Just played FNM with the standard list + Groundbreaker/Dungrove/Thrun. Ground breaker felt great when it connected with Aspect but I was getting absolutely destroyed with removal spells, especially against burn. I'm thinking about mainboarding Blossoming Defense in place Of Aspect of Hydra, dropping Groundbreaker/Baloth for 2x Rhonas and another Elder, dropping 1 Treetop village in place of another forest (for elder), and then I guess I'll keep one Baloth.
All I had for lifegain was Feed the Clan but I'll definitely be sideboarding at least 2x Life Goes On for Burn matchups because good lord was that brutal.
I did land a Vines on a doubly pumped InkMoth Nexus which the player very much did not expect, but I still want at least 2x Melira, Sylvok Outcast in sideboard for that matchup because I lost to infect twice. Probably another Dismember as well.
Another cool interaction I liked against Burn/infect was dropping Geist and then using Prey Upon to trade and force the undying trigger.
I hate to lose those incredibly satisfying Aspect plays but there were several times where I had a hand full of pump cards and a graveyard full of creatures who never had a chance to fight. I think I'd rather focus on increasing my resiliency/consistency rather than waiting around for Aspect to be relevant. Plus with less 3 drop devotion synergy, Aspect gets a lot less potent.
Excited to get Rhonas as well, I can see why he's valued so highly now.
I think you're devoting too many sideboard slots for very few matchups. I've been against Burn, and I've been the Burn player. I know how it feels, but going overboard with lifegain is not the way to go. When I play against Burn, I just make sure I have a spare copy of Aspect of Hydra in my hand, ready to be fired off. It destroys Burn; I can confidently say that from both sides of the matchup. If you want to gain more life, I would consider playing more copies of Scavenging Ooze, and saving them for when the graveyard is full. That way, you don't need to worry about your creatures being removed because they will be reinvested into lifegain and counters. Melira, Sylvok Outcast is too narrow of a card. You need an answer to infect that also applies to other matchups. Maybe you can play a few copies of Gut Shot. It will kill their Noble Hierarch and every single one of their other creatures, or it will force them to waste a spell protecting their card when it's not attacking. The reason I say Gut Shot is a better choice is because it's also an amazing card against Affinity, which a deck that you should be much more concerned about (and much more likely to face) at a tournament. Blossoming Defense is a solid card, but I wouldn't take out Aspect of Hydra completely. There are times when you need to race your opponent, and this will be the card that makes you win a turn earlier than you normally would.
Is Tireless Tracker worth it in non-fetch builds? It seems like it doesn't do enough work when we can only get a maximum of one clue per turn (excluding the possibility of an opponent using Path to Exile on one of our cards).
Some people are saying that the unbanning of Jace, the Mind Sculptor is not a bad thing because we're a fast deck. Personally, I think this the wrong way of looking at things. Against a control deck running it, our creatures are going to get removed, or maybe even boardwiped. If our control opponent plays Supreme Verdict, then plays Jace the turn after, we're not winning that match.
Solutions are Display of Dominance (which is not limited to killing Jace; Liliana of the Veil is a good target, and the second ability could come in handy), a faster clock with cards like Boggart Ram-Gang and Groundbreaker (which I see many people have been talking about), or Heroic Intervention (which will prevent boardwipes altogether and help us keep a healthy board state.
I played against Abzan two days ago with mono red Burn because I don't have the lands yet, and my opponent had Collective Brutality in games 1 and 2, but I won both of them. In game 2, he also had Scavenging Ooze and Shambling Vent as well, but small amounts of lifegain don't seem to matter too much, and Scavenging Ooze seems to need a lot of time in order to have a big impact on the board.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure Abzan and Jund are similar matchups.
With the unbanning of these two cards, the format will be warped in some way or another. I don't know which decks will rise and which decks will fall, but there's going to be some change to Tier 1 and Tier 2. Once the metagame settles with the inclusion of these two cards, there will be different decks Burn needs to look out for. I think most of us (and other modern players) will have to make frequent changes to our sideboards to adjust to a changing metagame.
One of the guys played 2 copies of Shrine of Burning Rage in the sideboard. I know it's bad, despite it winning another gp a while ago, but sideboard copies seem interesting.
I'm pretty sure it's bad in certain matchups so mainboard wouldn't be good, and maybe it's bad in ALL matchups, but I just want to know for sure if we're going to exclude the card as a choice altogether, whether it be in the main or in the side.
So there's been some talk about Vexing Devil as a card in Burn. While I agree that it's bad against Jeskai control and stuff because it can be answered so easily, it does perform well against non interactive decks where you need to race them. So I propose playing 2-3 copies in the sideboard as an option to lower the overall mana curve while doing more damage. There are many non-interactive decks out there that are sometimes too fast for us, and we don't need to bring in Vexing Devil against decks where it would be bad.
Hey guys, I'm new to the forum, and kind of new to the deck. I just got into playing the deck in Modern, and I thought I should build the Legacy version sometime soon, since I already have most of the cards. I understand the card choices in the deck, so that's okay, but as a new player to Legacy in general, I'm just wondering what kind of changes I should be making to my game plan in Legacy. I haven't made a decklist yet, but I'm planning on simply running a stock list. Is there anything in particular I should be looking out for in this format?
