It looks like Oko is starting to hit modern based on recent top 8 results. I have a 5K coming up in 1 month and am soliciting advice. What's our play vs Oko? Bolt the bird seems like a given. Add green for atarka's command and skullcrack 5-8? Leyline of punishment? Go rakdos for dreadbore? Smash to smithereens? Double bolt the walker as soon as he drops? I'm less worried about our creatures upgrading to Elks and more worried about infinite food tokens.
I agree about the giant. In the context of modern, the damage can't be prevented clause is outclassed by skullcrack dealing 3 and it also prevents lifegain. If I want a pseudo eidolon, I'd rather cindervines or the new Leyline of combustion. It's not a bad card but I think it's home is in standard.
Thanks both Patbou and Elcon. I have to admit that watching the person across from me play solitaire magic was not an enjoyable experience. I'll take your advice and throw this match into the "I hope I dodge it category". Take Care guys!
Hey everyone. I played my first game last week against neoform/allosaurus rider. I died game 1 and 3 on the draw turn 1. What's our strategy versus this deck? Obviously we can't win without any lands and not playing our first turn. My only thoughts are turn 1 pass and hold path to exile in response to griselbrand. On turn two, play two lands and hold skullcrack to prevent the lifegain from the draw engine? Leyline of punishment out of the board (gasp)? But then we don't do any damage or advance our game plan.
Just come back to Burn after a spell trying other stuff out...deck feels pretty good although I've noticed UW Control is pretty hard these days. New T3feri helps out a lot and MB Timely Reinforcements is such a drag. Any tips on how to fight the match-up? A couple of creatures in the opening hand with some burn is normally good but it doesn't always seal the deal...I normally board in 2 x Exquisite Firecraft.
Welcome back. I meant to post earlier, but you know how work goes keeping you busy. My UW control win rate is pretty good but it's definitely not an easy match. The first thing is you need to be very aggressive initially. Dump your creatures as fast as possible and keep turning then sideways. Anytime they tap out, unload as many spells as you can. Important disclaimer: be mana efficient - prioritize two drops, this is important for later. Around Turn 3 or 4, you'll have them at 4-6 life remaining, a Teferi will come down, or they have a hand full of counter spells, or both. Adjust your strategy as soon as this happens. Run your creatures into Teferi and finish with a bolt if you can. As you mentioned, this is important so you can instant speed a response to timely reinforcements with a skullcrack, although there is a chance they will counter this. If you can't kill Teferi, you're accepting that you're playing sorcery speed. Your next few turns are going to be draw/go. I strongly suggest reading Patrick Sullivan's guide to playing against counter magic. Remember when I said earlier to be mana efficient? The hope is that after a few extra turns of draw/go, you have at least 4, 1 mana burn spells. You're now waiting for them to tap some number of lands. When this happens, you're going to try to play all of your spells at once and hope all your 1 drops are more efficient than their more expensive counter magic. And yes, agreeing with R3doxNL that Firecraft is a great closer when they're at 4 life. Also if you're on RWg, a Cindervines in play is devastating against them.
Can someone give me tips against the humans matchups? It seems impossible
I agree completely with R3doxNL. This matchup is about 2 for 1 value and damage recursion. Searing Blaze and Grim Lavamancer are the work horses against this deck. When I have room in my sideboard and not packing 6 graveyard hate cards, I've also been running 2 copies of Satyr Firedancer. If it sticks, the board control it provides is incredible. Point all damage at face and essentially get a free creature removal. In Christmas land (which does happen more often than not) Blaze, creature, burn face, free burn second creature based on the static effect feels really good. Humans is light on hard removal so the Satyr does usually stick. The card also works well vs Spirits, and Affinity decks.
Meddling Mage is the trap you're playing around and like R3doxNL said, having it remove your suspended rift bolt does not feel good.
Can not he potentially change in depth burn? With the strong returns of spark elemental and Hellspark elemental ?
There is probably a deck for this guy, it may be a completely new deck. It's probably not for Burn.
