Tried this at FNM. people were honestly playing M19 powered Jank this week to be honest.
Match 1 vs Arcades defenders
Game 1: Opponent had mana troubles and I was able to push wide enough to get some damage past the walls eventually burning him out.
Game 2: He had a better start but I drew well on critical turns, fight with fire on first arcades, then he blocked with the second and I traded off a creature and burn spell to take him out. Without Arcades his deck kind of doesn't work so we got into a stalemate. I had two Chandra's negated but eventually I set up my The Flame of Keld third part of the saga with 3x burn spells and killed him from 15.
Match 2 vs Jeskai Sunbird's Invocation
Game 1: I got hit with settle the wreckage two turns in a row and never recovered. He hard cast Omniscience with 2x Sunbird's invocation in play then cast his whole deck.
Game 2: This time he didn't have any white in the early game so I got a lot of damage in before he played Teferi but I was then forced to plink Tef to stop the ultimate. First The flame of keld didn't even allow me to kill one of his walkers.. the second I hit three lands for turn and tilt scooped.
Match 3 vs Esper Control
Both games my opponent was dead before they got 4 lands.
I have been trying all sorts of configurations on MTG Arena and losing a lot :/. This version was from a Channel fireball article that I decided to try 2-1 at fnm was better than expected. I like the Bomat + The flame of keld interaction but... you really do question what the point of blue is at this point... like why not just not play wizards and play Ahn-crop crasher over adeliz? I think I am going to try to build a version without Bomat/Keld just because it feels like a worse version of a better deck.
I am definitely not having any issue getting lands :s... I always draw too many of them, Chandra is no problem to cast but... But I typically bring her in only in the slower more removal heavy games.
Our current card draw options: Bomat courier: Unreliable, have to discard our hand. Is a low cost, 1/1 haste creature. The Flame of Keld: Have to discard our hand, draws cards the turn after Chart a Course: Have to cast after combat to get draw over filtering Chandra, Torch of defiance: Slow, can be attacked.
Filtering options Opt: low cost, instant, digs 2 Anticipate: instant, digs 3. Dismissive Pyromancer: Is a Wizard, need a card in hand to discard, digs 1, multiple uses. Riddleform: Is sometimes a 3/3 flyier, lives through wraths, can be used multiple times, doesn't draw. Hazoret, the fevent: Sometimes an indestructible 5/4 with haste, turns all cards into 3 mana shocks. slow.
I was just sitting playing around with all these possibilities layed out trying to work out the best week one version.. I ended up with this. I had to move the Goblin Chainwhirlers to the main (oh no how terrible lol) just because I think I prefer the 3x abrade in the sideboard chainwhirler is just more always useful.. the tricky thing is... do I have enough spells now? its now full Sligh 20x20x20.
Will probably have standard showdown Tuesday but it might be a draft instead if people don't have their decks together.
I do still like Bomat Courier I just want to try something more wizardy. Turns out I don't own any The Flame of Keld *shrug*. I do have a nice playset of promo anticipates but since I have almost removed blue now and i am not 100% sure they are better than chart a course. you never need a land beyond the 4th so I start holding them in hand.
Typically if you play a lot of Propaganda effects, which is called "pillowfort", You want to combo off from behind your walls because people cannot kill you before you can pull off that combo.
Basically I think your issue is that you haven't locked down exactly what you want to do with your deck and you have through together a bunch of hate and good cards together. I to be fair my first UW deck was the same (my commander was Isperia, supreme judge and it was surprisingly good as a commander) and it took me a long time to work out how I should build it.
Okay so Tax makes things more expensive, Stax removes your ability to cast anything by attacking your resources (lands and artifacts)
Your creatures seem extremely vanilla, there are creatures with exactly the same abilities and mana costs but are just way way better. You also hate your own things with a lot of your cards, lots of nonbos.
I actually kind think GAAIV is kind of bad as a commander :/ everyone hates you and you don't achieve anything with him on the field. I think you need a bunch of combos so you can lock the game and combo out rather than trying to deal 3 x 40 with a Serra Angel :/. Its extremely frustrating to play against.... at least a nice infinite combo quickly ends the game. I use Dragonlord Ojutai as my UW control commander (features many of these hate cards but counter spells instead of tax and stax), Ojutai quickly ends the game as a commander. You also don't have any planeswalkers which can also be really good win cons with their ultimates while you lock people out of interacting with them.
