yeah curse works in my build from a culmination of little things the least of which is the 24 land count being a big push in my deck, I would rather loose games to flooding than not get to play magic at all. Heck at this point I could almost justify 25 because of the importance of hitting the first 4 land drops in my build as oppose to the first 3 in more stock builds. Curse can work against infect to an extent it just is that slow but if you have the all reactive spells little offense hand it will just lock up the game for you to win at leisure. Its mostly that a good chunk of my losses have come to the mirror and the card gives me the post board edge I feel I need for having a pod build instead of something like brimstone volley
Since every single list you posted is just an iteration of my deck (the scg iqs at ice spelled my last name wrongish). It has been slowly evolving (theres a tcg 5k 18th that i dont think you can find either) I should probably explain that curse is ONLY for the mirror, there are no other matchups I bring the card in. Being able to stop your opponent from blood artist/falkenrath aristocrat is very good/important but is otherwise not good enough any other matchups (does not match up well enough cost wise against the important cards that you care about in non-zombie matchups.)
Having narrow powerful sideboard answers is actually how you want your sideboard to be designed (I actually hate the combusts/doomblades in my board as they are just concessions to rounding out some numbers I want post board). Zombies mirror is a matchup I dont enjoy having at a coinflip and prefer to have that potential endgame trump. The arc trail in the sb at dc was a concession to the rise in elves though I would feel better having a second curse in the 75 to replace the md pods in the RB zombie mirror.
The reason I dont think Bonfire is necessary in the pod list is that it already excels at breaking standstills which is what bonfire does. A simple blood artist+sac outlet can win you the game in a much more overwhelming manner than bonfire in my experience while being marginally more consistent.
Some things Ive gotten from the deck recently: Vampire nighthawk is very good, the life gain and flying are both very important and it matches up a little more favorable against delver than something like messeneger while at the same time being an allstar against birds of paradise decks (block you wolfir silverheart/dungrove elder)
Bloodthrone Vampire just seems worse than dross hopper to me flying is real good right now with all the dumb green decks and vampire is gonna have a tough time clashing through thragtusks and silverhearts lategame when you just want to sneak in a couple points. Being worse than dross hopper isnt a bad thing, I think dross hopper may be insane in this deck (its been very good for me once you get over the fact that your playing (and sometimes tutoring for) a dross hopper)
Distress has also been good for me out of the board
I need help figuring out the mirror at this point though
Just gonna chime in on the butcher ghoul discussion, I cut down on gloom surgeons to squeeze dross hopper and butcher ghoul in to test my list. While dross hopper performed well enough for me, butcher ghoul was abysmal, given that its first half isnt even a card. It doesnt work well in a format of x/2s like huntmaster of fells and geist of saint taft. The fact that gloom surgeon gets through all combat while being a decent blocker when played makes him so much better than the ghoul. The thing I noticed about zombies was that none of the zombies give any board presence the turn they come into play, a weakness of the deck. Gloom Surgeon (and birthing pod kinda) cover this, while butcher ghoul would only further emphasize the fact that zombies have low immediate board impact cards. After cutting the initial surgeon count to 2 hes slowly moved to 3, then 3 and 1 in the board, to 4 in the main the card does a lot of work
Im wondering why saffi hasn't become stock in lists yet given the reasonable popularity of spellskite tbh. Saffi does work at protecting your combo pieces from non pte with the additional bonus of getting more cip triggers. She also loops with viscera seer/reveliark as a a kind of left field game plan from cards your already playing. Opinions?
Also has strangleroot geist as a pivot on the pod been discussed at all? does it have any merit? I dont know if it provides enough utility to be worth tutoring for.
Also a note on one ofs, Ive slowly been triming any one of that im not okay with naturally drawing in any game 1 scenario.
to me there are 3 creatures that can potentially claim the title best depending on how you define it, granted all 3 should instantly win the game if you untap with them...
