Renem you seem to missunderstand how Glissa, the Trator works vs Reality Smasher. Glissa deals first strike damage with death touch. Realaty smasher dies, glisa lives and no trample damage goes over to the player. If there is an artifact in the gravyard, even better as you now get one back.
Also you are probably not 'chording for glissa' you are holding up a chord for 3, it can be anything. In kiki chord it often was eternal witnes, you got the chord back, next turn you can get resto angel, and the turn after you would get kiki-jiki. I am sure abzan chord has some tricks up it sleeve as well. But, if they are to tap out for a smasher and turn it sideways getting glissa is a good option.
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I have dyslexia, no I am not going to spell check for you, yes you have to live with the horrors of it.
@Darkfear30:
Nice write-up, glad to see people so interested in the deck
Part of me really likes the all-in tutor build, reminds me of my earlier builds, makes me wanna slam Sigarda again
I might give Worship another shot in the SB... never did anything for me back when I tested it, but maybe that was just my bad luck.
Want to point some things out tho:
Kitchen Finks doesn't interact with Evolution the way you think it does. Sacrificing the creature is part of the casting cost, not the spell itself, so you cast Evo, sac Finks, Finks dies, Persist triggers and resolves, then Evolution resolves and you get whatever creature you're tutoring for. So sadly no Archangel/Gearhulk tricks there.
Some of the MU percentages you stated seem... optimistic, let's say. Eidolon + Sin Collector will not give us a 60%+ percentage vs AdNaus if they know what they're doing. But maybe I'm misunderstanding - are those your personal win % or how you see the MU in general?
Regarding beating land-combo, or any combo, really - Lost Legacy, Discard/Fulminator + Surgical Extraction are probably our best shot. Mindcensor, Teeg and the likes are too easy to kill (most Valakut decks run Anger AND bolt mainboard, some even mainboard Sudden Shocks to beat Infect) to consinstently do what they're supposed to. Also Stony Silence vs Tron helps a lot if you get it out early.
Do you feel the Wooded Bastion is necessary? I feel another Horizon Canopy would just be better, especially if you're running Razorverge Thickets already.
@Everyone:
Thought about doing a stream or dischord group chat to talk more about certain cards, how people approach the deck, etc. to gain more insight and info for the primer. Would you be interested in something like that? What format would you prefer to have that conversation in?
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"I can call an army to my side in the blink of an eye. Best not blink."
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
I'd probably be running 2 Temple Gardens, 1 Overgrown Tomb, and 1 Godless Shrine if I had Verdants, but it feels incorrect to run fewer than 5 shocks without them. I've recently been thinking that the second Godless would be better as a Horizon Canopy or a third Gavony, so I'll give that a try at my locals tomorrow.
@Pathrogas Well, that's unfortunate. That was how an L2 friend of mine had explained the interactions to me. So it goes ¯\_(-_-)_/¯
All-In tutors has been a lot of fun, although I had been looking at the core of the deck as 8 tutors and 4 finks. I haven't tried any builds that deviate from that core yet.
Worship has also been fun, but it's mostly there for the look that an opponent gives when they realize that they have no outs. It can totally steal games, but I have the tendency to not see it in games that I need to. Unlike the majority of the board, we can't tutor for it.
The percentages are my personal experience. I don't know that I've been playing against the best Ad Naus pilots, but I've never felt that they can combo fast enough to fight us game 2. Once we land Eidolon, they need to resolve a Phyrexian Unlife, Ad Nauseum on our turn, and we need to not have enchantment removal for the Unlife. Anecdotally, I've never seen it line up so nicely for them, but that's entirely my experience. It also "blanks" their Angel's Graces as part of a combo package. It feels great to say T1 dork into T2 Evolution into Eidolon with them holding up Ad Naus and Grace in hand.
I swapped out the second Horizon Canopy when people at my locals started packing more early aggro decks. I found that I was losing games by only a point or two of life, and that a painless green source coming in on turn three was important enough to justify it in hands that see it as a colorless source on turn one.
I'll have to pop in a copy or two of Lost Legacy and see how that goes! I had been toying around with Slaughter Games, but the red would understandably be an issue.
Also, I'd totally be up for a Discord on the deck! I sincerely feel that this deck is in the Tier 2 range, but I also feel that it would need to be tuned further to get there.
