I like Abrade more than Trophy against Spirits TBH. Maybe against humans it's better but against Spirits I really don't want to be ramping them into a Coco.
That being said, the ability to cut the 4th color is very interesting and I'd love to start working on something. I was trying out Noble Hierarch in the deck as well but I'm not sure that she's worth it. Let's discuss what the core of a Sultai DS mid-range list would be:
...
This leaves us with about 4-6 slots to play with, depending on what numbers you choose on my variables here. Another spicy card this Sultai DS player used was Predator's Strike which seems underwhelming on its own but maybe paired with Become Immense it could be the answer?
Another thing is missing out on red sweepers out of the SB. I really like Languish in this metagame but I don't know if we can support cmc 4 with all the Thalia's running around. Even some Spirits lists run her.
yeah ramping a coco deck doesnt sound great.
yeah your template looks more streamlined. im not a good brewer/deckbuilder by any stretch, and id rather tune. here is the draft i came up with since i couldnt find anything else:
at first i entertained the idea of including 1 or 2 copies of Mausoleum Secrets, which increased my interest in architects of will; i put the idea on the backburner though. i decided to keep it around as a delirium enabler if im playing a few flayers; also i initially had a tasigur in tombstalkers slot. i swapped it out for a 3rd traverse, but now its just tombstalker as a placeholder so i dont forget about it (lol). also i figured id be trying become immense out of the side, and architect lets you more easily delve without losing delirium (being 2 types and all). the 2 scours just help tie the room together.
the 1-3 lotv is surprising. my only experience with DS decks is GDS, and that was only for a while when i briefly borrowed the deck from a friend. maybe ill get one for the side, but tbh my opinion of lotv has been waning. it lets us leverage excess lands kinda, but the edict effect doesnt seem very good right now. at least the last hope has a chance of sniping something, ticking up, and staying alive.
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Modern: UWGSnow-Bant Control BURGrixis Death's Shadow GWBCoCo Elves WCDeath and Taxes (sold)
LOTV is not that great in the meta right now but she's good against Tarmogoyf decks so with the printing of Trophy I predict Tarmogoyf will grow in metagame presence and thus she should be useful again. Just my presumptions..
I think the 4th Tarmogoyf is more important than the 1st Grim Flayer. That being said, if you've got flayers and Traverse, maybe Tombstalker is too much?
Though Thought Scour does help with this. If we take the route of Become Immense, then we can certainly drop Tombstalker and possibly go up on Thought Scour? Maybe something like:
It would be more constructive to state why you think it doesnt make sense. This way does not really help.
I am also of the Jeff Hoogland school of thought that articulating one's argument is necessary to a constructive conversation.
That said, i do like Tas over zombie fish, due to both an easier delve (one less card in the yard could make a world of difference with goyf) and his activated ability. Fish's upside, eating the average goyf instead of bouncing off of it, i acknowledge, but find to be outweighed. Midrange is all about the grind, and card advantage built in to a dude is a good thing.
I am also a growing fan of tracker. Having them in deck makes lands held in hand less of a dead draw. It is should noted, as well, that tracker is a threat that is independent of the graveyard, which is important when opponent boards in a RiP. It does put you a little heavier into green, but not prohibitively so.
Also unless your trying to kill Zombie Fish 5 damage doesn't really do much for you over 4. The 5/5 and above are a Fed Goyf (most relevant case), Titans (probably dead to combo and gurmag would make no difference), fat Eldrazi again no difference, Wormcoil again no difference and a few dragons who have flying anyway.
LOTV is not that great in the meta right now but she's good against Tarmogoyf decks so with the printing of Trophy I predict Tarmogoyf will grow in metagame presence and thus she should be useful again. Just my presumptions..
I think the 4th Tarmogoyf is more important than the 1st Grim Flayer. That being said, if you've got flayers and Traverse, maybe Tombstalker is too much?
Though Thought Scour does help with this. If we take the route of Become Immense, then we can certainly drop Tombstalker and possibly go up on Thought Scour? Maybe something like:
...
We're basically losing Inquisition and Liliana in order to make room though so it's probably not worth it.
