Emrakul, the Promised End has won me so many games. I might be biased, because it is my favourite card, but I went 2nd on the same tournament a few months back playing her in the middle of Storm, E-Tron, and GDS meta. You can read my Tournament Report here. I don't know if it's a "win-more" card or just "I win the game" card because it has literally ended games every single time I've casted her. You can set your opponent's hand so that they can't deal with a 13/13 Trample Flying the next turn. It's usually a 1-turn clock when it comes down. There really aren't a lot of answers for it in Modern except against UW or Jeskai where they play Supreme Verdict and Detention Sphere, but taking a turn away from UW or Jeskai is absolutely massive as you can just burn away their important spells, especially with all the Planeswalkers lying around.
Ran this list to 4-3 at a 1k Tournament yesterday. I lost to Mono-G Tron, Dredge, and Burn. And I won against Valakut, Amulet Titan, Grixis Control, and Jeskai Control.
As you can see, I was not at all prepared for the Dredge matchup as I was not expecting to see any, but they had a good meta call and most Dredge decks over-performed that night. Against Mono-G Tron, I just drew horribly and he drew perfectly, though I think we can improve this matchup. I mulled to 5 both games, not being able to find anything good. Control matchups (JTMS decks) felt very good. We play more disruption and bigger threats and it just ends up being a good matchup for us even with JTMS and Field of Ruin. I felt ahead every game and the opposing control player always had to dig to find answer with JTMS and Azcanta activations. Azcanta was almost a trap for them as they really wanted to get value out of the flipped Azcanta so they would always activate it when I Field of Ruin'd it, allowing me to slam down my threats against a tapped out opponent. Valakut and Amulet, as expected, were just insanely good matchups for U-Tron. Most of our threats are bigger than their Titans, Mindslaver/Emrakul wrecks them, and we also play counterspell. On the contrary, Burn was still miserable, especially when they had a good start. I was always a turn away from stabilizing.
I'll just talk briefly about some cards choices and what I learned from my experience:
My idea was to lower the curve as much as possible and getting rid of situational "win-more" cards like Sundering Titan and Platinum Angel.
- Emrakul, the Promised End
I don't really know why more people don't play Emrakul. I've won every game that I've casted her. The cast trigger is so big on some games, especially against things like Stony Silence. I found that without her, I sometimes had games that I had in control, but couldn't close out. I usually cast her for 9 (Land, Artifact, Creature, Instant) and it's usually an unexpected bomb that a lot of people are surprised to see.
- Torrential Gearhulk
The card was pretty underwhelming. It was just okay when I had it and I couldn't cast half of my spells with it. It works wonders with Dismembers, but even then double blue on turn 6 is actually pretty hard to achieve most of the time. I think I'll be playing Platinum Angel or another Snapcaster Mage instead in this slot. Again, the card was only "situationally" good. I want the cards in my deck to be "consistently" good.
- Sundering Titan
I swapped its spot with my Wurmcoil from the SB. My reasoning was that Wurmcoil is something that we can cast on turn 6 that usually stabilizes the board or at least gives us a ramp if the opponent Paths it. Sundering Titan came in against a lot of greedy 3+ Color matchups and it was an outstanding performer. But I just don't think it's a better MB card than another Wurmcoil Engine. This is, again, a "win-more situationally" card.
- Walking Ballista
Walking Ballista was something that I was surprised to see how much it underperformed. It is way too slow. It's a 3/3 on Tron mana at best on Turn 3. It's a great as a one-of because it basically works as our spot removal or burn card, like Lightning Bolt. I would probably replace one with another early game card or a Dismember. Perhaps it's better against aggro decks, but I think Spellskite would even be better in this slot (probably not right) or maybe another Chalice of the Void? Not sure what yet.
