Kelvin Chew (Hyper) running a mash up of Knightfall and Vizier Druid. Talk about a spicy list. I kind of feel like this will end up being the worst of both worlds (aside from running Queller in Vizier Druid, which seems great) since the Vizier deck combos so well and the Knightfall combo really is an afterthought. Gives you much better post-board games against fair decks than Vizier Druid and better G1s than Knightfall.
Unless you're playing them Maindeck (which is a huge deckbuilding cost), they don't do much vs Storm. Better now that they run Gifts, but they can still scroll for Echoing Truth and kill us through it. The combination of Brutality, Discard, Surgical, Cage and Relic seems to work well enough but I don't have a ton of experience with the MU.
Vs Burn it's solid but as mentioned a lot of people are going heavy on Brutality and are also playing other discard. Vs Valakut is probably the best place for it.
Vs discard I don't think we care enough. Up to four cards in the deck to blank around eight of theirs potentially and we have great options for grinding and generating card advantage. I only feel like a deck should be boarding in Leyline against BGx if they're a dedicated combo deck (AdNaus, old Bloom are great examples).
Witchbane Orb ends up being a better Leyline on everything but T0 and you only need to run one. Against Valakut the lack of T0 is not super relevant and potentially better, as we can get a blowout and also potentially dodge hate (lands come in tapped after Scapeshift). Vs Burn is where this really hurts. We can also instant speed it against Storm, making it more relevant as it's more likely to counter a Grapeshot (though still potentially useless, as depending on how hard they go off we can still lose).
All in all, I think it's a chronically overrated card that doesn't belong in our deck because we aren't soft to discard like AdNauseum or Amulet are. When AdNaus hits T0 Leyline, their win chance against BGx skyrockets. When we hit it, it's okay.
RE: Surgical Extraction. Wouldn't Grafdigger's Cage have given you most of those games against Goryo's Vengeance, Bubble Hulk and Storm anyway? Because, keeping in mind the context that is this deck Cage can: turn on Opal, work toward Improvise mana, be found with Stirrings and Fair, be found off Whir or Tezzeret, turned into a 5/5 beater, work toward Tezz's ultimate, etc. My point being that we're looking to win with synergy and when an artifact (and a Stony Silence proof one at that) gets you similar returns than some other non artifact card, it should probably weight for something in your decision. Each non-artifact card we side-in has a substantial cost in ultimately turning off our deck.
I play Cage main in addition to a Relic, and currently 2 Surgical + 1 Relic post-board. Actually, my Cage was already destroyed against Storm (survived three Shattering sprees to win). The hulk opponent tried to go off T2 but couldn't due to Surgical as well, though cage would have worked there. I'm seeing both cards in most lists anyway, even if Cage is in the board.
Anyway, I also played FNM tonight and went 3-1. Still don't have a Sieve in paper so I went without, though I wish I had it tonight.
First round was against Skred Red. G1 was a fairly quick combo into a concession shortly afterwards. My opponent Anger'd my board once but had no other way to interact. G2 I got the combo online but met a Shatterstorm. Blood Moon locked me out of casting my Tezzeret and Maelstrom Pulse which would have taken care of my opponent's Koth and Chandra. G3 I got the combo quickly a third time but my opponent was stuck on three lands. He kept a very aggressive double Stormbreath hand, which wouldn't really have done anything. I could have Whir'd for Sieve in all three games to avoid losing to Shatterstorm had I had it. \
Second round was against some weird Bizzaro Tron deck. Was running Planar Portal, Lodestone Golem, Akroma's Memorial, Blightsteel... G1 I assembled the combo but then stalled for a bit. My opponent went double Lodestone, which I was jazzed about until he played Akroma's Memorial. He was able to Karn away my Foundry and slowly finish me off through my remaining thopters before I could find a second Foundry or Bridge. I played both GQs this game. G2 I opened with GQ surgical, but got stuck on one land afterwards for maybe five turns. My opponent struggled to find lands (he had one stripped from hand), but eventually landed double Lodestone again and killed me while I had uncastable Whir and Tezzeret in hand. I feel strongly that I would have won both these games if it were regular tron. The 4drop beaters really did me in despite me severly hurting the opponent's mana.
