It's PT week! All rejoice!
I wonder what everyone will be talking about here next monday hahaha...
I hope we won't be back to having people screaming to ban goyf, lotv, twin, scapeshift or other cards that is staple in modern.. lol.. But I guess that will be hard.. lol..
Just to ask you guys especially for those that plays more competitively such as going for GPT, GP, PTQ and PT. Undeniably that UWR control is a nice deck to play and require alot of knowledge regarding the meta and other decks to play it well but I'm interested to know how do you guys play around the length of the game?
When I play UWR control previously, games especially against BGx or mirror matches or control games against scapeshift and various decks tend to go long and at times into overtime and draws. With this in mind, in GP and big tournaments, usually 1 or 2 draws and perhaps another loss will means out of day 2 for the players so how do you prepare for long games then and ensure you don't draw often? I had friends who actually narrowly missed day 2 of GP simply because of a draw in one of the games and etc and hence one of their advise to me is to not to go into a overly controlling version as that usually means overtime and more draws which is very bad for big tournaments.
And also in such long games, it is also very mentally draining and to be able to do that consecutively 8 games or more seems very hard as well and so how do you guys prepare for mentally draining games especially now since BGx are more prevalent and hence longer are to be expected? Thanks.
You can try flashfreeze. it answers almost all of scapeshift cards except thrun..thoughtseize might be a better card against scapeshift since if they are comboing off, your life doesn't matter that much while you have th options to discard most of their big threats like titans and scapeshift except baloth.
valorous stance is also a card that I like to try against scapeshift as well since it deal with all their big creatures that they usually bring in in g2 and g3. I would take out shadow of doubt in main or sb though. it is mainly good if you hit or use it in turn 2 or 3. Using it in response to opponent casting scapeshift doesn't do much since scapeshift will either counter it or just don't sacrifice any lands.
I'm not sure what is your build but if you have mainboard discards and lilianna, it should be alot easier against scapeshift in game 1 because from experience, discards plus a successful resolution of lilianna usually dismantle my hand and make it very hard to combo off in G1 especially since now dig through time is gone. just my 2 cents.
I guess hero's blade probably will be for another build that runs alot more legendary creatures such as cliques, brimaz and the likes to really make full use of the free equip cost.. lol.. It is probably not very suitable if the only legendary creature inside is just Geist IMO.
I always thinK if you want to put leyline inside your sb, it should be at least 3 or 4.if you put only 1, you might as well put other cards cos leyline is a card that you will want to draw in your opening hand when you side it in in general like against bgx or burn type of decks..
Any other potential cards in FTR that you guys think might spike or go up alot cos of its' modern usage? Ugin, grandmaster?
I'm not a speculator. I just buy cards for own usage purely but of course I hope to buy them at a cheaper price instead of paying high prices for them. I saw the hype on forum on Tasigur and decided to just get a playset first and I managed to get playset at $6 USD per piece from a shop but I was lucky because the shop actually forget to update the price to USD $10 before I ordered and they decided to give me the $6 price still since the order was already placed and they updated it to $10 USD after selling me.
I personally feel that sowing salt is not a bad sideboard choice. I have used it fairly decently in my SB and alot of times, it feel great. I resolved it against mirror( celestial colonnade ) before, resolved it against jund ( raging ravine ), resolved it against a few times against scapeshift ( took out the valakut or one of the dual lands ) and a couple of other decks before as well so the impact of it resolving can determine the game itself.
Of course alot of times, it might not resolve but at times it will. molten rain is nice and I test it before but unless you are already giving them pressure like a quick clock with geist or resto, it doesn't serve you too much purpose because the 2 damage is still not that much and if they are not screwed on land, the impact is lesser. However if the opponent is land light, that land D can set them back enough to change the game in our tide granted that usually it is not easy since UWR durdle too much to be able to take advantage of the tempo that the card can give. Twin, delvers or tempo based base can take advantage of the tempo advantage that molten rain can give but if after molten rain resolve, you are not able to win fast, the tempo advantage is lost.
A lot of times, I don't think there is a clear cut answer on which card is better because there are too many factors. But one can probably says molten rain is meant to be a tempo card that is meant to slow down opponents while sowing salt is meant to destroy whatever lands they might actually need to use in the long term wise like valakut, manlands and etc. I actually never successfully used sowing salt on turn 4 before against a scapeshift or uwr deck because it will be hard but usually after a fight and bait over cards such as scapeshift and stuff and when we have the advantage and that is when I will try to cast.
