NW helps u hit land drops because you're drawing cards. Seeing more cards so u can hit drops 3 to 5 or 6 more consistently. What you said about NW being better for a lower curve makes zero sense. Go ahead and use Bob with a quarter of the deck costing 3+ Mana.
Moreover, it fills a need for this deck as a 2 drop. 2 or 3 is the correct number.
One of the decks primary wincons is a ticked up Lili. Spending Mana to search for cards for Lili to dump is anti-synergy. Most of these bw lists run 8 to 10 walkers, with as many as 12!
Are you suggesting to build a control deck with single target removal and no draw? Because pw value and souls only goes so far.
Because this is BW control. Take your Esper Control ideas to the proper thread.
Sure, NW helps you draw more lands. but it also costs you life and it fills your hand turn 2 when you already have a full hand. Look at UW control: they really don't play much card advantage outside of planeswalkers, just cantrips. Sphinx's Rev used to see play but that's because it's a win condition, not because the deck needs card advantage to keep the game under control. They didn't put it in as a curve filler, it's a curve topper to steal the game late when you run out of cards.
Liliana Ultimate is very unreliable. She will become a target before that happens. If she doesn't, awesome, but I wouldn't count on it.
Spending Mana to search for cards for Lili to dump is anti-synergy.
Exactly. So why are you saying we should play NW?
You don't need card draw to win with a control deck. PW value and Souls are good ways to grind out games. There are many decks that will fall way behind after a couple liliana activations. There are many decks that fall way behind after a couple gideon activations. You might lose against GW Valuetown but that's just the nature of that deck. And GW isn't even that popular. I'm more worried about beating Tron and KCI than I am about how I'm going to out grind BGx.
So I'm going to preface this by saying that I don't think the LotV build is bad but rather something I'm not interested in playing.
I posted in this thread because I'm still interested in having the same play patterns as the primer (proactive tap-out style of control) and admittedly didn't really take the time to properly elaborate my reasoning. It's nice to be able to bounce ideas off other people that have experience with something similar and I don't see the need to get so defensive. Sure, it might not strictly be a B/W control deck anymore but the goal is that it still plays like one.
With that being said, to further elaborate on my point on countermagic. I don't really want to go down that path as there are no counterspells I'd be interested in playing with only a light blue splash (logic knot, remand, mana leak, cryptic, countersquall etc.). I don't think countermagic is necessarily bad but something I'm not interested making significant cuts for. We then also start going more into the draw-go style of UW/x decks which is it's own thing.
The reason I want to look at search for azcanta is because this deck lacks card selection and not necessarily card advantage. I've jammed with nights whisper for awhile and always found it ranges from decent to outright terrible. We're able to make up for the lack of card draw with our walkers and high value spells but oftentimes don't draw them or draw the wrong one. It's led to a lot of situations where we either are unable to establish our board or close the game out when ahead. I believe Zyrnak tested Treasure Map recognizing this issue but I don't think it's good enough for modern. SoA gives us card selection to help establish our board and when it flips it allows us to dig for cards to close the game. I also feel like we have enough dead cards for each matchup in the mainboard for us to not really care about pitching things to the grave.
Splashing blue for only 2 cards in the main and maybe 3-5 in the sideboard allows us to keep field of ruin and maintain a fairly resilient manabase. It also gives us access to negate in the side which I think the deck would greatly benefit from. I'll need to find the time to draft up a list but it'd be something like what todd stevens played on mtgo with 2 blue shocks and cuts to removal and/or walkers.
I will just flat out say LOTV in the Gideon’s build is horrible. more than half the time her +1 just feels completely horrible so she ends up being a 3cmc edict. The games where her ultimate win you the game you are already way ahead. She’s alright in smallpox build Spend some time in the earlier pages and there’s tons of comments on testing and results with her. I’ve considered discovery/dispersal for a while because it synergizes with souls and I plan to test it. Liliana the last hope on the other hand is a great magic card and I would run her in this list before I touched a LOTV. I will say that shalia has also been nice deck tech in the side. I am also iffy on gideon Jura, he is just too slow and clunky.
As for the blue splash it’s just not viable and you would be changing the whole archetype and curve of the deck. There are plenty of successful esper lists like thopter swords or gifts combo, but Gideon tribal or superfriends doesn’t seem very viable in those colors.
If you only play 2 shocks and a basic you'll need a lot of fetch lands. You need at least 13 Blue sources to reliably cast SfA. I'm not saying it's a bad idea, but it's certainly not trivial on the mana base.
