Was the jund list BG or actual BGR? Was it stock? All the BG/x decks I play are running anything from 4/2 to 4/4 splits of Thoughtseize and Inquisition, ontop of 4 liliana's. Granted I've been running my own split of 4/2 inquisition and thoughtseizes, but just feels like it's top deck wars over and over. I mean if all they did was play dudes the match up would be super cake.
My problem with Grixis is i'm so reactive and it's very hard to sit on cards with so many BG/x decks running around. Between thoughtseize/inquisition and liliana's i'm constantly finding myself top decking as a control deck. If he sticks a liliana and I can't get one of my dreadbores it becomes very difficult to make any headway. Then their top decks are simply superior to mine until I can top deck cruel ultimatum. Hell serum visions has been one of the few things I can reliably do to "preserve" cards in hand and that's by leaving them on top of my library for as long as i can. (I've taken to using serum vision in anything blue now). This has lead my grixis builds to operate more like tap out control with a heavier emphasis on discard (running my own lilianas even) as opposed to counter magic. This has left me feeling cryptic command less as my mana base (without allied fetch lands) has had to shift farther from blue and I'm disliking getting stuck with them in hand only for them to disappear. I would still say keeping 1-2 wouldn't be a bad idea, but the days of 4x are done for me.
I've always felt Cruel Control has operated best as a tap out control, that relied heavily on hand control to ensure it could resolve the name sake card in a reasonable time frame. When you play as reactive as "draw go" is you typically have to wait until the opponent either has no cards in hand or you have extra counter magic up. I use mulldrifter a lot and have used it in both esper and grixis shells. It's a good card, and once you've run your opponent out of a good chunk of their threats you can afford to throw down a flying chump blocker that also draws you deeper into your deck. Add onto that the flexibility of using it as a divination early on if you need to draw and can't afford the whole five.
Nice comments on remand I can't not play at least two. Serum visions is trash.
Yea that whole being able to switch gears and tempo kill people is why bolt and snapy are so crucial to control in this format. Bolt snap bolt is 8 damage! Tarpit IS the best man land ever even if it is more fragile and does less dmg I love that it activates for less than colonnade.
No one else has tried my gifts ungiven and mystic retrieval engine?
I've used Gifts Ungiven in the past as a way to fetch up cruel ultimatum. The problem I ran into was that it made the deck more graveyard reliant than it needed to be. It also telegraphed what you were doing as, unless you were sitting on 10+ mana even EoT gifts into the two, still meant the opponent had a whole other turn to prepare itself.
Thus i went for the more "lubricated" approach, with cantrips and digging spells instead of the tutor approach. The deck seemed to operate much more efficiently. Serum Vision is obviously no Preordain or ponder, but it fit's nicely into the various open mana our turns offer. Holding Bolt, terminate, serum vision with 3 mana up... cast serum visions and hold onto your answers, set yourself up next turn and still maintain your ability to respond to opposition. It's inclusion is great, hell i'm starting to want a singleton copy of Temporal Mastery, in the deck because of the amount of scrying i'm doing now. People talk about how remand if played right "time walks" your opponent... well why not actually time walk them? That's how well serum visions is performing for me. I've ran Telling time in the past and it's sort of the same card at instant speed, but frankly sometimes the two mana would make it awkward, or forcing yourself to pick one of them to be you're next draw, but this just feels superior.
My only issue with tarpit, is that it comes into play tapped. When I ran 4 of them, i faced way more times where I would either NEED to make a land drop to damnation in time to save my life, or needed to make the land drop to ultimatum to save my life and it would pop up. Or the times where you hold a great openning hand, but stare down at creeping tar pit, dragonskull summit and drowned catacomb. I found that early on i simply did not have spare mana to activate my 2 toughness man land which is very valuable to my overall strategy and late game I would hardly every activate more than 2 (if ever that) so i went down to 2 of them.
Mmm Prof bolt!
With Thought Flare you are paying + 2 mana for +1 card over a thirst with no artifacts!
Just like thirst it is really great to see cards and more importantly filter bad ones in your hand. I love flare in itself but we just have better options, it didn't even see standard play... Gifts Ungiven gives you 2 cards with 2 in the yard (of your choice, possibly ones with flash back)
Remand> Think Twice imo, I really enjoy the extra protection from losing tempo/ board position, though I dont mind it if you can easily get it in the yard discarded off thirst or Gifts.
