Not interested in the cost reduction, i know how much of a trap that can be. The thing I'm interested in is the resilience the white monument provides and the aggressiveness the black one provides. I'll test with them when they release and see what they can do in a deck.
Also for clarification; I meant either/or as a 1-2 of. they aren't worth 4 slots.
I've been using a playset of Matter Reshaper in my list. I took out 1 each of out drain creatures and... something else, can't remember what. They've been working really well for me. They're aggressive, and flippingredients another creature off of it feels great, even a land is good. Anyone else experiment with him?
Has anyone played with Teysa, Orzhov Scion? I've been fooling around with the original Mafia Kings (don't get this, look back to original Rav standard) and Teysa provides a hell of alot of resilience in the deck. saccing most of your field then using the tokens to convoke a return is GG usually, and I've been able to use her second ability more than I thought I would.
I have an Abzan list i'm happy with, but I'm thinking of exploring B/W combo more.
New to this thread, and I have a quick question; The title advertises itsself as a Blitzkreig-type deck, but all the lists i've seen in the last few pages seem more like midrange builds. Is there something i'm missing or has the deck just evolved that much?
I've been playing an Abzan list with two CoCo and two rally and I've been having a pretty good time with it. I've been having a super fun time with it against "fair" decks, but have been having a bit of trouble with combo. Should I make room in my sideboard for Thalia? how do you guys attack combo?
been testing with Oviya Pashiri, Sage Lifecrafter as a 2 of and have been liking her. I have a more mid rangey build and she's excellent as a mana sink late game. this deck has a reliable amound of mana thanks to attune and a desire for creatures on board to stay in the game until our 4 and 5 drops come out. I've dumped her, brawler and attune turn 4 and then just made a 4/4 creature when I didn't have a play on turn 5. She's good and i'm probably gonna make room for her in the sideboard.
I'm an abzan player myself, though I have eschewed the Chord package for Leads. You've played your deck and I haven't, so if you're saying the mana base is fine I believe you. In my opinion we're talking about hedging win percentages here, with you thinking about deck match-ups and me thinking about reliably casting spells. I do see your point about not really needing to worry as you'll hopefully be chording for your SB cards, and I'm probably just overthinking mana because it's something I personally have trouble with.
one minor point is fetches let your get basics which is always relevant in modern against blood moon. TBH half the time I just fetch a basic land with them anyways.
As you can see, I take a very greedy approach with just 18 lands and going 11 CMC3 Creatures (inspired by the last successful list with 18 lands and 4 Nykthos). Regarding this, I think about replacing the Mirror Entity with a 3rd Dwynen's Elite. 3 Caverns because I just have no more, but would usually try to borrow the 4th and replace a Forest or the Pendelhaven with it.
Also the manabase is completey painless, what is a huge advantage against Burn, Zoo and Scapeshift, which all have to deal just that 1 Burn more to finish you. This come with the price of no non-Creature spells in SB that are not fully supported by just Green Mana. So I'm almost never stuck with anything in hand, that is just uncastable (it happens, but very rare, just can remind exactly 1 game with Mulligan to 6 and didn't want to lay Cavern on Rhino or Forge-Tender).
And with cutting Horizon Canopy which is quite sad, but you can't go with just no Forest, or at least, I don't want to, because Blood Moon is still a thing and getting beaten by it as an Elves Deck would be too hard. Still my manabase is quite soft to Blood Moon.
Regarding Shaman of the Pack, the really best thing about it, is winning EOT or in Response to something, what happens quite often. Your opp will tap out for Cryptic or Twin or stuff like that and with SotP in your build you just can go for the win then, while a GW Version just has to say yes and hope to survive and untap again, which felt really awkward.
The grindy attempt with Lead from SB feels ok. Taking out 2 Chords and bringing 3 Leads give me 3 shots to my Bullets, which sounds ok, because most of them also could fall from a CoCo or be found by Lead.
Elvish Champion is a nice SB for me, but not main anymore. The 3-Drops are too high and adding another one would do no good. Besides there are not enough Forests to warrant this and in Mirror you have to sandbag it, till enough Power to kill in 1 Attack, because it gives it to ALL Elves. Think about someone (Merfolk, D'n'T, ...) hitting you with Mutavault because of your Champ...
Chalice sounds like a nice addition to the SB and when I get my 4th Cavern, I will give it a try or even with just 3 Caverns it sounds like fun. There is no problem to get 4 Elves in play (like 1-Drop Turn 1 and 2 in Turn 2 including 1 Heritage, dropping the 4th and then Chalice) and so play around your own Chalice very easily. In the slot of Fracturing Gust sounds reasonable, perhaps even a 2nd one, if I find the space.
Regarding Lifegain, i'm not sold to Finks anymore and are regarding Essence Warden, but still am not sure, I would like them. If there is anything like Feed the Clan on a creature for 2 mana, that would be really nice (but also a bit broken I guess). Well, with painless manabase, it's also no big deal to just outrace Burn, especially if they are fetching greedy and deal themselves 6 damage just for 2 lands in play. With SotP you can punish this very hard.
Options I consider atm for these 2 slots: Kitchen Finks, Essence Warden, Cathedral Sanctifier or Children of Korlis, perhaps just 1 of them because normally it's enough to get 1 shot there to survive that 1 round needed to finish the opp. Probably give Essence Warden the first chance to shine in this spot, perhaps splitted with a 1-off Children of Korlis, but I have definitley no space to go with a 4-off Warden like other decks or at least, I think so and value something like Scooze higher because more Options against other decks and my only GY hate atm (which feels bad).
Also thinking about putting Spellskite to SB to play another Dwynen's Elite. Thinkings on that? Is Spellskite main still needed or can it go to SB? And wanting to get a 20 cards SB so much
the one problem I see with your manabase is that there's no way reliably to get the mana you need at the right time. I prefer a manabase of fetches with a few shocks (like 2-3) to be able to reliably cast everything you need to cast.
Prowess of the fair is a card I've played in mossy of my g/b elves decks from casual to competitive. It does so much for our deck to hate against spot removal or even board wipes. One of the most important things I've seen it do in my recent testing is turning on dwynen's elite after a board wipe. It's not as good against sweepers, but it really punishes decks relying on spot removal as they simply don't have enough removal for all the elves you can make. I usually run between two and three d e pending on the meta.
For people interested in the combo aspect of this archetype: anafenza, kin-tree spirit+safehold elite=infinite combo. Couple that with a bunch of cards to fill the yard and you got yourself a combo deck.
holy crap! awesome.
I'm thinking of adding Kitchen Finks and Anafenza to the deck now.
For people interested in the combo aspect of this archetype: anafenza, kin-tree spirit+safehold elite=infinite combo. Couple that with a bunch of cards to fill the yard and you got yourself a combo deck.
Also for clarification; I meant either/or as a 1-2 of. they aren't worth 4 slots.
I have an Abzan list i'm happy with, but I'm thinking of exploring B/W combo more.
EDIT: Also, why no Bloodghast?
Are their any other creatures I'm missing? Anything better? Looking for ideas so I can order the cards and sleeve it up for a future magic tourney.
one minor point is fetches let your get basics which is always relevant in modern against blood moon. TBH half the time I just fetch a basic land with them anyways.
the one problem I see with your manabase is that there's no way reliably to get the mana you need at the right time. I prefer a manabase of fetches with a few shocks (like 2-3) to be able to reliably cast everything you need to cast.
it's a four card combo, but you don't have to asemble it a piece at a time. Just rally or return them all back at once.
Also, Anafenza with Tokens is FUUUUN.