If only there was a burst-esque pump evasion spell that we could fetch with Mausoleum Secrets. THEN it would be worth building around.
i mean i presumed the same thing. i originally had a single tasigur to act as the 4th goyf, because i figured fatal push was going to be everywhere. i was already set on 2 snapcasters, and added the flayers on top to be a bit more threat dense; not to mention i wanted to see if the trample helped at all.
yeah that is so many pump spells, and one of them has to be predators strike? no thanks to that lol
i did some searching on the gatherer database for anything cheap in GB colors that offered trample, fear, menace, etc. the results were depressing. id rather just suit up a death's shadow with a Rancor. of course blue has some options for evasion, but i dismissed that option quickly. forcing some block action against our guys is generally a good thing, and all the better if we can blow them out with pump/removal/whatever. i was even eyeballing profane command, but casting it for a reasonable X is asking a lot.
i do think a copy of become immense is viable main board tech, even without trample. im gonna try 1 or 2 in the side first as a knockout punch to combo decks.
simic charm is close to being plausible. though its still the same problem
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It would be more constructive to state why you think it doesnt make sense. This way does not really help.
I am also of the Jeff Hoogland school of thought that articulating one's argument is necessary to a constructive conversation.
That said, i do like Tas over zombie fish, due to both an easier delve (one less card in the yard could make a world of difference with goyf) and his activated ability. Fish's upside, eating the average goyf instead of bouncing off of it, i acknowledge, but find to be outweighed. Midrange is all about the grind, and card advantage built in to a dude is a good thing.
I am also a growing fan of tracker. Having them in deck makes lands held in hand less of a dead draw. It is should noted, as well, that tracker is a threat that is independent of the graveyard, which is important when opponent boards in a RiP. It does put you a little heavier into green, but not prohibitively so.
Your points make sense, and I agree with them mostly. Its something I also thought about. The easier delve is totally a good thing and could really have a big impact. Also the ability is obviously great.
I personally think though that the extra attack is probably a little bit more relevant than you describe them. Clockwise Gurmag is 1 whole turn faster compared to tasigur. This is huge against Tron/Combo. Also opposing creatures can be blocked more favourable in general, it doesn't need to be goyf only. It could be a 5/5 Champion of the Parish, an opposing Angler from Hollow One, a Death Shadow, any big Hardened Scales creature etc. Also, I think it could also be relevant that an angler can kill a Jace or Teferi upon upticking in one shot. I will test this, since I am not sure which is more relevant, the cheaper delve or the higher attack. I basically don't account the ability that much here, since I think the deck can already grind good pretty much.
Tracker is indeed nice and I am trying 2 copies main atm. Being able to play around GY more is probably needed.
Also unless your trying to kill Zombie Fish 5 damage doesn't really do much for you over 4. The 5/5 and above are a Fed Goyf (most relevant case), Titans (probably dead to combo and gurmag would make no difference), fat Eldrazi again no difference, Wormcoil again no difference and a few dragons who have flying anyway.
Its one whole turn off the clock if you up from 4 to 5 attack. This is huge in general. If you are able to disrupt Tron/Valakut with Trophy/Unmoored Ego and then land a Gurmag its certainly relevant.
It would be more constructive to state why you think it doesnt make sense. This way does not really help.
Seeing 3 5/5 bodies that empty your graveyard and give nothing back doesnt seem valuable to me and is counter intuitive seeing as we run tarmogoyf. If you're going to run a delve threat, it makes more sense to run one that will generate value given the mana activation. In this case, Tasigur. For the other 2 slots (in place of your gurmag angler) why not play a less graveyard intensive threat like Tracker? It can outgrow angler and give us card draw. The idea of running a delve creature outside of Tasigur in a GB deck just causes tension with playing Tarmogoyf. This is why it doesn't make sense to run Angler in a sultai build. Not when you have a more efficient creature, Tarmogoyf, in the 75. Hope that makes sense and helps.....
Also unless your trying to kill Zombie Fish 5 damage doesn't really do much for you over 4. The 5/5 and above are a Fed Goyf (most relevant case), Titans (probably dead to combo and gurmag would make no difference), fat Eldrazi again no difference, Wormcoil again no difference and a few dragons who have flying anyway.
Its one whole turn off the clock if you up from 4 to 5 attack. This is huge in general. If you are able to disrupt Tron/Valakut with Trophy/Unmoored Ego and then land a Gurmag its certainly relevant.
