I probably should have stated that I don't play SSV, but use a Gideon Ally and Gideon of the trials instead. That frees up a 4 drop slot for the Kalitas.
A W/B Midrange list 6-1'd the Modern Challenge this past weekend. Looks like a fairly standard version of the build that got press from Nassif's streams, but -1 Fulminator Mage and +1 Kambal in the MB.
The only things worth noticing are the -1 Mutavault +1 Fetid Heath and the -1 Darkblast and +1 Settle the Breckage. I think the deck can actually go down to 24 lands though, but the sb inclusion is interesting.
I tried going down to 24 lands and it can hurt sometimes. Of course, at the same time with 25 lands you're pretty likely to flood.
To try to mitigate both of these I've started running 3 mutavaults and 3 shambling vents. It seems to be working well for me so far which only adds to my surprise that the previously posted list shaved a manland instead.
I took out the Mutavaults in favor or Field of Ruin. My area is infested with Tron and I wanted to have a chance on game 1. Swapped Batterskull with Kalitas to have a chance against Dredge too.
The next things I want to try is adding some Path to Exile on the MD and Zealous Persecution on the SB. Most midrange decks play 6-8 targeted removal, and even if ours is not as versatile as Bolt or Trophy, PtE seems better than Cast Out against Dredge, Tron and LtLH. On the other hand, ZP looks good as a combat trick that also works against (Bl)inkmoth Nexus, Tokens and aggro decks.
Would like some opinions on a few things I've been trying.
2 Serra avenger in place of 2 Sculler in the main (shifting those scullers to the sideboard). Sculler isn't always great, but in the right matchups it's pretty devastating so I still want access to all 4. Having the 3/3 flying vigilance has been pretty potent so far.
A one-of empty the pits either main or side. This deck doesn't exactly dump cards into the graveyard, but in games that go longer it can be an abrupt pivot to being the beatdown if you cast it for a large sum on your opponent's endstep.
I'm also kind of considering dropping fulminators altogether. I just don't see beating Tron as a possibility so it's possible that we could use the slots to shore up matchups that aren't so lopsided. If I'm mistaken on this let me know though.
It would be more helpful if you posted your list so we could get context. I've found that Fulminator is really powerful against UWx. It can stave off the Boardwipes / Cryptics / planeswalkers for a turn. But if you don't need the help against UWx it may be better to use those sideboard slots in another way like you said.
Would like some opinions on a few things I've been trying.
2 Serra avenger in place of 2 Sculler in the main (shifting those scullers to the sideboard). Sculler isn't always great, but in the right matchups it's pretty devastating so I still want access to all 4. Having the 3/3 flying vigilance has been pretty potent so far.
The problem is that you can't cast Serra Avenger early which you normally can with Vial.
A one-of empty the pits either main or side. This deck doesn't exactly dump cards into the graveyard, but in games that go longer it can be an abrupt pivot to being the beatdown if you cast it for a large sum on your opponent's endstep.
For one, creating a single "zombie" will cost 6 mana base with Empty The Pits. The deck turns the corner plenty fine with the 2 Sorins and the Lingering Souls, plus all the manlands. If you -really- need an instant speed card, stick with Secure The Wastes. This deck makes a lot of tokens but it's not a token deck.
I'm also kind of considering dropping fulminators altogether. I just don't see beating Tron as a possibility so it's possible that we could use the slots to shore up matchups that aren't so lopsided. If I'm mistaken on this let me know though.
I don't see why you would do that. If it's that bad, just do 3 Field of Ruin main instead of Mutavaults, and have multiple Stony Silence + a Surgical in the side.
Speaking of which, here's my current decklist. I used Gabe Nassif's version as a base, and then added some stuff from the Challenge, notably the Settle in the sideboard and the Fetid Heath maindeck.
The sideboard has the most alterations, as I've also included an Anguished Unmaking. To be honest I haven't been that happy with the 2nd Collective Brutality and I want to replace it with something else. This deck seems to have a lot of trouble with Green Decks like value company and Hardened Scales so I'd like to add something there to shore those up.
