There's been a lot of testing of CO there lately, and we'd appreciate ya'lls input.
Also for those of you struggling with Phoenix decks and Tron, I'd highly recommend throwing 1-2 Damping Spheres in your SB. I love Eidolon of Rhetoric as well, but since SB space is so limited, I've found damping sphere to be the better card against Modern as a whole right now.
What's the most competitive version of Devotion right now? I get that there's a few different philosophies and that you can tune to a local meta...etc but surely there's at least a core 50 cards with half of a sideboard that is "generally accepted as" a core list to build on? For instance, I'd imagine Pact is generally more competitive than P.Command because its a faster kill...we generally want 4x Wildspeakers... Is Gigantosaurus a core creature now?
Well, I ended Day 1 at 6-3 and the cut to Day 2 was 6-2-1, so I was just outside the bubble. I did manage to finish picking up my foils (Dissention GQs are so gorgeous), though. I'll be updating this post with my match notes and such later today when I have some more time.
I did see several other people at/near the top tables with Eldrazi though, so it had a good showing regardless.
My SB was:
3 Relic, 3 Ratchet Bomb, 3 Spatial Contortion, 2 Gut Shot, 1 Karn Scion of Urza, 1 Surgical Extraction, 1 Endbringer, 1 Sorcerous Spyglass
Edit: Match Updates: For SB I generally followed the wonderfully expansive SB guide posted and shared earlier in the thread.
Round 1: Matt Dotson: UR Breach: 1-0 (2-1 Games)
I got lucky. Game one I applied early pressure and had Chalice to lock out his cantrips. Turn two TKS let me know what I was up against and his list total goes down in 4 point chunks. Game 2 he stalls me with Remands and Mana Leaks long enough for a Breach-Emrakul, but game 3 Mama Eldrazi couldn't close it out and I won at 5 life after annihilator left me with Wastes and Serum Powder on board across from his Blood Moon. I cast Smasher off a sandbagged Temple and Monkey and rode it to victory.
Round 2: Tanner Thomas: BW Smallpox 2-0 (4-2 Games)
A playtest buddy, and we went in knowing basically each others entire 75. He took a very close game one off the back of multiple Smallpoxes and Thoughtseize taking the closing game cards in my hand. Games two and three though were won on the back of Matter Reshaper, which was an absolute mvp in replacing itself and ensuring I still had solid pressure. Game 3 also saw me getting to turn 2 Spyglass him and name LotV, then he had the common courtesy to draw another one off the top of his deck to give two dead cards in an attrition game.
Round 3: James Martin: Abzan Company 2-1 (4-4 Games)
I had a slow start in game one with Chalice, but he Company'd into the combo at my end of turn and showed me Recruiter+Ballista when I had no Dismember in hand. Game two was long, and he had infinite mana for several turns, but nothing to do with it. I clogged up the ground and knocked him to one, on his last turn he pulled a Pridemage to kill my Nexus and then had Recruiter off a Company with Ballista.
Round 4: Dave Goldstein: Mardu Mentor 3-1 (6-4 Games)
He misses a Mentor trigger in game one, but I have him locked behind Chalice and my creatures are bigger. He seems hesitant to cast spells into Chalice to trigger mentor, so Smasher smashes. Game two he mulled very low, and my draw went Reshaper into Smasher and closed things out quickly.
Round 5: Orion: RG Valakut 4-1 (8-5 Games)
Game 1 I get Molten Pinnacled from 20. My Chalice on 2 is too slow to stop the Khalni Heart Expedition he had in play, and I only bean him to 9 before the world explodes. Game 2 I keep a very quick hand that also had GQ + Surgical and he never finds another Scapeshift after I hit one with TKS. Game 3 is tricky and I take two hits of Rec Sage, putting me into the danger zone. He finds Prime Time but I have a wide board and hit a Stomping Ground with GQ+Surgical, then he can't clear it to set up for the Valakut kill. I proceed to attack in with a Reshaper and army of creature-lands for the kill.