Ashiok is a card I would suggest for a U splash too. She's very powerful and underplayed. with all the board wipes she should be easy to defend.
As for the blue splash it’s just not viable and you would be changing the whole archetype and curve of the deck.
Awkwardness with mana for the first few turns is definitely the biggest concern for me. It's something that I'd need to properly test but I think the benefit of good consistent card filtering might outweigh it. I don't really agree that it changes the whole archetype though other than it not strictly being a 'b/w deck'. The current idea is to use some of the flex spots for SfA and SfA only.
If you only play 2 shocks and a basic you'll need a lot of fetch lands. You need at least 13 Blue sources to reliably cast SfA. I'm not saying it's a bad idea, but it's certainly not trivial on the mana base.
Ashiok is a card I would suggest for a U splash too. She's very powerful and underplayed. with all the board wipes she should be easy to defend.
I think I could get away with 10 or so. Will have to find the time to proxy and test now. Not really sold on ashiok as its a grind engine and grind engines aren't really what the deck needs more of.
Uhh yeah, a thread titled "bw orzhov control" should be strictly about BW. I see this time and time again with these threads and I just check less and less because the integrity of most of these threads is a ******* joke.
It's like saying, oh I want to splash green in uw control, and pretending you didn't or shouldn't be in the bant control thread. Not everyone builds a deck like you. Some people enjoy the challenges of even a mono-colored deck. Let's even pretend your blue splash revolutionizes the deck. Are people going to call it orzhov control with a blue splash. No, they're going to call it Esper. And what you lost? People that want to build orzhov control are reading about Esper control. They're not going y
to contribute orzhov thoughts in an Esper thread. It is imperative that you see the big picture here and keep boards organized. It will keep the thread alive with people who may not have even played magic yet who simply want to build an orzhov deck.
You spit in the face of every orzhov player out there when you talk of colors that aren't orzhov in an orzhov thread.
I think I could get away with 10 or so. Will have to find the time to proxy and test now. Not really sold on ashiok as its a grind engine and grind engines aren't really what the deck needs more of.
It has suggestions on how many sources of each color you should include to reliably cast spells. "Reliably" is a subjective word but I generally agree with the author. At 10 sources of blue that means you'll be casting SfA on cuve 85% of the time which is not great. You're more likely casting it closer to turn 4. SfA is much better on turn 2 than 4. Obviously missing a few times isn't game breaking but keep it in mind.
Still working off the article, lets say you want to support Gideon of the Trials / Thoughtseize / SfA in terms of color (since I think you'll want to drop damnation to save yourself room in your mana base). That's 18 W 14 B and 13 U. So something like:
You still have room for a couple FoR and a good amount of basics. But this is predicated on dropping the double Black spells so any more black and you'll have to shuffle some things around. Hopefully that helps you get started on making a mana base.
Ya, Ashiok is just another grind card. The nice thing is that it's at 3 mana but that's probably not an issue for this deck.
You still have room for a couple FoR and a good amount of basics. But this is predicated on dropping the double Black spells so any more black and you'll have to shuffle some things around. Hopefully that helps you get started on making a mana base.
Yea I've seen it. I guess in my head I was thinking that 10 would be ok since I wouldn't always be able to cast it on turn 2 (need to play removal, hand disruption etc.) but thats probably not sound deckbuilding. I agree that damnation is probably the first thing to go as it's the only double black card in the list. I haven't really found the time at all to even test the deck so will put it on hold till I can. Appreciate the second opinion though.
It's like saying, oh I want to splash green in uw control, and pretending you didn't or shouldn't be in the bant control thread. Not everyone builds a deck like you. Some people enjoy the challenges of even a mono-colored deck. Let's even pretend your blue splash revolutionizes the deck. Are people going to call it orzhov control with a blue splash. No, they're going to call it Esper. And what you lost? People that want to build orzhov control are reading about Esper control. They're not going y
to contribute orzhov thoughts in an Esper thread. It is imperative that you see the big picture here and keep boards organized. It will keep the thread alive with people who may not have even played magic yet who simply want to build an orzhov deck.
You spit in the face of every orzhov player out there when you talk of colors that aren't orzhov in an orzhov thread.
You should probably chill the **** out. You “spit in the face” of every decent human being. Academy Award nomination for best actor in a drama, though.
