Hey everyone, with the new infinite mana combo of Devoted Druid and Vizier of remedies, wouldn't it be a great home for Kiki Chord since this deck is very mana hungry and that just Chord of Calling is a 1 card combo? You can insta kill with a chord in hand and the infinite mana combo in play. Since we already use mana dork in our base list, the cost of adding Devoted druid and vizier is not too bad and the upside is adding a lot of speed to the deck which would help greatly agaisnt fast combo decks like storm/affinity and the world famous TRON decks that eat us up T3.
I feel like this would be a nice home to add the combo since we already have a infinite mana sink kill that is naturally in the deck.
I've played a ton of matches now with the Abzan lists and the biggest draw is just having access to Finks/Seer/Vizier combo on top Druid/Vizier, which just makes for a much better all in combo strategy. I'm not saying it isn't possible, but I believe any deck playing Vizier/Druid that isn't Abzan Coco is probably just a worse version of the deck.
On a side note, I have had a decent amount of success against the deck after making space for Linvala, Keeper of Silence + Harsh Mentor in my board and bringing back Phyrexian Revoker to the main. As always, if Abzan Company picks up (it will).. hate for Kiki Company will pick up as well. Expect more Cages, Angers and removal heavy strategies to fight it in the near future.
I'm trying to put a company list together for this weekend as I was having lots of trouble vs DS and UW Control. But I don't know if I can find Shaman's for it. Hopefully I can find them if not I'll run an extra voice, ooze. Not sure what else to swap in. Wall of omens doesn't sound too terrible to just draw a card - thoughts?
Would you leave in staticaster for elspeth tokens against UW? I was getting wrecked by attacking into condemn and blessed alliance - I'll play tighter this Sunday.
Also, have you tested out courser or tracker in the kiki deck and how did it work out?
I think Shaman is a pretty important engine to the deck, not sure if it's that easy to replace. I've tested other versions of Company w/ Eldrazi Displacer over it but you need more Colorless sources (I played 4 Grove, 2 Gavony, 1 Ghost Quarter).
Staticaster is a fine answer to Elspeth and one of the reason's I've left it in before.
I've tested Courser/Rallier/Tracker a lot in the Finks slot in the past. I've just always been more successful w/ Finks vs. just about everything except when Anger of the Gods/Kalitas were super popular in almost every sideboard.
Company, Moon effects (cutting off Verdict, Cryptic & Colonnade), Selfless Spirit, Voice, Kitchen Finks & Witness. Spellskite is actually pretty important here to protect Magus from their limited spot removal if the option is available. Don't attack with creatures you really care about losing as Blessed Alliance / Condemn are popular in the main.
-3 Path to Exile
-1 Izzet Staticaster
-2 Noble Hierarch
If I see Clique MD I'll typically leave in a Staticaster because they're often on 1 MD / 1 Side + Snaps and sometimes Timely Reinforcements and it's worth having a toolbox-able answer to those after boarding out Paths as you can sometimes just get tempo'd out by a Clique/Leak (if they're on Leak)/Cryptic.
A thing to note if they are on Mana Leak, I'll use Chords/Resto to bait them into situations where my Companies/Voices can resolve.
Splashing for Staticaster is a lot closer to free than splashing Pontiff when all 7 dorks produce U. Tutoring it up and flashing it in at instant speed off of Fauna Shaman is pretty relevant as well. I've dropped the 4th color multiple times and always go back to it just for Staticaster.
Congrats Luda, that is super impressive. I am curious about how you navigate the grixis matchups and other cryptic mana leak decks. Those have always been very difficult for me and I often just get locked out by a string of cryptics...
On another note I have been tuning an evolution build, going off the series ari lax did and applying his suggestions, seems pretty good but still gets wrecked by counter magic. List is here http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/25-04-17-kiki-evolution/
Grixis/USA are a lot harder to navigate than UW Control.
Grixis (use Burkhart's list as a generic example) is a lot less scary Game 1. Voice/Finks/Eternal Witness/Company just bury the deck in value. Post board Anger/Damnation/Dispel come in and things can get much harder. Manage your resources and don't over extend. Village Bell-Ringer can really punish Cryptic Command.
Grixis Control/USA playing Mana Leak (Path in USA) are actually much more challenging in my opinion as they have 1-for-1 answers to your value creatures. USA has the annoying dance of can they just burn me out if I'm not fetching basics vs. I should be fetching shocks so Paths are just ramping me. Again, resource management is huge for both. I'd much rather play against the Control decks that are actually good right now that either of these.
