If anyone is game, I would be interested to hear quantitative figures about mulls taken or T2-uncastable Scullers. How often does that Sculler come out T3 or later, off-curve? How often odes it make an otherwise-keepable hand get thrown back for a second chance?
Splashing green gives access to abrupt decay, maelstrom pulse, ancient stirrings and BoP. Are the accelerations, card selection, and removal enough to justify the loss of Ghost Quarter ? Big reason for running Abzan over Bant would be access to blacks discard and removal suite, as well as access to Rhino.
If anyone is game, I would be interested to hear quantitative figures about mulls taken or T2-uncastable Scullers. How often does that Sculler come out T3 or later, off-curve? How often odes it make an otherwise-keepable hand get thrown back for a second chance?
Psyched for the new land, I gotta admit.
I want 4x of the new fastland.
Purely anecdotal, I have 14 w/b sources in my build, 4x Sculler. I land sculler on curve I'd say 2/3 times I see him in my opener. I'd love to see some hard numbers on how often other people are landing Tidehollow on curve.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
BUDGET DECK BUILDER SINCE 93'
Modern ------------------------- WU Azorius Titan Midrange
Commander ------------------- WUG Derevi, Empyrial Tactician
***Are you looking for cards priced below TCG NM "LOW" and with FREE SHIPPING? - Click HERE! for my sales thread - 485 Feedback 100% positive!***
Isn't your curve just a tad high with 7 5-drops? From your reports it sounds like you have no real board presence up until t5 unless it's just not in your reports.
If anyone is game, I would be interested to hear quantitative figures about mulls taken or T2-uncastable Scullers. How often does that Sculler come out T3 or later, off-curve? How often odes it make an otherwise-keepable hand get thrown back for a second chance?
Psyched for the new land, I gotta admit.
I want 4x of the new fastland.
Purely anecdotal, I have 14 w/b sources in my build, 4x Sculler. I land sculler on curve I'd say 2/3 times I see him in my opener. I'd love to see some hard numbers on how often other people are landing Tidehollow on curve.
I'm not 100% sold on these fast lands yet for this deck. Perhaps others feel the same way I'm not sure our deck benefits from them that much.
The only tapped lands we play with now are the shambling vents and to add these fast lands (not sure what we would cut for them) wouldn't we increase the chance of being stuck on turn 4 unable to cast thought knot, smasher/herder at times? I can understand budget concerns on marsh flats but perhaps more experienced players can weigh in.
Honestly, I think I'm going to keep my.mana base the same. Granted, not playing scullers, but.I like the option of fetching up basics against a moon deck.
Also, considering cutting cage for surgically in my board. My reasoning is we already come in preboarded.against dredge via relics. Cage can stop some shenanigans, but only until they draw their nature's.claim and from then on they.can still.do their thing. I haven't.seen many chord or CoCo decks, which is something cage stops, but I also run aven mindcensor. Surgical can hit stuff I would.normally.have issues.with, whether it be ad nauseam or valacut. Thoughts?
Also, considering cutting cage for surgically in my board. My reasoning is we already come in preboarded.against dredge via relics. Cage can stop some shenanigans, but only until they draw their nature's.claim and from then on they.can still.do their thing. I haven't.seen many chord or CoCo decks, which is something cage stops, but I also run aven mindcensor. Surgical can hit stuff I would.normally.have issues.with, whether it be ad nauseam or valacut. Thoughts?
I have found the Evo/Chord deck very tough to stop when piloted by a skilled opponent; they have so much redundancy now in tutoring that it's really hard to keep them from getting whatever they need.
Mindcensor is very good but plays best at instant speed, which can mean lost tempo if you don't flash it in on curve. Last time I flashed one in (responding to an Evolution from a Kiki pilot) it got Pathed after it resolved while the search was still on the stack. Felt bad. In our deck it might be correct in more cases to just flash it in T3 on their end step instead of sandbagging it for the surprise.
Mindcensor is better against Tron and RG Valakut builds though, both of which are tough. Cage is better against Dredge, Elves and other Company decks. Probably a meta call.
