I haven't really played this deck yet, so who am i to talk, but I feel that eerie interlude is WAY nastier than Xathrid Necromancer...you bounce your entire team from a wrath effect, or lethal damage from blocking, then they all come back, and ALL triggers happen at the same time. So as you can imagine, that can get pretty gross and give you a potential lethal swing on the turn around, especially with champions and lieutenants in the mix.
good effect but probably wrong deck. its a spell, so dilutes your coco's or vials. anything that isn't a human really need to have a great reason to be run in a deck like this. basically path to exile, coco, vial are the only noncreature things i would put in.
Can't click the link on my phone but I'm taking a wild guess that you're linking the Magic Aids video? If so, love that guy's channel. Props to him.
Had a long hard think on the coco vs. vial debate last night and eventually (bearing in mind I'm a devout abzan coco player) settled on vial being the hero we need (but not the one we deserve lol).
The ability to front-load our disruption and get under midrangey decks before they can catch up is a core aspect of what can make this deck good. We curve out early, fast and in doing so, disrupt our opponent and put them off balance.
I don't want to play this deck as a grindy mid-game list, I want to win before I've even drawn 11 cards from my library with a list that has no trouble with its mana and can Leverage vial aggressively to compliment the low land count.
If anything, I'd worry about needing more mana dorks in a list running coco. Dedicated coco decks run maybe 12 mana generating creatures in order to support a 4 mana spell with a low land count, and I don't want to go that route.
Genuine question to those players on coco, how many games are lost because you can't close out the game quickly in the early turns and get stuck not being able to cast coco on-curve or (perhaps worse) having to pass into your opponent's potentially 5th turn holding up coco when you could have instead been jamming those disruptive/hasty threats earlier and shutting an opponent off their game-plan or removal.
Coco is (perhaps!) the best creature-centric card advantage engine in the format, but for it to be anything other than a midrange grindy option, you need to be drawing (and sticking!) a mana accelerant. That doesn't bode well for a low to the ground fish deck, and Coco to me feels like a way to "not lose" rather than a way to win, simply because there's no way in hell you're casting coco early enough in a deck who's only accelerant is noble hierarch and probably only runs 20-21 lands. If anything, coco is going to be a turn 5 play on average due to the low land count. I'm personally not handicapping my list in that way. If your answer is to run more lands/mana dorks and less genuine threats, I'm not keen on that either. Coco feels like a great safety net but without reliable acceleration I don't see the value.
Vial on the other hand can perform a similar duty in terms of deploying threats on the board but it *is* a mana accelerant. That's why I'm having such a hard time seeing the ultimate benefit of coco in this deck.
But I'd welcome and appreciate a well-considered response addressing these shortfalls in support of coco. I want to get the full debate out for everyone to see.
Like I said I'm a huge coco fan, was singing the praises of the card before it was even released and had my copies preordered before most people had even noticed the card properly. I'm a coco convert. I just don't see it working properly here.
ok so I know that non-human creature spells are sort of a no-no given the mana base...but there are two cards I'd be interested in seeing what people thinking:
I'm guessing you missed my last response to you, which addressed a lot of the stuff you just reiterated, but here goes.
I want to start off by saying that there cannot be a comparison to other CoCo decks as far as general strategy/play patterns. Humans CoCo does not play the same way that other CoCo decks do. One of the big differences being that we play CoCo as an aggro card, meaning it's usually cast before attacks to ensure maximum damage. But more on that later...
- You mention that CoCo lives in "decks who's only accelerant is noble hierarch and probably only runs 20-21 lands" - every single CoCo list in this thread (or at least the vast majority) runs 21 lands and at least 6 or more dorks.
- In response to your previous post, I clearly laid out the fact (with exact numbers and everything) that the Vial version with a T1 Vial isn't even more aggressive by default than the CoCo version with a T1 dork.
- I have gone over the idea that the Coco variant is a grindy midrange deck and how/why it's not that. It's an aggressive, disruptive deck with on-strategy card advantage that also furthers its aggression.
- You talk about how the CoCo decks have to draw and stick an early dork while overlooking the fact that the Vial list needs Vial on T1 or at least T2 in order for it to be effective. Without that, it's basically just a CoCo deck without CoCo and with some dead cards thrown in.
Genuine question to those players on coco, how many games are lost because you can't close out the game quickly in the early turns and get stuck not being able to cast coco on-curve or (perhaps worse) having to pass into your opponent's potentially 5th turn holding up coco when you could have instead been jamming those disruptive/hasty threats earlier and shutting an opponent off their game-plan or removal.
The CoCo decks have zero problems closing games out; I'd argue they're better at it than the Vial list due to the fact that just a couple of removal spells on the other side + lack of card advantage means that the Vial deck doesn't have a way to close out if the opponent stabilizes. It's heavily leaning on Mantis Rider in such a scenario, which is a card CoCo decks can also run. Lord help the Vial deck if it actually gets hit with a sweeper. I have also gone over the fact that all of the CoCo variants I have played, even the slower ones, have no issues killing on T4 with a solid draw, even through blockers/removal. What is the Vial list doing that significantly increases that clock?
CoCo is almost always cast on main phase before attacks, so the idea of "having to pass into your opponent's turn holding up coco" really isn't a thing in most matchups. If I can cast it, I cast it. If I'm holding up CoCo, it's because I'm at the point where I have enough pressure on board to force my opponent to have an answer without needing to commit more to the board (this is almost purely a control matchup thing). Its actually these exact instances/matchups where I would MUCH rather have CoCo than Vial.
If your answer is to run more lands/mana dorks and less genuine threats, I'm not keen on that either.
You're overlooking the fact that these are tiny concessions (as little as 3 cards - 2 mana dorks, 1 land) to make way for a MAJOR increase in effective threat density with the way CoCo digs through the deck. It also allows you to play something like Path to Exile, which is still one of the best (if not the best) removal spell in the format and greatly punishes opponents for trying to lean on a single blocker, furthering our gameplan. If you REALLY want more creatures, you can easily crank the creature count to 35 just by cutting the paths for something, which puts it right up there with the Vial list.
Also, I think one of the huge advantages of Human CoCo over others is that the mana dorks are still on-strategy. They get pumped by lords and they can grow existing Champs/Lieutenants. This is something demonstrated in my previous response to you on the last page.
I think my biggest thing is this: Collected Company is a great card when we're ahead AND when we're behind. Aether Vial is great when things are going well but awful/nearly useless when things are going bad. Both versions present very similar clocks/strategies, so I will always take the card that is better in a wider array of scenarios, especially in a wide format like Modern.
