I used to run those exact six but I eventually cut down on the birds until it was just he 4 nobles. Birds just was not having enough of an impact on the game for me.
Same here lol. I tested with vials for a long time but eventually I decided I liked the way the deck plays out without them better. It trends towards longer grindier games that come down to well placed attacks and correct spell sequencing which is what I really love about the bears.
One thing I would mention is that I run 1-2 Collected Company, 4 Path, 2 Command since the companies let you retain card advantage and can prevent overextending.
I messes with eye of ugin and anything that pumps their colorless creatures. It would solely be against the eldrazi deck though and has no realy effect on anything else outside of corner case scenarios.
Amusingly, you're not relying on your opponent to make mistakes. You're relying on your opponent to make the correct play which is to not walk into into getting blown out. If they're constantly playing around wrath does it matter if you actually have a wrath or not? That's the point I'm making. I'm basically at the 2nd level here, while you're looking at this as a 1st level exercise. You're playing as if your opponent is playing around the card you think they think you have, which, for the person who's questioning removing Mindcensor, sometimes not having it is just as good as having it.
I think your last argument is also incorrect. People play around Path. They do. They want to make us use Path when it's least favorable to us, on a weaker target, and we want to save it to use it on their best targets, or at the most opportune time. They can choose to play around Path by not playing their best creature, forcing out Path by virtue of the board state, and then play their better creature knowing that we've played a path and the odds of having another path are less than likely.
Example: playing against Abzan Midrange, they play a Goyf, and then another, we handle one with the board state, but you question on whether or not to use Path on the other one. It's a 3/4, you're at 10 life. You use path on it, they follow up with a Siege Rhino and then you don't have a Path for the Rhino. I'm sure they had the ability to play a Rhino the past 2 turns, but they didn't. Why? Because you'd have Pathed the Rhino and they were playing around with their higher value creatures baiting removal. It happens.
I don't think you quite understand what i'm trying to convey. What you say is essentially correct but for the purposes of building a deck and arguing towards the inclusion or exclusion of particular cards its worthless advice.
During actual play given all the known information by both opponents (Cards played, Graveyard Size, Lands/Colors on Field, Cards in hand, Probability key cards are in hand or will be drawn from deck, ect..) it is indeed possible that the correct play from the opponents standpoint is take make a decision that is not optimal if they had actually known everything. i.e. what your attempting to describe. Those situations are entirely contextual and not something you should ever go into a match expecting to achieve but rather something to take advantage of when the possibly gain far outweighs the immediate disadvantage to you.
The problem with trying to play these mindgames are that the "levels", as you put it, are an infinite logic chain looping through two decisions based upon the possibility your opponent is bluffing you. In actuality a good magic player has many similarities to a good poker play and they simply run the numbers, as it were, and determine the line of play with the best chance of success.
This isn't to say that there is no advantage to be gained from representing more lines of play than you actually have but I firmly believe it should never come at a detriment to the functionality of your deck or your current path to victory.
In the context of our discussion this would mean choosing to play aven mindcensor in a metagame where it was not suited to force your opponent to respect the possibility you have it rather than for its actual impact on the game. Likewise this would include leaving up three mana to represent the possibility you have the mindcensor (regardless if it in your list or not) but at the cost of developing your board and losing valuable tempo when they call your bluff.
I don't think you need to cut forge tender...Its not like burn is going to be running Koz Return and my guess is that many decks will still prefer Anger of the gods due to the extra damage and exile.
I probably will keep my singleton in the sideboard with the difference being I keep one or two dromoka's command post side and don't put in the forge tender vs. Tron.
Am I the only one underwhelmed by Aven Mindcensor? Nobody at my LGS ever falls for it and it's a 3drop with mediocre stats.
The fact that they're playing around it means it works. It means they're not playing the optimal line. Just because they don't fall for it doesn't mean that it's not getting actual value.
@thebombzen,Please do a search on this thread. You'll find plenty of discussion on the merits and shortcomings of Aven Mindcensor and how the card does in various metagames.
