Woah Woah Woah, since when has painters servant been legal in modern? I always thought that thing was banned..
Anyways, I would look into Remand. It give you more temp and draw, and having stuff in your opponents hand isn't a bad thing because they wont be able to cast it anyways. Things for bounce too, such as Cyclonic Rift are good. Also maybe look into a Tron shell, sort of how the UW tron plays out maybe? If you don't then I suggest Cryptic Command as one of the best blue cards in the format (yes I know the mana is stretched).
[quote from="Torpf »" url="http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/established-modern/220174-g-r-tron?comment=2046"]
Currently do we all agree that it is better to play 21 lands and 2-3 Relic MB rather than 19-20 lands and 4x Relic? I also want to test that because many times I've a couple more lands than necessary, but on the other hand if I can't get tron online ensuring land drops is the only way to win.
I have been playing with 20 lands and 4x Relics for almost as long as I have been playing the deck. The upsides are that it is a cantrip and with the lower landcount you will be seeing enough cards that it shouldn't matter. Recently I have switched to 21 lands and 3x Relics because of the reduction of Melira, Jund, and Living End in my meta. I added a second Ghost Quarter which has given me some good results, but I am still not sold on the idea of it yet. I may try going down to 2 Relics and freeing another mainboard spot. I would like to look into the Mishra's Bauble route to see even more cards of the deck but I am reluctant to ever try taking out my Pyroclasms.
Out of curiosity, what are all of the best anti-combo side options? Slaughter Games is probably the most obvious but I'm really looking for maybe something that comes down earlier than turn 4. Thorn of Amethyst seemed interesting, but are there any other options?
Has anyone ever tried Imp's Mischief? I have been loving the card lately, and in goldfishing the deck to try out some different sideboards I found the card to work very well. It works as a counter spell against control decks. Redirects Abrupt Decay's and Bolts targeting Lily's or something else vulnerable. Now I know the deck pacts a ton of discard, but they are all really horrible to topdeck. This lets you have a wider range of options in the lategame as well as messing up some plays in the earlygame.
So with changing the topic a bit, has anyone tested out Dark Heart of the Wood before? I feel like this must have been discussed before, but it wasn't in the last 6-7 pages I just looked at. I found it because I was getting mowed down by the random Burn guy every night. I threw two into my sideboard at first, but then went down to just one. It's no Zuran Orb but it let me stabilize and regain control of all the matchups that I was previously was loosing in. I went on to beat the Burn guy 2-0 and an Affinity player 2-0 aswell. Does anyone know if there are any better forms of recurable lifegain that I could be looking into instead of this sort-of-narrow sideboard card? Finks? Baloth?
Unfortunately I've ran into some storm lately, which I don't really have a good plan for. I'm thinking about changing the 3x slaughter games in my sideboard for 3x chalice of the void, and the 1x relic of progenitus in my sideboard for 1x grafdigger's cage. What are your thoughts?
My thoughts are "if you're worried about Storm, why are you taking out some of your best cards against it?"
He's right, but I would like to add that I play one Chalice mainboard and one in my side. It has straightup won me more games than I can count at this point. Every deck has a cmc that it will crumble at, so a resolved Chalice really swings games in your favor. I'd encourage you to test it out.
1) What kind of a meta are you in that you have a necessity for the fourth pyroclasm?
I normally play against at least 1 URx, 1 affinity, 1-2 pod, 1 jund, 1 burn (+ others).
Hmmmm. Well I can see how a 4th Pyroclasm is going to really strengthen your matchups, but from looking at your list above, you could afford to drop the Staff of Nin to make a free slot. Also the list you posted has no Sylvian Scryings, are you actually playing without them or did you just forget to add them?
You could put in some fetchlands, mainly Verdant Catacombs or Marsh Flats and a Arid Mesa to fetch a playset of Blood Crypt. It will help fix your mana a bit better. Then you could run a couple less basics and the checklands.
Aside from that, look into some sweepers like Anger of the Gods and Damnation. They will be getting more value by 1 for 3ing your opponents instead of going 1 for 1 with all the spot removal you have. Lastly, you have a big jump in your curve going from everything at 1 and 2 mana, then 4 at 3, and 4 at 4. I'd say either smooth out your curve a bit more or look into dropping the Demigod's maybe for a more efficient beater.
During the Eldrazi Winter of 2016 many different flavours of decks were present. Colourless and UR versions first showed up at Pro Tour Oath of the Gatewatch, and in the coming months UW was the dominant deck before Bant came to prevalence using World Breaker to break Worship mirror matches. During this time RG versions of the deck were tried, but always outclassed by other variants and therefor never caught on.
