MTG Salvation

To me it seems like one of the biggest reasons why you play red is Anger of the Gods, K-Command and Bolt. Well Anger is of course strong against Elves, but how many people actually play that deck? I love Anger as well and would definitely play 1-2 in any current Jund sb, but there is no way I would add red just for a sweeper. And yes, I still think that 3 damage is very often not enough versus Humans and Spirits. Push is strictly the better against creature-based decks and against control you board out both anyways so I don't really get your argument here.
K-Command was an excellent card against Affinity of old, but have you ever played the card against KCI? It is maybe borderline playable against one of the best artifact decks in the current meta which says a lot about the card. I would actually say K-Command is more of a value card than an artifact hate. Leyline does a better job stopping artifact decks nowadays.

About the manabase:
It is a fact that you have to fetch-shock yourself more often in a 3-colored deck than in a 2-colored deck, so I don't know where your "1hp" comes from. It is simply way easier to preserve your life total in the Rock than in Jund because I can fetch a basic on each turn and still curve out if I would like to compared to Jund.

Regarding BBE:
I wanted to say that the biggest argument for Jund against control is always BBE. Yes, BBE is strong against PW's, but Rock does also have ways to deal with PW's. In the end it mostly comes down to Colonnade attacks and that is where Rock's manabase shines, because Jund cant't easily destroy manlands. A resolved Tracker followed by a fetchland is often more powerful than a random card off BBE.

"nothing replace anger of the gods and it's very good SB card now, imo."
I agree, but I am happy with Damnation and I think the card is even better in some matchups (Humans/Spirits) while being of course worse in others, Dredge for example.

"you can't play more than 4 good 1-cmc removals."
No, but why should I. I am happy with 4 and play 1 Deathmark in the sideboard.

"you can't play alpine moon the best SB card ever print to win against Tron and Valakut."
Alpine Moon is far far away from being that. I prefer Fulminator, Sphere and mainboard landhate all day over Alpine Moon.

"k.cmd is the best artifact hate because you can just play it MD and don't need any grudge in SB."
As I already said, K-Command is not enough artifact hate, especially not against the new breed of Mox Opal decks. You want Leyline and in Jund you would actually want additional Grudges in the board.

Don't get me wrong, I love Jund as much as you do, but I have the feeling that you feel personally attacked when I say something against the deck. I was just pointing out why for me currently the deck feels worse than Rock. In some months Junk or Jund might again be the better choices but for now I personally believe that BG is in a better spot than BGR.

I think the biggest thing missing here is the deck as a whole not just individual cards. You can compare the strengths of 1 card vs another all you want but it's kind of a fruitless effort. It's not about having 4 1-cmc removals spells and that's it. GB has very flexible removal at every cmc. 2-3 wastelands in the main and 2-4 trophy give you game against land decks and make things like surgical absolutely backbreaking in the SB. Why do you need moon only to have it get destroyed then lose. Moon is not a bad card, far from it but you don't have to include it in your game plan when you have just as flexible answers still in the colors. moon vs sphere for instance in tron/scapeshift/amulet match is not going to make a difference. They do the same thing at essentially the same speed.

I see jund as a slightly lower and more aggressive deck which is better in some matches but worse than others. GB is bigger and slower but much more well rounded. You choose GB because of the play style just as you would jund. I like GB more because every one of your cards get you a lot of consistent mileage where as cards like bob, BBE and even sometimes bolt don't. This is modern there's no definitive best version. It's very possible next set Gruul colors will get something amazing and then it's back to jund as top dog.

where do you find a fixed modern metagame? I want in on that format. You sound pretty much like you are in this forum to advocate jund. We are giving you reasons as to why we are playing these cards and not others but you give answers like "Ok and i am happy with my 2 push / 4 bolt..... no offense but that's not help a lot to discuss." In this scenario, push combined with the rest of the cards typically found in GB lists are enough. We aren't trying to hide tech. 4 push is enough, if more is needed in matches that are hard aggro you can add more in the SB, deathmark is a fine addition.