Messed around with A Gifts Ungiven build today with mostly all spells (and trying out a couple Pyro noobs)
Its pretty strong to just have 1 Cruel in you deck then make a gifts pile of Ultimatum Mystic Retrieval Snacaster Land or removal. If they don't eat your yard you basically have infinite action after that!
Revival is slow but its super sweet, gives you tons of late game gass, like a double snapcaster!
I still just want this card U1 instant, draw 2 discard 1, is that to much to ask for?
I used to run Cruel Gifts, and I might go back to trying something similar out but it had it's weaknesses to graveyard hate and could be considerably slow. Nothing worse that staring down Deathrite Shaman or scavenging ooze. I was however running Archaeomancer over the retreival simply because it was nice to have return an archaeomancer from the gy with a cruel ultimatum. That said mystic retrieval doesn't care where the opponent puts it... seems pretty good, if you need a wrath just stack damnation, snapcaster, mystic retrieval and two other completely valuable cards. Ultimately I moved away from too much graveyard reliance because of the prevelance of hate... but maybe it's just something a sideboard needs to be ready to fight through.
Inquisition - Duress - Thoughtseize: Each of these cards have their own niche and use whenever I play them.
Inquisition of Kozilek - has the strength of hitting anything but only up to cmc 3. I run this in any deck that has black in it but primarily prefer it's ability to slow down the critical early turns and help push past a turn 4.
Thoughtseize - has the strength of being able to grab anything but a land at the cost of life. In decks with low to mid removal I prefer this card primarily for it's flexibility.
Duress - has the strength of hitting anything other than a creature without cost. I play it in decks with high forms of removal because i'm less likely to feel the need to choose a creature anyway.
As for this deck specifically I run tons of removal, and have a particularly painful mana base. Anything I can do to lessen the weight on my life total the better, and duress fit's that bill. Especially when I consider i'm only likely to side in more disruption against creature light decks anyway like burn, storm, uwr.
Think Twice is a solid card and I consider using it a lot, because I really prefer my card draw to fit one of two (if not both) roles.
Role 1: To fill the blank spots in my turns, but either being cheap and filling extra mana (i.e. serum visions when I have 3 land and an izzet charm) or by being instant and End of Turn casting it with left over mana.
Role 2: To be flexible in it's use. I.e. having another mode, or an added use.
Since I am running Serum Vision I thought I would use the consult the necrosages primarily as a discard spell that can be used as a draw spell later once they have no cards. I've been using Mulldrifter lately as a draw spell that can eventually become a body so the sorcery speed didn't really disuade me.
As for the sideboard, yes you are right i probably shouldn't worry about the affinity match up specifically. That said i've had issues answering etched champion. But I may just add more damnation's to the sideboard for match ups like that.
Speaking of Damnation, on the subject I really like damnation for it's occasional value and it's ability to answer restoration tricks. Typically just feels good to play it because I KNOW it's going to work and I also really like that it hits hexproof guys like thrun. Also, it's a card the discourages over extending, while at the same discard forces people to want to empty their hand. At least 1 being represented is a must, with the option for more in the board.
Forked bolt just feels like a good card. I wanted to have some extra spot removal for highly aggressive weenie strategies and since I can't add 4 more lightning bolts I decided another cheap burn spell would suffice (or disfigure) but this one has the ability to split the damage which could help tremendously vs. affinity, soul sisters, lingering souls, goblins etc.
After some further thought I've decided to step away from the heavy creature suite. The spellstutter sprite wasn't really working out for me. Sure it wasn't terrible but just not what i was looking for. (man i really want Baleful Strix to be modern legal!)
So I started theory crafting around young pyromancer. After seeing it in action I decided he's so wonderful I thought he would fit great in Cruel Ultimatum. Blocking fodder, or the ability to go offensive early he just develops value. People must remove him. Unfortunately with that train of thought the excessive "creatures as spells" theme had to go.
I really want your opinions on Consult the Necrosages. Yes, by god why couldn't this guy be an instant?! BU really could use a boost in my opinion and having a solid draw spell at instant speed seems like a good start. Anyway, nothing I can do about it now, but I decided to test 2 of these guys. I love when I get to play with Esper Charm but at least for now, I want to keep the deck to 3 colors and this card offers basically the same flexibility at sorcery speed. Might end up being think twice eventually, but for now i'm trying them out. Has anyone else tried them?