As a final note, I want to clarify that I don't actually think the discussion should be Aether Vial vs Collected Company; if the deck can run CoCo and maintain a similar clock (which it does), it should. CoCo is the better card for this archetype, at least in my opinion, but it's not just a card vs card comparison. Running Aether Vial has side effects that I think are far more interesting and debatable than how the card itself stacks up against Company. I think the discussion needs to be about:
- Whether or not the CoCo decks can support a decent 5C mana base, because Mantis Rider is a beast.
- Whether or not the ability to use Thalia 1.0 as a 1 sided effect and the ability to reliably have draw step disruption (along with other similar Vial trickery) is worth not running CoCo/Path
- The importance of critical creature mass in a deck reliant on creature-based synergies, and how resilient the deck should be in the face of mass removal/sweepers
ok so I know that non-human creature spells are sort of a no-no given the mana base...but there are two cards I'd be interested in seeing what people thinking:
brave the elements which can not only protect from some wipes, but also can give you an unblockable swing, as most of our creatures are white.
These are cards usually run in the 1 drop Kytheon, Hero of Akros style Humans decks (there are a few lists in the Primer). The CoCo/Vial variants run creatures that already address the issues that these cards tackle (ex Reflector Mage clears blockers, meaning Brave isn't needed as much), so they're not seen as necessary.
@kingcars: thank you for your great wrap-up of both decks.
I think we can reliably play 5c with Coco and Mantis Rider. I have tested it in about 100 Games yet and I never had mana problems. That is also why I prefer Tireless Tracker in a creature mirror, because it can overcome stalls just by the pure card advantage. I am however testing both Tracker and Thalia.
I think the main advantage of the vial version is the one-sided Thalia V1.0 and the Xanthrid Necromancer. Especially the Thalia is making me want to play the vial version at the moment.
Thanks for the lengthy response. Nice points, well put across. I agree with much of what you said, and the bits I'm not convinced by I'll be testing and looking at to get some perspective and try to understand your position (I have the cards to test it out).
So as it stands there are clearly decent arguments to be made for each approach.
I'm not keen on upping the number of mana dorks above four. I believe noble hierarch to be providing a useful function beyond pure "birds of paradise" analogue because of the exalted keyword, which is very handy when twinned with a first strike thalia or a flying mantis rider. That's great, but as soon as "generic mana dork 5-6" enter the fray you've lost me.
I'm also not totally sold on the general structure of 21 lands and 6 mana dorks in what is essentially an aggro deck. It feels to me (and I freely admit that I make this statement without hard experience to back it up) that there's some sort of compromise happening here in order to accept coco in the maindeck which reduces the efficacy of the aggressiveness of the deck by some small percentage, like the total package in order to accommodate this one spell amounts to 7 cards. The 4 companies themselves, +1 land +2 dorks (maybe pseudo more if you count any lands which deal you damage?). By direct comparison, vial needs no such compromise, allowing a lower land count and needing no additional acceleration, so it has a smaller footprint in the deck. With a vial in play you never really need to hit more than a couple of lands on the field, which you can't really claim for a drawn coco. Vial is an enabler, coco requires an enabler, I hope you follow my train of thought haha.
It would be really interesting to have a direct side by side comparison between a rainbow vial list and a generally accepted 'stock' coco list over the course of a few hundred games and really get some solid analysis going on which version has the edge in specific matchups (like obviously coco will be better against certain decks there's no denying it, likewise with vial).
I have a fairly active but small playgroup & we test regularly. I could post some matchup analysis for you guys to see? It wouldn't be 'complete' because the sample size would be small, but we always take care to play games thoroughly and consider things properly when testing.
The first list a 5-color CoCo list running a very similar creature base to the Vial list Mullen ran, though I think there's a better way to construct that mana base than 4 City of Brass. Thoughts?
The first list a 5-color CoCo list running a very similar creature base to the Vial list Mullen ran, though I think there's a better way to construct that mana base than 4 City of Brass. Thoughts?
I've been testing 4 Cavern, 4 Territory, and 4 Reflecting Pool and the mana base has been fairly consistent.
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EDH GWSelvala and the Return to HumanityGW UWDragonlord Ojutai, Control's Elder DragonUW UBGTasigur, the God-Pharaoh's Gift to EDHUBG UBRNicol Bolas and his SuperfriendsPawnsUBR
Modern UWUW Control/Midrange/Bad JundUW WUBRGHumansWUBRG BGMidrangeBG
Yeah, I was looking at Reflecting Pool also, but I'm just not sure about running the full 4, I feel like it could easily lead to extra mulligans when you draw Reflecting Pool without the proper colors available to "reflect". I could see running 1 or 2 in a mana base with 4 Cavern, 4 Territory, and some combination of fetches/shocks, but more makes me nervous. What does the rest of your mana base look like?
CoCo in any deck, whether it be Humans, Vizier Company or Knightfall, suffers from the fact that it really need your deck to be built primarily from a suite of 3 drops. If you can get the dork to stick turn 1 AND you make both land drops, then sure the turn 3 CoCo feels amazing. But once again, the argument isn’t in whether or not CoCo is better than Vial or vice versa - it’s how you want your threats to be deployed. Vial enables a much faster threat deployment rate, and can let you play with cards in your hand to instant-speed disrupt your opponent. CoCo can do that too, but each cast is a gamble for the specific card you want. If you CoCo to look for a Kambal or Sin Collector and find 2 Thalia’s Lieutenants, that feels pretty awful.
Sorcery speed “pump the team for alpha strike” CoCos also leave you wide open for a blowout if your opponent mains (or aided in) board wipes. The alternative for Vial is to have a mantis rider + big Thalia and hierarch attacking in for chunks of damage at a time while you can either a) hold a freebooter to Vial I’m on your opponent’s drawstep to take any board wipes/removal and gain information, or b) Hold a Thalia 1.0 to Vial I’m at instant speed if they choose to take out for a board wipe. Yes, CoCo can potentially have more threat density and late game value, but Vial gives you the options to gain tons of virtual advantage via having your board stick.
Once again, CoCo is the endgame option, but for now Vial is the practical solution to being able to 1) race our opponents down, 2) pump our team out of chump trade range, and 3)disrupt our opponents enough to both hinder their plans and prevent them hindering ours.
