Quite surprised Ponza is alive and kicking again. Ponza was one of my pet decks a few years ago, can get explosive starts with utopia sprawl --> land destruction --> big scary things. One of the best creatures it can bring out against emeria is a stormbreath dragon, even as a 4/4 the dragon is dangerous because only boardwipes can kill it -- but that was back in 2018, my knowledge on ponza is certainly outdated. I'm curious what Ponza decks today use as finishers, or if they have a new strategy.
Classic aggro (Zoo or the like) is an excellent matchup in general, because prioritizing controlling the board will yield the results you are looking for. The more burn spells they play, the more you need to make card-economy negative plays. Think Philosophy of Fire, but in reverse. You are looking to create negative potential on their draw steps, setting up high-toughness blockers and instant-speed removal to blank both their lands AND their creatures, which will mean that over 50% of their deck turns into "not a burn spell". There are manabase decisions that this involves, but forcing them to use their burn is the key, because they run out eventually - Emeria's job is to facilitate that.
Through the Breach on the other hand is a combo deck, and therefore falls into the category of "bad matchup" as far as I am concerned. What was the specific list you played against? I have experience against many variants, but in all honesty Annihilator 6 plus 15 damage to the face is very difficult to beat until I have seven permanents. Accepting an 8 or 9-for one is not a winning strategy in general, even if it is mostly the plan, so if you are playing Breach every week I would be hesitant to recommend any Emeria list. It can be beaten, but I would need to know more to suggest specific counter-strategies. If it is the only such fast strategy, you can pinpoint it, but if there are too many different spell-based combos without sideboard overlap, these take up too much equity and Emeria ceases to maintain good post-board averages elsewhere.
Fluff;
Ponza has been fighting reasonably well against Primeval Titan decks lately, so I am not surprised to see it on the rise. I do think it is good for this version, though, even with 4-of Stormbreath Dragon. When there are more copies of sweepers than total possible dragons, the exchange of 4 life for a card can be made at least twice before I will begin to be concerned. The fact that these answers cost 1 mana less than the threat makes sequencing pretty simple around them as well, even through a Stone Rain. If I am starting to be concerned about the hasty flier I can always count on Pilgrim's Eye to either chump block or soak up burn, either way making it more difficult for them to finish the game. If their chosen attrition engine is dealt with, the games play out to serious flood issues for Ponza extremely quickly. The strategy is still missing some kind of card selection/inevitability. Tireless Tracker is good, but not enough, and the other engines are still clunky going long.
Well, it's almost certainly unplayable as a companion;
3 u/w u/w : Yorion, Sky Nomad - 4/5 flying Bird Serpent, ETB mass Flickerwisp for your permanents only.
The companion restriction is that your starting deck would have to be 80 cards in sanctioned Modern, so that kills the most important aspect of the card for me (the value of a free card going late, if it had been immediately able to fit with my current build). Beyond that, this is a fine finisher that can sometimes bring extra value, so someone in a blink shell may want to test this: it re-triggers ETBs on non-creature permanents, which is somewhat relevant. There may be a build that wants to run Planeswalkers with relevant minus abilities like Elspeth, Sun's Champion, extra permanent-based removal like Cast out, plus attrition like Elspeth Conquers Death and value options such as Stonehorn Dignitary, Omen of the Sun, The Birth of Meletis, and Solemn Simulacrum to go along with Ranger-Captain of Eos and Thraben Inspector and maybe even Glimmerpoint Stag for good measure.
Momentary Blink might provide enough redundancy at that point to be a real option, so there is a world where I can see this having 80 cards that can support it, but the logistics of losing consistent access to Path to Exile make me pessimistic on that front. If the 20 extra cards have to include 2 or 3 Winds of Abandon and another 2 or 3 Supreme Verdict and Wrath of God to maintain adequate ratios, the differences between the best and the second-best options may become more telling at a greater frequency. This also cuts into the small upside of the 20 extra cards by leaving less room for situational effects that you would not draw as often, and this is before we add the seven or eight extra lands that would be required to support them. This mana would conveniently have to include the fourth Emeria, the Sky Ruin, giving reasonable return on investment, but with four of these in an 80-card stack corner cases will be very difficult to address without massive groundwork. The trade-offs are a few gains to the maindeck balanced against a lower chance of drawing an even curve, and requires sacrificing a sideboard slot in addition to reducing the probable effectiveness of the other 14 cards by decreasing their relative weight as substitutions.
The last place I can see the card is as a straight value option in a normal, no frills, 60-card version of Emeria control. There, things seem a little more clear. It fits nicely into builds already running Flickerwisp, and comes with an extremely easy casting cost plus the potential of immediate value, so it is at least a candidate to consider alongside Geist-honored Monk, Gideon Jura, Cavalier of Dawn, Teferi, Hero of Dominaria, Lavinia of the Tenth and Dragonlord Ojutai - if you were ever interested in these effects. Once you are not playing Batterskull, Yorion or any of the previous six cards have metagame applications that can lead to their inclusion, so if you do not run Stoneforge Mystic he/she/it could be a reasonable alternate finisher that fulfills the turn-5 requirement.
I will post a sample decklist for the 80-card version I might build following this entry, but I do not recommend it. If the card seems strong enough to you, I encourage you to try it out and report back on your results.
And the Azor's Elocutors is, obviously, a stand-in for Yorion since it has an identical mana cost. Across the 20 extra cards, the 2:3 ratio of lands to spells is maintained, and aside from the unavoidable increase from 1 to 2 mana in Path to Exile #5 switching to a Winds of Abandon, all other points of the curve are either preserved or improved upon. The theory (dubiously supported by old Entomb and Buried Alive Reanimator decks, as well as by the slightly more recent Valakut "66 Special") is that the fourth Sun Titan will not increase its population in the opening hand by more than the deck's dilution due to an increase in size. There is also no need for another 5-drop or an extra finisher, since Yorion will be taking that position automatically. The fourth Supreme Verdict then joins the second Settle the Wreckage for the continued superabundance of mass removal, also giving one extra piece of instant-speed interaction as an offset for the lost "Virtual Path".
In the cheaper spells, the fourth copy of both Court Hussar and Mortarpod should be self-explanatory, as should the third Detention Sphere, but I could not justify Skittering Surveyor as a replacement for Pilgrim's Eye - the former is too ineffective at blocking to be seriously entertained. Since there is no closer replacement for Wall of Omens at 2 mana in white, I therefore split the difference by adding two extra copies of The Birth of Meletis, and then another Teferi, Time Raveler over the fourth Detention Sphere that it should otherwise have been since I needed a cantrip that would play well to the board. This dropped the curve by more than the loss of the "Virtual Path", and made me more comfortable with the expectation of having a universally playable 2-drop in the opener. An extra copy of Tef3ri also supports a situational increase of the instant-speed interaction which would have been covered by a fifth one-mana exile effect. All these changes play reasonably well into either Wrath or Yorion, who provides an extra flying blocker to somewhat mitigate the loss of the "Virtual Eye".
In the manabase, the additional deck thinning continues with the fourth Field of Ruin and a single Prismatic Vista, but the colour ratios drop slightly because the Hallowed Fountain is the only new solid untapped source for Blue. I am overly cautious about my mana requirements in control, so I switched one of the four extra deck-thinning Plains I wanted to add for a fourth dual land in Irrigated Farmland. I don't like that it is never immediately able to unlock the extra Blue three-drops, so it may be better as a shockland or a Prairie Stream, but I will at least test it out as it compensates at least some amount for losing "Virtual Omens" draws. The fourth Emeria, the Sky Ruin is a given in this configuration. A word of warning, however, 3 of 60 does not behave the same as 4 of 80, even if the ratio is preserved at scale. I have played super-sized decks in the past, and in practice lager numbers are needed to reach the theoretical averages, which are caused by multiples stacking up in enough games to balance out total absences in other games. Essentially, things tend to get more volatile in Battle of Wits-style construction. This is generally bad for control, unless overshooting on the reliability of effects is possible (generally through either card draw or functional reprints).
Overall, Yorion fits decently here and does come at an interesting moment for stabilization in this build, where there might be opportunity to set up multiple mid-game Mortarpod re-buys as a pseudo machine-gun. Given this entire exercise I am not as pessimistic as I was initially that the curve can be maintained, not to mention that adding The Birth of Meletis introduces a few new dynamics to many matchups, and so I will probably build this version and test it at least for two or three small tournaments. When this happens, I will write as full a report as possible, and post it here. I am still highly dubious that the sideboard sacrifice is worth the effort, not to mention the fact that Yorion will be worse than useless when our single legal companion is killed immediately in positions with empty boards, but an extra card at no direct cost is too powerful an advantage not to explore fully. Perhaps the maindeck can guarantee more wins than the sideboard will be asked to make up for. My intuition tells me that combo opponents will not care in the slightest about a largely irrelevant 4/5 flier, and this is probably the biggest mark against the card after its mathematical disadvantages to consistency, but the metagame may not always trend in such a way that this matters more than the redundancy and extra reach it provides.