My sideboard numbers need help. I know at my FNM's i'll have a better than average chance of facing, Junk, storm and affinity. The storm is as i've found easier to disrupt via graveyard hate, and the affinity decks vary from the red burn version to the tezzeret b/u version. Junk is junk, though I have a feeling he's going to cut down on his White and run both goyf and SCooze more akin to the BG ROCK deck that was at worlds (why is it called jund, when green black midrange has been famously Rock for sooooo long now?!).
It's been a while since i've really messed with my Cruel Ultimatums and since i've completed my set of Scalding Tarns I felt like revisiting the drawing board here.
Now I really put a sub emphasis on creatures. They had to have one of two things to be included. Value when cast, and or the natural ability to hit the yard. The reason was two fold, but primarily because Cruel Ultimatum works amazingly well when it can get an "extra spell" from the graveyard. Secondly, I also like getting extra value out of my Rise // Fall. Fall early, and top decking Rise later makes the card very flexible, but Rise really needs to reliably have a target in you're yard less you find those awkward moments when you might have to consider giving an opponent a creature from the yard back just to reuse half of it.
The Creatures Snapcaster Mage really goes without saying. His ability to recast a spell from the yard is just unbeatable. Mulldrifter is a love of mine from days past and i've been using him along side the Shadowborn Demon in my esper deck to great results. Speaking of the Demon... he's awesome. Sometimes he does his thing, then wait's patiently to die forcing opponents to hold off on an attack. Other times, he comes down removes something then demands to be removed lest he win the game on his own. Now Spellstutter Sprite is just something i'm testing out. 1/1 flying flash isn't the worst thing int he world at 2cmc, but it's penchant for saying no to thing's like:
And those are without getting into the possibility of having one of the field when you cast it. That said these can be replaced with most any other valuable creature, i'm just testing them out. Now Augur of Bolas used to be one of my go to dudes, but even with just 4 snapcasters and 4 of him, I felt like he missed too often for me to run him. Add in more dudes to the mix and I just don't think it's worth it.
The Lands
I really wish we could get allied fetches in modern already. Polluted Deta's oh how I miss thee. Until then i'm forced to run a slightly more painful mana base to get thing's done. I do have a few more basic's that normal primarily because an earlier version ran Solemn Simulacrum as an all around value dude, but really the only part of the lands I want to talk about is the last two spots. I decided to throw down the two "faerie" man-lands simply because they COULD help out a spellstutter sprite as a suprise for an unwary opponent, or at least complicate their decision making process when trying to figure out if I can counter something or not. The question is, do I run the cheaper, comes into play UNtapped Mutavault or the produces U but comes into play tapped Faerie Conclave. If the faeries were to be dropped as a whole or at least supporting the 4 main deck, I would probably just run Tectonic Edge as a solid way to answer a Celestial Colonnade.
Thoughts? Opinions? Should I scrap it and go back to the drawing board? Should I play Cruel Faeries? Should I finally go to sleep?
usually , you don't need to bounce a creature , most of CruelC have a decent amount of removal to get that nasty creatures out of board , away part is pretty mediocre , the only thing that makes me think far/away is useful is because there are 2 utilities in 1 card but not much more , to bounche creatures i'd run vapor snag, for sacrifices , my favourite by far is geth's verdict if far could bounce planeswalkers too i'd definetly run a couple of copy but that's not the case.
I think you are seriously underestimating far // away. for starters i don't HAVE to bounce your creature. There are plenty of times where I would love to get back my own snapcaster mage and force them to sacrifice. There are other times where a thrun or geist are running about and they have a stupid soul's token sitting right next to them.
Seriously... you may not always need to bounce a threat, but the possibility to do so is just flat better than dealing 1 damage, or gaining some life. Card advantage and flexibility are simply that important.
Condescend was great on the play, but always ended up siding it out when i was on the draw. Izzet Charm just seemed like a solid upgrade. I also opted to play 3 Electrolize in place of Telling time telling time dug 3 deep, but was 0 card advantage. There were several times where electrolize would have killed 2 creatures and replaced itself. Not to mention it single handedly feels like a counter to lingering souls. I also dropped 1 Rise // Fall to include a singleton Mystical Retrieval. Now when i need to gifts for Ultimatum its a bit more direct.
I'm still not sold on my SB. Shattering Spree could en up being a bust if i can't get too much red mana going and slaughter games being my only real way to combat storm seems iffy but backed by enough discard I might survive long enough to extract the win con.
