Sulfur Falls is in because well, drawing your only sulfur falls as your only land in a one land hand is pretty rare. Granted, it happens, but not often enough to make a serious difference IMO. There are a few benefits to Sulfur Falls over Shores:
1) It's better on every turn after turn 1, barring scenarios with one swamp and one sulfur falls opening, which is even rarer.
2) Red mana is more relevant than black in this deck
3) I need to be able to support the extra grim lavamancer that I'm running.
4) I run cryptic, and i want to be able to have my 4th land come in untapped always, for snapcaster shenanigans, pyro with deprive backup, or simply just for cryptic.
I've tried darkslick shores main, and overall i find that my maindeck pulls me towards sulfur falls as the better land. Of course, this is for my particular build, and the cryptic and lavamancer did influence my choice a lot. Without these, I would think that having Darkslick shores would be better too.
Few changes:
Back to the dragon's claw plan to increase our chances against burn post board, but still leaving one siege in for its versatility
Shatterstorm as another out to affinity
Rending volley will replace combust easily
Dropped a flashfreeze for dispel. Dispel comes in against more decks, and flashfreeze is less needed if im going up to 3 deprives anyway.
I'm questioning the shatterstorms. I know I wouldn't mind playing one, and research shows that most lists would have some form of sweep. That said, isn;t the affinity mathcup in our favor to begin with, in which case i'm not sure if the shatterstorm is necessary. If i had to replace it, I would probably try a tombstalker or keranos in that spot. For now i favor tombstalker slightly.
Thinking of putting a tombstalker in the sb, but don't really know what to cut. Not a fan of Blood moon after testing - the effect it has on our mana base is not significant, but not negligible. The threat of our deck playing blood moon already pushes a certain degree of conservative play, and i think capitalizing on that without subjecting ourselves to the same restrictions is good enough.
Sideboarding:
I don't think there's much doubt over what to bring in against each matchup, I'll try to cover what to take out:
Burn - Cryptic, Remand, Electrolyze. Essentially we want more early game interaction for us to stabilize after they run out of steam. The late game stuff goes out. Besides we need to bring in skites, claws, sieges, dispel. More stuff needs to come out to make space for these
Twin - Delvers. Against twin it is really more of a control mirror. Delver is the worst late game draw in the deck, and there are better ways to close out a game. If you need more space, a single bolt can be replaced with the rending volley. This is questionable, but we want to bring in Jace, Dispel, Volley, Flashfreeze, Siege, and something has to come out. I don't recommend bringing in skites though - Twin has a tendency to board out their combo, and skite becomes very irrelevant. Mind games.
Junk/Jund - Remands, Delvers. See the twin matchup for reasons for removing delver. These decks try to bring the game to a top deck war. Delver and remand reduces your chances of winning that war.
Affinity - Remands, Electrolyze. Remands come out for the Charms, and electrolyze for shatterstorm
Infect - Electrolyze, Remand. You don't have much to bring in against them anyway, and you are already favoured.
Bogles - Remand, Terminate, Murderous Cut. Watch out for the spiritdancers though, and try to leave at least one out to a big kor.
Control - Similar to Twin
Scapeshift - Electrolyze, Murderous Cut, Terminate. Leave in a bit of removal for titans if you need to.
Amulet - Electrolyze. You don't really need to pack much for them, bring in whatever counters you can.
This is a rough guide, let me know if you disagree and your reasons for disagreeing. I'm basing this analysis on the roles we want to assume in G2 and 3, as well as the average number of sideboard slots we devote to that particular matchup
I'm going to cut my third remand for my third deprive. The heavy U commitment means i might cut blood crypt from the deck, since i already have a basic swamp and basic mountain, and i want as many of my lands to tap for U as possible. If that's the case i would probably replace it with a darkslick shores.
I've realized that against decks with infinite removal such as UWR, Jund, etc we tend to be in danger of simply running out of threats. For these matchups, i think i might consider anashiok in the board. just a thought. Will test against them more first.
