I'm just not fully understanding why Lotus Cobra is soo good? I've been testing a ton of different things, but Cobra hasn't even been on my radar. What's it doing for us that's so good?
Also Tireless Tracker? I've never played with him. Seems a bit slow, but I see him in a few lists. Does he play better than he looks?
So i've been playing games on Cockatrice like a maniac lately. This deck has actually gotten me back into the magic groove. Been having a lot of fun testing out different configurations. There really is so many options for a deck like this. I've come to a list that's a little out of the box, but has been playing very consistently, and feels pretty awesome. Here's where im at..
So right off the bat what sticks out is 3 Reflector Mage, and 3 Renegade Rallier.
-Reflector Mage
It has been brought up before, but seriously, this guy is stupid good in this shell. Even just hardcasting it once can be surpringly good, and really stalls the opponent, but once you start blinking it with Cat or Saheeli it just gets so easy to completely stall out the opponents board. It forces the opponent to burn removal on him because he really is that good. Running 3 might seem crazy because you don't necessarily want him against something like Ad nauseam, but right now, this guy feels powerful almost every single time I see it. Running less crazy singles and upping numbers in an attempt to increase consistency.
-Renegade Rallier
My previous lists have all only ran 1 Rallier, and it was just OK. The strange thing about it, is the more you run, the better it actually gets. There are so many crazy value plays in this shell with Rallier, and the combination of Rallier and Voice of Resurgance is surprisingly incredibly powerful, and can be very hard for the opponent to overcome the incredible value between Voice and Rallier. Beyond Voice though, you can recur Fetchs and actually ramp mana, recur Oaths for Card selections, recur Walls for card draw, or even recur bolted Birds.
What do you guys think of something like Soul Snare, or Seal of Fire, as removal which can brought back with Rallier?
Here's my recent testing results with this list:
-2/0 Taking Turns-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Saheeli then Cat combo.
-2/1 GRb Valukuut-
Omen + Titan. - Saheeli then Cat combo - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-2/1 Mono R Prison-
Saheeli then Cat combo. - Koth & Chandra Ult - Saheeli then Cat combo.
-2/0 Illusions-
Cat then Saheeli combo. Voice + Elemental beatdown.
-2/0 Grixis Control-
Cat then Saheeli. - Sigaarda beatdown.
-2/0 Mono B Zombies-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Cat then Saheeli.
-1/2 Goblins-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Stuck on 2 lands and got beatdown, and finished with 2 Grenades. - Same g3.
-2/0 Doran-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-1/2 BW Control-
Voice/ Elemental + Rallier beatdown - G2-3 opponent goes Inquisition, thoughtseize, inquisition, collective brutality, liliana, emptys his hand, and continues to top deck like a friggin champ for about 10 turns.
-2/1 Taking Turns-
He comboed off. - GG to Teeg. - Teeg stalled him, and won with beatdown.
Been doing pretty well. Lost a couple matches, but had some bad luck in the games I lost. This list feels extremely consistent. The numbers are just feeling right on, and each card has great individual strength, as well as amazing synergy with everything else. Feeling good right now.
-Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
One interesting thing i've noticed, is in all the games i've played with this list, I haven't actually won with Kiki-Jiki even a single time. I wasn't expecting that. I figured it wouldn't come up too often, but that it would still come up every once in a while, but it actually hasn't. With the number of 3 drops it felt right to have a 5 drop to Evo into, and Kiki seemed like a solid choice when trying to keep consistency and synergy to a max. I'm thinking now I need a different 5 drop. I can't find anything that seems MD worthy though. Please guys, I need some ideas here? I could just go back to Sun Titan, which is a crazy power house, but a 5 drop would be ideal for where I want to be.
Soul Snare isn't Modern legal. Seal of Fire doesn't have that many good targets now and I'm not sure it worth a card slot.
Didn't realize Snare wasn't modern legal.
Seal of Fire actually has some potential for cool value plays though. With Rallier, you can actually deal 4 damage to a creature if you need to, instead of just 2. The activation of Seal being free gives you some cool options like, Seal a creature, Play Rallier, seal another creature. You just 3 for 1ed, killed 2 guys and got a 3/2 for just 3 mana. Definitely some potential value.
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Not just the Tendo King, the power of the Galactic Leyline surpasses that of the Tempa Emperor, No!, It's magnificent power is even greater than that!
I'm just not fully understanding why Lotus Cobra is soo good? I've been testing a ton of different things, but Cobra hasn't even been on my radar. What's it doing for us that's so good?
Also Tireless Tracker? I've never played with him. Seems a bit slow, but I see him in a few lists. Does he play better than he looks?
So i've been playing games on Cockatrice like a maniac lately. This deck has actually gotten me back into the magic groove. Been having a lot of fun testing out different configurations. There really is so many options for a deck like this. I've come to a list that's a little out of the box, but has been playing very consistently, and feels pretty awesome. Here's where im at..
So right off the bat what sticks out is 3 Reflector Mage, and 3 Renegade Rallier.
-Reflector Mage
It has been brought up before, but seriously, this guy is stupid good in this shell. Even just hardcasting it once can be surpringly good, and really stalls the opponent, but once you start blinking it with Cat or Saheeli it just gets so easy to completely stall out the opponents board. It forces the opponent to burn removal on him because he really is that good. Running 3 might seem crazy because you don't necessarily want him against something like Ad nauseam, but right now, this guy feels powerful almost every single time I see it. Running less crazy singles and upping numbers in an attempt to increase consistency.
-Renegade Rallier
My previous lists have all only ran 1 Rallier, and it was just OK. The strange thing about it, is the more you run, the better it actually gets. There are so many crazy value plays in this shell with Rallier, and the combination of Rallier and Voice of Resurgance is surprisingly incredibly powerful, and can be very hard for the opponent to overcome the incredible value between Voice and Rallier. Beyond Voice though, you can recur Fetchs and actually ramp mana, recur Oaths for Card selections, recur Walls for card draw, or even recur bolted Birds.
