On think twice/Remand/insert 2 drop, I just keep coming back to augur of bolas. He's an all star with his digging power that consistently gets you to an ultimatum. Think twice is too weak. Remand is still a strong possibility but competes with mana leak, Running too much permission can lead to a problem on its own since it's easy to stick an early threat and beat face without playing into a counter.
Never needed aotg or fallout for faeries, just let them burn themselves out while you electrolyze and keep their tokens from getting out of hand. When they overextend to overcome your disruption by tapping out then you play cruel ultimatum
Urborg necessary for cruel ultimatum? It helps but it's not a necessity no, I was talking about consistently hitting a t1 IOK and a t2 Geth's verdict while also being consistent with the other spells in the early game
The only reason I don't play anything else over cruel ultimatum as a "big finisher" is because it doesn't matter what your matchup is when using it. Do you want to drop a nicol bolas against tron when they could possibly just drop a karn and exile him the next turn? A titan when uwr can just field wipe? Olivia when a combo deck doesn't care about her at all (or oven worse just getting pathed by a zoo deck)? Cruel ultimatum bypasses all of these situations and is more likely to not only get you out of a bind regardless of your opponent, but it disrupts them enough while putting you at a much better place than any other finisher would on average. Outside of thoughtseize and countermagic, ultimatum itself is the most difficult to interact with on the stack and on resolve. Control decks want to maximize their interactive options while minimizing their opponent's.
The other win cons
Burn: Between Lighting Bolt, Electrolyze, and possibly geth's verdict(if you're willing to optimize your mana base for it), they immediately threaten to impact your opponent's life total. At the same time they're great removal spells, which means they're really flexible in the formulation of your gameplan according to the matchup/situation. Once again opposing removal can't interact with them and they have an immediate impact on the board.
Snapcaster Beats: This guy in conjunction with burn is where the crazy card advantage/utility/flexibility is at. Opens up more options for you while restricting the options of your opponent. Between snapcaster beats with eot burn spells being flash backed (and add in the spot discard) is another reason why uw/x control decks shouldn't be winning against cruel control. They have to generally overextend into dealing with your pressure and tempo backed up by spot discard, opening up opportunities to land an ultimatum and basically win the game
Tar Pit Beats: Backed by spot discard/ultimatum to bypass removal while providing free reach and mana fixing, another card that's difficult to interact with in the right hands and furthers the gameplan.
In regards to frank karsten's article and the mana base, here is what I did with his information
14 t1 red sources for lightning bolt
14 t1 black sources for IOK
20 blue sources for cc (falls a little short but sunken ruins helps to up the consistency) on t4 and higher than 90% consistent for mana leak ect on t2
19 Black sources for t2 geth's verdict (falls short by one black source but helped by sunken ruins and urborg for higher consistency) and over 90% consistent with a t4 damnation
Why is this important?
Say you're up against a fast deck be it fair or unfair and you have a starting hand of drowned catacomb and a steam vents on the play. You're sitting on a hand of 2 IOKS and you're actually set back a turn in this regard since you can't play IOK on turn 1. Being able to otherwise play IOK on t1 with a fetch instead of a drowned catacomb is totally worth it and actually saves you life even if you have to burn yourself. Why? Because you just stripped them of their turn 1 play or their gameplan was significantly disrupted. If it were a wild nacatl you just saved yourself a couple turns of getting beat in the face by a 3/3, I value shocking myself for 1 or even 3 to prevent that from happening, this would also free up the option to hold my mana open for a t2 mana leak (otherwise I would have to choose between one or the other by t2, potentially making IOK a dead card). Situations similar to this are proverbial if you're not playing a consistent deck against a deck that's built to maximize their efficiency. You have to fight consistency with your own consistency in this format. You trade a little bit of your life total for flexibility which in the long run preserves your life total moreso since you're not falling behind to an increasingly out of control board presence that restricts your ability to play x.
Another reason why 7-8 fetches are useful is the ability to bypass blood moon. With consistent IOK mana, I can force them to discard it (while even gathering the proper information that I'm up against a blood moon deck, which is important) while fetching basics at the same time to disregard it (being able to fetch basics also plays a role in minimizing the damage taken when playing a greedy mana base)
@tilzinger: I'm not really suggesting Cancel. I didn't really make it clear I guess, lol. I also don't like Remand that much. I dunno. I cut Mana Leak entirely. I have a very experimental build that I'm going to test tomorrow that includes white.
