Quote from Venomous72 »Quote from rothgar13 »It's not just you getting lucky, we're pretty decisively favored against Living End, so long as you play tight. Vial and Cursecatcher are huge against them, as is a post-Cascade Master of Waves. Their primer will say the same thing.
I need to practice more. That matchup is hard. I am certain I play it wrong. Got so close to a win last week. It just feels like I need pressure plus a counterspell in my hand the whole time.
The key here is to weigh whether you can muster a T4 kill with a counterspell for backup, or whether you need to ration your resources for the inevitable board wipe, then quickly recover. That's mostly determined by the cards you draw - if your hand is packing 3+ Lords and at least 1 (preferably 2) Cursecatcher/Negate/Spell Pierce, then you can go ahead and go for the throat (though watch out for Simian Spirit Guide) - otherwise, get 5 or so power on the board, pressure them until they have to cast a Cascade spell, then reassert yourself using Harbinger of the Tides, Master of Waves, and Tidebinder Mage in the sideboard. When choosing what color to wipe out using Spreading Seas, always try to take them off - both Cascade spells they employ (Demonic Dread and Violent Outburst) employ it. As long as you do that, you should be all right.
@Zulzanet: I'm guessing it'd be because you bump into Abzan Company, Elves, Grishoalbrand, and Kiki Chord more than you do Affinity, Bogles, Burn, or Infect, so the Cage would have more game against the field. But I agree - if we only look through the Living End lens, Chalice is categorically better in that matchup.
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It's the exact type of response I was talking about in my post. People ***** on ideas on this forum 99% of the time unless it comes from LSV or Reid or something. Yes there are bad ideas but often good ones (or ideas worth testing at least) are dismissed just as quickly.
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For example, Jund/Junk have been struggling with Eldrazi and Titanshift matchups. One gentleman in the Jund forum posted a list with Wrench Mind in the main and I think that is awesome. Goes after combo as well as emptying Eldrazi's hand. I am going to test a list with that soon. I remember last year or the year before there was a Big Abzan list (big junk...?) that had mainboard Sigarda, Big Elspeth, Wraths, etc. and it did very well against other midrange/Eldrazi decks. Just a couple examples obviously but you get the idea.
I feel like a lot of the issues that this forum or reddit thinks Modern has is because we all get pigeonholed into certain ways of thinking.
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It's good against Jeskai/control mirrors. Not sure if I am going to run 4 though. I wish I could see how Kevin Jones sideboarded.
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Agreed. This matchup already sucks. I wouldn't stress about one card that makes it slightly harder.
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*Looks at last two pages of this thread*
<_<...>_>....
War...war never changes....
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I never play dorks in my lists. I run 4 Rhinos. That dumb card has won me more games than any other card in Junk.
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I think Jund itself will probably sneak down to Tier 2, with Abzan moving back to the Tier 1 spot. I could be wrong, but if the goal is to out-grind AV decks, Lingering Souls is the answer for BGx.
Abzan also has Abrupt Decay for the thopter combo as well as Rest in Peace and Stony Silence. I also feel that Junk can hang with Grixis due to Souls and graveyard-nuking SB options, whereas I believe Jund is now just outclassed.
I am playing around with the idea of BUG, but the lack of a great kill spell (terminate, path, etc.) is tough.
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Goyf and Visions and Thopter-combo and Lilly.
Abrupt Decay and Scooze to fight the other combos, Visions to keep your hand reloaded/recover from multiple Lilly +1s.
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Lol the UWR thread thinks AV is no good for that deck. I look forward to the 'pros' jamming 4 and winning and seeing that thread do a complete 180.