I was a huge proponent of Extraction but have moved away from it recently; if you see a lot of combo decks it might very good. However, I have found that with lots of hand disruption, processing Lotus Blooms, and Stony Silence and Pithing Needle (name Lightning Storm) in the side, Ad Nauseam is not hard to beat in most cases. Use your disruption to take their life protection rather than AN itself in most cases, though, as Angel's Grace and Phyrexian Unlife can both slow us down and buy them more time to go off.
Part of my reasoning for surgical is that it plays against multiple decks for one SB slot. Ripping a TBR out of Zooicide, the surgicalling it, can easily end the game against them, since we have a large number of ways to clog up the board. Liiem I said, might be a meta call, but I only saw 1 CoCo deck out of the 30+ people at my most recent modern tournament and it was Abzan CoCo, which we are already pre-boarded against with relic. I guess Cage is good against Elves, but taking a look at mtggoldfish, I see neither Elves nor CoCo decks making up a significant portion of the metagame. Like I said about Dredge, they expect to go against things like Cage and RiP in post-board games. Cage doesn't do anything if it gets blown up, which is largely different than other GY hate like RiP and relic which actually effect the GY even if they are dealt with.
I agree that mindcensor is better against the Valacut decks than it is against Chord decks, but Cage does nothing against the Valacut decks while at least Mindcensor offers something against the CoCo/Chord/Evo decks. For me, itas a matter of cage just not doing enough against dredge decks, while surgical having play accross a good chunk of the field. Will continue testing, should be going against a full gauntlet soon, it will be streamed.
Testing Hangarback Walker in place of the displacer and the blight herder. Considering the 9th place eldrazi list at gp guangzhou ran 4 of them MD, I figure I would try it out. Works well with Sorin. I think at times we are not applying enopugh pressure early on and I don;t see my mana base accommodating for 4 Scullers. Also considering bearer of silence, wish it was a little more pushed as a 3/1.
Not sure if this has been discussed before, but is corrupted crossroads a poor option for the manabase; also would we ever consider running pyxis of pandemonium potentially as a 1-of?
This is the list i was talking about, top 4 in a japanese GPT (Uchida Kenji). I dont think its superior to any normal build of this threads users, but its a decklist, and maybe with some cards for someone to try!
This is the list i was talking about, top 4 in a japanese GPT (Uchida Kenji). I dont think its superior to any normal build of this threads users, but its a decklist, and maybe with some cards for someone to try!
Unlimited processing is really cool. Might want to replace smasher with blight herder.
As the spoilers keep coming out, These are some of the changes I've been play testing with promising results.
4 Concealed Courtyard the new fast lands are going to set burn back quite a bit as I see Abzan being the GBx deck De Jour since they'll have their own blackcleave cliffs as well as Grixis and Delver getting a bump. Blood moon is such a small part of the meta right now that I for one think if you're going to play 15 rounds and you lose a match to it once (maybe) I'm ok with that, you have Path and GQ to help you out if you know its coming down as well, in addition to Blight Herder to turn on colorless for TKS and Displacer activation. My base is the same I posted above
Flipping the number of IoK vs. TS, normally because of burn and lack of fast lands I side on the 3/2 IoK-TS split, but with fast lands and Through the breach as well as Bant Eldrazi on the rise I personally will be playing 3 TS and 2 IoK.
Lost Legacy aka The new memorcide is very promising against our worst matchups and I personally don't mind dedicating 2 possibly 3 (meta dependent) slots for it, the fact that it can be played on turn three in the same situation as Lili against Tron and Scapeshift/titan decks is wonderful. Tron's only money card against us is Karn. Their odds of having tron + karn on the play are as follows: 36.1% and 15.7%. On the draw 45.5% of the time for tron and 22.3% for turn 3 Karn. source. Between Ghost quarter and disruption along with lost legacy this should help us out a lot. Against Ad Naus this also helps if they turn 0 leyline and we've got dead TS and IoK better remove those from your hand in hopes of hitting disenchant and pithing needle.
Damnation vs. Languish - I've personally come across a lot more selfless spirit recently than i would like(elves, UW spirits, Naya Kiki); nullifying damnation. So I've swapped out Damnation for Languish and even against bant eldrazi the goal has always been to clear their scions and dorks since our removal deals with their creature suite very well, I would advise others to try it out as well and if you don't own them wait till rotation when they'll drop even more.
