Another common trend that was happening was that NO ONE ran main deck walkers. We had always talked about Relentless and Primal hunter, and wether we should accomodate for that or not, but it seems like the top players haven't needed them until the LotV in sideboard.
Should we take Garruk out of our main and look to play more of something else?
Another common trend that was happening was that NO ONE ran main deck walkers. We had always talked about Relentless and Primal hunter, and wether we should accomodate for that or not, but it seems like the top players haven't needed them until the LotV in sideboard.
Should we take Garruk out of our main and look to play more of something else?
I've actually done this with my current list and it seems to be working out rather well. The only walker really worth md'ing right now is Garruk Relentless, at least in my opinion. Primal Hunter is awesome, but he skews the mana too far into Green. That being said, if you are already running a green-heavy variant with SRG and/or Wolfir Avenger, then I think Primal Hunter is overall better than Relentless for the matches you want him.
LotV can't effectively be a mb walker right now specifically because of the number of reanimator lists running around, but she's also not great against zombies or any GW lists running Loxodon Smiter. She's great against most of the control lists and the GoST tempo lists, so I have her in my sb for those situations.
One of the best cards I have been testing MD is Underworld Connections. I run it as a 2-of, alongside Rakdos's Return as a 2-of, and the 2 spells really compliment each other very well. Even in the aggro match-ups it is not a terrible card.
Looking at our decks, the majority of our removal spells(with the exception of an overloaded Mizzium Mortars or Bonfire) are 1-for-1's. We make up for this by running threats that are mostly 2-for-1's (Huntmaster/Thragtusk). Our goal is to grind our opponents out by trading 1-for-1 our removal for their threats and forcing them into trading 2-for-1 their removal for our threats. We can speed up this process by using Rakdos's Return to help strip remaining cards. Eventually, however, we will end up in top deck mode against our opponents. When we get to this point, we do not have anything to give us an edge. This is where Underworld Connections really shines. At the point in the game where both you and your opponent are basically living off of the top, Underworld Connections, much like Bob, or even BBE to a lesser extent, in the Modern Jund lists allows us to gain incremental advantage and pull ahead.
In my testing so far, every game that I have cast an unanswered Underworld Connections, I felt very far ahead. Like I said, it's not a card you necessarily want to be casting on turn 3 against aggressive decks, but once you have stabilized the board, Connections is still a great card to have to allow you to remain stable.
For reference, here is where my main board is currently sitting:
Edit: One card I'm considering is Searing Spear. Having more instant speed removal options could be useful, plus the ability for spear to go to the dome when needed may be useful. Not sure where, or if, it would fit in the list, but it's on my list of cards to consider.
In practice it must not be good, because 2 decks placed well with it in the first SCG Open of the format, and no one has done so since, while Jund is putting 2+ decks into T8 every week.
The question I have been considering with this deck is..should we re-focus the MD to beat Control/other Midrange, and use the SB to beat Aggro? Aggro decks just don't seem to be as major of a factor in the metagame as we had expected them to be. But at the same time, it is much easier to beat Control G2 and G3 than it is to beat Aggro G2 and G3, because of the variance factor in Aggro decks having 'just win' hands.
@spacedog: I think that there are other cards with broader general applications that we could MD, such as Appetite for Brains or Deathrite Shaman or something, before MDing something like Slaughter Games.
Have you seen the decklists of lists that were not placing highly? Did they contain strangleroot geists? How do you know it's been played, and it not placing?
How do you know the lists that contain SRG were utilizing him properly?
Really how many tournaments since the open have their been to judge?
I do admit, I am seeing surprisingly little zombie/MonoR lists on MTGO, which is what strangleroot geist base lists really excel vs.
I was expecting a zombie meta of about 30% and that clearly isnt close to what's happening.
If zombies goes down to about 10% of the meta, I think removal heavy + MD control hate is the way to go.
Well, out of the decks labled "Jund Midrange" on starcity's website, there are 8 decks listed. None of them ran SRG (the last place listed was 30th). Within the top 16 decks there was the "Jund Aggro" decklist that placed 12th, which ran SRG, but from what I can tell, no one is really using them.