People are fixed on cards that are legacy legal and ignore the obvious best creatures hermit druid and goblin recruiter (arguably the best). I think emrakul is 3rd just in terms of raw stats and what lengths people go to get him into play and be worth it. SFM or delver is probably my third format pending. But the first 2 are real terrors and basically instantly win the game if you could play them in the "fair formats"
The second scenario lifetotals are exceptionally relevant, like instinctively bouncing the silver heart equip attack seems like a good line if you are way ahead in the race cause you can do that for 2 turns if they dont block with birds thats 20ish dmg assuming you dont die to crackbacks setting up a turn of snapcaster bounce silverheart, resto snapcaster gut shot birds could also be legit, but you risk the pod for 6 and 3 holes if you say go (huntmaster flipping). if you are up in the race but there is a lot of combat math going on.
Edit acutally scratch that, since you know about the resto angel, if they are competant you have to equip and pass, because if you do anything and they then resto angel on your turn they could just re soulbound wolfir and kill you or fizzle your tempo spell. this way huntmaster flips as well unless they play their angel, granted i dont think you can win if there is a manic vandal in your opponents 75.
The first one I would ship, on the draw with a forest it may be keepable (because that way your second source always comes into play untapped instead of bricking on rootbound crags). On the draw its like 65% for a turn 3 silverheart (turn 2 if land, birds+gsz for birds) if its good in the mu, otherwise the hand kinda fumbles, you really want that gsz to get a huntmaster of fells against delver and u cant get the mana to do that without hitting both ur 2nd and 3rd land drops. On the play this hand just looses and doesnt do enough against the times it "gets there" (runner lands)
Was wondering if there was gonna be one of these, thanks!
Few nitpicks, I dont remember BUG pod being in any of the finishes, but at 5 placements thats the same tier as Zombies(basically and better than delver spirits) but I think you meant RUG pod, still case for tier 1.5, maybe some mathematical % cutoffs for each tier? (5 and 10% are really close to where you started just a little less)
Secondly it may be right to consolidate some archetypes together for simple bookkeeping purposes, like B/x Zombies, or lump all the "Big Esper" Decks together, likewise delver spirits and delver tokens, can be put together I think. From there you could denote the minor differences in the lists.
ex:
Top 8 Deck Stats After Avacyn Restored: (120 total)
U/w Delver: 30
G/R Wolf Run Ramp: 21
R/G Aggro: 17
Naya Pod: 11
Esper Control: 9 (6 Solar Flare, 1 Planeswalker)
B/x Zombies: 6 (2r, 3u, 1mono black)
BUG Pod: 5 (RUG?)
Esper Delver Souls: 4
Mono Green: 2
Naya Ramp: 2
G/w Aggro: 2
U/B Control: 2
U/G Infect: 1
B/R Ramp: 1
Frites: 1
U/W Aggro: 1
R/U Control: 1
U/G Dork Ramp: 1
G/R Pod: 1
Mono Blue Illusions:1
Grixis: 1
It depends on how the archetypes are defined obviously, but this is just my opinion and another way to look at it. Like Illusions is basically the Monoblue form of delver, GR pod could be any number of things, and the ramp decks could also be lumped together depending on how you go about it
I keep seeing people saying testing standard is important, and match ups etc...
The reality is that while they help you gain very little actual margin in after a couple games that doing something else wouldnt already improve. Simply playing lots of magic and being able to break down board states and lines of play can extend over most matches. My largest (and fastest) growth in the game was when I use to just cube draft 3/4 times a week. We drafted somewhat seriously and when you deal with cube/edh where there are a ton of unique interactions you learn how to view scenarios differently and adapt to game states rather than the "by the book" article approach. There is a human aspect to the game and each player has a different play style, when sideboarding sometimes you do something differently based on how they played, maybe they think the match up works differently than you thought and board differently. Getting a feel for the course of post board games and your opponents play style is important. Grinding matchups just teaches you about the important cards but if your opponent is just as familiar with your ways to combat them they become less important so you have to adapt.
