Sorry, I absolutely do bring in collar against Humans, I was just posting on mobile from memory.
I skip collar against jund because of k command and generally drawing the game out any longer than we have to isn't ideal there as their card quality is so much better. Against decks like grixis/shadow variants I actually have a chance to counter k command but not against jund, and I think that's a big difference. It is miles better than a counterspell with BBE of course.
I also take out tarfire because it quickly makes opposing goyfs unroastable and instantly invalidates mandrills against goyf. That and confidant is the only surefire creature it kills and I personally wouldn't keep that in against us if I was on Jund.
Pretty simple as far as which cards are bad here, and the goal is just to improve topdecks/add removal.
For control matchups generally it's the same in that I bring all my threats in, but usually dropping burn spells, but the power level of moon varies greatly between the different control shells so I sometimes forgo them for more burn. Bring in deprive as well.
Against humans I've actually been taking out delver to fully play the control role and not lead to awkward situations with Anger.
In: 2 blood moon, 1 Magus of the moon, 1 roast, 2 Anger, 1 EE, 1 huntmaster, 1 knuckleblade, 1 ancient grudge, 2 destructive revelry
The moon plan is seriously underrated here. You plan on killing their mana dorks and vials anyways, and they're basically playing city of brass.deck. Generally if you can get them topdecking and you tutor up huntmaster, that's game.
After much fiddling with Jace I decided that, while powerful, the number of matchups where I actually wanted to bring him in was abysmally small. It seems fighting off BBE and Humans will take priority in the sideboard for some time to come.
After spending a lot of time thinking about which cantrip I wanted to add as the 60th card (3rd scour, 4th bauble, something else entirely) it sort of hit me like a brick, Censor is the perfect one mana cantrip for this deck. It gives me an extra counterspell against decks that I desperately need to interact with on the stack while filtering away against Cavern of Souls or heavy discard. If you get caught holding it up and your opponent plays under it, you can just cycle it and still have a mana available for any interaction you draw. I actually have been keeping it in against Jund over mana leak to fight off Lilliana early and cycle for threats late and I have been seriously impressed. I wouldn't run it over a counterspell, but over a cantrip it's a really solid choice. Paired with Curator and Traverse I feel the deck finally has ways to mitigate the problems that tempo decks have always had without brainstorm, having the right card at the wrong time. They can seem like they have a minor impact as I cycle them frequently but when you want to play the card at face value it feels awesome.
I've been really happy with Roast in the main. It has certainly had its bad moments but no more than players with path/push have against creatureless decks so really almost isn't worth mentioning.
Dropping my single Bojuka Bog and swapping my Firespouts for Anger has definitely seemed correct. Double red hasn't been an issue and if I draw it against Dredge I have yet to lose. Flipping that matchup on its own is worth it.
Huntmaster is probably the singular best card we have against Humans. They absolutely struggle to answer it and rarely hold cards to stop it from flipping. If you kill something like Meddling Mage or Freebooter to turn removal spells back on its pretty much over. I may consider bringing him back up to 2 copies in the future.
I feel the need to reiterate how insane it is to tutor for Magus of the Moon. That ***** is genuinely unfair and I love it.
I don't know if it would be better than other threat options, but after seeing it in action in the format I really believe Dire Fleet Daredevil could be a sideboard piece for us against Jund and decks like it. For starters, 2 power and first strike is the perfect roadblock for a dumb 3/2 elf I know. Against that same deck we struggle to answer their primary threat in Tarmogoyf and Daredevil opens up plenty of opportunities to take down a goyf for 3-4 mana with extra value. We don't have many cards that can do that. Turn three tapping out for a Daredevil and a thoughtseize to rip a threat we can't kill sounds pretty good too. Not to mention the late game shenanigans involving k command or collective brutality.
Other places it's useful:
Against burn, lightning helix would obviously be amazing but any burn is solid when paired with a way to wall guide.
Against Dredge, you can tutor him up to exile a loam, conflagrate, gnaw to bone, or looting as a piece of grave hate. It's niche but solid.
I like the sphere but not being able to cut Eldrazi off of colorless is a deal breaker for me. I think the tron matchup is better than any Eldrazi variant anyways. Storm is a good matchup while jund/abzan are not, which makes Moon the more valuable piece overall.
I hate etched champion. During Eldrazi winter when I ran two ceremonious rejections in the board my affinity matchup was so good just due to the crossover. Rejection really is great there.
