All of these Jund lists omit Elvish Visionary. That makes me sad. Lol. I have 4 of the FNM promo ones, I want to use them
I'm still an advocate for Visionary in Jund and it's not because I also have promo Visionaries but because of why it's in most lists in the first place - especially in lists that have made it to top 8 in GPs. I currently run 3 which feels like the perfect number after tons of play testing. To put it in a bigger picture, my list has 15 2for1s between CoCo, BBE, Dwynen's, and Visionary which is 1/4 of the deck. This is a strong ratio to have. Granted, I also run a 1of Lead for more value but it's a flex spot that I might change into a 19th land or 3rd ezuri.
TL;DR: Visionary remains a good card for many reasons; running Jund does not change its viability.
Interesting choice of cards. I see the strength of trapper but it weakens BBE and Coco hits by having that instead of visionaries. Aside from this Visionaries is MUCH more important in Jund because it doesn't run canopies for draw power.
2 Forest is also very risky against decks that runs Path or Blood Moon.
Just wanted to say grats on the top 16. GW Combo has definitely shown its strength through several top 8 finishes and players like yourself continue to prove that it's capable.
You'll find that at the moment BBE is the talk amongst us Elfies. The unbanning has given us a new avenue that most of us here are excited to explore. Incase you're wondering this is why you won't see much discussion on GW Combo. Feel free to chime in.
I've settled on 19 lands being the solution also, but I think the answer is the 5th fetch. Can't afford to play a Blood Crypt as it destoys our 1 land opener.
Blood Crypt acts as a colorless land in that regard. It sacrifices the utility we would get from a true colorless land like Westvale for consistency. That's the way I see it anyways.
Aside from that it is after all an extra land and just like other Elf builds we never needed the 15th green source for creatures.
That being said, a 5th fetch is by no means a bad idea. It's what I was originally going for.
Actually, that is a very interesting point. Turn 3/4 TS into BBE could be very powerful. Stripping their sweeper than BBE for the mass amount of damage (against control/Jace) is a sweet place to be.
I think BBE Jund Elves could really be good against grindy decks as predicted. That will give us some sideboard room to hedge against combo, quick creature decks. BBE being in the deck naturally makes our strategy more grindy and thus, having potent answers to combo/tron in sideboard could go a long way. I do like this direction, it is interesting.
Couldn't have said it better myself. As great as the deck seems on paper, I think there is still some room for tuning the mb.
More specifically, there are two problems I have been having with the deck. The first is the mana base. The deck always needs to have red and black mana on the field in the event of me having or potentially drawing into a Shaman/BBE.
Here's an example I faced. I fetched early on for an overgrown tomb because I had Shaman in my opening hand. Makes sense right? Well I had no way to generate red mana incase I drew into BBE - which I did. Because I had no red mana I could not use BBE on T3/T4 BBE. I lost because of this.
The same situation happened when it was the other way around. I had a BBE in my opener then fetched for Stomping ground with no way to generate black for Shaman and lost because of that as well.
It could have been a really bad day and quite frankly it was only one day of testing so there's not much data but I personally rather be safe than sorry. Here's my solution.
Brace yourself because it's a bit painful. I think adding a Blood Crypt as the 19th land is optimal. Blood Crypt is great in those situations when you need both colors and already have a forest on the field. Why do we need a 19th land? Great question.
Here is the second problem I was facing. It was not drawing enough lands to consistently have 3/4 lands by T4/5. This is a problem when we have 8 4cmc cards. I think 19 lands will give is that safety net we need.
You're absolutely right. Any GB veteran such as yourself knows that a noncreature sb has been the norm. What I said was directed to amni92.
TS: I think the 4th TS is more important now than before with the replacement of Chord for BBE. BBE being able to cascade into noncreature spells like TS could be life or death in an open meta where you could potentially play against combo.
Also BBE into Collective Brutality is a missed opportunity I think we should take advantage of.
So far I've casted Domri 3 times and it's been amazing all 3 of them, drawing cards, killing creatures and making our opponent spend resources managing it.
