There are plenty of cards in straight UR that care about cards in the grave, including Snapcaster, Reveler, and Lavamancer. And others that care about spells being cast, like Swiftspear, Thing, and Pyromancer. It's close to impossible to have this conversation without an actual list as a blueprint though, so if you can point me to a UR Delver list with a recent finish we'll be able to delve into the topic constructively. If not, my point stands that cantrips (and especially sorcery-speed ones) synergize on multiple levels in this archetype.
According to my definition, whether or not it plays green cards, UR Delver is indeed a thresh deck. Perhaps yours is different, but after reading that definition, do you disagree that it fits UR Delver?
Someone already linked to one a little bit earlier. In fact, it's the only one with any results worth noting.
It really seems to agree with the basic idea. That getting instants and sorceries into the grave is useful, but that once you get a delver or pyromancer onto the field, you'd much rather play at instant speed than sorcery in order to constantly threaten your opponent with counterspells, hence why the only sorcery is Serum Visions, and the other cycles have the same benefit that Opt does. It's less of a burden to use since you can just use them on the turns that you held up (Or bluffed holding up, often the effect can be the same) countermagic to slow your opponent down and ended up not needing to use it (Thought Scour and Heiroglyphic Illumination) while Heiroglyphic Illumination also has a much higher ceiling than Sleight of Hand, becoming a full card advantage spell in grindy matchups.
The only on cast trigger is Young Pyromancer. Lavamancer and Serpent find having a card in the graveyard useful, but they're also anti-synergy with each other and most likely one's sided out when the other is brought in, meaning that at most 6 creatures care about the graveyard at any one point in time, but in the case of Sleight of Hand... are you really unable to find a better card to flashback than Sleight of Hand? The only spell that Sleight of Hand puts into your graveyard for Snapcaster Mage is Sleight of Hand, when Thought Scour is not only instant, but has a chance of putting spells that you actually want to flashback into the pool. All Snapcaster needs is a single instant or sorcery, and Sleight of Hand would be one of the lowest priority flashback targets.
Sleight of Hand might have some synergy with the deck, but it's so minor that it's certainly not good enough to justify running the abysmal Sleight of Hand, and I really don't see how you could claim that sorcery speed cantrips synergise especially well in a deck type that runs counterspells given that instant speed cantrips mean that you can leave mana open on your turn to deter opponents with the threat of countermagic and then still make use of your mana even when they play around it, making instant speed all the more valuable and mitigating the tempo loss.
If you wanted to make it work, you'd probably want to run it in a deck with far more on cast synergies, like full on Kiln Fiend and Prowess style creatures, and even then you'd probably rather run different cantrips like Slip Through Space to make sure that those grounded attackers can actually connect.
Additionally, if you're going to go with that that definition, Sleight of Hand is also a terrible fit. "Often trades card advantage for speed" and "disrupts opponents with noncreature spells" are heavily at odds with Sleight of Hand. Cantrips are one of the biggest cases of trading speed for card advantage, as they tend to have much less powerful effects than other spells of their mana cost due to the fact that they're a 0 card advantage instead of a -1, and a part of Delver's disruption suite is counterspells, which require the ability to hold mana open on the opponent's turn, but have the drawback of potentially backfiring and wasting the held open mana if the opponent doesn't play anything worth countering and you have nothing at instant speed that you can play end of turn. As a card selection, sorcery speed cantrip, Sleight of Hand is an abysmal fit for that description.
I'm actually not a huge fan of running all the 1 mana cantrips.
As a tempo deck we can only run so many spells that don't affect the board state. Opt, Sleight of Hand and Serum Visions all have value in that they make sure that our draws are live draws, but that has diminishing returns. As we filter more and more, we end up drawing less and less excess lands, making the 1 mana cost of playing another card selection spell more and more significant.
Opt will probably replace Sleight of Hand, and Serum Visions will remain due to its synergy with Delver of Secrets. But we need enough cards to filter into to make these card selection spells worthwhile.
The whole point of thresh decks like Delver is that your card selection spells do impact the board state. They grow your creatures, trigger useful abilities, increase your ability to find business as needed, and enable cards like Delver in the first place. This argument reminds me of "Path is negative tempo" (how is removing a 4-mana creature for one mana "negative tempo?"). Critically assessing the role these cards actually play in your games will help you understand them.
