I think that's too many finishers, unless some are in the board.
Real question: Why is that too many "Finishers"?
Why is it okay to run 5 planeswalkers but not 5 creature cards that have a huge impact on the game, and can actually win it in a timely fashion? It's been very good in testing. Not to mention, Verdict into Blood Baron/Obzedat is very strong.
Why is it okay to run 5 planeswalkers but not 5 creature cards that have a huge impact on the game, and can actually win it in a timely fashion? It's been very good in testing. Not to mention, Verdict into Blood Baron/Obzedat is very strong.
While Verdict into a dude is pretty good often times we need to board wipe more than once, which eliminates your dude.
As to your "real question" Planeswalkers do more than just turn sideways, like your creatures do. Also a simple spell could remove your creature, where there are stricter options not found in every deck to deal with walkers.
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currently playing:
Standard UW Control UWB Control UB Control MODERN BRGJund X Affinity UWR Control
One obvious benefit of the PW's in this deck is their cmc is much lower than those finishers. Lili comes down turn 3 and Jace and Sorin come down turn 4. Jus saying. Still messing with it though.
Oh, btw Lili has been awesome, another form of removal and usually I am usually pitching land late game or high cmc junk early (not needed Terminus etc). I like her cmc a lot too. Turn 3 is pretty vital in this meta, and she makes an impact immediately.
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One obvious benefit of the PW's in this deck is their cmc is much lower than those finishers. Lili comes down turn 3 and Jace and Sorin come down turn 4. Jus saying. Still messing with it though.
Oh, btw Lili has been awesome, another form of removal and usually I am usually pitching land late game or high cmc junk early (not needed Terminus etc). I like her cmc a lot too. Turn 3 is pretty vital in this meta, and she makes an impact immediately.
Far//Away >> Liliana. Pretty much any spot removal in the format is better because if you cast her early she's going to get killed on the backswing (so maybe she's a Tribute to Hunger) and if you cast her late you're discarding cards that actually matter (everything in our deck is cantrips)
No more counters - even when people don't run Cavern they're just terrible in standard right now. Yeah, it feels good to have three mana up and not have to worry about bad things happening, but those situations are rare, and if you can afford to keep three mana up post-combat, it means you've usually won anyway.
No more AEtherling - Milling them out is way more consistent and uses less of our resources. Don't even bother trying to deal damage. We don't have to worry about them gaining life anymore or buying time by doing things to our AEtherling in combat. Tapping out main phase is extremely dangerous for our deck, as we usually have to do things like cast Azorius Charm just to stay alive. I recently switched out my singleton AEtherling to a second Jace, Memory Adept and it has been so much better for me as a win condition. Instead of having to wait for seven/eight mana to play and protect, I can just run Jace out many turns earlier and protect him by chumping or bouncing their guys. And if I'm not stabilized yet, I can choose to draw cards with Jace instead to get to six/seven mana to clear the board with Terminus or Rift.
Cyclonic Rift - It resets an opponent's Planeswalker (a weak point of the deck), or it bounces a creature against agro, or it's a complete tempo blow out if you get to seven mana. At every stage of the game this is a valuable card that shouldn't be overlooked. An end step overload Cyclonic Rift followed by Jace, MA will win the game most of the time. It gives us an out to Pithing Needle and Witchbane Orb as well, which are otherwise one card wins against us. The other option is to run Detention Sphere/Obliving Ring in this spot, but I've found those to be a tad too slow against the agro decks.
While Verdict into a dude is pretty good often times we need to board wipe more than once, which eliminates your dude.
As to your "real question" Planeswalkers do more than just turn sideways, like your creatures do. Also a simple spell could remove your creature, where there are stricter options not found in every deck to deal with walkers.
This is a good answer. If you're going to run 4 or 5 of those large creatures, you probably cut down on Supreme Verdicts and just play a midrange deck. Also, creature finishers tend to have poor defensive capabilities, being just 4 or 5 toughness creatures, and can only race. The whole point of Control is to not have to race.
