You obviously have gone salty Horrible, Infect is no longer the deck for you.
so cast it aside.
I for one, am going to continue to push this deck to it's limits.
i have seen your 75, you're not there yet. Nor are you qualified to make such a statement yet.
infect was nice when RTR-New phx ran modern. it won me a bunch of store credit, but the environment was right.
some people get attached to decks, i don't i just play what is right for the environment. keep in mind infect isn't a deck to sleeve up for a pro-tour or a GP. just FNM's
with that store credit standard popped up with the boss sligh lists before m15 came out, i was fortunate enough to start off with a 75 sleeved that was just a TAD bit better than the list you have.
keep in mind infect is like boss sligh or rabble red, there is a short window in time where the metagame hasn't fully developed or forgot about aggressive decks that slip through the cracks, but once the meta adjusts it significantly lowers the disadvantage that those cheap decks had thrived on/exploited.
you're also attempting to combat a deck that thrives on spell and mana efficiency (delver, affinity) with spell inefficiency in your 75, thinking it sets you ahead at all. infect was a great deck when it was cheap creatures that only had to get you to 10. with effective alternative cost spells. setting up all this other stuff tends to set you back and makes you susceptible to further setbacks (i mentioned spell snare your slyvan scrying).
tormod's crypt is a dead card, and spending a whole card on attempting to twart treasure cruise isn't helping your board state, it's merely giving delver more time) creeping corrosion is too expensive you'll be dead unless you're playing agaisnt a jank brew with no mox opal..
Find it interesting that this deck is still around, but i am glad alot less people are still playing it.
so basically, the delver decks and with khans coming out have really done this deck in.
swiftspear, treasure cruise and a few other cards were exactly what delver needed.
as someone who had played infect for 6+ months this year prior to khans, i reccomend agaisnt adopting the deck in this fast and powerful meta....infect has no interaction other than apsotle's blessing, or vines of vast wood which is reactive, everything in this deck is reactive which requires you to sand bag damage
people cite tom ross like there is no tomorrow, but he relies HEAVILY on ponder, daze, beserk, brainstorm, invigorate, and force of will in order to setup his combo kill. many of you also aren't running the noble hierarch the deck is built around. tom also takes no damage from his dual lands....
so before direct comparisons are made between the decks remember that 90% of your deck is significantly lower on the power spectrum than the tier 1 legacy deck.....
now that you fully understand that, you adopt a different play style.
this type of playstyle was great when infect just rotated out of standard and the reactive strategies worked well agaisnt the pro-active JUND lists floating around.....always going to bolt, or thoughtseize you or establishing a liliana-tarmo clock.
around the time affinity, splinter-twin and kiki-control started taking the meta infect became the list to start leaving behind...
now, with the delver and khans of tarkir affecting the meta heavily (there are twice as many fetchlands and some nice powerful cards for use to choke on) our slower reactive strategies that were setup to fight stuff like abrupt decay and lightning bolt no longer work.
i honestly believe it's time to cast these infect decks to the side....and become immense isn't the answer we need for an aggresive meta.
affinity is too quick of a clock to catch up to when they're on the play....
delver....is an uphill battle especially when we're mulling alot more than we have been thanks to dead cards in the 7 like mainboarded wild defiance, or become immense and stuff like slyvan scrying which are all just begging for us to be time walked with a simple spell snare, or mana leak
@overlord: Infect lists balance speed vs resiliency. Whenever you cut a creature and add a pump spell, you are increasing the decks speed, but lowering its resiliency.
Given that, we can ask, what are conventional bad matchups for infect? The answer is decks that prey on its relatively low resilency with cards like path/dismember/bolt i.e. jund/junk/twin.
This type of deck will improve your 'good' matchups while making your bad ones worse. I have a good win % vs UWR, in part because I avoid cards like distortion strike and assault strobe.