Right so faster clock vs an active ability and one less delve needed.
And I suppose the clock matters more for Sultai since you cannot make up the difference with bolts ala Jund.
Also unless your trying to kill Zombie Fish 5 damage doesn't really do much for you over 4. The 5/5 and above are a Fed Goyf (most relevant case), Titans (probably dead to combo and gurmag would make no difference), fat Eldrazi again no difference, Wormcoil again no difference and a few dragons who have flying anyway.
Its one whole turn off the clock if you up from 4 to 5 attack. This is huge in general. If you are able to disrupt Tron/Valakut with Trophy/Unmoored Ego and then land a Gurmag its certainly relevant.
Right so faster clock vs an active ability and one less delve needed.
And I suppose the clock matters more for Sultai since you cannot make up the difference with bolts ala Jund.
Yeah, exactly. I think Sultai can grind enough, this is not the issue. Its the closing speed and the missing reach what really bothers sometimes. So its overall the extra attack vs the lower delve cost for me.
sometimes you just want a big beat stick. i dont think the relevant difference is the activated ability, its just icing. what flyingdelver needs to know is which card better serves the intent (ie an efficient creature to apply pressure). angler has more power, and can present a shorter clock, but its also harder to cast. this can mean tapping extra lands and potentially losing you tempo, or taking extra turns to get into play. if these things happen enough, tasigur might actually be better for killing opponents quickly.
maybe angler does the job better, but the general lack of cards directly feeding the graveyard is suspect. best you can do is test it and try to take note of situations where anglers delve cost is complicating your gameplan, and if tasigur costing 1 less would have made a difference. if its close enough where you cant tell, then you take the activated ability into consideration because its mostly superfluous.
edit: also noteworthy since goyf vs. delve threats was brought up, but both angler and tasigur dodge fatal push. id imagine that being pretty relevant in the days to come.
It would be more constructive to state why you think it doesnt make sense. This way does not really help.
Seeing 3 5/5 bodies that empty your graveyard and give nothing back doesnt seem valuable to me and is counter intuitive seeing as we run tarmogoyf. If you're going to run a delve threat, it makes more sense to run one that will generate value given the mana activation. In this case, Tasigur. For the other 2 slots (in place of your gurmag angler) why not play a less graveyard intensive threat like Tracker? It can outgrow angler and give us card draw. The idea of running a delve creature outside of Tasigur in a GB deck just causes tension with playing Tarmogoyf. This is why it doesn't make sense to run Angler in a sultai build. Not when you have a more efficient creature, Tarmogoyf, in the 75. Hope that makes sense and helps.....
I get your point, and I agree that tracker is very attractive to run. I am currently testing 2 copies main, as I changed my deck a little. Gurmag and Goyf potential interfere, this is true, but tasigur also does. If we cut down on anglers (to like say 2 copies) then we would be on a similar count one would run tasigurs. So the difference is then the extra card to delve away. And this could matter, yeah, but I am not sure about that. Thats up for testing and its in my mind not very obvious.
We do run goyf, but the problem of Sultai is the missing closing speed compared to a Jund deck for example which has access to Bolts and KCommands. Therefore I think the extra attack really matters against uninteractive decks. And in that case gurmag serves as goyf 5 + 6. Even in Jund /Abzan decks, often you just want an extra goyf beyond the 4 you have. After all you can have all the removal spells in the world, you also gotta finish the game somehow.
And like I said, I am not that high on the ability of tasigur. Its a nice grinding tool, but I think Sultai can alread grind pretty well with Snappy, Jace, Trackers or even Azcanta if you wanna run it. I am more interested in the extra closing speed for now. However, given the meta might change, this also might become less relevant of course.
It would be more constructive to state why you think it doesnt make sense. This way does not really help.
Seeing 3 5/5 bodies that empty your graveyard and give nothing back doesnt seem valuable to me and is counter intuitive seeing as we run tarmogoyf. If you're going to run a delve threat, it makes more sense to run one that will generate value given the mana activation. In this case, Tasigur. For the other 2 slots (in place of your gurmag angler) why not play a less graveyard intensive threat like Tracker? It can outgrow angler and give us card draw. The idea of running a delve creature outside of Tasigur in a GB deck just causes tension with playing Tarmogoyf. This is why it doesn't make sense to run Angler in a sultai build. Not when you have a more efficient creature, Tarmogoyf, in the 75. Hope that makes sense and helps.....