We don't like relic because we can't recur it and we have to leave up one mana to sac it.
Atm I am using Surgical extraction and grafdigger's cage because that seems to be the consensus best grave hate.
But I was using Tormod's Crypt before (if you have budget concerns) and it was actually really good, comes down before counterspells you can use it for free at instant speed. I actually brought it in against control decks and didn't feel bad about it.
I was trying to work out how you fit in so many things that I didn't have space for but I worked out what was missing. You have very little non artifact removal and basically no instant speed removal. You are going to struggle to interact with people, hexproof, haste, indestructible and most combo decks.
Glissa is just not a deck that can ramp and tutor into an easy win con like you appear to be trying to do, at least not as easily as other GB decks, you are a grindy recursion deck so you need to interact a lot. At least if you want to be a control deck...
Glissa can be versatile so you have to be careful not to get distracted with all the different things you can do. Birthing Pod decks need a lot of creatures.
You can't just put a little bit of ramp in a ramp deck you have to go all in into ramp (particularly if you are going to drop interaction).
Perhaps some equipment is universally useful but I feel like you stepped past the staples here, if you want to equip up Glissa you got to get more equipment and equipment support and back up creatures to equip.
If you are a sac creature deck (I think Meren does this better) you need a much lower curve so you can start the attrition earlier in the game or grave pact and a sac creature in the same turn. Also a lot more sac outlets you only have iron works here.
Are you a combo deck? you have two combos in the deck (iron-works/deathmantle/wurmcoil and mindslaver lock) some tutors for the pieces but you are lacking the redundancy that is possible in a combo deck. Also no myr retriever/junk diver seems like a huge oversight, that's part of the (modern) Iron works combo.
I think you need to decide on a clearly defined plan A with a back up plan B incase that first one gets disrupted somehow and that's it.
I play Keeper of the nine gales in my bird tribal deck... the first few times I played it no one was ready for it.. I cyclonic rift and bounce every attempt anyone makes to get back on board. Its absoutle a must kill or it gets out of hand fast.
A 7/7 wins the game if they don't have that doom blade. A 3/3 gets blocked.
Trostani's summoner perhaps one gets blocked but you still have 3 others that get through or trade with something. Metor Golem is a 2 for 1 Summoner is a 4 for 1.
Yeah basically we lose when we run out of burn, There is a tricky balance about how we build the deck do we want to be true aggro where everything in our deck basically deals damage or do we want to be more tempo in which case we need deck manipulation to make sure we draw exactly what we need when we want it. I think how aggro and how tempo is going to depend on the meta and between sideboard and main.
As a sidenote I didn't realise departed deckhand wasn't actually an illusion, its only spells, you can equip it!.
It also won me many games over the weekend.
I hit every-time I cast militia bugler over the weekend... but that probabilistic hit rate is a bit low and he does have a point about 2 power creatures on turn 4 but.... peasant cubes have plenty of Champion of wits and Angel of inventions, In this situation peasant has stronger 2 powered creatures (to be played on turn 4/5) than standard.
Vampire Sovereign also felt like siege rhino, although perhaps the nature of core set draft caused plenty of very close race situations where a lightning helix and a large flyer was what I wanted every time.
I went undefeated on Saturday with this pretty standard UW flyiers deck. I didn't think my pool was good at all, most of the rares were terrible, I am only playing suncleaners because its a 1/4 and not for its text box. I sided a pair of Knight's Pledge against low removal decks slapping it on a flyier lets me get past spiders (greens main flyier defence). Departed Deckhand was truely amazing game winning uncommon.
On Sunday I went 2-2 with an abazan weeines deck featuring Resplendent angel,mentor of the meek and Open the Graves. My black kind of sucked but had a lot of synergy with my white and then my green was a lot better than black, in the end I messed up my mana base and didn't run enough green. :s really hard to run double white double green and double black cards in the same deck. The Transmogrifying Wand was both great for killing enemy bombs and terrible because my 2/2s couldn't attack into them. Vampire sovereign was the card I always wanted to draw in many of my very close games.