I'm not keen on upping the number of mana dorks above four. I believe noble hierarch to be providing a useful function beyond pure "birds of paradise" analogue because of the exalted keyword, which is very handy when twinned with a first strike thalia or a flying mantis rider. That's great, but as soon as "generic mana dork 5-6" enter the fray you've lost me.
I can understand that, but I think the point here is that Avacyn's Pilgrim isn't *really* just a generic mana dork. It's still a human. It grows Champs and Lieutenants, gets pumped by lords and provides mana acceleration. There's still a good amount of value to be had. In the scenario I described on the previous page, the T1 Pilgrim was a 3/3 just from doing things the deck wants to naturally do. While opponents are busy scrambling against our fatties, having those sneaky damage points on the board can be clutch.
I'm also not totally sold on the general structure of 21 lands and 6 mana dorks in what is essentially an aggro deck. It feels to me (and I freely admit that I make this statement without hard experience to back it up) that there's some sort of compromise happening here in order to accept coco in the maindeck which reduces the efficacy of the aggressiveness of the deck by some small percentage, like the total package in order to accommodate this one spell amounts to 7 cards. The 4 companies themselves, +1 land +2 dorks (maybe pseudo more if you count any lands which deal you damage?). By direct comparison, vial needs no such compromise, allowing a lower land count and needing no additional acceleration, so it has a smaller footprint in the deck.
You can't count the 4 CoCo towards the 7 card package and ignore the 4 Vial. Vial itself is a compromise because it's not a human and it doesn't get us more humans. CoCo is equivalent to 2 humans an absurdly high amount of the time (seriously, since running the 31 creature layout, over countless games I can count on 1, maybe 2 hands the number of times I've gotten less than 2. I think the actual mathematical percentage of hitting 2 or more is something like 92%). What you're describing is only a 3 card difference. The difference is 1 land and 2 mana dorks; I'm not counting Path here, as that is more of a luxury afforded by running CoCo as opposed to a compromise made for it (and it can easily be swapped out for creatures if the deck builder so chooses). The other thing to note is that it is only a 2 creature difference for a card that generates extra creatures, which is HUGE in a deck with lords and creatures that grow from other creatures entering the battlefield. Whatever tiny percentage is lost from the 2 extra dorks is more than made up for by the ability to just dig for and slam some big threats with a single spell.
With a vial in play you never really need to hit more than a couple of lands on the field, which you can't really claim for a drawn coco. Vial is an enabler, coco requires an enabler, I hope you follow my train of thought haha.
Not sure I'm on the same page here. Both cards have their requirements. Vial really needs to be down T1, maaaaaybe T2. I actually think that running Vial with mana dorks is quite awkward because they make for awkward T1 choices; the two almost seem to negate one another. CoCo requires 4 mana. One of those you can draw out of if things are going badly (which is rare), and once you do, it's game time. The other can't be recovered once the short 2 turn window has passed; from then on, you're stuck with 4 dead cards in your deck.
It would be really interesting to have a direct side by side comparison between a rainbow vial list and a generally accepted 'stock' coco list over the course of a few hundred games and really get some solid analysis going on which version has the edge in specific matchups (like obviously coco will be better against certain decks there's no denying it, likewise with vial).
I have a fairly active but small playgroup & we test regularly. I could post some matchup analysis for you guys to see? It wouldn't be 'complete' because the sample size would be small, but we always take care to play games thoroughly and consider things properly when testing.
Unfortunately I don't get to play in paper much and I haven't gotten to play MTGO in a few days, but hopefully I can hop back on soon and get back to testing.
CoCo in any deck, whether it be Humans, Vizier Company or Knightfall, suffers from the fact that it really need your deck to be built primarily from a suite of 3 drops.
If you can get the dork to stick turn 1 AND you make both land drops, then sure the turn 3 CoCo feels amazing.
Much like how in a Vial deck, it feels great if you have it on turn 1, but you really don't want it any later than turn 2. Vial is extremely timing sensitive. You can at least draw out of a mana screw and come back with a CoCo.
Vial enables a much faster threat deployment rate, and can let you play with cards in your hand to instant-speed disrupt your opponent.
Despite the fact that the Vial deck, even with a Vial on T1, isn't actually much (if any) faster than a CoCo deck. The instant speed disruption is cool (though in my experience, the instances in which I really want such an effect are very rare), but you're missing points of damage on the front end. If the argument is that Vial is more aggro, constantly playing Humans on the opponent's turn seems to go against that idea.
CoCo can do that too, but each cast is a gamble for the specific card you want. If you CoCo to look for a Kambal or Sin Collector and find 2 Thalia’s Lieutenants, that feels pretty awful.
The chances of hitting those cards in that situation are still much greater than in a deck with no way to dig, so you're kind of making an argument for CoCo without realizing it. CoCo is especially fantastic post-sideboard when you're wanting specific cards like that. Also, double Lieutenant off of CoCo rarely feels bad and often feels amazing .
Sorcery speed “pump the team for alpha strike” CoCos also leave you wide open for a blowout if your opponent mains (or aided in) board wipes.
I don't think any good CoCo player would play into a sweeper like that unless it was absolutely necessary for some reason. Not to mention that, especially post-sideboard, the chances of sniping the sweeper are quite good. In my previous post, I very specifically mentioned that sweeper matchups are one of the rare cases where we will actually hold onto our Companies. I have won plenty of games by forcing my opponent to tap out for a sweeper on turn 4, only to float some mana and cast Company EOT and continue smashing face. I would much rather have CoCo over Vial in these matchups.
Once again, CoCo is the endgame option, but for now Vial is the practical solution to being able to 1) race our opponents down, 2) pump our team out of chump trade range, and 3)disrupt our opponents enough to both hinder their plans and prevent them hindering ours.
I keep seeing this argument, yet I have not seen any numbers or actual scenarios to prove it. How exactly does Vial do any better at aggro, pumping the team or disruption? When discussing comparable draws between both versions like I did on the previous page, I'm not seeing it. Almost all the arguments I'm seeing against CoCo have required situations with bad draws or bad play. When using comparable draws and comparable play, it falls apart.
Let's compare some draws and general early plays real quick then;
Hand 1:
Vial, couple of lands, a one drop (could be a mana dork), 2 two drops and a three drop.
Hand 2:
Coco, couple of lands, a one drop (could be a mana dork), 2 two drops and a three drop.
These aren't out-of-the-ordinary hands to be suggesting.
Hand 1 can deploy turn 1 vial, play 2 creatures on turn 2 and potentially 2 creatures on turn 3 if any one of the three possibilities happened; a land or two-drop is drawn, or if the one-drop was a mana dork (with all those combined that's fairly likely). Each of those creatures played can disrupt an opponent's game plan before they get to cast spells.