What do you guys think of something like Soul Snare, or Seal of Fire, as removal which can brought back with Rallier?
Here's my recent testing results with this list:
-2/0 Taking Turns-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Saheeli then Cat combo.
-2/1 GRb Valukuut-
Omen + Titan. - Saheeli then Cat combo - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-2/1 Mono R Prison-
Saheeli then Cat combo. - Koth & Chandra Ult - Saheeli then Cat combo.
-2/0 Illusions-
Cat then Saheeli combo. Voice + Elemental beatdown.
-2/0 Grixis Control-
Cat then Saheeli. - Sigaarda beatdown.
-2/0 Mono B Zombies-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Cat then Saheeli.
-1/2 Goblins-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Stuck on 2 lands and got beatdown, and finished with 2 Grenades. - Same g3.
-2/0 Doran-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-1/2 BW Control-
Voice/ Elemental + Rallier beatdown - G2-3 opponent goes Inquisition, thoughtseize, inquisition, collective brutality, liliana, emptys his hand, and continues to top deck like a friggin champ for about 10 turns.
-2/1 Taking Turns-
He comboed off. - GG to Teeg. - Teeg stalled him, and won with beatdown.
Been doing pretty well. Lost a couple matches, but had some bad luck in the games I lost. This list feels extremely consistent. The numbers are just feeling right on, and each card has great individual strength, as well as amazing synergy with everything else. Feeling good right now.
-Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
One interesting thing i've noticed, is in all the games i've played with this list, I haven't actually won with Kiki-Jiki even a single time. I wasn't expecting that. I figured it wouldn't come up too often, but that it would still come up every once in a while, but it actually hasn't. With the number of 3 drops it felt right to have a 5 drop to Evo into, and Kiki seemed like a solid choice when trying to keep consistency and synergy to a max. I'm thinking now I need a different 5 drop. I can't find anything that seems MD worthy though. Please guys, I need some ideas here? I could just go back to Sun Titan, which is a crazy power house, but a 5 drop would be ideal for where I want to be.
It's been a while since I've played the deck, but Reveillark was an absolute house when I played with it. Seriously, there's just so much value there it's unreal. Definitely recommend checking it out. The only thing it doesn't get back in your list is Rallier.
Thoughts on Stonehorn Dignitary? Considering running it in place of Kiki-Jiki. Could be extremely frustrating for opponents with Cat & Saheeli, and the 4 toughness body keeps it out of Bolt range.
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Not just the Tendo King, the power of the Galactic Leyline surpasses that of the Tempa Emperor, No!, It's magnificent power is even greater than that!
Feeling pretty good about things right now. Low overall cmc, and high numbers to make things as consistent as I can, and with high impact ETB creatures.
Seemed like we had a lot of excitement in this thread recently, but it's all seemed to have died out. What happened? I'm having consistent success with the deck right now, and it's feeling super fun, and very effective.
Wish there were a few more people as excited on this as I am. Come on guys, this deck has real, and serious potential.
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Not just the Tendo King, the power of the Galactic Leyline surpasses that of the Tempa Emperor, No!, It's magnificent power is even greater than that!
Seemed like we had a lot of excitement in this thread recently, but it's all seemed to have died out. What happened? I'm having consistent success with the deck right now, and it's feeling super fun, and very effective.
Wish there were a few more people as excited on this as I am. Come on guys, this deck has real, and serious potential.
I love your list, I will run it tomorrow at FNM. I have been paying modern saheeli combos for a few weeks.
It's nice to see so many ideas in this thread that I also had on my own. I just started tinkering with this shell. I have to say, I don't know how I feel about Evolution yet. Having the toolbox is nice but I feel part of this decks strength is playing the value game, and Eldritch doesn't really supplement that game super well outside of getting the combos with it.
I've been tweaking my list still too. Against the real current meta it seems good. I did have 2 losses last night though. 1 vs adnause and 1 vs goblins. Goblins had nut draws both games so nothing I could do there but adnause I mulled to 5 g1 and then he had perfect g2 to pact t4 cat grace on upkeep and then adnaus ftw. Beat bang eldrazi and jund D's though so deck felt great there.
I am thinking of adding 1 aegis of the gods for playing against adnaus/storm type decks.
I crush eldrazi tron. I also play 4 spreading seas and a crumble in my sb though. Ds is the deck this deck loves to see. Battle rage is really the only scary card imo.
I also feel like trying 2 of the new nissa in here.
Last night at the FNM I ended up with a 3-1, ending 4th.
Review and thoughts:
1st game: vs Merfolks -
G1 was a bit easy because of a miss play from my opponent. I got in game a token of the Voice 3/3 and attacked only with a lord 2/2, no other one was played, so it died and made me win G1. I entered Ghostly Prison and Stony Silence, don't remember well what I get rid of.
G2 was easy for him, he got a perfect hand and I was blewed.
G3 I had 2 felidar, bouncing twice an Oath of Nissa for trying to look for Saheeli, and with my Ajani too, but I couldn't found nothing good. With island walk I couldn't resist much more with 7 elemental tokens and big fishes. Neither in G2 and G3 couldn't see a sideboard card.
Overall: 0 - 1
2nd game: bye
Overall: 1 - 1
3rd game: vs PiF -
G1 he comboed with Grapeshot at turn 4 and I didn't had a Path to Exile in hand to get rid of his two creatures. I entered from sideboard almost all, they leylines, the ghostly prison (for the Empty the Warrens, Spirit of the Labyrinth, Eidolon of Rhetoric and Rest in Peace).