Fast forward to April 2016 when Eye of Ugin was banned. Bant Eldrazi quickly rose from the ashes as the only Eldrazi deck to survive the banning. It even went on to win the 2016 World Championships in the hands of Brian Braun-Duin. A few other Eldrazi variants were tinkered with during this time, but yet again nothing caught on.
Fast forward one more time to 2017. People have continued tinkering with the Eldrazi and decks like Eldrazi Tron and Colourless Eldrazi Stompy have emerged while Bant Eldrazi has fallen out of the limelight. During this time what is now the standard RG Eldrazi list was tuned by Ben Weitz, but kept secret in anticipation for Pro Tour Rivals of Ixalan. That changed when Ben took it to a 5-0 finish in a Magic Online league, resulting in the list getting published and Eric Froehlich publishing an article on Channel Fireball about the deck. This attention turned lots of pros off of of the deck for the Pro Tour, but not Grzegorz Kowalski, who piloted it to a 7-3 record in the Modern portion of the event.
In early 2018 Grzegorz played the same deck to a 1st place finish at GP Lyon 2018, proving the deck and skyrocketing it in popularity. At the very next Modern Grand Prix, GP Pheonix 2018, after the Bloodbraid Elf and Jace the Mind Sculptor unbannings, Michael Hughes piloted the deck with a playset of Bloodbraid Elf to yet another top 8 finish, solidifying the deck as a strong contender in the Modern format.
RG Eldrazi is an aggro deck without question. Although the curve is higher than your typical aggro deck, it still tries to end the game as fast as possible by smashing the opponents face with Hasty creatures backed up by some burn spells. Casting Eldrazi cards ahead of the curve is what makes the deck so formidable, and is achieved thanks to the mana production abilities of Eldrazi Temple and mana dorks such as Noble Hierarch. The typical colourless Eldrazi creature package of Matter Reshaper, Thought-Knot Seer, and Reality Smasher is included, as well as Eldrazi Obligator since the deck dips into playing Red.
The core RG coloured cards in the deck come in the form of Bloodbraid Elf, Ancient Stirrings, and Lightning Bolt. Bloodbraid Elf is a hasty three power creature that fits in great to our plan while providing card advantage in the midgame. Ancient Stirrings is the best cantrip in Modern, allowing for great card selction and consistency in the deck. Finally, Lightning Bolt acts as both Creature removal and an alternate way to push damage through.
Sideboard choices often come in the form of Artifacts and look to cover several roles with each card. Ancient Grudge and Seal of Primordium deal with Artifacts and some Enchantments. Grafdigger's Cage and Relic of Progenitus deal with Graveyard based decks. Damping Sphere deals with big mana and combo decks. Finally, Pyroclasm/Kozilek's Return and Engineered Explosives are catch-all's for go-wide creature decks and any random low-cost permanents that need to be dealt with. These sideboard numbers are all low numbers because Ancient Stirrings acts as a consistency tool to find almost all of them.
Overall the decks strengths lie in its ability to close out games fast with resilient creatures that are cast ahead of the curve. There are 12 Haste creatures found in the standard lists which means your topdecks will be live a lot of the time. You also have 14 Turn 1 plays so you will always be interacting with the opponent from the start. The manabase is very smooth as far as 3-colour manabases go, and the deck does not use the Graveyard (and very little artifacts) so most of the common sideboard cards in Modern will be dead and it can take advantage of the better ones. The major downsides of the deck are that it is extremely weak to Blood Moon, and unless you are expecting one you can straight up lose. There are also some card advantage problems if the game gets late enough as there are no ways to draw extra cards.
Hierarch is less versatile than Birds of Paradise as it only provides Green mana for the deck, but it makes up for that with Exalted. The Exalted creatures can often be far more than the opponent was expecting and rack up extra damage fast. Besides acting as "Eldrazi Temple" 5-8, the mana ramp allows for a Turn 2 Eldrazi Temple into Thought-Knot Seer which is hard for many decks to beat. Lastly, the off colour mana produced pairs well with Engineered Explosives when you want to cast it for X values higher than 2, which the deck cannot do naturally. Overall, Hierarch is the premier manadork for the deck and a playset should always be included. If more mana dorks are required then Birds of Paradise is the next best option.
Scavenging Ooze
The 2-drop slot on the curve needs to be filled in case a Turn 1 Hierarch is killed or you don't have an early Eldrazi Temple to play your Eldrazi ahead of the curve. Graveyard hate stapled onto a 2/2 body that grows is a phenomenal card. Beyond just graveyard focused decks, it can exile opposing Snapcaster targets or flashback cards. It covers many matchups and even helps the beatdown plan as a late game mana sink that grows to be a must-answer threat. Although the 2-drop slot is a flex slot in the deck, Scavenging Ooze will never be a bad choice to fill it.
