I have to agree with Dady about the sweepers, though I've just been using Languish over Damnation because I'm cheap and already have to proxy Jace's Lately, despite my previous rooting for Abbot of Keral Keep, I've found myself boarding it out on almost every g2, so she's been cut. I've upped the Jaces to 4 and toyed with mainboard Anger, but it has only been useful about half of the time so far. It's hard for me to justify maindeck sweepers when there's so many decks they're basically dead against, but it is true that we run out of steam way too quickly. I think this deck still has much potential, but Abbot is maybe a card that should have been in the format before it started speeding up the way it has. With it gone, it leaves room for more flexibility and that's something that can't be sacrificed in this format.
Also, its sort of beating a dead horse but yeah, Liliana has proven to be useful nearly 10% of the time with this deck. The tendency with Lilly with this deck is, she either kills a pesky creature or discards a card once and then she's killed. With a creature base this low, most of the time it's best to just let her go when she's swung at. So since we are running Jace and Snap, as well as good discard we already have, it seems best to just take her out and slide 1 Tribute to Hunger in and call it a day if you don't already have the Lillys to throw in anyway.
I have thought about languish over damnation on purpose as a maindeck sweeper, leaving our delve dudes alive is a big deal and might work out better in the long run if we are maining sweepers against this faster meta, also in light of the changes main adding sweepers I am unsure as to whether or not I want to continue with pia and kiran. I think its very powerful and has never really performed poorly but maybe if I do move to languish making sure my wincons dodge the main deck sweeper might be a good thing to consider. I have also hunkered down into more of a control deck..... adding a single copy of cryptic command to the growing counter package alongside sweepers and finding bigger plays out of the board to leverage especially with jace. The biggest problem with control in modern is we dont have the same level of card advantage as legacy players, new jace offers a ton of card advantage but unlike legacy jace he needs the stuff around him to find the advantage so finding the cards and pinpointing the biggest plays with jace should be considered in our sideboards. As for the angers those were a meta call there is a lot of elves at my local shop. All adjustments including maindeck sweepers are a meta decision in honest at a big event I would look either 2 damnation or after serious testing the languish plan. I like the sweepers since the help to smooth out our worst matchups and in the matchups they arent so good we tend to be the favored deck do to the rest of the game plan and it isnt hard just to discard the sweeper to a jace loot and move on when they are bad. The deck has performed well above my expectations after transitioning into a serious control deck.
The only thing I have yet to find after really testing and playing through a lot of options with the deck is a way to reliably beat burn. I think I am equal or favored against a lot of decks given how the mainboard and sideboard have worked themselves into place but I think to truly do that especially in modern you have to pick a deck or 2 that you really can't beat and for me and this deck its burn I am just going to hope to dodge it. I don't like allocating precious sideboard slots to a matchup where even if I get the sideboard cards I am still probably going to lose I would prefer the board be full of bombs that all but beat the deck I am playing against or options that are flexible enough to want having in several matchups since that allows me to trim the bad cards from my list during any one matchup.
Spellskite has done some work for me against burn, but it does tend to get shot with an Ancient Grudge or a Wear//Tear too often. I'm just waiting for Wizards to print some sort of protection for our colors against burn, but it'll probably never happen because it would hurt burn's standing as a top 8 deck even moreso than it already is.
Other than that, my strategy against burn has always been to side in 2 Spellskite and 2 Dispel because it's always neat to counter a game-winning bolt or helix that your opponent is sure will win them the game. Swerve is another neat one that most people don't see coming, but I wouldn't actually recommend it.
These dasy dragons claw is not a good option since it turns on revelry same can be said of spellskite though. Burn is a deck in the meta right now that is just extremely hard to beat. I have things like dispel and spellskite in my board because of other matchups but I was looking for a high impact play that sadly we dont have. I still try against burn with what I have but it isn't something we have a way to reliably beat even with dragons claws or other options. Other than that working with 2 damnation main I have seen the deck perform much much better against a variety of decks. The card is really only dead against straight combo and twin. I have enjoyed having it even against Jund/Junk especially Junk as its a clean answer to lingering souls and such more often than not. This new angle of the deck has surprised me and going forward I think I am going to to keep testing this version.
Hey guys, I've been playing this list lately. This is a copy and paste from Modern MTG Reddit. I will add; I think the deck is great but there needs to be at least some counters in the main to not strait up loose to twin. Dispel seems to be best as you can go removal with dispel up vs. a flashed in twin target. It also hits CoCo, Kommand, and Cryptic. I run 1 snare in the main because there are a lot of Affinity decks in my meta. Well, here is the write up!
Decklist:
4 Jace Vryn's Prodigy
4 Snapcaster Mage
2 Pia and Kirian Nalaar
2 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
1 Gurmag Angler
3 Terminate
1 Go for the Throat
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Kolaghan's Command
4 Serum Visions
2 Thought Scour
3 Inquisition
1 Thoughtseize
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Dispel
1 Spell Snare
2 Steam Vents
1 Watery Grace
1 Blood Crypt
1 Sulfur Falls
2 Creeping Tar pit
2 Blackcleave Cliffs
2 Island
1 Swamp
1 Mountain
2 Scalding Tarn
4 Polluted Delta
2 Bloodstained Mire
Sideboard:
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Dispel
1 Thoughtseize
1 Languish
2 Pyroclasm
1 Rending Volly
1 Vandelblast
1 Magus of the Moon
2 Stone Rain
1 Spellskite
2 Vampric Link
I thought I would throw this list out there for folks wanting to try a different variant of Grixis that has shown some decent results. I didn't take play by play notes, but I'll go through the match ups and how the games went, then recap with thoughts on the deck going forward. I was playing in Portland, OR and we have a pretty diverse, skilled, and healthy modern scene here.
Match 1 vs UWR
Game 1:
First few turns he fetched for a hollowed fountain and steam vents so I put him on some UWR variant. Wasn't sure if it was control or Geist or... Had a turn 2 Tasigur, but waited until I could Inquisition and hold up a dispel. Ended up he was on a Geist Pyromancer build and we traded removal spells and counters with me eventually killing him with a tar pits at 2 life myself facing down 3 elemental tokens.
Game 2:
Side in dispel, Glen elendra, and Thoughtseize. Take out 2 scours and go with 61. I am able to take his path with a turn 1 Inquisition leaving just a Cryptic and 5 lands. Take the cryptic with a turn 2 Thoughtseize and proceed to drop a delve threat backed up with dispel and snap thoughtseize on the following turns.
Match 2 vs Grixis Control
Game 1:
Thought I was playing Twin and always left mana up to bluff removal and/or counters. We fought over delve threats and I eventually landed one with him drawing just counters after that.
Game 2: Still thinking I might be playing twin and sided in the Rending Volly, Glen Elendra, Dispel, and Thoughtseize. Took out 2 Bolts and 2 Thoughtscours. He lands a turn 2 Angler. we fight over it for a few turns, but I am able to snap block bolt dispel his mana leak. I resolve a Pia and Kirian and he draws reactive spells. Beats.