Yea I've seen it. I guess in my head I was thinking that 10 would be ok since I wouldn't always be able to cast it on turn 2 (need to play removal, hand disruption etc.) but thats probably not sound deckbuilding. I agree that damnation is probably the first thing to go as it's the only double black card in the list. I haven't really found the time at all to even test the deck so will put it on hold till I can. Appreciate the second opinion though.
Ya, it's only a splash so only put as many sources in as you can support. But I've cast a lot of turn 2 SfAs and that's the best time to cast it. And it seems like the deck is missing a good turn 2 play so you want it to be available when it fits the curve since it doesn't affect the board at all.
I havent posted in a while, but im convinced that this Deck is easily Tier 2, but its not seeing any big tournament results since there is no Reason for a pro Player to pick this deck above Jund which is Tier 1 atm.
I played 5-0 in my FNM yesterday with this List.
The MB stayed the same for most parts, but the SB has a lot changes since i posted the last time( i think like 5 months before idk).
Anyway those were my Match ups yestereday:
2-0 vs Demonic Pact Combo: Well the Deck is a Meme itself and its even more hilarious since there are Version of the Deck out there running GotT MB.
I won Game 1 with double Handhate ( Inquisition into Collective Brutality) taking 2 Harmless Offerings. Game 2 was a instant concede turn 2 after Thoughtseizing Harmless Offering into Extirpate. This MU is free for our Deck anyway since we can just play GotT and make his Emblem for not loosing to the gimmick.
2-1 vs Green Stompy: Lost Game 1 due to my Manabase. I had 2 Field of Ruins and 1 Godless shrine and couldnt use Fiel of Ruins since my opponent only had basic forest in play. After SB with Blessed Alliance and Timely Reinforcement this MU is a piece of Cake. I won Game 2 and 3 without any big troubles.
2-0 vs Infect: Well once more a realy great MU. 2 easy wins without any sweat. Went to 4 Infect Game 1 while holding 1 Fatal Push and 2 Path to Exile.
2-1 vs Burn: Well one good Example why to play the Gideon Version of this Deck. Turn 3 GotT Ebmlem and you are comfy with your 4 copies of GAoZ MB. After SB it only gets better with 2 Kambal, 2 Blessed Alliance and 1 Timely. I Lost this one game to a greedy starting Hand and not finding Lands for 4 turns. Even though i stabled the board with inquisition into turn 2 collective Brutality with all 3 modes. But well i didnt found any Lands and he Topdecked burn 4 Turns in a Row. Game 3 was a free again. He conceded after i dropped Sorin, Solemn Visior into GotT and GAoZ on the Board and he ended up Salty as **** :^).
Final 2-1 vs Goryos Goryo's Vengeance Griselbrand: I lost game 1 to a turn 3 Combo and 1 open Path wasnt enough since he used Griselbrand Abillity in responds. Game 2 was a RIP turn 2 game and i won after a few swings of GAoZ. Game 3 was actually intense but always in my favor. He discarded Griselbrand into turn 1 Looting and i extirpated Griselbrand. Split Second actually won the game since he was holding izzet charm. then i was able to find RIP on turn 5 or 6 and then the Planeswalker Beatdown started.
I'm convinced that this Deck is easily Tier 2, but its not seeing any big tournament results since there is no Reason for a pro Player to pick this deck above Jund which is Tier 1 atm.
Depends what you mean by "tier". Most of the time tier means popularity, not power level. Since the deck isn't popular it's not tier 2 by any means. Talking in terms of power I'm not sure. There are certainly decks it beats but I'm not sure your 5-0 is a representative sample of the meta by any means.
The big issue with the deck I see is that it's so reliant on 4 drops. wraths and planeswalkers at 4 are clunky and sometimes bad against a good chunk of the meta. Also you're playing 12 4/5 drops with no ramp or card selection. I just don't see how that can be competitive against such a fast format. 14 1-drops helps I suppose but your curve looks really bad. Maybe something like mind stone would help you cast your cards a bit faster, idk, I just can't get behind a deck with that kind of curve.
Hey guys. I'm not a Modern player so please take anything I have to say with a grain of salt.
I haven't seen anyone talk about the new Kaya, Orzhov Usurper. Now I know everyone regards her as a bad card, but she's a 3 mana walker in your colors while you say that this deck has too high of a mana curve.
Also, I'd like to argue that she is surprisingly relevant in the current metagame.
I've looked up the top decks at MTGGoldfish and looked at their lists, and broke down what she can do vs these decks.
