Round 1 was against Boros Burn which I beat, then ran into three very weird matchups: Elves (This matchup is a bye for them, they make more dudes bigger than we can, faster than we can. I only won the game I did because he made some massive misplays involving Burreton Forge-Tender), Restore Balance (Game 3 he got a god draw, leaving me with no hand and no board staring down 2 greater gargodon), and Sultai Death's Shadow (The pilot said after the match that he sees it as a bye because I have no good axis of interaction.)
To everyone *****ing about Path and Lightning Helix, don't. There are too many things that don't give a crap about Terminate for me to handle them all, and while I don't WANT to give them a land, it's often better than the alternative. Helix was also great at stabilizing, while Blood Moon was a completely dead card that I never sided in all night.
As much as it pains me to say it, I felt like I was playing catch-up all night, that we need more early game interaction and it never showed up. Every spell just felt underwhelming, even if it was the best card for the situation. Is anyone else getting that issue, or just me?
What did you see in those matches that "didn't give a crap about Terminate"? Terminate is pretty great and unless I'm missing something the only thing in Modern that doesn't get destroyed by Terminate is Ulamog and Wurmcoil Engine, since Wurmcoil Engine leaves behind two guys when it dies. I'd like to know how your matches went in detail for you to have a bad night like you did, which I apologize for.
Death's Shadow is a good matchup for us as well as Restore Balance even if it is pretty much non-existent, but when a player has the nuts it's tough to win. I beat Restore Balance when I last played it. Just put the pressure on them and use your hand disruption to its fullest effect to strip them of their Cascade spells. Elves is tough, change up your board to fight go wide strategies like that. Anguished Unmaking is bad, I'd drop it from your board completely. Add in threats that don't care about the 'yard, like Rabblemaster. Don't get discouraged with the deck, it's tough to pilot without any practice. Just fine tune your board for what you see at your LGS and give it another go next week!
3-1 tonight with the stock Selfeisek list. Only loss was to UW Control.
Don't really know how to board for that matchup, or if there are any specific cards we can run in the board for them.
Wear/Tear for Rest in Peace, Blood Moon to shut down their man-lands, board out 2 Lightning Helix and 2 Forked Bolt. Also one Terminate for one Kambal. The original Selfeisek version is weaker to UW than some updated lists, which have powerhouse creatures in the board to speed up the clock against combo and control, since this deck runs a lot slower than most decks.
Thoughts on using a burst lightning instead of a forked bolt in the main? I like the instant speed and ability to kick it to finish off opponent if drawn late game. Forked bolt only seems better against small creature decks which we already have a good matchup. Either way I'm torn between these 2. Is there another burn option for this spot? Thanks.
Burst Lightning is not as good as Forked Bolt. In the small creature matchups, Forked Bolt can eliminate two creatures, vs. Burst Lightning only going after one. Both can take down a two toughness creature as well, and both can go to face, but Forked Bolt is way better in that slot in Pyromancer decks for the first reason I stated above alone, even at sorcery speed. It also helps clear the way of pesky chump blockers from other "go wide" strategies, mana dorks or other small creatures for our tokens to swing in.
IMO Burn and Storm are definitely not miserable matchups. Tron has a miserable matchup against those decks. But not this deck.
Mardu has tons of discard and removal, which are both good against Storm/Burn. You are running CB maindeck, the best card against Burn. You can have a decent amount of GY hate in your SB to make Storm stumble. You are taking far less dmg from your own manabase compared to GBx.
The clock is indeed missing sometimes, agreed, but compared to GBx (which has good Burn/Storm matchups) the missing of a Clock certainly doesnt make the matchups miserable. They might be 50/50 or slightly unfavourable if you want, but its definitely not autoloose imo.
It isn't an auto-lose matchup, but it's an uphill battle for sure. Storm beats us out of the board with Empty the Warrens if you don't pack any sweepers (which I recommend). Brutality in the main is a rather new maindeck addition that fights Burn and Storm, but it's still tough for us. Kambal is a really good check to Storm, as it means they cannot go off without risking losing the match, and he is really good against Burn as well; blocks all their creatures and they have to waste a Burn spell to take him out, netting us five life (two from the drain, three from the burn spell). Kambal is a must have, especially over Dragon's Claw, and it's just really good against our worst matchups overall.