Just for context I play BW Smallpox right now. Not the same deck but we generally use the same card pool.
Collective Brutality is pretty good against GW Company decks, worse against the valuetown version, but still very good on the play. It most often kills a dork and snipes a company: the two cards we need to kill asap.
The thing with GW Valuetown is that we need to run them out of resources asap or they will run away with the game. I play this match up often as my friend plays GW Valuetown. The games I win are usually the games where I kill a dork, Discard their best turn 2 (3-drop creature) play, and Discard their Collected Company. After this Liliana / Sorin does the trick.
Two of these key plays can be preformed by Collective Brutality alone. It's really only great in your opening hand but your opening hand is essentially all you have to work with in the match up, you aren't going to out value the value train.
@Muad'dib That's a nice list. How is the Settle the Wreckage working for you? I've been thinking about trying it as a 1-of in the SB but my list is quite tight.
I've been trying out different configurations of the deck and noticed that it lacks mainly two things: a good early finisher and consistency on the draw. This is the last version I'm playing, which is actually doing quite well:
Kalitas is there to have a slight opportunity against Dredge on G1 and to add an early lifelinker against aggro decks. I've also tried Batterskull in this spot and, while it's really good, drawing it with Bob can be difficult. I also didn't want to have a higher curve.
I added +4 Night's Whispers to improve the overall consistency of the deck. This is the latest addition and, while it can look painful, we still have a lot of ways to gain life.
I also tweaked a bit the mana base, removing the Mutavaults in favor of Field of Ruin to have a better pairing against Tron, kill manlands and also Azcantas. I also added the playset of Steaming Vents to ensure I always have a manland and to gain some life or the NW.
Not being able to cast Avenger until turn 4 is fine in my opinion. I generally spend the first few turns on the disruption plan anyway. It's happened a few times now that on turn 4 I'll play an avenger and a bob. Feels like pretty good headway dropping a beater and a card advantage engine on the same turn after dumpstering your opponent's game plan for the previous 3.
As for empty the pits as oppose to secure the wastes, you can't delve for secure. Empty only costs more than 4 Mana if you have it to spare, otherwise you pay 4 and delve your whole graveyard which we aren't using anyway other than lingering souls. I wouldn't want more than one, but it's pretty spicy when it comes up.
As for fulminator, at one point I tried 3 fulminator and 3 ghost quarter (for the earliest possible interaction) against Tron and still got destroyed every time. I've boarded it for other matchups and it usually either does nothing at all or feels too slow to make much impact unless your opponent is already having mana problems.
I added +4 Night's Whispers to improve the overall consistency of the deck. This is the latest addition and, while it can look painful, we still have a lot of ways to gain life.
What about Discovery // Dispersal (first half). Only gives card "parity" unless you can bin a Lingering Souls; but also gives better card selection and is painless.
Ended up scrapping the previous changes for this. I still maintain that Serra avenger was solid, but I think this creature lineup is better overall.
I still also maintain that fulminator is underwhelming most of the time, but I'm going to keep trying it. Surely it's impactful sometimes if so many people sideboard it.
The 2 Kalitas are a mainboard hedge against dredge and they can just snowball games anyway.
The board is flush with boardwipes because siding into so many of them is devastating against any go-wide small creature deck. In my experience, humans is pretty rough in game 1, but afterwards a good boardwipe or two and it's smooth sailing.
Also, I went down to 24 lands. More often than not with 25 I was getting to 10-12 lands with almost nothing/stone nothing to spend all that mana on.
@Muad'dib That's a nice list. How is the Settle the Wreckage working for you? I've been thinking about trying it as a 1-of in the SB but my list is quite tight.
Thanks for the compliments about the list, it's been performing beyond my expectations. Regarding Settle - it's been decent, not amazing. I think I actually like Kalitas more because he can just take over creature matchups anyway, and it's more proactive. I haven't tested him in the deck yet but I notice that you and a lot of others are moving towards putting one in there!