Match 3 Mono Blue Merfolk
Game 1: Opponent mulls to 5 with a turn 1 vial. I am able to bolt his turn 2 play with no Cursecatcher vialed in. Drop jace on my turn 2 and am able to remove all his threats, and blow up vial plus discard him to no cards with Kommand. Kill him with an Angler.
Game 2: Side in pyroclasms, languish, rending volly, and EE. Side out thoughtscours and Pia and Kirian. Go with 61 on the draw again. Super grindy game. Trade removal with lords and block some Mutavaults with Snapcaster. Jace + is very good to break Kiria's bubble. Was at 1 life for a lot of turns with a Angler to block the 1 threat he was able to play. Eventually he gets 2 non lord fishes to stick and dismembers my angler. I land a Tasigur with tar pits to block plus a removal spell for a island walk lord. Languish off the top seals it and I am able to attack in for a few turns for the win.
Match 4 vs Junk
Game 1: Loose the die roll and get my hand ripped apart, Lilly + and lingering souls out of the game. Got creamed.
Game 2: Side out all the hand disruption and lilly, but screw up and leave in bolts. Side in Glen Elentra, EE, Pyroclasm, and Languish. Get wrecked by souls again.
Match 5 vs Bant Zoo
Game 1: On the play I am able to bolt the birds, inquisition away a voice, drop jace, and then drop an angler with dispel for the path. He plays Geist, but I happen to draw a Lilly and -2.
Game 2: Side in the dispel, Glen Elendra, Pyroclams, and Languish. Side out the thoughtscours and Pia and Kirian, go with 61 again. Opponent mulls to 6 and has no turn 1 dork. I am able to get him with hand disruption and a delve threat with dispel backup.
Match 6 vs Junk
Opponent is 4-0-1 and could draw into top 8. My breakers are great and it seems I could as well, but he wants to get a higher seed because it looks like there is an infect list in top 8. I offer the draw, but declined.
Game 1: I am able to race with a turn 2 Gurmaturg and dispel for the path. He is able to play a souls but I had a jace to bolt jace bolt his blockers and he has to chump with all the threats he is able to deploy. Close game but I get there.
Game 2: Offer to draw but he declines again. Side in 2 Stone rain, Magus of the Moon, Glen Elendra, EE, Pyroclasm, Languish. Side out 4 bolts and 2 lilly and 2 scouts. He leads off with inquisition into thoughtseize taking Magus and a jace. He gets stuck on swamp, temple garden, and urborg. I thoughtseize to take a goyf with the rest of his hand being bob, path, and decay. Proceed to stone rain the temple and play tarpit. He is able to resolve bob but I keep getting in with tarpit. Eventually he flips Rhino off bob to kill himself.
Top 8
Match 1 vs Abzan CoCo
Game 1: I'm ranked 1st and take the play. Inquisition his voice, bolt the bird, and kill everything on site. Get there with a Tasigur through multiple finks.
Game 2: About the same. Discard plus removal plus Jace.
Match 2 vs Junk
Game 1: Playing against my only loss so far. Close game but he gets there off souls at very low life.
Game 2: He mulls to 6 but starts with a Leyline of the Void. I inquisition and he has 2 oozes. I just have a jace and lands including the tar pits. We both draw crap and I am able to hard cast a Tasigur, but eventually die to a lilly plus souls. Opponent is super rad and we don't report top 4 split prizes and the other match is Tron vs Junk. He feels his Tron match up is awful and I would have a better chance. Ends up Tron looses and opponent goes on to win.
All in all it was a super fun deck to play. I've been tuning the list for about two months now and it feels great. I think the deck needs to have some, but very few one mana counters. It would otherwise be weak to twin when they are holding dispel for the removal on a flashed in twin piece on turn 4 plus CoCo is a beating without dispel. The deck sees so many cards over a game that only having 2-3 dispels seems fine, plus they can be looted away with Jace. Speaking of Jace, he's the real all star of the deck. It's nice to have a turn 2 play that can run away with the game. Sure he gets bolted/terminated/pathed/etc but that lets the deck play a followup delve threat and/or Kommand it back for value. Pia and Kirian were also amazing. When your in an attrition war it is nice to have something that still leaves a lot of value even if they snap bolt it. If they stick its potentially an 8 point life swing in 1 turn (4 on attacking and 4 on sacing). Plus they are able to mop up x/1's and x/2s. Aaaaand Kommand them back. Value town.
Anyways, thanks for reading this rambly post. Hope it was helpful!
Wahoo Grixis! Mr.T
edit Oooops. Guess I got 4th. We split prizes in top 4 and I headed home before the finals were over. Anyways, heres the scg link. Looks like they just labled it "jund" heh.
These dasy dragons claw is not a good option since it turns on revelry same can be said of spellskite though. Burn is a....
I agree that burn is a terrible matchup for us. Discard + rise//fall helps survive the first wave. I play 2x dispel in my main and negate + spellskite in the sideboard. Still not a great matchup.
I have cut the abbots entirely and am running a couple Young Pyromancers in its stead and a single Olivia Voldaren to take over the game in a grind.
Jace is a ******* legend. No two ways about it. He is sick vs creature matchups when Anger of the Gods and Damnation comes in. If he is ignored he outvalues the opponent and if he is not he takes a butt load of hurt due to his high loyalty.
Before Jace my deck was a tempo deck, ripping opponents hand and beating face with a delve creature + abbot, finishing off with bolt+snap+bolt. Now I see myself more like the grixis control deck having a threat in play midgame and protecting it.
The dude who mentioned that adding 3 Twins and 5 Tappers was the way to go wasn't lying... it makes the deck more consistent in its bad match ups, and then you just side into blue jund. PKN and Twin is pretty sick for generating tokens in grindy games. It feels a lot like this deck sometimes although you lose the engine.
But to be more on topic, Burn is a match up that you have to be OK with losing with this deck in my opinion. If you feel you need to overcompensate in the sideboard bc you see a lot of the bad decks, then maybe the deck isn't optimal for the meta. I've come to terms with the fact that grixis colors exist in this weird tempo/control/aggression space where you can adapt to any meta and have a couple play style options that can play well within that meta.
The dude who mentioned that adding 3 Twins and 5 Tappers was the way to go wasn't lying... it makes the deck more consistent in its bad match ups, and then you just side into blue jund. PKN and Twin is pretty sick for generating tokens in grindy games. It feels a lot like this deck sometimes although you lose the engine.
But to be more on topic, Burn is a match up that you have to be OK with losing with this deck in my opinion. If you feel you need to overcompensate in the sideboard bc you see a lot of the bad decks, then maybe the deck isn't optimal for the meta. I've come to terms with the fact that grixis colors exist in this weird tempo/control/aggression space where you can adapt to any meta and have a couple play style options that can play well within that meta.
Vampiric Link helps a lot vs. burn. It will always be a bad matchup, but that's probably the highest impact SB card you have access to. Definitely better than Dragon's Claw. It's even reasonable against some other aggro decks where you would never bring in Claw - I've brought it in vs. Zoo and Affinity in a variety of Grixis shells, depending on how much I have to take out.
