deaddrift, I used your list at a 68-player PPTQ this weekend with some slight changes (1 Inquisition for Thoughtseize because sitting down to register my friend said there was quite a bit of burn (there wasn't), 1 Eternal Scourge for Matter Reshaper after people were saying good things about early testing, 2 Wraths for 2 Damnations because I don't own any).
Unfortunately I got paired with GR Tron in round one. I made a bad mistake in game one because I did not think he had mana up for O-Stone so I played a second Reality Smasher to go for lethal, but I missed an untapped land and got wrecked. Got a quick win in game 2, but mulled to 5 in game 3 and lost easily.
Round 2, I got a quick win 2-1 win against Jeskai Nahiri. Turn 2 Thought-Knot into turn 3 Reality Smasher for game 1. I got stuck on two lands with a Spreading Seas on one in game 2. Game 3, I got an early Thought-Knot. He Clique'd away my Reality Smasher, but I consecutively drew Blight Herder, Blight Herder, Reality Smasher to overwhelm his back-to-back Nahiri's and kill him.
Round 3 was against Uw Merfolk. He was able to build up his board in game 1 and then play Spreading Seas to push through lethal. Game 2 was very stalled, with me leaving up 2 Ghost Quarters to fend off 2 Mutavaults and the threat of Spreading Seas. I played a couple of defensive Reality Smashers, then a Blight Herder with tokens, and finally drew Sorin to swing the race. Game 3 I was mauled by a triple lord draw with Aether Vial on turn 1 as well. That dropped me to 1-2.
Round 4 was against Grixis Delver. I got turn 2 Thought-Knot, exiling Remand. He got turn 3 Gurmag Angler, which I Pathed, and I was able to beat down for the win. Game 2, he played Delvers on turns 1 and 2. I played the Eternal Scourge. It got some damage in, along with him taking some pain from his mana base. He revealed Kolaghan's Command to flip the Delvers. I Pathed one of them and he chose to get the land and shuffle away the command. He attacked for 3 that turn, but decided to trade the Insectile Aberration with Eternal Scourge the next turn. He countered both halves of Lingering Souls, but I drew a second copy and the four spirits finished him off. 2-2
Game 4 was Jeskai Nahiri again. He scooped to a turn 3 Reality Smasher game 1. Game 2, he kept a sketchy 1 land hand with Celestial Colonnade. I Thoughtseized away a Path, leaving 2 Bolts, another Path, a Snapcaster, and Timely Reinforcements. Then I Ghost Quartered the Colonnade to make him choose white or red. He got a plains. I played Thought-Knot the next turn which took the Snapcaster and ate the Path. I followed that up with Reality Smasher and 4 spirits to secure the win. 3-2
Round 6 was against Living End with Kiki/Exarch combo. He was not happy to see main deck Relic of Progenitus (2 in my opening 7). Smashers did the bulk of the work to win both games. I probably was overzealous in game 2, using Surgical Extractions on his turn 1 cycled Deadshot Minotaur and turn 3 Fulminator Mage, instead of waiting to get a Living End, but it worked out ok. 4-2
Round 7 was against Elves. I got an early Thought-Knot to take one of her two copies of Collected Company in hand, but she actually drew the other two as well and overwhelmed me. Game 2, I had to mull to 5, couldn't find Wrath, and Lingering Souls didn't help against Ezuri's pump. 4-3 final record.
I really enjoyed the deck. It crushed the deck I wanted to beat (Jeskai). I expected quite a bit of Jund too, which there was. I just didn't run into it. I am definitely planning on running the deck again at other upcoming PPTQs and possibly GP Indianapolis.
Also if you are interested, the Top 8 archetypes were 2 GR Tron, 1 Burn, 1 Lantern Control, 1 Bogles, 1 Abzan, 1 Ad Nauseam, and 1 Living End.
Quarters: Abzan>Ad Nauseam, Burn>Tron, Tron>Living End, Lantern>Bogles.
Semis: Burn>Tron, Lantern>Abzan.
Finals: Burn>Lantern.
Sounds like you had a fun time! If you could please follow the format that deaddrift has been using for tournaments reports? It would be really helpful for people who are trying to figure out what cards are preforming well and under-performing. From your report it seems that reality smasher and thought-knot pulled their weight. It also looks like you won the favorable matchups (control, living end) but lost to tron and creature decks. How did you feel about the merfolk and elves matchup, what cards did you wish you had and what cards were horrible?
I had 2 flex spots with a Matter Reshaper and Displacer. I also took out Whip which probably would be a second copy of Sorin if I had it, but they served the same function. I miss the lifegain a bit, but the sideboard can be used to deal with that (Which is a WIP).
Why do you run a mainboard surgical extraction? Would an additional kill spell or anguished unmaking be better? I would try out cutting the surgical, duress, and oblivion ring for a couple of collective brutality and another CMC 3 creature. Just to try them out. Discarding eternal scourge with relic in play to activate another mode just screams value.
Lingering Souls
Relic
Thought-Knot
Path
I'd say run 4 of these or you're not playing Processors.
Continuing my evaluation of Scourge, I honestly might bring it up to 4 of. Even if it doesn't become a staple like the above cards I think it's a pretty broken card. In our shell it's probably the best reoccurring creature we could ask for. Time will tell.
The core of a processor deck should contain at least one processor card. For the core of a processor deck, see deaddrift's post here. Otherwise you are running a CBW midrange deck, which I am a huge fan of (see my sig)!
I knew I was forgetting something haha. Yeah definitely 3-4 stranglers minimum. I opted Ring over anguished due to the life loss, duress is due to a heavy burn meta (same reason for no anguished), I might consider getting rid of the surgical but it's a nice instant speed method of gettting rid of a troublesome card, I might move it to the side. Collective Brutality and Scourge sound like an interesting idea and warrants some testing.
What did you take out for the Scourges? Mind posting your list?
I'm not who you were replying to but I'd say trim either a Herder or Strangler to start with a 1-of for testing. I'm not sure the card is a 3 or 4-of in this deck, mostly because we want the value out of the cards we play faster than Eternal Scourge would give us through re-casting it. I can't imagine wanting more than 1 to play with in total between my hand/battlefield/yard/exile, and I can't see trimming anything for more than one or two copies unless you abandon the processor creatures completely. Which I would not consider doing, I think if you're ditching Blight Herders entirely you may as well go to Eldrazi and Taxes to make use of Aether Vials and new Thalia.
I totally agree that cards need to be flexible and give value, the value in our processor creatures is really fun and a big part of why I enjoy the deck. I threw out the idea of cutting mind stones as an attempt to keep up with the meta which has been getting faster (I played against two different goblin aggro decks this week). But back to my previous point on value, the reason I've dropped down to two copies of each processor is I was having 1 or more times a night where I had a processor ready to play, but I'd have had to cast it as a vanilla rather than process and that feels really really bad. You do not want dead cards in your hand, and that's what that situation becomes because you have to decide to drop it vanilla or wait to topdeck an exile effect. Right now I run 1 Reshaper and 1 Eternal Scourge, the logic behind that being that Reshaper is good enough to run one of for the card draw/potential permanent, but I don't want to play more than that as getting it exiled rather than sent to the yard for a draw is losing out on the value (looking at you, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet). Same thing with Eternal Scourge, I want to have something that is recurring and also on the board early to block/interrupt aggro. Obviously the card needs to be killed/exiled to get the value so you want it out there early.
This week I went 2-1-1 running the list in my sig with one change being -1 Pithing Needle, +1 Collective Brutality in the side. Even though against U/B Mill I was able to cast Collective Brutality turn two for a discard, and escalate it discarding Lingering Souls to -2/-2 his Hedron Crab, I feel like the card competes with Warping Wail for spot(s) in the side and I'm leaning toward Warping Wail simply for the facts that I'm not having to discard to escalate with W.W. and I know I'm getting the value out of a counterspell/creature exile whereas the Instant/Sorcery discard on Brutality might whiff (unless you've already had a look at their hand thanks to T1 discard). It just feels like too much setup needs to happen just right to get full value out of brutality.
