MTG Salvation

Commit was an all star, saving me from enchantments, making Sphinx of the Final Word look really bad, and just acting as a very versatile removal/counterspell. Memory never came up, but I know there will be some corner cases where it's useful. It's a safety net if you are losing to one of the random mill decks that are popping up, if your opponent has a better hand, but you manage to force through a Gearhulk Ect. I'd consider a 2nd in the board. Abrade and Supreme Will likewise over preformed. Endless Sands was at least a 2 for 1 every time and I got a 5 for 1 and a 4 for 1 from 1 copy saving multiple gearhulks and getting their triggers again. I was very careful to only cast Gearhulk if I was 1: Reasonably sure they couldn't kill it before I untapped, 2: I had a way to protect it, 3: I had a backup Gearhulk, or 4: I absolutely had to use it to stop something. I think I only activated Wandering Fumarole 4 times over the 6 rounds of play.

OK, I tried Endless Sands in UR and that card is nuts with Torrential Gearhulk. That let me cut Bolas from the main and I replaced it with Commit//Memory which was essential is beating a Fevered Visions that slipped through. I also moved Magma Spray to the board, maxed out on Abrade, added another Disallow, and a 2nd Pull From Tomorrow. The deck played very smoothly and I went undefeated.

Just as much of an issue as getting mana screwed, even with 27 lands and 10 non land cards with cycling in UW, I was having trouble hitting lands in many games. The key is having lands that do things other than just tap for mana. Manlands are usually good, but I've found Wandering Fumarole to often just turn on otherwise dead removal like Magma Spray and Fatal Push. I loved Westvale Abbey and Blighted Cataract as well as the cycling lands in UW. With Abrade becoming more popular, Endless Sands could be a cheap way to rebuy gearhulks and gain additional value from them against decks with a lot of removal for them. When I was playing BW control back before Kaladesh, between Shambling Vents, Westvale Abbeys, and Blighted Fens, I'd keep 7 land hands without worrying too much and it'd almost always work out. Lumbering Falls is a lot better than Wandering Fumarole so maybe going to a manabase like this is something worth consideration.

• 4 Aether Hub
  
• 4 Spirebluff Canal
  
• 4 Wandering Fumarole
  
• 2 Lumbering Falls
  
• 2 Sheltered Thicket
  
• 5 Island
  
• 5 Mountain

If you think 26 lands is too many for Standard control, you probably shouldn't be playing Control. I was playing 27 in UW before this set and always felt like I should be playing 28. You really want to hit your first 6 land drops in Gearhulk Control.

Quote from khaosknight69 »

I think it's probably a bit too early to be talking about what happens post-rotation, but that said I think the loss of fumarole and the gain of the new fastlands will make Grixis or Esper a bit more viable. We'll have to see until the rest of Ixalan spoilers drop, but my guess is the deck shifts to Grixis control.

Heads up: Talk about future sets and formats isn't allowed until the entire set is spoiled.

I see many people not playing Pull from Tomorrow at all even though Control Master Shaheen Soorani recently called it "The future of Control in Standard". I personally won't go below 1 and think that 2 would be correct if not playing Bolas. That said, we do have a plethora of great draw spells right now. I do see many playing 4 Hieroglyphic Illumination and I think that has to be wrong. It is more flexible, but I don't think you want to be cycling that aggressively in the early turns and it's power level when cast for 4 is far below that of Glimmer and Pull which is why I'm happy with 2.

Ok, so in the Mirror, a resolved Bolas is nearly impossible to beat unless you just have nothing else.

Westvale Abbey will eventually win a UR mirror.

Quote from kpal »

Quote from khaosknight69 »

is disallow still the best 3cmc counter to be running?

Yes.

I still want access to a couple Disallow, but will probably be running 3-4 Supreme Will.

I agree, I've been playing UW up until now, but the new tools UR is getting fill it's weak spots very well. UR lists were already running Aether Hub so playing 1-2 Bolas is practically free, at most, needing to add 2 cycle lands which are good anyways. Abrade and Hour of Devastation are both amazing and so is Supreme Will. I expect this to be tier 1, possibly the best deck.

Ok, sorry. There is a cost, it just isn't that big of one IMO. Ghost Quartering myself is something I do relatively aggressively if I need to to make a play, but it is bad if I'm stuck on 2-3 lands without a vial. It's also a play I make aggressively against Blood Moon as well as Pathing my own creature if I don't have a Queller or Spell Pierce to stop it. Really though, I'm fine with people boarding it in against me. I've won most of the games where people tried playing it against me.

OK, I like to use Frank Karsten's colored sources article as a guide for my manabases. That says 14 sources of a color gives a 95% chance of being able to play a 1 drop of that color, yet I have 15 of each, +4 Aether Vial, and plus the rare time I'm forced to ghost quarter my own land for a color which even counting that as 1/4 of a source, drives it up to an effective 20. When counting the gold cards, there's 1 more source making it 2 colored sources out of every 7.5 cards not including Vials or Ghost Quarters, so on average, that's 2 colored sources by 2nd turn even on the play with extra leeway to give. I also make it much easier by not playing any double colored spells. I used to play another colored source, but after hundreds of matches, found that I kept drawing too many lands so I recently cut the third basic I'd been running for another spell. The 5 colorless lands can occasionally hurt, but much more often, they disrupt the opponent or provide the card advantage that this deck is lacking. Ghost Quarter is so well positioned now it's rediculous. All of the Death's Shadow variants max out at 1-2 basics. Eldrazi Tron in a tier 1 deck, Affinity is still a contender with it's 8 manlands. Both versions of Abzan play utility lands, and that's not even counting draws with Arbiter. The games they do hurt are far less often than the ones where they win me the game.

Between 15 sources of each color for the creatures, 4 Aether Vials, and Ghost Quarters getting what you need in a pinch, the mana works out very well.

Nice, my friend swears by esper aggro and he's been doing great with it lately, Zombies seems to be a problem matchup for him though.

Today, we had some time on our hands, so our local modern specialist who has nearly every top tier modern deck built played several of them he thought would do ok against my UW Spirits and I crushed hard, losing a game here or there, but not losing any matches. He played Bant Eldrazi, Abzan, Grixis Shadow, Naya Burn, and Merfolk. It's nice knowing my brew does so well against the field. I love the fact that it beats up on decks like Tron and Affinity that I hate losing to as well.

You can certainly tune a list to beat those two decks. I haven't been playing Sultai much lately, mostly because I get bored from playing the same deck all the time, even if I'm doing well with it. Negates and Yahenni's Expertise are good against both decks and Kalitas can help deal with the zombies that would come back.

I feel like BW Zombies, Jeskai Control, and Bant Marvel are all at least tier 2 decks.