MTG Salvation

i forgot to quote. this was in response to Anthreion talking about my list that 4-0'd. *edit*

That was me btw I also 4-0'd with the exact same list the monday night before that, it just didn't make the mothership(therefore, it did not make mtgtop8) and i 3-1'd with it the week before that.


Just today with the same list, i 3-1'd today as well(all of these were on stream, and my VOD's can be found on twitch.tv/brianbgrp or on my youtube channel, under the same handle) today i lost to soul sisters, then managed to beat pod 3 times in a row(yeah, I don't even know, i normally have issues with pod. but today I got revenge)


i'm REALLY happy with my list, to the point that I'm worried about changing it to fit in polluted deltas. almost willing to just be soft to blood moon for a purely painless manabase. It's that big of a deal, in my oh so humble opinion, to not have to worry about any self damage from lands. Your life total is your most important resource.


also, I was originally against scions, now I won't leave home without 'em. I've explained in my stream a few times, but I think that modern is a very proactive format. you can't afford to sit and durdle the way a standard control list does, modern is too powerful/explosive for that. UWR can sorta get away with it due to bolt/snap/bolt and the rest of their reach letting them close out the game fast. A deck like ubfae, really can't do that. scion is our "reach" it lets you play the normal control game of trading 1for1 early game, until you stabilize the board presence, then get to slam down a scion, sometimesi two, and end the game in a matter of 2 turns, 3 tops. Honestly think that's super important, i had a game today that was a perfect example of that, where opponent(pod) was at 14 life with a dude or two on board, and me with a blossom and some tokens. eot flash in scion, and all of a sudden my board got scary(i cracked him for ten that turn, tar pits are good yo). that kind of closing power is very hard to pass up.


also about no spell snare. I just went away from early countermagic beyond spellstutter completely. that made room for the scions and more removal. honestly, i started playing the deck more like you'd play a bg/x style deck, and i've done considerably better with that outlook opposed to a normal draw/go control deck. Any questions hit me up on twitter @brianbgrp or feel free to join me in my stream sometime and chat I don't check mtgsalvation super often.

okay, wall of text inc. here's my tourney report, also posted it to /r/spikes for those who frequent there

okay, for those following us Faerie players, here's a quick tourney report from the CFB 10k ptq yesterday in Oakland, CA. I've been streaming lately, for those who remember, and my list is fairly close to what i've been streaming with(main difference is hurkyl's in the sideboard in paper, but not online due to ridiculous price tag. and also i last minute bought two lilianas and put them in the deck, 'cause my inner spike said if i didn't i'd regret it. and I'm glad I did.)
anyways, here's the list I played:
http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/ub-faeries-current/

my notes on the rounds aren't super strong, so it won't be a super detailed report, but i'll do a quick rundown of the 9 round tournament(409 players signed up, one short of a ten rounder)

round 1 Elliot - Bogles great, bogles in round 1, glad I got those Liliana's. game 1 was quick and dirty, with liliana coming down turn 3 and eating a kor spirit dancer with a Spirit Mantle on it, then me not letting anything else resolve.
game 2 he mulled to 5, and then had to deal with liliana, ee on 1,a nd a Spellskite.
1-0(2-0 games)

round 2 Matt - Tarmotwin game 1, he got stuck on 3 lands, I countered the few things he tried to play, and locked it up with cryptic land bounces while i beat in with a v clique.
game 2, well, game 2 Bitterblossom happened. t2 blossom just wins games, my notes/lifepad show most damage i took was from my blossom, and One swing with a goyf, while his steadily chipped down to zilch.
2-0(4-0 games)

round 3 Logan - Jund game 1, i ripped his hand apart with a discard heavy hand, and my lili hit before his, i don't remember all the details but game ended with my life going 20-18-15, and his going down in steady chunks of 2s and 3s till dead.
i specifically remember boarding out all my discard for more interaction here, based on stuff i read in my other thread about the Jund mirror matchup. so game 2 was very close, with him resolving coursers, and slowly beating me down with it, in the end I hit all the right topdecks while he got stuck with thoughtsiezes in his hand, game ended with me swinging for lethal both of us at 2 life.
3-0(6-0 in games)