If you really want to run RUG, Id start by cutting those distortion strikes and a strobe, and add 3 ichorclaw myr, which has good synergy with ghor-clan. if you do that, you want to strongly consider cutting mutagenic growth for rancor, and adding 1-2 more protection effects or gitaxian probes.
Another option is to try and get clever and run slaughterhorn, with the plan of using regular damage plus assault strobe to kill with ordinary damage a reasonable fraction of the time.
How do you do regular damage if all your creatures are dealing infect damage? Are you referring to adding non infect creatures like BOP inside for a alternate beatdown plan?
He's talking about the melira pod decks, creatures lose infect, can't get counters placed on them and no poison counters added.
But your meta would have to be really really bad at playing magic to win with regular damage
If a pod player can't beat a few 1/1 vanilla creatures, some sub par pump spells and a 3 drop 3/2 with no other effects he is a very bad player and it's just pathetic
UB Faries seem to be occurring more on cockatrice and I'm struggling against them post sideboard cause they have so much hate with -1/-1 removal, counters, and tokens for chump blocking. Any tips?
oh cockatrice players picked up on the deck that explains why the more recent posts have been...not of uniform quality. well guys, KTK fetches, infect it's been nice knowing ya!
My bad on the Thalia, I forgot most of my matchups against the deck also run the artifact that does the same thing and I falsely accused Thalia as the 2/3 enabler.
Twin isn't too bad for infect. Neither is storm but both decks are more reliable as they go off quickly and effectively.
Infect kind of needs a Glistener and pump in the hand and a muligan reduces your chances of surviving on game 2 or 3. For the newer players that's what we use to establish tiers. There are a lot of turn 1 kill decks in modern that are tier 4 because they don't really work unless it has the perfect hand.
Just because infect is capable of a turn 2 or 3 win does not mean it's the best deck ever. It's hard to explain to newer/ younger players. Turn 2 is cool and all but a turn 2 necropede that was path to exiled..on a muligan to 5..a card that is a 3 of in a sealed product hoses your chances at winning game 1, turn 2 thought seize or inquisition and boom you lose...not very hard...
JUND is the best deck in modern hands down, when you stare at a JUND deck across the table you know why your deck is $75 on tcg mid and theirs is $3000 in tcg mid not counting foils....JUND is that ******* good.
A lot of people here have never played it just do to the sheer price f it. But there are 2 players with it in my meta and...****....I hate when they show up. These dudes have money. I can't stand the kids who grab $20 worth of cards from the bulk bin go 2-3 or 3-2 at an fnm against ***** like vampire tribal or mono green devotion on a high school kid budget then claim that infect has amazing matchups against amazing decks you used to see on the protour and how infect is the best deck ever..
It's the same crowd that pushes dabbled red in standard
lingering souls creates flying tokens. I would think tom ross' list likes the matchup he gets force of wills and daze which provides interaction rather than just being hated by GW. his modern list doesn't look to be up to snuff
with thalia out you should not be able to play a dismember and a blighted agent and vines
dismember would be a 5 cmc spell with 2 phyrex mana, blighted agent is 2 cmc, then your vines is a 4 cmc spell
^ G/W is the "real" hate bears. idk what UG is, but it sounds like it is an easy matchup since thalia, path, lingering souls (usually a side board card) are not there to lock you out. you also lose a lot of land utility when you cut out white. I don't think your friend is running hatebears, just a deck he brewed up to hate on your infect deck. like the weird america control brews running around like the one that used scry lands and theros gods rather than vendillion cliques, snapcaster mages and fetchlands...that someone played once and claimed america control is nothing compared to infect. (go into the other sub-forums on here and look up the real decklists of the full power decks they are few and far between since modern isn't a huge format but they do exist usually with the older crowd)
hatebears is pretty unwinnable, its america control on steroids.
its not played online as much, which makes it easier for most of the people here. it also rarely see's high end play its more of a local game store deck.
