I'm gonna say some pretty heretical things, so please at least hear me out.
The deck has 2 major flaws:
1: Too many weak creatures
2: Mana flooding is very real.
I personally see Jace as the only reason to run this over GW at the present time, especially seeing as to how Retreat to Coralhelm sucks right now, and has sucked for a while. With that in mind, I think that the following is the list I'd run at FNM:
I've been playing Knightfall for about two years now. I always felt that there were too many 3 drops in the original Knightfall list, resulting in a need to recover tempo in the later stages of the game. Especially when the Bird/Hierarch gets pushed or bolted, one can end up losing a lot of tempo or get mana screwed and lose the game this way.
Also I felt that Path to Exile is not a good card in most of game 1's. I felt that having only 7 1 mana drops and the option to path an opposing Goblin Guide were not enough options on turn 1. Especially against opponents that do not interact early with your board, say Storm, Ad Nauseam or Dredge, I wondered what I could improve in the deckbuilding. Also I really disliked the Scavening Ooze plus Path to Exile interaction. What good is an Ooze when you can not sink your mana into it?
This led me to experimenting with Lightning Bolt and Wild Nacatl in a Knight of the Reliquary shell. Lightning Bolt, in contrast to Path to Exile, can go to the face and speed up your Plan B beat down up a turn. The only way I saw to smooth the mana requirements were to trim on cards that costUWx, namely the creature match up allstar Reflector Mage and the disruptive element Spell Queller. By losing Spell Queller we weaken our match up against combo a lot, but since we include a faster clock in the form of Wild Nacatl we can still snatch a win.
Opening up on red also means you can include Fiery Justice in your sideboard. This card feels really unfair when it connects with Humans or Counters Company. It can also be used against Death's Shadow decks, when played accordingly.
If you're on this route you may as well as go all the way and play big zoo over bant knightfall. You can even splash blue, but those lists are best placed in the zoo thread.
The uptick of Jeskai is what's making me move back up to 4 copies of Voice, it's interesting how we came to different conclusions. If you find him early against them then it becomes so much easier to beat them. Pre-Jace, Jeskai control was a cake walk, now that they have Secure the Wastes and PW's, the macthup has become harder, but that's where 3x Gaddock Teeg really shines out of the board. That and Dromoka's Commands/Avacyn. I think that matchup is all about the 2 drops and forcing them to rely on Path instead of Bolt, which is what Big Zoo does well.
The recent announcements of going back to Ravinca, again, should bode well for us. The first guilds out the gate are selesnya and boros, so hopefully we can pick up some more flexible board cards and hopefully an aggressive 2-3 drop - and dare I say another playable Wild Nacatl! I'm excited!
Yeah, I do run 2 in the board. I try to drop them before the hypothetical wrath turn, but they die to pretty much everything. Considering their more relevant cards are at 4 and 5 mana, trying to go a more "tempo" route with Teeg, early drops and Molten Rain might be effective.
I don't know if you watched last weeks SCG event, but Mardu Pyromancer won the finals against Jeskai Control with Moon in the main deck, and it pretty much won him game 1. Blood Moon may be worth including again if control decks get greedy with their mana base. I personally never board less than 3 Gaddock Teegs because the card is auto-win if he isn't dealt with, and I almost always want the 2nd one for when they kill the first. He hoses so many decks that it's busted.
Yesterday's tournament at my LGS ... With the rise in popularity of Teferi, Hero of Dominaria, people is playing different variants of UWx control decks. And honestly, those match-ups feel hopeless. I played once against straight up UW (with Teferi, Jace and Terminus) and once against UWR (more of the same). I didn't get to attack once in all of my games. Those decks are so dense in answers against creature strategies (which makes sense when people is trying to beat Humans) that I feel we have almost no chances at winning. I guess I could go up in numbers of cards like Voice of Resurgence and "grindy" planeswalkers in the sideboard (I've even considered running 1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant in the main along with the 4x BBE). But that probably makes us even slower and clunkier against all the unfair decks against which we don't have much hopes anyway.
Maybe going up to 23 lands and adding a second manland might be reasonable?
