erm holy crap and might be well worth a look are kinda different things
He looks bad to me, 1/2 for 3. If you have a planeswalker in hand you can use his super ability to put walker on the battlefield and say farewell to him end of turn
So after my opponents turn has entered the end step, we could put Koth of the hammer, Chandra, torch of defiance, sarkhan the masterless untap, and then use sarkhans ability to turn them all into dragons and swing for 12, not including the 4 from koth turning a mountain into a 4/4??
i would love to see a Skred Red Gruul now that they have more snow covered things popping back up, that would make skred see more play...and at least a "fixed" skred that targets creatures and planeswalkers - or God Forbid....Any Target
So after my opponents turn has entered the end step, we could put Koth of the hammer, Chandra, torch of defiance, sarkhan the masterless untap, and then use sarkhans ability to turn them all into dragons and swing for 12, not including the 4 from koth turning a mountain into a 4/4??
Yeah finally Skred has a turn4 kill.
t1 Mountain kill their bird
t2 Mountain SSG Planebound Accomplice
t3 Mountain, attack for 1, drop 3 walkers end of opp turn
t4 attack for 17, use Chandra for 2 damage
Only 8 cards combo, cool)
It's been a while since I've played, but Frostwalk Bastion looks pretty awesome, not quite a Mishra's Factory but it can block an unequipped etched champion and live to talk about it. super helpful for versions of the deck that don't run too many outs to the card mainboard.
the other snow-cards look pretty solid too, nothing in red so far though. which is kinda disappointing tbh. pillage is a nice upgrade over molten rain, i've always been a proponent of molten rain in the deck so that's a nice development. seasoned pyromancer seems like a powerful tool to play with, if we can get more use out of our graveyard. I'm not expecting much will come of it though.
maybe the pyromancer can function well with something like goblin engineer and an artifact package of some kind? but I can't think of too many artifacts <=3CMC that would be worth running beyond what we already have.
as much as i'm excited to play with new stuff like pyromancer/engineer...
building around the GY seems like a mistake anyway. part of our strength is that we can just nuke graveyards with relic of progenitus and the effect is entirely one-sided. if we build a version of skred where neutering the enemy's goyfs also shuts-down part of our deck, i don't know if i could call that terribly "innovative"
pyromancer might still be 'good enough' on its own merits though. basically a slower, redder, lingering souls that lets us discard blood moon typer cards in matches where they aren't relevant.
It looks like skred players, should consider splashing a second (or third) color. A lot of great snow-cards are spoilered in Horizons. I think Magic is trying to favour the other colors in snow-decks and red won't get a bomb this set. Because; they already got skred ;-)
With Prismatic Vista a multi-colored blood moon snow-deck is pretty acceptable.
Dead of Winter is insane indeed. So is On thin ice. Maybee we will get a skred-version in the top rankings soon
It looks like skred players, should consider splashing a second (or third) color. A lot of great snow-cards are spoilered in Horizons. I think Magic is trying to favour the other colors in snow-decks and red won't get a bomb this set. Because; they already got skred ;-)
With Prismatic Vista a multi-colored blood moon snow-deck is pretty acceptable.
Dead of Winter is insane indeed. So is On thin ice. Maybee we will get a skred-version in the top rankings soon
On thin ice is good
Dead of Winter I think is not. Skred was good against small creature decks, this kills small creatures, it has problems killing 4/5 Goyf, 6/6 Titan or Wurmcoil
Skred could use fetches before, Prismatic Vista isnt a breakthrough here
I didnt examine new set for good Skred cards and so far I didnt see many good cards in this thread
I can't say I know how your games have been playing out. However, I can say that it's been my experience that Skred has acted as a sort of red Path to Exile (minus the exiling of course).
That is to say that it's functioned just fine in the roll of, "kill anything it can target" (with the occasional exception for big, early-game Death's Shadows)
Aria of Flame seems like a hilarious way to deal with the occasional turn-3-6/6. certainly not a good idea, though. If only it could target creatures... still probably not a great plan, but i find it funny enough.
With that in mind, and considering that "X is the number of snow permanents you control" will only scale better with the release of so many new, playable, snow cards; I feel like Dead of Winter should function just fine in the role of a pseudo-Damnation. But with the additional upside that it's potentially one-sided and can kill indestructible creatures and what-not.
Prismatic Vista isn't exactly a breakthrough, to be sure. Yet it is a subtly powerful upgrade for us nonetheless.
