i've been testing against my friends melira pod deck. 4x cryptic is definitely what you want. sticking a GoST on 3 followed by a Cryptic on 4, every time, is usually the nuts.
IMHO (just my opinion, but I know a lot of you all are gonna strongly disagree with me, hehe fair enough, you have your beliefs too, as I have mine)
I really think 4 commands is a privilege that belongs more to the UW Midrange version (they earned it since they have a much more stable manabase to accommodate for the triple blue cost. Anyway, each deck has their strengths and weaknesses, we already have red for bolts and helixes and electrolyzes, perhaps it may be too greedy to tell our UW friends "I wanna have what you have too! 4 commands and even 4 tec edges!")
OR the mana base should be improved (I remembered Shouta's Eternal Command deck was also a 3 color deck, but check out how many basic islands he had (If I recalled correctly, it was 4), I may be wrong but I rationalized that as an adjustment made to accommodate the commands (Shouta don't punch me if I am wrong, I ain't as good as you are and I certainly can't read your mind haha, I am just guessing), then you would say shocklands, fountains and vents would do, but hey RDW and many fast aggro decks are around, perhaps simply fetching a basic island to help top up for the 3 blue is a safer way then excessively bolting yourself from shocks and fetches. I like the idea of mystic gate though :))
uhm i don't find it a problem, really. playing 4x remand and 3x electrolyze helps you to draw. in the very first turns you don't have bug threats to play anyways, the only one is geist. So i basically burn creatures and counter threats in the very first turns, and then start dropping mine. it never happened to be without any kind of threat by turn 4, btw.
what i am more worried about is that i left out a plains for that eiganjo and that's very bad because plains saves me from blood moon since it allowa me to play disenchant. Maybe i should take out that Mountain? or what? sometimes i hate those lands that enter tapped, so maybe i can take out that seachrome coast (no way i leave out colonnades since they are threats, and we have a few of them as fenrisian points out)
I understand and love both remand and electrolyzes for their added draw (in fact I play them both as 4 ofs and love it haha). And despite the low threat count, Geist himself is one when resolved is so hard to be dealt with, but Lili. damnation, verdict, and honestly IMO his biggest nightmare is to be plucked out by a turn 1 inquisition etc. still deals with him. I think where sphinx rev really comes in may be in the attrition games, a good textbook example is jund, if I get lucky I sneak in a Geist with tons of countermagic and spot removal as protection in my hand, but if not then we go back and forth with each other, one for one, until we both are low on bullets and Jund is relatively better at top-decking, I guess this is the moment where sphinx rev comes in, given this is most likely late game and we both have lots of lands, end of the jund player's turn, I cast a massive sphinx rev and BAM, the stalemate is over (unless the draws were all lands, well what do you know, sometimes crap happens :() and I take game. Where incremental advantage goes back and forth in attrition games, an explosive exponential advantage is simply one effective way to decide the victor.
As for seachrome coast, I can say that I wish that there was a UR scarland, and it'd be one of your best replacement for seachrome coast and even sulfur falls (ever drew an opening hand with great spells but 2 colonades and 1 sulfur fall, one word comes to mind "damn!" haha). Anyway, I doubt we can lose the colonnades, we don't have a UR manland that is comparable with the great colonnade, fairie conclave is no treetop village, so colonnade is likely to stay, and that means we got lots of UW lands (despite the fact that a bulk of them comes into play tap) and so you made the right choice to lose the coasts.
Hmm so if I did not see wrongly, that's 12 creatures and 4 manlands? Hmm just a question opened for everyone here: Without the mb Sphinx rev to help draw into bullets (creatures / manlands / burn etc.), wouldn't the threat density in this case be rather low? Afterall, we are not playing a pure control deck, we should want to be able to also do some consistent and considerable damage and win from there.
I mean I was thinking about this threat density issue when I saw Unwin's list, but when I saw sphinx rev, then I thought to myself "oh well, I guess that's fine then, he could just sphinx rev and draw into some creature or manland or more burn spells that may possibly in some cases win the game. Ok cool."
If you're worried about the 3 blue for cryptic just play Mystic Gate. Also, with most builds running more Fountains and Steam Vents than Foundries, the blue really shouldn't be an issue.
