RIPs aren't that great against CoCo. It does more harm to us than to them. Their combo isn't graveyard dependent and they also trim on combo pieces and go for the value plan with Tireless Tracker, Courser of Kruphix and the like.
My plan against them is to bring in 2 Angels, 1 Surgical and 2 Dispels. For that I cut 1 Search for Azcanta, 1 Mana Leak, 1 Negate, 1 Knot, 1 Timely Reinforcements. I let 2 Dispels for their 4 CoCos. They typically bring some sort of GY hate, usually Ooze, so Knot gets extra bad. Leak is really tough to make it effective because with so many dorks they can play around it easily (specially since we'll be pathing them ASAP). Timely produces little value. Both the lifegain and the bodies are pretty much worthless. Search for Azcanta is debatable since it helps you dig but at the same time doesn't help you that much in the early game because you are so mana tight.
Good luck on converting to Legacy. I would if I had a scene around me. If I were you I wouldn't give up on Modern just yet. I'm betting money that we'll get Counterspell on MH1 and it will help a lot our deck.
I'm more of the opinion at this point that War of the sparks spoilers and Modern Horizon spoilers can't come fast enough. It's very comparable to childlike anticipation of Christmas.
I agree. I need to rub it in the faces of my friends if Counterspell is back. Many others online are saying that it's a shoo-in, so I hope they are not letting me down.
I bought a playset of Counterspell from Jace's spellbook. To add to that I also bought a playset of Baleful Strix and Shardless Agents. My body is ready.
Oddly enough I keep winning against burn and tron and losing against things like spirits, phoenix, humans, infinite coco combo type decks. And Ad Nauseum, I really hate Ad Naus.
My tip against Spirits and Coco Combo is to not play around the Collected Company itself too much. Most times I lost because I respected it too much and got punished really hard for that. Try to soul read them and see if they have it or not. Then go for an aggressive play to swing the game into your favor. I bring in the Angels post sideboard so that I clog the board. It's tough to find an opening to tap out for it but you can put yourself in a situation where you have a Path/Dispel in your hand to back up "tapping out" for the Angel.
Humans it's slightly more difficult in my experience because of Meddling Mage and Freebooter. If you're struggling against all these creature heavy decks I suggest you add a Cataclysmic Gearhulk to your sideboard. It's a sweeper they're not expecting and they won't call it with Meddling Mage.
Ad Nauseam one of my plans against it is mana denial. Try to counter their mana rocks and FoR them out of existence. Runed Halo is really good here and against Phoenix if you can make room for it. Damping Sphere isn't incredible vs Ad Nauseam and Phoenix but it's ok. Against Ad Nauseam it can make their combo turn way difficult and probably fizzle. Phoenix can definitely play around it but doing so buys you so much time that you'll probably get them because of that. Against both the Surgical Extractions are great.
What matchup would Mentor help? None that I can think of. The bad matchups seem to be Tron (especially if they win the die roll) and Burn. I might try 2 Dampening Spheres in the sb just to try and shore up the sb game where I'm on the draw. Plus it's another good card vs Storm and Phoenix. If I wanted an early creature, I'd go with Thing in the Ice. But that just doesn't seem worth the slots.
In Modern Mentor is just a bad Geist of Saint Traft. For the Tron matchup my plan is go "tempo" style. I bring in 2 GoST, 2 Damping Sphere, 2 Stony Silence. With my 2 Main Cliques and Snaps, I just go ham on killing them while leaving mana up to counter their counter play. It's really tricky but you kinda have to since they have inevitability.
I agree. I'm on board with everything else DaveJacinto said. In fact, he may be a brother from another mother, lol.
But Hymn to Tourach shouldn't be in. I think Wrench Mind is the extent of how powerful a "Hymn" effect should be or possibly a bit more strong.
LOL! Thanks man.
I was a bit out of touch with reality with the Hymn thing now that I think of it. I think the Gerrard's Verdict or similar effect would be the go to BB: Discard two.