I see this card in an RB 8 ball deck with Ball Lightning and the new Lightning Skelemental. Likely powered out by Flamekin Harbinger and Smoke Braider with support from Unearth, Fling, Assault Strobe etc. I also agree that I don't see this in burn with either spark or hellspark. To achieve redundancy, we'd have to put in more elementals and give up Guide, Swifty and Eidolon. I think burn loses too much doing this but I believe there is absolutely a Rakdos shell for this.
The new Leyline looks like it's a better alternative to Kor Firewalker in the mirror for when Burn mirrors get big. Incidentally, it's an uncounterable hate card against Storm and they're forced to bounce it and can't Remand it. It also can beat Lantern-style mill decks. As Tyler said, it can go in the extended sideboard part of the binder and wait until it's needed.
If they don't deal with it, this is also a hard back breaker for Jund and the Rock with all their targeted removal as well. UW control? Sure counter 3 spells in a row (We spoke earlier about Cindervines against this deck - this new combustion card is better). I think if we put enough pressure into Phonenix early, this hurts their ability to go off with Pyromancer Ascencion and their control spells (of course the creatures are still a thing too but I think we have the tools to win here). Death Shadow also has a lot of disruption which gets them lower on health much faster. Lastly, this should ping 2 damage each time Walking Ballista is activated - someone please correct me if I'm wrong. If yes, that puts extra pressure on Tron, Amulet Titan, and Hardened Scales... although I'm not sure this is the best card in these instances.
In magic dream land, this plus Eidolon on the board is incredibly powerful. All of this is with the assumption that we can reliably turn 0 this card so that means we're running 4. I agree you Tyler and Elcon that I'm picking up 4 copies of this card and keeping them in a binder but I think at first glance, this is definitely something we want to be testing.
**Realized UW control targets spells and not you or permanents. Less good there**
I'd say 2 shocks and 3 basics I'd even go 3 vantage and 4 mountains too personally. With 6 fetches, 2 shocks, 3 vantage and 4 canyons, that's still way more than enough white sources personally. I'd even go up on fetches if you're running grim and blazes but that's me. Lol. I run 8 fetches, 2 shocks, and 2 cliffs and have no issues getting black in 19 lands but again... That's me. I'm waiting on the price to settle as well. Thoughts on the new red leyline for the mirror? leyline of combustion
I think that new Leyline is great in the mirror (assuming it's down turn zero). I also think it has fantastic potential against any black hand disruption, control and prison decks, spirits, humans, storm, anything with a walking ballista.
I've done a lot of testing Cindervines and can add to the comments being made. It's a great card and does incredible things in the matches you mentioned - UW Control, Blue Shadow, and it's an absolute beast against Storm as Eidolon 5-8. The thing is, we already have great matches against these decks. I've come to the conclusion that unless Whir Control becomes a really big phenomenon (that deck is an issue for us), I'll keep it in a binder for the time being. The thing about this card is it completes for our artifact removal in Smash to Smithereens or Destructive Revelry. The big issues I've had is when I play against the artifact decks or key artifacts, is I want instant speed removal. Dealing with a Wurmcoil, Cranial Plating, Aether Vial etc are much easier at instant speed rather than sorcery. I didn't like dropping Cindervines early and taking my foot off the gas against those decks and then leaving mana up to play removal. It's slower and the artifact decks get better against us when we aren't applying pressure - especially now with the new mulligan rule. That being said, I've never won any GPs so take what I say with a grain of salt
Dreadhorde Arcanist won't make it into modern burn for the same reasons Thermo-Alchemist, Keldon Marauders and Firebrand Archer don't make the modern cut - they represent no, or inessential, damage on their own and essentially nullify our turn 2 in which we could be dealing up to 6 damage without them. One could argue that Thermo-Alchemist can deal upwards of 3-4 damage the turn *after* it comes into play, and I think, in the long run, it's ultimately a better card in Burn than Dreadhorde Arcanist would ever be. The trample and power-matters clause of the Arcanist is meaningless in our decks.