GB is a simplification of colors and tools. You should read the extensive and amazing primer if you want break downs of things. Adding a 3rd color does not mean it makes it better even if some of those cards are singularly more powerful in certain situations. There are also a lot of results from various tournaments. You can see given what that meta looks like how each variant does. In general, GB IS performing better than jund. There are tons of reasons but it doesn't mean one is strictly better. Skred red won a GP but that means nothing. This is modern, one week GB rules, the next Jund rules. If you want the best deck I can promise you it's not jund or gb. It's a matter of personal preference at this point, saying one deck is 5-10% better doesn't mean it will perform that way for you.

In a meta that seems to be fairly heavy on Path to Exile, Field of Ruin, Blood Moon and Assassin’s Trophy, it stands to reason that some GBx players find having a larger spread of basics more beneficial to them.

I would say a typical golgari deck runs about 5-6 basics, wheras Jund typically has 3-4. A lot of that has to do with colour-fixing; spreading your resources across three colours means that running too many of a single coloured basic will be less reliable in getting the lands you need.

Jund offsets that by doubling the number of shocklands (2 vs 4). It needs the dual colours, and as such demands an increase in fetch lands to produce them. There’s nothing inherently bad about that, but it could be perceived that it may be disadvantgeous to some players, and that dividing your manabase into two colours as opposed to three would yield a greater consistency in getting the colours you need, for as little pain as possible - that is also another important factor to take in.

Aggro and Combo decks are fairly prevalent, with 5c Humans, Spirits and Dredge representing the top three decks constructed lately. All of these can deplete life totals rather quickly, and so it’s important to consider preserving life as best as possible. This is another reason why GB is seen as more preferential, as it only really needs 4 fetch lands, and 2 shocklands, meaning we aren’t losing as much life off them.

Because the basic count is much higher, it also means running 4 copies of Field of Ruin is more easily accomplished, and gives one of the great mainboard options to hit lands-matter decks like Tron.

GB also gives us the flexibility of running 4x Assassin’s Trophy, which I’ve grown accustomed to. Yes, running Lightning Bolt and K-Cmd have their advantages - with K-cmd’s modal versatility and Bolt’s applications for creature, walker, or direct damage - Assassin’s Trophy’s marriage of Path to Exile and Vindicate hits a broader array of targets, and to me it seems to be a better answer at a larger variety of decks. Sure, it’s one mana more, but I’ll gladly pay it when it’s a problem solver for anything. This also lets us fill out Fatal Push to 4. Depending on your build, typical Jund decks I’m seeing only can afford 2 slots for Pushes.

BBE is great, and will always feel good when Cascade into Goyf or Liliana, but there is always a chance that it just doesn’t hit something needed, like a push on a creatureless boardstate or a thoughtseize and inquisition on empty hands. Not only that but with Dark Confidant it also poses the risk of flipping it to Bob and losing a tad too mucn life. Theae are very situational, but to me are important factors to consider in why one variant is perhaps played more or preferred over another.

GB to me plays it much safer in its landbase and life preservation which can be a very crucial thing to consider when choosing between types.

Quote from yriel »

Totally agree on that but the metagame is not full of trophy, path to exil and bloo moon. It's why i play 3 ravlands in Jund.

I think I'd respectfully disagree with you there. They are all immensely prevalent threats, and ones that aren't taken lightly. Path is among the top 3/50 spells commonly played in Modern, and also 3/50 cards played overall. Assassin's Trophy is about to break into the top 20 cards played overall in the 8 weeks it's been legal. I'm using goldfish's metrics, but if it were as you are suggesting, these cards wouldn't be as highly placed as they are. Blood Moon is probably the only exception as it occupies the 46th spot and only in top spells played, but that it places at all is still telling that decks still do run it because decks still die to it.

Burn is still largely threatening in that it's cheap to build, and highly resilient. Most burn decks will run Blood Moon in the side. Blue Moon is also seeing more play lately, and they mainboard it. Jeskai/UW control have paths in the main as well as Field of Ruin. Mardu Pyromancers have Blood Moon in their mainboard as well. Mirror matches will have Assassin's Trophy, and Dredge now contains it in the side. These are only a couple of examples, but there's far more to suggest that running more basics is more beneficial for us in this current climate.