The swing cards in my build remain the following in this order: Sorin, Tidehollow & Declaration.
This is the list i was talking about, top 4 in a japanese GPT (Uchida Kenji). I dont think its superior to any normal build of this threads users, but its a decklist, and maybe with some cards for someone to try!
This list runs Shriekmaw because if you flicker it with Displacer in response to the Evoke sac trigger, you get to kill two creatures for 1B plus 2C plus your Shriekmaw remains on the field.
4x Rest in Peace makes Lingering Souls impossible, and duplicates are dead cards unless you're facing like Abrupt Decay maybe. But it makes Scourge better because it can die from blocks and then come back repeatedly.
The list runs 30 creatures and 23 lands, with 2 Vaults and a Wastes but zero Ghost Quarters, which is a big change. It appears very Displacer-centric, what with Shriekmaw, Strangler, Sculler, Seer, and Wall all having relevant ETB effects.
Many users are taking the build in a more BW intensive, Sculler and Processor-oriented direction. Personally I have been having success with a lower curve, more colorless, card-advantage direction, having recently scrapped Herders altogether for a fourth Strangler and three Reshapers. I notice the Japanese list runs 4 Smashers and no Herders, though.
Not sure if this has been discussed before, but is corrupted crossroads a poor option for the manabase; also would we ever consider running pyxis of pandemonium potentially as a 1-of?
Crossroads is bad because very few of our pool of spells are actually Devoid--that is, colorless spells that require colored mana to cast. It would be a Wastes 90% of the time. Pyxis is bad because you wouldn't know what you were processing until it was too late; what if you put Lingering Souls back in there, or a Snapcaster target, etc.? Too risky with no real upside vs. the other options. And it doesn't cantrip.
Hey Beautox, wanna take back over the primer? This is really your baby, after all. Let me know. BTW thanks for the Languish tip, I like your thinking.
Went 3-2 on MTGO tonight. Lost to 5c aggro and RG Ponza. I made a huge misplay against 5C aggro by keeping a really greedy one lander, which sucks because I had just pulled an LSV and crawled back to win the second game from 1 life. RG Ponza feels like such a bad MU, I got completely blown out.
I don't think I am going to change much in the way of the MD, honestly swapping the sorins and blight herders for reshapers feels like the best thing ever. Not sure what I can change in my board to cover those MU's without weakening others
Is anybody else having problems with RG scapeshift? I have about a 20% win percentage against that deck after 10 matches or so. Ghost quarter does pretty much nothing against a smart scapeshift player who fetches 6 mountains.
On a side note: I went 3-1 to win the modern tourney at my local mtg store last week taking 1st place due to tiebreakers and have gone 3-2, 3-2 online. I like worship, but am torn with tidehollow. On one hand it provides information and actively tears their hand apart, on the other hand it dies to everything. I do have a love-hate relationship with tidehollow in my CBW midrange brew and am still waiting for a great BW 2 drop.
Psyched for the new land, I gotta admit.
My H/W list
GXTronGX
RWxBurnRWx
I want 4x of the new fastland.
Purely anecdotal, I have 14 w/b sources in my build, 4x Sculler. I land sculler on curve I'd say 2/3 times I see him in my opener. I'd love to see some hard numbers on how often other people are landing Tidehollow on curve.
BUDGET DECK BUILDER SINCE 93'
Modern ------------------------- WU Azorius Titan Midrange
Commander ------------------- WUG Derevi, Empyrial Tactician
***Are you looking for cards priced below TCG NM "LOW" and with FREE SHIPPING? - Click HERE! for my sales thread - 485 Feedback 100% positive!***
Isn't your curve just a tad high with 7 5-drops? From your reports it sounds like you have no real board presence up until t5 unless it's just not in your reports.
My H/W list
I'm not 100% sold on these fast lands yet for this deck. Perhaps others feel the same way I'm not sure our deck benefits from them that much.
The only tapped lands we play with now are the shambling vents and to add these fast lands (not sure what we would cut for them) wouldn't we increase the chance of being stuck on turn 4 unable to cast thought knot, smasher/herder at times? I can understand budget concerns on marsh flats but perhaps more experienced players can weigh in.