G2 he comboed turn two with Empty the Warrens, putting 10 goblin tokens. In my third turn I landed a Ghostly Prison (he didn't expect that at all!) and the next two turns I comboed with Felidar + Saheeli.
G3 I entered a leyline with my opening hand. I got a RiP in my hand that I could land on turn 2, but I didn't (my bad) as I thought that in his T3, without the creature, wouldn't be able to combo, but he did. Fortunately, I resolved well the Gifts Ungiven sending the draw cards to graveyard along with the Grapeshot. He only could remove my leyline with a Wear/Tear after 14-15 storm. In my turn I landed the RiP (now yes!) and I won by brute force with the Voices.
Overall: 2 - 1
G4: vs Affinity
Game one was basically a free win for affinity player. I entered Stony silence and Ghostly Prison from my sideboard.
Game two I entered T3 Ghostly prison and next turn the Stony silence. As he laked of mana to attack and without attaching the equipment, I could run more than him and combo him.
Game three was my perfect hand against him. I got all my lands with red (without white), birds of paradise, ghostly prison and stony silence. I kept it, with T2 stony silence and T3 ghostly prison. Basically he got stomped with the infect lands. With my draws I got a Kiki-Jiki, Pia and a Voice. I just kept copying the first turns the birds if he tried to attack me with the infect creatures, and later on, copying at the end of turn my voice and Pia and Kiran Nalaar.
Overall: 3 - 1
The thing is that i only found once an Eldritch Evolution, and zero the Sun Titan, so I couldn't see it's potential in this deck, but I'm sure it would do awesome returning Saheeli or some other cards. Also I liked the Kiki-Jiki in this deck even I only found him in my last match.
Last night at the FNM I ended up with a 3-1, ending 4th.
Review and thoughts:
1st game: vs Merfolks -
G1 was a bit easy because of a miss play from my opponent. I got in game a token of the Voice 3/3 and attacked only with a lord 2/2, no other one was played, so it died and made me win G1. I entered Ghostly Prison and Stony Silence, don't remember well what I get rid of.
G2 was easy for him, he got a perfect hand and I was blewed.
G3 I had 2 felidar, bouncing twice an Oath of Nissa for trying to look for Saheeli, and with my Ajani too, but I couldn't found nothing good. With island walk I couldn't resist much more with 7 elemental tokens and big fishes. Neither in G2 and G3 couldn't see a sideboard card.
Overall: 0 - 1
2nd game: bye
Overall: 1 - 1
3rd game: vs PiF -
G1 he comboed with Grapeshot at turn 4 and I didn't had a Path to Exile in hand to get rid of his two creatures. I entered from sideboard almost all, they leylines, the ghostly prison (for the Empty the Warrens, Spirit of the Labyrinth, Eidolon of Rhetoric and Rest in Peace).
G2 he comboed turn two with Empty the Warrens, putting 10 goblin tokens. In my third turn I landed a Ghostly Prison (he didn't expect that at all!) and the next two turns I comboed with Felidar + Saheeli.
G3 I entered a leyline with my opening hand. I got a RiP in my hand that I could land on turn 2, but I didn't (my bad) as I thought that in his T3, without the creature, wouldn't be able to combo, but he did. Fortunately, I resolved well the Gifts Ungiven sending the draw cards to graveyard along with the Grapeshot. He only could remove my leyline with a Wear/Tear after 14-15 storm. In my turn I landed the RiP (now yes!) and I won by brute force with the Voices.
Overall: 2 - 1
G4: vs Affinity
Game one was basically a free win for affinity player. I entered Stony silence and Ghostly Prison from my sideboard.
Game two I entered T3 Ghostly prison and next turn the Stony silence. As he laked of mana to attack and without attaching the equipment, I could run more than him and combo him.
Game three was my perfect hand against him. I got all my lands with red (without white), birds of paradise, ghostly prison and stony silence. I kept it, with T2 stony silence and T3 ghostly prison. Basically he got stomped with the infect lands. With my draws I got a Kiki-Jiki, Pia and a Voice. I just kept copying the first turns the birds if he tried to attack me with the infect creatures, and later on, copying at the end of turn my voice and Pia and Kiran Nalaar.
Overall: 3 - 1
The thing is that i only found once an Eldritch Evolution, and zero the Sun Titan, so I couldn't see it's potential in this deck, but I'm sure it would do awesome returning Saheeli or some other cards. Also I liked the Kiki-Jiki in this deck even I only found him in my last match.
Anyways, I liked very much this deck!
Sounds like you got a bit lucky and hit all your sb cards when needed. I much prefer kataki over stony because with the evolution it's like you have 5 in your deck. With kci growing in numbers t2 kataki is nice as well.
I prefer Kataki while I'm playing spirits, against affinity it's very good, but having a Galvanic Blast it's gonna be more easier to get rid of it instead of a Stony Silence, meanwhile with spirits it's more easier to protect, just my thought about when playing one or another.
And yeah, I got a bit lucky with the sideboard! Just not against the fishes! But this is magic, not always is going to be perfect!
I'm preparing for post Amonkhet since my next tournament is after the release.
New cards in my list:
- angel of sanctions as a catch all removal while being evasive pressure
- dusk against eldrazi, DS, BGx midrange (apart from sweeping only opponent's creatures, the value from Dawn seems also really good in grindy matchups). I'm going to try a full set in the board.
Further changes:
- I'm down to 3 saheeli. She's bad in multiples and bad in quite a lot of situations anyway. I use Kiki-Jiki as the fourth saheeli that has the added benefit of being tutorable, so the deck is even more consistent than when running just 4 saheeli and 4 guardian whithout kiki-jiki.
- I replaced Path to exiles with worship mainboard. Against the decks you want path (eldrazi, DS, merfolk, etc) worship is way better, especially mainboard, when most decks simply have no answer to that card. Mainly against inkmoth nexus path is better, so I give up a small percentage against affinity and infect, but those are not heavily played in my meta.