Ah sorry I guess my description of the league wasn't too in depth. I'll try answering your point about it. First of all, here's the list, just to clarify which one.
good job on the win against Storm. How did the games go? I assume you won the two post-board games with graveyard disruption plus spot removal and/or Lavinia slowing them down?
In game one, he spent the first few turns just playing Serum Visions and Opt for a while, so by the time he was able to cast Gifts Ungiven I had found both Dovin's Vetos. Countered Gifts with the first one end of my turn, then next turn he plays Baral and rituals a bit, before trying a second Gifts, which I counter, leaving him with an empty hand, when he scoops. Second game he just goes super fast for a turn three win pretty much. Then third game I get Damping Spehre out early to slow him down, with backup from Remorseful Cleric and Veto. He eventually gets a decent storm count, but unfortunately for him his storm card this time was Empty The Warrens, and I had the Detention Sphere ready to wipe his gobbos out.
Please tell me what happened with Burn and Yawgmoth as well
I should clarify it was more of the Prowess variant than traditional burn. But they were pretty straightforward games, me trying to stall and take care of his threats as they come, and eventually he runs out of gas and I'm left with an active Emeria and Sun Titan. Batterskull was pretty helpful, though I think my personal MVP here was probably Charming Prince and his lifegain.
The Yawgmoth combo games were a little weird. What ended up happening is he would get a Yawgmoth down by turn three, I Detention Sphere it, then next turn he plays another. Then I draw a Flickerwisp and have to flicker the Sphere to take care of his new Yawgmoth. Happened all three games somehow. Only difference is in game two I ran out of removal by the time he got to Yawgmoth number 4, but I was able to take game 3.
As for Dredge, the games are back and forth, and take a little while to grow accustomed to, but the advantage is ours, so I would guess they had at least one blowout draw, but the other game(s) should have been competitive - let me know if they were not. How did you feel during the match? Were there any points of interaction you were uncertain of?
I kind of hate to blame my losses on just having bad draws, but I think that's seriously what happened here. I saw all of one Path To Exile in that round, and none of the Clerics I brought in from the board. On the other hand, he had super explosive draws. Gonna chalk this round up for variance.
Finally, I am most surprised by a loss against Ponza. What did they kill you with? What did you sideboard in and out? Was the list innovating something new? Since Mycosynth Lattice left the picture, their best lategame is gone, and the remainder can be cleanly dismantled, given time, so I assume this must have been possible unless they surprised you with something unexpected.
His deck was pretty interesting, a bit grindier than the normal Ponza list. He had a few copies of Klothys, God of Destiny, which was pretty good at dashing any of my hopes of getting stuff back from my graveyard. Sure, it's a big target for Path, but that's only if it's online as a creature. Besides Klothys, Chandra and W&6 gave the deck even more grindy late-game value.
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Thank you for the details, they explain a lot. Having Damping Sphere goes a long way in games 2+, and the first game is very likely attributed to the fact that they were looking for Remand as backup. Dovin's Veto being uncounterable is often irrelevant, but my guess is that it was probably crucial to that win in particular. Post-board, Empty the Warrens is a truly awful win condition for Storm against us, but a single Remorseful Cleric can often force them to go that route and Storm players frequently bring it in blind against anything playing Blue.
In round 2, Prowess is quite a bit easier to beat than traditional or Boros Burn, since they care about blockers and removal a lot more when it comes to their reach. Charming Prince is indeed nice, but you may see what I mean if I say it represents an edge that can be shaved while still keeping a very good win percentage here. Batterskull is a serious problem for them long-term.
Against Yawgmoth I have historically felt almost no fear at all. They can combo, in theory, but in practice sweepers make it very hard for them to threaten this consistently. Path to Exile is so cheap that there is almost never a clean window for them to do so unless you were forced to use it early (which their deck is not very good at providing incentive for around 0/4 blockers). One note of caution is that relying on a single Detention Sphere gives them a chance to upgrade dead removal for relevant Naturalize effects post-board, and my recommendation to minimize this is the same as it will be for the last two matchups: have access to Celestial Purge. I would also recommend you provide some extra coverage by playing one more Pithing Needle over your Burrenton Forge-Tender, unless you are finding yourself having to deal with too many Searing Blaze effects, or something like Bonfire of the Damned.
Your Dredge matchup does have Conflagrate as a version of this effect for him to contend with, so feel free to ignore me if this is the reason you are running the 1/1, but as you may have experienced it will not win you the game on its own unless you have the chance to both draw and use it for value. This makes it an effect I can live without, and I replace it with effects that pull the game back to the situations where Emeria control has torque, or prevent that torque from being overpowered in a normal draw. Speaking of which, can you give a little more information on how the games played out? You mentioned the things you were missing, but what about what you did see - from both your deck and theirs? If you say it is variance, I will certainly believe you; as I wrote in the mainpage's matchup breakdown, there are a few draws with which Dredge can literally run over almost anything on the play, but these are exceptionally rare. Some of them can even be interacted with them on the draw, provided that you have access to Celestial Purge as mentioned above. In every other case but these, there are small edges that can make all the difference in the world. I may be able to offer experience in these cases.
Finally, For Ponza you mentioned three cards that gave you trouble: Klothys, God of Destiny, Wrenn and Six, and Chandra. The number of viable "Chandras" makes my advice differ slightly in playstyle for "Pyromaster" versus "Torch of Defiance", and there are also two viable candidates among her six-drop incarnations, but I will assume for simplicity's sake that you played against Chandra, Torch of Defiance as that is the most common choice. In any event, I believe that the most significant upgrade that can be made against all of these cards is, again, Celestial Purge and extra Pithing Needle. Purge also interacts with several common finishers, and can break out of Blood Moon if the situation calls for it, but I would advise being very patient with it in general, as it is much better at exhausting threats and attrition engines. For Klothys in particular, why should you care if it exiles your entire graveyard on their turn, for example? As long as it is not a creature, it is awful at acceleration and puts them down a card for no benefit in the face of a sacrifice outlet, when their lack of reliable card advantage is the axis I aim to win the game on in around 75% of cases anyway. Your list cares about lifegain, so I suppose that is one potential issue, and another is that your creatures are weak to Lightning Bolt, but these are the price you pay for the aggression that helps win games like yours against Storm, and if you accept that then this is the payment. I have not found the trade to be worthwhile.
In essence, the minor long-term issues you bring up here can be resolved by swapping your sideboard Vetos for two Purges. The maindeck copies do the heavy lifting, but as a plan 1-for-1 countermagic does no more than keep opponents honest in some percentage of games. If this was my goal, I would try to minimize the downside by only playing one copy in the maindeck, as a singleton is enough for mind games, and can be recycled multiple times with Mistveil Plains if you choose to run the card. As long as you are trying to build with the intention to outlast, things will tend work out better when you draw the game out, but you still likely had several options with your build. Details are the key, however, so the more you tell me the more I can give specific advice tailored to your goals. Your decklist is a good starting point, but beyond that every card you see from them has the potential to matter.
Out of curiosity. What does everyone's sideboard look like these days?
Mine is sort of tailored to the decks that I encounter often, so it has 3 of on certain cards.
Just curious; what is your current maindeck, and how useful have you found the singletons of Dovin, Hand of Control and Trinisphere to be? When do you bring them in, and what cards are they best against? I have never played either, since I felt three mana was too much to pay for their value, but I am very interested in your thoughts on their effects once they are available.
Dovin, Hand of Control - his static ability slows down Burn and UR storm decks. Takes off some pressure on my life total if Burn is burning or attacking him instead of me.
Trinisphere - this was used by my Ponza deck as a sideboard card to slow down burn and storm. I use it here in Emeria for the same reason.
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Oh, my list is a simple stock list with a very slight green splash for tarmogoyf. I want to use the sfm + batterskull build that everyone in this thread is using, but unfortunately I don't have sfm anymore - sold my copies during the sfm unban hype. But I do plan to try the sfm list when I can buy some sfm again.
Can you give more detail on the specific card interactions your singletons enable? When have you found them to work better than expected, and when have they been worse? Which specific cards are you targeting with them when you bring them in, and do they do a good job at providing incidental damage to other options these cards are typically found with?
Edit: Also, do you have any combos or non-bos that you watch out for when you draw these cards?
