Thanks for testing him out, Lectrys. I will probably put him in as a 1-of when the set is released.
Interesting that you brought up Coating. I wonder if there's a deck that plays him and Karn. If you throw Saheeli in there, too, and Altar of the brood, you have yourself a weird (bad) combo deck.
Yeah, absolutely. I've been on about 3 serum visions over the stars. I was never on stars, even post-urza, because I always found there was too much tension between needing their draw ability and wanting to keep an artifact around. Witching Well, like astrolabe, yields enough of a payoff I believe on ETB that you're happy to have its effect along with the artifact left over. It's basically like a serum visions that swaps the random draw 1 (usually less important early game than the scry 2) for a later game draw 2, all while giving you an artifact in the meantime. And then it also has the added benefit of being a good late-game topdeck, reading scry 2 + draw 2, all for only 1 more generic mana than Glimmer of Genius.
So already a few spoilers from Throne are looking good for us. Witching Well seems like it could be a 2 of or so, as it makes a pretty decent turn one play to hit land drops, helps enable metalcraft, taps for whir or urza, and draws cards late. And the simic 3-drop walker makes artifact tokens with its +2, can turn stuff like astrolabes into 3/3's, and can likewise turn problem creatures and artifacts into 3/3's. It's also a good card against burn, as the food tokens yield 3 life and the loyalty is so high.
There already are quite a few people hopping on. The mirror is pretty fun, because you can go a few different ways with it. I try to put in as many prison cards as possible, and either needle foundry ASAP, or if I can go off first, then great. I usually find my opponent making a few mistakes, but that will go down once everyone gets more and more practice. Plague Engineer is probably the best card in the mirror.
Padeem has been tickling my fancy recently, but I don't quite think the current meta calls for it. I still don't think stars or wellspring are worth the slots, and that some number of visions (maybe even 1-2) can help smooth mulligans.
Still losing to tron, mostly. Hogaak is still hard, but I've learned to stop attacking the graveyard and focus on board control more, which helps. Storm variants, including twiddle storm, is on the rise, so more Ego may be called for. And a lot of red aggro/prowess decks means whenever I drop below 3 battle at the bridge I find myself being punished.
I think this forum does need a new name. While I don't exactly prefer Whirza, it has become the most recognizable and I don't want to try to force the issue to something we old timers prefer.
I wanted to mention that I've been messing around with an Esper build featuring Scheming Symmetry instead of the usual 4-color with Goblin Engineer. Symmetry is a card that presents a fun deck-building challenge, which I enjoy, but other than that symmetry also enables a quick Terminus which can be backbreaking against Hogaak after they get their 14-16 power on board. While I don't really think this build is anywhere close to better than 4 color, I do like some of the lines it has. And where symmetry requires other pseudo bad cards to work, this deck can afford to play some do-nothing artifacts like Codex Shredder.
Right now, for cards that make Symmetry work, I'm on:
Thought scour, raveler, and altar all offer decent payoffs that the deck already wants (altar for infinite mill over some other infinite payoff). Terminus is a 1-of main, 1-of sideboard. So Shredder is basically the chaff, which I'm OK with because it has some micro-synergies with bauble, early self mill to hit a sword, and recurring something late game. I'll continue to test it out for fun, and report back.
For the most part, I agree with his sideboadring guide (if you happen to play those cards), but I definitely would board out 3 opals against both Jund and UW control, and not board out Goblin Engineers. Against Jund, they represent card advantage by fetching astrolabes and recurring them.
I think his build is sub-optimal. I don't like Chromatic Star over Serum Visions, even playing with Sai, which is currently not a card I would maindeck given all of the Tron and Hogaak running around. If you're looking for a 1-drop artifact that can be sacced for value, why not just max out on Nihil Spellbomb, which at the minimum does that job at the cost of one B mana extra, but in other situations exiles graveyards early on. I dunno. I see lists that he linked to with Pentad Prism and just cringe at his comment that "it synergizes nicely with whir" that lack the deeper context that while prism allows you to more easily whir for bridge on turn 3, that any 0 cmc artifact does an equal job because you don't have to take your second turn off and can play a more relevant artifact (and will have a more empty hand for that bridge).
I wouldn't bring back Jar, necessarily. I'd rather just put in Sai in the sideboard or something, or more Dead of Winter. The biggest new threat out of Jund is certainly Plague Engineer. Sweepers like Dead of Winter still clean up against them.
As for playing this deck online, absolutely don't just make thopters for Urza's ability unless you need to. Typically, if you're up against combo or Tron, you just need to get *something* from Urza. Like a needle for O-Stone, or something like that. It doesn't have to be your win-con. Today, I had infinite on board game 2 against tron, and I Urza'd for 5 minutes (I'd already won game one) to get a needle on O-Stone, thinking that was his only out. Sadly, he had an Emrakul the Promised End, and then proceeded to exile my deck with Urza. If I had just played and sacced all my thopters foundries, he wouldn't have been able to do this. Oh well, lesson learned. So while it's hard to know all your opponent's outs, you do get a feel for the bare minimum to just win.