The random aspect of Hymn just adds a lot of non-games to the equation. Sorry for suggesting that.
I voted for the #2. Sometimes I feel extra aggravated by the linearity of the format. On the other hand, my LGS has a pretty decent metagame that fluctuates just the right amount to keep it fresh and interesting.
Even though I'm enjoying most of the games, playing UW, I really feel that I'm putting myself at a disadvantage on purpose for playing something I want to. Modern isn't perfect but it's good enough. I'm still scared of the disparity of the power of the format "pillars". I still think that the U pillar is way weaker than the rest.
Considering that the format is fine at the moment I would just do a couple of things to make it, in my perspective better:
1. Unban Stoneforge Mystic, Preordain and Green Sun's Zenith
2. Print on Horizons the following cards: Counterspell, Containment Priest, Flametongue Kavu, Shardless Agent, Baleful Strix and probably Hymn to Tourach and Daze.
I really want to try using 4x Disrupting Shoal and a Monastery Mentor or 2. I kind of traded my deck in frustration though... I'm on Tron for the time being, but I already miss UW even though I'm winning a lot more and much faster.
Don't get me started on Mentor... It's my favorite card that never got the chance to be good in Modern. UW is amazing!!!! You shouldn't have traded it away. It's definitely a deck that will only get better in the future and it surely rewards persistence. I got a bit frustrated after a couple of events and moved back to GDS... All it took me was one league to change my mind. I feel way more comfortable playing UW now. It has been ~9 months of only playing this deck.
I don't think so, I'm not so susceptible to confirmation bias; I've had enough situations come up in the past already where logic knot is a brick, most often when you go colonnade into island and curse yourself for playing knot over leak. Or when your opponent is on maindeck relic of progenitus, gaddock teeg, or when bad players think it's appropriate to bring RIP in against you. I'm sure you've come across all of these scenarios as well. Logic knot might be for you if feeling like a genius 1% of the time is more important than not having a dead card some percent of the time.
No one is denying that Knot is a mediocre counterspell, but the number of times it rots in your hand is also dependent on the fact that the rest of your counter suite is suboptimal. The typical suite is 1 Snare, 1/2 Knots, 0/1 Leaks, 1 Negate.
With this configuration, there's a somewhat high chance that the 1st counter you'll need is a Knot and that you'll fail to do it because you haven't met the requirements for it to be any good. On the other hand, if you're playing 4 Counterspells and 1 Knot, since CS is the most generic counter there is, you can navigate the game in such a way that you diminish the Knot's downside.
Anyway you can dislike it all you want. I hate both Knot and Leak. I hate to play them and I lost countless games that I feel I shouldn't, just because they aren't stellar in the late game and, in the case of Knot, sometimes mediocre in the early game. I'll definitely be playing 4 CS and some number of Snares. If there's room I'll fit in a couple of Knots and move the Negates to sideboard and burn my Mana Leaks at the fireplace.
PS: I just ordered a playset of the Jace spellbook ones because the frame looks really nice and it's one of my favorite arts for the card. I only wish they don't screw me over by printing it with an even cooler art that will make me want to let go of the awesome frame these have.
Playing logic knots in addition to counterspell are fine if you think you need plenty of countermagic, but not until you've got the 4th counterspell. Playing around spell snare is way too cute. Firstly because the vast majority of decks you'll be up against won't be playing any spell snares and secondly because spell snare has other high value targets against us.
It's too early to say that. But on paper having a couple of Knots won't be that big of a deal. I'm currently playing 5 counters + 5th removal spell. It's really easy to find space for the 4 Counterspells, 1-2 Knots and 1-2 Snares.
I've been playing GQ since I picked up the deck because I wanted to beat tron big time. To do that I almost always played Crucible, sometimes on the maindeck others out of the board.