I'm thinking boarding out creatures game 2 is probably a wise decision as my opponents will probably keep their removal in order to deal with the Nighthawks. This, of course, blanks their removal and puts them in a rough spot. I have no idea how this will play out but I will definitely post a report tomorrow night or Friday. I'm curious to see how Esper Charm works out. I've always loved that card in Cruel Control. Any feedback before tomorrow evening is appreciated, of course
Based on your mana base, you're better off running damnation instead of aotg, but even then you're a couple black sources short on casting it on t4
CC won't be getting cast on t4
Your turn one plays won't be cast on t1 consistently
ect
Vampire nighthawk? That card is completely modern unplayable.
The only white card I can justify in this list would be esper charm
For black spot removal, I think you're always better off running edicts than anything else (terminate, doom blade, ect) since they bypass hexproof and protection effects, it's especially important against tron and infect.
We have devour flesh, geth's verdict, tribute to hunger and far // away
D flesh is meh, we have the backup gameplan of playing a counter burn game just like uwr with eot electrolyze, bolts, snapcaster/tar pit beats and imo the lifegain is very relevant.
Far // away and tribute are good in terms of raw power but that 3cmc cost is huge, electrolyze and snapcaster (into bolt, iok, snare) fill the 3 drop slot already. Also they are do nothing's against a lot of the unfair decks.
My preference is geth's verdict, the 1 damage dealt is relevant even if it seems miniscule, plus it comes with an edict effect. The one damage isn't much against a mill or UR storm deck for example, but it's better to have the 1 damage over the nothing that comes with terminate/dismember/gftt ect. The extra few points of damage netted from geth's verdict over other black spot removal feeds more into the backup counterburn gameplan. The only downside is the mana restriction, but I get around it by running 19-20 black sources with a couple of unique lands that aggressively fix mana (sunken ruins and urborg).
I used to, was a pet card of mine, there are two comparable cards to bsz; Forbidden Alchemy and Cruel Ultimatum
I prefer alchemy since it's always better in the earlier game, I would rather dig four deep than draw 2 on t5.
On t7 + I would always rather just have a cruel ultimatum
The only time bsz would practically be more effective than either is on t6, I just prefer the flexibility and power level of the other 2. Draw spells with flashback are underplayed in this format imo, especially with spot discard, lili, and the inherent flexibility they give you when paired with reactionary instants at (or around) the same cmc
UWR and other control variants should be easy imo, they can't handle the spot discard, the eot snapcaster harassment, and cruel ultimatum all at the same time. Just familiarize yourself moreso with the mu and it should be an easy win
Against Affinity I think we have a slight advantage at least, matchup familiarity is key though.
I just want to stress the importance of reliably disrupting your opponent's gameplan in the first few turns. Spell Snare and/or IOK are a must alongside lightning bolt, they are both universally strong against the field and help pave the way for an ultimatum. Personally, I prefer IOK since it gives you information and helps you form your gameplan while it also deals with way more problematic cards than snare, also enables some more flexibility with the bounce mode of cc. Snare is better if you can't afford 8 fetches since it's easier on the mana base (when taking subsequent turns into consideration, the explanation would be a long write-up), and it's better in some scenarios (like your opponent just playing in top deck mode).
I was messing around with it, it's not too stellar. Courser of kruphix, caryatid, master of waves, and lots of other creatures are very big. This format allows for slow and big creatures too, I'm coming from a hiatus due to playing modern a lot and wanted to give standard a go so anything that resembles lightning bolt sounded tempting. Another reason I'm cutting lightning strike/dreadbore is because I want to stay on curve after thoughtseize, being able to cast strike or syncopate on t2 AFTER thoughtseize is too much of a volatile liability mana-wise in this format so I changed it up a bit to run smoother by playing ratchet bomb and devour flesh instead of dreadbore and lightning strike. There is a bit of a long winded thought-process behind card-choice/eval but it's going to take a while for me to explain them all. In the meantime, I'm gonna whore out this article again
To start, D flesh is unconditional in that it's an edict, so we won't have to worry about it being a dead removal spell (ultimate price against specters and reckoners, lightning strike against x/4s, or doom blades against D Demons ect). Another practical/common occurrence would be using against opposing removal in response to save keranos from deicide, or multiple specters from D spheres and bile blights. There is also the rare occurence of buying myself a couple turns against burn. A couple downsides are that it doesn't do very much against esper and burn, gives your opponent life, and also isn't what you want to see against a field of multiple creatures.
