MTG Salvation

My singleton Blast Zone over the third Field of Ruin has been doing a TON of work and is a great answer the the walkers as well, although unfortunately probably can't afford to run more of them. I'm running a 2/2 split of Tar Pit and Colonnade and the pits have been great for providing some pressure and getting an early threat against slow decks.

Anyone have tips for main/sideboard in control mirrors? I've been getting stomped by Teferi, Time Raveler and Narset, Parter of Veils just locking me out of the game. I know the obvious answer is "don't let them resolve" but assuming I miss that boat what's the next best approach to dealing with them in the early-mid game before I can reliably have manlands to pressure them? I generally try to aggressively play a Snapcaster if possible to add pressure to them.

I was under the impression that our biggest issue was still having our engines killed or not finding another one? Just because you mulligan to an engine does not mean it survives. I always play assuming that if I have one engine it will get killed. As far as I can tell, this is one of the few cards spoiled so far that helps with these issues that we don't already have (Unearth is cool, but it does essentially the exact same thing that Claim/Fame does). Again, I don't see how Giver of Runes really helps at all, I think that a one mana counterspell or something like Apostle's Blessing is just better in most cases.

Also, I don't think that our wincon has any issues really if the deck does what it is supposed to do (barring sideboard hate like Leyline), so idk why everyone is trying to make other wincons work that clearly don't really fit our deck.

Echo of Eons doesn't belong in this deck at all. I don't see Unearth making a large impact since no one really plays Mentor anyway (although I'm glad to have Unearth in Modern). Giver of Runes seems... bad. The best part about Mom is that it can protect itself also, so you always need two removal spells after it loses summoning sickness. Still don't understand how no one is talking about the two mana creature tutor in the set; as far as I can tell it is by far the best card for our deck spoiled so far and seems exactly along the lines of what we need.

Anyone going to mention Eladamri's Call? We could even play Glittering Wish to get more copies of it, although not sure that is ideal. Is there anything else in green that we want? Maybe a version with Eldritch Evolution?

Claim is better than Ghostform by a long shot.

One issue I've noticed recently is that sometimes I'll be set up to combo out and win, but I'll just be one arcane short and won't draw any more. Usually, I can chain Peer Through Depths into itself and just win, but if I draw more counterspells or something then sometimes I just brick.

My friend who I've been testing with a bit suggested Yahenni's Expertise, which I'm definitely considering. Wiping the board and setting up to combo by casting Tainted Remedy for free seems pretty decent.

That iteration is actually very close to where I started out, but honestly after some testing it was very underwhelming. Personally, Rise from the Tides was exactly what I was looking for in an alternate win condition and it has seriously impressed me every time I have cast it. Also, I disagree, I don't think we want to be rushing to assemble our combo immediately necessarily. However, I'm curious to see if that version can hold its own!

Hello all,

Some of you may have seen a deck called "Arcane Remedy" or something similar in the past. As I am returning after not playing for a few months due to university and have always love brews, I have become intrigued with the deck and whether it could be viable and have since picked up a version. To me, playing off-the-beaten-path decks is very rewarding and fun. I'd like to get some feedback on it and see if anyone else is playing anything similar.

What is Arcane Remedy?
Arcane Remedy is a deck that was created sometime around when Magic Origins (and thus Tainted Remedy) dropped. It is a combo-control deck that seeks to land a Tainted Remedy and quickly burn opponents out by splicing Roar of Jukai onto cantrips and other effects. The deck plays as a control deck for the majority of the game, and seeks to begin combo-ing off once the game is under reasonable control or an opportunity arises to close it out.

How is this list different than those of old (~2015)?
All of the lists I have found for a deck like this have mostly been from around 2015, with very little discussion since then. The list presented here differs from other lists I have seen mainly in that it tries to avoid cards that are mediocre besides the fact that they have the subtype arcane. Obviously, the list is not optimized, which is part of why I wanted to see if the community had any ideas to improve it.

Decklist


Sideboard


Obviously the sideboard is not at ALL optimal, nor a full 15 cards right now, I kind of just threw some cards into my deckbox that might be useful, since I haven't had time to determine what a good board is for my meta(s).

