What do you think the worst matchups are then, and what makes UW one of the easiest?
Playtest it. UG morph has a very good matchup against UW barring specific hate. UW doesnt run that much spot removal and even less instant speed. Most lists have two paths and thats it. They rely on white sweepers. Also most don't run much counterspells, two negates main is common and even more common is no counterspells. If you get out a jace pre-morph or if they dont have a jace post morph its usually GG. However, more UW decks are starting to run things like telemin performance and Mind control in the SB to take care of the Iona problem.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
MTG Rules Advisor
Quote from thundyr »
Jacerator is an aggro deck - it just wins by attacking the library, it doesn't really control the board other than to play a few Fogs
For a total of 26, Is anyone having luck running less... I have found 26 is doing me good and never want to miss a land drop so I am worried to go less.
Edit: Also how is siding in Sphinx of the Steel Wind vs. Jund working out for everyone?
What do you guys think about Terastodon? The card is a beast, and can be extremely difficult to deal with. Plus it can be hardcast in a pinch.
However, it's really susceptible to Wrath effects, so maybe something to bring in against aggro decks? I just bought some Polymorphs, and they should be here tomorrow so I'm eager to build the deck, and have some fun with it. I have all the usual targets, but was thinking Terastodon could work as well, and wanted some opinions in case it isn't even worth testing.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"I've always been a fan of reality by popular vote" - Stephen Colbert (in response to Don McLeroy)
Terastodon is a good card... but I think it fits in this deck. Would you rather have a 9/9 and 3 3/3's that you have to sac 3 lands to get? or a 15/15 with abilities to back it or a white angel that shuts a whole color down.
It just seems like Terastodon can really be a double edged sword. If they kill it... you have a few 3/3's and are way down in lands.
Edit: Also it doesn't have trample... So they can chump block it until either you run out of counters or they get a removal spell. Some evasion is better than none.
Edit: Also how is siding in Sphinx of the Steel Wind vs. Jund working out for everyone?
Sphinx of the Steel Wind is an amazing side board against Jund. I have had two in mine for the last few months and at first it was good because it almost locks them out unless they are running Deathmark in their deck. With the life gain and the blocking there is very little they can do at that point. Over all this along with Spreading Seas makes the matchup against Jund much better.
Also, has anyone else been trying out UR polymorph?
I think the reason people are using them both is to try and get them both out. Which doesn't make sense to me. Either one should win the game pretty much. I find that keeping Iona in the sideboard is what i like to do most. That way if i am playing a mono color deck I side them in and it is basically over if she comes out.
I think the reason people are using them both is to try and get them both out. Which doesn't make sense to me. Either one should win the game pretty much. I find that keeping Iona in the sideboard is what i like to do most. That way if i am playing a mono color deck I side them in and it is basically over if she comes out.
in the current metagame, which creature is a better target, iona or emrakul in your opinion. jund is the top dog, and u/w is for sure picking up steam and could possibly be the best. also what are your thoughts on deprive ? for my counters md, im running 3 negate, and 2 spell pierce.
in the current metagame, which creature is a better target, iona or emrakul in your opinion. jund is the top dog, and u/w is for sure picking up steam and could possibly be the best. also what are your thoughts on deprive ? for my counters md, im running 3 negate, and 2 spell pierce.
Looking at a possible meta game that is going to be flooded with either Polymorph or U/W, I'd have to say Iona is the stone blade. In the mirror you just name blue and they should be just kold. Against U/W naming white leaves them to Jace outs (game 1) and usually that's just GG. Even game 2 I'd probably still just name white.
That being said, there is argument for different fatties in the board. I like having some number of Sphinx of the Steel Wind and Emrakul in the sideboard. Emrakul is game over for Jund since they've got 0 ways of actually dealing with him, although I suppose if have like 3 thrinaxes then you might be in trouble after annihilating them.
Also, pack a good # of Telemin's Performance, I know I will be.
i suppose telemins performance is good for the mirror, but i dont see any other deck running a few creatures, i suppose uw, but they play around 8 to 10 creatures i suppose.
There are some advantages of running two different creatures. They maybe minor, but they still play some role.
In the event you play with double Emrakul, you run the risk of the mirror match casting Polymorph on your leftover token and starting you back at square one.