But nonetheless, against Scapeshift, sowing salt alot of times isn't that good is simply because it is our SB card while in 2nd and 3rd game, scapeshift generally go the creature base route by bringing in titan, batterskull, baloth and etc and took out a few of scapeshift and stuff and hence if you tap out for a sowing salt on turn 4, 5 or 6 and it get countered, you can be very well be staring at a titan when they untap the next turn and that can give you a very quick clock if you are unable to deal with the creature.
For tron, I can't say that much since I never play against much tron so far but so far, resolving sowing salt IMO have a slightly bigger impact in a long game wise as compared to molten rain if you are playing a UWR control version..
I myself play UWR control, UWR midrange, different variant of twins and as well as scapeshift and a few other decks thus that is what I observe personally when I use UWR control against various decks and when I use the above decks to play against UWR control. Just my 2 cents.
Nice list. Please let me know how you fare with the deck. I am trying to decide whether to do the black splash or white splash. Was initially going for the white splash for valorous stance and better sb options such as leyline and stuff but after looking at the black splash, i'm kinda interested to see how it will work out with the black splash especially since I managed to get a playset of Tasigur cheap at about $6 USD ea at a shop yesterday. The shop actually priced it wrongly and forgot to change the price after they restocked but they decided to still give me the cheap price which I saw and ordered it for and changed the price after that. Nice shop.
I did try a grixis version before with all the discards but it felt bad though as you neither can reliablely go off or aggro your way with a win but with Tasigur, it certainly look more interesting and less reliant on the combo so I look forward to see how you guys fare with this new deck tech..
And also would you consider slaughter games as a possible SB choice as well?
It is better in terms of mana cost but the sorcery speed doesn't really appeal to me since that means you have to cast it before combat and opponents will know what you want to do and can have a higher chance of dealing with your creatures. Sometimes opponent will choose not to block or remove your creature if they think they are just taking 2 infect damage but if they realize you have double strike on, that can really change how they react to you when you declare combat.
Infect is a deck that really play the stack at times to give the surprise element and the sudden kill blow.. of course if opponent knows we are playing infect, most likely he will be killing our creatures in their own main phases and not giving us the chance to attack or play the stack game with them. And For Battle rage, it usually it is not hard to get to 4 power ( just need 1 pump spell) to activate the ferocious ability if necessary which means in the event the opponent have chump blockers for glistener elf or your flyers such as lingering souls( a card that we will be seeing alot more often with junk on the rise, the trample can help to push through.
But of course, will need to test it out first on how it work though. The idea is there but it is still theorycrafting and it probably may not work as well as what I hope it can do for sure.. lol..
Control doesn't exist in Modern...we're basically the only Control deck an we're less than 2% of the metagame. On top of that, it takes a hell of a cheap sideboard threat to make you want to board something specifically for Control mirrors that isn't simply Negate, Counterflux, Clique, etc. The other guy was right in saying Geist is hard to top in that regard; and Negate is still just better. Of course, if you're not poor, Vendilion Clique is leaps and bounds the best sideboard card for combo/control.
With the banning of Pod and Cruise I believe control is back in with a chance. I think we'll see a resurgence of UWR. But does it need to develop a plan for dealing with Ascendency? What are the worst MUs? Also, is Mantis Rider any good?
Sorry for all the questions. I'm new to UWR (have played a few dozen matches with it).
Just counter the ascendency and they will find it hard to go off. They do have soft counters though. Need to have abit of graveyard hate for them if you want to deal with them.
Regarding Mantis, no. it is not a good creature to use in modern because there are better choices for us such as geist or blade splicer..:)
How do I get this rename credit? That is because I realize someone have previously used my email to register here and given me a username that I do not wish to use even though I wish to use this email. Thank you.
I hope we won't be back to having people screaming to ban goyf, lotv, twin, scapeshift or other cards that is staple in modern.. lol.. But I guess that will be hard.. lol..
When I play UWR control previously, games especially against BGx or mirror matches or control games against scapeshift and various decks tend to go long and at times into overtime and draws. With this in mind, in GP and big tournaments, usually 1 or 2 draws and perhaps another loss will means out of day 2 for the players so how do you prepare for long games then and ensure you don't draw often? I had friends who actually narrowly missed day 2 of GP simply because of a draw in one of the games and etc and hence one of their advise to me is to not to go into a overly controlling version as that usually means overtime and more draws which is very bad for big tournaments.