Ratchet bomb over dreadbore: Since it can take care of troublesome enchantments like D sphere, chain to the rocks, and connections while being way better than dreadbore against aggro decks and a much needed out to pack rat. Since d flesh is replacing lightning strike, I don't have to worry about fat creatures so much either so I'm cool with maining ratchet bomb. Can make for a bad topdeck though
Top all that off with how much smoother the deck runs due to their casting cost and it's clear how the pros outweight the cons imo
From my perspective, grixis got a huge boost with just a couple cards form JOU (temple of ephiphany and keranos)
We're fighting mono blue, mono black devotion, mono black aggro, esper, bg/x constellation, and RW burn so I'm tuning my post-board gameplan to meet these matchups. Trying to keep the gameplan consistent with multiples of cross-applicable cards, still need to playtest more to find out which match-ups need the most work, right now I think it's burn while I'm pretty confident against Esper, MBD, and mud
Quick update on the brews, the "cruel control" version can be decent, but again just another bad esper control in this format, thought I could capitalize on synergy but it's too volatile
The keranos devotion idea has promise from playing around with it, I learned that we need a t1 play and thoughtseize is the best t1 play we have. Naturally it doesn't jive well with frostburn weird if you want to cast thoughtseize on t1 (need 14 untapped black sources
\
I think mystical teachings is an out dated card, it's not a very impactful move on t4 (as you said) for this format in place of damnation, snappy, and cc. It also requires you to pack in a lot of silver bullets that are good in some match-ups but dead/not cross-apllicable enough making them a liability to draw into early on. This is why I prefer universally disruptive cheap cards like Bolt, IOK, geth's verdict, mana leak and repeal, these 2 cmc spells naturally pair well with think twice giving you flexibility and the ability to adapt your gameplan for the later turns.
Feast would require 19 black sources, can't run it with dictate/dissolve reliably unless you want to run a playset of dimir guildgate. With so many cipt lands you won't be able to do anything before you get killed.
Master of the feast would call for something completely different, seems like a tough card to break
Basically a keranos deck that wants him active, haven't played with it too much yet but it's fun. It has a midrangey angle that controls the board with my own presence with jace, keranos, and specter generating card advantage on their own
Standard/watered down version of cruel control, gameplan is to play a draw-go game with dictate of kruphix and then penalize the opponent for drawing cards with Brain Maggot, Fate Unraveler, and Rakdos's return. Opportunity can force the opponent to take damage for lethal with unravelers in play. My own creatures also survive Extinguish all Hope, while unraveler attacks the revelation decks/mbd meta.
Really just trying to find some synergy/tech for grixis and good reason for going grixis over esper or mbd, the main reasons being a form of synergy unique to these colors. Now that we can't complain (as much) about mana requirements as well as some new additions to our card pool, it's going to be fun to brainstorm again
Steam augury costs 1 more than forbidden alchemy which is huge. It conflicts with cc, snapcaster mage, and damnation in terms of mana cost and also gives your opponent to put the relevant cards (according to the situation) into the bin.
Alchemy comes down a turn sooner, you can choose any card from the top four of your library and it has flashback. "Topdeck" modes become a lot more comfortable with the sheer digging power/flash back ability that is forbidden alchemy.
Props for being honest and posting your results, what was the list you played and how did the matches transpire. What were some of the main reasons for losing? Issues with mana? Dead cards? wrong sideboarding options? How would you change it to win next time?
