I've not personally tried just slotting it in, but it doesn't seem particularly good. Delver is a pretty weak creature in modern, and its not a faerie, which really hurt it. You also pretty much have to play serum visions along side it, which some people already do, but not everyone does.
Its also a pretty weak topdeck lategame, like many other cards we play are (bitterblossom, discard, ancestral, etc). I just don't see the value added by delver to be enough to outweigh these disadvantages.
I don't play cantrips (I still play AVs when I play this deck) but discard is necessary, IMO.
Some people have played things like kalitas, tasigur, gifted aetherborn, looter scooter, batterskull, etc, in the past. Theres nothing wrong with them, but in my opinion, adding creatures like these isn't really improving the deck.
Faeries is not amazing from behind. As you mentioned, we don't have big bodies, nor do we have mainboard sweepers.
We do have chump + tarpit, which is moderately strong (and other evasive creatures) but as you mentioned, we can't fall too far behind early.
I've written posts on this in the past, but the answer then, is not to plan for worst-cast, its to not fall behind early.
We have bitterblossom, which on turn 2 is great. I play AV, which is also great early. Discard is also good for this reason, shreding their hand early gives us a good start.
Yes, these cards are bad if drawn late, but as you noticed, if we accomplish nothing in the first couple turns and fall very far behind, we're probably just losing anyways. Maximize your deck for average to best case, IMO.
People have played vedalken shackles / threads of disloyalty / sower of temptation in the past. (IMO, shackles is the worst as we dont have that many islands). We have entrancing melody now as well. They're fine, if you want to play some in the board, go ahead. I personally am a fan of sower, as it doesn't have restrictions, and we're mostly interested in this effect against things like eldrazi, which doesn't play too many removal spells in the first place.
People have also played thought scour here, but at that point you're just approaching grixis midrange/control, and probably better off dropping the faeries.
People have also tried white splashes. It gets brought up a ton. Search the thread for their results, but to my knowledge, no one who has tried it has stuck to it. It turns out that cutting a bunch of cards for the white splash doesn't make the deck better, just different. Yes vault of the archangel, sorin, and path to exile do solve some of our problems, but you introduce new ones by adding them.
IMO, the deck just needs another good faerie. A 1 drop with a relevant effect would be nice, or something else disruptive with flash, but another creature that deals damage and counts towards SSS/mistbind/scion/etc is probably the most important thing we could get. Don't hold your breath though.
If faerie miscreant were a wizard, I could see a pretty big potential change, but as it is, I don't think so.
We're never going to have it be a counterspell on turn 2 (which defeats half the purpose) and faeries generally ends games fast enough that mana leak being a dead card late game isn't crippling.
No one here plays scions. Its one of those cards that every so often someone goes "why is no one playing this?" And then they quickly figure out its just not that good.
White splashes are the same way. Its been brought up numerous times in the past 400 pages, but to my knowledge, no one has ever stayed on it. Its just not better than straight ub.
If you want to go for more of a control deck, then just play a control deck. Esper control is potentially very well positioned moving forward.
Faeries is still in the same old "its ok, I guess, but not really better than (insert other blue deck)."
The closing speed has historically dictated how I build my faeries decks (3 vendlions, 3 mistbind, 3+ tarpits usually). I value being able to end the game in this deck.
On the other hand, jace does not demand we play a fast clock. A U/B midrange or control deck with jace, and perhaps with bitterblossom, is fine. You could play things like tasigur if you wanted more things to hit people with, but as I suggested in my previous post, we're better off either committing more to an aggressive build (with no mainboard jace) or more to a control build (more like U/B control).
Cutting bitterblossom for thoughtseize seems silly to me. If you're at the point where you're cutting bitterblossoms, you should just play U/B control.
I think that jace will not likely be a mainboard card in faeries. In the board for grindy matchups seems more likely.
At the very least, no deck should be playing both mistbind and jace. You either focus more on tempo with mbc, or more on control with jace.
That being said, I think straight U/B control might be viable now, so don't be afraid to drop the faeries and try it out. It might end up being good.
Being able to bounce our own faeries with jace is pretty neat too.
I could see faeries being well positioned post jace, but I'm not actually sure if we want to be playing jace ourselves. Maybe in the board.