- Chalice of the Void
Just a great card. I think I was wrong to say you only need to play 2. It is extremely disruptive and it shuts down a lot of SB cards that other control players bring in like Ceremonious Rejection. It shuts down so many cards against control, some aggro, and combo decks, but I don't know if you really need a full playset of these as it's a dead card against Cavern of Souls decks. More testing is needed on how many we actually play. It's definitely at least a 1-of in the Main and another 1-2 in the SB.
- Dismember
I do think Dismember is better than Spatial Contortion in the MB. It kills most of the things in the meta and also kills Celestial Colonnade so it's almost never a "dead" card, while Spatial could just be a waste of a slot.
- Counterspells
I'm still not sure which counterspells are the best for us. Dispel is great because you can drop a Wurmcoil with a dispel backup on a single blue source, but it's a nonbo with Chalice. Negate is probably better because it answers some of the Gx Tron threats as well. I don't think you can ever play cards like Summary Dismissal when we have cards like Commit // Memory, which also gets around "uncounterable" clause. Seriously people, the double blue is very hard to achieve. That's why I'm even reluctant to play another Snapcaster Mage because we need double blue to really get value out of it.
- GY Hate
I'm not sure which GY Hate card to play anymore. Grafdigger was my go-to, but I don't know about this now. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.
- Land Choices
I dropped Gemstone Caverns because, again, it fell under "situationally win-more" card. I hated drawing it when it wasn't dropped down at the start. I always wished that it was another blue source so I just replaced it with another Island and I think this is right. I do, however, wished for another way to destroy lands. Perhaps another Field of Ruin or a Ghost Quarter is better.
I'm still tweaking around my SB choices. Really not sure what to play yet and I'm hoping to get some feedback. I have a 5k Open coming up this Saturday so I'll be testing and preparing for it all week.
Overall, I think there is this illusion for a lot of U-Tron players that playing more of the "win-more" cards is better. But in reality, it's what really hinders our consistency. We need to be playing cards that are almost always good and we can't spare any room for those greedy cards.
Again, I don't think we need MORE cantrips or card draws. Thirst is extremely powerful. How many times did you guys lose because you just had 3-4 colorless lands and didn't have a blue source? How is Telling Time or Think Twice going to help out? We need early game cards that will help us get to the late game without blue sources.
Here are some unused/underused or just completely ridiculous cards just to open up some conversations:
- Drift of Phantasms (Stops Geist tokens, Freebooter/Mantis Rider, Affinity, etc, and could fetch our 3 CMC cards like O-Stone, TFK, Treasure/Trinket Mage)
- Kaijin of the Vanishing Touch (Another flying defender that has an upside of returning creature back to their owner's hand, probably worse than Drift)
- Torpor Orb (Stops most of Humans triggers, TKS, Flickers from Taxes, etc)
- Commit/Memory (Some people already play it, gets around uncounterable creatures, counts as a sorcery towards Emrakul if you play that)
- Perilous Voyage (better Cyclonic Rift on 2 CMC or less creatuers, scries 2)
- Keiga, the Tide Star (5/5 Flyer that blocks most things and has an upside when it dies, probably too expensive and worse than Wurmcoil)
- Vedalken Plotter (Seen some of these pop up in the Japanese meta, great in Tron matchups)
- Crystal Shard (I've seen the card exactly once in modern from some weird UW taxes deck with Ghostly Prisons and it seemed to be super annoying)
- Flashfreeze (Heck, people run Celestial Purge in their SB's, why not this? There's a ton of RG decks out there right now)
- Curse of the Swine (Probably too expensive, yes definitely too expensive)
- Entrancing Melody (Too cute? I'd play it if it costed a single U source, not double)
- Exhaustion (Could be a timewalk if played right)
I know some of these are just plain ridiculous, but that was the point so we can open up some options.
Tried Batterskull and the main problem was that I could not find the freaking thing. It being a 5 CMC is really the upside AND the downside, unless we play Fabricate and I don't think that's what we really want. It's great once you get it down though.