@tadiou, Relying on your opponent to make mistakes is not really any sort of metric to add merit to an argument on a cards inclusion in a deck. Going by a more obvious form of that logic our opponent will never play their best creatures because we play path to exile in our deck...
One word answers aside there are a number of ways to beat tokens. Rancor is certainly one of them but I prefer to stay away since it always opens you up to the possibility of a 2 for 1.
When i'm facing tokens post board there are some key cards I would like to see.
Though since its a planeswalker causing your specific problem only Thalia and EE are really relevant from that list.
Its definitely a strategy we are weak too and the usual answer is to force them to block until the tokens are gone and then win. In your case though elspeth is the one causing you issues I would strongly consider a 1 of sideboarded pithing needle as it catches many important threats in modern currently. Also you could consider Elspeth, Knight Errant in your Side/Main. She has always kind of been an average card for our deck but might do well in your meta.
On a separate note: what does everyone think of running a singleton dryad arbor in place of a nonbasic? I like the idea of vialing it into play at the bottom of turn one.
For the purposes of the deck I don't see much point in having dryad arbor. It doesn't function well as an attacker, its a terrible blocker, Gives additional targets for stray damage ie: electrolyze @ sweepers, It cant even produce mana for a real mana dork on T1 and later turns its still dangerous since we want all our mana functional if possible, and I don't really see the point in vialing it in since vial on its own represents a very powerful piece of "Ramp" as it were, so all your really doing is emptying your hand .5-1 turn faster with the extreme risk of a blowout.
Am I the only one underwhelmed by Aven Mindcensor? Nobody at my LGS ever falls for it and it's a 3drop with mediocre stats. I replaced it with 2x Kitchen Finks but if URW KikiResto becomes popular I might switch to 2x Archangel of Tithes. I wasthinking about that anyway because I have a hard time beating Lingering Souls and Blade Splicer.
My opinion on Aven Mindcensor is that when evaluating it for a slot you always assume its a 2/1 flier for flash excepting in the following matchups: Tron, Scapeshift, possibly Bx Eldrazi, and various decks relying on Chord of Calling. Anything else you get out of it (LD is the hope) is inconsistent enough that you cannot assume it as an advantage to having it in the deck. I recommend regarding that as an unexpected bonus if you get there.
Can someone sell me on Oath of Nissa? I understand that card selection is good, but is it really better than the tempo that Aether Vial provides? Is Aether Vial just poorly positioned right now?
Look at it this way. Oath of Nissa does absolutely nothing to advance our board-state at the cost of: one mana, the small risk of card disadvantage, making Thalia disadvantageous more often, and most likely some significant tempo. Its benefit is that we get to look three cards deep to hopefully find something relevant which will more often than not be a land.
The only time I would be happy to be casting one in our deck right now is in grindy matches late game where we need to find gas and cast it asap. Only opponents I can think of there are going to be jund and possibly grixis.
I am aware that I tend to play the deck a little differently than most people but it seems fairly easy to say that you will always prefer to play a mana Dork or Vial T1 and in general there really isn't spare mana lying around since with all the activated abilities on our lands and such the deck runs very lean.
Even in jund where it potentially gets goyf one bigger and its the deck that seems to most want it its highly debated
@Redtwister, A bit early for some of those conclusions I would think. Twin being such a staple of the format it had become something of a benchmark for combo decks to look at and ask themselves "What are the reasons to play this over a Twin deck?"
I agree that tron will gain a certain boost from this, alongside affinity and possibly burn they will probably gain percentage points on the meta but far from combo not being relevant the decks that twin kept somewhat suppressed by its presence will now have a decent shot and filling in the void. Ad-Naus, Storm, Living End, Coco-Combo (As you mentioned), and others are all powerful decks but consistently had problems when facing twin.
