Playable in UW, almost everything flies, but it doesn't stop The New Stoopid. Fair card for a fair format, but that isn't Modern. Tmpo/Aggro Control can't deal with the obscene linearity without disruption. Maybe Force of Negation is playable, not sure it solves the issue either.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Standard
Tempo Modern
Eldrazi and Staxes
Whir Prison Legacy
5c Humans
DnT
"I'm a lead farmer... !" Quote ruined due to policy.
I would asume it is the best 3 drop after Spell Queller and Drogskoll Captain. It should take the place of Gheist of Saint traft. Spirits often winn when they asemble a critical ammas of lord. Before the printing of Supreme Phantom spirits was barly on the radar. Spirits even play Phantasmal Image to have acess to lord 9, 10 and 11. This new one will be good.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I have dyslexia, no I am not going to spell check for you, yes you have to live with the horrors of it.
Playable in UW, almost everything flies, but it doesn't stop The New Stoopid. Fair card for a fair format, but that isn't Modern. Tmpo/Aggro Control can't deal with the obscene linearity without disruption. Maybe Force of Negation is playable, not sure it solves the issue either.
^This is exactly the reason why cards like that are out of date. No Matter the splash you are running , the 3cmc slot is congested, it takes something as powerful as spell queller to make you want to consider making room for it. Teferi time raveler has been that kind of drop for me in my UW, Esper and Jeskai lists. Lingering Souls share the same power level. I fail to imagine any new spirit creature though, it'd be too strong if paired up with collected company or thalia in the uw built, so I'm not expecting anything like that from this set.
The only thing that can ever get out to get spirits a better deck is a 1cmc spirit, we all acknowledged that since Supreme Phantom has been legal. It takes it to have some textbox, and again I'm not expecting anything as powerful as Mausoleum Wanderer, but still something that either applies pressure or interacts. The more proactive, the better it will be given the reactive nature of most of our best cards.
I'd love to see this in Black or Red, because they are the most unexplored versions, that may also bring to light a 4c spirits archetype, so I'll keep my fingers crossed.
Hopes and dreams aside, this tribe needs to curve out into pressure and disruption, Force is somehow a reasonable card because it interacts on turn 0 and generates tempo. The problem arises when you are trying to recover from that card disadvantage... which tools do we have to do so? very few/none.
A 1cmc spirit is now critical to end the game on turn 4 rather than on turn 5 more consistently. I can actually get nuts draws and finish the race on the fourth turn, but most of the times it takes me five, even when no disruption occurs from the other side of the table.
All of the other 2 and 3 cmc spells are just helping us to win grindier games, the 1cmc drop is necessary to keep up with the most linear and degenerate decks in the format.
It's a crazy Modern GY format where 2 mana GY hate just means Game Over (for the person playing GY hate!)
So far, this is a format where you have to beat UW Control, GY decks (Bridgevine, Phoenix, and Dredge), Humans (for now, might also get run out of the format), possibly Neoform, and whatever the latest Whir Prison Combo deck, and then every other possible thing.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Standard
Tempo Modern
Eldrazi and Staxes
Whir Prison Legacy
5c Humans
DnT
"I'm a lead farmer... !" Quote ruined due to policy.
Hey guys and gals I'll be streaming the mtgo modern playoffs on azorius this Saturday at 11am est. It'll be a good look at the future of the modern meta probably best preview before SCGPITT and you'll get to see my derpy ass stumble through matches against some of mtgos best hope to see y'all Saturday, I'm in the process of giving the channel a facelift in preparation
Twitch.tv enigmaNJ
Works been crazy and I apologise for my long absence lol i have a few other streams on there 1 pre and post horizons are my last two league 5-0s that can be found on mtggoldfish, see the matches on my channel! I hope y'all enjoy it
I think we ve finally got the spirit that will push UW-Esper-Jeskai. I'm really excited about it because it both allows you to curve out in the early game and sink the mana later giving a reason to multiple vials to be there. I always recall Todd Anderson saying a good card is a card you can spend both in the beginning and later in the match, this looks like one of those.