True, True, I agree, Mystic Gate is a good addition to adjust the mana base in order to accommodate 4 commands. Without which, I wouldn't be so confident as to say that the vents and fountains would suffice for 4 commands haha. But of course, perhaps some players are perhaps so much better at shuffling that land screw/flood is rarely an issue to them haha.
i played eiganjo castle in my patriot delver, and really, i used it just a couple of times. Since vendilion is legendary, too, i think it could be a little more useful in this build. I am gonna give it a try, leaving out a basic Plains.
and i agree with you guys about tectonic edge. i run it in 2x, with another 1x in SB, and they are enough. playing 3 colors is easy to go color screw.
still dunno if i should go 2x vendilion clique or 3x, and i am torn between the 2x and 4x cryptic command. i don't think lightning helix must be in 4x here, probably i am gonna drop a copy of it to add the third command.
Hmm I have been using 2 cliques, so far I think it is good enough, and haha lighter on the wallet than 3 or 4 of. Besides, angel can blink it to save it from spot removal/burn and recur it's ETB effect
I think helixes can be up to player's preference I saw some list playing 3. Electrolyzes too may also be very much player's preference (though some advocate it as a 4 of).
Some think path can even be played at 3 or even 2, but hmph when playing UWR Midrange, I still find an opponent's Tarmogoyf and just having red spells in my hand a rather disturbing situation.
No doubt about it, command is very very(emphasize again, I agree) very powerful (IMO it's power is almost like a creatureless/instant equivalent of the past jund's bbe). But it comes at a cost that I am concern of, 3 blue mana is not impossible, but may put some strain on a 3 color deck, I sure wouldn't want to have 2 or more commands in my hand with only 2 blue sources, so perhaps I would suggest a seemingly safer "half-way" approach, and just play 2 commands. If you really really want to maximize the upside exposure of command and play them as 4 of, then perhaps it may be good to consider if the mana base needs some adjustments to accommodate the cost of that power, not just to increase the consistency of being able to cast the commands without mana color problems but also it may mean having more basic islands to prevent taking excessive damage from blue shocks (since rdw and zoo and any fast aggro deck are lurking around)
Aggainst affinity, Arcbound Ravager must get countered or killed on the spot. Postboard i sideboard all counters out and board in removal, Stony Silence and Baneslayers. Another card that is very good against affinity is Hurkyl's Recall, but i prefer Engineered Explosives in that spot because Boolge and BW Tokens decks. About Vendilion Clique you are 100% right, it's very good creatue, it can give you information and it can be devastating for opponent. Next time i will try 2 Restoration Angel/ 2 Vendilion Clique and i think that thats better yes. I realy like Sphinx's Revelation but is slow for this deck, will test 2 Cryptic Commands in that spot. I think that Remand is more suitable for Delver builds, i played 4 Remands in this deck and it was fine if i have had a threat in play otherwise it was only Think Twice without flashback late game. I like Remand but I prefer Mana Leak in that spot. Counterflux is there for wining counter wars because it can't be countered. I was mana-screwed rarely mostly because stuck on 2 or 3 lands. My opponents were mana-screwed because of Tectonic Edges:D. Thx for suggestions.
Don't mind if I drop by and share a few of my opinions on your list I like the creature line up. However, just a few talking points.
4 Tec Edges: Hmm I personally find more than 2 colorless lands rather risky in 3 color decks (especially when you are running cryptics), so perhaps 2 is safer and would suffice for land d.
Eiganjo Castle: I only recently started playing it as a 1 of, and I'd never want to look back. In fact, I felt so silly for not putting it in earlier. Protects Geists and Cliques and "oh was that pyroclasm you cast, sorry geist is still on the board "
Remand: I started of with leaks, but after I gave remand a try, I am please with it. It works better in delver, but it is good enough in UWR Midrange. Often I find that, just a bit more time is still what I like to have in UWR Midrange, and just that bit of time and a draw would be what it takes to put the opponent behind and let me take the win.
MB 4 Counterflux: Hmm let's see, for combo? I'd love it against UR Storm, but this contender is fortunately (to some) and unfortunately (to others) less seen these days. Against other combo (ie. eggs, infect etc), I think cheaper countermagic is more effective since they become alive earlier. How about for control or countermagic war? Hmm I still would suggest cheaper countermagic, spell pierce is just U, spell snare at U hits almost every other commonly used countermagic (leak, remand and snapcaster, yes tiago himself hehe).
It opts for a a more control, less aggressive approach. I think the inclusion of Jace 4.0 is very interesting and I think it'll become clear in the next short while if he is indeed viable for Modern.