Overall the rares suck but there are a lots of really powerful uncommons. The game play is well basic.. but still exciting as it results in close skill testing games. I like that this format is a lot less bomb heavy.
I ended up taking out the contortions (moving to the side) before FNM. It was surprisingly modern this week because the standard people were sleeping in before midnight prerelease. I wasn't ready lol I just made some paniced changes before the event when i saw a bunch of control players...
1-2 Humans
1-2 G Tron
2-1 Jeskai. (Actually went to time but since we weren't playing for anything we played it out).
Rip me. Each time there was at least one non game where one of us got mana screwed and died, most of the time it was actually my opponents.
The Humans game was extremely close.
Game 1 he got stuck on 1 land. Walking balista gg.
Game 2 Thought- knot stoped his attacks. I got tron.. then had nothing to do with it while a freebooter plinked away in the air. I drew trinket mage which I could use to ballista his whole board. He vial-ed in Malcontents to kill me. Game 3 I bounced his early plays Thought knot reveals 2x mantis rider + Reflector mage. I take a rider but he draws an image and he is hitting me for 6 in the air. I find treasure mage but he can reflector my plat angel.
Vs Gtron.
Game 1 Both have natural Tron. Remand Khan play mindslaver (with another in hand) he casts Ulamog instead GG.
Game 2 He never gets tron or even a 3rd land.
Game 3 I have 2x field of ruin but no tron pieces, basically I am playing a normal control, I try to keep him off tron but he still has 2 tron pieces forcing me to negate a map.. he reply's with a scrying and Ulamog GG.
vs Jeskai.
Game 1 He has two lands most of the game. Chalice on 2. Torrential gearhulk beatdown.
Game 2 My turn to be mana screwed I miss a few land drops I start discarding rather than play into his spells (keep up my own counters)
Game 3 Goes to time but whatever. Quick tron into 2x thought Knot Seer on Search for azcanta. He has commands but no 3rd blue. He gets to it with a field of ruin on my tron.. I re-establish tron. I just beat him to death with the Thought Knot while I keep him afraid of my full and (thanks to eot thirsts) eventually I win a counter war over a wurmcoil and he was dead.
I traded for some spreading seas (and a spell snare) with the Jeskai player who I hadn't seen at the store before. hopefully they will help with the Tron match up :s...
3 Bomat Courier
4 Soul scar mage
4 Ghitu Lavarunner
4 Vishino Pyromancer
4 Adeliz, the cinder wind
2 Goblin Chainwhirler
Spells
4 Warlords Fury
4 Shock
4 Lightning strike
3 The flame of Keld
4 Wizard's lightning
4 Spirebluff canal
4 Sulfur Falls
10 Mountains
2 Islands
2 Spell pierce
2 Chandra's Defeat
3 Abrade
2 Sorcerer's Spyglass
2 Kari Zev's Expertise
2 Fight with Fire
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
Tried this at FNM. people were honestly playing M19 powered Jank this week to be honest.
Match 1 vs Arcades defenders
Game 1: Opponent had mana troubles and I was able to push wide enough to get some damage past the walls eventually burning him out.
Game 2: He had a better start but I drew well on critical turns, fight with fire on first arcades, then he blocked with the second and I traded off a creature and burn spell to take him out. Without Arcades his deck kind of doesn't work so we got into a stalemate. I had two Chandra's negated but eventually I set up my The Flame of Keld third part of the saga with 3x burn spells and killed him from 15.
Match 2 vs Jeskai Sunbird's Invocation
Game 1: I got hit with settle the wreckage two turns in a row and never recovered. He hard cast Omniscience with 2x Sunbird's invocation in play then cast his whole deck.
Game 2: This time he didn't have any white in the early game so I got a lot of damage in before he played Teferi but I was then forced to plink Tef to stop the ultimate. First The flame of keld didn't even allow me to kill one of his walkers.. the second I hit three lands for turn and tilt scooped.
Match 3 vs Esper Control
Both games my opponent was dead before they got 4 lands.