Third round was against a RUGw Delver list featuring Become Immense+Battle Rage and Geist of St Traft. G1 was an easy combo win. My opponent got their combo as well, but Brutality + Bauble looks let me know what was up so I knew not to attack too aggressively and lose a game that I otherwise couldn't lose. G2 I got a T3 Tezzeret and eventually got behind bridge. The turn after I got the combo going, my opponent had two Ancestral Visions resolve. He went Stony Silence into double Natural State and had the combo+bolt for exactly lethal with his Delver. Luckily I was sandbagging a Fatal Push the whole game and won with Tez ult plus 2x thopter beats.
Fourth round was against KCI. T1 Pithing Needle on KCI and my opponent lost several turns later to Thopter beats, only realizing that Needle does nothing against Ironworks after the game ended. I could have legitimately won the game with Sieve in the deck. G2 I kept a hand with Relic plus double surgical. I got stuck on two lands and punted by playing Foundry out before Sword, getting it Disenchanted. I disrupted the combo with my exile effects but ended up losing to 3/3 Hangarback beats. I'm confident I could have won had I not misplayed my sequencing. G3 I had the nuts with some early cantriping into T2 Mox+Prism+Relic, T3 Witchbane Orb (opponent was using Pia's Revolution), T4 Tezzeret and then had Surgical + Whir backup all game as I beat down with 5/5s.
All in all the deck performed great. The ease with which you win a lot of G1s is really nice. I'll probably have my Sieve by Monday and I'll be sure to add that. Serum Visions was pretty nice and I think I'll keep the two in for now. I did kind of miss not having Thoughtsieze against Eggs where Brutality was going to whiff 99% of the time and thus wasn't worth playing, but we can beat so many combo decks without it. Might try to make room for some in the future.
Also, have you seen my Gx Tron match-up testing posts?
Edit: Just looked at the posts. Seems like all of the other cards were more relevant than fountain while also being applicable in other MUs. Getting it T2 (T3 on the play) seems awesome but anytime after and I'd expect it to be lackluster.
I've found Surgical Extraction to be pretty useful outside of the big mana matchups, mostly against a plethora of combo decks. Used it to beat Goryo's, Bubble Hulk, Storm (screwed him off of blue while going off with surgical on Manamorphose, though you can tie up their mana with surgical on any rit) and Vizer Druid (which feels like a terribad MU because they only care about removal and Cage). Many of those are niche, but it's made me a fan of running surgical over extra relics/spellbombs.
Good point on Witchbane vs Hurkyl's. Hadn't considered that.
Hi all, started playing the deck recently and here are some thoughts I've had.
I've been playing a light green splash for 1 MB decay in place of a Push and an additional Decay and Pulse in the board. I agree with your thoughts, Magpie, that you definitely don't need 4x Decay and 2x Pulse.
I have played the least with the Stirrings version, but I'm leaning towards not liking it as much as playing without for a lot of the same reasons mentioned. You can aim for very consistent G1s but it makes sideboarding more difficult. Stirrings also fails to hit the majority of our gas cards (Tezz, Whir, Foundry). I think if I wanted additional filtering I would run a couple Serum Visions in place of the 22nd land and either an interactive spell or a bullet.
I put Altar of the Brood in my board to try it out and immediately played against UW control! However, the plan felt kind of foolish. I didn't actually want Surgical in my deck postboard against them and while the incidental mill can clinch games that stall and go long, I don't think it was worth, especially since you need multiple in the board for it to be relevant.
I've also found Witchbane Orb to be lacking, though I haven't played many MUs where it's stellar (i.e. instant speed beat Valakut). It's pretty mediocre against most combo decks since they're already bringing in artifact hate and bounce spells (Storm, AdNaus). I'm inclinded to think something like Sun Droplet, more Brutality, or Chalice is better against Burn and against Valakut we just go ham on GQ+Surgical.
