I get how to play the card, I just don't think it goes as linear as your example. I know you called out RDW as a problem, so let me give an R/G midrange example. You're on the draw: T1 Mystic>T2 BTE into Caryatid. They're now a land drop away from a T3 Stormbreath and sitting on 3 creatures. You better have the Essence Scatter or Syncopate in hand or its GG. Devour flesh ain't gonna help you here.
They're only at 4 power. R/G is one example where Doom Blade is better due to their plethora of mono-colored creatures (EDIT:whoops, non-black*) outside of BTE.
As said previously, Devour Flesh isn't a sham-wow card. It's aggregate worth, however, that cleans up after you hit the top of their curve with your counter. If you counter Stormbreath, you're looking at 4 power, one of which is a Defender. At this point, cast Devour Flesh knowing that it doesn't really matter what you hit.
In a deck full of spot removal, Devour Flesh probably sucks (I ran it in the side when I ran mostly grixis spot removal pre-rotation). Now, along with Syncopate, my tune has completely changed on this card.
I think Doom Blade might have a place in the MD, I just think that I'd run more Devour Fleshs than I would Doom Blades. Doom Blade and Ultimate Price are perfect SB players. Sort of like explosive 6th men on a basketball squad; they're super effective some of the time but pretty bad enough of the time to not put them in the starting lineup.
Slaughter Games is a fine sideboard card. I'd run at least one if you see lots of UWx or the like in your meta. Probably not so good if everyone runs RDW, but at worst it takes a single SB slot.
Pithing Needle functions in a similar way, say if you're having trouble with Domri or the like.
Devour Flesh is better than Doom Blade because usually you can let their t2 resolve [exception being RDW], or have to if they're on the play. After that, leave mana open for counters for t3-t53 and you can EoT Devour Flesh. If you let them establish a board presence where they have options such as sacking something undesirable, you're doing something wrong (probably). Sure Doom Blade gives you more leeway with letting stuff resolve and killing their dude while a monstrosity is on the stack, but Doom Blade is dodged by a lot of relevant standard beaters. Maybe Hero's Downfall is better (?) but it is super slow.
Though this is just repitition for most.
I like the Shimmering Grotto manabase a lot. Functionally, it lets us use our cheap spells much faster than Prophetic Prism and doesn't require the t2 manasink (which stinks for us). It's not very good as your land drop t1-t2 but should iron itself out into the late game.
Turn // Burn was compared to Shock because an advocate of T/B did earlier.
@Izzet Charm: Looting requires that you actually have a hand bigger than 2, which isn't always the case. The shock requires an x/2 (I have no idea how many decks run x/2s, but from looking around the forum it's RDW, Boros, and... dork decks, I guess?). The counter matters for about 5 turns. It's a conditionally good card. I also like most of my cards as passable topdecks. This is maybe one of the worst.
We don't have a developed standard and people are advocating cards that are only for specific metas.
Doesn't that sound incorrect?
You can Essence Scatter a God. You can Essence Scatter a Blood Baron.
We have answers. Just because you didn't get a FNM promo of them doesn't mean that you shouldn't use obvious ones like Essence Scatter, Syncopate, and Devour Flesh. These are general cards and their breadth is wide. Narrowness is good when you know what you're looking for. Breadth is good when you're looking at a FNM of 25 homebrews or daily 8 random piles of RtR+Theros.
Edit:
@ the note on INS/Hayes email: I mean it's probably alot of counters. It would seem like 2-4x Devour Flesh functions as well as a counter in some cases. Or, gee, Lightning Strike. People played Searing Spear last year because it was an OK card. That extra point of damage makes it a much more comfortable play, I think. I wouldn't go down much further from where they're at. Counters are super good right now.
Now, I'm going to get a lot of crap for this suggestion.
Pre-rotation I had The Rock put together but wanted some extra punching power for the inevitable mirror that I would be facing in an upcoming IQ. Now, the IQ got cancelled so I only have play testing results but I ran 2x Sanguine Bond and 1x Homicidal Seclusion. It worked well. My Thragtuks turned into fireballs and my mutavaults could turn into a 10 point life swing in moments of "living the dream." Oh, and Disciple was much better. Of course, it slowed me down, as I did not run Liliana to stop the hexproof guys and general aggro decks. The engine itself was not damaged since I still ran 4x Thragtusk, 4x DD, and 3x Disciple (one more than regular so Discipling a LZ or Geralf's was not a bad play).