I have been trying all sorts of configurations on MTG Arena and losing a lot :/. This version was from a Channel fireball article that I decided to try 2-1 at fnm was better than expected. I like the Bomat + The flame of keld interaction but... you really do question what the point of blue is at this point... like why not just not play wizards and play Ahn-crop crasher over adeliz? I think I am going to try to build a version without Bomat/Keld just because it feels like a worse version of a better deck.
Our current card draw options:
Bomat courier: Unreliable, have to discard our hand. Is a low cost, 1/1 haste creature.
The Flame of Keld: Have to discard our hand, draws cards the turn after
Chart a Course: Have to cast after combat to get draw over filtering
Chandra, Torch of defiance: Slow, can be attacked.
Filtering options
Opt: low cost, instant, digs 2
Anticipate: instant, digs 3.
Dismissive Pyromancer: Is a Wizard, need a card in hand to discard, digs 1, multiple uses.
Riddleform: Is sometimes a 3/3 flyier, lives through wraths, can be used multiple times, doesn't draw.
Hazoret, the fevent: Sometimes an indestructible 5/4 with haste, turns all cards into 3 mana shocks. slow.
4 Soul scar mage
4 Ghitu Lavarunner
4 Vishino Pyromancer
2 Dissmissive pyromancer
4 Adeliz, the cinder wind.
2 Goblin Chainwhirler
Spells
4 Warlords Fury
4 Shock
4 Opt
4 Lightning strike
4 Wizards lightning
4 Spirebluff canal
4 Sulfur Falls
10 Mountains
2 Islands
2 Spell pierce
2 Chandra's Defeat
3 Abrade
2 Sorcerer's Spyglass
2 Kari Zev's Expertise
2 Fight with Fire
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
Will probably have standard showdown Tuesday but it might be a draft instead if people don't have their decks together.
I do still like Bomat Courier I just want to try something more wizardy. Turns out I don't own any The Flame of Keld *shrug*. I do have a nice playset of promo anticipates but since I have almost removed blue now and i am not 100% sure they are better than chart a course. you never need a land beyond the 4th so I start holding them in hand.
Sun Titan and Rest in Piece
Avacyn, Guardian Angel and Cursed Totem
Lodestone golem and Vyn Wingmare and most of your deck.
Winter orb and stasis and a bunch of 5+ cost cards, without a good way to untap all your things.
Typically if you play a lot of Propaganda effects, which is called "pillowfort", You want to combo off from behind your walls because people cannot kill you before you can pull off that combo.
Basically I think your issue is that you haven't locked down exactly what you want to do with your deck and you have through together a bunch of hate and good cards together. I to be fair my first UW deck was the same (my commander was Isperia, supreme judge and it was surprisingly good as a commander) and it took me a long time to work out how I should build it.
1 Grand Arbiter Augustin IV
Creatures
1 Sunscape Familiar
1 Spelltithe Enforcer
1 Serra Angel
1 Stormscape Familiar
1 Felidar Sovereign
1 Akroma, Angel of Wrath
1 Fatespinner
1 Windborn Muse
1 Magus of the Moat
1 Sun Titan
1 Avacyn, Guardian Angel
1 Bruna, the Fading Light
1 Archangel
1 Isperia, Supreme Judge
1 Zetalpa, Primal Dawn
1 Lodestone Golem
1 Shepherd of the Lost
1 Aven Mindcensor
1 Norn's Annex
1 Ojutai, Soul of Winter
1 Vryn Wingmare
1 Twilight Shepherd
1 Adarkar Valkyrie
Artifacts
1 Lightning Greaves
1 Azorius Signet
1 Sapphire Medallion
1 Icy Manipulator
1 Meekstone
1 Talisman of Progress
1 Cursed Totem
1 Sol Ring
1 Winter Orb
1 Swiftfoot Boots
1 Mist of Stagnation
1 Web of Inertia
1 Ghostly Prison
1 Aurification
1 Stony Silence
1 Aura of Silence
1 Teferi's Moat
1 Propaganda
1 Kismet
1 Arcane Laboratory
1 Luminarch Ascension
1 Rest in Peace
1 Stasis
1 Sphere of Safety
1 Rhystic Study
1 Land Tax
Sorceries
1 Planar Cleansing
1 Rout
1 Wrath of God
1 Supreme Verdict
Instants
1 Capsize
1 Sphinx's Revelation
1 Path to Exile
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Wing Shards
1 Swords to Plowshares
1 Cyclonic Rift
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Azorius Chancery
1 Irrigated Farmland
1 Adarkar Wastes
1 Prairie Stream
1 Nimbus Maze
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Port Town
1 Tranquil Cove
1 Skycloud Expanse
1 Temple of Enlightenment
1 Azorius Guildgate
1 Sejiri Refuge
1 Glacial Fortress
1 Command Tower
14 Plains
10 Island
Okay so Tax makes things more expensive, Stax removes your ability to cast anything by attacking your resources (lands and artifacts)
Your creatures seem extremely vanilla, there are creatures with exactly the same abilities and mana costs but are just way way better. You also hate your own things with a lot of your cards, lots of nonbos.