As for "utilizing SRG properly", apparently there's something that you're doing that other people don't realize? Are you only using it to block or something? Somadelnocha was super gung-ho about Mana Bloom being the best card ever, and he was quite obviously wrong; green centric lists just weren't testing to be as strong from the looks of things. Bollskis was running a green heavy list but I don't know how well that's been doing recently. I kept his list as a test deck for the mirror, but myself and others don't like the deck as much as the current top lists.
I agree its very possible I've just been playing against the right decks/running hot.
It's not that im just adament the card was good, my results have been showing that it was better than I speculated.. And its from situations I've been getting in that I didnt realize, not because my opponenets just shat the bucket
It has been doing faboulously against control and zombies, but really bad against G/W, Reanimator and tokens.
I've been playing mostly against control in the recent tournaments.
As for the top 8, maybe they have recognized the metagame to be shifting far away from zombies and hence geist might very well be a bad choice right now.
Strangleroot is a fantastic blocker versus zombies' 12 1-drops, but he's not a serious clock in control matchups and gets outclassed against midrange. Adjust according to what you expect to face.
Can someone help me out with figuring out which of my lists is "optimal"? I kinda like the Wolfir Avenger list, but i think the numbers are a bit off. I dont know if the Bonfires are needed, and I kinda want to merge the numbers a bit.
I think with a 24 land deck we can't have too much of a top curve. Having at least 8 turn 3 plays is huge, and I have that with 3 Keyrune, 3 Avenger and 2 Connections. The 4 Farseek is mandatory and I actually think Avenger is better than Nighthawk at the moment due to Regeneration and interaction with Huntmaster, which is important. Plus, if they sweep you can flash it in after, which is handy.
Essentially this is what I believe the deck HAS to be:
Against control, you take out the 4 Pillar, 3 Wolfir, 1 Mizzium Mortars, 1 ??? and bring in 2 Thundermaw, 3 Appetite, 2 Liliana, 1 Rakdos's Return, 1 Vraska.
Against Zombies you go -1 Rakdos's Return, -2 Underworld Connections for +2 Deathrite Shaman +1 Blasphemous Act
Against Mirror you go -3 Wolfir, for +1 Vraska, +2 Thundermaw Hellkite automatically. I think you also drop the 4 Pillars for 3 Appetite for Brains and 1 of...I'm not sure. Blasphemous Act? Liliana? 1 Of Slaugher Games? Thoughts on this one...?
And check out the super awesome reanimator tech (that matchup I need to work on...maybe tweak the board for it. We'll see i guess.)
Strangleroot is a fantastic blocker versus zombies' 12 1-drops, but he's not a serious clock in control matchups and gets outclassed against midrange. Adjust according to what you expect to face.
Yeah, I agree with this. I'm going to give Strangleroot a shot this Friday. It certainly changes the look of the deck. But I'll also have Vampiric Nighthawk and extra removal sitting in my deckbox so that I can make a quick change for next week should this not work out.
The last 2 spots should be either 2 swamp or 2 mountain, or even a 1/1 split if you feel that works better.
As for the last 2 spots in your main, garruk relentless has been testing very well for me lately. granted in my variant, I've gone down to 1 due to the fact I wanted to fit in other spells. He is very good against control and pretty decent against the GW decks, two decks that are fairly popular in my area.
This was the list that I won the last tournament with (went 7-1)...
Played against 1 Jund, 2 esper control, 1 bant enchantment agro (horrible matchup but got lucky), 2 bant control, 1 reanimator, 1 zombie.
Weakness of the deck:
G/W. You either needs to get faster than them or have lots of effecient removal. My list is slower and lacks the necessary quick removal to consistantly remove their threats. Instants speed removal is especially helpful. 4/4 is the magic number that blanks my list (smiter).
Rakdos Keyrunes.
Tokens.
Hexproof (although Id say this is true for the vast majority of jund lists)
Mana consistancy. I drew very well in the torunament, but playing online recently have sometimes needed mana.
CHANGES:
Would put 2x abrupt decay main and a 3rd sever the bloodline main, probably take out a huntmaster (anything SRG and Wolfir Avenger is weak to huntmaster is also weak to).
I would also move 2x pillar of flames to sideboard.
Abrupt decay minimizes a little weakness to G/W agro , Tokens and Bant enchantment and mizzium mortars is just too hard to overload in my list.
Also kills problematic key runes and detention spheres.
It's mana is also much easier to cast in the green version of the deck than dreadbore.
Tamiyo is just such a ***** to deal with I refer to play any less than 2 dreadbore main tho.