You consider Burn/Storm as being the worst matchups for the deck?
Absolutely not. Tron is essentially auto-lose, especially if we don't draw our hate against them and don't present a good clock. Burn is probably a 60-40 matchup, storm is winnable but we need a good clock and to draw lots of burn to face and ensure their creatures don't stick for long. We've got game against them but they're tough to win. Any creature deck is great for us, and I think other mid-range battles are 50-50. But Tron is definitely our worst matchup followed by Burn, in my opinion.
Considering we don't have a good clock in a lot of our combo matchups, has anyone considered running a threat in the board as a one of that isn't weak to grave hate? Maybe a Rabblemaster or Hazoret in the board?
IMO Burn and Storm are definitely not miserable matchups. Tron has a miserable matchup against those decks. But not this deck.
Mardu has tons of discard and removal, which are both good against Storm/Burn. You are running CB maindeck, the best card against Burn. You can have a decent amount of GY hate in your SB to make Storm stumble. You are taking far less dmg from your own manabase compared to GBx.
The clock is indeed missing sometimes, agreed, but compared to GBx (which has good Burn/Storm matchups) the missing of a Clock certainly doesnt make the matchups miserable. They might be 50/50 or slightly unfavourable if you want, but its definitely not autoloose imo.
It isn't an auto-lose matchup, but it's an uphill battle for sure. Storm beats us out of the board with Empty the Warrens if you don't pack any sweepers (which I recommend). Brutality in the main is a rather new maindeck addition that fights Burn and Storm, but it's still tough for us. Kambal is a really good check to Storm, as it means they cannot go off without risking losing the match, and he is really good against Burn as well; blocks all their creatures and they have to waste a Burn spell to take him out, netting us five life (two from the drain, three from the burn spell). Kambal is a must have, especially over Dragon's Claw, and it's just really good against our worst matchups overall.
However, I will try Molten Raind instead, it works way better with Blood Moon in combination, which is my goal.
I don't understand why there are Dragon Claw's and the Kambal in the SB. Burn and Storm are definitely good matchups anyway. I think its wasted space which you need to handle attrition based matchups.
Burn and Storm are definitely not one of our good matchups. Our clock is too slow against Storm when they threaten to go off at any moment without sufficient pressure, which this deck lacks at times, and we are often on the backfoot against Burn. Kambal is a must have in the sideboard, even as a two of. I'm interested in your opinion on how those are good matchups.
TheAmazinSpoder, just as Brulander said, playing Helix has that negative effect where we want to be shocking ourselves off the fetch for Helix, which means we really aren't taking full advantage of the life gain effect like we would want. Playing Brutality and a mountain over one of the Sacred Foundry I play in my main 60 has this secret tech of keeping our life total higher than it would be if I played four shocklands, which is pretty helpful against Burn. I think that switching from two Helix to two Brutality and playing three basic mountains and two basic swamps will be really nice against Burn. I need to post my list one of these days, but I never get on my computer for that. I'm always on my phone. Swiftspears are definitely cut-able, as people have had success without it, as seen by the Top 4 finish at GP Santa Clara this weekend. I still stand by my reasoning on why the Plains is bad, though. I wouldn't ever play it again, even after testing it out in the past.
Hey guys! What's the Humans matchup like? Any tips or tricks? Recently started playing this deck and I find it to be a difficult matchup. Thank you in advance!
Im new to this deck and was wondering if there is a reason we don’t play Liliana of the veil?
Honestly, the slots are tough to replace and it's difficult (for me at least) to find room for her. I've really wanted to test her our but haven't done so yet. I think the fact that she costs 1BB is also something to consider, as she is un-castable under a Blood Moon with the stock list. I run two swamps in my 75 so I have the option of casting more black spells under a Blood Moon. I thought about dropping Lightning Helix for a couple of Brutality, but I might try one Brutality and a LotV over the two Helix in my 75. It's worth testing her out, though, so if you want to try it out, do so and let us know about your results!
Hi everyone! Long time lurker, but first time poster.