Now, I have done 0 playtesting for this deck and I don't think I'll be running it this week or in the near future. But the Whip would seem to be a better Homicidal Seclusion. Thragtusk is gone but Grey is there as well as Reaper of the Wilds. Scavenging Ooze became a little greater than incremental. The biggest thing missing is Disciple when running Sanguine Bond, as the burn and draw ability is incredible. I just wish re-animator were still a thing so Crypt Incursion & Sanguine Bond would be a legitimate win-con. Bond also boosts devotion.
The biggest problem is that it make this deck just a little more contingent on card draw. It makes it worse against aggro since adding a t5 enchantment does you no favors. Sanguine Bond should be able to operate with both Reaper and Grey making Whip not necessary, but just Bond and creatures is not what I'd consider an impending doom for your opponent.
I think the part of Turn // Burn that people are forgetting is that split apart, each spell is pretty lousy. Far // Away has the advantage of having Away, which is consistently getting you one. You can't Burn early game then Snapcaster into Turn anymore (made Turn // Burn card much better). Sure the format has slowed, but how many things do we need to kill by fusing? Blood Baron? We have removal that is cheaper. Don't get your panties in a bunch and run inefficient removal.
I'd rather run another counter. It's a SB card for sure. Maindeck if you're paranoid about creatures that aren't in standard showing up in standard decks.
Underworld Cerebus would seem to be much worse than Master of Cruelties.
Running mill as a win-con is miserable. I'm doing it for UB because "no other good options other than Aetherling". But really, discussing Mind Grind because it's hilarious more than legitimate.
Hero's Downfall isn't great. The only advantage it has over Dreadbore is that you can EoT a planeswalker when the drop him on t3, so they only get 1 activation off. Dreadbore then pseudo taps you out (hope you weren't missing your land drops) but I don't notice a huge difference. Murder didn't see a ton of play in lists. I don't see this as much better.
Someone earlier said that Syncopate is the card to have in our decks. I hated Syncopate this summer. But now I think it's the bomb. I'm not sure why, but I always seem to be able to rip it off for something awesome starting with rotation testing.
Play Devour Flesh. Play more than one. It's good. It won't be obviously good. But work with it a lot and you'll start to see it. t2 Devour Flesh and t3 Away is nuts and you don't even have to worry about rogue monoblack decks. Also, you don't have to freak about Rootborn and Charms with Devour.
I'm considering Quicken for Grixis and it makes me sick.
Specter is a bad card, but perfect mana fixing sounds okay to me. The interaction is interesting at least.
While running Grixis, I'm not sure why one would want to run more Inspiration than Steam Augury. In a tap-out build, Inspiration seems much worse.
In a dual colored deck, I can understand Inspiration, but for this shard we've already established that we need a lot of dig.
In my testing for UB, I've found that 4x Inspiration and 2x Opportunity is enough. It's not like we have access to a bunch of cheap cycling or draw that is any good. Grixis gives us Steam Augury but it's not like that lowers our draw curve. Acting like the block decks won't port and that we can have a avg mana cost of 10.5 or whatever is incorrect. The decks will be reasonably fast with little staying power outside of VoR, Rootborn Defenses, and Boros/Golgari Charm. So running 8 draw spells that cost 4 or more mana seems like a bad time. I'd rather just run a full set of Devour Flesh.
Magma Jet has been bleh in testing. It's fine against RDW but sucks against Selesnya and mono-green lists.
I feel that Mind Grind gives us more control since you can just count their lands. Psychic Spiral is a exhausting wait until you get to 25 cards in your graveyard and is dependent on you getting stuff in your gy whereas Mind Grind is dependent on you hitting land drops. Acting like tapping out is a big deal at that point in the game is kind of silly. Either they have the counter or the fattie or they don't. If you're worried about it, leave mana open for a counter. Having tested both, I don't think either Mind Grind or Psychic Spiral is very good. Their impact and the way I end up playing them is virtually the same (although one I can do EoT, big whoop I guess). If you lose a single game, your possibility of going to turns is very high. Nobody likes to play on turns. Neither is MD-able IMO unless you're full blown permission.
Does Mind Grind fit as a finisher for a permission build? I've been considering running it for UB as I've done much more testing for UB control than for Grixis (easier on the mana).
Psychic Spiral is probably better, although I think Mind Grind gives us more control over what we hit them for.
4x Inspiration and 2x Opportunity has worked well. I've been running 2x Mutavault as pseudo-Snapcaster beats.
Consuming Aberration misses a lot of the typical removal. At least we can Devour Flesh for a whole bunch. Aetherling is a better more consistent finisher but I enjoy the cute finishers.
Shock would appear to be heavily underrated in our RDW matchup. Though, yes, hilariously bad in any other matchup.
