White got some powerful cards in this set. Cast Out and Angel of Sanctions can hit non-creatures, Gideon might brick some combos.
Lately, I find that the only White cards I want to play in this deck are Path and Wrath... which is awkward for a deck that needs to play all Plains!
BW with Push, Path and discard has a lot ways to cheaply interact in a relevant way with a fast format. That's what I'm leaning towards now, even though I like Green's ramp and Prime Time a lot.
So, Smuggler's Copter is still super awesome. Upped the count to 4. Wall of Omens was less than impressive with the Copter, so took those out for Inquisitor Exarch. My new list:
Thraben Inspector looks good in a Copter deck (oterwise blocking on T2 is impossible...). Might consider a Weathered Wayfarer or two for the same reason.
A follow up Blade Splicer could create a pretty formidable wall too.
The ability to hit Planeswalkers hard on turn 3 make Copter worth investigating.
While I love this deck, I think it needs a big shake up to move up from Tier Irrelevant, and yet another 3 synergistic mana cantrip isn't it (on a splash no less).
Let's look at the staples as listed in this primer:
Emeria: The reason to play the deck. That's how we go bigger than the midrange/control decks. Problem is, it doesn't do anything until very late in the game and costs us the ability to play the best lands in the formats.
Sun Titan: In a deck full of value creatures, Sun Titan is a fine top end but wrapping the deck around Sun Titan is a trap IMO. I mean, taking out the Titans for Nahiris and an Emrakul would make the deck less synergistic, but probably more powerful. BTW, things don't need to be 3 cmc or less because it synergies with Titan, they need to be cheap because we'll die before playing them otherwise.
Wall of Omens, Lone Missionary: These 2 drops are supposed to stall and get us to the late game, but they don't do much against most of the meta. They can't block against the most common aggro decks and do stone nothing against combo.
Hussar: Another crappy blocker that puts us over midrange decks.
Flickerwisp: A decent blocker against Infect and Affinity, can pressure planeswalkers. Combos with Sun Titan to put games out of reach.
D Sphere: Catch all answer. A little slow and fragile though.
Supreme Verdict: The card that turns aggro games around, but soft to man lands.
Path to Exile: Nothing bad to say here.
Negate: Hits things that are otherwise problematic. Hard to hold up early though.
The powerful cards IMO are Emeria (beats midrange/control), Supreme Verdict (beats creatures), Path (efficient removal for all the efficient threats) and Negate. I think the others are there to support and enable Sun Titan (which is a fine plan, but it has many shortcomings as you are all aware).
Going one step further (to remove reference to any other color), I would say the heart of the deck is Emeria + a Wrath effect + Path. These are the only cards that are Modern playable on their own merits (Emeria is stretching it, but there's no way we're not playing Emeria).
From there we need:
1- early plays to survive against aggro;
2- ways to disrupt (or race) combo;
3- a top end.
The Sun Titan package checks #3, is okayish at #1 but does nothing for #2 (and doesn't leave room for a splash to shore up the weakness).
I'm pretty sure that Eternal Witness is a better build around than Sun Titan for the Emeria deck. Getting access to efficient threat, ramp, things that hit non-creature permanents, tutors and recurring non-creatures opens up interesting and powerful abilities.
That being said, I'll admit that my own tries have only resulted in a deck that has a comparable winrate to UW Emeria (better agaisnt combo/big mana, worse against Infect), but I'll keep at it.
I don't think it is good enough, it is just a worse Sun Titan and is also massively overcosted at 7-cmc.
Even something like Reveillark is much more playable (as a 1x-off).
I have been trying a UW Glint Nest Crane list in the last weeks with 1 White Gearhulk in there and I rather like him. He's rarely dead and can blow out some decks (Affinity, Prison).
I like the Artifacts heavy list, but it doesn't break the deck. I still feel that Green offers the most in terms of power level.
My Bant list could sure use a lot of tweaking, but I'm pretty conviced that Primeval Titan is the way to go. I started with a split and eventually ditched the Sun Titan, which wasn't as busted without Flickerwisp/Phantasmal Image.
I liked Ewit better as a recuraion engine anyways. Getting back counters/Paths/Wraths/Command gives a lot of flexibility.
I'll convede that the the cpunter suite needs tweaking, but I 'm pretty sure that Condescend has a place in the deck (but it might be more a sideboard thing).
I played Garruk Wilspeaker a bit, but it was only interesting against midrange. I hadn't considred the new Nissa yet.