I've added 2 Elves of Deep Shadow in place of 2 Nettle sentinel since our explosiveness potential is already lower because we play several cards that can't be casted with only 3 green mana and it provides black mana for our powerful SB cards. I'm thinking about cutting 1 Ezuri (going down to 2) and play a 2nd Domri because I'm loving it.
Thoughts on this forgotten planeswalker?
On the other hand. I've always loved the idea of a creature based toolbox and that's out the ecuation for obvious reasons if we go chord-less. So what's the base of a GOOD elf sideboard with the jund composition?
I'm with Syreal94 on this one. I like Domri in our deck but Jund just cannot afford the space IMHO. For GRx it would make sense because by not having Shamans it has much more room and flexibility in both the MB and SB. The Naya list I posted intrigues me for this reason of space and flexibility - also Kessig Wolf Run is Nuts. I think there's still room for innovation with GRx builds and that's pretty exciting.
I also agree with Syreal94 on GBx builds relying primarily on a noncreature sb. The Jund list I posted has a version of what I think is most optimal to have a fighting chance in an open meta. For metas that I'm familiar with I would obviously try to adapt my sb.
Very well put Syreal94. This is more so for every one else.
It's important to note that when comparing BBE to Collected Company we're not trying to replace it but instead figure out a better card in the spot of Chord of Calling for Shaman builds. Anybody who has played GB in the past knows that having Chord has never been the plan to having a winning chance against fast decks. If you guys want to win against fast decks then play GW Combo. You can't have your cake and eat it.
@Worldsaverinc
No Company will make the deck too slow. Being able to cheat out two creatures at instant speed is still much more powerful than chaining Sylvan into BBEs. As I said, we don't want to replace Company. After all that's the card that put us in the map in the first place - hence the name of this thread.
There's plenty of information on why BBE is good for Shaman builds in these last two pages. BG/Abzan Elves used to be my favorite builds but now I firmly believe Jund is the way to go. Here's what I'm personally running.
For the crazies that wanna do Naya over GW combo, here's a list I tuned. I found that it really only needs white for eidolon and ethersworn which are nuts against storm/ad nauseum.
This Naya list kinda reminds me of Andrew Sullano's GW Elf Company list he placed with a few years ago. It was purely focused on going wide and overrunning. I really like Kessig in here that I even thought about adding a 19th land as the 2nd copy.
I did read the article, but we're not Jund, we're Elves. Jadine's article is great when you're a proper midrange deck. When you're a linear based deck that uses BBE for value, you can't afford to deviate from the plan.
Don't get it twisted, we are a linear deck first. Always keep that in mind. Talara's Battalion is exponentially worse without the BBE cascade and is not servicable with it (notably, dies to bolt, doesn't go wide, doesn't replace itself or draw a card or go infinite). Just on raw card evaluation, Talara's Battalion is nothing but bad. If a card is bad on raw card evaluation, its not making it into the deck.
BBE being in the deck doesn't remove t1 Heritage t2 Dwynen's lol, it just makes T3-4 better. If you want to properly build a deck around BBE, then build actual Jund! Emberflux has the rest of what I was gonna say already, so I'm not gonna repeat it.
We're not a deck that will fully use BBE's cascade to its potential. We're simply using it to refill/fill the board. We will however use BBE's body and typeline the best, occasionally squeezing out a 4/3 or a 5/4 haste.
on RG:
I've already backpeddaled from Atarka's Command and straight to Bolts. The cheapness of the card in initial goldfishes show up and while it doesn't do nearly as much damage in a vacuum, its versatility in matchups (imagine cleaning up T1 Overseer or an Inkmoth all in, yummy) gives it the nod on future playtesting. I'll jam some with it again this weekend.
I've been thinking more on RG. Is Red sufficient for such a broad meta? It seems like it would falter quickly against fast decks. I'm thinking Naya would be better for white's silver bullets. The manabase ratio will be the same as the one you posted for Jund - which I agree with entirely - except Red will be the leading color for bolt, blood moon, etc.