Also something I never see enough is when people do test they dont do post board testing given that your guarenteed at least 1 post board per round and will likely play more post board games than pre board.
The exile clause isn't really a drawback, its more of a limit to how many times he can block. Think of it like arc slogger activates and arc slogger was good back in the day. Gloom surgeon is basically makes combat really difficult for your opponent. Would you play a 2/1 that whenever it blocked or became blocked got like +0/+10? I think hes comparable to that. Another interesting thing is how much toughness does a vanilla 2 power creature have to have to be playable? The key here is that gloom surgeon is somewhat efficient on defense, can be used on offense and his ability shouldnt be seen as a means of settup or a drawback.
Well my question wasnt to this deck in particular but more of a general way to cope with the format. I believe I have a deck with a fundamental turn 6 where it just kills the other player but it requires both an arcane melee and a reforge the soul to actually go off and win the game most of the time even though alternative paths are possible.
My question was since I could in theory make room to interact in this deck what is the most efficient way to do so? How much do I have to fear the fundamental turn of the formats ability to kill me?
Meanwhile, most aggro decks can have you dead on turn 4 or 5 consistently, without even factoring in the boost to their burn that they get from arcane melee.
If a combo deck could say reliably kill on turn 6 in this format, how would you go about buying the time to get there? with no more than 6 slots devoted to non-combo cards?
I run a few of each because in a format like this the damage does add up, especially when you are using pod to nug yourself for basically a million.
But I think all decks should keep a diverse spread of lands, I run choke to punish the all shocklands/island decks, and even in legacy there is "choke insurance"
so i just rechecked some websites, looks like dhg stopped doing modern events when the ptq season ended but Im not sure.
Pandemonium holds weekly sunday at 6:30 but thats in boston, and they allow proxies and stuff... Finding tournaments in real life has been tough since the season ended
Im assuming your refering to ice imports given your a CT resident (first sunday every month, I havent been able to go to one yet but want to). Im pretty sure Feinstein over at diehard games in providence runs weekly modern tournaments if u live in the far eastern CT.
I don't believe there is a comprehensive list and you just have to look a little, hope, and get lucky.
Having narrow powerful sideboard answers is actually how you want your sideboard to be designed (I actually hate the combusts/doomblades in my board as they are just concessions to rounding out some numbers I want post board). Zombies mirror is a matchup I dont enjoy having at a coinflip and prefer to have that potential endgame trump. The arc trail in the sb at dc was a concession to the rise in elves though I would feel better having a second curse in the 75 to replace the md pods in the RB zombie mirror.
Some things Ive gotten from the deck recently: Vampire nighthawk is very good, the life gain and flying are both very important and it matches up a little more favorable against delver than something like messeneger while at the same time being an allstar against birds of paradise decks (block you wolfir silverheart/dungrove elder)
Bloodthrone Vampire just seems worse than dross hopper to me flying is real good right now with all the dumb green decks and vampire is gonna have a tough time clashing through thragtusks and silverhearts lategame when you just want to sneak in a couple points. Being worse than dross hopper isnt a bad thing, I think dross hopper may be insane in this deck (its been very good for me once you get over the fact that your playing (and sometimes tutoring for) a dross hopper)
Distress has also been good for me out of the board
I need help figuring out the mirror at this point though
Also has strangleroot geist as a pivot on the pod been discussed at all? does it have any merit? I dont know if it provides enough utility to be worth tutoring for.
Also a note on one ofs, Ive slowly been triming any one of that im not okay with naturally drawing in any game 1 scenario.