It has happened a bigger number of times that I'd like to admit, that I'd get completly screwed out of playing my mana intensive spells like Absorb, Supreme Verdict, etc... because I just had too many colorless sources. To add to this issue. I've played recently against ponza and got my white mana completely annihilated and I felt I had 1 too few basic plains.
Because of this I readjusted my sideboard plan against tron with the inclusion of 2 Damping Spheres and adding the second Geist of Saint Traft. With this change, I played against tron only twice and I didn't miss the GQ and the Geist, as expected was amazing. I managed to win 3rd game with 2 minutes on the clock starting in. The Damping Spheres haven't been stelar but it slows them down enough if you can present a clock and they also hoze other matchups like Phoenix, Storm, Elves, Ad Nauseam, Amulet...
On Counterspell... I'll definately play 4 CS main, in place of Mana Leak, Logic Knot, Negate and Condemn. I'll keep my 1of Spell Snare and probably up its count to 2 on the main. (It's probably one of the best counters in modern and will probably be even more so because of Counterspell). On the sideboard I'll play the 2 Dispel and 1/2 Negates. That will probably be it. I totally think we deserve it and this is the time to get it.
Again, I would give you constructive criticism, but I don't really have any -- this list seems perfectly reasonable. I guess my only complaint would be that maybe you should cut the GQ since you're playing an Absorb?
Maybe play a 2nd Sphere instead of the 2nd Purge, since BGx brings in Nissa?
The GQ has the potential to cause awkward hands. I had to GQ a non-zero amount of times, specially because of the double W spells, absorb being the most demanding one. The thing is that FR isn't fast enough against Tron.
The 2nd Sphere could really be a smart inclusion. I have a problem with it being 3cmc and sorcery speed but hitting Nissa on the GBx matchups instead of just LoTV is a big deal. Sphere is something that I tend to cut often when sideboard so it's a tricky decision. I'll give it a try on my testing on MTGO.
I’m partial to being in the “three mana counters seem bad” group in modern. Absorb also seems awkward with FoR but maybe I’m wrong?
@DaveJacinto
I can agree that 4 cryptics can create some clunky hands, I might try cutting one and going back to a snare with Phoenix being so popular. Also, care to share your list?
Having 2 Dspheres has been nice. Most people expect one. Sometimes the second catches people by surprise. I also personally don’t just like relying on Teferi tuck. Cutting one and playing another clique main isn’t a horrible idea though.
This is the list I'm currently thinking about taking to GP Bilbao.
Feel free to dissect it or ask for any specific plan. I used to be on 2 Cliques main and I loved it... The reason I changed it was because locally Tron, BGx and UWx went down significantly while Phoenix, Burn and GDS went up.
So I ended up cutting my Crucible of Worlds from the SB for a second Purge, switch Clique for the Blessed Alliance and cutting one Hieroglyphic for an Absorb.
I actually just took the condemn/oust slot out for a serum visions, but maybe I just have too many cantrips now. I do like spell snare and usually play one copy. I've been siding Teferi out vs burn, but Cindervines has got me a couple times so maybe I should keep him in?
Teferi isn't great... But Cindervines is such a beating that I'm not really sure what the best strategy should be. I usually bring the Angels in and sideout some of the high CMC cards. Between Jaces, Teferi and CC we should have some cuts. I also cut the Azcanta.
Having too much cantrips is something I really dislike. I often see myself drawing into air and with the format as it is it's something we can't afford to do.
Been a follower on here for awhile but don’t post much. Thought I’d share a list for feedback and discussion. I’ve been on this deck forever and have played so many iterations and tried just about everything in flex slots. This is currently what I have settled on.
I don’t play oust (or condemn) and haven’t for awhile. Path plus an extra cheap counter has always felt “good enough” so I don’t need the extra cheap removal.
