MTG Salvation

Micarc, I like your list. I'm running something quite similar with some minor differences :



1) No SfA has been no burden : Glimmer of Genius has been great has a 1-of. Think Twice helps hitting land drops, but Serum Visions sets that up, so it okay having more velocity with the Glimmer. The card is really great and has major upsides with the potential of seing 4 cards.
2) 1 Sphinx's Revelation is ok. 2 would be overkill.
3) I've cut down 1 Teferi and kept Jace. I was bashing a bit on Jace from time to time, but after more than 65 games under the belt with him, he's better in our shell than Teferi. I find no place for Teferi (except maybe in place of Glimmer).
4) Counter spell suite : 4 Cryptic, 2 Spell Snare, 2 Logic Knot, 2 Mana Leak and 1 Negate is pretty good. It could be 3/1/1 Logic Knot/Mana Leak/Negate also, depending on the meta. But it sure fits well.
5) Sideboard is great against combo : that's one of our major axis of leverage. Having 2 Dispel, 2 Thoughtseize and 2 Surgical Extraction helps a lot against combo decks and it mostly is GG when resolving a Surgical on a key card (Ad Nauseam, Grapeshot, Scapeshift, etc.). Having 2 Blessed Alliance, 2 Timely Reinforcement and 1 Collective Brutality helps shore out Burn too. Finaly, Baneslayer Angel is the go-to finisher when needed. It could be Teferi, but the Angel is so good!

The deck feels really great, good interactions and could go 7-2 with good ties and some intensive playing.

Cheers!

I like these last few lists as they look more streamlined draw go. It's possible search and opt have been traps and we should just hold onto think twice. It's nice to see people pumping Jace as I picked up three early on only to see that he seemed worse than teferi in any uwx deck. Zero teferi and one or two Jace makes me feel better about where I put my Esper walker money ;p

What would you rather have in your sideboard guys : 2 Collective Brutality ; or 1 Collective Brutality and 1 Baneslayer Angel ; or 1 Collective Brutality and 1 Runed Halo ? I'm thinking about the optimal balance againt combo and aggro deck here.

Does brutality even belong in this deck? I am pretty sure it does not. Blessed alliance adds removal or lifegain, and you should likely go with negate or dispel for handling noncreature problems. Thoughtseize is probably okay too if you want something for big mana or combo decks.

But brutality just seems off when we can get the same effects at better rates that have more synergy with the deck.

Brutality doesn't really belong. I could see maybe playing 1 if you felt it was the best use of sideboard space, but it seems unlikely.
We don't really have " extra" cards to be discarding, and while you can usually make do when you cast it, you can also make the choice to play something else in your list.

I want to have a good sideboard against Burn, Storm, Titanshift and Affinity mostly. Here's what I have right now, but I'm very opponed to changing a couple of cards :



1 Baneslayer Angel and 1 Collective Brutality are the flex slots. What would you guys have in place of them (or in place of Collective Brutality if you keep the Angel)?

Settle the wreckage or engineered explosives likely. Maybe runed halo or an Elspeth Suns champion. Not loving the stony silence or timely tbh. Perhaps ceremonious rejection

I really hate having to rely on Logic Knot and Negate in the mainboard, why can't they just give us Counterspell?!?!?!!?

I have a question about my sideboard. I am currently running:



The Utter End is a flex-spot, it used to be Cast Out and before that Hero's Downfall. I had Anguished Unmaking but sometimes don't want to pay the 3 life. Given a 'standard' draw-go style main deck, what should I put in that slot in the current meta? Utter End's 4 casting cost is just too much to make it useful in most matchups.

Thanks!

Runes halo is a nice catch all that's cheap enough to drop without tapping out. Detention sphere would be another option but sort of does a different thing. Engineered explosives is the other universal answer. But mostly between bounce discard and counters and wreaths you can solve most permanents. Spell based combo kinda hurts more imo and halo can do something there where the others don't (eg name gifts or grapeshot or lightning storm)

And since you have two halo already this alot doesn't need to be a catch-all. Put something else there that shores up more specific problems. I notice blessed alliance seems to have fallen out of favour with people on timely instead. Any particular reason for this?

Just a quick report. Went undefeated on Modern side events at GP Sâo Paulo (that sounds much but it was actually only 5 matches). Two matches won 1-0 time (I never play for that to happen, but those were some grindy matches.)
Never got to play against control, which was what I wanted to test against and what I still don't know if the configuration of my deck is good enough.

