MTG Salvation

I agree it's a bit dubious playing a Loam deck with Surgicals everywhere.

I used to play Bloodbraid, but as others have said its not good with mana dorks.

Playing all 8 mana dorks feels like too many at times but its nice to be able to go turn 1 dork turn 2 Seismic Assault / Crusher / Scooze with mana open to activate / Field of Ruin. I would have to reconfigure my list entirely if I were to remove them and add Bloodbraid.

Has anyone tested Magmatic Insight?

Drawing multiple Seismic Assault can be awkward. Looting or Lightning Axe can fix this. I played 4 Axe the other day but that felt like too many.

How does everyone like Commune with the Gods? It feels great to grab Assault while dumping lands and Life from the Loam, but sometimes I just miss entirely or end up having a grab a mana dork and that feels quite bad.

I used to play Courser of Kruphix in here: not sure how that would fare in today's meta. Play's fairly well with Loam and Crusher.

Control matchup seems tricky. I may have to get Chandras or something to help with it.

Cindervines is interesting I'll be sure to try it out.

Is 2 Fire-lit thicket excessive? I'm only playing one right now but sometimes wish I had the second to help when I draw forest.

Does anyone play Molten Vortex as additional assaults or are they not needed?

So many thoughts. I always have the core of Loam + Assault + Crusher by aside from that there's so many options and nothing is really set in stone. I hope Horizons gives us some new goodies for this archetype.

The London Mulligan goes into effect today on MTGO, correct? When do the first events using this rule get posted? Tomorrow? Let's keep an eye on what decks do well as a result of this rule.

Quote from DudeFromDenmark »

He doesn´t have a signature spell?

Already spoiled. Dovin's Veto

Quote from CrypticCommander »

I like how simple this list is. The only thing I'm concerned with is the manabase. 3 Forest with Seismic Assault is tough without playing at least 3 Fire-Lit Thicket. I'd play 1 or 2 Forest and add either Fire-Lit Thicket or Copperline Gorge. If the thought is you want Arbor Elf to tap for mana more consistently, I'd just play 3 Stomping Ground and a second Sheltered Thicket to fetch for. With 8 fetches, 3 shocks, and 2 forests, Arbor Elf will be turned on a majority of the time.

Ghost Quarter has been classically better than Field of Ruin in this archetype for the same reason, and because Life from the Loam into Field of Ruin takes 5 mana while Loam GQ takes 2. You can also GQ yourself to get additional red mana when you need to cast Seismic Assault.

I prefer Field of Ruin because with a turn 1 dork I can fire it off turn 2, and it's not tempo negative like Ghost Quarter is.

I'll reconsider the 3 forests if I run into any problems. I need a high enough basic land count to pair with the 4 Field of Ruins. I wouldn't drop to less than 6 basics but could go 4 mountain, 2 forest.

Quote from BlazingRagnarok »

Could Bolt Bend find its way into the sideboard of GDS? It's much better than Stubborn Denial in the Humans matchup, and it allows some interesting lines of play against burn.

Reflector Mage and Deputy of Detention can only target opponent's cards unfortunately.

Only card from Phoenix I would want under a watchlist is Manamorphose, not Faithless Looting. It's really the card that enables the fast phoenix starts, quick Awoken Horrors, and makes Pyromancer's Ascension go crazy. Deck is still perfectly viable without Manamorphose, just slower.

Besides, I'd rather kill only storm than kill off dredge, mardu pyromancer, griselbrand decks, UR Livind End, Hollow One and the many other decks that currently or may in the future use looting.

And even then, storm always seems to bounce back from getting its cards banned (Rite of Flame, Seething Song, Ponder + Preordain, Gitaxian Probe).

Again, just something for the watchlist. I think it's too soon for any action to be taken yet.

Here's the list I've been playing. It's a lot of fun

Quote from headminerve »

Does it work with Revival // Revenge ? Iirc, "controls" means the card is on the bf ?

