Hey U Tron peeps! Throne of Eldraine hasn't brought us too many new things, but one that's flying under the radar is Wishclaw Talisman. In my testing so far it has been pretty powerful, and has some sweet synergy with Karn, the Great Creator. We've played lots of tutor effects in the past but this one is by far the most flexible. Obviously it requires being built around a little bit, (more talismans for black sources etc.), but I think it could be worth it, what do you guys think? Anything else from ELD that you are trying?
I've been loving Force of negation, the math behind the cards actually says that 16-17 blue cards is enough. If you want one in your opening hand and a blue card you need to up it a little bit to 19 for it to be reliable. There is an article by Frank Karsten on CFB that breaks it down further, and one for Force of Will by Caleb Durward also on CFB. We are basically playing the minimum to have it be 90%+ chance of having a card to pitch, which should be enough.
Always having a card to pitch to thirst isn't always needed, normally the card selection is enough. The card advantage half of the card is certainly nice though. I'm currently playing 12 maindeck artifacts and have never felt bad about discarding 2 or having a Walking Ballista or Expedition Map to discard.
That's just the odds of having something to pitch to Force though, meaning you might be discarding your only other piece of interaction, or that card draw that you really wanted to find another answer.
It's possible that it's not really a problem, like I said more testing needs to be done with the card.
Yeah KGC isn't really my cup of tea, though I could see him being valuable if built around.
I would love to try out Force of Negation, though I worry we don't play enough blue spells for it to be super effective, and upping the blue count means we would play less artifacts so Thirst for Knowledge becomes a lot worse. In the Pitch Blue Narset deck the pitch spells are valuable because the deck is roughly 70% blue cards, and that's including being able to cheat and use Mistvein Borderpost as a land that's also blue card, which we can't really do. Playing more Torrential Gearhulks could help, but there's not too many useful blue artifacts unfortunately.
That being said, a free counter is incredibly powerful, could be worthwhile playing a few in the sideboard as a trick against combo/control decks? I will have to test it to be sure.
First of all, I went 4-0 in a small local tourney of 12 people! Mostly I think I just got lucky with a lot of turn 3-4 tron, while dodging bad matchups. I can type up a tournament report if anyone wants it, here is the list I played:
Anyways, it seems like the discussion here has diminished lately, is there some other place that people are talking about U Tron?
Also, I have noticed to no one has taken over the primer on the new mtgnexus site, linked here, I would do it but I don't think I'm experienced enough with the deck.
Hey everyone! Just wanted to let you all know that I've made the primer over on mtgnexus.com Click here to go to the thread!
I will be working on updating the Primer in the next couple days(for both sites) to include discussions about some of the newer cards as well as more/updated deck lists etc.
Someone is testing Archmage's Charm? Seems like a very powerfull card in mono U and is seeing play even in UR decks.
Archmage's Charm is an incredibly powerful spell, but our 3 drop slot is pretty full so it's only like a 2-of max in my testing.
Recently I've been playing with Jace's Archivist in place of Lore Broker. Reasoning being that Archivist has way more of an impact on the game both before we have the combo and afterwards that the 1 mana difference is worth it. Too often I would get Broker running with Narset only for my opponent to still just kill me or one of the combo pieces. Archivist has felt pretty strong so far, would recommend trying it.
So, my initial impression upon testing the deck is that we REALLY need Narset out by turn 3 or 4. She single-handedly defines what this deck is. So yeah, I'm currently trying to include as much draw power as possible (full set of Remand, Serum Visions, even considering Opt) in order to dig as deep as possible for her. Perhaps Supreme Will instead of Commit/Memory? And then there's the new Force of Negation: definitely not a budget option, but given how cheap the rest of the game is, investing in one big money card might be worthwhile. The new Force really looks like it could do a lot of work for this deck.
I agree that more draw power is good for the deck. I'm playing with 4 serum visions 2 opt right now. Force of Negation is a good card, but it doesn't protect our Narset/Thief from instant speed removal/countermagic. Shoal and Commandeer both can do that. For this reason I think Force is better as a sideboard card against combo decks or control where you want the extra interaction, but I could see 1-2 main being fine.
It also appears to be cheaper than most things you see in Modern today, which is a plus
Definitely. It helps that most of the cards aren't played really at all outside of our deck or other fringe control strategies. If the deck ever becomes more popular I could see certain cards that haven't had a lot of printings, Commandeer for example, getting quite expensive, especially since it is a unique effect.
If you guys haven't seen the news, mtgsalvation is no longer closing! The old staff is also working on a new site, mtgnexus.com, so that's something to keep an eye on. Who knows maybe that will be another good place to hold the pitch blue discussion.