I agree with this and what others have said. Burn isn't the home for this card in Modern but it does look spicy. I think the home is Faithless Looting, pitch Living End and Ulamog (or something else big and scary). Cast Dreadhorde Arcanist turn 2 then swing turn 3 cast living end and bring Ulamog online. Or do something broken in other formats like cast Ancestral Recall without suspension. I do believe however that this card is the card engine that puts the death nail in the soon to be Faithless Looting coffin.
Hi fellow burn mages. I have a GP this weekend and could use your advice with my final 2 sideboard slots. I'm at work so not a lot of time to post (sorry for no decklist). I'm running Boros stock list with 2 helix, 2 skullcrack in the main.
SB is as follows:
3 x cindervines - creevian this addition is for you buddy
3 x RIP
3 x Path to Exile
2 x Skullcrack
2 x Defecting Palm
2 x ???
My thought debate is exquisite firecraft for control decks or Searing Blood for creature decks. I'm leaning towards blood. I'm curious what you guys think in the meta right now. Thanks guys, you all rock!
Regarding the rock, I agree it's tough to play against thanks to hand disruption and their creatures. I have a really good success rate against it though. Looking at my notes, I'm currently 7-1 vs the deck at large tournaments. In all matchups, my success has been after dropping RIP, stabilizing the board and playing the slow game. My opponents were always ahead and a resolved RIP ended the threat and board presence of goyfs, scooze, and finks. The matches were all grindy going to turn 8 or more and 6 of my wins came at the hands of top decking burn or dying the following turn on the counter swing. I find there's very little room for error in spell sequencing against this deck and redundancy in cards is our best advantage. I'd be interested to hear if others have success stories by different means?
@Creevian, thanks for your thoughts about cindervines. I find it interesting we agree on so much but came to different conclusions. Along with you I don't think there's a wrong answer as both are viable.
Btw has anyone tested cindervines over drev? (not just theorycrafted)
Reasons why it was good / bad?
I've tested it a lot actually. I'm at work right now so excuse my lack of notes as backup. It's both better and worse depending on your matchup and meta.
Better against spell heavy decks. It wrecks UW control, jeskai control, solid against a grindy burn mirror (terrible if mirror has a nut draw though). It was awesome vs kci and is decent against storm. Basically longer matches and/or higher spell density is where it shines.
The antithesis and where it's worse is fast aggro matches with lots of creatures. It isn't on the board long enough to make a difference with ping damage here. It's also substantially worse vs artifacts or enchantments that need to be removed immediately ie- leylines, chalice etc. Here, you always need to hold an extra mana up to make it worthwhile and can't remove chalice 1 until turn 3 at the earliest.
I like reverly better in the end for two reasons. First, it's faster instant speed interaction. Second, the decks where cindervines is great, we already have a good matchup. It felt win more to me.
Sideboard (15)
3 Path to Exile
2 Deflecting Palm
2 Rest in Peace
2 Skullcrack
2 Smash to Smithereens
2 Ensnaring Bridge
2 Exquisite Firecraft
The SB Plan is to try to win to Phoenix decks, Dredge, Control, Jund, Humans, and of course Burn.
Those ones will be the most played decks at the event...
Do you think it's ok?
Thanks!
Welcome! For what it's worth, here are my 2 cents based on the current meta:
My personal feeling is you'll want more graveyard hate. There are a lot of decks running recursion strategies right now and shutting them down hard and reliably is a good thing. I don't know if 2 cards in the board is reliable enough right now. Life gain is always a nemesis in games 2 and 3 so try to run 4 anti life gain effects in Skullcrack. Deflecting Palm and Ensnaring Bridge tend to not play well with each other but are best used against big creatures that outclass us. I'd pick 1 or the other to either shut them down or reverse damage. Right now, I'm feeling better about Palm instead of Bridge but that's just my gut. Lastly, If you don't like humans, then consider a few extra searing effects. Searing Blood works great in this match as does Satyr Firedancer specifically for humans... although it's tougher to play against other decks with heavier removal packages.