It let's us choose any basic land, not just one of two choices. This allows us to more easily run a potential 3-color snow deck.
Maybe it isn't enough on its own, but with the help of Arcum's Astrolabe it actually seems kind-of feasible. Though I am loathe to play non-snow lands in a deck like skRED, if only because of Scrying Sheets.
I also dislike paying life for my lands in skRED, having a particularly 'non-violent' land-base has made the difference in countless matches vs burn. though, 4 fetches in the lot isn't like to change that too much.
UPDATE :
Okay so Alpine Guide is *not* insane
I was pretty pumped till i read that last line of text.
There seems to be a trend so far in horizons, alpine guide, goblin engineer, and seasoned pyromancer, all pitch stuff into the yard.
Alpine guide is potentially useful in cases when we are color splashing, you can get whatever dual land you want, its coming in tapped anyway. There is a small synergy I see with Madblind mountain. You can tutor out this land to help fix your top decks when you have big mana going and are sacking artis for cards, and activating sheets, if you dont like the card you activate and shuffle up. it takes 5 mana for you to sheet and madblind in the same turn. Totally doable in those late game floods. He seems okay v white or path to exile metas where you end up +1 on lands for playing him.
Seasoned pyro is a good card to have added to our maybeboard. I dont see how exactly it fits right now but if yard mechanics get any stronger its a possibility. Hes a bit of a non bo with relics as well. cool card. doesnt live through anger
goblin engineer another non bo with mainboard relics but this is a powerful magic card. If there becomes more grave pay off he could be better. doesnt live through anger. but its good to have this tool down the road. ( goblin arti skred anyone)
magmatic sinkhole- not great in our current build with our relics. but has potential if we keep filling the yard. we need a good 5 damage card, they are all conditional. There may be a time where this condition is best
arcums astrolabe is really nice with the snow synergy off sheets and it can get you that 1 draw. it doesnt help us ramp but its a nice card along with coldsteel hart we have options to evolve
icehide golem- the 2/2 for 1 snow bear honestly aiiiint bad. Again hes nice off the sheets package bad with the anger package
none of these cards can really survive in our existing shell. But i have been playing 2 karn scion of urza for a while now to help me get a little more aggressive at times and pump out chump blockers. Ice hide golem, relic , mind stone karn, karn activate, drop a t3 4/4. at 4 5/5 if uninterrupted. obviously the perfect progression would be another koth for a clock. I have gotten lucky and hit a couple rare t4 kills and a few other t5s without the icehide golem beats added in.
This really doesnt work with anger and really do not want to be a deck dependent on artifacts or a deck that gets blown out by strong forms of hate which are out there. and I dont see anything in this set that can take us away from anger. Whipflare? Shrapnel blast to make use of dead artis? I dont think theres any real reason to flex our deck now to much. but now we have a few directions for the future.
tradition/dragon/ artifact/graveyard/ goblin skred ( hasnt seemed horribly far off in testing, skirk prospector and squee was fun)
We also got 1 very solid upgrade! I think 4x pillage will be the package in the sideboard. gets around welding jar and wrecks tron and is just super flexible.
but this set is great for us as a community! Modern horizons is keeping our theme alive and well with a handful of cards that have potential in the future! Hope the last spoilers show us even more love! But if not the light is brighter then it has been in a while.
I play a ton of merfolk as well but the meta seems solid again for skred red.But I did just jam a few friendly leagues with skred. 4-1 and a 3-2. Tron,uw Humans and phoenix are all solid matches for us as top dogs. I will play it a few times for sure when the league formatting changes again on mtgo! So lets get skreddin!!
Haven't posted in here for a while, but I'll be honest, Dead of Winter has got me really excited, not to mention Seasoned Pyromancer.
I think that Prismatic Vista is a great card for snow-land wielding mages, especially as a dual coloured deck. The problem before was that playing two colours, you had to play some number of dual lands. Now, you don't as you have 8 copies of Bloodstained Mire that can always fetch the right land you need (well, as long as you play BR :)). Also, Arcum's Astrolabe allows you to filter without spending a card to do it, and upping your snow count.
Alpine Guide while it has an amazing art, I don't think is what we really need. I can see maybe playing him if you are running a 2-3 colour version, and you run one or two shock lands to grab with him then sac a basic when he dies, but even then, removing snow-permanents seems bad.