Thanks, if possible i'll see if i can add some of your work into the primer
One thing i disagree though: Jund and Junk are difficult matchups to play, but i don't think it's cad enough that we are unfavored game 1. I would say against jund and junk we are even for all 3 games, and it depends on how we draw. Depending on the board we could even be favored in post board.
Grim Lavamancer is a better 1 drop than Delver, but a worse top deck. Against a lot of decks landing it turn 1/2 has given me free wins, but i may consider dropping it for the single thirst. If i wanted thirst, it's a tough choice between the 3rd remand or grim lavamancer.
we really need a good 2 mana draw spell.
EDIT: quick search showed cerebral vortex and perilous research, both of which are promising
Ashiok is the main source of inevitability in this de k. Sometimes they answer our spirits and snapcasters and two beatsticks. Ashiok gives us a way out that liliana does not. Ashiok also happens to help out our defense, albeit a little slowly. Souls are a way to accrue value and stall until our gifts engine takes over
Came up with this list. Dropped Esper charm for gifts ungiven, it's primarily a control deck with potential for combo, essentially removing weaknesses from the pure control or pure combo builds of Esper or gifts. Sideboard can include some gameending threats for rites, or silver bullets for gifts. It's untested but sounds amazing when you consider how versatile it can be
I can understand the tombstalker, but i think it's a better board than maindeck. And while i see the value of cutting delvers, i think young pyromancer needs to stay.
The most powerful thing about this deck is that is has the ability to play aggro, control or midrange in any given matchup. There are some decks against which a turn 2 flipped delver equals a free win for you, and some games where a young pyromancer that they can't get rid off will help you stabilize and win. I don't think it's worth giving that up.
I could see putting some heavy threats in the board and bringing them in if we want to play a more midrangey game, but i think the 4 delvers in the main deck are a necessity. I think tombstalker is a better board choice than keranos, for that matter
About that list, i don't like the counter suite. The only hard counter is the 2 commands, and it seems you will have a hard time if the game grinds on. I feel with that list you give up a lot of late game inevitability that young pyro provides, especially since your top decks are a lot worse with 5 discard spells and 20 lands. you also give up the explosive early games that delver provides, and though you can get turn 2 tasigurs it's not as reliable as a delver. Sure it's midgame is a lot stronger, but i don't see how the build is better than the delver build in terms of versatility and adaptability.
I could be wrong, but it needs extensive testing; it really deviates too far for me to make an accurate judgment.
EDIT: when i first built this deck i tried to go delverless too, but i added the delvers back eventually
EDIT: Tested delverless on mtgo. cutting delvers for tombstalkers and more scours is promising. I don't agree on the discard plan or the lack of pyromancers still though. pyromancers have been the MVP of the deck every time i played it.
After some testing online, if i wanted to go delverless, i would replace the 4 delvers with 2 tombstalkers, 1 extra thought scour and a darkblast, and cut one murderous cut for the second terminate, giving something like this:
The manabase isn't perfect, but i still want as little shocks as possible, and i chose drowned catacombs since with 19 lands, a 1 lander is not very likely, making drowned catacomb better than darkslick shores in most cases. I'm conflicted over the deprive/remand ratio. I'm not sure if it should be 3/2 or 2/3 though. This is the list i would run after a little bit of tuning on MTGO.
Foul-Tongue Shriek
B
Instant
Target opponent loses life equal to the number of attacking creatures you control. You gain that much life
I'm excited to try this. I don't think it's very good, but hey we're desperate anyway
There are enough decks against which ashiok is completely useless that I can justify not maindecking him, but I think it's a decent to try him out first.
Against some decks you just keep adding him, till the point where you either threaten an identity crisis or an endless stream of creatures
Kolaghan's Command replacing one copy of electrolyze main deck
Rending Volley replacing Combust
Random cards I want to test:
Ashiok in the board - It worked in Fabiano's deck, it could work for use post board where we become more midrangey. I think it's the best walker we have against midrange/creature decks, including affinity where we just spit out a creature every other turn. It sounds unlikely, but I'm trying it out for a while.
