to disrupt them that much, while Ooze is pretty bad because it's so slow, though against UW they're often also on the Gifts plan so it gains some additional utility.
Storm: 50-70%. Goblin Guide is king, but Young Pyro is pretty good. Clique and Ooze aren't too bad because their abilities are relevant, but you'd much rather have one of the other two for the early pressure.
Twin, UR, UWR and RUG: 45-60%. Young Pyro is pretty awkward vs Deceiver Exarch and so is Goblin Guide, though the issue is less bad. Clique is probably the best one because it avoids that and also disrupts. Ooze is mediocre unless they're RUG, in which case another threat that stands up to Goyf is pretty good. Huntmaster out of RUG also makes Guide and Young Pyro look even worse. RUG is by far the harder matchup, but it's still really close. UWR makes Guide look pretty bad because of Wall of Omens, and now overloading Path to Exile is a thing w/ more Oozes.
Burn: 30-50%. Being 3 colors sucks, but we do have a lot of lifegain out of the board - especially with Huntmaster. Ooze is obviously the best. After that it's not clear to me - Guide seems pretty bad and Clique's disruption doesn't do much vs such a linear deck, while Young Pyro's ability isn't that relevant but maybe is good for racing.
Affinity: 40-60%. Ooze's lifegain is pretty relevant while Guide and Young Pyro often can't attack or block the relevant things. Clique is too slow for the disruption to do much against them. Ooze seems like the clear winner. Side note: build your SB right and this is easily a 60% matchup - just play 2 Ancient Grudge and an Engineered Explosives in your board and don't question it. Add a Shatterstorm if you're really worried or a Destructive Revelry is you also want more interaction for Ensoul Artifact on Darksteel Citadel that has applications elsewhere.
Scapeshift: 40-60%. Goblin Guide is the best since you just want early pressure, though Young Pyro doesn't a pretty good job as well. Clique's disruption is pretty decent as well while Ooze is mostly slow and irrelevant. We're much better vs the standard version than against the GerryT Omen version - in the latter case, the early pressure is that much more important because a turn 2 Omen can cause some major problems.
My big picture takeaway is that you can't be favored in the Bxy Rock or UWR Matchups, so don't try too hard and instead just beat Pod, Twin, combo and Tron. This makes Scavenging Ooze look the worst since we can be favored against Pod without it, and probably Goblin Guide and Young Pryomancer look the best. Perhaps a mix of Clique and Young Pyro is worth trying to hedge against the twin variants. In any case, I'm trying Young Pyro in that slot next.
I'm definitely not 100% sure, but this is the rough picture of RUG Delver's place in the metagame that I'm beginning to see after playing it for some time.
I keep wanting to make room for G Probe but I am afraid.
Thanks!
I haven't tried Vedalken Shackles - I came close to putting it in the SB right before one ptq but decided to stick with Threads. It just doesn't seem like the sort of card that fits into a deck based on Delver of Secrets. It's an awful early tempo play because it costs 5 mana over two turns, it doesn't flip Delver, and it requires you to play more land to be effective. In Delver, you really want to be able to keep 1 land hands and to be able to operate effectively on 2-3 mana for several turns. If you aren't hitting your 4th land drop to steal Goyf, Shackles looks a lot worse. If you're at the point where you really want Shackles, you probably don't want to play Delver anymore, so cut the Delvers and play RUG Midrange/Control. It's an idea I've seriously considered. Reid Duke has a pretty interesting list in that direction here: http://www.channelfireball.com/videos/channel-reiderrabbit-modern-rug-control/ but the next question you have to ask yourself is, why aren't you playing Tarmo-Twin? Not that RUG midrange isn't a viable option, but if you can't answer that question you might just be playing a bad version of something else.
Me:
4x Delver of Secrets
4x Snapcaster Mage
4x Young Pyromancer
4x Tarmogoyf
I've played UR Delver and RUG Delver combined for over the last several months. I felt for a long time that RUG was superior, with the resilience of Goyf and SB options (Ancient Grudge). I was following the RUG Delver thread, but my list was definitely more "tempo" oriented with 19 lands and no Cryptics, but it was neither fast nor particularly great in attrition. After seeing results for UR Delver, I decided to try the deck out again, and realized that it has a much better tempo/aggro plan than RUG does. But, here's my question: does the deck benefit from running both Pyro and Goyf, and in return, no Cliques or Lavamancers? Goyf certainly feels more high impact than either, and it seems like a nice compliment to Young Pyro, adding addition pressure to the ground that can't be Bolted, Angered, Electrolyzed, or Pyroclasmed away.