As for the Pyromancer, I think he's great even if you exile him from the graveyard before using him. I think he allows you to run 4x Blood Moon as the extra copies are just fuel for him. Also, he's a great top deck. Divination that also drops a 2/2? Yes please.
Anyway, I can't wait to see what people come up with. If DoW and Vista allows you to go RB, does that open the door to a more Rakdos control with access to all the hand disruption? Are Pyromancer and the Bastion strong enough to keep pushing mono red for consistency (and like someone said, mono-red is great because we don't hurt ourselves with our mana). Anyway, this set has me excited.
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Modern: RG Ponza / Some Number of Racks / Skred / Dredgevine
Legacy: UB Reanimator / LEDless Dredge
Pyromancer does seem good. Is the fact that he gets hit by anger just not good enough? I havent found a creature that ive really liked angering into or one that doesnt have some downside with relic. Were really pretty good in all the matches where he shines though. we can anger away the creatures we planned on chumping and were good in the long game. We can chose to go to bigger creatures like hazoret, or extra walkers like karn. The one thing pyromancer does is give us a filter at a fairly crucial turn in the game. I dont mean to keep talking him up but ive really enjoyed karn scion of urza in skred for the draw or creature. He can sort of flex our hand a bit. I just think we want to spend t 3 mooning,pillaging,angering, or hope we have a mind stone to slam a walker. He is good but im not sure I will really test him as im still happy with karn and dont think he fits with our core values of mainboard relic and anger and big t3 slams
Pyromancer does seem good. Is the fact that he gets hit by anger just not good enough? I havent found a creature that ive really liked angering into or one that doesnt have some downside with relic. Were really pretty good in all the matches where he shines though. we can anger away the creatures we planned on chumping and were good in the long game. We can chose to go to bigger creatures like hazoret, or extra walkers like karn. The one thing pyromancer does is give us a filter at a fairly crucial turn in the game. I dont mean to keep talking him up but ive really enjoyed karn scion of urza in skred for the draw or creature. He can sort of flex our hand a bit. I just think we want to spend t 3 mooning,pillaging,angering, or hope we have a mind stone to slam a walker. He is good but im not sure I will really test him as im still happy with karn and dont think he fits with our core values of mainboard relic and anger and big t3 slams
I've tried Karn a little, I think it comes to personal preference. With him, Koth and Chandra, Torch of Defiance, that's three different options at 4cmc. What's your Planeswalker split? I lean more towards Chandra as I like the control aspect of the deck, and while Koth is the most explosive, he's also the worse of all three when behind which is where I put most of my stock in a control deck.
And that's the reason why I really like the Pyromancer. He seems like an incredible top deck in an attrition fight. I don't think he wants to be your three drop unless you really need him to be. I think you're more likely to discard Anger than to play after he's on the board. Pia and Kiran Nalaar have been an all-star for me in so many games, and yet, a 2/2 and two 1/1s that all die to Anger. I know they are very different, and I think that's the issue for Pyromancer, is he to be an aggressive 4 power for 3 early in game, or is he more of a late game grounded Mulldrifter? The cool thing about him is I think he can be both. He can also play great defense in a pinch. Being able to get 1/1s out of dead cards is great. Personally I play with Eternal Scourge since I lean towards more #s of Chandra, so he's also a good card to pitch as you will eventually get him back with a Relic.
Anyway, I think this will be fun to try and figure out. Also, how many Frostwalk Bastion to run? It sucks that Blood Moon will thaw the life out of him, but I am definitely going to try 2 or 3.
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well if your going to run some bastions, maybe pyro and full moon would be the way to go. filter some awkward lands or get to your man lands. But its weird we always want moon but there are so many games where we just flood out
i run a 4 koth, 2 chandra, 2 karn list a the expense of p and k. P and k is relly good, i just didnt know what exactly to cut. so ive gone heavy on sweepers with 2 sweltering suns main as well ( sometimes swap for abrades) I generally run an artifact heavy sideboard, 3 d sphere, 1 grafdiggers, 3 dragons claw, spyglass to help maximize karns clock power post side.
bastion and the new golem are actually really interesting with karn and scrying sheets its just sucks blood moon shuts down their entire interaction lol. and we cant play snow without playing blood moon? Could we load an arti build with galvanic blast? shrapnel blast? full p and k, maybe a pia nalaar 1 of lol? beat people down with the artifact army?
we seem pretty weak to new karn though. without a threat down against him were kinda dead in the water. our removal package really isnt suited for all of the walkers out there karn and all the uw and lilis. We may have to start getting creative on how to keep ourselves alive out there so pyro has to be alteast worth a shot at a build.
bastion would probably be a 2 of? I often like to play higher numbers of scrying sheets but you may have to lower them to like a 2/2 split to make sure your hitting RR consistently. or go all in and run a 4 sheet 2/3 bastion package with a bunch of colorless and artis.
we also have to be careful for koth....runnning to many of any non mountains may hurt us. so 2 is probably a safe bet.