round 4 Jesus - young pyro delver
game 1 was very intense and close, and came down to him having to have the exact topdeck to win. his out was topdecking snapcaster, snap Vapor Snag my blocker, swing with delver, then bolt for lethal exactly. anything else, and I kill him on the next turn. He hit the snapcaster, and I can't be mad about losing to drawing your out.
game 2 was a bit of a blowout, i killed his turn 1 delver, killed his turn 2 young pyro, then he had another young pyro turn 3, and I didn't draw an answer to it or it's horde of tokens until he had lethal on board. Them's the breaks.
3-1(6-2 in games)

rd 5 Nathan - Affinity ugh, turn 1 Darksteel Citadel, ornithopter, springleaf, Vault Skirge, t2 Cranial Plating. my life total went 19, 18, 11, 3, 1. his went 18. Yeah, affinity is rough.
game 2 was, somehow, worse. I stayed in it for a while, but couldn't manage to catch him stumble or draw a single Hurkyl's Recall to reset things all game. he also had 3 Vault Skirges on turn 2.
3-2(6-4 in games) Feeling a little dejected, but glad I had dodges affinity so far(there is TONS of affinity in the bay area, california. literally tons. I got lucky to only play it once today) but figured, 9 rounds, x-2 may sneak in. and my breakers should be decent so I'll keep going, cash was up to top 64, so x-3 was live for cashing.

On to round 6! Ben playing Jund.
played out very similarly to the last Jund matchup, game 1 he couldn't get anything going, and I had all the right answers at the right times. I ended the game without taking any damage, and doing a good job of keeping things at my control.
game 2, same game plan as earlier, out come sthe discard, in comes more kill spells, negates, etc. this one was alot closer, i remember a courser doing alot of work, singlehandedly bringing me from 20-8. then he had a Batterskull coming the next turn, with him at 8 life. and i topdecked a negate to stop it, then v clique next turn and finished him off with clique and tar pit.
4-2(8-4 in games)

okay, still live. doing really good with very strong wins all around, breakers looking decent as both of my losses are currently undefeated at the top table as well time for round 7.
round 7, eric with burn.
game 1, i did my best to just survive, not let eidolons resolve and get in damage when i could. he flooded a good bit, and i took over at 3 life and ended the game.
out comes thoughtsiezes and a single IOK, in comes 2 negates and a Spellskite. same thing as game 1, I actually end up stabilizing at 1 life, him at 8, no cards in hand. and upkeep mistbind him, then next turn kill him with mistbind + manlands. pretty much how most of my burn wins go, i win the game on the brink of death with them out of gas.
5-2(10-4 in games) getting excited now, as I'm thinking I may be able to sneak in with 2 more solid finishes.

round 8, Austin playing pod.
game 1, he resolves a Spellskite, and I hit one of my more aggressive draws, and just started beating down, countering multiple Kitchen Finks, and using v clique to force a early Chord of Calling for 2(instead of 3) so he could only get a voice, instead of a finks, which was enough to secure me game 1.
out comes remands, and all my discard. in comes more kill spells, and Sower of Temptations. Austin, unfortunately, gets stuck on 2 lands, and only resolves a voice of resurgance, which i promptly steal with sower, he hits a noble, that gets liliana'd, then i seal it away with voice/sower/tar pit. he seemed a little upset, understandably, but my hand would have stopped about anything he coulda done with land drops anyways. i was sitting on a second sower, 2 smothers and a cryptic.
6-2(12-4 in games)

