MTG Salvation

From the Phoenix discord:
-Eldrazi + Chalice
-Dredge
-Ad Nauseam
-UW Miracles with maindeck RIP
-UW Spirits (maindecking 3 thalias and 4 paths)
-Breach Amulet
-Abzan Midrange

FNM report:


Round 1 - Jund
G1 my opponent tempo'd me out with Discard into Goyf. G2 I played control and burned out a BBE with Charm and Liliana with Burst, then untapped into a large Drake. G3 I had Thing on the board and opponent tried to play Lili OTV (presumably to edict) but I countered it with Charm's spell pierce mode, then next turn rez'd a Phoenix and took over. A Phoenix got tagged with Anger once, but otherwise recurring Phoenixes played both offense and defense all match. 2-1.

Round 2 - GW Value-Tokens
Both games I had burn spells controlling early dorks followed by Thing bouncing a board of tokens. In G2 I hit T2 Thing into T3 flip thing + 2 Phoenix and opponent scooped. 2-0.

Round 3 - Ad Nauseam
G1 on the draw I kept a hand with T2 thing and cantrips but couldn't flip it T3. Opponent combo'd out on their T4 before I could do anything. G2 I hit T2 Kiln Fiend, dealt 10 damage T3, then countered Ad Nauseam with Dispel backed up by Charm and opponent scooped. G3 I once again hit T2 Kiln Fiend, and dealt 19 damage to the opponent T3 with manamorphose + Bolts. The opponent proceeded to hold on for another 7+ turns by casting Phyrexian Unlife and 3 copies of Angel's Grace. I patiently attacked with Fiend (and eventually a second Fiend), but couldn't deal too much damage because I had to hold mana for Charm in case he drew into his last land or Ad Naus. Eventually the double Fiends got there. Had a Drake stuck in hand but couldn't play it while keeping Charm mana up. 2-1.

Round 4 - Bant Spirits (ID, played out for fun)
I ID'd this round because I hadn't played the matchup yet but in retrospect it felt pretty favored. I started on defense, using Bolt effects to keep lords and Selfless Spirit clear, then turned the corner with Drake / Phoenix. During G2 I swung in with 2 Phoenixes and he CoCo'd in 2 Phantoms to eat them. Second main phase I played Engineered Explosives on 2, passed, and popped the EE when he tried to CoCo again. I rezzed my Phoenixes by casting Manamorphose into Anger of the Gods (to hit Drogskol Captain + 2 Hierarchs) into Serum Visions, but he countered the Anger with Dromoka's Command. I swung in with the 2 rez'd Phoenixes, forcing him to trade with one, and I ended up burning him out a turn later. 2-0.

4-0 overall

Takeaways:

Izzet Charm - invaluable. Won a game vs Jund by piercing Liliana and gave me MB interaction vs Ad Nauseam. I shaved some copies vs GW Tokens and Bant Spirits, but I was never unhappy with the full set in the main.

Kiln Fiend - did exactly what he was supposed to do vs Ad Nauseam -- 19 damage T3!

Crackling Drake - the flying and lack of respect for GY hate continue to be very relevant. Drake was anywhere from 7 to 12 power today. Not sure whether I want the 4th copy or not -- it's a great card that you want to see towards the end of most games but sometimes gets stuck in hand while you prioritize other spells.

Engineered Explosives - cleared two Supreme Phantoms vs Spirits and was brought in as an additional out vs Jund's Goyfs but didn't come up there. I'm not sure that EE is generally better than the third Anger in Izzet lists, but it did well tonight, at least.

Thought Scour vs Sleight of Hand has been a contentious point of conversation. Here I will summarize the Pros and Cons for each.

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Thought Scour - an Instant that improves the chances of hitting our best plays by helping us to bin additional copies of Arclight Phoenix / Faithless Looting and grow Crackling Drake. As a trade-off, Scour replaces itself with a random card.

At best, a play like T2 Manamorphose + Thought Scour + Faithless looting lets you dig 6 cards down for a 35% chance of hitting another Phoenix. Combined with a Phoenix in hand this could lead to an extremely aggressive start. What kind of performance can we expect from Scour on average?

Per Thought Scour Cast:

74.8% mill 0 Phoenix/Looting
23.5% mill 1 Phoenix/Looting
1.7% mill 2 Phoenix/Looting

23.0% Drake +1 Power (Scour Only)
50.7% Drake +2 Power
26.3% Drake +3 Power

Overall most likely scenario for a single given cast is to bin 0 Phoenix/Looting and give Drake +2 Power.

However, over 4 rounds, assuming 1-2 ("1.5" avg) casts of Scour per game and 2.5 avg games per round, you will typically mill 2 copies of Phoenix and 2 copies of Looting into the GY.

In some cases, having that extra Phoenix in the grave or 1-2 points of power on the Drake will make the difference between a game win and a game loss. While that sounds small, those games might determine their respective matches, which could tip your overall placement.

One philosophy is that Modern rewards players that proactively build around and hit broken nut draws. Having more "hot" hands is more important than having more "keepable" openers. Therefore, strengthening our nut draws with Scour is the most sensible way to fill our flex slots.

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Sleight of Hand - a Sorcery that focuses on improving the deck's performance through added selection and consistency. As a trade-off, it doesn't raise the ceiling of the deck's best-possible plays.