When I last played the deck 2 months ago, I went with Bant and I don't think I would go back to playing Sun Titan over his Green (and mean) cousin. Ewit and Scooze are awesome too. Beast Within is super versatile.
Can Glint-Nest Crane be interesting? It's a cheap blocker that's effective against Infect/Affinity, it can find creatures (Eye, Skite, Batterskull/Pod, familiar or Sad Robot, Tidehollow Sculler, Gearhulks), combo pieces (ThopterSword, Blasting station), removal (Explosives, O Stone, Executioner's Capsule and all kinds of tech.
Quick question then : why does this deck see so little play in major events, or in any event listed on mtgtop8? Just curious about what people think...
Reactive decks are having a hard time in Modern these days. Decks that incorporate control/disruptive elements need a quick clock to actually win games.
Jund, Abzan, Bant Eldrazi and Nahiri decks can play a slower controlling game when they need to, but they also have powerful standalone threats that will win the game quickly before proactive decks can find a breach in their armor.
Grixis and UWx control haven't been performing particularly well either despite being chockful of expensive Modern staples. Scapeshift moved away from combo-control to full on combo cutting Blue altogether. Etc.
I spent the last few weeks playing Bant Emeria to try to make the deck more proactive with Primeval Titan over his White cousin and I don't want to go back. Playing 14 Green sources (+ 4 Sakura Tribe Elders) to support a lot of GG cards made me lose some games to mana, but it opened a lot of possibilities. Eternal Witness is a real Allstar. Wipe/Counter -> Witness -> Wipe/Counter again is sweet. I also won a bunch of games with a Primal Command + Witness soft lock.
The deck was much better against Tron (roughly 40$ match win rate), but worse against BGx for some reason. Winning against Ad Nauseum and Storm was a nice change of too. I played a bunch of Leagues and went basically 50-50 overall.
I ended up with something like this (I don't remember the sideboard at the moment) :
I had a lot of fun playing the deck, but it too often felt like I wasn't in the same league as my opponents. I gave up on the deck for now, but I'll come back eventually. I probably need to refine that counterspell suite.
Hey everyone, I recently picked up the BW deck (with a list very similar to the posted in the primer) and jumped right in a MTGO League. I haven't played anything "aggressive" in Modern yet, so that was a nice change of pace. I went 3-2 beating Bant Eldrazi, Grixis Death's Shadow and Titan Breach and losing to Affinity and Dredge.
I'm not quite sure how to approach matchups like Affinity. Thalia comes in a turn too late, Arbiter is much less impactful, they have a ton of evasion and can go very wide. I got smoked by two very fast Overseer hands, so there could be a bit of bad luck involved, but I can't seem to figure out what I can leverage in this matchup (I see people reporting fairly high level 2-0 wins, so I must be missing something!).
Dredge felt a bit similar. I did win a game in which he had to get rid of my graveyard hate before going off, only for me to flash in a Heretic Thalia and attack for lethal into an open board, but games 1 and 3 he just went super wide, super fast and I was never really in the game.
I get that both of those decks have nut draws that will win through pretty much everything, but I guess I'm just used to playing with board wipes and being able to let them extend before stabilizing.
I expect Elves to also be a difficult matchup. What have you found to be the keys against these decks?
I think the appeal is that it makes the counterspells better, not that it takes their slot. I'd shave a Shpere or two an a few 3 cmc creatures to make room for them and hold up mana as often as possible. It could make the Gifts package interesting again.
Well, just as I talk about BW or GW... Blue-White just gets a new toy: Spell Queller.
Nice Flash Flying body. Can be used as removal and/or tempo as we build up our board.
Sac outlets look even better, turning Queller into a permanent exiling counterspell.
It's not very interesting to recurse (except for the nice body), but with Reveillark and a sac outlet in play, it's instant counterspells at will, giving us a soft lock with Emeria. I already like to run one Reveillark in the deck.
Even without the Blasting Station combo, it might be the type of card that disrupts the opponent enough to make combo not horrible.
It's a bit crappy with board wipes if you counter opposing creatures though (or Collected Company effects)... and it does nothing to alleviate the 3 mana glut. Might need too much work to work. Sideboard card maybe?
I've been toying with a BW version running Ravenous Rats and some hand disruption. Sin Collector from the board should help against combo. T2 Rat T3 Flickerwisp can slow down some opponents, but Rats quickly becomes worse than Wall of Omens - a lot of decks can operate from their top deck somewhat efficiently.