Round 6: Noah Rolf: Ponza 4-2 (9-7 Games)
He won the die roll and had great pressure. I was on the play in game two and had great pressure. Game 3 was close, but Inferno Titan closed it out for him.
Round 7: Michael Kidd: Hollow One 5-2 (11-8 Games)
Game 1 he has a busted Hollow One draw and I get rolled over. Games two and three I had Chalice and multiple Relics, then my life total never drops below 12 in either game.
Round 8: Robby Graham: Grixis Delver 5-3 (11-10 Games)
Game 1 he rolls me over with multiple Pyromancers and Angler. Game 2 I keep Ratchet Bomb, Contortion, and a curve, but he starts on Delver and simply tempos me out of the game.
Round 9: Seth Asher: 4c Traverse Reveler 6-3 (13-10 Games)
Game one was short with him never getting Delirium and having to Traverse for Basic Land but then drawing out nothing but fetchlands. Game two has a little more back and forth, but I eventually draw into Endbringer and begin invalidating his Flayer or Reveler as blockers and drawing cards while finishing off the game with a double Blinkmoth attack.
Final Thoughts: Karn was lackluster. I would much rather have gone up to the 4th Bomb, Relic, or an All is Dust. I never played against Humans, Infect, Storm, Tron, Jund, real Control (either Jeskai or UW), or the Mirror; just showing how diverse and wide open the metagame is right now. I still feel very confident in the deck but know there were some mulligan decisions I could have made differently to potentially have changed my 6-3 to a 7-2 or even an 8-1 due to how close some of the matches were.
Pic attached from before I picked up the final foil lands on site and decided to go to 3 Relic and 2 Gutshot.
Haha, I was your round 6 opponent. The CES community sure is small! I ended up getting knocked out of Day 2 by the same margin. You have me seriously considering buying into CES though...either that or RG Eldrazi, hard to choose between them right now.
Either way it was a pleasure meeting you and seeing the deck in action, in person.
I mean, Bolt is an amazing card, for sure, and in any other red deck I played in modern, it was instantly a 4 of. I will try to run 3 bolts instead of 1 Sweltering Suns and 2 Abrade, maybe it'll be worth it. I might also Switch out Chandra ToD (currently running 1 main, and 1 side), since she's been somewhat underwhelming for me. Would you rather include Baloth or Thragtusk in your sideboard ? Or even Kitchen Finks, which I need to test.
There is an argument to be made that our axis of disruption is not cheap burn spells, and that 4x bolt further reduces our chances of cascading into a Rain/Moon effect. I have thought about moving away from Bolt entirely, in favor of more payoff spells for all of the ramp we see, and to optimize cascades.
As for ToD, she gets a lot better with courser out, but even without she's pretty great in grindy matchups. Unfortunately the meta is heavy on combo/aggro right now, so yeah, she's not quite as impactful. Still, she can ramp into 8 mana on T3 so thats something.
When it domes to my sideboard cards, I try to have as many BBE hits as possible. So rather than something like Shatterstorm or Fracturing Gust I run more Grudges, instead of Baloth I run a third Finks, and instead of Hour of Devestation I run a single Roast. Watching all your payoff spells and sideboard cards cascade to the bottom, while your shuffle effects are mooned out, feels bad.
It honestly boggles my mind that we are the only red deck that I'm aware of which runs some number of bolts less than 4. I run one Abrade in the side as my 4th because the deck is so tight as it is, but the cheap removal is key and it is the most played spell in the format for a reason. I can see an argument for running sweepers, Glorybringers, 2x Chandra ToD, etc instead, but bolt is just such a versatile spell, its hard to leave out.
I'm just jumping into modern with this deck and I have some questions. I played my first two actual matches with it today. The first was TRON. I understand we're supposed to have a decent match up against them. I won the first game to the opponent mulliganing down to 3 cards. The second game I misplayed, playing a Blood Moon, not putting two and two together to realize I was taking myself off green by doing so. That felt pretty bad. Lost the third game to terrible draws.
The next match was against infect. What do we even do against infect? The two games both felt pretty hopeless. Didn't help that he Thoughtseized my Anger of the Gods game 2.