On that note, I have been playing BA lately over maindeck Timely and it has been great. While it isn’t “spot” removal it has so many applications right now I don’t know if I wouldn’t play it. I’ve noticed it’s power just with simple things like having GDS player gain the life, killing shadow and then having them Sac an angler. Or against affinity having a way to deal with champion that isn’t a board wipe.
Your list is quite stock. Like you mentioned you are cutting the 5th removal for the 6th Cantrip which is something that I'm not that into. The 4th CC seems too much. The spell is great but we can get our hands clogged with expensive cards. I'm currently playing 5 non-CC counters and 3 MD lifegain spells (1 Timely, 1 Absorb and 1 BA). That's kinda of a meta call since I have too many Burn-like decks around.
Been a follower on here for awhile but don’t post much. Thought I’d share a list for feedback and discussion. I’ve been on this deck forever and have played so many iterations and tried just about everything in flex slots. This is currently what I have settled on.
I don’t play oust (or condemn) and haven’t for awhile. Path plus an extra cheap counter has always felt “good enough” so I don’t need the extra cheap removal.
On that note, I have been playing BA lately over maindeck Timely and it has been great. While it isn’t “spot” removal it has so many applications right now I don’t know if I wouldn’t play it. I’ve noticed it’s power just with simple things like having GDS player gain the life, killing shadow and then having them Sac an angler. Or against affinity having a way to deal with champion that isn’t a board wipe.
I think your list looks fine, but it leads me to a few questions for everyone.
Firstly, how many of you are on only 1 Azcanta? I've found it to be essential in finding Terminus on time, and great in mirrors. I play 2.
How do you feel about 1 Absorb? I've been loving it so far, played in a few events and did well (in both UW and UWx).
Why are people still on a mainboard Verdict? I used to play it, but I realised that I'm playing Terminus because Verdict is pretty bad right now. Any thoughts on cutting it or maybe playing a Settle if you want?
How many of you are on mainboard DSpheres, and how many do you play? I like to play 1, but it's been a very long time since I played 2 main.
I've been playing a 1/1 split of Oust/Condemn and it's been fine. I'm thinking about Alliance main as well, since I haven't seen Humans in weeks at my LGS, and we regularly get 20+ people per FNM.
Absorb has been great for me. I always enjoyed playing 5 wipes... Been changing from Verdict to Settle depending whether Dredge is around or if GDS is around. DSphere is an obligatory 1of, probably a 2of. This would depend if your meta has too many Tron, BGx, UWx .
I've been away from the archtype since the Humans takeover that occured last year. Now it's becoming more appealing to come back to play GDS but I've missed the latest developments on the deck.
Can someone explain to me the pros and cons of the SV/Opt/Looting/Bauble/TScour splits? There is hardly any consensus and I find it interesting to see everyone's PoVs on the matter. Personally I'm not a fan of SV at all so I didn't play it back then, but what about the rest? Is looting just a better TScour? Is Looting the TScour 5+? Do we really need to play Bauble? How many should we play? The full playset or just 3 like many do?
Looting is worse than scour in most spots because it nets you -1 card in hand, whereas scour is card neutral. The copies that we run are there to help maximise the chances of a turn 2 Angler. The other reason you might run 2 Lootings is when you have Leyline of the Void in your sideboard. Leyline is not favored over surgical at the moment, but if you do run them, you want to be able to discard them later.
I am a big advocate of the full 4 Thought Scour. Card is just great.
Mishra's Bauble gives multiple benefits to this deck and should be run as a 3-4 of. On the first few turns it allows you to power out angler, targeting your opponent gives you more information for resolving your Thoughtseizes, targeting yourself allows you to psuedo-scry for your street wraith draws and lastly you can hold them as Revolt enablers for your Fatal Pushes.
Serum Visions is favored over Opt because it helps to sculpt your draws in a more controlled manor. It also allows you to access the two scryed cards via street wraith. If you do not want visions in your deck, I suggest maxing out on scour and baubles with at least 1-2 lootings.