Dovin does not really hurt my deck, because his ability only effects opponents. He make all burn spells cost 1 more, really slows them down. And if he get killed, it makes goyfs stronger.
Trinisphere is a bit trickier to use. Turns all my two drops into 3 drops. Typically, I try to cast something meaningful on turn two before casting the sphere on turn 3. It's almost an easy win if I get this down turn 3 against certain decks.
Burn and UR storm are cheap and easy to build for people in my area. Which is why I have 5 sideboard slots for these two. 1 Dovin HoC, 1 Trinisphere, 1 Halo, 2 Veto.
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edit:
about my list.. it does not have any field of ruin or quarter.. I try to compensate for this by having a playset of spreading seas.
the single baneslayer used to be a batterskull. Changed it to the angel as she is not vulnerable to knight of autumn and other artifact removal. Will change back to skull if I ever get sfm's.
gy hate on the other side of the table hits harder. For example, a rest in peace hits both emeria and goyf.
with 8 fetchlands, in a way I'm also more vulnerable to moon effects, thankfully not much moon in my area. I try to compensate for this by having pilgrim's eye. Pilgrim is also an excellent goyf fattener, because it is both an artifact and a creature.
A bit more detail on Dovin and 3-Sphere would be appreciated, though. When you say the artifact is an "easy win against certain decks", what decks do you mean, and what does an "easy win" look like? How many turns will it buy you on average if you are behind, and how difficult is it to get rid of if you are ahead? Things like that, and your play patterns, will help determine if there are other potential applications for the two cards in different metas.
As for your list, you say you have tuned it to your own local meta, so I will trust that you like your results. The fact that you have to play a Basic Forest in addition to the Basic Island is a punishing blow to activating Emeria, though, so if you say there is not a lot of Blood Moon in your area I would heavily recommend first substituting it for a Canopy Vista, and then adding an extra Temple Garden or two over some number of Windswept Heath if you are looking for green mana to cast Tarmogoyf. Pilgrim's Eye into Island for guaranteed a turn-four Supreme Verdict is generally too important to lose access to, but the Forest has no such justification and on top of that will kill your chances of casting the sideboard Dovin's Veto, Runed Halo, and Devout Lightcaster on-curve.
Spreading Seas I will never speak ill against, it is free deck velocity at 2 mana that has a chance of messing up opposing manabases. If you have the slots, go for it. I am, however, surprised at no Court Hussar, since you are playing a complicated manabase for just two maindeck effects (since sweepers can be provided by several different options in mono-white already, if necessary) plus one additional one in the side. Your 3-drop slot, and your curve consistency overall, might appreciate the help of 1 or 2.
Ok, sorry for not going too in depth. My meta has many "kill you fast" decks like Burn, storm, and infect. These decks have a high density of one mana spells, a curve much lower than mine, so typically sticking a 3-sphere on turn 3 or even turn 4 can put a wrench on their plans. 3-sphere forces them to play at 3 cmc curve, a thing their decks are really not designed to do, so it causes a slowdown. Of course, I don't rely on 3-sphere alone.. 3-sphere is instead a part of the team of 2 veto, 1 halo, 1 Dovin hoc, and 1 sphere. It all depends.. am I on the play or on the draw? Decision trees come from that. Do have path? did I stick a goyf or wall on turn 2? Did they play a creature? Storm decks here besically cannot get rid of a resolved sphere. Burn brings in a few copies of that RG spell that do also 2 damage whenever it hits an artifact or enchantment. Btw, against Burn I always name Eidolon of the Great Revel with runed halo, that card is a pain.
And lastly, Infect has become surprisingly difficult to play against. Modern horizons gave them a new toy, scale up. Have you played against the scale up versions? It has a faster clock, because a single scale gives their creature 6 power. The local decks here also have evolved to have a single spellskite in their main. Game 2, if they have not sticked a spellskite.. it becomes a cat and mouse game whether they spell pierce my mortarpod or not. Infect is another reason I removed batterskull for a baneslayer. Because skull can be spell pierced, and the angel can help block their flying land.
Hmm, you do have a point about the forest. Will try to replace it with a vista.
Will think it over if could add a hussar or not. On 25 lands, so I could just cut a land for a hussar.
I have a bit of a better picture now. In the fast matchups, though, I was under the impression that either Trinisphere would come down after a lot of the damage had been done, or it would tap me out of Path to Exile the turn it came down, meaning the opposition could feel free to use all of their available land to go all-in on an attack without fear of interaction. Since the card cannot be relevantly recycled, I was not very keen on devoting sideboard space to it (even if there are matchups where the effect is clearly worthwhile). The main problem is that Emeria control generally has no mana advantage engine, so we start off down a 3-mana investment for the artifact, and degenerate opponents can abuse the symmetry against us with their plan Bs. Also, with Burn they will eventually draw lands, so they still must be met with lifegain in the long term. You have the potential for a quick clock, which changes that dynamic, but unless you have a kill within the next two or three turns I find that taxing their spells is not enough. Tell me; do you always side in your Planeswalker with it?
Moving on, to answer your question, I have played against Scale Up infect twice, and things are still very bad for them. They are more explosive, but not enough to be a consistent turn-2 kill, so blockers continue to wreck all of their plans while other things get set up. The tempo loss of Spell Pierce is dangerous, but if the builds around your area are running extra copies of those they are slowing down their draws again. My version runs Stoneforge Mystic to play around counterspells by putting Mortarpod directly into play anyway if they hold up mana. If your meta has a large amount of both Burn and Infect, though, you could consider maindecking a Spellskite yourself. It is a very powerful option when you can soak up every pump spell or modal burn spell they have, and complements 'Goyf extremely well against almost everything else, while randomly screwing up rogue strategies like Auras. It costs a lot in the midrange matchups, but since you have made several non card-equity decisions (Goyf, Missionary, Baneslayer) which indicate you are not fighting that battle anyway, it may be worth your while.
If you do not want to go that far, I think that Runed Halo is an excellent option overall, and I would consider swapping your Trinisphere for a second one so that you can make it a more consistent plan. Your comment about Eidolon is even more relevant when you have a beater, since if you stop attacking into it now they are caught between a rock and a hard place by their own triggers. Finally, The Hussar over a 25th land seems very good considering your curve, you have only three 4-drops, a single 5-drop, and three 6-drops, plus several extra 2-mana plays and a number of cantrips/searches, so you are well below the converted mana cost where you would start needing a 25th land. I have 24 in my build, and I have 4 more expensive plays than you do. Hussar splits the difference between an extra land and additional utility anyway with its ETB, and it ramps up the power of the Emeria, the Sky Ruin endgame essentially for free. I would trim Windswept Heath for it, and that will help your Burn matchup a touch as well.
Edit: You mentioned Mortarpod post-board against Infect, but the list you posted contains none. Was that in another version?
yeah, I always bring in Dovin HoC against Burn, Infect, and Storm. Why?
oh, I see now. Having sfm makes it easier to dodge spell pierce from Infect.
Thanks for noticing. My list indeed has 58 cards. Probably forgot to write the mortarpods yesterday. Edited the list previously posted. Also trimmed a windswept to add one hussar to the list.
My current deck. Thinking if could get a set of sfm's, could simply do... -4 goyf -1 baneslayer +4 sfm +1 batterskull, then go straight UW on the lands.
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on another thing. I was thinking of adding an Elspeth, Knight Errant or a Gideon, Ally of Zendikar to the deck to increase threat density. Is this a good or bad idea?
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And lastly, not sure on the deck name. Have you played against "Druid Devastation" decks? It's a combo deck with toolbox ability. I personally have not played against it yet. But one of my friends have played against it a bit, and that deck seems to combo rather consistently. Are they a good or bad matchup for us?
I would like to know how often you have drawn the two together. Are there any odd sequencing decisions you have to make when you have both of them? Also, have you ever had any odd rules interactions crop up? I know that having both Dovin and 3-Sphere in play does no more than just having the Sphere would against 0, 1, or 2-mana plays, for example, but have you ever noticed any other quirks?
Next, the card switches you proposed to get to a straight W/u list are reasonable, but you will sometimes run out of Equipment with just three targets. You can start there, but be ready to assess how important that is to you in the long-term. I have found it to be a very worthwhile consideration.
Gideon and Elspeth are aggressive options, and to be honest I have not found either of them to have a ton of synergy with the deck at the four-mana slot in the curve; this is the point where you want a stabilizing play. They can do that, but only sometimes, and only against decks attacking on the ground. Thinking long-term, these types of plays have mostly been worse than sweepers at filling that role, and they do not scale as well into the Emeria, the Sky Ruin lategame. If you think that things may be different for you, try them out. They are still going to be strong cards in the abstract, so they may win games, but I urge you to pay attention to the way they warp your play. The wins they enable don't come around often, and do have a subtle cost to them.