I'm not sure how Thoughtseize is really that good in our MU matchups. It doesn't stall the board, allowing us to get the the mana that we can rip them apart at, it just puts them down a card. Now that card could be crucial (see whatever 4 or 3 drop they adopt) but pulling apart a hand that has a bevy of two and one drops seems senseless. 2 life for a lottery seems not super great. Just OK.
However, thoughtseize in the matchup with new Jund or U/W/x decks is : DDDDDD.
Anger of the Gods was the sweeper we needed this summer. Well now it's here. Thank God(s).
I think 4x Jace stinks. Unless you're automatically going for -2 in every situation. I like the flexibility that 2-3 Jaces gives you. Ultimating him happens a lot more than you'd think.
We are much better situated with aggro than we were before. Crypt Incursion is included in the SB because it works well with Psychic Strike. Maze's End.dec might be a sort of thing post-rotation. Perhaps Encroaching Wastes still has to be considered? Keyrune is still our best interpretation of ramp. It defends fairly well.
I'm running 4x Far // Away since fusing both halves EoT got substantially better with Thoughtseize.
When I pick up Izzet Charm in a grip full of grixis cards, I know that I don't use it correctly. People have tried to explain the card but I think the understanding and timing of the card has to be developed more than explained. I think it's one of those weird "well, you just have to do it" parts of Magic. Knowing your matchup is key, of course, but I've found I always forget that the card does nothing in your hand when you're in a tight spot. Izzet Charm is a card I think you play if you really "get it" and know what you're digging for.
I really want to play tap-out with our card selection, which Read the Bones would force us into alongside Jace, AOT, Niv, Anger of the Gods, and Master of Cruelties.
If I want to play draw-go, I think I'd want to stick with UB. You still have access to planeswalker removal (Murrrdduuuurrrrbooooorreeeee), counters, and some pseudos-sweepers (do we even need them?) all at instant speed. Bingo bango.
People are acting like tokens won't be a thing. What were generally the top two decks people were playing in block? Generally Selesnya and RDW. RDW is probably difficult for us but as long as you're packing cheap removal it shouldn't be an automatic lose (or maybe it's a good matchup for us with cheap burn and Staticaster in the SB, really this matchup is dependent on your deck and not a general outcome every single person playing Grixis Control). Selesnya should be a blowout. Play bounce spells MD. At bare minimum, it lets you set up for late game.
Draw-go seems like it needs Inspiration. I really want to play Omenspeaker in draw-go since I always lose the die roll against aggro decks. Their two drop is so important and if I'm on the play I just don't have an option to deal with it until the next turn. Turn 3 for RDW can be 11 damage [Denizen, Emissary, Fire-Fister, Phoenix] (keep mind we're at 2 mana). Like jeez, maybe I counter Phoenix. Omenspeaker might (with Fire-Fister in mind) be a roadblock. Maybe. But probably we just need to play a sorcery speed sweeper (see Anger of the Gods). Which would incline me torwards not playing draw-go.
Has Sanguine Bond been tried? Now, it slows The Rock considerably, but I've found our spot removal and Mutilates acceptable (I run Farseek to hit it t3). Some people have dropped the Farseek, which is understandable as we don't need it like Jund would need it (it's not often we're casting more than one spell a turn).
Sanguine Bond gives us the punching power we want with Disciple. Disciple can often be disappointing when you rip a Thragtusk for 3 lands and some subpar cards.
I'm placing the card in over Liliana (which opens me up to a variety of Tier 1.5 decks like hexproof but I think after SB that I get game 2 & 3). We don't get value out of our discards. I don't run the ooze so there's that. My creature package and enchantment suit looks like:
Nighthawk might have more of a place in this build, although hitting their bombs is huge with LZ. Geralf's lets us stay resilient to Jund (though the Ooze makes it a lot worse) and U/W/x control.
This puts us waaaayyy top heavy in the curve, which is probably a mistake but one I'm willing to make. t4 Sanguine Bond into t5 Thragtusk is hard to get around.
A landed Homicidal Seclusion and Sanguine Bond is usually gg if I have a creature but HS is a miser so supposing that happens often is incorrect. Sanguine Bond lets us have the mirror, I think. Fireballing your Thragtusks can't be bad if you can get to 5 mana. I've found this switch up makes us much more draw dependent but I think we mulligan well since we've already got The Rock creature shell.
Sideboard is switched due to Sanguine Bond. I need reanimator tech since I don't run the ooze. 2x Crypt Incursion would seem to do the trick (mostly I just want to kill a reanimator deck with Crypt Incursion but that seems unlikely because they'll probably already over 30 life by the time they have 10 creatures in their graveyard). 2x Tribute to Hunger and 1x Barter in Blood for the hexproof matchup.
