Since you lost 2 games due to goblins I would bring in, in addition, mass removal, izzet staticaster and a negate also. I would cut those ancestral vision. The match up is favoured for us if we play conservatively, especially post sideboard we have tons of cards against them! I really love runed halo against them. Is super good, naming Grapeshot or also Goblin token
You cannot name goblin token with rune halo since it’s not a card name
You're right. However this isn't really how I want to approach the burn matchup.
Tomorrow and this whole week I'm going to be doing an installment series of testing different esper draw go oriented decks and reporting the results to all of you. These include clique / resto oriented lists, something with bitterblossom / vault of the archangel, very traditional single win con list, and my personal favorite, esper based 4 color control with mulldrifters and reveillarks.
Don't worry, there will be no less than 26 land and plenty of cryptic command / esper charm action.
Stay tuned
True, i don't think any of those cards are actually good in this deck. I like the land a baneslayer plan since it does't warp the sideboard.oust-a-snapcaster mage plan is also better than people give it credit for
vendilion cliques are also super solid since you need to close fast, especially when you don't draw baneslayer
Ooh, I forgot about him. Yeah, he might actually be the best anti-burn card. Doesn't die to Destructive Rev/Wear Tear, can't be bolted out, and gains life. The only thing that it can't do is block a Swiftspear profitably, which is certainly tolerable.
So there is this card named kor firewalker who does paladin's job better...
Not against decent burn players. If you block with fire walker they can skull rack you and then since damage can't be prevented, fire walker dies. Can't do that to paladin.
since atarka's command sees more play than skullcrack i would say that paladin is even more risky since you will need to get him in combat to get the life
Feels more and more like everyone in here has abandoned the "mission for vision"
@Stokpile as it seems like you keep advocating the card, i would like to hear your take on it in an Esper shell.
I havent gotten to test it a lot yet, but i have also just jammed it into my "old" Esper draw go, and as someone mentioned, the "Esper visions" deck might need to be built in a completely different way, than Wafo-Tapa Esper (AKA Draw-go)
What would you suggest if you were to build a Esper deck with visions?
the traditional esper mana cruve is probably not best suited to use ancestral vision at it's best. Jeskai control and grixis midrange/control are probably better unless you build a discard heavy version of esper. But then the problem is that your visions will draw you a bunch of late game discard
So if I'm looking to get some "oops I win" moments from gifts but don't want to lean too heavily on gifts As a crutch, what list should I start with? I still want to be draw go, no Liliana crap, and no thopter foundry either.
Steer me. I'll test the daylights out of it
As a UW Gifts player, I second this request. It would be great if someone could show me how to fit Gifts into Esper without weakening either the combo or the control shell too much, but I am pretty sure that it doesn't easily work.
Display deck statistics
This is the main deck i'm trying right now. The thopter combo actualy uses very little space. It's more of a normal UW control deck but with a better attrition plan. It still plays out like a control deck. The list is probably not optimal but i like the feel of it right now. I like to have some Elspeth SC, Gideon and Teferi in the side to dodge the GY hate when needed.
Edit: the 2nd detention sphere should probably be oblivion ring
Speaking of gifts ungiven, a lot of lists are playing snow covered lands in order to gifts for 2 islands or 2 plains. Is there really a situation where you would want to gifts for basic land? i guess you could in response to blood moon but even then you wouldn't be able to get exactly the color you want. Since the fact that seeing snow covered and regular land side by side pretty much tells your opponent that you are on gifts, i was wondering if there was really any use for it
So after a grand total of 53 matches since yesterday (stayed up all night with the crew to bring you the most juicy statistics), I can safely say I'm playing 0 AV.