@primer
Alrighty, worked on my primer some more, should be able to put everything into something neat looking later tonight, tomorrow night if I fall asleep while formatting everything.
@testing
Also tested a bunch against Sultai Midrange (3 Liliana, Lost Hope and 2 Kalitas mainboard), which was immensly enjoyable and very balanced as a matchup. Very interesting with the boardstates and such. Also went 2-1 vs Emeria Control, which also seems like a pretty doable MU if we know what we're up against.
I've went bac to 61 cards after doing the math again. The % difference to draw any given card is ~0.03% lower than in a 60 card deck, and while yes, it adds up, it's probably still worth it in a tutor-based strategy like ours. [Disclaimer - I'm pretty basic when it comes to my math skills, so if someone with actual knowledge in statistics could check on that it'd be much appreciated]
I added a 3rd Evolution as the 61st card, cut the Sin Collector for another Kitchen Finks, and cut the 3rd Witness and 1 Wall of Roots for 2 Noble Hierarch (so total 7 dorks, 4 Birds, 2 Noble, 1 Wall). Played very smoothly so far.
One relevant thing for everyone considering Stirring Wildwood or any other manland. Fatal Push makes them actually the worst. I got my Wildwood murdered for 1 Mana twice and it was pretty devastating both times. Not sure yet, but I'm probably cutting it for something else as soon as Push is legal.
@dicord
Let's give this a few days - everyone who's interested, state what days and times are good for you, what timezone you guys are in, and if you'd prefer a stream or a discord conversation. If people are up for it we'll set up a date for next week.
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"I can call an army to my side in the blink of an eye. Best not blink."
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Sorry to 'barge in here' but I am super confused, and you are the people with the most competense in this aria. MtgGoldfish featured a deck tech with Sultai Chord. I am very confused by theese chard choises. Especialy the 3 drops.
Could you give some insight on the spicy cards? I am baffeled.
@Darkfear30
If it's personal experience that's more understandable, yeah. I found that AdNaus can deal with only Eidolon pretty easily (Slaughter Pact/Echoing Truth into combo, Unlife). We have a positive MU post-board, although it depends on the board, but we need those exile effects like Lost Legacy, Memoricide, etc. to properly deal with them, at least in my experience so far with the MU.
@VidarThor
To me it looks like a bunch of fun, but janky cards. Guess the idea is to ramp with the Oracles, attack, switch something with a Ninja and Evo the Ninja into one of the 6-drops. Dunno what to say about the 3 drops.. Finks, Witness seem pretty standard to me for a Chord deck. Not quite sure about some of the card choices either, guess there's a lot of trial and error going on as well, as it's a new strategy and all.
@VidarThor
It's interesting to see a list that focuses on the even drop slot. Most Evolution lists I've seen tend to go 1-3-5 rather than 2-4-6. In the even lists, I imagine that Demon of Dark Schemes is a house. I just wonder if that and Grave Titan are good enough to risk getting cards that are difficult to cast getting stuck in your hand. It looks like you get to see some really sweet cards hit play with that build!
@Pathrogas
Can we shoot for Wednesday for the Discord group? I'm free from noon to like 5 if we can get that going.
I've been playing around archangel during Eldrazi Winter and with Eldritch Evolution since it was spoiled. When the card was good, it was amazing. Then you have games where they're just stuck in your hand + a bad topdeck after all your creatures are dead, or they're countered and you 2 for 1 yourself. I do believe the card will only get stronger when more creatures are printed however.
The point is to get to the midgame and play for value. 2 Archangels will give you an out when you need it. I've played with other 5 drops, such as Thragtusk and Reveillark. The Reveillark + Eternal Witness loop is SO GOOD! Unfortunately, I took it out because I don't want the deck to be too vulnerable to grave hate.
I've tested it so far versus the recent Junk Lists with Fatal Push (The card is amazing. Killing Grim Flayer and Goyf so easily was great. On the other side, he killed my Rhino and Resto with ease). I've also tested against some Esper Control as well as UW Control, among some other brews like Bring to Light. I haven't had too many problems yet. I'm only worried about running 8 creature-only removal and dying to straight combo decks.