On the Scavenging Ooze: This card would make a ton of sense in this build, right? Well, I'm not sure. The green necessary for the card puts us in an awkward place. I can't just drop it and start ripping creatures from graveyards because I've got usually only 2-3 green sources in play (10 total in land base). That's something I think I've got to screw around more with. Was Ooze the guy who displaced Farseek in this build? If so, I'm not sure I want to go below 3x Farseek since t3 Mutilate can keep us out of burn range against an aggro deck. Any pre-Ooze and post-Ooze The Rock standard players want to weigh in on this?
There are loads of playables for The Rock, so if you can think of options that would be better (even if Sanguine Bond needs to go out of the MD and into the binder) let me know.
Aetherling as a finisher is pretty undisputed around these parts (unless, y'know, Drownyard). However, we tend to have some variation on our #2.
First, a #2 would seem to be necessary in case of getting #1 stripped, which a number of control decks run (Pithing Needle, Slaughter Games). An ultimate Jace or Ral after Aetherling gets stripped only seems good if you get the stuff that lets you kill your opponent, otherwise you've just played a bunch of stuff that makes the game go much longer. Therefore, running a #2 would seem to allow us a second route, in case #1 isn't an option. You don't need 4x #2 but that seems pretty obvious for anyone who knows the ins and outs of running a standard control deck.
So should we run Olivia? Chapin states in his interview that the 2 best finishers in standard are Olivia and Aetherling. I'm not completely sold on his argument. Olivia might be the best finisher in Jund but I'm not sure she's the best in Grixis. Jund operates under the notion that it gets to mid to late game much sooner than anyone else. Getting 6 mana for Olivia can happen t4-5 with a dork and Farseek. We have t5 if we land a keyrune. We're already stretched thin with needing to keep the board generally clear from t1-t(infinity), alotting for the occasional 3 power duder getting in there. Olivia is very mana intensive. She's great for Jund since getting to 6 or more mana is not unfeasible. They can play her and use her in the same turn.
We don't appear to be in the same situation. Let's say that we play her t6. We can thing ping a dork or set ourselves up to steal a dude next turn. Jund can put here in t6, ping a dude, and maybe kill a x/2 dude. If she gets killed when the opponent untaps, no big deal since you're got a number of other threats. We don't have that luxury since most are running lots of counters/spot removal. We play Olivia with the hope that we can untap. If we can't we don't get that much.
Niv-Mizzet is in the same position. If we don't untap with Niv (let's say we play them the same turn. I generally play Olivia with 6 mana so that I can get here to 4/4. Though in a bind, I will use her to chump block. The flexibility of 4cmc rather than 6cmc is not quite taken into consideration here.) then, whatever, we're in the same spot that we had with Olivia.
If we untap with Niv, then we can start pinging to their head or remove creatures. He's similar to Olivia in that regard. However, if you need an out, you don't have to steal, you can just ping and dig. I am under the impression that our spells are powerful. On the stack, Niv can protect himself since he can dig for a Far // Away getting him back to your hand.
I've started working with Niv to see what happens. Even though his mana cost is higher than Olivia, I've been happy with him. Olivia requires your decks strengths to be in your mana and we're brutally outclassed by Jund. Niv lets us play to our strengths which are our spells.
However, if you can claim (with personal experience) that, even though we don't use Olivia like Jund, Olivia is preferable to Niv then I'm all ears. I've found that Olivia needs a couple turns of sticking around to really get good use. Niv digs when you untap. He can perform the same action as Olivia (ping dudes) but has a better 2nd option (dig rather than steal). He is more expensive (sort of illogical given that I previously stated that Olivia is worse since she requires more mana but this goes back to the statement that Olivia isn't really 4cmc except when situations are dire) but is more worth it in my experience. Niv also hits harder for his first swing, which is nice.
Rakdos Cackler seems better than Deathrite in any aggro build. Deathrite would seem to just be hitting their instants and sorceries for endgame burn and gain us life from our pitched creatures. If our threats can stick around, do we need the endgame burn?
Also, I know we want perfect mana all the time but why run Guildgates when you could just hope for the best with 4x Overgrown and 20 basics? Speeds seems critical here.
For the build I'm working on, I'm thinking 4x DD and 2x Deadbridge for cheap big bodies and cheap scavenge targets for Varolz. 6 at 4cmc seems like a bit much but things slow down at rotation, right? Either way, this deck doesn't seem super great right now because we don't play Falkenrath Aristocrat.
Is a Cavern not a significant problem for you then? Depending on Far // Away and Tribute and a single Dreadbore seems borderline sketchy to me for spot removal in that regard.