Yep, still 61 cards. It's just a thing I do for spice.
I feel that the 4 thoughtscour alongside jace, snap, kCommand, and Rise allow the deck to run more redundant 1 ofs that allow for more flexibility in the mb and sb, while maintaining consistency. I brought the Angler back in because I felt that too often I was just wanting another big dumb beater to get in the way of my opponents creatures or help me end the game quickly and him + murderous cut gives me more pay offs for running the 4th Thoughtscour. So far he's performed exactly the role I've need him to, even if he just eats a terminate so my follow-up Tasigur can live a turn or two longer. The 2nd EE in the SB continues to be necessary; the 2 weeks I played without it, I often found myself missing it. Slaughter Pact is mostly for Master of Waves that plague me in the merfolk matchups, but I have found myself bringing it in for other matchups as well (it's pretty sweet against infect as well, which is another locally popular deck). The 1 of mb dispel has been sweet at protecting my threats and I've been ruminating on adding a 2nd one to the mb.
Edit: I haven't been able to make up my mind on fulminator vs molten rain, but I think that having access to up to 6 regrowth effects for creatures post-board means that you should always run at least one copy of fulminator in the 75. I think the correct comination is always X Molten Rain + 1 Fulminator. Drawing 1 fulminator is sweet because you can usually buy it back 2-3 times if that's the route you want to go (**** you, Tron), but the 2nd one is often unecessary and probably always better as a molten rain (which you can still flashback as well).
Edit 2: I just wanted to point out how funny I find the fact that my signature has become relevant again.
Look at the card. Now back to Jace. Now back to that card, now back to Jace! Sadly, it isn't Jace, but if it stopped being a junk rare and became relevant, it could act like it's Jace. Crack some Worldwake. What do you have? You have a Jace, the card you wish this card could be like. Look again. THE CARD IS NOW A $75 BILL. Anything possible when you play Magic with Jace and not junk rares. This is probably spam.
To be honest, I don't remember really any of the matchups. Last week the first two rounds were against basically casual decks, and I don't remember my 3rd round opponent, though it was definitely a real deck. My 4th round was against merfolk, which was super close and I barely got it 2-1 after bluffing my opponent into not swinging for lethal.
Look at the card. Now back to Jace. Now back to that card, now back to Jace! Sadly, it isn't Jace, but if it stopped being a junk rare and became relevant, it could act like it's Jace. Crack some Worldwake. What do you have? You have a Jace, the card you wish this card could be like. Look again. THE CARD IS NOW A $75 BILL. Anything possible when you play Magic with Jace and not junk rares. This is probably spam.
Has anyone tried out Hangarback Walker in their list? Hangarback walker may be the early drop we need that can be used defensively to block multiple times and a lategame threat if left alone. Also, it has a hilarious synergy with Pia. Would like to know some feedback if anyone have attempted the use!
It's too slow, and we're usually using all of our mana in the early turns so he'll most likely end up sitting around with 1 counter on him for longer than we want him to.
Look at the card. Now back to Jace. Now back to that card, now back to Jace! Sadly, it isn't Jace, but if it stopped being a junk rare and became relevant, it could act like it's Jace. Crack some Worldwake. What do you have? You have a Jace, the card you wish this card could be like. Look again. THE CARD IS NOW A $75 BILL. Anything possible when you play Magic with Jace and not junk rares. This is probably spam.
Creatures:
3x Snapcaster Mage
3x Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
2x Young Pyromancer
2x Tasigur, the Golden Fang
2x Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1x Gurmag Angler
1x Grim Lavamancer
Noncreature Spells:
4x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Serum Visions
3x Thought Scour
4x Lightning Bolt
2x Terminate
1x Go for the Throat
1x Dreadbore
2x Rise//Fall
3x Kolaghan's Command
1x Echoing Truth
22 Lands
Sideboard:
1x Spellskite
2x Molten Rain
1x Fulminator Mage
1x Negate
2x Dispel
1x Glen Elendra Archmage
2x Vampiric Link
2x Anger of the Gods
1x Damnation
1x Engineered Explosives
1x Nihil Spellbomb
Match 1: Merfolk
Game 1:
Terrible matchup from the start as I saw aether vial come down turn one after an island. He proceeds to dump all his hand onto the field and I try to remove as many fishes as possible but do not have enough gas to spot them. Vampiric Link, Anger of the Gods, Damnation, Engineered Explosives comes in.
Game 2:
Serum vision into anger of the gods but opponent places spreading seas on turn 2 and turn 3 on my red sources but I do a good job removing all his relevant threats. He punches me each turn with mutavaults and turn 5 he plays Master of Waves. I finally draw into mountains and I finally have enough red sources to boardwipe which still leaves behind the mutavaults and Master of Waves. Unfortunately, he drops a second Master of Waves and proceeds to pummel me to death with the double buffed mutavaults.
Match 1 Loss 0-2
In hindsight, perhaps I should have boarded in land destruction to kill mutavaults since it is very hard for us to deal with manlands. Not sure what to take out in place of them, however. Will test out molten rains and fulminators next time.
Match 2: UR Twin
Game 1:
Lose the dice roll, opponent plays turn 1 serum visions, turn 2 serum visions, turn 3 snapcaster into visions, turn 4 peek at my EOT, sees no removal and flashes in exarch. Turn 5 he combos off. Now I knew what he was playing, sided in Spellskite, Molten Rain, Fulminator Mage, Negate, Dispels, Glen Elendra Archmage.
Game 2:
Start of strong with turn 1 inquisition to take his remand, land turn 2 jace which gets bolted. Play another inquisition and see bolt, counterflux, splintertwin, snapcaster, keranos, and a land. I make him discard counterflux before continuing to rip his hand apart with fall which hit snapcaster and splinter twin. I later snapcaster fall again and he has 2 card in hand which is keranos and bolt. I begin the snapcaster beats until he snap bolts it. As a response, I use kolaghan's command to do 2 damage to his snapcaster and make him discard his Keranos which he could have played the following turn and turn the tides. Game drags on until I land a young pyromancer and kill him with tokens.
Game 3:
Similar game to game 2. Turn 1 serum visions, turn 2 jace (unfortunately gets bolted to death at EOT), turn 3 fall, turn 4 molten rain, turn 5 snap-fall is a brutal opening against any control deck. I rip his hand apart with the help of dispel which prevented my fall from being countered and land a spellskite and Tasigur which I ride to victory.
Match 2 Win 2-1
Felt great with the help of the sideboard. Fall was the MVP of the match, discarding all relevant threats. Fall was especially more powerful past turn 3 or 4 once you know that the opponent has no lands in hand. I felt like I was in control of the match the entire time which was a great feeling against Twin since it's usually the other way around.