I used to run Collective Brutality before Fatal Push came out. I don't know if I should straight up replace it, but I'm torn between the two. Collective Brutality is a better all around card that can help in all kinds of match ups, including Tron (although not great) and Ad Nauseam. But Fatal Push helps you survive the fast decks more easily and helps you out attrition the BGx decks. Using Eternal Witness to regrowth a Push was the best feeling.
I'll be running this deck at my LGS next week, so I'll make some records and report back when I can. Also, the discord channel seems like a great idea!
Alright, I'mma level with you guys. This formatting thing was a lot more work than I initially thought it'd be
I'm a real perfectionist with these things, so I don't wanna release a 90% finished thing. I'm done with the formatting, the banner and most of the content, just gonna finish writing down the matchups and alt. card choices. Gonna do that over the weekend so the primer will be up on sunday night/monday morning. Gives me time to have it checked for weird phrasing and typos and such as well.
Glad to see more people putting up lists. Looking forward to the discord chat if we get enough people together Remember to let us know about when you'd be up for it (weekday and time of day) and what timezone you're in. We're international after all, so we probably have to work out time differences and such.
@Darkfear30
Wednesday should be fine for me (if the time difference isn't too silly). Let's see when other people will have time.
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"I can call an army to my side in the blink of an eye. Best not blink."
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
I have a similar decklist to this, except it's in Bant colors to run Mystic Snake and Familiar's Ruse. I have a single copy of Archangel Avacyn in addition to my Selfless Spirit to provide extra defense against sweepers, but I'm wondering how she stacks up against Cataclysmic Gearhulk, since they're both sweepers with the same cost. I also have Evolutionary Leap in the sideboard to counteract Grafdigger's Cage and Leonin Arbiter (my cousin plays Hatebears, so I usually have to be prepared to face them), and I'm wondering if there are more efficient ways to play around search-hate cards. Lastly, I want to know if anyone has tried out Renegade Rallier as a value option, since this deck has some juicy targets for him.
@broesl66: Thanks! Glad to hear you like it
I'll see what I can do about the name change.
@BlazingRagnarok: Qasali Pridemage/Reclamation Sage can deal wit Grafdigger's Cage without eating up addition slots. Honestly though, I've never had much problems with either card. They make us play fair, but we're actually very good at playing fair. Unless Hatebears can put down both cards very early AND have a very aggressive start we should be able to just outvalue them with our creatures (also true for Bant in general, since we share most of the key cards).
Haven't tried Renegade Rallier, but my gut feeling is that he isn't that great in this deck. Getting back Voice of Resurgence or fetchlands is great and all, but I think he's better in an aggressive strategy (like the Landfall Rallier deck on Hooglands YT channel). Not getting back Path to Exile, Chord of Calling or Eternal Witness is a pretty huge drawback in this deck.
Liliana, the Last Hope is a very powerful card that, in my opinion, fits our playstyle extremely well. She produces value and slows down our opponents attacks when we need her to while also presenting a respectable threat that will eventually just win the game if she isn't dealt with. There are matchups where she doesn't do anything, but I find those to be pretty rare. I'd say give her a try and see for yourself Make sure to check your mana base though - BB turn 2 or 3 can be rough if you're mainly GW in the main.
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"I can call an army to my side in the blink of an eye. Best not blink."
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
I think the Abzan Toolbox name is pretty appropriate, so nice job on that front.
I run a totally different version of the deck, less toolbox-y, more beat your face in with undercosted beaters, good disruption, and a nice tutor package. My version of the deck may be less "versatile" or resourceful, but I have fallen in love with my version, and feel like I have a chance in most matchups.
Having said all that, I took my version to FNM Friday night... I had a "decent" night, some good matchups, and some really Bad ones... I end up placing like 10th out of 25, but had a fun night at the shop. My favorite moment though, came while playing against a nicely assembled JUND deck. I see like 3 Bobs, 3 LOTV's, and 3 Tarmogoyf. I do the math... Those 9 cards cost like 4 times as much as my whole deck. I have a good match with him, and end up winning 2 games to 1.
It was a cool to beat a really Expensive deck. Sure, you don't need an expensive deck to play, but it's still hard to beat a well-designed, Expensive deck when you are running a deck more in the "reasonable" region of cost. I was thrilled, although Bill, my opponent was NOT. Good beats equal good times, and I had real fun squeaking by with that win.
