MTG Salvation

+1 for Catdag
Both wurmcoil and ballista are better then battlesphere - They are more resillent against mass removal (only Pte really hurts wurmcoil engine). Battlesphere is 1 mana more then wurmcoil engine (sometimes it's relevant enough). Ballista is far better - it's not dead in early game or in games without tron online.
We don't exacly need new finisher for the deck, If we are winning we already do this (no matter if it is wurmcoil/titan/ballista or slaver). These 4 myr-guys doesn't make a difference for me - You want an edge against wide aggro decks? 7 mana is a way too much and with fast tron ANY big guy from our deck will be devastating (against goblins for eg. ballista is the beast - wurmcoil sometimes isn't enough against Legion Loyalist first strike even casted on 3rd turn). Against control ballista is way better (it dodge PtE and verdicts + can hit their planeswalking finishers).

I don't exacly like torrential gearhulk here (it's the same thing like with opt) - snappy is another pair of boots - he can be casted for 2 and already kill something or just chump (aka gain virtual life).

mtgnorin, you made a good point. Battlesphere can come on t3 if you have tron, but Gearhulk will never come on t3. It does come with an instant(and playing 8 instants with X in the cost doesnt make it so good). I prefer not having either on the deck, to be honest. Maybe I would even have sundering titan, since my meta is full of 2 and specially 3 color decks(jund, abzan etc)
what is ****ed up is how my meta is full of burn, makes it hard for me. Whats the general consensus on this matchup?

I've been taking this list to some success at my local LGS



I can't afford chalice yet
I also play in a very control/combo oriented meta so I find the mindslavers and thought knots very good.

Quote from IngloriousOmen »

Quote from Catdag »

mtgnorin, you made a good point. Battlesphere can come on t3 if you have tron, but Gearhulk will never come on t3. It does come with an instant(and playing 8 instants with X in the cost doesnt make it so good). I prefer not having either on the deck, to be honest. Maybe I would even have sundering titan, since my meta is full of 2 and specially 3 color decks(jund, abzan etc)
what is ****ed up is how my meta is full of burn, makes it hard for me. Whats the general consensus on this matchup?

Against Burn, Chalice *4 is really good.
If you face too many and want a more anti-aggro sideboard, consider Steel Wall (0/4 defender for 1 generic mana) and Filigre Familiar (2/2 for 3, gives you 2hp, and draw a card when he dies), they are quite helpful against dredge, burn...
Platinum angel + some counters and you can gain a lot of turns vs Burn, Affinity, Infect...
Of course, Spatial contortion are great. You can go 2MB and 2 SB if burn is really a big problem, because their swiftspear or goblin guides are very powerful vs Tron. Most of the time, a single creature will deal around 6-8 dmgs on game 1.

But the best option remains Chalice on 1.

I main Trinket and Treasure, decent blockers to say the least, and a couple of Chalice. Honestly, burn is such an issue I even considered dragon's claw. I think conclusion is mainly to put more spatial contortion, at least in the SB too, and I am going to cut filigree and bottle gnomes. I really like the refreshments, feels soooo good to draw lands from guides that are stopped in them, and when they suck the bolt, omggg its just so bad for the burn player(but actually it ends up being bad for me, resultswise). I considered spell skite for a while, but I have mixed feelings, specially because all the typical artifact hate gets it too, and its rare that you pay blue mana instead of life. It sucks against smash to smithereens.
Kozilek is great, its awesome to jam a 12/12 that draws insanely, but I really don't see myself getting to that much mana while being so ahead I can cast it no trouble to finish the opponent. You probably could counter a path to exile most of the time, or ***** like that, otherwise its just random. if I have 10 mana, I rather put wurmcoil + counter, mindslaver or whatever I can do with 10 mana that means leaving a counterspell that I will certainly counter meaningfull ***** or not having to worry about neeeding to counter something. Obviously filling my hand is great, obviously a 12/12 menace is a great clock, but it doesnt sit right for the past 6 turns I had to hold it. Ugin is better IMO, it draws cards in the ultimate, get rid of permanents, does direct damage, cost 2 less.
What is the opinion on talismans? I feel they fit well in Shoktroopas Utron, because of EExplosives, but otherwise... I don't know, I think I like Solemn and gemstone caverns better for this purpose.

I rather not tap out on turn two or three to play a Talisman. That's when other people are playing their most important spells. So I'd rather hold up a counterspell.

