1. Meta dependent. If you see a lot of abzan or humans or other primarily creature decks go with IOK. otherwise duress.
2. I often don't even run Collective Brutality in the side. This is a playsyyle choice. Because of my meta I would pit a ghost quarter, bojuka bog and additional land destruction in there.
3. Personally I would add another fetch land. Steam vents if you want more blue out of the board for spme reason.
4. Again a meta call. Bog is good because we can mill it and get it back with loam. If you're in a gy heavy meta maybe 3x or 4x void is better.
5. Playstyle. Would you rather spend 3 mana on an answer with finality, or 2 mana on a more short term one? Would you rather just run nature's claim because of what you see in your meta.
What I really recommend is start with your ' price is no object ' sideboard. Write down each deck that you typically see in your local meta.
Then go through each card on the list for each deck that is there. Put it down in a spreadsheet with cards down the side and decks across the top.
Is the card good in this matchup? What would you take out for it? How does that affect your curve? What cards in your main deck are bad in this match up?
Then decide if that card is good or bad for the match up. Make a note of it. A simple check mark is fine for a first pass.
If you have any cards without check marks, replace them with something else.
@smashpacman - Glad you're reporting again. Thinking about the rules change lead me back to this thread and starting to play this deck again after having fun with Liliana Tribal after SaffronOlives's video the other day. I had thought about Chandra, Pyromaster, but she seems less good here than in Jund. I do think that Chandra Nalaar is worth testing though since her ultimate read, "Win the game" and it happens so quickly like you said.
But I think the real benefit comes in the versatility of Lilianas now and keeping them from being dead cards. But the lack of 2-drops in this decks makes it really dependent on making land drops IMHO.
I did some testing online the other day and P&K are truly great. Games it landed were games I won.
Do you think Pyromaster would be any good here? I had also thought about the new 5-drop liliana or Liliana Vess, since she can tutor up what we may need for next turn, dodge opposing Thoughtseize, and not conflict with existing Lilianas anymore. The combo of Veil and Last hope are enough to win in Liliana Tribal when they are both out, and both this deck and that one run a similar disruption/kill package. Have you thought about Vess? Or do you think there would be mana issues with blood moon there too? I was considering adding more fetches to try to mitigate it. For now I just copy/pasted your mana base.
Re: beast within. I played a game in a comp league the other day against ad nauseum where they got their turn 1 leyline on. I had pulse in hand, and snap kept. I bricked on finding a land that could produce black and lost when otherwise had all the tools I needed to get dredging and wasted them trying to find a fetch land just in time for them to combo.
That said, it seems worth trying though it doesnt deal with multiples.
Has anyone considered Mindbreak Trap as a storm answer? Would it be helpful in any other matchup? The only one I can think of is Devoted Druid combo. That's still not enough of the meta to be relevant.
Hey all, ran through a modern comp league and went 3-2. Losses coming from storm both times. I played the Levy style Failure//Comply list with hallowed fountain in the board and just not sure it for my play style. Have others given much testing to this or is Driven // Dispair accepted as the better option? I can see how it certainly helps scapeshift and storm matchup which are notoriously poor for us as we know. How much does it boost those matchups?
I'll be trying Driven next time through. I noticed that the Modern Challenege results had no dredge and no affinity last weekend in the top 32. Paradoxically as we know, now may be the time to really jam one of those two decks. FYSA
IMHO,
1) Dig like hell off the top of the deck for the answer. I'll often keep a faithless+mom hug hand post board even without an answer, because I'll see another 7 cards by turn 2. I did lose a match at a decent event because j kept a hand that didn't hand answers and I didn't anticipate cage when caching burn.
2) remember that just because the deck uses the GY it doesn't have to do it exclusively. If I keep a 1 lander that is otherwise amazing I'll draw from the top like hell to get the second land. Usually I'll be dripping the necessary pieces in the yard while doing so. Then when I hit that land drop after draw, land, looting, draw I can mom hug my way to a decent board state. Also, I run 20 lands. That's 1/3 cards. If I'm hurting for the second land drop I'm going to just draw all 3 chances naturally.
@Ivg, What do you play against RIP? Just bring in TS and hope to strip it from them?
I agree about Abrupt Decay. The times I need it the mana is too hard to get at the right time. I'm back to 2 Nature's Claim in their spots. But no big finishes to report for me.
@Chill_Axe, if you have a bunch of them in your local maybe running a Prepare // Fight would be good? Seems a little cute and a little slow, but you could always make them fight your Narcomoeba. I wouldn't worry about it for a large event though. It is a fairly small part of the meta and the matchup lottery is just a part of modern.
@Ivg - been there, my friend. This almost exclusively happens to me in paper, and less often on MODO. I have my own silly way of dealing with it in paper: mash shuffle 9 times, pile shuffle in 7 piles, mash again 9-11 times. Mathematically, riffle shuffling 9 times should be closed enough to a truly randomized for a 52 card deck, so I go with it for a 60 deck.
