Jace is incredibly tempting, but I still prefer snappy. Push, snap, push is still a very strong line.. Especially now with death Jund becoming so popular. Snappy has versatility as well, being an ambush viper, or EoT flash in to beat next turn, and flashing back a thoughtsieze or IoK are still perfectly fine plays. I agree about counter in the main deck.. After playing Willy Edels list a fait bit, stubborn denial either was amazing or dead in hand.. Now I understand that's the nature of the card, but I think that there were a few too many games where is was pretty subpar.. I'm currently going to test a few cards in it's slot and see how I go.
My choice of Snap over baby jace comes down to two things: pressure and timing. 2 power is not a lot, but it's a helluva (is my California showing yet?) Lot better than 0/2. And being able to snap push at the end of turn then swing on an empty field, to me anyway, beats the ability to rebuy ancestral visions anyday. That said, jaces ult is one of the few ways to win after Abzan company goes INF life...
To the point of having a GBx template available via Jund and Abzan, I submit to you this: Jund and Abzan are different decks. They share some cards and some strategies, but they play to distinctly different strengths. It stands to reason that Sultai will also be its own flavor and strategy, one that could just as easily be modeled after Grixis style draw-going into delve threats as Jund style sorcery speed attrition. I'm not dismissing your build or style of Sultai, just asking you to acknowledge that others exist and are considered viable until proven otherwise, either through testing or tourney.
Jace and Snap aren't mutually exclusive either. Consider this list that took 5th at States last year, which I used as a model for the latest build I've testing:
Also, Jace doesn't let you rebuy Ancestral Vision unfortunately. Since AV has no mana cost, you can't pay for it. I think you meant to type Serum Visions, but just wanted to make sure there was no confusion
I've been jamming Sultai Flayer at my past few local modern 4 rounders after a more controlling sultai build was posting poor results. I found myself constantly boarding the Grim Flayers from the board to the main so I figured why not give it a crack as the go to. Went 3-1 and 4-0 with the only loss coming against Jeskai when I mistapped super late in the game and didn't leave of Blue for a spellskite activation that was preventing bolt to the face for the loss.
Anyway Grim Flayer is an absolutely absurd magic card and in a deck with a lot of situational spells and ways to abuse the graveyard his trigger is awesome. I'm at the point where I'm using Goyf's as bait for flayers in a lot of situations.
The main plan of the deck is to set up a fast threat. Thanks to thoughscour we have an impressive 8 threats that can come down on turn 2. Goyf is probably the worst threat in the deck right now. Flayer fuels our draws going forward while being relatively easy to turn on and the Delve monsters dodge the commonly played removal completely (Push and Bolt). Flayer's trample is also been surprisingly relavent in my games.
The most common criticism I've run into is people asking why I'm playing Ancestral Vision in a Liliana of the Veil deck. I don't find them to be anymore dis-synergistic than Lili + Bob. And resolving one even in the midgame can be backbreaking for a lot of decks. Once you've stabilized and pushed both players to hellbent with lili not many decks can beat a draw three.
Collective Brutality is the real deal, I've been trying to make room for a third but don't think I can afford to cut an IoK or the TS for it.
I've been going back and forth on the Maelstrom Pulse vs Abrupt Decay numbers. I really wanted to make room for 2 Pulses to have more answers for threats Push can't handle, but the instant speed and lower CMC has me sticking to 2 decays for now.
I have not had any issues turning on Delirium and have minimal interest in introducing air to the deck and running copies of bauble.
The sideboard is still very much a work in progress, but I've been very impressed with the Ishkanah/Thrun/Traverse package. Gives me a really solid creature based trump card in the grindy mirrors and makes me less soft to lingering souls which is otherwise an absolute back breaker.
Seems like an interesting take on Death's Shadow. I can't argue with any of his choices. If only Baubles weren't so dang expensive I'd pick them up and try it out.
Your List looks very similar to a Abzan list, minus the pte and hierarchs. What are the strengths of this deck compared to Jund and Abzan? I'm in the process of getting cards for BG(x) decks and I really like the Sultai colors.
Your List looks very similar to a Abzan list, minus the pte and hierarchs. What are the strengths of this deck compared to Jund and Abzan? I'm in the process of getting cards for BG(x) decks and I really like the Sultai colors.
There are a few advantages. First thought scour is awesome with Delve and Grim Flayer. It reduces the need to run things like bauble and tarfire. Not many decks are built to handle turn 2 Tasigur.
Second Ancestral Vision is incredibly powerful. And given the cheap average CMC of the deck it's usually pretty easy to slip it into your curve.