okay, this is it, i'm going into the last round at 35th place, with fairly solid breakers(57.25, 70.5882, 51.3276 for those who can understand this mumbo jumbo) not sure if i could make top 8 without some crazy luck, but I think if i won, i coulda snuck into top 16, at least. so onto the final match of the day!
round 9 Andrew playing burn burn again, he starts off with Goblin Guide into eidolon, i get to remand the eidolon, but I end up stuck on 3 lands, with a handful of 4 drops and lose game 1 with him down to 9 life. easily beatable if i had hit my fourth land.
game 2, Spellskite just does insane work at stopping him from being aggressive, and i just tear in with spellstutters countering, basically, everything, and a Vendilion Clique putting the clock on. end the game at a healthy 10 life and him dead.
game 3, well, game 3 i mull once, then get stuck with River of Tears, tec edge, swamp. and don't hit a fourth land until i'm at 6 life, he has 2 cards in hand, and he knows i have a Spell Snare(Goblin Guide showed him) and he's holding back for a few turns. so obviously he has 2 drops. i hit a land finally...another River of Tears. i tanked for a solid minute debating if i could shields down until the end of my turn, finally decided I wasn't winning the game by being stuck on 3 lands and had to take the risk. ate a double Boros Charm as soon as i played the land. Thems the breaks.

6-3(12-6 in games) a very solid day for me, i think. all my wins were VERY solid, and I'm okay with losing to affinity, as it's easily my most difficult matchup. the yp deck, close game 1, he beat me solidly game 2. and the last round was variance finally catching up, ended the night in 48th place, cashing for 50 bucks and a solid ego boost for my deck choices/play.
only changes I think i'd make, is i want to try out a Black Sun's Zenith in the side as a one of, replacing the Surgical Extraction or the Darkblast. it shuts off persist from pod, should do some work against affinity, and hoses every creature in the YP deck. and i need something to help recover from those decks.
now to get liliana's online for more testing! any questions, hit me up on here or on twitter @brianbgrp or ask in my stream if ya see me there www.twitch.tv/brianbgrp

OK just finished up at the CFB ptq. Ended the day at 6-3 finishing 48th out of 409 players. I'll try and do a full report tomorrow afternoon (too tired to think ATM) but I'll leave ya with this: every game I won, I won 2-0. My day went boggles 2-0, tarmotwin 2-0, jund 2-0, young pyro delver 0-2, affinity 0-2, jund 2-0, burn 2-0, pod 2-0, burn 1-2. I only lost the match against burn in the last round due to stuck on 3 lands game 1 and game 3, otherwiset hand beat him easy and I would have locked in top 8. My other two losses were both in the running for top 8, with the affinity player locked.


I'll try for a more full report + deck list tomorrow, very happy with my performance today, and only one or two changes I think I'd make after this.

Yeah I am. Still learning about streaming, so it isn't any kind of polished stream. No can/mic ATM. Just me playing and chatting.

The vod from yesterday is pretty good tho, won an 8 man then did some 2 mans afterwards. And played a Fae mirror to start the stream. Like I said on reddit, I dont have any kind of regular stream schedule or anything, just started doing it at someone's request, and there seems to be some interest, so figure it can't hurt to have some content for people to watch/critique. Its all a learning experience for me. I play it on mtgo to practice for paper (going to CFB ptq this Sunday, so wish me luck!)

my thoughts on Alex Sittner and UB fae in this meta game...i think it's actually decently well positioned, I just think everyone ASSUMES it isn't, and is straying away from it. the fact that Sittner has twice now placed decently in two large scale modern tournaments with the deck show that it's at least viable. If it had the representation of some of the other big decks in modern, i'd be willing to bet we'd have seen chances at higher place finishes, or more well placed finishes at least.

13-2 is a damn good record at a gp, imo, and the fact that someone else this weekend went 13-0 in the first 13 rounds, and still didn't top 8, should prove that only looking at the top 8 of this event is short sighted.

i feel like it's only a matter of time before someone gets lucky and gets that last little push to make it into the top 8 of an event, and put the deck back on the masses radar. I'm excited, personally.

okay, let's move on before this turns into a full blown tantrum like last time. agree to disagree, 'cause we are no longer having a discussion, but starting an argument. let's keep the thread productive and stop with the personal attacks.