Isnt it better to condescend for 1 that moon instead of dropping a talisman? I would understand having talismans if you run spell pierce for that matter, or spell snare on the draw, but these situations are so uncommom that idk... think when I have 2 lands untapped and one of them is a blue source, of course, I rather condescend, remand, you name it. Thats why I run 7~8 Islands normally.
I am reluctant about TKS too, a lot of people Fatal Push where I play, and I just dont mind when my Trinket/Treasure gets pushed on revolt, its gymnastic for absolutely nothing, when they have the chance to play it, because its just natural to draw a lil chalice from the mage, or coil from treasure.

Hey U-Tron fanatics. I am here to post a decklist I have been playing to an insane amount of success recently. I ran a much more conventional/traditional U Tron list for years but after I saw a rough version of the following deck online I knew I had to get some reps in. This list is the result of about 2 months of testing, tuning and playing. I haven't seen many people talking about anything like it on other threads nor other sites but the power is definitely there. Feel free to ask questions about card choices and numbers. Forgive the poor formatting.

1 Basilisk Collar
4 Expedition Map
4 Conduit of Ruin
4 Thought-Knot Seer
4 Matter Reshaper
2 Solemn Simulacrum
2 Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger
4 Condescend
4 Remand
3 Repeal
3 Dismember
4 Eldrazi Temple
4 Urza's Tower
4 Urza's Mine
4 Urza's Power Plant
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
8 Island

SB

3 Ratchet Bomb
4 Spreading Seas
3 Warping Wail
1 Cavern of Souls
2 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Flashfreeze
1 Marrow Shards

I really don't wanna play chalice because of their price and the potential of them being banned, is is okay to run without them?

Imo Sundering Titan is worth to play mainboard (he's decent big creature even when land ponza isn't that exiting for eg. against eldratron).
You really didn't liked ballista? I've got totally oppositve feelings about the card (maybe beacuse I have really fast and aggresive local meta).
TKS is good but he's a lot better with eldrazi temples onboard - which we cannot afford. The worst thing about him is that he gives our opponent a card and we don't play that much creatures like eldrazi tron does (so Our TKS will gets removed for sure even if he takes their best card) and TKS is really poor topdeck lategame (plz just compare the guy with walking ballista :P)

@timtamthebadman96: It's interesting decklist but I don't see what it's better then normal mono-u tron decklists or pure eldrazi tron (which don't really need any counterspells and is a deck to beat without questioning). What arguments lead You to this kind of "heresy-list"?

@SystemSCSnake: I don't think chalice will see a banhammer - It's not that oppresive but I know that hitting death shadow hurts. I suppose the first card to get ban is eldrazi temple... Anyway To fight with fast decks You need at last one chalice of the void in mainboard (and 1-2 ways to fech it). Without it fighting against zoo/tribals (like goblins/elves) burn (where mainboard chalice is soo good) and death shadow variants is hard (without chalice and fast tron it's just impossible IMO).

I gotta say I'm super surprised about the amount of people that are against trinket mage and walking ballista, especially when they'd rather play fabricate ? The deck is built around getting card advantage off each spell and trinket does exactly that. It replaces a card in your hand, gives you a 2/2 body, and can either tutor a wincon (ballista), hate (chalice), sweeper (explosives), or mana fixing (map). It also allows you to run a bunch of silver bullets out of the sideboard.

As for mana rocks I love them, but I struggle to find a place in the mainboard to squeeze them in. Already I can't get every spell I want in there and it's not as though the deck every struggles to curve out. That being said I'm up to 2 engineered explosives (1 main, 1 side), and I would loooove some rocks to get it up to CMC 3.

Quote from bradstone »

As for mana rocks I love them, but I struggle to find a place in the mainboard to squeeze them in. Already I can't get every spell I want in there and it's not as though the deck every struggles to curve out. That being said I'm up to 2 engineered explosives (1 main, 1 side), and I would loooove some rocks to get it up to CMC 3.

one of the main solutions to this problem that I've found can just be to play a black land, like River of Tears or Urborg, tomb of yawgmoth, then all you have to play for rocks is Talisman of progress. Plus if you decide to play urborg as your black source, it also works well with titan for killing manlands, opposing tron lands, etc.

In what situation is Bottle Gnomes better than Filigree Familiar?

