MTG Salvation

Knight of Glory seems like a good idea for smacking Shadow down with a spirit token for ~4 turns to kill them while it blocks Shadow/Angler/Tasigur forever. Exalted is actually the ability that makes me want to cast it over the other 2, though Crusader ends the game insanely fast and is also a consideration, but casting Crusader while boarding in Liliana of the Veil seems like it'll be impossible to cast.

Hmm, well, I'm the 18th place player. I'll be honest and say I've played literally 15 matches altogether with this deck since Eye of Ugin got banned. I just made a meta call to all-in the Death's Shadow decks on Thursday and played 90% RidetheIguana's deck, with some changes to ignore big mana decks knowing how bad Valakut decks are against Shadow. I probably dropped at least one match due to inexperience and missing one damage here and there, most notably in the on-camera round 9 match game 2.
I played against 6 Shadow, UWR Kiki, Eldrazi Tron, Burn, MonoU Tron, Affinity, 2 Dredge, Abzan, and Naya Company.

I lost to Dredge, UWR Kiki, and 2 Shadow decks. Both Shadow games felt winnable, with me being, and I lost the Dredge match due to a mulligan to 3 in game 1 and then played around the incorrect card in game 3. I was just super flooded out in the UWR match and was attacking with multiple Shambling Vents in a turn in both games into Wall of Omens just to gain life...

I beat 4 Shadow decks, Eldrazi Tron, Naya Company, Burn, MonoU Tron, Affinity, Dredge and Abzan, all fairly good matchups except for Eldrazi Tron, where Todd Stevens drew the absolute worse string of cards I have ever seen in my life, so it didn't matter that I just ignored land hate. I faded a non-land card for like 10+ turns in both games.

Obviously I boarded out Tidehollow Sculler in 11 matches, but I think the card is necessary just in case I run into combo or Company decks. Even if it eats a removal spell, I get information out of it, and it's one less removal spell TKS is eating.

Vault of the Archangel is an interesting card. It's super mana hungry and forces me to basically cast no spells whenever I hold it up, so against the Shadow decks, I'm just usually staring down Shadow with something like 2 Souls until I can draw a removal spell or Blight Herder, and if they find enough removal to kill the Souls, I'm usually just dead. but if I find Blight Herder first, they usually die. However, it was definitely great at racing the aggro decks and felt fine against Eldrazi Tron.

Liliana, the Last Hope was mediocre as expected. I want more removal spells somewhere. It's kinda of hard to beat Shadow when I'm just chumping with all of my tokens because I can never draw a Path. I wonder where I could fit in a Dismember and/or Push in the main deck, and I would look to replace Liliana with Declaration in Stone or Journey to Nowhere. I may remove Aven Mindcensor too. I've already decided to ignore big mana decks...might as well continue doing so. The Knight of Glorys in the other deck looks interesting and is something I might try. I was considering Auriok Champion even though it's difficult to cast, but it's literally unkillable by Shadow except for EE.


TL;DR, I suck, had no practice, played against like 13 positive matchups and probably punted a couple matches by giving away a few free damage because I am super conservative.

I was picking up some Balance cards...and there appears to be a shortage of foil Ricochet Traps. Did that happen with the Living End buyout? Or perhaps something I'm missing?

Hey, I've been playing this deck on and off, and I'm wondering what you sideboard out Aether Vial against usually. I do understand that against the attrition matchups like BGx decks, they come out, but what about against Delver decks? Against the slower, Tasigur/Pyromancer Grixis lists, it almost seems like an attrition matchup, but they do have some counters as well.

Pile A:
Gaea's Cradle
Some Modern staples making up the difference to TCGMid

Pile B:
4x Show and Tell

You should reference Stormboards for DDFT advice. That's their most active section, and all of the proficient DDFT players frequent it. They've got DD piles and card discussions, etc.

What do you mean reset Chrome? I've had this problem for years...I certainly haven't kept Chrome going continuously for that long...

Quote from Drifting Skies »

If you could forward a message on to those in charge of your web development team. The front-page banner that generally lists the different events, sales, and such going on... When I click on one of those, I get taken to the current Creature Collection page, instead of the page of relevance. Also, the left/right scroll arrows to move between the different banner ads don't seem to work.

I am running Windows 8 and the current version (38.0.2125.104 m) of Google Chrome on an HP Laptop if this helps identify the problem.

Quote from DJ_Keesee »

Drifting Skies,

Thanks for the heads up! It looks like this may have already been corrected as I can't reproduce the issue.

Let me know if you are still having the problem. If so, just let me know which banner is misdirecting you.

Have a great day!

I never thought to report this issue since it's pretty irrelevant, albeit a bit inconvenience for when you have sales linked to the banner, but I've had it for about 4.5 years now actually. I've been on Windows 7 using Windows Chrome for the entire time. It doesn't matter what banner it is. Also, I can't change banner pages by clicking the page number.

Edit: If it helps, I'm using a Lenovo W510 laptop...

I keep buying from them and it's always the best service and shipping.

I do wonder though...is it normal to charge tax on singles when I'm ordering from NC? Is it a state tax thing? I can't say I've ever been charged tax when I buy singles, even from LGS, so I'm quite puzzled. I thought it was usually considered already taxed when the boosters were opened.

Hmm, well, Jace is usually used as a win con when you've got most things locked up, such as having CounterTop on board with Jace, or your opponent is down to 1-2 useless cards and you slam Jace. Other than that, Jace is a ton of utility. Creature bounce is actually super relevant tempo gain.