Zombies is a fine matchup so the pillar loss (for instant speed removal) G1 shouldn't hurt that bad.
I would altar the mana base a bit so can use evolving wilds to fix for red/green mana depending on the contents on the opening hand. Not too many turn 1 plays that this should effect, nor am I struggling for mana around turn 4 very often... Fixing is more the issue.
Note:
I Don't recommend this list unless zombies/control are the big players in the meta. If zombies takes the back burner, Im liking the creature light, keyrune, removal list better. Think it's more well rounded against the "fringe' strategies, despite having noticeably worse zombies/MonoR matchup (imo a slightly worse control matchup unless you mainboard a lot of control hate)
The hidden advantage strangleroot geist version has over the other versions is to punish inconsistency. It puts a much faster clock on your opponents if they stumble on lands/stabilizing, while still having the flexibility to hate on a lot of decks post board.
Against control, if you get a fast start it is common to draw out a detention sphere or two on your lowly creatures which allows them a lot less removal for your bigger/serious threats that youd prefer not to get sphered.
Against the "other jund" version, Jace is frequently -2ing instead of +1ing vs the strangleroot gesit version. Increases the efficacy of dreadbore.
Thanks man. I took your advice and I'm gonna start testing something akin to this.
I realised right away I needed more green. I thought I was short on red but I THINK i'm ok...I'll try out a bit more and see but with Keyrune the emphasis is on need green so thanks.
Garruk I'm going to try out and see. That 1 slot is a ***** to find but I love the rest of my list. Has been quite good for me in testing so far but I really want to crunch out crunching in a couple of days.
Somadelnocha was super gung-ho about Mana Bloom being the best card ever, and he was quite obviously wrong;...
You were misinterpreting what I was saying with that statement, which is this: if you're looking to play a consistent long game, all while keeping the "nutdraw" possibly live, Mana Bloom as a 2-of was better in testing than the full set of Farseeks, on the principal of playing more actual spells than most average Jund lists. I'd go so far as to say that if you wanted to play less than 3 Farseeks in your build, that Mana Bloom would be an acceptable substitute.
A recent idea has been to keep all four Pillars in the SB, and play the Deathrite Shamans MD, but I play against enough Zombie decks to still warrant them MD. Personally, I loved having 3 Underworld Connections, and want to find room MD for it, though it could find a spot in the SB. 3 Farseek is the most I'd want to play in a deck that definitively gets to the late game, and occasionally needs every single top deck to be live.
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Thanks man. I took your advice and I'm gonna start testing something akin to this.
I realised right away I needed more green. I thought I was short on red but I THINK i'm ok...I'll try out a bit more and see but with Keyrune the emphasis is on need green so thanks.
Garruk I'm going to try out and see. That 1 slot is a ***** to find but I love the rest of my list. Has been quite good for me in testing so far but I really want to crunch out crunching in a couple of days.
Also FWIW, It's a clearly better list against american mid-range thats popping up too.
But yeah the green/red mana tension is an issue with the deck
I think this lists manabase is a bit better. I think 14 and 12 of each of :symr::symb: is good. this seems like a pretty consistent manabase. If needed I'll tweak the numbers to add one more green for 1 black. Thats really all I want to do but I can't do that yet so 14/12/12 seems good. My deck has 19 Green, 17 Red and 13 Black, but having the black for removal is important so about even with the red I think. If i could go 15/12/11 I would but I can't unfortunately.
As for the board, i have 1 green source, a **** tonne of black and red so maybe its good to have it like this...
That leaves me 3 slots. I want to use them for some amount of the following cards:
Vampire Nighthawk - Would be a 3 of.
Wolfir Avenger - Would be a 3 of.
Rakdos's Return - Would probably only be a 1 of, leaving 2 slots for something else.
Deathrite Shaman - Would be a 3 of.
Murder - Would probably be a 3 of, maybe a 2 of + one RR.
What do people think I should include? Meta is mostly control/other Jund/Junk Tokens/RWU Geist.dec
That leaves me 3 slots. I want to use them for some amount of the following cards:
Vampire Nighthawk - Would be a 3 of.
Wolfir Avenger - Would be a 3 of.
Rakdos's Return - Would probably only be a 1 of, leaving 2 slots for something else.
Deathrite Shaman - Would be a 3 of.