My personal split is 1x Faithless Looting, 2x Serum Visions, 3x Mishra's Bauble and 4x Thought Scour. I have found it to be a good mix.
Thanks a lot for your insight. I reckon that Looting is net card disadvantage but at the same type it can act as virtual card advantage. Being able to pitch extra Pushes against UW/Titanshift/Tron while digging deeper than most of the cantrips sounds really good to me. I never played with the card in this deck before but when I saw it it made perfect sense to me. It's still a Dark Ritual with added card selection which is appealing.
After pondering the Pros and Cons you mentioned I'd start off testing with 4 TS, 3 Bauble, 2 Looting, 1 Opt. The norm has being SV over Opt if it comes to that but I really dislike the card. It plays really strangely with fetch lands and it almost always felt clunky.
My plan against them is to bring in 2 Angels, 1 Surgical and 2 Dispels. For that I cut 1 Search for Azcanta, 1 Mana Leak, 1 Negate, 1 Knot, 1 Timely Reinforcements. I let 2 Dispels for their 4 CoCos. They typically bring some sort of GY hate, usually Ooze, so Knot gets extra bad. Leak is really tough to make it effective because with so many dorks they can play around it easily (specially since we'll be pathing them ASAP). Timely produces little value. Both the lifegain and the bodies are pretty much worthless. Search for Azcanta is debatable since it helps you dig but at the same time doesn't help you that much in the early game because you are so mana tight.
Good luck on converting to Legacy. I would if I had a scene around me. If I were you I wouldn't give up on Modern just yet. I'm betting money that we'll get Counterspell on MH1 and it will help a lot our deck.
Humans it's slightly more difficult in my experience because of Meddling Mage and Freebooter. If you're struggling against all these creature heavy decks I suggest you add a Cataclysmic Gearhulk to your sideboard. It's a sweeper they're not expecting and they won't call it with Meddling Mage.
Ad Nauseam one of my plans against it is mana denial. Try to counter their mana rocks and FoR them out of existence. Runed Halo is really good here and against Phoenix if you can make room for it. Damping Sphere isn't incredible vs Ad Nauseam and Phoenix but it's ok. Against Ad Nauseam it can make their combo turn way difficult and probably fizzle. Phoenix can definitely play around it but doing so buys you so much time that you'll probably get them because of that. Against both the Surgical Extractions are great.
I was a bit out of touch with reality with the Hymn thing now that I think of it. I think the Gerrard's Verdict or similar effect would be the go to BB: Discard two.
The random aspect of Hymn just adds a lot of non-games to the equation. Sorry for suggesting that.
Even though I'm enjoying most of the games, playing UW, I really feel that I'm putting myself at a disadvantage on purpose for playing something I want to. Modern isn't perfect but it's good enough. I'm still scared of the disparity of the power of the format "pillars". I still think that the U pillar is way weaker than the rest.
Considering that the format is fine at the moment I would just do a couple of things to make it, in my perspective better:
1. Unban Stoneforge Mystic, Preordain and Green Sun's Zenith
2. Print on Horizons the following cards: Counterspell, Containment Priest, Flametongue Kavu, Shardless Agent, Baleful Strix and probably Hymn to Tourach and Daze.
With this configuration, there's a somewhat high chance that the 1st counter you'll need is a Knot and that you'll fail to do it because you haven't met the requirements for it to be any good. On the other hand, if you're playing 4 Counterspells and 1 Knot, since CS is the most generic counter there is, you can navigate the game in such a way that you diminish the Knot's downside.
Anyway you can dislike it all you want. I hate both Knot and Leak. I hate to play them and I lost countless games that I feel I shouldn't, just because they aren't stellar in the late game and, in the case of Knot, sometimes mediocre in the early game. I'll definitely be playing 4 CS and some number of Snares. If there's room I'll fit in a couple of Knots and move the Negates to sideboard and burn my Mana Leaks at the fireplace.