Playing two Iona lack the inevitability of hard casting an Emrakul should the game be drawn out long, or a Thought Hemorrhage that pulls out your Polymorphs.
Plus, it helps if the opponent chooses a different route with a Thought Hemorrhage, and targets your huge creatures, leaving him unable to pull out all your win-cons with one spell.
The two major choices are also very different threats to different archetypes. Emrakul is like nothing to U/W control packing all the mass removal, while Iona is always a bit of a gamble against shards based decks like Jund, or Naya. Sure, you run the risk of inconsistency, but you also get a chance of reward by sealing up the first game pretty handily, with little to no stress.
So I don't see running two different creatures as making a person a bad player. I see it as a concession to having a varied metagame.
Some of these situations are a bit narrow, but you'd be surprised how often it pops up online, and at your local tourneys. (And these are considering you use the general U/G build)
In the event you play with double Emrakul, you run the risk of the mirror match casting Polymorph on your leftover token and starting you back at square one.
Playing two Iona lack the inevitability of hard casting an Emrakul should the game be drawn out long, or a Thought Hemorrhage that pulls out your Polymorphs.
Plus, it helps if the opponent chooses a different route with a Thought Hemorrhage, and targets your huge creatures, leaving him unable to pull out all your win-cons with one spell.
Iona is always a bit of a gamble against shards based decks like Jund
Just my opinion here -
1 - MD Iona always. Against poly mirror, you call blue, problem solved.
2 - The game should be over far before you reach 15 mana.
3 - Any one who thought hemorrhages anything besides polymorph first (followed by Jace second) is bad.
4 - The only thing that scares me about Jund with Iona naming black is SGC. And even that is not too terrible to deal with. (Vines and Jace help a lot here).
I can find no reason to run anything but Iona MD, but maybe my meta is different than yours.
The thing I don't like about Emrakul MB is that he doesn't shut down like Iona does. Against a vamp player, or a player running white with Judgement, Coup, and O-rings, or black control, Emrakul is not as big of a threat. Sure, he may be huge when he attacks, but I have found that when people know he is coming they can deal with him easily.
I am not sure I will even run him in my sideboard tbh, I still favor Progenitus over him in this deck.
The big Decks in the meta right now are Jund's 3 variants, Naya (Boss variant, and even allies isn't too bad), and Mythic.
The main problem with Iona is she does nothing to change your opponent's board position. Against jund a Iona naming black (which is almost always the right color to call) still has to race against the board they still have, and deal with the non-black spells it's still casting. Against Mythic even a 3rd turn Iona might not be the biggest creature on the board. after a turn or two. Against Boss Naya there really isn't a good color to call, you name white you still have to deal with the same threat that Mythic is throwing at you... except it has a Basalisk collar on it.
Emmmy against these matchups give your oppoent exactly 1 turn to not lose to annhilator 6. Some Jund builds run a fleshbag in the board. otherwise they hope they've overan you. Boss Naya has a singleton O-ring which if you've identified your opponent as being boss naya, wait the turn or two you need to combo with into the roil\counter backup. Mythic Has nothing main, and only a day or two in the board. and unlike Iona, that turn 4 emrakul will ALWAYS be the biggest body on the board.
The main argument for Iona is that she locks the opponent out, which isn't always true. Sure against a mono-colored deck it's a race of their board vs. Iona. but most of these decks are Very aggresive. meaning they've gotten you to 12-10 by the time you've resolved polymorph, and might have the ability to storm you. even if you hold Iona off to block. With a 4th 5th turn Emrakul your opponent's board position doesn't count for poop. Even vampires, assuming gatekeeper didn't resolve, with their nighthawks, still needs a nighthawk, and 6 other permanent's in play for that to matter. you can still swing into that nighthawk and do irreversable damage to the vampire's player's board as they went from 5 lands 3 creatures to 1 land, meanwhile your Emrakul is back in your library ready to be polymorphed out again, even as soon as next turn if you're holding a deprive with a garden on the board.
And then there is what Annihlator 6 does to 3-colored decks that Iona can't do. best-case scenario for any of these deck is they were able to keep their tri-lands. but usual-case scenario is they got set to 0 and it's impossible to cast spells if you don't have the mana for it.
I keep the counters in my sideboard, since they don't affect most match ups (control isn't run frequently where I am), so that may be a meta decision.