But randomness has clusters. You hit a cluster. Bummer. Keep the faith. You'll be good again in no time.
There are some weird micro/macro archetype things going on with the site, so it doesn't tell the whole story
There really are some strange meta game things happening right now on MTGO in particular. Paper tournaments the meta seems WIDE OPEN (see SCG Worcester reaults, a 350 person tournament, where mono black zombies took a top 8). But because of how spikey the competitive leagues are on mtgo we see a really skewed meta game on mtggoldfish. I think it's largely a result of the zplit between competitive and friendly leagues combined with the polarization of Death's Shadow decks. It's really peculiar.
But for fairly large tournaments everything still looks pretty balanced and open. The chatter on reddit is still largely circulating around the fact that modern is still anyone's format.
We fit REALLY WELL into the Mtgo meta right now. I'm surprised there isn't more grave hate being played, but I think we'll see an uptick. I don't remember who in here said it, but they related it to me during a game: dredge is like affinity, it's good when its bad and bad when its good. We'll probably see a small spike in graveyard hate and then our meta game share will drop a bit. That's a two fold reason. First is that we are on the rise, secondos is that living end is likely to see an uptick in play with new cycling cards printed.
Just my thoughts. We're a great choice online right now, but my LGS would be a different story.
I don't want to see any good card for us - Dredge showed that it's still one of the best deck in modern, with something good from Amonkhet we could end in ban territory. Be happy with what we have
Agreed.
I do think thay or climb in meta game share has to do with the death's shadow match up more than anything else and the amount of death's shadow out the is just dumb right now. The match up is just really good for us.
So yeah. We're still tier 1/2 without any toys. If something gets printed that breaks the deck.... well.. that's a discussion for another thread.
Hi all, after years and years of just playing limited I decided it was time to use the all the cards I've gathered over the years and pick up modern. I'm looking forward to learning dredge, reading all the content here on this forum, and trying to be as active on here as well asking questions. I've read the dredge primer (great job by the way) and have only been goldfishing by myself just to see some of the common play choices that I might come across (I know this isn't ideal since a lot of play choices are determined by matchup and what is on the battlefield for your opponent).
So to start off the learning, if you have both Insolent Neonate, Faithless Looting, and Stinkweed Imp in your starting hand, what is your T1 play? Neonate or Looting? Is it more dependent of how much land you have in your hand? I feel like if you only have 1 land in your starting hand it's better to start with a T1 Looting to get more land then bin dredgers with the discard 2 at the end of the Looting?
Thanks for all the help everyone, looking forward to learn how to pilot this deck!
Against an unknown opponent I usually lead with neonate. I play a lot online and therefore see a lot of burn. Being able to chump with neonates and then activate in response is good for a few life points and has stolen me a couple of game 1s against burn. The same could be said for any aggressive deck, too, but burn is the most common turn 1 hasty guy.
I also like to lead with neonate regardless if I have a stinkweed imp and a second untapped land drop. Trying to get another dredger before the next draw step is important. The draw step dredge is the most important because it's free. This can make Faithless Looting on turn 2 stronger because you can play it before the land drop and if you get even just a reasonable amount of luck end up with 15 or so cards in the yard and land your ghast or amalgam on turn 2. So yeah. I play the odds on that one.
The other case is post board. Depending on the cards in my hand other than those (did I mull to 5 with no thoughtseize against scapeshift?) I may loot to dig for hate.
2. I often don't even run Collective Brutality in the side. This is a playsyyle choice. Because of my meta I would pit a ghost quarter, bojuka bog and additional land destruction in there.
3. Personally I would add another fetch land. Steam vents if you want more blue out of the board for spme reason.
4. Again a meta call. Bog is good because we can mill it and get it back with loam. If you're in a gy heavy meta maybe 3x or 4x void is better.
5. Playstyle. Would you rather spend 3 mana on an answer with finality, or 2 mana on a more short term one? Would you rather just run nature's claim because of what you see in your meta.
What I really recommend is start with your ' price is no object ' sideboard. Write down each deck that you typically see in your local meta.
Then go through each card on the list for each deck that is there. Put it down in a spreadsheet with cards down the side and decks across the top.
Is the card good in this matchup? What would you take out for it? How does that affect your curve? What cards in your main deck are bad in this match up?
Then decide if that card is good or bad for the match up. Make a note of it. A simple check mark is fine for a first pass.
If you have any cards without check marks, replace them with something else.
https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/mtgo-standings/modern-challenge-2017-10-08
But I think the real benefit comes in the versatility of Lilianas now and keeping them from being dead cards. But the lack of 2-drops in this decks makes it really dependent on making land drops IMHO.