Spellskite was okay. It was pretty good on certain matchups and completely useless in others. It just doesn't do enough on its own I'm afraid. For a sb spot, I think I'd rather play Silent Arbiter or Torpor Orb. It's still great against Infect and sometimes Bogles, but I'd really rather play a second EE if it came to that.
Hangarback I feel like is even slower than Walking Ballista. Great thing about Ballista is that it can be used as a removal or even burn some point of damage at your opponent if it ever gets pathed.
Well if you start talking about other colors and archetypes, there's just no end to it. Why would Jeskai control player play Jeskai Geist? Why would people play madcap instead of TTB in Blue Moon? Why does anyone play Grixis control when you can play Death's Shadow? Why would you play Bant Coco when you can go Abzan Coco? Why would you play Bant Eldrazi when you can just play Eldrazi Tron or RG Tron? Seriously, it doesn't end.
The point of Blue Tron is to get a more interactive styled deck that doesn't straight out lose to combo, but still get to play the big things that Tron likes to play. Our problem nowadays is not the choice of Blue over Green. It's that the meta shifted quite a lot from more midrange-y (like Jund, Junk, Abzan, etc) and combo-heavy decks (like Storm, Ad Nauseam, Twin, etc) to faster creature heavy decks in the last 2-3 years. But the deck list hasn't really changed much to adapt to it. That's why we are struggling.
If you look at the past 2 weeks or so worth of threads, you should see that a lot of us are having the same problem. And one of the main point that came out of it was that we NEED a blue source for early game interaction (unless you just have t3 Tron into a threat). Lowering the curve also helps for consistency too, but I don't think that we need more cantrips like Serum Visions because we already have so much cantrips and filters.
I have found that playing a less greedy manabase (with more islands) and some Talismans have been great for me. I fear that a lot of people underestimate the value of these mana-rocks. And having more flexible cards like Walking Ballista and Supreme Will is great too. I also think that we're in a meta-game where packing mainboard 1-2x dismember is also great (or a must), especially in a Vial, BBE, and Cavern meta.
We are in between some meta-shifts right now and I think it's the perfect time to tune our deck more. The shift seems to be going towards more midrange and control heavy meta. So we'll have to see as we're supposed to have a great matchup against either of those archetypes, but we don't know the full context of the BBE midrange or JTMS control with Field of Ruin.
I've actually been contemplating with Spellskite. It seems really good right now with so many Humans, Burn and Jund in the meta. Also doesn't get bounced by Thing in the Ice from some UR or UW lists.
So I've done some analysis for the following 3 decks to figure out why U-Tron is so inconsistent.
And I think the main reason is the mana source, and obviously, the lack of a good removal. I'll explain why:
(The decklists were borrowed from the most notable decklists from mtggoldfish)
MB Mana/Spell Colors - 18x U Spells / 10x U Sources (14x if you include Expedition Map)
First of all, I completely understand every deck runs differently so it's not right to directly compare an archetype to another.
I believe Mono-U Tron is a very unique deck in that it plays like a combo or a Gx Tron deck, but its main gameplan is that of a control deck. The thing is that Mono-U severely lacks removal compared to other control decks so it has bad matchup (pre-board) against almost every aggro deck in the meta (which is around 50% of the current metagame). I think the deck actually plays a lot like Storm in that you use counterspells to get to your wincons. The problem is that U-Tron lacks the manabase to consistently use most of its spells AND it relies heavily on the fact that you will almost always have more mana than your opponent. So missing a land drop puts you behind. It's a deck where keeping a 5-6 lander could actually be the correct answer because it has SO many cantrips, but again, this is if you have the blue source. I believe that this is the MAIN reason why the deck loses to itself very often with you not being able to cast a lot of your cards.
- Jeskai Control has 97% chance to draw at least 1 blue source in their opening hand.
- Mono-G Tron has 81% chance to draw at least 1 green source in their opening hand.
- Mono-U Tron has 74% chance to draw at least 1 blue source in their opening hand.