Yeah, there are a ton online, too. The deck is basically just as hard, if not harder for us now, because the spots vacated by bridge and altar (which are both kind of shut down nicely by pithing needle) are now going to either more interaction or maindeck leylines. I've been involved in a lot of close battles with the deck, and getting eeked out. I'm thinking of putting Plague Engineers in the sideboard for Zombie.
Honestly, I think I have a better record against tron these days than I do Hogaak. If Hogaak just didn't have trample...
Now everyone's sideboard looks a lot different, and I think that's fine, as long as you know what you want to do with all the cards pretty well. My sideboard changes fairly often, but these 4 sideboard cards are set in stone for me: Ego, Battle, Deputy, Dead of Winter. Ego is just the best card against combo, battle gives you the best possible card against burn and other aggro decks not named infect, deputy is a great catch-all that can't be hit by negate, veto, denial, or force, and Dead of Winter can swing certain matchups. Spell pierce has been pretty good, recently. But if more dredge and new Hogaak increases, I might have to look at more spellbombs in the side.
To answer your question about Cavern for artificer, just remember that your opponent has a finite number of counterspells and resources. If they counter your goblin, that's one less mana leak they can use on something else. And that's even if they have a leak or the delve counterspell. So, in other words, adding a land just to marginally shore up one matchup that is already sort of in our favor seems like a mistake.
This has all happened before, and it will happen again. Pentad prism is bad! BAD I TELL YOU!
JLambe, list looks good. I personally think 3 whir is where we want to be right now, but I do understand the card is now flexible. Give Deputy of Detention a try out of the board, (probably over explosives), and I think you will find yourself boarding him in and finding him useful more often than you'd think.
Yesterday I've came up with the idea that maybe it is no longer that far fetched to just dump the enchantment removal from the SB and go with 4 Altar of the Brood + 3 Sai, Master Thopterist.
What do you guys think? Has anyone tried that so far?
I tried altar of the brood in the side way back when. It was only good against UW control and stuff like Scapeshift, and that was back when our maindeck didn't present as robust a threat suite. Today, Altar would be a poor sideboard choice, as it has no utility outside of being a win-con and a slow one compared with other options.
But to your first point, dumping enchantment removal for me looks like shifting to more flexible answers. I play 2 Teferi maindeck, which can bounce problem permanents, and from the sideboard, I play 2 Deputy of Detention, which can obviously hit enchantments, but is also good against decks like dredge.
Kanister streamed that deck yesterday and seemed pretty unimpressed with it. I'm not sold on what Karn really adds to the deck
Agree. I've tried jamming Karn and Thopter/Sword for a while (pre Horizons, too) and Karn just doesn't add much in a direction that the deck tends to want to go.
@St3ncil - I've thought about Bitter Ordeal, but imagine it's turn 3 against a combo deck. Wouldn't you much rather have an Unmoored Ego in hand?
To answer your question, I think it doesn't make the cut. If you're using it to make tokens with engineer, I can't imagine the board state where the few 1/1's you're making are going to make a difference over the scenario of drawing cards by recurring astrolabe. Sword getting extracted is actually pretty rare, and usually only happens when an opponent casts a turn 1 or 2 discard into surgical.
My personal opinion is that all 2 cmc "value" targets for engineer, such as wellspring and schematic, are win-more. Engineer should be fetching combo pieces primarily, and if that is a risky route for whatever reason, then he should be fetching astrolabe to draw cards. Why spend valuable deck slots on these slight upgrades to astrolabe that could be more low-to-the-ground cards like serum visions, or removal, or additional silver bullets to shore up week matchups, or alternate win-cons like aether grid?
I've played the mirror quite a few times, including today. I like to prison up as much as possible post board, needle foundry asap and try to outgrind. But everyone's sideboard strategy is different right now. For instance, I lost game 3 because of an unexpected plague engineer killing my goblin after I chumped his goblin. The mirror seems to be who can land an urza first. Aether grid is still money in the mirror - I really don't understand why people run spellbomb + trawler.
My favorite card of all time: Vesuvan Doppleganger. When I laid eyes on it as a 13 year old, MtG became the game that I played. Beautiful art, great power at the time, fun to play, and one of the first desirable rares I ever opened out of a pack.
Interesting that you brought up Coating. I wonder if there's a deck that plays him and Karn. If you throw Saheeli in there, too, and Altar of the brood, you have yourself a weird (bad) combo deck.
Still losing to tron, mostly. Hogaak is still hard, but I've learned to stop attacking the graveyard and focus on board control more, which helps. Storm variants, including twiddle storm, is on the rise, so more Ego may be called for. And a lot of red aggro/prowess decks means whenever I drop below 3 battle at the bridge I find myself being punished.
I think this forum does need a new name. While I don't exactly prefer Whirza, it has become the most recognizable and I don't want to try to force the issue to something we old timers prefer.
Right now, for cards that make Symmetry work, I'm on:
Thought scour, raveler, and altar all offer decent payoffs that the deck already wants (altar for infinite mill over some other infinite payoff). Terminus is a 1-of main, 1-of sideboard. So Shredder is basically the chaff, which I'm OK with because it has some micro-synergies with bauble, early self mill to hit a sword, and recurring something late game. I'll continue to test it out for fun, and report back.
