MTG Salvation

Quote from Spitlebug

I would be more worried about trying to make sure your mana is fixed then if you are going to be countered.

Interesting. I haven't had a problem with color screw. But I think I'm running more lands and posts that you. 13 and 16 respectively.

BTW, I wanted to ask, how's the playmat coming along? I might try to buy one from you if you don't mind!

Nice find on Toils of Night and Day! Not sure it'll make the cut, but it's definitely interesting.

Quote from Valanarch

Could Leyline of Anticipation work here?

No.

Quote from Spitlebug

I assume you mean Slaughter Games since you can't run Slaughter Pact in this deck without the guarantee of knowing what you will Cascade into, or whether you could pay for it.

We do have a Mana Short we can use in Modern for 3 CMC. I think Exhaustion almost fits that bill.

Exhaustion doesn't fit the bill because it doesn't do what Mana Short does for us. Mana Short taps our opponent out on their end step so that we may resolve spells on our turn. This effect needs to be instant speed, for the same reason we Violent Outburst on our opponent's end step to get it countered so that we can resolve Ardent Plea on our turn.

I took the deck to a 25 player modern tournament in San Francisco. I went 3-2 on the day including a first round bye. To everyone asking if the deck has enough win-cons I believe the answer is yes, but I will say that I believe the deck needs more draw to get to your win-cons. I'm going to drop the 2 mainboard Beast Within and go up to a playset of Thirst for Knowledge. More than draw I believe the deck desperately needs more protection against counterspells. I played against Scapeshift and he cast Remand on every single Restore Balance that I tried to resolve. We're talking like 7 times in 2 games. I really really really wish that City of Solitude was legal in modern. I believe that effect is what the deck is missing against couterspells. Does anyone know of an alternative? For now I'm going to try out Dosan the Falling Leaf, which isn't ideal because it's a creature.

Howdy boys! I'm new here, but I've read over half of this thread. I'm really stoked about this deck and have been working on it for about a week. I took it to my first tournament last night and went 2-2. For those of you in Berkeley you probably know Eudemonia and you know that this is a very competitive environment, so going 2-2 wasn't that bad. My second loss was really close, but I'll get into that later. On to my list and musings!



For starters the first thing that you would notice about my deck that I'm going with the borderpost version. I prefer this version because, uninterrupted, it's faster and it makes your Restore Balance better because you have less lands. If the deck can kill 3 of your opponents lands and a creature on turn 3 you're probably going to win. I admit the posts do come with risk, but to me, that makes the deck more enjoyable. The next thing that you might notice is that I'm running zero creatures besides Greater Gargadon and that I'm intentionally excluding March of the Machines. I've been in situations where I needed to Restore Balance but I couldn't because March of the Machines was on the table. There's just too much risk involved with running that card. The next thing that you might *not* notice is that besides Greater Gargadon and Restore Balance everything in the mainboard has a converted mana cost of 3, which is a perfect segue into my card by card choices.

Perplex - After a few games I noticed that I really didn't want to run anything that costs 4 mana and I definitely didn't want anything that costs 5. At this point I was still running my list with 3 Idyllic Tutor. Then while I was browsing thing thread I came across a reply by CubesCZ where he asked what people thought about Perplex but no one answered him. Immediately I was floored. This tutors almost my entire deck! At first I was running 3 and now I've gone up to 4. It's that good! Keeping the CMC at 3 allows for the deck to become a true toolbox deck, and allows you to run less copies of your utility cards. The only drawback is that it's really slow, but slowness is the type of thing that a quickly resolved Restore Balance affords you. One thing my build needs work on is the best suite of utility cards to run, but for now I'm just trying to get used to the deck.

Thirst for Knowledge - Yeah, that's right! Over Thieves' Fortune! Now I can already hear Spitlebug telling me that I'm wrong, but hear me out. Thieves' Fortune is *not* a dig 4 draw 2 spells card. If that were the case then Lightning Bolt would be considered 3 damage draw a card. Just because a card is instant speed does not make it a draw spell. I can however see how Thieves' Fortune is a better card for Spitlebug's list because he's not running Bow of Nylea. Thirst for Knowledge draws me more cards and let's me discard my Restore Balance so that I may recycle them with [card]Bow of Nylea[\card]. Again as long as you're in control of the game you can get away with this type of magical durdle christmas land.