Tron is indeed good for Ponza, however, a good Tron hand can beat a mediocre Ponza hand. My experience is Ponza mulligans a lot. You kind of need the turn one dork (or at least Utopia Sprawl). Some specific matchups, you can keep a hand slower hand if it includes removal. Like Marc said, try to always get your basic forest with fetchland, since after Blood Moon lands you'll have someting like 13 mountains and 8 forests remaining in the deck. The only case you need a R/G dual is when arbor elf is in play and you need 2 red and have no other choice.
Infect is a bit weird, it really depends on your build. If you don't play much removal mainboard it's going to be a painful experience. Try to capitalize on that, keep in mid that they can pump as a response, so you probably want to bolt during your turn, and not just before combat. LD works good against them, given you're not dead before. I've seen infect players concede on blood moon resolving on turn 2, because they had no basic into play. Most lists run like 2~4 basics. You can just shut them down with Blood Moon and then Stone Rain. You can still get destroyed by a turn 2 kill, but if that happens, you probably just want to go to game 2. Trinisphere can be good against them (most of the time they cannot pump their dudes enough) on the play. On the Draw, I'd probably wouldn't run them.
Tron is one of those matchups where, if I can afford to, I always run out the Utopia Sprawl before the Arbor Elf. Getting your elf killed on the draw is a tempo loss you usually can't afford against most decks, and Tron is no exception.
Infect I've found is actually not a bad matchup if you have 3x bolts main and board in all your removal/wipes after G2. You also have to understand that every single creature in your deck is a blocker until the opponent has no infect attackers on board, if you hold your Trackers back or tap your Elf for anything other than to play another blocker, you are absolutely setting yourself up to get blown out. We want to force infect to grind, something they are not at all good at. There are lots of little interactions that you will learn by getting blown out and then not doing that again as well, like playing removal on your turn to force the wasting of a pump spell, not boarding in Finks to block (Persist doesn't trigger after infect damage), etc. But overall, T2 Blood Moon > Stone rain basics is usually lights out. I've only ever lost against once Infect player, and he is honestly excellent with his deck, killing me for exactly 10 infect every time.
I've seen a few lists experimenting with Scooze or Stormbreath over PKN, and I can't really get behind it. The ability to machinegun clues while growing your tracker is too good. If it weren't for their being legendary I'd run 3. I'm actually still tempted to go up to 3 anyways, its just hard to cut anything for it.
I used to play ponza before the unbanning of Bloodbraid Elf, and decided, after playing the deck as is, to change it towards BBE build.
Looking at this thread, this is what I have so far :
I have some questions about the numbers on some cards, such as Abrade, Primal Command and Sweltering Suns.
In theory, I guess Abrade is pretty good against human and hollow one, but anyone has some experience with it ?
Hi
I'm buy ponza recently and I have not played with it yet.
I come from a few months playing just jund moon and burn.
I would like a help with sb, the list I Want to play is the "traditional" without changes.
I need help mainly because I do not have trinisphere, do I really need it?
my idea of side:
2 Ooze
2 Damping Sphere
2 Kitchen Finks
2 Ancient Grudge
1 Beast Within Or Reclamation sage?
3 Anger of the Gods
1 Obstinated Baloth
1 Thragtusk
1 Crumble to dust
My meta:
Valakut - a Lot
Burn
Jund and abzan
Tron
Storm
Humans
Bw Tokens(terrible match for my jund, lol)
Folk
I wouldn't play Damping Sphere, it is only really good against Tron, which is an already good matchup. I feel the same about Crumble to Dust, it's targeted at either Valakut or Tron, and both are ok.
You can probably add Boil or Choke if you feel you might face some blue decks. Trinisphere is really good against storm. You might want to add Grafdigger's cage if they play CoCo.
Considering your Metagame, I think the hardest matchup is Humans, for which there isn't really a good card.
Second the above, except to say Choke is probably better than boil, and that while UWx is generally favored for us, UR Moon is not, so its worth running a choke for them.
Also, for Humans, Torpor Orb is great. Unfortunately it hoses PKN and Inferno Titan ETB triggers though.