md repeal and cryptic command are good answers to leyline. Try replacing a think twice, remand, or a shadow of doubt. Just gotta re-work the game plan into bouncing it before an ultimatum, or with another counter in hand. Leyline can be a pain but it does water down the opposition
On coalition relic, if you're trying to ramp into an ultimatum, you're pretty much just playing a bad version of tron while watering down your ability to disrupt your opponent in the early game
Updated
3 Augur of Bolas
3 Snapcaster Mage
Instants (19)
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Mana Leak
3 Geth's Verdict
4 Electrolyze
4 Cryptic Command
Sorcery (9)
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Damnation
3 Cruel Ultimatum
4 Creeping Tar Pit
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Marsh Flats
4 Steam Vents
1 Blood Crypt
1 Watery Grave
1 Sunken Ruins
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3 Swamp
2 Island
1 Mountain
4 Thoughtseize
3 Countersquall
4 Stone Rain
1 Jace, Architect of Thought
1 Batterskull
2 Ratchet Bomb
Recent 4-0 UB teachings list, 4th one down (taken from the teachings thread)
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/mtgo-standings/modern-daily-2014-07-12
This one is interesting, I would personally just run the full set of seize and IOK but that's just me
The other win cons
Burn: Between Lighting Bolt, Electrolyze, and possibly geth's verdict(if you're willing to optimize your mana base for it), they immediately threaten to impact your opponent's life total. At the same time they're great removal spells, which means they're really flexible in the formulation of your gameplan according to the matchup/situation. Once again opposing removal can't interact with them and they have an immediate impact on the board.
Snapcaster Beats: This guy in conjunction with burn is where the crazy card advantage/utility/flexibility is at. Opens up more options for you while restricting the options of your opponent. Between snapcaster beats with eot burn spells being flash backed (and add in the spot discard) is another reason why uw/x control decks shouldn't be winning against cruel control. They have to generally overextend into dealing with your pressure and tempo backed up by spot discard, opening up opportunities to land an ultimatum and basically win the game
Tar Pit Beats: Backed by spot discard/ultimatum to bypass removal while providing free reach and mana fixing, another card that's difficult to interact with in the right hands and furthers the gameplan.
In regards to frank karsten's article and the mana base, here is what I did with his information
4 Creeping Tar Pit
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Marsh Flats
4 Steam Vents
1 Blood Crypt
1 Watery Grave
1 Sunken Ruins
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3 Swamp
2 Island
1 Mountatin
14 t1 red sources for lightning bolt
14 t1 black sources for IOK
20 blue sources for cc (falls a little short but sunken ruins helps to up the consistency) on t4 and higher than 90% consistent for mana leak ect on t2
19 Black sources for t2 geth's verdict (falls short by one black source but helped by sunken ruins and urborg for higher consistency) and over 90% consistent with a t4 damnation
Why is this important?
Say you're up against a fast deck be it fair or unfair and you have a starting hand of drowned catacomb and a steam vents on the play. You're sitting on a hand of 2 IOKS and you're actually set back a turn in this regard since you can't play IOK on turn 1. Being able to otherwise play IOK on t1 with a fetch instead of a drowned catacomb is totally worth it and actually saves you life even if you have to burn yourself. Why? Because you just stripped them of their turn 1 play or their gameplan was significantly disrupted. If it were a wild nacatl you just saved yourself a couple turns of getting beat in the face by a 3/3, I value shocking myself for 1 or even 3 to prevent that from happening, this would also free up the option to hold my mana open for a t2 mana leak (otherwise I would have to choose between one or the other by t2, potentially making IOK a dead card). Situations similar to this are proverbial if you're not playing a consistent deck against a deck that's built to maximize their efficiency. You have to fight consistency with your own consistency in this format. You trade a little bit of your life total for flexibility which in the long run preserves your life total moreso since you're not falling behind to an increasingly out of control board presence that restricts your ability to play x.
Another reason why 7-8 fetches are useful is the ability to bypass blood moon. With consistent IOK mana, I can force them to discard it (while even gathering the proper information that I'm up against a blood moon deck, which is important) while fetching basics at the same time to disregard it (being able to fetch basics also plays a role in minimizing the damage taken when playing a greedy mana base)
That mana base is pretty bad, you won't be able to stay on curve/will be time-walking yourself at least once every match due to not meeting the mana intensity requirements of your spells. Check this article out http://www.channelfireball.com/articles/frank-analysis-how-many-colored-mana-sources-do-you-need-to-consistently-cast-your-spells/
Based on your mana base, you're better off running damnation instead of aotg, but even then you're a couple black sources short on casting it on t4
CC won't be getting cast on t4
Your turn one plays won't be cast on t1 consistently
ect
Vampire nighthawk? That card is completely modern unplayable.