When a friend gets back in town I'm going to try and jam a bunch of the Tron MU to see if Quicksilver Fountain pulls its weight. Perhaps multiple needle, 3-4 GQ, 2-3 Surgical and Crucible is enough.
I've started finding Padeem to be actually useful as an anti-hate and grindy sideboard option. Initially I never wanted to board her in and cut her but it hasn't been bad. I could see it going either way.
I've utilized Herald quite a bit, boarding it in very often. I've liked it so far, though I find most opponents have some way to deal with it post-board even if they aren't expecting it (and who is, really), which really sucks. Stuff like Liliana, Maelstrom Pulse, Detention Sphere, etc.
I end up changing my SB significantly often and the MB flex spots fairly often as well as I attempt to better familiarize myself with the deck and figure out what works best. Option overload is a real thing!
Below is my most recent MB from memory. Moved Brutalities to the side since I've found I board them out quite often and find myself wanting more Whir targets G1.
How I ended up on lotus cobra in the list is a long story. But now after playing I love it because it speeds us up against the unfair decks, and puts us ahead of the fair decks, by allowing us to do multiple things per turn. The synergy between Knight, tracker and our ability to play instant speed (with fetchlands) is very powerful. We can cast additonal spells, or pump with gavony, canopy instantly replaces itself if needed. etc etc.
I cant imagine playing a list without them now. The alternatives (at least for me) is a 3/4th voice or an additonal copy of pridemage or spirit, which I havent found I need, I would much rather the explosiveness of t2 cobra + fetchland.
all I can say is test it. Im hoping more people try it, and im hoping its as good for them as it has been for me.
I played one last night (didn't have access to more, guess I sold mine a while back). Actually saw it in most games, though. Only cast it once, all other times it just sat in my hand as I did better things with my mana or held it to redeploy after a board wipe. Basically just felt like drawing a mana dork.
Our deck has some mana intensive things (mostly Kessig and Gavony, sometimes clues if we're going nuts but that's kind of a win-more scenario) but mostly isn't that mana hungry. While getting to play a three drop and a two drop on turn three when we don't have a dork/it's killed is nice, I don't think it's worth running a ninth mana dork that happens to (usually) be worse than a mana dork since it can't T2 a three drop.
I'll give it some more time, but so far it's exactly what I expected it to be.
On a more positive note, I almost crushed a Modern FNM after not playing for about a month and a half. 2-0 Jeskai Saheeli: tried to Blood Moon me G2, where I GQ'd him off of white in response. Poor boarding; 2-0 GB counters: HB, Balista, Constrictor, etc. Thought it was stompy after G1 where I combo'd T3, boarded really poorly but won thanks to Gavony; 2-1 Burn: Opponent ran out of gas G1 where I was otherwise definitely dead, lost G2 due to a terrible keep and poor boarding, crushed G3 with T2 Finks into CoCo.
Then I played against Skred with 4x Stormbreath dragon... now, I feel like normally this MU would be fine, but Stormbreath is just... ouch. He saw two in both games and I saw one Knight in two games despite casting two CoCos. Really terrible CoCos in this match, but it happens.
@JetpackBlues - Why did you decide to start playing Lotus Cobra and in what ways has it performed well for you?
Cobra can get us some explosive plays sometimes and lets us CoCo T3 like another Dork would. It also works better than a dork for generating mana when comboing. However, I don't see that as worth the slot, especially since I feel like the deck is pretty tight as is.
Blessed alliance is really good vs many midrange decks (jund, eldrazi, the mirror) and aggro (all kinds of zoo, bogles, burn, infect). It is really versatile, and this deck is one of the few that can use all three modes (other decks run it because it's good, but don't often use the untap mode). Surprise untapping knights is fun.
So what's your post board plan against, say, Jund? Are you trimming Quellers? I have plenty of cards I could board in, but not as many that I want to board out. Like -2 Retreat, -2 Pridemage, -1-2 Birds of Parades, -1-2 Queller for +2-3 Reflector Mage, +1-2 Finks, +2 Alliance?