lingering souls, shuts off your inkmoth, especially with a thalia on the field and so many maindeck hate agaisnt you, like the path to exiles which really sucks when you tap 6 land just to get your 2 mutagenic growth in.
one thing to watch for is the untapped noble hierarchs and all of the fetch lands they run. don't swing into a resto angel flash if they have a fetch, a noble hierarch untapped.
also the guy out here runs a playset of goyf idk if you guy locally does, so if you need to hold those pump spells back to weaken that goyf since thalia pretty much shuts off dismember, or a resto angel blinking a goyf so you don't have a target
there are a few more combat tricks but basically play around it and hope to count to 10.
if you're playing at a high level event its a non-issue though, like at a GP if you have those 2 byes probably won't run into the deck
i usually have no problems with twin decks, i don't run wild defiance
snapcaster can't stop an inkmoth and in response to vendillion burn all of your pump
i have played games agaisnt tron where my opening hand had 3 might of old krosa in it and i let out an audible sigh
it's just not a great card to draw agaisnt a deck that mainboards spellskites and then sides in a full playset.
playing the stack, is really just a polite way of exploiting your opponents lack of understanding of the complex game rules. giant growth is generally a better card to maindeck if your userbase is filled with less experienced in competitive play, newer and younger players
otherwise agaisnt dudes who know whats up, might of old krosa gets you to 10 faster.
youre not going to trick a legacy player into bolting a glistener elf with 1 forest open on your turn, but you will bait the high school kid who is an fnm grinder
they probably don't bat an eyelash at 4x misty, 4x breeding pool, and whatever high end cards they desire
if noble hierarch were a $0.50 card it would be an auto include in infect.
back when rancor was $12/playset many infect lists didn't feature them
Thanks for the advice! I'm thinking of playing 4x Glistener Elf, 4x Ichorclaw Myr and 4x Sylvan Scrying. A hand without infect creature but with Scrying can be considered? Or should we ditch that hand as well?
I also saw decks playing Viridian Corrupter MD to have something vs Spellskite in G1. Useful?
depends on the deck you play agaisnt and the meta.
Viridian corrupter is not an optional effect, if you have an ichor on the field it will be destroyed by your own corrupter hitting the field.
with control you generally want to poke at them since they're constantly aiming to 2/3 for one your creatures
going all in only to see a path to exile or a well timed lightning bolt
by well timed i mean you casting giant growth on your creature, them responding with the bolt your creature dies before the giant growth resolves, hits the graveyard you're out 2 cards...for his one.
vines will stop the twin combo for 1, single turn
chances are that if you're using vines of vastwood on their creatures you're not in good shape.
also, this trick doesn't work with a spellskite on their board.
play anyway you like, but aggressively muligan, you need to see a win in that hand. you don't have time to wait to draw a second land, or a glistener elf or the first pump spell
Next week there is a local FNM Modern event which I would like to attend. I'm sleeving up a standard Mono-Green infect list (since it's not that expensive, which allows me to try out the format without too much initial investment) but I have almost no experience in modern tournaments. I have been reading through this thread and picked up some useful info but I was wondering if there are any particular tips / tricks which you can give me. I don't the meta at the event / store so anything to prepare me a bit would be helpful
muligan aggressively, if you can't win with the hand you have ship it. chances are you'll only see 2-3 more cards before you win or lose. (most likely lose).
don't be afraid to scoop when a lingering souls, thoughtseize, inquisition or spellskite lands the board to conceal information about your deck, they don't know what the S/B if you don't needlessly grind out a game 1 that you're going to lose anyways.
they don't know if you're running an artifact heavy mono-green list. or a creature and fetchland heavy U/G list running hierarchs or if you're running the BUG version.
grinding out a game 1 with a spellskite on board or a t1 then a turn 2 thoughtseize you should scoop to keep that info not-public
I don't think you are in position to call someone bad if you think that "nothing we have can't deal with blockers" in affinity. Really? Apostle's blessing is death's sentence for them. Nothing THEY have can stop it, except winning the die roll and having a really good hand.
in the hands of a great pilot, affinity should have no problem racing infect.