Match 3: Monowhite Lifegain
Game 1:
I grimace as the opponent plays a turn 2 Auriok Champion. We have no way of removing him other than bouncing. I land a turn 2 jace and turn 3 young pyromancer. He proceeds to play another auriok champion and 2 Ajani's pridemate. I play fall and discard his 3rd copy of Auriok Champion and Ajani. I bide my time with my young pyromancer ferociously pumping out tokens to block the 20/20 pridemates until turn 5 I cast echoing truth on the two auriok champions to his empty hand then Jace -3 for fall to get remove the untouchable champions from the field. I thought I was in the clear until he drops two Serra Ascendants. My young pyromancer tokens that were blocking the giant pridemates now could not do anything against the flying 6/6 lifelink guys. I take two hits before I draw into two Pias and I have never been happier to see them. I block the ascendants and sacrificing my thopters to kill his soul wardens as well as preventing him from gaining life. With the extra turns gained from Pia (I was at 6, one hit away from dying by the ascendants), I alphastrike his life down from 55 to 27 with the help of gurmag angler, tasigur, and pyromancer tokens in order to shrink his ascendants. When he attempts to strike back with his two gigantic pridemates, I terminate one and block one with the pyromancer token that spawned from casting terminate. He runs out of gas and I steamroll him with creatures.
The player had to leave after game 1 so I got match win. The matchup (at least game 1 with the auriok champions) felt like a terrible one but the little tricks you can do with this deck was quite spectacular. Young pyromancer was the saving grace as it pumped out more than 10 tokens over the course of the match, preventing from the pridemates from ever reaching my life totals. If we had a game 2 and 3, I would have brought in all my boardwipes to help clear the field.
Match Win 1-0
Game 4: Affinity
Game 1:
He throw down half of his hand turn 1 but luckily enough, I draw enough kill spells to survive and stabilize at 4 life. Multiple kolaghan's commands were amazing since I kept killing creatures and artifacts which, later on I learned preventing metalcraft for galvanic blast which he had in his hand the whole time from killing me. Side in Vampiric Link, Anger of the Gods, Damnation, Engineered Explosives.
Game 2:
Similar to game 1 but I misplay my Kolaghan's command. I chose to deal 2 damage to inkmoth nexus and destroy artifact to arcbound ravager. He responds by sacrificing every artifact he has in play onto ravager, sacrificing itself to give inkmoth nexus all his counters, and kill me with infect. Lesson learned.
Game 3:
Turn 2 jace helped mitigate a lot of damage from signal pests and later on sacrificed himself to cast Kolaghan's command from the graveyard to kill a steel overseer and cranial plating. The opponent continued to put pressure on me with arcbound ravagers and vault skirges but I draw into a damnation which quickly ends the game.
Match Won 2-1
Affinity is tough but winnable with all the removal in our deck. Kolaghan's command is simply amazing against their deck but need to make sure to utilize the most out of its modes. Always destroy their inkmoths with destroy artifact clause, not deal 2 damage, when arcbound ravager is in play.
Match 5: Jund
Game 1:
Inquisition, thoughtseize, into Liliana destroys my opening hand and gigantic tarmagoyf joins the party and makes short work of my life total. I drew dreadbore before I died and I was able to remove liliana but it was too late for me to recover from all the discard. Side in Molten Rain, Fulminator Mage, Damnation
Game 2:
I start off with serum visions and land a turn 2 jace that gets immediately bolted. I kill his dark confidants and tarmagoyf and huntmaster when they enter play but I am unable to remove a liliana that hits the field. I really wish to draw dreadbore but unable to do so. We have back and forth killing all of each other's creatures with all of our removal spells but liliana is on the opponent's side. Eventually, my entire hand is in the graveyard thanks to lili and raging ravines activates enough times to kill me.
Match Loss 0-2
Grixis can deal with dark confidants, goyfs, and huntmaster but a very hard time dealing with planeswalkers. Dreadbore was definitely a good addiction to the deck to kill random planeswalkers such as lili, karn, ugin, and garruk but I did not draw it game 2 in a timely fashion and got outvalued by Jund. Match felt winnable as long as they didn't land an early liliana. I made the mistake of taking out too many bolts game 2 which may have helped whittle down loyalty counters on Lili.
Overall, I am very impressed with the deck's ability to stand toe to toe to many decks out there. It has its weaknesses such as having abysmal matchup against burn but the deck itself felt very solid. I still need more testing and playing to learn the smallest of nuances of playing this deck since there are so many decisions you have to make to pilot well. Echoing truth was one new addition made to the list and although it only saw play once, I can see it being a good one of to combat any pro-red or black cards (master of waves, auriok champion) out there paired with discard or mass tokens (master of waves again, token decks).
cant help but notice that Abbot is increasingly absent from many of the new sorcery speed lists, in favor of more copies of the now more-expensive-than-snapcaster baby jace.
Perhaps the name "Abbot Grixis" is less accurate than "Baby J Grixis".
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
BGW Elves BGW|BW Tokens BW|WBR Sword&ShieldWBR|BUG DelverBUG|UWR Kiki UWR | UR Storm UR
cant help but notice that Abbot is increasingly absent from many of the new sorcery speed lists, in favor of more copies of the now more-expensive-than-snapcaster baby jace.
Perhaps the name "Abbot Grixis" is less accurate than "Baby J Grixis".
It's more that they were both ran side by side and now people are dropping abbots in favor of Young Pyromancer and PKNalaar or other threats. I just foiled out my Pia and Kia because of how well they've performed for me.
Look at the card. Now back to Jace. Now back to that card, now back to Jace! Sadly, it isn't Jace, but if it stopped being a junk rare and became relevant, it could act like it's Jace. Crack some Worldwake. What do you have? You have a Jace, the card you wish this card could be like. Look again. THE CARD IS NOW A $75 BILL. Anything possible when you play Magic with Jace and not junk rares. This is probably spam.
I'm still playing with 3x Abbot and 3x Jace. I think Abbot is better in a grindier meta where you're able to really get the most value out of him. Problem is, the meta nowadays is pretty big on Burn, Infect, Affinity, and other linear strategies, and having a 2-drop that you don't want to cast until turn 4 is pretty mediocre against those types of decks. It doesn't matter how much value you get when you're dead before you can cash it in.
To fight these types of decks, I feel like we need to drop Abbots in favor of either instant speed interaction or more solid mid-game threats like Young Pyromancer or Pia and Kiran Nalaar.
Abbot is great in grindy meta games but weaker otherwise I totally agree. My local meta and the modern meta in general is so fast right now I shelved the abbots in favor of a much more controlling and interactive list against decks going big and wide. Pia is absolutely insane and since lately I have had one Engineered Explosives and one Damnation in the MB the switch from abbot/pyromancer to Pia has been great. She's a better k-command target because of the instant value she provides. Also with Pia and sweepers in the MB I have played 3 copies of hangar back walker to decent success. Good synergy with Pia and the sweepers I have had to pack to combat the current meta it's also a much better late game card since it gives the deck some level of inevitability.