I think the deck needs more consistent ways to get blue sources to perform better, using cards like Talismans and Solemn Simulacrum. I first thought it was the cantrips and card advantages that we were lacking that was causing the deck to perform inconsistently. But this is not true as the deck has probably the most cantrips and card draws in the format aside from certain combo decks and Death's Shadow. It's just that we spend the first few turns doing nothing or not having the access to a blue source to do something interactive that puts us far behind. And Modern is a format where the first few turns are essential to a lot of decks.
I don't actually know how to fix this as the decklist is already tight enough. What do you guys think?
Oh and seriously, so much respect to Shoktroopa who's been piloting this deck to great success for years. I just don't know how.
Just wanted to give a quick shoutout to Pierakor who's given the deck so much love and dedication for the last few years. I heard he's not gonna be playing U-Tron any longer. We will miss you man!
My only problem with JTMS is that I feel like it's gonna be tough for us to protect him to get value. And I think the games where he will win us the game, we would probably win without him anyways.
Speaking of the meta-shift, I think here are some cards to consider in the 75:
- Negate: I think Negate is at a great spot right now, especially combined with Chalice on 1.
- Spellskite: I think it's back to being good again with the meta shifting towards aggro. Also protects our vital artifacts from BBE -> K-Command.
- Spreading Seas: It's probably at its best place right now and into the next few months where people will play greedy mana-bases to play JTMS or play decks that have BBE in it (Jund, Temur, etc). Also great against Burn, which is becoming FotM.
- Batterskull: Lots of decks play Path to Exile right now and I think Batterskull could come back as our 2nd or 3rd Wurmcoil Engine.
- All is Dust: E-Tron and Affinity has taken quite a bit of damage from the unbans and I think this card is actually a good option for us. Goes behind Stony Silence and Meddling Mage (since most people don't anticipate this card). Also could be bought back with Snapcaster.
I think I need to re-test Walking Ballista since I didn't really see any creature decks. I do like the Negate and maybe one should be a Disdainful Stroke.
1x Academy Ruins
1x Field of Ruin
7x Island
1x Oboro, Palace in the Clouds
1x River of Tears
1x Tolaria West
4x Urza's Mine
4x Urza's Power Plant
4x Urza's Tower
Artifact (10)
1x Chalice of the Void
1x Engineered Explosives
4x Expedition Map
2x Mindslaver
1x Oblivion Stone
4x Condescend
1x Cyclonic Rift
2x Dismember
3x Remand
3x Repeal
1x Supreme Will
4x Thirst for Knowledge
Creature (8)
1x Emrakul, the Promised End
1x Torrential Gearhulk
1x Snapcaster Mage
1x Treasure Mage
2x Walking Ballista
2x Wurmcoil Engine
Planeswalker (1)
1x Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
1x All Is Dust
2x Chalice of the Void
1x Dismember
1x Dispel
3x Spatial Contortion
1x Spell Snare
3x Spreading Seas
1x Sundering Titan
2x Surgical Extraction
Ran this list to 4-3 at a 1k Tournament yesterday. I lost to Mono-G Tron, Dredge, and Burn. And I won against Valakut, Amulet Titan, Grixis Control, and Jeskai Control.
As you can see, I was not at all prepared for the Dredge matchup as I was not expecting to see any, but they had a good meta call and most Dredge decks over-performed that night. Against Mono-G Tron, I just drew horribly and he drew perfectly, though I think we can improve this matchup. I mulled to 5 both games, not being able to find anything good. Control matchups (JTMS decks) felt very good. We play more disruption and bigger threats and it just ends up being a good matchup for us even with JTMS and Field of Ruin. I felt ahead every game and the opposing control player always had to dig to find answer with JTMS and Azcanta activations. Azcanta was almost a trap for them as they really wanted to get value out of the flipped Azcanta so they would always activate it when I Field of Ruin'd it, allowing me to slam down my threats against a tapped out opponent. Valakut and Amulet, as expected, were just insanely good matchups for U-Tron. Most of our threats are bigger than their Titans, Mindslaver/Emrakul wrecks them, and we also play counterspell. On the contrary, Burn was still miserable, especially when they had a good start. I was always a turn away from stabilizing.