I've been getting back into modern these past two months. Before picking up Mardu Pyromancer I was on U/W control for a bit, but I love the Mardu colors and have always thought hand disruption to be one of the most efficient ways to handle a wide variety of threats. Can't play what you don't have in your hand, well, that's true most of the time lol.
I've made a few changes to Self's "stock" list.
I've dropped burst lightning and a forked bolt for two fatal pushes in the main. The kicker on burst lightning I found to be too heavy, and fork bolt is great, but sometimes things need to die. Can't tell you how many times a champion of the parish with a fat ass pushed my ***** in.
I've cut a Kommand and dreadbore for 2 collective brutality. Kommand at 3 mana feels a bit heavy at times, and more often then not it gets pitched to reveler or looting. Dreadbore is great unconditional removal against a permanent type that can be a real nuisance to handle, and so I've kept it in the side. I've found the versatility of brutality to be pretty great. Kills most dudes, great against combo decks, and the life drain/gain has been more relevant than I believed.
The three cards I'm iffy on are the two swiftspears and one of blood moon. I've recently been thinking about trying out grim lavamancer in the place of swiftspear. What do you all think? Has anyone tested lavamancer in her place?
In regards to blood moon, I have a sick alter, and there are times where it just wins you games that you have no right winning. Can really hose a good bit of decks that aren't ready for it game one, but lately I've been contemplating the 20th land.
If I take moon out of the maindeck, then the terminates may become paths.
I've also included a basic plains in the deck. I run 2 helix in the main and with the blood moon in the main I feel it's nice to be able to fetch a plains out and still cast helix through blood moon if need be. I know that souls can be flashed back, but if you don't have a way to pitch it, then it can be a dead card in hand.
I'll post my current list later when I'm not on the *****ter at work.
Any feedback is wanted and welcome!
Welcome to Mardu! The deck is great, I love it. So glad to have another Mardu player. Regarding Swiftspear, there is good talk about it in which I and another person or two discussed Swiftspear's strengths. Grim Lavamancer isn't a replacement in my opinion, as often times we'll be exiling our key instants and sorceries to it, which means we'll have a more expensive Bedlam Reveler to cast. If you want to try it out, play more fetches in the deck over a few basics to support Lavamancer, but it makes you weaker to burn which is already a rough matchup. I tested Grim Lavamancer and honestly hated it specifically for that reason, so I didn't test it more. Regarding Blood Moon, if you feel it's not necessary at your local meta, then by all means make some switches and try it out! But the power of Blood Moon is there and it can lock us up a lot of free wins. When I was playing against Knightfall, I took care of their dorks early on and then was able to lock the game up with a Blood Moon so that they couldn't cast any blue spells, which really helped shut them off and slow them down (they only had two Quellers and a fetch in hand). I personally love Blood Moon, so I play it. Plains is not really that good if you run moon believe it or not. With our low land count, and such a delicate Mana base, I play two Sacred Foundry in order to reliably cast my white spells in Helix and Souls and still have the option of casting red spells, but plains doesn't give us the option of casting our most important red spells. A lot of times you'll find yourself with only four lands in play and a plains is really bad with a hand full of red spells, so I think it's bad. If you play Path over Terminate and no Blood Moon in the 75, then by all means put a plains in the deck. The deck still runs great under a Blood Moon, and Helix is our weakest spell in the deck by far imo so I'm comfortable discarding it under a Blood Moon to Reveler or Faithless Looting. Moon is really just too strong and helps keep our opponents off balance before we can finish them off with a flurry of tokens or a huge Bedlam Reveler. Other than that, the changes seem pretty solid to me. I play two Push over a Forked Bolt and a Burst Lightning as well, and they're awesome. They've not disappointed this far. Hope my personal advice is of some use to you! If any of this is confusing I apologize, for I'm typing all this on my phone so if some clarification is necessary let me know. Have fun with the deck and let us know anything you find interesting or have any questions!
Where are you guys at on the creature base? I'm not a huge fan of swiftspear. Is she necessary? What about some running 1-2 pack rat? It would let us discard late game land/dead draws and also discard souls.
Pack rat is too slow to be in a tier 1 deck in modern. Avoid it.