The only Black in the deck is 4 Rats, one Seal of Doom and 2 Dismember. Board has Sin Collector, Duress, Thoughtseize and Surgical Extraction. Chittering Rats being BB is though, and with the amount of fetchlands in the format, probably not that powerful anyways. Tidehollow Sculler with a sac outlet is sweet and makes me want to put the Station/Hunter combo in the list, but that takes a lot of room in the deck.
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Another option I've been pondering is going heavier in the ramp direction with Sakura Tribe Elder, Wood Elves and possibly Ulvenwald Hydra to tutor up lands. MAybe something like Tireless Tracker can help give us a plan in case our graveyard is denied.
I haven't tried it yet... but it mostly looks like a bad ramp deck lol.
Lately, I find that the only White cards I want to play in this deck are Path and Wrath... which is awkward for a deck that needs to play all Plains!
BW with Push, Path and discard has a lot ways to cheaply interact in a relevant way with a fast format. That's what I'm leaning towards now, even though I like Green's ramp and Prime Time a lot.
Thraben Inspector looks good in a Copter deck (oterwise blocking on T2 is impossible...). Might consider a Weathered Wayfarer or two for the same reason.
A follow up Blade Splicer could create a pretty formidable wall too.
The ability to hit Planeswalkers hard on turn 3 make Copter worth investigating.
I had a 50/50 matchup with Tron as Bant Emeria, thanks to counterspells, Beast Within and Acidic Slime. If that deck is on the rise, Green looks good.
Let's look at the staples as listed in this primer:
Emeria: The reason to play the deck. That's how we go bigger than the midrange/control decks. Problem is, it doesn't do anything until very late in the game and costs us the ability to play the best lands in the formats.
Sun Titan: In a deck full of value creatures, Sun Titan is a fine top end but wrapping the deck around Sun Titan is a trap IMO. I mean, taking out the Titans for Nahiris and an Emrakul would make the deck less synergistic, but probably more powerful. BTW, things don't need to be 3 cmc or less because it synergies with Titan, they need to be cheap because we'll die before playing them otherwise.
Wall of Omens, Lone Missionary: These 2 drops are supposed to stall and get us to the late game, but they don't do much against most of the meta. They can't block against the most common aggro decks and do stone nothing against combo.
Hussar: Another crappy blocker that puts us over midrange decks.
Flickerwisp: A decent blocker against Infect and Affinity, can pressure planeswalkers. Combos with Sun Titan to put games out of reach.
D Sphere: Catch all answer. A little slow and fragile though.
Supreme Verdict: The card that turns aggro games around, but soft to man lands.
Path to Exile: Nothing bad to say here.
Negate: Hits things that are otherwise problematic. Hard to hold up early though.
The powerful cards IMO are Emeria (beats midrange/control), Supreme Verdict (beats creatures), Path (efficient removal for all the efficient threats) and Negate. I think the others are there to support and enable Sun Titan (which is a fine plan, but it has many shortcomings as you are all aware).
Going one step further (to remove reference to any other color), I would say the heart of the deck is Emeria + a Wrath effect + Path. These are the only cards that are Modern playable on their own merits (Emeria is stretching it, but there's no way we're not playing Emeria).
From there we need:
1- early plays to survive against aggro;
2- ways to disrupt (or race) combo;
3- a top end.
The Sun Titan package checks #3, is okayish at #1 but does nothing for #2 (and doesn't leave room for a splash to shore up the weakness).
I'm pretty sure that Eternal Witness is a better build around than Sun Titan for the Emeria deck. Getting access to efficient threat, ramp, things that hit non-creature permanents, tutors and recurring non-creatures opens up interesting and powerful abilities.
That being said, I'll admit that my own tries have only resulted in a deck that has a comparable winrate to UW Emeria (better agaisnt combo/big mana, worse against Infect), but I'll keep at it.
Th ecombo doesn't speed up the deck though... and it still folds to graveyard hate.
I have been trying a UW Glint Nest Crane list in the last weeks with 1 White Gearhulk in there and I rather like him. He's rarely dead and can blow out some decks (Affinity, Prison).
I like the Artifacts heavy list, but it doesn't break the deck. I still feel that Green offers the most in terms of power level.
I liked Ewit better as a recuraion engine anyways. Getting back counters/Paths/Wraths/Command gives a lot of flexibility.
I'll convede that the the cpunter suite needs tweaking, but I 'm pretty sure that Condescend has a place in the deck (but it might be more a sideboard thing).