Finally, I have not played against that deck in a while, but I did see it once in a tournament. It mostly felt like a trade-off for increased consistency in exchange for losing access to Collected Company, which probably contributed to their loss on the day as their fair beatdown plan suffered because of it. The key to creature-based combo decks is keeping the board clear anyway, so whenever such decks have less card advantage it makes me feel much better about things. They can threaten to combo early, but they have to assemble three specific creatures while playing around Path to Exile, Mortarpod, Detention Sphere, and Teferi, Time Raveler, and after that if a Wrath of God resolves the game generally becomes very, very hard for them to win. Unless they have an instant-speed way to put two combo pieces on the table, I never feel threatened after turn 5 or so without a lot of advance warning.
They are singles, so it's rare for me to have them both together in hand. However, in situation I have both in hand.. it depends on the deck I'm facing. Against Burn I would no doubt put down the trini first, because taxing them for 2 more in most their spells is better than taxing them for 1, sometimes they only have exactly 2 lands, they can't cast anything at all with a trini in play. However, against infect or storm, I would always cast Dovin first.. to bait out a possible spell pierce or some other counterspell they might have, I would then follow up with the 3-sphere next turn.
No quirks so far. As I've said, having them both at the same time is rare. Usually, my opponent would have dealt with one of them or the game ended before I could find the other.
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Well, you do have a point on the walkers. Not much synergy. They cannot be revived by titan or emeria. I'll think about it more.
Speaking of walkers. There was a time in 2018 that I won against eldrazi tron using Gideon Jura. He had a bunch of elrazi on his side, I had titan, jura and many wisps on my side. Activate Jura ability, they all had to attack him.. leaving me free to swing for the win next turn. Stopped him from reaching ulamog mana with the crucible + quarter combo. I'm thinking if Jura still has a place in the deck today, or is he outdated already?
_____________________
About Druid Devastation. Oh, I see.. that's nice to hear then.
Got worried, because someone told me that that Druid deck is strong enough to beat Hogaak decks when Hog wasn't banned yet.
So how did those games end, by combat? Did you win or lose, and on what turn?
Gideon Jura is still a strong enough effect, but as I mentioned (on page 68 I believe) it competes with Batterskull. What I was getting at there was that enabling the low end of the curve (Stoneforge Mystic, in this case) is more important than anything that can happen after 4 mana. The only thing I care about at that point is having literally any play that might help bridge the gap to Sun Titan and Emeria triggers. To grant the turn-2 play consistent value in this direction, I don't think there is another option than to cut the other 5-drops.
Druid combo may have been fast enough against Hogaak, but I assume that was because Hogaak did not interact with it easily. if at all. If you do absolutely nothing to stop the deck, Devoted Druid can indeed generate 1,000 mana a large percentage of the time on turn 3. To do this though, they need a non-summoning sick Druid, PLUS 2-mana 2/1, AND something to do with the mana. When you factor in spot removal, things are much less rosy. To my mind, it is the exact same reason why Infect had a good matchup against Hogaak. When the format is defined by speed, degenerate cheap creatures shine because interacting is the domain of slow decks.
The Azorius companion was a huge bust in my opinion when it comes to our deck. While it could be fun as a deck building challenge, I don’t see it making any of our bad matchups any better. The only one I saw that could be worth considering was Zirda, the Dawnwaker, if combined with Eldrazi Displacer, Thraben Inspector, or Stoneforge Mystic in a mono white build. As for the list I’m running, it’s Gerant’s with a GotT instead of T3feri.
I completely agree on Yorion in the bad matchups, but I would add that the one strategy I can see it influencing directly is Jund. The way the games play out against them typically leads to a topdeck war where everything that isn't able to be played to the board gets discarded to Liliana of the Veil and Kolaghan's Command, plus more recently Kroxa, Titan of Death's Hunger. The fact that Yorion gives a "free" resource that is never susceptible to hand disruption might be a clean +10-+20% advantage, and the deckbuilding exercise you mention is purely to determine how realistic unlocking this "free" card might be. As I have mentioned elsewhere, Jund tends to be one of the better decks in metagames where Emeria Control has a chance of winning a large tournament, so turning that matchup into an auto-win is an advantage I might be willing to jump through quite a few hoops for. It is a popular deck against which my build has a clear edge, but the better the opposition is the closer the matchup feels.
With regards to the other hybrid legends, I consider the ones taht must be cast with double W more playable than those that require double U, but since they are potentially options that can grant value in the long term, here is my assessment of their individual restrictions:
Lurrus - while the 3/2 for 3 is probably one of the more interesting options, it requires giving up on D-sphere, Hussar, Titan, Eye, Tef3ri, and any sideboard creatures/enchantments that cost more than 2, and I therefore do not believe it to be a viable Companion. As a 3/2 Lifelinker it is in theory a maindeckable card which can be recurred by Emeria and Titan, however, and I might just barely see a world where it can immediately re-cast something like a Mishra's Bauble on turn 3 or a Kami of False Hope on turn 4 for value, but as it stands it would likely require warping the deck substantially to see play.
Kaheera - as another 3/2 for 3 it currently conflicts with literally every single one of the 18 creatures in my maindeck, plus nearly every single card I have ever seriously considered for the maindeck or sideboard, and I therefore feel confident in making a rare absolute statement here by calling it completely unplayable as a Companion for any Emeria Control I have ever seen. As a normal card, it might be tempting to consider if and only if your choice of supplemental finisher includes the likes of Regal Caracal at the 5-drop slot, plus extra synergies elsewhere, but I have huge reservations even there.
Zirda - a 3/3 for three on its own, once again the card conflicts with almost every nonland permanent in the maindeck, this time with the exception of Stoneforge Mystic and its equipment, plus Tef3ri, and also invalidates 60% of the sideboard with its restriction, and is therefore not a currently viable companion. As a maindeck card, its activated ability is purely aggressive, and its cost reduction matters very little to a deck planning to make many land drops and go into a long game, so I am highly skeptical of its utility overall - even if it can be recurred by Titan and Emeria.
Gyruda - this 6/6 for 6 locks out all 1,3,5, and any potential 7-mana plays in the maindeck (including the best removal spell, the best card selection, and most of the better backup finishers), and would be prohibited by 7 of the current 15 sideboard cards while costing 4UU, so I once again believe I can apply a categorical "unplayable as a Companion" label. As a maindeck card, its ETB is essentially a Sun Titan trigger expanded to the opposing graveyard (plus mill 4 for both decks), but only on ETB and only on 0,2,4,6,8,10-mana etc. creatures. I am not very hopeful here either.
Keruga - on the face of things the 5/4 for 5 precludes all non-permanent removal spells including Path to Exile and all Wrath of God variants in the maindeck, plus the early curve creatures and Mortarpod as well as nearly the entirety of the sideboard for games 2 and 3, and is therefore a huge disadvantage when building in a Control shell. Likely also unplayable in the maindeck, due to a 3UU cost, but at the very least can be considered here as an inflexible Mulldrifter with much higher upside. I am not interested in the slightest, but someone else might be in some Evoke or Suspend-heavy shell.
Lutri - this 3/2 Flash for 3 prohibits most maindeck and sideboard redundancy due to the singleton restriction, crippling the current advantages of curving and planning for topdeck outs, and as of now I also consider it an unplayable Companion in Emeria Control. Similarly to Lurrus, I can see a theoretical world where it supplements maindeck or sideboard strategies, but with an UU cost and requiring another spell on the stack it has much less synergy with any attrition plan than Lurrus does when considering its effect in isolation.
In my opinion, this leaves Yorion as the only on-colour Companion with a legitimate chance, plus Lurrus and Keruga as potential build-arounds that would spin the deck in a new direction, with all other options requiring a substantial investment for middling to irrelevant advantage. My logic is that the only one that is even close to playable in the current shell deserves a shot simply to be able to assess the value of the mechanic, which is why I am committing to attempting it (albeit without much hope of success).
(Edit: Zirda may find a home as well, but it would require specifically Wall of Omens and Sun Titan to leave, which makes me less than eager to try it out unless a replacement for these exists - and these are critical effects for Emeria. Tellingly, Thraben Inspector actually does not have an activated ability itself, so I can't see it making the cut at the moment.)
On another note, how are you getting along with the list? Are you having any unexpected difficulties with it?
Quite surprised Ponza is alive and kicking again. Ponza was one of my pet decks a few years ago, can get explosive starts with utopia sprawl --> land destruction --> big scary things. One of the best creatures it can bring out against emeria is a stormbreath dragon, even as a 4/4 the dragon is dangerous because only boardwipes can kill it -- but that was back in 2018, my knowledge on ponza is certainly outdated. I'm curious what Ponza decks today use as finishers, or if they have a new strategy.