And I don't know what you're expecting...the deck is a lot of durdle. You control everything and then try to find a win-con. It's not uncommon to go 1-0 in games for a match win due to time. In fact, against less experienced opponents, I've slow rolled the win con to do exactly that. The more experienced players concede to have time for the second game.

Why would you expect a creatureless deck to have board presence? What are you expecting? You can attempt the legends build if you want more board presence, but that's still quite limited.

I don't know if there's a general guideline to playing. You basically try to stabilize. Against creature decks, blow up big threats like Bob, sometimes Stoneforge depending on answers. Deathrite is super situational. A lot of it depends on answers. It's usually fine to take like 8 damage from useless dudes like Thalia, Tarmogoyf, Geese, Delver in order to play around Pierce and Daze. I usually consider the game stabilized when I've cleared anything over 2 power from the board and I have a Top in play. Top is super important. Don't play that into Daze, Pierce, etc, though sometimes Force is harder to play around. It's quite common for me to sandbag Top until turn 3 against Pierce decks.
There are some trains of thought against Pierce/Daze decks that you want to run removal into the counters in order to resolve more spells later. I don't personally agree with that line of play though. I'm a very conservative player and usually holds win-cons until I have protection as well, but sometimes, you just have to Entreat for 4 and hope they have no answers. Judging these situations takes experience.

Be mindful of the clock. I've said things about experienced players conceding in order to have time for 2 other games, but it goes both ways. There are games that I can drag out for an extra 10 turns or something, but the chances of winning those are slim. You want to concede those to have time for games 2 and 3. Draw bracket sucks; you play against Lands and Miracles all day if you get there. Losing a match 0-1 also sucks.


Well, this was a bunch of me splurging out thoughts. I don't know if it was helpful, and there are probably a few controversial points in there as well.

That is very close to what I play, except our removal suite differs. I'm glad that I'm not the only person coming to a similar conclusion.

You don't think Aetherspouts is good as a catchall for when you don't have enough removal? There have certainly been times where I'm praying for an Aetherspouts, but it's possible with your additional spot removal that it never gets to that.

How is everyone feeling about playing basically zero card advantage/card draw? This just doesn't feel like a control deck anymore

Hmm, I've done some small amount of testing myself. I also believe that we need to have the Master of Waves and whatnot to be competitive.
I'm personally on 4x Master, 2x Sphinx, 3x Ashiok, 2x Jace. I'm also doing 3/3 Thoughtseize/Despise split, with only 3 Dissolve and 3 Downfall.

I've noticed that I can't really maintain total control over the game against most of the midrange decks. There is a small window where I've been able to get them into topdeck mode for about 2 turns, and that's really when I think I need to close out the game. It seems to usually be in the T5-T6 range after I've stripped a threat and killed about 2. My responsive top decks are just not as good as the threats that demand answers. Thus, some kind of midrange threat is necessary to close out the game. Master of Waves for a devotion of at least 2 is prefect for that. Prognostic Sphinx....I'm not too impressed with, since it's just so SLOW. The only redeeming quality is that it can dig us into more answers for anything the opponent might come up with. But the ~6 turns they have is a LONG time, and there are times when I just die to a Stormbreath or they drop a Polukranos with me unable to find an answer in time. I used to have Doom Engine for awhile, but the 6 mana is actually a lot.

There's just no way to absolutely win the late game like Revelation did...

Thing abaout mainboarding Disdainful Stroke is...what if you run into the burn/aggro decks? You can't really afford any dead cards in the first few turns.

The thing with Singing Bell Strike is that it enables Stubborn Denial if it's used on a big dude. I can't say I'd be happy about that. I was also considering Encrust to enable Master of Waves. But same problem there. I'd play it if it hit Planeswalkers... I don't really know if BUG or RUG midrange is a thing yet, so it might be a non-issue.

I've also been super unimpressed with Prognostic Sphinx. Sure, I love the triple Scry and basically invincibility, but it's so SLOW. If you're in burn range, it's entirely possible to get killed by top decks while you take your 6 attacks to kill them. I can't say I have a solution though.

I'm brewing up a similar deck as well. I'm unconvinced on Master at the moment, but it's still a strong consideration. I really would like a few more devotion to play it...but I can't really see anything. Theoretically, we'll have 3 devotion when he comes out, assuming we dropped everything on curve. Singing Bell Strike MAY be a possibility...but it seems weak.

I think Despise will be a huge player for a while. It will basically never miss.

I think some amount of Bile Blights are necessary as a 2 mana answer. Especially in the first month or so, we need to deal with hyper aggro. In the same vein, some amount of Pharika's Cures will probably be necessary in the board.

In the sideboard, I think a large number of Disdainful Strokes will be good. Anything not aggro has finishers at 4+ mana. I don't think I'd be sad to Counterspell relevant things.

I'm uncertain that the Divinations are necessary...but I can't say I've tried. Do you actually want to be casting that? It seems like I'd rather hold up Dissolve or slam Ashiok.

Hmm, so I'm not sure about this one.

Pile A:
1x Ancestral Recall (Unlimited LP. Back looks pretty good. Front edges have some yellowing)

Pile B:
4x Tarmogoyf (Future Sight, 1 SP, 1 MP)
3x Dark Confidant (1 RAV LP, 2 MMA NM)
1x Volcanic Island (Unlimited, LP)

Neither side really needs either pile. I was thinking about slowly selling parts of my unused collection for cash, but I'm in no rush.
I understand it might not be possible to do this accurately with no pictures, and I'll find some pictures of the Recall if there's that big of a difference.