I get your point, and I agree that tracker is very attractive to run. I am currently testing 2 copies main, as I changed my deck a little. Gurmag and Goyf potential interfere, this is true, but tasigur also does. If we cut down on anglers (to like say 2 copies) then we would be on a similar count one would run tasigurs. So the difference is then the extra card to delve away. And this could matter, yeah, but I am not sure about that. Thats up for testing and its in my mind not very obvious.
We do run goyf, but the problem of Sultai is the missing closing speed compared to a Jund deck for example which has access to Bolts and KCommands. Therefore I think the extra attack really matters against uninteractive decks. And in that case gurmag serves as goyf 5 + 6. Even in Jund /Abzan decks, often you just want an extra goyf beyond the 4 you have. After all you can have all the removal spells in the world, you also gotta finish the game somehow.
And like I said, I am not that high on the ability of tasigur. Its a nice grinding tool, but I think Sultai can alread grind pretty well with Snappy, Jace, Trackers or even Azcanta if you wanna run it. I am more interested in the extra closing speed for now. However, given the meta might change, this also might become less relevant of course.
I also wonder if sultai shadow becomes a bit better now. Trophy plus counter magic?
i think its worth trying out. im planning on playing some GBx DS variant, and i think sultai has some good things to offer. its 2 obstacles/problems that stand out to me is the no temur battle rage, and sultai cards pushing you to go bigger - which conflicts with the more aggressive nature of DS.
there are a lot of creature decks playing heavily to the board right now with minimal removal of their own, making the lack of TBR all the more noticeable. also the powerful interaction that sultai is gaining in general is snapcaster paired with trophy; which is a 4 mana play. both of these push you to go slightly bigger to compensate. however, similar to how GDS got leaner and more aggressive, im not sure if DS decks on the more midrange end of the spectrum are good in modern atm. maybe that will end up changing.
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I took 5th in a PPTQ today, losing in the quarters to UW Control, a heavily favored match. My opponent would even admit he managed to runner, runner, runner, runner his way out of 2 of the 3 games we played.
Spectators got to see Grim Flayer do what Grim Flayer excels at, in the face of something like Reat in Peace. The notion that the card needs to be a 4/4 was dismissed multiple times throughout the event, even though he always ended games as a 4/4.
The real takeaway was this - Sultai is a GB Midrange deck. It has to play like one. Using counterspells in the main really changes the entire dynamic of the deck and it makes your threats less efficient. Your optimal gameplay is to just play T1 discard, T2 cheap efficient threat, T3 a combination of turn 1 & 2 or something that leads to a redundant maneuver turn 4 maintain game state or work second angle (like developing a planeswalker).
Time and time again, that was the most efficient thing I have ever found the deck capable of doing. I have played with countless iterations and had countless discussions in regards to common card options that come to mind.
Delve threats don’t come down early enough for you to follow up your powerful discard. They come down late enough that you are losing the opportunity to diversify your game state. Turns 3 and 4 really need to set up your plan B while bolstering your plan a. Delve threats are very linear in this sense.
Tireless Tracker creates an odd dichotomy where your deck wants you to be tapping out to advance a game state, but your creatures wants you to start loading your eggs in a basket while offering a means to gas your hand in a reactive manner in a proactive deck. I think in straight BG this is less of a concern because you don’t have certain things you have o be working towards, like Jace set ups or Snapcaster value trades.
My initial interactions really tried to make creatures like Tassigur, Mandrils, and Angler work. Even JVP, and the deck played less efficiently in retrospect. Just my two cents after my PPTQ today and reflecting on the things I really appreciate out of the deck and what I felt was the main contributor to how consistently my games played out as I worked towards 5th place.
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STANDARD|UW Control MODERN| UBG Midrange PAUPER| UG Fog COMMANDER| UBG The Mimeoplasm
I forgot who turned me onto Grim Flayer a while back, but it is probably the best card in the deck hands down.
I can also post SB plans I wrote down if anyone is interested in seeing those.
Nissa is so much fun to play. Had her as a one of in a shadow deck iteration I played and using her scry and flip abilities were just gas and never left worried about my next draws.
