That SCG list without fetches seems unplayable. So few white sources, super awkward with searing blaze and only 2 GG, which is basically the best 1-drop in the deck. Apparently he won but that must have been more lucky than good.
I haven't played against UW control with the new additions yet. Not being able to skullcrack their timely with Teferi out will definitely be annoying so maybe Teferi needs to die. Eidolon should still be great, though. Teferi is not really an answer to eidolon as you can just replay it immediately. Firecraft is always nice against UW so if you have trouble, just make sure to have 2 of those in the SB.
Just come back to Burn after a spell trying other stuff out...deck feels pretty good although I've noticed UW Control is pretty hard these days. New T3feri helps out a lot and MB Timely Reinforcements is such a drag. Any tips on how to fight the match-up? A couple of creatures in the opening hand with some burn is normally good but it doesn't always seal the deal...I normally board in 2 x Exquisite Firecraft.
Welcome back. I meant to post earlier, but you know how work goes keeping you busy. My UW control win rate is pretty good but it's definitely not an easy match. The first thing is you need to be very aggressive initially. Dump your creatures as fast as possible and keep turning then sideways. Anytime they tap out, unload as many spells as you can. Important disclaimer: be mana efficient - prioritize two drops, this is important for later. Around Turn 3 or 4, you'll have them at 4-6 life remaining, a Teferi will come down, or they have a hand full of counter spells, or both. Adjust your strategy as soon as this happens. Run your creatures into Teferi and finish with a bolt if you can. As you mentioned, this is important so you can instant speed a response to timely reinforcements with a skullcrack, although there is a chance they will counter this. If you can't kill Teferi, you're accepting that you're playing sorcery speed. Your next few turns are going to be draw/go. I strongly suggest reading Patrick Sullivan's guide to playing against counter magic. Remember when I said earlier to be mana efficient? The hope is that after a few extra turns of draw/go, you have at least 4, 1 mana burn spells. You're now waiting for them to tap some number of lands. When this happens, you're going to try to play all of your spells at once and hope all your 1 drops are more efficient than their more expensive counter magic. And yes, agreeing with R3doxNL that Firecraft is a great closer when they're at 4 life. Also if you're on RWg, a Cindervines in play is devastating against them.
The trick to beat timely is to have lower life than your oponent ... logic right ? now how do we do that ?
Fetch as soon as you can, and go get an untapped sacred foundry. So by turn 2, you "start the game at 14 life".
Play your eidolon as soon as possible, so you will also loose life while casting your spells.
Play your horizon lands as soon as you can, and tap them for mana each turn. even if you dont use your mana !
Then, as stay_on_target said, read Patrick Sullivan's guide to playing against counter magic:
stack all your burn spells in hand and wait for them to tap for a teferi/jace/wrath/field of rune and dump your hand
All really good advice above, thanks a lot. I've read the Patrick Sullivan guide a few times before. I used to find UW control an easier matchup than it is nowadays (and other non-life gain forms of control like Mono-Blue Tron are still pretty good I feel). I will report back to see if my winrate improves!
I played a variant of Burn yesterday, with 4 Seeker of the Way, 4 Soulfire Grand Master, 2 Exquisite Firecraft, 2 Anger of the Gods and 3 Deflecting Palm in the main deck, instead of Goblin Guide, Eidolon, Skewer the Critics and some Rift Bolt. I thought these cards would help in the current metagame, heavy with Dredge, Phoenix and UW Control. The deck is obviously slower, but the big life cushion is pseudo card advantage (as is, a lot more turns to top deck the final burn spell).
I won 2-1 vs CoCo Vizier and Discard Combo, but lost 0-2 vs UW Spirit. This deck bugs me a lot, and there seems to be no way out of it. Between Mausoleum Wanderer, Rattlechains, Drogskol Captain, Selfless Spirit and Spell Queller, it’s pretty hard to interact with the board. Simply ignoring it and going to the face seems the best option. But even then, Wanderer and Queller can counter my spells (and Exquisite Firecraft isn’t even a safe bet against Queller, because it exiles), and it’s super hard to burn Queller and get the spell back.
Is there any tricks in how to play or sequence the spells? Or special cards that would do the job from the SB?