They're only at 4 power. R/G is one example where Doom Blade is better due to their plethora of mono-colored creatures (EDIT:whoops, non-black*) outside of BTE.
I would advocate that Devour Flesh plus a deck well-rounded in Syncopates/Essence Scatter. While this case wouldn't be better with Devour Flesh, it would be better having an Essence Scatter in this case than Doom Blade IMO.
As said previously, Devour Flesh isn't a sham-wow card. It's aggregate worth, however, that cleans up after you hit the top of their curve with your counter. If you counter Stormbreath, you're looking at 4 power, one of which is a Defender. At this point, cast Devour Flesh knowing that it doesn't really matter what you hit.
In a deck full of spot removal, Devour Flesh probably sucks (I ran it in the side when I ran mostly grixis spot removal pre-rotation). Now, along with Syncopate, my tune has completely changed on this card.
I think Doom Blade might have a place in the MD, I just think that I'd run more Devour Fleshs than I would Doom Blades. Doom Blade and Ultimate Price are perfect SB players. Sort of like explosive 6th men on a basketball squad; they're super effective some of the time but pretty bad enough of the time to not put them in the starting lineup.
Pithing Needle functions in a similar way, say if you're having trouble with Domri or the like.
Devour Flesh is better than Doom Blade because usually you can let their t2 resolve [exception being RDW], or have to if they're on the play. After that, leave mana open for counters for t3-t53 and you can EoT Devour Flesh. If you let them establish a board presence where they have options such as sacking something undesirable, you're doing something wrong (probably). Sure Doom Blade gives you more leeway with letting stuff resolve and killing their dude while a monstrosity is on the stack, but Doom Blade is dodged by a lot of relevant standard beaters. Maybe Hero's Downfall is better (?) but it is super slow.
Though this is just repitition for most.
I like the Shimmering Grotto manabase a lot. Functionally, it lets us use our cheap spells much faster than Prophetic Prism and doesn't require the t2 manasink (which stinks for us). It's not very good as your land drop t1-t2 but should iron itself out into the late game.
I like Cyclonic Rift a lot. It's a 2x MD for me.
I'm finding I only splash red for 4x Augury, 2x AotG, and miser Master of Cruelties.
@Izzet Charm: Looting requires that you actually have a hand bigger than 2, which isn't always the case. The shock requires an x/2 (I have no idea how many decks run x/2s, but from looking around the forum it's RDW, Boros, and... dork decks, I guess?). The counter matters for about 5 turns. It's a conditionally good card. I also like most of my cards as passable topdecks. This is maybe one of the worst.
We don't have a developed standard and people are advocating cards that are only for specific metas.
Doesn't that sound incorrect?
You can Essence Scatter a God. You can Essence Scatter a Blood Baron.
We have answers. Just because you didn't get a FNM promo of them doesn't mean that you shouldn't use obvious ones like Essence Scatter, Syncopate, and Devour Flesh. These are general cards and their breadth is wide. Narrowness is good when you know what you're looking for. Breadth is good when you're looking at a FNM of 25 homebrews or daily 8 random piles of RtR+Theros.
Edit:
@ the note on INS/Hayes email: I mean it's probably alot of counters. It would seem like 2-4x Devour Flesh functions as well as a counter in some cases. Or, gee, Lightning Strike. People played Searing Spear last year because it was an OK card. That extra point of damage makes it a much more comfortable play, I think. I wouldn't go down much further from where they're at. Counters are super good right now.
Pre-rotation I had The Rock put together but wanted some extra punching power for the inevitable mirror that I would be facing in an upcoming IQ. Now, the IQ got cancelled so I only have play testing results but I ran 2x Sanguine Bond and 1x Homicidal Seclusion. It worked well. My Thragtuks turned into fireballs and my mutavaults could turn into a 10 point life swing in moments of "living the dream." Oh, and Disciple was much better. Of course, it slowed me down, as I did not run Liliana to stop the hexproof guys and general aggro decks. The engine itself was not damaged since I still ran 4x Thragtusk, 4x DD, and 3x Disciple (one more than regular so Discipling a LZ or Geralf's was not a bad play).
Now, I have done 0 playtesting for this deck and I don't think I'll be running it this week or in the near future. But the Whip would seem to be a better Homicidal Seclusion. Thragtusk is gone but Grey is there as well as Reaper of the Wilds. Scavenging Ooze became a little greater than incremental. The biggest thing missing is Disciple when running Sanguine Bond, as the burn and draw ability is incredible. I just wish re-animator were still a thing so Crypt Incursion & Sanguine Bond would be a legitimate win-con. Bond also boosts devotion.