- instead of using voice-into-rallier-shenenigans for value, I just run 4x finks, which is value by itself. This saves your evolutions to ramp into something like Sigarda (which is way more powerful in grindy matchups than voice into rallier) or Kiki-Jiki to just win the game on the spot.
- I was sceptic at first, but after some testing I'm starting to become convinced about lotus cobra. T2 cobra is often a T3 win out of nowhere, (either with guardian + saheeli, or saheeli + evolution) I'm playing 3 cobra instead of 2 now.
I like Reflector Mage but I am afraid it does little vs some decks. Could it be a 3-of in the sideboard like some Bant Company lists run? I haven't tested him at all though in this shell, so take my comment lightly. Do you feel he wins you games where other 3-drops would not do it? Would love to hear more why you find him invaluable.
Also you are running 3 Ralliers. A thought: do you always have targets for him in the yard? I could see upping Evolutions to 3 in the main with 3 Ralliers to have a hugher chance of him getting value.
Also, I was running no Sun Titan for a long time. But with the amount of 3-drops you have you should add a spot for him!
So with Ref Mage, I started with only 1 in the main, but while testing it was like every single time I drew it, it was awesome. So I ended up throwing together the current list im playing as something a bit different just to see how it feels, and it felt great. Ref Mage is surprisingly high impact even if he only hits the battlefield once. If you get to blink him for more value, he can really bog down the opponents board, which can either stall until you combo, or open a lane for attackers. Running 3 just lets me see a Ref Mage in games more consistently. Also, as far as a sideboard card, i'm actually under the impression hes better in more match ups, than he is bad in match ups, which makes me want him main, and not in the side. I find myself rarely siding him fully out.
Renegade Rallier in high numbers feels amazing. There is literally always a target for him, and knowing you have multiple in the deck means you don't need to hold him off to make some big play, you can just shoot them out for pure value at a moments notice. Even just grabbing a fetch land to ramp feels super powerful, and gets Rallier on the field where he can be blinked later for more value. But Rallier with Voice is again, a surprisingly powerful value engine. It's extremely hard for decks to overcome Voice coming back over and over, and making Huge Elemental tokens everytime they try to deal with him. It's a super powerful synergy between those cards that feels awesome. Bringing back Wall is not the worst with Rallier, but bringing back Oaths feels pretty powerful. Rallier just has incredibly synergy with everything else the deck is doing, and that's exactly what i'm looking for with this build; Synergy, and Consistency.
Sun Titan is an absolute house in this deck. He's been in and out of lists, but currently i'm trying to keep everything low cmc and easily castable, but I might go back to Titan in the future. His combo with Saheeli can come out of nowhere to win games too.
So i've put a bunch of games into cockatrice over the past few days but havent really been keeping track of matches, just jamming games. I gotta say, the combination of Reflector mage, and Stonehorn Dignitary in the deck, with Cat and Saheeli is insanely annoying for the opponent. And then the value of Voice and Rallier on top of that is just a lot for the opponent to overcome while also worrying about holding up removal to stop a potential combo. The deck is feeling incredibly sweet right now.
New cards in my list:
- angel of sanctions as a catch all removal while being evasive pressure
- dusk against eldrazi, DS, BGx midrange (apart from sweeping only opponent's creatures, the value from Dawn seems also really good in grindy matchups). I'm going to try a full set in the board.
Further changes:
- I'm down to 3 saheeli. She's bad in multiples and bad in quite a lot of situations anyway. I use Kiki-Jiki as the fourth saheeli that has the added benefit of being tutorable, so the deck is even more consistent than when running just 4 saheeli and 4 guardian whithout kiki-jiki.
- I replaced Path to exiles with worship mainboard. Against the decks you want path (eldrazi, DS, merfolk, etc) worship is way better, especially mainboard, when most decks simply have no answer to that card. Mainly against inkmoth nexus path is better, so I give up a small percentage against affinity and infect, but those are not heavily played in my meta.
- instead of using voice-into-rallier-shenenigans for value, I just run 4x finks, which is value by itself. This saves your evolutions to ramp into something like Sigarda (which is way more powerful in grindy matchups than voice into rallier) or Kiki-Jiki to just win the game on the spot.
- I was sceptic at first, but after some testing I'm starting to become convinced about lotus cobra. T2 cobra is often a T3 win out of nowhere, (either with guardian + saheeli, or saheeli + evolution) I'm playing 3 cobra instead of 2 now.
Angel of Sanctions, and Dusk both look very interesting. I'll prolly test them out too, but i'm curious to hear about how they played for you if you have done any early testing with them yet.
I had been playing Kiki through about 15 matches and never ended up playing him even a single time. Maybe that was just weird testing for me, but I ended up taking him out because he warps the mana base, and never saw any play. Has he been actually doing anything for you?
I'm extremely interested in the Worship idea. That could be just another layer for the opponent to be forced to deal with that could possibly be pretty effective. It definitely seems a little random and iffy at first, but the more I think about it, the more i'm interested. One of the things Path does though is open up a lane for attackers. Playing no removal could find us in a place where our beatdown plan is shut down. My list with the Ref Mages, or maybe something like Deadeye Harpooner could potentially overcome that still though.
I personally rarely Evo Voice into Rallier. Voice and Rallier are both amazing on there own, and sometimes it's a good play, but I'm normally finding Cat or Stonehorn with Evos g1. Evo really shines in g2/3 though where you start to pull hate bullets with it. I agree Sigaarda can be a very powerful play to Evo into, shes won me a few games basically on her own.
Cobra is something I need to test I guess. It's hard to see it's power on paper. Seems to increase potential power/speed, but lower consistency.