Third Tar Pit is by far the best creature land of the B/x decks. Unblockable is so good.
Last access to Tiny Jace or Snapcaster out of the board is crazy strong. I'm on Jace at the moment because people have been bringing in GY hate and the looter side is better than the 2/1 against leyline and RiP.
Basically vs abzan the calculus is lingering souls, path, and better sideboard options vs thought scour, ancestral and tar pit.
a small addendum to grapefruits assessment, tar pit IS great, but in a world of fatal push, lumbering falls is amazing as well. i personally run a 2/2 split.
No sideboard yet, but there's a lot of things I like.
I've considered Mishra's Bauble, Nameless Inversion, and Architects of Will. Maybe one of those would be good, but I'm hesitant to drop on flashback targets. Instead, I'm trying what worked out well with RUG Delver which is just relying on Instant, Land, Creature, and Sorcery. There's a couple PW's in there too if you really need them and both Jace/Liliana can help you discard additional cards.
There's a couple different builds that could be possible here. For example Flayer over Bob, which would probably then lead towards wanting another Delirium enabler. I'm pretty sure that means I want a pure fetch/shock manabase, with a few basics to fetch once I've taken enough damage. Another thing if you go for the Flayer route, which involves some bigger creatures, is that you could use Thought Scour+Artful Dodge. Dodge inparticular I think has a lot of potential filling a similar role as Temur Battle Rage to get through opponents that go wide.
One thing that I'm finding difficult right now is the manabase. Fastlands are ordinarily pretty good, but fetches add more enablers for Push, and fetch/shock also enable Shadow.
On Tar Pit vs Lumbering falls I think it's heavily influenced by the rest of your list. Since I'm heavy on discard with 6 spells plus the 4 Lili's I can often activate Tar Pit on an empty handed opponent. In a list that is less interested in discard I would be much more interested in Lumbering Falls.
I've been dabbling in this archetype a bit. Of note i made it to be very similar to jund/abzan. I wanted to be more proactive so i skipped out on the counters in the main deck. That being said i'm also opting for Jace, Vryn's Prodigy over snapcaster mage because the discard spells are much better with Jace. Here's my list.
The card that sticks out in the sideboard is rain of tears. I like it more than fulminator mage simply because of jace. Should make for multiple land destroys a game vs tron along with counter spells.
I think you're mimicing Jund a bit too closely. I think enabling Delirium would work better with blue over red using the sort of setup I outlined above.
If you want something to replace Temur Battle Rage though, look into Artful Dodge. It goes real well with Thought Scour and Grim Flayer.
The problem I'm having is fitting both cantrips and discard.
There is already an outline of how GBx decks can be successful in modern. Abzan and Jund are perfect examples. So what we need to do is copy and paste what makes them successful and put that into our deck. This means putting discard, efficient threats, and cheap yet broad answers. So now that we have our Inquisition of Kozilek's, Tarmogoyf's, and Abrupt Decay's how can we do something in blue that gives us an advantage over red or white?
Now for the people who want to play Delver of Secrets or a more tempo oriented deck, then it would probably be better to stick with counter spells and snapcasters, but after playing both types of decks I can undoubtedly say that the Control version is the stronger of the two and if one were to become a tier 1 deck, I would definitely place my bets on the control version.
To the point of having a GBx template available via Jund and Abzan, I submit to you this: Jund and Abzan are different decks. They share some cards and some strategies, but they play to distinctly different strengths. It stands to reason that Sultai will also be its own flavor and strategy, one that could just as easily be modeled after Grixis style draw-going into delve threats as Jund style sorcery speed attrition. I'm not dismissing your build or style of Sultai, just asking you to acknowledge that others exist and are considered viable until proven otherwise, either through testing or tourney.
Jund and Abzan have a history of being very successful in modern so that's why I chose to model them instead of Grixis for my build of Sultai. I mentioned that you could build a tempo oriented build of Sultai, but I also said that I believe the control version is stronger. This doesn't mean that a tempo build wouldn't be better in certain metagames, but rather on a card for card basis the control version beats the tempo version in card power level. I did throw in my two cents saying that I also think if one were to become tier one it would be control and maybe that's where my mistake was since that's just my own opinion.
Jace and Snap aren't mutually exclusive either. Consider this list that took 5th at States last year, which I used as a model for the latest build I've testing:
I've been dabbling in this archetype a bit. Of note i made it to be very similar to jund/abzan. I wanted to be more proactive so i skipped out on the counters in the main deck. That being said i'm also opting for Jace, Vryn's Prodigy over snapcaster mage because the discard spells are much better with Jace. Here's my list.