Re: Eldrazi I haven't played against Bant at all basically, but I agree with the controlling approach listed. I have played against Colorless a bunch and am still unsure of exact board configuration. Unlike against Bant Eldrazi, I think we need to play an aggro-tempo plan. Negate/Unified will are very good as beating a resolved All is Dust or Ugin is... hopeful at best. Reflector Mage is amazing, letting us out-race their fast draws and delay stuff like Endbringer taking over the game.
I find myself rarely boarding in Alliance against midrange decks, but it's a hard call. You typically have four easy cuts in Retreat and Pridemage, and then you bring in your Reflector Mages and Finks. Staticaster is good against Abzan and some Grixis builds as well. Negate is also a consideration, but I find myself often not boarding it unless against a control-heavy Grixis list.
This makes it hard to find room for Alliance in some cases, as I think most of our creatures are better than it is. Trimming Quellers is an option, as pseudo-remand can often be mediocre in these MUs, but just having flash fliers is often great and they help a lot in closing out games.
i see eldritch evolution in sidesboards from time to time. in what matchup would this be brought in for? any match where you desperately want a 3 drop?
Any matchup where a specific creature is really good. I.e. to fetch Kataki vs Affinity, Eidolon vs combo decks, Staticaster vs x/1 decks. I've used this strategy in my Naya builds to decent success, basically allowing you to increase your density of sideboard cards.
I know Kelvin Chew has been running one for a while, but I don't really get why as he doesn't run any of these high-impact silver bullets. I don't think it's worth running to get generally good creatures.
Regarding planeswalkers: I've been testing Tamiyo and she's been solid and very fun to play with. Weaker than just running the fourth CoCo IMO, but a decent option.
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Devoted Druid
2 Duskwatch Recruiter
1 Eternal Witness
4 Knight of the Reliquary
2 Noble Hierarch
3 Reflector Mage
1 Rhonas the Indomitable
4 Spell Queller
4 Vizier of Remedies
Non-Dudes
3 Chord of Calling
4 Collected Company
2 Retreat to Coralhelm
1 Botanical Sanctum
1 Breeding Pool
1 Flooded Strand
3 Forest
2 Gavony Township
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Kessig Wolf Run
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Plains
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
4 Windswept Heath
3 Izzet Staticaster
4 Meddling Mage
3 Path to Exile
1 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scavenging Ooze
2 Tireless Tracker
Kelvin Chew (Hyper) running a mash up of Knightfall and Vizier Druid. Talk about a spicy list. I kind of feel like this will end up being the worst of both worlds (aside from running Queller in Vizier Druid, which seems great) since the Vizier deck combos so well and the Knightfall combo really is an afterthought. Gives you much better post-board games against fair decks than Vizier Druid and better G1s than Knightfall.
Unless you're playing them Maindeck (which is a huge deckbuilding cost), they don't do much vs Storm. Better now that they run Gifts, but they can still scroll for Echoing Truth and kill us through it. The combination of Brutality, Discard, Surgical, Cage and Relic seems to work well enough but I don't have a ton of experience with the MU.
Vs Burn it's solid but as mentioned a lot of people are going heavy on Brutality and are also playing other discard. Vs Valakut is probably the best place for it.
Vs discard I don't think we care enough. Up to four cards in the deck to blank around eight of theirs potentially and we have great options for grinding and generating card advantage. I only feel like a deck should be boarding in Leyline against BGx if they're a dedicated combo deck (AdNaus, old Bloom are great examples).
Witchbane Orb ends up being a better Leyline on everything but T0 and you only need to run one. Against Valakut the lack of T0 is not super relevant and potentially better, as we can get a blowout and also potentially dodge hate (lands come in tapped after Scapeshift). Vs Burn is where this really hurts. We can also instant speed it against Storm, making it more relevant as it's more likely to counter a Grapeshot (though still potentially useless, as depending on how hard they go off we can still lose).