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Not just the Tendo King, the power of the Galactic Leyline surpasses that of the Tempa Emperor, No!, It's magnificent power is even greater than that!
I like mage too although I haven't touched this deck since the Druid/vizier combo brought me back to abzan coco. Both decks are fun inf combo decks and my builds were already in on finks with saheeli.
Couple notes, I have always played with reveillark, and the card is bonkers in Kiki, and generates more value with cards like pia, but perhaps rebuying shaheeli is just too good?
A couple cards I brought over are staticaster and glen. I go a little deeper on the 4c mana base, and glen is just a house against spellbased combo which lists like these normally struggle against. My list omits path, and is built more like a traditional Kiki pod deck where if you are facing down a steel overseer or eldrazi displacer you try to tutor up a staticaster or Linvala if not just racing to a combo finish. Sideboard is a little rough but cards like keranos singlehandedly win matchups and ruric thar is a beast. Also, no engineered explosives anyone? That card is sooooo good!
G3 I entered a leyline with my opening hand. I got a RiP in my hand that I could land on turn 2, but I didn't (my bad) as I thought that in his T3, without the creature, wouldn't be able to combo, but he did. Fortunately, I resolved well the Gifts Ungiven sending the draw cards to graveyard along with the Grapeshot.
How could he have cast Gifts if you had leyline of sanctity out?
I play all the time online but don't always keep track of games. I ran a small series a few hours ago and here's the resaults:
-2/1 Goblins-
Got beatdown g1. - Cat then top decked Saheeli turn before I was about to die. - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-2/1 BW Tokens-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Discard and beatdown. - 2 Elemental + Voice + Rallier beatdown
-2/1 UW Holy Relic Affinity-
Saheeli then Cat combo. - He "combos" then gets the Beatdown. - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-2/0 Mono Black Control-
Cat the Saheeli combo. - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-0/2 Burn-
Opponent has perfect hand and burns me out. - Same g2.
First off, I started taking notes like this when I had a few other combos in the deck, as a way to see what way I was winning with most. But now that the current list is basically just Copy Cat, or beatdown, taking "notes" like this doesn't provide a whole lot of info. In future series i run, I'm gonna try to take a few more notes, and keep track of what i'm boarding in/out.
I've been doing incredible with this deck though. I haven't had a win percentage this high with a deck in a long long time. Burn completely crushed me though in this series. He had great hands, but he probably could have won those games with weaker hands also. It's a rough match for my current list. The Lone Missionarys in the board I thought would be good cuz they gain life, chump, and can come back with Rallier, but they just didnt do enough for me.
I'm thinking of swapping the Missionarys in the board for Worship. Thoughts?
Angel of Sanctions was sweet. They made Evo feel pretty powerful, having a strong 5 drop to evolve into, and being able to deal with pretty much any random problem is nice. Actually never embalmed her yet though, but the option is pretty sweet, and fits right into our value plan the deck has so strongly already.
Wall of Omens is a polarizing card. It's ok, but it never feels amazing. It has decent synergy with everything else though, and I can't find a better option for that slot. Thoughts?
Opinion on Geist-Honored Monk? Seems like It could be pretty powerful. A Bird in play, a Voice, you play this guy t4 and hes a 5/5 Vigilance, and gives you 2 flyers. Also potentially pumps up Voice if it had been, or gets killed. Outside of bolt range, outside of Push range.
Also Hero of Bladehold is a similar card that can be super powerful. Would going wide with a token type build be a road worth exploring?
Also Tireless Tracker? I've never played with him. Seems a bit slow, but I see him in a few lists. Does he play better than he looks?
So i've been playing games on Cockatrice like a maniac lately. This deck has actually gotten me back into the magic groove. Been having a lot of fun testing out different configurations. There really is so many options for a deck like this. I've come to a list that's a little out of the box, but has been playing very consistently, and feels pretty awesome. Here's where im at..
2 Noble Hierarch
4 Voice of Resurgence
3 Wall of Omens
3 Reflector Mage
3 Renegade Rallier
1 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
4 Felidar Guardian
4 Saheeli Rai
4 Oath of Nissa
3 Path to Exile
2 Eldritch Evolution
3 Wooded Foothills
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Razorverge Thicket
2 Temple Garden
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Fire-Lit Thicket
2 Forest
1 Plains
1 Eldritch Evolution
1 Blessed Alliance
2 Stony Silence
2 Lone Missionary
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Archangel of Tithes
1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Caldera Hellion
So right off the bat what sticks out is 3 Reflector Mage, and 3 Renegade Rallier.
-Reflector Mage
It has been brought up before, but seriously, this guy is stupid good in this shell. Even just hardcasting it once can be surpringly good, and really stalls the opponent, but once you start blinking it with Cat or Saheeli it just gets so easy to completely stall out the opponents board. It forces the opponent to burn removal on him because he really is that good. Running 3 might seem crazy because you don't necessarily want him against something like Ad nauseam, but right now, this guy feels powerful almost every single time I see it. Running less crazy singles and upping numbers in an attempt to increase consistency.
-Renegade Rallier
My previous lists have all only ran 1 Rallier, and it was just OK. The strange thing about it, is the more you run, the better it actually gets. There are so many crazy value plays in this shell with Rallier, and the combination of Rallier and Voice of Resurgance is surprisingly incredibly powerful, and can be very hard for the opponent to overcome the incredible value between Voice and Rallier. Beyond Voice though, you can recur Fetchs and actually ramp mana, recur Oaths for Card selections, recur Walls for card draw, or even recur bolted Birds.
What do you guys think of something like Soul Snare, or Seal of Fire, as removal which can brought back with Rallier?
Here's my recent testing results with this list:
-2/0 Taking Turns-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Saheeli then Cat combo.