Abbot is great in grindy meta games but weaker otherwise I totally agree. My local meta and the modern meta in general is so fast right now I shelved the abbots in favor of a much more controlling and interactive list against decks going big and wide. Pia is absolutely insane and since lately I have had one Engineered Explosives and one Damnation in the MB the switch from abbot/pyromancer to Pia has been great. She's a better k-command target because of the instant value she provides. Also with Pia and sweepers in the MB I have played 3 copies of hangar back walker to decent success. Good synergy with Pia and the sweepers I have had to pack to combat the current meta it's also a much better late game card since it gives the deck some level of inevitability.
I gotta say recurring pia over and over again is one of the sweetest things you can do in modern right now. Its pretty hard to lose when you get to that stage of the game, and playing 2-3 PKNalaar has brought me back from the brink several times.
Look at the card. Now back to Jace. Now back to that card, now back to Jace! Sadly, it isn't Jace, but if it stopped being a junk rare and became relevant, it could act like it's Jace. Crack some Worldwake. What do you have? You have a Jace, the card you wish this card could be like. Look again. THE CARD IS NOW A $75 BILL. Anything possible when you play Magic with Jace and not junk rares. This is probably spam.
Ok, 4rth week I play this deck. I don't really have time for testing so I mainly play in FNMs and I've been tweaking the list. I have to say that in 1 of the 2 stores I play there is a TON of aggro which we are horrible against. However I am fairly confident that the list I ended up yesterday has a real game against aggro decks without weakening our other MUs. I went 2-1-1 yesterday which is not that impressive on first sight but score SHOULD had been 4-0 I believe if 1) I was a better player 2) my opponent was faster on the draw I got. So here is the list:
Match 1: Against Green Stompy. I had a 100% lose ration against this deck. Finally I managed to win with a 2-0 actually. Damnation mainboard was stellar and sideboard worked wonders. To be fair, he flooded a bit at the end of G1 but still, I really had a game, both games were close but I was winning confidently.
Match 2: Against UR Twin. Amazing MU I think. Game 1 I win after a grindy game with Jace. Game 2 I get mana screwed on 2 lands for ever and eventually he wins. Made a mistake at some point and could had stabilized although I was always dead if he drew burn/twin. Still deck sustained well even on 2 lands. Game 3 I was winning but we were already on turns. I think I would had won with resolved jace and a bunch of removals in my hand.
Math 3: Against UWR delver. Not the best MU, game 1 he rides a geist to victory. Game 2 my board helps a lot, he gets mana screwed and I win. Game 3 I stabilize on 9 life with jace flipped and empty board. I draw 7 lands in a raw (and put 2 lands on bottom with serum visions) and he goes: creature creature, land creature, Bolt Bolt Bolt. Can't find variance, I had the game and bricked. I still fill confident that this deck has a game against delvers, even against geist which is our worst nightmare.
Match 4: Against Amulet Bloom. Game 1 I am in absolute control, win with jace ultimate (first time). Game 3 he pulls a T3 kill through discard. Game 4 he mulled to 5 and I had an amazing hand with 3 discard spells and terminate. Eventually I take over.
Overall I was very happy with the deck. I start feeling more and more confident with the playstyle, although I still play a lot like a control deck and not like a mid range deck but that is a habit I will eventually get over. I am thinking of replacing Thoughtseize with Rise/Fall but I am not sure yet. I really don't feel like Lili has something to offer right now especially with how fast is the meta.
Also, its sort of beating a dead horse but yeah, Liliana has proven to be useful nearly 10% of the time with this deck. The tendency with Lilly with this deck is, she either kills a pesky creature or discards a card once and then she's killed. With a creature base this low, most of the time it's best to just let her go when she's swung at. So since we are running Jace and Snap, as well as good discard we already have, it seems best to just take her out and slide 1 Tribute to Hunger in and call it a day if you don't already have the Lillys to throw in anyway.
The only thing I have yet to find after really testing and playing through a lot of options with the deck is a way to reliably beat burn. I think I am equal or favored against a lot of decks given how the mainboard and sideboard have worked themselves into place but I think to truly do that especially in modern you have to pick a deck or 2 that you really can't beat and for me and this deck its burn I am just going to hope to dodge it. I don't like allocating precious sideboard slots to a matchup where even if I get the sideboard cards I am still probably going to lose I would prefer the board be full of bombs that all but beat the deck I am playing against or options that are flexible enough to want having in several matchups since that allows me to trim the bad cards from my list during any one matchup.
Other than that, my strategy against burn has always been to side in 2 Spellskite and 2 Dispel because it's always neat to counter a game-winning bolt or helix that your opponent is sure will win them the game. Swerve is another neat one that most people don't see coming, but I wouldn't actually recommend it.
Decklist:
4 Jace Vryn's Prodigy
4 Snapcaster Mage
2 Pia and Kirian Nalaar
2 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
1 Gurmag Angler
3 Terminate
1 Go for the Throat
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Kolaghan's Command
4 Serum Visions
2 Thought Scour
3 Inquisition
1 Thoughtseize
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Dispel
1 Spell Snare
2 Steam Vents
1 Watery Grace
1 Blood Crypt
1 Sulfur Falls
2 Creeping Tar pit
2 Blackcleave Cliffs
2 Island
1 Swamp
1 Mountain
2 Scalding Tarn
4 Polluted Delta
2 Bloodstained Mire
Sideboard:
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Dispel
1 Thoughtseize
1 Languish
2 Pyroclasm
1 Rending Volly
1 Vandelblast
1 Magus of the Moon
2 Stone Rain
1 Spellskite
2 Vampric Link
I thought I would throw this list out there for folks wanting to try a different variant of Grixis that has shown some decent results. I didn't take play by play notes, but I'll go through the match ups and how the games went, then recap with thoughts on the deck going forward. I was playing in Portland, OR and we have a pretty diverse, skilled, and healthy modern scene here.
Match 1 vs UWR
Game 1:
First few turns he fetched for a hollowed fountain and steam vents so I put him on some UWR variant. Wasn't sure if it was control or Geist or... Had a turn 2 Tasigur, but waited until I could Inquisition and hold up a dispel. Ended up he was on a Geist Pyromancer build and we traded removal spells and counters with me eventually killing him with a tar pits at 2 life myself facing down 3 elemental tokens.
Game 2:
Side in dispel, Glen elendra, and Thoughtseize. Take out 2 scours and go with 61. I am able to take his path with a turn 1 Inquisition leaving just a Cryptic and 5 lands. Take the cryptic with a turn 2 Thoughtseize and proceed to drop a delve threat backed up with dispel and snap thoughtseize on the following turns.
Match 2 vs Grixis Control
Game 1:
Thought I was playing Twin and always left mana up to bluff removal and/or counters. We fought over delve threats and I eventually landed one with him drawing just counters after that.
Game 2: Still thinking I might be playing twin and sided in the Rending Volly, Glen Elendra, Dispel, and Thoughtseize. Took out 2 Bolts and 2 Thoughtscours. He lands a turn 2 Angler. we fight over it for a few turns, but I am able to snap block bolt dispel his mana leak. I resolve a Pia and Kirian and he draws reactive spells. Beats.