I played Garruk Wilspeaker a bit, but it was only interesting against midrange. I hadn't considred the new Nissa yet.
http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/modern-archives/modern-archives-deck-creation/600378-mono-value-control-aka-azorious-titan?page=95#c1925
There is something there, but it didn't break anything.
Tron is winnable, RG Breach is a breeze. Ad Nauseum is winnable.
Reactive decks are having a hard time in Modern these days. Decks that incorporate control/disruptive elements need a quick clock to actually win games.
Jund, Abzan, Bant Eldrazi and Nahiri decks can play a slower controlling game when they need to, but they also have powerful standalone threats that will win the game quickly before proactive decks can find a breach in their armor.
Grixis and UWx control haven't been performing particularly well either despite being chockful of expensive Modern staples. Scapeshift moved away from combo-control to full on combo cutting Blue altogether. Etc.
I spent the last few weeks playing Bant Emeria to try to make the deck more proactive with Primeval Titan over his White cousin and I don't want to go back. Playing 14 Green sources (+ 4 Sakura Tribe Elders) to support a lot of GG cards made me lose some games to mana, but it opened a lot of possibilities. Eternal Witness is a real Allstar. Wipe/Counter -> Witness -> Wipe/Counter again is sweet. I also won a bunch of games with a Primal Command + Witness soft lock.
The deck was much better against Tron (roughly 40$ match win rate), but worse against BGx for some reason. Winning against Ad Nauseum and Storm was a nice change of too.
I ended up with something like this (I don't remember the sideboard at the moment) :
3 Scavenging Ooze
4 Sakura Tribe Elder
4 Eternal Witness
1 Restoration Angel
1 Acidic Slime
3 Primeval Titan
4 Negate
4 Condescend
3 Supreme Verdict
2 Primal Command
24 Lands:
2 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
4 Windspwept Heath
3 Flooded Strand
4 Temple Garden
1 Canopy Vista
2 Hallowed Fountain
1 Ghost Quarter
4 Plains
2 Forest
1 Island
I had a lot of fun playing the deck, but it too often felt like I wasn't in the same league as my opponents. I gave up on the deck for now, but I'll come back eventually. I probably need to refine that counterspell suite.
I'm not quite sure how to approach matchups like Affinity. Thalia comes in a turn too late, Arbiter is much less impactful, they have a ton of evasion and can go very wide. I got smoked by two very fast Overseer hands, so there could be a bit of bad luck involved, but I can't seem to figure out what I can leverage in this matchup (I see people reporting fairly high level 2-0 wins, so I must be missing something!).
Dredge felt a bit similar. I did win a game in which he had to get rid of my graveyard hate before going off, only for me to flash in a Heretic Thalia and attack for lethal into an open board, but games 1 and 3 he just went super wide, super fast and I was never really in the game.
I get that both of those decks have nut draws that will win through pretty much everything, but I guess I'm just used to playing with board wipes and being able to let them extend before stabilizing.
I expect Elves to also be a difficult matchup. What have you found to be the keys against these decks?
Nice Flash Flying body. Can be used as removal and/or tempo as we build up our board.
Sac outlets look even better, turning Queller into a permanent exiling counterspell.
It's not very interesting to recurse (except for the nice body), but with Reveillark and a sac outlet in play, it's instant counterspells at will, giving us a soft lock with Emeria. I already like to run one Reveillark in the deck.
Even without the Blasting Station combo, it might be the type of card that disrupts the opponent enough to make combo not horrible.
It's a bit crappy with board wipes if you counter opposing creatures though (or Collected Company effects)... and it does nothing to alleviate the 3 mana glut. Might need too much work to work. Sideboard card maybe?
Thoughts?
The only Black in the deck is 4 Rats, one Seal of Doom and 2 Dismember. Board has Sin Collector, Duress, Thoughtseize and Surgical Extraction. Chittering Rats being BB is though, and with the amount of fetchlands in the format, probably not that powerful anyways. Tidehollow Sculler with a sac outlet is sweet and makes me want to put the Station/Hunter combo in the list, but that takes a lot of room in the deck.
---
Another option I've been pondering is going heavier in the ramp direction with Sakura Tribe Elder, Wood Elves and possibly Ulvenwald Hydra to tutor up lands. MAybe something like Tireless Tracker can help give us a plan in case our graveyard is denied.
I haven't tried it yet... but it mostly looks like a bad ramp deck lol.