Hand 2 can play one creature on turn 1, one creature on turn 2 and then if you drew a land for coco (less likely than the either/or of land or two drop for the vial hand) and if your one-drop was a mana dork (and if that mana dork survived two turns), it can cast coco on turn 3 for two random creatures off the top of your deck. that's relying on a lot of 'ands'. coco is powerful, but this is just a fairly reasonable average scenario and i'm seeing a fairly clear-cut difference between the two.
Of the two equivalent hands, vial is slightly faster (and a more reliable/redundant). Hands are enabled by vial, coco requires enabling. that's a huge difference for a fish-style aggro deck.
If you were to weight a hand towards a better coco-enabling type of hand (I.e. Double mana dork, three lands, coco and any other creature) I'd say hey sure that looks decent in a vacuum but are we an aggro deck or what? That's the kind of hand that would make me giddy in the abzan coco deck and would be a slam-the-table snap-keep there but here it just looks slow. Hands such as that are less likely in the vial build because of running 2 less dorks, 1 less land and no four-mana spells.
My footprint argument is important btw. 3 cards difference is really significant. Vial has a footprint of only itself. Coco has a footprint of itself, plus the two extra dorks and an extra land.
and... You said somewhere in your post that overloading on three-drops is totally fine. I mean, this is what I'm talking about; by doing this you're transitioning your deck into a deck of two halves, where in order to get there with too many three-drops you're relying on extra mana dorks and four mana spells to be able to cast more than one card a turn (or even just cast them at all). Vial has the multiple-spells-per-turn angle going for it, overwhelming spot removal and being the aggressor. If you're struggling through a quagmire of three-drops in your hand just trying to stick a third land or a mana dork to cast just a single threat a turn, you're going to get merk'd by midrange GBx style decks.
there's going to be matchups and decks where CoCo is a slam-dunk, but those will be slower matchups. in the fast matchups you want to be flying out of the gates, rather than playing to 'not losing the grindy game'.
if anything, CoCo in this deck is sort of playing the role of Master of Waves in the merfolk deck. it's a "hey I haven't won the game yet, let's shut the door" kind of card. that's fine. it's powerful. not arguing that point at all. Amazing card, worth including as an option. i'm just posing the question on what's on average faster and earlier with its disruption (and on average that will be vial)
We’re really just arguing two sides of the same coin that is Humans tribal. I can see a similar argument going in Merfolk, in that if all Merfolk were green, they probably would’ve ran CoCo too in a more grindy decklist, but the vial option wouldnt lose any of its efficacy. I’m not saying CoCo is a bad card, nor am I trying to say Vial is the superior card. I’m simply saying that the argument of “CoCo is strictly better in almost every sense, Vial is fringe and inferior” doesn’t hold mettle.
Like purklepuff mentioned, the footprint of CoCo is pretty steep, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that those footprints are bad ones. At the end of the day, someone who had bad draws with Vial might say that the build is inferior, and another with bad draws with CoCo might say that CoCo is inferior. Both builds have access to literally the same cards - Vial has advantages and drawbacks just as CoCo has advantages and drawbacks. There’s no point in trying to say one is better than the other simply because there IS no superior choice.
My meta has a lot of grindy BGx decks around and I know a vial even on turn one will never bring me the speed to kill them before they stall the game.
on paper, vial versions should be better against GBX style decks than CoCo variants.
reasoning - your average GBx deck will dsee maybe 2 removal spells on average over the course of the first couple of turns. Vial lets you play more than one creature per turn, empty your hand faster (blanking their 6+ maindeck discard spells fairly quickly) and on top of that, your creatures are disruptive and can blank removal or get rid of it before they have the opportunity to use it. CoCo builds will naturally lean more on the idea of sticking a mana dork, and have a heavier proliferation of three-drops which forces you down a slower and more fragile path of only being able to stick one threat per turn and being vulnerable to your dorks being killed. Once you get to CoCo mana you'll fare better, but your opponent will have time to discard it from your hand or just stop you from hitting the mana you need until you're too far behind for it to matter. in short you're more vulnerable to spot removal and discard, which is the core tenet of GBx decks).
by building the deck around CoCo, you are giving yourself the impression that you've got an edge in 'grindy games' but you're actually structuring your deck and play sequencing in such a way that runs helplessly straight into your average GBx deck's plans (i.e. snipe a threat per turn until their board is irrelevant). the ability to stick maybe four (or more) creatures on the board by turn 3 is a better way to approach the matchup, by putting them on the back-foot where their discard becomes dead draws and they have to find the answer rather than easily pick off your single threats one by one.
if you've been finding GBx decks hard to beat, perhaps that's why.
that's not to say that both versions can't steal games. obviously both versions have their fast draws! it's just that i'm directly comparing vial and coco, and when drawn, the effects are markedly different over the first four or so turns of the game.
It's a bit complex. Coco Humans have a slightly favorable MU against Jund, mostly because they don't run sweepers main deck. But it's really hard to beat UWx control because of Supreme Verdict alone. Living End is unfavorable while it's a combo deck (but it has sweepers and land denial), while it has a favorable Storm MU because that deck doesn't interact enough with our creatures or mana development.
Humans have polarized cards, then some MUs can turn bad because you don't draw the right cards. The clock ain't aggro enough (unlike Infect, Merfolk, Elves or Affi) so we can rely only on it, while the interaction isn't wide enough to stand a chance in a too long game. We're right in the middle and we need very good creatures to be strong but fair, otherwise we're just a deck that does 2 different things sub-optimally.
The deck needs a few more SB humans for our bad MUs, and maybe one extra maindeck card to set this deck in the Tier 2 status for good. I'm jealous of tribal decks that run Queller, Kopala, Kira, etc...
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Pioneer - A bunch of stuff Modern - Humans Legacy - Grixis Phoenix / Death & Taxes
Don't have enough time at the moment to do a full response regarding the sample hands, as there is a lot to go through there (and it really needs to be a lot more specific in order for a proper comparison/analysis to work), but I did want to hit on a couple of quick points
My footprint argument is important btw. 3 cards difference is really significant. Vial has a footprint of only itself. Coco has a footprint of itself, plus the two extra dorks and an extra land.