Another positive on W.W. is it can counter Scapeshift. I have only played this matchup one time, just a couple weeks ago, and the Cryptic Commands kept me at bay long enough for the combo to go off both games. The match up definitely felt bad, and getting a surgical on Snapcaster or Cryptic is probably the best way to stop them from slowing you down. W.W. could definitely be used in the match up, it would be easy to leave two colorless mana open to counter a Scapeshift if you can't make them discard it. And after countering it, it leaves the card in the yard for possible Surgical as well. Am I correct that if we manage to extract Scapeshift we win? I have no knowledge of the deck or match up, so I'm not sure.
Edit: I forgot to mention that the Eternal Scourge I added for this week did see play against an aggro deck. They had to bolt it so they could attack one turn, and the next turn or turn after I brought it back into play. That is exactly what the card should be doing in this deck IMO.
I agree with herfs that you might consider two more removal spells in place of your main board Duress and Extraction. I ran Extraction main for quite a while (though this was pre-Moon) and had to remove it to make way for other priorities.
deaddrift, I used your list at a 68-player PPTQ this weekend with some slight changes (1 Inquisition for Thoughtseize because sitting down to register my friend said there was quite a bit of burn (there wasn't), 1 Eternal Scourge for Matter Reshaper after people were saying good things about early testing, 2 Wraths for 2 Damnations because I don't own any).
Welcome to the thread, fireshoes, and thanks for the play report! You certainly saw your share of the hard match-ups.
The mono-color tribal aggro decks (Merfolk, Elves, Goblins) are hard because A) they are so wide and fast, B) they don't tend to put very much in the yard, making Relic-->Strangler much weaker, and C) they all feature some kind of evasion (islandwalk, trample, Legion Loyalist). Zoo, Suicide Zoo, and Affinity do not pose these same problems for us. Mull aggressively in these matches for sweepers--just today I have been re-considering Engineered Explosives as a possible 1-of in place of a Bomb, simply because it is faster. A Flaying Tendrils might be good in the place of a single Damnation for the same reason. (BTW you might consider running Languish over Wrath just because BB is marginally easier to get than WW with my land package.) Also, leaving Ghost Quarter up against Merfolk is exactly right.
This is where the metagame tweaking happens for me: Tuning the side by small degrees. I believe the core of the deck is very good against the larger Modern meta, and the only thing I worry about now is shoring up this kind of weakness by getting the sideboard hate dialed in just right. And that can change over time.
I'd say trim either a Herder or Strangler [for Scourge] to start with a 1-of for testing. I can't see trimming anything for more than one or two copies unless you abandon the processor creatures completely.
I threw out the idea of cutting mind stones as an attempt to keep up with the meta which has been getting faster (I played against two different goblin aggro decks this week).
The reason I've dropped down to two copies of each processor is I was having 1 or more times a night where I had a processor ready to play, but I'd have had to cast it as a vanilla rather than process and that feels really really bad. You do not want dead cards in your hand, and that's what that situation becomes because you have to decide to drop it vanilla or wait to topdeck an exile effect.
Another positive on Warping Wail is it can counter Scapeshift. Am I correct that if we manage to extract Scapeshift we win? I have no knowledge of the deck or match up, so I'm not sure.
Thanks, Tituba9. I trimmed your post down to the parts I thought I could address. I agree with your take on Scourge exactly, but hate the thought of cutting anything I have in the deck right now.
I actually think Mind Stones make us faster, not slower. We don't have a lot to do on T2 in many games. To speed up the build I would be more likely to drop a Smasher and/or Herder for a Reshaper or two, myself. I love Mind Stone and think it is incredibly important if, like me, you run 12 cards at 4+ CMC.
I, too, have to cast a processor for no added value sometimes and am not a huge fan, but in some cases this is actually a good play. For instance, Herder blocks most opponents' big creatures regardless of having any little helpers, and a T2 Strangler on the play is great against control decks or Tron. I was at four of each processor early on and cut to three due to the variability. For now I like it like that. I don't consider casting Strangler or Herder without processing to be a dead card situation, personally--at least, not in the way drawing a Mind Stone feels, when I already played a Stony Silence!
I have not run Warping Wail, ever. I never felt I had room for it. I would be very interested to hear others' experiences with it in this build since it does have some pretty great versatility. It would help vs. Scapeshift, for sure. (BTW in a Bring to Light build, Extracting Scapeshift would pretty much guarantee a win, but in a Titanshift build not necessarily. ALL the Valakut builds are tough for me, personally.)
Hey guys, great job keeping this thread alive. I've been playing this build since before eye and casually lurking here. I have some questions for you about card choices, sorry if they have already been asked. Here's my current deck:
I think my biggest issues stem from the manabase, but I currently lack the funds for marsh flats and cavern of souls. I do really enjoy having 2x maps and several utility lands, but it does get inconsistent. What is the consensus on Urborg, Thespian's stage, and Westvale? I find I often need more black mana so I like urborg, and we seem to generate a lot of tokens so I like westvale. Thespian's stage, however, seems slow and im not sure of its worth. I have been thinking of trying Vesuva out.
As for creatures, I do like Kalitas, but it looks like deaddrift dropped him/the lifegain flex spot from his list. I really like the lifegain/exile/tokens that he provides. I'm also curious about why you would choose Matter Reshaper over displacer.
Finally, for the sideboard, what do recommend for an unknown meta? I'm currently in the process of moving, so I'm not sure what to expect at a new shop. I used to play against a lot of goblins, elves, kitchen finks, tron, and affinity.
Let me know your thoughts. Again, sorry if most of this was discussed previously in the thread.
I think my biggest issues stem from the manabase, but I currently lack the funds for marsh flats and cavern of souls. I do really enjoy having 2x maps and several utility lands, but it does get inconsistent. What is the consensus on Urborg, Thespian's stage, and Westvale? I find I often need more black mana so I like urborg, and we seem to generate a lot of tokens so I like westvale. Thespian's stage, however, seems slow and im not sure of its worth. I have been thinking of trying Vesuva out.
As for creatures, I do like Kalitas, but it looks like deaddrift dropped him/the lifegain flex spot from his list. I really like the lifegain/exile/tokens that he provides. I'm also curious about why you would choose Matter Reshaper over displacer.
Finally, for the sideboard, what do recommend for an unknown meta? I'm currently in the process of moving, so I'm not sure what to expect at a new shop. I used to play against a lot of goblins, elves, kitchen finks, tron, and affinity.
Let me know your thoughts. Again, sorry if most of this was discussed previously in the thread.
For the mana base, Marsh Flats is definitely ideal as it does a few things. It fetches your B/W lands and basics, which will help a lot with your consistency (assuming your issues are generating B/W early in the game). The ability to fetch your basics is pretty key in the modern format as well. I understand it is out of reach for you right now and to compensate I suggest going up to 3 or even 4 Godless Shrine and a third Shambling Vent. Purchasing/trading for those Flats should be your biggest priority for upgrading the deck, you can get away with two Flats and 3 Shrines but most run three Flats and two Shrines. Cut the Isolated Chapel entirely. Cut Urborg as well, we only ran it so we could use Oblivion Sower generated lands and Sower won't be played without Eye of Ugin. You want that slot for the additional B/W lands mentioned above. Same with Thespian's Stage, it is just too slow and most games will just be a non-basic Wastes. Cavern of Souls is not really 100% necessary if you're working with a budget, and most often you only run one so if you get it you don't have to worry much when playing against blue. I run two because I see lots of blue in my local meta and I want to get it more consistently, but you can get away without any, you just play around their open mana for counter-spells. Getting one is much lower priority than Flats. By bumping up your B/W land count and trimming 2-3 utility lands, the need for Expedition Map is gone and you can replace them with Mind Stones. These are a much better fit in the deck as they give us 6 ramps cards for TKS and Smasher rather than just the 4 Temples. They provide cantrip late as well. It is faster than map and provides several things rather than just a fetch. With these Mind Stones you can pretty safely drop the Wastes basic from your list unless you see heavy Blood Moon play. Personally I love Westvale Abbey in the deck as it does quite a lot between going over the top with a flyer, potentially albeit rarely getting value in response to your opponent playing a board-wipe, and generating a token/chump block late game. Many don't play it in favor of, I'd say, a third Ghost Quarter but as our local Tron player has moved onto something else for now, I've been pretty content with just two Ghost Quarters and have had one when I needed it. Actually if you end up with open land slots after cutting Thespian/Wastes/Isolated Chapel, keep the Urborg in for now since you're using Flaying Tendrils in the side. Ideally no Urborg, but since you have no Flats it is probably better than a basic Swamp or something.