I played a variant of Burn yesterday, with 4 Seeker of the Way, 4 Soulfire Grand Master, 2 Exquisite Firecraft, 2 Anger of the Gods and 3 Deflecting Palm in the main deck, instead of Goblin Guide, Eidolon, Skewer the Critics and some Rift Bolt. I thought these cards would help in the current metagame, heavy with Dredge, Phoenix and UW Control. The deck is obviously slower, but the big life cushion is pseudo card advantage (as is, a lot more turns to top deck the final burn spell).
I don't think that many of those cards are good at all in Burn. Seeker and Soulfire are way too slow for a Burn deck, and you're going to just get wrecked by damage from fast decks before those cards make an impact at all. I've played board wipes in the side before and never really liked them. I love and hate Deflecting Palm because I've busted someone with an Emrakul with it and I've had it sit dead in my hand while my opponent stabilized and I could have just won with a real burn spell instead of that reactive card. I think it's a significant mistake to take out Guide, Eidolon, Skewer, and Rift for those cards. You're losing your speed (Guide), oppression (Eidolon), and key pieces of the Burn strategy and replacing them with slow cards that don't do enough to justify their slowness.
UW Control should be kind of straight forward, I think. It comes down to knowing how to play around their counters by bottlenecking their mana.
I won 2-1 vs CoCo Vizier and Discard Combo, but lost 0-2 vs UW Spirit. This deck bugs me a lot, and there seems to be no way out of it. Between Mausoleum Wanderer, Rattlechains, Drogskol Captain, Selfless Spirit and Spell Queller, it’s pretty hard to interact with the board. Simply ignoring it and going to the face seems the best option. But even then, Wanderer and Queller can counter my spells (and Exquisite Firecraft isn’t even a safe bet against Queller, because it exiles), and it’s super hard to burn Queller and get the spell back.
Is there any tricks in how to play or sequence the spells? Or special cards that would do the job from the SB?
They'll gum up the board, so you should unload creatures as fast as you can and get damage out of them before they're irrelevant. Eidolon should do a lot of work in games where they aren't dumping their hand with Vial. However, you're going to have trouble with aggressive decks that are as disruptive as they can be. I think it's just going to be a race. The same "bottleneck mana" strategy should buy you something in this matchup, too. Blaze and Blood should do a good job, too.
I've tested a lot against bant spirits before recent sets and it was a pretty easy matchup. They could only win if they had a fast Geist or really went back to back spell quellers with a lord thrown in.
I don't like eidolon in the matchup because they easily block it or fly over it so with vial or coco it's just you who gets punished. Boarding in more searing effects and maybe a few paths is the way to go as it keeps their board clear while you kill them. In case of Bant spirits, make sure to kill the Noble to slow them down a lot and not allow a fast Geist or early queller.
UW control matchup, well the Timely Reinforcements counterplay we already established. I think exquisite firecraft has won enough games for me with a significant blue presence in my area that if you see it enough, throw in two. You'll be glad you did. Your ideal starting hand contains two creatures so you can force removal and reduce their countermagic options, particularly post board where dispel is likely going to be a factor. Finally, board in path to exile, two copies or three. The common UW control sb will bring in cheap counters like dispel and 1-2 baneslayer angel/lyra dawnbringer. They will most likely tap out for it, given that it easily can win a game. Board out searing blaze, bring in firecraft and path.
Spirits: I see this a lot, people wanting to control the board. Spirits has no lifelink creatures, no lifegain, and rattlechains doesn't stop searing blaze from hitting the face. Race. You are faster. The only creatures worth taking the time to kill are hierarch and baby thalia. Spell Queller is annoying, sure, but it also sits in the same spot on the curve as CoCo. Either let them CoCo and respond with damage, or let a critical mass build up and suspend a rift bolt or two to force the matter. Queller is one of those cards that players often misuse because they reeeaaaally want that exile effect when sometimes you just want to plant it. Board out eidolon on the draw, higher-cost burn like helix, skullcrack or skewer on the play in some combination. Eidolon is still a fine turn two play going first. If your opponent is forced to rely on aether vial, they'll never really be able to swarm the board. Their curve is a bit too high. I'd bring in searing blood from the side, path only if you don't have blood.
If you are on Mardu or Rakdos, Nihil Spellbomb is a possibility.
Some try to rely on Ensnaring Bridge to buy the time needed to finish the job. Particularly against Hogaak, but not necesarily Dredge, Deflecting Palm might do the trick.