Stats are sweet, flying and the flash bonus is something I did not expect at all. I like it cause Esper and Jeskai can wait and see whether to play the creature or hold up bolt of push, but honestly, I see this being best in UWR, because you absolutely want to set up an early race by playing the 1cmc spirit, and keep pressuring.
One of the nightmares in jeskai is flooding, because the deck is less resilient to grinding than the other versions, and you are likely to end up out of steam once the tempo plan begins to fail. So this sinker is critical to keep the ball rolling. Guess I'll trim/get rid of Light up the stage and try this in 2 or 3 copies.
Also... How good is this to dig the deck to find answers to cages like bridges and other garbage? The mono blue symbol is so critical because it makes you sink easily under blood moon.
I'm very pleased and I think WoTC is aware of the fact that new super powerful 1cmc spirits are making bant oppressive (or maybe I'll be proven wrong by the end of the week), I honestly think this is the powerlevel we deserve, and being this one of those cards that struggle to find room in current bant lists, I'm hoping for people to brew and come up with something sweet and new.
This will be the jeskai list I'll be testing by the way
To me the new bird might end up being good because that and a phantom make your lord providers boltproof, something drogskol can't do. I think a new UW spirits with 11 1cmc drops and 10 lords might end up being an interesting built
I've attended my first FNM with Jeskai going 4-0 with the neoform deck dying by itself on the last round, still being able to grab some informations, like the importance of 1cmc pieces of hate in the side (that could be Cage or force, yet I'm not sold on force in a deck with few ways to make card advantage).
Teferi Time Raveler is a key card to complement PtE in dealing with -out of bolt range- creatures, it adds solidity to the deck that otherwise lacks a value permanent. Dovin might be just as good, as far as the tempo plan is concerned, if it wasn't that TTR has a static ability that shuts control down and ruins the day to midrange deck ( quelled a spell, attacked and bounced it back to my hand ready to 2x1 them during their next turn. gg). My idea is that you need 4x MB answers to creatures like kalitas, goyf, thing in the ice and such. TTR is a tempo anwer, but I can swear the tempo swing is absolutely.
Horizon Lands are simply critical to dig for fuel in a deck that aims to play the game with 4 lands at most. Having a relatively low curve with no 4cmc spells, and just 10 3cmc drops, eight of which are vialable creatures, make the horizon lands way less painful, cause you re most likely cycling them soon. I've been testing Jeskai back in March with no TTR nor Horizon Lands, and the difference is perceivable to say the least.
Burn spells are excellent at playing the tempo game both aggressively, cutting your opponent off a turn, and defensively, spending one mana to deal with their 2/3 mana creature, or spending two to deal with it and gaining those 3 points of life which will most likely give you an extra turn, meaning an extra attack phase.
Also, as opposed to black, red removals go to the face so they are excellent against all of those big mana decks where Fatal Push and PtE would be dead cards. Worst case scenario, your opponent has got ways to gain life repeatedly, but hey, every strategy has got their weak spot.
Most importantly, because of the flexibility they provide, I ve been able to slam 5x burn along with 2PtE and 2 TTR, which makes an excellent removal/containment package against aggro decks. It's counterintuitive at a first glance, because the manabase is more painful so you'd be inclined to think it's getting your aggro matchup worse. Instead, you' re going up on the removal count, and those removals are not even ramping the opponent, so once you sit at the table and play you feel how good splashing B/R is at letting you take the control role against any creature deck.
Infect on the rise and humans tier1 are good news for this version.
Light up the Stage has been an intuition I ve had some months ago and it's been a solid 2of to be used in the mid/late game to pull ahead, it works nicely with a low curve, but the boost it provides is still limited to two cards and the new spectral sailor is now coming with the benefit of being a creature which adds damages to the race, synergizing, and overlapping Stage in the same situations where extra cards are required: if you have cards in your hand , then you re not out of gas and it's just an extra piece of pressure which goes along with your beatdown plan. If you're out of gas it draws without revealing ( where Stage lets you hold up more mana but can't let you recur to Vial, Spectral Sailor allows you to abuse your Aether Vials instead, giving no informations about what you've drawn). I'm pretty confident Sailor is going to be a good addition replacing any other card advantage engine in non-company decks.