I have playtested with both Kalitas and Displacer, but found them both underwhelming in this deck. I think Kalitas shines in Jund because the Jund player can dismantle their opponent's hand/removal and make Kalitas stick, but in my playtesting he was usually quickly removed. He isn't ramped by Temple and BB can be hard to cast, small negative but you do not want to have a hand where kalitas is your only turn 4 play, it's turn 4, and you can't play it. The Kalitas slot basically competes with the smaller Eldrazi, and with the addition of Eternal Scourge there is no room for Kalitas as Scourge with almost definitely impact the game more. Lastly, saccing a 2/2 token for Abbey isn't as good as saccing the 1/1 scions or spirits. Kalitas is a really really good value card, but just not quite the perfect fit for this deck. Maybe deaddrift can give a more in-depth explanation as I did not play Kalitas for very long.
Displacer is really good in Eldrazi and Taxes because it is a more control and lock-down oriented deck. Because it too competes with the small Eldrazi for the slot it needs to consistently give value beyond being a 3/3 to be worth it over Scourge or Reshaper, and in my experience it did not work out. Once again with Eternal Scourge now here, Displacer is more than likely no longer an option in a format where Lightning Bolt reigns supreme. The abundance of removal is actually a good thing for Reshaper, as regardless of the card draw's converted mana cost, it is still a draw and that is good. Also Wasteland Strangler's ETB trigger works off of revealing it to a Reshaper's death trigger, that is some sexy value. Reshaper only does not give value if it is exiled rather than killed/destroyed, and for that reason I am considering dropping it in favor of a second Eternal Scourge. But either of those two cards are more than likely better than Kalitas and Displacer right now.
Going into an unknown meta, I'd start with something like this;
2x Damntation (Flaying Tendrils)Note: I only own 1 damnation and would trim a Pithing Needle/Warping Wail from my S.B. for a second copy if I could.
1x Anguished Unmaking
2x Disenchant
2x Stony Silence
3x total between Timely Reinforcements + Rest for the Weary
1x Surgical Extraction
1-2x Pithing Needle
2x Engineering Explosives/Ratchet Bomb
I'm aware previously Rest in Peace hasn't been too impactful in the deck, but if we're playing with Eternal Scourge is it possible we might need to reconsider it as a one of? It does make some fairly big impacts to the deck's make up as it conflicts with Lingering Souls, so I was wondering what people thought of taking the deck in a less token based direction?
I completely understand the value of Lingering Souls btw and I'm not saying it's a better build to go more all in on Eternal Scourge, but we're a deck that can take advantage of a recurring threat like that and I think we may have to be a bit more open about where it could take us and it also lets us lean less heavily on our colours. The problem with Rest in Peace mainboard before was that it didn't do enough, though in some match ups it completely destroyed some decks and did a lot of incidental damage to others (Storm, Dredge, against Snappy and Goyf, Delve card) so I'd probably be testing it as a one of, to basically allow us to use the cantrip side of relics a bit more freely and basically to allow more long game with the Scourges. I'm currently thinking of adding Mind Stone's for card draw/ ramp and maybe some more removal? If anyone can think of any direction or card suggestions that might work in a more midrange/controlish version of the deck or cards in white, black or colourless that would take advantage of either Eternal Scourge, less token or a permentant effect like Rest then let me know?
I think that us being able to target ourselves with Relic's first ability to get Scourge from the yard to exile is enough reason to stick with the god card that is Lingering Souls rather than put RiP in the main or side. If you're all-in on a Scourge deck you need Surgical Extractions to get all 4 copes in exile from 1 in the yard.
Thanks for the awesome replay Tituba9. I definitely will make getting marsh flats a priority, I wasn't sure if the extra pain was worth it as I was already having a lot of trouble with all the self inflicted damage against a heavy aggro meta. I have been trying to get them on pucatrade but without much success. I really did enjoy using maps and a bunch of utility lands, but I agree that cutting them for the additional ramp and draw from stones will work much better. I wan under the impression that Urborg was used in order to make eye a tappable land (which we dont need now) and that it was needed for the manabase due to all the colorless lands we use.
Kalitas has been easy enough for me to cast, but that might be due to maps/urborg. He definitely helps a lot for grindy match ups. But I definitely agree that displacer has been a bit underwhelming, especially when it dies to bolt. It does work filtering my opponents hand with TKS and the added strangler value though, provided I can keep it alive long enough. I havent had a chance to try out Eternal Scourge, but it looks very promising. Do you feel that it is just a flex spot or should it be more than that? I also haven't tried reshaper yet, but it does sound better than displacer from your description.
How do you deal with decks that go infinite? I have come across several situations where I was unable to prevent my opponent from gaining infinite life so having an alternate win con like Ulamogs mill proved very useful.
@Tituba9 At what point are we placing too much strain on an effect that we have as a 4 of in the deck that we also use as a cantrip?
Also I understand the power of Surgical being able to pull out all 4 from your deck, but who is playing 4? And would it even be needed? It would cost 12 mana a turn to play them all, unless you're doing it for the purposes of very psuedo-card draw and deck thinning? Being able to recur 1 or 2 should generally be enough.
I try to use Relic as a cantrip minimally unless it's really late game or I have a backup Relic in hand. Saving Relic to crack in response to something your opponent does is added value and something I've been trying to do more of. I play against lots of Snapcaster, a mill that makes use of Crypt Incursion, Jund,etc. where I need to hold that relic back. That means its on the board longer and for the 1-2 Eternal Scourge in the deck it should always be there for the times when Scourge is in the yard. I think Scourge might see the yard less go straight to exile because any spell/ability the opponent does to it takes it to exile. I was responding to your last question about cards that would be useful with Scourge and I assumed you were talking about a deck that removed processors for a playset of Scourge. In processors I think there's room for 2 Scourge at max and the only support card I would bring in is maybe a Gemstone Caverns over my Abbey for an OP turn 1 on rare occasions.
Thanks for the awesome replay Tituba9. I definitely will make getting marsh flats a priority, I wasn't sure if the extra pain was worth it as I was already having a lot of trouble with all the self inflicted damage against a heavy aggro meta. I have been trying to get them on pucatrade but without much success. I really did enjoy using maps and a bunch of utility lands, but I agree that cutting them for the additional ramp and draw from stones will work much better. I wan under the impression that Urborg was used in order to make eye a tappable land (which we dont need now) and that it was needed for the manabase due to all the colorless lands we use.
Kalitas has been easy enough for me to cast, but that might be due to maps/urborg. He definitely helps a lot for grindy match ups. But I definitely agree that displacer has been a bit underwhelming, especially when it dies to bolt. It does work filtering my opponents hand with TKS and the added strangler value though, provided I can keep it alive long enough. I havent had a chance to try out Eternal Scourge, but it looks very promising. Do you feel that it is just a flex spot or should it be more than that? I also haven't tried reshaper yet, but it does sound better than displacer from your description.
How do you deal with decks that go infinite? I have come across several situations where I was unable to prevent my opponent from gaining infinite life so having an alternate win con like Ulamogs mill proved very useful.
You are right, I forgot about how Urborg made Eye tappable, that was very good. My local meta has shifted to more blue and more aggro lately, which is probably why Kalitas wasn't as effective. I do really like the card and against lots of grindy matchups I can see it doing well. Batterskull is really good in grindy matchups as well, and it's worked out often enough for me where I like it in that flex spot.
I like Eternal Scourge because once you get it in your hand it's all but guaranteed to stick around in the game. But it doesn't effect the game like any of our other eldrazi, so I think it is just a utility card.