Control not being all that relevant is something of a misnomer in the modern forums as of late. Traditional draw-go control, yes, this is not really present but instead due to the card pool and the variety of viable decks it is forced to take different forms. Its just not feasible to cram 12 situational counter-spells into a deck alongside some removal and jump in to the modern meta hoping to be successful, There has to be some sort of proactive game plan paired with permission in order to win consistently.
@Redtwister, A bit early for some of those conclusions I would think. Twin being such a staple of the format it had become something of a benchmark for combo decks to look at and ask themselves "What are the reasons to play this over a Twin deck?" But that doesn't mean that its the ONLY combo deck and its disappearance destroys an entire archtype...
I agree that tron will gain a certain boost from this, alongside affinity and possibly burn they will probably gain percentage points on the meta but far from combo not being relevant the decks that twin kept somewhat suppressed by its presence will now have a decent shot at filling in the void. Ad-Naus, Storm, Living End, Coco-Combo (As you mentioned), and others are all powerful decks but consistently measured up worse than just playing twin instead.
Control not being all that relevant is something of a misnomer in the modern forums as of late. Traditional draw-go control, yes, this is not really present but instead due to the card pool and the variety of viable decks it is forced to take different forms. Its just not feasible to cram 12 situational counter-spells into a deck alongside some removal and jump in to the modern meta hoping to be successful, There has to be some sort of proactive game plan paired with permission in order to win consistently.
I predict we will see some mid-meta changes to the Ban List as it becomes a meta with only giant creature ramp mid-range and pure aggro dominating the format. GW Hatebears and Merfolk become the decks most capable of upsetting the meta, IMO, and with Combo gone, each can focus on beating their worst matches.
As stated above I disagree with this statement, I highly recommend you read a few articles to get a better idea of how wizards goes through the banning process and what they hope to achieve by it. Also this will help you judge how the metagame might react to situations such as this but its never as radical as what you propose.
I found tons after about thirty seconds of searching google. In particular Eric Lauer's quotes in this one are informative.
Realistically speaking you wont be able to activate it more than once a turn and it necessitates the use of a utility land so i don't see it ever coming down and bouncing something immediately which gives the opponent a turn to come to grips with it and adjust their gameplan. Alongside the three mana initial investment I cant see it see play outside the vial builds but I am sure death and taxes will test it and perhaps even start running it alongside of flickerwisp or even instead of.
All in all without aether vial I don't think this is something you want to be running but with it the possibilities are there and with the aggressive costing might even be doable.
@Thomaster87, I thought about it as well when it was spoiled but what eventually turned me off to it was the fact that I honestly couldn't think of any situation where I want to be attacking with three creatures excepting when I am already about to win or as a last ditch effort to get damage through.
Just curious, but how much difference is birds from noble? My friend want to make Hatebears but does not want to spend the money on nobles.
It's fairly common to substitute Birds of Paradise for Noble hierarch for budget reasons and functionally the deck will run fine. However Noble has the price it does for a very good reason and the exalted triggers can often make the difference between winning and losing games due to being able to push through damage and not being a terrible topdeck late in the game.
I would recommend your friend to build the deck with birds if he likes it and plan to upgrade to nobles as he is able.
A card I've been looking at is Return to the Ranks. It finds Thalia, Arbiter, Pridemage, Scooze, Voice, Spellskite, and Hierarch. That's a lot of recursion potential.
The big issue I have with return to the ranks is that while it does indeed have many targets in our deck most of those are relatively low impact and I cant see the card being all that useful. By the time your cast return for any significant amount of creatures I see two things being true in most cases:
1: Its been a grindy matchup which put those creatures in the grave in the first place.
2: The creatures will the vast majority of the time not affect the board state terribly much. The 2/2's do not match well late game versus Goyf's, Anglers, Tasigur, Rhinos, Olivia, Huntsmaster, and other threats that control and grindy mid-range decks tend to play. Best scenarios I see are finding some exalted triggers and being able to go on the offensive or casting it for three against affinity and getting a pridemage back..