I'm surprised that you cut PKN if you are running Karn, seeing that they bring two artifacts with them to pump up the Karn tokens.
Have you ever tried cutting some number of Koth? I'm currently running 4 Chandras and two Koths, and I've also done well in tournaments where I run zero Koths. His power is so time specific, that I'm either amazed at his power or crying because he was my top deck in a dire need of something to get me back in a games I'm behind, and as I said in previous posts, I think of Skred as more of a control deck, and Koth is not a control walker. So, honestly if Karn is in the deck, I would suggest trying a 2/2 split with Koth and PNK at the very least.
I think the snow golem sounds very interesting if you are running Karn as your main walker. I think right now, it's all about trying random things and seeing how they play out. I'll be tempted to try two colours for either Dead of Winter or Marit lage's Slumber (how fun and bad does that card seem?)
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I also went up to 5 sweepers to accommodate. It was more the 5 sweepers were seeming necessary in the meta and karn could also rebuild afterwards. I also feel like STORMY B is an untouchable lol. The card is just so savage and were the only ones keeping him alive!. I would have to tweak the whole sweeper and removal package to feel great about p and k.
Ill deff consider cutting a koth or two, ive thought about it in the past. I think his power is always going to be love/ hate. Hes a walker that doesn't generate cards or protect himself.But hes koth the hammer and wins us a lot of games through his ult and beats. Ive also played the second koth and swung with two mountains so many times lol. I didnt want to drop P and k, they do seem great with karn.I also went up to 5 sweepers to accommodate. It was more the 5 sweepers were seeming necessary in the meta and karn could also rebuild afterwards. I would have to rebuild the whole sweeper package unless i am just looking too hard into not wanting to sweep away our own board even with the traditional 3 sweepers.
i think our removal is poorly suited in the meta right now. anger is still solid but its missing so much. There are so many plaineswalkers right now that skred is really feeling bad. with this sort of artifact build. Even if we dropped stormy b on the top end. We could try galvanic blasts, shrapnel blasts, golem, p and k, pia nalar, even probably try whipflare as a sweeper that doesnt completely stomp us.
skred is barely hanging in the ring as far as modern is concerned. Ive been having some serious ups and downs with it in results. I dont think there is anything we couldnt try for a way forward or just for fun. Its hard to hear that good ole skred red is a back up deck to a lot of people for fun. try your lists and if your feeling strong in the meta try and go for a 5-0! ive had a few 4-1s in friendlies but will be giving a few experimental lists or runs at tourney play. EVEN IF ITS THE MARIT LAGE SPICE!
Im going to work on an arti list to get posted to see what anyone thinks. i really do like the idea of bringing p and k in. Everyone loves mom and pops one stop thopter shop!
Everyone loves mom and pops one stop thopter shop!
Haha!
5 sweepers seem like a lot. I'd be interested to see your list. I honestly don't think we're that bad in the current meta. I think we line up well with some of the most played cards. Looking at all of 2019 results so far on mtgtop8.com, the top nonland used cards are: Lightning Bolt - PKN, Scourge, Stormbreath, Koth and his 4/4 mountain, and even Seasoned Pyromancer all beat it or leave something behind. Faithless Looting - Main deck Relics. Serum Visions - We are a slower deck, so this just gives us more time. Snapcaster Mage - Bolt, Skred, Anger, Relic, Abrade. Opt - See visions Fatal Push - PKN, Stormbreath, Scourge... And here is the main reason I shy away from Koth at times. A pushed mountain can be so devastating. Too bad his +1 is not "up to one target mountain" if you just want to plus him without making a manland. Path to Exile - The same trio of PNK, Stormbreath and Scourge. Walking Ballista - Depends on the scale, but bolt, skred, and Chandra can get him, Abrade... they will always get their value out of him, so it's tough for any deck to handle cleanly. Ancient Stirrings - See visions Thoughtseize - Is what is Inquisition of Kozilek - We have quite a few important pieces this doesn't hit, but still, see thoughtseize Manamorphose - Boo Thought Scour - Relic Noble Hierarch - see Snapcaster Cryptic Command - Hurts Aether Vial - Abrade main. Arclight Phoenix - Relic Dismember - Stormbreath is the one guy who really doesn't like this one. Thing in the Ice - Skred, Chandra, Koth's 4/4 mountain, Glorybringer if you run him (I do like a 2/1 split with 2 Stormbreaths and one Bringer) Surgical Extraction - Diverse threats, so I don't care what they take here unless it rips another one or two from my hand.