Kalitas is there to have a slight opportunity against Dredge on G1 and to add an early lifelinker against aggro decks. I've also tried Batterskull in this spot and, while it's really good, drawing it with Bob can be difficult. I also didn't want to have a higher curve.
I added +4 Night's Whispers to improve the overall consistency of the deck. This is the latest addition and, while it can look painful, we still have a lot of ways to gain life.
I like the deck! I'm worried about the Night's Whisper for burn but I guess it's a meta dependent thing. I'm definitely considering throwing a singleton in there.
Ended up scrapping the previous changes for this. I still maintain that Serra avenger was solid, but I think this creature lineup is better overall.
I still also maintain that fulminator is underwhelming most of the time, but I'm going to keep trying it. Surely it's impactful sometimes if so many people sideboard it.
The 2 Kalitas are a mainboard hedge against dredge and they can just snowball games anyway.
I'm liking the Kalitas you and other posters are talking about. I'm going to throw some in there. Regarding Fulminator, that's totally fine if you're not a big fan - a lot of people here seem to like Field of Ruin more. In my meta there is burn and a lot of different control, but not so much Tron. Fulminator does work vs Control because it can do beatdown (I've had it get to a 4/2 with both Sorins out) and also take out lands.
The board is flush with boardwipes because siding into so many of them is devastating against any go-wide small creature deck. In my experience, humans is pretty rough in game 1, but afterwards a good boardwipe or two and it's smooth sailing.
Definitely agreed about boardwipes.
Also, I went down to 24 lands. More often than not with 25 I was getting to 10-12 lands with almost nothing/stone nothing to spend all that mana on.
Yeah I've been feeling that I need to drop down to 24 as well. I'm lookin at cutting Vault of the Archangel because I've activated it maybe twice out of the 40+ games I've already used. It's just too mana intensive sometimes.
Definitely think Vault is the right land to cut. It just doesn't do anything (other than possibly make your mana a little awkward in the early game) most of the time.
Even when it's relevant your opponent will just avoid combat as much as possible until they have some means of recovering from it.
NW is performing really well as a 4-off for me, though if your meta in infested with burn it might not be the best idea. I haven't felt it so harmful with 4 Vents, 3 Sorins that give Lifelink and the Vaults. Speaking of which, I wouldn't remove them, not only because it makes combat difficult for aggro decks (if they don't attack you are essentially buying turns to set up your walkers) but it also make your spirits semi-unblockable (no opponent would like to trade their Colonnades for a 1/1 on defense).
In fact, let's hope for a good 1-2cmc orzhov creature, since >3cmc ones are easier to find.
I'm not convinced about Pack Rat, it does nothing when it ETB, it's not a great top deck and it's easy to kill until you have a copy, and even then a Maelstrom Pulse just deals with it.
I've been taking a look at different finishers. The cards I've been considering are Gideon AoZ, Batterskull (again), 2nd copy of Kalitas and Obzedat. The list is quite tight, though, I'm unsure what to take to add them other than the Sorins, which are already quite important.
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To try to mitigate both of these I've started running 3 mutavaults and 3 shambling vents. It seems to be working well for me so far which only adds to my surprise that the previously posted list shaved a manland instead.
I took out the Mutavaults in favor or Field of Ruin. My area is infested with Tron and I wanted to have a chance on game 1. Swapped Batterskull with Kalitas to have a chance against Dredge too.
The next things I want to try is adding some Path to Exile on the MD and Zealous Persecution on the SB. Most midrange decks play 6-8 targeted removal, and even if ours is not as versatile as Bolt or Trophy, PtE seems better than Cast Out against Dredge, Tron and LtLH. On the other hand, ZP looks good as a combat trick that also works against (Bl)inkmoth Nexus, Tokens and aggro decks.
2 Serra avenger in place of 2 Sculler in the main (shifting those scullers to the sideboard). Sculler isn't always great, but in the right matchups it's pretty devastating so I still want access to all 4. Having the 3/3 flying vigilance has been pretty potent so far.
A one-of empty the pits either main or side. This deck doesn't exactly dump cards into the graveyard, but in games that go longer it can be an abrupt pivot to being the beatdown if you cast it for a large sum on your opponent's endstep.