-2/1 GRb Valukuut-
Omen + Titan. - Saheeli then Cat combo - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-2/1 Mono R Prison-
Saheeli then Cat combo. - Koth & Chandra Ult - Saheeli then Cat combo.
-2/0 Illusions-
Cat then Saheeli combo. Voice + Elemental beatdown.
-2/0 Grixis Control-
Cat then Saheeli. - Sigaarda beatdown.
-2/0 Mono B Zombies-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Cat then Saheeli.
-1/2 Goblins-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Stuck on 2 lands and got beatdown, and finished with 2 Grenades. - Same g3.
-2/1 Grixis Delver-
Double Voice/Elemental beatdown. - Double Delver beatdown. - Double Voice/Elemental beatdown.
-2/0 Doran-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-1/2 BW Control-
Voice/ Elemental + Rallier beatdown - G2-3 opponent goes Inquisition, thoughtseize, inquisition, collective brutality, liliana, emptys his hand, and continues to top deck like a friggin champ for about 10 turns.
-2/1 Taking Turns-
He comboed off. - GG to Teeg. - Teeg stalled him, and won with beatdown.
-2/0 Skred Red-
P&K + Elemental beatdown. - Elemental beatdown.
-1/2 Tezzerator-
G1 beatdown ftw. - Draw nothing but lands for like 5-6 turns. - Mull to 4 on unplayable 1 land hands ruins me.
-2/0 GR Indomitable Creativity -
T3 combo. - Cat then Saheeli next turn.
-2/1 Goblins-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Goblin beatdown. - P&K & Ref Mage beatdown.
Been doing pretty well. Lost a couple matches, but had some bad luck in the games I lost. This list feels extremely consistent. The numbers are just feeling right on, and each card has great individual strength, as well as amazing synergy with everything else. Feeling good right now.
-Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
One interesting thing i've noticed, is in all the games i've played with this list, I haven't actually won with Kiki-Jiki even a single time. I wasn't expecting that. I figured it wouldn't come up too often, but that it would still come up every once in a while, but it actually hasn't. With the number of 3 drops it felt right to have a 5 drop to Evo into, and Kiki seemed like a solid choice when trying to keep consistency and synergy to a max. I'm thinking now I need a different 5 drop. I can't find anything that seems MD worthy though. Please guys, I need some ideas here? I could just go back to Sun Titan, which is a crazy power house, but a 5 drop would be ideal for where I want to be.
Seal of Fire doesn't have that many good targets now and I'm not sure it's worth a card slot.
Didn't realize Snare wasn't modern legal.
Seal of Fire actually has some potential for cool value plays though. With Rallier, you can actually deal 4 damage to a creature if you need to, instead of just 2. The activation of Seal being free gives you some cool options like, Seal a creature, Play Rallier, seal another creature. You just 3 for 1ed, killed 2 guys and got a 3/2 for just 3 mana. Definitely some potential value.
It's been a while since I've played the deck, but Reveillark was an absolute house when I played with it. Seriously, there's just so much value there it's unreal. Definitely recommend checking it out. The only thing it doesn't get back in your list is Rallier.
3 Noble Hierarch
4 Voice of Resurgence
3 Wall of Omens
3 Reflector Mage
3 Renegade Rallier
1 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Stonehorn Dignitary
4 Felidar Guardian
4 Saheeli Rai
4 Oath of Nissa
3 Path to Exile
2 Eldritch Evolution
3 Wooded Foothills
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Razorverge Thicket
2 Temple Garden
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
1 Sacred Foundry
2 Forest
1 Plains
======================
1 Eldritch Evolution
1 Blessed Alliance
2 Stony Silence
2 Lone Missionary
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Archangel of Tithes
1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Caldera Hellion
Feeling pretty good about things right now. Low overall cmc, and high numbers to make things as consistent as I can, and with high impact ETB creatures.
Thoughts on Venser, the Sojourner?
Anyone else still playing/testing this? What are your guys lists looking like lately?? Any interesting testing notes or observations?
Wish there were a few more people as excited on this as I am. Come on guys, this deck has real, and serious potential.
I love your list, I will run it tomorrow at FNM. I have been paying modern saheeli combos for a few weeks.
BGStandard Green AggroGB
UWRGModern Saheeli CobraGRWU
UBRGLegacy StormGRBU
Wizards Certified Rules Advisor
You have the wrong link. I think you meant to link to this one.
I am thinking of adding 1 aegis of the gods for playing against adnaus/storm type decks.
I also feel like trying 2 of the new nissa in here.
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Voice of Resurgence
4 Felidar Guardian
2 Restoration Angel
2 Wall of Omens
2 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Blade Splicer
1 Eternal Witness
1 Renegade Rallier
1 Sun Titan
1 Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
Planeswalkers
4 Saheeli Rai
1 Ajani, Mentor of Heroes
Spells
3 Path to Exile
2 Eldritch Evolution
4 Oath of Nissa
Lands (22)
2 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothils
1 Polluted Delta
1 Flooded Strand
1 Bloodstainer Mire
2 Temple Garden
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Stomping Ground
1 Breeding Pool
1 Raging Ravine
1 Spiring Vantage
1 Cinder Gale
1 Cooperline Gorge
3 Forest
3 Plains
3 Leyline of Sanctity
2 Stony Silence
2 Ghostly Prison
2 Geist of Saint Traft
2 Kor Firewalker
2 Rest in peace
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Spirit of the Labyrinth
Last night at the FNM I ended up with a 3-1, ending 4th.
Review and thoughts:
1st game: vs Merfolks -
G1 was a bit easy because of a miss play from my opponent. I got in game a token of the Voice 3/3 and attacked only with a lord 2/2, no other one was played, so it died and made me win G1. I entered Ghostly Prison and Stony Silence, don't remember well what I get rid of.
G2 was easy for him, he got a perfect hand and I was blewed.