Also, considering cutting cage for surgically in my board. My reasoning is we already come in preboarded.against dredge via relics. Cage can stop some shenanigans, but only until they draw their nature's.claim and from then on they.can still.do their thing. I haven't.seen many chord or CoCo decks, which is something cage stops, but I also run aven mindcensor. Surgical can hit stuff I would.normally.have issues.with, whether it be ad nauseam or valacut. Thoughts?
My H/W list
Mindcensor is very good but plays best at instant speed, which can mean lost tempo if you don't flash it in on curve. Last time I flashed one in (responding to an Evolution from a Kiki pilot) it got Pathed after it resolved while the search was still on the stack. Felt bad. In our deck it might be correct in more cases to just flash it in T3 on their end step instead of sandbagging it for the surprise.
Mindcensor is better against Tron and RG Valakut builds though, both of which are tough. Cage is better against Dredge, Elves and other Company decks. Probably a meta call.
I was a huge proponent of Extraction but have moved away from it recently; if you see a lot of combo decks it might very good. However, I have found that with lots of hand disruption, processing Lotus Blooms, and Stony Silence and Pithing Needle (name Lightning Storm) in the side, Ad Nauseam is not hard to beat in most cases. Use your disruption to take their life protection rather than AN itself in most cases, though, as Angel's Grace and Phyrexian Unlife can both slow us down and buy them more time to go off.
I agree that mindcensor is better against the Valacut decks than it is against Chord decks, but Cage does nothing against the Valacut decks while at least Mindcensor offers something against the CoCo/Chord/Evo decks. For me, itas a matter of cage just not doing enough against dredge decks, while surgical having play accross a good chunk of the field. Will continue testing, should be going against a full gauntlet soon, it will be streamed.
Testing Hangarback Walker in place of the displacer and the blight herder. Considering the 9th place eldrazi list at gp guangzhou ran 4 of them MD, I figure I would try it out. Works well with Sorin. I think at times we are not applying enopugh pressure early on and I don;t see my mana base accommodating for 4 Scullers. Also considering bearer of silence, wish it was a little more pushed as a 3/1.
My H/W list
RBW Mardu Pyro
X Eldrazi
Pauper:
X Affinity
G Stompy
3 Eternal Scourge
4 Reality Smasher
3 Shriekmaw
4 Thought-Knot Seer
4 Tidehollow Sculler
4 Wall of Omens
4 Wasteland Strangler
4 Path to Exile
4 Rest in Peace
4 Caves of Koilos
4 Eldrazi Temple
4 Godless Shrine
3 Plains
4 Shambling Vent
1 Swamp
2 Vault of the Archangel
1 Wastes
2 Disenchant
2 Distended Mindbender
3 Leyline of Sanctity
2 Pithing Needle
2 Stony Silence
2 Zealous Persecution
This is the list i was talking about, top 4 in a japanese GPT (Uchida Kenji). I dont think its superior to any normal build of this threads users, but its a decklist, and maybe with some cards for someone to try!
RBW Mardu Pyro
X Eldrazi
Pauper:
X Affinity
G Stompy
Unlimited processing is really cool. Might want to replace smasher with blight herder.
Anyone test this list?
4 Concealed Courtyard the new fast lands are going to set burn back quite a bit as I see Abzan being the GBx deck De Jour since they'll have their own blackcleave cliffs as well as Grixis and Delver getting a bump. Blood moon is such a small part of the meta right now that I for one think if you're going to play 15 rounds and you lose a match to it once (maybe) I'm ok with that, you have Path and GQ to help you out if you know its coming down as well, in addition to Blight Herder to turn on colorless for TKS and Displacer activation. My base is the same I posted above
4 Caves of Koilos
4 Eldrazi Temple
3 Shambling Vent
3 Ghost Quarter
2 Plains
1 Fetid Heath
1 Godless Shrine
1 Urborg, tomb of yawgmoth
1 Swamp
Flipping the number of IoK vs. TS, normally because of burn and lack of fast lands I side on the 3/2 IoK-TS split, but with fast lands and Through the breach as well as Bant Eldrazi on the rise I personally will be playing 3 TS and 2 IoK.