Both Jund and Naya seem strong on paper. Jund has the strength of SotP, hand disruption, and efficient removal whereas Naya has the strength of bolt/atarkas and strong silver bullets (magus/blood moon, eidolon/ethersworn, kataki, selfless, etc) but nothing to contribute to the strong Elf synergy like SotP. I believe if the meta is full of midrange/control then Jund would be the clear choice; however, if the meta is full of tron/combo then Naya would be better suited. With that being said it raises the question of: Would Naya BBE be worth running over GW Combo when both decks have the same 'good' match ups? I'm personally leaning towards no based on GW Combo's several competitive REL top 8 finishes.
In any case I think for the rest of this month Jund is most optimal because the majority of players are feeding on the hype of Jund Midrange and UWx Control.
On the topic of: removing chord will make our fast MUs worse. Any version that isn't running the combo such as GB already had a bad MU even with chord. With GB the way to fight fast decks was with TS or Spot removal and that doesn't change by replacing chord with BBE. In fact it gets much better because you can now cascade into those spells whereas with chord it's a nonbo.
There's also no reason to fully revolve around BBE because that's only one card in a deck that's already been performing for years without it. Going aggro with Talara's and Wren's Run is an entirely different strategy that hasn't had success in the past afaik. This deck's strategy is still to be explosive, go wide, and use our big mana spells (coco/bbe/chord) to threaten lethal.
Edit: RG does look interesting with BBE into Atarkas. Maybe the aggressive strategy (wrens run, talara's) would work with that color combination.
Hey guys. It's been a while since I posted here. Glad to see the Elf community continues to go strong. I would like to comment on a couple things that will hopefully spark some meaningful discussion.
Firstly it's awesome that Elves placed in a GP yesterday!! They were featured playing against burn which we won by a landslide - no surprise there.
Secondly. Guys.. This is serious. Jace the Mind Sculptor and Bloodbraid Elf have been unbanned. What will this mean for us moving forward? Are we boned with the rise of midrange and control?
Edit: Will Jund Elves be a thing? BBE into Shaman sounds pretty sweet though whiffing on a dork seems more likely. I do like the aggressive nature of going Jund by having another 3/2 body except with haste and the ability to 2 for 1. With coco that's eight 2 for 1s which is great for recovering from boardwipes. We'll also have access to magus of the moon.
Veteran Elves players, based on your experience what are the common mistakes one usually does when playing this deck? It could be for the GB, GW or Abzan build. I'm pretty sure Elf newbies like me can gain a lot from what you can contribute. Could be a general play or something we might do in a certain match up. Thanks in advance to anyone who will share their thoughts
Sequencing, mulligans, and sideboarding are the three big ones I see new Elf players struggle with.
How can it not be in this deck? Its a mini stampede anyway with archdruid mama. I thinks the right answer here is 2. I mean this is archdruid 5 and 6 with a tad of stampede. Test it and keep it.
I agree.
One line of play I can see being strong is having 4 Elves on the field, cast this and grab Ezuri. It flips on your EOT. On your next turn play a land, play ezuri and overrun with new cradle.
TL;DR This card has the potential to both grab Ezuri and give you the mana you need to overrun the following turn.
Gaea's cradle can be played as 4 because it's an immediate impact that lets you create insane amounts of mana in one turn for lethal. Also, it's a land off the bat which doesn't take slots from chord/CoCo or creatures.
That being said, I feel like a case can be made for 2. For GW combo I think -1 land and -1 chord could work. It's been proven via Ross Merriam - though not intentional - that 17 lands is consistent with this version. 9 noncreature spells is the max I would personally go.
I'm still an advocate for Visionary in Jund and it's not because I also have promo Visionaries but because of why it's in most lists in the first place - especially in lists that have made it to top 8 in GPs. I currently run 3 which feels like the perfect number after tons of play testing. To put it in a bigger picture, my list has 15 2for1s between CoCo, BBE, Dwynen's, and Visionary which is 1/4 of the deck. This is a strong ratio to have. Granted, I also run a 1of Lead for more value but it's a flex spot that I might change into a 19th land or 3rd ezuri.