I forgot who turned me onto Grim Flayer a while back, but it is probably the best card in the deck hands down.
I can also post SB plans I wrote down if anyone is interested in seeing those.
Interesting list. In my mind, since you only got 15 blue mana sources you can't support a turn 3 Clique or a turn 4 Jace potentially (you would need 19 or at least 18 blue sources for that). This is not something I would like personally. Also I don't think that I like 4 manlands in a 22 land build, in my experience, the etb tapped clause does hurt you too much. Especially when you run 3 LoTV and 3 Jace this hurts. In my liking 22 lands is also too few especially when you don't have cantrips and have 7 three drops and 3 four drops. For a consistant manabase you would run 24 lands for such a mana curve.
yeah ramping a coco deck doesnt sound great.
yeah your template looks more streamlined. im not a good brewer/deckbuilder by any stretch, and id rather tune. here is the draft i came up with since i couldnt find anything else:
2 snapcaster mage
2 grim flayer
4 street wraith
3 tarmogoyf
1 tombstalker
1 liliana, the last hope
3 mishra's bauble
2 thought scour
2 architects of will
2 dismember
2 assassin's trophy
2 traverse the ulvenwald
4 thoughtseize
2 inquisition of kozilek
3 stubborn denial
1 island
1 forest
1 swamp
4 polluted delta
3 verdant catacombs
3 misty rainforest
2 watery grave
2 overgrown tomb
1 breeding pool
at first i entertained the idea of including 1 or 2 copies of Mausoleum Secrets, which increased my interest in architects of will; i put the idea on the backburner though. i decided to keep it around as a delirium enabler if im playing a few flayers; also i initially had a tasigur in tombstalkers slot. i swapped it out for a 3rd traverse, but now its just tombstalker as a placeholder so i dont forget about it (lol). also i figured id be trying become immense out of the side, and architect lets you more easily delve without losing delirium (being 2 types and all). the 2 scours just help tie the room together.
the 1-3 lotv is surprising. my only experience with DS decks is GDS, and that was only for a while when i briefly borrowed the deck from a friend. maybe ill get one for the side, but tbh my opinion of lotv has been waning. it lets us leverage excess lands kinda, but the edict effect doesnt seem very good right now. at least the last hope has a chance of sniping something, ticking up, and staying alive.
UWGSnow-Bant Control
BURGrixis Death's Shadow
GWBCoCo Elves
WCDeath and Taxes(sold)I think the 4th Tarmogoyf is more important than the 1st Grim Flayer. That being said, if you've got flayers and Traverse, maybe Tombstalker is too much?
Though Thought Scour does help with this. If we take the route of Become Immense, then we can certainly drop Tombstalker and possibly go up on Thought Scour? Maybe something like:
4 Death's Shadow
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Street Wraith
1 Grim Flayer
1 Snapcaster mage
3 Thought Scour
4 Mishra's Bauble
4 Thoughtseize
3 Fatal Push
2 Assassin's Trophy
2 Dismember
3 Stubborn denial
2 Traverse the Ulvenwald
3 Become Immense
2 Predator's Strike
18 Lands
We're basically losing Inquisition and Liliana in order to make room though so it's probably not worth it.
If only there was a burst-esque pump evasion spell that we could fetch with Mausoleum Secrets. THEN it would be worth building around.
Draft My Cube!
I am also of the Jeff Hoogland school of thought that articulating one's argument is necessary to a constructive conversation.
That said, i do like Tas over zombie fish, due to both an easier delve (one less card in the yard could make a world of difference with goyf) and his activated ability. Fish's upside, eating the average goyf instead of bouncing off of it, i acknowledge, but find to be outweighed. Midrange is all about the grind, and card advantage built in to a dude is a good thing.