I did some testing online the other day and P&K are truly great. Games it landed were games I won.
Do you think Pyromaster would be any good here? I had also thought about the new 5-drop liliana or Liliana Vess, since she can tutor up what we may need for next turn, dodge opposing Thoughtseize, and not conflict with existing Lilianas anymore. The combo of Veil and Last hope are enough to win in Liliana Tribal when they are both out, and both this deck and that one run a similar disruption/kill package. Have you thought about Vess? Or do you think there would be mana issues with blood moon there too? I was considering adding more fetches to try to mitigate it. For now I just copy/pasted your mana base.
Spam warning issued (strategy advice). With the rules question answered, I'm locking this thread to prevent more strategy discussion. -MadMage
That said, it seems worth trying though it doesnt deal with multiples.
Has anyone considered Mindbreak Trap as a storm answer? Would it be helpful in any other matchup? The only one I can think of is Devoted Druid combo. That's still not enough of the meta to be relevant.
I'll be trying Driven next time through. I noticed that the Modern Challenege results had no dredge and no affinity last weekend in the top 32. Paradoxically as we know, now may be the time to really jam one of those two decks. FYSA
1) Dig like hell off the top of the deck for the answer. I'll often keep a faithless+mom hug hand post board even without an answer, because I'll see another 7 cards by turn 2. I did lose a match at a decent event because j kept a hand that didn't hand answers and I didn't anticipate cage when caching burn.
2) remember that just because the deck uses the GY it doesn't have to do it exclusively. If I keep a 1 lander that is otherwise amazing I'll draw from the top like hell to get the second land. Usually I'll be dripping the necessary pieces in the yard while doing so. Then when I hit that land drop after draw, land, looting, draw I can mom hug my way to a decent board state. Also, I run 20 lands. That's 1/3 cards. If I'm hurting for the second land drop I'm going to just draw all 3 chances naturally.
I agree about Abrupt Decay. The times I need it the mana is too hard to get at the right time. I'm back to 2 Nature's Claim in their spots. But no big finishes to report for me.
@Chill_Axe, if you have a bunch of them in your local maybe running a Prepare // Fight would be good? Seems a little cute and a little slow, but you could always make them fight your Narcomoeba. I wouldn't worry about it for a large event though. It is a fairly small part of the meta and the matchup lottery is just a part of modern.
I don't say much on this thread, but yeah. Dredge is fine. Why is this a conversation?
I've been playing modern since right after Pod was banned. This is the most diverse it's been. Period.
But randomness has clusters. You hit a cluster. Bummer. Keep the faith. You'll be good again in no time.
There really are some strange meta game things happening right now on MTGO in particular. Paper tournaments the meta seems WIDE OPEN (see SCG Worcester reaults, a 350 person tournament, where mono black zombies took a top 8). But because of how spikey the competitive leagues are on mtgo we see a really skewed meta game on mtggoldfish. I think it's largely a result of the zplit between competitive and friendly leagues combined with the polarization of Death's Shadow decks. It's really peculiar.
But for fairly large tournaments everything still looks pretty balanced and open. The chatter on reddit is still largely circulating around the fact that modern is still anyone's format.
We fit REALLY WELL into the Mtgo meta right now. I'm surprised there isn't more grave hate being played, but I think we'll see an uptick. I don't remember who in here said it, but they related it to me during a game: dredge is like affinity, it's good when its bad and bad when its good. We'll probably see a small spike in graveyard hate and then our meta game share will drop a bit. That's a two fold reason. First is that we are on the rise, secondos is that living end is likely to see an uptick in play with new cycling cards printed.
Just my thoughts. We're a great choice online right now, but my LGS would be a different story.
Agreed.
I do think thay or climb in meta game share has to do with the death's shadow match up more than anything else and the amount of death's shadow out the is just dumb right now. The match up is just really good for us.
So yeah. We're still tier 1/2 without any toys. If something gets printed that breaks the deck.... well.. that's a discussion for another thread.
Against an unknown opponent I usually lead with neonate. I play a lot online and therefore see a lot of burn. Being able to chump with neonates and then activate in response is good for a few life points and has stolen me a couple of game 1s against burn. The same could be said for any aggressive deck, too, but burn is the most common turn 1 hasty guy.
I also like to lead with neonate regardless if I have a stinkweed imp and a second untapped land drop. Trying to get another dredger before the next draw step is important. The draw step dredge is the most important because it's free. This can make Faithless Looting on turn 2 stronger because you can play it before the land drop and if you get even just a reasonable amount of luck end up with 15 or so cards in the yard and land your ghast or amalgam on turn 2. So yeah. I play the odds on that one.
The other case is post board. Depending on the cards in my hand other than those (did I mull to 5 with no thoughtseize against scapeshift?) I may loot to dig for hate.