Spooly:
I don't know if I agree that UR has the best tempo or aggro plan - in my experience, RUG with a creature suite of 4 Delver, 4 Goblin Guide, 4 Goyf, 4 Snapcaster has the best version of that plan. The problem is that vs some decks, that tempo plan is pretty bad and you need to be able to play a longer game, so Goblin Guide just has to go. Though if BGx and UWR start disappearing from the metagame and combo comes to the forefront, I'll be sleeving up my Goblin Guides. Even the non guide RUG lists with the same creature suite as the UR lists except Goyf instead of Young Pyro seems slightly better at the aggro/tempo plan to me just because Goyf is more resilient, though Young Pyro has it's upsides and combined with the relatively painless manabase of UR it's close.
I don't know if Young Pyromancer is the right card to replace Goblin Guide, but that's what I'm leaning towards as of yesterday. It's almost as good as Guide as an aggressive creature, and is a much better mid-late game card. I haven't tested them together in the same deck yet, but in the lists that I've been running I'm leaning towards a creature suite of 4 Delver, 4 Goyf, 4 Snapcaster, 3 Young Pyro, and maybe the 4th Young Pryo, but in that slot I'm also considering: Grim Lavamancer, Vendillion Clique, Scavenging Ooze, Forked Bolt, and the 2nd Spell Snare. I'm leaning toward toward Spell Snare at the moment, but I see good reasons for all of them.
Me:
I agree with everything you've said, especially with the fact that Delver is by far the worst card in RUG decks. I have tested variations of RUG control, but frankly, Jund/Junk does it better. I tested Guide a fair bit, and it's a very
good card; unfortunately, this is not the meta for it! Maybe one day...
I think that the UR shell is roughly what we want to be looking at in terms of the best home for a Delver deck. When I ran UR, I liked a high count of 1CMC counters. After reading the SCG article about a PTQ that was taken down by UR Delver, I'm less convinced of their necessity. I think we want more 2 mana counters-- between 6 and 8. The 1 mana counters tend to be weak draws later in the game and situational (don't get me wrong though-- I like Snare quite a bit!). Another issue is that they are still 1 for 1 trades, and most decks have better card advantage engines to pull ahead if we try to play that game.
When I played either version of the deck, my main issue was balancing aggression and control playstyle elements. For example, on the draw, I would be more or less forced to play control because I couldn't afford for them to resolve something powerful that I couldn't later answer, and would thus fall too far behind to get ahead (thinking Birthing Pod, Liliana on an empty board, Courser of Kruphix). To this end, I find Vapor Snag to be a godsend; I can tap out in the early turns and apply pressure because I know I can deal with any of their powerful creatures in a snap (Wurmcoil, an opposing Goyf, Courser, a big Ooze, Linvala, etc). The card also has further uses, such as clearing blockers and saving our own creatures (which is not to be underestimated). Yes, such cards can often present card disadvantage, but with Young Pyro, we can generate a lot of value by simply snagging our own Pyro in response to removal.
Running Pyro with Goyf also increases our threat density. Lavamancer is excellent, but slow. There have been many games where I have hesitated to play it for need of doing something with a greater immediate impact. Clique is a favourite of mine, but 3 mana is hefty and I would prefer a threat that didn't die to Bolt, since that is already a weakness of UR Delver. Goyf also helps us deal with opposing Goyfs, and really helps our interaction on the ground with other creature based decks.
Before I recap my thoughts, I'd like to add that Runechanter's Pike did shine very brightly the few games I tested it, but it may be unnecessary with the heavy hitting Goyf does for us.
Overall, I like Young Pyro for his ability to let us play more proactively (with mana up for a response, it is generally unprofitable for the opponent to attempt to trade 1 for 1 to remove him) and as another source of CA, something the deck needs when games go longer. To this end as well, I think that a higher Remand count is in order, to keep cards flowing (which has many benefits for us, especially if we can delay our opponents from dealing with a threat on the board). 18 lands is plenty with a cantrip suite consisting of 4 Visions, 4 Probe, 1-2 Electrolyze (I like 2), and 3-4 Remand. I like a Keranos and Batterskull in the side and I think our land and cantrip base supports a few 5 drops just fine. Vapor Snag type effects are a good way of letting us play pro actively while still having the ability to manage the opponent's threats without holding Mana up every turn, and thus, deprecating our own ability to deploy threats. Void Snare interests me as a cheap catch all, but the sorcery-speed keeps me hesitant.