Cryptic command maindeck - playing 1 copy with 18 lands now, haven't had trouble with a single copy since i don't draw it that often, and when i do draw it it breaks games
I think dragons claw is still better against burn, but I play siege because it also happens to shore up our other matchups.
There are some decks against which we want to play as a control deck, eg zoo, merfolk, to some extent bw tokens, soul sisters. Is it worth trying anger of the gods in the board against these decks?
only 2 smash to smithereens as artifact hate. granted he has a ton of other burn related removal.
4(!) dragon claws in the board. That's how bad the burn matchup is.
2-2-2 split of pierce, snare and remand: no mana leaks at all
1) It's better on every turn after turn 1, barring scenarios with one swamp and one sulfur falls opening, which is even rarer.
2) Red mana is more relevant than black in this deck
3) I need to be able to support the extra grim lavamancer that I'm running.
4) I run cryptic, and i want to be able to have my 4th land come in untapped always, for snapcaster shenanigans, pyro with deprive backup, or simply just for cryptic.
I've tried darkslick shores main, and overall i find that my maindeck pulls me towards sulfur falls as the better land. Of course, this is for my particular build, and the cryptic and lavamancer did influence my choice a lot. Without these, I would think that having Darkslick shores would be better too.
My board as it is:
2 Rakdos Charm
2 Engineered Explosives
2 Dragon's Claw
1 Flashfreeze
1 Monastery Siege
1 Jace, Architect of Thought
1 Dispel
1 Deathmark
1 Rending Volley
1 Shatterstorm
Few changes:
Back to the dragon's claw plan to increase our chances against burn post board, but still leaving one siege in for its versatility
Shatterstorm as another out to affinity
Rending volley will replace combust easily
Dropped a flashfreeze for dispel. Dispel comes in against more decks, and flashfreeze is less needed if im going up to 3 deprives anyway.
I'm questioning the shatterstorms. I know I wouldn't mind playing one, and research shows that most lists would have some form of sweep. That said, isn;t the affinity mathcup in our favor to begin with, in which case i'm not sure if the shatterstorm is necessary. If i had to replace it, I would probably try a tombstalker or keranos in that spot. For now i favor tombstalker slightly.
Thinking of putting a tombstalker in the sb, but don't really know what to cut. Not a fan of Blood moon after testing - the effect it has on our mana base is not significant, but not negligible. The threat of our deck playing blood moon already pushes a certain degree of conservative play, and i think capitalizing on that without subjecting ourselves to the same restrictions is good enough.
Sideboarding:
I don't think there's much doubt over what to bring in against each matchup, I'll try to cover what to take out:
Burn - Cryptic, Remand, Electrolyze. Essentially we want more early game interaction for us to stabilize after they run out of steam. The late game stuff goes out. Besides we need to bring in skites, claws, sieges, dispel. More stuff needs to come out to make space for these
Twin - Delvers. Against twin it is really more of a control mirror. Delver is the worst late game draw in the deck, and there are better ways to close out a game. If you need more space, a single bolt can be replaced with the rending volley. This is questionable, but we want to bring in Jace, Dispel, Volley, Flashfreeze, Siege, and something has to come out. I don't recommend bringing in skites though - Twin has a tendency to board out their combo, and skite becomes very irrelevant. Mind games.
Junk/Jund - Remands, Delvers. See the twin matchup for reasons for removing delver. These decks try to bring the game to a top deck war. Delver and remand reduces your chances of winning that war.
Affinity - Remands, Electrolyze. Remands come out for the Charms, and electrolyze for shatterstorm
Infect - Electrolyze, Remand. You don't have much to bring in against them anyway, and you are already favoured.
Bogles - Remand, Terminate, Murderous Cut. Watch out for the spiritdancers though, and try to leave at least one out to a big kor.