I'm playing at GP Calgary in a couple weeks so I'm going through the same process with the side board. As it stands now, I'm looking at:
3 x Destructive Revelry (Most don't like splashing for enchantment removal but I REALLY hate watching Leylines, Worships and Spreading Seas get played)
2 x Rest in Peace
1 x Relic of Progenitus
2 x Path to Exile
2 x Skullcrack (I'm splitting 2 and 2 Skullcrack and Helix in the main)
2 x Searing Blood
1 x Deflecting Palm
*Debating 2 x or Firewalker or Exquisite Firecraft
I haven't decided yet on the last sets of cards yet but I'll get there eventually. Best of luck in your tournament arfmagic.
Thanks in advance everyone!
I'm interested in your thoughts on this matter.
Welcome back. I meant to post earlier, but you know how work goes keeping you busy. My UW control win rate is pretty good but it's definitely not an easy match. The first thing is you need to be very aggressive initially. Dump your creatures as fast as possible and keep turning then sideways. Anytime they tap out, unload as many spells as you can. Important disclaimer: be mana efficient - prioritize two drops, this is important for later. Around Turn 3 or 4, you'll have them at 4-6 life remaining, a Teferi will come down, or they have a hand full of counter spells, or both. Adjust your strategy as soon as this happens. Run your creatures into Teferi and finish with a bolt if you can. As you mentioned, this is important so you can instant speed a response to timely reinforcements with a skullcrack, although there is a chance they will counter this. If you can't kill Teferi, you're accepting that you're playing sorcery speed. Your next few turns are going to be draw/go. I strongly suggest reading Patrick Sullivan's guide to playing against counter magic. Remember when I said earlier to be mana efficient? The hope is that after a few extra turns of draw/go, you have at least 4, 1 mana burn spells. You're now waiting for them to tap some number of lands. When this happens, you're going to try to play all of your spells at once and hope all your 1 drops are more efficient than their more expensive counter magic. And yes, agreeing with R3doxNL that Firecraft is a great closer when they're at 4 life. Also if you're on RWg, a Cindervines in play is devastating against them.
I agree completely with R3doxNL. This matchup is about 2 for 1 value and damage recursion. Searing Blaze and Grim Lavamancer are the work horses against this deck. When I have room in my sideboard and not packing 6 graveyard hate cards, I've also been running 2 copies of Satyr Firedancer. If it sticks, the board control it provides is incredible. Point all damage at face and essentially get a free creature removal. In Christmas land (which does happen more often than not) Blaze, creature, burn face, free burn second creature based on the static effect feels really good. Humans is light on hard removal so the Satyr does usually stick. The card also works well vs Spirits, and Affinity decks.
Meddling Mage is the trap you're playing around and like R3doxNL said, having it remove your suspended rift bolt does not feel good.
I see this card in an RB 8 ball deck with Ball Lightning and the new Lightning Skelemental. Likely powered out by Flamekin Harbinger and Smoke Braider with support from Unearth, Fling, Assault Strobe etc. I also agree that I don't see this in burn with either spark or hellspark. To achieve redundancy, we'd have to put in more elementals and give up Guide, Swifty and Eidolon. I think burn loses too much doing this but I believe there is absolutely a Rakdos shell for this.
If they don't deal with it, this is also a hard back breaker for Jund and the Rock with all their targeted removal as well. UW control? Sure counter 3 spells in a row (We spoke earlier about Cindervines against this deck - this new combustion card is better). I think if we put enough pressure into Phonenix early, this hurts their ability to go off with Pyromancer Ascencion and their control spells (of course the creatures are still a thing too but I think we have the tools to win here). Death Shadow also has a lot of disruption which gets them lower on health much faster. Lastly, this should ping 2 damage each time Walking Ballista is activated - someone please correct me if I'm wrong. If yes, that puts extra pressure on Tron, Amulet Titan, and Hardened Scales... although I'm not sure this is the best card in these instances.