Went 3-2 in todays tournament, meta was 50%+ blue based control with some Affinity players in there, rest was some random decks. After hearing that EVERYONE was on control I changed the mainboard Shriekmaw I'm testing for the Thrun, the Last Troll from the sideboard. Then never got to cast him in any game.
Matchups were: Esper Control (2-0), UB Faeries (2-1), Affinity (2-0, Thoughtcast version, only 1 Galvanic Blast), Blue Moon (0-2, land destruction in the sideboard) and RUG Moon (0-2, mull to 5 G1, got my Archangel of Thune stolen by Vedalken Shackles, didn't resolve a spell until turn 6 or 7 G2 while being stuck on 3 lands, great fun...)
Deck felt great, matchups I won were pretty easy all things considered, but the sideboard needs more stuff against Control in this meta. Choke, here we go again... Mulliganing against Blood Moon was frustrating as always, but oh well.
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"I can call an army to my side in the blink of an eye. Best not blink."
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
You should consider Ethersworn Canonist over the more expensive 3 drop. It's more or less the same thing. Moreover, sideboarding Kataki, War's Wage can erase artifact decks.
I'm developing a similar deck, in fact it uses many of the same cards: Finks, Thune. Melira, Sylvok Outcast is an extremely good card for Finks, no matter that it hoses infect.
There are much cheaper and better ways to hose blue decks and you'll find them in "GoGo Gadget". We might be able to steal some ideas from each other.
Melira, Sylvok Outcast is decent if you're expecting a lot of Infect, but otherwise is pretty lackluster. She can get cute with Kitchen Finks, yes, but that trick usually only works against decks with very little interaction - and those usually have ways of ignoring that synergy.
Your anti-control suite consists of 12-16 mainboard cards, most of which aren't viable for us. Hope of Ghirapur is decent combo protection, but not really what we're looking for, as it only works once. Gaddock Teeg is a consideration for us, but primarily against Combo and Tron, as he dies too easily against Control without Spellskite and/or Selfless Spirit on the board.
Choke ruins exactly the decks I want it to ruin - Decks with loads of basic Islands and Blood Moon. It's not the end-all answer against other control strategies like Jeskai or Esper, but those are already better matchups in a way due to their inability to lock our ability to play our cards down on turn 3. They're forcing a fair fight, and we're generally pretty good with fair fights.
Went 3-3 at a GPT yesterday. Won against Hatebears, Burn and some BG brew, lost to Zoo, UB Whir Control and RG Breach.
Messed up pretty hard against Zoo game 2 by not fetching in my turn 1. There was no reason to wait (I had no Path), and I even thought about Aven Mindcensor probably being in my opponents deck during boarding. Of course I ignored all that, fetched in his turn and got Mindcensor'd, didn't hit a land and died.
UB Control had 2x Vedalken Shackles and 2x Batterskull and Damnations mainboard. Game 1 took over 30 minutes, probably should've conceded earlier. Beat the first set of Shackles+Batterskull+Baby Jace+O-Stone+10000Mana, but the second B-Skull into Shackles was too much. Didn't feel particularly close either, even though I did have a lot of play against his stuff. Gaame 2 didn't draw Stony and died to a timely Fatal Push draw vs my Gaddock Teeg.
RG Breach... is RG Breach.
I've tested a bit more against Titanshift and went 0-7, with the last 4 games being post-board and me drawing double Lost Legacy every game. At this point I'd recommend just conceding the Valakut MU's, honestly. They aren't worth using up SB slots if you're running specific hate just for them.
I feel that the deck needs to be more pro-active. I've faced 6 different strategies yesterday, all requiring different answers. Now, we're good at answering, but we don't have a clock to run away with the game if they can't beat our answers quickly. Dunno, I'll look around the 600000 potential cards once again...
How's the deck going for you guys?
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"I can call an army to my side in the blink of an eye. Best not blink."
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
I've played it the last couple fnms here and went 2/2 both times. I live in a small town but the meta is always all tier 1,2 decks with very few brews. For me I either have fantastic games with all the answers or I get nothing. Like this past Friday I didn't see a chord or Evo the entire night but resto's and rhino's was enough for 2 matches. So yeah it works but variance for me has been brutal.