I'll just talk briefly about some cards choices and what I learned from my experience:
My idea was to lower the curve as much as possible and getting rid of situational "win-more" cards like Sundering Titan and Platinum Angel.
- Emrakul, the Promised End
I don't really know why more people don't play Emrakul. I've won every game that I've casted her. The cast trigger is so big on some games, especially against things like Stony Silence. I found that without her, I sometimes had games that I had in control, but couldn't close out. I usually cast her for 9 (Land, Artifact, Creature, Instant) and it's usually an unexpected bomb that a lot of people are surprised to see.
- Torrential Gearhulk
The card was pretty underwhelming. It was just okay when I had it and I couldn't cast half of my spells with it. It works wonders with Dismembers, but even then double blue on turn 6 is actually pretty hard to achieve most of the time. I think I'll be playing Platinum Angel or another Snapcaster Mage instead in this slot. Again, the card was only "situationally" good. I want the cards in my deck to be "consistently" good.
- Sundering Titan
I swapped its spot with my Wurmcoil from the SB. My reasoning was that Wurmcoil is something that we can cast on turn 6 that usually stabilizes the board or at least gives us a ramp if the opponent Paths it. Sundering Titan came in against a lot of greedy 3+ Color matchups and it was an outstanding performer. But I just don't think it's a better MB card than another Wurmcoil Engine. This is, again, a "win-more situationally" card.
- Walking Ballista
Walking Ballista was something that I was surprised to see how much it underperformed. It is way too slow. It's a 3/3 on Tron mana at best on Turn 3. It's a great as a one-of because it basically works as our spot removal or burn card, like Lightning Bolt. I would probably replace one with another early game card or a Dismember. Perhaps it's better against aggro decks, but I think Spellskite would even be better in this slot (probably not right) or maybe another Chalice of the Void? Not sure what yet.
- Chalice of the Void
Just a great card. I think I was wrong to say you only need to play 2. It is extremely disruptive and it shuts down a lot of SB cards that other control players bring in like Ceremonious Rejection. It shuts down so many cards against control, some aggro, and combo decks, but I don't know if you really need a full playset of these as it's a dead card against Cavern of Souls decks. More testing is needed on how many we actually play. It's definitely at least a 1-of in the Main and another 1-2 in the SB.
- Dismember
I do think Dismember is better than Spatial Contortion in the MB. It kills most of the things in the meta and also kills Celestial Colonnade so it's almost never a "dead" card, while Spatial could just be a waste of a slot.
- Counterspells
I'm still not sure which counterspells are the best for us. Dispel is great because you can drop a Wurmcoil with a dispel backup on a single blue source, but it's a nonbo with Chalice. Negate is probably better because it answers some of the Gx Tron threats as well. I don't think you can ever play cards like Summary Dismissal when we have cards like Commit // Memory, which also gets around "uncounterable" clause. Seriously people, the double blue is very hard to achieve. That's why I'm even reluctant to play another Snapcaster Mage because we need double blue to really get value out of it.
- GY Hate
I'm not sure which GY Hate card to play anymore. Grafdigger was my go-to, but I don't know about this now. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.
- Land Choices
I dropped Gemstone Caverns because, again, it fell under "situationally win-more" card. I hated drawing it when it wasn't dropped down at the start. I always wished that it was another blue source so I just replaced it with another Island and I think this is right. I do, however, wished for another way to destroy lands. Perhaps another Field of Ruin or a Ghost Quarter is better.
I'm still tweaking around my SB choices. Really not sure what to play yet and I'm hoping to get some feedback. I have a 5k Open coming up this Saturday so I'll be testing and preparing for it all week.