I play 2 baron, and 3 augur in main plus 2 aetherling in sideboard, but I'm currently experimenting with lifebane zombie and fiendslayer paladin for a more aggressive board presence.
I think my wins are about 60/40 mill/beat. I think every deck needs at least one creature in the main that can end the game. For me, the maindeck solution here is baron. He's a 4 turn clock to a lot of decks (16, 12, 8, lethal with a 10/10 flyer) or gains me enough life to ensure my mill condition has time to finish.
Another thing I think current esper needs is a transformative sideboard. You can't build a deck that deals with everything, but I see a lot of control players still playing to win that first matchup vs control (despite control being uncommon overall).
Most decks are all in on the aggro plan game 1 (jund, reanimator, elves, green stuff, gruul, naya, etc). Against the fast aggro decks, it's not a great matchup any way you go, but it's a lot better if you have 3 chances to win rather than just the last two. Vs jund, there's no need for strict control cards until post-board because that's when they'll be bringing in the hate. This is when I side in the extra anti-control hate (things like negate and extra planeswalker hate) and more win conditions (I usually add one or two aetherlings as they're siding out the spot removal that doesn't work on the barons they saw game 1).
When I play control, I usually have a decent game 1 if I get drownyard or baron first, but my game 2 is much extremely strong (I bring in about 12 cards for this matchup).
You guys act as though my 5CC creatures are vanilla. They aren't. They aren't easily killed, either. If you need to wrath twice, then wrath twice, and then play your beater - you act though it's suddenly not possible if you play more than 2 creatures.
I'm not playing 10+ creatures... and I'm not playing midrange. I've very much enjoyed being able to immediately apply pressure once I get on top of my opponent, not to mention, Blood Baron and Ghost Council can be a huge boon life gain/blocker wise allowing you to stay alive or get ahead in games you normally wouldn't.
And, since when is having 5 creatures that can win too many for a control deck?
Control decks have consistently played over 5+ creatures that can potentially win the game. You guys act like this is unheard of.
I-Never-Smile, don't take me for an average forum poster who doesn't completely understand the importance of tempo and mana curves. Having 4 cards at 5CC and 1 at 6 CC in a control deck is not going to ruin my curve, nor is it going to ruin my tempo.
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I-Never-Smile, don't take me for an average forum poster who doesn't completely understand the importance of tempo and mana curves. Having 4 cards at 5CC and 1 at 6 CC in a control deck is not going to ruin my curve, nor is it going to ruin my tempo.
And people tell me that I'm pretentious on this forum. Good grief.
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And people tell me that I'm pretentious on this forum. Good grief.
Your response was lacking in any real advice or merit, and it came off as condescending. You then again managed to do the same thing with this post. Good job.
/Moving on.
Are people generally swapping out Warped Physique for Doom Blade? (Play online, so haven't got to test it out yet)
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You guys act as though my 5CC creatures are vanilla. They aren't. They aren't easily killed, either. If you need to wrath twice, then wrath twice, and then play your beater - you act though it's suddenly not possible if you play more than 2 creatures.
With the miniscule amount of removal that most decks play Obzedat and blood Baron are just big, dumb creatures. Blood Baron is probably better, given the reasonable life gain, and resistance to Jund 's removal, but they're still just large aggro creatures.
It's not like you're tlaking about Olivia, NIv Mizzet, or Ætherling. All your doing is attacking and blocking with these things, while making your sweepers worse.
The lifegain is so small that you have to win off racing. Only the smallest creatures are going to be beaten by the lifegain if you hold your big creature back on defense. These things are far from Batterskull and Wurmcoil Engine.
It's not like you're talking about Olivia, NIv Mizzet, or Ætherling. All you're doing is attacking and blocking with these things, while making your sweepers worse.
Bolded for truth. The only creature that should cost significant amounts of mana in this deck is AEtherling, as it unkillably wins the game even if you sweep and regardless of blockers/opponent's removal/etc. You resolve it, survive a few turns, and win. Hey, you can even use it to block whatever stuff gets thrown back at you as it has psuedo-vigilance.