Some of my worst matchups are against infinite combo decks (Kiki and Abzan CoCo), due to me just getting into the format and having to learn both what cards these decks run, how they interact, how I stop it, and how the stack works. So hopefully someone else comes along with a better answer, but against Kiki you bascially need to have a Path to Exile/Go for the Throat in hand and the open mana to cast it from turn 4 on. They can turn 4 (maybe 3?) flash in Resto Angel on your end step, then on their turn cast Kiki for the combo. You either peel Kiki or Resto from their hands and extract it, or hold back an instant speed removal. Cracking Relic in response to them casting Chord of Calling and Eternal Witness. I think CoCo is one of the worst matchups for processors, to stop their combo you can crack Relic in response to one of their creature's persist trigger being on the stack, or extract it as well. You can use a Path on a combo piece in response to them casting Melira, Sylvok Outcast, if they are Chording for the last combo piece then before it resolves instant removal a creature on the board. Basically, hold relic/removal to stop the combo rather than casting it as soon as a piece hits the board. But from my experience this matchup is bad for us and often a game is won from a fast opening hand thanks to Temples rather than winning the long game through control. The Ulamog and Conduits in your sideboard would be better as EE/Ratchet Bomb/Pithing Needle/ A second Stony Silence because all those cards will impact more matchups, and will impact the game more often than Ulamog as that is a slow gameplan. Pithing Needle naming Karn, or Lilly against Jund, or Nahiri agianst Jeskai (and now apparantly Kiki Chord decks as well), costs you 1 mana and impacts the game heavily in your favor against a lot of the field.
Rest in Peace nerfs Lingering Souls and that is not acceptable, except maybe as a sideboard option in a heavy Dredge/Living End/Storm-type meta. Souls is bad against those decks anyway. I would love to see some kind of janky Rest in Peace/Eternal Scourge/Gemstone Caverns/Misthollow Griffin/Serum Powder build, but I can't see how to make such a deck work at all. Lingering Souls is absolutely one of the best cards in the entire format. If you are in BW and not reliant on Æther Vial you should run four of them. Also, the cantrip from Relic is a bigger deal than most people recognize. Multiple Rests are dead, but multiple Relics are good.
hankypank, I think you could probably play with the Khans fetches (Polluted Delta, Windswept Heath etc.) for budget reasons while you're getting the Zendikar lands that you should have for this build; nine times out of ten we are fetching for Godless Shrine anyway. But Flats is important, especially if you expect to face decks running Blood Moon. Cavern of Souls helps a lot with the blue decks but is not as high a priority, and Sea Gate Wreckage has a lot to recommend it. [EDIT] BTW, welcome to the forums! You picked a great deck to start with, haha.
Kalitas is so good in Jund because they have a million ways to kill, not exile, things. He is anti-synergistic in our deck despite his other excellent qualities, and this deck is carefully crafted to make use of small synergies throughout the build. He's not terrible, but he's pointing in the wrong direction.
I think Abzan CoCo and Kiki Chord are pretty decent matches for us; I would say about even. But you have to know your outs. Against both decks:
Sandbag a Path, if possible, to remove a combo piece. This can be hard since they have a lot of threats. Careful with your timing. Throat and Unmaking can work but slow us waaaay down compared to the 1 CMC Path.
Keep mana up for a Relic crack (I like to use Ghost Quarter for this if possible because it can hit Gavony Township as well, if needed) in response to the Finks persist trigger--i.e., before it leaves the graveyard, or in response to Eternal Witness naming a target in the yard.
Side in sweepers like Damnation for their beatdown plan. Flaying Tendrils is very good against Abzan CoCo, but much weaker against Kiki Chord. EE and Bomb are decent but not great against both, mostly for their dorks.
Pithing Needle naming Kiki or Viscera Seer (or Gavony Township) is very strong, but both can Chord for Qasali Pridemage so watch out for that.
Consider holding your Thoughtseize/IoK until they have seen a few extra cards rather than casting it T1.
Extract a combo piece if possible. The timing should be the same as you would crack Relic. Since Extraction is "free" to cast they will often not see this coming.
It's easy to lose track of how much mana the decks have available because of all the dorks and Convoke. Both decks can also Chord for lots of toolbox answers, so familiarity with the builds helps with sequencing correctly. Ulamog is too slow for this deck anymore and I feel certain that there is no room in the 75 for him, despite his ability to mill out infinite life opponents.
The situations you're describing though are kind of part of my point. You've held back on using a cantrip to get some sort of interaction sure, but it's something you're playing from the battlefield so its not a surprise on your end, and the opponent can play around it. Just being able to use it more flexible as a cantrip allows you greater flexibility.
Rest in Peace plays in the exact same way, but removes the games because you don't have to play them, you've already won on that axis and it is harder to remove but enchantment hate is less common than artifact hate. Jund will maybe use an Abrupt Decay on it, but that puts the Abrupt Decay into exile and basically wastes it.
I also wouldn't remove Processors for the Scourges, the exile effects we have for both play off each other. I was definitely talking about using Lingering Souls slots. Sorry, I'm not trying to be awkward in saying that, I just want to be clear I'm talking about making a version of the deck that works with the synergies between the Processors and the Scourges, plus if you take into account Scourges going into the graveyard rather than just exiling itself under removal it makes cards like Collective Brutality better because you can discard Scourges to fund escalate etc. I mean Black has a ton of method to use something like Scourge, so I'm basically asking people for ideas that would work within the Processor deck that exists.
I meant that in certain matchups I use it for cantrip minimally. I always try to assess how relevant Relic is against an opponent, and against something like burn with zero graveyard play, you bet I'm cantripping ASAP to draw more answers. I think if Rest in Peace didn't non-bo with Lingering Souls so hard it would be incredible in the deck. But Souls is just too good to even consider Rest in Peace, unless like Deaddrift said, you had a local meta that warranted 1-2 in the Sideboard. Souls also pairs with Collective Brutality nicely along with Scourge. I really like Brutality, but I'm just finding it difficult to find room for it even in the sideboard. I don't know if the flexibility alone is enough to justify it, are there matchups where casting Brutality would almost certainly seal a game/match win? I'm not trying to say there aren't, it's just a new card and hard to pinpoint where it shines.
I think Abzan CoCo and Kiki Chord are pretty decent matches for us; I would say about even. But you have to know your outs. Against both decks:
Sandbag a Path, if possible, to remove a combo piece. This can be hard since they have a lot of threats. Careful with your timing. Throat and Unmaking can work but slow us waaaay down compared to the 1 CMC Path.
Keep mana up for a Relic crack (I like to use Ghost Quarter for this if possible because it can hit Gavony Township as well, if needed) in response to the Finks persist trigger--i.e., before it leaves the graveyard, or in response to Eternal Witness naming a target in the yard.
Side in sweepers like Damnation for their beatdown plan. Flaying Tendrils is very good against Abzan CoCo, but much weaker against Kiki Chord. EE and Bomb are decent but not great against both, mostly for their dorks.
Pithing Needle naming Kiki or Viscera Seer (or Gavony Township) is very strong, but both can Chord for Qasali Pridemage so watch out for that.
Consider holding your Thoughtseize/IoK until they have seen a few extra cards rather than casting it T1.
Extract a combo piece if possible. The timing should be the same as you would crack Relic. Since Extraction is "free" to cast they will often not see this coming.
It's easy to lose track of how much mana the decks have available because of all the dorks and Convoke. Both decks can also Chord for lots of toolbox answers, so familiarity with the builds helps with sequencing correctly. Ulamog is too slow for this deck anymore and I feel certain that there is no room in the 75 for him, despite his ability to mill out infinite life opponents.
This is all really good stuff. I did not catch Pithing Needle shutting down Viscera Seer, and I totally agree that holding back discards, especially when it means not taking a shock T1 to play them, is smart. It's nice to fetch or play a shrine T1 and bring it in tapped, then T2 cast a discard spell and relic their card to exile as well. With all our shocks, Anguished, and Thoughtseize it's important to manage life totals.
Talking about sb, what about Memoricide over Surgical? In most combos mups surgical depends on a discard (mostly on a seize to discard a nahiri/ company/ ad nauseam/ scape*****) and it nombo so hard with relic...
@Tituba9 I'll have to give batterskull a shot, I've been eyeing it up for a while now so I'm glad to hear it's been working for you. Thanks for the input on combo decks. You are absolutely right about needing more knowledge of the format to make the right decisions. It's definitely something I need to improve and I guess only comes from experience. I'll try dropping Ulamog/conduits for some pithing needles and ratchet bombs.