You're overlooking a lot of things here. Aether Vial is a huge footprint by itself. It's extremely situational in terms of timing, it's terrible in multiples, and terrible "late" in the game. Aether Vial requires you to play a lot of creatures at the same points of the mana curve. The Vial list runs extra Meddling Mages and 4 Thalia, Guardian of Thrabens (which can't even be played in multiples). These aren't exactly aggro cards. The whole curve of the Vial deck is crazy because of this, with 8 1-drops, 19 (yes, nineteen) 2-drops and 9 3-drops, with the 2 cmc slot extremely bloated in order to make Vial most effective. More on this momentarily.
and... You said somewhere in your post that overloading on three-drops is totally fine. I mean, this is what I'm talking about; by doing this you're transitioning your deck into a deck of two halves, where in order to get there with too many three-drops you're relying on extra mana dorks and four mana spells to be able to cast more than one card a turn (or even just cast them at all). Vial has the multiple-spells-per-turn angle going for it, overwhelming spot removal and being the aggressor. If you're struggling through a quagmire of three-drops in your hand just trying to stick a third land or a mana dork to cast just a single threat a turn, you're going to get merk'd by midrange GBx style decks.
1) If 9-10 3 drops is considered "overloading" then I think we have very different definitions of the term.
2) I said nothing about "overloading" the deck with 3 drops. I said that we have access to a lot of amazing 3 drops, so why not maximize their effectiveness?
3) I would also like to point you to the fact that the Vial list that won last weekend ran....9 3 drops. That's the same number I run in my Bant Black CoCo list. Some lists run 10, but that's usually the max. Is going from 9 to 10 the magic number where we're overloading? In contrast, would we consider 19 2 drops overloading?
We also keep going around this circle where the argument ends up being along the lines of "well if the CoCo deck runs bad and we assume the Vial deck has T1 Vial all the time and never draws them late (or in multiples) and always has the correct number of counters for what's in hand, the Vial deck is better." These arguments only serve to muddy the waters. You can't just pound away at one deck's potential bad draws and ignore the other. There's a whole other can of worms to get into on that subject, but I'll tackle that later.
The main takeaway I'm aiming for with my recent posts is that BOTH cards require a deckbuilding footprint, both cards can be situational in different ways, both cards enable similarly aggressive plays etc, so most of these pros and cons are more or less a wash at the end. The REAL discussion, in my opinion, are the different play patterns enabled by these cards (ie draw step disruption, main phase aggressive CoCos etc) and what other side effects do they have (ability to dig for silver bullets, ability to run smoother mana, ability to have 1 sided Thalias, ability to have on-strategy card advantage) etc. Lets discuss these things and actually move forward in figuring out how to maximize each version.
I agree with Kingcars. It's important not to turn the topic into a theory-crafting debate that never ends (no point in opposing the 2 variants by stacking arguments over and over). Play the deck, get some reps, come back and give feedback.
I want to try Hostage Taker so bad with Coco and 22 lands, and possibly get rid of a couple Path to Exile. Actually, if a player wants to run 8 mana dorks, why doesn't he get rid of Path entirely, add Reflecting Pool, and keep Coco as the only noncreature spell ? It would certainly be doable if we had a 1-cmc Human dork that added G instead of W (to ensure Coco, dammit !).
good effect but probably wrong deck. its a spell, so dilutes your coco's or vials. anything that isn't a human really need to have a great reason to be run in a deck like this. basically path to exile, coco, vial are the only noncreature things i would put in.
Lol
Can't click the link on my phone but I'm taking a wild guess that you're linking the Magic Aids video? If so, love that guy's channel. Props to him.
Had a long hard think on the coco vs. vial debate last night and eventually (bearing in mind I'm a devout abzan coco player) settled on vial being the hero we need (but not the one we deserve lol).
The ability to front-load our disruption and get under midrangey decks before they can catch up is a core aspect of what can make this deck good. We curve out early, fast and in doing so, disrupt our opponent and put them off balance.
I don't want to play this deck as a grindy mid-game list, I want to win before I've even drawn 11 cards from my library with a list that has no trouble with its mana and can Leverage vial aggressively to compliment the low land count.
If anything, I'd worry about needing more mana dorks in a list running coco. Dedicated coco decks run maybe 12 mana generating creatures in order to support a 4 mana spell with a low land count, and I don't want to go that route.
Genuine question to those players on coco, how many games are lost because you can't close out the game quickly in the early turns and get stuck not being able to cast coco on-curve or (perhaps worse) having to pass into your opponent's potentially 5th turn holding up coco when you could have instead been jamming those disruptive/hasty threats earlier and shutting an opponent off their game-plan or removal.
Coco is (perhaps!) the best creature-centric card advantage engine in the format, but for it to be anything other than a midrange grindy option, you need to be drawing (and sticking!) a mana accelerant. That doesn't bode well for a low to the ground fish deck, and Coco to me feels like a way to "not lose" rather than a way to win, simply because there's no way in hell you're casting coco early enough in a deck who's only accelerant is noble hierarch and probably only runs 20-21 lands. If anything, coco is going to be a turn 5 play on average due to the low land count. I'm personally not handicapping my list in that way. If your answer is to run more lands/mana dorks and less genuine threats, I'm not keen on that either. Coco feels like a great safety net but without reliable acceleration I don't see the value.
Vial on the other hand can perform a similar duty in terms of deploying threats on the board but it *is* a mana accelerant. That's why I'm having such a hard time seeing the ultimate benefit of coco in this deck.
But I'd welcome and appreciate a well-considered response addressing these shortfalls in support of coco. I want to get the full debate out for everyone to see.
Like I said I'm a huge coco fan, was singing the praises of the card before it was even released and had my copies preordered before most people had even noticed the card properly. I'm a coco convert. I just don't see it working properly here.
Repel the Abominable which can stop storm, titanshift, etc. and
brave the elements which can not only protect from some wipes, but also can give you an unblockable swing, as most of our creatures are white.
—Radha, Keldon warlord
I want to start off by saying that there cannot be a comparison to other CoCo decks as far as general strategy/play patterns. Humans CoCo does not play the same way that other CoCo decks do. One of the big differences being that we play CoCo as an aggro card, meaning it's usually cast before attacks to ensure maximum damage. But more on that later...
- You mention that CoCo lives in "decks who's only accelerant is noble hierarch and probably only runs 20-21 lands" - every single CoCo list in this thread (or at least the vast majority) runs 21 lands and at least 6 or more dorks.
- In response to your previous post, I clearly laid out the fact (with exact numbers and everything) that the Vial version with a T1 Vial isn't even more aggressive by default than the CoCo version with a T1 dork.