List was:


So, my SB is a train wreck but I like it - I think Baneslayer is not as good anymore, with PWs helping us close the game, timely reinforcements and people leaving removal, I think our plan A is good enough.
I was actually with 2 SfA on the side and zero main (lending ideas from my legacy deck). But I ended up with one main and zero side... I still think think twice is gas on this deck. SfA is very good, and I have troubles not playing it.. the ceiling is too high, but I dislike tapping out for it or having two early in my hand.
3 Snapcaster is gas - they give you too many outs during Jace brainstorm.
I still play 1 secure, it's a flexible all around card, I still think it deserves the slot.
I would like one more slot for the fourth cryptic, but I don't know what to cut (maybe the azcanta).
1 timely is gas. Without Rev to help stabilize life, it works wonder.

MUs were:
Double up tournament (Mardu Pyro, Eldratron, ID)
Normal tournament (Humans, Storm, KCI)

All MUs seemed good, the storm player wasn't very good. Eldratron and KCI went to time, with me winning 1-0 each.

Quote from BadMcFadden »

I notice blessed alliance seems to have fallen out of favour with people on timely instead. Any particular reason for this?

I personally still swear by Alliance, and even still play 2 in my main. I'd like to see Timely kill a bogle/Thrun. Or stop an Infect creature. Timely still just gets Skullcracked. I'd much rather play Kitchen Finks than Timely, but it's still just Alliance for me.

How does everyone feel about the Mardu Pyromancer matchup? It seems rough with discard to take our sweepers, cheap card-positive threats, and recursion with flashback and Kommand. Any tips?

Mardu pyro is absurdly grindy but the tools are all there. Verdicts clean up tokens, counters can stop reveler and kcommand. Things just have to line up decently

Mardu Pyro feels like Jund, but lingering souls and blood moon make things a little awkward.
I fear an unanswered Bob much more than an unanswered Pyromancer... but turn 3 they have Moon and Lili, which they'll probably stick after discard spells...
Using five early interactions (2LK, 1 Negate, 2 seize) makes me a little more comfortable, but not nearly enough. After you fetch all your basics blood moon isn't much of a problem anymore.
Aside from that, it's playing tight... faithless looting is broken, so they see a lot of cards. One or two Revelers will probably resolve, and that's ok.
After flipping azcanta, untapping with Jace, resolving Rev, resolving a large secure, game's probably over...
I don't see many tricks or tips to the MU - draw cards (think twice still a beast), fetch basics, hope to hit one or two sweepers, untap with a PW/azcanta.

I sided in Timely, Elspeth (which won me G2), wrath of god, EE, 2x Surgical (don't know if it's correct, but I sided out LK/negate/seize, so), celestial purge, sorcerous spyglass (i'd rather have a proactive way to answer Lili than counters).

We have a better mardu matchup than most control decks, but it will depend a lot on how good the other player is.
You need to get sufficient mileage out of your 2 for 1s, while not getting "got" by moons/hazorets/other random I-wins.
Knowing when to use esper charm on them can make a lot of difference, as often times doing so is useless, but occasionally its really strong.
Generally though, you want to keep your life total up, and keep afloat on card quality in the early game, and try to make up any card advantage only later.
If you know where or not they play lotv, that can be useful information, as its obviously annoying when resolved.

I could see some nice value in charming in response to a flashbacks looting if they're going for it with two in hand. Not a total blowout but pretty good tempo value!

But only sometimes. If we hit random crap, then we may have been better off just drawing 2 instead.

@Cody Can you say a little more about when you ECharm mindrot against Mardu? I don't yet have a good feel for it. Up until recently, last time I played against Mardu it was odd matches a year or so ago with Confidant and Kambal mainboard and no Reveler haha.

Kind of based on feel. Not sure i have any good metrics. You want to know if revelers are castable, play around k command, etc.
I will say in general, you should always err on the side of not mind rotting them.
Also pay attention to the colors they have, if they tried to cast a reveler with cards still in hand, how theyve been maming land drops, etc.
Id suggest playing the deck a bit to learn the sequencing (and also because its fun).

How effective are cards like baneslayer and Elspeth sun's champion in the sideboard? The "haymakers" so to speak. I've had some good results with both but that doesn't mean I ever really needed them, nor that something else could have done more overall for my win rate from the board.

BSA versus burn and aggro and Elspeth vs anything grindy seems to be the gist - with BSA being sometimes good for grindy matches too. But do we need the help from the board for those matches? I'm a little more comfortable with baneslayer because burn can be hard. But do we need a midrange bomb (other than baneslayer if we're on that already)?