So far Teferi, Time Raveler has felt good against both creature decks and combo/control decks. Ticking down to deal with permanents and get an extra draw is awesome, but my favorite part about him is getting to Wrath/Day's at instant speed. So far the mana hasn't been too much of a problem running 3 colors, I went up 1 more land to have room for a few more fetches while still keeping the basic count high. I also cut one Geier Reach for a plains which has been nice against field of ruin/path, though I do miss the extra combo piece. Verdict being blue, (and also being 4 cmc) has been great in place of damnation, and obviously it deals with creatures better than Engulf. Haven't tested Dovin's Veto yet, mostly because I'm not sure where I can fit it in.
Burn is a difficult matchup, but not unwinnable, and far from our worst matchup.
Commandeering a lightning helix targeting goblin guide is usually how I end up winning against burn.
Notable New Toys From Modern Horizons: Note: These are just my opinions, (for the most part) I haven't actually done testing with many of the new cards yet.
Force of Negation: We will start with the most obvious. While not a direct replacement for Disrupting Shoal, it is extremely powerful. Maybe could be substituted for a few Commandeer? Either way, it definitely has a place in the 75 somewhere, though the deck is already so good against combo decks that Force of Negation was built to dismantle, we really want better ways to deal with aggro, and not hitting creature spells is a huge downside. Also can't stop our opponent's interaction from interacting with our combo during our turn. It does play nicely with Teferi, Time Raveler.
Prohibit: The deck is already full of conditional countermagic, why not add more! While I do like that it is 2 cmc, (replacing remand maybe?) and the kicker cost counters nearly every spell in the metagame. 2cmc is also relevant for Disrupting Shoal, just in case you can't pay to actually cast Prohibit I guess.
Flusterstorm: This one is interesting. On one hand, only hitting instants and sorceries for your Mana Tithe kinda sucks, but on the other, it has a pretty high ceiling for a 1 cmc spell. Probably best in the sideboard for control matchups, where casting it at the end of a counter-war gives it a ton of value.
Archmage's Charm: My favorite new card, it's baby Cryptic Command! Having a divination that also functions as a Cancel is already pretty sweet, and that's not even counting the 3rd mode. The most relevant target being Aether Vial for us, though being able to take a Death's Shadow is good too. Getting the 3 blue mana shouldn't be too difficult for us, being mostly mono blue afterall, but it does mean it is in a weird spot in our curve for Disrupting Shoal, because most of those are combo pieces, not interaction. Swapping out a few Vendilion Clique is the best option I think. I really like extra card draw for the deck because it can sometimes seem like it is a little hard to find our stuff pre-combo.
Twisted Reflection: A blue card that can actually kill creatures is nice, though it has competition with Tyrant's Scorn. Either way I think it is a nice addition.
Winter's Rest: Another more-permanent way to deal with creatures, where sending them to hand may not always be useful. We play a lot of basics so slotting in Snow Covered Island is pretty easy. Not as good vs creatures where you're more worried about their ability than their body in combat, Thalia, Guardian of Thraben etc, but still an interesting option.
Dead of Winter: Again, we can easily have snow permanent with our basics, so this may be a faster, and easier to cast, Damnation. Not being blue makes me sad as usual, but the deck sometimes really wants a Anger of the Gods effect.
Echo of Eons: Being 6 cmc for Disrupting Shoal makes it worse than Day's Undoing in most matchups. We also don't have a ton of discard to get the flashback cost going, besides the 4 Lore Brokers which have been getting cut recently, there's a few Geier Reach Sanitariums and then that's pretty much it. Also it opens our combo up to graveyard hate where it wasn't as vulnerable before. Not ending our turn when it resolves is nice, but not nice enough to discount all of the downsides when compared to Day's Undoing, and I don't think we really need to play this as additional copies of Day's Undoing.
So that's my take on the new additions from mh1, what are your thoughts? Any new cards that I missed?
So far Teferi, Time Raveler has felt good against both creature decks and combo/control decks. Ticking down to deal with permanents and get an extra draw is awesome, but my favorite part about him is getting to Wrath/Day's at instant speed. So far the mana hasn't been too much of a problem running 3 colors, I went up 1 more land to have room for a few more fetches while still keeping the basic count high. I also cut one Geier Reach for a plains which has been nice against field of ruin/path, though I do miss the extra combo piece. Verdict being blue, (and also being 4 cmc) has been great in place of damnation, and obviously it deals with creatures better than Engulf. Haven't tested Dovin's Veto yet, mostly because I'm not sure where I can fit it in.