The other problem I have (And the one that puts the nail in the coffin for me) is that I quite often use those creatures as fuel for my Scooze allowing me to make it into a credible threat. If your banking on reanimating those guys later scooze becomes a less attractive option and I would much rather be proactive in his use since that card takes over games.
Pretty much in any case I could see myself wanting to cast it I would much rather have Collected Company as I can get smiters, Finks, ect.. from that which are the big beaters for us.
@Epsilonson: I'm curious, why did you SB Rest in Peace against Abzan Liege in the GP? To counter half of Lingering Souls? I also see that you only SB 1 Explosives in that matchup...
Thanks for the report!
He probably put it in there to shrink goyfs and dodge the second wave of souls. Since it's Lil kid junk, there could also potentially be Finks to chump block aggro strategies or Knight of the Reliquary to lay the beats; RIP handles that. Access to G/W sideboard cards is one of my fave reasons for this deck. The hate is real lol.
@CosmoKramer, Pretty much what jonathanveedot mentioned. Also, he had four voice of resurgence in the main-deck. I debated between a second explosives (With the risk that I can have it as a dead draw vs a field of rhino/Goyf/Liege) or to go with RiP and hope to gain a cards worth of advantage of it after it lands.
That was my logic at the time but definitely looking back should have at least taken both explosives. Only thing I can remember is that after the first game I was still worried about the Rhino/Goyf so I went with RiP. Ended up being the vagaries of magic that gave him the triple souls and no individual beater. Hindsight says I should probably have found room for both.
Glad to have the report read through! =) Let me know if you have any other input.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
One thing I would mention is that I run 1-2 Collected Company, 4 Path, 2 Command since the companies let you retain card advantage and can prevent overextending.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
I messes with eye of ugin and anything that pumps their colorless creatures. It would solely be against the eldrazi deck though and has no realy effect on anything else outside of corner case scenarios.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
I don't think you quite understand what i'm trying to convey. What you say is essentially correct but for the purposes of building a deck and arguing towards the inclusion or exclusion of particular cards its worthless advice.
During actual play given all the known information by both opponents (Cards played, Graveyard Size, Lands/Colors on Field, Cards in hand, Probability key cards are in hand or will be drawn from deck, ect..) it is indeed possible that the correct play from the opponents standpoint is take make a decision that is not optimal if they had actually known everything. i.e. what your attempting to describe. Those situations are entirely contextual and not something you should ever go into a match expecting to achieve but rather something to take advantage of when the possibly gain far outweighs the immediate disadvantage to you.
The problem with trying to play these mindgames are that the "levels", as you put it, are an infinite logic chain looping through two decisions based upon the possibility your opponent is bluffing you. In actuality a good magic player has many similarities to a good poker play and they simply run the numbers, as it were, and determine the line of play with the best chance of success.
This isn't to say that there is no advantage to be gained from representing more lines of play than you actually have but I firmly believe it should never come at a detriment to the functionality of your deck or your current path to victory.
In the context of our discussion this would mean choosing to play aven mindcensor in a metagame where it was not suited to force your opponent to respect the possibility you have it rather than for its actual impact on the game. Likewise this would include leaving up three mana to represent the possibility you have the mindcensor (regardless if it in your list or not) but at the cost of developing your board and losing valuable tempo when they call your bluff.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
I probably will keep my singleton in the sideboard with the difference being I keep one or two dromoka's command post side and don't put in the forge tender vs. Tron.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
@thebombzen,Please do a search on this thread. You'll find plenty of discussion on the merits and shortcomings of Aven Mindcensor and how the card does in various metagames.
@tadiou, Relying on your opponent to make mistakes is not really any sort of metric to add merit to an argument on a cards inclusion in a deck. Going by a more obvious form of that logic our opponent will never play their best creatures because we play path to exile in our deck...
One word answers aside there are a number of ways to beat tokens. Rancor is certainly one of them but I prefer to stay away since it always opens you up to the possibility of a 2 for 1.
When i'm facing tokens post board there are some key cards I would like to see.