As a whole I expect more competitive decks to follow the last modern event we had. Still expect to see Affinity, Martyr Proc, Storm, and B/W tokens since they did well enough... but the Fish player didn't seem happy i expect him to upgrade to something more competitive. Other decks i think will tune up some.
sooo.... what your saying is there should be a different thread to discuss Grixis Control? Not everyone is going to run 4 to 5 colors. I would totally agree with your statment if this was Competitive 5cc only but that grixis cruel control tag at the end must have confused me.
I know the deck isn't likely to win a GP but i'm pretty proud of myself and thought i would share the experience.
Round 1: Green / White enchantment beats blah blah blah
Game 1: He through out some beaters that i was able to keep down long enough for me to find the singleton damnation. Couple turns later, Cruel Ultimatum followed but another one.
Game 2: Sided out Condescend for Pyroclasm... Lost the game when he nailed a griffon guide on a hexproof dude. Couldn't kill the thing before he killed me.
Game 3: Inquisition, lightning bolt, into Pyroclasm. Eventually cast Cruel Ultimatum 3 times.
Result: 2 - 1
Round 2: Highly Aggressive Rakdos
Game 1: We both Muligan to 6, inquisition into fall, followed by another fall and a lightning bolt and he was too slow to recover. Gifts found Ultimatum EoT and he concieded when i returned Archeomancer to my grip.
Game 2: Turn 1 bolt into turn 2 condescend. Double Augur of Bolas mucked the ground up (he apparently sided out most of his removal since he saw no real creatures game 1) Used Rise to effectively gain card advantage by returning an augur in play with a snap caster in my yard rince repeat. Exiled my Graveyard in response to my Archeomancer for Ultimatum... dragged the game out for a while until I could safely find the second copy.
Result: 2 - 0
Round 3: Martyr Proc
Game 1: Double Inquisition and Fall after he mulliganed to 6... he top decks lands for a while and eventually loses to ultimatum.
Game 2: Turn one Serra Ascendant, Turn 2 Martyr of Sands Couldn't keep up. Stabalized but should have just concieded. Eventually lost anyway.
Game 3: Sided in 2 Slaughter Games and 3 Pyroclasms removed Condescends and 2 Augur of Bolas. Slaughter Games'd his Serra Ascendants and Proclamation. Take him from 30+ down to 16 before time was called. Played out the rounds and he had no way to win, but Needed another turn to ultimatum and throw the 3 lightning bolts at his head...
Result: 1 - 1 - 1 (lucked out there was another table that went to a draw as well)
Round 4: Affinity
Game 1: Double Cranial Plating and an etched champion later I was toast. Tried to keep most of his dudes dead but couldn't touch champion.
Game 2: Sided in 2 Rakdos Charms and 3 Pyroclasms. Removed Condescend and Augur of bolas. He opens up with land, thopter, drum opal Vault Skirge... Dug ferverously for a red mana source... by the time it came he stuck double champions. Would have grabbed Cruel Ultimatum but somehow he stuck a Nihil Spellbomb so I had to play fair to get it. Turn after i got it, he stuck a cranial plating and swung for the fences.
Result: 0 - 2
Cut to top 8 and I scrapped in thanks to a mix of tie breakers, drops and someone elses draw. 8th seed.
Round 5: Rakdos Deck Wins
Game 1: Turn 1 Bolt, Turn 2 Fall, Turn 3 Fall. He hits top deck mode and I coast to victory with a timely Ultimatum followed by another, and another
Game 2: Turn 1 Inquisition turn 2 Pyroclasm... can't find a gifts or ultimatum to save my life, get down to 4 life before bolts and snapcaster mages with the help of a Creeping Tar Pit could seal the deal.
Result 2 - 0
Round 6: Modern Fish
Game 1: Inquisition to see only 1 lord and some silvergill adept's. Remove the lord and he stalls for a turn, eventually sticks some fish, but i keep the lords dead and finally stabalize at 2 with my first cruel ultimatum. He has no cards and when he sees i can cast it again next turn off of snapcaster conceids.
Game 2: Side in Pyroclasms: He starts with Aether Vial and my Early Inquisition shows a spell peirce in the hand I decided to play around. Eventually he gets 2 silvergills and a merrow rejay, I bolt the lord to save myself some life but he double spell peirces to save it I drop to 4 and Freely pyroclasm next turn sweeping the board. Some 1 for 1 trades and eventually i land a cruel ultimatum that turns him belly up and unable to beat me.