Gaddock. Teeg. The Kithkin Hobbit is a house against them. That and Voice + fast clock. At the end of the day though it's still a bad matchup, their deck literally exists to eat decks like Zoo for breakfast.
Today I learned that KCI can off through a Thalia... whoops. Went 2-2 with my list at FNM due to a major punt against KCI. On my turn 2 I played thalia and then on turn 3 I played a Scooze and Goyf. Instead of playing Goyf I should have kept Scooze mana up which would have just won me the game. Oh well, hopefully never make that mistake again. Then because of that I had to play the last round and didn't draw a red source against my sultai midrange opponent until turn 10 in game 1 and then game 2 I drew 9 lands and 2 noble hierarchs to accompany a whole 3 non mana cards. Was great. Happens. Damping Sphere is legit though.
I've thought about this in the past, but then I always ask myself why? Zoo is an aggressive deck by nature with disruptive creatures for value, and lingering souls is neither of the two which makes it clash with the essence of the deck.
Went 3-0-1 last night (should really be 4-0...) with my list above. I beat Ad Nauseam, Infect, and Abzan Midrange. Literally had the win against storm but my opponent wouldn't scoop to me after taking 90% of the match time and him dead on board in turns. Tilting.
That Ross Merriam list looks very oddly put together. Copter in 1 drop Zoo seems great, but I'm sure that if you're topping off with only 3 3drops then it needs to be Knight or 2 BBE. Also, needs more Ghor-Clan.
Played something really similar to Zulander's this past weekend at a 40 shock event.
2nd seed going into top 8. Proceeded to lose to affinity.
Congrats! I feel your pain though, sometimes that just happens.
I went 3-1 last week losing to Jeskai Control and beating Merfolk, Affinity, and Abzan midrange. I was annoyed by losing to Jeskai because it's normally a good matchup, but when they draw the good UW cards and not the bad red cards it can be problematic.
With about 6 weeks out from GP Vegas, here's the current list I'm running:
I'm testing Shalai out for the U/x control decks, and it has some fringe use against combo decks in making them go off twice. I'll let you guys know how it goes. I will be taking a month off from magic though in about a week so I'm not sure how much testing I'll actually get done.
I have been wondering about the dampening sphere vs blood moon sideboard slot. I get that dampening sphere helps in two ways, taxing spells on turn two and fights Tron lands and Eldrazi temple a turn before "natural" tron is assembled. My main issue is that blood moon can fight valakut and mana greedy decks where sphere can't, increasing the value of moon in the sideboard. On the other side taxing storm and control decks is nice but it doesn't apply any pressure. Running Thalia or Teeg are just better options I think against storm and control decks. Keeping the pressure on and slowing down their hand is the best path to victory for zoo decks. I know it can be meta dependent but just running blind into a meta I feel like running moon, Thalia or Teeg are a better choice. Trying to get a read from other zoo players on sphere's role in the sideboard and what people have noticed?
If you have a ton of Valakut in your meta than Moon is definitely the way to go. Otherwise I would say sphere trumps thalia and moon, but not Teeg, only because Teeg stops wrath effects as well. Being able to turn two a hate effect against Tron on the play is huuuuge, and you can only do that with Moon if you had a turn 1 dork.
Karn was decent when I played him. I played him against BW Eldrazi Bears and he was just terrible, they kept processeing the cards I exiled with Karn and then kept blinking the tokens I would make. I played Karn against my ponza opponent but I already had the win, so there wasn't any relevent things I learned from him last night other than I want my planeswalker to be able to kill something, so I may go back to running a Domri Rade again.
I've been searching around and this seems to be the thread for any Zoo variant, am I mistaken?
Anyways, let's see if I can get the Bushwhacker Zoo players to show up and share their updated lists!
I appreciate Zoo lists in any shapes and sizes! Good job and wish you continued success! I personally am not a fan of small zoo at the moment so I'll defer to people who are currently running them.
The deck has 2 major flaws:
1: Too many weak creatures
2: Mana flooding is very real.