Good Matchups:
They are looking to establish a board with KCI, Scrap Trawler, Myr Retriever and the like. In turn, Kaya can get rid of most of their early artifacts, the most important being Pyrite Spellbomb, Mox Opal, and Engineered Explosives. Keep in mind that the removal is exile, so exiling their Spellbomb means that they can't get their combo off.
Kaya is actually pretty good here. Exiling instants and sorceries means that they can't Snap them to cast them again, or exile them for Angler's delve. Exiling Street Wraith gives us life, which is relevant in the matchup. And, of course, Kaya can very effectively deal with the all-star himself.
Looking at their sideboard we have 1 more relevant card to remove in the form of Grim Lavamancer, if they do slot it in.
Here Kaya's +1 is king. They have a ton of creatures for her to exile and gain life from, and disabling their dredgeengines can be crippling to their deck. Exiling Conflagrate is also very relevant to prevent the flashback from happening. Finally, to top it off, we can even get rid of their Shriekhorn to prevent them from running through their deck.
Kaya actually has a ton of stuff which she can remove vs this deck with her -1. The list is: Amulet of Vigor, Engineered Explosives, Walking Ballista, Sakura-Tribe Scout, Skyshroud Ranger. If we use a board wipe, most of these are creatures for her to gain us life with. However she becomes absolutely useless when they get their threats on the board, so our goal with her is to slow them down as much as possible and delay so we can find our answers, and I feel she's actually quite servicable at that.
The good news is that Kaya can kill almost half their deck with her -1, and give us lifegain from 1/3 of their deck with her +1. The bad news is that those that she can't are pretty high priority - Arcbound Ravager and Inkmoth Nexus. However, I do feel like since we're in BW we have plenty of cards that will be able to take care of those cards instead.
Also, their sideboard is highly relevant for her. They have Pithing Needle which can shut her down, but if they don't name her with it she can kill it, which is valuable. Grafidgger's Cage also shuts down our Lingering Souls and she can kill it.
Kaya is surprisingly relevant here. They have plenty of relevant creatures for us to exile from their graveyard, the most important being Bloodghast and Flamewake Phoenix, and exiling stuff from their yard is good in general to prevent Gurmag Angler and Tasigur from hitting the field. She can also get rid of their early Flameblade Adept which is important. The lifegain she gives us can mean the difference between winning and losing.
Looking at their sideboard, relevant things she can remove are Engineered Explosives and Grim Lavamancer.
Bad Matchups:
The monster deck that needs an answer. Admittedly Kaya does less than I'd hoped vs it - Drake doesn't care if the instants and sorceries get exiled, and there are no permanents Kaya can kill. However if the opponent is foolish enough to leave a Phoenix or Jump-Start card in the yard vs you, Kaya can get rid of it and even gain you life, which is very relevant in the matchup.
Kaya can exile Goblin Guide and Monastery Swiftspear, but her lifegain probably won't be relevant since most of their graveyard will be noncreature spells. Her ultimate could gain us some life if we reach it, but she will most likely be killed by burn before then. Still, taking both a creature and a burn spell from them might be enough to help win the matchup.
Kaya takes care of three high priority targets which are Champion, Hierarch, and Vial. Also, her +1 will pretty much always give us lifegain. However, I feel like she is much too vulnerable to their other creatures. If we can protect her and use her +1 to try and keep stabilizing she will net us a sizable amount of lifegain, but I feel like that is a nigh impossible mission with all their threats.
Very similar to Humans. The deck has the same targets for her to kill with her -1, and just as much creatures to benefit from with her +1, but ultimately it's not enough of a defense, especially once Drogskol Captain resolves.
The deck that controls the game better than this deck does. Kaya can kill their small artifacts, most importantly Expedition Map, as well as Wurmcoil Engine tokens and Walking Ballista, but other than that she is completely useless here and will most likely be sided out.
Kaya can't really interact with spells on the stack, so she isn't useful here which isn't surprising. The best she can hope to do is exile stuff that we don't want them to reuse with Past in Flames, but that is way too minor of an effect to help in the matchup.
Admittedly I thought she was better in this matchup, but once I looked at the decklist I saw she really couldn't contribute much. She can kill Kalitas's tokens and shrink their Goyf, but that is too narrow of an effect and not much of a defense. If they do discard creatures to their LOTV, though, we can net some life out of it.
Similar to Jund. We can still shrink their Goyf, and we can eat cards in graveyard with her before their Ooze does or before Liliana, the Last Hope brings them back. Otherwise she's a dead card.
They have an Engineered Explosives and Nihil Spellbomb in sideboard, but that doesn't matter.