Hmm interesting, the deck operates on a more controlling level. Any idea on how it improves/affects the match-ups?
So after all the deck tweaking, I decided last minute to play 4C Gifts instead of Esper Midrange, and did rather horribly... Oh well
Haha, I understand. When I was testing out with DRS. When people see my esper landbase and DRS, they'd say "4C Gifts", but when I drop my GOST on turn 3, I see some frowning faces thinking "ehhhh wth is that???" and I'd be thinking "hehe, guess again"
Or when some people look through the deck, and they just simply throw some kind of sweeping statement (I don't like this kind of comments, hmph they don't really put in enough thought before speaking. And it is hmph irresponsible, they just simply throw a statement at you, but if you follow them, you bear the consequences of the error.) at you "Ah this looks like 4C Gifts, why don't you just play 4C Gifts"
The truth is they may look the same, but they are very different in terms of strategy and difficulty. I heard someone playing 4C Gifts said "4C Gifts is so sensitive, you change it abit, you may have changed everything..."
Our gameplan in Esper Midrange in a nutshell can be said to be having access to play disruption, drain our opponent's resources and we expect to drop a threat by turn 3 to 4 that the opponent needs to deal with (and it can be very difficult to deal with ie. GOST, Finks, Splicer etc), then we go into beatdown mode while we keep on throwing out disruption/removal.
(4C Gifts players may disagree or feel free to add on here, please do so. I am not a Gifts player, I am merely just stating out my observations here) 4C Gifts is definitely more grindy, and expects to grind it out and survive until later turns when they can safely throw out a Gifts or assemble their win cons (ie. Unburial rites + Iona/Elesh), the 4C Gifts pilot need to be much more patient and projects the gameplan further (ya they need to think more, it's not like simply throwing out a GOST, protect him and just keep attacking), this takes thought, time and presents a higher level of difficulty to pilot. Games are often long, and in a tournament setting with time limits, such a deck may be mentally draining and can considerably cause games to just go time-out. But I heard that when played skilfully, a Gifts deck can almost outlast and out-grind any other deck. I respect a skillful Gifts deck pilot, and the level of difficulty to pilot it well, I doubt that for most people, it is a deck that can be last minute taken up and be played with significant success, I believe it needs some practice.
Anyway, better luck again next time Keep it going.
I've eventually decided that the Swords are a bit too slow for this deck and Spell Snare I'm still very iffy about. Thus, I have decided rather to put in more removal, that can deal with those annoying Hexproof guys as well as a Batterskull to help against Aggro and an Esper Charm as a useful 1-of.
Will let you know how it goes, but otherwise comments/criticisms/suggestions are alway appreciated.
The Sideboard has also undergone a severe renovation.
I like your list with Deathrite Shaman and Batterskull, I have been spending a bit of time testing out Deathrite Shaman and even trying to move this deck into 4C, adding in the green. Still testing out though, but the shamans are just awesome.
Just some of my opinions, it's just my views only. I still prefer to stick with 4 Geist of Saint Traft, he is just straight up a win-con, and he is also a removal against opponent's Geist of Saint Traft. I am still quite iffy about Lingering Souls without weapon support, I'd still prefer kitchen finks since he helps replenish the lifepoint loss from fetch and shocks and is a good persisting wall, or even 2-3 of restoration angel. Hmm this is something I did quite a few times with restoration angel and it is quite neat, I got a Deathrite Shaman in play, my opponent tries to maybe abrupt decay or throw a bolt or a removal at it, in response I activate Deathrite Shaman to "eat up" one of his/her fetches in the grave to get mana, flash in restoration angel and blink Deathrite Shaman out of harm's way, next turn my turn, my opoonent has got a 3/4 flier and a shaman staring at him/her
So wish you all the best for your Modern FNM, I look forward to hearing about your experience there
With an esper mana base Geth's is almost always going to be just worse than devour flesh.
I really don't think so, after playing with them for awhile. If Liliana of the Veil costs 1BB to cast, and she's being played in the deck, how could the BB for Geth's Verdict be of any problem at all??? Plus if you look through the landbase, yes please take a closer look at the landbase, you would realize that it is very heavy on B sources, the initial reason was to support a turn one inquisition of korzilek/thoughtseize and Liliana of the Veil whom most of us have agreed that she is very useful in this meta with GOST decks running around, then I realized that it also provided the convenience to access Geth's Verdict.