The biggest problem is that it make this deck just a little more contingent on card draw. It makes it worse against aggro since adding a t5 enchantment does you no favors. Sanguine Bond should be able to operate with both Reaper and Grey making Whip not necessary, but just Bond and creatures is not what I'd consider an impending doom for your opponent.
And then it might just be "win-more."
Take what you will.
I'd rather run another counter. It's a SB card for sure. Maindeck if you're paranoid about creatures that aren't in standard showing up in standard decks.
Running mill as a win-con is miserable. I'm doing it for UB because "no other good options other than Aetherling". But really, discussing Mind Grind because it's hilarious more than legitimate.
Hero's Downfall isn't great. The only advantage it has over Dreadbore is that you can EoT a planeswalker when the drop him on t3, so they only get 1 activation off. Dreadbore then pseudo taps you out (hope you weren't missing your land drops) but I don't notice a huge difference. Murder didn't see a ton of play in lists. I don't see this as much better.
Someone earlier said that Syncopate is the card to have in our decks. I hated Syncopate this summer. But now I think it's the bomb. I'm not sure why, but I always seem to be able to rip it off for something awesome starting with rotation testing.
Play Devour Flesh. Play more than one. It's good. It won't be obviously good. But work with it a lot and you'll start to see it. t2 Devour Flesh and t3 Away is nuts and you don't even have to worry about rogue monoblack decks. Also, you don't have to freak about Rootborn and Charms with Devour.
I'm considering Quicken for Grixis and it makes me sick.
Specter is a bad card, but perfect mana fixing sounds okay to me. The interaction is interesting at least.
While running Grixis, I'm not sure why one would want to run more Inspiration than Steam Augury. In a tap-out build, Inspiration seems much worse.
In a dual colored deck, I can understand Inspiration, but for this shard we've already established that we need a lot of dig.
In my testing for UB, I've found that 4x Inspiration and 2x Opportunity is enough. It's not like we have access to a bunch of cheap cycling or draw that is any good. Grixis gives us Steam Augury but it's not like that lowers our draw curve. Acting like the block decks won't port and that we can have a avg mana cost of 10.5 or whatever is incorrect. The decks will be reasonably fast with little staying power outside of VoR, Rootborn Defenses, and Boros/Golgari Charm. So running 8 draw spells that cost 4 or more mana seems like a bad time. I'd rather just run a full set of Devour Flesh.
Magma Jet has been bleh in testing. It's fine against RDW but sucks against Selesnya and mono-green lists.
I feel that Mind Grind gives us more control since you can just count their lands. Psychic Spiral is a exhausting wait until you get to 25 cards in your graveyard and is dependent on you getting stuff in your gy whereas Mind Grind is dependent on you hitting land drops. Acting like tapping out is a big deal at that point in the game is kind of silly. Either they have the counter or the fattie or they don't. If you're worried about it, leave mana open for a counter. Having tested both, I don't think either Mind Grind or Psychic Spiral is very good. Their impact and the way I end up playing them is virtually the same (although one I can do EoT, big whoop I guess). If you lose a single game, your possibility of going to turns is very high. Nobody likes to play on turns. Neither is MD-able IMO unless you're full blown permission.
Psychic Spiral is probably better, although I think Mind Grind gives us more control over what we hit them for.
4x Inspiration and 2x Opportunity has worked well. I've been running 2x Mutavault as pseudo-Snapcaster beats.
Consuming Aberration misses a lot of the typical removal. At least we can Devour Flesh for a whole bunch. Aetherling is a better more consistent finisher but I enjoy the cute finishers.
I'm not sure how Thoughtseize is really that good in our MU matchups. It doesn't stall the board, allowing us to get the the mana that we can rip them apart at, it just puts them down a card. Now that card could be crucial (see whatever 4 or 3 drop they adopt) but pulling apart a hand that has a bevy of two and one drops seems senseless. 2 life for a lottery seems not super great. Just OK.
However, thoughtseize in the matchup with new Jund or U/W/x decks is : DDDDDD.
Anger of the Gods was the sweeper we needed this summer. Well now it's here. Thank God(s).
I think 4x Jace stinks. Unless you're automatically going for -2 in every situation. I like the flexibility that 2-3 Jaces gives you. Ultimating him happens a lot more than you'd think.