Murder - Would probably be a 3 of, maybe a 2 of + one RR.
What do people think I should include? Meta is mostly control/other Jund/Junk Tokens/RWU Geist.dec
If that's mostly what your local meta is, I think some of the normal jund staples are no longer needed. Obviously you want to be good against zombies but if the lions share of your meta is jund/tokens/control/Raka midrange, you can surely trim pillar of flame for example since it's actively bad versus most of those decks.
Regardless, RR is excellent against most of those archetypes so that seems like an auto include. deathrite shaman doesn't seem like a particularly good maindeck card though I could see it's merits. Having some number of murders also seems optimal as instant speed interaction is slime. I think Ultimate price would probably be just as good though. Maybe 1/1. Meh.
LP, I'm checking your article out as well. Behind all of your swag is the brain of one of the most intelligent Magic players I've ever known. I guess that's one more thing for you to add to the wall of ego that is your Sally sig.
I can go with that. LK, you are the Mace Windu of red mages...cool, tempered logic in deliberation, but capable of just flat kicking tail when the situation warrants it.
There is not a ton of Zombies in my local meta, but there are some. I don't want to auto-lose G1 and be stuck trying to win 2 straight against a deck that can easily nu-dtraw you. If I boarded Pillar, I would be running MD Searing Spear, which is not that much better. Plus I would have no turn 1 removal for decks like GW Aggro, WX Humans etc. I don't see tons of these at Saturday night tournaments, but I assume I will at SCG IQs, Opens, ptqs, etc.
Has anyone looked into Augur spree as a way to deal with x/4's? Im playing it as a 1 of in my board and actually like it as i can kill trolls with it as well.
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top 100 SCG Sacramento
1st place GPT Seattle
1st place GPT Anaheim
It seems like the only benefit of that card over Murder is that it kills Troll and Aristocrat, at the cost of not killing anything with /5. Doesn't seem like a worthwhile tradeoff to me.
When Auger Spree is in question, why not play Tragic Slip instead? It isn't that much work to turn it on, and 1 is significantly cheaper than 3 (and easier to cast, color-wise.)
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Oh, my username is the same on Xbox and Cockatrice, add me!
"For some of us, easier Magic is good Magic, but if you are one of those 'intelligent types,' feel free to play your Hive Mind mirrors. The rest of us are here for the fireworks." - Kent Ketter
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That is fair i suppose. Keep in mind you can pump your own hellkites ;]
^This... while auger spree is a good spot removal, you would run it only if you have x/5+ creatures on your 75. That way, even if you don't have any targets from your opp, you can still pump your own creature for that extra push... else, tragic slip would be better...
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Should we take Garruk out of our main and look to play more of something else?
RGBWHumanimatorWBGR
Modern:
BWGProject MeliraGWB
Commander:
UBWNo-Creature MeriekeWBU
RGUlasht's BrigadeGR
I've actually done this with my current list and it seems to be working out rather well. The only walker really worth md'ing right now is Garruk Relentless, at least in my opinion. Primal Hunter is awesome, but he skews the mana too far into Green. That being said, if you are already running a green-heavy variant with SRG and/or Wolfir Avenger, then I think Primal Hunter is overall better than Relentless for the matches you want him.
LotV can't effectively be a mb walker right now specifically because of the number of reanimator lists running around, but she's also not great against zombies or any GW lists running Loxodon Smiter. She's great against most of the control lists and the GoST tempo lists, so I have her in my sb for those situations.
One of the best cards I have been testing MD is Underworld Connections. I run it as a 2-of, alongside Rakdos's Return as a 2-of, and the 2 spells really compliment each other very well. Even in the aggro match-ups it is not a terrible card.
Looking at our decks, the majority of our removal spells(with the exception of an overloaded Mizzium Mortars or Bonfire) are 1-for-1's. We make up for this by running threats that are mostly 2-for-1's (Huntmaster/Thragtusk). Our goal is to grind our opponents out by trading 1-for-1 our removal for their threats and forcing them into trading 2-for-1 their removal for our threats. We can speed up this process by using Rakdos's Return to help strip remaining cards. Eventually, however, we will end up in top deck mode against our opponents. When we get to this point, we do not have anything to give us an edge. This is where Underworld Connections really shines. At the point in the game where both you and your opponent are basically living off of the top, Underworld Connections, much like Bob, or even BBE to a lesser extent, in the Modern Jund lists allows us to gain incremental advantage and pull ahead.