All the non basic lands - Blood Moon.
You can't be prepared for absolutely everything, but I think Skred is in a decent spot, especially if you play a more reactive game. While I think there's a spot for Karn, I feel this may not be the right time. He almost feels like a worse Koth, and when he works really well, he's almost a win more. For right now, I'm still on the Chandra train for this meta. That she can kill stuff like Thing in the Ice, give you ramp and card advantage while also having a ridiculous ultimate, not to mention that she can kill someone behind a leyline and bridge given enough time is fantastic. And she's the reason I run bridge in my side.
Also, now with Pillage as an option, the sideboard can do even more. I don't know, man, I really think the deck is in a good spot. I've been on Racks (8 or 10, take your pick) for the last little while, but I'm totally excited to get back into Skred. Also, as an aside, I love this deck like I love Racks for a simple reason... no fetches. Searching your library and shuffling in 3-5 times a game if not more can get tiring in a long tournament, and I appreciate that Skred just slaps down basics (well, mostly just basics) all day long
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its pretty good in skred for a sideboard card... Cant be countered, and immediately makes an emblem to do 1 damage every turn, then can make another next turn
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He looks bad to me, 1/2 for 3. If you have a planeswalker in hand you can use his super ability to put walker on the battlefield and say farewell to him end of turn
G Green Stompy
RG Shamans
UB Mill
UG Infect
WUBRG Slivers!
t1 Mountain kill their bird
t2 Mountain SSG Planebound Accomplice
t3 Mountain, attack for 1, drop 3 walkers end of opp turn
t4 attack for 17, use Chandra for 2 damage
Only 8 cards combo, cool)
G Green Stompy
RG Shamans
UB Mill
UG Infect
WUBRG Slivers!
the other snow-cards look pretty solid too, nothing in red so far though. which is kinda disappointing tbh.
pillage is a nice upgrade over molten rain, i've always been a proponent of molten rain in the deck so that's a nice development.
seasoned pyromancer seems like a powerful tool to play with, if we can get more use out of our graveyard. I'm not expecting much will come of it though.
maybe the pyromancer can function well with something like goblin engineer and an artifact package of some kind? but I can't think of too many artifacts <=3CMC that would be worth running beyond what we already have.
as much as i'm excited to play with new stuff like pyromancer/engineer...
building around the GY seems like a mistake anyway. part of our strength is that we can just nuke graveyards with relic of progenitus and the effect is entirely one-sided. if we build a version of skred where neutering the enemy's goyfs also shuts-down part of our deck, i don't know if i could call that terribly "innovative"
pyromancer might still be 'good enough' on its own merits though. basically a slower, redder, lingering souls that lets us discard blood moon typer cards in matches where they aren't relevant.
UPDATE :
okay so Dead of Winter is actually insane
With Prismatic Vista a multi-colored blood moon snow-deck is pretty acceptable.
Dead of Winter is insane indeed. So is On thin ice. Maybee we will get a skred-version in the top rankings soon
RBWMardu Nahiri, GBElves, UW Emeria, RSkred Red,
GBelcher, BDevotion, GWRNaya landfall, UWBEsper Miracles
Dead of Winter I think is not. Skred was good against small creature decks, this kills small creatures, it has problems killing 4/5 Goyf, 6/6 Titan or Wurmcoil
Skred could use fetches before, Prismatic Vista isnt a breakthrough here
I didnt examine new set for good Skred cards and so far I didnt see many good cards in this thread
G Green Stompy
RG Shamans
UB Mill
UG Infect
WUBRG Slivers!