Oh well, so far in my games with them, no problem casting them, but I only run them as a 2-of, since that is all I need because I am and I believe most of us are mainboarding Liliana of the Veil too. I've gotta thank a friend of mine from my EDH playgroup who recommended me this card.
Observations: This is no Hymn to Tourach, but when your opponent has 2 cards or less in hand, this is an instant speed Hymn to Tourach. Esper charm speeds up the process of forcing the opponent into a topdecking mode, when timed correctly it gets around and destroys countermagic. But eventhough we like keeping our opponents low on resources and topdecking, we don't really have the fast clock to fully take advantage of that. Being "Hymned" your opponent may feel the pinch and start playing frantically, this is the psychological effect we want, but if your opponent is calm and realizes that you don't have a fast clock against them, they can just sit on their cards and wait to replenish their hand while you try to draw into a threat.
Therefore, if this card is to be played, I suggest it as a 1 of, at most 2 of. Keep it until you have a threat, and time it well before using it, ie. casting it when your opponent has 2 cards in hand and tapped out before you drop a GOST on the field, can turn your opponent's face pale white.
I have been curious about these counters in modern.
delay? not as good or as great as remand? Dispel Very conditional Familiar's Ruse is a really interesting card if you have multiple splicers in play for some reason. Muddle the Mixture counter of sorts and a tutor card. Rune Snag I like it but you want to use one early so the rest mid and late game are not useless. Spell Rupture i think this could actually have a place in modern. Unified Will I dont know if this could even be used.
Correct me if I am wrong, but it seems you have a preference for blue spells. Don't get me wrong, I am cool with that In fact, I am also interested to find out if there are really better countermagic to run in Modern as opposed to existing Mana Leaks and Remands which IMO is still not good enough to really satisfy countermagic players and their desire to say "No! Nah nah no buts. Just No. Zip! No (full-stop) Nonono~. No.".
For your list of suggestions, these are my thoughts (feel free to debate, since they are just opinions ):
delay:
When I take a look at this again, I was thinking why did I not try this out previously when I was more into WUR Delver. I think this countermagic is neat in tempo-type decks possibly as an additional choice to remand. It's starting to make me feel like trying to brew a UR Delver with a full set of Tec edges. Nonetheless, I wonder how effective is it really in this Midrange deck. Given a choice for this deck, IMO I would prefer to bin threats (even better still exile threats, but not many cards allow us to do that at a low mana cost) rather than delaying them, but some can argue that sometimes buying a turn or two can win you the game, but that is often so if you can frequently put up a reasonably fast clock. This deck, hmm I don't really think that the clock we put up is really that fast, it's not bad, but still considerably not that fast.
Dispel : Yup it is conditional. Probably a good SB card nowadays with blue Geist decks running around, it helps in the countermagic war.
Familiar's Ruse: This deck does not run many creatures. This countermagic is good, but I think it's more effective in more creature-based decks, merfolk maybe.
Muddle the Mixture: Hmm, can try it out, the transmute is a nice bonus effect. Off hand, I am wondering if we often use our countermagic to counter instants and sorcery more in the Modern format or do we use them more on disrupting creatures from resolving? (well I don't know about you, but it does seems like Modern is a very creature-dependent format, as in creatures are often the win-cons, ie. kiki jiki-deceiver, melira, GOST, etc.)
Rune Snag : Probably the mana leak that scales along with the game, but Deathrite shaman (which is running around quite rampantly these days in Modern) could erase the incremental effect of this card.
Spell Rupture: Again like Ruse, I think it is more effective in creature heavy decks. I have this strange feeling of taking a closer look at modern merfolk now.
Unified Will : Again like Ruse, I think it is more effective in creature heavy decks. Merfolk and hmm has anyone seriously ever thought about blue robots/affinity.
Another card people have talked about is Deprive:
I would prefer this in a Delver tempo deck which has a significantly lower mana curve.
Also there is Dissipate, as we know from the current Standard format. It costs 3 mana but ends up exiling the targeted spell. But still the big issue is that it costs 3.
So yup, as it has been since the start of modern, it's not that we don't have any countermagic spells but so far, but they all come with a "but...", it makes me (and I guess some of us) miss the good old Counterspell.