@deadrift Thanks! I'm glad to be here. As soon as I find another competitive store I hope to become a frequent contributor. I really love this deck, it really feels like you can interact with anything. I'll look into getting the kahns fetches, I wasn't sure how worth it they were if I was just going to try and upgrade to the zendikar ones. I guess I am still confused about how they help get around blood moon. I was under the impression that as soon as I play a shrine or a flats they immediately become a mountain and are useless. Also, I have a sea gate wreckage that I have tested in my standard eldrazi version, but I was under the impression that the modern processors mana curve was to high or I was holding removal to often to make it that useful.
Thanks for the combo input. Pithing needles seem like a must. What about wrath of god over damnation? do we have enough white sources for that instead? Also, Do you have any experience playing against a deck called taking turns? I'm not sure how often it is played, but a guy at my local store plays it weekly. I haven't been matched up against it yet, but every match I watch his opponent just ends up sitting there until he wins or they draw from time. Just curious how our matchup is against that archetype.
Yeah, I'd discourage you from buying the Khans fetches if you don't have them already. Max out on Godless Shrines and run an Isolated Chapel or a Fetid Heath (if you have it) instead. Some players have advocated against running fetches, but in my opinion that is incorrect. What the fetches do is they allow you to anticipate or respond to a Blood Moon; if the Moon is already on board then you are right, they are just Mountains when you play them. Ghost Quarter works the same way; crack it in response to a Moon on the stack.
Wrath is an OK substitute for Damnation but is a little harder to cast. Languish is another option and leaves Smashers and Herders alive (but also Goyfs, Tasigurs, Rhinos etc.)
Taking Turns is tough, need a fast clock and lots of hand disruption for that one. Best goal is to shut them off their card draw with Thoughtseixe/IoK or TKS if possible; Unmaking, Bomb, or Disenchant can hit Howling Mine or Dictate of Kruphix.
Yeah, I'd discourage you from buying the Khans fetches if you don't have them already. Max out on Godless Shrines and run an Isolated Chapel or a Fetid Heath (if you have it) instead. Some players have advocated against running fetches, but in my opinion that is incorrect. What the fetches do is they allow you to anticipate or respond to a Blood Moon; if the Moon is already on board then you are right, they are just Mountains when you play them. Ghost Quarter works the same way; crack it in response to a Moon on the stack.
@deaddrift - Love your decklist. I don't have any marsh flats at the moment, so if I were to use another fetch land (even as a placeholder) should I prioritize on using fetch lands that can get plains or swamps?
I have a sea gate wreckage that I have tested in my standard eldrazi version, but I was under the impression that the modern processors mana curve was to high or I was holding removal to often to make it that useful.
That is the exact same reason I haven't even tried Sea Gate yet for that slot. I prefer Abbey because there's no restrictions to the ability. For how rarely a 1-of land sees the battlefield without maps to fetch it, I don't want to not even be able to use it because I have cards in my hand.
Nice to see it got a top 8. It does seem unfocused running Abbey while also running no Herders. It seems to be focusing heavily on flickering for control and ETB triggers, and Wall of Omens is something I've considered trying out for a 2-drop, having two more cards that give us draw and also blocks to buy time for us to ramp out the fatties. Not sure if it's better than the new eldrazi or Herder which it would replace, but it is something to think about if this meta keeps getting heavier on aggro.
So I've got the no-banlist tournie tomorrow, and I'm hoping for some last minute advice from you guys on some card choices. Here is my current build, similar to the old Eye of Ugin builds while squeezing in some of the banned cards. The sideboad has lot's of 1-ofs because I can dig with Sensei's Divining Top. Where I'm stuck is I would really like to add a 3rd Blight Herder and 3rd Strangler. Herder because with Eye of Ugin there's the possibility of chaining them with multiples in hand (however having 4 cards in exile is not even close to guaranteed), and Strangler to take out The inevitable Delver of Secrets popping up. In order to fit 2 (or even 3) more of these cards I've considered two things. I could cut the two Sowers and Ulamong in favor of these cheaper eldrazi, changing the search function of Eye of Ugin from targeting Ulamog to targeting Herder/Smasher, or cutting the Stoneforge Mystics entirely because with all these sol lands it could be competing with ramped eldrazi both turn 2 and turn 3 (obviously I'd want to use its ability to cheat out a turn 3 Batterskull if I play it on turn 2). Another thing to consider is generating a white by turn 2 to play the Mystic. Lastly, I trimmed a copy of Lingering Souls and I'm really not confident that is the right choice. If you guys see this post I'd love some input to help me finally decide on what to do!
Well after the ban of Eye of Ugin i rebuild my Eldrazi decks to play Legacy/Casual with friends but with the new toys in Shadow over inninstrad and Eldritch moon i rebuild them again to modern. The major loss in power was of course the old RU Agro deck but now is fair and still a lot of fun, maybe not tier 2 like bant eldrazi but still a lot of fun.
I don't have any marsh flats at the moment, so if I were to use another fetch land (even as a placeholder) should I prioritize on using fetch lands that can get plains or swamps?
That's a tough one, depends on how much Blood Moon you expect. Lean towards black if you're not too worried about Moon because it allows you to play T1 Thoughtseize/IoK; but white is better against Moon because you can then cast Lingering Souls from hand and you can Path a Spirit or Scion to get the Swamp or Wastes.
I would like to make a case for trying an alternative direction for a processor deck I think is under-tested and should be explored. I am not claiming it is better than B/W processors, but my testing indicates it is at least viable and worth a shot.
This deck utilizes many of the same cards the traditional B/W processors lists have relied on for a while now but with the inclusion of blue and a control emphasis.
I will sum this post up by evaluating Ulamog's Nullifier:
Casting cost
not bad for an eldrazi processor. Fit's nicely into the curve of Wasteland Strangler, Nullifier, Herder. Cost is reduced with Eldrazi Temple, but not required to be effective. U/B mana is a good color combination to build around for a control shell.
Processing
same as all processors - it needs to be in a shell that includes a multitude of effects that exile and contribute to the deck's game plan. Luckily white offers many cheap and versatile exile effects that help contribute to a control deck without being included "just because they exile."
Effect
Having a creature that hard counters a spell is an amazing effect. This is not your average mystic snake either. This is almost always going to be a two for one, and a win condition in a control deck. I think of it as an improved Snapcaster mage-remand-mana leak combination. It lacks the versatility of flashback, but makes up for it with counterspell. It is also similar to cryptic command, but easier to cast - a heavy gun of many control decks. This eldrazi does not cantrip, but it doesn't need to. Instead of a random draw - you get a 2/3 flying body. This card is not really "better" than any of these examples (except the snake imo), but it is at the very least par for the course... Pair this with the ability to upgrade Delay by processing suspended spells and you are now running 8 hard counters in your deck.
Stats
2/3 does actually pass the bolt test because this card has an etb effect and allows us to process things like delay. If your opponent is bolting him, you likely already got your value. Flying is very relevant, and the three toughness allows you to block many creatures in modern favorably (such as goblin guide as one example).
I hope that you find my deck interesting at the very least. Sorry to interrupt your discussion...
Thanks
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Legacy:B The Gate // B Pox Modern:RGB Dredge // RBG Goblins // B The Gate // UBR Tezz AoB Control // RBG Prison Pox EDH:RBU Thraximundar // R Norin the Wary // RWB Kaalia of the Vast // BUR Grixis Combos // BU Gisa and Geralf Tribal Tiny Leaders:BUW Sydri, Galvanic Genius // R Feldon of the Third Path
Sounds like you had a fun time! If you could please follow the format that deaddrift has been using for tournaments reports? It would be really helpful for people who are trying to figure out what cards are preforming well and under-performing. From your report it seems that reality smasher and thought-knot pulled their weight. It also looks like you won the favorable matchups (control, living end) but lost to tron and creature decks. How did you feel about the merfolk and elves matchup, what cards did you wish you had and what cards were horrible?
Why do you run a mainboard surgical extraction? Would an additional kill spell or anguished unmaking be better? I would try out cutting the surgical, duress, and oblivion ring for a couple of collective brutality and another CMC 3 creature. Just to try them out. Discarding eternal scourge with relic in play to activate another mode just screams value.
The core of a processor deck should contain at least one processor card. For the core of a processor deck, see deaddrift's post here. Otherwise you are running a CBW midrange deck, which I am a huge fan of (see my sig)!
