So what you guys think? Mardu Kiki-Control a thing or you guys think I'm silly?
I played Boros Kiki-Control (+ a Godless Shrine for Lingering Souls) for a while and it was great against aggro and fairly even against BGx depending on the build. It struggled against Twin's tempo plan and rolled over to Bloom, so now that those menaces are gone I think it's worth another look. The black splash would help against combo, and I think Painful Truths needs to be in there at least as a 2 of in the 75 to help grindy matchups. The benefit of Mardu is that it can be tuned with a ton of land, search and graveyard hate if that is necessary. The downside is that it lacks the early pressure that BGx can generate, so Tron ends up still being tough even with a good amount of hate.
One thing you could look at for your build is having an opinionated maindeck. I know midrange in general tries to be saltine-bland in G1, but IMO Mardu can skew itself to beat aggro without giving up too much against other matchups.
I have found RiP to be great against any Grixis build as it shuts off their card advantage engines almost completely (particularly those running flip Jace but even ones without) and they have an extremely hard time getting rid of it. It's also just a pleasure to see the tilt when someone activates Tasigur with a RiP out.
103.1 covers shuffling at the beginning of the game. 716.2 covers shortcutting. The opponent could stop the shortcut to interact, but if they have no interaction couldn't force all the shuffles.
Lingering Souls looks a bit out of place in this style of deck - it's slow and without anthems or other pumps, or ways to get value from sacking tokens, is it underpowered? With your card advantage engines, you are likely to finish your opponent by burning them out. Your creatures get outclassed pretty quickly even with prowess, which is where Butcher/Falkenrath typically come in. So it may be worth exploring dropping the souls for some more aggro - Boros Charm, or a split like 2 Charm, 1 Kommand, 1 Terminate? More flat-out kill spells are probably worthwhile so that you can save your burn to go to the face and clear out fatties to keep attacking.
I think Secure is ok as a 1-of. Being instant speed counteracts some of the value "lost" by not casting it for a large amount, and it can randomly be quite powerful. However, having 2 in hand is generally not a great feeling.
I have considered Anathemancer as well, but it seems better if you are running Resto and/or Flickerwisp for extra effects. Otherwise, there is a lot of "cooperation" required on your opponents part to make it efficient since paying 3 mana to deal 1-3 damage is pretty meh. It can definitely be a gotcha card though against grindy midrange decks - I've had games against Grixis last until they had 10+ nonbasics. Just may be too cute.
It would be interesting to see stats on the times where Windbrisk obviously wins the game vs quietly loses the game. Everyone remembers the sweet plays where they drop an anthem or Persecution for a blowout, but I cut them when I kept losing due to it coming into play tapped and getting too far behind in tempo. While it is technically card advantage, it can't be considered a full card as there is the very real possibility that you will never get to attack with 3 creatures or it gets blown up.
What are the bad match up for wb token? For me I seems to be losing to merfolk and twin
Tron is terrible. Merfolk is pretty bad because Tokens is susceptible to blue tempo in general, and unblockability invalidates the defensiveness of tokens. Twin is not that bad, it's a matter of being patient but realizing you have to get a clock going since you are equally grindy but they have inevitability.
is wall of omens good in this deck in replacement for dark confidant? it impacts quickly and u get the value right away. if dark confidant gets removed u lose value.
It depends on what resources you value in your build. Wall of Omens is pretty good against aggro by preserving life with no resource loss. However, it doesn't do anything to get you closer to winning. While Bob is fragile he does provide early pressure and threatens to win the game both directly by attacking and indirectly through card advantage. Whether him getting killed is losing value depends on what else you are trying to do. If him eating removal means you can stick a bigger threat later it's not really lost value, it's a pseudo-Duress. If you don't have a follow-up threat it's worse.
well... let's say you play it T2 with 1 counter, then you spend each turn 1 mana to put a counter on. then it needs to die. than you have some tokens. Bitterblossom does the very same each turn for 0 mana and you can use the tokens right in the moment
Bitterblossom is 0 mana but 1 life per turn which some people have been complaining about. Obviously each have pros/cons which is why I am wondering if it's been tested.
Edit: the reason I brought it up is that there was a discussion about a Jund list running it, and it seems to fit the Tokens plan much better than Jund.
Has anyone tested out Hangarback Walker? It theoretically provides a resilient, proactive early play and the ability to go tall if necessary (granted it will take a while to get there but this deck goes long anyway...). While it technically turn on removal, it's nearly always going to be a 2+ for 1 in a meta with very few Paths around.
It seems like it may be helpful instead of saying "this is worse than X" to say "what does Mardu have access to that X/Y/Z don't?"
Let's assume the most likely comparable decks are Jund (midrange) and Grixis (combo, tempo and aggro-control). This means we are looking at what Wx uniquely brings:
Is it fair to say that any Mardu deck not relying on one of those is going to be a worse version of X? If so, how can we piece together the strengths of RB with these unique W facets?
I played Boros Kiki-Control (+ a Godless Shrine for Lingering Souls) for a while and it was great against aggro and fairly even against BGx depending on the build. It struggled against Twin's tempo plan and rolled over to Bloom, so now that those menaces are gone I think it's worth another look. The black splash would help against combo, and I think Painful Truths needs to be in there at least as a 2 of in the 75 to help grindy matchups. The benefit of Mardu is that it can be tuned with a ton of land, search and graveyard hate if that is necessary. The downside is that it lacks the early pressure that BGx can generate, so Tron ends up still being tough even with a good amount of hate.
One thing you could look at for your build is having an opinionated maindeck. I know midrange in general tries to be saltine-bland in G1, but IMO Mardu can skew itself to beat aggro without giving up too much against other matchups.
Tron is terrible. Merfolk is pretty bad because Tokens is susceptible to blue tempo in general, and unblockability invalidates the defensiveness of tokens. Twin is not that bad, it's a matter of being patient but realizing you have to get a clock going since you are equally grindy but they have inevitability.
It depends on what resources you value in your build. Wall of Omens is pretty good against aggro by preserving life with no resource loss. However, it doesn't do anything to get you closer to winning. While Bob is fragile he does provide early pressure and threatens to win the game both directly by attacking and indirectly through card advantage. Whether him getting killed is losing value depends on what else you are trying to do. If him eating removal means you can stick a bigger threat later it's not really lost value, it's a pseudo-Duress. If you don't have a follow-up threat it's worse.
Bitterblossom is 0 mana but 1 life per turn which some people have been complaining about. Obviously each have pros/cons which is why I am wondering if it's been tested.
Edit: the reason I brought it up is that there was a discussion about a Jund list running it, and it seems to fit the Tokens plan much better than Jund.
Let's assume the most likely comparable decks are Jund (midrange) and Grixis (combo, tempo and aggro-control). This means we are looking at what Wx uniquely brings:
Tokens
Lifegain
Blink/flicker effects
Hatebears/hatebirds
Mass reanimation
Walkers: Sorin, Elspeth, Ajani
Is it fair to say that any Mardu deck not relying on one of those is going to be a worse version of X? If so, how can we piece together the strengths of RB with these unique W facets?