My main problem with the list right now is it's really hard to justify cutting any of the creatures. They all serve their own disruption/beating purpose. There's a variety of dudes I wanna fit in (Imposing Sovereign, Serra Avenger, Kitchen Finks, maindeck Phyrexian Revoker, etc) but its so hard to find room. Grunt is basically a body/GY hate but he has fading. Who would you cut for him?
Imposing Sovereign is a sideboard card. 2 mana 2/1 on the floor with an ability that only hurts haste decks and (very slighty hurts) Twin is just not good enough for the mainboard.
Serra Avenger, as I've mentioned before, is downright underwhelming and has been subject to being sided out against almost all decks. She's no longer part of my build.
Kitchen Finks should be considered for every build, but I suggest you look at your meta first, if it's heavy on the aggro and affinity, you put them in, but in most other cases, it's just a persisting beater and is slowly losing relevance in the modern scene. (He'll always be good, but he's not as good as he was when Bloodbraid Elf was still a thing.
He doesn't have fading.
Show me your decklist and I'll see what can come out.
So i guess my thought is that leonin is fine from turns 1-6 especially if your GQ are backed up by TE and that running 4 of each makes that very resonable. Even post turn 6 you just pick your moment and be patient and you will still get plenty of value based on arbiter alone. You typically curve out at 3 (sometimes four for resto) so every 3 drop needs to be as high impact as possible. Blade spicer wins games, flickerwisp enables some of the real degenerate plays this deck makes, fiend hunter exiles dudes, crusader wins games, silverblade wins games and plays huge defence, mangara kills all the things, but aven mindcensor is often an easily removed and redudent piece on the board. The only time it shines is against decks like pod based ones that relay on searching and you flash in mindcensor to stop ot but in most othercases he gets sided out
There are very few matchups where you side him out.
ANY three colour builds, he stays in against. Affinity, Tron, Pod, Scapeshift.
Seriously, run MINIMUM of two of these guys, 3 is a really solid number.
I really like the idea of this deck, so I'm using it as a base, but just some quick thoughts from an addicted brewer:
1) Sculler + resto angel/vialed flickerwisp = 2 cards, 1 permanently. This seems pretty good, and perhaps warrants upping angel/sculler count.
2) Pontiff doesn't do both, it's choose one, so it seems kind of bad to me.
3) Our curve is too high for confidant
4) Lingering souls is a great card, but it can't be vialed, there's no trickiness with blink, and we don't really have the excess mana to use it as a sink.
5) I know you said this build is "more aggressive", and thus no thalia, but you have to keep in mind that thalia is basically timewalking certain decks, if not even better. Tempo is HUGE in aggressive decks because it gives you an extra jump towards finishing the game before they combo/stabilize/sweep.
*snip*
I really want to fit finks in there somewhere but I have a little bit of an unhealthy obsession with nighthawk, and the utility creatures are too powerful.
1) Sculler + Resto AND flickerwisp = 2 cards and the third under the Scullor. In all Black D&T builds, I'd run 4 Scullor.
2) Remember, it has the haunt ability.
3)Yeah, I'd never run Dark Confidant in a deck with so little lifegain, maybe in a build that has Knight of Meadowgrain or something like that.
4) You have to remember that this is a more aggressive build, and fliers are a super big help, especially if you manage to squeeze swords into it.
5) I completely agree with you on this point. If Thalia comes back in, Souls goes out however. It's that simple and I think it just depends on how non-creature heavy your meta is.
I have a real fundememtal question about the deck. Is Aven Mindcensor nessessary. So i understand it has been a core card and is a "redundent" effect to arbiter but it just feels so slow and the body so low impact. In legacy fetch lands are often saved till past turn 3 for thier shuffle effects for brainstorms and JtMS but in modern they are used right away amd i feel like i rarely get a mindcensor at a time it feels good. I see some list run restoration angel and Mindcensor but i wonder if it should be just resto and open two 3cc spots in the Deck. And maybe board 2 Censors against scape and pod decks?
In my opinion, past turn 4/5, Aven Mindcensor is actually better than Leonin Arbiter.