It impacts it with exactly Young Pyromancer. Delver cares that it's in the deck, but Opt and Sleight of Hand both don't help to flip it any more than any other instant/sorcery spell does.
Opt and Serum Visions together should already be enough to find enough threats as is, and if you're having to play a cycle spell into a cycle spell into a cycle spell in order to find your Delver, then you've already fallen so far behind that it's going to be hell to try and catch back up afterwards, especially when you're filtering out excess lands, and thus keeping your mana count low.
Opt I like due to the fact that it's instant speed, and thus is less of a burden as you can play it on turns that you're holding up a counterspell and your opponent doesn't play anything worth countering, and Serum Visions because it makes flipping Delver so much more consistent, but Sleight of Hand feels like it would be better to just run more Vapor Snags/Lightning Bolts/Mana Leaks/Logic Knots (In a non-lavamancer version, or possibly even as a 1 of in them) instead if you're not running at least 8 creatures that care about spells being cast. (i.e. Versions running multiple Thing in the Ice or Prowess Creatures.)
You aren't playing a Thresh deck that cares about getting a mass of cards into your grave, you're playing a Delver deck whose flagship card cares about the card on top of your deck, and Young Pyromancer which you'd much rather leave open mana to protect and play at as close to instant speed as possible once it's on the board rather than potentially getting an extra 1/1.
It sounds as though you're the one that isn't actually assessing the deck's various parts. Most delver decks don't run creatures that grow from casting them, only have exactly one ability that triggers off it, and would rather just put more gas into the deck instead of needing to use mana to find it in the first place rather than running the worst of the cantrips being discussed. Even if I did find the Pyromancer triggers worthwhile, I'd rather run Thought-Scour to put cards in the grave to make Snapcaster more versatile and more importantly, play at instant speed to allow me to hold up counterspells when I need them and only pay for it at end of turn when I have the spare mana.
I'm actually not a huge fan of running all the 1 mana cantrips.
As a tempo deck we can only run so many spells that don't affect the board state. Opt, Sleight of Hand and Serum Visions all have value in that they make sure that our draws are live draws, but that has diminishing returns. As we filter more and more, we end up drawing less and less excess lands, making the 1 mana cost of playing another card selection spell more and more significant.
Opt will probably replace Sleight of Hand, and Serum Visions will remain due to its synergy with Delver of Secrets. But we need enough cards to filter into to make these card selection spells worthwhile.
I don't think that will work, as Freebooter's effect is just one ability while Fiend Hunter and Sculler are two separate triggers for the same reason that it doesn't work with Banisher Priest.
A single lieutenant on turn 3 gets it out of Anger range, and a 4/3 is a pretty impressive clock as is. Additionally, the downside if it goes poorly isn't really quite as bad as I initially felt since Path to Exile and Anger of the Gods don't actually kill it, and most decks that do run kill remova mainboard like Burn, Traditional Black/Green Midrange and Death's Shadow typically end up being limited more by cards in hand than mana available due to how low to the ground they are.
It might not be good enough in the end, but it's probably worth consideration given that the standard for human 2 drops is a bit lower than other CMCs
My only concern there is that, at that point, we're not just soft to blood moon, we just straight up lose to it on the spot. Maybe it's like that already, but I like being able to fetch out early basics in those matchups. And having basics to fetch from Path to Exile and Ghost Quarter is often relevant. I'd be more than happy to make such concessions in a blitz aggro build, but not as much in a Company build.
It's really not /that/ bad. Turn 1 mana generating creature is a pretty common turn 1 play. While Avacyn's pilgrim only generates white, Noble Hierarch produces the three colours common to pretty much every company build. I'd hardly call it losing to blood moon on the spot.
On that note. I wonder if Trinket Mage with more than just Engineered Explosives has any merit.
For instance, running a single Mishra's Bauble and Darksteel Citadel to make the first one significantly less bad main deck in the case where you don't need Engineered Explosives (Either to just draw a card and see your opponent's next draw if you don't really need anything in particular, or Citadel if you really want to guarantee that you make that 4th mana drop for Collected Company on the next turn), and in the side deck using Dispeller's Capsule and Relic of Progenitus or Tormod's Crypt as enchantment/graveyard hate, along with a single Pithing Needle for devoted druid combo, as well Gavony Township/Knightfall/Planeswalker based win conditions and a Chalice of the Void for Restore Balance and Living End (X=0) or control (x=1) (which can be cast through using Cavern of Souls) as they can be fetched by Trinket Mage.