That is to say that it's functioned just fine in the roll of, "kill anything it can target" (with the occasional exception for big, early-game Death's Shadows)
With that in mind, and considering that "X is the number of snow permanents you control" will only scale better with the release of so many new, playable, snow cards; I feel like Dead of Winter should function just fine in the role of a pseudo-Damnation. But with the additional upside that it's potentially one-sided and can kill indestructible creatures and what-not.
Prismatic Vista isn't exactly a breakthrough, to be sure. Yet it is a subtly powerful upgrade for us nonetheless.
It let's us choose any basic land, not just one of two choices. This allows us to more easily run a potential 3-color snow deck.
Maybe it isn't enough on its own, but with the help of Arcum's Astrolabe it actually seems kind-of feasible. Though I am loathe to play non-snow lands in a deck like skRED, if only because of Scrying Sheets.
I also dislike paying life for my lands in skRED, having a particularly 'non-violent' land-base has made the difference in countless matches vs burn. though, 4 fetches in the lot isn't like to change that too much.
UPDATE :
Okay so Alpine Guide is *not* insane
I was pretty pumped till i read that last line of text.
Alpine guide is potentially useful in cases when we are color splashing, you can get whatever dual land you want, its coming in tapped anyway. There is a small synergy I see with Madblind mountain. You can tutor out this land to help fix your top decks when you have big mana going and are sacking artis for cards, and activating sheets, if you dont like the card you activate and shuffle up. it takes 5 mana for you to sheet and madblind in the same turn. Totally doable in those late game floods. He seems okay v white or path to exile metas where you end up +1 on lands for playing him.
Seasoned pyro is a good card to have added to our maybeboard. I dont see how exactly it fits right now but if yard mechanics get any stronger its a possibility. Hes a bit of a non bo with relics as well. cool card. doesnt live through anger
goblin engineer another non bo with mainboard relics but this is a powerful magic card. If there becomes more grave pay off he could be better. doesnt live through anger. but its good to have this tool down the road. ( goblin arti skred anyone)
magmatic sinkhole- not great in our current build with our relics. but has potential if we keep filling the yard. we need a good 5 damage card, they are all conditional. There may be a time where this condition is best
arcums astrolabe is really nice with the snow synergy off sheets and it can get you that 1 draw. it doesnt help us ramp but its a nice card along with coldsteel hart we have options to evolve
icehide golem- the 2/2 for 1 snow bear honestly aiiiint bad. Again hes nice off the sheets package bad with the anger package
none of these cards can really survive in our existing shell. But i have been playing 2 karn scion of urza for a while now to help me get a little more aggressive at times and pump out chump blockers. Ice hide golem, relic , mind stone karn, karn activate, drop a t3 4/4. at 4 5/5 if uninterrupted. obviously the perfect progression would be another koth for a clock. I have gotten lucky and hit a couple rare t4 kills and a few other t5s without the icehide golem beats added in.
This really doesnt work with anger and really do not want to be a deck dependent on artifacts or a deck that gets blown out by strong forms of hate which are out there. and I dont see anything in this set that can take us away from anger. Whipflare? Shrapnel blast to make use of dead artis? I dont think theres any real reason to flex our deck now to much. but now we have a few directions for the future.
tradition/dragon/ artifact/graveyard/ goblin skred ( hasnt seemed horribly far off in testing, skirk prospector and squee was fun)
We also got 1 very solid upgrade! I think 4x pillage will be the package in the sideboard. gets around welding jar and wrecks tron and is just super flexible.
but this set is great for us as a community! Modern horizons is keeping our theme alive and well with a handful of cards that have potential in the future! Hope the last spoilers show us even more love! But if not the light is brighter then it has been in a while.
I play a ton of merfolk as well but the meta seems solid again for skred red.But I did just jam a few friendly leagues with skred. 4-1 and a 3-2. Tron,uw Humans and phoenix are all solid matches for us as top dogs. I will play it a few times for sure when the league formatting changes again on mtgo! So lets get skreddin!!
Nah, Alpine Guide makes you sac a land when he leaves the battlefield, not when he dies. If he gets exiled it still triggers.
I think that Prismatic Vista is a great card for snow-land wielding mages, especially as a dual coloured deck. The problem before was that playing two colours, you had to play some number of dual lands. Now, you don't as you have 8 copies of Bloodstained Mire that can always fetch the right land you need (well, as long as you play BR :)). Also, Arcum's Astrolabe allows you to filter without spending a card to do it, and upping your snow count.