Result: 2-0
Final: Split with roomate
Definitely need a better game vs. affinity as once a champion hits i'm royally screwed... probably going to swap out pyroclasms for infest. Also really need to try and fix up the mana base... get scalding tarns and a singleton steam vents in there... sometimes i definitely needed both a red AND a blue with my fetches but had to pick. Condescend was very nice... even though it got sided out quite a few games for the board sweeper... but when you go in knowing you are on the draw it loses value. Most of the time played like super mana leak. I was disappointed to not go up against jund, (or was I? lol) so i have no idea how that match up is. I did see some Golgari Zombies and another Martyr Proc decks though. Anyway i'm sleepy so feel free to give me some constructive feedback or tell me i'm terrible it all works the same
Just want to point out that Evasive Action is not legal in modern.
This is just my .02 here.
I've used Gifts Ungiven in the past as a way to fetch up cruel ultimatum. The problem I ran into was that it made the deck more graveyard reliant than it needed to be. It also telegraphed what you were doing as, unless you were sitting on 10+ mana even EoT gifts into the two, still meant the opponent had a whole other turn to prepare itself.
Thus i went for the more "lubricated" approach, with cantrips and digging spells instead of the tutor approach. The deck seemed to operate much more efficiently. Serum Vision is obviously no Preordain or ponder, but it fit's nicely into the various open mana our turns offer. Holding Bolt, terminate, serum vision with 3 mana up... cast serum visions and hold onto your answers, set yourself up next turn and still maintain your ability to respond to opposition. It's inclusion is great, hell i'm starting to want a singleton copy of Temporal Mastery, in the deck because of the amount of scrying i'm doing now. People talk about how remand if played right "time walks" your opponent... well why not actually time walk them? That's how well serum visions is performing for me. I've ran Telling time in the past and it's sort of the same card at instant speed, but frankly sometimes the two mana would make it awkward, or forcing yourself to pick one of them to be you're next draw, but this just feels superior.
My only issue with tarpit, is that it comes into play tapped. When I ran 4 of them, i faced way more times where I would either NEED to make a land drop to damnation in time to save my life, or needed to make the land drop to ultimatum to save my life and it would pop up. Or the times where you hold a great openning hand, but stare down at creeping tar pit, dragonskull summit and drowned catacomb. I found that early on i simply did not have spare mana to activate my 2 toughness man land which is very valuable to my overall strategy and late game I would hardly every activate more than 2 (if ever that) so i went down to 2 of them.
I used to run Cruel Gifts, and I might go back to trying something similar out but it had it's weaknesses to graveyard hate and could be considerably slow. Nothing worse that staring down Deathrite Shaman or scavenging ooze. I was however running Archaeomancer over the retreival simply because it was nice to have return an archaeomancer from the gy with a cruel ultimatum. That said mystic retrieval doesn't care where the opponent puts it... seems pretty good, if you need a wrath just stack damnation, snapcaster, mystic retrieval and two other completely valuable cards. Ultimately I moved away from too much graveyard reliance because of the prevelance of hate... but maybe it's just something a sideboard needs to be ready to fight through.
Inquisition of Kozilek - has the strength of hitting anything but only up to cmc 3. I run this in any deck that has black in it but primarily prefer it's ability to slow down the critical early turns and help push past a turn 4.
Thoughtseize - has the strength of being able to grab anything but a land at the cost of life. In decks with low to mid removal I prefer this card primarily for it's flexibility.
Duress - has the strength of hitting anything other than a creature without cost. I play it in decks with high forms of removal because i'm less likely to feel the need to choose a creature anyway.
As for this deck specifically I run tons of removal, and have a particularly painful mana base. Anything I can do to lessen the weight on my life total the better, and duress fit's that bill. Especially when I consider i'm only likely to side in more disruption against creature light decks anyway like burn, storm, uwr.
Think Twice is a solid card and I consider using it a lot, because I really prefer my card draw to fit one of two (if not both) roles.
Role 1: To fill the blank spots in my turns, but either being cheap and filling extra mana (i.e. serum visions when I have 3 land and an izzet charm) or by being instant and End of Turn casting it with left over mana.
Role 2: To be flexible in it's use. I.e. having another mode, or an added use.
Since I am running Serum Vision I thought I would use the consult the necrosages primarily as a discard spell that can be used as a draw spell later once they have no cards. I've been using Mulldrifter lately as a draw spell that can eventually become a body so the sorcery speed didn't really disuade me.
As for the sideboard, yes you are right i probably shouldn't worry about the affinity match up specifically. That said i've had issues answering etched champion. But I may just add more damnation's to the sideboard for match ups like that.