- I have gone over the idea that the Coco variant is a grindy midrange deck and how/why it's not that. It's an aggressive, disruptive deck with on-strategy card advantage that also furthers its aggression.
- You talk about how the CoCo decks have to draw and stick an early dork while overlooking the fact that the Vial list needs Vial on T1 or at least T2 in order for it to be effective. Without that, it's basically just a CoCo deck without CoCo and with some dead cards thrown in.
The CoCo decks have zero problems closing games out; I'd argue they're better at it than the Vial list due to the fact that just a couple of removal spells on the other side + lack of card advantage means that the Vial deck doesn't have a way to close out if the opponent stabilizes. It's heavily leaning on Mantis Rider in such a scenario, which is a card CoCo decks can also run. Lord help the Vial deck if it actually gets hit with a sweeper. I have also gone over the fact that all of the CoCo variants I have played, even the slower ones, have no issues killing on T4 with a solid draw, even through blockers/removal. What is the Vial list doing that significantly increases that clock?
CoCo is almost always cast on main phase before attacks, so the idea of "having to pass into your opponent's turn holding up coco" really isn't a thing in most matchups. If I can cast it, I cast it. If I'm holding up CoCo, it's because I'm at the point where I have enough pressure on board to force my opponent to have an answer without needing to commit more to the board (this is almost purely a control matchup thing). Its actually these exact instances/matchups where I would MUCH rather have CoCo than Vial.
You're overlooking the fact that these are tiny concessions (as little as 3 cards - 2 mana dorks, 1 land) to make way for a MAJOR increase in effective threat density with the way CoCo digs through the deck. It also allows you to play something like Path to Exile, which is still one of the best (if not the best) removal spell in the format and greatly punishes opponents for trying to lean on a single blocker, furthering our gameplan. If you REALLY want more creatures, you can easily crank the creature count to 35 just by cutting the paths for something, which puts it right up there with the Vial list.
Also, I think one of the huge advantages of Human CoCo over others is that the mana dorks are still on-strategy. They get pumped by lords and they can grow existing Champs/Lieutenants. This is something demonstrated in my previous response to you on the last page.
I think my biggest thing is this: Collected Company is a great card when we're ahead AND when we're behind. Aether Vial is great when things are going well but awful/nearly useless when things are going bad. Both versions present very similar clocks/strategies, so I will always take the card that is better in a wider array of scenarios, especially in a wide format like Modern.
As a final note, I want to clarify that I don't actually think the discussion should be Aether Vial vs Collected Company; if the deck can run CoCo and maintain a similar clock (which it does), it should. CoCo is the better card for this archetype, at least in my opinion, but it's not just a card vs card comparison. Running Aether Vial has side effects that I think are far more interesting and debatable than how the card itself stacks up against Company. I think the discussion needs to be about:
- Whether or not the CoCo decks can support a decent 5C mana base, because Mantis Rider is a beast.
- Whether or not the ability to use Thalia 1.0 as a 1 sided effect and the ability to reliably have draw step disruption (along with other similar Vial trickery) is worth not running CoCo/Path
- The importance of critical creature mass in a deck reliant on creature-based synergies, and how resilient the deck should be in the face of mass removal/sweepers
These are cards usually run in the 1 drop Kytheon, Hero of Akros style Humans decks (there are a few lists in the Primer). The CoCo/Vial variants run creatures that already address the issues that these cards tackle (ex Reflector Mage clears blockers, meaning Brave isn't needed as much), so they're not seen as necessary.
I think we can reliably play 5c with Coco and Mantis Rider. I have tested it in about 100 Games yet and I never had mana problems. That is also why I prefer Tireless Tracker in a creature mirror, because it can overcome stalls just by the pure card advantage. I am however testing both Tracker and Thalia.
I think the main advantage of the vial version is the one-sided Thalia V1.0 and the Xanthrid Necromancer. Especially the Thalia is making me want to play the vial version at the moment.
So as it stands there are clearly decent arguments to be made for each approach.
I'm not keen on upping the number of mana dorks above four. I believe noble hierarch to be providing a useful function beyond pure "birds of paradise" analogue because of the exalted keyword, which is very handy when twinned with a first strike thalia or a flying mantis rider. That's great, but as soon as "generic mana dork 5-6" enter the fray you've lost me.
I'm also not totally sold on the general structure of 21 lands and 6 mana dorks in what is essentially an aggro deck. It feels to me (and I freely admit that I make this statement without hard experience to back it up) that there's some sort of compromise happening here in order to accept coco in the maindeck which reduces the efficacy of the aggressiveness of the deck by some small percentage, like the total package in order to accommodate this one spell amounts to 7 cards. The 4 companies themselves, +1 land +2 dorks (maybe pseudo more if you count any lands which deal you damage?). By direct comparison, vial needs no such compromise, allowing a lower land count and needing no additional acceleration, so it has a smaller footprint in the deck. With a vial in play you never really need to hit more than a couple of lands on the field, which you can't really claim for a drawn coco. Vial is an enabler, coco requires an enabler, I hope you follow my train of thought haha.
It would be really interesting to have a direct side by side comparison between a rainbow vial list and a generally accepted 'stock' coco list over the course of a few hundred games and really get some solid analysis going on which version has the edge in specific matchups (like obviously coco will be better against certain decks there's no denying it, likewise with vial).
I have a fairly active but small playgroup & we test regularly. I could post some matchup analysis for you guys to see? It wouldn't be 'complete' because the sample size would be small, but we always take care to play games thoroughly and consider things properly when testing.
The first list a 5-color CoCo list running a very similar creature base to the Vial list Mullen ran, though I think there's a better way to construct that mana base than 4 City of Brass. Thoughts?
W Humans
Modern
G Stompy
EDH
GWU Rafiq
I've been testing 4 Cavern, 4 Territory, and 4 Reflecting Pool and the mana base has been fairly consistent.
GWSelvala and the Return to HumanityGW
UWDragonlord Ojutai, Control's Elder DragonUW
UBGTasigur, the God-Pharaoh's Gift to EDHUBG
UBRNicol Bolas and his Super
friendsPawnsUBRModern
UWUW Control/Midrange/Bad JundUW
WUBRGHumansWUBRG
BGMidrangeBG
W Humans
Modern
G Stompy
EDH
GWU Rafiq
4 Cavern,
4 Unclaimed Territory,
4 Windswept Heath,
1 Verdant Catacombs,
1 Forest,
1 Plains,
1 Hallowed Fountain,
1 Godless Shrine,
1 Overgrown Tomb,
1 Breeding Pool,
1 Stomping Ground,
1 Temple Garden
However, I often felt that I drew too many lands.