I'm also kind of considering dropping fulminators altogether. I just don't see beating Tron as a possibility so it's possible that we could use the slots to shore up matchups that aren't so lopsided. If I'm mistaken on this let me know though.
The problem is that you can't cast Serra Avenger early which you normally can with Vial.
For one, creating a single "zombie" will cost 6 mana base with Empty The Pits. The deck turns the corner plenty fine with the 2 Sorins and the Lingering Souls, plus all the manlands. If you -really- need an instant speed card, stick with Secure The Wastes. This deck makes a lot of tokens but it's not a token deck.
I don't see why you would do that. If it's that bad, just do 3 Field of Ruin main instead of Mutavaults, and have multiple Stony Silence + a Surgical in the side.
Speaking of which, here's my current decklist. I used Gabe Nassif's version as a base, and then added some stuff from the Challenge, notably the Settle in the sideboard and the Fetid Heath maindeck.
The sideboard has the most alterations, as I've also included an Anguished Unmaking. To be honest I haven't been that happy with the 2nd Collective Brutality and I want to replace it with something else. This deck seems to have a lot of trouble with Green Decks like value company and Hardened Scales so I'd like to add something there to shore those up.
// 10 Creature
4 Dark Confidant
4 Tidehollow Sculler
1 Kambal, Consul of Allocation
1 Fulminator Mage
// 5 Instant
4 Fatal Push
1 Path to Exile
// 25 Land
4 Concealed Courtyard
2 Godless Shrine
4 Marsh Flats
2 Mutavault
2 Plains
2 Shambling Vent
6 Swamp
1 Vault of the Archangel
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Fetid Heath
3 Liliana of the Veil
1 Liliana, the Last Hope
2 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
2 Sorin, Solemn Visitor
// 12 Sorcery
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Thoughtseize
1 Collective Brutality
4 Lingering Souls
// 2 Artifact
2 Ensnaring Bridge
// 3 Creature
1 Kambal, Consul of Allocation
2 Fulminator Mage
// 4 Enchantment
2 Rest in Peace
2 Stony Silence
// 2 Instant
1 Anguished Unmaking
1 Settle the Wreckage
// 4 Sorcery
1 Duress
1 Collective Brutality
2 Damnation
Collective Brutality is pretty good against GW Company decks, worse against the valuetown version, but still very good on the play. It most often kills a dork and snipes a company: the two cards we need to kill asap.
The thing with GW Valuetown is that we need to run them out of resources asap or they will run away with the game. I play this match up often as my friend plays GW Valuetown. The games I win are usually the games where I kill a dork, Discard their best turn 2 (3-drop creature) play, and Discard their Collected Company. After this Liliana / Sorin does the trick.
Two of these key plays can be preformed by Collective Brutality alone. It's really only great in your opening hand but your opening hand is essentially all you have to work with in the match up, you aren't going to out value the value train.
I've been trying out different configurations of the deck and noticed that it lacks mainly two things: a good early finisher and consistency on the draw. This is the last version I'm playing, which is actually doing quite well:
Creatures
4 Dark Confidant
2 Tidehollow Sculler
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
Instants
4 Fatal Push
2 Path to Exile
Lands
2 Concealed Courtyard
2 Godless Shrine
4 Marsh Flats
4 Field of Ruin
2 Plains
4 Shambling Vent
4 Swamp
1 Vault of the Archangel
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3 Liliana of the Veil
1 Liliana, the Last Hope
2 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
1 Sorin, Solemn Visitor
Sorceries
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Thoughtseize
2 Collective Brutality
4 Lingering Souls
4 Night's Whispers
Artifacts
2 Ensnaring Bridge
Creatures
2 Kambal, Consul of Allocation
3 Fulminator Mage
Enchantments
3 Rest in Peace
2 Stony Silence
1 Anguished Unmaking
Sorceries
2 Damnation
Kalitas is there to have a slight opportunity against Dredge on G1 and to add an early lifelinker against aggro decks. I've also tried Batterskull in this spot and, while it's really good, drawing it with Bob can be difficult. I also didn't want to have a higher curve.