The only white card I can justify in this list would be esper charm
Sorry, but honestly you're just gonna get wrecked
We have devour flesh, geth's verdict, tribute to hunger and far // away
D flesh is meh, we have the backup gameplan of playing a counter burn game just like uwr with eot electrolyze, bolts, snapcaster/tar pit beats and imo the lifegain is very relevant.
Far // away and tribute are good in terms of raw power but that 3cmc cost is huge, electrolyze and snapcaster (into bolt, iok, snare) fill the 3 drop slot already. Also they are do nothing's against a lot of the unfair decks.
My preference is geth's verdict, the 1 damage dealt is relevant even if it seems miniscule, plus it comes with an edict effect. The one damage isn't much against a mill or UR storm deck for example, but it's better to have the 1 damage over the nothing that comes with terminate/dismember/gftt ect. The extra few points of damage netted from geth's verdict over other black spot removal feeds more into the backup counterburn gameplan. The only downside is the mana restriction, but I get around it by running 19-20 black sources with a couple of unique lands that aggressively fix mana (sunken ruins and urborg).
I prefer alchemy since it's always better in the earlier game, I would rather dig four deep than draw 2 on t5.
On t7 + I would always rather just have a cruel ultimatum
The only time bsz would practically be more effective than either is on t6, I just prefer the flexibility and power level of the other 2. Draw spells with flashback are underplayed in this format imo, especially with spot discard, lili, and the inherent flexibility they give you when paired with reactionary instants at (or around) the same cmc
Quick Update
3 Snapcaster Mage
Instants (21)
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Think Twice
3 Mana Leak
3 Geth's Verdict
1 Condescend
3 Electrolyze
1 Forbidden Alchemy
3 Cryptic Command
Sorcery (10)
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Damnation
3 Cruel Ultimatum
4 Creeping Tar Pit
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Marsh Flats
4 Steam Vents
1 Blood Crypt
1 Watery Grave
1 Sunken Ruins
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3 Swamp
2 Island
1 Mountain
4 Thoughtseize
3 Terminate
3 Countersquall
1 Rakdos Charm
1 Spellskite
3 Stone Rain
@badtoazt
UWR and other control variants should be easy imo, they can't handle the spot discard, the eot snapcaster harassment, and cruel ultimatum all at the same time. Just familiarize yourself moreso with the mu and it should be an easy win
Against Affinity I think we have a slight advantage at least, matchup familiarity is key though.
I just want to stress the importance of reliably disrupting your opponent's gameplan in the first few turns. Spell Snare and/or IOK are a must alongside lightning bolt, they are both universally strong against the field and help pave the way for an ultimatum. Personally, I prefer IOK since it gives you information and helps you form your gameplan while it also deals with way more problematic cards than snare, also enables some more flexibility with the bounce mode of cc. Snare is better if you can't afford 8 fetches since it's easier on the mana base (when taking subsequent turns into consideration, the explanation would be a long write-up), and it's better in some scenarios (like your opponent just playing in top deck mode).
To start, D flesh is unconditional in that it's an edict, so we won't have to worry about it being a dead removal spell (ultimate price against specters and reckoners, lightning strike against x/4s, or doom blades against D Demons ect). Another practical/common occurrence would be using against opposing removal in response to save keranos from deicide, or multiple specters from D spheres and bile blights. There is also the rare occurence of buying myself a couple turns against burn. A couple downsides are that it doesn't do very much against esper and burn, gives your opponent life, and also isn't what you want to see against a field of multiple creatures.