IMHO (just my opinion, but I know a lot of you all are gonna strongly disagree with me, hehe fair enough, you have your beliefs too, as I have mine)
I really think 4 commands is a privilege that belongs more to the UW Midrange version (they earned it since they have a much more stable manabase to accommodate for the triple blue cost. Anyway, each deck has their strengths and weaknesses, we already have red for bolts and helixes and electrolyzes, perhaps it may be too greedy to tell our UW friends "I wanna have what you have too! 4 commands and even 4 tec edges!")
OR the mana base should be improved (I remembered Shouta's Eternal Command deck was also a 3 color deck, but check out how many basic islands he had (If I recalled correctly, it was 4), I may be wrong but I rationalized that as an adjustment made to accommodate the commands (Shouta don't punch me if I am wrong, I ain't as good as you are and I certainly can't read your mind haha, I am just guessing), then you would say shocklands, fountains and vents would do, but hey RDW and many fast aggro decks are around, perhaps simply fetching a basic island to help top up for the 3 blue is a safer way then excessively bolting yourself from shocks and fetches. I like the idea of mystic gate though :))
As for seachrome coast, I can say that I wish that there was a UR scarland, and it'd be one of your best replacement for seachrome coast and even sulfur falls (ever drew an opening hand with great spells but 2 colonades and 1 sulfur fall, one word comes to mind "damn!" haha). Anyway, I doubt we can lose the colonnades, we don't have a UR manland that is comparable with the great colonnade, fairie conclave is no treetop village, so colonnade is likely to stay, and that means we got lots of UW lands (despite the fact that a bulk of them comes into play tap) and so you made the right choice to lose the coasts.
Hmm so if I did not see wrongly, that's 12 creatures and 4 manlands? Hmm just a question opened for everyone here: Without the mb Sphinx rev to help draw into bullets (creatures / manlands / burn etc.), wouldn't the threat density in this case be rather low? Afterall, we are not playing a pure control deck, we should want to be able to also do some consistent and considerable damage and win from there.
I mean I was thinking about this threat density issue when I saw Unwin's list, but when I saw sphinx rev, then I thought to myself "oh well, I guess that's fine then, he could just sphinx rev and draw into some creature or manland or more burn spells that may possibly in some cases win the game. Ok cool."
True, True, I agree, Mystic Gate is a good addition to adjust the mana base in order to accommodate 4 commands. Without which, I wouldn't be so confident as to say that the vents and fountains would suffice for 4 commands haha. But of course, perhaps some players are perhaps so much better at shuffling that land screw/flood is rarely an issue to them haha.
Hmm I have been using 2 cliques, so far I think it is good enough, and haha lighter on the wallet than 3 or 4 of. Besides, angel can blink it to save it from spot removal/burn and recur it's ETB effect
I think helixes can be up to player's preference
Some think path can even be played at 3 or even 2, but hmph when playing UWR Midrange, I still find an opponent's Tarmogoyf and just having red spells in my hand a rather disturbing situation.
No doubt about it, command is very very(emphasize again, I agree) very powerful (IMO it's power is almost like a creatureless/instant equivalent of the past jund's bbe). But it comes at a cost that I am concern of, 3 blue mana is not impossible, but may put some strain on a 3 color deck, I sure wouldn't want to have 2 or more commands in my hand with only 2 blue sources, so perhaps I would suggest a seemingly safer "half-way" approach, and just play 2 commands. If you really really want to maximize the upside exposure of command and play them as 4 of, then perhaps it may be good to consider if the mana base needs some adjustments to accommodate the cost of that power, not just to increase the consistency of being able to cast the commands without mana color problems but also it may mean having more basic islands to prevent taking excessive damage from blue shocks (since rdw and zoo and any fast aggro deck are lurking around)
Don't mind if I drop by and share a few of my opinions on your list
4 Tec Edges: Hmm I personally find more than 2 colorless lands rather risky in 3 color decks (especially when you are running cryptics), so perhaps 2 is safer and would suffice for land d.
Eiganjo Castle: I only recently started playing it as a 1 of, and I'd never want to look back. In fact, I felt so silly for not putting it in earlier. Protects Geists and Cliques and "oh was that pyroclasm you cast, sorry geist is still on the board
Remand: I started of with leaks, but after I gave remand a try, I am please with it. It works better in delver, but it is good enough in UWR Midrange. Often I find that, just a bit more time is still what I like to have in UWR Midrange, and just that bit of time and a draw would be what it takes to put the opponent behind and let me take the win.