Controls means it is on the battlefield. Revival wouldn't count

I'm surprised Amulet didn't get banned over Summer Bloom when they had the chance. But then again, everyone thought the deck was dead without Bloom - joke's on them now

Primal Tomb
Land
T: Add C to your mana pool.
T: Add CC to your mana pool. Activate this ability only if you control 2 or more basic lands.

These are some seriously pushed commons. A lot of seriously pushed commons in this set actually.

Quote from Mortal Coil »

I don't think Belcher is the reason Chrome Mox should stay on the banned list. You actually can build a fairly consistent Belcher deck with just Chrome Mox, and Mox Opal as your mana base, shockingly enough, but that's beside the point really. Chrome Mox is an incredibly swingy card, especially on the play, when you're up 2 mana to nothing on turn 1. It gives most aggro, midrange, and control decks a huge leg up if they get to start with it, to the point where the advantage can easily snowball way out of control. I'd argue that the reason Fairies was so dominant was the Chrome Mox into Spellstutter Sprite starts. The only way to compete is to run 4 Chrome Mox yourself. It's a major issue in terms of deckbuilding balance. If you're building a deck with colored spells, it's usually correct to start with 4 Chrome Mox. Heck, half of the reason Tezzerator is so strong in NBLM is that it can afford to run Chrome Mox and Mox Opal, allowing some truly absurd turn 1 plays. Trust me, Chrome Mox should stay banned, and was absolutely a design mistake. There are three cards on the Banned List that absolutely need to stay banned or Modern will no longer be a fun format for most people: Skullclamp, Dread Return, and Chrome Mox. I can conceive of ways that you could make a meta to balance Dark Depths, Umezawa's Jitte, the artifact lands, or Sensei's Divining Top, but those three just break the game in half. You'd need to completely rework the rules to make them fair.

Ignoring the Chrome Mox debate for a minute here, I am going to have to disagree that those 3 cards are the ones that should stay banned forever in modern.

Skullclamp I agree with, that one is obvious.

The other two I believe to be Sensei's Divining Top and Eye of Ugin. The first one causes time delays in the format and potentially makes miracles tier 0. The second one - well we saw what happens when Eye and Temple are legal at the same time.

Dread Return makes dredge somewhat better than it is currently, but it doesn't solve any of dredge's problems. It still loses to the same graveyard hate that it currently does.

Back to Chrome Mox.

Chrome Mox is a very powerful card yes, but even though it has broad applications across the format not every colored deck is going to want to play it. It's still card disadvantage in the end. Noble Hierarch is also fairly swingy on the play, and many decks would prefer to play that than Chrome Mox.

Chrome Mox is, IMO, a way for decks that do not have access to Aether Vial, Mox Opal, mana dorks (birds, hierarch, arbor elf), Tron Lands, Eldrazi Lands, or red Rituals to compete against these decks by trading card advantage for mana. Tezzerator? Please show me a list and how you are going to reliably play both Mox Opal and Chrome Mox in the same deck when they each require you to play cards that do not synergize well together (Opal requires artifacts, Chrome requires non-artifacts)

Quote from Lord_Mektar »

Reading all these LD cards gave me a nifty idea for one:

Forced Mining 1R
Sorcery
Destroy target land an opponent controls. That player creates two colorless Treasure artifact tokens with “{T}, Sacrifice this artifact: Add one mana of any color.”

This way, the player on the receiving end can still cast things for a few more turns as they dig for a replacement land, and they're even ramped slightly. On the other hand, if you stick Stony Silence first, Forced Mining becomes an insanely good true Sinkhole.

I'm a very big fan of this card. I think it should be able to target yourself as well though

The new repeatable red Snapcaster Mage seems potentially busted. True, it only triggers on attack, but it can be used to recur manaless spells like Restore Balance, Living End, Ancestral Visions, or Wheel of Fate.

It is also more aggressive than snapcaster since you can simply double each of your pump spells.

I think it has real potential.

What's with all the sacrifice effects in this set?