So I've been considering adding
2 spellskite to the sideboard.
Am I crazy? It seems great blocks TiTi, eats removal, eats burn.
I'd say you're crazy, but that's me. "Blocks TiTi" seems a stretch. Any creature in the deck serves this purpose when titi is attacking and nothing we have will live through it. The whole deck dies to removal, too, and we don't have things that we need to protect like decks that typically run spellskite. As for burn - run more auriok champions and knights of autumn. I havent found burn to be too tough unless they get the 8 searing effect draw.
ticking the right sweet spot are all the things I have to learn... the important thing for me is to play steady and don't rush my turn.
Also, remember that you can also respond to the Vial's triggered ability with it on the stack during your upkeep. Some tricks with that include:
Vial has 1 counter on it and you have a one drop and a three drop in hand, you can vial in your one drop during upkeep and then increase the counter.
If you have a Horizon Canopy in play and you're not sure if you should increase or leave the counters where they are, you can pop the canopy with the trigger on the stack to get more information from the drawn card about which line to take.
-Sequencing: I often struggle which one drop is the best. For me it's safe to play T1 Aether Vial. The choice between Champion of the Parish and Noble Hierarch is often pro Hierarch. I think it's better to lose the Dork if you have enough mana in your hand then your threat
Adding to what SmauG said -
* in general, you want to play vial on 1 as the longer the game goes the worse it is. There's corner cases (like the one SmauG mentions about needing to race) where you wouldn't do this. Its tough to give an "always do X" rule about anything.
* The same goes for just having a choice btwn Champion and Hierarch. It really comes down to what else you have in your hand (how many lands? do you have a great 3 drop that you want to play in this match on 2?). All else equal, I tend to play hierarch first for the same type of reason as vial - Humans is best when it can be explosive and be playing 2 spells per turn. If youre running Buglers then this becomes even more critical as it is a very slow card if you can't Bugle and then play the card you choose right away.
Especially with Whirler Rogue. Not sure in which matchups it's the best card.
In general I bring in Whirler Rogue for matches where I have too many bad cards I need to pull and need to just get to 60 in the main, or I need to have a bit more defense (especially flying), or have to grind, or need to force through board stalls.
Examples:
* Humans Mirror (remember that you can target *their phantasmal image* with the Rogues ability and kill it, in addition to pushing through blockers)
* Dredge
* Spirits
* BGx and UWx midrange piles
* Hollow One
* Infect
* Affinity
* Shadow
-Playing with Aether Vial... I'm an aggro guy. Slam my stuff and win (or die). Things like holding priority, faking a vial activation, ticking the right sweet spot are all the things I have to learn... the important thing for me is to play steady and don't rush my turn.
Get in the habit of activating the vial and giving your opponent the chance to respond to the activation on the stack before putting the creature in play. You don't want to reveal what your choice will be until you have to, so make sure to give the opp a chance to make a bad play, especially if you're looking to vial in a meddling mage.
The sweet spot will depend on the match and card in your 75 that are most powerful in that match, but I would say most times I get it to 2 and leave it there, mana concerns and getting a ton of 3 drops in hand aside.
What else ? The problem I have with this card is that it's not better than Selfless Spirit. I'm not sold but I'm also unaware of what Modern looks like right now.
I think Tajic, Legion's Edge should be looked at as a hasty Anafenza, the Foremost (both having similar bolstering mechanics) with additional text that may help against red removal. Being able to essentially be 4 power the turn it hits the board is another way to win games out of nowhere. In other words, look at the additional damage he can help push through instead of the protection that is (sometimes) granted.
what would you do if you cast a Freebooter and the Opp's hand (Jund) is something like this: BBE, Maelstrom Pulse, Abrupt Decay, Land and Thoghtseize.
What would you take? My choice would be Pulse most of the Times.
