Hangarback Walker seems to be appearing in both the aggro and control versions of Abzan. Courser of Kruphix appears in the control version but is absent from all the aggro builds I've seen.
Played a control list very solar to tBuzzsaw's this week. Went 3-1 and finished 3rd of 20. My only loss was to, ironically, UR Artifacts. First time I've lost to it.
After losing the first game to a god draw I sideboarded in the extra command, unravel the aethers, sweepers and token hate and won the second game by exiling his walker then end hostilities to leave myself with thopters against an open board. I could see he was kicking himself for pumping his walker to 3/3.
In the third game my sideboard just failed to show up. In fact, across the whole match I never saw a virulent plague, unravel the aether or drown in sorrow. Let's call it variance.
I do relish the idea of a return match though and still believe this build has a strong chance against the field.
What is the difference between midrange and control or are sites using that interchangeably?
Anyways, I've been missing fleecemain alot but he is just bad vs languish. With no early drops, dramoka's command becomes an awful card, something that was amazing before Origins. I've been testing out hangarback walker to see if he is suitable for an early and late creature like fleecemain was. Well it is as amazing as I thought. Here is my list.
4 siege rhino
4 courser of kruphix
4 hangarback walker
2 nissa, vastwood seer
2 den protector
1 dragonlord dramoka
4 sandsteppe citadel
4 temple of malady
4 temple of silence
4 windswept heath
4 forest
1 plains
2 caves of koilos
2 llanowar wastes
1 urborg, tomb of yawgmoth
I've been playing abzan for months now and before Origins, I had it perfected. Every time I feel like trying a new deck I always immediately go back to abzan.
Ps I'll format everything and write more when I get on a computer.
I guess one way of differentiating is to consider a continuum with aggro at one pole and control at the other. Then mid-range sits in the middle, possibly with some features of both aggressive and control.
Looking at your deck I can see the reasoning behind dropping fleecemane, but I think languish belongs in a control deck. The number of creatures you're playing suggests a mid-range approach and for me there are too many that die to the languish. Hangarback excepted of course. If you're going to play mid-range with a creature reliant approach, you could consider swapping at least one languish for end hostilities, crux or tragic arrogance to improve your flexibility. For the same reason you could drop a command for an utter end.
Personally though, I'd look for a way to keep lions in your 75. They're still that good and languish just isn't showing up in the volume we anticipated.
I finished 12-3 and could have very easily top 8ed if I were a slightly better player.
Losses were to a rogue mono-red heroic brew, G/W Kibler list piloted by Tom Martell, and G/R devotion with insane draws.
Going forward I would move the Sorin to the sideboard to create room for a third elspeth which would shore up the G/W match-up and mirrors. I would cut the Gaea's Revenge for the previously mentioned Sorin and perhaps another Anafenza. Anafenza has a ton of utility against a lot of decks (Rally, anything playing hangarback or liliana as well as decks that need a good body on a 3 drop). Having access to up to 6 board wipes (Drown, Hostilities, Languish) was absolutely awesome. I also wouldn't mind trying to find more room for a second unravel the aether. It has a lot of utility outside of ensoul decks since enchantments, obelisk of urd, perilous vault are all things.
Ponypuddle, besides two Elspeth and s Sorin, what is your 60th card?
I went 4-0-1 in the Swiss at games day. Won against mono black in the quarters then lost to UW heroic in the semis.
My Swiss matches were:
UB control 1-0
White weenie 2-0
GB Elves 2-1
ID - player was on Mardu Dragons
Goblins - 2-0
The deck played very well all day until the semi, when I had to mull to 6 in both games that I subsequently lost.
Still playing 2 main deck lions and 2 main deck visionaries, with a third lion in the SB. They were great against the field.
I did sideboard out the visionaries against UW heroic for sweepers and spot removal, and regretted it as I could have used more chumps. It seemed he could counter removal or protect his guys against spot removal all day long. Really found myself missing self inflicted wound here.
Ajani and Sorin were both good, but I never used Ugin at all.
2 days of testing with the slimmed down list (Languish out, excessive removal out, Lions in, 1 Sorin and Ajani in) leads me to these results:
Fleecemane Lion is so good. Why did we ever drop this cat from the deck? What were we thinking? Madness.