Alpine Guide while it has an amazing art, I don't think is what we really need. I can see maybe playing him if you are running a 2-3 colour version, and you run one or two shock lands to grab with him then sac a basic when he dies, but even then, removing snow-permanents seems bad.
Frostwalk Bastion. I love this guy too.
As for the Pyromancer, I think he's great even if you exile him from the graveyard before using him. I think he allows you to run 4x Blood Moon as the extra copies are just fuel for him. Also, he's a great top deck. Divination that also drops a 2/2? Yes please.
Anyway, I can't wait to see what people come up with. If DoW and Vista allows you to go RB, does that open the door to a more Rakdos control with access to all the hand disruption? Are Pyromancer and the Bastion strong enough to keep pushing mono red for consistency (and like someone said, mono-red is great because we don't hurt ourselves with our mana). Anyway, this set has me excited.
Modern: RG Ponza / Some Number of Racks / Skred / Dredgevine
Legacy: UB Reanimator / LEDless Dredge
I've tried Karn a little, I think it comes to personal preference. With him, Koth and Chandra, Torch of Defiance, that's three different options at 4cmc. What's your Planeswalker split? I lean more towards Chandra as I like the control aspect of the deck, and while Koth is the most explosive, he's also the worse of all three when behind which is where I put most of my stock in a control deck.
And that's the reason why I really like the Pyromancer. He seems like an incredible top deck in an attrition fight. I don't think he wants to be your three drop unless you really need him to be. I think you're more likely to discard Anger than to play after he's on the board. Pia and Kiran Nalaar have been an all-star for me in so many games, and yet, a 2/2 and two 1/1s that all die to Anger. I know they are very different, and I think that's the issue for Pyromancer, is he to be an aggressive 4 power for 3 early in game, or is he more of a late game grounded Mulldrifter? The cool thing about him is I think he can be both. He can also play great defense in a pinch. Being able to get 1/1s out of dead cards is great. Personally I play with Eternal Scourge since I lean towards more #s of Chandra, so he's also a good card to pitch as you will eventually get him back with a Relic.
Anyway, I think this will be fun to try and figure out. Also, how many Frostwalk Bastion to run? It sucks that Blood Moon will thaw the life out of him, but I am definitely going to try 2 or 3.
Modern: RG Ponza / Some Number of Racks / Skred / Dredgevine
Legacy: UB Reanimator / LEDless Dredge
i run a 4 koth, 2 chandra, 2 karn list a the expense of p and k. P and k is relly good, i just didnt know what exactly to cut. so ive gone heavy on sweepers with 2 sweltering suns main as well ( sometimes swap for abrades) I generally run an artifact heavy sideboard, 3 d sphere, 1 grafdiggers, 3 dragons claw, spyglass to help maximize karns clock power post side.
bastion and the new golem are actually really interesting with karn and scrying sheets its just sucks blood moon shuts down their entire interaction lol. and we cant play snow without playing blood moon? Could we load an arti build with galvanic blast? shrapnel blast? full p and k, maybe a pia nalaar 1 of lol? beat people down with the artifact army?
we seem pretty weak to new karn though. without a threat down against him were kinda dead in the water. our removal package really isnt suited for all of the walkers out there karn and all the uw and lilis. We may have to start getting creative on how to keep ourselves alive out there so pyro has to be alteast worth a shot at a build.
we also have to be careful for koth....runnning to many of any non mountains may hurt us. so 2 is probably a safe bet.
Have you ever tried cutting some number of Koth? I'm currently running 4 Chandras and two Koths, and I've also done well in tournaments where I run zero Koths. His power is so time specific, that I'm either amazed at his power or crying because he was my top deck in a dire need of something to get me back in a games I'm behind, and as I said in previous posts, I think of Skred as more of a control deck, and Koth is not a control walker. So, honestly if Karn is in the deck, I would suggest trying a 2/2 split with Koth and PNK at the very least.
I think the snow golem sounds very interesting if you are running Karn as your main walker. I think right now, it's all about trying random things and seeing how they play out. I'll be tempted to try two colours for either Dead of Winter or Marit lage's Slumber (how fun and bad does that card seem?)