All in all, I think it's a chronically overrated card that doesn't belong in our deck because we aren't soft to discard like AdNauseum or Amulet are. When AdNaus hits T0 Leyline, their win chance against BGx skyrockets. When we hit it, it's okay.
I play Cage main in addition to a Relic, and currently 2 Surgical + 1 Relic post-board. Actually, my Cage was already destroyed against Storm (survived three Shattering sprees to win). The hulk opponent tried to go off T2 but couldn't due to Surgical as well, though cage would have worked there. I'm seeing both cards in most lists anyway, even if Cage is in the board.
Anyway, I also played FNM tonight and went 3-1. Still don't have a Sieve in paper so I went without, though I wish I had it tonight.
2x Watery Grave
1x Breeding Pool
3x Darkslick Shores
1x Botanical Sanctum
3x Island
1x Swamp
4x Polluted Delta
2x Flooded Strand
2x Ghost Quarter
1x Academy Ruins
1x Inventor's Fair
Tezzeret
3x Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
Instant/Sorcery
2x Serum Visions
1x Collective Brutality
4x Whir of Invention
2x Fatal Push
1x Abrupt Decay
4x Pentad Prism
4x Mishra's Bauble
3x Mox Opal
2x Welding Jar
1x Trading Post
2x Ensnaring Bridge
3x Thopter Foundry
2x Sword of the Meek
1x Grafdigger's Cage
1x Relic of Progenitus
1x Pithing Needle
1x Expedition Map
1x Engineered Explosives
2x Herald of Anguish
1x Padeem, Consul of Innovation
2x Surgical Extraction
1x Relic of Progenitus
2x Collective Brutality
1x Witchbane Orb
1x Ghost Quarter
1x Crucible of Worlds
1x Abrupt Decay
1x Maelstrom Pulse
1x Pithing Needle
1x Damnation
First round was against Skred Red. G1 was a fairly quick combo into a concession shortly afterwards. My opponent Anger'd my board once but had no other way to interact. G2 I got the combo online but met a Shatterstorm. Blood Moon locked me out of casting my Tezzeret and Maelstrom Pulse which would have taken care of my opponent's Koth and Chandra. G3 I got the combo quickly a third time but my opponent was stuck on three lands. He kept a very aggressive double Stormbreath hand, which wouldn't really have done anything. I could have Whir'd for Sieve in all three games to avoid losing to Shatterstorm had I had it. \
Second round was against some weird Bizzaro Tron deck. Was running Planar Portal, Lodestone Golem, Akroma's Memorial, Blightsteel... G1 I assembled the combo but then stalled for a bit. My opponent went double Lodestone, which I was jazzed about until he played Akroma's Memorial. He was able to Karn away my Foundry and slowly finish me off through my remaining thopters before I could find a second Foundry or Bridge. I played both GQs this game. G2 I opened with GQ surgical, but got stuck on one land afterwards for maybe five turns. My opponent struggled to find lands (he had one stripped from hand), but eventually landed double Lodestone again and killed me while I had uncastable Whir and Tezzeret in hand. I feel strongly that I would have won both these games if it were regular tron. The 4drop beaters really did me in despite me severly hurting the opponent's mana.
Third round was against a RUGw Delver list featuring Become Immense+Battle Rage and Geist of St Traft. G1 was an easy combo win. My opponent got their combo as well, but Brutality + Bauble looks let me know what was up so I knew not to attack too aggressively and lose a game that I otherwise couldn't lose. G2 I got a T3 Tezzeret and eventually got behind bridge. The turn after I got the combo going, my opponent had two Ancestral Visions resolve. He went Stony Silence into double Natural State and had the combo+bolt for exactly lethal with his Delver. Luckily I was sandbagging a Fatal Push the whole game and won with Tez ult plus 2x thopter beats.