Speaking of Damnation, on the subject I really like damnation for it's occasional value and it's ability to answer restoration tricks. Typically just feels good to play it because I KNOW it's going to work and I also really like that it hits hexproof guys like thrun. Also, it's a card the discourages over extending, while at the same discard forces people to want to empty their hand. At least 1 being represented is a must, with the option for more in the board.
Forked bolt just feels like a good card. I wanted to have some extra spot removal for highly aggressive weenie strategies and since I can't add 4 more lightning bolts I decided another cheap burn spell would suffice (or disfigure) but this one has the ability to split the damage which could help tremendously vs. affinity, soul sisters, lingering souls, goblins etc.
So I started theory crafting around young pyromancer. After seeing it in action I decided he's so wonderful I thought he would fit great in Cruel Ultimatum. Blocking fodder, or the ability to go offensive early he just develops value. People must remove him. Unfortunately with that train of thought the excessive "creatures as spells" theme had to go.
Here is what I came up with:
4x Scalding Tarn
3x Watery Grave
3x Blood Crypt
2x Steam Vents
2x Mountain
2x Island
2x Swamp
1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
2x Dragonskull Summit
2x Drowned Catacomb
2x Creeping Tar Pit
4x Snapcaster Mage
4x Young Pyromancer
Other 27
4x Serum Visions
4x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Lightning Bolt
3x Izzet Charm
3x Electrolyze
1x Damnation
3x Terminate
2x Cruel Ultimatum
2x Consult the Necrosages
1x Far // Away
I really want your opinions on Consult the Necrosages. Yes, by god why couldn't this guy be an instant?! BU really could use a boost in my opinion and having a solid draw spell at instant speed seems like a good start. Anyway, nothing I can do about it now, but I decided to test 2 of these guys. I love when I get to play with Esper Charm but at least for now, I want to keep the deck to 3 colors and this card offers basically the same flexibility at sorcery speed. Might end up being think twice eventually, but for now i'm trying them out. Has anyone else tried them?
My sideboard numbers need help. I know at my FNM's i'll have a better than average chance of facing, Junk, storm and affinity. The storm is as i've found easier to disrupt via graveyard hate, and the affinity decks vary from the red burn version to the tezzeret b/u version. Junk is junk, though I have a feeling he's going to cut down on his White and run both goyf and SCooze more akin to the BG ROCK deck that was at worlds (why is it called jund, when green black midrange has been famously Rock for sooooo long now?!).
Now I really put a sub emphasis on creatures. They had to have one of two things to be included. Value when cast, and or the natural ability to hit the yard. The reason was two fold, but primarily because Cruel Ultimatum works amazingly well when it can get an "extra spell" from the graveyard. Secondly, I also like getting extra value out of my Rise // Fall. Fall early, and top decking Rise later makes the card very flexible, but Rise really needs to reliably have a target in you're yard less you find those awkward moments when you might have to consider giving an opponent a creature from the yard back just to reuse half of it.
That said here's the list:
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Watery Grave
1 Steam Vents
2 Blood Crypt
2 Drowned Catacomb
2 Dragonskull Summit
3 Island
4 Swamp
2 Mountain
2 Faerie Conclave / Mutavault / Tectonic Edge
Creatures 13
4 Spellstutter Sprite
3 Mulldrifter
4 Snapcaster Mage
2 Shadowborn Demon
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Duress
3 Serum Visions
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Cruel Ultimatum
1 Damnation
1 Far // Away
3 Terminate
3 Rise // Fall
4 Faerie Macabre
2 Shriekmaw
2 Slaughter Games
1 Damnation
3 Infest
3 Duress
The Creatures
Snapcaster Mage really goes without saying. His ability to recast a spell from the yard is just unbeatable. Mulldrifter is a love of mine from days past and i've been using him along side the Shadowborn Demon in my esper deck to great results. Speaking of the Demon... he's awesome. Sometimes he does his thing, then wait's patiently to die forcing opponents to hold off on an attack. Other times, he comes down removes something then demands to be removed lest he win the game on his own. Now Spellstutter Sprite is just something i'm testing out. 1/1 flying flash isn't the worst thing int he world at 2cmc, but it's penchant for saying no to thing's like:
And those are without getting into the possibility of having one of the field when you cast it. That said these can be replaced with most any other valuable creature, i'm just testing them out. Now Augur of Bolas used to be one of my go to dudes, but even with just 4 snapcasters and 4 of him, I felt like he missed too often for me to run him. Add in more dudes to the mix and I just don't think it's worth it.