The card that sticks out in the sideboard is rain of tears. I like it more than fulminator mage simply because of jace. Should make for multiple land destroys a game vs tron along with counter spells.
I've been dabbling in this archetype a bit. Of note i made it to be very similar to jund/abzan. I wanted to be more proactive so i skipped out on the counters in the main deck. That being said i'm also opting for Jace, Vryn's Prodigy over snapcaster mage because the discard spells are much better with Jace. Here's my list.
The card that sticks out in the sideboard is rain of tears. I like it more than fulminator mage simply because of jace. Should make for multiple land destroys a game vs tron along with counter spells.
Completely agree with this if you're playing shadow you need some sort of I win button. Without the threat of battle rage Death's Shadow is much less threatening.
The cantrip aspect of it is nice. But the flashback on Artful Dodge seems too good to pass up in a thought scour + Liliana deck. Happy to see it go to the bin till it's relevant.
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To the point of having a GBx template available via Jund and Abzan, I submit to you this: Jund and Abzan are different decks. They share some cards and some strategies, but they play to distinctly different strengths. It stands to reason that Sultai will also be its own flavor and strategy, one that could just as easily be modeled after Grixis style draw-going into delve threats as Jund style sorcery speed attrition. I'm not dismissing your build or style of Sultai, just asking you to acknowledge that others exist and are considered viable until proven otherwise, either through testing or tourney.
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=102258
Also, Jace doesn't let you rebuy Ancestral Vision unfortunately. Since AV has no mana cost, you can't pay for it. I think you meant to type Serum Visions, but just wanted to make sure there was no confusion
Anyway Grim Flayer is an absolutely absurd magic card and in a deck with a lot of situational spells and ways to abuse the graveyard his trigger is awesome. I'm at the point where I'm using Goyf's as bait for flayers in a lot of situations.
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Grim Flayer
3x Tasigur, The Golden Fang
1x Gurmag Angler
Sorceries (10)
3x Ancestral Vision
3x Inquisition of Kozilek
1x Thoughtseize
2x Collective Brutality
1x Maelstrom Pulse
Instants (10)
4x Thought Scour
4x Fatal Push
2x Abrupt Decay
4x Liliana of the Veil
1x Liliana, the Last Hope
Lands (23)
3x Verdant Catacombs
3x Polluted Delta
2x Misty Rainforest
2x Overgrown Tomb
1x Watery Grave
1x Breeding Pool
3x Darkslick Shores
4x Creeping Tar Pit
2x Swamp
1x Island
1x Forest
3x Fulminator Mage
2x Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
2x Spellskite
2x Scavenging Ooze
1x Maelstrom Pulse
1x Collective Brutality
1x Traverse the Ulvenwald
1x Ishkanah, Grafwidow
1x Thrun, the Last Troll
1x Night of Souls' Betrayal
The main plan of the deck is to set up a fast threat. Thanks to thoughscour we have an impressive 8 threats that can come down on turn 2. Goyf is probably the worst threat in the deck right now. Flayer fuels our draws going forward while being relatively easy to turn on and the Delve monsters dodge the commonly played removal completely (Push and Bolt). Flayer's trample is also been surprisingly relavent in my games.
The most common criticism I've run into is people asking why I'm playing Ancestral Vision in a Liliana of the Veil deck. I don't find them to be anymore dis-synergistic than Lili + Bob. And resolving one even in the midgame can be backbreaking for a lot of decks. Once you've stabilized and pushed both players to hellbent with lili not many decks can beat a draw three.
Collective Brutality is the real deal, I've been trying to make room for a third but don't think I can afford to cut an IoK or the TS for it.
I've been going back and forth on the Maelstrom Pulse vs Abrupt Decay numbers. I really wanted to make room for 2 Pulses to have more answers for threats Push can't handle, but the instant speed and lower CMC has me sticking to 2 decays for now.
I have not had any issues turning on Delirium and have minimal interest in introducing air to the deck and running copies of bauble.
The sideboard is still very much a work in progress, but I've been very impressed with the Ishkanah/Thrun/Traverse package. Gives me a really solid creature based trump card in the grindy mirrors and makes me less soft to lingering souls which is otherwise an absolute back breaker.
There are a few advantages. First thought scour is awesome with Delve and Grim Flayer. It reduces the need to run things like bauble and tarfire. Not many decks are built to handle turn 2 Tasigur.