Tricks & benefits of playing Arcane Remedy
The deck has some interesting subtleties that make it perform more efficiently than it appears:

• Horobi's Whisper, along with some Thought Scour for fuel, can serve as a very effective removal spell, allowing you to reliably remove multiple threats with only one card.
• Any card that may be spliced remains in your hand. This means that when combo-ing out, Roar of Jukai can be spliced again and again, presuming that you have an arcane for it to piggyback with.
• Multiple Roar of Jukai (or any other splice card, for that matter) can be stacked onto one arcane. For example, if you have two Roar of Jukai in your hand, you can splice both onto one arcane and cause the opponent to "gain" ten life instead of five.
• The core combo of the deck has few inherent weaknesses (aside from the obvious drawback of having cards that don't do much on their own), unlike many other combo decks or strategies. For example, Leyline of Sanctity has no effect on anything we are doing, neither does countering the spell that Roar of Jukai is being spliced onto, as the lifegain is part of the cost and thus can't be interacted with. Cards like Rule of Law or other Storm hate don't ruin us, either.
• Because we are playing control, we have more time and resources to answer problematic cards than pure combo decks, which are more focussed on their own game plan than stopping the opponent's strategy.
• The lack of creatures in our deck surely poses some weaknesses, however, this also nullifies the usefulness of our opponents removal. Most decks will play a decent number of dedicated cards for creature removal, all of which are essentially blanks against us.
• If plan A of sticking a Tainted Remedy and Roar of Jukai fails, Peer Through Depths allows us to dig deep for the one of Rise from the Tides to close the game out.

I already have some changes in mind (replacing Hideous Laughter with Damnation, adding Field of Ruin, adding Cryptic Command for example), but would like to hear other suggestions for changes I can make. As of yet, I have played in a few local tournaments and have done decently, given how new I am to this deck. I've played against Storm (2-0), Elves (0-2), Affinity (2-0), Humans (0-2), Amulet Titan (2-1), 4C Control (0-2), Taking Turns (2-0), UWR Control (1-1-1), Cheeri0s (0-2) and Scapeshift (1-2).

Meh, if we wanted more Retract's I personally would play Hurkyl's Recall basically the same effect because I think 2 CMC is too high to protect our guy and Recall can have extra utility. But I guess time will tell.

After looking at it some more, Claim//Fame seems pretty awesome... I think I might replace Noxious Revival with it once Hour of Devastation drops because honestly while I love the card more than anything, NR just has not been impressing me lately

Being to get an engine back for one less mana and no tempo loss (unlike NR) seems really good!

Claim//Fame could be interesting, although the Fame side doesn't really do anything for us

I should be getting my Opals in the next week now, and I played at Modern last night with some interesting results. Match 1 against a mono-black brew kinda thing that was kind of like burn (lost 2-1 because I lost game 1 when I bricked 3 turns in a row with triple paladin ), match 2 against my friend's Eldrazi Taxes (won 2-0, grinded out both games through turn 2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben which was the highlight of the night), match 3 against Merfolk (lost 2-1, had to mull a ton game 1 and he had a really aggressive clock, game 2 I got him through Vapor Snag, game 3 was close but I lost due to double Ceremonious Rejection on Mox Opals and couldn't find the mana I needed). Overall though it was pretty awesome and I definitely played a lot better than a couple weeks ago. Winning through Thalia twice in a row was super cool!

As I said before, I'm planning on trying a version that uses black for discard once I finish up my deck, but I had another idea...
What about a transformational sideboard with Thopter Foundry and Sword of the Meek? It is basically the exact opposite of our combo (slow and grindy vs. fast and fragile) so I have a feeling people wouldn't be ready to deal with it. With Puresteel Paladin in play we draw off the Foundry triggers as well. Let me know what you guys think of this possibility.

Cheers,

Relatively new to Cheeri0s, but I have been reading forums and whatnot for it for some time now. Anyway, last night I borrowed the Opals and played a sub-par list (I had to use an Echoing Truth instead of the 4th retract >.>) in Modern night with around 16 people. Long story short I got matched against a Mardu brew game one that was packing a TON of discard/etc., got the by game two, and got matched against Burn game three. Didn't do too hot at all but I felt I played decently with what I had to work with and my low experience. I don't feel it was conclusive enough to say much about my take on the deck as of yet.

However, I've had some ideas for cards I want to try out. For reference, almost all my test games so far have been against Eldrazi and Taxes since that's my friend's deck. Firstly, for Thalia, Guardian of Thraben and Eidolon of the Great Revel I want to try out Snapback because I feel it is just better than Echoing Truth for those situations. Secondly, I feel I might want to move away from counters and into a discard suite because I feel sometimes when things go south I end up having turns where I can't do anything but pass the turn holding up a counterspell, when discard would have given me better tempo plays.

I should hopefully be able to get my set of Opals within a month or so and can test more.
Cheers,

Best SB cards for Jund/Junk/midrange in general? I got destroyed by BG Rock yesterday in finals and last week a bit as well. Too much removal and too many powerful threats.