With this said, this is where I'm at with Jeskai Spirits
Alpine moon won me the game against tron t1. That 1cmc is huge really, it lets you curve out. How many times i've found myslef in the position of having an empty turn one, with a turn two I had to spend in casting stony or Damping, delaying my race. Alpine moon made me curve out in my two drop and begin to attack earlier. Not sure about the split with Damping sphere, I may want more dampings if Amulet was more present in my meta.
I've not been playing Grafdigger's cage since february '18 where it lost me the finals against storm. They remove it and get full access to the GY, however: The new mulligan rule demands an early answer, so does bridgevine, and the bonus of stopping the new eladamri's call decks, company and such makes it worth testing again. I like Relic better, but relic has no static ability, and static is the keyword you need to approach this metagame.
I think I'm quite weak to cages(Urza thopters), this is the reason why I'm on 2x red Eidolons and Chandra. I'm not willing to give up on that matchup just to have my 3rd counterspell but I may be wrong. I'll wait to attend the new PTQs events before making changes.
hey! Following some discussions in the discord, i've been trying with middling success a green splash for UW spirits (just for sideboard hate), but it felt distant from the solidity of my last 5-0 league
with the printing of spectral sailor, i'll be testing this all-spirits list , with 3 copies of the new card. Right now i'm testing with topplegeist in its stead
nebelgast herald has been chosen due to its synergy with the sailor, the potential of a fast clock and the presence of humans and hogaakvine... but i'll gladly come back to
I don't think we can afford that many 3-drops, i think 11-12 is the maximum
In addition pte is very good, i'm not feeling comfortable reducing our cheapest interaction for anything
Modern // Legacy // Pauper
WUBRG
"Of course you should fight fire with fire. You should fight everything with fire."
Tempo
Modern
Eldrazi and Staxes
Whir Prison
Legacy
5c Humans
DnT
"I'm a lead farmer... !" Quote ruined due to policy.
^This is exactly the reason why cards like that are out of date. No Matter the splash you are running , the 3cmc slot is congested, it takes something as powerful as spell queller to make you want to consider making room for it. Teferi time raveler has been that kind of drop for me in my UW, Esper and Jeskai lists. Lingering Souls share the same power level. I fail to imagine any new spirit creature though, it'd be too strong if paired up with collected company or thalia in the uw built, so I'm not expecting anything like that from this set.
The only thing that can ever get out to get spirits a better deck is a 1cmc spirit, we all acknowledged that since Supreme Phantom has been legal. It takes it to have some textbox, and again I'm not expecting anything as powerful as Mausoleum Wanderer, but still something that either applies pressure or interacts. The more proactive, the better it will be given the reactive nature of most of our best cards.
I'd love to see this in Black or Red, because they are the most unexplored versions, that may also bring to light a 4c spirits archetype, so I'll keep my fingers crossed.
Hopes and dreams aside, this tribe needs to curve out into pressure and disruption, Force is somehow a reasonable card because it interacts on turn 0 and generates tempo. The problem arises when you are trying to recover from that card disadvantage... which tools do we have to do so? very few/none.
A 1cmc spirit is now critical to end the game on turn 4 rather than on turn 5 more consistently. I can actually get nuts draws and finish the race on the fourth turn, but most of the times it takes me five, even when no disruption occurs from the other side of the table.
All of the other 2 and 3 cmc spells are just helping us to win grindier games, the 1cmc drop is necessary to keep up with the most linear and degenerate decks in the format.
Bump that.
It's a crazy Modern GY format where 2 mana GY hate just means Game Over (for the person playing GY hate!)
So far, this is a format where you have to beat UW Control, GY decks (Bridgevine, Phoenix, and Dredge), Humans (for now, might also get run out of the format), possibly Neoform, and whatever the latest Whir Prison Combo deck, and then every other possible thing.
Tempo
Modern
Eldrazi and Staxes
Whir Prison
Legacy
5c Humans
DnT
"I'm a lead farmer... !" Quote ruined due to policy.