In my testing so far, every game that I have cast an unanswered Underworld Connections, I felt very far ahead. Like I said, it's not a card you necessarily want to be casting on turn 3 against aggressive decks, but once you have stabilized the board, Connections is still a great card to have to allow you to remain stable.
For reference, here is where my main board is currently sitting:
4 Blood Crypt
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Woodland Cemetery
4 Rootbound Crag
1 Dragonskull Summit
2 Evolving Wilds
1 Forest
1 Mountain
1 Swamp
2 Kessig Wolf Run
4 Huntmaster of the Fells
4 Thragtusk
3 Olivia Voldaren
Spells 25
2 Underworld Connections
3 Rakdos Keyrune
3 Dreadbore
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Ultimate Price
4 Pillar of Flame
3 Mizzium Mortars
2 Rakdos's Return
4 Farseek
Edit: One card I'm considering is Searing Spear. Having more instant speed removal options could be useful, plus the ability for spear to go to the dome when needed may be useful. Not sure where, or if, it would fit in the list, but it's on my list of cards to consider.
Have you seen the decklists of lists that were not placing highly? Did they contain strangleroot geists? How do you know it's been played, and it not placing?
How do you know the lists that contain SRG were utilizing him properly?
Really how many tournaments since the open have their been to judge?
I do admit, I am seeing surprisingly little zombie/MonoR lists on MTGO, which is what strangleroot geist base lists really excel vs.
I was expecting a zombie meta of about 30% and that clearly isnt close to what's happening.
If zombies goes down to about 10% of the meta, I think removal heavy + MD control hate is the way to go.
On mtgo Im 6-0 against MonoR so far lol
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As for "utilizing SRG properly", apparently there's something that you're doing that other people don't realize? Are you only using it to block or something? Somadelnocha was super gung-ho about Mana Bloom being the best card ever, and he was quite obviously wrong; green centric lists just weren't testing to be as strong from the looks of things. Bollskis was running a green heavy list but I don't know how well that's been doing recently. I kept his list as a test deck for the mirror, but myself and others don't like the deck as much as the current top lists.
RGBWHumanimatorWBGR
Modern:
BWGProject MeliraGWB
Commander:
UBWNo-Creature MeriekeWBU
RGUlasht's BrigadeGR
It's not that im just adament the card was good, my results have been showing that it was better than I speculated.. And its from situations I've been getting in that I didnt realize, not because my opponenets just shat the bucket
It has been doing faboulously against control and zombies, but really bad against G/W, Reanimator and tokens.
I've been playing mostly against control in the recent tournaments.
As for the top 8, maybe they have recognized the metagame to be shifting far away from zombies and hence geist might very well be a bad choice right now.
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I think with a 24 land deck we can't have too much of a top curve. Having at least 8 turn 3 plays is huge, and I have that with 3 Keyrune, 3 Avenger and 2 Connections. The 4 Farseek is mandatory and I actually think Avenger is better than Nighthawk at the moment due to Regeneration and interaction with Huntmaster, which is important. Plus, if they sweep you can flash it in after, which is handy.
Essentially this is what I believe the deck HAS to be:
4 Thragtusk
3 Olivia Voldaren
3 Wolfir Avenger
1 Garruk Relentless
3 Rakdos Keyrune
4 Farseek
4 Pillar of Flame
3 Dreadbore
2 Mizzium Mortars
2 Sever the Bloodline
2 Underworld Connections
1 Rakdos's Return
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Forest
2 Mountain
2 Kessig Wolf Run
4 Rootbound Crag
3 Woodland Cemetery
1 Dragonskull Summit
See: Sig
Also: Tentative board:
2 Slaughter Games
2 Deathrite Shaman
1 Rakdos' Return
1 Vraska, the Unseen
1 Rise from the Grave
2 Thundermaw Hellkite
2 Liliana of the Veil
1 Blasphemous Act
Against control, you take out the 4 Pillar, 3 Wolfir, 1 Mizzium Mortars, 1 ??? and bring in 2 Thundermaw, 3 Appetite, 2 Liliana, 1 Rakdos's Return, 1 Vraska.