The above only referred to her +1 and -1 abilities. Her ultimate gives an increasing amount of life as the game goes on, and gets even more relevant when run with cards like: Surgical Extraction / Extirpate - can shut down Dredge and Phoenix, and maybe help against storm. Path to Exile - our lord and savior.
One more synergy I'd like to point out is between Kaya and LOTV. We can either +1 Lili to force them to discard or -2 her to force them to sac, then +1 Kaya to exile whatever they put in the GY. Plus, we can discard Lingering Souls to Lili to help us in protecting our walkers. To me this feels like a pretty good game plan.
So that's enough from me! Feel free to correct me if I made any mistakes (which I likely did). I still feel like even in the worst case she is worthy of testing. What do you guys think?
The KCI deck was banned today so looking at your match ups there are now 5 good match ups and 9 bad match ups. That means she is probably a sideboard piece. So does she beat out any sideboard cards we already have? That depends a lot on your specific build and meta.
One thing missing from your points is timing. Kaya can't come down until turn 3 and she doesn't really affect the board in big ways when she does come down so it's tough to play her on turn 3. The big reason she is so bad against Humans is that exiling their 1 cmc permanents is not the job of your 3 drops but your 1 drops. We should be pushing the hierarchs when we can.
Against the graveyard decks exiling two cards on turn 3 doesn't get you very far against their fast starts. It could be a piece to a working plan though.
Overall she doesn't seem to really shine in any match up so it's hard to justify her as a sideboard piece. At the same time she's never a dead card, but often really underwhelming in the majority of match ups so it's hard to justify playing her mainboard. I'm going to test her once I can get my hands on one but I'm skeptical.
Hello everyone. I have not been active in this forum since the beginning days over a year ago (Maybe 2?). But with all the graveyard decks popping up and steam rolling through Modern, I cant help but this this deck would be awesome.
We have Path to Exile, Condemn, Rest in Peace, Leyline of the Void, Surgical Extraction, & Settle the Wreckage, and I'm sure there are some cards I could be forgetting about on top of the other Wrath of God effects we have.
I would like to pick up the conversation on this again, put our heads together and see if we could come up with something more.
Hope I can get a few of you to join me and getting this deck back on the right track.
I forgot a few cards in my last post like Nihil Spellbomb, Relic of Progenitus, and Runed Halo
Since last playing with this deck there are some cards that are worth talking about to see if they would make this better like:
Now the 2 creatures Djeru, With Eyes Open & Thalia's lancers might look a little odd, but they both tutor for our Planeswalkers.
I played with the Lancers before and I always liked them, they are a 4/4 beater them self's but also they go get whatever Planewalker you need at the moment and is, then they are another threat coming down next turn, that is hard for our opponent to deal with most of the time.
I used Kalitas, Traitor of Ghetbefore and he was "okay" maybe he is better now with all the graveyard decks, but I have not used Djeru yet and think I will try him this weekend, he has 1 less toughness does not have First Strike like the Lancers, but does have Vigilance and prevents a damage that would be done to a Planeswalker, and that might come in more handy then I have thought of before.
Something I have put together for testing this weekend.
Kaya, Orzhov Usurper and Relic of Progenitus are new in the deck for me but with the Dredge and Arclight Phoenix decks right now, I think they could be a really good call. Also adding a Runed Haloin the start I wanted it for the Arclight decks to name Thing in the Ice but it turns out it is good vs. every deck really and is just a answer for whatever the threat is on the board or will have from your opponent.
Been thinking of trying this deck. Has anything changed since the release of War of the Spark? Is there anything from Modern Horizons that this deck will instantly slot in? Kaya's Guile seems to be an obvious one but not sure on how many copies.
Moreover, it fills a need for this deck as a 2 drop. 2 or 3 is the correct number.
One of the decks primary wincons is a ticked up Lili. Spending Mana to search for cards for Lili to dump is anti-synergy. Most of these bw lists run 8 to 10 walkers, with as many as 12!
Are you suggesting to build a control deck with single target removal and no draw? Because pw value and souls only goes so far.
Because this is BW control. Take your Esper Control ideas to the proper thread.
Liliana Ultimate is very unreliable. She will become a target before that happens. If she doesn't, awesome, but I wouldn't count on it.
Exactly. So why are you saying we should play NW?
You don't need card draw to win with a control deck. PW value and Souls are good ways to grind out games. There are many decks that will fall way behind after a couple liliana activations. There are many decks that fall way behind after a couple gideon activations. You might lose against GW Valuetown but that's just the nature of that deck. And GW isn't even that popular. I'm more worried about beating Tron and KCI than I am about how I'm going to out grind BGx.