Also you are probably not 'chording for glissa' you are holding up a chord for 3, it can be anything. In kiki chord it often was eternal witnes, you got the chord back, next turn you can get resto angel, and the turn after you would get kiki-jiki. I am sure abzan chord has some tricks up it sleeve as well. But, if they are to tap out for a smasher and turn it sideways getting glissa is a good option.
Nice write-up, glad to see people so interested in the deck
Part of me really likes the all-in tutor build, reminds me of my earlier builds, makes me wanna slam Sigarda again
I might give Worship another shot in the SB... never did anything for me back when I tested it, but maybe that was just my bad luck.
Want to point some things out tho:
Kitchen Finks doesn't interact with Evolution the way you think it does. Sacrificing the creature is part of the casting cost, not the spell itself, so you cast Evo, sac Finks, Finks dies, Persist triggers and resolves, then Evolution resolves and you get whatever creature you're tutoring for. So sadly no Archangel/Gearhulk tricks there.
Some of the MU percentages you stated seem... optimistic, let's say. Eidolon + Sin Collector will not give us a 60%+ percentage vs AdNaus if they know what they're doing. But maybe I'm misunderstanding - are those your personal win % or how you see the MU in general?
Regarding beating land-combo, or any combo, really - Lost Legacy, Discard/Fulminator + Surgical Extraction are probably our best shot. Mindcensor, Teeg and the likes are too easy to kill (most Valakut decks run Anger AND bolt mainboard, some even mainboard Sudden Shocks to beat Infect) to consinstently do what they're supposed to. Also Stony Silence vs Tron helps a lot if you get it out early.
Do you feel the Wooded Bastion is necessary? I feel another Horizon Canopy would just be better, especially if you're running Razorverge Thickets already.
@Everyone:
Thought about doing a stream or dischord group chat to talk more about certain cards, how people approach the deck, etc. to gain more insight and info for the primer. Would you be interested in something like that? What format would you prefer to have that conversation in?
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
Angel Feeder
Nic Fit Pod
U Tron
All-In tutors has been a lot of fun, although I had been looking at the core of the deck as 8 tutors and 4 finks. I haven't tried any builds that deviate from that core yet.
Worship has also been fun, but it's mostly there for the look that an opponent gives when they realize that they have no outs. It can totally steal games, but I have the tendency to not see it in games that I need to. Unlike the majority of the board, we can't tutor for it.
The percentages are my personal experience. I don't know that I've been playing against the best Ad Naus pilots, but I've never felt that they can combo fast enough to fight us game 2. Once we land Eidolon, they need to resolve a Phyrexian Unlife, Ad Nauseum on our turn, and we need to not have enchantment removal for the Unlife. Anecdotally, I've never seen it line up so nicely for them, but that's entirely my experience. It also "blanks" their Angel's Graces as part of a combo package. It feels great to say T1 dork into T2 Evolution into Eidolon with them holding up Ad Naus and Grace in hand.
I swapped out the second Horizon Canopy when people at my locals started packing more early aggro decks. I found that I was losing games by only a point or two of life, and that a painless green source coming in on turn three was important enough to justify it in hands that see it as a colorless source on turn one.
I'll have to pop in a copy or two of Lost Legacy and see how that goes! I had been toying around with Slaughter Games, but the red would understandably be an issue.
Also, I'd totally be up for a Discord on the deck! I sincerely feel that this deck is in the Tier 2 range, but I also feel that it would need to be tuned further to get there.
Angel Feeder
Nic Fit Pod
U Tron
Alrighty, worked on my primer some more, should be able to put everything into something neat looking later tonight, tomorrow night if I fall asleep while formatting everything.
@testing
Also tested a bunch against Sultai Midrange (3 Liliana, Lost Hope and 2 Kalitas mainboard), which was immensly enjoyable and very balanced as a matchup. Very interesting with the boardstates and such. Also went 2-1 vs Emeria Control, which also seems like a pretty doable MU if we know what we're up against.
I've went bac to 61 cards after doing the math again. The % difference to draw any given card is ~0.03% lower than in a 60 card deck, and while yes, it adds up, it's probably still worth it in a tutor-based strategy like ours. [Disclaimer - I'm pretty basic when it comes to my math skills, so if someone with actual knowledge in statistics could check on that it'd be much appreciated]
I added a 3rd Evolution as the 61st card, cut the Sin Collector for another Kitchen Finks, and cut the 3rd Witness and 1 Wall of Roots for 2 Noble Hierarch (so total 7 dorks, 4 Birds, 2 Noble, 1 Wall). Played very smoothly so far.