MB 4 Counterflux: Hmm let's see, for combo? I'd love it against UR Storm, but this contender is fortunately (to some) and unfortunately (to others) less seen these days. Against other combo (ie. eggs, infect etc), I think cheaper countermagic is more effective since they become alive earlier. How about for control or countermagic war? Hmm I still would suggest cheaper countermagic, spell pierce is just U, spell snare at U hits almost every other commonly used countermagic (leak, remand and snapcaster, yes tiago himself hehe).
10 Creatures:
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Geist of Saint Traft
2 Vendilion Clique
17 Instants
4 Path to Exile
3 Mana Leak
4 Disfigure
2 Go for the throat
2 Geth's Verdict
2 Smother
9 Sorcery
4 Lingering Souls
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Thoughtseize
24 Lands:
4 Marsh Flats
4 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Celestial Colonade
1 Vault of the Archangels
1 Eiganjo Castle
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Godless Shrine
2 Watery Grave
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Arid Mesa
1 Island
1 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Darkslick Shores
2 Seachrome coast
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Negates
2 Stony Silence
2 Celestial Purge
2 Torpor Orb
3 Timely Reinforcements
An updated recent version.
Hmm interesting, the deck operates on a more controlling level. Any idea on how it improves/affects the match-ups?
Haha, I understand. When I was testing out with DRS. When people see my esper landbase and DRS, they'd say "4C Gifts", but when I drop my GOST on turn 3, I see some frowning faces thinking "ehhhh wth is that???" and I'd be thinking "hehe, guess again"
Or when some people look through the deck, and they just simply throw some kind of sweeping statement (I don't like this kind of comments, hmph they don't really put in enough thought before speaking. And it is hmph irresponsible, they just simply throw a statement at you, but if you follow them, you bear the consequences of the error.) at you "Ah this looks like 4C Gifts, why don't you just play 4C Gifts"
The truth is they may look the same, but they are very different in terms of strategy and difficulty. I heard someone playing 4C Gifts said "4C Gifts is so sensitive, you change it abit, you may have changed everything..."
Our gameplan in Esper Midrange in a nutshell can be said to be having access to play disruption, drain our opponent's resources and we expect to drop a threat by turn 3 to 4 that the opponent needs to deal with (and it can be very difficult to deal with ie. GOST, Finks, Splicer etc), then we go into beatdown mode while we keep on throwing out disruption/removal.
(4C Gifts players may disagree or feel free to add on here, please do so. I am not a Gifts player, I am merely just stating out my observations here) 4C Gifts is definitely more grindy, and expects to grind it out and survive until later turns when they can safely throw out a Gifts or assemble their win cons (ie. Unburial rites + Iona/Elesh), the 4C Gifts pilot need to be much more patient and projects the gameplan further (ya they need to think more, it's not like simply throwing out a GOST, protect him and just keep attacking), this takes thought, time and presents a higher level of difficulty to pilot. Games are often long, and in a tournament setting with time limits, such a deck may be mentally draining and can considerably cause games to just go time-out. But I heard that when played skilfully, a Gifts deck can almost outlast and out-grind any other deck. I respect a skillful Gifts deck pilot, and the level of difficulty to pilot it well, I doubt that for most people, it is a deck that can be last minute taken up and be played with significant success, I believe it needs some practice.
Anyway, better luck again next time
Just some of my opinions, it's just my views only. I still prefer to stick with 4 Geist of Saint Traft, he is just straight up a win-con, and he is also a removal against opponent's Geist of Saint Traft. I am still quite iffy about Lingering Souls without weapon support, I'd still prefer kitchen finks since he helps replenish the lifepoint loss from fetch and shocks and is a good persisting wall, or even 2-3 of restoration angel. Hmm this is something I did quite a few times with restoration angel and it is quite neat, I got a Deathrite Shaman in play, my opponent tries to maybe abrupt decay or throw a bolt or a removal at it, in response I activate Deathrite Shaman to "eat up" one of his/her fetches in the grave to get mana, flash in restoration angel and blink Deathrite Shaman out of harm's way, next turn my turn, my opoonent has got a 3/4 flier and a shaman staring at him/her
So wish you all the best for your Modern FNM, I look forward to hearing about your experience there
I really don't think so, after playing with them for awhile. If Liliana of the Veil costs 1BB to cast, and she's being played in the deck, how could the BB for Geth's Verdict be of any problem at all??? Plus if you look through the landbase, yes please take a closer look at the landbase, you would realize that it is very heavy on B sources, the initial reason was to support a turn one inquisition of korzilek/thoughtseize and Liliana of the Veil whom most of us have agreed that she is very useful in this meta with GOST decks running around, then I realized that it also provided the convenience to access Geth's Verdict.
