Two Felidar Guardians also create a loop that triggers the altar. As does liquimetal coating + saheeli rai (which combo's also nice with Felidar Guardian, so quite a few synergies!)
Having tried to make all kinds of eternal command decks work for years, one of the first things I tried with this list was trying to fit eternal witness in. It just seems so sweet!! I played 3 witness at first, then 2, then dropped them altogether. Tapping out sorcery speed is just not what this deck wants. Plus it's quite an easily disrupted combo in the current meta: bolt or push on your witness and your command fizzles, giving your opponent the opportunity to remove your 3-mana spell + 4-mana spell with just one 1-mana spell. In a tempo deck like ours, that's a tempo loss that's very hard to overcome. Maybe in a different meta heavily skewed towards decks without cheap removal like tron and dredge eternal command would work.
Ok, I'm trying to solve the issue this deck has that often you have a reclamation out, but are nonetheless unable to close the game within a few turns. This is an issue against decks like burn and storm that kill you even if you keep cryptic up, but also in a lot of situations where opponent has an amount of resilient threats on board, which often happens against spirits, hardened scales, dredge, hollow one, etc. In these situations durdling around with zenith for 2 or 3, or looping nexus or a few cryptics without being able to kill him in the meantime often leads to losing the game after all, plus not having enough time left to squeeze out two wins, so you draw the match at best.
Two weird solutions that I brewed up are:
1. Panglacial wurm.
Between fetches and teachings, casting this thing during your end step (from your library, card advantage!) is a breeze as soon as turn 4 with enough mana left open to remand/logic knot something during opponent's turn.
2. Switching Nexus, Zenith and one Cryptic for a Worldspine Wurm, Through the Breach and a Summoner's pact.
Together with teachings this means you have a deck with effectively 5x through the breach and 6x worldspine wurm. So as long as you have one half of the combo in hand, this is a very consistent turn 4 combo that only takes 3 spots in your deck.
I'm going to test one of those solutions during two paper tournaments this weekend. Which one should I test?
I've been playing around too with a few chalice decks last week. Goldfished a few different brews a bit, but found it significantly more clunky than with one-drops, especially because you don't have spirit guides for a T1 2 drop play (I even tried 2 gemstone caverns, but that card hurts your manabase more than it helps in this deck). being able to cycle your 4 Illumination is also significantly worse than being able to play 8 opt + push/path. My conclusion was that it does not wreck enough decks to be worth being a worse deck against all other decks. But if anybody reaches a different conclusion I'd love to hear it, because I like lock-style decks.
Can you guys post your winrate against burn? I feel it's 85% favoured for the burn player. I know there's a video of FTZZ winning against burn with a pulse in his opening hand, but in reality the matchup rarely plays out that way. My personal experience is that this deck is way too clunky to survive long enough to teach into lifegain if you don't draw your lifegain naturally. And even if you survive the first 4 turns, looping cryptics also often doesn't really seal the deal for you because you can't counter their bolts AND tap their creatures with cryptic at the same time (smart burn players attack first, cast spells later), and you don't have many ways of ending the game quickly, so after playing a few cryptics you're often still dead.
I really like the options bant offers over sultai. The mana is not that much more painful when you only need black on turn 5 or 6 for flashbacking teachings (and sometimes for trophy which you also rather play late game when the extra land matters less).
It's definitely not a fully optimized list though. Things I'm testing:
- sphinx's revelation over zenith (pro: lifegain is better against aggro, con: can't target opponent)
- no nexus (pro: is dead card early and often winmore late, con: is useful sometimes)
- eternal witness over snapcaster (pros: eternal command loop with WR + gives you 4th land if needed, con: sorcery speed)
- the 4th WR (pro: I really want to have it always, and having two in play is better than having zero, con: takes up a spot in the deck)
Have you guys experimented with other colors than BUG?
By the way, I've been playing a bant version of this deck for the past few weeks and very happy with it, with only a light black splash for flashbacking teachings and playing trophy. White gives you access to powerful cards like path, settle the wreckage, spell queller and some powerful sideboard cards. Also instead of snapcasters I'm playing eternal witness which combines very well with Wilderness Reclamation into an eternal command loop.