Overall, I think there is this illusion for a lot of U-Tron players that playing more of the "win-more" cards is better. But in reality, it's what really hinders our consistency. We need to be playing cards that are almost always good and we can't spare any room for those greedy cards.
- Drift of Phantasms (Stops Geist tokens, Freebooter/Mantis Rider, Affinity, etc, and could fetch our 3 CMC cards like O-Stone, TFK, Treasure/Trinket Mage)
- Kaijin of the Vanishing Touch (Another flying defender that has an upside of returning creature back to their owner's hand, probably worse than Drift)
- Torpor Orb (Stops most of Humans triggers, TKS, Flickers from Taxes, etc)
- Commit/Memory (Some people already play it, gets around uncounterable creatures, counts as a sorcery towards Emrakul if you play that)
- Perilous Voyage (better Cyclonic Rift on 2 CMC or less creatuers, scries 2)
- Keiga, the Tide Star (5/5 Flyer that blocks most things and has an upside when it dies, probably too expensive and worse than Wurmcoil)
- Vedalken Plotter (Seen some of these pop up in the Japanese meta, great in Tron matchups)
- Crystal Shard (I've seen the card exactly once in modern from some weird UW taxes deck with Ghostly Prisons and it seemed to be super annoying)
- Flashfreeze (Heck, people run Celestial Purge in their SB's, why not this? There's a ton of RG decks out there right now)
- Curse of the Swine (Probably too expensive, yes definitely too expensive)
- Entrancing Melody (Too cute? I'd play it if it costed a single U source, not double)
- Exhaustion (Could be a timewalk if played right)
I know some of these are just plain ridiculous, but that was the point so we can open up some options.
Spellskite was okay. It was pretty good on certain matchups and completely useless in others. It just doesn't do enough on its own I'm afraid. For a sb spot, I think I'd rather play Silent Arbiter or Torpor Orb. It's still great against Infect and sometimes Bogles, but I'd really rather play a second EE if it came to that.
Hangarback I feel like is even slower than Walking Ballista. Great thing about Ballista is that it can be used as a removal or even burn some point of damage at your opponent if it ever gets pathed.
The point of Blue Tron is to get a more interactive styled deck that doesn't straight out lose to combo, but still get to play the big things that Tron likes to play. Our problem nowadays is not the choice of Blue over Green. It's that the meta shifted quite a lot from more midrange-y (like Jund, Junk, Abzan, etc) and combo-heavy decks (like Storm, Ad Nauseam, Twin, etc) to faster creature heavy decks in the last 2-3 years. But the deck list hasn't really changed much to adapt to it. That's why we are struggling.
I have found that playing a less greedy manabase (with more islands) and some Talismans have been great for me. I fear that a lot of people underestimate the value of these mana-rocks. And having more flexible cards like Walking Ballista and Supreme Will is great too. I also think that we're in a meta-game where packing mainboard 1-2x dismember is also great (or a must), especially in a Vial, BBE, and Cavern meta.
We are in between some meta-shifts right now and I think it's the perfect time to tune our deck more. The shift seems to be going towards more midrange and control heavy meta. So we'll have to see as we're supposed to have a great matchup against either of those archetypes, but we don't know the full context of the BBE midrange or JTMS control with Field of Ruin.