Alright guys, I have a very promising beginning of Esper draw-go. just came back with a 3-1 tournament win at FNM, defeating GP calgary top8 trent playing golgari control.
my only loss was to my roomate, which he bought me a pack of smokes if I conceded.
round 1 was against grixis planeswalkers (the list that got 1st at a pro-tour too lazy to find the exact one, was a known net-decker)
round 2 was against vampire aggro.
round 3 was my free pack of smokes.
round 4 was golgari control.
all of my matches I played were either 2-0 or 1-0-1. essentially undefeated as esper has a tendency to go to time.
This list I've made from reviewing past winning esper lists and amalgamating what needed to go in and what didn't need to stay. I had 2 augurs in but sold them for tournament entry and kinda thankful as all the decks were relatively slow and augur was unnecessary. Even with Cavern around, my counterspell suite performed admirably. My removal suite answered what I needed to, when it needed to. My control matchups were won by simply milling them out, the aggro match won off jace ultimates.
A very important aspect of my particular variant is the angles of attack, simultaneously using mutavault, drownyard, aetherling, and sphinx's rev all huge threats for the opponent to deal with, while still maintaining the countermagic and removal suite necessary to survive and ensure one of the 3 actual game-ending cards ending the game.
I must say, I'm quite celebratory of Magic's 20th birthday! got the promo dimir charm for my deck, my prize winnings went to getting another snapcaster and, of course national crack-a-pack day.
Lose the forbidden alchemy and use think twice. By the time you can flashback alchemy, you should be putting something else on the board. Also replace one or two azorius charms with think twice. That charm very often turns into expensive cycling, but at least think twice offers card advantage through the second draw.
Replace the d-spheres with o-rings. The decks that you sideboard renounce the guilds for also need your d-spheres. The problem is that you will wind up sacking the sphere and returning something nasty.
lose the ratchet bombs too. The problem here is that they're too slow against the current aggro. They're nice against tokens, but curse of death's hold and RIP do so much more (plus, you're already packing 6 cards that always wipe the entire board regardless of cmc).
I'd suggest appetite for brains as a 2-of vs jund (it hits everything relevant except liliana and rakdos's return).
I'd consider negate, curse, and ghost quarter (it's far better until it rotates)
I'm not overly fond of Liliana in your deck because (1) the environment is still not great for her with all of the aggro and flash in the format (Loxodon Smiter is also still around) and (2) you aren't playing Lingering Souls. Having 6 flashback cards in your MD really helps, although even then with the amount of Jund + Scavenging Ooze running around, it can get oozed away if you don't play the FB card quickly.
Also, I do not like Curse of Death's Hold in your MD. It is a good SB card as a one-of to deal with Junk Crats and certain weenie decks like the new W/r weenie human decks that is seeing some play. However, I think it is fairly useless on Turn 5 against any of the bigger aggro decks, control, or Jund.
I'm not a big fan of Cyclonic Rift--I think I'd rather just play 2 more Azorius Charm. You've got 2 Detention Sphere MD to deal with the problems like PWs in G1.
I think Dissipate is still much better than Render Silent at this point. I'd play 2 Dissipate and 2 Syncopate. Syncopate is also fairly bad on the draw when your opponent is often 1 mana ahead of you in the early game.
Anyway, you might want to sneak Lingering Souls in there somewhere. Maybe dropping the Curses to the SB, and perhaps one creature--you can get by easily with 2 Snapcasters and 1 Aetherling. I don't really think you need more win conditions. Obzedat has grown a bit worse for me recently in the aggro meta.
I used to use lingering souls, but it did not work well for me at all, Cyclonic rift seems to be game changing from my testing. You are definitely right about Lilianna though, she does not work for me, the discard hurts too much.
I haven't played standard in months, foregoing it for modern masters limited, so my list is terribly outdated. I last updated soon after DGM, and had good results, but that was a whole different meta. I'm thinking of taking it to gameday next weekend and could use some help. I've made a few obvious changes (Doom Blade), but that's it.