Improved selection helps in many core aspects of the deck:

A 1-lander with Sleight is potentially keepable on the play and comfortably keepable on the draw. A 1-lander with Scour is probably not keepable either way. By increasing our pool of keepable hands we effectively improve the number of nut draws we can access while also decreasing the number of non-games we encounter.

Sleight of Hand also improve our odds of successfully chaining spells to rez Phoenix. Scour has a 50% chance of replacing itself with another Instant/Sorcery compared to Sleight's 75% chance. There are also situations where you have the necessary three spells in hand but need another land to cast them all -- Scour can find the land 31% of the time, while Sleight finds it 50% of the time. This performance difference can be less pronounced in the mid game when our hand is full of spells, but in the late game -- as our grip thins -- Sleight's selection is more likely to make the difference in enabling a successful Phoenix-rez / Thing-flip.

While Sleight doesn't instantly bin spells in the graveyard, its improved ability to draw into more spells can also effectively translate into larger Drakes. And once the Drake is large enough to one-shot the opponent, any extra size is superfluous.

Unfortunately, Scour's ability to bin Phoenix and Looting are dependent upon the graveyard -- and thus vulnerable to GY hate. Sleight's improved selection remains constant in games 2/3.

Finally, improved selection means a better ability to dig for cards you need -- extra threats, answers, or valuable SB cards. This selection becomes more valuable the longer the game runs and the more fluid your role selection needs to be.

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Role Flexibility
Although our deck aims to be on the offense as often as possible, our ~T4 clock demands that we offer some small amount of interaction and stay ready to fluidly shift between offense and defense. Sleight and Scour help this in different ways. Sleight's selection lets you dig for the cards you need to support your current role -- maybe you need that 1-of Lightning Axe on defense or really need a Drake to turn the corner. Conversely, Scour doesn't help you find these cards, but by being an Instant it allows you to keep your "shields up", holding mana open for interactive spells and then potentially Scouring EOT.

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In summary, both spells effectively improve our number of nut draws and help us to maintain role flexibility, although in different ways.

Thought Scour utilizes the GY to further turbo-charge our offensive nut draws, while also complementing our other instant speed interaction.

Sleight of Hand offers a reduction of non-games, better Thing-flip / Phoenix-rez chain rates, overall better dig power, and resistance to GY hate.

We have enough data to suggest that both spells are viable, and there may not be a "correct" spell to run. In making the choice yourself, ask
(1) In terms of play-style, am I "all-in" (Scour) or "flex" (Sleight) oriented?
(2) Are my average games running shorter (Scour) or longer (Sleight)?
(3) Am I encountering moderate GY hate (Scour) or heavy hate (Sleight)?

Hi everyone! I've got the deck in paper on the way.

In the mean time, I've started a UR Spells discord channel so we can chat and tune in real time, hope to see you all there.

Hi everyone, I've been playing around with this deck -- mostly just goldfishing atm -- and I've been thinking about building it out in paper. I find the role-flexibility provided by Thing in the Ice and SB interaction to be more fun than the "all-in" mono-red Steam-Kin approach, even if I'm not sure that it's "better".

From the perspective of a Thing in the Ice fan, this deck really seems like the best possible shell for it. The high density of cantrips help to consistently flip Thing, even in the late game, and the abundance of reach via burn spells and Phoenix solves the old issue of swinging in once with Awoken Horror and then getting chump blocked repeatedly while they come back into the game.

So far ~1 Mission Briefing and ~1 Noxious Revival have seemed like good additions which increase the selection and speed of the deck, although they are also GY-dependent.

I would prefer more general use SB counterspells rather than Dragon Claws and Traps.

I think the remaining points of optimization are:

1) How does the deck do against GY hate? What is the best SB strategy against RIP? Against Leyline? Currently I'm thinking of just cutting a couple Revelers G2/G3 and boarding in some counterspells and/or non-GY-dependent threats like Young Pyro / Vendilion Clique / Crackling Drake. Running 3 Revelers main instead of 4 might even be correct (!), as I frequently pitch early Revelers, the deck has so many cantrips (and Noxious Revival) to find a Reveler by the time it's online, and this could help us hedge against GY hate.

2) Along those lines, what is the ideal blend of SB counterspells? How many counterspells can we bring in before the deck becomes too clunky? This is meta-dependent, but a good starting point might be to look at successful UR Wizard Tempo SBs:
2x Disdainful Stroke
2x Ceremonious Rejection
1x Dispel
2x Negate

3) What is the optimal ratio of Thought Scour, Chart a Course, and Izzet Charm?

• Thought Scour provides Phoenix, Thing, and Reveler with the most velocity but becomes "air" in the face of GY hate, its GY-filling is random, and it can't help discard spells in hand. Overall high ceiling, low floor, lots of variance.
• Izzet Charm seems to be most commonly used for its looting mode, which is worse than either Faithless Looting or Chart a Course. I'm not sure yet how much value to place in the flexibility of its "Creature Shock" or "Spell Pierce" modes. Bolt + Temper provide a high enough density of X/3 removal that the "Creature Shock" doesn't seem too valuable, but I could imagine scenarios where having a MB Spell Pierce (even at 2 CMC) might help to protect an early Phoenix or Thing. Anyone have experience on this?
• Chart a Course is kinda clunky as a 2-CMC spell that won't impact the board, but is a better Looting card than Izzet Charm, and the best top-deck of the three.