I gave this a quick try online against Naya Zoo and Jeskai Control, and Trinket Mage was a star in both matches, getting Engineered Explosives against Zoo, which completely turned around round 1. I didn't draw it round 2, but I would have been happy to topdeck at any point in the game, but the deck just won on its own before I drew it.
Against Jeskai Control I played it turn 2, but I went had no idea what they were playing, so I just grabbed my Darksteel Citadel which let me Collected Company Turn 3, for a Sin Collector and a Thalia, which showed Emrakul, Double Reflector Mage, and land with no non-creature spells. So I just went full aggro and ran them over before they topdecked verdict.
Game 2 I put in Pithing Needle, and Chalice of the Void. I got a fairly good aggro start though, and went with that, playing turn 3 Sin Collector to scout for Verdict/Wrath of God instead of Trinket Mage. Turn 4 was Collected Company, which hit Trinket mage #2 and a Hierarch, so I grabbed Chalice of the Void, then on 5 went for Sin Collector taking Cryptic Command, and then Chaliced for X = 1, at which point they conceded.
Very small sample size, and I did get quite fortunate, but I did like the feel of the Trinket Mage package, and I'll definitely test it some more once I have the time.
A card I've run in the past is Grand Abolisher. What are thoughts and opinions on that in the metagame as it stands?
I'm not a huge fan of it. It's double white, which in a bit harsh/painful when both your black and your blue shock are whiteless, additionally, most decks don't absolutely need to cast much other than counterspells (when you're already running 4 Cavern of Souls') since we're a pretty fair deck with little haste or "I win if I'm not disrupted at instant speed" plays.
My big issue with Copter is that with us already running 4 Vials and 4 Thraben Inspectors, it means that Stony Silence becomes quite good against us, and it's something that a lot of people are probably running in their side deck due to affinity, and also something that we want to bring in against affinity ourselves. Boarding out vials for Stony Silence is one thing, but do we really have enough to board out vials + copters without having to bring in bad cards?
One of my favorite pet cards is Meddling Mage. I would love to play him in a UW hate bears package, but the only other card that I would want is reflector mage, and that just isn't good enough.
Reflector Mage is a 4 of in Human Company, and Meddling Mage is a Sideboard card in it.
Turn 1 Hierarch Turn 2 Dreamstealer seems like it can completly go out of control if your opponent doesn't have a removal immediatly since you attack for 2 with he Exalted trigger. With Thalia Lieutnenant or Mayor of Avabruck it gets even better. Especially against combo-ish decks like Storm, RG Valakut or even Eldrazi Tron and Tron that play few removals, making them discard 2-3 cards on turn 3 seems backbreaking.
Needle Specter has never been played but the fact that Dreamstealer is an human, has 1 additional thoughness and has Eternalize for Control match-ups is enough of an upside for me to consider it.
I feel like it's not a great option over Sin Collector. Storm at least sides in lightning bolts, and Valakut decks bring in more Anger of the Gods while typically maindecking those + lightning bolt.
Then there's also the fact that he has to connect, and is thus blocked by Baral, Goblin Electromancer, and Sakura Tribe Elder.
Additionally, with combo tending to try to "go off" on turn 4-5, if you don't get a dork and have to play him naturally on 3, he might get 1, or if he's lucky 2 attacks off, meaning that he wont be discarding much more than Sin Collector, and in the case of "I need to win or disrupt my opponent before the next turn" main phase collected company, which is more common than you'd think, he's an absolutely terrible hit.
There's just too much that can go wrong in comparison to Sin Collector, and unless you have him down on turn 2, his ceiling isn't all that much better either unless you specifically manage to have him down on turn 2.
Eternalise might possibly be good for control matches, however, so is the ability for Sin Collector to surgically relieve the opponent of a board wipe or a cryptic command when you want to collected company (Or even get pulled out of collected company and remove a board wipe) where Dreamstealer would let them discard excess lands, or non-cryptic command counterspells while you have a cavern of souls on the field, as is the incidental benefit of getting to look at their hand in the process. There's also the somewhat fringe but not irrelevant benefit that Sin Collector exiles rather than discards, thus doesn't fuel Delve, hits both parts of Flashback cards like Lingering Souls, and stops blue decks from recasting it with Snapcaster.
He's pretty devestating if he comes down turn 2 off a noble hierarch and isn't answered right away, but that's also a pretty specific situation.