I posted in this thread because I'm still interested in having the same play patterns as the primer (proactive tap-out style of control) and admittedly didn't really take the time to properly elaborate my reasoning. It's nice to be able to bounce ideas off other people that have experience with something similar and I don't see the need to get so defensive. Sure, it might not strictly be a B/W control deck anymore but the goal is that it still plays like one.
With that being said, to further elaborate on my point on countermagic. I don't really want to go down that path as there are no counterspells I'd be interested in playing with only a light blue splash (logic knot, remand, mana leak, cryptic, countersquall etc.). I don't think countermagic is necessarily bad but something I'm not interested making significant cuts for. We then also start going more into the draw-go style of UW/x decks which is it's own thing.
The reason I want to look at search for azcanta is because this deck lacks card selection and not necessarily card advantage. I've jammed with nights whisper for awhile and always found it ranges from decent to outright terrible. We're able to make up for the lack of card draw with our walkers and high value spells but oftentimes don't draw them or draw the wrong one. It's led to a lot of situations where we either are unable to establish our board or close the game out when ahead. I believe Zyrnak tested Treasure Map recognizing this issue but I don't think it's good enough for modern. SoA gives us card selection to help establish our board and when it flips it allows us to dig for cards to close the game. I also feel like we have enough dead cards for each matchup in the mainboard for us to not really care about pitching things to the grave.
Splashing blue for only 2 cards in the main and maybe 3-5 in the sideboard allows us to keep field of ruin and maintain a fairly resilient manabase. It also gives us access to negate in the side which I think the deck would greatly benefit from. I'll need to find the time to draft up a list but it'd be something like what todd stevens played on mtgo with 2 blue shocks and cuts to removal and/or walkers.
Appreciate the input you guys have given already.
Ashiok is a card I would suggest for a U splash too. She's very powerful and underplayed. with all the board wipes she should be easy to defend.
Awkwardness with mana for the first few turns is definitely the biggest concern for me. It's something that I'd need to properly test but I think the benefit of good consistent card filtering might outweigh it. I don't really agree that it changes the whole archetype though other than it not strictly being a 'b/w deck'. The current idea is to use some of the flex spots for SfA and SfA only.
I think I could get away with 10 or so. Will have to find the time to proxy and test now. Not really sold on ashiok as its a grind engine and grind engines aren't really what the deck needs more of.
to contribute orzhov thoughts in an Esper thread. It is imperative that you see the big picture here and keep boards organized. It will keep the thread alive with people who may not have even played magic yet who simply want to build an orzhov deck.
You spit in the face of every orzhov player out there when you talk of colors that aren't orzhov in an orzhov thread.
have you seen this article? https://www.channelfireball.com/articles/how-many-colored-mana-sources-do-you-need-to-consistently-cast-your-spells-a-guilds-of-ravnica-update/
It has suggestions on how many sources of each color you should include to reliably cast spells. "Reliably" is a subjective word but I generally agree with the author. At 10 sources of blue that means you'll be casting SfA on cuve 85% of the time which is not great. You're more likely casting it closer to turn 4. SfA is much better on turn 2 than 4. Obviously missing a few times isn't game breaking but keep it in mind.
Still working off the article, lets say you want to support Gideon of the Trials / Thoughtseize / SfA in terms of color (since I think you'll want to drop damnation to save yourself room in your mana base). That's 18 W 14 B and 13 U. So something like:
4 Marsh Flats
3 Flooded Strand
1 Polluted Delta
2 Godless Shrine
2 Hallowed Fountain
1 Watery Grave
4 Plains
2 Swamp
1 Island
1 Celestial Colonnade
1 Shambling Vent
2 Field of Ruin
You still have room for a couple FoR and a good amount of basics. But this is predicated on dropping the double Black spells so any more black and you'll have to shuffle some things around. Hopefully that helps you get started on making a mana base.
Ya, Ashiok is just another grind card. The nice thing is that it's at 3 mana but that's probably not an issue for this deck.
Yea I've seen it. I guess in my head I was thinking that 10 would be ok since I wouldn't always be able to cast it on turn 2 (need to play removal, hand disruption etc.) but thats probably not sound deckbuilding. I agree that damnation is probably the first thing to go as it's the only double black card in the list. I haven't really found the time at all to even test the deck so will put it on hold till I can. Appreciate the second opinion though.