Slimming down and not running bulky trap cards like Languish was the best thing I could have done for this deck. Forget full control, give me some legit tempo options at the 2 spot and creature-biased walkers like Sorin and Ajani maindeck all damn day. Midrange best range.
This feels right to me. I think 3 x Elspeth is correct with either Ajani or Sorin main board. Not sure we can support 5 x non-flip planes walkers at cmc of 4,5 or more unless we are willing to drop all sweeper sorceries. Personally I'd choose to keep one in the main. Either crux, arrogance or hostilities, depending upon own creature mix and anticipated levels of horde/devotion in the field.
Sorin is probably the better choice if you expect lots of hordes and want the security of life gain. Ajani if you anticipate a mixed field, as Ajani is adaptable to the card draw role when buffing creatures isn't moving you forward.
At games day I'm thinking of trying a 9 x 2-drop approach with 3 x lion, 2 x visionary and 4 x den protector. This on the back of dropping a languish and staying at 25 land. This should give me greater resilience to aggro and allow me to main board Ajani, not Sorin.
The other dilemma is how much artifact/enchantment hate to place in the main. 1 x Utter End is good, but relegating Ugin to the side costs us an option and I'm sure we've all seen the time when thoughtseize was played only to have the opponent peel the killer ariefact/enchantment from a top deck their very next turn.
This guy use to play at my store eons ago and to this day is still known to be one of the worst saltiest players known in Magic, not to mention a bad player in general. Not much to say other than I took advantage of his poor draws and baited counter spells on Nissa and Sorin to save Rhinos and Elspeth. Second game was roughly the same. Bad control players are just too much fun to mess with. Afterward like clockwork he has a temper tantrum that would make a four year old embarrassed.
I played against a guy like this at my Regionals, too. Thankfully, he was one of my few wins. He was on green-red devotion. The trouble started when I had a 3/2 Den Protector in play and Bile Blight in hand. He had out a couple creatures including a Whisperwood Elemental. As expected, he attacked with the Whisperwood. I blocked with Den Protector, tapped two lands, and cast Bile Blight on his Whisperwood. He had this look of frustration on his face, and then he put the Whisperwood into his graveyard. Then he points at my Den Protector and says "That dies, too." I said "no, the Whisperwood became a 1/1." He said "Yeah, after damage was dealt." I said "No, I played Bile Blight immediately after blocks were declared. I haven't changed my life total from the other unblocked creature yet. And why would anyone cast the Bile Blight after combat in this case?" He got this really frustrated look and was looking around as if he was thinking about calling a judge. Honestly I was thinking of calling a judge as well, it was pretty obvious this guy was trying to cheat his way into killing my creature, but he grunted and said "fine, whatever."
That is such a sorry side of the game.
Have you seen the footage on the net of the guy who lose-rages then turns the table over before storming off in a gigantic hissy fit?
If it wasn't for the fact that he's 250lb with a full beard you'd swear he was six years old.
My FNM was an experiment. Twenty players involved and I finished second going 3-0-1. I went with 2 Elvish Visionaries and 2 Fleecemane Lions in the 2 drop slot, with a languish and a tragic arrogance as my sweepers. Not consistent I know, but strangely rewarding. Drew the first round against G Devotion - had him on the ropes in the third round but ran out of time.
I must confess, TBuzzsaw, the Visionaries are effective. The fact that they replace themselves and give a 1/1 blocker does feel like card advantage, and seems to help stall the early rush from opponents on aggro. They and the fleecemanes were always welcome draws, even late game. I never used Languish at all - never had it played against me either - and only once used tragic arrogance. More often, Elspeth and Ugin were fine and effective for multiple creature removal. In one game, when Ugin hit the table, my opponent scooped straight away. 3 Elspeth and 1 Ugin, with an Ajani in the sideboard, were value Planeswalkers all night.
I guess I'm mostly agreeing with Scasseden here - the control versions that use only den protector, rhino, courser and nissa seem really vulnerable at the moment. I think we're better off with 6-8 creatures at 2cmc (inc. protectors) and at the moment am still favouring the lion slightly. Nissa too was always welcome - not perhaps as a game changer or finisher, but she certainly provides a useful land boost, and a potential threat that demands attention.