I added +4 Night's Whispers to improve the overall consistency of the deck. This is the latest addition and, while it can look painful, we still have a lot of ways to gain life.
I also tweaked a bit the mana base, removing the Mutavaults in favor of Field of Ruin to have a better pairing against Tron, kill manlands and also Azcantas. I also added the playset of Steaming Vents to ensure I always have a manland and to gain some life or the NW.
Should have posted that before, my bad.
Not being able to cast Avenger until turn 4 is fine in my opinion. I generally spend the first few turns on the disruption plan anyway. It's happened a few times now that on turn 4 I'll play an avenger and a bob. Feels like pretty good headway dropping a beater and a card advantage engine on the same turn after dumpstering your opponent's game plan for the previous 3.
As for empty the pits as oppose to secure the wastes, you can't delve for secure. Empty only costs more than 4 Mana if you have it to spare, otherwise you pay 4 and delve your whole graveyard which we aren't using anyway other than lingering souls. I wouldn't want more than one, but it's pretty spicy when it comes up.
As for fulminator, at one point I tried 3 fulminator and 3 ghost quarter (for the earliest possible interaction) against Tron and still got destroyed every time. I've boarded it for other matchups and it usually either does nothing at all or feels too slow to make much impact unless your opponent is already having mana problems.
What about Discovery // Dispersal (first half). Only gives card "parity" unless you can bin a Lingering Souls; but also gives better card selection and is painless.
Ended up scrapping the previous changes for this. I still maintain that Serra avenger was solid, but I think this creature lineup is better overall.
I still also maintain that fulminator is underwhelming most of the time, but I'm going to keep trying it. Surely it's impactful sometimes if so many people sideboard it.
The 2 Kalitas are a mainboard hedge against dredge and they can just snowball games anyway.
The board is flush with boardwipes because siding into so many of them is devastating against any go-wide small creature deck. In my experience, humans is pretty rough in game 1, but afterwards a good boardwipe or two and it's smooth sailing.
Also, I went down to 24 lands. More often than not with 25 I was getting to 10-12 lands with almost nothing/stone nothing to spend all that mana on.
Thanks for the compliments about the list, it's been performing beyond my expectations. Regarding Settle - it's been decent, not amazing. I think I actually like Kalitas more because he can just take over creature matchups anyway, and it's more proactive. I haven't tested him in the deck yet but I notice that you and a lot of others are moving towards putting one in there!
I like the deck! I'm worried about the Night's Whisper for burn but I guess it's a meta dependent thing. I'm definitely considering throwing a singleton in there.
I'm liking the Kalitas you and other posters are talking about. I'm going to throw some in there. Regarding Fulminator, that's totally fine if you're not a big fan - a lot of people here seem to like Field of Ruin more. In my meta there is burn and a lot of different control, but not so much Tron. Fulminator does work vs Control because it can do beatdown (I've had it get to a 4/2 with both Sorins out) and also take out lands.
Definitely agreed about boardwipes.
Yeah I've been feeling that I need to drop down to 24 as well. I'm lookin at cutting Vault of the Archangel because I've activated it maybe twice out of the 40+ games I've already used. It's just too mana intensive sometimes.
Even when it's relevant your opponent will just avoid combat as much as possible until they have some means of recovering from it.
It's fairly slow, but it does synergize with the 3 mutavaults many lists (mine included) run and turns dead draws into live ones.
With maelstrom pulse being at an all-time low in GBx decks thanks to trophy the only deck that can hose it is UW with D-Sphere and their boardwipes.
Might a minimal number pack rats be a worthy inclusion?
I'm not convinced about Pack Rat, it does nothing when it ETB, it's not a great top deck and it's easy to kill until you have a copy, and even then a Maelstrom Pulse just deals with it.
I've been taking a look at different finishers. The cards I've been considering are Gideon AoZ, Batterskull (again), 2nd copy of Kalitas and Obzedat. The list is quite tight, though, I'm unsure what to take to add them other than the Sorins, which are already quite important.