I'll post my decklist later today, now at work.
edit: Oh and I don't play Nexus, because is in my opinion a bit of win-more. But not yet 100% sure about that though.
Pre-board it has the grindy value plan of cycling creatures and bringing them back with Living End, cast either via As Foretold or Bring to Light.
Post-board against fast decks, remove the Remands and Ancestral Visions for 4 Violent Outburst and 3 Anger of the Gods (for Humans, Affinity, Dredge, anything with small bodies) or 3 Pulse of Murasa (Burn, Mardu Pyromancer, anything grindy). This allows you to cascade into Living End reliably, with the backup plans of As Foretold -> Living End, and Bring to Light -> Living End.
Against Tron and Valakut decks there's turn 2-3 Blood Moon. Search for Tomorrow helps find basic Islands, which is also the reason there are 6 fetches. I haven't played against much Tron, so the plan against these decks is very much up for debate. I haven't tried Damping Sphere yet. I would assume that it's not that good in this deck, but I try to base my choices on playtesting rather than assumptions.
The two worst cards are Valley Rannet and Search for Tomorrow. They're good in certain situations, like against control where you want to hit your land drops reliably and can start hardcasting your creatures. I think maindeck Anger of the Gods over Search for Tomorrow is also totally reasonable.
Simian Spirit Guide is really good for casting Violent Outburst, Cryptic Command, or Bring to Light a turn early. Turn 2 As Foretold also feels strong. It also helps manafix for Anger of the Gods. (As do Valley Rannet and Search for Tomorrow.)
Ultimately it's the instant speed Living End that makes the deck tick. So one option is to play Violent Outburst main, with Ancestral Vision in the side for grindy matchups. I haven't tested that configuration yet.
Speaking of instant speed Living End, we can also cast it off of As Foretold using Alchemist's Refuge on our opponent's turn, for instance. Refuge also lets us suspend Search for Tomorrow on our opponent's turn, cast Ancestral Vision on our opponent's turn, cast creatures on our opponent's turn, etc. This is huge against control. This makes Refuge a huge Field of Ruin target, which makes Pulse of Murasa feel so good versus grindy decks. You can also get back a cycler with Pulse for extra value.
But it does feel like this overall shell, somewhere between control and combo, feels like the right style of control for the current format. Gotta go fast. You really want to have access to turn 2 Living End, or turn 3 at the latest.
Oh, I should mention that I initially played around with leaving Remand in with Violent Outburst. Then you cascade into Remand, return the Outburst to hand and draw a card. It was just too cute and inconsistent. The strength of the deck lies in the many ways to cast Living End, from turns 2-5, some being instant speed.
One other shortcoming that I'm trying to fix is the inability to play Relic of Progenitus or Tormod's Crypt to eat our opponent's graveyard. We're totally reliant on Bojuka Bog for that. Thankfully the Tolaria West's are less pressured to grab Living End or AV, and can be used to grab Bog or Refuge more often. As the games go long, casting Living End to wipe your opponent's board, eating their yard, then casting another Living End to get back your own board becomes more important.
I implore people to test this deck out, please. There are lots of matchups that I haven't been able to test (Modern is a huge format now). And while it feels like a powerful deck, I'm completely open to suggestions.
It also takes a while to get into the right mindspace for the deck, similar to the original deck. I've been testing this Temur version for weeks with friends, and I still make sequencing errors. It really has a tremendous number of decision trees to account for once you get past turn 4. For example:
Do I use this Spirit Guide to cast As Foretold on turn 2, or save it so I can Cryptic on turn 3?
Do I play Tolaria West tapped on turn 1 so I can wipe my opponent's board with SSG+Violent Outburst on turn 2, or suspend Search for Tomorrow so I can Cryptic on turn 3?
I really like this line of thinking. I don't own some of the cards, so can't test it myself yet. But please let us know how it performs in future tournaments!