You should probably chill the **** out. You “spit in the face” of every decent human being. Academy Award nomination for best actor in a drama, though.
But yeah we should be talking about orzhov
Ya, it's only a splash so only put as many sources in as you can support. But I've cast a lot of turn 2 SfAs and that's the best time to cast it. And it seems like the deck is missing a good turn 2 play so you want it to be available when it fits the curve since it doesn't affect the board at all.
Good luck with the deck!
I played 5-0 in my FNM yesterday with this List.
3x Marsh Flats
4x Field of Ruins
2x Godless Shrine
2x Isolated Chapel
6x Plains
3x Shambling Vent
3x Swamp
1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1x Vault of the Archangel
Planeswalker
3x Gideon of the Trials
4x Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
1x Gideon Jura
1x Sorin, Solemn Visitor
2x Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
4x Fatal Push
4x Path to Exile
Sorcerys
2x Collective Brutality
2x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Thoughtseize
2x Day of Judgment
2x Wrath of God
4x Lingering Souls
2x Kambal, Consul of Allocation
3x Rest in Peace
2x Stony Silence
2x Blessed Alliance
1x Anguished Unmaking
2x Extirpate
1x Timely Reinforcements
1x Sorin, Solemn Visitor
1x Gideon Jura
The MB stayed the same for most parts, but the SB has a lot changes since i posted the last time( i think like 5 months before idk).
Anyway those were my Match ups yestereday:
2-0 vs Demonic Pact Combo: Well the Deck is a Meme itself and its even more hilarious since there are Version of the Deck out there running GotT MB.
I won Game 1 with double Handhate ( Inquisition into Collective Brutality) taking 2 Harmless Offerings. Game 2 was a instant concede turn 2 after Thoughtseizing Harmless Offering into Extirpate. This MU is free for our Deck anyway since we can just play GotT and make his Emblem for not loosing to the gimmick.
2-1 vs Green Stompy: Lost Game 1 due to my Manabase. I had 2 Field of Ruins and 1 Godless shrine and couldnt use Fiel of Ruins since my opponent only had basic forest in play. After SB with Blessed Alliance and Timely Reinforcement this MU is a piece of Cake. I won Game 2 and 3 without any big troubles.
2-0 vs Infect: Well once more a realy great MU. 2 easy wins without any sweat. Went to 4 Infect Game 1 while holding 1 Fatal Push and 2 Path to Exile.
2-1 vs Burn: Well one good Example why to play the Gideon Version of this Deck. Turn 3 GotT Ebmlem and you are comfy with your 4 copies of GAoZ MB. After SB it only gets better with 2 Kambal, 2 Blessed Alliance and 1 Timely. I Lost this one game to a greedy starting Hand and not finding Lands for 4 turns. Even though i stabled the board with inquisition into turn 2 collective Brutality with all 3 modes. But well i didnt found any Lands and he Topdecked burn 4 Turns in a Row. Game 3 was a free again. He conceded after i dropped Sorin, Solemn Visior into GotT and GAoZ on the Board and he ended up Salty as **** :^).
Final 2-1 vs Goryos Goryo's Vengeance Griselbrand: I lost game 1 to a turn 3 Combo and 1 open Path wasnt enough since he used Griselbrand Abillity in responds. Game 2 was a RIP turn 2 game and i won after a few swings of GAoZ. Game 3 was actually intense but always in my favor. He discarded Griselbrand into turn 1 Looting and i extirpated Griselbrand. Split Second actually won the game since he was holding izzet charm. then i was able to find RIP on turn 5 or 6 and then the Planeswalker Beatdown started.
Depends what you mean by "tier". Most of the time tier means popularity, not power level. Since the deck isn't popular it's not tier 2 by any means. Talking in terms of power I'm not sure. There are certainly decks it beats but I'm not sure your 5-0 is a representative sample of the meta by any means.
The big issue with the deck I see is that it's so reliant on 4 drops. wraths and planeswalkers at 4 are clunky and sometimes bad against a good chunk of the meta. Also you're playing 12 4/5 drops with no ramp or card selection. I just don't see how that can be competitive against such a fast format. 14 1-drops helps I suppose but your curve looks really bad. Maybe something like mind stone would help you cast your cards a bit faster, idk, I just can't get behind a deck with that kind of curve.
I haven't seen anyone talk about the new Kaya, Orzhov Usurper. Now I know everyone regards her as a bad card, but she's a 3 mana walker in your colors while you say that this deck has too high of a mana curve.