-Thalia, Guardian of Thraben (Before Turn 3)
-Dromoka's Command (I still play two main board even though many seem to dislike it these days)
-Ghostly Prison
-And most importantly Engineered Explosives
Though since its a planeswalker causing your specific problem only Thalia and EE are really relevant from that list.
Its definitely a strategy we are weak too and the usual answer is to force them to block until the tokens are gone and then win. In your case though elspeth is the one causing you issues I would strongly consider a 1 of sideboarded pithing needle as it catches many important threats in modern currently. Also you could consider Elspeth, Knight Errant in your Side/Main. She has always kind of been an average card for our deck but might do well in your meta.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
For the purposes of the deck I don't see much point in having dryad arbor. It doesn't function well as an attacker, its a terrible blocker, Gives additional targets for stray damage ie: electrolyze @ sweepers, It cant even produce mana for a real mana dork on T1 and later turns its still dangerous since we want all our mana functional if possible, and I don't really see the point in vialing it in since vial on its own represents a very powerful piece of "Ramp" as it were, so all your really doing is emptying your hand .5-1 turn faster with the extreme risk of a blowout.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
My opinion on Aven Mindcensor is that when evaluating it for a slot you always assume its a 2/1 flier for flash excepting in the following matchups: Tron, Scapeshift, possibly Bx Eldrazi, and various decks relying on Chord of Calling. Anything else you get out of it (LD is the hope) is inconsistent enough that you cannot assume it as an advantage to having it in the deck. I recommend regarding that as an unexpected bonus if you get there.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
Look at it this way. Oath of Nissa does absolutely nothing to advance our board-state at the cost of: one mana, the small risk of card disadvantage, making Thalia disadvantageous more often, and most likely some significant tempo. Its benefit is that we get to look three cards deep to hopefully find something relevant which will more often than not be a land.
The only time I would be happy to be casting one in our deck right now is in grindy matches late game where we need to find gas and cast it asap. Only opponents I can think of there are going to be jund and possibly grixis.
I am aware that I tend to play the deck a little differently than most people but it seems fairly easy to say that you will always prefer to play a mana Dork or Vial T1 and in general there really isn't spare mana lying around since with all the activated abilities on our lands and such the deck runs very lean.
Even in jund where it potentially gets goyf one bigger and its the deck that seems to most want it its highly debated
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
I agree that tron will gain a certain boost from this, alongside affinity and possibly burn they will probably gain percentage points on the meta but far from combo not being relevant the decks that twin kept somewhat suppressed by its presence will now have a decent shot and filling in the void. Ad-Naus, Storm, Living End, Coco-Combo (As you mentioned), and others are all powerful decks but consistently had problems when facing twin.
Control not being all that relevant is something of a misnomer in the modern forums as of late. Traditional draw-go control, yes, this is not really present but instead due to the card pool and the variety of viable decks it is forced to take different forms. Its just not feasible to cram 12 situational counter-spells into a deck alongside some removal and jump in to the modern meta hoping to be successful, There has to be some sort of proactive game plan paired with permission in order to win consistently.
@Redtwister, A bit early for some of those conclusions I would think. Twin being such a staple of the format it had become something of a benchmark for combo decks to look at and ask themselves "What are the reasons to play this over a Twin deck?" But that doesn't mean that its the ONLY combo deck and its disappearance destroys an entire archtype...
I agree that tron will gain a certain boost from this, alongside affinity and possibly burn they will probably gain percentage points on the meta but far from combo not being relevant the decks that twin kept somewhat suppressed by its presence will now have a decent shot at filling in the void. Ad-Naus, Storm, Living End, Coco-Combo (As you mentioned), and others are all powerful decks but consistently measured up worse than just playing twin instead.
Control not being all that relevant is something of a misnomer in the modern forums as of late. Traditional draw-go control, yes, this is not really present but instead due to the card pool and the variety of viable decks it is forced to take different forms. Its just not feasible to cram 12 situational counter-spells into a deck alongside some removal and jump in to the modern meta hoping to be successful, There has to be some sort of proactive game plan paired with permission in order to win consistently.