The Lands
I really wish we could get allied fetches in modern already. Polluted Deta's oh how I miss thee. Until then i'm forced to run a slightly more painful mana base to get thing's done. I do have a few more basic's that normal primarily because an earlier version ran Solemn Simulacrum as an all around value dude, but really the only part of the lands I want to talk about is the last two spots. I decided to throw down the two "faerie" man-lands simply because they COULD help out a spellstutter sprite as a suprise for an unwary opponent, or at least complicate their decision making process when trying to figure out if I can counter something or not. The question is, do I run the cheaper, comes into play UNtapped Mutavault or the produces U but comes into play tapped Faerie Conclave. If the faeries were to be dropped as a whole or at least supporting the 4 main deck, I would probably just run Tectonic Edge as a solid way to answer a Celestial Colonnade.
Thoughts? Opinions? Should I scrap it and go back to the drawing board? Should I play Cruel Faeries? Should I finally go to sleep?
I think you are seriously underestimating far // away. for starters i don't HAVE to bounce your creature. There are plenty of times where I would love to get back my own snapcaster mage and force them to sacrifice. There are other times where a thrun or geist are running about and they have a stupid soul's token sitting right next to them.
Seriously... you may not always need to bounce a threat, but the possibility to do so is just flat better than dealing 1 damage, or gaining some life. Card advantage and flexibility are simply that important.
1 Marsh Flats
1 Verdant Catacomb
3 Watery Grave
3 Blood Crypt
1 Steam Vents
1 Creeping Tar Pit
2 Drowned Catacomb
2 Dragonskull Summit
1 Snow-Covered Swamp
1 Snow-Covered Island
1 Snow-Covered Mountain
1 Mountain
2 Swamp
1 Island
4 Snapcaster Mage
3 Augur of Bolas
1 Archaeomancer
Other 27
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Terminate
1 Dreadbore
2 Gifts Ungiven
2 Cruel Ultimatum
1 Damnation
3 Rise // Fall
3 Izzet Charm
3 Electrolize
1 Mystic Retrieval
3 Slaughter Games
3 Infest
3 Shattering Spree
1 Damnation
1 Rise // Fall
3 Duress
1 Augur of Bolas
Condescend was great on the play, but always ended up siding it out when i was on the draw. Izzet Charm just seemed like a solid upgrade. I also opted to play 3 Electrolize in place of Telling time telling time dug 3 deep, but was 0 card advantage. There were several times where electrolize would have killed 2 creatures and replaced itself. Not to mention it single handedly feels like a counter to lingering souls. I also dropped 1 Rise // Fall to include a singleton Mystical Retrieval. Now when i need to gifts for Ultimatum its a bit more direct.
1 Mystical Retrieval
1 Whatever
I'm still not sold on my SB. Shattering Spree could en up being a bust if i can't get too much red mana going and slaughter games being my only real way to combat storm seems iffy but backed by enough discard I might survive long enough to extract the win con.
As a whole I expect more competitive decks to follow the last modern event we had. Still expect to see Affinity, Martyr Proc, Storm, and B/W tokens since they did well enough... but the Fish player didn't seem happy i expect him to upgrade to something more competitive. Other decks i think will tune up some.
sooo.... what your saying is there should be a different thread to discuss Grixis Control? Not everyone is going to run 4 to 5 colors. I would totally agree with your statment if this was Competitive 5cc only but that grixis cruel control tag at the end must have confused me.
1 Scalding Tarn
3 Marsh Flat
1 Verdant Catacomb
3 Watery Grave
3 Blood Crypt
2 Drowned Catacomb
2 Dragonskull Summit
2 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Snow-Covered Swamp
1 Snow-covered Island
1 Snow-Covered Mountain
1 Mountain
2 Swamp
1 Island
3 Augur of Bolas
4 Snapcaster Mage
1 Archaeomancer
Other 27
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Terminate
1 Dreadbore
2 Gifts Ungiven
3 Condescend
2 Cruel Ultimatum
1 Damnation
4 Rise // Fall
3 Telling Time
3 Slaughter Games
2 Rakdos Charm
1 Dreadbore
3 Pyroclasm
3 Trickbind
3 Duress
I know the deck isn't likely to win a GP but i'm pretty proud of myself and thought i would share the experience.
Round 1: Green / White enchantment beats blah blah blah
Game 1: He through out some beaters that i was able to keep down long enough for me to find the singleton damnation. Couple turns later, Cruel Ultimatum followed but another one.