One relevant thing for everyone considering Stirring Wildwood or any other manland. Fatal Push makes them actually the worst. I got my Wildwood murdered for 1 Mana twice and it was pretty devastating both times. Not sure yet, but I'm probably cutting it for something else as soon as Push is legal.
@dicord
Let's give this a few days - everyone who's interested, state what days and times are good for you, what timezone you guys are in, and if you'd prefer a stream or a discord conversation. If people are up for it we'll set up a date for next week.
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
Could you give some insight on the spicy cards? I am baffeled.
4 Coiling Oracle
1 Snapcaster Mage
1 Spellskite
4 Wall of Roots
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Eternal Witness
1 Kitchen Finks
1 Identity Thief
1 Nekrataal
2 Ninja of the Deep Hours
1 Sidisi, Brood Tyrant
1 Bloodline Keeper
1 Gonti, Lord of Luxury
1 Acidic Slime
1 Demon of Dark Schemes
1 Grave Titan
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Eldritch Evolution
3 Chord of Calling
1 Murderous Cut
24 lands
4 Blooming Marsh
1 Botanical Sanctum
1 Breeding Pool
2 Forest
1 Island
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Overgrown Tomb
3 Polluted Delta
1 Swamp
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Watery Grave
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
1 Razormane Masticore
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Silent Arbiter
1 Sower of Temptation
1 Thragtusk
2 Collective Brutality
3 Lost Legacy
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Liliana, the Last Hope
1 Nissa, Vital Force
Link to the deck: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/instant-deck-tech-bug-chord-modern
If it's personal experience that's more understandable, yeah. I found that AdNaus can deal with only Eidolon pretty easily (Slaughter Pact/Echoing Truth into combo, Unlife). We have a positive MU post-board, although it depends on the board, but we need those exile effects like Lost Legacy, Memoricide, etc. to properly deal with them, at least in my experience so far with the MU.
@VidarThor
To me it looks like a bunch of fun, but janky cards. Guess the idea is to ramp with the Oracles, attack, switch something with a Ninja and Evo the Ninja into one of the 6-drops. Dunno what to say about the 3 drops.. Finks, Witness seem pretty standard to me for a Chord deck. Not quite sure about some of the card choices either, guess there's a lot of trial and error going on as well, as it's a new strategy and all.
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
It's interesting to see a list that focuses on the even drop slot. Most Evolution lists I've seen tend to go 1-3-5 rather than 2-4-6. In the even lists, I imagine that Demon of Dark Schemes is a house. I just wonder if that and Grave Titan are good enough to risk getting cards that are difficult to cast getting stuck in your hand. It looks like you get to see some really sweet cards hit play with that build!
@Pathrogas
Can we shoot for Wednesday for the Discord group? I'm free from noon to like 5 if we can get that going.
Angel Feeder
Nic Fit Pod
U Tron
For now, I'm playing this list:
2 Archangel of Thune
3 Eternal Witness
3 Kitchen Finks
4 Noble Hierarch
1 Orzhov Pontiff
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Restoration Angel
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Selfless Spirit
1 Siege Rhino
1 Spellskite
1 Spike Feeder
3 Voice of Resurgence
3 Wall of Roots
4 Chord of Calling
4 Fatal Push
4 Path to Exile
Land (22)
2 Forest
3 Gavony Township
1 Godless Shrine
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Marsh Flats
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Plains
1 Razorverge Thicket
1 Swamp
2 Temple Garden
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Windswept Heath
1 Anafenza, the Foremost
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
1 Melira, Sylvok Outcast
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
3 Stony Silence
2 Abrupt Decay
4 Thoughtseize
The point is to get to the midgame and play for value. 2 Archangels will give you an out when you need it. I've played with other 5 drops, such as Thragtusk and Reveillark. The Reveillark + Eternal Witness loop is SO GOOD! Unfortunately, I took it out because I don't want the deck to be too vulnerable to grave hate.