Against Zombies you go -1 Rakdos's Return, -2 Underworld Connections for +2 Deathrite Shaman +1 Blasphemous Act
Against Mirror you go -3 Wolfir, for +1 Vraska, +2 Thundermaw Hellkite automatically. I think you also drop the 4 Pillars for 3 Appetite for Brains and 1 of...I'm not sure. Blasphemous Act? Liliana? 1 Of Slaugher Games? Thoughts on this one...?
And check out the super awesome reanimator tech (that matchup I need to work on...maybe tweak the board for it. We'll see i guess.)
Am I on the right track..?
Thanks Hero's of the Plane
Modern
-------------
xRxAffinityxRx
Yeah, I agree with this. I'm going to give Strangleroot a shot this Friday. It certainly changes the look of the deck. But I'll also have Vampiric Nighthawk and extra removal sitting in my deckbox so that I can make a quick change for next week should this not work out.
4 overgrown tomb
4 blood crypt
4 woodland cemetery
4 rootbound crag
2 kessig wolf run
2 ???
The last 2 spots should be either 2 swamp or 2 mountain, or even a 1/1 split if you feel that works better.
As for the last 2 spots in your main, garruk relentless has been testing very well for me lately. granted in my variant, I've gone down to 1 due to the fact I wanted to fit in other spells. He is very good against control and pretty decent against the GW decks, two decks that are fairly popular in my area.
Just some food for thought.
(246-174-26)
4 Strangleroot Geist
4 Wolfir Avenger
3 Olivia Voldaren
4 Huntmaster of the Fells
2 Thundermaw Hellkite
4 Thragtusk
Sorceries
4 Farseek
4 Pillar of Flame
2 Sever the Bloodline
2 Bonfire of the Damned
2 Dreadbore
4 Blood Crypt
2 Kessig Wolf Run
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Rootbound Crag
3 Woodland Cemetery
2 Mountain
This was the list that I won the last tournament with (went 7-1)...
Played against 1 Jund, 2 esper control, 1 bant enchantment agro (horrible matchup but got lucky), 2 bant control, 1 reanimator, 1 zombie.
Weakness of the deck:
G/W. You either needs to get faster than them or have lots of effecient removal. My list is slower and lacks the necessary quick removal to consistantly remove their threats. Instants speed removal is especially helpful. 4/4 is the magic number that blanks my list (smiter).
Rakdos Keyrunes.
Tokens.
Hexproof (although Id say this is true for the vast majority of jund lists)
Mana consistancy. I drew very well in the torunament, but playing online recently have sometimes needed mana.
CHANGES:
Would put 2x abrupt decay main and a 3rd sever the bloodline main, probably take out a huntmaster (anything SRG and Wolfir Avenger is weak to huntmaster is also weak to).
I would also move 2x pillar of flames to sideboard.
Abrupt decay minimizes a little weakness to G/W agro , Tokens and Bant enchantment and mizzium mortars is just too hard to overload in my list.
Also kills problematic key runes and detention spheres.
It's mana is also much easier to cast in the green version of the deck than dreadbore.
Tamiyo is just such a ***** to deal with I refer to play any less than 2 dreadbore main tho.
Zombies is a fine matchup so the pillar loss (for instant speed removal) G1 shouldn't hurt that bad.
I would altar the mana base a bit so can use evolving wilds to fix for red/green mana depending on the contents on the opening hand. Not too many turn 1 plays that this should effect, nor am I struggling for mana around turn 4 very often... Fixing is more the issue.
Note:
I Don't recommend this list unless zombies/control are the big players in the meta. If zombies takes the back burner, Im liking the creature light, keyrune, removal list better. Think it's more well rounded against the "fringe' strategies, despite having noticeably worse zombies/MonoR matchup (imo a slightly worse control matchup unless you mainboard a lot of control hate)
The hidden advantage strangleroot geist version has over the other versions is to punish inconsistency. It puts a much faster clock on your opponents if they stumble on lands/stabilizing, while still having the flexibility to hate on a lot of decks post board.
Against control, if you get a fast start it is common to draw out a detention sphere or two on your lowly creatures which allows them a lot less removal for your bigger/serious threats that youd prefer not to get sphered.
Against the "other jund" version, Jace is frequently -2ing instead of +1ing vs the strangleroot gesit version. Increases the efficacy of dreadbore.
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I realised right away I needed more green. I thought I was short on red but I THINK i'm ok...I'll try out a bit more and see but with Keyrune the emphasis is on need green so thanks.