Hey everyone. I played my first game last week against neoform/allosaurus rider. I died game 1 and 3 on the draw turn 1. What's our strategy versus this deck? Obviously we can't win without any lands and not playing our first turn. My only thoughts are turn 1 pass and hold path to exile in response to griselbrand. On turn two, play two lands and hold skullcrack to prevent the lifegain from the draw engine? Leyline of punishment out of the board (gasp)? But then we don't do any damage or advance our game plan.
Hey everyone. I played my first game last week against neoform/allosaurus rider. I died game 1 and 3 on the draw turn 1. What's our strategy versus this deck? Obviously we can't win without any lands and not playing our first turn. My only thoughts are turn 1 pass and hold path to exile in response to griselbrand. On turn two, play two lands and hold skullcrack to prevent the lifegain from the draw engine? Leyline of punishment out of the board (gasp)? But then we don't do any damage or advance our game plan.
I'm interested in your thoughts on this matter.
Turn 1 wins = bad matchup for everyone. Just hope they’ll fizzle or don’t draw the combo. If they do, you can either Path to Exile or Skullcrack on Griselbrand when opponent activates the demon’s ability. Or maybe Deflecting Palm when they try to Combo and attack with a pumped Griselbrand. But if they draw their deck and play the dude that make them win when they’re milled out, there’s just nothing Burn or any other deck can do.
Fast combo is a weakness for Burn. There's not much you can do to change that.
Grafdigger's Cage will stop Neoform, but they'll bring in artifact hate to blow it up. You can try slowing them down with Skullcrack/Path. You can try killing Lab Man in response to drawing a card, but it won't work if they can draw another at instant speed.
Reality is that you should treat such things like Legacy combo decks vs Legacy Burn, accept that you're up a creek without a paddle against them, and accept defeat. Otherwise, you're forced to drastically alter your sideboard and then you're weaker in winnable matchups.
Thanks both Patbou and Elcon. I have to admit that watching the person across from me play solitaire magic was not an enjoyable experience. I'll take your advice and throw this match into the "I hope I dodge it category". Take Care guys!
It certainly isn't a fun experience, no. It's part of why I got disillusioned with Legacy Burn. I could run over Delver decks all day long, but then "Entomb, Reanimate, Iona name red" and other similar situations led me to the conclusion that I'm often just donating my entry fee with Legacy Burn.
I think that a decent barometer for a deck's acceptability in Modern is whether it's too fast of a combo for Burn to play fun-police against. My gut feeling is that if such a deck is consistently too fast for Burn, it's not acceptable for Modern and gets banned eventually.
Thanks both Patbou and Elcon. I have to admit that watching the person across from me play solitaire magic was not an enjoyable experience. I'll take your advice and throw this match into the "I hope I dodge it category". Take Care guys!
I agree about the giant. In the context of modern, the damage can't be prevented clause is outclassed by skullcrack dealing 3 and it also prevents lifegain. If I want a pseudo eidolon, I'd rather cindervines or the new Leyline of combustion. It's not a bad card but I think it's home is in standard.
I've been rocking this deck at my LGS's, I've top 8'ed 5 times, with a 3rd place and a FNM win with worse cards than the current version, which is almost complete:
I haven't played against UW control with the new additions yet. Not being able to skullcrack their timely with Teferi out will definitely be annoying so maybe Teferi needs to die. Eidolon should still be great, though. Teferi is not really an answer to eidolon as you can just replay it immediately. Firecraft is always nice against UW so if you have trouble, just make sure to have 2 of those in the SB.
Welcome back. I meant to post earlier, but you know how work goes keeping you busy. My UW control win rate is pretty good but it's definitely not an easy match. The first thing is you need to be very aggressive initially. Dump your creatures as fast as possible and keep turning then sideways. Anytime they tap out, unload as many spells as you can. Important disclaimer: be mana efficient - prioritize two drops, this is important for later. Around Turn 3 or 4, you'll have them at 4-6 life remaining, a Teferi will come down, or they have a hand full of counter spells, or both. Adjust your strategy as soon as this happens. Run your creatures into Teferi and finish with a bolt if you can. As you mentioned, this is important so you can instant speed a response to timely reinforcements with a skullcrack, although there is a chance they will counter this. If you can't kill Teferi, you're accepting that you're playing sorcery speed. Your next few turns are going to be draw/go. I strongly suggest reading Patrick Sullivan's guide to playing against counter magic. Remember when I said earlier to be mana efficient? The hope is that after a few extra turns of draw/go, you have at least 4, 1 mana burn spells. You're now waiting for them to tap some number of lands. When this happens, you're going to try to play all of your spells at once and hope all your 1 drops are more efficient than their more expensive counter magic. And yes, agreeing with R3doxNL that Firecraft is a great closer when they're at 4 life. Also if you're on RWg, a Cindervines in play is devastating against them.