Match 3 Mono Blue Merfolk
Game 1: Opponent mulls to 5 with a turn 1 vial. I am able to bolt his turn 2 play with no Cursecatcher vialed in. Drop jace on my turn 2 and am able to remove all his threats, and blow up vial plus discard him to no cards with Kommand. Kill him with an Angler.
Game 2: Side in pyroclasms, languish, rending volly, and EE. Side out thoughtscours and Pia and Kirian. Go with 61 on the draw again. Super grindy game. Trade removal with lords and block some Mutavaults with Snapcaster. Jace + is very good to break Kiria's bubble. Was at 1 life for a lot of turns with a Angler to block the 1 threat he was able to play. Eventually he gets 2 non lord fishes to stick and dismembers my angler. I land a Tasigur with tar pits to block plus a removal spell for a island walk lord. Languish off the top seals it and I am able to attack in for a few turns for the win.
Match 4 vs Junk
Game 1: Loose the die roll and get my hand ripped apart, Lilly + and lingering souls out of the game. Got creamed.
Game 2: Side out all the hand disruption and lilly, but screw up and leave in bolts. Side in Glen Elentra, EE, Pyroclasm, and Languish. Get wrecked by souls again.
Match 5 vs Bant Zoo
Game 1: On the play I am able to bolt the birds, inquisition away a voice, drop jace, and then drop an angler with dispel for the path. He plays Geist, but I happen to draw a Lilly and -2.
Game 2: Side in the dispel, Glen Elendra, Pyroclams, and Languish. Side out the thoughtscours and Pia and Kirian, go with 61 again. Opponent mulls to 6 and has no turn 1 dork. I am able to get him with hand disruption and a delve threat with dispel backup.
Match 6 vs Junk
Opponent is 4-0-1 and could draw into top 8. My breakers are great and it seems I could as well, but he wants to get a higher seed because it looks like there is an infect list in top 8. I offer the draw, but declined.
Game 1: I am able to race with a turn 2 Gurmaturg and dispel for the path. He is able to play a souls but I had a jace to bolt jace bolt his blockers and he has to chump with all the threats he is able to deploy. Close game but I get there.
Game 2: Offer to draw but he declines again. Side in 2 Stone rain, Magus of the Moon, Glen Elendra, EE, Pyroclasm, Languish. Side out 4 bolts and 2 lilly and 2 scouts. He leads off with inquisition into thoughtseize taking Magus and a jace. He gets stuck on swamp, temple garden, and urborg. I thoughtseize to take a goyf with the rest of his hand being bob, path, and decay. Proceed to stone rain the temple and play tarpit. He is able to resolve bob but I keep getting in with tarpit. Eventually he flips Rhino off bob to kill himself.
Top 8
Match 1 vs Abzan CoCo
Game 1: I'm ranked 1st and take the play. Inquisition his voice, bolt the bird, and kill everything on site. Get there with a Tasigur through multiple finks.
Game 2: About the same. Discard plus removal plus Jace.
Match 2 vs Junk
Game 1: Playing against my only loss so far. Close game but he gets there off souls at very low life.
Game 2: He mulls to 6 but starts with a Leyline of the Void. I inquisition and he has 2 oozes. I just have a jace and lands including the tar pits. We both draw crap and I am able to hard cast a Tasigur, but eventually die to a lilly plus souls. Opponent is super rad and we don't report top 4 split prizes and the other match is Tron vs Junk. He feels his Tron match up is awful and I would have a better chance. Ends up Tron looses and opponent goes on to win.
All in all it was a super fun deck to play. I've been tuning the list for about two months now and it feels great. I think the deck needs to have some, but very few one mana counters. It would otherwise be weak to twin when they are holding dispel for the removal on a flashed in twin piece on turn 4 plus CoCo is a beating without dispel. The deck sees so many cards over a game that only having 2-3 dispels seems fine, plus they can be looted away with Jace. Speaking of Jace, he's the real all star of the deck. It's nice to have a turn 2 play that can run away with the game. Sure he gets bolted/terminated/pathed/etc but that lets the deck play a followup delve threat and/or Kommand it back for value. Pia and Kirian were also amazing. When your in an attrition war it is nice to have something that still leaves a lot of value even if they snap bolt it. If they stick its potentially an 8 point life swing in 1 turn (4 on attacking and 4 on sacing). Plus they are able to mop up x/1's and x/2s. Aaaaand Kommand them back. Value town.
Anyways, thanks for reading this rambly post. Hope it was helpful!
Wahoo Grixis! Mr.T
edit Oooops. Guess I got 4th. We split prizes in top 4 and I headed home before the finals were over. Anyways, heres the scg link. Looks like they just labled it "jund" heh.
I agree that burn is a terrible matchup for us. Discard + rise//fall helps survive the first wave. I play 2x dispel in my main and negate + spellskite in the sideboard. Still not a great matchup.
I have cut the abbots entirely and am running a couple Young Pyromancers in its stead and a single Olivia Voldaren to take over the game in a grind.
Jace is a ******* legend. No two ways about it. He is sick vs creature matchups when Anger of the Gods and Damnation comes in. If he is ignored he outvalues the opponent and if he is not he takes a butt load of hurt due to his high loyalty.
Before Jace my deck was a tempo deck, ripping opponents hand and beating face with a delve creature + abbot, finishing off with bolt+snap+bolt. Now I see myself more like the grixis control deck having a threat in play midgame and protecting it.
But to be more on topic, Burn is a match up that you have to be OK with losing with this deck in my opinion. If you feel you need to overcompensate in the sideboard bc you see a lot of the bad decks, then maybe the deck isn't optimal for the meta. I've come to terms with the fact that grixis colors exist in this weird tempo/control/aggression space where you can adapt to any meta and have a couple play style options that can play well within that meta.
Vampiric Link helps a lot vs. burn. It will always be a bad matchup, but that's probably the highest impact SB card you have access to. Definitely better than Dragon's Claw. It's even reasonable against some other aggro decks where you would never bring in Claw - I've brought it in vs. Zoo and Affinity in a variety of Grixis shells, depending on how much I have to take out.
3 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
3 Snapcaster Mage
2 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
2 Pia and Kia Nalaar
1 Gurmag Angler
Spells (29)
4 Serum Visions
4 Thought Scour
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Terminate
1 Dismember
1 Tribute to Hunger
1 Murderous Cut
3 Kolaghan's Command
2 Rise // Fall
2 Mana Leak
1 Dispel
1 Dispel
1 Negate
1 Countersquall
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Slaughter Pact
1 Languish
1 Rending Volley
1 Pyroclasm
1 Crumble to Dust
1 Molten Rain
1 Fulminator Mage
1 Rise // Fall
2 Engineered Explosives
1 Spellskite
Yep, still 61 cards. It's just a thing I do for spice.