Swiftspear is super efficient. Its about playstyle. You want to be aggressive run 2-4, otherwise you will need to play a control game in SOME matchups.
Exactly this about Swiftspear. Not to mention, off a Bedlam draw she's fantastic, even in mid-late game when we've gained control of the board. She's an extra threat and it's actually super easy to get in good damage with Swiftspear because our must answer threats are more dangerous than a Swiftspear. I think she's vital and unassumingly strong.
I was thinking about Tilonalli's Summoner in this deck as a finisher, possibly just in the board. With Pyromancer and Lingering Souls, getting to Ascend is easier than it might seem on paper and it's a way for us to add a threat to the board that avoids our use of the 'yard. It can be easy to strip the opponent of removal spells to where they're topdecking at the time we'd want to play it, but still seems pretty frail and our deck wants to do something every turn with efficient spells so sinking all our Mana into it seems pretty weak. I kind of talked myself out of it with typing all this, but does anyone else have any opinion on it?
I agree that Rally the Peasants is kinda win-more, but I think the flashback ability is what makes it at least somewhat viable -- combined with your discard effects it has a very low opportunity cost so you can always pitch it when you don't have enough threats out and then flash it back later if you do. Additionally the deck really needs ways to turn up the gas vs Tron, Storm etc, where “win-more” becomes “win-enough”.
Couldn't agree more; the deck really isn't fast enough to win against faster decks so Rally the Peasants helps with that. Not sure what I'd take out for it, personally, though. The slots in my deck are kind of tight.
What did you see in those matches that "didn't give a crap about Terminate"? Terminate is pretty great and unless I'm missing something the only thing in Modern that doesn't get destroyed by Terminate is Ulamog and Wurmcoil Engine, since Wurmcoil Engine leaves behind two guys when it dies. I'd like to know how your matches went in detail for you to have a bad night like you did, which I apologize for.
Death's Shadow is a good matchup for us as well as Restore Balance even if it is pretty much non-existent, but when a player has the nuts it's tough to win. I beat Restore Balance when I last played it. Just put the pressure on them and use your hand disruption to its fullest effect to strip them of their Cascade spells. Elves is tough, change up your board to fight go wide strategies like that. Anguished Unmaking is bad, I'd drop it from your board completely. Add in threats that don't care about the 'yard, like Rabblemaster. Don't get discouraged with the deck, it's tough to pilot without any practice. Just fine tune your board for what you see at your LGS and give it another go next week!
Wear/Tear for Rest in Peace, Blood Moon to shut down their man-lands, board out 2 Lightning Helix and 2 Forked Bolt. Also one Terminate for one Kambal. The original Selfeisek version is weaker to UW than some updated lists, which have powerhouse creatures in the board to speed up the clock against combo and control, since this deck runs a lot slower than most decks.
Burst Lightning is not as good as Forked Bolt. In the small creature matchups, Forked Bolt can eliminate two creatures, vs. Burst Lightning only going after one. Both can take down a two toughness creature as well, and both can go to face, but Forked Bolt is way better in that slot in Pyromancer decks for the first reason I stated above alone, even at sorcery speed. It also helps clear the way of pesky chump blockers from other "go wide" strategies, mana dorks or other small creatures for our tokens to swing in.
Absolutely not. Tron is essentially auto-lose, especially if we don't draw our hate against them and don't present a good clock. Burn is probably a 60-40 matchup, storm is winnable but we need a good clock and to draw lots of burn to face and ensure their creatures don't stick for long. We've got game against them but they're tough to win. Any creature deck is great for us, and I think other mid-range battles are 50-50. But Tron is definitely our worst matchup followed by Burn, in my opinion.
Considering we don't have a good clock in a lot of our combo matchups, has anyone considered running a threat in the board as a one of that isn't weak to grave hate? Maybe a Rabblemaster or Hazoret in the board?
It isn't an auto-lose matchup, but it's an uphill battle for sure. Storm beats us out of the board with Empty the Warrens if you don't pack any sweepers (which I recommend). Brutality in the main is a rather new maindeck addition that fights Burn and Storm, but it's still tough for us. Kambal is a really good check to Storm, as it means they cannot go off without risking losing the match, and he is really good against Burn as well; blocks all their creatures and they have to waste a Burn spell to take him out, netting us five life (two from the drain, three from the burn spell). Kambal is a must have, especially over Dragon's Claw, and it's just really good against our worst matchups overall.