I usually go fairly minimal on threats against affinity and bring in every piece of removal in the 75. At three mana it can Be slow but in conjunction with all your other interaction you buy yourself enough time to play it and it kills your real target (overseer, skirge, master of etherium) while cleaning up any ornithopters/memnites you otherwise wouldn't waste removal on but are annoying nonetheless.
@mike
I wasn't trying to understate CO's effectiveness once it's in play. So many hands (particularly mulligans) start with just lands cantrips and interaction and you have to dig for threats. The enchantment just limits your ability to translate those hands into somewhat aggressive starts while in itself can at times be a poor topdeck. It does have 'home run' potential though in that you can run away with the game whichever is a lot for a one drop. I think using that card will just come down to personal preference, as it can be a little boom or bust.
Also, I've been really happy with Roast in the main. It's been dead a few times but not a huge deal.
The double red cost is tough, but I'll at least be testing it again. Against spreading seas it may not be doable.
Why not bring in Anger against affinity though? I always liked sweepers there personally.
After seeing several different archetypes incorporate Curious Obsession lately it's obvious it's powerful say the least. My issue with it here is that it's best on a one drop and we usually only have 4. That and if your opponent has immediate answers for your first few threats it's either dead in hand or has its target removed. If you were to build more around it with max shoal, and more one drops it could be the basis of a really good tempo strategy. I don't think our current shell supports more than one of these.
You know I was huge on curator, but don't know how I could justify an extra cantrip at this point when the deck suddenly crammed two 4 mana walkers. I tried a copy of Jace in the main but it led to some awkward moments so I think for us it's best as a sideboard piece. To include both jaces in my board I took a page out of mikefon's book and moved a roast to the maindeck to hopefully get more out of my sideboard.
I'm considering swapping firespout for anger of the gods for the same reason. I don't want to ruin my sideboard by clogging it with grave hate but I don't want to be without a hard answer to dredge. Firespout is the superior card here, but if it lets me drop Bojuka bog and get more out of my board it may be worth it. Can anyone sell me on anger?
A Starcity writer called it out as a potential spec target today, so now it's already starting to move. I'm not sure what shell wants to max out on both Jace and a free counter but there's definitely potential for a powerful tempo deck. Also, pitch an extra Jace to counter a Jace. Sounds fun.
Unrelated, but if we ever find ourselves in the potential abyss of a Modern riddled with routine Jace on Jace exchanges, a Treetop Village could be a great sideboard card. 3 damage is the sweet spot to hit Jace and two mana to activate it manageable even for this deck.
I don't think the banlist update has happened on the MTGO client as of now so have yet to play with Jace. Will try to squeeze in a few leaves when it happens.
@mnesci
Also worth noting your simic charm would have protected collar from k command. Looks like you dominated lol.
I wouldn't say Melody was 'bad' but it just compared to EE so poorly in terms of the number of matchups in which you actually want it that it's hard to justify its inclusion over a second EE if that's the sort of removal you are looking for. EE is a bomb against affinity, lantern, bogles etc while being a serviceable sweeper in other creature matchups. Melody comes in against deaths shadow, other tarmogoyf decks, and nacatls and not that many other places, and if you look all of those matchups are ground EE also already covers. This format is so hard to cover with a sideboard, which makes melody narrow, even if powerful.
I actually havnt found hollow one to be that poor, like all the street wraith decks. Outside of their nut draws, tarmogoyf instantly outclasses all their threats. I commonly trade mandrills early with hollow ones. I run vapor snag to somewhat eliminate early hollow one plays and the cheap counters can stop their looting/goblin lore which leaves them durdling early. Out of the board roast and the artifact hate is a huge help and they are usually the unprepared for basilisk collar.
The Phoenix is a little annoying though so I try to remove their threat precombat; if a lose this matchups is generally due to big game hunter. So good.
While I like curator a lot, it was the obvious luxury slot that would Ben perfect to fit in a Jace. I'm also testing a second copy over bedlam reveler in the board and I'm feelings really hopeful about these changes. Jace is...awesome. Having a reliable source of card advantage could be exactly what the ddck needs.
@mnesci
Against UW I cut almost all my burn, load up on threats/moon/counters
I was so nervous it was going to be stoneforge. That card would wreck us. (But that's for another thread)
As already stated, Temur unbannings! At least there's potential for us this time around, even if it in reality only helps other decks.