I'm expecting to see mostly aggro and midrange, so I went a bit heavy on mainboard removal. I'm a bit worried that I'm pretty much punting game 1 against any planeswalker-heavy decks, as I opted for terminus over cleansing and all my answers are in the sideboard, but I suspect that focusing on stopping the aggro game will serve me well.
Suggestions are welcome. I'm pretty surprised how unprepared I feel for a very low level of competition after a few months away.
I think that's too many finishers, unless some are in the board.
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Real question: Why is that too many "Finishers"?
Why is it okay to run 5 planeswalkers but not 5 creature cards that have a huge impact on the game, and can actually win it in a timely fashion? It's been very good in testing. Not to mention, Verdict into Blood Baron/Obzedat is very strong.
My DCI ELO Ratings - May they rest in peace :'(
While Verdict into a dude is pretty good often times we need to board wipe more than once, which eliminates your dude.
As to your "real question" Planeswalkers do more than just turn sideways, like your creatures do. Also a simple spell could remove your creature, where there are stricter options not found in every deck to deal with walkers.
currently playing:
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One obvious benefit of the PW's in this deck is their cmc is much lower than those finishers. Lili comes down turn 3 and Jace and Sorin come down turn 4. Jus saying. Still messing with it though.
Oh, btw Lili has been awesome, another form of removal and usually I am usually pitching land late game or high cmc junk early (not needed Terminus etc). I like her cmc a lot too. Turn 3 is pretty vital in this meta, and she makes an impact immediately.
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Because it takes a dump on your mana curve, and tempo exists.
Far//Away >> Liliana. Pretty much any spot removal in the format is better because if you cast her early she's going to get killed on the backswing (so maybe she's a Tribute to Hunger) and if you cast her late you're discarding cards that actually matter (everything in our deck is cantrips)
Sig by Ace of Spades studio at http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=451747
I'm a child playing an adult's card game.
Esper CONTROL: http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showpost.php?p=10441008&postcount=239
I'm a Rules Advisor. Woo-hoo.
Gamer's Armory in Raleigh, NC. Best bad store ever.
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Glacial Fortress
4 Watery Grave
4 Drowned Catacomb
4 Godless Shrine
3 Isolated Chapel
4 Nephalia Drownyard
Sorceries and Instants (20)
3 Sphinx's Revelation
3 Terminus
3 Think Twice
3 Far // Away
4 Azorius Charm
4 Cyclonic Rift
4 Augur of Bolas
3 Snapcaster Mage
Planeswalkers (6)
2 Jace, Memory Adept
2 Jace, Architect of Thought
1 Tamiyo, the Moon Sage
1 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
2 Crypt Incursion
2 Curse of Death's Hold
1 Illness in the Ranks
1 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
4 Warped Physique
2 Supreme Verdict
3 Renounce The Guilds
No more counters - even when people don't run Cavern they're just terrible in standard right now. Yeah, it feels good to have three mana up and not have to worry about bad things happening, but those situations are rare, and if you can afford to keep three mana up post-combat, it means you've usually won anyway.
No more AEtherling - Milling them out is way more consistent and uses less of our resources. Don't even bother trying to deal damage. We don't have to worry about them gaining life anymore or buying time by doing things to our AEtherling in combat. Tapping out main phase is extremely dangerous for our deck, as we usually have to do things like cast Azorius Charm just to stay alive. I recently switched out my singleton AEtherling to a second Jace, Memory Adept and it has been so much better for me as a win condition. Instead of having to wait for seven/eight mana to play and protect, I can just run Jace out many turns earlier and protect him by chumping or bouncing their guys. And if I'm not stabilized yet, I can choose to draw cards with Jace instead to get to six/seven mana to clear the board with Terminus or Rift.