Twitch.tv enigmaNJ
Stats are sweet, flying and the flash bonus is something I did not expect at all. I like it cause Esper and Jeskai can wait and see whether to play the creature or hold up bolt of push, but honestly, I see this being best in UWR, because you absolutely want to set up an early race by playing the 1cmc spirit, and keep pressuring.
One of the nightmares in jeskai is flooding, because the deck is less resilient to grinding than the other versions, and you are likely to end up out of steam once the tempo plan begins to fail. So this sinker is critical to keep the ball rolling. Guess I'll trim/get rid of Light up the stage and try this in 2 or 3 copies.
Also... How good is this to dig the deck to find answers to cages like bridges and other garbage? The mono blue symbol is so critical because it makes you sink easily under blood moon.
I'm very pleased and I think WoTC is aware of the fact that new super powerful 1cmc spirits are making bant oppressive (or maybe I'll be proven wrong by the end of the week), I honestly think this is the powerlevel we deserve, and being this one of those cards that struggle to find room in current bant lists, I'm hoping for people to brew and come up with something sweet and new.
This will be the jeskai list I'll be testing by the way
4 Mausoleum Wanderer
2 Spectral Sailor
4 Selfless Spirit
4 Rattlechains
4 Supreme Phantom
4 Spell Queller
4 Drogskol Captain
Spells: 13
4 Aether Vial
2 Path to Exile
3 Lightning Bolt
2 Lightning Helix
2 Teferi, Time Raveler
4 Flooded Strand
4 Scalding Tarn
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Steam Vents
2 Seachrome Coast
1 Spirebluff Canal
2 Fiery Islet
1 Sunbaked Canyon
1 Island
1 Plains
1 Slayers' Stronghold
1 Moorland Haunt
1 Stony Silence
1 Damping Sphere
1 Alpine Moon
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Rest In Peace
2 Remand
2 Eidolon of the Great Revel
1 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
1 Dovin, Grand Arbiter
1 Chandra, torch of Defiance
https://www.mtgsalvation.com/articles/49778-a-new-and-exciting-beginning
Eagle is just not a lord for thalia like our other lords and has a B1G 4S$.
Yes 3 cmc is a bit on the expensive side, but it is just as good as drogskol captain at accelerating our race, and protects himself better.
The flashy pirate, is instead a B0M8.
Teferi Time Raveler is a key card to complement PtE in dealing with -out of bolt range- creatures, it adds solidity to the deck that otherwise lacks a value permanent. Dovin might be just as good, as far as the tempo plan is concerned, if it wasn't that TTR has a static ability that shuts control down and ruins the day to midrange deck ( quelled a spell, attacked and bounced it back to my hand ready to 2x1 them during their next turn. gg). My idea is that you need 4x MB answers to creatures like kalitas, goyf, thing in the ice and such. TTR is a tempo anwer, but I can swear the tempo swing is absolutely.
Horizon Lands are simply critical to dig for fuel in a deck that aims to play the game with 4 lands at most. Having a relatively low curve with no 4cmc spells, and just 10 3cmc drops, eight of which are vialable creatures, make the horizon lands way less painful, cause you re most likely cycling them soon. I've been testing Jeskai back in March with no TTR nor Horizon Lands, and the difference is perceivable to say the least.
Burn spells are excellent at playing the tempo game both aggressively, cutting your opponent off a turn, and defensively, spending one mana to deal with their 2/3 mana creature, or spending two to deal with it and gaining those 3 points of life which will most likely give you an extra turn, meaning an extra attack phase.
Also, as opposed to black, red removals go to the face so they are excellent against all of those big mana decks where Fatal Push and PtE would be dead cards. Worst case scenario, your opponent has got ways to gain life repeatedly, but hey, every strategy has got their weak spot.
Most importantly, because of the flexibility they provide, I ve been able to slam 5x burn along with 2PtE and 2 TTR, which makes an excellent removal/containment package against aggro decks. It's counterintuitive at a first glance, because the manabase is more painful so you'd be inclined to think it's getting your aggro matchup worse. Instead, you' re going up on the removal count, and those removals are not even ramping the opponent, so once you sit at the table and play you feel how good splashing B/R is at letting you take the control role against any creature deck.