TL;DR: Visionary remains a good card for many reasons; running Jund does not change its viability.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
Interesting choice of cards. I see the strength of trapper but it weakens BBE and Coco hits by having that instead of visionaries. Aside from this Visionaries is MUCH more important in Jund because it doesn't run canopies for draw power.
2 Forest is also very risky against decks that runs Path or Blood Moon.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
You'll find that at the moment BBE is the talk amongst us Elfies. The unbanning has given us a new avenue that most of us here are excited to explore. Incase you're wondering this is why you won't see much discussion on GW Combo. Feel free to chime in.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
Blood Crypt acts as a colorless land in that regard. It sacrifices the utility we would get from a true colorless land like Westvale for consistency. That's the way I see it anyways.
Aside from that it is after all an extra land and just like other Elf builds we never needed the 15th green source for creatures.
That being said, a 5th fetch is by no means a bad idea. It's what I was originally going for.
Just my 2 cents.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
Couldn't have said it better myself. As great as the deck seems on paper, I think there is still some room for tuning the mb.
More specifically, there are two problems I have been having with the deck. The first is the mana base. The deck always needs to have red and black mana on the field in the event of me having or potentially drawing into a Shaman/BBE.
Here's an example I faced. I fetched early on for an overgrown tomb because I had Shaman in my opening hand. Makes sense right? Well I had no way to generate red mana incase I drew into BBE - which I did. Because I had no red mana I could not use BBE on T3/T4 BBE. I lost because of this.
The same situation happened when it was the other way around. I had a BBE in my opener then fetched for Stomping ground with no way to generate black for Shaman and lost because of that as well.
It could have been a really bad day and quite frankly it was only one day of testing so there's not much data but I personally rather be safe than sorry. Here's my solution.
Brace yourself because it's a bit painful. I think adding a Blood Crypt as the 19th land is optimal. Blood Crypt is great in those situations when you need both colors and already have a forest on the field. Why do we need a 19th land? Great question.
Here is the second problem I was facing. It was not drawing enough lands to consistently have 3/4 lands by T4/5. This is a problem when we have 8 4cmc cards. I think 19 lands will give is that safety net we need.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
TS: I think the 4th TS is more important now than before with the replacement of Chord for BBE. BBE being able to cascade into noncreature spells like TS could be life or death in an open meta where you could potentially play against combo.
Also BBE into Collective Brutality is a missed opportunity I think we should take advantage of.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
I'm with Syreal94 on this one. I like Domri in our deck but Jund just cannot afford the space IMHO. For GRx it would make sense because by not having Shamans it has much more room and flexibility in both the MB and SB. The Naya list I posted intrigues me for this reason of space and flexibility - also Kessig Wolf Run is Nuts. I think there's still room for innovation with GRx builds and that's pretty exciting.
I also agree with Syreal94 on GBx builds relying primarily on a noncreature sb. The Jund list I posted has a version of what I think is most optimal to have a fighting chance in an open meta. For metas that I'm familiar with I would obviously try to adapt my sb.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
It's important to note that when comparing BBE to Collected Company we're not trying to replace it but instead figure out a better card in the spot of Chord of Calling for Shaman builds. Anybody who has played GB in the past knows that having Chord has never been the plan to having a winning chance against fast decks. If you guys want to win against fast decks then play GW Combo. You can't have your cake and eat it.
@Worldsaverinc
No Company will make the deck too slow. Being able to cheat out two creatures at instant speed is still much more powerful than chaining Sylvan into BBEs. As I said, we don't want to replace Company. After all that's the card that put us in the map in the first place - hence the name of this thread.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
4 Cavern of Souls
3 Forest
4 Gilt-Leaf Palace
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Pendelhaven
1 Stomping Ground
4 Windswept Heath
// Creatures
4 Bloodbraid Elf
4 Dwynen's Elite
4 Elvish Archdruid
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Elvish Visionary
2 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Shaman of the Pack
4 Collected Company
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Collective Brutality
2 Fatal Push
2 Fracturing Gust
3 Leyline of the Void
4 Thoughtseize
For the crazies that wanna do Naya over GW combo, here's a list I tuned. I found that it really only needs white for eidolon and ethersworn which are nuts against storm/ad nauseum.