Second Ancestral Vision is incredibly powerful. And given the cheap average CMC of the deck it's usually pretty easy to slip it into your curve.
Third Tar Pit is by far the best creature land of the B/x decks. Unblockable is so good.
Last access to Tiny Jace or Snapcaster out of the board is crazy strong. I'm on Jace at the moment because people have been bringing in GY hate and the looter side is better than the 2/1 against leyline and RiP.
Basically vs abzan the calculus is lingering souls, path, and better sideboard options vs thought scour, ancestral and tar pit.
I've been operating on a similar idea. I have yet to take it to an FNM though.
This is where I'm currently at:
4 Polluted Delta
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Watery Grave
2 Overgrown Tomb
1 Breeding Pool
2 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Island
4 Blooming Marsh
4 Death's Shadow
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Snapcaster Mage
2 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
4 Dark Confidant
Planeswalkers 3
3 Liliana of the Veil
Spells 18
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Thoughtseize
3 Traverse the Ulvenwald
4 Fatal Push
3 Abrupt Decay
No sideboard yet, but there's a lot of things I like.
I've considered Mishra's Bauble, Nameless Inversion, and Architects of Will. Maybe one of those would be good, but I'm hesitant to drop on flashback targets. Instead, I'm trying what worked out well with RUG Delver which is just relying on Instant, Land, Creature, and Sorcery. There's a couple PW's in there too if you really need them and both Jace/Liliana can help you discard additional cards.
There's a couple different builds that could be possible here. For example Flayer over Bob, which would probably then lead towards wanting another Delirium enabler. I'm pretty sure that means I want a pure fetch/shock manabase, with a few basics to fetch once I've taken enough damage. Another thing if you go for the Flayer route, which involves some bigger creatures, is that you could use Thought Scour+Artful Dodge. Dodge inparticular I think has a lot of potential filling a similar role as Temur Battle Rage to get through opponents that go wide.
One thing that I'm finding difficult right now is the manabase. Fastlands are ordinarily pretty good, but fetches add more enablers for Push, and fetch/shock also enable Shadow.
1 Dark Confidant
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Scavenging Ooze
3 Grim Flayer
1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Thoughtseize
2 Serum Visions
4 Fatal Push
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Go for the Throat
1 Victim of Night
3 Liliana of the Veil
1 Liliana, the Last Hope
2 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Breeding Pool
2 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Darkslick Shores
1 Forest
1 Hissing Quagmire
1 Island
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Overgrown Tomb
3 Polluted Delta
2 Swamp
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Watery Grave
3 Ancestral Vision
1 Collective Brutality
1 Damnation
1 Ceremonious Rejection
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Kitchen Finks
2 Negate
1 Night of Souls' Betrayal
3 Rain of Tears
The card that sticks out in the sideboard is rain of tears. I like it more than fulminator mage simply because of jace. Should make for multiple land destroys a game vs tron along with counter spells.
If you want something to replace Temur Battle Rage though, look into Artful Dodge. It goes real well with Thought Scour and Grim Flayer.
The problem I'm having is fitting both cantrips and discard.
Jund and Abzan have a history of being very successful in modern so that's why I chose to model them instead of Grixis for my build of Sultai. I mentioned that you could build a tempo oriented build of Sultai, but I also said that I believe the control version is stronger. This doesn't mean that a tempo build wouldn't be better in certain metagames, but rather on a card for card basis the control version beats the tempo version in card power level. I did throw in my two cents saying that I also think if one were to become tier one it would be control and maybe that's where my mistake was since that's just my own opinion.
This is very true. I do prefer to play Jace as a four-of, but having a few snapcasters can be good as well.
I like it. Similar to my own
Link to deck @ TappedOut.net
yeah yours looks sweet too, a lot of the cards you have in that i don't i wish i could find room for lol
Begrudgingly, I think I have to include Street Wraith, which makes me want to go a little heavier on Delirium.
So what I'm thinking is a very cantrip heavy build that can play a Delver numbers of each card
4 Polluted Delta
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Watery Grave
2 Overgrown Tomb
1 Breeding Pool
2 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Island
3 Death's Shadow
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
2 Snapcaster Mage
3 Grim Flayer
4 Street Wraith
Planeswalkers 2
2 Liliana of the Veil
Spells 20
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Thoughtseize
4 Traverse the Ulvenwald
4 Thought Scour
3 Fatal Push
1 Collective Brutality
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Artful Dodge
The cantrip aspect of it is nice. But the flashback on Artful Dodge seems too good to pass up in a thought scour + Liliana deck. Happy to see it go to the bin till it's relevant.