Infect on the rise and humans tier1 are good news for this version.
Light up the Stage has been an intuition I ve had some months ago and it's been a solid 2of to be used in the mid/late game to pull ahead, it works nicely with a low curve, but the boost it provides is still limited to two cards and the new spectral sailor is now coming with the benefit of being a creature which adds damages to the race, synergizing, and overlapping Stage in the same situations where extra cards are required: if you have cards in your hand , then you re not out of gas and it's just an extra piece of pressure which goes along with your beatdown plan. If you're out of gas it draws without revealing ( where Stage lets you hold up more mana but can't let you recur to Vial, Spectral Sailor allows you to abuse your Aether Vials instead, giving no informations about what you've drawn). I'm pretty confident Sailor is going to be a good addition replacing any other card advantage engine in non-company decks.
With this said, this is where I'm at with Jeskai Spirits
4 Mausoleum Wanderer
2 Spectral Sailor
4 Selfless Spirit
4 Rattlechains
4 Supreme Phantom
4 Spell Queller
4 Drogskol Captain
Spells: 13
4 Aether Vial
2 Path to Exile
3 Lightning Bolt
2 Lightning Helix
2 Teferi, Time Raveler
Land: 21
4 Flooded Strand
3 Scalding Tarn
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Steam Vents
1 Seachrome Coast
1 Spirebluff Canal
1 Inspiring Vantage
2 Fiery Islet
1 Sunbaked Canyon
2 Island
1 Plains
1 Cavern of Souls
1 Slayers' Stronghold
1 Stony Silence
1 Damping Sphere
2 Alpine Moon
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Rest In Peace
1 Mana Leak
1 Force of Negation
2 Eidolon of the Great Revel
1 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
1 Dovin, Grand Arbiter
1 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
Alpine moon won me the game against tron t1. That 1cmc is huge really, it lets you curve out. How many times i've found myslef in the position of having an empty turn one, with a turn two I had to spend in casting stony or Damping, delaying my race. Alpine moon made me curve out in my two drop and begin to attack earlier. Not sure about the split with Damping sphere, I may want more dampings if Amulet was more present in my meta.
I've not been playing Grafdigger's cage since february '18 where it lost me the finals against storm. They remove it and get full access to the GY, however: The new mulligan rule demands an early answer, so does bridgevine, and the bonus of stopping the new eladamri's call decks, company and such makes it worth testing again. I like Relic better, but relic has no static ability, and static is the keyword you need to approach this metagame.
I think I'm quite weak to cages(Urza thopters), this is the reason why I'm on 2x red Eidolons and Chandra. I'm not willing to give up on that matchup just to have my 3rd counterspell but I may be wrong. I'll wait to attend the new PTQs events before making changes.
Happy brewing folks!
with the printing of spectral sailor, i'll be testing this all-spirits list , with 3 copies of the new card. Right now i'm testing with topplegeist in its stead
4 aether vial
4 path to exile
Creatures (31)
4 mausoleum wanderer
3 spectral sailor
4 rattlechains
4 selfless spirit
4 supreme phantom
4 spell queller
4 drogskol captain
3 nebelgast herald
1 kira, great glass-spinner
2 cavern of souls
4 flooded strand
2 misty rainforest
4 seachrome coast
1 hallowed fountain
2 island
1 plains
3 waterlogged grove
1 horizon canopy
1 breeding pool
3 rest in peace
3 damping sphere
3 unified will
2 collector ouphe
1 gaddock teeg
2 deputy of detention
1 echoing truth
nebelgast herald has been chosen due to its synergy with the sailor, the potential of a fast clock and the presence of humans and hogaakvine... but i'll gladly come back to
Elves || GSpirits G || Spirits || Fish
Pauper
GElvesG || CAffinityC
Commander
G Roon (and the Hidden Realms) G
In addition pte is very good, i'm not feeling comfortable reducing our cheapest interaction for anything
Elves || GSpirits G || Spirits || Fish
Pauper
GElvesG || CAffinityC
Commander
G Roon (and the Hidden Realms) G