The text for primers is just generic filler currently as each variant has been all over the place for some time and none of them are actually putting up results at the moment.
To answer your questions though:
Traditional Kiki Chord / Kiki Company in my opinion are best in a balanced meta, both have the ability to grind for days and combat most decks in the format.
Nahiri Chord is probably best in a Control/Midrange dominated meta.
Kiki Evolution / Kiki Company are best suited in a combo dominated meta having earlier access to toolbox creatures suited to slow down/soft lock most combo oriented decks.
I think all variants are equal dogs to big mana (Tron/Titan+Valakut decks). Eldritch Evolution is a terrible card in a Control dominated meta.
An opponent could hold their removal spells for Vizier because it's hard to accomplish much without it. With all the cheap removal and targeted discard around Vizier seems easier to disrupt compared to the standard combo + toolbox cards or even the Angel/Feeder 2nd combo
With the exception of Gutshot, Izzet Staticaster & Orzhov Pontiff as cards that deal with Vizer, how is it any easier to disrupt than Anafenza or Melira? Not to mention all 3 of those cards were already killing Seer to begin with.
Is there really any reason to target Vizer if I have a non-summoning sick Druid on board? I'm just going to make infinite Mana in response if they let Vizer resolve.
You lose out on fetching Hallowed Fountain w/ 4 of 9 fetches which can lead to a more painful mana base from time to time, but that's about it. You may want to tinker with different splits of Foothills/Flooded Strand. Strand misses out on fetching basic forest though which is pretty important.
Just a heads up though for future reference, primer/deck discussion threads here aren't typically used for the discussion of budget options.
Kelvin Chew's 5-0 list from yesterday. He'd posted the other day that he was 34-6 (85% WR) in matches over the last few days with a few updates. Most notable changes are the full 8x Dorks & 3x Unified Wills from the board.
I've played a ton of matches now with the Abzan lists and the biggest draw is just having access to Finks/Seer/Vizier combo on top Druid/Vizier, which just makes for a much better all in combo strategy. I'm not saying it isn't possible, but I believe any deck playing Vizier/Druid that isn't Abzan Coco is probably just a worse version of the deck.
On a side note, I have had a decent amount of success against the deck after making space for Linvala, Keeper of Silence + Harsh Mentor in my board and bringing back Phyrexian Revoker to the main. As always, if Abzan Company picks up (it will).. hate for Kiki Company will pick up as well. Expect more Cages, Angers and removal heavy strategies to fight it in the near future.
Your reports honestly do nothing if your list isn't updated/shared.
I think Shaman is a pretty important engine to the deck, not sure if it's that easy to replace. I've tested other versions of Company w/ Eldrazi Displacer over it but you need more Colorless sources (I played 4 Grove, 2 Gavony, 1 Ghost Quarter).
Staticaster is a fine answer to Elspeth and one of the reason's I've left it in before.
I've tested Courser/Rallier/Tracker a lot in the Finks slot in the past. I've just always been more successful w/ Finks vs. just about everything except when Anger of the Gods/Kalitas were super popular in almost every sideboard.
Post board is usually:
+2 Fulminator
+2 Blood Moon
+1 Selfless Spirit
+1 Reclamation Sage (D Sphere & RIP)
-3 Path to Exile
-1 Izzet Staticaster
-2 Noble Hierarch
If I see Clique MD I'll typically leave in a Staticaster because they're often on 1 MD / 1 Side + Snaps and sometimes Timely Reinforcements and it's worth having a toolbox-able answer to those after boarding out Paths as you can sometimes just get tempo'd out by a Clique/Leak (if they're on Leak)/Cryptic.
A thing to note if they are on Mana Leak, I'll use Chords/Resto to bait them into situations where my Companies/Voices can resolve.
Grixis/USA are a lot harder to navigate than UW Control.
Grixis (use Burkhart's list as a generic example) is a lot less scary Game 1. Voice/Finks/Eternal Witness/Company just bury the deck in value. Post board Anger/Damnation/Dispel come in and things can get much harder. Manage your resources and don't over extend. Village Bell-Ringer can really punish Cryptic Command.
Grixis Control/USA playing Mana Leak (Path in USA) are actually much more challenging in my opinion as they have 1-for-1 answers to your value creatures. USA has the annoying dance of can they just burn me out if I'm not fetching basics vs. I should be fetching shocks so Paths are just ramping me. Again, resource management is huge for both. I'd much rather play against the Control decks that are actually good right now that either of these.