PS: I just ordered a playset of the Jace spellbook ones because the frame looks really nice and it's one of my favorite arts for the card. I only wish they don't screw me over by printing it with an even cooler art that will make me want to let go of the awesome frame these have.
It has happened a bigger number of times that I'd like to admit, that I'd get completly screwed out of playing my mana intensive spells like Absorb, Supreme Verdict, etc... because I just had too many colorless sources. To add to this issue. I've played recently against ponza and got my white mana completely annihilated and I felt I had 1 too few basic plains.
Because of this I readjusted my sideboard plan against tron with the inclusion of 2 Damping Spheres and adding the second Geist of Saint Traft. With this change, I played against tron only twice and I didn't miss the GQ and the Geist, as expected was amazing. I managed to win 3rd game with 2 minutes on the clock starting in. The Damping Spheres haven't been stelar but it slows them down enough if you can present a clock and they also hoze other matchups like Phoenix, Storm, Elves, Ad Nauseam, Amulet...
On Counterspell... I'll definately play 4 CS main, in place of Mana Leak, Logic Knot, Negate and Condemn. I'll keep my 1of Spell Snare and probably up its count to 2 on the main. (It's probably one of the best counters in modern and will probably be even more so because of Counterspell). On the sideboard I'll play the 2 Dispel and 1/2 Negates. That will probably be it. I totally think we deserve it and this is the time to get it.
The 2nd Sphere could really be a smart inclusion. I have a problem with it being 3cmc and sorcery speed but hitting Nissa on the GBx matchups instead of just LoTV is a big deal. Sphere is something that I tend to cut often when sideboard so it's a tricky decision. I'll give it a try on my testing on MTGO.
4 Celestial Colonnade
4 Field of Ruin
4 Flooded Strand
1 Ghost Quarter
2 Glacial Fortress
2 Hallowed Fountain
6 Island
2 Plains
Planeswalkers (5):
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Teferi, Hero of Dominaria
Creatures (3):
2 Snapcaster Mage
1 Vendilion Clique
Removal (7):
4 Path to Exile
1 Condemn
1 Blessed Alliance
1 Detention Sphere
1 Hieroglyphic Illumination
4 Opt
Counterspells (8):
1 Absorb
1 Logic Knot
1 Mana Leak
1 Negate
1 Spell Snare
3 Cryptic Command
Board wipes (5):
1 Supreme Verdict
4 Terminus
Other spells (2):
1 Timely Reinforcements
1 Search for Azcanta
1 Baneslayer Angel
1 Vendillion Clique
2 Celestial Purge
2 Dispel
1 Geist of Saint Traft
1 Lyra Dawnbringer
1 Negate
2 Rest in Peace
2 Stony Silence
1 Settle the Wreckage
1 Surgical Extraction
So I ended up cutting my Crucible of Worlds from the SB for a second Purge, switch Clique for the Blessed Alliance and cutting one Hieroglyphic for an Absorb.
Having too much cantrips is something I really dislike. I often see myself drawing into air and with the format as it is it's something we can't afford to do. Your list is quite stock. Like you mentioned you are cutting the 5th removal for the 6th Cantrip which is something that I'm not that into. The 4th CC seems too much. The spell is great but we can get our hands clogged with expensive cards. I'm currently playing 5 non-CC counters and 3 MD lifegain spells (1 Timely, 1 Absorb and 1 BA). That's kinda of a meta call since I have too many Burn-like decks around.
Absorb has been great for me. I always enjoyed playing 5 wipes... Been changing from Verdict to Settle depending whether Dredge is around or if GDS is around. DSphere is an obligatory 1of, probably a 2of. This would depend if your meta has too many Tron, BGx, UWx .
After pondering the Pros and Cons you mentioned I'd start off testing with 4 TS, 3 Bauble, 2 Looting, 1 Opt. The norm has being SV over Opt if it comes to that but I really dislike the card. It plays really strangely with fetch lands and it almost always felt clunky.