Your smartass remark about apostle's blessing a 2-4 of in a the main deck being a "death sentence" for affinity usually isn't that big of a deal, since a good pilot can gal blast your pro artifact creature away and chump block-sac +1/+1 counter you to death.
affinity is a deck that requires a great pilot though, so many people buy it hearing it's a tier 1 deck that doesn't require fetchlands, and is a deck that is recommended to a lot of newer players wanting to get into modern at the competitive level. Infect is a tier 2 usually tier 3 deck (infect used to compete back when shoal was legal).
I could say the same thing about infect - in the hands of good pilot, it has no problem racing slower aggro deck that is affinity.
If Infect would lose to a single spell like galvanic blast, nobody would play it. Just about every instant in your maindeck counters it. And imo blessing should be 4-of in maindeck in monogreen, both because it is useful against creatures and spells, and because you can cast it via cathedral/nexus. UG has better options though. Also I wonder what is a "good pilot". The one who always draws his galvanic blast? Affinity easily keeps hands without blast game 1 (And rightfully so, because it can race most decks in the format. But not infect.)
And Affinity is recommended to a newer players? Really? It is a MOST complicated deck in a format, requires a freaking lot of decisions, and a very experienced in a format pilot. Most new players cannot even diffenrentiate between a mulligan hand and a snap-keep-goldfish one (myself included, lol ). And infect with shoal is completely different deck from monogreen. It is like lumping together monogreen and monoblack infect because "they are both infect!"
A good affinity pilot does not just do nothing on t1, they should be baled to deal 10 damage in turn 2 if they go all in. Which is rare, if they don't play a mox opal ( I'm guessing the kid you played is playing opal-less and etched champion less build.) you hold galv blast when the infect player taps out to pump during his race, then 2 for one him. Or 3 for one him when he's going all in attempting to trample over an etched champion blocker.
When facing a good player, you should not have enough of a clock to
Holdback and waiting till you have a lethal then go all in with apostles. You shouldn't.....
Affinity is the deck recommended to poet entail spikes wanting to get into modern, as it's "only" a $650 deck to be in contention at ptqs and other higher end events. That is recommended more to spikes while the kid playing pile of red starter deck cards might be recommended the b/w token event deck.
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i have seen your 75, you're not there yet. Nor are you qualified to make such a statement yet.
infect was nice when RTR-New phx ran modern. it won me a bunch of store credit, but the environment was right.
some people get attached to decks, i don't i just play what is right for the environment. keep in mind infect isn't a deck to sleeve up for a pro-tour or a GP. just FNM's
with that store credit standard popped up with the boss sligh lists before m15 came out, i was fortunate enough to start off with a 75 sleeved that was just a TAD bit better than the list you have.
keep in mind infect is like boss sligh or rabble red, there is a short window in time where the metagame hasn't fully developed or forgot about aggressive decks that slip through the cracks, but once the meta adjusts it significantly lowers the disadvantage that those cheap decks had thrived on/exploited.
you're also attempting to combat a deck that thrives on spell and mana efficiency (delver, affinity) with spell inefficiency in your 75, thinking it sets you ahead at all. infect was a great deck when it was cheap creatures that only had to get you to 10. with effective alternative cost spells. setting up all this other stuff tends to set you back and makes you susceptible to further setbacks (i mentioned spell snare your slyvan scrying).
tormod's crypt is a dead card, and spending a whole card on attempting to twart treasure cruise isn't helping your board state, it's merely giving delver more time) creeping corrosion is too expensive you'll be dead unless you're playing agaisnt a jank brew with no mox opal..
so basically, the delver decks and with khans coming out have really done this deck in.