I've tested it so far versus the recent Junk Lists with Fatal Push (The card is amazing. Killing Grim Flayer and Goyf so easily was great. On the other side, he killed my Rhino and Resto with ease). I've also tested against some Esper Control as well as UW Control, among some other brews like Bring to Light. I haven't had too many problems yet. I'm only worried about running 8 creature-only removal and dying to straight combo decks.
I used to run Collective Brutality before Fatal Push came out. I don't know if I should straight up replace it, but I'm torn between the two. Collective Brutality is a better all around card that can help in all kinds of match ups, including Tron (although not great) and Ad Nauseam. But Fatal Push helps you survive the fast decks more easily and helps you out attrition the BGx decks. Using Eternal Witness to regrowth a Push was the best feeling.
I'll be running this deck at my LGS next week, so I'll make some records and report back when I can. Also, the discord channel seems like a great idea!
Modern:RGWNaya BurnRGW|WBGAbzan Angel ChordWBG|WUUW ControlWU|UBUB FaeriesUB
Standard:GWGW HumansGW
Legacy:WBGAbzan MaverickWBG
Commander:WUBRBreya, Etherium ShaperWUBR|GWSelvala, Explorer ReturnedGW
360 Cube:http://www.cubetutor.com/viewcube/7000
I'm a real perfectionist with these things, so I don't wanna release a 90% finished thing. I'm done with the formatting, the banner and most of the content, just gonna finish writing down the matchups and alt. card choices. Gonna do that over the weekend so the primer will be up on sunday night/monday morning. Gives me time to have it checked for weird phrasing and typos and such as well.
Glad to see more people putting up lists. Looking forward to the discord chat if we get enough people together Remember to let us know about when you'd be up for it (weekday and time of day) and what timezone you're in. We're international after all, so we probably have to work out time differences and such.
@Darkfear30
Wednesday should be fine for me (if the time difference isn't too silly). Let's see when other people will have time.
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
Angel Feeder
Nic Fit Pod
U Tron
We're live.
(And now with the correct version as well Originally uploaded an older version with only 2 Evos and lots of other stuff missing)
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
I'll see what I can do about the name change.
@BlazingRagnarok: Qasali Pridemage/Reclamation Sage can deal wit Grafdigger's Cage without eating up addition slots. Honestly though, I've never had much problems with either card. They make us play fair, but we're actually very good at playing fair. Unless Hatebears can put down both cards very early AND have a very aggressive start we should be able to just outvalue them with our creatures (also true for Bant in general, since we share most of the key cards).
Haven't tried Renegade Rallier, but my gut feeling is that he isn't that great in this deck. Getting back Voice of Resurgence or fetchlands is great and all, but I think he's better in an aggressive strategy (like the Landfall Rallier deck on Hooglands YT channel). Not getting back Path to Exile, Chord of Calling or Eternal Witness is a pretty huge drawback in this deck.
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
Angel Feeder
Nic Fit Pod
U Tron
Liliana, the Last Hope is a very powerful card that, in my opinion, fits our playstyle extremely well. She produces value and slows down our opponents attacks when we need her to while also presenting a respectable threat that will eventually just win the game if she isn't dealt with. There are matchups where she doesn't do anything, but I find those to be pretty rare. I'd say give her a try and see for yourself Make sure to check your mana base though - BB turn 2 or 3 can be rough if you're mainly GW in the main.
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
I run a totally different version of the deck, less toolbox-y, more beat your face in with undercosted beaters, good disruption, and a nice tutor package. My version of the deck may be less "versatile" or resourceful, but I have fallen in love with my version, and feel like I have a chance in most matchups.
Having said all that, I took my version to FNM Friday night... I had a "decent" night, some good matchups, and some really Bad ones... I end up placing like 10th out of 25, but had a fun night at the shop. My favorite moment though, came while playing against a nicely assembled JUND deck. I see like 3 Bobs, 3 LOTV's, and 3 Tarmogoyf. I do the math... Those 9 cards cost like 4 times as much as my whole deck. I have a good match with him, and end up winning 2 games to 1.
It was a cool to beat a really Expensive deck. Sure, you don't need an expensive deck to play, but it's still hard to beat a well-designed, Expensive deck when you are running a deck more in the "reasonable" region of cost. I was thrilled, although Bill, my opponent was NOT. Good beats equal good times, and I had real fun squeaking by with that win.