In magic dream land, this plus Eidolon on the board is incredibly powerful. All of this is with the assumption that we can reliably turn 0 this card so that means we're running 4. I agree you Tyler and Elcon that I'm picking up 4 copies of this card and keeping them in a binder but I think at first glance, this is definitely something we want to be testing.
**Realized UW control targets spells and not you or permanents. Less good there**
I think that new Leyline is great in the mirror (assuming it's down turn zero). I also think it has fantastic potential against any black hand disruption, control and prison decks, spirits, humans, storm, anything with a walking ballista.
I agree with this and what others have said. Burn isn't the home for this card in Modern but it does look spicy. I think the home is Faithless Looting, pitch Living End and Ulamog (or something else big and scary). Cast Dreadhorde Arcanist turn 2 then swing turn 3 cast living end and bring Ulamog online. Or do something broken in other formats like cast Ancestral Recall without suspension. I do believe however that this card is the card engine that puts the death nail in the soon to be Faithless Looting coffin.
SB is as follows:
3 x cindervines - creevian this addition is for you buddy
3 x RIP
3 x Path to Exile
2 x Skullcrack
2 x Defecting Palm
2 x ???
My thought debate is exquisite firecraft for control decks or Searing Blood for creature decks. I'm leaning towards blood. I'm curious what you guys think in the meta right now. Thanks guys, you all rock!
@Creevian, thanks for your thoughts about cindervines. I find it interesting we agree on so much but came to different conclusions. Along with you I don't think there's a wrong answer as both are viable.
I've tested it a lot actually. I'm at work right now so excuse my lack of notes as backup. It's both better and worse depending on your matchup and meta.
Better against spell heavy decks. It wrecks UW control, jeskai control, solid against a grindy burn mirror (terrible if mirror has a nut draw though). It was awesome vs kci and is decent against storm. Basically longer matches and/or higher spell density is where it shines.
The antithesis and where it's worse is fast aggro matches with lots of creatures. It isn't on the board long enough to make a difference with ping damage here. It's also substantially worse vs artifacts or enchantments that need to be removed immediately ie- leylines, chalice etc. Here, you always need to hold an extra mana up to make it worthwhile and can't remove chalice 1 until turn 3 at the earliest.
I like reverly better in the end for two reasons. First, it's faster instant speed interaction. Second, the decks where cindervines is great, we already have a good matchup. It felt win more to me.
Welcome! For what it's worth, here are my 2 cents based on the current meta:
My personal feeling is you'll want more graveyard hate. There are a lot of decks running recursion strategies right now and shutting them down hard and reliably is a good thing. I don't know if 2 cards in the board is reliable enough right now. Life gain is always a nemesis in games 2 and 3 so try to run 4 anti life gain effects in Skullcrack. Deflecting Palm and Ensnaring Bridge tend to not play well with each other but are best used against big creatures that outclass us. I'd pick 1 or the other to either shut them down or reverse damage. Right now, I'm feeling better about Palm instead of Bridge but that's just my gut. Lastly, If you don't like humans, then consider a few extra searing effects. Searing Blood works great in this match as does Satyr Firedancer specifically for humans... although it's tougher to play against other decks with heavier removal packages.
I'm playing at GP Calgary in a couple weeks so I'm going through the same process with the side board. As it stands now, I'm looking at:
3 x Destructive Revelry (Most don't like splashing for enchantment removal but I REALLY hate watching Leylines, Worships and Spreading Seas get played)
2 x Rest in Peace
1 x Relic of Progenitus
2 x Path to Exile
2 x Skullcrack (I'm splitting 2 and 2 Skullcrack and Helix in the main)
2 x Searing Blood
1 x Deflecting Palm
*Debating 2 x or Firewalker or Exquisite Firecraft
I haven't decided yet on the last sets of cards yet but I'll get there eventually. Best of luck in your tournament arfmagic.