swiftspear, treasure cruise and a few other cards were exactly what delver needed.
as someone who had played infect for 6+ months this year prior to khans, i reccomend agaisnt adopting the deck in this fast and powerful meta....infect has no interaction other than apsotle's blessing, or vines of vast wood which is reactive, everything in this deck is reactive which requires you to sand bag damage
people cite tom ross like there is no tomorrow, but he relies HEAVILY on ponder, daze, beserk, brainstorm, invigorate, and force of will in order to setup his combo kill. many of you also aren't running the noble hierarch the deck is built around. tom also takes no damage from his dual lands....
so before direct comparisons are made between the decks remember that 90% of your deck is significantly lower on the power spectrum than the tier 1 legacy deck.....
now that you fully understand that, you adopt a different play style.
this type of playstyle was great when infect just rotated out of standard and the reactive strategies worked well agaisnt the pro-active JUND lists floating around.....always going to bolt, or thoughtseize you or establishing a liliana-tarmo clock.
around the time affinity, splinter-twin and kiki-control started taking the meta infect became the list to start leaving behind...
now, with the delver and khans of tarkir affecting the meta heavily (there are twice as many fetchlands and some nice powerful cards for use to choke on) our slower reactive strategies that were setup to fight stuff like abrupt decay and lightning bolt no longer work.
i honestly believe it's time to cast these infect decks to the side....and become immense isn't the answer we need for an aggresive meta.
affinity is too quick of a clock to catch up to when they're on the play....
delver....is an uphill battle especially when we're mulling alot more than we have been thanks to dead cards in the 7 like mainboarded wild defiance, or become immense and stuff like slyvan scrying which are all just begging for us to be time walked with a simple spell snare, or mana leak
He's talking about the melira pod decks, creatures lose infect, can't get counters placed on them and no poison counters added.
But your meta would have to be really really bad at playing magic to win with regular damage
If a pod player can't beat a few 1/1 vanilla creatures, some sub par pump spells and a 3 drop 3/2 with no other effects he is a very bad player and it's just pathetic
With the sheer amount of newer players wanting infect decks I think I can come out of this not losing a dime
oh cockatrice players picked up on the deck that explains why the more recent posts have been...not of uniform quality. well guys, KTK fetches, infect it's been nice knowing ya!
Twin isn't too bad for infect. Neither is storm but both decks are more reliable as they go off quickly and effectively.
Infect kind of needs a Glistener and pump in the hand and a muligan reduces your chances of surviving on game 2 or 3. For the newer players that's what we use to establish tiers. There are a lot of turn 1 kill decks in modern that are tier 4 because they don't really work unless it has the perfect hand.
Just because infect is capable of a turn 2 or 3 win does not mean it's the best deck ever. It's hard to explain to newer/ younger players. Turn 2 is cool and all but a turn 2 necropede that was path to exiled..on a muligan to 5..a card that is a 3 of in a sealed product hoses your chances at winning game 1, turn 2 thought seize or inquisition and boom you lose...not very hard...
JUND is the best deck in modern hands down, when you stare at a JUND deck across the table you know why your deck is $75 on tcg mid and theirs is $3000 in tcg mid not counting foils....JUND is that ******* good.
A lot of people here have never played it just do to the sheer price f it. But there are 2 players with it in my meta and...****....I hate when they show up. These dudes have money. I can't stand the kids who grab $20 worth of cards from the bulk bin go 2-3 or 3-2 at an fnm against ***** like vampire tribal or mono green devotion on a high school kid budget then claim that infect has amazing matchups against amazing decks you used to see on the protour and how infect is the best deck ever..