On topic of cheap powerful decks - I just went t1 Eldrazi Temple, t2 Eldrazi Temple into Thought-Knot Seer, t3 Forest into Reality Smasher against a friend playing Burn on xmage. Feels kinda silly knowing that all my plays that games together cost barely more than a single Goblin Guide in paper.
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
Matchups were: Esper Control (2-0), UB Faeries (2-1), Affinity (2-0, Thoughtcast version, only 1 Galvanic Blast), Blue Moon (0-2, land destruction in the sideboard) and RUG Moon (0-2, mull to 5 G1, got my Archangel of Thune stolen by Vedalken Shackles, didn't resolve a spell until turn 6 or 7 G2 while being stuck on 3 lands, great fun...)
Deck felt great, matchups I won were pretty easy all things considered, but the sideboard needs more stuff against Control in this meta. Choke, here we go again... Mulliganing against Blood Moon was frustrating as always, but oh well.
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
I'm developing a similar deck, in fact it uses many of the same cards: Finks, Thune. Melira, Sylvok Outcast is an extremely good card for Finks, no matter that it hoses infect.
There are much cheaper and better ways to hose blue decks and you'll find them in "GoGo Gadget". We might be able to steal some ideas from each other.
Melira, Sylvok Outcast is decent if you're expecting a lot of Infect, but otherwise is pretty lackluster. She can get cute with Kitchen Finks, yes, but that trick usually only works against decks with very little interaction - and those usually have ways of ignoring that synergy.
Your anti-control suite consists of 12-16 mainboard cards, most of which aren't viable for us. Hope of Ghirapur is decent combo protection, but not really what we're looking for, as it only works once. Gaddock Teeg is a consideration for us, but primarily against Combo and Tron, as he dies too easily against Control without Spellskite and/or Selfless Spirit on the board.
Choke ruins exactly the decks I want it to ruin - Decks with loads of basic Islands and Blood Moon. It's not the end-all answer against other control strategies like Jeskai or Esper, but those are already better matchups in a way due to their inability to lock our ability to play our cards down on turn 3. They're forcing a fair fight, and we're generally pretty good with fair fights.
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
Messed up pretty hard against Zoo game 2 by not fetching in my turn 1. There was no reason to wait (I had no Path), and I even thought about Aven Mindcensor probably being in my opponents deck during boarding. Of course I ignored all that, fetched in his turn and got Mindcensor'd, didn't hit a land and died.
UB Control had 2x Vedalken Shackles and 2x Batterskull and Damnations mainboard. Game 1 took over 30 minutes, probably should've conceded earlier. Beat the first set of Shackles+Batterskull+Baby Jace+O-Stone+10000Mana, but the second B-Skull into Shackles was too much. Didn't feel particularly close either, even though I did have a lot of play against his stuff. Gaame 2 didn't draw Stony and died to a timely Fatal Push draw vs my Gaddock Teeg.
RG Breach... is RG Breach.
I've tested a bit more against Titanshift and went 0-7, with the last 4 games being post-board and me drawing double Lost Legacy every game. At this point I'd recommend just conceding the Valakut MU's, honestly. They aren't worth using up SB slots if you're running specific hate just for them.
I feel that the deck needs to be more pro-active. I've faced 6 different strategies yesterday, all requiring different answers. Now, we're good at answering, but we don't have a clock to run away with the game if they can't beat our answers quickly. Dunno, I'll look around the 600000 potential cards once again...
How's the deck going for you guys?
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
2 Birds of Paradise
1 Eternal Witness
4 Noble Hierarch
1 Orzhov Pontiff
1 Qasali Pridemage
2 Renegade Rallier
1 Scavenging Ooze
3 Siege Rhino
1 Sin Collector
1 Thragtusk
4 Voice of Resurgence
2 Wall of Omens
1 Anafenza, the Foremost
1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
Spells (11)
4 Path to Exile
2 Collective Brutality
3 Eldritch Evolution
2 Lingering Souls
2 Forest
1 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Blooming Marsh
2 Gavony Township
1 Godless Shrine
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Marsh Flats
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Razorverge Thicket
1 Stirring Wildwood
2 Temple Garden
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Windswept Heath
2 Fulminator Mage
2 Rest in Peace
2 Stony Silence
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Fatal Push
1 Lingering Souls
1 Lost Legacy
4 Thoughtseize