Oh well, so far in my games with them, no problem casting them, but I only run them as a 2-of, since that is all I need because I am and I believe most of us are mainboarding Liliana of the Veil too. I've gotta thank a friend of mine from my EDH playgroup who recommended me this card.
Observations: If the deck can support Liliana of the Veil, then it has no problem playing Geth's Verdict. This card is a nice 2-of in the deck as additional removal for hexproof creatures like Geist of Saint Traft and Thrun, the Last Troll. When your opponent is down to 1 life left, this card nicely acts as a burn spell finisher (rulings: As long as the player is a legal target when Geth's Verdict resolves, that player loses 1 life even if he or she didn't sacrifice a creature (most likely because he or she didn't control any).).
So by playing UWB, we can play Geist of Saint Traft and we have so many ways to deal with our opponent's Geist of Saint Traft, sweet.
Observations: This is no Hymn to Tourach, but when your opponent has 2 cards or less in hand, this is an instant speed Hymn to Tourach. Esper charm speeds up the process of forcing the opponent into a topdecking mode, when timed correctly it gets around and destroys countermagic. But eventhough we like keeping our opponents low on resources and topdecking, we don't really have the fast clock to fully take advantage of that. Being "Hymned" your opponent may feel the pinch and start playing frantically, this is the psychological effect we want, but if your opponent is calm and realizes that you don't have a fast clock against them, they can just sit on their cards and wait to replenish their hand while you try to draw into a threat.
Therefore, if this card is to be played, I suggest it as a 1 of, at most 2 of. Keep it until you have a threat, and time it well before using it, ie. casting it when your opponent has 2 cards in hand and tapped out before you drop a GOST on the field, can turn your opponent's face pale white.
For your list of suggestions, these are my thoughts (feel free to debate, since they are just opinions
delay:
When I take a look at this again, I was thinking why did I not try this out previously when I was more into WUR Delver. I think this countermagic is neat in tempo-type decks possibly as an additional choice to remand. It's starting to make me feel like trying to brew a UR Delver with a full set of Tec edges. Nonetheless, I wonder how effective is it really in this Midrange deck. Given a choice for this deck, IMO I would prefer to bin threats (even better still exile threats, but not many cards allow us to do that at a low mana cost) rather than delaying them, but some can argue that sometimes buying a turn or two can win you the game, but that is often so if you can frequently put up a reasonably fast clock. This deck, hmm I don't really think that the clock we put up is really that fast, it's not bad, but still considerably not that fast.
Dispel : Yup it is conditional. Probably a good SB card nowadays with blue Geist decks running around, it helps in the countermagic war.
Familiar's Ruse: This deck does not run many creatures. This countermagic is good, but I think it's more effective in more creature-based decks, merfolk maybe.
Muddle the Mixture: Hmm, can try it out, the transmute is a nice bonus effect. Off hand, I am wondering if we often use our countermagic to counter instants and sorcery more in the Modern format or do we use them more on disrupting creatures from resolving? (well I don't know about you, but it does seems like Modern is a very creature-dependent format, as in creatures are often the win-cons, ie. kiki jiki-deceiver, melira, GOST, etc.)
Rune Snag : Probably the mana leak that scales along with the game, but Deathrite shaman (which is running around quite rampantly these days in Modern) could erase the incremental effect of this card.
Spell Rupture: Again like Ruse, I think it is more effective in creature heavy decks. I have this strange feeling of taking a closer look at modern merfolk now.
Unified Will : Again like Ruse, I think it is more effective in creature heavy decks. Merfolk and hmm has anyone seriously ever thought about blue robots/affinity.
Another card people have talked about is Deprive:
I would prefer this in a Delver tempo deck which has a significantly lower mana curve.
Also there is Dissipate, as we know from the current Standard format. It costs 3 mana but ends up exiling the targeted spell. But still the big issue is that it costs 3.
So yup, as it has been since the start of modern, it's not that we don't have any countermagic spells but so far, but they all come with a "but...", it makes me (and I guess some of us) miss the good old Counterspell.