And also in such long games, it is also very mentally draining and to be able to do that consecutively 8 games or more seems very hard as well and so how do you guys prepare for mentally draining games especially now since BGx are more prevalent and hence longer are to be expected? Thanks.
valorous stance is also a card that I like to try against scapeshift as well since it deal with all their big creatures that they usually bring in in g2 and g3. I would take out shadow of doubt in main or sb though. it is mainly good if you hit or use it in turn 2 or 3. Using it in response to opponent casting scapeshift doesn't do much since scapeshift will either counter it or just don't sacrifice any lands.
I'm not sure what is your build but if you have mainboard discards and lilianna, it should be alot easier against scapeshift in game 1 because from experience, discards plus a successful resolution of lilianna usually dismantle my hand and make it very hard to combo off in G1 especially since now dig through time is gone. just my 2 cents.
For cards like pact of negation, slaughter pact.
Let says opponent cast a slaughter pact on my creature and I remand it back and he recast it. Does he pay 6 mana at his upkeep or 3?
And let says, if the pact is countered with a dispel, does the opponent still need to pay for the upkeep cost still?
Thank you.
Edit: You can also try dismember , murderous cut or vendetta as well i guess?
I'm not a speculator. I just buy cards for own usage purely but of course I hope to buy them at a cheaper price instead of paying high prices for them. I saw the hype on forum on Tasigur and decided to just get a playset first and I managed to get playset at $6 USD per piece from a shop but I was lucky because the shop actually forget to update the price to USD $10 before I ordered and they decided to give me the $6 price still since the order was already placed and they updated it to $10 USD after selling me.
Of course alot of times, it might not resolve but at times it will. molten rain is nice and I test it before but unless you are already giving them pressure like a quick clock with geist or resto, it doesn't serve you too much purpose because the 2 damage is still not that much and if they are not screwed on land, the impact is lesser. However if the opponent is land light, that land D can set them back enough to change the game in our tide granted that usually it is not easy since UWR durdle too much to be able to take advantage of the tempo that the card can give. Twin, delvers or tempo based base can take advantage of the tempo advantage that molten rain can give but if after molten rain resolve, you are not able to win fast, the tempo advantage is lost.
A lot of times, I don't think there is a clear cut answer on which card is better because there are too many factors. But one can probably says molten rain is meant to be a tempo card that is meant to slow down opponents while sowing salt is meant to destroy whatever lands they might actually need to use in the long term wise like valakut, manlands and etc. I actually never successfully used sowing salt on turn 4 before against a scapeshift or uwr deck because it will be hard but usually after a fight and bait over cards such as scapeshift and stuff and when we have the advantage and that is when I will try to cast.
But nonetheless, against Scapeshift, sowing salt alot of times isn't that good is simply because it is our SB card while in 2nd and 3rd game, scapeshift generally go the creature base route by bringing in titan, batterskull, baloth and etc and took out a few of scapeshift and stuff and hence if you tap out for a sowing salt on turn 4, 5 or 6 and it get countered, you can be very well be staring at a titan when they untap the next turn and that can give you a very quick clock if you are unable to deal with the creature.
For tron, I can't say that much since I never play against much tron so far but so far, resolving sowing salt IMO have a slightly bigger impact in a long game wise as compared to molten rain if you are playing a UWR control version..
I myself play UWR control, UWR midrange, different variant of twins and as well as scapeshift and a few other decks thus that is what I observe personally when I use UWR control against various decks and when I use the above decks to play against UWR control. Just my 2 cents.
I did try a grixis version before with all the discards but it felt bad though as you neither can reliablely go off or aggro your way with a win but with Tasigur, it certainly look more interesting and less reliant on the combo so I look forward to see how you guys fare with this new deck tech..
And also would you consider slaughter games as a possible SB choice as well?
Infect is a deck that really play the stack at times to give the surprise element and the sudden kill blow.. of course if opponent knows we are playing infect, most likely he will be killing our creatures in their own main phases and not giving us the chance to attack or play the stack game with them. And For Battle rage, it usually it is not hard to get to 4 power ( just need 1 pump spell) to activate the ferocious ability if necessary which means in the event the opponent have chump blockers for glistener elf or your flyers such as lingering souls( a card that we will be seeing alot more often with junk on the rise, the trample can help to push through.
But of course, will need to test it out first on how it work though. The idea is there but it is still theorycrafting and it probably may not work as well as what I hope it can do for sure.. lol..
Regarding Mantis, no. it is not a good creature to use in modern because there are better choices for us such as geist or blade splicer..:)