Here's what I was thinkin'
3x Omenspeaker
2x Niv-Mizzet
1x Aetherling
Planeswalkers (2)
2x Jace, Architect of Thought
Instants and Sorceries (24)
3x Essence Scatter
2x Psychic Strike
2x Dreadbore
4x Inspiration
1x Opportunity
3x Anger of the Gods
1x Cyclonic Rift
4x Far // Away
1x Rakdos's Return
2x Thoughtseize
1x Izzet Charm
2x Rakdos Keyrune
Land (26)
4x Blood Crypt
4x Steam Vents
4x Watery Grave
2x Izzet Guildgate
2x Rakdos Guildgate
2x Temple of Deceit
3x Swamps
3x Mountain
2x Island
2x Thoughtseize
2x Shock
1x Dissolve
2x Staticaster
2x Crypt Incursion
2x Ratchet Bomb
2x Counterflux
2x Devour Flesh
We are much better situated with aggro than we were before. Crypt Incursion is included in the SB because it works well with Psychic Strike. Maze's End.dec might be a sort of thing post-rotation. Perhaps Encroaching Wastes still has to be considered? Keyrune is still our best interpretation of ramp. It defends fairly well.
I'm running 4x Far // Away since fusing both halves EoT got substantially better with Thoughtseize.
When I pick up Izzet Charm in a grip full of grixis cards, I know that I don't use it correctly. People have tried to explain the card but I think the understanding and timing of the card has to be developed more than explained. I think it's one of those weird "well, you just have to do it" parts of Magic. Knowing your matchup is key, of course, but I've found I always forget that the card does nothing in your hand when you're in a tight spot. Izzet Charm is a card I think you play if you really "get it" and know what you're digging for.
Things I could have missed:
Read the Bones
Steam Augury
Ultimate Price
Hero's Downfall
Magmajet
Thoughtflare
Cute cards:
Grave Betrayal (I'm more curious about how people would play around this card rather than actually putting it in a competitive deck.
Hythonia the Cruel
Mercurial Chemister
If I want to play draw-go, I think I'd want to stick with UB. You still have access to planeswalker removal (Murrrdduuuurrrrbooooorreeeee), counters, and some pseudos-sweepers (do we even need them?) all at instant speed. Bingo bango.
People are acting like tokens won't be a thing. What were generally the top two decks people were playing in block? Generally Selesnya and RDW. RDW is probably difficult for us but as long as you're packing cheap removal it shouldn't be an automatic lose (or maybe it's a good matchup for us with cheap burn and Staticaster in the SB, really this matchup is dependent on your deck and not a general outcome every single person playing Grixis Control). Selesnya should be a blowout. Play bounce spells MD. At bare minimum, it lets you set up for late game.
Draw-go seems like it needs Inspiration. I really want to play Omenspeaker in draw-go since I always lose the die roll against aggro decks. Their two drop is so important and if I'm on the play I just don't have an option to deal with it until the next turn. Turn 3 for RDW can be 11 damage [Denizen, Emissary, Fire-Fister, Phoenix] (keep mind we're at 2 mana). Like jeez, maybe I counter Phoenix. Omenspeaker might (with Fire-Fister in mind) be a roadblock. Maybe. But probably we just need to play a sorcery speed sweeper (see Anger of the Gods). Which would incline me torwards not playing draw-go.
Sanguine Bond gives us the punching power we want with Disciple. Disciple can often be disappointing when you rip a Thragtusk for 3 lands and some subpar cards.
I'm placing the card in over Liliana (which opens me up to a variety of Tier 1.5 decks like hexproof but I think after SB that I get game 2 & 3). We don't get value out of our discards. I don't run the ooze so there's that. My creature package and enchantment suit looks like:
3x Lifebane Zombie
3x Geralf's Messenger
2x Disciple of Bolas
4x Thragtusk
4x Desecration Demon
2x Sanguine Bond
1x Homicidal Seclusion
Nighthawk might have more of a place in this build, although hitting their bombs is huge with LZ. Geralf's lets us stay resilient to Jund (though the Ooze makes it a lot worse) and U/W/x control.
This puts us waaaayyy top heavy in the curve, which is probably a mistake but one I'm willing to make. t4 Sanguine Bond into t5 Thragtusk is hard to get around.
A landed Homicidal Seclusion and Sanguine Bond is usually gg if I have a creature but HS is a miser so supposing that happens often is incorrect. Sanguine Bond lets us have the mirror, I think. Fireballing your Thragtusks can't be bad if you can get to 5 mana. I've found this switch up makes us much more draw dependent but I think we mulligan well since we've already got The Rock creature shell.
Sideboard is switched due to Sanguine Bond. I need reanimator tech since I don't run the ooze. 2x Crypt Incursion would seem to do the trick (mostly I just want to kill a reanimator deck with Crypt Incursion but that seems unlikely because they'll probably already over 30 life by the time they have 10 creatures in their graveyard). 2x Tribute to Hunger and 1x Barter in Blood for the hexproof matchup.