Main Deck wise, from the first tournament result, it looks like they cut a Sin Collector, an Avacyn's Pilgrim and a Mayor for Anafenza, an Abzan Falconer, and a 4th copy of GoT Thalia.
The Xathrid Necromancers, Meddling Mages and Orzhov Pontifs in the side are pretty cool.
Against which decks would you rather have Sin Collector pre-board over something like Kambal for instance ?
Well, the obvious answer to that is Valakut decks. Unless you manage to get 2 lands + a mana generator, by turn 3 you're probably looking at them needing 1/2 spells before they can kill with Through the Breach or Scapeshift. The other obvious answer is decks that mainboard sweepers like Blue-White Control, Jeskai Control, and RG Breach.
I didn't get the impression that it was weak to burn. He was just quite unfortunate. Game 1 he went second in the kind of matchup where who goes first is a huge decider and the game ended up losing by exactly 1 turn.
In game 2, he managed to win with a 5 card hand. His opponent flooded, but the still only played 2 lands (the number of cards that he was down by at the start) over their ideal number.
In game 3 he got stuck on 2 lands.
The deck seemed fine against burn, the result just seemed to be a case of a fairly even matchup + the variance inherent to MTG.
Someone already linked to one a little bit earlier. In fact, it's the only one with any results worth noting.
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/689488#paper
It really seems to agree with the basic idea. That getting instants and sorceries into the grave is useful, but that once you get a delver or pyromancer onto the field, you'd much rather play at instant speed than sorcery in order to constantly threaten your opponent with counterspells, hence why the only sorcery is Serum Visions, and the other cycles have the same benefit that Opt does. It's less of a burden to use since you can just use them on the turns that you held up (Or bluffed holding up, often the effect can be the same) countermagic to slow your opponent down and ended up not needing to use it (Thought Scour and Heiroglyphic Illumination) while Heiroglyphic Illumination also has a much higher ceiling than Sleight of Hand, becoming a full card advantage spell in grindy matchups.
The only on cast trigger is Young Pyromancer. Lavamancer and Serpent find having a card in the graveyard useful, but they're also anti-synergy with each other and most likely one's sided out when the other is brought in, meaning that at most 6 creatures care about the graveyard at any one point in time, but in the case of Sleight of Hand... are you really unable to find a better card to flashback than Sleight of Hand? The only spell that Sleight of Hand puts into your graveyard for Snapcaster Mage is Sleight of Hand, when Thought Scour is not only instant, but has a chance of putting spells that you actually want to flashback into the pool. All Snapcaster needs is a single instant or sorcery, and Sleight of Hand would be one of the lowest priority flashback targets.
Sleight of Hand might have some synergy with the deck, but it's so minor that it's certainly not good enough to justify running the abysmal Sleight of Hand, and I really don't see how you could claim that sorcery speed cantrips synergise especially well in a deck type that runs counterspells given that instant speed cantrips mean that you can leave mana open on your turn to deter opponents with the threat of countermagic and then still make use of your mana even when they play around it, making instant speed all the more valuable and mitigating the tempo loss.
If you wanted to make it work, you'd probably want to run it in a deck with far more on cast synergies, like full on Kiln Fiend and Prowess style creatures, and even then you'd probably rather run different cantrips like Slip Through Space to make sure that those grounded attackers can actually connect.
Additionally, if you're going to go with that that definition, Sleight of Hand is also a terrible fit. "Often trades card advantage for speed" and "disrupts opponents with noncreature spells" are heavily at odds with Sleight of Hand. Cantrips are one of the biggest cases of trading speed for card advantage, as they tend to have much less powerful effects than other spells of their mana cost due to the fact that they're a 0 card advantage instead of a -1, and a part of Delver's disruption suite is counterspells, which require the ability to hold mana open on the opponent's turn, but have the drawback of potentially backfiring and wasting the held open mana if the opponent doesn't play anything worth countering and you have nothing at instant speed that you can play end of turn. As a card selection, sorcery speed cantrip, Sleight of Hand is an abysmal fit for that description.
It impacts it with exactly Young Pyromancer. Delver cares that it's in the deck, but Opt and Sleight of Hand both don't help to flip it any more than any other instant/sorcery spell does.