G3 I had 2 felidar, bouncing twice an Oath of Nissa for trying to look for Saheeli, and with my Ajani too, but I couldn't found nothing good. With island walk I couldn't resist much more with 7 elemental tokens and big fishes. Neither in G2 and G3 couldn't see a sideboard card.
Overall: 0 - 1
2nd game: bye
Overall: 1 - 1
3rd game: vs PiF -
G1 he comboed with Grapeshot at turn 4 and I didn't had a Path to Exile in hand to get rid of his two creatures. I entered from sideboard almost all, they leylines, the ghostly prison (for the Empty the Warrens, Spirit of the Labyrinth, Eidolon of Rhetoric and Rest in Peace).
G2 he comboed turn two with Empty the Warrens, putting 10 goblin tokens. In my third turn I landed a Ghostly Prison (he didn't expect that at all!) and the next two turns I comboed with Felidar + Saheeli.
G3 I entered a leyline with my opening hand. I got a RiP in my hand that I could land on turn 2, but I didn't (my bad) as I thought that in his T3, without the creature, wouldn't be able to combo, but he did. Fortunately, I resolved well the Gifts Ungiven sending the draw cards to graveyard along with the Grapeshot. He only could remove my leyline with a Wear/Tear after 14-15 storm. In my turn I landed the RiP (now yes!) and I won by brute force with the Voices.
Overall: 2 - 1
G4: vs Affinity
Game one was basically a free win for affinity player. I entered Stony silence and Ghostly Prison from my sideboard.
Game two I entered T3 Ghostly prison and next turn the Stony silence. As he laked of mana to attack and without attaching the equipment, I could run more than him and combo him.
Game three was my perfect hand against him. I got all my lands with red (without white), birds of paradise, ghostly prison and stony silence. I kept it, with T2 stony silence and T3 ghostly prison. Basically he got stomped with the infect lands. With my draws I got a Kiki-Jiki, Pia and a Voice. I just kept copying the first turns the birds if he tried to attack me with the infect creatures, and later on, copying at the end of turn my voice and Pia and Kiran Nalaar.
Overall: 3 - 1
The thing is that i only found once an Eldritch Evolution, and zero the Sun Titan, so I couldn't see it's potential in this deck, but I'm sure it would do awesome returning Saheeli or some other cards. Also I liked the Kiki-Jiki in this deck even I only found him in my last match.
Anyways, I liked very much this deck!
Sounds like you got a bit lucky and hit all your sb cards when needed. I much prefer kataki over stony because with the evolution it's like you have 5 in your deck. With kci growing in numbers t2 kataki is nice as well.
And yeah, I got a bit lucky with the sideboard! Just not against the fishes! But this is magic, not always is going to be perfect!
New cards in my list:
- angel of sanctions as a catch all removal while being evasive pressure
- dusk against eldrazi, DS, BGx midrange (apart from sweeping only opponent's creatures, the value from Dawn seems also really good in grindy matchups). I'm going to try a full set in the board.
Further changes:
- I'm down to 3 saheeli. She's bad in multiples and bad in quite a lot of situations anyway. I use Kiki-Jiki as the fourth saheeli that has the added benefit of being tutorable, so the deck is even more consistent than when running just 4 saheeli and 4 guardian whithout kiki-jiki.
- I replaced Path to exiles with worship mainboard. Against the decks you want path (eldrazi, DS, merfolk, etc) worship is way better, especially mainboard, when most decks simply have no answer to that card. Mainly against inkmoth nexus path is better, so I give up a small percentage against affinity and infect, but those are not heavily played in my meta.
- instead of using voice-into-rallier-shenenigans for value, I just run 4x finks, which is value by itself. This saves your evolutions to ramp into something like Sigarda (which is way more powerful in grindy matchups than voice into rallier) or Kiki-Jiki to just win the game on the spot.
- I was sceptic at first, but after some testing I'm starting to become convinced about lotus cobra. T2 cobra is often a T3 win out of nowhere, (either with guardian + saheeli, or saheeli + evolution) I'm playing 3 cobra instead of 2 now.
My list after Amonkhet:
4 birds of paradise
1 noble hierarch
3 lotus cobra
4 voice of resurgence
1 glen elendra archmage
4 felidar guardian
1 deadeye harpooner
4 kitchen finks
1 kiki-jiki, mirror breaker
1 angel of sanctions
1 sigarda, host of herons
spells
4 oath of nissa
3 saheeli rai
3 eldritch evolution
3 worship
2 arid mesa
4 wooded foothills
4 windswept heath
1 plains
2 forest
1 mountain
1 hallowed fountain
1 breeding pool
1 temple garden
1 stomping ground
2 razorverge thicket
2 gavony township
1 acidic slime
1 glen elendra archmage
2 stony silence
2 selfless spirit
1 scavenging ooze
4 dusk
1 izzet staticaster
1 eidolon of rhetoric
1 gaddock teeg
1 reclamation sage
Feedback on my choices is always welcome!
So with Ref Mage, I started with only 1 in the main, but while testing it was like every single time I drew it, it was awesome. So I ended up throwing together the current list im playing as something a bit different just to see how it feels, and it felt great. Ref Mage is surprisingly high impact even if he only hits the battlefield once. If you get to blink him for more value, he can really bog down the opponents board, which can either stall until you combo, or open a lane for attackers. Running 3 just lets me see a Ref Mage in games more consistently. Also, as far as a sideboard card, i'm actually under the impression hes better in more match ups, than he is bad in match ups, which makes me want him main, and not in the side. I find myself rarely siding him fully out.