I feel that the 4 thoughtscour alongside jace, snap, kCommand, and Rise allow the deck to run more redundant 1 ofs that allow for more flexibility in the mb and sb, while maintaining consistency. I brought the Angler back in because I felt that too often I was just wanting another big dumb beater to get in the way of my opponents creatures or help me end the game quickly and him + murderous cut gives me more pay offs for running the 4th Thoughtscour. So far he's performed exactly the role I've need him to, even if he just eats a terminate so my follow-up Tasigur can live a turn or two longer. The 2nd EE in the SB continues to be necessary; the 2 weeks I played without it, I often found myself missing it. Slaughter Pact is mostly for Master of Waves that plague me in the merfolk matchups, but I have found myself bringing it in for other matchups as well (it's pretty sweet against infect as well, which is another locally popular deck). The 1 of mb dispel has been sweet at protecting my threats and I've been ruminating on adding a 2nd one to the mb.
Edit: I haven't been able to make up my mind on fulminator vs molten rain, but I think that having access to up to 6 regrowth effects for creatures post-board means that you should always run at least one copy of fulminator in the 75. I think the correct comination is always X Molten Rain + 1 Fulminator. Drawing 1 fulminator is sweet because you can usually buy it back 2-3 times if that's the route you want to go (**** you, Tron), but the 2nd one is often unecessary and probably always better as a molten rain (which you can still flashback as well).
Edit 2: I just wanted to point out how funny I find the fact that my signature has become relevant again.
URURxUR
UWUWxUW
URURxUR
UWUWxUW
URURxUR
UWUWxUW
Decklist:
Creatures:
3x Snapcaster Mage
3x Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
2x Young Pyromancer
2x Tasigur, the Golden Fang
2x Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1x Gurmag Angler
1x Grim Lavamancer
Noncreature Spells:
4x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Serum Visions
3x Thought Scour
4x Lightning Bolt
2x Terminate
1x Go for the Throat
1x Dreadbore
2x Rise//Fall
3x Kolaghan's Command
1x Echoing Truth
22 Lands
Sideboard:
1x Spellskite
2x Molten Rain
1x Fulminator Mage
1x Negate
2x Dispel
1x Glen Elendra Archmage
2x Vampiric Link
2x Anger of the Gods
1x Damnation
1x Engineered Explosives
1x Nihil Spellbomb
Match 1: Merfolk
Game 1:
Terrible matchup from the start as I saw aether vial come down turn one after an island. He proceeds to dump all his hand onto the field and I try to remove as many fishes as possible but do not have enough gas to spot them. Vampiric Link, Anger of the Gods, Damnation, Engineered Explosives comes in.
Game 2:
Serum vision into anger of the gods but opponent places spreading seas on turn 2 and turn 3 on my red sources but I do a good job removing all his relevant threats. He punches me each turn with mutavaults and turn 5 he plays Master of Waves. I finally draw into mountains and I finally have enough red sources to boardwipe which still leaves behind the mutavaults and Master of Waves. Unfortunately, he drops a second Master of Waves and proceeds to pummel me to death with the double buffed mutavaults.
Match 1 Loss 0-2
In hindsight, perhaps I should have boarded in land destruction to kill mutavaults since it is very hard for us to deal with manlands. Not sure what to take out in place of them, however. Will test out molten rains and fulminators next time.
Match 2: UR Twin
Game 1:
Lose the dice roll, opponent plays turn 1 serum visions, turn 2 serum visions, turn 3 snapcaster into visions, turn 4 peek at my EOT, sees no removal and flashes in exarch. Turn 5 he combos off. Now I knew what he was playing, sided in Spellskite, Molten Rain, Fulminator Mage, Negate, Dispels, Glen Elendra Archmage.
Game 2:
Start of strong with turn 1 inquisition to take his remand, land turn 2 jace which gets bolted. Play another inquisition and see bolt, counterflux, splintertwin, snapcaster, keranos, and a land. I make him discard counterflux before continuing to rip his hand apart with fall which hit snapcaster and splinter twin. I later snapcaster fall again and he has 2 card in hand which is keranos and bolt. I begin the snapcaster beats until he snap bolts it. As a response, I use kolaghan's command to do 2 damage to his snapcaster and make him discard his Keranos which he could have played the following turn and turn the tides. Game drags on until I land a young pyromancer and kill him with tokens.
Game 3:
Similar game to game 2. Turn 1 serum visions, turn 2 jace (unfortunately gets bolted to death at EOT), turn 3 fall, turn 4 molten rain, turn 5 snap-fall is a brutal opening against any control deck. I rip his hand apart with the help of dispel which prevented my fall from being countered and land a spellskite and Tasigur which I ride to victory.
Match 2 Win 2-1
Felt great with the help of the sideboard. Fall was the MVP of the match, discarding all relevant threats. Fall was especially more powerful past turn 3 or 4 once you know that the opponent has no lands in hand. I felt like I was in control of the match the entire time which was a great feeling against Twin since it's usually the other way around.
Match 3: Monowhite Lifegain
Game 1:
I grimace as the opponent plays a turn 2 Auriok Champion. We have no way of removing him other than bouncing. I land a turn 2 jace and turn 3 young pyromancer. He proceeds to play another auriok champion and 2 Ajani's pridemate. I play fall and discard his 3rd copy of Auriok Champion and Ajani. I bide my time with my young pyromancer ferociously pumping out tokens to block the 20/20 pridemates until turn 5 I cast echoing truth on the two auriok champions to his empty hand then Jace -3 for fall to get remove the untouchable champions from the field. I thought I was in the clear until he drops two Serra Ascendants. My young pyromancer tokens that were blocking the giant pridemates now could not do anything against the flying 6/6 lifelink guys. I take two hits before I draw into two Pias and I have never been happier to see them. I block the ascendants and sacrificing my thopters to kill his soul wardens as well as preventing him from gaining life. With the extra turns gained from Pia (I was at 6, one hit away from dying by the ascendants), I alphastrike his life down from 55 to 27 with the help of gurmag angler, tasigur, and pyromancer tokens in order to shrink his ascendants. When he attempts to strike back with his two gigantic pridemates, I terminate one and block one with the pyromancer token that spawned from casting terminate. He runs out of gas and I steamroll him with creatures.
The player had to leave after game 1 so I got match win. The matchup (at least game 1 with the auriok champions) felt like a terrible one but the little tricks you can do with this deck was quite spectacular. Young pyromancer was the saving grace as it pumped out more than 10 tokens over the course of the match, preventing from the pridemates from ever reaching my life totals. If we had a game 2 and 3, I would have brought in all my boardwipes to help clear the field.
Match Win 1-0
Game 4: Affinity
Game 1:
He throw down half of his hand turn 1 but luckily enough, I draw enough kill spells to survive and stabilize at 4 life. Multiple kolaghan's commands were amazing since I kept killing creatures and artifacts which, later on I learned preventing metalcraft for galvanic blast which he had in his hand the whole time from killing me. Side in Vampiric Link, Anger of the Gods, Damnation, Engineered Explosives.