If they are playing 1 colour, Leonin Arbiter is better, vs two colour, I'm unsure, but vs three colour Aven Mindcensor is the BOMB. He's almost guarantee'd to go in for 2 every turn, he has flash, and the ability can't just be avoided.
However, at 3 mana and only being better than his counterpart past turn 4/5, I only run 3, as do many other builds.
Pontiff: This card is not in the Finks slot, as far as I'm concerned, it is in the ZP slot in this more aggressive build. The hilarious thing about Pontiff is that you can play it, then flicker it, giving you a net +2/+2 and your opponent's creatures -2/-2. It is a spendy play, but with a three-charge Vial, 4 lands in play, and a RA in hand it is not all that out of the question.
I really like your build, but you do realise that Orzhov Pontiff is a Choose ONE ability, right?
You either get to give their stuff -1/-1 OR your stuff +1/+1.
G1: 1 Land hand, but two aether vials along with 1 blade splicer, double path to exile and a Leonin Arbiter, it was a snap up.
It got a bit close when he went turn 1 Goblin Guide turn 2 Strangleroot Geist turn 3 wooly Thoctar, but in the end I make it all the way with Flickerwisps
G2: Keep 1 Land hand with 2 Aether Vials while I'm on the play. Manage to race him by running into BOTH of my sideboarded Kitchen Finks and Loxodon Smiter.
G3: See 1x Finks, see my Skylasher and make about a trillion Blade Splicer Tokens and just keep spanking in. Eventually, Gavony Township goes the rest of the way after he gains loads of life off the Vault Scourge and after he stops pulling Dispatch's out of his ass.
Had a friendly with a mono-white D&T after...THRASHED it. Absolutely wrecked. I still had 20 life by the end. Man, Loxodon Smiters are the ****.
Get paid this Thursday coming, so going to try and get my hands on at least 2 Horizon Canopy and 1 more Gavony Township.
Changes I've made for next week:
Fourth Thalia, Guardian of Thraben stays. I'm really unsure of where to go with this deck.
I don't even think it needs Noble Hierarch really. But I shall test it as we have a casual deck testing night coming up next week.
Nothing changed about the decklist for next time aside from the 3 new lands I mentioned earlier.
I've also slightly modified the sideboard to account for possible Robots. In goes Kataki, War's Wage. Out comes Back to Nature
t'Prodigy, Geralfs Messenger is a great suggestions but I'm a bit worried that it'll wreck havoc with my manabase. Both from a colour perspective (Lots of colourless mana producers and plains) and from a curve-perspective (less 2cmc cards). I know Aether Vial helps me out but I won't draw it every single game.
Would Inquisitor Exarch be preferable compared to Serra Avenger?
I've thought about using Isolated Chapels but during goldfishing I often encounter situations where I don't have a basic plain or Godless Shrine, which leads to tempo loss.
For the whole Inquisitor Exarch vs Serra Avenger fight, I'm not keen on...either of them, to be honest. I'm not really sure what else to suggest as they are the few cards that have synergy with D&T, but after playing with Serra Avenger , it was just a sponge for their Lightning Bolt, and that's ALL it was. Sure, there MAY be other things they want to kill, but as I've mentioned, it's ONLY amazing off of turn 1 Aether Vial. It's just straight up "meh" in ALL other situations.
Inquisitor Exarch, in my opinion is HIGHLY overrated. In all my iterations while running the Exarch, I found that in all situations, there was something else I would rather blink. Sure, it's nice vs Red Deck Wins, but that was the ONLY match-up I didn't sideboard him out after 3 nights of playing him.
There are indeed, most notably Dark confidant in the main and sin collector and zealous persecution in the side. If Thalia isn't good in the meta for whatever reason there is also lingering souls.
I'm not sure I understand his reasoning for main 2 discard spells when he has sculler.
I'm reasonably new to modern and D&T really sparked my interests. It seems like a fun and rewarding deck to play, suits my playstyle and is reasonably cheap compared to other Tier 1 / 2 decks.
After reading most of the primer I've come up with the following deck:
In my experience, Serra Avenger is just a 1-for-1. I play him, they remove him.