My early game is better because I have tokens online faster, so I can chump block quicker and don't die as fast to creature decks. I can poly on turn 3 against decks who are tapped out. As long as I have 2 tokens the only color I'm worried about is white. I can win with Garruk and tokens fairly handily. Sac effects don't hurt me at all.
Also I can hard cast my fatty - and do - in games. He can't be countered, and time walks. If I'm playing blue or suspect O-rings or Journey, I'll wait to hard cast him rather than use poly, then I use poly on my opponents bad threats.
Every deck that's ran can counter target polymorph by using the removal that every deck runs to blow up your poly target. the Counterspells in the deck either keep that token alive, or brush off pesky wrath effects after the fact.
Sorry, I guess I'll explain a bit more. I don't cast Polymorph when my opponent has a fist full of cards and untapped mana. But rather than put cards that stop me from losing, I have chosen cards that help me win. So I save Polymorph for when I can cast it and feel relatively confident that I'm not going to whiff on the token due to instant speed removal. I will poly turn three, sure, if I have 2 tokens (one to kill, one against the gatekeeper etc.) and they are tapped out. If Time walk on legs hits the table, and you have tokens left over, you only have to worry about white cards, nothing else can touch him. My deck, incidentally, almost always has tokens on the table. That's why I have a fairly stable early game and limited susceptibility to disruption. Nearly 1/3th of my deck produces token creatures. Of those, 7 produce tokens that can attack.
I do realize that, yes.
Okay so how often do you win games 2 or 3 playing like that. because every deck is capable of Bluffing an answer to you. if all I have to do is keep mana for 2 removal spells untapped and 4 cards in my hands to assure you'll never try to do anything then I win, because by the time you grow a pair and attempt to "test the waters" i've slowly whittled you down to nothing and are really holding more that 4 removal spells.
Yes and no...I've been thinking about All is Dust and in the straight UG versions it gives you a decent Wrath effect. That is fair...but you are talking about the mirror and in the mirror You are likely to be running afoul of Emrakul...at least if all the chatter on this thread is representative of what people are actually playing. And AiD is of no value against Emrakul. So I guess you need to be more clear about the application of the card you advocate...AiD is great at killing your enemy's Jace, Awakening Zone, plant tokens, etc., so aggressively using one is a good idea. But it is not a solution to a resolved Emrakul. You already have that in Jace anyway and I think most mirrors are going to come down to who can stick a PW.
The big Decks in the meta right now are Jund's 3 variants, Naya (Boss variant, and even allies isn't too bad), and Mythic.
The main problem with Iona is she does nothing to change your opponent's board position. Against jund a Iona naming black (which is almost always the right color to call) still has to race against the board they still have, and deal with the non-black spells it's still casting. Against Mythic even a 3rd turn Iona might not be the biggest creature on the board. after a turn or two. Against Boss Naya there really isn't a good color to call, you name white you still have to deal with the same threat that Mythic is throwing at you... except it has a Basalisk collar on it.
Emmmy against these matchups give your oppoent exactly 1 turn to not lose to annhilator 6. Some Jund builds run a fleshbag in the board. otherwise they hope they've overan you. Boss Naya has a singleton O-ring which if you've identified your opponent as being boss naya, wait the turn or two you need to combo with into the roil\counter backup. Mythic Has nothing main, and only a day or two in the board. and unlike Iona, that turn 4 emrakul will ALWAYS be the biggest body on the board.
The main argument for Iona is that she locks the opponent out, which isn't always true. Sure against a mono-colored deck it's a race of their board vs. Iona. but most of these decks are Very aggresive. meaning they've gotten you to 12-10 by the time you've resolved polymorph, and might have the ability to storm you. even if you hold Iona off to block. With a 4th 5th turn Emrakul your opponent's board position doesn't count for poop. Even vampires, assuming gatekeeper didn't resolve, with their nighthawks, still needs a nighthawk, and 6 other permanent's in play for that to matter. you can still swing into that nighthawk and do irreversable damage to the vampire's player's board as they went from 5 lands 3 creatures to 1 land, meanwhile your Emrakul is back in your library ready to be polymorphed out again, even as soon as next turn if you're holding a deprive with a garden on the board.
And then there is what Annihlator 6 does to 3-colored decks that Iona can't do. best-case scenario for any of these deck is they were able to keep their tri-lands. but usual-case scenario is they got set to 0 and it's impossible to cast spells if you don't have the mana for it.