4 Cavern of Souls
4 Copperline Gorge
3 Forest
1 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
4 Windswept Heath
// Creatures
4 Bloodbraid Elf
4 Dwynen's Elite
4 Elvish Archdruid
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Elvish Visionary
3 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Collected Company
3 Lead the Stampede
3 Ancient Grudge
2 Blood Moon
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Elvish Champion
1 Ethersworn Canonist
3 Lightning Bolt
1 Magus of the Moon
3 Relic of Progenitus
This Naya list kinda reminds me of Andrew Sullano's GW Elf Company list he placed with a few years ago. It was purely focused on going wide and overrunning. I really like Kessig in here that I even thought about adding a 19th land as the 2nd copy.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
I've been thinking more on RG. Is Red sufficient for such a broad meta? It seems like it would falter quickly against fast decks. I'm thinking Naya would be better for white's silver bullets. The manabase ratio will be the same as the one you posted for Jund - which I agree with entirely - except Red will be the leading color for bolt, blood moon, etc.
Both Jund and Naya seem strong on paper. Jund has the strength of SotP, hand disruption, and efficient removal whereas Naya has the strength of bolt/atarkas and strong silver bullets (magus/blood moon, eidolon/ethersworn, kataki, selfless, etc) but nothing to contribute to the strong Elf synergy like SotP. I believe if the meta is full of midrange/control then Jund would be the clear choice; however, if the meta is full of tron/combo then Naya would be better suited. With that being said it raises the question of: Would Naya BBE be worth running over GW Combo when both decks have the same 'good' match ups? I'm personally leaning towards no based on GW Combo's several competitive REL top 8 finishes.
In any case I think for the rest of this month Jund is most optimal because the majority of players are feeding on the hype of Jund Midrange and UWx Control.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
There's also no reason to fully revolve around BBE because that's only one card in a deck that's already been performing for years without it. Going aggro with Talara's and Wren's Run is an entirely different strategy that hasn't had success in the past afaik. This deck's strategy is still to be explosive, go wide, and use our big mana spells (coco/bbe/chord) to threaten lethal.
Edit: RG does look interesting with BBE into Atarkas. Maybe the aggressive strategy (wrens run, talara's) would work with that color combination.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
Firstly it's awesome that Elves placed in a GP yesterday!! They were featured playing against burn which we won by a landslide - no surprise there.
Secondly. Guys.. This is serious. Jace the Mind Sculptor and Bloodbraid Elf have been unbanned. What will this mean for us moving forward? Are we boned with the rise of midrange and control?
Edit: Will Jund Elves be a thing? BBE into Shaman sounds pretty sweet though whiffing on a dork seems more likely. I do like the aggressive nature of going Jund by having another 3/2 body except with haste and the ability to 2 for 1. With coco that's eight 2 for 1s which is great for recovering from boardwipes. We'll also have access to magus of the moon.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
Sequencing, mulligans, and sideboarding are the three big ones I see new Elf players struggle with.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
I agree.
One line of play I can see being strong is having 4 Elves on the field, cast this and grab Ezuri. It flips on your EOT. On your next turn play a land, play ezuri and overrun with new cradle.
TL;DR This card has the potential to both grab Ezuri and give you the mana you need to overrun the following turn.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth
That being said, I feel like a case can be made for 2. For GW combo I think -1 land and -1 chord could work. It's been proven via Ross Merriam - though not intentional - that 17 lands is consistent with this version. 9 noncreature spells is the max I would personally go.
GBRJund Elves
GWDevoted Elves
WDeath & Taxes
GWUBRHumans
EDH:
GTitania, Protector of Argoth