All things being equal I'd take Abrupt Decay as it is the more efficient removal in that hand. Between Abrupt Decay and Maelstrom Pulse the opponent can kill your Kitesail Freebooter regardless, so at least try to make it as inefficient for them as possible.
Whats your Oppinion about Militia Bugler
Love him but I'm not sure that four copies is correct. He is powerful but can be slow too. I have been testing 2-3 copies main and I probably like 2 more than 3. I definitely wouldn't be trimming Mantis Rider to fit in copies 3 and 4. If I wanted four I would most likely cut Thalia, Reflector Mage, Meddling Mage, Phantasmal Image in some combination down to 3 copies to get the slots.
Do you think it is Worth it or should i stay at 18
I wouldn't even go down to 18 land in this deck. If you want the ability to grind better then I'd look to creatures that enable you to go long against the midrange decks than cutting lands. You can see some of the options I utilize below.
what do you think are the most important cards in the Sideboard
I usually have some number of these at all times in my board:
Although I haven't tested it yet, I feel that Qasali Pridemage is the go-to artifact/enchantment removal card. It also happens to be a Wizard, like Meddling Mage and Reflector Mage.
There are some Humans' players locally that have tried different things for Humans and I think this one and Shalai, Voice of Plenty are the best ones I've seen.
I posted this a few weeks back when folks were asking how to handle Torpor Orb and I couldn't agree more about The Cat Wizard. Haven't tried Shalai, Voice of Plenty but have seen it pop up on a few lists; what exactly are people bringing it in for?
Hey y'all. I've been playing Humans on MTGO for a while and I'm wondering how everyone has felt facing Tocatli Honor Guard or Torpor Orb out of the sideboard It's so demoralizing to see it turn 2, especially after I've played a Champion of the Parish, haha.
I've replaced the Reclamation Sages in the board with Qasali Pridemages to handle the growing number of Torpor Orb out there. So far, no issues in casting it. I also like the fact that it allows for keeping Aether Vial on the (imo) optimal number of two counters and the additional exalted triggers are appreciated by Mantis Rider. Having the ability be activated also allows the Cat Wizard to come out earlier to get some extra damage in where Reclamation Sage tends to rot in hand waiting for a target.
Tocatli Honor Guard is a bigger concern with only 1 Dismember being able to answer it, but given that its (mostly) contained to Hatebear decks I don't see it being utilized consistently enough against us to really worry about.
Yup, thanks. Wasn't thinking about the recursion / tutoring aspect of the Minister of Pain. I realized that 99.9% of time we would just sac himself for the effect. Will try him + moons out. thanks.
The list doesnt feel like a midrange deck where you want to be in control of the game with lili of the veil.
It's very a kill deck where you want creatures after creature;
Traverse into BBE ---> shadow into kcommand bring back BBE and put some more pressure.
Kcommand help the goal of having 100% of the time a huge creature on board while still being another 2 for 1.
My plan against combo deck is not to destroy their hand with lili. TS + CB combined with DS + TBR is enaugh.
As a jund player, I would love to play lili, but this list isnt her place to my eyes.
I like the list. Some questions to you (and anyone else who has experience)
Blood Moon and Magus of the Moon Where are you bringing these in? What problems are they solving? I ask because you're also running Temur Battle Rage in the board and I feel they work against similar archetypes but maybe I'm just missing something obvious. I'm perfectly ok to be wrong about Blood Moon and realize its where this deck needs to be.
Minister of Pain how is this working out? Why this over something like Golgari Charm? I realize it only hits their stuff and all, but with NOSB this slot seems like it could be something else. I also don't see sacrificing one of the other creatures in this deck for a 2/3 body aside from really odd situations. Again, maybe I'm missing something.
Collective Brutality Why four? Do you have enough decks in your meta to warrant that much? I feel like you could probably drop to three and use a slot for something that can help in some of those matchups but also in others that brutality is not as good.