Jace and Garruk have been all I need to deal with anything that Iona doesn't stop.
Most of my games there is not a whole lot on the board to worry about post Iona, because they either tap out early casting threats allowing me an early poly, or they hold back keeping mana open for token removal.
So I built a skeleton version of this deck and I was wondering how you guys beat aggro decks and how many token producers you guys use? I routinely find myself getting beat in the face to like 3 or 4 in my testing and by the time I get Iona out in which case it didn't matter because they just use multiple attackers and beat around her. I'm using Garruk, Growth Spasm, and Khalni Garden as the token makers but I keep running into times where I don't have a token at all. Just curious as I want to play this deck. It looks like a lot of fun.
I agree that Emrakul is better than Proggie. However Iona over Emrakul is purely a metagame choice. If your meta is all vamps\Red deck wins\WW then Iona will almost always be a better call. however against decks like jund and boss naya that run removal\threats in multiple colors or Mythic\Eldrazi green that is fatter than Iona just as fast then Emrakul is the correct choice for main.
I'm choosing Emrakul over Iona mostly because my Local meta game is very diverse, and if I go to larger events like SCG Opens then I can expect Jund, Jund, Jund, Naya, Naya, Chapin Control, and maybe the occasional RDW. it's simply a numbers game for me at this point.
I think its interesting to see the debates regarding the three creatures. Obviously Iona is the best.... what about Terastadon though? It seems like a turn 4 Terastadon (possibly targeting your own lands) is just as good as Emrakul or Progenitus.
Negative. so you're giving yourself a 9/9 that doesn't trample, and 3/3's and setting yourself backwards 3 lands. in what matchup is this a good idea UW control, Day says hello. Jund, Bloodbraid into terminate seems like it's no bueno for you. Mythic, you'll lose to a resolved knight of the reliquary. RDW, okay there's one matchup where a 9/9 non trampler with 3 3/3 friends might be a dominate board position. but you likely didn't get there before turn 3. so you're likely just in burn range anyway, so you're holding back the team to cover a ball ligtning.
I mean, its the same thing as in Vintage Oath. Not many decks are going to have an answer to that. Against Control, you can just blow up their lands if you go for the turn 4, but against Black decks (with Gatekeepers) you can just as easily blow up your own lands and that be your protection.... maybe as a Sideboard threat? Dunno... I do think that the decks running Iona x 2 are wrong. Clearly you want the ability to follow up your Polymorph with another Polymorph... Cutting yourself off is bad tech.
against black decks they just Doomblade your 9/9 or hold it off with a nighthawk, or they doomblade it. agaisnt control if you bomb out 3 of their lands and give them the 3/3's they block your Terrastodon, or cast Into the roil, and beat you with your tokens. Before See beyond the reason for running 2 ionas was so that if you drew one you wern't dead in the water until you could jace-shuffle. see beyond gives you 7-8 outs in order to correct a drawn bomb. at which point 1 iona\emrakul is correct.
I played Polymorph a while back, when Time Sieve was big (a.k.a pre-Zendikar) because in my Japanese box I opened two foil Poly's and decided to have some fun. We played U/W Control with Progenitus as our kill condition (obv. morphin into it) with Spectral Processions. Now, a lot of these cards are out of standard, but the concept of playing a Control deck with Polymorph win-condition is exceptional. The deck also had the ability to consistently turn 4 morph, with 8 md ways to do it. In the update, you would have potentially the same number of ways to do it (b/c you play Chalice) and you could even run Gideon and morph him into something. He seems like a good way to protect your life total until you Morph into something to win the game......
Just some thoughts. I figure the U/G version is probably better, and as my testing with Polymorph into Iona is limited to two games just now, I am just tossing idea's around to help stimulate discussion.... I am very intrigued by the new success of Polymorph, and I'm hoping it starts doing well enough to be a genuine piece to the metagame puzzle.
The U/W version is more capable of surviving the longer game, the G\U version is the speed version. I've played and tested both versions, and i've concluded it's just a matter of taste. I like the idea of speed over survivability, especially now that we have emrakul which ends games faster.
im using a split right now, 1 emrakul, and 1 iona, what are your thoughts, i like the fact that i have two options.