Quote from Athen

I'm playing the list that got 8th at the SCG IQ last week.

http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=52913

that was my list, i lost in round one of the finals 'cause i had zero answer for a resolved olivia voldaren(save unsummon). I also made a ton of bad plays earlier that lost me a few games(lol keep 1 land hand 'cause island delver and unsummon multiples!) I've since added green splash for abrupt decays and simic charms(devour flesh in side board for hexproof/olivia hate). deck feels alot stronger so far, still needs alot of testing.


also want to test the red splash for reach/removal and maybe a white splash variant for geist/az charm/orz charms...but I dunno, i feel the esper color scheme opens up so many strong options it's better to go slightly more midrange with resto's and such, making delver a less than desirable card. it will be last resort if i feel BUg isn't doing it.

p.s., that top 8 finish I got to dimir charm eot to put craterhoof on the opponents topdeck, then let duskmantle trigger ping the guy for 7. then swung with dusky for lethal. I <3 duskmantle, though he does get sided out against alot of aggro(mayors in my board atm are the current side strat, it was nighthawks before)

FAERIES AT THE PRO TOUR!

If you're in the market for a sweeper I'd recommend black sun's zenith over damnation. It might cost more in a few random situations, but it is a clean answer to persist creatures and gives you the chance to re-draw it. Whether or not you want the zenith effect is another matter, but if I picked one in a vacuum I'd take the zenith.

Gifts as a package is bad in modern. So why do you think throwing it into a deck that already fights itself on mana is a good idea, when it makes the deck more inconsistent AND adds to you killing yourself from lifeloss?

I can't wrap my head around how people can still think that line is in any way, shape, or form competitive. A deck BUILT around Gifts doesn't work in this meta, what makes you think jamming it in a deck suddenly fixes everything?

Quote from pig22

Quote from Lord Seth

Are there deck lists anywhere of the Top 16? The official coverage page seems to only give the Top 8.

Ya, there on the scg home site here http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/deckshow.php?&t[C1]=28&start_date=03/08/2014&end_date=03/09/2014&start=1&finish=20

Huh, so Faeries made it into the Top 16? Interesting.

The meta sure does look more interesting when you expand to the Top 16...

So, sittner went 13-2 placing 15th with UB. Deck list is up on star city games. Not too shabby for a "bad" deck lol

I think many of you are expecting results way to fast. The meta is very unclear at this moment with the xception of Pod, American, and Affinity. Those have not changed greatly, but they are threat nonetheless. I know this deck will take time to reach tier 1 or may never, but it is a FUN deck to play. That being said, sticking to your deck might pay off eventually as persistance generally shines through. Please be patient with the deck. Investigating other splashes does indeed make turn 4 cryptic command difficult. Green may be the best splash, but I am not sure what is worth running for it? Here is a list of easy splash spells and explinations.
Tarmogoyf- Best dude we can play, and I would invest 4 spots as it is a great defense/offense.
Scavenging Ooze- great defense, but do we have enough mana to make him bolt proof?
Back to nature (1G)- Destroys Boggles at instant speed, but can hurt our BB. Might be worth it as UB has enchant removal
Abrupt Decay- Best cheap removal, but does it destroy versus American?
Malestrom Pulse- Great removal for 8 rack and other decks that play plainswalkers, enchants, and artifacts we can't get rid of. Does hardly anything against American.
Thrun the Last Troll- Why not? He is great in the mirror.