Cyclonic Rift - It resets an opponent's Planeswalker (a weak point of the deck), or it bounces a creature against agro, or it's a complete tempo blow out if you get to seven mana. At every stage of the game this is a valuable card that shouldn't be overlooked. An end step overload Cyclonic Rift followed by Jace, MA will win the game most of the time. It gives us an out to Pithing Needle and Witchbane Orb as well, which are otherwise one card wins against us. The other option is to run Detention Sphere/Obliving Ring in this spot, but I've found those to be a tad too slow against the agro decks.
This is a good answer. If you're going to run 4 or 5 of those large creatures, you probably cut down on Supreme Verdicts and just play a midrange deck. Also, creature finishers tend to have poor defensive capabilities, being just 4 or 5 toughness creatures, and can only race. The whole point of Control is to not have to race.
I think my wins are about 60/40 mill/beat. I think every deck needs at least one creature in the main that can end the game. For me, the maindeck solution here is baron. He's a 4 turn clock to a lot of decks (16, 12, 8, lethal with a 10/10 flyer) or gains me enough life to ensure my mill condition has time to finish.
Another thing I think current esper needs is a transformative sideboard. You can't build a deck that deals with everything, but I see a lot of control players still playing to win that first matchup vs control (despite control being uncommon overall).
Most decks are all in on the aggro plan game 1 (jund, reanimator, elves, green stuff, gruul, naya, etc). Against the fast aggro decks, it's not a great matchup any way you go, but it's a lot better if you have 3 chances to win rather than just the last two. Vs jund, there's no need for strict control cards until post-board because that's when they'll be bringing in the hate. This is when I side in the extra anti-control hate (things like negate and extra planeswalker hate) and more win conditions (I usually add one or two aetherlings as they're siding out the spot removal that doesn't work on the barons they saw game 1).
When I play control, I usually have a decent game 1 if I get drownyard or baron first, but my game 2 is much extremely strong (I bring in about 12 cards for this matchup).
I'm not playing 10+ creatures... and I'm not playing midrange. I've very much enjoyed being able to immediately apply pressure once I get on top of my opponent, not to mention, Blood Baron and Ghost Council can be a huge boon life gain/blocker wise allowing you to stay alive or get ahead in games you normally wouldn't.
And, since when is having 5 creatures that can win too many for a control deck?
Control decks have consistently played over 5+ creatures that can potentially win the game. You guys act like this is unheard of.
I-Never-Smile, don't take me for an average forum poster who doesn't completely understand the importance of tempo and mana curves. Having 4 cards at 5CC and 1 at 6 CC in a control deck is not going to ruin my curve, nor is it going to ruin my tempo.
My DCI ELO Ratings - May they rest in peace :'(
And people tell me that I'm pretentious on this forum. Good grief.
This is spam. Please keep your comments constructive.
-rujasu
Your response was lacking in any real advice or merit, and it came off as condescending. You then again managed to do the same thing with this post. Good job.
/Moving on.
Are people generally swapping out Warped Physique for Doom Blade? (Play online, so haven't got to test it out yet)
My DCI ELO Ratings - May they rest in peace :'(
With the miniscule amount of removal that most decks play Obzedat and blood Baron are just big, dumb creatures. Blood Baron is probably better, given the reasonable life gain, and resistance to Jund 's removal, but they're still just large aggro creatures.
It's not like you're tlaking about Olivia, NIv Mizzet, or Ætherling. All your doing is attacking and blocking with these things, while making your sweepers worse.
The lifegain is so small that you have to win off racing. Only the smallest creatures are going to be beaten by the lifegain if you hold your big creature back on defense. These things are far from Batterskull and Wurmcoil Engine.
Bolded for truth. The only creature that should cost significant amounts of mana in this deck is AEtherling, as it unkillably wins the game even if you sweep and regardless of blockers/opponent's removal/etc. You resolve it, survive a few turns, and win. Hey, you can even use it to block whatever stuff gets thrown back at you as it has psuedo-vigilance.
Sig by Ace of Spades studio at http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=451747
I'm a child playing an adult's card game.
Esper CONTROL: http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showpost.php?p=10441008&postcount=239
I'm a Rules Advisor. Woo-hoo.