On the Scavenging Ooze: This card would make a ton of sense in this build, right? Well, I'm not sure. The green necessary for the card puts us in an awkward place. I can't just drop it and start ripping creatures from graveyards because I've got usually only 2-3 green sources in play (10 total in land base). That's something I think I've got to screw around more with. Was Ooze the guy who displaced Farseek in this build? If so, I'm not sure I want to go below 3x Farseek since t3 Mutilate can keep us out of burn range against an aggro deck. Any pre-Ooze and post-Ooze The Rock standard players want to weigh in on this?
There are loads of playables for The Rock, so if you can think of options that would be better (even if Sanguine Bond needs to go out of the MD and into the binder) let me know.
Aetherling as a finisher is pretty undisputed around these parts (unless, y'know, Drownyard). However, we tend to have some variation on our #2.
First, a #2 would seem to be necessary in case of getting #1 stripped, which a number of control decks run (Pithing Needle, Slaughter Games). An ultimate Jace or Ral after Aetherling gets stripped only seems good if you get the stuff that lets you kill your opponent, otherwise you've just played a bunch of stuff that makes the game go much longer. Therefore, running a #2 would seem to allow us a second route, in case #1 isn't an option. You don't need 4x #2 but that seems pretty obvious for anyone who knows the ins and outs of running a standard control deck.
So should we run Olivia? Chapin states in his interview that the 2 best finishers in standard are Olivia and Aetherling. I'm not completely sold on his argument. Olivia might be the best finisher in Jund but I'm not sure she's the best in Grixis. Jund operates under the notion that it gets to mid to late game much sooner than anyone else. Getting 6 mana for Olivia can happen t4-5 with a dork and Farseek. We have t5 if we land a keyrune. We're already stretched thin with needing to keep the board generally clear from t1-t(infinity), alotting for the occasional 3 power duder getting in there. Olivia is very mana intensive. She's great for Jund since getting to 6 or more mana is not unfeasible. They can play her and use her in the same turn.
We don't appear to be in the same situation. Let's say that we play her t6. We can thing ping a dork or set ourselves up to steal a dude next turn. Jund can put here in t6, ping a dude, and maybe kill a x/2 dude. If she gets killed when the opponent untaps, no big deal since you're got a number of other threats. We don't have that luxury since most are running lots of counters/spot removal. We play Olivia with the hope that we can untap. If we can't we don't get that much.
Niv-Mizzet is in the same position. If we don't untap with Niv (let's say we play them the same turn. I generally play Olivia with 6 mana so that I can get here to 4/4. Though in a bind, I will use her to chump block. The flexibility of 4cmc rather than 6cmc is not quite taken into consideration here.) then, whatever, we're in the same spot that we had with Olivia.
If we untap with Niv, then we can start pinging to their head or remove creatures. He's similar to Olivia in that regard. However, if you need an out, you don't have to steal, you can just ping and dig. I am under the impression that our spells are powerful. On the stack, Niv can protect himself since he can dig for a Far // Away getting him back to your hand.
I've started working with Niv to see what happens. Even though his mana cost is higher than Olivia, I've been happy with him. Olivia requires your decks strengths to be in your mana and we're brutally outclassed by Jund. Niv lets us play to our strengths which are our spells.
However, if you can claim (with personal experience) that, even though we don't use Olivia like Jund, Olivia is preferable to Niv then I'm all ears. I've found that Olivia needs a couple turns of sticking around to really get good use. Niv digs when you untap. He can perform the same action as Olivia (ping dudes) but has a better 2nd option (dig rather than steal). He is more expensive (sort of illogical given that I previously stated that Olivia is worse since she requires more mana but this goes back to the statement that Olivia isn't really 4cmc except when situations are dire) but is more worth it in my experience. Niv also hits harder for his first swing, which is nice.
Pretty sure we had a miscommunication.
I mean to ask if Cavern of Souls had any impact on your counters and if you felt that GQ was not a necessity in that regard.
Also, I know we want perfect mana all the time but why run Guildgates when you could just hope for the best with 4x Overgrown and 20 basics? Speeds seems critical here.
For the build I'm working on, I'm thinking 4x DD and 2x Deadbridge for cheap big bodies and cheap scavenge targets for Varolz. 6 at 4cmc seems like a bit much but things slow down at rotation, right? Either way, this deck doesn't seem super great right now because we don't play Falkenrath Aristocrat.
Is a Cavern not a significant problem for you then? Depending on Far // Away and Tribute and a single Dreadbore seems borderline sketchy to me for spot removal in that regard.