Yes, ancestral visions is not perfect. Its also not always useless after turn 3 or 4. Sure, against burn it might be, but even against grixis shadow, I've had plenty of turn 5 suspended AVs be relevant.
I personally think liliana is generally very bad in faeries. Its only real draw is sheer powerlevel, but faeries as a deck has never been about that. The card doesn't synergize well enough with the rest of the deck, generally speaking.
I think faeries utilizes spell queller poorly, generally speaking. Spellstutter sprite and mistbind clique benefit us playing a large number of faeries. Its basically the draw to actually playing the deck. If spell queller were a faerie, it would obviously be played in the deck, as it does things we're looking for, but it is not. It being a 3 drop means it doesn't take the place of cards like mana leak, and it obviously does not replace cryptic command. Meaning in order to fit copies in, we have to be cutting cards that it doesn't directly replace, and are possibly cards like mistbind, vendlion clique, etc, which makes the synergistic aspect of the deck worse.
On the other hand, an esper midrange deck can have the upside of spell queller, instant speed gameplay, etc, without the downside of being sort-of-faerie-tribal but sort-of-just-a-pile. You could just play esper charms, quellers, snaps, discard, cantrips, maybe some delve creatures or lingering souls, etc. Like, if lingering souls made faeries, we'd play it, and its has the raw powerlevel that we could play it, but no one does because it doesn't really fit into the deck well. If you want a lingering souls deck, play abzan, or mardu, or some type of esper, or even black-white tokens.
Faeries generally wants to run cards like discard, ancestral visions, and bitterblossom, which function similarly to jund's cards.
I may be a minority here, but I win a vast majority of my games in which I have some type of early advantage (or atleast not falling behind early).
I play discard and ancestral visions in addition to bitterblossom, to increase my chances of having a lead out of the gates.
This is one of the reasons I think ancestral visions is a core card for faeries, but a lot of people like the build the deck differently.
On the other hand, I play esper draw-go. I'm familiar with control decks in those colors, and trying to play a lot of faeries doesn't give you the proper tools. In general, people try to get too cute with the white splash. Splashing for path to exile and sorin solemn visitor along with sideboard cards is probably better than trying all sorts of things.
I like spell queller as much as the next guy, but playing either esper midrange, or jeskai midrange with it will work a lot better than faeries.
Lastly, if you read through the whole thread, you'll find the white splash brought up multiple times. Consistently, its found to not be worthwhile. It has real costs in terms of consistency and damage from lands, and its upsides are questionably worth it. I don't think anyone who regularly posts here who has tried it has stuck with it over a more "normal" build.
2 ghost quarter + 4 mutavault is too much I think. Cutting atleast 1 gq is probably correct.
Id also cut 1-2 islands for more duals as well.
Imo, 3 snapcasters is kind of a lot for your deck, I might cut 1.
I also think 4 fatal push 3 iok is too much hedging vs small creatures. 2 thoughtseize, and 0 removal spells for bigger creatures is brutal. Dismember, go for the throat, murderous cut, heros downfall, etc, are all good to diversify.
Darkslick shores just isn't our best land.
I know a lot of people like it, and its not incorrect in all lists, but it has a lot of problems.
Anyone playing multiple cryptics, mistbinds, snapcasters, etc, is going to feel it sometimes.
Secluded glen is again, obviously dependent on the build of the deck. Revealing cards is not ideal, but I've seen plenty of people say something to the tune of "I would never play this card because of the information, even if it nearly always entered untapped" which is very unfair in my mind.
The biggest problem with talking about this deck is how different lists can look.
That being said, I personally am a fan of secluded glen, and a fan of river of tears. Drowned catacombs is alright, and I avoid darkslick shores.
Also, 14 island/swamps is more than it seems like.
I think secluded glen is better than a lot of people give it credit for. Revealing cards means your opponent is going to be playing around it, and you can often get a good handle on how the next couple of turns will play out. Additionally, playing a glen tapped when you have a faerie in hand can also be a relevant mind game.
Not intending to be mean, but your list definitely would struggle against titanshift, IMO.
You only have 2 mistbind/1 vendilion, you have no mainboard thoughtseizes, you have 3 spell snare, and only 1 logic knot.