I don't think we will be implementing BBE in any fashion. While the guaranteed 2-for-1 makes it a good card against any deck trying to beat you with value, the decks we would bring it in against don't care much about a 3/2 at all. Jund abzan grixis and Mardu have no trouble simply outclassing BBE on the ground and nullifying it's impact as that second spell gained from casting it. If they are ever forced to use removal on it that's great but for four mana I think this deck in particular wants something with a higher rate of success closing out games, by winning on its own. I could see it paired with blue to some degree of success in modern but not with delver I don't think. It is great against Jace though.
Jace is a little complicated and I'm frankly not very sure at all. He will need testing. I know for certain 2 would be the most you could fit in the 75, and 1 in the MB would probably be the limit as well. Jace is a ridiculously powerful permanent but many of moderns predators can ignore him almost completely. Tron, Affinity, Titanshift, Burn, Ad nauseum, etc. would love to see us tap out on turn four for Jace. He would be greatly effective against our bad matchups in midrange/control but may be too narrow (in terms of what decks it is 'safe' against) for the main deck.
That being said...he doesn't flip delver, isn't a threat, can't be tutored for, and isn't necessarily effective in a majority of modern matchups. The bar for entry into this deck for a card that fits those specs is ridiculously high, and Jace must do a ton of work to correct bad matchups in my mind to justify its inclusion. Definitely possible though, it is THE Jace.
One thing I wanted to point out about the Jace unbanning, stubborn denial just got a huge boost in relevance. People are going to be licking their lips when they hit four lands and see us with a mere, single island untapped...
That, and you'd be crazy not to be packing a Savage Knuckleblade to get out from under a Jace from now on.
I think this is a very reasonable line of thought. If you don't have the hate in your opening hand it often won't be enough, and this deck can't really afford to jam 3-4 pieces like some decks do. (If only we had nihil spellbomb..)
Dredge isn't going to be good unless you really dedicate a lot of slots so shoring up other matchups could be worthwhile.
@mnesci
I like that seas can complement blood moon by turning off opponents basics. During eldrazi winter most of us were running 3 moon 2 seas and it worked great. Hitti manlands is really good too. Three blood moon can be awkward sometimes when your opponents draws a waste/basics. Even when moon is a bomb drawing multiplex can lose you games. I could see a 2/1 split but if you havnt tried tutoring up a Magus of the moon, it's awesome. Can't bring it in against bolt but so often I can bring it in as my only moon affect and have great access to it. Humans is a great example where it's much better than moon. Naturally helps against multi moon draws as against decks like jeskai you only bring in two. Against decks like eldrazi, you essentially have 6 blood moons. Prettt sweet.
There's a reason clique has seen so much play in eternal formats. It's not a big player in modern for a number of reasons but what is essentially a pre-flipped delver with flash for three mana it absolutely fits into our aggressive gameplan while extending your game against any deck trying to go over the top of you. Doubles down as great against removal heavy decks. (Steal a push/demands a push). I personally wish I could fit it in.
There's a bigger showing of death and taxes/coco/soul sisters and things like that online so perhaps I see more that others. Boros burn too. Revelry is great elsewhere so it's not there necessarily because RIP is everywhere.
I will add that deprive is naturally a better sideboard card for us than a MB inclusion as I am currently doing, because then you only have to fetch for it when you bring it in. Also, if you board it in that means they have 'must-counter' spells so the land bounce should generally be even more likely to be negligible. I only moved it to the main recently in an attempt to get more out of my sideboard.
There's loaming shaman or ooze. There's also that dinosaur. 3/2 for 2G, exiles stuff in the yard to gain life or a pump, but I don't know if those are fast enough.
@mike
Whoops, I forgot what flashfreeze did halfway through that post it seems...lol
I'm interested in your tracker results
I like the idea of extraction. Beats goryo. Against dredge pulling amalgam seems like it would often be enough. Other than that conflagrate can beat you but their aggro plan would be diminished. Against living end if you counter the first living end you just extract it and it leaves them dead in the water. Plus snapcaster lets you do it twice for only two mana total. That's cool.
Just try to remember with curator it's a cantrip first and a threat second. I aggressively cycle it away where a 4/4 flyer isn't likely to be better than interaction. Being able to use it on turn one to help dig for lands/interaction is the best feature a creature can have in a 17 land deck. Doubling down as a threat against our worst matchups is gravy.