People are fixed on cards that are legacy legal and ignore the obvious best creatures hermit druid and goblin recruiter (arguably the best). I think emrakul is 3rd just in terms of raw stats and what lengths people go to get him into play and be worth it. SFM or delver is probably my third format pending. But the first 2 are real terrors and basically instantly win the game if you could play them in the "fair formats"
Edit acutally scratch that, since you know about the resto angel, if they are competant you have to equip and pass, because if you do anything and they then resto angel on your turn they could just re soulbound wolfir and kill you or fizzle your tempo spell. this way huntmaster flips as well unless they play their angel, granted i dont think you can win if there is a manic vandal in your opponents 75.
The first one I would ship, on the draw with a forest it may be keepable (because that way your second source always comes into play untapped instead of bricking on rootbound crags). On the draw its like 65% for a turn 3 silverheart (turn 2 if land, birds+gsz for birds) if its good in the mu, otherwise the hand kinda fumbles, you really want that gsz to get a huntmaster of fells against delver and u cant get the mana to do that without hitting both ur 2nd and 3rd land drops. On the play this hand just looses and doesnt do enough against the times it "gets there" (runner lands)
Few nitpicks, I dont remember BUG pod being in any of the finishes, but at 5 placements thats the same tier as Zombies(basically and better than delver spirits) but I think you meant RUG pod, still case for tier 1.5, maybe some mathematical % cutoffs for each tier? (5 and 10% are really close to where you started just a little less)
Secondly it may be right to consolidate some archetypes together for simple bookkeeping purposes, like B/x Zombies, or lump all the "Big Esper" Decks together, likewise delver spirits and delver tokens, can be put together I think. From there you could denote the minor differences in the lists.
ex:
Top 8 Deck Stats After Avacyn Restored: (120 total)
U/w Delver: 30
G/R Wolf Run Ramp: 21
R/G Aggro: 17
Naya Pod: 11
Esper Control: 9 (6 Solar Flare, 1 Planeswalker)
B/x Zombies: 6 (2r, 3u, 1mono black)
BUG Pod: 5 (RUG?)
Esper Delver Souls: 4
Mono Green: 2
Naya Ramp: 2
G/w Aggro: 2
U/B Control: 2
U/G Infect: 1
B/R Ramp: 1
Frites: 1
U/W Aggro: 1
R/U Control: 1
U/G Dork Ramp: 1
G/R Pod: 1
Mono Blue Illusions:1
Grixis: 1
It depends on how the archetypes are defined obviously, but this is just my opinion and another way to look at it. Like Illusions is basically the Monoblue form of delver, GR pod could be any number of things, and the ramp decks could also be lumped together depending on how you go about it
The reality is that while they help you gain very little actual margin in after a couple games that doing something else wouldnt already improve. Simply playing lots of magic and being able to break down board states and lines of play can extend over most matches. My largest (and fastest) growth in the game was when I use to just cube draft 3/4 times a week. We drafted somewhat seriously and when you deal with cube/edh where there are a ton of unique interactions you learn how to view scenarios differently and adapt to game states rather than the "by the book" article approach. There is a human aspect to the game and each player has a different play style, when sideboarding sometimes you do something differently based on how they played, maybe they think the match up works differently than you thought and board differently. Getting a feel for the course of post board games and your opponents play style is important. Grinding matchups just teaches you about the important cards but if your opponent is just as familiar with your ways to combat them they become less important so you have to adapt.
Also something I never see enough is when people do test they dont do post board testing given that your guarenteed at least 1 post board per round and will likely play more post board games than pre board.
My question was since I could in theory make room to interact in this deck what is the most efficient way to do so? How much do I have to fear the fundamental turn of the formats ability to kill me?
If a combo deck could say reliably kill on turn 6 in this format, how would you go about buying the time to get there? with no more than 6 slots devoted to non-combo cards?
But I think all decks should keep a diverse spread of lands, I run choke to punish the all shocklands/island decks, and even in legacy there is "choke insurance"
Pandemonium holds weekly sunday at 6:30 but thats in boston, and they allow proxies and stuff... Finding tournaments in real life has been tough since the season ended
I don't believe there is a comprehensive list and you just have to look a little, hope, and get lucky.