Blood Moon is great vs. all of them.
Took a break from Knightfall and picked Kiki Company back up for a 16 player GPT a few days ago for fun -
Swiss:
R1: Boggles - 2-0
R2: BUG Midrange - 2-1
R3: UW Control - 2-1
R4: GR Tron - 2-1
R5: ID
Cut to top 4:
Semis: UW Control - 2-0
Finals: Concede/Split Prize, opponent planned on attending Vegas.. I'm not.
Also took it for a spin on Xmage the past 2 nights where I'd had free time, currently sitting at 9-0 only accepting 1500+ rated constructed opponents:
Death's Shadow Jund - 2-0 (2-0, 2-1)
UW Control - 2-0 (2-0, 2-0)
Infect - 1-0 (2-0)
Ad Naus - 1-0 (2-1)
Abzan - 1-0 (2-0)
Grixis Shadow - 1-0 (2-1)
GW Tron - 1-0 (2-1)
It's nice to see the deck still feels pretty strong, here's the 75 I've been running and have been relatively happy with:
4x Birds of Paradise
3x Eternal Witness
3x Fauna Shaman
1x Izzet Staticaster
1x Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
3x Kitchen Finks
1x Magus of the Moon
3x Noble Hierarch
1x Qasali Pridemage
1x Restoration Angel
1x Scavenging Ooze
1x Selfless Spirit
1x Spellskite
1x Village Bell-Ringer
3x Voice of Resurgence
1x Breeding Pool
2x Forest
2x Gavony Township
2x Grove of the Burnwillows
2x Horizon Canopy
1x Plains
1x Sacred Foundry
2x Stomping Ground
1x Temple Garden
4x Windswept Heath
4x Wooded Foothills
Instant (10)
3x Chord of Calling
4x Collected Company
3x Path to Exile
2x Blessed Alliance
2x Blood Moon
1x Eidolon of Rhetoric
1x Eldritch Evolution
1x Engineered Explosives
2x Fulminator Mage
1x Izzet Staticaster
1x Kataki, War's Wage
1x Reclamation Sage
1x Scavenging Ooze
1x Selfless Spirit
1x Stony Silence
Additional fetches raise the chance of having a bolt proof KOTR on 2-3.
Traditional Kiki Chord is anything but an aggro deck.
Evolution is about access to bullets on earlier turns, not the number of bullets you're looking to play.
None of the versions have a positive record vs. G/x Tron Varaints.
8-rack is a test of resource management, but the deck is terrible against 2-for-1 bodies. Nor has it actually been relevant in Modern for some time.
To answer your questions though:
Traditional Kiki Chord / Kiki Company in my opinion are best in a balanced meta, both have the ability to grind for days and combat most decks in the format.
Nahiri Chord is probably best in a Control/Midrange dominated meta.
Kiki Evolution / Kiki Company are best suited in a combo dominated meta having earlier access to toolbox creatures suited to slow down/soft lock most combo oriented decks.
I think all variants are equal dogs to big mana (Tron/Titan+Valakut decks). Eldritch Evolution is a terrible card in a Control dominated meta.
With the exception of Gutshot, Izzet Staticaster & Orzhov Pontiff as cards that deal with Vizer, how is it any easier to disrupt than Anafenza or Melira? Not to mention all 3 of those cards were already killing Seer to begin with.
Is there really any reason to target Vizer if I have a non-summoning sick Druid on board? I'm just going to make infinite Mana in response if they let Vizer resolve.
Just a heads up though for future reference, primer/deck discussion threads here aren't typically used for the discussion of budget options.
4 Birds of Paradise
2 Courser of Kruphix
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
3 Scavenging Ooze
1 Selfless Spirit
4 Spell Queller
1 Tireless Tracker
3 Voice of Resurgence
Instant (8)
4 Collected Company
4 Path to Exile
Enchantment (2)
2 Retreat to Coralhelm
1 Botanical Sanctum
1 Breeding Pool
1 Flooded Strand
3 Forest
1 Gavony Township
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Kessig Wolf Run
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Plains
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
4 Windswept Heath
2 Blessed Alliance
1 Eldritch Evolution
1 Izzet Staticaster
2 Kitchen Finks
2 Negate
3 Reflector Mage
3 Unified Will
1 Vendilion Clique
It's one sided. "Whenever an opponent"