I like seas, bur with three slots already dedicated to blood moon, four total is a lot and limits your interaction suite quite a bit. I do like that it is good against both midrange/control AND the big mana decks. Have you tried clique here? In conjunction with counters it really enhances a permission suite IMO, and tutoring for it on a critical turn is great.
It stands out to me that you only have one Revelry and an EE to deal with RIP. I'm too scared to run without two Revelry myself. The cards just really good against us.
I also really like forked bolt here and have argued for it much in the past but with traverse I think I would always give the nod to tarfire. Unless forked bolt was in the board.
The counterspell debate is one I've had over this deck quite a bit and it's a tough call. The options are effective but narrow. I see flashfreeze has merits against burn but unless it hits deflecting palm it's generally going to work about 4 life. That's good but not gamebreaking. It's great against shift except...it misses through the breach. Falls flat against tron any all combo. I'm not sure where this card shines in the format honestly. Stroke is good against tron, shift, ad nauseum, reasonable against storm for gifts/pif, Ok against jeskai for nahiri and cryptic but not great, effective against eldrazi, and other places but some matchups where you really want an extra counter it does nothing. Like lantern control for example. Rejection is probably the most powerful overall but the most narrow. A bomb against tron, lantern, eldrazi, and affinity(countering champion is amazing), hits lotus bloom from ad nauseum...ect. But completely misses archetypes all together.
In a deck where you already have moon clogging up the board space, most of us are already compromising on graveyard hate to do so. That makes every sideboard slot incredibly valuable, meaning narrow counters arnt going to be as big of a contributor as one you can bring in to a diverse array of matchups. This is why Deprive has been my go to complement to mana leak in this deck. I would say at least 80% of the time it is functionally counterspell. We always miss land drops so replaying a land the next turn is usually not even a draw back. I often use it on my turn to generate a mana (net loss of one mana for counterspell? Wow) when opponents try to disrupt my combat step with removal. Sure, the land bounce can hurt occasionally, but nothing makes a counterspell worse than being dead in hand or not even worth bringing in to matchups where you need another counter desperately. Deprive never misses and comes in whenever I need more permission. I love it.
@mike
I see you dropped a mandrills. What led to that?
Also, how has extraction been for you?
I'm glad I see so many of us on Knuckeblade now. So many wouldn't give him a chance!
When I first included collar I always brought it in against shadow but less often after being hit by command a few too many times. If they weren't so heavy on discard the counters would be better and it would be a safer play but I really don't like the two mana counters here, at least leak. It is a really good trump to their hard to deal with threats but if the game goes long they usually answer it. Perfectly reasonable to bring in though, a couple of stubborn denials can easily carry it to victory.
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I skip collar against jund because of k command and generally drawing the game out any longer than we have to isn't ideal there as their card quality is so much better. Against decks like grixis/shadow variants I actually have a chance to counter k command but not against jund, and I think that's a big difference. It is miles better than a counterspell with BBE of course.
I also take out tarfire because it quickly makes opposing goyfs unroastable and instantly invalidates mandrills against goyf. That and confidant is the only surefire creature it kills and I personally wouldn't keep that in against us if I was on Jund.
How has deprive worked for you?
In: 2 Blood Moon, 1 Huntmaster, 1 knuckleblade, 1 roast, 1 EE
Out: 2 tarfire, 3 stubborn denial, 1 mana leak
Pretty simple as far as which cards are bad here, and the goal is just to improve topdecks/add removal.
For control matchups generally it's the same in that I bring all my threats in, but usually dropping burn spells, but the power level of moon varies greatly between the different control shells so I sometimes forgo them for more burn. Bring in deprive as well.
Against humans I've actually been taking out delver to fully play the control role and not lead to awkward situations with Anger.
Out: 4 delver, 3 stubborn denial, 2 mana leak, 1 censor, 2 spell snare
In: 2 blood moon, 1 Magus of the moon, 1 roast, 2 Anger, 1 EE, 1 huntmaster, 1 knuckleblade, 1 ancient grudge, 2 destructive revelry
The moon plan is seriously underrated here. You plan on killing their mana dorks and vials anyways, and they're basically playing city of brass.deck. Generally if you can get them topdecking and you tutor up huntmaster, that's game.
After much fiddling with Jace I decided that, while powerful, the number of matchups where I actually wanted to bring him in was abysmally small. It seems fighting off BBE and Humans will take priority in the sideboard for some time to come.