The idea is that yes, regular jund has better average cascade targets. However, shadow plays significantly more "effective copies" of BBE, and they take advantage of the 3/2 haste body better.
So instead of casting 1 BBE (or 2 in a long game) and having an amazing hit, shadow can reliably cast 3 or 4 because of Traverse and zero mana cantrips and more kcommands than regular jund.
Agree here. Because of this, the BBE build gets to turn 4 and then starts chaining BBE every turn one way or another. Some folks said earlier its more of a Traverse / Tarmogoyf deck than a Shadow deck, which I agree with. Its like being able to tutor for a collected company off a single green mana.
Does someone have tested the match-up vs BBE Jund (with the classical version splashing white in the SB, which should be the best shell against them)?
Regarding the BBE DS list, I am skeptical that we will be better than them in this BBE strategy, I do not see how... This is why I tend to be more interested in the outcome of the match-up with our traditional lists!
I've been testing the match some over the last week and it doesn't feel that great for us. In general, I think the best way to beat Jund is with lingering souls if you can run that card.
I don't know if the BBE version is better than any of the prior iterations of this deck. It plays differently in some ways and similar in others. I would say it has more of an aggressive midrange feel and less of the aggro-combo-tempo feels of the ones with blue and/or white.So far, I am not a huge fan of some of the changes needed to support BBE like dropping some discard, adding land, etc. That said, BBE is the most fun card I've played with in a long time, so it has that going for it. Kolaghans' Command is still a sick card, adding seal of fire / tarfire makes pretty huge goyfs, too.
From my limited experience, it feels like it probably loses to the same things that Jund loses to while also not having a great Jund matchup - but it is hardly alone in that category. Others may have different opinions.
I played the traditional Traverse shadow list this weekend. Top 8ed a 37 person event going 4-0-2 during swiss. The proactive speed of the deck felt very strong. A lot of decks feel too light on early interaction and I think it's actually very well positions right now.
Lost in the quarterfinals in 3 against affinity. Losing to a topdecked cranial plating both games.
The manabase is amazing. Also something that hasn't really been mentioned yet is that the BBE version is a lot easier to play. I know that part of the draw of the deck is that its fun to tinker around with all of these little decisions and such. There's still Bauble/Wraith tricks, but the deck is much less exhausting to play, which is a big plus when you're planning on playing 9 rounds in a day.
You'll never have complicated fetching decisions, you almost always get another BBE if you have the mana to cast her, you don't have to decide when you can and can't leave blue mana up, etc.
I felt the same thing in testing various 3 color BBE versions over the last week as well and forgot to mention it. My brain hurts significantly less with this style of the deck than the 5 color variant. For FNM-length tournaments, it isn't a make or break consideration but playing 9+ round days all those decision trees add up to the overall mental fatigue.
I think you're severely understating the moon effects in this build. You stated your reasoning was your experience with regular jund.
The moon plays out much differently here than in regular jund. You'll have access to the effect a lot more consistently because of traverse, and this deck doesn't rely on manlands as additional threats. You also will almost never screw yourself with it because the deck has 12 fetches and 4 traverse vs Jund's 9ish fetches. This deck is also much better at applying pressure, so the disruption given from the moon is a lot more substantial. Regular jund could give the opponent enough time to draw out of their color screw.
I mean we need something for big mana and such, were you planning on packing a bunch of fulminator instead? I don't think that is as good, but I guess it is an option I can start testing.
EDIT: oh, you want to play TBR in that slot to just kill them instead of trying to disrupt them. Hmm. That's an option I hadn't really considered. That's probably also reasonable. I'm not sure we could actually race them without the blue counter magic, but I guess BBE could also change things.