Also, I'd like to argue that she is surprisingly relevant in the current metagame.
I've looked up the top decks at MTGGoldfish and looked at their lists, and broke down what she can do vs these decks.
Good Matchups:
Looking at their sideboard we have 1 more relevant card to remove in the form of Grim Lavamancer, if they do slot it in.
Also, their sideboard is highly relevant for her. They have Pithing Needle which can shut her down, but if they don't name her with it she can kill it, which is valuable. Grafidgger's Cage also shuts down our Lingering Souls and she can kill it.
Looking at their sideboard, relevant things she can remove are Engineered Explosives and Grim Lavamancer.
Bad Matchups:
They have an Engineered Explosives and Nihil Spellbomb in sideboard, but that doesn't matter.
Surgical Extraction / Extirpate - can shut down Dredge and Phoenix, and maybe help against storm.
Path to Exile - our lord and savior.
One more synergy I'd like to point out is between Kaya and LOTV. We can either +1 Lili to force them to discard or -2 her to force them to sac, then +1 Kaya to exile whatever they put in the GY. Plus, we can discard Lingering Souls to Lili to help us in protecting our walkers. To me this feels like a pretty good game plan.
So that's enough from me! Feel free to correct me if I made any mistakes (which I likely did). I still feel like even in the worst case she is worthy of testing. What do you guys think?
One thing missing from your points is timing. Kaya can't come down until turn 3 and she doesn't really affect the board in big ways when she does come down so it's tough to play her on turn 3. The big reason she is so bad against Humans is that exiling their 1 cmc permanents is not the job of your 3 drops but your 1 drops. We should be pushing the hierarchs when we can.
Against the graveyard decks exiling two cards on turn 3 doesn't get you very far against their fast starts. It could be a piece to a working plan though.
Overall she doesn't seem to really shine in any match up so it's hard to justify her as a sideboard piece. At the same time she's never a dead card, but often really underwhelming in the majority of match ups so it's hard to justify playing her mainboard. I'm going to test her once I can get my hands on one but I'm skeptical.
We have Path to Exile, Condemn, Rest in Peace, Leyline of the Void, Surgical Extraction, & Settle the Wreckage, and I'm sure there are some cards I could be forgetting about on top of the other Wrath of God effects we have.
I would like to pick up the conversation on this again, put our heads together and see if we could come up with something more.
Hope I can get a few of you to join me and getting this deck back on the right track.
Since last playing with this deck there are some cards that are worth talking about to see if they would make this better like:
Now the 2 creatures Djeru, With Eyes Open & Thalia's lancers might look a little odd, but they both tutor for our Planeswalkers.
I played with the Lancers before and I always liked them, they are a 4/4 beater them self's but also they go get whatever Planewalker you need at the moment and is, then they are another threat coming down next turn, that is hard for our opponent to deal with most of the time.
I used Kalitas, Traitor of Ghetbefore and he was "okay" maybe he is better now with all the graveyard decks, but I have not used Djeru yet and think I will try him this weekend, he has 1 less toughness does not have First Strike like the Lancers, but does have Vigilance and prevents a damage that would be done to a Planeswalker, and that might come in more handy then I have thought of before.
Something I have put together for testing this weekend.
3 Gideon of the Trials
3 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
2 Liliana of the Veil
1 Kaya, Orzhov Usurper
1 Sorin, Solemn Visitor
1 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
1 Ob Nixilis Reignited
1 Damnation
1 Settle the Wreckage
1 Day of Judgment
1 Wrath of God
2 Fatal Push
4 Path to Exile
1 Collective Brutality
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Lingering Souls
2 Night's Whisper
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Thoughtseize
1 Runed Halo
1 Isolated Chapel
3 Godless Shrine
3 Marsh Flats
5 Plains
3 Shambling Vent
3 Swamp
4 Field of Ruin
1 Vault of the Archangel
Kaya, Orzhov Usurper and Relic of Progenitus are new in the deck for me but with the Dredge and Arclight Phoenix decks right now, I think they could be a really good call. Also adding a Runed Haloin the start I wanted it for the Arclight decks to name Thing in the Ice but it turns out it is good vs. every deck really and is just a answer for whatever the threat is on the board or will have from your opponent.
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1336170#paper
BWModern Black/White Control
WGBOGGLES
Draft My Innistrad Cube!
I would recommend you guys try Liliana, dreadhorde general in that spot. The passive is super good and can get rid of stuff elspeth can't.