I tried the split before rise, I hated every single time I flipped Proggie against decks with white only to get it dayed, only to have it shuffle back in and end up ontop of Iona.
in the current metagame, which creature is a better target, iona or emrakul in your opinion. jund is the top dog, and u/w is for sure picking up steam and could possibly be the best. also what are your thoughts on deprive ? for my counters md, im running 3 negate, and 2 spell pierce.
if you are looking at the overall metagame that is Jund, Jund, Jund, Naya, Naya, UW, RDW, Mythic, Eldrazi X. I think Emrakul is the better choice. Iona has the nice ability to lock out a color (usually their prominate Removal color) however most of these decks run Removal in 2 colors, so you have to have counter backup to protect the token, and counter backup to Protect Iona if you've named the wrong color.
Emrakul on the other hand only has a limited # of weakeness that are even played in these decks. his form of control lockdown comes in the form of annihilator 6 which is better than Iona in most cases because it kills lands which can lock them out of the mana to cast most of their spells. There is no Racing a Emrakul after it attacks because part of it's attack is a falcon punch to the junk.
however if you're looking at a metagame that is Vamp vamp Vamp vamp RDW RDW RDW WW WW UW control, Iona is by far the better maindeck choice as she hands down can win these games.
Is Deprive even worth it here?
I feel like Spell Pierce and Negate can do it alone.
It really depends on your build, if your deck is heavy on the green then No because UU is hard to come by.
in a heavy Blue build (most typical versions of this deck are) then UU isn't a issue, they're flat out better than the Essence scatters you have to run for the creature threat. and they slightly better than negate because they can be used to counter creatures instead of just protecting the combo, because sometimes you just don't want Ball lightning to resolve.
because sometimes you just don't want Ball lightning to resolve.
One reason UR version of this deck can hang with RDW... Bolt can hit almost all of it's threats...
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Currently Playing: Standard:
Nothing, the format Bores me! Legacy: RBurn (Made on the Cheap!)R RGBelcherRG WSoldier StompyW BReanimatorB EDH: BUGRWSliver OverlordWRGUB BGeth, Lord of the VaultB
Question. Can anyone name a circumstance in which Emrakul is better than Progenitus. Hell, the only time I can think of that emrakuls better is when the opponent is at 11-15 life and you really need the 1 turn clock as opposed to the two turn.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
MTG Rules Advisor
Quote from thundyr »
Jacerator is an aggro deck - it just wins by attacking the library, it doesn't really control the board other than to play a few Fogs
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Playtest it. UG morph has a very good matchup against UW barring specific hate. UW doesnt run that much spot removal and even less instant speed. Most lists have two paths and thats it. They rely on white sweepers. Also most don't run much counterspells, two negates main is common and even more common is no counterspells. If you get out a jace pre-morph or if they dont have a jace post morph its usually GG. However, more UW decks are starting to run things like telemin performance and Mind control in the SB to take care of the Iona problem.
Where is everyone at with the manabase?
I have
For a total of 26, Is anyone having luck running less... I have found 26 is doing me good and never want to miss a land drop so I am worried to go less.
Edit: Also how is siding in Sphinx of the Steel Wind vs. Jund working out for everyone?
However, it's really susceptible to Wrath effects, so maybe something to bring in against aggro decks? I just bought some Polymorphs, and they should be here tomorrow so I'm eager to build the deck, and have some fun with it. I have all the usual targets, but was thinking Terastodon could work as well, and wanted some opinions in case it isn't even worth testing.
"I've always been a fan of reality by popular vote" - Stephen Colbert (in response to Don McLeroy)
GPolukranos, Kill ALL the Things!G
It just seems like Terastodon can really be a double edged sword. If they kill it... you have a few 3/3's and are way down in lands.
Edit: Also it doesn't have trample... So they can chump block it until either you run out of counters or they get a removal spell. Some evasion is better than none.
Sphinx of the Steel Wind is an amazing side board against Jund. I have had two in mine for the last few months and at first it was good because it almost locks them out unless they are running Deathmark in their deck. With the life gain and the blocking there is very little they can do at that point. Over all this along with Spreading Seas makes the matchup against Jund much better.
Also, has anyone else been trying out UR polymorph?