CBW midrange deck
CBW eldrazi processor deck
CBW bw eldrazi shadow midrange
CBW midrange deck
CBW eldrazi processor deck
CBW bw eldrazi shadow midrange
I'm not who you were replying to but I'd say trim either a Herder or Strangler to start with a 1-of for testing. I'm not sure the card is a 3 or 4-of in this deck, mostly because we want the value out of the cards we play faster than Eternal Scourge would give us through re-casting it. I can't imagine wanting more than 1 to play with in total between my hand/battlefield/yard/exile, and I can't see trimming anything for more than one or two copies unless you abandon the processor creatures completely. Which I would not consider doing, I think if you're ditching Blight Herders entirely you may as well go to Eldrazi and Taxes to make use of Aether Vials and new Thalia.
I totally agree that cards need to be flexible and give value, the value in our processor creatures is really fun and a big part of why I enjoy the deck. I threw out the idea of cutting mind stones as an attempt to keep up with the meta which has been getting faster (I played against two different goblin aggro decks this week). But back to my previous point on value, the reason I've dropped down to two copies of each processor is I was having 1 or more times a night where I had a processor ready to play, but I'd have had to cast it as a vanilla rather than process and that feels really really bad. You do not want dead cards in your hand, and that's what that situation becomes because you have to decide to drop it vanilla or wait to topdeck an exile effect. Right now I run 1 Reshaper and 1 Eternal Scourge, the logic behind that being that Reshaper is good enough to run one of for the card draw/potential permanent, but I don't want to play more than that as getting it exiled rather than sent to the yard for a draw is losing out on the value (looking at you, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet). Same thing with Eternal Scourge, I want to have something that is recurring and also on the board early to block/interrupt aggro. Obviously the card needs to be killed/exiled to get the value so you want it out there early.
This week I went 2-1-1 running the list in my sig with one change being -1 Pithing Needle, +1 Collective Brutality in the side. Even though against U/B Mill I was able to cast Collective Brutality turn two for a discard, and escalate it discarding Lingering Souls to -2/-2 his Hedron Crab, I feel like the card competes with Warping Wail for spot(s) in the side and I'm leaning toward Warping Wail simply for the facts that I'm not having to discard to escalate with W.W. and I know I'm getting the value out of a counterspell/creature exile whereas the Instant/Sorcery discard on Brutality might whiff (unless you've already had a look at their hand thanks to T1 discard). It just feels like too much setup needs to happen just right to get full value out of brutality.
Another positive on W.W. is it can counter Scapeshift. I have only played this matchup one time, just a couple weeks ago, and the Cryptic Commands kept me at bay long enough for the combo to go off both games. The match up definitely felt bad, and getting a surgical on Snapcaster or Cryptic is probably the best way to stop them from slowing you down. W.W. could definitely be used in the match up, it would be easy to leave two colorless mana open to counter a Scapeshift if you can't make them discard it. And after countering it, it leaves the card in the yard for possible Surgical as well. Am I correct that if we manage to extract Scapeshift we win? I have no knowledge of the deck or match up, so I'm not sure.
Edit: I forgot to mention that the Eternal Scourge I added for this week did see play against an aggro deck. They had to bolt it so they could attack one turn, and the next turn or turn after I brought it back into play. That is exactly what the card should be doing in this deck IMO.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
The mono-color tribal aggro decks (Merfolk, Elves, Goblins) are hard because A) they are so wide and fast, B) they don't tend to put very much in the yard, making Relic-->Strangler much weaker, and C) they all feature some kind of evasion (islandwalk, trample, Legion Loyalist). Zoo, Suicide Zoo, and Affinity do not pose these same problems for us. Mull aggressively in these matches for sweepers--just today I have been re-considering Engineered Explosives as a possible 1-of in place of a Bomb, simply because it is faster. A Flaying Tendrils might be good in the place of a single Damnation for the same reason. (BTW you might consider running Languish over Wrath just because BB is marginally easier to get than WW with my land package.) Also, leaving Ghost Quarter up against Merfolk is exactly right.
This is where the metagame tweaking happens for me: Tuning the side by small degrees. I believe the core of the deck is very good against the larger Modern meta, and the only thing I worry about now is shoring up this kind of weakness by getting the sideboard hate dialed in just right. And that can change over time. Thanks, Tituba9. I trimmed your post down to the parts I thought I could address. I agree with your take on Scourge exactly, but hate the thought of cutting anything I have in the deck right now.
I actually think Mind Stones make us faster, not slower. We don't have a lot to do on T2 in many games. To speed up the build I would be more likely to drop a Smasher and/or Herder for a Reshaper or two, myself. I love Mind Stone and think it is incredibly important if, like me, you run 12 cards at 4+ CMC.
I, too, have to cast a processor for no added value sometimes and am not a huge fan, but in some cases this is actually a good play. For instance, Herder blocks most opponents' big creatures regardless of having any little helpers, and a T2 Strangler on the play is great against control decks or Tron. I was at four of each processor early on and cut to three due to the variability. For now I like it like that. I don't consider casting Strangler or Herder without processing to be a dead card situation, personally--at least, not in the way drawing a Mind Stone feels, when I already played a Stony Silence!
I have not run Warping Wail, ever. I never felt I had room for it. I would be very interested to hear others' experiences with it in this build since it does have some pretty great versatility. It would help vs. Scapeshift, for sure. (BTW in a Bring to Light build, Extracting Scapeshift would pretty much guarantee a win, but in a Titanshift build not necessarily. ALL the Valakut builds are tough for me, personally.)
3x Blight Herder
4x Caves of Koilos
1x Eldrazi Displacer
4x Eldrazi Temple
2x Expedition Map
2x Ghost Quarter
1x Go for the Throat
2x Godless Shrine
1x Inquisition of Kozilek
1x Isolated Chapel
1x Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
4x Lingering Souls
4x Path to Exile
2x Plains
4x Reality Smasher
4x Relic of Progenitus
2x Shambling Vent
1x Sorin, Solemn Visitor
2x Swamp
1x Thespian's Stage
4x Thought-Knot Seer
2x Thoughtseize
1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1x Vault of the Archangel
3x Wasteland Strangler
1x Wastes
1x Westvale Abbey
1x All Is Dust
2x Anguished Unmaking
2x Conduit of Ruin
1x Disenchant
2x Flaying Tendrils
1x Ghost Quarter
1x Stony Silence
2x Surgical Extraction
2x Timely Reinforcements
1x Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger
Link to deck @ TappedOut.net
I think my biggest issues stem from the manabase, but I currently lack the funds for marsh flats and cavern of souls. I do really enjoy having 2x maps and several utility lands, but it does get inconsistent. What is the consensus on Urborg, Thespian's stage, and Westvale? I find I often need more black mana so I like urborg, and we seem to generate a lot of tokens so I like westvale. Thespian's stage, however, seems slow and im not sure of its worth. I have been thinking of trying Vesuva out.
As for creatures, I do like Kalitas, but it looks like deaddrift dropped him/the lifegain flex spot from his list. I really like the lifegain/exile/tokens that he provides. I'm also curious about why you would choose Matter Reshaper over displacer.
Finally, for the sideboard, what do recommend for an unknown meta? I'm currently in the process of moving, so I'm not sure what to expect at a new shop. I used to play against a lot of goblins, elves, kitchen finks, tron, and affinity.
Let me know your thoughts. Again, sorry if most of this was discussed previously in the thread.