I, like you, took an interest in Simic Charm. It has been somewhat underwhelming in my testing. I'm not sure about running 3 Snag or 2 Snag and 2 Charm, which amounts to 4 bounce-effects + some versatility for protecting our threats and pushing damage through. Gut Shot is another card that seems decent in a list running 4x Pyro; it deals with a lot of things that we'd usually waste a Bolt on. It's also another free spell, which has obvious merits outside of Young Pyro interactions. If not Gut Shot, however, then I would definitely consider some number of Forked Bolt and Burst Lightning. I ran Forked Bolt a few months ago when everyone was on the Pillar plan, and I think Forked Bolt is superior. Both bother me for being sorceries, which really makes a difference in game.
Edit: Spooly said he would chime in later, so stay tuned!
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Young Pyromancer
4 Tarmogoyf
Sorceries (10)
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Serum Visions
2 Pillar of Flame
2 Gut Shot
4 Vapor Snag
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Spell Snare
2 Spell Pierce
4 Remand
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Steam Vents
3 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
1 Island
1 Mountain
2 Flame Slash
2 Negate
2 Ancient Grudge
1 Destructive Revelry
1 Spell Pierce
2 Dispel
2 Combust
2 Forked Bolt
1 Pillar of Flame
I have the cards but I am currently not running it because I got tired of RUG Delver (played it for 8 months or so) and am now playing Death & Taxes/Ad Nauseam. But, I may go back to it before the end of the year. If I were to play it today, this is the list I would run (maybe cut a remand and a spell snare for 2x mana leak). I played this deck with Snapcaster Mage and/or Vendilion Clique for months but I don't think this deck wants to be playing 3 mana spells (Snapcaster is a 3 mana spell 95% of the time).
Delver is fragile but aggressive and pyro/goyf are both resilient/generate value. You also have a bunch of cheap counters and vapor snag to keep them alive. You honestly don't need more than 12 threats, especially with both pyro and goyf.
I roughly agree. I've been happy with 6 two mana counters for some time to go along with 1 Spell Pierce and 1 Spell Snare. I've been wanting another counterspell and have been leaning toward the second Spell Snare, but I could easily see playing a second Remand instead for the reasons you list.
I like Vapor Snag, but against decks like Jund/Junk/BG, Pod and sometimes UWR, I often just want to permanently remove something like a Tarmogoyf, a Courser of Kruphix, a Wall of Roots, or a Restoration Angel so that I can keep the ground pounders pushing damage through. To this end, I only run 1 Vapor Snag and instead run 1Flame Slash and 1 Dismember. I've tried 2 Dismembers and that's definitely too much life loss, but the ability to permanently deal with some of the bigger blockers is crucial to making sure that the ground pounders keep the damage flowing. I was especially happy with this configuration when I was playing UR with Goblin Guide and Young Pyromancer because it's crucial to make sure the ground is clear for the little guys to get damage in. In the RUG lists I played that still had Goblin Guide, this was still true. Arguably the last build I ran with no Guides and no Pyros didn't need so many permanent removal spells for the bigger-butted creatures, but I get the feeling that with Young Pyromancer back in the deck, the hard removal for bigger butted dudes will be well worth it.
I tried Runechanter's Pike for a bit online in a UR build with no fetches (not willing to invest that much on MTGO). I've only played a few matches, but every time I drew Pike it was awful. I really only want it in some matchups - Jund/Junk and UWR are main ones. I could see it in the SB, especially with Pyromancer in the deck, but at that point there's a good argument for just running a Sword instead since you'll only bring it in against certain decks. Maybe 2 Swords so you can bring in the one that is best suited for a given matchup. Sword of War and Peace vs UWR in particular seems brutal and probably a better option than Keranos given the aggressive stance we want to take.