I do the same thing.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=380755
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=380755
Looking at a possible meta game that is going to be flooded with either Polymorph or U/W, I'd have to say Iona is the stone blade. In the mirror you just name blue and they should be just kold. Against U/W naming white leaves them to Jace outs (game 1) and usually that's just GG. Even game 2 I'd probably still just name white.
That being said, there is argument for different fatties in the board. I like having some number of Sphinx of the Steel Wind and Emrakul in the sideboard. Emrakul is game over for Jund since they've got 0 ways of actually dealing with him, although I suppose if have like 3 thrinaxes then you might be in trouble after annihilating them.
Also, pack a good # of Telemin's Performance, I know I will be.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=380755
In the event you play with double Emrakul, you run the risk of the mirror match casting Polymorph on your leftover token and starting you back at square one.
Playing two Iona lack the inevitability of hard casting an Emrakul should the game be drawn out long, or a Thought Hemorrhage that pulls out your Polymorphs.
Plus, it helps if the opponent chooses a different route with a Thought Hemorrhage, and targets your huge creatures, leaving him unable to pull out all your win-cons with one spell.
The two major choices are also very different threats to different archetypes. Emrakul is like nothing to U/W control packing all the mass removal, while Iona is always a bit of a gamble against shards based decks like Jund, or Naya. Sure, you run the risk of inconsistency, but you also get a chance of reward by sealing up the first game pretty handily, with little to no stress.
So I don't see running two different creatures as making a person a bad player. I see it as a concession to having a varied metagame.
Some of these situations are a bit narrow, but you'd be surprised how often it pops up online, and at your local tourneys. (And these are considering you use the general U/G build)
I feel like Spell Pierce and Negate can do it alone.
BGStandard Green AggroGB
UWRGModern Saheeli CobraGRWU
UBRGLegacy StormGRBU
Wizards Certified Rules Advisor
Just my opinion here -
1 - MD Iona always. Against poly mirror, you call blue, problem solved.
2 - The game should be over far before you reach 15 mana.
3 - Any one who thought hemorrhages anything besides polymorph first (followed by Jace second) is bad.
4 - The only thing that scares me about Jund with Iona naming black is SGC. And even that is not too terrible to deal with. (Vines and Jace help a lot here).
I can find no reason to run anything but Iona MD, but maybe my meta is different than yours.
The big Decks in the meta right now are Jund's 3 variants, Naya (Boss variant, and even allies isn't too bad), and Mythic.
The main problem with Iona is she does nothing to change your opponent's board position. Against jund a Iona naming black (which is almost always the right color to call) still has to race against the board they still have, and deal with the non-black spells it's still casting. Against Mythic even a 3rd turn Iona might not be the biggest creature on the board. after a turn or two. Against Boss Naya there really isn't a good color to call, you name white you still have to deal with the same threat that Mythic is throwing at you... except it has a Basalisk collar on it.
Emmmy against these matchups give your oppoent exactly 1 turn to not lose to annhilator 6. Some Jund builds run a fleshbag in the board. otherwise they hope they've overan you. Boss Naya has a singleton O-ring which if you've identified your opponent as being boss naya, wait the turn or two you need to combo with into the roil\counter backup. Mythic Has nothing main, and only a day or two in the board. and unlike Iona, that turn 4 emrakul will ALWAYS be the biggest body on the board.
The main argument for Iona is that she locks the opponent out, which isn't always true. Sure against a mono-colored deck it's a race of their board vs. Iona. but most of these decks are Very aggresive. meaning they've gotten you to 12-10 by the time you've resolved polymorph, and might have the ability to storm you. even if you hold Iona off to block. With a 4th 5th turn Emrakul your opponent's board position doesn't count for poop. Even vampires, assuming gatekeeper didn't resolve, with their nighthawks, still needs a nighthawk, and 6 other permanent's in play for that to matter. you can still swing into that nighthawk and do irreversable damage to the vampire's player's board as they went from 5 lands 3 creatures to 1 land, meanwhile your Emrakul is back in your library ready to be polymorphed out again, even as soon as next turn if you're holding a deprive with a garden on the board.
And then there is what Annihlator 6 does to 3-colored decks that Iona can't do. best-case scenario for any of these deck is they were able to keep their tri-lands. but usual-case scenario is they got set to 0 and it's impossible to cast spells if you don't have the mana for it.