I actually kind think GAAIV is kind of bad as a commander :/ everyone hates you and you don't achieve anything with him on the field. I think you need a bunch of combos so you can lock the game and combo out rather than trying to deal 3 x 40 with a Serra Angel :/. Its extremely frustrating to play against.... at least a nice infinite combo quickly ends the game. I use Dragonlord Ojutai as my UW control commander (features many of these hate cards but counter spells instead of tax and stax), Ojutai quickly ends the game as a commander. You also don't have any planeswalkers which can also be really good win cons with their ultimates while you lock people out of interacting with them.
Atm I am using Surgical extraction and grafdigger's cage because that seems to be the consensus best grave hate.
But I was using Tormod's Crypt before (if you have budget concerns) and it was actually really good, comes down before counterspells you can use it for free at instant speed. I actually brought it in against control decks and didn't feel bad about it.
Glissa is just not a deck that can ramp and tutor into an easy win con like you appear to be trying to do, at least not as easily as other GB decks, you are a grindy recursion deck so you need to interact a lot. At least if you want to be a control deck...
Glissa can be versatile so you have to be careful not to get distracted with all the different things you can do.
Birthing Pod decks need a lot of creatures.
You can't just put a little bit of ramp in a ramp deck you have to go all in into ramp (particularly if you are going to drop interaction).
Perhaps some equipment is universally useful but I feel like you stepped past the staples here, if you want to equip up Glissa you got to get more equipment and equipment support and back up creatures to equip.
If you are a sac creature deck (I think Meren does this better) you need a much lower curve so you can start the attrition earlier in the game or grave pact and a sac creature in the same turn. Also a lot more sac outlets you only have iron works here.
Are you a combo deck? you have two combos in the deck (iron-works/deathmantle/wurmcoil and mindslaver lock) some tutors for the pieces but you are lacking the redundancy that is possible in a combo deck. Also no myr retriever/junk diver seems like a huge oversight, that's part of the (modern) Iron works combo.
I think you need to decide on a clearly defined plan A with a back up plan B incase that first one gets disrupted somehow and that's it.
I have my list in this thread but I am pretty sure I have changed it since this.
https://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/commander-edh/multiplayer-commander-decklists/791004-glissa-the-traitor-early-midrange-build-feedback
Trostani's summoner perhaps one gets blocked but you still have 3 others that get through or trade with something. Metor Golem is a 2 for 1 Summoner is a 4 for 1.
Yeah basically we lose when we run out of burn, There is a tricky balance about how we build the deck do we want to be true aggro where everything in our deck basically deals damage or do we want to be more tempo in which case we need deck manipulation to make sure we draw exactly what we need when we want it. I think how aggro and how tempo is going to depend on the meta and between sideboard and main.
It also won me many games over the weekend.
I hit every-time I cast militia bugler over the weekend... but that probabilistic hit rate is a bit low and he does have a point about 2 power creatures on turn 4 but.... peasant cubes have plenty of Champion of wits and Angel of inventions, In this situation peasant has stronger 2 powered creatures (to be played on turn 4/5) than standard.
Vampire Sovereign also felt like siege rhino, although perhaps the nature of core set draft caused plenty of very close race situations where a lightning helix and a large flyer was what I wanted every time.