I've played a very similar version with settle the wreckage and have to disagree with clixxi. Settle the wreckage is a house (sweeper that doesn't fill the yard). Especially if people don't expect it. In your local environment the surprise is quickly gone and people play around it, but at a GP the surprise factor is a real thing. I'm not sold on gideon though and WW on T3 is sometimes hard. Instead I would just play the fourth path here, lowering your curve and freeing up a spot from your sideboard. To further lower your curve you could consider cutting a Command for a Pierce. I would also play at least one Mystic Gate if you're playing WW spells like settle the wreckage.
To get your SB further down to 15 cards I would cut a Fearie or the Cage: with paths and settle the wreckage opp's graveyard doesn't fill too quickly, plus you also have bog to tutor up to remove opp's graveyard.
I've read in some places (on 1310hazzzard's twitch for instance) that the control matchup is supposed to be good. That's not my experience at all, I find this a very unfavourable matchup that a few dispels post board doesn't fix. But maybe I'm playing it wrong? How do you guys tackle control: what's the general play sequence and what do you board out?
Yeah I played against this version yesterday. Kinda hard to living end my own riverwinders when the opponent gets griselbrands... Was a very fun match!
Two weird solutions that I brewed up are:
1. Panglacial wurm.
Between fetches and teachings, casting this thing during your end step (from your library, card advantage!) is a breeze as soon as turn 4 with enough mana left open to remand/logic knot something during opponent's turn.
2. Switching Nexus, Zenith and one Cryptic for a Worldspine Wurm, Through the Breach and a Summoner's pact.
Together with teachings this means you have a deck with effectively 5x through the breach and 6x worldspine wurm. So as long as you have one half of the combo in hand, this is a very consistent turn 4 combo that only takes 3 spots in your deck.
I'm going to test one of those solutions during two paper tournaments this weekend. Which one should I test?
What's your experience here?
1 snapcaster mage
2 eternal witness
2 spell queller
spells
4 opt
3 path to exile
4 remand
4 growth spiral
1 blessed alliance
1 assassin's trophy
1 pulse of murasa
4 wilderness reclamation
4 cryptic command
3 mystical teachings
1 settle the wreckage
1 blue sun's zenith
2 celestial colonnade
4 misty rainforest
4 flooded strand
2 polluted delta
1 temple garden
1 hallowed fountain
1 watery grave
1 breeding pool
1 overgrown tomb
1 hinterland harbor
1 flooded grove
1 plains
1 forest
3 island
1 supreme verdict
1 settle the wreckage
2 knight of autumn
1 surgical extraction
1 pulse of murasa
1 fracturing gust
1 assassin's trophy
2 unmoored ego
1 baneslayer angel
1 lyra dawnbringer
2 dispel
1 vendilion clique
I really like the options bant offers over sultai. The mana is not that much more painful when you only need black on turn 5 or 6 for flashbacking teachings (and sometimes for trophy which you also rather play late game when the extra land matters less).
It's definitely not a fully optimized list though. Things I'm testing:
- sphinx's revelation over zenith (pro: lifegain is better against aggro, con: can't target opponent)
- no nexus (pro: is dead card early and often winmore late, con: is useful sometimes)
- eternal witness over snapcaster (pros: eternal command loop with WR + gives you 4th land if needed, con: sorcery speed)
- the 4th WR (pro: I really want to have it always, and having two in play is better than having zero, con: takes up a spot in the deck)
Have you guys experimented with other colors than BUG?
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/much-abrew-sultai-wilderness-teachings-modern-magic-online
By the way, I've been playing a bant version of this deck for the past few weeks and very happy with it, with only a light black splash for flashbacking teachings and playing trophy. White gives you access to powerful cards like path, settle the wreckage, spell queller and some powerful sideboard cards. Also instead of snapcasters I'm playing eternal witness which combines very well with Wilderness Reclamation into an eternal command loop.
I'll post my decklist later today, now at work.
edit: Oh and I don't play Nexus, because is in my opinion a bit of win-more. But not yet 100% sure about that though.
I really like this line of thinking. I don't own some of the cards, so can't test it myself yet. But please let us know how it performs in future tournaments!
To get your SB further down to 15 cards I would cut a Fearie or the Cage: with paths and settle the wreckage opp's graveyard doesn't fill too quickly, plus you also have bog to tutor up to remove opp's graveyard.
Thanks a lot!