And I think the main reason is the mana source, and obviously, the lack of a good removal. I'll explain why:
(The decklists were borrowed from the most notable decklists from mtggoldfish)
4 Forest
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Sanctum of Ugin
4 Urza's Mine
4 Urza's Power Plant
4 Urza's Tower
Creatures
2 Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger
2 Walking Ballista
1 World Breaker
3 Wurmcoil Engine
1 All Is Dust
4 Ancient Stirrings
2 Dismember
4 Sylvan Scrying
Other Spells
4 Chromatic Sphere
4 Chromatic Star
4 Expedition Map
4 Karn Liberated
3 Oblivion Stone
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Kozilek, the Great Distortion
1 Life from the Loam
3 Nature's Claim
2 Pithing Needle
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Thought-Knot Seer
3 Thragtusk
Removal (8)
- 2x Dismember
- 2x Walking Ballista
- 4x Karn Liberated
Sweepers (6)
- 1x All is Dust
- 3x Oblivion Stone
- 2x Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
Cantrip/Consistency/Flexibility (21)
- 4x Ancinet Stirrings
- 4x Sylvan SCrying
- 4x Chromatic Sphere
- 4x Chromatic Star
- 4x Expedition Map
- 1x Relic of Progenitus
Wincons (14)
- 4x Karn Liberated
- 1x World Breaker
- 3x Wurmcoil Engine
- 2x Walking Ballista
- 2x Ulamog
- 2x Ugin
MB Mana/Spell Colors
- 9x G Spells / 12 G Sources (16 including Expedition Map)
3 Celestial Colonnade
4 Flooded Strand
2 Glacial Fortress
2 Hallowed Fountain
3 Island
1 Plains
1 Sacred Foundry
4 Scalding Tarn
1 Spirebluff Canal
2 Steam Vents
1 Sulfur Falls
Creatures
3 Snapcaster Mage
1 Torrential Gearhulk
4 Cryptic Command
2 Electrolyze
3 Lightning Bolt
3 Lightning Helix
3 Logic Knot
1 Negate
4 Path to Exile
1 Secure the Wastes
4 Serum Visions
1 Spell Snare
1 Sphinx's Revelation
2 Supreme Verdict
Other Spells
1 Nahiri, the Harbinger
2 Search for Azcanta
2 Celestial Purge
1 Detention Sphere
3 Dispel
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Negate
2 Runed Halo
1 Supreme Verdict
2 Vendilion Clique
1 Wear / Tear
Counterspells (9)
- 4x Cryptic Command
- 3x Logic Knot
- 1x Negate
- 1x Spell Snare
Removal (12)
- 2x Electrolyze
- 3x Lightning Helix
- 3x Lightning Bolt
- 4x Path to Exile
Sweepers (2)
- 2x Supreme Verdict
Cantrip/Consistency/Flexibility (15)
- 2x Electroylze
- 4x Cryptic Command
- 4x Serum Visions
- 2x Search for Azcanta
- 3x Snapcaster Mage
Wincons (6)
- 3x Celestial Colonnade
- 1x Torrential Gearhulk
- 1x Nahiri, the Harbinger
- 1x Sphinx’s Revelation
- 1x Secure the Wastes
MB Mana/Spell Colors
- 24x U Spells / 23 U Sources
- 12x W Spells / 13 W Sources
- 9x R Spells / 9 R Sources
1 Academy Ruins
1 Gemstone Caverns
5 Island
1 Oboro, Palace in the Clouds
1 River of Tears
1 Snow-Covered Island
1 Tectonic Edge
1 Tolaria West
4 Urza's Mine
4 Urza's Power Plant
4 Urza's Tower
Creatures
1 Platinum Angel
1 Snapcaster Mage
1 Solemn Simulacrum
1 Sundering Titan
1 Treasure Mage
1 Walking Ballista
1 Wurmcoil Engine
4 Condescend
1 Cyclonic Rift
2 Dismember
3 Remand
3 Repeal
1 Supreme Will
4 Thirst for Knowledge
Other Spells
1 Chalice of the Void
1 Engineered Explosives
4 Expedition Map
2 Mindslaver
1 Oblivion Stone
1 Talisman of Dominance
1 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
2 Chalice of the Void
2 Dismember
1 Ghost Quarter
3 Spatial Contortion
3 Spreading Seas
3 Surgical Extraction
1 Wurmcoil Engine
Counterspells (7)
- 4x Condescend
- 3x Remand
- 1x Supreme Will
Removal (7)
- 2x Dismember
- 3x Repeal
- 1x Cyclonic Rift
- 1x Walking Ballista
Sweepers (4)
- 1x Oblivion Stone
- 1x Engineered Explosives
- 1x Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
- 1x Cyclonic Rift
Cantrip/Consistency (22)
- 4x Condescend
- 3x Remand
- 3x Repeal
- 1x Supreme Will
- 4x Thirst for Knowledge
- 1x Treasure Mage
- 1x Snapcaster Mage
- 1x Solemn Simulacrum
- 4x Expedition Map
Wincons (8)
- 1x Academy Ruins
- 1x Platinum Angel
- 1x Sundering Titan
- 1x Walking Ballista
- 1x Wurmcoil Engine
- 2x Mindslaver
- 1x Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
MB Mana/Spell Colors
- 18x U Spells / 10x U Sources (14x if you include Expedition Map)
First of all, I completely understand every deck runs differently so it's not right to directly compare an archetype to another.