Bile blight keeps getting an occasional 2 for 1 or more, which is why it's in the main and ultimate price is not.
Tragic Arrogance and bile blight will be in my 60 next FNM, languish will not.
One final point - I never faced a true control deck all night. There are control players in my meta, but they all had a really underwhelming night with none finishing in the top four.
Get on board the Rec Sage Hype Train 2015. Blow up their Foundry and get something to beat face with (or just trade with a thopter, w/e lol). Virulent Plague out of the board is pretty sweet tech tho. They can't do anything about it. Just sucks that you can't keep your own dudes alive from Elspeth -- could potentially make it difficult to close out the game...
This feels right. I guess in this match up we could also (gasp) side out one of two Elspeth for a combination of other walkers like Ajani and Garruk who have some synergy with Dragonlord D or who can hit the Hangarback.
By playing a languish in the main and an end hostilities in the sideboard, and by playing lions and siege rhino and tasigur and a dragonlord dromoka plus the den protectors in the main with raptors in the sideboard I'm trying to give myself good resilience to whichever sweeper shows up.
This because everyone seems to be playing sweepers.
Sorry my last wasn't fully explained. My second round was against an artefact/enchantment brew that used sphinx's tutelage to force mass milling. I beat it comfortably, especially after siding in raptors, but found myself wishing for the flexibility of artifact and enchantment hate instead of the enchantment only package I was running with commands and back to nature. Some white weenies are running hall of triumph too. So the Rec sage seems like a good option as it provides both types of hate and a body too.
I can understand the raised eyebrow at lion with languish in the main, but if you're going to run a sweeper, you have to accept that it will probably take some of your guys as well as your opponent's. I don't think playing languish with lion is any worse than end hostilities and rhino or crux and no dragons in that regard.
I finished FNM in second place with a 3-1 record. My last two matches were both against the mirror.
I beat the first guy by getting Elspeth to stick first. The second guy beat me by playing Whip and recursing rhino after rhino.
What I learned is that our 75 must include reclamation sage and/or naturalize. Erase, command and even back to nature are inadequate unless sharing places with the former. Don't rely on thoughtseize to catch the tricky artefacts.
One other point - the only player using Languish was me! I was really surprised not to see more of it and it served me really well against white weenie in the first match.
Still on the fence about fleecemane. The fact that everyone else was sweeping with end hostilities gave me a real advantage when I had one or more monstrous.
After losing the first game to a god draw I sideboarded in the extra command, unravel the aethers, sweepers and token hate and won the second game by exiling his walker then end hostilities to leave myself with thopters against an open board. I could see he was kicking himself for pumping his walker to 3/3.
In the third game my sideboard just failed to show up. In fact, across the whole match I never saw a virulent plague, unravel the aether or drown in sorrow. Let's call it variance.
I do relish the idea of a return match though and still believe this build has a strong chance against the field.
That is a thing of beauty. I think you've captured all the essential elements in that list yet kept it bespoke to your own preferences.
I like the 7 temple 3 Heath land list too. Nice work.
I guess one way of differentiating is to consider a continuum with aggro at one pole and control at the other. Then mid-range sits in the middle, possibly with some features of both aggressive and control.
Looking at your deck I can see the reasoning behind dropping fleecemane, but I think languish belongs in a control deck. The number of creatures you're playing suggests a mid-range approach and for me there are too many that die to the languish. Hangarback excepted of course. If you're going to play mid-range with a creature reliant approach, you could consider swapping at least one languish for end hostilities, crux or tragic arrogance to improve your flexibility. For the same reason you could drop a command for an utter end.
Personally though, I'd look for a way to keep lions in your 75. They're still that good and languish just isn't showing up in the volume we anticipated.
Ponypuddle, besides two Elspeth and s Sorin, what is your 60th card?
My Swiss matches were:
UB control 1-0
White weenie 2-0
GB Elves 2-1
ID - player was on Mardu Dragons
Goblins - 2-0
The deck played very well all day until the semi, when I had to mull to 6 in both games that I subsequently lost.
Still playing 2 main deck lions and 2 main deck visionaries, with a third lion in the SB. They were great against the field.