Bow of Nylea - Recycling Restore Balance can be very important, especially if you're playing against counters. There will be games where if you could cast Restore Balance 6 times you would if you could. Bow allows this. The lifegain isn't nothing to sneeze at either. I've beaten burn decks on the back of the bow before. I haven't killed a Delver of Secrets with it yet, but I'm sure it'll be sweet when it happens. Ya know what else Bow of Nylea does that's sweet? Putting counters on hexproof creatures...

Simic Keyrune - Oh boy, kids! We're going deeeeeep! Have you ever had one of your Greater Gargadon cast into the realms of the unknown for 1 white mana? I have The Simic were conscious of this problem and delivered with a solution as about as best as you could hope for from 3 mana. Last night my opponent was sitting with bolts and paths in his hand as I slowly killed him with Simic Keyrune. Throw some counters on him with Bow of Nylea and don't forget that Ardent Plea has exalted!

On to the tourney report!

Round 1: I lost in game 3 to junk. I screwed up and played the wrong borderpost on turn 1, which prevented me from a t3 balance. He then drew into mono hand disruption and destroyed me.

Round 2: Hilarious game. I played against red, white, black control. In game one he had Ajani Vengent at 8 and Liliana of the veil at 7 at the same time and I somehow managed to still win. He ultimated Liliana of the veil, and in response I floated all my mana, picked my pile then used Beast Within my only land. Untapped, killed Liliana of the veil, and then proceeded to kill Ajani Vengent with Simic Keyrune and then he scooped.

Round 3: Fish opponent in Game 3 had an insane draw. I was at 9 he swung for lethal on his turn 4. I had 3 mana with a Violent Outburstin hand, but he had Cursecatcher on board

Round 4 I completely destroyed american control. Boring games, not even close. Blood Moon is a huge beating against this deck.

Onward!

Queue the Hitler Finds Out Thoughtseize Isn't Being Reprinted in M14 Videos.

What are the season begin and end dates for 2013?

Does anyone have a updated text list from the OP? Thanks!

For example:

White
#1 :
#2 : Armory Guard
#3 : Arrest

This is what I have, I'm missing 4 cards and I can't figure out which ones they are.

I've been drafting since INN and I've gotten to the point to where I realize I'm not as good as I could be because I don't pay enough attention to what all the available archetypes in the format are. It's obvious to me now that I need to concentrate more on game plans rather than card's individual value. With that being said I'm having a hard time finding current articles online that overview all the available archetypes in this format. Can anyone point me in the right direction for articles of this nature? Thanks!

Ahh yes, I forgot to mention that I think I'm going to ban all the gotcha cards.

I've decided I'm probably going to do half "Un" and half another set. Can someone compare/contrast Unglued with Unhinged? I read that one person said that Unhinged "sucked" compared to Unglued. Keep in mind this is going to be a sealed event. Would you say that one set is better than the other?

For my birthday this May I was thinking about buying a box of Unglued or Unhinged and doing a sealed with 5 of my friends. I'm wondering if this is a good idea and more specifically the following questions:

1. Does this seem like a good idea? Looking the sets the cards look pretty hilarious. Overall would doing a sealed with these cards be balanced/fun?

2. I read somewhere that Unhinged "sucks". Is Unglued truly better than Unhinged?

3. It looks like a box comes with 48 10-card packs. Would doing a sealed with 6 people each getting 8 packs (80 cards) work well?

4. The cheapest I can find a box of Unglued is $480. Anyone know where it might be cheaper?

I heard about this and I'm wondering what it's called. Does anyone know? What about a link to the rules? Thanks!

NPH it is! I'm going to hope for a good infect deck as well as a Melira, Sylvok Outcast for sideboard infection protection. Thanks!

Awesome! If it was between 6xMB and 6xNP which one would you go with and why? The objective is to beat him as badly as possible!