I have here in this notebook 48 instances of "used think twice before turn 5 of the game, ripped a cryptic, verdict, spell snare which was crucial, or a much needed path to exile"
What this usually looked like was ripping the think twice itself on turn 3, eot'ing it, and ripping a verdict, cryptic, or possibly just a land which enabled me to cast one of those things. Often times the card I ripped off of the EOT turn 3 think twice was garbage for the situation I was in, but getting that card out of the way enabled me to untap and topdeck the card I needed a turn earlier. 48 times out of 53 matches is very close to what most would consider "at least once every match I was in a position where I really seriously needed think twice and AV would have done nothing"
There were exactly 35 instances I've marked down of "turn 7 or later, holding a grip of lands, rip think twice and play it plus flashback EOT, ripping a relevant spell for stabilization" of those 35 instances, 26 of them were "Dead on board if I don't rip cryptic, verdict, or path" and of those 26 instances the required stabilization cards were in fact drawn 22 times (from either think twice, flashback, or the following draw step after drawing two cards)
That's 26 theoretical times out of 35 were AV straight up gets us killed, and 22 ACTUAL times were AV gets us killed.
Now here's the disclaimer: AV is obviously good, but it's going to shine in decks without a lot of inherent card advantage. Decks like uw/r control are now possible, maybe some BUG things or just straight UW or UB. AV can fill the role of Esper Charm in those decks as far as raw drawing power is concerned.
US on the other hand, are trying to fix something that isn't broken. Please note how none of the historical decks that played AV never had Sphinx's Rev also (because it wasn't printed, but still) That's because realistically the AV was getting cast later in the game. Well, now we have REV for that purpose, and the EARLY game AV play has already been discussed, and it's not great.
By all means I'll be brewing U/W tapout on the side or something wit AV, but as far as the deck actually being discussed in this forum, the numbers are in, and they say "meh"
You don't have to cut think twice. What i'm planning on testing is to cut SoD and snappy from the original list and go from there
The major difference is that think twice is not used to dig for a specific answer, so much as it is for raw card advantage. Its for getting everything.
Telling time is too. If you absolutely need a boardwipe, telling time isn't as good. If you're just casting the spell to cycle it, then telling time also sets up your next draw, which is often good, especially early where you can get land drops and such. With a fetchland they're both essentially equal.
As I mentioned above, if you play 8 fetches, TT is better. 6, probably better. If you have 4, maybe not.
Again, telling time is better if you're not desperately digging for an answer.
If you have 3 revs, you also might have a bit more draw power to work with.
As I see it, an early telling time is nearly always better, but a late one can be worse. With the extra rev, this balances out a bit.
That being said, I would probably not run either unless my deck was set up to dig for specific cards (teachings, etc)
I don't think this is relevant. The better telling time is not better enough to make up for the worst one. In the best cast it will be slightly better than anticipate but in the worst case it will kill you. But the discussion really should be do we want this effect at all? I don't think this effect come with the appropriate power level in modern to be warranted in the deck
I know this was mentioned on this thread a couple of days ago but I still think hallowed moonlight should be in a lot more lists and given a lot more respect. As everybody knows the Esper draw go build needs 2-4 additional 2 mana cantrip on top of the think twice this is most commonly shadow of doubt or remand. Now I think remand has really fallen of late I mean it’s bad against elzrazi, affinity, infect, etc… like I think when treasure cruise and dig through time where in modern it was great but I think its just a cantrip that does not synergise with your main targeted removal (path to exile). And I think shadow of doubt is still really good because as someone said the other day when its good its really good, you play against an agro deck you’re on the play they decide to keep a one land hand which is a fetch then you shadow of doubt to cut them of that land then that shadow of doubt just won you the game. But I think a good new replacement for remand in the current state of modern is hallowed moonlight, virtually every deck has a target for it, lets just list a few things it hits: kills tokens and half of the lingering souls (which can be a big problem for us because counters don’t really work on it), if you Hallowed Moonlight with a supreme verdictkitchen finks and other persist or undying creatures get exiled, many decks run flicker effects like UW control with restoration angle or flickerwisp, through the breach or any graveyard strategy, living end, tooth and nail combo, Dregdevine (which is raising in popularity), hate bears and merfolk with aether vile as well as master of waves and probably what its best against is any deck running collected company and/or chord of the calling. If the eldrazi deck is still a thing after banning’s, hallowed moonlight is great against eldrazi displacer, matter reshaper and eldrazi 1/1 tokens
Like we did with remand look at it first as a can trip second as a removal spell, there was one day where it was just too fringe and not enough of the meta game relied on cheating creatures into play but at the moment I think it should be consisted more as a two of in esper builds.