Opt and Serum Visions together should already be enough to find enough threats as is, and if you're having to play a cycle spell into a cycle spell into a cycle spell in order to find your Delver, then you've already fallen so far behind that it's going to be hell to try and catch back up afterwards, especially when you're filtering out excess lands, and thus keeping your mana count low.
Opt I like due to the fact that it's instant speed, and thus is less of a burden as you can play it on turns that you're holding up a counterspell and your opponent doesn't play anything worth countering, and Serum Visions because it makes flipping Delver so much more consistent, but Sleight of Hand feels like it would be better to just run more Vapor Snags/Lightning Bolts/Mana Leaks/Logic Knots (In a non-lavamancer version, or possibly even as a 1 of in them) instead if you're not running at least 8 creatures that care about spells being cast. (i.e. Versions running multiple Thing in the Ice or Prowess Creatures.)
You aren't playing a Thresh deck that cares about getting a mass of cards into your grave, you're playing a Delver deck whose flagship card cares about the card on top of your deck, and Young Pyromancer which you'd much rather leave open mana to protect and play at as close to instant speed as possible once it's on the board rather than potentially getting an extra 1/1.
It sounds as though you're the one that isn't actually assessing the deck's various parts. Most delver decks don't run creatures that grow from casting them, only have exactly one ability that triggers off it, and would rather just put more gas into the deck instead of needing to use mana to find it in the first place rather than running the worst of the cantrips being discussed. Even if I did find the Pyromancer triggers worthwhile, I'd rather run Thought-Scour to put cards in the grave to make Snapcaster more versatile and more importantly, play at instant speed to allow me to hold up counterspells when I need them and only pay for it at end of turn when I have the spare mana.
As a tempo deck we can only run so many spells that don't affect the board state. Opt, Sleight of Hand and Serum Visions all have value in that they make sure that our draws are live draws, but that has diminishing returns. As we filter more and more, we end up drawing less and less excess lands, making the 1 mana cost of playing another card selection spell more and more significant.
Opt will probably replace Sleight of Hand, and Serum Visions will remain due to its synergy with Delver of Secrets. But we need enough cards to filter into to make these card selection spells worthwhile.
A single lieutenant on turn 3 gets it out of Anger range, and a 4/3 is a pretty impressive clock as is. Additionally, the downside if it goes poorly isn't really quite as bad as I initially felt since Path to Exile and Anger of the Gods don't actually kill it, and most decks that do run kill remova mainboard like Burn, Traditional Black/Green Midrange and Death's Shadow typically end up being limited more by cards in hand than mana available due to how low to the ground they are.
It might not be good enough in the end, but it's probably worth consideration given that the standard for human 2 drops is a bit lower than other CMCs
It's really not /that/ bad. Turn 1 mana generating creature is a pretty common turn 1 play. While Avacyn's pilgrim only generates white, Noble Hierarch produces the three colours common to pretty much every company build. I'd hardly call it losing to blood moon on the spot.
This seems like it has a good possibility of making the cut in at least some 4/5 colour decks.
For instance, running a single Mishra's Bauble and Darksteel Citadel to make the first one significantly less bad main deck in the case where you don't need Engineered Explosives (Either to just draw a card and see your opponent's next draw if you don't really need anything in particular, or Citadel if you really want to guarantee that you make that 4th mana drop for Collected Company on the next turn), and in the side deck using Dispeller's Capsule and Relic of Progenitus or Tormod's Crypt as enchantment/graveyard hate, along with a single Pithing Needle for devoted druid combo, as well Gavony Township/Knightfall/Planeswalker based win conditions and a Chalice of the Void for Restore Balance and Living End (X=0) or control (x=1) (which can be cast through using Cavern of Souls) as they can be fetched by Trinket Mage.
4 Champion of the Parish
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Avacyn's Pilgrim
4 Thalia's Lieutenant
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Sin Collector
4 Reflector Mage
4 Trinket Mage
Artifacts:
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Mishra's Bauble
3 Path to Exile
4 Collected Company
Lands:
4 Windswept Heath
4 Flooded Strand
4 Cavern of Souls
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Temple Garden
1 Breeding Pool
2 Forest
1 Plains
1 Darksteel Citadel
3x Stony Silence
3x Aven Mindcensor
1x Tormod's Crypt
1x Pithing Needle
1x Chalice of the Void
1x Path to Exile
2x Kambal, Consul of Allocation
1x Disenchanter's Capsule
2x Dusk // Dawn
I gave this a quick try online against Naya Zoo and Jeskai Control, and Trinket Mage was a star in both matches, getting Engineered Explosives against Zoo, which completely turned around round 1. I didn't draw it round 2, but I would have been happy to topdeck at any point in the game, but the deck just won on its own before I drew it.