Coupled with the 4 snapcaster mages, you don't have a whole lot of disruption for them game 1.
I'd highly suggest trying to find room for a disdainful stroke or flashfreeze or 2 in the board.
I personally am not a fan of spell snares in this deck (it has a lot of overlap with spellstutter sprite).
I think shadow of doubt is pretty decent as well, though I've always struggled to find space for it. I think the card is pretty fine though.
I agree that I don't love secluded glen in your list. I'm a big fan of river of tears, but I admit not everyone is. Drowned catacombs or sunken ruins might do you better than glen, however. I think you don't have enough faeries to really make it work, but if you disagree, feel free to keep running it.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Its also a pretty weak topdeck lategame, like many other cards we play are (bitterblossom, discard, ancestral, etc). I just don't see the value added by delver to be enough to outweigh these disadvantages.
Some people have played things like kalitas, tasigur, gifted aetherborn, looter scooter, batterskull, etc, in the past. Theres nothing wrong with them, but in my opinion, adding creatures like these isn't really improving the deck.
Faeries is not amazing from behind. As you mentioned, we don't have big bodies, nor do we have mainboard sweepers.
We do have chump + tarpit, which is moderately strong (and other evasive creatures) but as you mentioned, we can't fall too far behind early.
I've written posts on this in the past, but the answer then, is not to plan for worst-cast, its to not fall behind early.
We have bitterblossom, which on turn 2 is great. I play AV, which is also great early. Discard is also good for this reason, shreding their hand early gives us a good start.
Yes, these cards are bad if drawn late, but as you noticed, if we accomplish nothing in the first couple turns and fall very far behind, we're probably just losing anyways. Maximize your deck for average to best case, IMO.
People have played vedalken shackles / threads of disloyalty / sower of temptation in the past. (IMO, shackles is the worst as we dont have that many islands). We have entrancing melody now as well. They're fine, if you want to play some in the board, go ahead. I personally am a fan of sower, as it doesn't have restrictions, and we're mostly interested in this effect against things like eldrazi, which doesn't play too many removal spells in the first place.
People have also played thought scour here, but at that point you're just approaching grixis midrange/control, and probably better off dropping the faeries.
People have also tried white splashes. It gets brought up a ton. Search the thread for their results, but to my knowledge, no one who has tried it has stuck to it. It turns out that cutting a bunch of cards for the white splash doesn't make the deck better, just different. Yes vault of the archangel, sorin, and path to exile do solve some of our problems, but you introduce new ones by adding them.
IMO, the deck just needs another good faerie. A 1 drop with a relevant effect would be nice, or something else disruptive with flash, but another creature that deals damage and counts towards SSS/mistbind/scion/etc is probably the most important thing we could get. Don't hold your breath though.
We're never going to have it be a counterspell on turn 2 (which defeats half the purpose) and faeries generally ends games fast enough that mana leak being a dead card late game isn't crippling.
White splashes are the same way. Its been brought up numerous times in the past 400 pages, but to my knowledge, no one has ever stayed on it. Its just not better than straight ub.
If you want to go for more of a control deck, then just play a control deck. Esper control is potentially very well positioned moving forward.
Faeries is still in the same old "its ok, I guess, but not really better than (insert other blue deck)."
23 lands also seems pretty low here. I get that you have opt, but opt isn't that strong at finding lands.
On the other hand, jace does not demand we play a fast clock. A U/B midrange or control deck with jace, and perhaps with bitterblossom, is fine. You could play things like tasigur if you wanted more things to hit people with, but as I suggested in my previous post, we're better off either committing more to an aggressive build (with no mainboard jace) or more to a control build (more like U/B control).
I think that jace will not likely be a mainboard card in faeries. In the board for grindy matchups seems more likely.
At the very least, no deck should be playing both mistbind and jace. You either focus more on tempo with mbc, or more on control with jace.
That being said, I think straight U/B control might be viable now, so don't be afraid to drop the faeries and try it out. It might end up being good.
I could see faeries being well positioned post jace, but I'm not actually sure if we want to be playing jace ourselves. Maybe in the board.