18 lands seems ambitious to me, but I also play slightly fewer cantrips so maybe it can work. I don't like Remand as much you - my biggest problem is that in the grindy matchups against nonblue decks, it doesn't deal with the problem cards. We often need to actually counter that Goyf or Liliana, not just delay it for a turn. I play 2 Deprive for this reason. In the spots where Remand is at its best as a Time Walk, Deprive is nearly as good - it generates the same amount of tempo, but it doesn't replace itself. The biggest downside is that Remand is just bonkers in counter wars and Deprive is just another counterspell in that spot. Deprive is better vs Jund/Junk and Remand is better vs. some variants of UWR and Tarmo-Twin, so you can definitely choose the split based on what you expect. I definitely don't like more than 2 Deprive because of diminishing returns - it's easy to pick your spots with Deprive so that returning a land isn't a problem (and sometimes is a benefit!) when you only have 1 or 2 in the deck, but as you get more you're forced more and more to cast Deprive on turn 2 and miss a land drop.
I'm a little skeptical of Keranos out of Delver. It's a fantastic grindy card, but 5 mana is a fairly high number. I've had some success with Huntmaster vs. UWR, but I haven't really gotten to try it vs Jund/Junk. My fear about Keranos vs. Jund/Junk is that it's pretty ineffective vs. Lingering Souls and manlands, which can be crucial when we're trying to race at the end. But this is all theoretical - I haven't really tested it yet, so I'm pretty uncertain.
I didn't really like Simic Charm that much when I tried it. It usually fine, never fantastic, and occasionally downright awful. Gut Shot seems pretty bad to me. In so many matchups it will do basically nothing unless you draw a Pyromancer. I'd rather play a card that is more relevant on its own. I'm not a huge fan of Burst Lightning either because as a removal spell, it can't kill anything Bolt can't kill without costing a million mana. Boltable things are already easy to deal with; I'd rather my other removal spells efficiently deal with things that Bolt has trouble with. The extra damage to the dome is nice, but 5 mana is a lot. Forked Bolt, on the other hand, I like. I originally went with Pillar of Flame in that spot because I was worried about Kitchen Finks and Voice of Resurgence out of Pod, but Forked Bolt is still pretty good against them and way better against Lingering Souls and, incidentally, the (pseudo) mirror. I had both cards in my last build, but I could see cutting the Pillar for something else.
0 Snapcasters is a very small number. I could see shaving one since you don't want to be Snapcaster flooded and he is a bit mana intensive, but Snapcaster is one of the key reasons we can stand toe to toe against the midrange and control decks in the mid-late game - it's a Demonic Tutor that also generates card advantage and in particular, gives you a lot more bolts to burn out your opponents with. Sure, Snapcaster is a little slower than we would like in an ideal world, but the trade off is worth it.
The games we win are the ones where we are able to establish an aggressive board position and protect it, while simultaneously sabotaging the efforts of our opponents to drop a significant threat. We don't win games by answering slews of threats and then dropping a bomb; we need to be the aggressors whilst disrupting our opponents. While I support Mana Leak and Deprive in lists as answers to the things we need dead, I don't feel that they directly compete with Remand. An effect as powerful as a counterspell stapled to a cantrip is perfect for us. Remand buys us a turn against most relevant blowout spells (sweeper, Liliana, Electrolyze, Cryptic, Sphinx's, Splinter Twin combo piece, Scapeshift, etc.), which is really two draws; the cantrip, and the turn we survive to untap with.
Our plan is to clock our opponent with one of our threats. If Remand buys us a turn, that's one less turn on the clock. It's one more token for Young Pyro. It's two more cards we get to see-- another threat, another answer for the next threat our opponent attempts to deploy, another land drop, another burn spell to close out the game. Tempo decks live and die by having the right card at the right time to maintain the advantage they've created. We don't run many individually powerful cards, so topdecking is something we don't generally want to do. Remand ensures we dig deeper to hit what we need, and to slow our opponents down to buy our threats more time.
Vapor Snag is often worth more than the potential 1-for-1 trade we get with regular removal by being an instant (a distinct advantage over Flame Slash, since it hits manlands, Twin combo pieces, and extra utility to save our own threats). Also notable is the extra reach it lends us through the tacked on life loss. It's not a perfect card, but it answers nearly anything, which, outside of Dismember, is as good as we can hope for. The ability to save our dudes and the fact that we can flash it back without paying 8 life makes it the best option (IMO) available to us for the deck at this time.
My main point of contention to your reasoning for both sets of cards is that often I find that delaying for a turn is not enough primarily because it's hard to reliably keep the pressure up against some decks. If you go turn 1 Delver and it survives, then turn 2 Remand or EOT Snag for their Goyf or w/e is generally fantastic. If they kill your Delver though, then it's drastically different because you're not getting damage in while you're delaying. There are a bunch of other situations that are similar to this and that I find myself in all the time.