Garruk I'm going to try out and see. That 1 slot is a ***** to find but I love the rest of my list. Has been quite good for me in testing so far but I really want to crunch out crunching in a couple of days.
Thanks Hero's of the Plane
Modern
-------------
xRxAffinityxRx
You were misinterpreting what I was saying with that statement, which is this: if you're looking to play a consistent long game, all while keeping the "nutdraw" possibly live, Mana Bloom as a 2-of was better in testing than the full set of Farseeks, on the principal of playing more actual spells than most average Jund lists. I'd go so far as to say that if you wanted to play less than 3 Farseeks in your build, that Mana Bloom would be an acceptable substitute.
Onto other things, though!
4 Blood Crypt
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Dragonskull Summit
4 Woodland Cemetery
4 Rootbound Crag
2 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Swamp
1 Forest
Spells
1 Rakdos Keyrune
2 Underworld Connections
3 Dreadbore
2 Rakdos's Return
2 Sever the Bloodline
3 Farseek
2 Golgari Charm
2 Bonfire of the Damned
2 Pillar of Flame
4 Huntmaster of the Fells
3 Vampire Nighthawk
3 Thragtusk
2 Deadbridge Goliath
3 Olivia Voldaren
2 Thundermaw Hellkite
A recent idea has been to keep all four Pillars in the SB, and play the Deathrite Shamans MD, but I play against enough Zombie decks to still warrant them MD. Personally, I loved having 3 Underworld Connections, and want to find room MD for it, though it could find a spot in the SB. 3 Farseek is the most I'd want to play in a deck that definitively gets to the late game, and occasionally needs every single top deck to be live.
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"For some of us, easier Magic is good Magic, but if you are one of those 'intelligent types,' feel free to play your Hive Mind mirrors. The rest of us are here for the fireworks." - Kent Ketter
Playing in Type 2...BGRJundHearted
Also FWIW, It's a clearly better list against american mid-range thats popping up too.
But yeah the green/red mana tension is an issue with the deck
Last Updated 02/07/24
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As for the board, i have 1 green source, a **** tonne of black and red so maybe its good to have it like this...
14/12/12 ... thoughts on this ratio?
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4 Thragtusk
4 Huntmaster of the Fells
4 Farseek
4 Pillar of Flame
3 Dreadbore
2 Olivia Voldaren
2 Rakdos Keyrune
2 Garruk Relentless
2 Sever the Bloodline
2 Bonfire of the Damned
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Mizzium Mortars
1 Underworld Connections
That leaves me 3 slots. I want to use them for some amount of the following cards:
Vampire Nighthawk - Would be a 3 of.
Wolfir Avenger - Would be a 3 of.
Rakdos's Return - Would probably only be a 1 of, leaving 2 slots for something else.
Deathrite Shaman - Would be a 3 of.
Murder - Would probably be a 3 of, maybe a 2 of + one RR.
What do people think I should include? Meta is mostly control/other Jund/Junk Tokens/RWU Geist.dec
If that's mostly what your local meta is, I think some of the normal jund staples are no longer needed. Obviously you want to be good against zombies but if the lions share of your meta is jund/tokens/control/Raka midrange, you can surely trim pillar of flame for example since it's actively bad versus most of those decks.
Regardless, RR is excellent against most of those archetypes so that seems like an auto include. deathrite shaman doesn't seem like a particularly good maindeck card though I could see it's merits. Having some number of murders also seems optimal as instant speed interaction is slime. I think Ultimate price would probably be just as good though. Maybe 1/1. Meh.
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I do appreciate that the instant speed is nice of course.
Want to see me in action? Check out my stream! Currently broadcasting Boros Burn in Standard. Full archive available.
Want to play better magic? Come join us at diestoremoval.com
Oh, my username is the same on Xbox and Cockatrice, add me!
"For some of us, easier Magic is good Magic, but if you are one of those 'intelligent types,' feel free to play your Hive Mind mirrors. The rest of us are here for the fireworks." - Kent Ketter
Playing in Type 2...BGRJundHearted
1st place GPT Seattle
1st place GPT Anaheim
^This... while auger spree is a good spot removal, you would run it only if you have x/5+ creatures on your 75. That way, even if you don't have any targets from your opp, you can still pump your own creature for that extra push... else, tragic slip would be better...