Control - Similar to Twin
Scapeshift - Electrolyze, Murderous Cut, Terminate. Leave in a bit of removal for titans if you need to.
Amulet - Electrolyze. You don't really need to pack much for them, bring in whatever counters you can.
This is a rough guide, let me know if you disagree and your reasons for disagreeing. I'm basing this analysis on the roles we want to assume in G2 and 3, as well as the average number of sideboard slots we devote to that particular matchup
I'm going to cut my third remand for my third deprive. The heavy U commitment means i might cut blood crypt from the deck, since i already have a basic swamp and basic mountain, and i want as many of my lands to tap for U as possible. If that's the case i would probably replace it with a darkslick shores.
I've realized that against decks with infinite removal such as UWR, Jund, etc we tend to be in danger of simply running out of threats. For these matchups, i think i might consider anashiok in the board. just a thought. Will test against them more first.
Considering cutting the remand though for either a thirst or a deprive
One thing i disagree though: Jund and Junk are difficult matchups to play, but i don't think it's cad enough that we are unfavored game 1. I would say against jund and junk we are even for all 3 games, and it depends on how we draw. Depending on the board we could even be favored in post board.
Idrareb: One thirst is definitely good, but i think 2 is really a little too much? I would like to see the list you're currently testing though.
My list for reference:
4 Delver of Secrets
3 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
3 Snapcaster Mage
1 Grim Lavamancer
4 Serum Visions
4 Gitaxian Probe
3 Remand
2 Spell Snare
2 Deprive
1 Cryptic Command
2 Electrolyze
2 Thought Scour
2 Murderous Cut
1 Terminate
Grim Lavamancer is a better 1 drop than Delver, but a worse top deck. Against a lot of decks landing it turn 1/2 has given me free wins, but i may consider dropping it for the single thirst. If i wanted thirst, it's a tough choice between the 3rd remand or grim lavamancer.
we really need a good 2 mana draw spell.
EDIT: quick search showed cerebral vortex and perilous research, both of which are promising
Black Sun's Zenith shuffles itself in which helps when you need to gift for a sweep.
I could see moving ashioks to the board and going down to 3 lingering souls.
4 might not be the best, but i know 2-3 is a certainty.
perhaps in those 3 slots we could fit
1 Esper Charm
1 Timely Reinforcements
1 Negate
2 Cryptic Command
1 Ojutai's Command
3 Remand
2 Murderous Cut
1 Path to Exile
1 Doom Blade
1 Dismember
2 Supreme Verdict
1 Wrath of God
1 Black Sun's Zenith
1 Sphinx's Revelation
1 Unburial Rites
4 Lingering Souls
2 Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
3 Snapcaster Mage
4 Polluted Delta
4 Flooded Strand
1 Marsh Flats
3 Island
1 Swamp
2 Plains
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Vault of the Archangel
2 Hallowed Fountain
1 Godless Shrine
1 Watery Grave
1 Drowned Catacomb
1 Glacial Fortress
1 Isolated Chapel
Came up with this list. Dropped Esper charm for gifts ungiven, it's primarily a control deck with potential for combo, essentially removing weaknesses from the pure control or pure combo builds of Esper or gifts. Sideboard can include some gameending threats for rites, or silver bullets for gifts. It's untested but sounds amazing when you consider how versatile it can be
The most powerful thing about this deck is that is has the ability to play aggro, control or midrange in any given matchup. There are some decks against which a turn 2 flipped delver equals a free win for you, and some games where a young pyromancer that they can't get rid off will help you stabilize and win. I don't think it's worth giving that up.
I could see putting some heavy threats in the board and bringing them in if we want to play a more midrangey game, but i think the 4 delvers in the main deck are a necessity. I think tombstalker is a better board choice than keranos, for that matter
About that list, i don't like the counter suite. The only hard counter is the 2 commands, and it seems you will have a hard time if the game grinds on. I feel with that list you give up a lot of late game inevitability that young pyro provides, especially since your top decks are a lot worse with 5 discard spells and 20 lands. you also give up the explosive early games that delver provides, and though you can get turn 2 tasigurs it's not as reliable as a delver. Sure it's midgame is a lot stronger, but i don't see how the build is better than the delver build in terms of versatility and adaptability.