I personally see Jace as the only reason to run this over GW at the present time, especially seeing as to how Retreat to Coralhelm sucks right now, and has sucked for a while. With that in mind, I think that the following is the list I'd run at FNM:
2 Birds of Paradise
4 Voice of Resurgence
2 Scavenging Ooze
2 Selfless Spirit
2 Smuggler's Copter
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Spell Queller
2 Tireless Tracker
2 Courser of Kruphix
3 path to exile
4 Collected Company
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
22 lands
If you're on this route you may as well as go all the way and play big zoo over bant knightfall. You can even splash blue, but those lists are best placed in the zoo thread.
https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/2018-spring-announcement-day-2018-05-18
I don't know if you watched last weeks SCG event, but Mardu Pyromancer won the finals against Jeskai Control with Moon in the main deck, and it pretty much won him game 1. Blood Moon may be worth including again if control decks get greedy with their mana base. I personally never board less than 3 Gaddock Teegs because the card is auto-win if he isn't dealt with, and I almost always want the 2nd one for when they kill the first. He hoses so many decks that it's busted.
Gaddock. Teeg. The Kithkin Hobbit is a house against them. That and Voice + fast clock. At the end of the day though it's still a bad matchup, their deck literally exists to eat decks like Zoo for breakfast.
I've thought about this in the past, but then I always ask myself why? Zoo is an aggressive deck by nature with disruptive creatures for value, and lingering souls is neither of the two which makes it clash with the essence of the deck.
That Ross Merriam list looks very oddly put together. Copter in 1 drop Zoo seems great, but I'm sure that if you're topping off with only 3 3drops then it needs to be Knight or 2 BBE. Also, needs more Ghor-Clan.
Congrats!
Congrats! I feel your pain though, sometimes that just happens.
I went 3-1 last week losing to Jeskai Control and beating Merfolk, Affinity, and Abzan midrange. I was annoyed by losing to Jeskai because it's normally a good matchup, but when they draw the good UW cards and not the bad red cards it can be problematic.
With about 6 weeks out from GP Vegas, here's the current list I'm running:
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Voice of Resurgence
2 Scavenging Ooze
4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Loxodon Smiter
4 Bloodbraid Elf
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Path to Exile
2 Lightning Helix
1 Dromoka's Command
1 Domri Rade
4 Windswept Heath
2 Arid Mesa
2 Stomping Ground
2 Sacred Foundry
1 Temple Garden
2 Forest
1 Plains
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Archangel Avacyn
3 Gaddock Teeg
1 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
1 Shalai, Voice of Plenty
2 Kozilek's Return
2 Dromoka's Command
2 Damping Sphere
1 Stony Silence
1 Ancient Grudge
1 Grafdigger's Cage
I'm testing Shalai out for the U/x control decks, and it has some fringe use against combo decks in making them go off twice. I'll let you guys know how it goes. I will be taking a month off from magic though in about a week so I'm not sure how much testing I'll actually get done.
If you have a ton of Valakut in your meta than Moon is definitely the way to go. Otherwise I would say sphere trumps thalia and moon, but not Teeg, only because Teeg stops wrath effects as well. Being able to turn two a hate effect against Tron on the play is huuuuge, and you can only do that with Moon if you had a turn 1 dork.
Tron
UW Control
Jeskai
Jund
Abzan
Humans
Pretty much
Any midrange deck
Any fliers.dec
Any deck with wrath effects.
2 Gaddock Teeg
1 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
1 Qasali Pridemage
2 Kozilek's Return
2 Dromoka's Command
1 Stony Silence
1 Ancient Grudge
1 Grafdigger's Cage
3 Damping Sphere
Karn was decent when I played him. I played him against BW Eldrazi Bears and he was just terrible, they kept processeing the cards I exiled with Karn and then kept blinking the tokens I would make. I played Karn against my ponza opponent but I already had the win, so there wasn't any relevent things I learned from him last night other than I want my planeswalker to be able to kill something, so I may go back to running a Domri Rade again.
I appreciate Zoo lists in any shapes and sizes! Good job and wish you continued success! I personally am not a fan of small zoo at the moment so I'll defer to people who are currently running them.