Fourth round was against KCI. T1 Pithing Needle on KCI and my opponent lost several turns later to Thopter beats, only realizing that Needle does nothing against Ironworks after the game ended. I could have legitimately won the game with Sieve in the deck. G2 I kept a hand with Relic plus double surgical. I got stuck on two lands and punted by playing Foundry out before Sword, getting it Disenchanted. I disrupted the combo with my exile effects but ended up losing to 3/3 Hangarback beats. I'm confident I could have won had I not misplayed my sequencing. G3 I had the nuts with some early cantriping into T2 Mox+Prism+Relic, T3 Witchbane Orb (opponent was using Pia's Revolution), T4 Tezzeret and then had Surgical + Whir backup all game as I beat down with 5/5s.
All in all the deck performed great. The ease with which you win a lot of G1s is really nice. I'll probably have my Sieve by Monday and I'll be sure to add that. Serum Visions was pretty nice and I think I'll keep the two in for now. I did kind of miss not having Thoughtsieze against Eggs where Brutality was going to whiff 99% of the time and thus wasn't worth playing, but we can beat so many combo decks without it. Might try to make room for some in the future.
Edit: Just looked at the posts. Seems like all of the other cards were more relevant than fountain while also being applicable in other MUs. Getting it T2 (T3 on the play) seems awesome but anytime after and I'd expect it to be lackluster.
I've found Surgical Extraction to be pretty useful outside of the big mana matchups, mostly against a plethora of combo decks. Used it to beat Goryo's, Bubble Hulk, Storm (screwed him off of blue while going off with surgical on Manamorphose, though you can tie up their mana with surgical on any rit) and Vizer Druid (which feels like a terribad MU because they only care about removal and Cage). Many of those are niche, but it's made me a fan of running surgical over extra relics/spellbombs.
Good point on Witchbane vs Hurkyl's. Hadn't considered that.
I've been playing a light green splash for 1 MB decay in place of a Push and an additional Decay and Pulse in the board. I agree with your thoughts, Magpie, that you definitely don't need 4x Decay and 2x Pulse.
I have played the least with the Stirrings version, but I'm leaning towards not liking it as much as playing without for a lot of the same reasons mentioned. You can aim for very consistent G1s but it makes sideboarding more difficult. Stirrings also fails to hit the majority of our gas cards (Tezz, Whir, Foundry). I think if I wanted additional filtering I would run a couple Serum Visions in place of the 22nd land and either an interactive spell or a bullet.
I put Altar of the Brood in my board to try it out and immediately played against UW control! However, the plan felt kind of foolish. I didn't actually want Surgical in my deck postboard against them and while the incidental mill can clinch games that stall and go long, I don't think it was worth, especially since you need multiple in the board for it to be relevant.
I've also found Witchbane Orb to be lacking, though I haven't played many MUs where it's stellar (i.e. instant speed beat Valakut). It's pretty mediocre against most combo decks since they're already bringing in artifact hate and bounce spells (Storm, AdNaus). I'm inclinded to think something like Sun Droplet, more Brutality, or Chalice is better against Burn and against Valakut we just go ham on GQ+Surgical.
When a friend gets back in town I'm going to try and jam a bunch of the Tron MU to see if Quicksilver Fountain pulls its weight. Perhaps multiple needle, 3-4 GQ, 2-3 Surgical and Crucible is enough.
I've started finding Padeem to be actually useful as an anti-hate and grindy sideboard option. Initially I never wanted to board her in and cut her but it hasn't been bad. I could see it going either way.
I've utilized Herald quite a bit, boarding it in very often. I've liked it so far, though I find most opponents have some way to deal with it post-board even if they aren't expecting it (and who is, really), which really sucks. Stuff like Liliana, Maelstrom Pulse, Detention Sphere, etc.
I end up changing my SB significantly often and the MB flex spots fairly often as well as I attempt to better familiarize myself with the deck and figure out what works best. Option overload is a real thing!
Below is my most recent MB from memory. Moved Brutalities to the side since I've found I board them out quite often and find myself wanting more Whir targets G1.