I could be wrong, but it needs extensive testing; it really deviates too far for me to make an accurate judgment.
EDIT: when i first built this deck i tried to go delverless too, but i added the delvers back eventually
EDIT: Tested delverless on mtgo. cutting delvers for tombstalkers and more scours is promising. I don't agree on the discard plan or the lack of pyromancers still though. pyromancers have been the MVP of the deck every time i played it.
After some testing online, if i wanted to go delverless, i would replace the 4 delvers with 2 tombstalkers, 1 extra thought scour and a darkblast, and cut one murderous cut for the second terminate, giving something like this:
3 Snapcaster Mage
3 Tasigur
2 Tombstalker
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Serum Visions
4 Gitaxian Probe
3 Remand
2 Deprive
2 Spell Snare
1 Cryptic Command
2 Electrolyze
3 Thought Scour
1 Murderous Cut
2 Terminate
1 Darkblast
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Steam Vents
1 Watery Grave
1 Blood Crypt
3 Island
2 Swamp
1 Mountain
1 Drowned Catacomb
The manabase isn't perfect, but i still want as little shocks as possible, and i chose drowned catacombs since with 19 lands, a 1 lander is not very likely, making drowned catacomb better than darkslick shores in most cases. I'm conflicted over the deprive/remand ratio. I'm not sure if it should be 3/2 or 2/3 though. This is the list i would run after a little bit of tuning on MTGO.
Foul-Tongue Shriek
B
Instant
Target opponent loses life equal to the number of attacking creatures you control. You gain that much life
I'm excited to try this. I don't think it's very good, but hey we're desperate anyway
Against some decks you just keep adding him, till the point where you either threaten an identity crisis or an endless stream of creatures
Kolaghan's Command replacing one copy of electrolyze main deck
Rending Volley replacing Combust
Random cards I want to test:
Ashiok in the board - It worked in Fabiano's deck, it could work for use post board where we become more midrangey. I think it's the best walker we have against midrange/creature decks, including affinity where we just spit out a creature every other turn. It sounds unlikely, but I'm trying it out for a while.
Cryptic command maindeck - playing 1 copy with 18 lands now, haven't had trouble with a single copy since i don't draw it that often, and when i do draw it it breaks games
There are some decks against which we want to play as a control deck, eg zoo, merfolk, to some extent bw tokens, soul sisters. Is it worth trying anger of the gods in the board against these decks?
The only huge difference between us is that he run 19 land and I run 18.
We pretty much agree on everything else with slight deviations.
For reference my latest list:
4 Delver of Secrets
3 Snapcaster Mage
4 Young Pyromancer
1 Grim Lavamancer
4 Serum Visions
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Gitaxian Probe
3 Deprive
2 Remand
2 Spell Snare
2 Electrolyze
2 Thought Scour
2 Murderous Cut
1 Terminate
1 Forked Bolt
4 Bloodstained Mire
2 Steam Vents
1 Watery Grave
1 Blood Crypt
3 Island
1 Mountain
1 Swamp
1 Sulfur Falls
2 Engineered Explosives
2 Spellskite
2 Rakdos Charm
2 Flashfreeze
2 Monastery Siege
1 Jace, Architect of Thought
1 Combust
1 Deathmark
1 Negate
1 Keranos, God of Storms
I feel that deprive encourages 18 land builds more since you probably will end up with extra lands in your hand.
http://www.channelfireball.com/videos/channel-calebd-modern-ur-delver/
interesting things about his list:
only 2 smash to smithereens as artifact hate. granted he has a ton of other burn related removal.
4(!) dragon claws in the board. That's how bad the burn matchup is.
2-2-2 split of pierce, snare and remand: no mana leaks at all