Speaking of card draw engines that don't open you up to getting 2-for-1'd, Bygone Bishop anyone? He can also be vialed in to leave your mana open for casting, and doesn't require you to attack every turn or lose the advantage. And a body is always better than an enchantment, even if a bit slower.
Also, as much as I hate the card, I feel that any creature based white deck should have 1-2 Worship in the side to shore up those bad matchups.
Has anyone considered running 3-4x Eidolon of Rhetoric MB as a lockpiece? Being able to play instant speed allows us to get around it pretty easily, as we can play on our opponents turn, and Aether Vial gives us another way around it as well. However, it would probably be most powerful on T2, but has the least amount of synergy with Bant...
Thoughts?
I liked the idea of the Red Eidolon as a lock piece, just not the idea of the RR casting cost, and the fact that it actually hurts us pretty bad.
My biggest hypes so far have been 3 mana Kiora/Vivien and the Arkbow.
https://discord.gg/VdmtKa
There's been a lot of testing of CO there lately, and we'd appreciate ya'lls input.
Also for those of you struggling with Phoenix decks and Tron, I'd highly recommend throwing 1-2 Damping Spheres in your SB. I love Eidolon of Rhetoric as well, but since SB space is so limited, I've found damping sphere to be the better card against Modern as a whole right now.
10 mana 16/16 with Indestructible and Convoke
Lets get to brewing
Haha, I was your round 6 opponent. The CES community sure is small! I ended up getting knocked out of Day 2 by the same margin. You have me seriously considering buying into CES though...either that or RG Eldrazi, hard to choose between them right now.
Either way it was a pleasure meeting you and seeing the deck in action, in person.
There is an argument to be made that our axis of disruption is not cheap burn spells, and that 4x bolt further reduces our chances of cascading into a Rain/Moon effect. I have thought about moving away from Bolt entirely, in favor of more payoff spells for all of the ramp we see, and to optimize cascades.
As for ToD, she gets a lot better with courser out, but even without she's pretty great in grindy matchups. Unfortunately the meta is heavy on combo/aggro right now, so yeah, she's not quite as impactful. Still, she can ramp into 8 mana on T3 so thats something.
When it domes to my sideboard cards, I try to have as many BBE hits as possible. So rather than something like Shatterstorm or Fracturing Gust I run more Grudges, instead of Baloth I run a third Finks, and instead of Hour of Devestation I run a single Roast. Watching all your payoff spells and sideboard cards cascade to the bottom, while your shuffle effects are mooned out, feels bad.
Tron is one of those matchups where, if I can afford to, I always run out the Utopia Sprawl before the Arbor Elf. Getting your elf killed on the draw is a tempo loss you usually can't afford against most decks, and Tron is no exception.
Infect I've found is actually not a bad matchup if you have 3x bolts main and board in all your removal/wipes after G2. You also have to understand that every single creature in your deck is a blocker until the opponent has no infect attackers on board, if you hold your Trackers back or tap your Elf for anything other than to play another blocker, you are absolutely setting yourself up to get blown out. We want to force infect to grind, something they are not at all good at. There are lots of little interactions that you will learn by getting blown out and then not doing that again as well, like playing removal on your turn to force the wasting of a pump spell, not boarding in Finks to block (Persist doesn't trigger after infect damage), etc. But overall, T2 Blood Moon > Stone rain basics is usually lights out. I've only ever lost against once Infect player, and he is honestly excellent with his deck, killing me for exactly 10 infect every time.
Second the above, except to say Choke is probably better than boil, and that while UWx is generally favored for us, UR Moon is not, so its worth running a choke for them.
Also, for Humans, Torpor Orb is great. Unfortunately it hoses PKN and Inferno Titan ETB triggers though.
Also, as much as I hate the card, I feel that any creature based white deck should have 1-2 Worship in the side to shore up those bad matchups.
Thoughts?
I liked the idea of the Red Eidolon as a lock piece, just not the idea of the RR casting cost, and the fact that it actually hurts us pretty bad.