It's the same crowd that pushes dabbled red in standard
with thalia out you should not be able to play a dismember and a blighted agent and vines
dismember would be a 5 cmc spell with 2 phyrex mana, blighted agent is 2 cmc, then your vines is a 4 cmc spell
'goyf makes it a 4 turn clock
its not played online as much, which makes it easier for most of the people here. it also rarely see's high end play its more of a local game store deck.
lingering souls, shuts off your inkmoth, especially with a thalia on the field and so many maindeck hate agaisnt you, like the path to exiles which really sucks when you tap 6 land just to get your 2 mutagenic growth in.
one thing to watch for is the untapped noble hierarchs and all of the fetch lands they run. don't swing into a resto angel flash if they have a fetch, a noble hierarch untapped.
also the guy out here runs a playset of goyf idk if you guy locally does, so if you need to hold those pump spells back to weaken that goyf since thalia pretty much shuts off dismember, or a resto angel blinking a goyf so you don't have a target
there are a few more combat tricks but basically play around it and hope to count to 10.
if you're playing at a high level event its a non-issue though, like at a GP if you have those 2 byes probably won't run into the deck
snapcaster can't stop an inkmoth and in response to vendillion burn all of your pump
it's just not a great card to draw agaisnt a deck that mainboards spellskites and then sides in a full playset.
playing the stack, is really just a polite way of exploiting your opponents lack of understanding of the complex game rules. giant growth is generally a better card to maindeck if your userbase is filled with less experienced in competitive play, newer and younger players
otherwise agaisnt dudes who know whats up, might of old krosa gets you to 10 faster.
youre not going to trick a legacy player into bolting a glistener elf with 1 forest open on your turn, but you will bait the high school kid who is an fnm grinder
mono green is the budget version of u/g
by the time someone can afford 4X noble hierarch
they probably don't bat an eyelash at 4x misty, 4x breeding pool, and whatever high end cards they desire
if noble hierarch were a $0.50 card it would be an auto include in infect.
back when rancor was $12/playset many infect lists didn't feature them
depends on the deck you play agaisnt and the meta.
Viridian corrupter is not an optional effect, if you have an ichor on the field it will be destroyed by your own corrupter hitting the field.
with control you generally want to poke at them since they're constantly aiming to 2/3 for one your creatures
going all in only to see a path to exile or a well timed lightning bolt
by well timed i mean you casting giant growth on your creature, them responding with the bolt your creature dies before the giant growth resolves, hits the graveyard you're out 2 cards...for his one.
vines will stop the twin combo for 1, single turn
chances are that if you're using vines of vastwood on their creatures you're not in good shape.
also, this trick doesn't work with a spellskite on their board.
play anyway you like, but aggressively muligan, you need to see a win in that hand. you don't have time to wait to draw a second land, or a glistener elf or the first pump spell
muligan aggressively, if you can't win with the hand you have ship it. chances are you'll only see 2-3 more cards before you win or lose. (most likely lose).
don't be afraid to scoop when a lingering souls, thoughtseize, inquisition or spellskite lands the board to conceal information about your deck, they don't know what the S/B if you don't needlessly grind out a game 1 that you're going to lose anyways.
they don't know if you're running an artifact heavy mono-green list. or a creature and fetchland heavy U/G list running hierarchs or if you're running the BUG version.
grinding out a game 1 with a spellskite on board or a t1 then a turn 2 thoughtseize you should scoop to keep that info not-public
A good affinity pilot does not just do nothing on t1, they should be baled to deal 10 damage in turn 2 if they go all in. Which is rare, if they don't play a mox opal ( I'm guessing the kid you played is playing opal-less and etched champion less build.) you hold galv blast when the infect player taps out to pump during his race, then 2 for one him. Or 3 for one him when he's going all in attempting to trample over an etched champion blocker.
When facing a good player, you should not have enough of a clock to
Holdback and waiting till you have a lethal then go all in with apostles. You shouldn't.....
Affinity is the deck recommended to poet entail spikes wanting to get into modern, as it's "only" a $650 deck to be in contention at ptqs and other higher end events. That is recommended more to spikes while the kid playing pile of red starter deck cards might be recommended the b/w token event deck.