In remands best case scenario your opponent casts a tasigur the golden fang delving 5 and then you remand it, so what he can just play it in a turn or two later.
In hallowed moonlights best case scenario, your opponent goes off with living end cycling 5 creatures exiles 2 simian spirit guide casts Violent Outburst on your end step and you cast hallowed moonlight in response you exile the 5 creatures of theirs shutting off their combo draw a card and all that for the lonely price of one colorless and one white mana.
Interested what you guys think of it being run as a 2-3 of?
it doesn't work all that well against vial and resto angel. I'm not sure that's where you want to spend you 2 mana
Honestly speaking, that Planeswalker would be horrible even if the cc was four instead of six. At six mana, Elspeth just wins the game in a pair of turns.
I think he would be really good at 4 but at 6 he is probably unplayable
T: Add C to your mana pool 5, T, pay 1 life : put a 1/1 white and black Human Cleric creature token onto the battlefield. 5, T sacrifice five creatures : Transform Vale of (???)'s Abbey, then untap it.
Ormendahl, Prince of profanes
Legendary creature - Demon
(black)
Flying, lifelink, indestructible, haste
9/7
You cannot name goblin token with rune halo since it’s not a card name
Which card is that?
True, i don't think any of those cards are actually good in this deck. I like the land a baneslayer plan since it does't warp the sideboard.oust-a-snapcaster mage plan is also better than people give it credit for
vendilion cliques are also super solid since you need to close fast, especially when you don't draw baneslayer
since atarka's command sees more play than skullcrack i would say that paladin is even more risky since you will need to get him in combat to get the life
the traditional esper mana cruve is probably not best suited to use ancestral vision at it's best. Jeskai control and grixis midrange/control are probably better unless you build a discard heavy version of esper. But then the problem is that your visions will draw you a bunch of late game discard
Deck: Untitled Deck
//Main
3 Gifts Ungiven
1 Unburial Rites
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
2 Thopter Foundry
1 Sword of the Meek
1 Muddle the Mixture
4 Path to Exile
3 Mana Leak
1 Dismember
1 Snapcaster Mage
3 Engineered Explosives
4 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Wrath of God
1 Supreme Verdict
3 Cryptic Command
2 Spell Snare
4 Celestial Colonnade
2 Academy Ruins
4 Flooded Strand
3 Island
1 Plains
2 Snow-Covered Island
1 Snow-Covered Plains
2 Hallowed Fountain
1 Watery Grave
2 Polluted Delta
1 Mystic Gate
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Day of Judgment
2 Detention Sphere
//Sideboard
1 Terastodon
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
1 Gideon Jura
1 Negate
1 Dispel
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Disenchant
2 Timely Reinforcements
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Extirpate
1 Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir
1 Celestial Purge
2 Thoughtseize
This is the main deck i'm trying right now. The thopter combo actualy uses very little space. It's more of a normal UW control deck but with a better attrition plan. It still plays out like a control deck. The list is probably not optimal but i like the feel of it right now. I like to have some Elspeth SC, Gideon and Teferi in the side to dodge the GY hate when needed.
Edit: the 2nd detention sphere should probably be oblivion ring
You don't have to cut think twice. What i'm planning on testing is to cut SoD and snappy from the original list and go from there
I don't think this is relevant. The better telling time is not better enough to make up for the worst one. In the best cast it will be slightly better than anticipate but in the worst case it will kill you. But the discussion really should be do we want this effect at all? I don't think this effect come with the appropriate power level in modern to be warranted in the deck
It really is more like an 8 cards combo
it doesn't work all that well against vial and resto angel. I'm not sure that's where you want to spend you 2 mana
I think he would be really good at 4 but at 6 he is probably unplayable
looks interesting but a bit expensive
Elspeth is probably better if we are in the market for a 6 mana walker
it would be more like "Abbey of the Oriental Vale"
http://www.mtgsalvation.com/cards/shadows-over-innistrad/26767-westvale-abbey
Their translation makes no sense. "orient" means east lol