I'm actually running a VERY similar list to this. Major difference is I'm running snow covered basics because I want to run Dead of Winter and I'm running a single Teferi's Puzzle Box and a pair of Sphinx's Tutelage as an alternate wincon. I've had a pretty good showing so far against whir prison, and Humans (VERY surprisingly. Top decking a Verdict is good! Who knew?!?), and about 50/50 with a modified Ponza and a GW Value/Devoted Ballista deck. (Sorry, Ashiok blocks your Chord, and I'll commandeer your CoCo) Obviously, I need LOTS more testing for this.
You're running Verdit and Dead of Winter? How many of each? Sphinx's Tutelage is cute, I hadn't thought of that. Would you mind posting the full decklist?
So I've been looking at building this recently, and wanted to ask about matchups. I've looked at the primer, and unless I'm completely oblivious it doesn't mention matchups. What are the good matchups for this deck?
Matchup discussion can be found in the "Matchups" section of the primer,(click "The Good, The Bad and The Funky" to expand them) though it is a somewhat broad overview because the matchups heavily depend on what version of the deck you are running/what cards you have in the sideboard etc. Another good place to look is the sideboarding/alternate card choices section because I go over more in-depth what specific cards do against specific decks.
For those of you who wish to continue on with our community here, the staff and I have begun building a new home. We'll announce and discuss the prospect when it is more concrete and closer to completion.
. So, in theory, we will have a home in whatever that becomes. If not then I guess reddit is my next idea? Something like Tappedout.net could work also, and at least it has card previews in the client instead of reddit's image host-link bot thingy.
Anyways, I will definitely be taking the Narset Pitch Blue discussion somewhere, just not entirely sure where yet. Let me know what you guys think is best.
Do you folks have thoughts on how to play Disrupting Shoal correctly? (Specifically with regard to T1 discard spells).
Let's say my opening hand is:
2x Island, Serum Visions, Disrupting Shoal, Narset, End of Days, Remand
I'm on the draw. On my opponent's T1, they play Inquisition of Kozilek. Do I counter it with Shoal?
What if my opening hand is:
2x Island, Serum Visions, Disrupting Shoal, Remand, Snapback, Field-Mist Borderpost
Again, I'm on the draw. On my opponent's T1, they play Inquisition of Kozilek. Do I counter it with Shoal?
This is always a tough one. On one hand, countering it makes their Inquisition more efficient, but on the other hand, you get to keep Narset in hand with enough lands to play her, as well as some card draw and interaction. If you have thief in hand and it's an Inquisition and not a Thoughtseize, I would say let it resolve because you get to keep your combo piece regardless.
Hi there,
I'm new to the forums but I have taken an interest in this deck. So, I thought I would pitch in (see what I did there?)
Anyway I played the deck (the exact list from the primer) in a local Thursday night Modern tournament and didn't do terrible.
The MUs were:
Lantern 2-0
Mono G Tron 2-1
Phoenix 1-2 (lol)
Gb Elves 2-0
I can elaborate more on how the MUs felt, if you're interested. For now I want to suggest a few changes to the deck and why.
Now, what did I do with the deck? When I was playing, most of my problems came from the inability to interact with the board in a favourable way. Once something slips our counters the going gets rough. I think most people here have understood that so far. That's why in the primer humans, burn, etc. are listed as our bad MUs. Additionally I felt like sometimes I was forced to chump with my Lore Broker just to keep my Narset, Parter of Veils around... not the greatest combo piece in the world. Also, since we are so creature light it draws a lot of removal, which makes it quite unreliable.
I had games where I played the broker and it was actively bad because it did not impact the board and I didn't want to loot with it since my opponent was struggling.
So, I decided to cut it and replace it with another 2 drop: Thing in the Ice.
Thing blocks for our Narset, Thing bounces the board and Thing kills quickly. It is especially pretty when you can bounce the board and lead into a Day's Undoing (like Engulf the Shore, but not as *****ty)
To accomodate for the Thing I had to adjust the creature count. I cut some V Cliques (moved to SB) and added some 1 mana cantrips, which fulfill the role of the looting with the Lore Broker and take a counter off our Thing in the Ice.
But Lore Broker was fulfilling an importent role once we reach our lock. Yes, that's why I upped the count of Geier Reach Sanitarium. To be honest I always felt like it was the better, more reliable combo piece anyway... That it costs 2 to activate never bothered me since at that point our opponent is basically locked out of the games and I can make land drops until I win.
So all of this to say: Lore Broker out, Thing in the Ice in.
What do you think?
First off thanks for the feedback, I like the brewing with TITI, have been testing with it myself, actually.