Fetch as soon as you can, and go get an untapped sacred foundry. So by turn 2, you "start the game at 14 life".
Play your eidolon as soon as possible, so you will also loose life while casting your spells.
Play your horizon lands as soon as you can, and tap them for mana each turn. even if you dont use your mana !
Then, as stay_on_target said, read Patrick Sullivan's guide to playing against counter magic:
stack all your burn spells in hand and wait for them to tap for a teferi/jace/wrath/field of rune and dump your hand
I played a variant of Burn yesterday, with 4 Seeker of the Way, 4 Soulfire Grand Master, 2 Exquisite Firecraft, 2 Anger of the Gods and 3 Deflecting Palm in the main deck, instead of Goblin Guide, Eidolon, Skewer the Critics and some Rift Bolt. I thought these cards would help in the current metagame, heavy with Dredge, Phoenix and UW Control. The deck is obviously slower, but the big life cushion is pseudo card advantage (as is, a lot more turns to top deck the final burn spell).
I won 2-1 vs CoCo Vizier and Discard Combo, but lost 0-2 vs UW Spirit. This deck bugs me a lot, and there seems to be no way out of it. Between Mausoleum Wanderer, Rattlechains, Drogskol Captain, Selfless Spirit and Spell Queller, it’s pretty hard to interact with the board. Simply ignoring it and going to the face seems the best option. But even then, Wanderer and Queller can counter my spells (and Exquisite Firecraft isn’t even a safe bet against Queller, because it exiles), and it’s super hard to burn Queller and get the spell back.
Is there any tricks in how to play or sequence the spells? Or special cards that would do the job from the SB?
Modern : Burn WR and Humans / Allies / Slivers WUBRG
Dreaming of a competitive Modern Werewolves deck.
1st, GP Toronto Sunday Super Series 2016 : Ally Company RWBG
Top 8, PPTQ Shadows over Innistrad : Boros Humans WR.
and use TopDecked MTG to manage your decks and collection on your Apple or Android device.
I don't think that many of those cards are good at all in Burn. Seeker and Soulfire are way too slow for a Burn deck, and you're going to just get wrecked by damage from fast decks before those cards make an impact at all. I've played board wipes in the side before and never really liked them. I love and hate Deflecting Palm because I've busted someone with an Emrakul with it and I've had it sit dead in my hand while my opponent stabilized and I could have just won with a real burn spell instead of that reactive card. I think it's a significant mistake to take out Guide, Eidolon, Skewer, and Rift for those cards. You're losing your speed (Guide), oppression (Eidolon), and key pieces of the Burn strategy and replacing them with slow cards that don't do enough to justify their slowness.
UW Control should be kind of straight forward, I think. It comes down to knowing how to play around their counters by bottlenecking their mana.
They'll gum up the board, so you should unload creatures as fast as you can and get damage out of them before they're irrelevant. Eidolon should do a lot of work in games where they aren't dumping their hand with Vial. However, you're going to have trouble with aggressive decks that are as disruptive as they can be. I think it's just going to be a race. The same "bottleneck mana" strategy should buy you something in this matchup, too. Blaze and Blood should do a good job, too.
I don't like eidolon in the matchup because they easily block it or fly over it so with vial or coco it's just you who gets punished. Boarding in more searing effects and maybe a few paths is the way to go as it keeps their board clear while you kill them. In case of Bant spirits, make sure to kill the Noble to slow them down a lot and not allow a fast Geist or early queller.