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Classic aggro (Zoo or the like) is an excellent matchup in general, because prioritizing controlling the board will yield the results you are looking for. The more burn spells they play, the more you need to make card-economy negative plays. Think Philosophy of Fire, but in reverse. You are looking to create negative potential on their draw steps, setting up high-toughness blockers and instant-speed removal to blank both their lands AND their creatures, which will mean that over 50% of their deck turns into "not a burn spell". There are manabase decisions that this involves, but forcing them to use their burn is the key, because they run out eventually - Emeria's job is to facilitate that.
Through the Breach on the other hand is a combo deck, and therefore falls into the category of "bad matchup" as far as I am concerned. What was the specific list you played against? I have experience against many variants, but in all honesty Annihilator 6 plus 15 damage to the face is very difficult to beat until I have seven permanents. Accepting an 8 or 9-for one is not a winning strategy in general, even if it is mostly the plan, so if you are playing Breach every week I would be hesitant to recommend any Emeria list. It can be beaten, but I would need to know more to suggest specific counter-strategies. If it is the only such fast strategy, you can pinpoint it, but if there are too many different spell-based combos without sideboard overlap, these take up too much equity and Emeria ceases to maintain good post-board averages elsewhere.
Fluff;
Ponza has been fighting reasonably well against Primeval Titan decks lately, so I am not surprised to see it on the rise. I do think it is good for this version, though, even with 4-of Stormbreath Dragon. When there are more copies of sweepers than total possible dragons, the exchange of 4 life for a card can be made at least twice before I will begin to be concerned. The fact that these answers cost 1 mana less than the threat makes sequencing pretty simple around them as well, even through a Stone Rain. If I am starting to be concerned about the hasty flier I can always count on Pilgrim's Eye to either chump block or soak up burn, either way making it more difficult for them to finish the game. If their chosen attrition engine is dealt with, the games play out to serious flood issues for Ponza extremely quickly. The strategy is still missing some kind of card selection/inevitability. Tireless Tracker is good, but not enough, and the other engines are still clunky going long.
3 u/w u/w : Yorion, Sky Nomad - 4/5 flying Bird Serpent, ETB mass Flickerwisp for your permanents only.
The companion restriction is that your starting deck would have to be 80 cards in sanctioned Modern, so that kills the most important aspect of the card for me (the value of a free card going late, if it had been immediately able to fit with my current build). Beyond that, this is a fine finisher that can sometimes bring extra value, so someone in a blink shell may want to test this: it re-triggers ETBs on non-creature permanents, which is somewhat relevant. There may be a build that wants to run Planeswalkers with relevant minus abilities like Elspeth, Sun's Champion, extra permanent-based removal like Cast out, plus attrition like Elspeth Conquers Death and value options such as Stonehorn Dignitary, Omen of the Sun, The Birth of Meletis, and Solemn Simulacrum to go along with Ranger-Captain of Eos and Thraben Inspector and maybe even Glimmerpoint Stag for good measure.
Momentary Blink might provide enough redundancy at that point to be a real option, so there is a world where I can see this having 80 cards that can support it, but the logistics of losing consistent access to Path to Exile make me pessimistic on that front. If the 20 extra cards have to include 2 or 3 Winds of Abandon and another 2 or 3 Supreme Verdict and Wrath of God to maintain adequate ratios, the differences between the best and the second-best options may become more telling at a greater frequency. This also cuts into the small upside of the 20 extra cards by leaving less room for situational effects that you would not draw as often, and this is before we add the seven or eight extra lands that would be required to support them. This mana would conveniently have to include the fourth Emeria, the Sky Ruin, giving reasonable return on investment, but with four of these in an 80-card stack corner cases will be very difficult to address without massive groundwork. The trade-offs are a few gains to the maindeck balanced against a lower chance of drawing an even curve, and requires sacrificing a sideboard slot in addition to reducing the probable effectiveness of the other 14 cards by decreasing their relative weight as substitutions.
The last place I can see the card is as a straight value option in a normal, no frills, 60-card version of Emeria control. There, things seem a little more clear. It fits nicely into builds already running Flickerwisp, and comes with an extremely easy casting cost plus the potential of immediate value, so it is at least a candidate to consider alongside Geist-honored Monk, Gideon Jura, Cavalier of Dawn, Teferi, Hero of Dominaria, Lavinia of the Tenth and Dragonlord Ojutai - if you were ever interested in these effects. Once you are not playing Batterskull, Yorion or any of the previous six cards have metagame applications that can lead to their inclusion, so if you do not run Stoneforge Mystic he/she/it could be a reasonable alternate finisher that fulfills the turn-5 requirement.
I will post a sample decklist for the 80-card version I might build following this entry, but I do not recommend it. If the card seems strong enough to you, I encourage you to try it out and report back on your results.
This is the original version, as posted both above and on the homepage:
4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Pilgrim's Eye
3 Court Hussar
3 Sun Titan
2 Batterskull
3 Mortarpod
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Teferi, Time Raveler
2 Detention Sphere
1 Wrath of God
1 Settle the Wreckage
4 Path to Exile
3 Emeria, The Sky Ruin
7 Plains
3 Field of Ruin
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Prairie Stream
1 Island
1 Mistveil Plains
4 Flooded Strand
2 Hallowed Fountain
3 Aven Mindcensor
1 Lone Missionary
1 Lavinia, Azorius Renegade
2 Pithing Needle
2 Celestial Purge
1 Blessed Alliance
1 Disenchant
1 Aura of Silence
And here is the 80-card "expanded" version that attempts to minimize losses from curve or effect inconsistency:
4 The Birth of Meletis
4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Pilgrim's Eye
4 Court Hussar
4 Sun Titan
2 Batterskull
4 Mortarpod
1 Crucible of Worlds
2 Teferi, Time Raveler
3 Detention Sphere
4 Supreme Verdict
1 Wrath of God
2 Settle the Wreckage
1 Winds of Abandon
4 Path to Exile
10 Plains
4 Field of Ruin
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Prairie Stream
1 Irrigated Farmland
1 Island
1 Mistveil Plains
1 Prismatic Vista
4 Flooded Strand
3 Hallowed Fountain
3 Remorseful Cleric
2 Aven Mindcensor
1 Lone Missionary
1 Lavinia, Azorius Renegade
2 Pithing Needle
2 Celestial Purge
1 Blessed Alliance
1 Disenchant
1 Aura of Silence
1 Azor's Elocutors
The additions, then, are as follows:
And the Azor's Elocutors is, obviously, a stand-in for Yorion since it has an identical mana cost. Across the 20 extra cards, the 2:3 ratio of lands to spells is maintained, and aside from the unavoidable increase from 1 to 2 mana in Path to Exile #5 switching to a Winds of Abandon, all other points of the curve are either preserved or improved upon. The theory (dubiously supported by old Entomb and Buried Alive Reanimator decks, as well as by the slightly more recent Valakut "66 Special") is that the fourth Sun Titan will not increase its population in the opening hand by more than the deck's dilution due to an increase in size. There is also no need for another 5-drop or an extra finisher, since Yorion will be taking that position automatically. The fourth Supreme Verdict then joins the second Settle the Wreckage for the continued superabundance of mass removal, also giving one extra piece of instant-speed interaction as an offset for the lost "Virtual Path".
In the cheaper spells, the fourth copy of both Court Hussar and Mortarpod should be self-explanatory, as should the third Detention Sphere, but I could not justify Skittering Surveyor as a replacement for Pilgrim's Eye - the former is too ineffective at blocking to be seriously entertained. Since there is no closer replacement for Wall of Omens at 2 mana in white, I therefore split the difference by adding two extra copies of The Birth of Meletis, and then another Teferi, Time Raveler over the fourth Detention Sphere that it should otherwise have been since I needed a cantrip that would play well to the board. This dropped the curve by more than the loss of the "Virtual Path", and made me more comfortable with the expectation of having a universally playable 2-drop in the opener. An extra copy of Tef3ri also supports a situational increase of the instant-speed interaction which would have been covered by a fifth one-mana exile effect. All these changes play reasonably well into either Wrath or Yorion, who provides an extra flying blocker to somewhat mitigate the loss of the "Virtual Eye".