1x Swamp
3x Island
2x Watery Grave
1x Breeding Pool
4x Darkslick Shores
1x Spire of Industry
1x Inventor's Fair
1x Academy Ruins
2x Ghost Quarter
4x Polluted Delta
1x Flooded Strand
4x Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
Instants
4x Whir of Invention
2x Fatal Push
1x Abrupt Decay
Artifacts
3x Thopter Foundry
2x Sword of the Meek
1x Time Sieve
4x Mishra's Bauble
3x Mox Opal
2x Welding Jar
4x Pentad Prism
1x Crucible of Worlds
1x Expedition Map
1x Pithing Needle
1x Engineered Explosives
1x Grafdigger's Cage
1x Relic of Progenitus
1x Trading Post
2x Ensnaring Bridge
I played one last night (didn't have access to more, guess I sold mine a while back). Actually saw it in most games, though. Only cast it once, all other times it just sat in my hand as I did better things with my mana or held it to redeploy after a board wipe. Basically just felt like drawing a mana dork.
Our deck has some mana intensive things (mostly Kessig and Gavony, sometimes clues if we're going nuts but that's kind of a win-more scenario) but mostly isn't that mana hungry. While getting to play a three drop and a two drop on turn three when we don't have a dork/it's killed is nice, I don't think it's worth running a ninth mana dork that happens to (usually) be worse than a mana dork since it can't T2 a three drop.
I'll give it some more time, but so far it's exactly what I expected it to be.
On a more positive note, I almost crushed a Modern FNM after not playing for about a month and a half. 2-0 Jeskai Saheeli: tried to Blood Moon me G2, where I GQ'd him off of white in response. Poor boarding; 2-0 GB counters: HB, Balista, Constrictor, etc. Thought it was stompy after G1 where I combo'd T3, boarded really poorly but won thanks to Gavony; 2-1 Burn: Opponent ran out of gas G1 where I was otherwise definitely dead, lost G2 due to a terrible keep and poor boarding, crushed G3 with T2 Finks into CoCo.
Then I played against Skred with 4x Stormbreath dragon... now, I feel like normally this MU would be fine, but Stormbreath is just... ouch. He saw two in both games and I saw one Knight in two games despite casting two CoCos. Really terrible CoCos in this match, but it happens.
Cobra can get us some explosive plays sometimes and lets us CoCo T3 like another Dork would. It also works better than a dork for generating mana when comboing. However, I don't see that as worth the slot, especially since I feel like the deck is pretty tight as is.
So what's your post board plan against, say, Jund? Are you trimming Quellers? I have plenty of cards I could board in, but not as many that I want to board out. Like -2 Retreat, -2 Pridemage, -1-2 Birds of Parades, -1-2 Queller for +2-3 Reflector Mage, +1-2 Finks, +2 Alliance?
Re: Eldrazi I haven't played against Bant at all basically, but I agree with the controlling approach listed. I have played against Colorless a bunch and am still unsure of exact board configuration. Unlike against Bant Eldrazi, I think we need to play an aggro-tempo plan. Negate/Unified will are very good as beating a resolved All is Dust or Ugin is... hopeful at best. Reflector Mage is amazing, letting us out-race their fast draws and delay stuff like Endbringer taking over the game.
This makes it hard to find room for Alliance in some cases, as I think most of our creatures are better than it is. Trimming Quellers is an option, as pseudo-remand can often be mediocre in these MUs, but just having flash fliers is often great and they help a lot in closing out games.
Any matchup where a specific creature is really good. I.e. to fetch Kataki vs Affinity, Eidolon vs combo decks, Staticaster vs x/1 decks. I've used this strategy in my Naya builds to decent success, basically allowing you to increase your density of sideboard cards.
I know Kelvin Chew has been running one for a while, but I don't really get why as he doesn't run any of these high-impact silver bullets. I don't think it's worth running to get generally good creatures.
Regarding planeswalkers: I've been testing Tamiyo and she's been solid and very fun to play with. Weaker than just running the fourth CoCo IMO, but a decent option.