Sure, it's cute off of a turn 1 Aether Vial, but that's all it is, in all other situations, it's straight up unimpressive.
I get what you're saying with Bolt but I excluded it because I was afraid I wouldn't have enough creatures in MD to fight through removal, I guess I could probably replace Helix with bolt.
On Arbiter and fetches I get that there is some anti-synergy with the two, but using fetches and Trokair helps you dodge the symmetry of Boom. Likewise Arbiter helps turn GQ's into Strip Mines and Path becomes much better tempo. I don't know if cutting either of these is worth it.
What's the problem with the crusher? He's probably the biggest clock the deck has, is it because he lacks evasion?
As for crusher, I just don't feel he's really needed, especially in a deck trhat's almost never sad to see lands.
If you take him out, you could try out 2 manlands, this way, you're happy to see lands at pretty much ANY point of the game.
I get what you're saying with Bolt but I excluded it because I was afraid I wouldn't have enough creatures in MD to fight through removal, I guess I could probably replace Helix with bolt.
On Arbiter and fetches I get that there is some anti-synergy with the two, but using fetches and Trokair helps you dodge the symmetry of Boom. Likewise Arbiter helps turn GQ's into Strip Mines and Path becomes much better tempo. I don't know if cutting either of these is worth it.
What's the problem with the crusher? He's probably the biggest clock the deck has, is it because he lacks evasion?
I get the whole Boom tricks, I understand that it's awesome, but it's just too...cute...and too many tricks.
I'd prefer to see more flicker and Mangara come back in.
I also get the Path/Ghost Quarter synergy with Leonin Arbiter, I know that that's the main part of the deck. Don't take out those, I just think that you're running too many cute tricks that MAY work.
Sure, when they DO work, it'll be cool, but I think strengthening the actual point of the deck and having a really nice curve will help out a lot more than being able to come out ahead in a boom situation.
The pros I can see from Red Splash are additional methods to deny specific colors from greedier decks such as Jund or 4CC Gifts using Boom // Bust and Blood Moon As well as the possibility of being able to MD Burn to add more reach to the deck. I've been testing the deck out online and seems to perform pretty well, but I'm still messing around with the creature selection so if anyone has any suggestions I'd appreciate them.
You're in red and you're NOT running Lightning Bolt?? It's literally the best card in modern.
If you don't want to run it, I suggest going to another colour combo.
replace Lightning Helix with Bolt, especially when you have 3 Thalia's main.
Flagstones of Trokair AND Arid Mesa with 4 Leonin Arbiter in the main?
I'd suggest cutting either Leonin Arbiter tricks, or the fancy lands.
I get the whole Flagstones + Boom combination, but it's the Arbiter's WILL bite you in the ass as some point for your cuteness.
Imposing Sovereign is a sideboard card. 2 mana 2/1 on the floor with an ability that only hurts haste decks and (very slighty hurts) Twin is just not good enough for the mainboard.
Serra Avenger, as I've mentioned before, is downright underwhelming and has been subject to being sided out against almost all decks. She's no longer part of my build.
Phyrexian Revoker is a sideboard card again. Same reasoning as Imposing Sovereign, only it hurts different things.
Kitchen Finks should be considered for every build, but I suggest you look at your meta first, if it's heavy on the aggro and affinity, you put them in, but in most other cases, it's just a persisting beater and is slowly losing relevance in the modern scene. (He'll always be good, but he's not as good as he was when Bloodbraid Elf was still a thing.
He doesn't have fading.
Show me your decklist and I'll see what can come out.
There are very few matchups where you side him out.
ANY three colour builds, he stays in against. Affinity, Tron, Pod, Scapeshift.
Seriously, run MINIMUM of two of these guys, 3 is a really solid number.
In such an aggressive build, what do you think of Jotun Grunt?
1) Sculler + Resto AND flickerwisp = 2 cards and the third under the Scullor. In all Black D&T builds, I'd run 4 Scullor.
2) Remember, it has the haunt ability.
3)Yeah, I'd never run Dark Confidant in a deck with so little lifegain, maybe in a build that has Knight of Meadowgrain or something like that.