Game 2:
Similar to game 1 but I misplay my Kolaghan's command. I chose to deal 2 damage to inkmoth nexus and destroy artifact to arcbound ravager. He responds by sacrificing every artifact he has in play onto ravager, sacrificing itself to give inkmoth nexus all his counters, and kill me with infect. Lesson learned.
Game 3:
Turn 2 jace helped mitigate a lot of damage from signal pests and later on sacrificed himself to cast Kolaghan's command from the graveyard to kill a steel overseer and cranial plating. The opponent continued to put pressure on me with arcbound ravagers and vault skirges but I draw into a damnation which quickly ends the game.
Match Won 2-1
Affinity is tough but winnable with all the removal in our deck. Kolaghan's command is simply amazing against their deck but need to make sure to utilize the most out of its modes. Always destroy their inkmoths with destroy artifact clause, not deal 2 damage, when arcbound ravager is in play.
Match 5: Jund
Game 1:
Inquisition, thoughtseize, into Liliana destroys my opening hand and gigantic tarmagoyf joins the party and makes short work of my life total. I drew dreadbore before I died and I was able to remove liliana but it was too late for me to recover from all the discard. Side in Molten Rain, Fulminator Mage, Damnation
Game 2:
I start off with serum visions and land a turn 2 jace that gets immediately bolted. I kill his dark confidants and tarmagoyf and huntmaster when they enter play but I am unable to remove a liliana that hits the field. I really wish to draw dreadbore but unable to do so. We have back and forth killing all of each other's creatures with all of our removal spells but liliana is on the opponent's side. Eventually, my entire hand is in the graveyard thanks to lili and raging ravines activates enough times to kill me.
Match Loss 0-2
Grixis can deal with dark confidants, goyfs, and huntmaster but a very hard time dealing with planeswalkers. Dreadbore was definitely a good addiction to the deck to kill random planeswalkers such as lili, karn, ugin, and garruk but I did not draw it game 2 in a timely fashion and got outvalued by Jund. Match felt winnable as long as they didn't land an early liliana. I made the mistake of taking out too many bolts game 2 which may have helped whittle down loyalty counters on Lili.
Overall, I am very impressed with the deck's ability to stand toe to toe to many decks out there. It has its weaknesses such as having abysmal matchup against burn but the deck itself felt very solid. I still need more testing and playing to learn the smallest of nuances of playing this deck since there are so many decisions you have to make to pilot well. Echoing truth was one new addition made to the list and although it only saw play once, I can see it being a good one of to combat any pro-red or black cards (master of waves, auriok champion) out there paired with discard or mass tokens (master of waves again, token decks).
Perhaps the name "Abbot Grixis" is less accurate than "Baby J Grixis".
BGW Elves BGW|BW Tokens BW|WBR Sword&ShieldWBR|BUG DelverBUG|UWR Kiki UWR | UR Storm UR
It's more that they were both ran side by side and now people are dropping abbots in favor of Young Pyromancer and PKNalaar or other threats. I just foiled out my Pia and Kia because of how well they've performed for me.
URURxUR
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To fight these types of decks, I feel like we need to drop Abbots in favor of either instant speed interaction or more solid mid-game threats like Young Pyromancer or Pia and Kiran Nalaar.
I gotta say recurring pia over and over again is one of the sweetest things you can do in modern right now. Its pretty hard to lose when you get to that stage of the game, and playing 2-3 PKNalaar has brought me back from the brink several times.
URURxUR
UWUWxUW
3 Snapcaster Mage
2 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
1 Gurmag Angler
1 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Grim Lavamancer
2 Mana Leak
3 Thought Scour
4 Serum Visions
2 Terminate
1 Dismember
1 Go for the Throat
1 Damnation
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Kolaghan's Command
1 Thoughtseize
4 Polluted Delta
4 Scalding Tarn
1 Bloodstained Mire
2 Island
1 Swamp
1 Mountain
2 Steam Vents
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Watery Grave
1 Blackleave Cliffs
1 Darkslick Shores
1 Sulfur Falls
2 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Anger of the Gods
1 Damnation
1 Darkblast
2 Dispel
1 Duress
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Izzet Staticaster
2 Molten Rain
2 Negate
1 Spellskite
2 Vandalblast
Match 1: Against Green Stompy. I had a 100% lose ration against this deck. Finally I managed to win with a 2-0 actually. Damnation mainboard was stellar and sideboard worked wonders. To be fair, he flooded a bit at the end of G1 but still, I really had a game, both games were close but I was winning confidently.
Match 2: Against UR Twin. Amazing MU I think. Game 1 I win after a grindy game with Jace. Game 2 I get mana screwed on 2 lands for ever and eventually he wins. Made a mistake at some point and could had stabilized although I was always dead if he drew burn/twin. Still deck sustained well even on 2 lands. Game 3 I was winning but we were already on turns. I think I would had won with resolved jace and a bunch of removals in my hand.
Math 3: Against UWR delver. Not the best MU, game 1 he rides a geist to victory. Game 2 my board helps a lot, he gets mana screwed and I win. Game 3 I stabilize on 9 life with jace flipped and empty board. I draw 7 lands in a raw (and put 2 lands on bottom with serum visions) and he goes: creature creature, land creature, Bolt Bolt Bolt. Can't find variance, I had the game and bricked. I still fill confident that this deck has a game against delvers, even against geist which is our worst nightmare.
Match 4: Against Amulet Bloom. Game 1 I am in absolute control, win with jace ultimate (first time). Game 3 he pulls a T3 kill through discard. Game 4 he mulled to 5 and I had an amazing hand with 3 discard spells and terminate. Eventually I take over.
Overall I was very happy with the deck. I start feeling more and more confident with the playstyle, although I still play a lot like a control deck and not like a mid range deck but that is a habit I will eventually get over. I am thinking of replacing Thoughtseize with Rise/Fall but I am not sure yet. I really don't feel like Lili has something to offer right now especially with how fast is the meta.
Any suggestions on my list guys?
UB Faeries (15-6-0)
UWR Control (10-5-1)/Kiki Control/Midrange/Harbinger
UBR Cruel Control (6-4-0)/Grixis Control/Delver/Blue Jund
UWB Control/Mentor
UW Miracles/Control (currently active, 14-2-0)
BW Eldrazi & Taxes
RW Burn (9-1-0)
I do (academic) research on video games and archaeology! You can check out my open access book here: https://www.sidestone.com/books/the-interactive-past
Both are listed as Grixis Control
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/deckshow.php?t[T3]=28&event_ID=47&feedin=&start_date=10/31/2015&end_date=11/01/2015&city=Dallas&state=&country=&start=1&finish=32&exp=&p_first=&p_last=&simple_card_name[1]=&simple_card_name[2]=&simple_card_name[3]=&simple_card_name[4]=&simple_card_name[5]=&w_perc=0&g_perc=0&r_perc=0&b_perc=0&u_perc=0&a_perc=0&comparison[1]=>=&card_qty[1]=1&card_name[1]=&comparison[2]=>=&card_qty[2]=1&card_nam