Spirits: I see this a lot, people wanting to control the board. Spirits has no lifelink creatures, no lifegain, and rattlechains doesn't stop searing blaze from hitting the face. Race. You are faster. The only creatures worth taking the time to kill are hierarch and baby thalia. Spell Queller is annoying, sure, but it also sits in the same spot on the curve as CoCo. Either let them CoCo and respond with damage, or let a critical mass build up and suspend a rift bolt or two to force the matter. Queller is one of those cards that players often misuse because they reeeaaaally want that exile effect when sometimes you just want to plant it. Board out eidolon on the draw, higher-cost burn like helix, skullcrack or skewer on the play in some combination. Eidolon is still a fine turn two play going first. If your opponent is forced to rely on aether vial, they'll never really be able to swarm the board. Their curve is a bit too high. I'd bring in searing blood from the side, path only if you don't have blood.
I want to win but I don’t know what I need Sideboard.
PLZ help me with Sideboard
There are some artifact pieces available. Tormod's Crypt is played sometimes, as is Grafdigger's Cage.
If you are on Mardu or Rakdos, Nihil Spellbomb is a possibility.
Some try to rely on Ensnaring Bridge to buy the time needed to finish the job. Particularly against Hogaak, but not necesarily Dredge, Deflecting Palm might do the trick.
Others rely on just winning fast enough!
Frenzy-Affinity-Ghost Quarter-Rock-Tokens- RGWPhyrexian Zoo- WVial KnightsStandard:
BW Knights(Rotated)Pioneer: RW Knights - BW Rally Zombies - UW Heroes
Commander:WUG
Jenara, Asura of War- WGSigarda, Host of HeronsCasualties of economicsLegacy: Good-night, sweet prince. Mono-R Burn
I'm interested in your thoughts on this matter.
Turn 1 wins = bad matchup for everyone. Just hope they’ll fizzle or don’t draw the combo. If they do, you can either Path to Exile or Skullcrack on Griselbrand when opponent activates the demon’s ability. Or maybe Deflecting Palm when they try to Combo and attack with a pumped Griselbrand. But if they draw their deck and play the dude that make them win when they’re milled out, there’s just nothing Burn or any other deck can do.
Modern : Burn WR and Humans / Allies / Slivers WUBRG
Dreaming of a competitive Modern Werewolves deck.
1st, GP Toronto Sunday Super Series 2016 : Ally Company RWBG
Top 8, PPTQ Shadows over Innistrad : Boros Humans WR.
and use TopDecked MTG to manage your decks and collection on your Apple or Android device.
Grafdigger's Cage will stop Neoform, but they'll bring in artifact hate to blow it up. You can try slowing them down with Skullcrack/Path. You can try killing Lab Man in response to drawing a card, but it won't work if they can draw another at instant speed.
Reality is that you should treat such things like Legacy combo decks vs Legacy Burn, accept that you're up a creek without a paddle against them, and accept defeat. Otherwise, you're forced to drastically alter your sideboard and then you're weaker in winnable matchups.
I think that a decent barometer for a deck's acceptability in Modern is whether it's too fast of a combo for Burn to play fun-police against. My gut feeling is that if such a deck is consistently too fast for Burn, it's not acceptable for Modern and gets banned eventually.
Frenzy-Affinity-Ghost Quarter-Rock-Tokens- RGWPhyrexian Zoo- WVial KnightsStandard:
BW Knights(Rotated)Pioneer: RW Knights - BW Rally Zombies - UW Heroes
Commander:WUG
Jenara, Asura of War- WGSigarda, Host of HeronsCasualties of economicsLegacy: Good-night, sweet prince. Mono-R Burn
Frenzy-Affinity-Ghost Quarter-Rock-Tokens- RGWPhyrexian Zoo- WVial KnightsStandard:
BW Knights(Rotated)Pioneer: RW Knights - BW Rally Zombies - UW Heroes
Commander:WUG
Jenara, Asura of War- WGSigarda, Host of HeronsCasualties of economicsLegacy: Good-night, sweet prince. Mono-R Burn
4x monastery swiftspear
4x eidolon of the great revel
1x grim lavamancer
4x lightning bolt
4x Lava spike
4x Rift bolt
4x lightning helix
4x boros charm
3x searing blaze
1x skullcrack
4x skewer the critics
4x inspiring vantage
3x bloodstained mire
3x wooded foothills
3x mountain
2x sacred foundry
4x sunbaked canyon
2x rest in peace
2x deflecting palm
2x wear//tear
2x skullcrack
1x exquisite firecraft
2x smash to smithereens
2x kor firewalker
What do you think of this version, considering my meta is mostly blind and changes everyday?