So I will try:
4 Cavern of Souls
4 Unclaimed Territory
4 Windswepth Heath
3 Arid Mesa
1 Plains
1 Forest
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
1 Godless Shrine
1 Hallowed Fountain or Breeding Pool
Sorcery speed “pump the team for alpha strike” CoCos also leave you wide open for a blowout if your opponent mains (or aided in) board wipes. The alternative for Vial is to have a mantis rider + big Thalia and hierarch attacking in for chunks of damage at a time while you can either a) hold a freebooter to Vial I’m on your opponent’s drawstep to take any board wipes/removal and gain information, or b) Hold a Thalia 1.0 to Vial I’m at instant speed if they choose to take out for a board wipe. Yes, CoCo can potentially have more threat density and late game value, but Vial gives you the options to gain tons of virtual advantage via having your board stick.
Once again, CoCo is the endgame option, but for now Vial is the practical solution to being able to 1) race our opponents down, 2) pump our team out of chump trade range, and 3)disrupt our opponents enough to both hinder their plans and prevent them hindering ours.
I can understand that, but I think the point here is that Avacyn's Pilgrim isn't *really* just a generic mana dork. It's still a human. It grows Champs and Lieutenants, gets pumped by lords and provides mana acceleration. There's still a good amount of value to be had. In the scenario I described on the previous page, the T1 Pilgrim was a 3/3 just from doing things the deck wants to naturally do. While opponents are busy scrambling against our fatties, having those sneaky damage points on the board can be clutch.
You can't count the 4 CoCo towards the 7 card package and ignore the 4 Vial. Vial itself is a compromise because it's not a human and it doesn't get us more humans. CoCo is equivalent to 2 humans an absurdly high amount of the time (seriously, since running the 31 creature layout, over countless games I can count on 1, maybe 2 hands the number of times I've gotten less than 2. I think the actual mathematical percentage of hitting 2 or more is something like 92%). What you're describing is only a 3 card difference. The difference is 1 land and 2 mana dorks; I'm not counting Path here, as that is more of a luxury afforded by running CoCo as opposed to a compromise made for it (and it can easily be swapped out for creatures if the deck builder so chooses). The other thing to note is that it is only a 2 creature difference for a card that generates extra creatures, which is HUGE in a deck with lords and creatures that grow from other creatures entering the battlefield. Whatever tiny percentage is lost from the 2 extra dorks is more than made up for by the ability to just dig for and slam some big threats with a single spell.
Not sure I'm on the same page here. Both cards have their requirements. Vial really needs to be down T1, maaaaaybe T2. I actually think that running Vial with mana dorks is quite awkward because they make for awkward T1 choices; the two almost seem to negate one another. CoCo requires 4 mana. One of those you can draw out of if things are going badly (which is rare), and once you do, it's game time. The other can't be recovered once the short 2 turn window has passed; from then on, you're stuck with 4 dead cards in your deck.
Agreed.
Unfortunately I don't get to play in paper much and I haven't gotten to play MTGO in a few days, but hopefully I can hop back on soon and get back to testing.
I'm not seeing the problem here. Humans have a fantastic suite of 3 drops to choose from: Mantis Rider, Reflector Mage, Thalia, Heretic Cathar, Anafenza, the Foremost, Sin Collector, Eternal Witness, Tireless Tracker, the list goes on. We WANT our deck to have a good density of these fantastic cards (10-11 for most lists), so Company is a natural fit.
Much like how in a Vial deck, it feels great if you have it on turn 1, but you really don't want it any later than turn 2. Vial is extremely timing sensitive. You can at least draw out of a mana screw and come back with a CoCo.
Despite the fact that the Vial deck, even with a Vial on T1, isn't actually much (if any) faster than a CoCo deck. The instant speed disruption is cool (though in my experience, the instances in which I really want such an effect are very rare), but you're missing points of damage on the front end. If the argument is that Vial is more aggro, constantly playing Humans on the opponent's turn seems to go against that idea.
The chances of hitting those cards in that situation are still much greater than in a deck with no way to dig, so you're kind of making an argument for CoCo without realizing it. CoCo is especially fantastic post-sideboard when you're wanting specific cards like that. Also, double Lieutenant off of CoCo rarely feels bad and often feels amazing .
I don't think any good CoCo player would play into a sweeper like that unless it was absolutely necessary for some reason. Not to mention that, especially post-sideboard, the chances of sniping the sweeper are quite good. In my previous post, I very specifically mentioned that sweeper matchups are one of the rare cases where we will actually hold onto our Companies. I have won plenty of games by forcing my opponent to tap out for a sweeper on turn 4, only to float some mana and cast Company EOT and continue smashing face. I would much rather have CoCo over Vial in these matchups.
I keep seeing this argument, yet I have not seen any numbers or actual scenarios to prove it. How exactly does Vial do any better at aggro, pumping the team or disruption? When discussing comparable draws between both versions like I did on the previous page, I'm not seeing it. Almost all the arguments I'm seeing against CoCo have required situations with bad draws or bad play. When using comparable draws and comparable play, it falls apart.
Hand 1:
Vial, couple of lands, a one drop (could be a mana dork), 2 two drops and a three drop.
Hand 2:
Coco, couple of lands, a one drop (could be a mana dork), 2 two drops and a three drop.
These aren't out-of-the-ordinary hands to be suggesting.
Hand 1 can deploy turn 1 vial, play 2 creatures on turn 2 and potentially 2 creatures on turn 3 if any one of the three possibilities happened; a land or two-drop is drawn, or if the one-drop was a mana dork (with all those combined that's fairly likely). Each of those creatures played can disrupt an opponent's game plan before they get to cast spells.
Hand 2 can play one creature on turn 1, one creature on turn 2 and then if you drew a land for coco (less likely than the either/or of land or two drop for the vial hand) and if your one-drop was a mana dork (and if that mana dork survived two turns), it can cast coco on turn 3 for two random creatures off the top of your deck. that's relying on a lot of 'ands'. coco is powerful, but this is just a fairly reasonable average scenario and i'm seeing a fairly clear-cut difference between the two.
Of the two equivalent hands, vial is slightly faster (and a more reliable/redundant). Hands are enabled by vial, coco requires enabling. that's a huge difference for a fish-style aggro deck.