Renegade Rallier in high numbers feels amazing. There is literally always a target for him, and knowing you have multiple in the deck means you don't need to hold him off to make some big play, you can just shoot them out for pure value at a moments notice. Even just grabbing a fetch land to ramp feels super powerful, and gets Rallier on the field where he can be blinked later for more value. But Rallier with Voice is again, a surprisingly powerful value engine. It's extremely hard for decks to overcome Voice coming back over and over, and making Huge Elemental tokens everytime they try to deal with him. It's a super powerful synergy between those cards that feels awesome. Bringing back Wall is not the worst with Rallier, but bringing back Oaths feels pretty powerful. Rallier just has incredibly synergy with everything else the deck is doing, and that's exactly what i'm looking for with this build; Synergy, and Consistency.
Sun Titan is an absolute house in this deck. He's been in and out of lists, but currently i'm trying to keep everything low cmc and easily castable, but I might go back to Titan in the future. His combo with Saheeli can come out of nowhere to win games too.
So i've put a bunch of games into cockatrice over the past few days but havent really been keeping track of matches, just jamming games. I gotta say, the combination of Reflector mage, and Stonehorn Dignitary in the deck, with Cat and Saheeli is insanely annoying for the opponent. And then the value of Voice and Rallier on top of that is just a lot for the opponent to overcome while also worrying about holding up removal to stop a potential combo. The deck is feeling incredibly sweet right now.
Angel of Sanctions, and Dusk both look very interesting. I'll prolly test them out too, but i'm curious to hear about how they played for you if you have done any early testing with them yet.
I had been playing Kiki through about 15 matches and never ended up playing him even a single time. Maybe that was just weird testing for me, but I ended up taking him out because he warps the mana base, and never saw any play. Has he been actually doing anything for you?
I'm extremely interested in the Worship idea. That could be just another layer for the opponent to be forced to deal with that could possibly be pretty effective. It definitely seems a little random and iffy at first, but the more I think about it, the more i'm interested. One of the things Path does though is open up a lane for attackers. Playing no removal could find us in a place where our beatdown plan is shut down. My list with the Ref Mages, or maybe something like Deadeye Harpooner could potentially overcome that still though.
I personally rarely Evo Voice into Rallier. Voice and Rallier are both amazing on there own, and sometimes it's a good play, but I'm normally finding Cat or Stonehorn with Evos g1. Evo really shines in g2/3 though where you start to pull hate bullets with it. I agree Sigaarda can be a very powerful play to Evo into, shes won me a few games basically on her own.
Cobra is something I need to test I guess. It's hard to see it's power on paper. Seems to increase potential power/speed, but lower consistency.
Not sure how I feel about Chord in the deck though.
Couple notes, I have always played with reveillark, and the card is bonkers in Kiki, and generates more value with cards like pia, but perhaps rebuying shaheeli is just too good?
A couple cards I brought over are staticaster and glen. I go a little deeper on the 4c mana base, and glen is just a house against spellbased combo which lists like these normally struggle against. My list omits path, and is built more like a traditional Kiki pod deck where if you are facing down a steel overseer or eldrazi displacer you try to tutor up a staticaster or Linvala if not just racing to a combo finish. Sideboard is a little rough but cards like keranos singlehandedly win matchups and ruric thar is a beast. Also, no engineered explosives anyone? That card is sooooo good!
How could he have cast Gifts if you had leyline of sanctity out?
The current List:
3 Noble Hierarch
4 Voice of Resurgence
3 Wall of Omens
3 Reflector Mage
3 Renegade Rallier
1 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Angel of Sanctions
4 Felidar Guardian
4 Saheeli Rai
4 Oath of Nissa
3 Path to Exile
2 Eldritch Evolution
3 Wooded Foothills
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Razorverge Thicket
2 Temple Garden
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
1 Sacred Foundry
2 Forest
1 Plains
======================
1 Eldritch Evolution
1 Blessed Alliance
2 Stony Silence
2 Lone Missionary
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Archangel of Tithes
1 Linvala, keeper of Silence
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Caldera Hellion
I play all the time online but don't always keep track of games. I ran a small series a few hours ago and here's the resaults:
-2/1 Goblins-
Got beatdown g1. - Cat then top decked Saheeli turn before I was about to die. - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-2/1 BW Tokens-
Cat then Saheeli combo. - Discard and beatdown. - 2 Elemental + Voice + Rallier beatdown
-2/1 UW Holy Relic Affinity-
Saheeli then Cat combo. - He "combos" then gets the Beatdown. - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-2/0 Mono Black Control-
Cat the Saheeli combo. - Cat then Saheeli combo.
-0/2 Burn-
Opponent has perfect hand and burns me out. - Same g2.
First off, I started taking notes like this when I had a few other combos in the deck, as a way to see what way I was winning with most. But now that the current list is basically just Copy Cat, or beatdown, taking "notes" like this doesn't provide a whole lot of info. In future series i run, I'm gonna try to take a few more notes, and keep track of what i'm boarding in/out.
I've been doing incredible with this deck though. I haven't had a win percentage this high with a deck in a long long time. Burn completely crushed me though in this series. He had great hands, but he probably could have won those games with weaker hands also. It's a rough match for my current list. The Lone Missionarys in the board I thought would be good cuz they gain life, chump, and can come back with Rallier, but they just didnt do enough for me.
I'm thinking of swapping the Missionarys in the board for Worship. Thoughts?
Angel of Sanctions was sweet. They made Evo feel pretty powerful, having a strong 5 drop to evolve into, and being able to deal with pretty much any random problem is nice. Actually never embalmed her yet though, but the option is pretty sweet, and fits right into our value plan the deck has so strongly already.
Wall of Omens is a polarizing card. It's ok, but it never feels amazing. It has decent synergy with everything else though, and I can't find a better option for that slot. Thoughts?
Also Hero of Bladehold is a similar card that can be super powerful. Would going wide with a token type build be a road worth exploring?
Imagine Bird t1, Voice t2, Hero t3, Geist t4. That's a pretty gnarly curve.