Well, i half agree here, humans and spirits are not stupid aggro deck which focus only on life points like old zoo or burn, loose some lifes more to have anger and bolt seems like a fair trade because a lot of times you want loose 3hp to kill a mantis rider or a spell queller quickly. I don't say it's a reason to prefear jund, just both ways are ok on this point for me. About dredge i more disagree because 2 life don't save you if you don't have any hate.

I feel like you're making light of dredge if you think 2 life won't matter in any capacity. Creeping Chill offers a 6-point life swing for free, and is largely uncounterable. And I've seen games won by Conflagrate where X=2. This is coming from a Dredge player; I only just recently sold Dredge to build BG last week! Preserving life does matter against Dredge, now more than ever with Creeping Chill. The extra shock and fetch lands will take their toll eventually, especially when you add Thoughtseize into the mix.

My whole point here is that a central reason for preferring Golgari to Jund is that it is relatively painless in comparison, which can be more appealing. This isn't discounting Jund in the slightest, and I hope no one takes my post that way. I think Jund has 3 excellent colours it uses, however if we're to break down both decks, and since you're asking why some prefer Golgari now over Jund, I thought I'd offer a few reasons as to why I chose to build Golgari over Jund last week. Anger of the Gods is one of Modern's strongest board wipes, Huntmaster of the Fells and BBE are excellent creatures and apply great pressure. Bolt and K-Cmd are fantastic spells.

That being said, if you're asking for a reason as to why people prefer Golgari to Jund, I'd say that a Painless land base and a higher basic count are among a few reasons why I went with it. I feel that 2 colours keeps things relatively consistent.

Jund can run 4 trophy too and can play with 0 BBE too.

I think I need to clarify that I never stated that Jund can't, but rather a typical Jund list will not run 4 Assassin's Trophies, and 0 BBE.

Both Jund and GB can play Yahenni's Expertise, for example, but that doesn't mean it's a norm, and that was more my point, apologies if I didn't explain it well enough

It's more of a norm to see less Assassin's Trophies and 3-4 BBE in any given Jund deck. Though there are BG decks that will opt for an even split of Trophies and Decays, and use the extra slots to fill out Inquisition of Kozilek, Thoughtseize, or add Funeral Charm. So you're not wrong to take my broader generalization with a grain of salt; decks have flexibility and I was merely pointing out typical 75's you'd tend to see rather than the nuanced tweaks that players make to their builds.

I am ok with the life preservation justification but when nobody plays blood moon

I honestly don't think this is accurate. Blood Moon is still very much played in Modern. It's among the top 50 spells in modern as of this post. I'm using mtggoldfish's metrics, but to say nobody plays it isn't accurate if it still hits a top 50 list of the most common spells modern runs.

To conclude, after this discussion i really want try tireless tracker or another guy instead of BBE and maybe 2 surgical instead of the third alpine moon and the 4th artifact graveyard hate.
Thanks for an,swer !

Thank you for the discussion

FNM results.


r1 storm
g1 I miss land drops for 5 turns and die on t8 when he has a single card in hand, past in flames and I am stuck on 3 lands with lethal next turn. I missed my 3rd land for a while and never hit my 4th with a TKS in hand..brutal. g2 we have a good game and he tries to go off through some disruption. basically he double manamorphose, no cards in hand and flips into an empty the warrens, of course, and I don't see any of my wraths or pulses...We play a few extra games for fun and they actually went a lot more like I thought they would...aka, I slaughter him mercilessly. That's magic for ya, sometimes variance is on your side, sometimes not.
0-1

r2 metalwork colossus combo
this deck despite it being jank is actually very resilient. It's similar to KCI but instead of a really stupid and BS combo it just poops out artifacts and recurs colossus. g1 I would say it's like a 80-20 or better in his favor. g2 my SB cards get me there and in g3 he losses to his deck. Draws lots of lands and useless cards like nature's claims.
1-1

r3 burn
fun turn with me having 2 4/5 goyfs a liliana TLH on 2 loyalty, him at 15 and me at 2 life. I'm trying to think how on earth I can deal 15 in 1 turn. So i know that minusing lili makes them 5/6 so I start with that, flipping a reality smasher and well, i take that, cast and smush for 15 hahaha oh man totally stole that game. I LOVE smasher. g2 he just gets TOTALLY run over i don't think i dropped below 10 health. brutality into discard and fast beats. GG
2-1