In the manabase, the additional deck thinning continues with the fourth Field of Ruin and a single Prismatic Vista, but the colour ratios drop slightly because the Hallowed Fountain is the only new solid untapped source for Blue. I am overly cautious about my mana requirements in control, so I switched one of the four extra deck-thinning Plains I wanted to add for a fourth dual land in Irrigated Farmland. I don't like that it is never immediately able to unlock the extra Blue three-drops, so it may be better as a shockland or a Prairie Stream, but I will at least test it out as it compensates at least some amount for losing "Virtual Omens" draws. The fourth Emeria, the Sky Ruin is a given in this configuration. A word of warning, however, 3 of 60 does not behave the same as 4 of 80, even if the ratio is preserved at scale. I have played super-sized decks in the past, and in practice lager numbers are needed to reach the theoretical averages, which are caused by multiples stacking up in enough games to balance out total absences in other games. Essentially, things tend to get more volatile in Battle of Wits-style construction. This is generally bad for control, unless overshooting on the reliability of effects is possible (generally through either card draw or functional reprints).
Overall, Yorion fits decently here and does come at an interesting moment for stabilization in this build, where there might be opportunity to set up multiple mid-game Mortarpod re-buys as a pseudo machine-gun. Given this entire exercise I am not as pessimistic as I was initially that the curve can be maintained, not to mention that adding The Birth of Meletis introduces a few new dynamics to many matchups, and so I will probably build this version and test it at least for two or three small tournaments. When this happens, I will write as full a report as possible, and post it here. I am still highly dubious that the sideboard sacrifice is worth the effort, not to mention the fact that Yorion will be worse than useless when our single legal companion is killed immediately in positions with empty boards, but an extra card at no direct cost is too powerful an advantage not to explore fully. Perhaps the maindeck can guarantee more wins than the sideboard will be asked to make up for. My intuition tells me that combo opponents will not care in the slightest about a largely irrelevant 4/5 flier, and this is probably the biggest mark against the card after its mathematical disadvantages to consistency, but the metagame may not always trend in such a way that this matters more than the redundancy and extra reach it provides.
Let me know what you all think.
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/2911130#paper
In game one, he spent the first few turns just playing Serum Visions and Opt for a while, so by the time he was able to cast Gifts Ungiven I had found both Dovin's Vetos. Countered Gifts with the first one end of my turn, then next turn he plays Baral and rituals a bit, before trying a second Gifts, which I counter, leaving him with an empty hand, when he scoops. Second game he just goes super fast for a turn three win pretty much. Then third game I get Damping Spehre out early to slow him down, with backup from Remorseful Cleric and Veto. He eventually gets a decent storm count, but unfortunately for him his storm card this time was Empty The Warrens, and I had the Detention Sphere ready to wipe his gobbos out.
I should clarify it was more of the Prowess variant than traditional burn. But they were pretty straightforward games, me trying to stall and take care of his threats as they come, and eventually he runs out of gas and I'm left with an active Emeria and Sun Titan. Batterskull was pretty helpful, though I think my personal MVP here was probably Charming Prince and his lifegain.
The Yawgmoth combo games were a little weird. What ended up happening is he would get a Yawgmoth down by turn three, I Detention Sphere it, then next turn he plays another. Then I draw a Flickerwisp and have to flicker the Sphere to take care of his new Yawgmoth. Happened all three games somehow. Only difference is in game two I ran out of removal by the time he got to Yawgmoth number 4, but I was able to take game 3.
I kind of hate to blame my losses on just having bad draws, but I think that's seriously what happened here. I saw all of one Path To Exile in that round, and none of the Clerics I brought in from the board. On the other hand, he had super explosive draws. Gonna chalk this round up for variance.
His deck was pretty interesting, a bit grindier than the normal Ponza list. He had a few copies of Klothys, God of Destiny, which was pretty good at dashing any of my hopes of getting stuff back from my graveyard. Sure, it's a big target for Path, but that's only if it's online as a creature. Besides Klothys, Chandra and W&6 gave the deck even more grindy late-game value.
Modern:
(online)Enduring Ideal
(online)BUG
(paper)Mono White Control
Standard:
(paper) Whatever I can throw together
(online) UWR Control
Legacy:
(paper)The Gate
(paper)Dream Halls
Thank you for the details, they explain a lot. Having Damping Sphere goes a long way in games 2+, and the first game is very likely attributed to the fact that they were looking for Remand as backup. Dovin's Veto being uncounterable is often irrelevant, but my guess is that it was probably crucial to that win in particular. Post-board, Empty the Warrens is a truly awful win condition for Storm against us, but a single Remorseful Cleric can often force them to go that route and Storm players frequently bring it in blind against anything playing Blue.
In round 2, Prowess is quite a bit easier to beat than traditional or Boros Burn, since they care about blockers and removal a lot more when it comes to their reach. Charming Prince is indeed nice, but you may see what I mean if I say it represents an edge that can be shaved while still keeping a very good win percentage here. Batterskull is a serious problem for them long-term.
Against Yawgmoth I have historically felt almost no fear at all. They can combo, in theory, but in practice sweepers make it very hard for them to threaten this consistently. Path to Exile is so cheap that there is almost never a clean window for them to do so unless you were forced to use it early (which their deck is not very good at providing incentive for around 0/4 blockers). One note of caution is that relying on a single Detention Sphere gives them a chance to upgrade dead removal for relevant Naturalize effects post-board, and my recommendation to minimize this is the same as it will be for the last two matchups: have access to Celestial Purge. I would also recommend you provide some extra coverage by playing one more Pithing Needle over your Burrenton Forge-Tender, unless you are finding yourself having to deal with too many Searing Blaze effects, or something like Bonfire of the Damned.
Your Dredge matchup does have Conflagrate as a version of this effect for him to contend with, so feel free to ignore me if this is the reason you are running the 1/1, but as you may have experienced it will not win you the game on its own unless you have the chance to both draw and use it for value. This makes it an effect I can live without, and I replace it with effects that pull the game back to the situations where Emeria control has torque, or prevent that torque from being overpowered in a normal draw. Speaking of which, can you give a little more information on how the games played out? You mentioned the things you were missing, but what about what you did see - from both your deck and theirs? If you say it is variance, I will certainly believe you; as I wrote in the mainpage's matchup breakdown, there are a few draws with which Dredge can literally run over almost anything on the play, but these are exceptionally rare. Some of them can even be interacted with them on the draw, provided that you have access to Celestial Purge as mentioned above. In every other case but these, there are small edges that can make all the difference in the world. I may be able to offer experience in these cases.
Finally, For Ponza you mentioned three cards that gave you trouble: Klothys, God of Destiny, Wrenn and Six, and Chandra. The number of viable "Chandras" makes my advice differ slightly in playstyle for "Pyromaster" versus "Torch of Defiance", and there are also two viable candidates among her six-drop incarnations, but I will assume for simplicity's sake that you played against Chandra, Torch of Defiance as that is the most common choice. In any event, I believe that the most significant upgrade that can be made against all of these cards is, again, Celestial Purge and extra Pithing Needle. Purge also interacts with several common finishers, and can break out of Blood Moon if the situation calls for it, but I would advise being very patient with it in general, as it is much better at exhausting threats and attrition engines. For Klothys in particular, why should you care if it exiles your entire graveyard on their turn, for example? As long as it is not a creature, it is awful at acceleration and puts them down a card for no benefit in the face of a sacrifice outlet, when their lack of reliable card advantage is the axis I aim to win the game on in around 75% of cases anyway. Your list cares about lifegain, so I suppose that is one potential issue, and another is that your creatures are weak to Lightning Bolt, but these are the price you pay for the aggression that helps win games like yours against Storm, and if you accept that then this is the payment. I have not found the trade to be worthwhile.
In essence, the minor long-term issues you bring up here can be resolved by swapping your sideboard Vetos for two Purges. The maindeck copies do the heavy lifting, but as a plan 1-for-1 countermagic does no more than keep opponents honest in some percentage of games. If this was my goal, I would try to minimize the downside by only playing one copy in the maindeck, as a singleton is enough for mind games, and can be recycled multiple times with Mistveil Plains if you choose to run the card. As long as you are trying to build with the intention to outlast, things will tend work out better when you draw the game out, but you still likely had several options with your build. Details are the key, however, so the more you tell me the more I can give specific advice tailored to your goals. Your decklist is a good starting point, but beyond that every card you see from them has the potential to matter.
I hope this is helpful!
Mine is sort of tailored to the decks that I encounter often, so it has 3 of on certain cards.
2 Dovin's Veto
1 Dovin, Hand of Control
3 Celestial Purge
1 Devout Lightcaster
1 Runed Halo
1 Trinisphere
3 Stony Silence
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Just curious; what is your current maindeck, and how useful have you found the singletons of Dovin, Hand of Control and Trinisphere to be? When do you bring them in, and what cards are they best against? I have never played either, since I felt three mana was too much to pay for their value, but I am very interested in your thoughts on their effects once they are available.