(Before you reply, I know the most popular decks and what they run, so I'm not a total newb in that sense.)
I understand what you;re saying, but I'm concerned about bringing in too many non creature spells post-board. To me, a singleton copy of Loaming Shaman can push our graveyard hate over the top when it needs to be, and it has other utility as well. But yes, I'm quite aware of the fact that we already have a lot of graveyard hate in the main.
Against BR Hollow One, I'm not too sure if graveyard hate is necessary. This deck tends to be particularly resourceful with the graveyard, but it does not rely on it. The mainboard hate should be sufficient in this matchup. It would be like bringing in graveyard hate against control; it wouldn't be bad, but a creature would often times be better. However, if the list runs Vengevine, I guess extra graveyard hate would be a good choice.
Changing the topic, what are the kinds of plays that distinguish a great Burn player from a mediocre one? I know that Burn can be a very skill intensive deck to play, and it's these subtle plays that make a huge difference in the outcome of these games. When I see these plays, I understand what's going on and why the decision was made, but I would never have thought to make these plays myself. I'm interested in understanding the thought process behind expert players. Here are a few more questions for those who feel like they are experts with the deck:
-What do you play first when sequencing your spells, Boros Charm or Lightning Helix? In what situations?
-When should you hold lands back or choose not to fetch in case you topdeck a Searing Blaze? Is it even worth doing on turn 2 or 3?
-Would you ever side out a land, such as a Stomping Ground against decks like the mirror?
-Do you ALWAYS drop Eidolon of the Great Revel on turn 2?
These are just a few questions, but I'm more interested in learning the thought process behind an experienced Burn players.
Blood Sun deals no damage, so it doesn't help our game plan. It costs 3 mana, so we'll likely be taking an entire turn off just trying to cast it instead of potentially playing 2 burn spells. It's an interesting card that needs to be tested more, and it could become a good modern card, but Burn just isn't the right deck for it. If you want to punish your opponent's greedy manabase, I would suggest that you use Molten Rain as a card, as it deals damage to your opponent and it actually destroys your opponent's land, so you can bring it in against Tron decks as well.
I think you're devoting too many sideboard slots for very few matchups. I've been against Burn, and I've been the Burn player. I know how it feels, but going overboard with lifegain is not the way to go. When I play against Burn, I just make sure I have a spare copy of Aspect of Hydra in my hand, ready to be fired off. It destroys Burn; I can confidently say that from both sides of the matchup. If you want to gain more life, I would consider playing more copies of Scavenging Ooze, and saving them for when the graveyard is full. That way, you don't need to worry about your creatures being removed because they will be reinvested into lifegain and counters.
Melira, Sylvok Outcast is too narrow of a card. You need an answer to infect that also applies to other matchups. Maybe you can play a few copies of Gut Shot. It will kill their Noble Hierarch and every single one of their other creatures, or it will force them to waste a spell protecting their card when it's not attacking. The reason I say Gut Shot is a better choice is because it's also an amazing card against Affinity, which a deck that you should be much more concerned about (and much more likely to face) at a tournament.
Blossoming Defense is a solid card, but I wouldn't take out Aspect of Hydra completely. There are times when you need to race your opponent, and this will be the card that makes you win a turn earlier than you normally would.
Some people are saying that the unbanning of Jace, the Mind Sculptor is not a bad thing because we're a fast deck. Personally, I think this the wrong way of looking at things. Against a control deck running it, our creatures are going to get removed, or maybe even boardwiped. If our control opponent plays Supreme Verdict, then plays Jace the turn after, we're not winning that match.
Solutions are Display of Dominance (which is not limited to killing Jace; Liliana of the Veil is a good target, and the second ability could come in handy), a faster clock with cards like Boggart Ram-Gang and Groundbreaker (which I see many people have been talking about), or Heroic Intervention (which will prevent boardwipes altogether and help us keep a healthy board state.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure Abzan and Jund are similar matchups.
I'm pretty sure it's bad in certain matchups so mainboard wouldn't be good, and maybe it's bad in ALL matchups, but I just want to know for sure if we're going to exclude the card as a choice altogether, whether it be in the main or in the side.
(Before you reply, I know the most popular decks and what they run, so I'm not a total newb in that sense.)
Against BR Hollow One, I'm not too sure if graveyard hate is necessary. This deck tends to be particularly resourceful with the graveyard, but it does not rely on it. The mainboard hate should be sufficient in this matchup. It would be like bringing in graveyard hate against control; it wouldn't be bad, but a creature would often times be better. However, if the list runs Vengevine, I guess extra graveyard hate would be a good choice.
-What do you play first when sequencing your spells, Boros Charm or Lightning Helix? In what situations?
-When should you hold lands back or choose not to fetch in case you topdeck a Searing Blaze? Is it even worth doing on turn 2 or 3?
-Would you ever side out a land, such as a Stomping Ground against decks like the mirror?
-Do you ALWAYS drop Eidolon of the Great Revel on turn 2?
These are just a few questions, but I'm more interested in learning the thought process behind an experienced Burn players.