That being said, I've been wanting another counterspell in the MD, and another Remand is on the short list along with Spell Snare and maybe Spell Pierce. The fact that Remand draws you a card when you're delaying does help a lot, and the upside vs. blue decks is just insane. In addition, Flame Slash hasn't been that good for me. It doesn't kill a Tarmogoyf much more often than Lightning Bolt does, and sorcery speed is a big problem. I could see putting the 2nd Vapor Snag back in for that slot. Ideally I'd want another Dismember, but the life loss is just too much.
What are your thoughts on Keranos though? I haven't tried him out yet, so I'm working purely on theory.
Keranos is great vs GBx. Probably the best card in the mirror as well, which extends well to the Twin matchup because they side out the combo. It's also very strong against UWR and Pod. Pretty much a blowout in grindy matchups, and gives us reasonable scaling power. I tend to like it more than Batterskull since the token is so easily answered, whereas Keranos is not. Batterskull is good for stabilising, whereas Keranos puts you very far ahead as long as you're not terribly behind.
I'm mainly worried about 2 things with respect to Keranos - 1) vs. BGx he doesn't impact the board, so you might just die to the manlands + Goyf or w/e without having the chance to grind them out, and 2) vs. UWR resolving a Keranos gives them an opportunity to resolve their own Keranos / Batterskull / something big and annoying. Have you had any issues with either of these?
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Steam Vents
2 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
2 Island
1 Mountain
1 Forest
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Young Pyromancer
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Serum Visions
3 Mana Leak
2 Deprive
1 Remand
1 Spell Snare
1 Spell Pierce
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Electrolyze
1 Forked Bolt
1 Dismember
2 Vapor Snag
Basically, Young Pyromancer comes in alongside Tarmogoyf for the reasons discussed upthread. Pillar of Flame is cut and Forked Bolt stays because while both Pillar is slightly better vs. Pod, Forked Bolt has far wider application. I cut a land and added a cantrip in order to see how well it works, but I'm a bit skeptical 18 is the correct number. Worth testing though! The cantrip I added was almost Remand, but then I listened to a modern enthusiast podcast that criticized Remand for the same reasons I've been complaining about it, and went with a second Electrolyze instead. I cut the Flame Slash for a Vapor Snag mainly for the reasons Ectomark gave up thread - Flame Slash rarely is able to kill a creature Lightning Bolt could have killed before that creature does real damage anyway (Goyf is still typically too big, Restoration Angel has flash, etc), so why not something more versatile? You could argue for a 2nd Dismember, but this deck is already packing a metric ton of life loss, so I want to stay away.
The Sideboard I'm much less sure about. With 18 land, the 5 drops seem way too expensive. I also feel like I've been oversbing for midrange decks - I barely had anything to bring in against Tron, for example. Counterflux wasn't enough because Emrakul was coming eventually, though hopefully with the Young Pryos the deck is aggressive enough that the Counterfluxes work better as a tempo play. Here's what I'm currently thinking:
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Ancient Grudge
2 Huntmaster of the Fells
1 Combust
1 Counterflux
2 Blood Moon
2 Threads of Disloyalty
1 Batterskull
1 Scavenging Ooze
This SB is definitely not what I want to play, but I don't know what to do with it. I like having access to an Ooze as graveyard hate for various things and lifegain when it's warranted. I'm still gunshy on Keranos because it's a 5 drop and is slow, but am willing to be convinced (I plan to test it eventually). Batterskull is good enough in a wide variety of places that I'm less concerned about it costing 5. Threads is fantastic vs. BGx and its variants, and I'm happy to go back up to 2. But I don't have many cards to bring in vs. things like Tron or Scapeshift. I could add another Blood Moon, but both decks can deal with that without much problem (Chromatic Star into Nature's Claim or EOT Cryptic, untap kill you). Maybe a Negate is the card I want, since it counters Karn, Scapeshift, and most combo cards. The creatures Tron lists play are effectively dealt with by Grudge for the most part anyway. On the other hand, I could put the second Counterflux back in, but with only 18 land, 3 mana counters look pretty sketchy.
I suppose I'm really looking for two things that I can't seem to find - 1) A widely applicable high impact SB card that can come in vs. Tron, Scapeshift, and other combo / over the top decks, and 2) A removal spell for 1-2 mana that is preferably instant speed and can kill 4/5 Goyfs and Restoration Angel. Here's to hoping Khans delivers something, I guess.