Dovin, Hand of Control - his static ability slows down Burn and UR storm decks. Takes off some pressure on my life total if Burn is burning or attacking him instead of me.
Trinisphere - this was used by my Ponza deck as a sideboard card to slow down burn and storm. I use it here in Emeria for the same reason.
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Oh, my list is a simple stock list with a very slight green splash for tarmogoyf. I want to use the sfm + batterskull build that everyone in this thread is using, but unfortunately I don't have sfm anymore - sold my copies during the sfm unban hype. But I do plan to try the sfm list when I can buy some sfm again.
3 Lone Missionary
4 Wall of Omens
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Pilgrim's Eye
1 Court Hussar
1 Baneslayer Angel
3 Sun Titan
4 Path to Exile
1 Wrath of God
2 Supreme Verdict
Enchantment: 7
4 Spreading Seas
1 Oblivion Ring
2 Detention Sphere
Planeswalker: 1
1 Gideon of the Trials
2 Mortarpod
Manabase: 24
3 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
4 Flooded Strand
3 Hallowed Fountain
1 Temple Garden
1 Island
1 Canopy Vista
8 Plains
3 Windswept Heath
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Can you give more detail on the specific card interactions your singletons enable? When have you found them to work better than expected, and when have they been worse? Which specific cards are you targeting with them when you bring them in, and do they do a good job at providing incidental damage to other options these cards are typically found with?
Edit: Also, do you have any combos or non-bos that you watch out for when you draw these cards?
Trinisphere is a bit trickier to use. Turns all my two drops into 3 drops. Typically, I try to cast something meaningful on turn two before casting the sphere on turn 3. It's almost an easy win if I get this down turn 3 against certain decks.
Burn and UR storm are cheap and easy to build for people in my area. Which is why I have 5 sideboard slots for these two. 1 Dovin HoC, 1 Trinisphere, 1 Halo, 2 Veto.
________________
edit:
about my list.. it does not have any field of ruin or quarter.. I try to compensate for this by having a playset of spreading seas.
the single baneslayer used to be a batterskull. Changed it to the angel as she is not vulnerable to knight of autumn and other artifact removal. Will change back to skull if I ever get sfm's.
gy hate on the other side of the table hits harder. For example, a rest in peace hits both emeria and goyf.
with 8 fetchlands, in a way I'm also more vulnerable to moon effects, thankfully not much moon in my area. I try to compensate for this by having pilgrim's eye. Pilgrim is also an excellent goyf fattener, because it is both an artifact and a creature.
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A bit more detail on Dovin and 3-Sphere would be appreciated, though. When you say the artifact is an "easy win against certain decks", what decks do you mean, and what does an "easy win" look like? How many turns will it buy you on average if you are behind, and how difficult is it to get rid of if you are ahead? Things like that, and your play patterns, will help determine if there are other potential applications for the two cards in different metas.
As for your list, you say you have tuned it to your own local meta, so I will trust that you like your results. The fact that you have to play a Basic Forest in addition to the Basic Island is a punishing blow to activating Emeria, though, so if you say there is not a lot of Blood Moon in your area I would heavily recommend first substituting it for a Canopy Vista, and then adding an extra Temple Garden or two over some number of Windswept Heath if you are looking for green mana to cast Tarmogoyf. Pilgrim's Eye into Island for guaranteed a turn-four Supreme Verdict is generally too important to lose access to, but the Forest has no such justification and on top of that will kill your chances of casting the sideboard Dovin's Veto, Runed Halo, and Devout Lightcaster on-curve.
Spreading Seas I will never speak ill against, it is free deck velocity at 2 mana that has a chance of messing up opposing manabases. If you have the slots, go for it. I am, however, surprised at no Court Hussar, since you are playing a complicated manabase for just two maindeck effects (since sweepers can be provided by several different options in mono-white already, if necessary) plus one additional one in the side. Your 3-drop slot, and your curve consistency overall, might appreciate the help of 1 or 2.
And lastly, Infect has become surprisingly difficult to play against. Modern horizons gave them a new toy, scale up. Have you played against the scale up versions? It has a faster clock, because a single scale gives their creature 6 power. The local decks here also have evolved to have a single spellskite in their main. Game 2, if they have not sticked a spellskite.. it becomes a cat and mouse game whether they spell pierce my mortarpod or not. Infect is another reason I removed batterskull for a baneslayer. Because skull can be spell pierced, and the angel can help block their flying land.
Hmm, you do have a point about the forest. Will try to replace it with a vista.
Will think it over if could add a hussar or not. On 25 lands, so I could just cut a land for a hussar.
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Want to play a UW control deck in modern, but don't have jace or snaps?
Please come visit us at the Emeria Titan control thread
I have a bit of a better picture now. In the fast matchups, though, I was under the impression that either Trinisphere would come down after a lot of the damage had been done, or it would tap me out of Path to Exile the turn it came down, meaning the opposition could feel free to use all of their available land to go all-in on an attack without fear of interaction. Since the card cannot be relevantly recycled, I was not very keen on devoting sideboard space to it (even if there are matchups where the effect is clearly worthwhile). The main problem is that Emeria control generally has no mana advantage engine, so we start off down a 3-mana investment for the artifact, and degenerate opponents can abuse the symmetry against us with their plan Bs. Also, with Burn they will eventually draw lands, so they still must be met with lifegain in the long term. You have the potential for a quick clock, which changes that dynamic, but unless you have a kill within the next two or three turns I find that taxing their spells is not enough. Tell me; do you always side in your Planeswalker with it?
Moving on, to answer your question, I have played against Scale Up infect twice, and things are still very bad for them. They are more explosive, but not enough to be a consistent turn-2 kill, so blockers continue to wreck all of their plans while other things get set up. The tempo loss of Spell Pierce is dangerous, but if the builds around your area are running extra copies of those they are slowing down their draws again. My version runs Stoneforge Mystic to play around counterspells by putting Mortarpod directly into play anyway if they hold up mana. If your meta has a large amount of both Burn and Infect, though, you could consider maindecking a Spellskite yourself. It is a very powerful option when you can soak up every pump spell or modal burn spell they have, and complements 'Goyf extremely well against almost everything else, while randomly screwing up rogue strategies like Auras. It costs a lot in the midrange matchups, but since you have made several non card-equity decisions (Goyf, Missionary, Baneslayer) which indicate you are not fighting that battle anyway, it may be worth your while.
If you do not want to go that far, I think that Runed Halo is an excellent option overall, and I would consider swapping your Trinisphere for a second one so that you can make it a more consistent plan. Your comment about Eidolon is even more relevant when you have a beater, since if you stop attacking into it now they are caught between a rock and a hard place by their own triggers. Finally, The Hussar over a 25th land seems very good considering your curve, you have only three 4-drops, a single 5-drop, and three 6-drops, plus several extra 2-mana plays and a number of cantrips/searches, so you are well below the converted mana cost where you would start needing a 25th land. I have 24 in my build, and I have 4 more expensive plays than you do. Hussar splits the difference between an extra land and additional utility anyway with its ETB, and it ramps up the power of the Emeria, the Sky Ruin endgame essentially for free. I would trim Windswept Heath for it, and that will help your Burn matchup a touch as well.
Edit: You mentioned Mortarpod post-board against Infect, but the list you posted contains none. Was that in another version?
oh, I see now. Having sfm makes it easier to dodge spell pierce from Infect.
Thanks for noticing. My list indeed has 58 cards. Probably forgot to write the mortarpods yesterday. Edited the list previously posted. Also trimmed a windswept to add one hussar to the list.
My current deck. Thinking if could get a set of sfm's, could simply do... -4 goyf -1 baneslayer +4 sfm +1 batterskull, then go straight UW on the lands.
on another thing. I was thinking of adding an Elspeth, Knight Errant or a Gideon, Ally of Zendikar to the deck to increase threat density. Is this a good or bad idea?
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And lastly, not sure on the deck name. Have you played against "Druid Devastation" decks? It's a combo deck with toolbox ability. I personally have not played against it yet. But one of my friends have played against it a bit, and that deck seems to combo rather consistently. Are they a good or bad matchup for us?
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Want to play a UW control deck in modern, but don't have jace or snaps?
Please come visit us at the Emeria Titan control thread
I would like to know how often you have drawn the two together. Are there any odd sequencing decisions you have to make when you have both of them? Also, have you ever had any odd rules interactions crop up? I know that having both Dovin and 3-Sphere in play does no more than just having the Sphere would against 0, 1, or 2-mana plays, for example, but have you ever noticed any other quirks?
Next, the card switches you proposed to get to a straight W/u list are reasonable, but you will sometimes run out of Equipment with just three targets. You can start there, but be ready to assess how important that is to you in the long-term. I have found it to be a very worthwhile consideration.