Just to be clear: you played the stock list in the tournament?
Anyways, how did you manage to 2-0 elves? Seems to me that it can be a pretty rough matchup, though not nearly as bad as humans etc.
Now about the new list you posted:
Have you thought about a few Teferi's Puzzle Box in place of Lore Broker?
Has TITI felt like enough in creature matchups to not have any wrath effects in the sideboard? Tolaria West has been pretty sweet in my games so far, and I like the inclusion here especially after cutting brokers.
Also: you mentioned it briefly, but I would like to stress how important it is that Thing in the Ice is able to flip from casting Day's Undoing, doing the Engulf the Shore trick but for 3 mana instead of 7.
That's just the odds of having something to pitch to Force though, meaning you might be discarding your only other piece of interaction, or that card draw that you really wanted to find another answer.
It's possible that it's not really a problem, like I said more testing needs to be done with the card.
Yeah KGC isn't really my cup of tea, though I could see him being valuable if built around.
I would love to try out Force of Negation, though I worry we don't play enough blue spells for it to be super effective, and upping the blue count means we would play less artifacts so Thirst for Knowledge becomes a lot worse. In the Pitch Blue Narset deck the pitch spells are valuable because the deck is roughly 70% blue cards, and that's including being able to cheat and use Mistvein Borderpost as a land that's also blue card, which we can't really do. Playing more Torrential Gearhulks could help, but there's not too many useful blue artifacts unfortunately.
That being said, a free counter is incredibly powerful, could be worthwhile playing a few in the sideboard as a trick against combo/control decks? I will have to test it to be sure.
First of all, I went 4-0 in a small local tourney of 12 people! Mostly I think I just got lucky with a lot of turn 3-4 tron, while dodging bad matchups. I can type up a tournament report if anyone wants it, here is the list I played:
4x Condescend
1x Dismember
3x Remand
3x Repeal
1x Spatial Contortion
1x Spell Burst
2x Supreme Will
4x Thirst for Knowledge
Artifact (9)
2x Chalice of the Void
1x Dimir Signet
4x Expedition Map
1x Mindslaver
1x Talisman of Dominance
1x Torrential Gearhulk
2x Trinket Mage
2x Walking Ballista
3x Wurmcoil Engine
Planeswalker (1)
1x Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
Land (23)
1x Academy Ruins
1x Field of Ruin
6x Island
2x River of Tears
1x Tolaria West
4x Urza's Mine
4x Urza's Power Plant
4x Urza's Tower
1x Chalice of the Void
2x Dismember
1x Engineered Explosives
2x Filigree Familiar
2x Nimble Obstructionist
2x Silent Arbiter
2x Spatial Contortion
1x Sphinx of the Final Word
2x Tormod's Crypt
Anyways, it seems like the discussion here has diminished lately, is there some other place that people are talking about U Tron?
Also, I have noticed to no one has taken over the primer on the new mtgnexus site, linked here, I would do it but I don't think I'm experienced enough with the deck.
I will be working on updating the Primer in the next couple days(for both sites) to include discussions about some of the newer cards as well as more/updated deck lists etc.
Archmage's Charm is an incredibly powerful spell, but our 3 drop slot is pretty full so it's only like a 2-of max in my testing.
Recently I've been playing with Jace's Archivist in place of Lore Broker. Reasoning being that Archivist has way more of an impact on the game both before we have the combo and afterwards that the 1 mana difference is worth it. Too often I would get Broker running with Narset only for my opponent to still just kill me or one of the combo pieces. Archivist has felt pretty strong so far, would recommend trying it.
I agree that more draw power is good for the deck. I'm playing with 4 serum visions 2 opt right now. Force of Negation is a good card, but it doesn't protect our Narset/Thief from instant speed removal/countermagic. Shoal and Commandeer both can do that. For this reason I think Force is better as a sideboard card against combo decks or control where you want the extra interaction, but I could see 1-2 main being fine.
Definitely. It helps that most of the cards aren't played really at all outside of our deck or other fringe control strategies. If the deck ever becomes more popular I could see certain cards that haven't had a lot of printings, Commandeer for example, getting quite expensive, especially since it is a unique effect.
A few people have been building with Teferi, so I don't think you can say "no one":
Myth Realzied is just a worse Thing in the Ice for the most part.
Burn is a difficult matchup, but not unwinnable, and far from our worst matchup.
Commandeering a lightning helix targeting goblin guide is usually how I end up winning against burn.
Note: These are just my opinions, (for the most part) I haven't actually done testing with many of the new cards yet.