r4 hardened scales
I win in 3 very hard games. I could not believe how hard this deck was to play against. he just has so much value and his guys get so huge almost everything is must answer. I think I'm going to add a torpor orb in the SB for this and other matches like humans/spirits etc. To be honest I think i only won because he played poorly. He missed a lot of triggers of various sorts. I need to play against this more, I think I could have made better choices too along the way. I know how the deck plays but not having reps against it I know I played suboptimally. Even with huge goyfs and scoozes I always felt behind.
3-1

Came in 9th missing out on breakers. We had 31 people which means we were 1 short of having 5 rounds. 4 rounds really sucks especially at 31 people. What can you do. Sadly no top 8 means no more modern for me but got to play cube so I guess it's fine

What is torpor orb for? The animator module? It does bot work with replacement effects, only triggered abilaties.

So, I couldn't help but feel that right now, playing a midrange deck with 24 to 25 lands feels rough to play in general. I've been trying to jam 4C/Grixis Shadow.

BBE feels, like others said, so awful to cast when you're being swarmed with creatures. BBE felt super, super good when first unbanned because so many people wanted to play Jace.

I feel like it's going to take something back breaking like

Turn 1 Shaman into Turn 2 LOTV

or

Turn 2 Shaman into Turn 3 BBE

to really start keeping up with modern.

Obviously Shaman has no chance being unbanned, as it's too powerful even for legacy.

I'm still keeping a close eye on GBx discussions but right now I think part of the problem is that we don't know where we stand. We're too low to to the ground to do well against control/ramp, and too slow to keep up with aggro/tribal decks---too stretched thin to deal with these graveyard decks.

It is looking like Rock is looking better than Jund at the moment.

@VidarThor thanks for the clarification, good point

Quote from VidarThor »

What is torpor orb for? The animator module? It does bot work with replacement effects, only triggered abilaties.

A bit of a quote would help understanding you.

I believe Torpor Orb was suggested as a side-board card for Humans. It would prevent all of those nasty counters piling up. Spirits were mentioned too, but I don't know that deck well; it would shut-off Rattlechains EtB effect.

@pzbw7z it's actually kind of both. I did mention it for humans and spirits where it is fine vs both of those but I hoping it would basically shut down creatures entering with counters like ballista/ravager/walker, etc. but I guess it's not to be.

Quote from Akalah »

@pzbw7z it's actually kind of both. I did mention it for humans and spirits where it is fine vs both of those but I hoping it would basically shut down creatures entering with counters like ballista/ravager/walker, etc. but I guess it's not to be.

I guess you have to go Abzan if you want to play Solemnity.

An awesome primer. Many thanks. Love having a place where Rock enthusiests can get together and ask questions, debate, and improve. Rock, Jund, Abzan.., all part of the same family.

I would recommend both new and experienced to tune into Mtg Grim Flayer on Youtube and watch the matchups and play patterns. It is incredibly good content for the Modern Rock player.

Quote from shocker_nation »

An awesome primer. Many thanks. Love having a place where Rock enthusiests can get together and ask questions, debate, and improve. Rock, Jund, Abzan.., all part of the same family.

I would recommend both new and experienced to tune into Mtg Grim Flayer on Youtube and watch the matchups and play patterns. It is incredibly good content for the Modern Rock player.

Thanks man, and it's great to see you on here!


Just had two games against Dredge: on the play both games, T2 Scooze both games, completely painless lands with access to GGG on T3 both games...aaaaand I got absolutely run over with no chance whatsoever both games. Pretty frustrating stuff, but I won't read much into it that we don't already know.

That said, how have people's experiences been with maindeck Spellbombs? I've been less than satisfied with including them main in the past--despite their high floor they can still be annoyingly clunky--but I'm certainly willing to revisit the notion. 1 main/3 side is what I'm leaning toward, any thoughts?