Gideon and Elspeth are aggressive options, and to be honest I have not found either of them to have a ton of synergy with the deck at the four-mana slot in the curve; this is the point where you want a stabilizing play. They can do that, but only sometimes, and only against decks attacking on the ground. Thinking long-term, these types of plays have mostly been worse than sweepers at filling that role, and they do not scale as well into the Emeria, the Sky Ruin lategame. If you think that things may be different for you, try them out. They are still going to be strong cards in the abstract, so they may win games, but I urge you to pay attention to the way they warp your play. The wins they enable don't come around often, and do have a subtle cost to them.
Finally, I have not played against that deck in a while, but I did see it once in a tournament. It mostly felt like a trade-off for increased consistency in exchange for losing access to Collected Company, which probably contributed to their loss on the day as their fair beatdown plan suffered because of it. The key to creature-based combo decks is keeping the board clear anyway, so whenever such decks have less card advantage it makes me feel much better about things. They can threaten to combo early, but they have to assemble three specific creatures while playing around Path to Exile, Mortarpod, Detention Sphere, and Teferi, Time Raveler, and after that if a Wrath of God resolves the game generally becomes very, very hard for them to win. Unless they have an instant-speed way to put two combo pieces on the table, I never feel threatened after turn 5 or so without a lot of advance warning.
They are singles, so it's rare for me to have them both together in hand. However, in situation I have both in hand.. it depends on the deck I'm facing. Against Burn I would no doubt put down the trini first, because taxing them for 2 more in most their spells is better than taxing them for 1, sometimes they only have exactly 2 lands, they can't cast anything at all with a trini in play. However, against infect or storm, I would always cast Dovin first.. to bait out a possible spell pierce or some other counterspell they might have, I would then follow up with the 3-sphere next turn.
No quirks so far. As I've said, having them both at the same time is rare. Usually, my opponent would have dealt with one of them or the game ended before I could find the other.
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Well, you do have a point on the walkers. Not much synergy. They cannot be revived by titan or emeria. I'll think about it more.
Speaking of walkers. There was a time in 2018 that I won against eldrazi tron using Gideon Jura. He had a bunch of elrazi on his side, I had titan, jura and many wisps on my side. Activate Jura ability, they all had to attack him.. leaving me free to swing for the win next turn. Stopped him from reaching ulamog mana with the crucible + quarter combo. I'm thinking if Jura still has a place in the deck today, or is he outdated already?
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About Druid Devastation. Oh, I see.. that's nice to hear then.
Got worried, because someone told me that that Druid deck is strong enough to beat Hogaak decks when Hog wasn't banned yet.
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Want to play a UW control deck in modern, but don't have jace or snaps?
Please come visit us at the Emeria Titan control thread
So how did those games end, by combat? Did you win or lose, and on what turn?
Gideon Jura is still a strong enough effect, but as I mentioned (on page 68 I believe) it competes with Batterskull. What I was getting at there was that enabling the low end of the curve (Stoneforge Mystic, in this case) is more important than anything that can happen after 4 mana. The only thing I care about at that point is having literally any play that might help bridge the gap to Sun Titan and Emeria triggers. To grant the turn-2 play consistent value in this direction, I don't think there is another option than to cut the other 5-drops.
Druid combo may have been fast enough against Hogaak, but I assume that was because Hogaak did not interact with it easily. if at all. If you do absolutely nothing to stop the deck, Devoted Druid can indeed generate 1,000 mana a large percentage of the time on turn 3. To do this though, they need a non-summoning sick Druid, PLUS 2-mana 2/1, AND something to do with the mana. When you factor in spot removal, things are much less rosy. To my mind, it is the exact same reason why Infect had a good matchup against Hogaak. When the format is defined by speed, degenerate cheap creatures shine because interacting is the domain of slow decks.
UWAzorius Titan ControlUW
BWOrzhov ControlBW
I completely agree on Yorion in the bad matchups, but I would add that the one strategy I can see it influencing directly is Jund. The way the games play out against them typically leads to a topdeck war where everything that isn't able to be played to the board gets discarded to Liliana of the Veil and Kolaghan's Command, plus more recently Kroxa, Titan of Death's Hunger. The fact that Yorion gives a "free" resource that is never susceptible to hand disruption might be a clean +10-+20% advantage, and the deckbuilding exercise you mention is purely to determine how realistic unlocking this "free" card might be. As I have mentioned elsewhere, Jund tends to be one of the better decks in metagames where Emeria Control has a chance of winning a large tournament, so turning that matchup into an auto-win is an advantage I might be willing to jump through quite a few hoops for. It is a popular deck against which my build has a clear edge, but the better the opposition is the closer the matchup feels.
With regards to the other hybrid legends, I consider the ones taht must be cast with double W more playable than those that require double U, but since they are potentially options that can grant value in the long term, here is my assessment of their individual restrictions:
Lurrus - while the 3/2 for 3 is probably one of the more interesting options, it requires giving up on D-sphere, Hussar, Titan, Eye, Tef3ri, and any sideboard creatures/enchantments that cost more than 2, and I therefore do not believe it to be a viable Companion. As a 3/2 Lifelinker it is in theory a maindeckable card which can be recurred by Emeria and Titan, however, and I might just barely see a world where it can immediately re-cast something like a Mishra's Bauble on turn 3 or a Kami of False Hope on turn 4 for value, but as it stands it would likely require warping the deck substantially to see play.
Kaheera - as another 3/2 for 3 it currently conflicts with literally every single one of the 18 creatures in my maindeck, plus nearly every single card I have ever seriously considered for the maindeck or sideboard, and I therefore feel confident in making a rare absolute statement here by calling it completely unplayable as a Companion for any Emeria Control I have ever seen. As a normal card, it might be tempting to consider if and only if your choice of supplemental finisher includes the likes of Regal Caracal at the 5-drop slot, plus extra synergies elsewhere, but I have huge reservations even there.
Zirda - a 3/3 for three on its own, once again the card conflicts with almost every nonland permanent in the maindeck, this time with the exception of Stoneforge Mystic and its equipment, plus Tef3ri, and also invalidates 60% of the sideboard with its restriction, and is therefore not a currently viable companion. As a maindeck card, its activated ability is purely aggressive, and its cost reduction matters very little to a deck planning to make many land drops and go into a long game, so I am highly skeptical of its utility overall - even if it can be recurred by Titan and Emeria.
Gyruda - this 6/6 for 6 locks out all 1,3,5, and any potential 7-mana plays in the maindeck (including the best removal spell, the best card selection, and most of the better backup finishers), and would be prohibited by 7 of the current 15 sideboard cards while costing 4UU, so I once again believe I can apply a categorical "unplayable as a Companion" label. As a maindeck card, its ETB is essentially a Sun Titan trigger expanded to the opposing graveyard (plus mill 4 for both decks), but only on ETB and only on 0,2,4,6,8,10-mana etc. creatures. I am not very hopeful here either.
Keruga - on the face of things the 5/4 for 5 precludes all non-permanent removal spells including Path to Exile and all Wrath of God variants in the maindeck, plus the early curve creatures and Mortarpod as well as nearly the entirety of the sideboard for games 2 and 3, and is therefore a huge disadvantage when building in a Control shell. Likely also unplayable in the maindeck, due to a 3UU cost, but at the very least can be considered here as an inflexible Mulldrifter with much higher upside. I am not interested in the slightest, but someone else might be in some Evoke or Suspend-heavy shell.
Lutri - this 3/2 Flash for 3 prohibits most maindeck and sideboard redundancy due to the singleton restriction, crippling the current advantages of curving and planning for topdeck outs, and as of now I also consider it an unplayable Companion in Emeria Control. Similarly to Lurrus, I can see a theoretical world where it supplements maindeck or sideboard strategies, but with an UU cost and requiring another spell on the stack it has much less synergy with any attrition plan than Lurrus does when considering its effect in isolation.
In my opinion, this leaves Yorion as the only on-colour Companion with a legitimate chance, plus Lurrus and Keruga as potential build-arounds that would spin the deck in a new direction, with all other options requiring a substantial investment for middling to irrelevant advantage. My logic is that the only one that is even close to playable in the current shell deserves a shot simply to be able to assess the value of the mechanic, which is why I am committing to attempting it (albeit without much hope of success).
(Edit: Zirda may find a home as well, but it would require specifically Wall of Omens and Sun Titan to leave, which makes me less than eager to try it out unless a replacement for these exists - and these are critical effects for Emeria. Tellingly, Thraben Inspector actually does not have an activated ability itself, so I can't see it making the cut at the moment.)
On another note, how are you getting along with the list? Are you having any unexpected difficulties with it?