MTG Salvation

• Worth running? Too slow?

• Opens up fetches
• Just fetches? or add color for better removal and sideboard- which color? White? Black? Red? prob not blue
• Remove Leatherback Baloth since we have better low drops?
• Remove Aspect of Hydra? It will be weaker without Baloth but it seems okay
• Hardened Scales version? Can it be viable? Probably not.

Quote from Beachweed »

I don't disagree with the notion of playing your best rather than limiting yourself, to be clear. My main goal here is to open people up to the idea that there might very well be a more consistent approach to this deck that is a good deal different from the lists we typically see in this thread. I don't take offense and I'm glad we can use this place for healthy debate, as was intended. There are two important points that I want to make first:

From what I gather, you are a proponent of 10 one drops in conjunction with some number of Leatherback Baloths. I have forgone 3 drops altogether for a list running 19 lands and 12 one drops, replacing Baloth with a playset of Young Wolf. I think this makes the deck stronger in a big way in that you will a) almost always have a turn one creature to play (this deck can't afford to durdle on turn one, especially when the rest of modern is almost always doing something on turn one) and b) Rancor is easier to set up for fast damage without the risk of getting 2-for-oned.
EDIT: Obviously you're aware of the need to do something turn one, hence the playing of 10 one drops instead of 8, but bumping that up to 12 further plays into this and gives us a better chance of having more options on turn 2, with the combination of Treetops and spells.

I play almost strictly on MTGO now, where you're liable to encounter pretty much anything in a 2-man queue. Such an environment is obviously much different from an LGS FNM, so results will vary. That being said I think its safe to say that I've gotten to play against many more archetypes with this deck on MTGO than one would have at a LGS.

Now that that's out of the way I want to address your argument that Young Wolf will only get the Undying trigger if the opponent is bad, or playing sub optimally. If you had played with it against the likes of Bushwacker Zoo, Naya Burn, Dredge etc then you would know that there are many instances in which your opponent simply has no choice but to attack into Young Wolf if they want to advance their game plan of killing you quickly. Sitting back on cards like Bloodghast, Goblin Guide and Wild Nacatl isn't usually good. Plenty of times Young Wolf has got in the way of an early Goblin Guide, or has been a top deck against a burn/ aggro deck. It is also more resilient against Liliana of the Veil, which is problematic for this deck. You say that Young Wolf is easy to play around, but even in the instance that the opponent can afford to play around it and chooses to then I would say it is doing work by altering their game plan. This is especially true if it is hindering their attacks.

Perhaps I have had more success on the Young Wolf game plan because it is more reliable, and not simply because my opponents are playing poorly? If it is due to the latter, than I guess I am just very lucky with who I play against online.