As stated above I disagree with this statement, I highly recommend you read a few articles to get a better idea of how wizards goes through the banning process and what they hope to achieve by it. Also this will help you judge how the metagame might react to situations such as this but its never as radical as what you propose.
I found tons after about thirty seconds of searching google. In particular Eric Lauer's quotes in this one are informative.
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/arcana/brief-history-modern-banned-list-2015-02-03 - History of modern bans
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
Realistically speaking you wont be able to activate it more than once a turn and it necessitates the use of a utility land so i don't see it ever coming down and bouncing something immediately which gives the opponent a turn to come to grips with it and adjust their gameplan. Alongside the three mana initial investment I cant see it see play outside the vial builds but I am sure death and taxes will test it and perhaps even start running it alongside of flickerwisp or even instead of.
All in all without aether vial I don't think this is something you want to be running but with it the possibilities are there and with the aggressive costing might even be doable.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
It's fairly common to substitute Birds of Paradise for Noble hierarch for budget reasons and functionally the deck will run fine. However Noble has the price it does for a very good reason and the exalted triggers can often make the difference between winning and losing games due to being able to push through damage and not being a terrible topdeck late in the game.
I would recommend your friend to build the deck with birds if he likes it and plan to upgrade to nobles as he is able.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
The big issue I have with return to the ranks is that while it does indeed have many targets in our deck most of those are relatively low impact and I cant see the card being all that useful. By the time your cast return for any significant amount of creatures I see two things being true in most cases:
1: Its been a grindy matchup which put those creatures in the grave in the first place.
2: The creatures will the vast majority of the time not affect the board state terribly much. The 2/2's do not match well late game versus Goyf's, Anglers, Tasigur, Rhinos, Olivia, Huntsmaster, and other threats that control and grindy mid-range decks tend to play. Best scenarios I see are finding some exalted triggers and being able to go on the offensive or casting it for three against affinity and getting a pridemage back..
The other problem I have (And the one that puts the nail in the coffin for me) is that I quite often use those creatures as fuel for my Scooze allowing me to make it into a credible threat. If your banking on reanimating those guys later scooze becomes a less attractive option and I would much rather be proactive in his use since that card takes over games.
Pretty much in any case I could see myself wanting to cast it I would much rather have Collected Company as I can get smiters, Finks, ect.. from that which are the big beaters for us.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro
@CosmoKramer, Pretty much what jonathanveedot mentioned. Also, he had four voice of resurgence in the main-deck. I debated between a second explosives (With the risk that I can have it as a dead draw vs a field of rhino/Goyf/Liege) or to go with RiP and hope to gain a cards worth of advantage of it after it lands.
That was my logic at the time but definitely looking back should have at least taken both explosives. Only thing I can remember is that after the first game I was still worried about the Rhino/Goyf so I went with RiP. Ended up being the vagaries of magic that gave him the triple souls and no individual beater. Hindsight says I should probably have found room for both.
Glad to have the report read through! =) Let me know if you have any other input.
GUGEdric, Spymaster of Trest - Elfball
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic- Doomsday!
RWUEphara, God of the Polis - Blink + Control
GBGGlissa, the Traitor - Stax & Lands
URGMaelstrom Wanderer - Goodstuff RUG
RGWMayael the Anima - Timmy
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher - The One Hit Wonder
RGWMarath, Will of the Wild - Old-school Enchantress Hate
RWRAurelia, the Warleader - Equipment Aggro
GGGReki, the History of Kamigawa - Legends + Banding
UBRSedris, the Traitor King - Creatures with : Ability
BUBPhenax, God of Deception - Mill
*Sidenote, I specifically excluded infinite combos from all these decks with the exception of Marath and the squirrel nest + Earthcraft combo.
Looking for something Aggressive in modern? Try - BR Aggro