Now lets look at the cost of playing said cards. We need Blue/black in every land we play. Overgrown Tomb (2 Life), Breeding Pool (2 life), Verdent Catacombs (1-3 Life), and Mysti Rainforest (1-3 life). We can get down to 1 life easy before Bitterblossom hits the field. No life gain in the deck makes it a serious suicide run. We can use check lands, but how reliable are they for a turn 4 cryptic command or Mistbind Clique? Now I am not saying we shouldn't test this. New findings always help whether they are bad or good. I playtested the BUG version and found I was either able to play green stuff or crytpic command, but barely both. Against a burn deck, I always lost from life loss from my own hand. Zoo match up was great, but they are not the entire meta. Tron ate my lunch as my control of hand and spells was reduced. Affinity was OK, but I attribute the win to my oppenent being a bad player or bad draws. I will stick with UB fae fo now as it seems best to handle most of the meta as opposed to splashing green or red.
I dropped Sword of Light and Shadow by accident cause I was testing and forgot to exchange Fire and Ice or it (never drew it while testing). At the Modern FNM, It was a game winner against all the damn RG decks as I drew it about every game. I was not gaining life, but drawing ***** loads of cards from the sword and baby Jace. The extra 2 damage was really icing on the cake for killing little dudes or brining that life total down. Fire and Ice is the bomb here. We draw cards, we generaly win more often.

Minor oversight, people in the past have made it before, so whatever. Please dont insult his intelligence on it. Anyway, speaking of decks where Grafdiggers Cage may be good, is there anyone here who has any insight into playing against the gifts control/rock strategy (Seems pretty good)? It feels like the deck attacks from too many minor angles that can put a wrench in our lines of play at certain stages of the game. Lingering Souls tokens pretty much cause problems for your aggressive gameplan with bitterblossom tokens, a well-timed liliana strips your hand and Elesh Norn/Iona CAN basially wipe our board or stop us in our tracks. It really feels like sword of light and shadow is really good here though because the big issue is the lingering souls tokens basically buying them a boatload of time to set up. I am trying to look at all the angles but correct/enlighten me if I am missing something

Quote from Abstractual

Well, he did go 7-3 in Modern.... that's not exactly a bad record. Speaking of Yasooka.

Also, I just played consecutive matches against Melira Pod, and SoFaF was ace. Also, I don't see how SoFaI or SoLaS are even remotely as relevant vs Twin variants as SoFaF. Either way you're going to have to fight through Bolt and Path on the equip, but SoFaF disrupts their hand, which is much more important than 2 damage, 3 life or even drawing a card. Same goes for UWR, and Storm even to a lesser extent because they are pretty fast as you've said.

Drawing a card is almost always better than making your opponent discard a card. Also, the 2 damage is extremely relevant against Twin's creatures.

After 28 pages I have to say, I think this thread has been sidetracked a bit. So there are 3 main things being discussed for at least since the PT if not more: 1) Faeries is a great deck vs Faeries is a terrible deck 2) my removal is better than yours 3) swords swords swords.

I don't want to flame anyone here, I hate flaming, I am trying to say that I feel like we haven't actually looked into the core ideas of the deck yet. Every time we go that way we just go to say how incredible this deck is. We rake statements from old articles as rules (like 4 cryptics shouldn't even be considered, anyone who plays less is stupid) and we haven't done any serious exploration. Even Liliana has seen limited discussion, even though it was on yasooka's list. I think someone had mentioned it before but it was not even discussed.

I think we shouldn't go on by simply saying: Fae is great, old lists are great, we just need to fight over the specifics. I don't think we have even found why Fae is great in the present day.

Don't get it like I am bashing on the deck, I've been playing Fae since it was legal in standard, I played extended Fae, I played UB Fae in modern w/o bitterblossom, UR hoogland Fae, EDH Fae, anytime I can play the deck I do it. I just see that we are discussing irrelevant stuff right now (why SoFaF is better than SoLaS, they are both great guys, there is a reason they are both being played).

So, I propose, lets bring back the discussion to the main deck, what are we trying to achieve by playing fae? What is our game plan? How do we want to win? How we want to defend ourselves? Basic ideas so we know where this discussion is heading. Right now we don't know if we are control, midrange, tempo, if we want to win by just hitting BB and going for it or by playing a midrange plan etc.

That's just my feeling thouhg, i might be completely off here and the discussion might be going great, I just wanted to share my thoughts on it.