4) You have to remember that this is a more aggressive build, and fliers are a super big help, especially if you manage to squeeze swords into it.
5) I completely agree with you on this point. If Thalia comes back in, Souls goes out however. It's that simple and I think it just depends on how non-creature heavy your meta is.
In my opinion, past turn 4/5, Aven Mindcensor is actually better than Leonin Arbiter.
If they are playing 1 colour, Leonin Arbiter is better, vs two colour, I'm unsure, but vs three colour Aven Mindcensor is the BOMB. He's almost guarantee'd to go in for 2 every turn, he has flash, and the ability can't just be avoided.
However, at 3 mana and only being better than his counterpart past turn 4/5, I only run 3, as do many other builds.
I really like your build, but you do realise that Orzhov Pontiff is a Choose ONE ability, right?
You either get to give their stuff -1/-1 OR your stuff +1/+1.
My Decklist:
3x Dryad Militant
4x Leonin Arbiter
4x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
3x Scavenging Ooze
2x Restoration Angel
3x Blade Splicer
2x Mangara of Corondor
3x Flickerwisp
3x Aven Mindcensor
3x Loxodon Smiter
Partyfacts:
4x Aethervial
4x Path to Exile
Locations:
4x Razorverge Thicket
2x Sunpetal Grove
2x Brushland
1x Temple Gardens
3x Forest
3x Plains
2x Treetop Village
4x Ghost Quarter
1x Eiganjo Castle
1x Gavony Township
1x Renounce the Guilds
2x Mirran Crusader
1x Skylasher
1x Melira, Sylvok Outcast
2x Kitchen Finks
2x Gaddock Teeg
1x Spellskite
1x Engineered Explosives
2x Rest in Peace
1x Aura of Silence
1x Back to Nature
My games for the night:
Round 1: Naya Aggro
G1: 1 Land hand, but two aether vials along with 1 blade splicer, double path to exile and a Leonin Arbiter, it was a snap up.
It got a bit close when he went turn 1 Goblin Guide turn 2 Strangleroot Geist turn 3 wooly Thoctar, but in the end I make it all the way with Flickerwisps
I FORGOT TO SIDEBOARD GAAAHHHHHHHHHH
G2: I play a Leonin Arbiter, Ghost Quarter, Double Path to Exile and then about 20 flying dudes. EZ.
Round 2: UWR Control
G1: Thalia, Guardian of Thraben kicks some ass, along with double Loxodon Smiter. In the end, I kill him with Gavony Township.
Side in: Skylasher, 2x Kitchen Finks (to soak up removal)
Side out: 1x Aven Mindcensor, 1x Leonin Arbiter 2x Scavenging Ooze
G2: He keeps a two land hand. I open Leonin Arbiter and double Ghost Quarter *salutes* GG!
Round 3: Robots
G1: He goes double signal pest, Mox Opal, Vault Scourge and I see no removal.
Side in: Skylasher (his entire deck seems to be flying), 2x Kitchen Finks, Melira, Sylbok Outcast (I'm scared of Inkmoth Nexus
Side out: 3x Scavenging Ooze, 1x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
G2: Keep 1 Land hand with 2 Aether Vials while I'm on the play. Manage to race him by running into BOTH of my sideboarded Kitchen Finks and Loxodon Smiter.
Side In: Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
Side Out: Melira, Sylvok Outcast (he doesn't seem to be running them...hey, I'm not complaining)
G3: See 1x Finks, see my Skylasher and make about a trillion Blade Splicer Tokens and just keep spanking in. Eventually, Gavony Township goes the rest of the way after he gains loads of life off the Vault Scourge and after he stops pulling Dispatch's out of his ass.
Had a friendly with a mono-white D&T after...THRASHED it. Absolutely wrecked. I still had 20 life by the end. Man, Loxodon Smiters are the ****.
Get paid this Thursday coming, so going to try and get my hands on at least 2 Horizon Canopy and 1 more Gavony Township.
Changes I've made for next week:
Fourth Thalia, Guardian of Thraben stays. I'm really unsure of where to go with this deck.