For the mana base, Marsh Flats is definitely ideal as it does a few things. It fetches your B/W lands and basics, which will help a lot with your consistency (assuming your issues are generating B/W early in the game). The ability to fetch your basics is pretty key in the modern format as well. I understand it is out of reach for you right now and to compensate I suggest going up to 3 or even 4 Godless Shrine and a third Shambling Vent. Purchasing/trading for those Flats should be your biggest priority for upgrading the deck, you can get away with two Flats and 3 Shrines but most run three Flats and two Shrines. Cut the Isolated Chapel entirely. Cut Urborg as well, we only ran it so we could use Oblivion Sower generated lands and Sower won't be played without Eye of Ugin. You want that slot for the additional B/W lands mentioned above. Same with Thespian's Stage, it is just too slow and most games will just be a non-basic Wastes. Cavern of Souls is not really 100% necessary if you're working with a budget, and most often you only run one so if you get it you don't have to worry much when playing against blue. I run two because I see lots of blue in my local meta and I want to get it more consistently, but you can get away without any, you just play around their open mana for counter-spells. Getting one is much lower priority than Flats. By bumping up your B/W land count and trimming 2-3 utility lands, the need for Expedition Map is gone and you can replace them with Mind Stones. These are a much better fit in the deck as they give us 6 ramps cards for TKS and Smasher rather than just the 4 Temples. They provide cantrip late as well. It is faster than map and provides several things rather than just a fetch. With these Mind Stones you can pretty safely drop the Wastes basic from your list unless you see heavy Blood Moon play. Personally I love Westvale Abbey in the deck as it does quite a lot between going over the top with a flyer, potentially albeit rarely getting value in response to your opponent playing a board-wipe, and generating a token/chump block late game. Many don't play it in favor of, I'd say, a third Ghost Quarter but as our local Tron player has moved onto something else for now, I've been pretty content with just two Ghost Quarters and have had one when I needed it. Actually if you end up with open land slots after cutting Thespian/Wastes/Isolated Chapel, keep the Urborg in for now since you're using Flaying Tendrils in the side. Ideally no Urborg, but since you have no Flats it is probably better than a basic Swamp or something.
I have playtested with both Kalitas and Displacer, but found them both underwhelming in this deck. I think Kalitas shines in Jund because the Jund player can dismantle their opponent's hand/removal and make Kalitas stick, but in my playtesting he was usually quickly removed. He isn't ramped by Temple and BB can be hard to cast, small negative but you do not want to have a hand where kalitas is your only turn 4 play, it's turn 4, and you can't play it. The Kalitas slot basically competes with the smaller Eldrazi, and with the addition of Eternal Scourge there is no room for Kalitas as Scourge with almost definitely impact the game more. Lastly, saccing a 2/2 token for Abbey isn't as good as saccing the 1/1 scions or spirits. Kalitas is a really really good value card, but just not quite the perfect fit for this deck. Maybe deaddrift can give a more in-depth explanation as I did not play Kalitas for very long.
Displacer is really good in Eldrazi and Taxes because it is a more control and lock-down oriented deck. Because it too competes with the small Eldrazi for the slot it needs to consistently give value beyond being a 3/3 to be worth it over Scourge or Reshaper, and in my experience it did not work out. Once again with Eternal Scourge now here, Displacer is more than likely no longer an option in a format where Lightning Bolt reigns supreme. The abundance of removal is actually a good thing for Reshaper, as regardless of the card draw's converted mana cost, it is still a draw and that is good. Also Wasteland Strangler's ETB trigger works off of revealing it to a Reshaper's death trigger, that is some sexy value. Reshaper only does not give value if it is exiled rather than killed/destroyed, and for that reason I am considering dropping it in favor of a second Eternal Scourge. But either of those two cards are more than likely better than Kalitas and Displacer right now.
Going into an unknown meta, I'd start with something like this;
2x Damntation (Flaying Tendrils)Note: I only own 1 damnation and would trim a Pithing Needle/Warping Wail from my S.B. for a second copy if I could.
1x Anguished Unmaking
2x Disenchant
2x Stony Silence
3x total between Timely Reinforcements + Rest for the Weary
1x Surgical Extraction
1-2x Pithing Needle
2x Engineering Explosives/Ratchet Bomb
I think that us being able to target ourselves with Relic's first ability to get Scourge from the yard to exile is enough reason to stick with the god card that is Lingering Souls rather than put RiP in the main or side. If you're all-in on a Scourge deck you need Surgical Extractions to get all 4 copes in exile from 1 in the yard.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
Kalitas has been easy enough for me to cast, but that might be due to maps/urborg. He definitely helps a lot for grindy match ups. But I definitely agree that displacer has been a bit underwhelming, especially when it dies to bolt. It does work filtering my opponents hand with TKS and the added strangler value though, provided I can keep it alive long enough. I havent had a chance to try out Eternal Scourge, but it looks very promising. Do you feel that it is just a flex spot or should it be more than that? I also haven't tried reshaper yet, but it does sound better than displacer from your description.
How do you deal with decks that go infinite? I have come across several situations where I was unable to prevent my opponent from gaining infinite life so having an alternate win con like Ulamogs mill proved very useful.
I try to use Relic as a cantrip minimally unless it's really late game or I have a backup Relic in hand. Saving Relic to crack in response to something your opponent does is added value and something I've been trying to do more of. I play against lots of Snapcaster, a mill that makes use of Crypt Incursion, Jund,etc. where I need to hold that relic back. That means its on the board longer and for the 1-2 Eternal Scourge in the deck it should always be there for the times when Scourge is in the yard. I think Scourge might see the yard less go straight to exile because any spell/ability the opponent does to it takes it to exile. I was responding to your last question about cards that would be useful with Scourge and I assumed you were talking about a deck that removed processors for a playset of Scourge. In processors I think there's room for 2 Scourge at max and the only support card I would bring in is maybe a Gemstone Caverns over my Abbey for an OP turn 1 on rare occasions.
You are right, I forgot about how Urborg made Eye tappable, that was very good. My local meta has shifted to more blue and more aggro lately, which is probably why Kalitas wasn't as effective. I do really like the card and against lots of grindy matchups I can see it doing well. Batterskull is really good in grindy matchups as well, and it's worked out often enough for me where I like it in that flex spot.
I like Eternal Scourge because once you get it in your hand it's all but guaranteed to stick around in the game. But it doesn't effect the game like any of our other eldrazi, so I think it is just a utility card.
Some of my worst matchups are against infinite combo decks (Kiki and Abzan CoCo), due to me just getting into the format and having to learn both what cards these decks run, how they interact, how I stop it, and how the stack works. So hopefully someone else comes along with a better answer, but against Kiki you bascially need to have a Path to Exile/Go for the Throat in hand and the open mana to cast it from turn 4 on. They can turn 4 (maybe 3?) flash in Resto Angel on your end step, then on their turn cast Kiki for the combo. You either peel Kiki or Resto from their hands and extract it, or hold back an instant speed removal. Cracking Relic in response to them casting Chord of Calling and Eternal Witness. I think CoCo is one of the worst matchups for processors, to stop their combo you can crack Relic in response to one of their creature's persist trigger being on the stack, or extract it as well. You can use a Path on a combo piece in response to them casting Melira, Sylvok Outcast, if they are Chording for the last combo piece then before it resolves instant removal a creature on the board. Basically, hold relic/removal to stop the combo rather than casting it as soon as a piece hits the board. But from my experience this matchup is bad for us and often a game is won from a fast opening hand thanks to Temples rather than winning the long game through control. The Ulamog and Conduits in your sideboard would be better as EE/Ratchet Bomb/Pithing Needle/ A second Stony Silence because all those cards will impact more matchups, and will impact the game more often than Ulamog as that is a slow gameplan. Pithing Needle naming Karn, or Lilly against Jund, or Nahiri agianst Jeskai (and now apparantly Kiki Chord decks as well), costs you 1 mana and impacts the game heavily in your favor against a lot of the field.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
hankypank, I think you could probably play with the Khans fetches (Polluted Delta, Windswept Heath etc.) for budget reasons while you're getting the Zendikar lands that you should have for this build; nine times out of ten we are fetching for Godless Shrine anyway. But Flats is important, especially if you expect to face decks running Blood Moon. Cavern of Souls helps a lot with the blue decks but is not as high a priority, and Sea Gate Wreckage has a lot to recommend it. [EDIT] BTW, welcome to the forums! You picked a great deck to start with, haha.
Kalitas is so good in Jund because they have a million ways to kill, not exile, things. He is anti-synergistic in our deck despite his other excellent qualities, and this deck is carefully crafted to make use of small synergies throughout the build. He's not terrible, but he's pointing in the wrong direction.