I think his build is sub-optimal. I don't like Chromatic Star over Serum Visions, even playing with Sai, which is currently not a card I would maindeck given all of the Tron and Hogaak running around. If you're looking for a 1-drop artifact that can be sacced for value, why not just max out on Nihil Spellbomb, which at the minimum does that job at the cost of one B mana extra, but in other situations exiles graveyards early on. I dunno. I see lists that he linked to with Pentad Prism and just cringe at his comment that "it synergizes nicely with whir" that lack the deeper context that while prism allows you to more easily whir for bridge on turn 3, that any 0 cmc artifact does an equal job because you don't have to take your second turn off and can play a more relevant artifact (and will have a more empty hand for that bridge).
As for playing this deck online, absolutely don't just make thopters for Urza's ability unless you need to. Typically, if you're up against combo or Tron, you just need to get *something* from Urza. Like a needle for O-Stone, or something like that. It doesn't have to be your win-con. Today, I had infinite on board game 2 against tron, and I Urza'd for 5 minutes (I'd already won game one) to get a needle on O-Stone, thinking that was his only out. Sadly, he had an Emrakul the Promised End, and then proceeded to exile my deck with Urza. If I had just played and sacced all my thopters foundries, he wouldn't have been able to do this. Oh well, lesson learned. So while it's hard to know all your opponent's outs, you do get a feel for the bare minimum to just win.
Honestly, I think I have a better record against tron these days than I do Hogaak. If Hogaak just didn't have trample...
4 Mishra's Bauble
4 Mox Opal
1 Grafdigger's Cage
3 Pithing Needle
4 Arcum's Astrolabe
4 Thopter Foundry
2 Sword of the Meek
1 Damping Sphere
1 Ensnaring Bridge
Creatures: 8
4 Goblin Engineer
4 Urza, Lord High Artificer
Instants/Sorceries: 5
2 Serum Visions
3 Whir of Invention
1 Ghirapur Aether Grid
2 Teferi, Time Raveler
Land: 20
4 Prismatic Vista
2 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
1 Watery Grave
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Steam Vents
1 Snow-Covered Swamp
1 Snow-Covered Plains
6 Snow-Covered Island
1 Spirebluff Canal
2 Unmoored Ego
3 Battle at the Bridge
2 Deputy of Detention
2 Blood Moon
3 Spell Pierce
1 Path to Exile
2 Dead of Winter
Now everyone's sideboard looks a lot different, and I think that's fine, as long as you know what you want to do with all the cards pretty well. My sideboard changes fairly often, but these 4 sideboard cards are set in stone for me: Ego, Battle, Deputy, Dead of Winter. Ego is just the best card against combo, battle gives you the best possible card against burn and other aggro decks not named infect, deputy is a great catch-all that can't be hit by negate, veto, denial, or force, and Dead of Winter can swing certain matchups. Spell pierce has been pretty good, recently. But if more dredge and new Hogaak increases, I might have to look at more spellbombs in the side.
To answer your question about Cavern for artificer, just remember that your opponent has a finite number of counterspells and resources. If they counter your goblin, that's one less mana leak they can use on something else. And that's even if they have a leak or the delve counterspell. So, in other words, adding a land just to marginally shore up one matchup that is already sort of in our favor seems like a mistake.
JLambe, list looks good. I personally think 3 whir is where we want to be right now, but I do understand the card is now flexible. Give Deputy of Detention a try out of the board, (probably over explosives), and I think you will find yourself boarding him in and finding him useful more often than you'd think.
I tried altar of the brood in the side way back when. It was only good against UW control and stuff like Scapeshift, and that was back when our maindeck didn't present as robust a threat suite. Today, Altar would be a poor sideboard choice, as it has no utility outside of being a win-con and a slow one compared with other options.
But to your first point, dumping enchantment removal for me looks like shifting to more flexible answers. I play 2 Teferi maindeck, which can bounce problem permanents, and from the sideboard, I play 2 Deputy of Detention, which can obviously hit enchantments, but is also good against decks like dredge.
Agree. I've tried jamming Karn and Thopter/Sword for a while (pre Horizons, too) and Karn just doesn't add much in a direction that the deck tends to want to go.
@St3ncil - I've thought about Bitter Ordeal, but imagine it's turn 3 against a combo deck. Wouldn't you much rather have an Unmoored Ego in hand?
To answer your question, I think it doesn't make the cut. If you're using it to make tokens with engineer, I can't imagine the board state where the few 1/1's you're making are going to make a difference over the scenario of drawing cards by recurring astrolabe. Sword getting extracted is actually pretty rare, and usually only happens when an opponent casts a turn 1 or 2 discard into surgical.
My personal opinion is that all 2 cmc "value" targets for engineer, such as wellspring and schematic, are win-more. Engineer should be fetching combo pieces primarily, and if that is a risky route for whatever reason, then he should be fetching astrolabe to draw cards. Why spend valuable deck slots on these slight upgrades to astrolabe that could be more low-to-the-ground cards like serum visions, or removal, or additional silver bullets to shore up week matchups, or alternate win-cons like aether grid?