Burn and Storm are definitely not one of our good matchups. Our clock is too slow against Storm when they threaten to go off at any moment without sufficient pressure, which this deck lacks at times, and we are often on the backfoot against Burn. Kambal is a must have in the sideboard, even as a two of. I'm interested in your opinion on how those are good matchups.
Honestly, the slots are tough to replace and it's difficult (for me at least) to find room for her. I've really wanted to test her our but haven't done so yet. I think the fact that she costs 1BB is also something to consider, as she is un-castable under a Blood Moon with the stock list. I run two swamps in my 75 so I have the option of casting more black spells under a Blood Moon. I thought about dropping Lightning Helix for a couple of Brutality, but I might try one Brutality and a LotV over the two Helix in my 75. It's worth testing her out, though, so if you want to try it out, do so and let us know about your results!
Welcome to Mardu! The deck is great, I love it. So glad to have another Mardu player. Regarding Swiftspear, there is good talk about it in which I and another person or two discussed Swiftspear's strengths. Grim Lavamancer isn't a replacement in my opinion, as often times we'll be exiling our key instants and sorceries to it, which means we'll have a more expensive Bedlam Reveler to cast. If you want to try it out, play more fetches in the deck over a few basics to support Lavamancer, but it makes you weaker to burn which is already a rough matchup. I tested Grim Lavamancer and honestly hated it specifically for that reason, so I didn't test it more. Regarding Blood Moon, if you feel it's not necessary at your local meta, then by all means make some switches and try it out! But the power of Blood Moon is there and it can lock us up a lot of free wins. When I was playing against Knightfall, I took care of their dorks early on and then was able to lock the game up with a Blood Moon so that they couldn't cast any blue spells, which really helped shut them off and slow them down (they only had two Quellers and a fetch in hand). I personally love Blood Moon, so I play it. Plains is not really that good if you run moon believe it or not. With our low land count, and such a delicate Mana base, I play two Sacred Foundry in order to reliably cast my white spells in Helix and Souls and still have the option of casting red spells, but plains doesn't give us the option of casting our most important red spells. A lot of times you'll find yourself with only four lands in play and a plains is really bad with a hand full of red spells, so I think it's bad. If you play Path over Terminate and no Blood Moon in the 75, then by all means put a plains in the deck. The deck still runs great under a Blood Moon, and Helix is our weakest spell in the deck by far imo so I'm comfortable discarding it under a Blood Moon to Reveler or Faithless Looting. Moon is really just too strong and helps keep our opponents off balance before we can finish them off with a flurry of tokens or a huge Bedlam Reveler. Other than that, the changes seem pretty solid to me. I play two Push over a Forked Bolt and a Burst Lightning as well, and they're awesome. They've not disappointed this far. Hope my personal advice is of some use to you! If any of this is confusing I apologize, for I'm typing all this on my phone so if some clarification is necessary let me know. Have fun with the deck and let us know anything you find interesting or have any questions!
Exactly this about Swiftspear. Not to mention, off a Bedlam draw she's fantastic, even in mid-late game when we've gained control of the board. She's an extra threat and it's actually super easy to get in good damage with Swiftspear because our must answer threats are more dangerous than a Swiftspear. I think she's vital and unassumingly strong.
I was thinking about Tilonalli's Summoner in this deck as a finisher, possibly just in the board. With Pyromancer and Lingering Souls, getting to Ascend is easier than it might seem on paper and it's a way for us to add a threat to the board that avoids our use of the 'yard. It can be easy to strip the opponent of removal spells to where they're topdecking at the time we'd want to play it, but still seems pretty frail and our deck wants to do something every turn with efficient spells so sinking all our Mana into it seems pretty weak. I kind of talked myself out of it with typing all this, but does anyone else have any opinion on it?
Couldn't agree more; the deck really isn't fast enough to win against faster decks so Rally the Peasants helps with that. Not sure what I'd take out for it, personally, though. The slots in my deck are kind of tight.