I am also a growing fan of tracker. Having them in deck makes lands held in hand less of a dead draw. It is should noted, as well, that tracker is a threat that is independent of the graveyard, which is important when opponent boards in a RiP. It does put you a little heavier into green, but not prohibitively so.
i mean i presumed the same thing. i originally had a single tasigur to act as the 4th goyf, because i figured fatal push was going to be everywhere. i was already set on 2 snapcasters, and added the flayers on top to be a bit more threat dense; not to mention i wanted to see if the trample helped at all.
yeah that is so many pump spells, and one of them has to be predators strike? no thanks to that lol
i did some searching on the gatherer database for anything cheap in GB colors that offered trample, fear, menace, etc. the results were depressing. id rather just suit up a death's shadow with a Rancor. of course blue has some options for evasion, but i dismissed that option quickly. forcing some block action against our guys is generally a good thing, and all the better if we can blow them out with pump/removal/whatever. i was even eyeballing profane command, but casting it for a reasonable X is asking a lot.
i do think a copy of become immense is viable main board tech, even without trample. im gonna try 1 or 2 in the side first as a knockout punch to combo decks.
simic charm is close to being plausible. though its still the same problem
UWGSnow-Bant Control
BURGrixis Death's Shadow
GWBCoCo Elves
WCDeath and Taxes(sold)Your points make sense, and I agree with them mostly. Its something I also thought about. The easier delve is totally a good thing and could really have a big impact. Also the ability is obviously great.
I personally think though that the extra attack is probably a little bit more relevant than you describe them. Clockwise Gurmag is 1 whole turn faster compared to tasigur. This is huge against Tron/Combo. Also opposing creatures can be blocked more favourable in general, it doesn't need to be goyf only. It could be a 5/5 Champion of the Parish, an opposing Angler from Hollow One, a Death Shadow, any big Hardened Scales creature etc. Also, I think it could also be relevant that an angler can kill a Jace or Teferi upon upticking in one shot. I will test this, since I am not sure which is more relevant, the cheaper delve or the higher attack. I basically don't account the ability that much here, since I think the deck can already grind good pretty much.
Tracker is indeed nice and I am trying 2 copies main atm. Being able to play around GY more is probably needed.
Its one whole turn off the clock if you up from 4 to 5 attack. This is huge in general. If you are able to disrupt Tron/Valakut with Trophy/Unmoored Ego and then land a Gurmag its certainly relevant.
Seeing 3 5/5 bodies that empty your graveyard and give nothing back doesnt seem valuable to me and is counter intuitive seeing as we run tarmogoyf. If you're going to run a delve threat, it makes more sense to run one that will generate value given the mana activation. In this case, Tasigur. For the other 2 slots (in place of your gurmag angler) why not play a less graveyard intensive threat like Tracker? It can outgrow angler and give us card draw. The idea of running a delve creature outside of Tasigur in a GB deck just causes tension with playing Tarmogoyf. This is why it doesn't make sense to run Angler in a sultai build. Not when you have a more efficient creature, Tarmogoyf, in the 75. Hope that makes sense and helps.....
Right so faster clock vs an active ability and one less delve needed.
And I suppose the clock matters more for Sultai since you cannot make up the difference with bolts ala Jund.
Yeah, exactly. I think Sultai can grind enough, this is not the issue. Its the closing speed and the missing reach what really bothers sometimes. So its overall the extra attack vs the lower delve cost for me.
maybe angler does the job better, but the general lack of cards directly feeding the graveyard is suspect. best you can do is test it and try to take note of situations where anglers delve cost is complicating your gameplan, and if tasigur costing 1 less would have made a difference. if its close enough where you cant tell, then you take the activated ability into consideration because its mostly superfluous.
edit: also noteworthy since goyf vs. delve threats was brought up, but both angler and tasigur dodge fatal push. id imagine that being pretty relevant in the days to come.
UWGSnow-Bant Control
BURGrixis Death's Shadow
GWBCoCo Elves
WCDeath and Taxes(sold)I get your point, and I agree that tracker is very attractive to run. I am currently testing 2 copies main, as I changed my deck a little. Gurmag and Goyf potential interfere, this is true, but tasigur also does. If we cut down on anglers (to like say 2 copies) then we would be on a similar count one would run tasigurs. So the difference is then the extra card to delve away. And this could matter, yeah, but I am not sure about that. Thats up for testing and its in my mind not very obvious.
We do run goyf, but the problem of Sultai is the missing closing speed compared to a Jund deck for example which has access to Bolts and KCommands. Therefore I think the extra attack really matters against uninteractive decks. And in that case gurmag serves as goyf 5 + 6. Even in Jund /Abzan decks, often you just want an extra goyf beyond the 4 you have. After all you can have all the removal spells in the world, you also gotta finish the game somehow.