Against Jeskai Control I played it turn 2, but I went had no idea what they were playing, so I just grabbed my Darksteel Citadel which let me Collected Company Turn 3, for a Sin Collector and a Thalia, which showed Emrakul, Double Reflector Mage, and land with no non-creature spells. So I just went full aggro and ran them over before they topdecked verdict.
Game 2 I put in Pithing Needle, and Chalice of the Void. I got a fairly good aggro start though, and went with that, playing turn 3 Sin Collector to scout for Verdict/Wrath of God instead of Trinket Mage. Turn 4 was Collected Company, which hit Trinket mage #2 and a Hierarch, so I grabbed Chalice of the Void, then on 5 went for Sin Collector taking Cryptic Command, and then Chaliced for X = 1, at which point they conceded.
Very small sample size, and I did get quite fortunate, but I did like the feel of the Trinket Mage package, and I'll definitely test it some more once I have the time.
I'm not a huge fan of it. It's double white, which in a bit harsh/painful when both your black and your blue shock are whiteless, additionally, most decks don't absolutely need to cast much other than counterspells (when you're already running 4 Cavern of Souls') since we're a pretty fair deck with little haste or "I win if I'm not disrupted at instant speed" plays.
Reflector Mage is a 4 of in Human Company, and Meddling Mage is a Sideboard card in it.
I feel like it's not a great option over Sin Collector. Storm at least sides in lightning bolts, and Valakut decks bring in more Anger of the Gods while typically maindecking those + lightning bolt.
Then there's also the fact that he has to connect, and is thus blocked by Baral, Goblin Electromancer, and Sakura Tribe Elder.
Additionally, with combo tending to try to "go off" on turn 4-5, if you don't get a dork and have to play him naturally on 3, he might get 1, or if he's lucky 2 attacks off, meaning that he wont be discarding much more than Sin Collector, and in the case of "I need to win or disrupt my opponent before the next turn" main phase collected company, which is more common than you'd think, he's an absolutely terrible hit.
There's just too much that can go wrong in comparison to Sin Collector, and unless you have him down on turn 2, his ceiling isn't all that much better either unless you specifically manage to have him down on turn 2.
Eternalise might possibly be good for control matches, however, so is the ability for Sin Collector to surgically relieve the opponent of a board wipe or a cryptic command when you want to collected company (Or even get pulled out of collected company and remove a board wipe) where Dreamstealer would let them discard excess lands, or non-cryptic command counterspells while you have a cavern of souls on the field, as is the incidental benefit of getting to look at their hand in the process. There's also the somewhat fringe but not irrelevant benefit that Sin Collector exiles rather than discards, thus doesn't fuel Delve, hits both parts of Flashback cards like Lingering Souls, and stops blue decks from recasting it with Snapcaster.
He's pretty devestating if he comes down turn 2 off a noble hierarch and isn't answered right away, but that's also a pretty specific situation.
http://magic.wizards.com/en/events/coverage/gplv17/9-32-decklists-2017-06-18
A WGUB variant managed to get to 19th place.
Main Deck wise, from the first tournament result, it looks like they cut a Sin Collector, an Avacyn's Pilgrim and a Mayor for Anafenza, an Abzan Falconer, and a 4th copy of GoT Thalia.
The Xathrid Necromancers, Meddling Mages and Orzhov Pontifs in the side are pretty cool.
Well, the obvious answer to that is Valakut decks. Unless you manage to get 2 lands + a mana generator, by turn 3 you're probably looking at them needing 1/2 spells before they can kill with Through the Breach or Scapeshift. The other obvious answer is decks that mainboard sweepers like Blue-White Control, Jeskai Control, and RG Breach.
I didn't get the impression that it was weak to burn. He was just quite unfortunate. Game 1 he went second in the kind of matchup where who goes first is a huge decider and the game ended up losing by exactly 1 turn.
In game 2, he managed to win with a 5 card hand. His opponent flooded, but the still only played 2 lands (the number of cards that he was down by at the start) over their ideal number.
In game 3 he got stuck on 2 lands.
The deck seemed fine against burn, the result just seemed to be a case of a fairly even matchup + the variance inherent to MTG.