4 Delver of Secrets
1 Gnarlwood Dryad
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Hooting Mandrills
2 Snapcaster Mage
1 Curator of Mysteries
Spells:29
4 Serum Visions
3 Mishra's Bauble
3 Traverse the Ulvenwald
2 Thought Scour
1 Censor
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Tarfire
1 Roast
2 Vapor Snag
3 Stubborn Denial
2 Spell Snare
2 Mana Leak
2 Steam Vents
1 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Scalding Tarn
2 Wooded Foothills
2 Island
1 Forest
1 Mountain
1 Basilisk Collar
1 Feed the Clan
1 Deprive
2 Destructive Revelry
1 Ancient Grudge
1 Roast
2 Anger of the Gods
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Savage Knuckleblade
1 Huntmaster of the Fells
1 Magus of the Moon
2 Blood Moon
After spending a lot of time thinking about which cantrip I wanted to add as the 60th card (3rd scour, 4th bauble, something else entirely) it sort of hit me like a brick, Censor is the perfect one mana cantrip for this deck. It gives me an extra counterspell against decks that I desperately need to interact with on the stack while filtering away against Cavern of Souls or heavy discard. If you get caught holding it up and your opponent plays under it, you can just cycle it and still have a mana available for any interaction you draw. I actually have been keeping it in against Jund over mana leak to fight off Lilliana early and cycle for threats late and I have been seriously impressed. I wouldn't run it over a counterspell, but over a cantrip it's a really solid choice. Paired with Curator and Traverse I feel the deck finally has ways to mitigate the problems that tempo decks have always had without brainstorm, having the right card at the wrong time. They can seem like they have a minor impact as I cycle them frequently but when you want to play the card at face value it feels awesome.
I've been really happy with Roast in the main. It has certainly had its bad moments but no more than players with path/push have against creatureless decks so really almost isn't worth mentioning.
Dropping my single Bojuka Bog and swapping my Firespouts for Anger has definitely seemed correct. Double red hasn't been an issue and if I draw it against Dredge I have yet to lose. Flipping that matchup on its own is worth it.
Huntmaster is probably the singular best card we have against Humans. They absolutely struggle to answer it and rarely hold cards to stop it from flipping. If you kill something like Meddling Mage or Freebooter to turn removal spells back on its pretty much over. I may consider bringing him back up to 2 copies in the future.
I feel the need to reiterate how insane it is to tutor for Magus of the Moon. That ***** is genuinely unfair and I love it.
I don't know if it would be better than other threat options, but after seeing it in action in the format I really believe Dire Fleet Daredevil could be a sideboard piece for us against Jund and decks like it. For starters, 2 power and first strike is the perfect roadblock for a dumb 3/2 elf I know. Against that same deck we struggle to answer their primary threat in Tarmogoyf and Daredevil opens up plenty of opportunities to take down a goyf for 3-4 mana with extra value. We don't have many cards that can do that. Turn three tapping out for a Daredevil and a thoughtseize to rip a threat we can't kill sounds pretty good too. Not to mention the late game shenanigans involving k command or collective brutality.
Other places it's useful:
Against burn, lightning helix would obviously be amazing but any burn is solid when paired with a way to wall guide.
Against Dredge, you can tutor him up to exile a loam, conflagrate, gnaw to bone, or looting as a piece of grave hate. It's niche but solid.
Thoughts?
I usually go fairly minimal on threats against affinity and bring in every piece of removal in the 75. At three mana it can Be slow but in conjunction with all your other interaction you buy yourself enough time to play it and it kills your real target (overseer, skirge, master of etherium) while cleaning up any ornithopters/memnites you otherwise wouldn't waste removal on but are annoying nonetheless.
@mike
I wasn't trying to understate CO's effectiveness once it's in play. So many hands (particularly mulligans) start with just lands cantrips and interaction and you have to dig for threats. The enchantment just limits your ability to translate those hands into somewhat aggressive starts while in itself can at times be a poor topdeck. It does have 'home run' potential though in that you can run away with the game whichever is a lot for a one drop. I think using that card will just come down to personal preference, as it can be a little boom or bust.
Also, I've been really happy with Roast in the main. It's been dead a few times but not a huge deal.
Why not bring in Anger against affinity though? I always liked sweepers there personally.
After seeing several different archetypes incorporate Curious Obsession lately it's obvious it's powerful say the least. My issue with it here is that it's best on a one drop and we usually only have 4. That and if your opponent has immediate answers for your first few threats it's either dead in hand or has its target removed. If you were to build more around it with max shoal, and more one drops it could be the basis of a really good tempo strategy. I don't think our current shell supports more than one of these.