I believe Mono-U Tron is a very unique deck in that it plays like a combo or a Gx Tron deck, but its main gameplan is that of a control deck. The thing is that Mono-U severely lacks removal compared to other control decks so it has bad matchup (pre-board) against almost every aggro deck in the meta (which is around 50% of the current metagame). I think the deck actually plays a lot like Storm in that you use counterspells to get to your wincons. The problem is that U-Tron lacks the manabase to consistently use most of its spells AND it relies heavily on the fact that you will almost always have more mana than your opponent. So missing a land drop puts you behind. It's a deck where keeping a 5-6 lander could actually be the correct answer because it has SO many cantrips, but again, this is if you have the blue source. I believe that this is the MAIN reason why the deck loses to itself very often with you not being able to cast a lot of your cards.
- Jeskai Control has 97% chance to draw at least 1 blue source in their opening hand.
- Mono-G Tron has 81% chance to draw at least 1 green source in their opening hand.
- Mono-U Tron has 74% chance to draw at least 1 blue source in their opening hand.
I think the deck needs more consistent ways to get blue sources to perform better, using cards like Talismans and Solemn Simulacrum. I first thought it was the cantrips and card advantages that we were lacking that was causing the deck to perform inconsistently. But this is not true as the deck has probably the most cantrips and card draws in the format aside from certain combo decks and Death's Shadow. It's just that we spend the first few turns doing nothing or not having the access to a blue source to do something interactive that puts us far behind. And Modern is a format where the first few turns are essential to a lot of decks.
I don't actually know how to fix this as the decklist is already tight enough. What do you guys think?
Oh and seriously, so much respect to Shoktroopa who's been piloting this deck to great success for years. I just don't know how.
List is basically the same list as Shok's, piloted by Richard Wright (who's gone 2nd at an IQ years ago with UW Tron).
I wonder what our decks are gonna look like after this week?
I don't see your deck here. Which place were you ranked at?
Just wanted to give a quick shoutout to Pierakor who's given the deck so much love and dedication for the last few years. I heard he's not gonna be playing U-Tron any longer. We will miss you man!
Speaking of the meta-shift, I think here are some cards to consider in the 75:
- Negate: I think Negate is at a great spot right now, especially combined with Chalice on 1.
- Spellskite: I think it's back to being good again with the meta shifting towards aggro. Also protects our vital artifacts from BBE -> K-Command.
- Spreading Seas: It's probably at its best place right now and into the next few months where people will play greedy mana-bases to play JTMS or play decks that have BBE in it (Jund, Temur, etc). Also great against Burn, which is becoming FotM.
- Batterskull: Lots of decks play Path to Exile right now and I think Batterskull could come back as our 2nd or 3rd Wurmcoil Engine.
- All is Dust: E-Tron and Affinity has taken quite a bit of damage from the unbans and I think this card is actually a good option for us. Goes behind Stony Silence and Meddling Mage (since most people don't anticipate this card). Also could be bought back with Snapcaster.