Force of Negation: We will start with the most obvious. While not a direct replacement for Disrupting Shoal, it is extremely powerful. Maybe could be substituted for a few Commandeer? Either way, it definitely has a place in the 75 somewhere, though the deck is already so good against combo decks that Force of Negation was built to dismantle, we really want better ways to deal with aggro, and not hitting creature spells is a huge downside. Also can't stop our opponent's interaction from interacting with our combo during our turn. It does play nicely with Teferi, Time Raveler.
Prohibit: The deck is already full of conditional countermagic, why not add more! While I do like that it is 2 cmc, (replacing remand maybe?) and the kicker cost counters nearly every spell in the metagame. 2cmc is also relevant for Disrupting Shoal, just in case you can't pay to actually cast Prohibit I guess.
Flusterstorm: This one is interesting. On one hand, only hitting instants and sorceries for your Mana Tithe kinda sucks, but on the other, it has a pretty high ceiling for a 1 cmc spell. Probably best in the sideboard for control matchups, where casting it at the end of a counter-war gives it a ton of value.
Archmage's Charm: My favorite new card, it's baby Cryptic Command! Having a divination that also functions as a Cancel is already pretty sweet, and that's not even counting the 3rd mode. The most relevant target being Aether Vial for us, though being able to take a Death's Shadow is good too. Getting the 3 blue mana shouldn't be too difficult for us, being mostly mono blue afterall, but it does mean it is in a weird spot in our curve for Disrupting Shoal, because most of those are combo pieces, not interaction. Swapping out a few Vendilion Clique is the best option I think. I really like extra card draw for the deck because it can sometimes seem like it is a little hard to find our stuff pre-combo.
String of Disappearances: Additional copies of Vapor Snag that no one asked for. At least it has cool art.
Twisted Reflection: A blue card that can actually kill creatures is nice, though it has competition with Tyrant's Scorn. Either way I think it is a nice addition.
Winter's Rest: Another more-permanent way to deal with creatures, where sending them to hand may not always be useful. We play a lot of basics so slotting in Snow Covered Island is pretty easy. Not as good vs creatures where you're more worried about their ability than their body in combat, Thalia, Guardian of Thraben etc, but still an interesting option.
Dead of Winter: Again, we can easily have snow permanent with our basics, so this may be a faster, and easier to cast, Damnation. Not being blue makes me sad as usual, but the deck sometimes really wants a Anger of the Gods effect.
Echo of Eons: Being 6 cmc for Disrupting Shoal makes it worse than Day's Undoing in most matchups. We also don't have a ton of discard to get the flashback cost going, besides the 4 Lore Brokers which have been getting cut recently, there's a few Geier Reach Sanitariums and then that's pretty much it. Also it opens our combo up to graveyard hate where it wasn't as vulnerable before. Not ending our turn when it resolves is nice, but not nice enough to discount all of the downsides when compared to Day's Undoing, and I don't think we really need to play this as additional copies of Day's Undoing.
You're running Verdit and Dead of Winter? How many of each?
Sphinx's Tutelage is cute, I hadn't thought of that. Would you mind posting the full decklist?
Matchup discussion can be found in the "Matchups" section of the primer,(click "The Good, The Bad and The Funky" to expand them) though it is a somewhat broad overview because the matchups heavily depend on what version of the deck you are running/what cards you have in the sideboard etc. Another good place to look is the sideboarding/alternate card choices section because I go over more in-depth what specific cards do against specific decks.
Anyways, I will definitely be taking the Narset Pitch Blue discussion somewhere, just not entirely sure where yet. Let me know what you guys think is best.
This is always a tough one. On one hand, countering it makes their Inquisition more efficient, but on the other hand, you get to keep Narset in hand with enough lands to play her, as well as some card draw and interaction. If you have thief in hand and it's an Inquisition and not a Thoughtseize, I would say let it resolve because you get to keep your combo piece regardless.
First off thanks for the feedback, I like the brewing with TITI, have been testing with it myself, actually.
Just to be clear: you played the stock list in the tournament?
Anyways, how did you manage to 2-0 elves? Seems to me that it can be a pretty rough matchup, though not nearly as bad as humans etc.
Now about the new list you posted:
Have you thought about a few Teferi's Puzzle Box in place of Lore Broker?
Has TITI felt like enough in creature matchups to not have any wrath effects in the sideboard?
Tolaria West has been pretty sweet in my games so far, and I like the inclusion here especially after cutting brokers.
Also: you mentioned it briefly, but I would like to stress how important it is that Thing in the Ice is able to flip from casting Day's Undoing, doing the Engulf the Shore trick but for 3 mana instead of 7.