I think Abzan CoCo and Kiki Chord are pretty decent matches for us; I would say about even. But you have to know your outs. Against both decks:
I meant that in certain matchups I use it for cantrip minimally. I always try to assess how relevant Relic is against an opponent, and against something like burn with zero graveyard play, you bet I'm cantripping ASAP to draw more answers. I think if Rest in Peace didn't non-bo with Lingering Souls so hard it would be incredible in the deck. But Souls is just too good to even consider Rest in Peace, unless like Deaddrift said, you had a local meta that warranted 1-2 in the Sideboard. Souls also pairs with Collective Brutality nicely along with Scourge. I really like Brutality, but I'm just finding it difficult to find room for it even in the sideboard. I don't know if the flexibility alone is enough to justify it, are there matchups where casting Brutality would almost certainly seal a game/match win? I'm not trying to say there aren't, it's just a new card and hard to pinpoint where it shines.
This is all really good stuff. I did not catch Pithing Needle shutting down Viscera Seer, and I totally agree that holding back discards, especially when it means not taking a shock T1 to play them, is smart. It's nice to fetch or play a shrine T1 and bring it in tapped, then T2 cast a discard spell and relic their card to exile as well. With all our shocks, Anguished, and Thoughtseize it's important to manage life totals.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
Hey look what I found, seems a little unfocused to me, but it posted results a couple weeks ago:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/modern-w-b-eldrazi-27215#paper
@deadrift Thanks! I'm glad to be here. As soon as I find another competitive store I hope to become a frequent contributor. I really love this deck, it really feels like you can interact with anything. I'll look into getting the kahns fetches, I wasn't sure how worth it they were if I was just going to try and upgrade to the zendikar ones. I guess I am still confused about how they help get around blood moon. I was under the impression that as soon as I play a shrine or a flats they immediately become a mountain and are useless. Also, I have a sea gate wreckage that I have tested in my standard eldrazi version, but I was under the impression that the modern processors mana curve was to high or I was holding removal to often to make it that useful.
Thanks for the combo input. Pithing needles seem like a must. What about wrath of god over damnation? do we have enough white sources for that instead? Also, Do you have any experience playing against a deck called taking turns? I'm not sure how often it is played, but a guy at my local store plays it weekly. I haven't been matched up against it yet, but every match I watch his opponent just ends up sitting there until he wins or they draw from time. Just curious how our matchup is against that archetype.
Wrath is an OK substitute for Damnation but is a little harder to cast. Languish is another option and leaves Smashers and Herders alive (but also Goyfs, Tasigurs, Rhinos etc.)
Taking Turns is tough, need a fast clock and lots of hand disruption for that one. Best goal is to shut them off their card draw with Thoughtseixe/IoK or TKS if possible; Unmaking, Bomb, or Disenchant can hit Howling Mine or Dictate of Kruphix.
@deaddrift - Love your decklist. I don't have any marsh flats at the moment, so if I were to use another fetch land (even as a placeholder) should I prioritize on using fetch lands that can get plains or swamps?
That is the exact same reason I haven't even tried Sea Gate yet for that slot. I prefer Abbey because there's no restrictions to the ability. For how rarely a 1-of land sees the battlefield without maps to fetch it, I don't want to not even be able to use it because I have cards in my hand.
Nice to see it got a top 8. It does seem unfocused running Abbey while also running no Herders. It seems to be focusing heavily on flickering for control and ETB triggers, and Wall of Omens is something I've considered trying out for a 2-drop, having two more cards that give us draw and also blocks to buy time for us to ramp out the fatties. Not sure if it's better than the new eldrazi or Herder which it would replace, but it is something to think about if this meta keeps getting heavier on aggro.
So I've got the no-banlist tournie tomorrow, and I'm hoping for some last minute advice from you guys on some card choices. Here is my current build, similar to the old Eye of Ugin builds while squeezing in some of the banned cards. The sideboad has lot's of 1-ofs because I can dig with Sensei's Divining Top. Where I'm stuck is I would really like to add a 3rd Blight Herder and 3rd Strangler. Herder because with Eye of Ugin there's the possibility of chaining them with multiples in hand (however having 4 cards in exile is not even close to guaranteed), and Strangler to take out The inevitable Delver of Secrets popping up. In order to fit 2 (or even 3) more of these cards I've considered two things. I could cut the two Sowers and Ulamong in favor of these cheaper eldrazi, changing the search function of Eye of Ugin from targeting Ulamog to targeting Herder/Smasher, or cutting the Stoneforge Mystics entirely because with all these sol lands it could be competing with ramped eldrazi both turn 2 and turn 3 (obviously I'd want to use its ability to cheat out a turn 3 Batterskull if I play it on turn 2). Another thing to consider is generating a white by turn 2 to play the Mystic. Lastly, I trimmed a copy of Lingering Souls and I'm really not confident that is the right choice. If you guys see this post I'd love some input to help me finally decide on what to do!
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
The WB processor i removed 2x Eye of Ugin,2x Swords of plowshares ,2x Hymn of Tourach and added the 2x Mind Stone recommended by Deaddrift, 1x Ghost Quarter, 1x Westvale abbey and testing 2x Declaration in Stone how removal/clean board hybrid against some decks.
This is my WB List right now, i dont have any big meta, little local tournaments and most played against friends.
2x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
4x Godless Shrine
4x Eldrazi Temple
2x Shambling Vents
4x Caves of Koilos
2x Ghost Quarter
1x Westvale Abbey
1x Vault of the Archangel
2x Plain
2x Swamp
2x Declaration in Stone
2x Inquisition of Kozilek
2x Duress
4x Path to exile
4x Lingering Souls
1x Sorin, Solemn Visitor
Artifacts
2x Mind Stone
4x Relic of Progenitus
3x Reality Smasher
4x Thought-Knot Seer
3x Blight Herder
4x Wasteland Strangler
BWC Processors Eldrazi CWB
UBC Emerge EldraziCBU
C Tron Eldrazi C
RBC Meld Eldrazi CBR
GU Tokens Eldrazi UG
I would like to make a case for trying an alternative direction for a processor deck I think is under-tested and should be explored. I am not claiming it is better than B/W processors, but my testing indicates it is at least viable and worth a shot.
The deck is an esper control build
This deck utilizes many of the same cards the traditional B/W processors lists have relied on for a while now but with the inclusion of blue and a control emphasis.
I will sum this post up by evaluating Ulamog's Nullifier:
Casting cost
not bad for an eldrazi processor. Fit's nicely into the curve of Wasteland Strangler, Nullifier, Herder. Cost is reduced with Eldrazi Temple, but not required to be effective. U/B mana is a good color combination to build around for a control shell.
Processing
same as all processors - it needs to be in a shell that includes a multitude of effects that exile and contribute to the deck's game plan. Luckily white offers many cheap and versatile exile effects that help contribute to a control deck without being included "just because they exile."
Effect
Having a creature that hard counters a spell is an amazing effect. This is not your average mystic snake either. This is almost always going to be a two for one, and a win condition in a control deck. I think of it as an improved Snapcaster mage-remand-mana leak combination. It lacks the versatility of flashback, but makes up for it with counterspell. It is also similar to cryptic command, but easier to cast - a heavy gun of many control decks. This eldrazi does not cantrip, but it doesn't need to. Instead of a random draw - you get a 2/3 flying body. This card is not really "better" than any of these examples (except the snake imo), but it is at the very least par for the course... Pair this with the ability to upgrade Delay by processing suspended spells and you are now running 8 hard counters in your deck.
Stats
2/3 does actually pass the bolt test because this card has an etb effect and allows us to process things like delay. If your opponent is bolting him, you likely already got your value. Flying is very relevant, and the three toughness allows you to block many creatures in modern favorably (such as goblin guide as one example).
I hope that you find my deck interesting at the very least. Sorry to interrupt your discussion...
Thanks
Modern: RGB Dredge // RBG Goblins // B The Gate // UBR Tezz AoB Control // RBG Prison Pox
EDH: RBU Thraximundar // R Norin the Wary // RWB Kaalia of the Vast // BUR Grixis Combos // BU Gisa and Geralf Tribal
Tiny Leaders: BUW Sydri, Galvanic Genius // R Feldon of the Third Path
Projects:
Gisa and Geralf Extreme-Tribal EDH
Esper Eldrazi Processor Control
Brewing with Kuldotha Forgemaster
Primer: "The Gate" - Mono Black in Modern
Modern Prison Pox - building a better plague