I personally think liliana is generally very bad in faeries. Its only real draw is sheer powerlevel, but faeries as a deck has never been about that. The card doesn't synergize well enough with the rest of the deck, generally speaking.
I think faeries utilizes spell queller poorly, generally speaking. Spellstutter sprite and mistbind clique benefit us playing a large number of faeries. Its basically the draw to actually playing the deck. If spell queller were a faerie, it would obviously be played in the deck, as it does things we're looking for, but it is not. It being a 3 drop means it doesn't take the place of cards like mana leak, and it obviously does not replace cryptic command. Meaning in order to fit copies in, we have to be cutting cards that it doesn't directly replace, and are possibly cards like mistbind, vendlion clique, etc, which makes the synergistic aspect of the deck worse.
On the other hand, an esper midrange deck can have the upside of spell queller, instant speed gameplay, etc, without the downside of being sort-of-faerie-tribal but sort-of-just-a-pile. You could just play esper charms, quellers, snaps, discard, cantrips, maybe some delve creatures or lingering souls, etc. Like, if lingering souls made faeries, we'd play it, and its has the raw powerlevel that we could play it, but no one does because it doesn't really fit into the deck well. If you want a lingering souls deck, play abzan, or mardu, or some type of esper, or even black-white tokens.
I may be a minority here, but I win a vast majority of my games in which I have some type of early advantage (or atleast not falling behind early).
I play discard and ancestral visions in addition to bitterblossom, to increase my chances of having a lead out of the gates.
This is one of the reasons I think ancestral visions is a core card for faeries, but a lot of people like the build the deck differently.
On the other hand, I play esper draw-go. I'm familiar with control decks in those colors, and trying to play a lot of faeries doesn't give you the proper tools. In general, people try to get too cute with the white splash. Splashing for path to exile and sorin solemn visitor along with sideboard cards is probably better than trying all sorts of things.
I like spell queller as much as the next guy, but playing either esper midrange, or jeskai midrange with it will work a lot better than faeries.
Lastly, if you read through the whole thread, you'll find the white splash brought up multiple times. Consistently, its found to not be worthwhile. It has real costs in terms of consistency and damage from lands, and its upsides are questionably worth it. I don't think anyone who regularly posts here who has tried it has stuck with it over a more "normal" build.
Id also cut 1-2 islands for more duals as well.
Imo, 3 snapcasters is kind of a lot for your deck, I might cut 1.
I also think 4 fatal push 3 iok is too much hedging vs small creatures. 2 thoughtseize, and 0 removal spells for bigger creatures is brutal. Dismember, go for the throat, murderous cut, heros downfall, etc, are all good to diversify.
I know a lot of people like it, and its not incorrect in all lists, but it has a lot of problems.
Anyone playing multiple cryptics, mistbinds, snapcasters, etc, is going to feel it sometimes.
Secluded glen is again, obviously dependent on the build of the deck. Revealing cards is not ideal, but I've seen plenty of people say something to the tune of "I would never play this card because of the information, even if it nearly always entered untapped" which is very unfair in my mind.
That being said, I personally am a fan of secluded glen, and a fan of river of tears. Drowned catacombs is alright, and I avoid darkslick shores.
Also, 14 island/swamps is more than it seems like.
I think secluded glen is better than a lot of people give it credit for. Revealing cards means your opponent is going to be playing around it, and you can often get a good handle on how the next couple of turns will play out. Additionally, playing a glen tapped when you have a faerie in hand can also be a relevant mind game.
You only have 2 mistbind/1 vendilion, you have no mainboard thoughtseizes, you have 3 spell snare, and only 1 logic knot.
Coupled with the 4 snapcaster mages, you don't have a whole lot of disruption for them game 1.
I'd highly suggest trying to find room for a disdainful stroke or flashfreeze or 2 in the board.
I personally am not a fan of spell snares in this deck (it has a lot of overlap with spellstutter sprite).
I think shadow of doubt is pretty decent as well, though I've always struggled to find space for it. I think the card is pretty fine though.
I agree that I don't love secluded glen in your list. I'm a big fan of river of tears, but I admit not everyone is. Drowned catacombs or sunken ruins might do you better than glen, however. I think you don't have enough faeries to really make it work, but if you disagree, feel free to keep running it.