1 Daybreak Chaplain
1 Suncleanser
1 Diamond Mare
1 Departed Deckhand
2 Aven Wind Mage
1 Mirror Image
1 Aviation Pioneer
1 Pegasus Courser
1 Trusty Packbeast
2 Star-Crowned Stag
1 Snapping Drake
1 Scholar of Stars
1 Djinn of Wishes
1 Knight of the Tusk
1 Explosive Apparatus
1 Anticipate
2 Luminous bonds
1 Hieromancer's Cage
1 Inspired Charge
1 Totally Lost
lands
9 Island
8 Plains
I went undefeated on Saturday with this pretty standard UW flyiers deck. I didn't think my pool was good at all, most of the rares were terrible, I am only playing suncleaners because its a 1/4 and not for its text box. I sided a pair of Knight's Pledge against low removal decks slapping it on a flyier lets me get past spiders (greens main flyier defence). Departed Deckhand was truely amazing game winning uncommon.
On Sunday I went 2-2 with an abazan weeines deck featuring Resplendent angel,mentor of the meek and Open the Graves. My black kind of sucked but had a lot of synergy with my white and then my green was a lot better than black, in the end I messed up my mana base and didn't run enough green. :s really hard to run double white double green and double black cards in the same deck. The Transmogrifying Wand was both great for killing enemy bombs and terrible because my 2/2s couldn't attack into them. Vampire sovereign was the card I always wanted to draw in many of my very close games.
Overall the rares suck but there are a lots of really powerful uncommons. The game play is well basic.. but still exciting as it results in close skill testing games. I like that this format is a lot less bomb heavy.
1 Academy Ruins
1 Gemstone Caverns
6 Island
1 River of Tears
2 Field of Ruin
4 Urza's Mine
4 Urza's Power Plant
4 Urza's Tower
Spells = 17
4 Condescend
2 Dismember
1 Cyclonic Rift
3 Remand
3 Repeal
4 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Chalice of the Void
4 Expedition Map
2 Mindslaver
1 Oblivion Stone
2 Talisman of Dominance
Creatures = 8
1 Platinum Angel
1 Solemn Simulacrum
1 Treasure Mage
1 Trinket Mage
1 Walking Ballista
2 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Torrential gearhulk
Planeswalkers = 2
2 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
1 Surgical extraction
1 Grafdiggers Cage
1 Pithing Needle
2 Spatial Contortion
2 Negate
1 Ratchet Bomb
1 Hurkyl's Recall
2 Filigree Familiar
2 Thought-knot Seer
1 Aetherize
1 Sundering Titan
1-2 Humans
1-2 G Tron
2-1 Jeskai. (Actually went to time but since we weren't playing for anything we played it out).
Rip me. Each time there was at least one non game where one of us got mana screwed and died, most of the time it was actually my opponents.
Game 1 he got stuck on 1 land. Walking balista gg.
Game 2 Thought- knot stoped his attacks. I got tron.. then had nothing to do with it while a freebooter plinked away in the air. I drew trinket mage which I could use to ballista his whole board. He vial-ed in Malcontents to kill me. Game 3 I bounced his early plays Thought knot reveals 2x mantis rider + Reflector mage. I take a rider but he draws an image and he is hitting me for 6 in the air. I find treasure mage but he can reflector my plat angel.
Vs Gtron.
Game 1 Both have natural Tron. Remand Khan play mindslaver (with another in hand) he casts Ulamog instead GG.
Game 2 He never gets tron or even a 3rd land.
Game 3 I have 2x field of ruin but no tron pieces, basically I am playing a normal control, I try to keep him off tron but he still has 2 tron pieces forcing me to negate a map.. he reply's with a scrying and Ulamog GG.
vs Jeskai.
Game 1 He has two lands most of the game. Chalice on 2. Torrential gearhulk beatdown.
Game 2 My turn to be mana screwed I miss a few land drops I start discarding rather than play into his spells (keep up my own counters)
Game 3 Goes to time but whatever. Quick tron into 2x thought Knot Seer on Search for azcanta. He has commands but no 3rd blue. He gets to it with a field of ruin on my tron.. I re-establish tron. I just beat him to death with the Thought Knot while I keep him afraid of my full and (thanks to eot thirsts) eventually I win a counter war over a wurmcoil and he was dead.
I traded for some spreading seas (and a spell snare) with the Jeskai player who I hadn't seen at the store before. hopefully they will help with the Tron match up :s...