And like I said, I am not that high on the ability of tasigur. Its a nice grinding tool, but I think Sultai can alread grind pretty well with Snappy, Jace, Trackers or even Azcanta if you wanna run it. I am more interested in the extra closing speed for now. However, given the meta might change, this also might become less relevant of course.
I also wonder if sultai shadow becomes a bit better now. Trophy plus counter magic?
there are a lot of creature decks playing heavily to the board right now with minimal removal of their own, making the lack of TBR all the more noticeable. also the powerful interaction that sultai is gaining in general is snapcaster paired with trophy; which is a 4 mana play. both of these push you to go slightly bigger to compensate. however, similar to how GDS got leaner and more aggressive, im not sure if DS decks on the more midrange end of the spectrum are good in modern atm. maybe that will end up changing.
UWGSnow-Bant Control
BURGrixis Death's Shadow
GWBCoCo Elves
WCDeath and Taxes(sold)Spectators got to see Grim Flayer do what Grim Flayer excels at, in the face of something like Reat in Peace. The notion that the card needs to be a 4/4 was dismissed multiple times throughout the event, even though he always ended games as a 4/4.
The real takeaway was this - Sultai is a GB Midrange deck. It has to play like one. Using counterspells in the main really changes the entire dynamic of the deck and it makes your threats less efficient. Your optimal gameplay is to just play T1 discard, T2 cheap efficient threat, T3 a combination of turn 1 & 2 or something that leads to a redundant maneuver turn 4 maintain game state or work second angle (like developing a planeswalker).
Time and time again, that was the most efficient thing I have ever found the deck capable of doing. I have played with countless iterations and had countless discussions in regards to common card options that come to mind.
Delve threats don’t come down early enough for you to follow up your powerful discard. They come down late enough that you are losing the opportunity to diversify your game state. Turns 3 and 4 really need to set up your plan B while bolstering your plan a. Delve threats are very linear in this sense.
Tireless Tracker creates an odd dichotomy where your deck wants you to be tapping out to advance a game state, but your creatures wants you to start loading your eggs in a basket while offering a means to gas your hand in a reactive manner in a proactive deck. I think in straight BG this is less of a concern because you don’t have certain things you have o be working towards, like Jace set ups or Snapcaster value trades.
My initial interactions really tried to make creatures like Tassigur, Mandrils, and Angler work. Even JVP, and the deck played less efficiently in retrospect. Just my two cents after my PPTQ today and reflecting on the things I really appreciate out of the deck and what I felt was the main contributor to how consistently my games played out as I worked towards 5th place.
STANDARD|UW Control MODERN| UBG Midrange PAUPER| UG Fog COMMANDER| UBG The Mimeoplasm
3 Dark Confidant
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Grim Flayer
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Nissa, Steward of Elements
3 Liliana of the Veil
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
3 Fatal Push
4 Abrupt Decay
4 Thoughtseize
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Maelstrom Pulse
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Polluted Delta
1 Breeding Pool
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Watery Grave
4 Creeping Tar Pit
2 Swamp
1 Island
1 Forest
3 Spell Snare
1 Vendilion Clique
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Fatal Push
2 Damnation
3 Damping Sphere
2 Engineered Explosives
I forgot who turned me onto Grim Flayer a while back, but it is probably the best card in the deck hands down.
I can also post SB plans I wrote down if anyone is interested in seeing those.
STANDARD|UW Control MODERN| UBG Midrange PAUPER| UG Fog COMMANDER| UBG The Mimeoplasm
Nissa is so much fun to play. Had her as a one of in a shadow deck iteration I played and using her scry and flip abilities were just gas and never left worried about my next draws.
Interesting list. In my mind, since you only got 15 blue mana sources you can't support a turn 3 Clique or a turn 4 Jace potentially (you would need 19 or at least 18 blue sources for that). This is not something I would like personally. Also I don't think that I like 4 manlands in a 22 land build, in my experience, the etb tapped clause does hurt you too much. Especially when you run 3 LoTV and 3 Jace this hurts. In my liking 22 lands is also too few especially when you don't have cantrips and have 7 three drops and 3 four drops. For a consistant manabase you would run 24 lands for such a mana curve.