Every deck that's ran can counter target polymorph by using the removal that every deck runs to blow up your poly target. the Counterspells in the deck either keep that token alive, or brush off pesky wrath effects after the fact.
Okay so how often do you win games 2 or 3 playing like that. because every deck is capable of Bluffing an answer to you. if all I have to do is keep mana for 2 removal spells untapped and 4 cards in my hands to assure you'll never try to do anything then I win, because by the time you grow a pair and attempt to "test the waters" i've slowly whittled you down to nothing and are really holding more that 4 removal spells.
This is correct. the mirror is a Jacewar.
Jace and Garruk have been all I need to deal with anything that Iona doesn't stop.
Most of my games there is not a whole lot on the board to worry about post Iona, because they either tap out early casting threats allowing me an early poly, or they hold back keeping mana open for token removal.
I agree that Emrakul is better than Proggie. However Iona over Emrakul is purely a metagame choice. If your meta is all vamps\Red deck wins\WW then Iona will almost always be a better call. however against decks like jund and boss naya that run removal\threats in multiple colors or Mythic\Eldrazi green that is fatter than Iona just as fast then Emrakul is the correct choice for main.
I'm choosing Emrakul over Iona mostly because my Local meta game is very diverse, and if I go to larger events like SCG Opens then I can expect Jund, Jund, Jund, Naya, Naya, Chapin Control, and maybe the occasional RDW. it's simply a numbers game for me at this point.
Negative. so you're giving yourself a 9/9 that doesn't trample, and 3/3's and setting yourself backwards 3 lands. in what matchup is this a good idea UW control, Day says hello. Jund, Bloodbraid into terminate seems like it's no bueno for you. Mythic, you'll lose to a resolved knight of the reliquary. RDW, okay there's one matchup where a 9/9 non trampler with 3 3/3 friends might be a dominate board position. but you likely didn't get there before turn 3. so you're likely just in burn range anyway, so you're holding back the team to cover a ball ligtning.
against black decks they just Doomblade your 9/9 or hold it off with a nighthawk, or they doomblade it. agaisnt control if you bomb out 3 of their lands and give them the 3/3's they block your Terrastodon, or cast Into the roil, and beat you with your tokens. Before See beyond the reason for running 2 ionas was so that if you drew one you wern't dead in the water until you could jace-shuffle. see beyond gives you 7-8 outs in order to correct a drawn bomb. at which point 1 iona\emrakul is correct.
The U/W version is more capable of surviving the longer game, the G\U version is the speed version. I've played and tested both versions, and i've concluded it's just a matter of taste. I like the idea of speed over survivability, especially now that we have emrakul which ends games faster.
I tried the split before rise, I hated every single time I flipped Proggie against decks with white only to get it dayed, only to have it shuffle back in and end up ontop of Iona.
if you are looking at the overall metagame that is Jund, Jund, Jund, Naya, Naya, UW, RDW, Mythic, Eldrazi X. I think Emrakul is the better choice. Iona has the nice ability to lock out a color (usually their prominate Removal color) however most of these decks run Removal in 2 colors, so you have to have counter backup to protect the token, and counter backup to Protect Iona if you've named the wrong color.
Emrakul on the other hand only has a limited # of weakeness that are even played in these decks. his form of control lockdown comes in the form of annihilator 6 which is better than Iona in most cases because it kills lands which can lock them out of the mana to cast most of their spells. There is no Racing a Emrakul after it attacks because part of it's attack is a falcon punch to the junk.
however if you're looking at a metagame that is Vamp vamp Vamp vamp RDW RDW RDW WW WW UW control, Iona is by far the better maindeck choice as she hands down can win these games.
It really depends on your build, if your deck is heavy on the green then No because UU is hard to come by.
in a heavy Blue build (most typical versions of this deck are) then UU isn't a issue, they're flat out better than the Essence scatters you have to run for the creature threat. and they slightly better than negate because they can be used to counter creatures instead of just protecting the combo, because sometimes you just don't want Ball lightning to resolve.
One reason UR version of this deck can hang with RDW... Bolt can hit almost all of it's threats...
Currently Playing:
Standard:
Nothing, the format Bores me!
Legacy:
RBurn (Made on the Cheap!)R
RGBelcherRG
WSoldier StompyW
BReanimatorB
EDH:
BUGRWSliver OverlordWRGUB
BGeth, Lord of the VaultB