Gamer's Armory in Raleigh, NC. Best bad store ever.
my only loss was to my roomate, which he bought me a pack of smokes if I conceded.
round 1 was against grixis planeswalkers (the list that got 1st at a pro-tour too lazy to find the exact one, was a known net-decker)
round 2 was against vampire aggro.
round 3 was my free pack of smokes.
round 4 was golgari control.
all of my matches I played were either 2-0 or 1-0-1. essentially undefeated as esper has a tendency to go to time.
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Glacial Fortress
4 Watery Grave
4 Drowned Catacomb
3 Godless Shrine
3 Isolated Chapel
2 Nephalia Drownyard
2 Mutavault
1 Island
//Creatures
2 Snapcaster Mage
1 Aetherling
//Permanent Spells
2 Jace, Architect of Thought
1 Detention Sphere
4 Think Twice
2 Warped Physique
2 Dissipate
2 Syncopate
2 Essence Scatter
3 Azorius Charm
3 Far // Away
3 Sphinx's Revelation
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Terminus
1 Dimir Charm
1 Cyclonic Rift
1 Ratchet Bomb
1 Terminus
1 Supreme Verdict
1 Obzedat, Ghost Council
2 Negate
1 Glaring Spotlight
2 Tragic Slip
2 Rest in Peace
1 Blind Obedience
1 Detention Sphere
2 Pithing Needle
This list I've made from reviewing past winning esper lists and amalgamating what needed to go in and what didn't need to stay. I had 2 augurs in but sold them for tournament entry and kinda thankful as all the decks were relatively slow and augur was unnecessary. Even with Cavern around, my counterspell suite performed admirably. My removal suite answered what I needed to, when it needed to. My control matchups were won by simply milling them out, the aggro match won off jace ultimates.
A very important aspect of my particular variant is the angles of attack, simultaneously using mutavault, drownyard, aetherling, and sphinx's rev all huge threats for the opponent to deal with, while still maintaining the countermagic and removal suite necessary to survive and ensure one of the 3 actual game-ending cards ending the game.
I must say, I'm quite celebratory of Magic's 20th birthday! got the promo dimir charm for my deck, my prize winnings went to getting another snapcaster and, of course national crack-a-pack day.
2 Encroaching Wastes
4 Drowned Catacomb
4 Glacial Fortress
3 Godless Shrine
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Isolated Chapel
4 Watery Grave
Creatures
3 Augur of Bolas
1 Obzedat, Ghost Council
2 AEtherling
2 Detention Sphere
4 Azorius Charm
2 Forbidden Alchemy
3 Sphinx's Revelation
3 Warped Physique
3 Lingering Souls
4 Supreme Verdict
3 Render Silent
1 Far // Away
Planeswalker
2 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
2 Jace, Architect of Thought
2 Ratchet Bomb
2 Terminus
2 Blood Baron of Vizkopa
3 Rest in Peace
2 Notion Thief
2 Sin Collector
2 Renounce the Guilds
Suggestions are appreciated!
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Lose the forbidden alchemy and use think twice. By the time you can flashback alchemy, you should be putting something else on the board. Also replace one or two azorius charms with think twice. That charm very often turns into expensive cycling, but at least think twice offers card advantage through the second draw.
Replace the d-spheres with o-rings. The decks that you sideboard renounce the guilds for also need your d-spheres. The problem is that you will wind up sacking the sphere and returning something nasty.
lose the ratchet bombs too. The problem here is that they're too slow against the current aggro. They're nice against tokens, but curse of death's hold and RIP do so much more (plus, you're already packing 6 cards that always wipe the entire board regardless of cmc).
I'd suggest appetite for brains as a 2-of vs jund (it hits everything relevant except liliana and rakdos's return).
I'd consider negate, curse, and ghost quarter (it's far better until it rotates)
On another note, a deck that's hard for me is BW post, how do I side against this deck?
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If it's actually an issue, pithing needle and planar cleansing would help a lot.