I did sideboard out the visionaries against UW heroic for sweepers and spot removal, and regretted it as I could have used more chumps. It seemed he could counter removal or protect his guys against spot removal all day long. Really found myself missing self inflicted wound here.
Ajani and Sorin were both good, but I never used Ugin at all.
This feels right to me. I think 3 x Elspeth is correct with either Ajani or Sorin main board. Not sure we can support 5 x non-flip planes walkers at cmc of 4,5 or more unless we are willing to drop all sweeper sorceries. Personally I'd choose to keep one in the main. Either crux, arrogance or hostilities, depending upon own creature mix and anticipated levels of horde/devotion in the field.
Sorin is probably the better choice if you expect lots of hordes and want the security of life gain. Ajani if you anticipate a mixed field, as Ajani is adaptable to the card draw role when buffing creatures isn't moving you forward.
At games day I'm thinking of trying a 9 x 2-drop approach with 3 x lion, 2 x visionary and 4 x den protector. This on the back of dropping a languish and staying at 25 land. This should give me greater resilience to aggro and allow me to main board Ajani, not Sorin.
The other dilemma is how much artifact/enchantment hate to place in the main. 1 x Utter End is good, but relegating Ugin to the side costs us an option and I'm sure we've all seen the time when thoughtseize was played only to have the opponent peel the killer ariefact/enchantment from a top deck their very next turn.
Oops.
Thanks for pointing that out.
Feeling pretty foolish right now
That is such a sorry side of the game.
Have you seen the footage on the net of the guy who lose-rages then turns the table over before storming off in a gigantic hissy fit?
If it wasn't for the fact that he's 250lb with a full beard you'd swear he was six years old.
I must confess, TBuzzsaw, the Visionaries are effective. The fact that they replace themselves and give a 1/1 blocker does feel like card advantage, and seems to help stall the early rush from opponents on aggro. They and the fleecemanes were always welcome draws, even late game. I never used Languish at all - never had it played against me either - and only once used tragic arrogance. More often, Elspeth and Ugin were fine and effective for multiple creature removal. In one game, when Ugin hit the table, my opponent scooped straight away. 3 Elspeth and 1 Ugin, with an Ajani in the sideboard, were value Planeswalkers all night.
I guess I'm mostly agreeing with Scasseden here - the control versions that use only den protector, rhino, courser and nissa seem really vulnerable at the moment. I think we're better off with 6-8 creatures at 2cmc (inc. protectors) and at the moment am still favouring the lion slightly. Nissa too was always welcome - not perhaps as a game changer or finisher, but she certainly provides a useful land boost, and a potential threat that demands attention.
Bile blight keeps getting an occasional 2 for 1 or more, which is why it's in the main and ultimate price is not.
Tragic Arrogance and bile blight will be in my 60 next FNM, languish will not.
One final point - I never faced a true control deck all night. There are control players in my meta, but they all had a really underwhelming night with none finishing in the top four.
This feels right. I guess in this match up we could also (gasp) side out one of two Elspeth for a combination of other walkers like Ajani and Garruk who have some synergy with Dragonlord D or who can hit the Hangarback.
The white weenies I've faced have one each of hall and spear.
I respect that these don't worry you. I haven't lost to them either, yet but I'd rather be prepared than not.
I guess it comes down to packing what you need to deal with your own meta.
This because everyone seems to be playing sweepers.
I can understand the raised eyebrow at lion with languish in the main, but if you're going to run a sweeper, you have to accept that it will probably take some of your guys as well as your opponent's. I don't think playing languish with lion is any worse than end hostilities and rhino or crux and no dragons in that regard.
I beat the first guy by getting Elspeth to stick first. The second guy beat me by playing Whip and recursing rhino after rhino.
What I learned is that our 75 must include reclamation sage and/or naturalize. Erase, command and even back to nature are inadequate unless sharing places with the former. Don't rely on thoughtseize to catch the tricky artefacts.
One other point - the only player using Languish was me! I was really surprised not to see more of it and it served me really well against white weenie in the first match.
Still on the fence about fleecemane. The fact that everyone else was sweeping with end hostilities gave me a real advantage when I had one or more monstrous.