Yea, I think I would rather just try to race and call it a day. My experience with blood moon against things like tron is its nice as a delay but it doesn't necessarily win the game on its own. Other folks may have different opinions and tactics here. I guess I could have explained my thinking better, but in many ways I agree with this angle posited by geneyquakes:
. Against removal heavy decks where your turn two Goyf often dies, you probably don't want TBR anyway. Against Affinity, Storm, Tron, Valakut and the like - matches where you very much want Battle Rage - your turn two and three creatures are much more likely to be alive when elf flips over a TBR on turn 4, and this will quite often represent lethal.
When fighting linear strategies I would rather just have TBR as my card to board in to rather than something like blood moon. I also am not a huge fan of fulminator mages and am always on the lookout for something better in those slots too. I've gone so far as to replace them with Anathemancer to varying degrees of success at times - again, just looking to push through those last few points of damage rather than simply trying to grind the opp out.
I'd say you're crazy, but that's me. "Blocks TiTi" seems a stretch. Any creature in the deck serves this purpose when titi is attacking and nothing we have will live through it. The whole deck dies to removal, too, and we don't have things that we need to protect like decks that typically run spellskite. As for burn - run more auriok champions and knights of autumn. I havent found burn to be too tough unless they get the 8 searing effect draw.
Also, remember that you can also respond to the Vial's triggered ability with it on the stack during your upkeep. Some tricks with that include:
Adding to what SmauG said -
* in general, you want to play vial on 1 as the longer the game goes the worse it is. There's corner cases (like the one SmauG mentions about needing to race) where you wouldn't do this. Its tough to give an "always do X" rule about anything.
* The same goes for just having a choice btwn Champion and Hierarch. It really comes down to what else you have in your hand (how many lands? do you have a great 3 drop that you want to play in this match on 2?). All else equal, I tend to play hierarch first for the same type of reason as vial - Humans is best when it can be explosive and be playing 2 spells per turn. If youre running Buglers then this becomes even more critical as it is a very slow card if you can't Bugle and then play the card you choose right away.
In general I bring in Whirler Rogue for matches where I have too many bad cards I need to pull and need to just get to 60 in the main, or I need to have a bit more defense (especially flying), or have to grind, or need to force through board stalls.
Examples:
* Humans Mirror (remember that you can target *their phantasmal image* with the Rogues ability and kill it, in addition to pushing through blockers)
* Dredge
* Spirits
* BGx and UWx midrange piles
* Hollow One
* Infect
* Affinity
* Shadow
Get in the habit of activating the vial and giving your opponent the chance to respond to the activation on the stack before putting the creature in play. You don't want to reveal what your choice will be until you have to, so make sure to give the opp a chance to make a bad play, especially if you're looking to vial in a meddling mage.
The sweet spot will depend on the match and card in your 75 that are most powerful in that match, but I would say most times I get it to 2 and leave it there, mana concerns and getting a ton of 3 drops in hand aside.
Right so his 3 and +1+1 to something else thats (assumedly) swinging in with him = 4
I think Tajic, Legion's Edge should be looked at as a hasty Anafenza, the Foremost (both having similar bolstering mechanics) with additional text that may help against red removal. Being able to essentially be 4 power the turn it hits the board is another way to win games out of nowhere. In other words, look at the additional damage he can help push through instead of the protection that is (sometimes) granted.
Here's one written recently by Ondrej Strasky that I found to have a lot of good info. http://arnbl.blogspot.com/2018/09/the-ultimate-humans-primer.html?m=1
All things being equal I'd take Abrupt Decay as it is the more efficient removal in that hand. Between Abrupt Decay and Maelstrom Pulse the opponent can kill your Kitesail Freebooter regardless, so at least try to make it as inefficient for them as possible.
Love him but I'm not sure that four copies is correct. He is powerful but can be slow too. I have been testing 2-3 copies main and I probably like 2 more than 3. I definitely wouldn't be trimming Mantis Rider to fit in copies 3 and 4. If I wanted four I would most likely cut Thalia, Reflector Mage, Meddling Mage, Phantasmal Image in some combination down to 3 copies to get the slots.