Ratchet bomb over dreadbore: Since it can take care of troublesome enchantments like D sphere, chain to the rocks, and connections while being way better than dreadbore against aggro decks and a much needed out to pack rat. Since d flesh is replacing lightning strike, I don't have to worry about fat creatures so much either so I'm cool with maining ratchet bomb. Can make for a bad topdeck though
Top all that off with how much smoother the deck runs due to their casting cost and it's clear how the pros outweight the cons imo
From my perspective, grixis got a huge boost with just a couple cards form JOU (temple of ephiphany and keranos)
4 Nightveil Specter
3 Keranos, God of Storms
Planeswalkers (3)
3 Ral Zarek
Instants (16)
4 Devour Flesh
3 Syncopate
3 Psychic Strike
3 Hero's Downfall
3 Opportunity
Artifacts (3)
3 Ratchet Bomb
4 Thoughtseize
1 Rakdos's Return
Lands (26)
4 Steam Vents
4 Watery Grave
4 Blood Crypt
3 Temple of Epiphany
2 Temple of Deceit
1 Temple of Malice
8 Swamp
4 Dispel
4 Negate
3 Rakdos's Return
3 Dimir Charm
1 Ratchet Bomb
Mana -
Black: 19
Blue: 13
Red: 12
We're fighting mono blue, mono black devotion, mono black aggro, esper, bg/x constellation, and RW burn so I'm tuning my post-board gameplan to meet these matchups. Trying to keep the gameplan consistent with multiples of cross-applicable cards, still need to playtest more to find out which match-ups need the most work, right now I think it's burn while I'm pretty confident against Esper, MBD, and mud
Burn: Dispel, Negate, Rakdos's Return
Esper: Dispel, Negate, Rakdos's Return
Aggro: Ratchet Bomb + Dimir Charm
MBD: Rakdos's Return, Dimir Charm
MUD: Ratchet Bomb, Dimir Charm
Constellation: Ratchet Bomb, Dimir Charm
The keranos devotion idea has promise from playing around with it, I learned that we need a t1 play and thoughtseize is the best t1 play we have. Naturally it doesn't jive well with frostburn weird if you want to cast thoughtseize on t1 (need 14 untapped black sources
\
4 Nightveil Specter
3 Keranos, God of Storms
Planeswalkers (3)
3 Ral Zarek
Instants (16)
4 Lightning Strike
3 Syncopate
3 Psychic Strike
3 Far // Away
3 Thoughtflare
Sorcery (8)
4 Thoughtseize
3 Dreadbore
1 Rakdos's Return
4 Steam Vents
4 Watery Grave
4 Blood Crypt
4 Temple of Epiphany
6 Swamp
2 Island
2 Mountain
4 Duress
3 Negate
3 Doom Blade
1 Mizzium Mortars
4 ?
Master of the feast would call for something completely different, seems like a tough card to break
4 Frostburn Weird
4 Nightveil Specter
3 Keranos, God of Storms
Planeswalkers (4)
4 Jace, Architect of Thought
Instants (18)
3 Syncopate
3 Izzet Charm
3 Lightning Strike
3 Far // Away
3 Psychic Strike
3 Thoughtflare
1 Rakdos's Return
Lands (26)
4 Blood Crypt
4 Steam Vents
4 Watery Grave
3 Temple of Epiphany
3 Temple of Deceit
4 Island
2 Swamp
2 Mountain
Basically a keranos deck that wants him active, haven't played with it too much yet but it's fun. It has a midrangey angle that controls the board with my own presence with jace, keranos, and specter generating card advantage on their own
4 Brain Maggot
3 Fate Unraveler
Enchantments (4)
4 Dictate of Kruphix
Instant (16)
4 Lightning Strike
3 Syncopate
3 Dissolve
3 Far // Away
3 Opportunity
3 Extinguish all hope
3 Rakdos's Return
Lands (27)
4 Blood Crypt
4 Steam Vents
4 Watery Grave
3 Temple of Epiphany
3 Temple of Deceit
5 Island
2 Swamp
2 Mountain
Standard/watered down version of cruel control, gameplan is to play a draw-go game with dictate of kruphix and then penalize the opponent for drawing cards with Brain Maggot, Fate Unraveler, and Rakdos's return. Opportunity can force the opponent to take damage for lethal with unravelers in play. My own creatures also survive Extinguish all Hope, while unraveler attacks the revelation decks/mbd meta.
Really just trying to find some synergy/tech for grixis and good reason for going grixis over esper or mbd, the main reasons being a form of synergy unique to these colors. Now that we can't complain (as much) about mana requirements as well as some new additions to our card pool, it's going to be fun to brainstorm again
Alchemy comes down a turn sooner, you can choose any card from the top four of your library and it has flashback. "Topdeck" modes become a lot more comfortable with the sheer digging power/flash back ability that is forbidden alchemy.
On coalition relic, if you're trying to ramp into an ultimatum, you're pretty much just playing a bad version of tron while watering down your ability to disrupt your opponent in the early game