I'm considering swapping firespout for anger of the gods for the same reason. I don't want to ruin my sideboard by clogging it with grave hate but I don't want to be without a hard answer to dredge. Firespout is the superior card here, but if it lets me drop Bojuka bog and get more out of my board it may be worth it. Can anyone sell me on anger?
Unrelated, but if we ever find ourselves in the potential abyss of a Modern riddled with routine Jace on Jace exchanges, a Treetop Village could be a great sideboard card. 3 damage is the sweet spot to hit Jace and two mana to activate it manageable even for this deck.
@mnesci
Also worth noting your simic charm would have protected collar from k command. Looks like you dominated lol.
I actually havnt found hollow one to be that poor, like all the street wraith decks. Outside of their nut draws, tarmogoyf instantly outclasses all their threats. I commonly trade mandrills early with hollow ones. I run vapor snag to somewhat eliminate early hollow one plays and the cheap counters can stop their looting/goblin lore which leaves them durdling early. Out of the board roast and the artifact hate is a huge help and they are usually the unprepared for basilisk collar.
The Phoenix is a little annoying though so I try to remove their threat precombat; if a lose this matchups is generally due to big game hunter. So good.
Little update to those interested-
4 Delver of Secrets
1 Gnarlwood Dryad
2 Snapcaster Mage
4 Tarmogoyf
1 Savage Knuckleblade
2 Hooting Mandrills
Artifacts:3
3 Mishra's Bauble
Sorceries:7
4 Serum Visions
3 Traverse the Ulvenwald
Instants:18
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Spell Snare
3 Stubborn Denial
2 Tarfire
2 Thought Scour
2 Vapor Snag
1 Deprive
2 Mana Leak
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
Lands:17
1 Breeding Pool
1 Forest
2 Island
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Mountain
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Steam Vents
1 Stomping Ground
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Magus of the Moon
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Basilisk Collar
2 Roast
2 Firespout
1 Ancient Grudge
2 Destructive Revelry
1 Feed the Clan
2 Blood Moon
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Bojuka Bog
While I like curator a lot, it was the obvious luxury slot that would Ben perfect to fit in a Jace. I'm also testing a second copy over bedlam reveler in the board and I'm feelings really hopeful about these changes. Jace is...awesome. Having a reliable source of card advantage could be exactly what the ddck needs.
@mnesci
Against UW I cut almost all my burn, load up on threats/moon/counters
As already stated, Temur unbannings! At least there's potential for us this time around, even if it in reality only helps other decks.
I don't think we will be implementing BBE in any fashion. While the guaranteed 2-for-1 makes it a good card against any deck trying to beat you with value, the decks we would bring it in against don't care much about a 3/2 at all. Jund abzan grixis and Mardu have no trouble simply outclassing BBE on the ground and nullifying it's impact as that second spell gained from casting it. If they are ever forced to use removal on it that's great but for four mana I think this deck in particular wants something with a higher rate of success closing out games, by winning on its own. I could see it paired with blue to some degree of success in modern but not with delver I don't think. It is great against Jace though.
Jace is a little complicated and I'm frankly not very sure at all. He will need testing. I know for certain 2 would be the most you could fit in the 75, and 1 in the MB would probably be the limit as well. Jace is a ridiculously powerful permanent but many of moderns predators can ignore him almost completely. Tron, Affinity, Titanshift, Burn, Ad nauseum, etc. would love to see us tap out on turn four for Jace. He would be greatly effective against our bad matchups in midrange/control but may be too narrow (in terms of what decks it is 'safe' against) for the main deck.
That being said...he doesn't flip delver, isn't a threat, can't be tutored for, and isn't necessarily effective in a majority of modern matchups. The bar for entry into this deck for a card that fits those specs is ridiculously high, and Jace must do a ton of work to correct bad matchups in my mind to justify its inclusion. Definitely possible though, it is THE Jace.
One thing I wanted to point out about the Jace unbanning, stubborn denial just got a huge boost in relevance. People are going to be licking their lips when they hit four lands and see us with a mere, single island untapped...
That, and you'd be crazy not to be packing a Savage Knuckleblade to get out from under a Jace from now on.
Dredge isn't going to be good unless you really dedicate a lot of slots so shoring up other matchups could be worthwhile.