I wouldn't even go down to 18 land in this deck. If you want the ability to grind better then I'd look to creatures that enable you to go long against the midrange decks than cutting lands. You can see some of the options I utilize below.
I usually have some number of these at all times in my board:
My "top flex spots" from experience are
Hope that helps
I posted this a few weeks back when folks were asking how to handle Torpor Orb and I couldn't agree more about The Cat Wizard. Haven't tried Shalai, Voice of Plenty but have seen it pop up on a few lists; what exactly are people bringing it in for?
I've replaced the Reclamation Sages in the board with Qasali Pridemages to handle the growing number of Torpor Orb out there. So far, no issues in casting it. I also like the fact that it allows for keeping Aether Vial on the (imo) optimal number of two counters and the additional exalted triggers are appreciated by Mantis Rider. Having the ability be activated also allows the Cat Wizard to come out earlier to get some extra damage in where Reclamation Sage tends to rot in hand waiting for a target.
Tocatli Honor Guard is a bigger concern with only 1 Dismember being able to answer it, but given that its (mostly) contained to Hatebear decks I don't see it being utilized consistently enough against us to really worry about.
I like the list. Some questions to you (and anyone else who has experience)
Blood Moon and Magus of the Moon Where are you bringing these in? What problems are they solving? I ask because you're also running Temur Battle Rage in the board and I feel they work against similar archetypes but maybe I'm just missing something obvious. I'm perfectly ok to be wrong about Blood Moon and realize its where this deck needs to be.
Minister of Pain how is this working out? Why this over something like Golgari Charm? I realize it only hits their stuff and all, but with NOSB this slot seems like it could be something else. I also don't see sacrificing one of the other creatures in this deck for a 2/3 body aside from really odd situations. Again, maybe I'm missing something.
Collective Brutality Why four? Do you have enough decks in your meta to warrant that much? I feel like you could probably drop to three and use a slot for something that can help in some of those matchups but also in others that brutality is not as good.
Agree here. Because of this, the BBE build gets to turn 4 and then starts chaining BBE every turn one way or another. Some folks said earlier its more of a Traverse / Tarmogoyf deck than a Shadow deck, which I agree with. Its like being able to tutor for a collected company off a single green mana.
I've been testing the match some over the last week and it doesn't feel that great for us. In general, I think the best way to beat Jund is with lingering souls if you can run that card.
I don't know if the BBE version is better than any of the prior iterations of this deck. It plays differently in some ways and similar in others. I would say it has more of an aggressive midrange feel and less of the aggro-combo-tempo feels of the ones with blue and/or white.So far, I am not a huge fan of some of the changes needed to support BBE like dropping some discard, adding land, etc. That said, BBE is the most fun card I've played with in a long time, so it has that going for it. Kolaghans' Command is still a sick card, adding seal of fire / tarfire makes pretty huge goyfs, too.
From my limited experience, it feels like it probably loses to the same things that Jund loses to while also not having a great Jund matchup - but it is hardly alone in that category. Others may have different opinions.
Post a list when you get a chance?
I felt the same thing in testing various 3 color BBE versions over the last week as well and forgot to mention it. My brain hurts significantly less with this style of the deck than the 5 color variant. For FNM-length tournaments, it isn't a make or break consideration but playing 9+ round days all those decision trees add up to the overall mental fatigue.
Yea, I think I would rather just try to race and call it a day. My experience with blood moon against things like tron is its nice as a delay but it doesn't necessarily win the game on its own. Other folks may have different opinions and tactics here. I guess I could have explained my thinking better, but in many ways I agree with this angle posited by geneyquakes:
When fighting linear strategies I would rather just have TBR as my card to board in to rather than something like blood moon. I also am not a huge fan of fulminator mages and am always on the lookout for something better in those slots too. I've gone so far as to replace them with Anathemancer to varying degrees of success at times - again, just looking to push through those last few points of damage rather than simply trying to grind the opp out.