Game 2: Sided out Condescend for Pyroclasm... Lost the game when he nailed a griffon guide on a hexproof dude. Couldn't kill the thing before he killed me.
Game 3: Inquisition, lightning bolt, into Pyroclasm. Eventually cast Cruel Ultimatum 3 times.
Result: 2 - 1
Round 2: Highly Aggressive Rakdos
Game 1: We both Muligan to 6, inquisition into fall, followed by another fall and a lightning bolt and he was too slow to recover. Gifts found Ultimatum EoT and he concieded when i returned Archeomancer to my grip.
Game 2: Turn 1 bolt into turn 2 condescend. Double Augur of Bolas mucked the ground up (he apparently sided out most of his removal since he saw no real creatures game 1) Used Rise to effectively gain card advantage by returning an augur in play with a snap caster in my yard rince repeat. Exiled my Graveyard in response to my Archeomancer for Ultimatum... dragged the game out for a while until I could safely find the second copy.
Result: 2 - 0
Round 3: Martyr Proc
Game 1: Double Inquisition and Fall after he mulliganed to 6... he top decks lands for a while and eventually loses to ultimatum.
Game 2: Turn one Serra Ascendant, Turn 2 Martyr of Sands Couldn't keep up. Stabalized but should have just concieded. Eventually lost anyway.
Game 3: Sided in 2 Slaughter Games and 3 Pyroclasms removed Condescends and 2 Augur of Bolas. Slaughter Games'd his Serra Ascendants and Proclamation. Take him from 30+ down to 16 before time was called. Played out the rounds and he had no way to win, but Needed another turn to ultimatum and throw the 3 lightning bolts at his head...
Result: 1 - 1 - 1 (lucked out there was another table that went to a draw as well)
Round 4: Affinity
Game 1: Double Cranial Plating and an etched champion later I was toast. Tried to keep most of his dudes dead but couldn't touch champion.
Game 2: Sided in 2 Rakdos Charms and 3 Pyroclasms. Removed Condescend and Augur of bolas. He opens up with land, thopter, drum opal Vault Skirge... Dug ferverously for a red mana source... by the time it came he stuck double champions. Would have grabbed Cruel Ultimatum but somehow he stuck a Nihil Spellbomb so I had to play fair to get it. Turn after i got it, he stuck a cranial plating and swung for the fences.
Result: 0 - 2
Cut to top 8 and I scrapped in thanks to a mix of tie breakers, drops and someone elses draw. 8th seed.
Round 5: Rakdos Deck Wins
Game 1: Turn 1 Bolt, Turn 2 Fall, Turn 3 Fall. He hits top deck mode and I coast to victory with a timely Ultimatum followed by another, and another
Game 2: Turn 1 Inquisition turn 2 Pyroclasm... can't find a gifts or ultimatum to save my life, get down to 4 life before bolts and snapcaster mages with the help of a Creeping Tar Pit could seal the deal.
Result 2 - 0
Round 6: Modern Fish
Game 1: Inquisition to see only 1 lord and some silvergill adept's. Remove the lord and he stalls for a turn, eventually sticks some fish, but i keep the lords dead and finally stabalize at 2 with my first cruel ultimatum. He has no cards and when he sees i can cast it again next turn off of snapcaster conceids.
Game 2: Side in Pyroclasms: He starts with Aether Vial and my Early Inquisition shows a spell peirce in the hand I decided to play around. Eventually he gets 2 silvergills and a merrow rejay, I bolt the lord to save myself some life but he double spell peirces to save it I drop to 4 and Freely pyroclasm next turn sweeping the board. Some 1 for 1 trades and eventually i land a cruel ultimatum that turns him belly up and unable to beat me.
Result: 2-0
Final: Split with roomate
Definitely need a better game vs. affinity as once a champion hits i'm royally screwed... probably going to swap out pyroclasms for infest. Also really need to try and fix up the mana base... get scalding tarns and a singleton steam vents in there... sometimes i definitely needed both a red AND a blue with my fetches but had to pick. Condescend was very nice... even though it got sided out quite a few games for the board sweeper... but when you go in knowing you are on the draw it loses value. Most of the time played like super mana leak. I was disappointed to not go up against jund, (or was I? lol) so i have no idea how that match up is. I did see some Golgari Zombies and another Martyr Proc decks though. Anyway i'm sleepy so feel free to give me some constructive feedback or tell me i'm terrible it all works the same