Bottle gnomes are better against burn (with aca ruins You can block all day long and gain 3 life at the end step).
I do like talisman version of the deck but I think that 23 lands are minimum (with tolaria west as a 23rd land).
This list got a few too much 2 drops (talismans + remands + chalices + expedition map plays + repeal for 1, condescend for 1, spell burst...) It's just a lot things to do on 2nd turn (and playing talisman is the worst one).
I would go:
-1 treasure mage
-1 chalice of the void
-1 karn (he's really not needed here - it's just way too random and don't work good in late game)
-1 epiphany (I played this a lot when it was printed and that was just a win-more card IMO)
-1/2 spell burst (1 is really enough for this kind of card - for me it can be just second wurmcoil in this slot)
and: (mostly for better early game and tutor power for 0 cmc)
+1 trinket mage
+2 walking ballista
+1 engineered explosives
+1 tolaria west
and swap 1 talisman of dominance for talisman of progress (to have a chance of makin EE on 3 counters).

Then I would test if this 3rd talisman is better then 24rd land - beacuse I'm still not sure (but these 3 talismans seems to be nice with just tron lands on hand - so mulliganing should be better).

Infect and Auras see basically no play. At all. Filigree Familiar is decent vs grindy midrange (Jund, Abzan, Shadow decks) as well as Burn and D+T.

hi guys, i dont play tron but someone just told me that ugin and chalice of the void are now required cards for the deck is this true?

At last 1 chalice is needed (in trinket bulids), Ugin is just too good for not playing him here

Guys I've got a question about Perilous Voyage You tried this new bounce spell?
I've tested it in SB and it wasn't bad (scry2 is really cool) and can bounce bigger threats for less mana then repeal - but I don't think it's that good replacement (it lacks bounce Our things like various mages). Anybody runs this card?

Nervous about my upcoming pptq. Gonna take it to an IQ this weekend and then Regionals to hopefully get a fill of the meta around where i am playing. So I can be pretty prepared.

Hey folks, first time posting but I've been on the deck for 3 years and loved every minute of it. I usually play fairly standard lists (more towards pie style than shok) but I've been feeling like I need to do something different lately. My meta tends to be very fair and somewhat slow, which sounds good for us, but I've been having some problems with facing turn 1 thoughtseize 4 out of 4 matches a night. I've also been really underwhelmed by some of the normal staples like angel and chalice in my meta. Does anyone have advice for cards/configurations that would be good to get an edge on a fair, discard heavy meta, or do I really just need to reexamine my playstyle?

My big problem with chalice has been that without the usual good matchups for it being common I often feel like it just doesn't accomplish that much. Against discard decks especially I find that vs discard heavy hands it usually just gets taken first, and otherwise my opponent are just playing cards that don't get hit by chalice on 1 and by turn 3/4 I would rather be doing other things besides dropping chalice on 2. My meta seems to favor traditional BGx, eldrazi, and other random grindy decks like fae and tokens, with a smattering of control and combo. As metas go it's a pretty favorable one, I just can't seem to shake the feeling that I'm playing too many cards that aren't impactful enough against the decks I see often. I really like the idea of playing spell pierce, and might throw an extra gemstone back in my board.

I've been really resistant to playing leylines because I don't like the idea of having a card in my deck that's unstable after t1. I know there's been other discussion of it on here before. If I am playing against a ton of discard is it worth it?

My playstyle tends to be to play like a draw go control deck first, then tron. Should I be trying to force early tron more against the kinds of decks I'm seeing? I'm also a fan of keeping land heavy hands, which I could see being a source of my discard woes.

My current list is:

I also briefly flirted with Opt, but was underwhelmed.
Thank you so much for your help!

Hey everyone

I hope not to warm up any topic that has been chewed through over and over again, but I’ve found only little about Disrupting Shoal using the search function and wanted to ask, if anyone has any experience in playing with it?

Here‘s my current build:



I am playing with the thought of replacing the 2 MB Spatial Contortion and 2 Solemn Simulacrum for 4 Disrupting Shoal. This would leave us with 7 1cmc, 9 2cmc and 6 3cmc blue spells to ditch to a potentially saving D’Shoal pre-board should we need it. I often find myself facing quite some threats ranging from 1-3 cmc that I would like to counter, but don’t have enough counterspells for or not enough mana due to T1 map or beginning on the draw. Lategame, UU usually isn’t an issue anymore in my experience and D’Shoal could be hardcast.

The Spatials are sided out more often than not and most of the time Chalice and D’Shoal should do the job too. Solemn is ok, feels a bit lacking though. I am well aware, that lowering the overall artifact count is worsening Thirst and D‘Shoal being card disadvantage but maybe, just maybe, we are loaded well enough to make it our Modern-legal Force of Will?

Did anyone tinker with it recently?