I figured that in AFT builds you would play some number of mission briefing to fill a flashback roll that snap gives but also synergize with the suspend spells. Seems like a powerful 1 of.
Mission Briefing is probably good, but I certainly wouldn't cut a Snapcaster for it. Honestly, I'd probably add a 4th Snapcaster before the first Briefing. Snap just does so much: it chumps or trades off, pressures opposing planeswalkers, it gets bounced by Jace or Cryptic or Thing, and it attacks for the win.
Finding a second Ancestral after you've resolved As Foretold is usually not too hard with all the cantrips and Tolaria West. And needing access to a 5th Ancestral doesn't come up very often. I may try Briefing for a league or two, see if there is more to it than meets the eye. I will say that Briefing plays better against Surgical Extraction, so that is something to keep in mind.
Any thoughts on using the new Teferi? Being able to combo off without worrying about counters and the ability to time warp at instant speed seem pretty good. And for just 3 mana nonetheless
Teferi, Time Raveler seems great if it resolves vs control, but those matchups are typically pretty good for the Taking Turns deck anyway, no? Maybe it's also good against something like Grixis Death's Shadow, or maybe even Infect?
The opportunity cost is pretty low, since it's three mana and it can bounce something and draw a card the turn you play it. Being able to bounce stuff like Blood Moon, Pyromancer Ascension, Chalice of the Void, is potentially really useful. I am certainly excited to try it out.
I’m going to assume it’s a strictly worse build, but I think it’s at least worth brewing with maybe.
Totally worth a shot, I never want to discourage brewing with a new card. The card is definitely powerful, it draws you an extra card every turn. My take is that the "win the game by decking yourself" plan is probably more trouble than it's worth. If you draw your whole deck it's pretty trivial to have some other way to win, in fact you probably need to have another way in case they can deal with the Jace. So the card would need to be doing something else in the mid-game, preferably something that another card doesn't already do better. Having said all that, playing JWOS alongside JTMS does sound really good.
Congrats on day 2 and cashing!
Timely reinforcements is interesting to have mainboard. How has it performed? I’ve loved it sideboard.
Thanks @JPoJohnson! Timely performs a lot like a sideboard card. Awesome sometimes, useless other times. Right now, it is at least useful in almost every matchup, particularly the poorer ones. Maindecking 1 Timely is pretty common in UW Control for this reason. Finding the Timely is basically the only way [for my deck] to beat burn in game 1 (Dredge too, to a lesser extent). Needing to gain 6 life (or 12 with snap) comes up surprisingly often. With so much card draw the deck is actually pretty good at finding 1-ofs. I actively want Timely versus burn, dredge, jund/rock and non-spirits creature decks. It is notably awful vs Tron, Artifact Prison, and Ad Nauseum.
I've also tried 1 Surgical Extraction main instead, which was again awesome sometimes, and really bad other times. I like the surgical vs phoenix, dredge, tron, scapeshift, and basically any deck named after a specific card. Overall, I found Surgical was a bit too narrow so I went with Timely for this event.
Right now though, with War of the Spark spoilers, I’m looking at trying out a full dictate/mine build using the new Jace walker. A lot of hate has been put on him, but with the crazy amount of draw power the dictate/mine build allows, I feel it might have the potential to be a quick and efficient way to close games. Any thoughts or constructive criticisms?
I think that the new Jace, Wielder of Mysteries is probably just worse than Jace, the Mind Sculptor in a typical Turns deck. Most of the time, if you've drawn your whole deck you've already won. The card is not particularly quick or efficient. Maybe there is some other build that uses the graveyard and/or aggressively self-mills that could take advantage of the new Jace. I'm just not sure what that deck would look like.
Hi everyone. I thought I'd share my hybrid Turns/Control list that I played at GP Calgary to a 10-5 finish and 52nd place. The deck was very good to me on Friday where I won a Last Chance Trial (4-0) to earn 2 byes and on Day 1 where I made it to 8-0 before the cut. I was riding high into Day 2, then I promptly lost 4 matches in a row crushing my dreams of a top 8 finish.
I've been working on this deck for off and on for about a year, but really dedicated myself to it in the last few months, with the rise of UR Phoenix decks. I've had good success locally (I top 4'ed a 4k open in Edmonton a few weeks back) and on MTGO (24-11 in comp leagues, still no 5-0). I could write pages about how the deck works, the other variations I've tried, the different match-ups, lines of play etc. But for now I'm just sharing my latest list.
Also, I want to say congrats to Daniel Wong on yet another great GP finish! I regret not saying hi when I saw you on Day 2. It's because of you that I ever sleeved up Time Warp in modern.
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Finding a second Ancestral after you've resolved As Foretold is usually not too hard with all the cantrips and Tolaria West. And needing access to a 5th Ancestral doesn't come up very often. I may try Briefing for a league or two, see if there is more to it than meets the eye. I will say that Briefing plays better against Surgical Extraction, so that is something to keep in mind.
The opportunity cost is pretty low, since it's three mana and it can bounce something and draw a card the turn you play it. Being able to bounce stuff like Blood Moon, Pyromancer Ascension, Chalice of the Void, is potentially really useful. I am certainly excited to try it out.
Thanks @JPoJohnson! Timely performs a lot like a sideboard card. Awesome sometimes, useless other times. Right now, it is at least useful in almost every matchup, particularly the poorer ones. Maindecking 1 Timely is pretty common in UW Control for this reason. Finding the Timely is basically the only way [for my deck] to beat burn in game 1 (Dredge too, to a lesser extent). Needing to gain 6 life (or 12 with snap) comes up surprisingly often. With so much card draw the deck is actually pretty good at finding 1-ofs. I actively want Timely versus burn, dredge, jund/rock and non-spirits creature decks. It is notably awful vs Tron, Artifact Prison, and Ad Nauseum.
I've also tried 1 Surgical Extraction main instead, which was again awesome sometimes, and really bad other times. I like the surgical vs phoenix, dredge, tron, scapeshift, and basically any deck named after a specific card. Overall, I found Surgical was a bit too narrow so I went with Timely for this event.
Other more universally useful cards I've tried in that slot and liked include Search for Azcanta, Mana Leak or another copy of Remand, Cryptic Command, Exhaustion or Tolaria West.
4x Ancestral Vision
4x Serum Visions
4x As Foretold
1x Exhaustion
1x Teferi, Hero of Dominaria
3x Time Warp
1x Timely Reinforcements
2x Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1x Living End
1x Engineered Explosives
Instant Speed (16)
3x Cryptic Command
4x Opt
4x Path to Exile
1x Remand
3x Snapcaster Mage
1x Spell Snare
4x Field of Ruin
4x Flooded Strand
2x Glacial Fortress
1x Hallowed Fountain
7x Island
1x Mikokoro, Center of the Sea
1x Plains
2x Tolaria West
1x Dispel
1x Negate
1x Spell Pierce
1x Spell Snare
2x Stony Silence
2x Surgical Extraction
3x Terminus
2x Thing in the Ice
1x Timely Reinforcements
1x Circle of Protection: Red
I've been working on this deck for off and on for about a year, but really dedicated myself to it in the last few months, with the rise of UR Phoenix decks. I've had good success locally (I top 4'ed a 4k open in Edmonton a few weeks back) and on MTGO (24-11 in comp leagues, still no 5-0). I could write pages about how the deck works, the other variations I've tried, the different match-ups, lines of play etc. But for now I'm just sharing my latest list.
Also, I want to say congrats to Daniel Wong on yet another great GP finish! I regret not saying hi when I saw you on Day 2. It's because of you that I ever sleeved up Time Warp in modern.