I like that seas can complement blood moon by turning off opponents basics. During eldrazi winter most of us were running 3 moon 2 seas and it worked great. Hitti manlands is really good too. Three blood moon can be awkward sometimes when your opponents draws a waste/basics. Even when moon is a bomb drawing multiplex can lose you games. I could see a 2/1 split but if you havnt tried tutoring up a Magus of the moon, it's awesome. Can't bring it in against bolt but so often I can bring it in as my only moon affect and have great access to it. Humans is a great example where it's much better than moon. Naturally helps against multi moon draws as against decks like jeskai you only bring in two. Against decks like eldrazi, you essentially have 6 blood moons. Prettt sweet.
There's a reason clique has seen so much play in eternal formats. It's not a big player in modern for a number of reasons but what is essentially a pre-flipped delver with flash for three mana it absolutely fits into our aggressive gameplan while extending your game against any deck trying to go over the top of you. Doubles down as great against removal heavy decks. (Steal a push/demands a push). I personally wish I could fit it in.
There's a bigger showing of death and taxes/coco/soul sisters and things like that online so perhaps I see more that others. Boros burn too. Revelry is great elsewhere so it's not there necessarily because RIP is everywhere.
I will add that deprive is naturally a better sideboard card for us than a MB inclusion as I am currently doing, because then you only have to fetch for it when you bring it in. Also, if you board it in that means they have 'must-counter' spells so the land bounce should generally be even more likely to be negligible. I only moved it to the main recently in an attempt to get more out of my sideboard.
There's loaming shaman or ooze. There's also that dinosaur. 3/2 for 2G, exiles stuff in the yard to gain life or a pump, but I don't know if those are fast enough.
@mike
Whoops, I forgot what flashfreeze did halfway through that post it seems...lol
I'm interested in your tracker results
I like the idea of extraction. Beats goryo. Against dredge pulling amalgam seems like it would often be enough. Other than that conflagrate can beat you but their aggro plan would be diminished. Against living end if you counter the first living end you just extract it and it leaves them dead in the water. Plus snapcaster lets you do it twice for only two mana total. That's cool.
I like seas, bur with three slots already dedicated to blood moon, four total is a lot and limits your interaction suite quite a bit. I do like that it is good against both midrange/control AND the big mana decks. Have you tried clique here? In conjunction with counters it really enhances a permission suite IMO, and tutoring for it on a critical turn is great.
It stands out to me that you only have one Revelry and an EE to deal with RIP. I'm too scared to run without two Revelry myself. The cards just really good against us.
I also really like forked bolt here and have argued for it much in the past but with traverse I think I would always give the nod to tarfire. Unless forked bolt was in the board.
The counterspell debate is one I've had over this deck quite a bit and it's a tough call. The options are effective but narrow. I see flashfreeze has merits against burn but unless it hits deflecting palm it's generally going to work about 4 life. That's good but not gamebreaking. It's great against shift except...it misses through the breach. Falls flat against tron any all combo. I'm not sure where this card shines in the format honestly. Stroke is good against tron, shift, ad nauseum, reasonable against storm for gifts/pif, Ok against jeskai for nahiri and cryptic but not great, effective against eldrazi, and other places but some matchups where you really want an extra counter it does nothing. Like lantern control for example. Rejection is probably the most powerful overall but the most narrow. A bomb against tron, lantern, eldrazi, and affinity(countering champion is amazing), hits lotus bloom from ad nauseum...ect. But completely misses archetypes all together.
In a deck where you already have moon clogging up the board space, most of us are already compromising on graveyard hate to do so. That makes every sideboard slot incredibly valuable, meaning narrow counters arnt going to be as big of a contributor as one you can bring in to a diverse array of matchups. This is why Deprive has been my go to complement to mana leak in this deck. I would say at least 80% of the time it is functionally counterspell. We always miss land drops so replaying a land the next turn is usually not even a draw back. I often use it on my turn to generate a mana (net loss of one mana for counterspell? Wow) when opponents try to disrupt my combat step with removal. Sure, the land bounce can hurt occasionally, but nothing makes a counterspell worse than being dead in hand or not even worth bringing in to matchups where you need another counter desperately. Deprive never misses and comes in whenever I need more permission. I love it.
@mike
I see you dropped a mandrills. What led to that?
Also, how has extraction been for you?
I'm glad I see so many of us on Knuckeblade now. So many wouldn't give him a chance!