Modern: RG Ponza / Some Number of Racks / Skred / Dredgevine
Legacy: UB Reanimator / LEDless Dredge
Ill deff consider cutting a koth or two, ive thought about it in the past. I think his power is always going to be love/ hate. Hes a walker that doesn't generate cards or protect himself.But hes koth the hammer and wins us a lot of games through his ult and beats. Ive also played the second koth and swung with two mountains so many times lol. I didnt want to drop P and k, they do seem great with karn.I also went up to 5 sweepers to accommodate. It was more the 5 sweepers were seeming necessary in the meta and karn could also rebuild afterwards. I would have to rebuild the whole sweeper package unless i am just looking too hard into not wanting to sweep away our own board even with the traditional 3 sweepers.
i think our removal is poorly suited in the meta right now. anger is still solid but its missing so much. There are so many plaineswalkers right now that skred is really feeling bad. with this sort of artifact build. Even if we dropped stormy b on the top end. We could try galvanic blasts, shrapnel blasts, golem, p and k, pia nalar, even probably try whipflare as a sweeper that doesnt completely stomp us.
skred is barely hanging in the ring as far as modern is concerned. Ive been having some serious ups and downs with it in results. I dont think there is anything we couldnt try for a way forward or just for fun. Its hard to hear that good ole skred red is a back up deck to a lot of people for fun. try your lists and if your feeling strong in the meta try and go for a 5-0! ive had a few 4-1s in friendlies but will be giving a few experimental lists or runs at tourney play. EVEN IF ITS THE MARIT LAGE SPICE!
Im going to work on an arti list to get posted to see what anyone thinks. i really do like the idea of bringing p and k in. Everyone loves mom and pops one stop thopter shop!
Haha!
5 sweepers seem like a lot. I'd be interested to see your list. I honestly don't think we're that bad in the current meta. I think we line up well with some of the most played cards. Looking at all of 2019 results so far on mtgtop8.com, the top nonland used cards are:
Lightning Bolt - PKN, Scourge, Stormbreath, Koth and his 4/4 mountain, and even Seasoned Pyromancer all beat it or leave something behind.
Faithless Looting - Main deck Relics.
Serum Visions - We are a slower deck, so this just gives us more time.
Snapcaster Mage - Bolt, Skred, Anger, Relic, Abrade.
Opt - See visions
Fatal Push - PKN, Stormbreath, Scourge... And here is the main reason I shy away from Koth at times. A pushed mountain can be so devastating. Too bad his +1 is not "up to one target mountain" if you just want to plus him without making a manland.
Path to Exile - The same trio of PNK, Stormbreath and Scourge.
Walking Ballista - Depends on the scale, but bolt, skred, and Chandra can get him, Abrade... they will always get their value out of him, so it's tough for any deck to handle cleanly.
Ancient Stirrings - See visions
Thoughtseize - Is what is
Inquisition of Kozilek - We have quite a few important pieces this doesn't hit, but still, see thoughtseize
Manamorphose - Boo
Thought Scour - Relic
Noble Hierarch - see Snapcaster
Cryptic Command - Hurts
Aether Vial - Abrade main.
Arclight Phoenix - Relic
Dismember - Stormbreath is the one guy who really doesn't like this one.
Thing in the Ice - Skred, Chandra, Koth's 4/4 mountain, Glorybringer if you run him (I do like a 2/1 split with 2 Stormbreaths and one Bringer)
Surgical Extraction - Diverse threats, so I don't care what they take here unless it rips another one or two from my hand.
All the non basic lands - Blood Moon.
You can't be prepared for absolutely everything, but I think Skred is in a decent spot, especially if you play a more reactive game. While I think there's a spot for Karn, I feel this may not be the right time. He almost feels like a worse Koth, and when he works really well, he's almost a win more. For right now, I'm still on the Chandra train for this meta. That she can kill stuff like Thing in the Ice, give you ramp and card advantage while also having a ridiculous ultimate, not to mention that she can kill someone behind a leyline and bridge given enough time is fantastic. And she's the reason I run bridge in my side.
Also, now with Pillage as an option, the sideboard can do even more. I don't know, man, I really think the deck is in a good spot. I've been on Racks (8 or 10, take your pick) for the last little while, but I'm totally excited to get back into Skred. Also, as an aside, I love this deck like I love Racks for a simple reason... no fetches. Searching your library and shuffling in 3-5 times a game if not more can get tiring in a long tournament, and I appreciate that Skred just slaps down basics (well, mostly just basics) all day long
Modern: RG Ponza / Some Number of Racks / Skred / Dredgevine
Legacy: UB Reanimator / LEDless Dredge