Lost Legacy aka The new memorcide is very promising against our worst matchups and I personally don't mind dedicating 2 possibly 3 (meta dependent) slots for it, the fact that it can be played on turn three in the same situation as Lili against Tron and Scapeshift/titan decks is wonderful. Tron's only money card against us is Karn. Their odds of having tron + karn on the play are as follows: 36.1% and 15.7%. On the draw 45.5% of the time for tron and 22.3% for turn 3 Karn. source. Between Ghost quarter and disruption along with lost legacy this should help us out a lot. Against Ad Naus this also helps if they turn 0 leyline and we've got dead TS and IoK better remove those from your hand in hopes of hitting disenchant and pithing needle.
Damnation vs. Languish - I've personally come across a lot more selfless spirit recently than i would like(elves, UW spirits, Naya Kiki); nullifying damnation. So I've swapped out Damnation for Languish and even against bant eldrazi the goal has always been to clear their scions and dorks since our removal deals with their creature suite very well, I would advise others to try it out as well and if you don't own them wait till rotation when they'll drop even more.
The swing cards in my build remain the following in this order: Sorin, Tidehollow & Declaration.
4x Rest in Peace makes Lingering Souls impossible, and duplicates are dead cards unless you're facing like Abrupt Decay maybe. But it makes Scourge better because it can die from blocks and then come back repeatedly.
The list runs 30 creatures and 23 lands, with 2 Vaults and a Wastes but zero Ghost Quarters, which is a big change. It appears very Displacer-centric, what with Shriekmaw, Strangler, Sculler, Seer, and Wall all having relevant ETB effects.
Many users are taking the build in a more BW intensive, Sculler and Processor-oriented direction. Personally I have been having success with a lower curve, more colorless, card-advantage direction, having recently scrapped Herders altogether for a fourth Strangler and three Reshapers. I notice the Japanese list runs 4 Smashers and no Herders, though. Crossroads is bad because very few of our pool of spells are actually Devoid--that is, colorless spells that require colored mana to cast. It would be a Wastes 90% of the time. Pyxis is bad because you wouldn't know what you were processing until it was too late; what if you put Lingering Souls back in there, or a Snapcaster target, etc.? Too risky with no real upside vs. the other options. And it doesn't cantrip.
Hey Beautox, wanna take back over the primer? This is really your baby, after all. Let me know. BTW thanks for the Languish tip, I like your thinking.
I don't think I am going to change much in the way of the MD, honestly swapping the sorins and blight herders for reshapers feels like the best thing ever. Not sure what I can change in my board to cover those MU's without weakening others
4 Reality Smasher
4 Thought-Knot Seer
3 Wasteland Strangler
2 Eldrazi Displacer
4 Matter Reshaper
Spells
4 Relic of Progenitus
4 Lingering Souls
4 Path to Exile
2 Thoughtseize
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Go for the Throat
1 Anguished Unmaking
4 Eldrazi Temple
1 Godless Shrine
4 Marsh Flats
4 Caves of Koilos
3 Ghost Quarter
1 Swamp
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3 Shambling Vent
1 Vault of the Archangel
2 Plains
1 Surgical Extraction
2 Blessed Alliance
1 Pithing Needle
1 Timely Reinforcements
2 Wrath of God
1 Anguished Unmaking
1 Stony Silence
1 Aven Mindcensor
1 Collective Brutality
2 Fulminator Mage
2 Zealous Persecution
My H/W list
Im pretty excited for Kaladesh, and the new cards that will fit this deck.
RBW Mardu Pyro
X Eldrazi
Pauper:
X Affinity
G Stompy
On a side note: I went 3-1 to win the modern tourney at my local mtg store last week taking 1st place due to tiebreakers and have gone 3-2, 3-2 online. I like worship, but am torn with tidehollow. On one hand it provides information and actively tears their hand apart, on the other hand it dies to everything. I do have a love-hate relationship with tidehollow in my CBW midrange brew and am still waiting for a great BW 2 drop.
CBW midrange deck
CBW eldrazi processor deck
CBW bw eldrazi shadow midrange