If you were to weight a hand towards a better coco-enabling type of hand (I.e. Double mana dork, three lands, coco and any other creature) I'd say hey sure that looks decent in a vacuum but are we an aggro deck or what? That's the kind of hand that would make me giddy in the abzan coco deck and would be a slam-the-table snap-keep there but here it just looks slow. Hands such as that are less likely in the vial build because of running 2 less dorks, 1 less land and no four-mana spells.
My footprint argument is important btw. 3 cards difference is really significant. Vial has a footprint of only itself. Coco has a footprint of itself, plus the two extra dorks and an extra land.
and... You said somewhere in your post that overloading on three-drops is totally fine. I mean, this is what I'm talking about; by doing this you're transitioning your deck into a deck of two halves, where in order to get there with too many three-drops you're relying on extra mana dorks and four mana spells to be able to cast more than one card a turn (or even just cast them at all). Vial has the multiple-spells-per-turn angle going for it, overwhelming spot removal and being the aggressor. If you're struggling through a quagmire of three-drops in your hand just trying to stick a third land or a mana dork to cast just a single threat a turn, you're going to get merk'd by midrange GBx style decks.
there's going to be matchups and decks where CoCo is a slam-dunk, but those will be slower matchups. in the fast matchups you want to be flying out of the gates, rather than playing to 'not losing the grindy game'.
if anything, CoCo in this deck is sort of playing the role of Master of Waves in the merfolk deck. it's a "hey I haven't won the game yet, let's shut the door" kind of card. that's fine. it's powerful. not arguing that point at all. Amazing card, worth including as an option. i'm just posing the question on what's on average faster and earlier with its disruption (and on average that will be vial)
Like purklepuff mentioned, the footprint of CoCo is pretty steep, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that those footprints are bad ones. At the end of the day, someone who had bad draws with Vial might say that the build is inferior, and another with bad draws with CoCo might say that CoCo is inferior. Both builds have access to literally the same cards - Vial has advantages and drawbacks just as CoCo has advantages and drawbacks. There’s no point in trying to say one is better than the other simply because there IS no superior choice.
on paper, vial versions should be better against GBX style decks than CoCo variants.
reasoning - your average GBx deck will dsee maybe 2 removal spells on average over the course of the first couple of turns. Vial lets you play more than one creature per turn, empty your hand faster (blanking their 6+ maindeck discard spells fairly quickly) and on top of that, your creatures are disruptive and can blank removal or get rid of it before they have the opportunity to use it. CoCo builds will naturally lean more on the idea of sticking a mana dork, and have a heavier proliferation of three-drops which forces you down a slower and more fragile path of only being able to stick one threat per turn and being vulnerable to your dorks being killed. Once you get to CoCo mana you'll fare better, but your opponent will have time to discard it from your hand or just stop you from hitting the mana you need until you're too far behind for it to matter. in short you're more vulnerable to spot removal and discard, which is the core tenet of GBx decks).
by building the deck around CoCo, you are giving yourself the impression that you've got an edge in 'grindy games' but you're actually structuring your deck and play sequencing in such a way that runs helplessly straight into your average GBx deck's plans (i.e. snipe a threat per turn until their board is irrelevant). the ability to stick maybe four (or more) creatures on the board by turn 3 is a better way to approach the matchup, by putting them on the back-foot where their discard becomes dead draws and they have to find the answer rather than easily pick off your single threats one by one.
if you've been finding GBx decks hard to beat, perhaps that's why.
that's not to say that both versions can't steal games. obviously both versions have their fast draws! it's just that i'm directly comparing vial and coco, and when drawn, the effects are markedly different over the first four or so turns of the game.
Humans have polarized cards, then some MUs can turn bad because you don't draw the right cards. The clock ain't aggro enough (unlike Infect, Merfolk, Elves or Affi) so we can rely only on it, while the interaction isn't wide enough to stand a chance in a too long game. We're right in the middle and we need very good creatures to be strong but fair, otherwise we're just a deck that does 2 different things sub-optimally.
The deck needs a few more SB humans for our bad MUs, and maybe one extra maindeck card to set this deck in the Tier 2 status for good. I'm jealous of tribal decks that run Queller, Kopala, Kira, etc...
You're overlooking a lot of things here. Aether Vial is a huge footprint by itself. It's extremely situational in terms of timing, it's terrible in multiples, and terrible "late" in the game. Aether Vial requires you to play a lot of creatures at the same points of the mana curve. The Vial list runs extra Meddling Mages and 4 Thalia, Guardian of Thrabens (which can't even be played in multiples). These aren't exactly aggro cards. The whole curve of the Vial deck is crazy because of this, with 8 1-drops, 19 (yes, nineteen) 2-drops and 9 3-drops, with the 2 cmc slot extremely bloated in order to make Vial most effective. More on this momentarily.
1) If 9-10 3 drops is considered "overloading" then I think we have very different definitions of the term.
2) I said nothing about "overloading" the deck with 3 drops. I said that we have access to a lot of amazing 3 drops, so why not maximize their effectiveness?
3) I would also like to point you to the fact that the Vial list that won last weekend ran....9 3 drops. That's the same number I run in my Bant Black CoCo list. Some lists run 10, but that's usually the max. Is going from 9 to 10 the magic number where we're overloading? In contrast, would we consider 19 2 drops overloading?
We also keep going around this circle where the argument ends up being along the lines of "well if the CoCo deck runs bad and we assume the Vial deck has T1 Vial all the time and never draws them late (or in multiples) and always has the correct number of counters for what's in hand, the Vial deck is better." These arguments only serve to muddy the waters. You can't just pound away at one deck's potential bad draws and ignore the other. There's a whole other can of worms to get into on that subject, but I'll tackle that later.
The main takeaway I'm aiming for with my recent posts is that BOTH cards require a deckbuilding footprint, both cards can be situational in different ways, both cards enable similarly aggressive plays etc, so most of these pros and cons are more or less a wash at the end. The REAL discussion, in my opinion, are the different play patterns enabled by these cards (ie draw step disruption, main phase aggressive CoCos etc) and what other side effects do they have (ability to dig for silver bullets, ability to run smoother mana, ability to have 1 sided Thalias, ability to have on-strategy card advantage) etc. Lets discuss these things and actually move forward in figuring out how to maximize each version.
I want to try Hostage Taker so bad with Coco and 22 lands, and possibly get rid of a couple Path to Exile. Actually, if a player wants to run 8 mana dorks, why doesn't he get rid of Path entirely, add Reflecting Pool, and keep Coco as the only noncreature spell ? It would certainly be doable if we had a 1-cmc Human dork that added G instead of W (to ensure Coco, dammit !).