I have run 2 in the main when I run flayers. They are supricingly relevant, and it opens up slots in the sifeboard. I no flayer rock I think they sound a bit worse.

Although Sol Maka played mishras baubles, so you never know.

Another top 8 in the books for me at our 40 person FNM. Same list I've been on, Rockdrazi, no changes

r1 sultai midrange
g1 I just completely bury him. These matches seem to be whomever gets the first tracker wins. G2 he gets tracker and then I get buried. g3 I keep a hand with 2 eldrazi temples and 3 tks and 2 stone uncastable cards. I kept because it's a neat hand that never happens but I knew it was risky, if I never draw another land I just can't cast anything. WEELLLL that's exactly what happened. literally never drew a 3rd land and he was able to come back.
0-1

r2 hardened scales
both games were pretty easy now that I have a bit more experience in how the deck plays. Flaying tendrils MVP but with the right draws this deck is really scary. It has such awesome grind to it.
1-1

r3 UR wildfire
total brew but he had a bunch of land destroy and what not like blood moons and frost titans. It was kinda like skred red in a way, semi prisony but much worse. smushers put in work as did assassin's trophy.
2-1

r4 rock
we trade a LOT of resources and much back and forth. Honestly they were very fun games but my threats usually line up much better in these GBx mirrors. I beat him in 2 with goys and scoozes and trackers. just good ol fashioned magic.
3-1

r5 counters company
g1 i Just totally bury him with removal and hard beats and smusher to finish him off. g2 I get totally buried under his tracker/knight of reliquary combo. those 2 cards play very nicely together. g3 we have a mega long game. At one point i cast flaying tendrils and like 6 for 2 him (had to lose a treetop to trade with a courser) Eventually I get out kalitas and then a scooze who got monstrous and he ran out of answers.
4-1

top 8: jund
I was happy to play this as in general my threats line up and in my experience I would say I'm favored albeit slightly. However jund did jund things and his removal lined up perfectly and BBE's only hit gas despite so many potentially bad flips, was a close game tho. g2 I keep a 2 colored lands with 2 scoozes and a push but largely medium hand. I debated mulling looking for either more early game or more lands and probably should have but who wants to mull in an attrition matchup where every card counts. I eventually get to my 3rd land but that was it and just drew all my top end. Only playing 1 card a turn for 6-7 turns obviously is not going to beat jund.
4-2

I run 24 lands and got stuck on lands in very important games. Variance is always a thing and at 24 lands I guess I'll be prone to screw more than flood. Better mull decisions would have helped for sure but they were reasonable 7's against grindy decks. I only had to mull once for real vs Rock throughout the night and I will be more wary of this in the future. Overall I played pretty well and didn't make any obvious mistakes so I can't complain.

Grand Prix Portland #2 The Rock - Daniel Geiter

https://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=20722&d=336695&f=MO

The Rock is performing well on the big stage. I will be testing this build this weekend at a local tournament. It looks like good and I am curious as to how the 3 surgical extraction's perform as graveyard hate.

Has Deathmark come up for discussion here? It actually seems entirely reasonable given the amount of Human and Spirit decks. It's also okay against other BGx decks and it's good against Titan decks.

Against Spirits and Humans, an extra cheap removal might be better than a sweeper; one might just be dead before accumulating four mana.

I see it listed in the Primer, so I guess Delver approves. People on Facebook have made some pretty ridiculous comments about it. One poster said it was too narrow for Modern and then suggested Disfigure! Apparently in earnest. One has to wonder what the hell people are thinking sometimes.

I wouldn't knock disfigure it's actually a very solid card. It's definitely more well rounded than deathmark is. However is it the right tool for the job? If you need speed than 100% disfigure. However, as a 1 of against specific archetypes you most likely wont see it till mid-late game where it can kill things like powered up scoozes, champion of parishes, some spirits, etc. Disfigure as a combat trick can also be pretty huge and essentially kill things it otherwise couldn't. More often than not, disfigure is the better card.

Quote from Akalah »

Another top 8 in the books for me at our 40 person FNM. Same list I've been on, Rockdrazi, no changes

What would you say are the pros vs. cons of this deck vs regular GB Rock though? Never seen Rockdrazi but seems interesting.