I don't even think it needs Noble Hierarch really. But I shall test it as we have a casual deck testing night coming up next week.
Nothing changed about the decklist for next time aside from the 3 new lands I mentioned earlier.
I've also slightly modified the sideboard to account for possible Robots. In goes Kataki, War's Wage. Out comes Back to Nature
So, any suggestions??
For that 2 drop slot, you might want to try Knight of Meadowgrain or Epochrasite or Knight of the White Orchid.
For the whole Inquisitor Exarch vs Serra Avenger fight, I'm not keen on...either of them, to be honest. I'm not really sure what else to suggest as they are the few cards that have synergy with D&T, but after playing with Serra Avenger , it was just a sponge for their Lightning Bolt, and that's ALL it was. Sure, there MAY be other things they want to kill, but as I've mentioned, it's ONLY amazing off of turn 1 Aether Vial. It's just straight up "meh" in ALL other situations.
Inquisitor Exarch, in my opinion is HIGHLY overrated. In all my iterations while running the Exarch, I found that in all situations, there was something else I would rather blink. Sure, it's nice vs Red Deck Wins, but that was the ONLY match-up I didn't sideboard him out after 3 nights of playing him.
Yeah, I understand the not wanting to run Isolated Chapel. Most Green/White decks run Gavony Township and I've found that a good replacement for that in Black/White is Vault of the Archangel.
You wouldn't run Dark Confidant in a deck with 2 Restoration Angels and 4 Flickerwisp/Blade Splicer/2x Aven Mindcensor.
Zealous Persecution is AWESOME. Good suggestion, but I'm not sold on Sin Collector, or at least, not with 6 discard in the main already.
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben is good in every meta. She's the bossiest of bosses. The amount of games she wins me is unreal.
The extra 2 discard are probably for turn 1 in case of no aether vial, which is fine, if anything, I think 1 more would be best for his curve.
You might want to try putting the Kitchen Finks into the side for vs aggro/Red Deck Wins and completely cutting Serra Avenger and replacing them with 3x Geralf's Messenger and either 1 more Inquisition of Kozilek, 1 more Thalia, Guardian of Thraben or one more Aven Mindcensor.
In my experience, Serra Avenger is just a 1-for-1. I play him, they remove him.
Sure, it's cute off of a turn 1 Aether Vial, but that's all it is, in all other situations, it's straight up unimpressive.
Add 1x Shizo, Death's Storehouse and 1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth to your mana base.
You're in black, so you may want to look into Deathrite Shaman, elspecially with all the Ghost Quarters and Tectonic Edges you're throwing away.
With 4 Godless Shrines, I'd prefer to see Isolated Chapel over Fetid Heath/Caves of Koilos.
As for crusher, I just don't feel he's really needed, especially in a deck trhat's almost never sad to see lands.
If you take him out, you could try out 2 manlands, this way, you're happy to see lands at pretty much ANY point of the game.
I get the whole Boom tricks, I understand that it's awesome, but it's just too...cute...and too many tricks.
I'd prefer to see more flicker and Mangara come back in.
I also get the Path/Ghost Quarter synergy with Leonin Arbiter, I know that that's the main part of the deck. Don't take out those, I just think that you're running too many cute tricks that MAY work.
Sure, when they DO work, it'll be cool, but I think strengthening the actual point of the deck and having a really nice curve will help out a lot more than being able to come out ahead in a boom situation.
You're in red and you're NOT running Lightning Bolt?? It's literally the best card in modern.
If you don't want to run it, I suggest going to another colour combo.
replace Lightning Helix with Bolt, especially when you have 3 Thalia's main.
Flagstones of Trokair AND Arid Mesa with 4 Leonin Arbiter in the main?
I'd suggest cutting either Leonin Arbiter tricks, or the fancy lands.
I get the whole Flagstones + Boom combination, but it's the Arbiter's WILL bite you in the ass as some point for your cuteness.
I'd take out the Countryside Crusher and the Mask of Memory, up the Bolt count to 4 and possibly 3x Aven Mindcensor?? (I'm unsure about the Mindcensors)
Don't you mean...en-principle...