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I like the build, if this was my deck, id replace the augurs with snapcasters, with forbidden alchemy, you really dont need the augur to dig. I would run dissipate over render silent, and i'd cut 1 warped physique for a far // away. You may want to replace a detention sphere with an oblivion ring, if your meta runs renounce the guilds regularly. also, nephalia drownyard is infinitely better than encroaching wastes in this deck. i also really like to run a merciless eviction or a planar cleansing in the sideboard for vs planeswalker deck since esper doesnt really have any cool ways to deal with pw's.
4 Drowned Catacomb
4 Watery Grave
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Glacial Fortress
3 Godless Shrine
4 Isolated Shrine
2 Ghost Quarter
Creatures (4)
2 AEtherling
2 Obzedat, Ghost Council
Planeswalker (5)
2 Jace, Architect of Thought
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Azorius Charm
2 Cyclonic Rift
2 Far Away
1 Render Silent
3 Sphinx's Revelation
3 Syncopate
3 Think Twice
3 Warped Physique
Sorcery (4)
4 Supreme Verdict
Enchantment (4)
2 Curse of Death's Hold
2 Detention Sphere
2 Notion thief
2 Sin Collector
2 Rest in Peace
2 Crypt Incursion
2 Renounce the Guilds
2 Appetite for Brains
2 Merciless Eviction
1 Cyclonic Rift
Signature and Avatar by Inkfox Aesthetics
I'm not overly fond of Liliana in your deck because (1) the environment is still not great for her with all of the aggro and flash in the format (Loxodon Smiter is also still around) and (2) you aren't playing Lingering Souls. Having 6 flashback cards in your MD really helps, although even then with the amount of Jund + Scavenging Ooze running around, it can get oozed away if you don't play the FB card quickly.
Also, I do not like Curse of Death's Hold in your MD. It is a good SB card as a one-of to deal with Junk Crats and certain weenie decks like the new W/r weenie human decks that is seeing some play. However, I think it is fairly useless on Turn 5 against any of the bigger aggro decks, control, or Jund.
I'm not a big fan of Cyclonic Rift--I think I'd rather just play 2 more Azorius Charm. You've got 2 Detention Sphere MD to deal with the problems like PWs in G1.
I think Dissipate is still much better than Render Silent at this point. I'd play 2 Dissipate and 2 Syncopate. Syncopate is also fairly bad on the draw when your opponent is often 1 mana ahead of you in the early game.
Anyway, you might want to sneak Lingering Souls in there somewhere. Maybe dropping the Curses to the SB, and perhaps one creature--you can get by easily with 2 Snapcasters and 1 Aetherling. I don't really think you need more win conditions. Obzedat has grown a bit worse for me recently in the aggro meta.
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My "current" list:
2x Island
1x Plains
4x Drowned Catacomb
4x Glacial Fortress
1x Isolated Chapel
4x Hallowed Fountain
3x Watery Grave
3x Godless Shrine
1x Jace, Memory Adept
1x Jace, Architect of Thought
2x Augur of Bolas
2x Snapcaster Mage
1x Aetherling
4x Azorius Charm
1x Warped Physique
2x Far // Away
3x Dissipate
1x Crypt Incursion
3x Think Twice
1x Devour Flesh
2x Doom Blade
2x Terminus
4x Supreme Verdict
Side:
2x Appetite for Brains
2x Renounce the Guilds
1x Ratchet Bomb
1x Syncopate
1x Negate
2x Witchbane Orb
1x Pithing Needle
1x Aetherling
1x Warped Physique
1x Crypt Incursion
2x Oblivion Ring
I'm expecting to see mostly aggro and midrange, so I went a bit heavy on mainboard removal. I'm a bit worried that I'm pretty much punting game 1 against any planeswalker-heavy decks, as I opted for terminus over cleansing and all my answers are in the sideboard, but I suspect that focusing on stopping the aggro game will serve me well.
Suggestions are welcome. I'm pretty surprised how unprepared I feel for a very low level of competition after a few months away.
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