Eldrazi Obligator
Eldrazi Obligator is one of the only Eldrazi benefits we get when moving into Red. Luckily, it perfectly aids the gameplan with it's 3-power Hasty body. Attacking for 3 on Turn 2 is going to be common as most times you will be ahead on mama. Otherwise it can be saved for later in the game to steal an opponents threat and smash face for millions of damage. Some things to note about the card is that Devoid allows it to be found off of Ancient Stirrings, and it can trade with an Etched Champion. The activated ability is an on cast trigger, so even if Obligator[/card] is countered you can still steal a creature. You can also pay it off of the Cascade trigger from Bloodbraid Elf, putting 6 + your opponents best creature of Hasty power into play.
Matter Reshaper
Matter Reshaper is a sticky Eldrazi creature that is the bread and butter for grindy card advantage intensive matchups. There are only a fewcardsintheformat that cleanly deal with it, so you can be almost guaranteed to get a 2-for-1 with it. It is good to note that putting the card you reveal into play is a may trigger, meaning that if you want to avoid playing an Engineered Explosives for 0, or your 4th land to avoid Tectonic Edge, you can.
Thought-Knot Seer
TKS is one of the most powerful Eldrazi cards you can play. Although it gives your opponent a card as it leaves the battlefield, a random card off the top of their deck is always worse than the best card from their hand. Couple that with the potential to be played as early as Turn 2 and you have a very strong threat.
Bloodbraid Elf
With the 2018 unbanning BBE was at long last released from her five year prison. She is a great addition to the deck with her Hasty body and ability to get actual card advantage, something the deck lacks. She pairs well with Eldrazi Obligator as you can still pay its threaten cost off of the Cascade trigger. It is also important to keep the Cascade trigger in mind when deck building. For example, play Lightning Bolt before Dismember as removal since it works on an empty board. Lastly, when sideboarding keep cards like Engineered Explosives in mind as they will lower the number of good cascade hits. Deckbuilding aside, BBE is a very powerful card and the full playset should always be played.
Reality Smasher
The largest of the colourless Eldrazi package, Reality Smasher does what the name suggests and, well.... smashes. Coming down as early as Turn 3 and often getting pumped by Noble Hierarch, there isn't much that can stand in its way. It also has a built-in Hexproof making it great against removal spells and almost always guaranteeing a 2-for-1. Later in the game they can often be chained together with Ancient Stirrings to really put the pressure on your opponent and close out the game.
Proven Maindeck Noncreature Spells
Ancient Stirrings
Ancient Stirrings is the glue that holds the deck together. It is the best cantrip in Modern and gives the deck an incredible amount of consistency. Since you often have a mana advantage through Eldrazi Temple or Noble Hierarch, playing G more for your Eldrazi just means you will be playing them on curve which isn't the worst thing to be doing. Stirrings allows for only playing 1-2 key colourless sideboard cards since you can dig for them quickly.
Lightning Bolt
Lightning Bolt has been the king of Modern for the longest time and with the reintroduction of Bloodbraid Elf it won't be falling anytime soon. It not only removes problem creatures from decks that can outrace you, but it also provides some reach for when you need a few extra points of damage to win. Couple that with the ability to cast it on an empty board from a Bloodbraid Elf cascade and you have a versatile card that fits perfectly into the decks needs and gameplan.
Dismember
Creatures in Modern have been becoming increasingly stronger for less mana and sometimes Lightning Bolt can't deal with them. Death's Shadow, Tasigur, and Gurmag Angler are some examples that your Eldrazi cards can't attack through, so killing them is the next best option.
Mind Stone
Mind Stone is not the flashiest card in the deck, but it does add a little in a lot of areas. Acting as ramp it allows for a lower land count. It provides Blood Moon insurance that is found by Ancient Stirrings. It even cycles in the last game when you need an extra card!
Proven Maindeck Lands
Wooded Foothills
Because of the decks heavy colourless requirement it isn't playing many shocklands. Only a couple fetchlands are played which allow you to get the single shockland, or basic lands if you are anticipating a Blood Moon.
Grove of the Burnwillows is for all reasons a perfect tri-land. It taps for every type of mana the deck needs and the lifegain can be somewhat ignored. There will be times that the opponent wins with only a couple of life left that could have been prevented otherwise, but when you are smashing with 4/4's and 5/5's those times are few and far between.
Karplusan Forest is the mirror image of Grove. The damage it deals to you is often worse because most decks in the format are looking to get your health to 0 and you are only helping them. Read how the game is going to decide if you should be using Grove of the Burnwillows or Karplusan Forest for your coloured sources.
Eldrazi Temple
Eldrazi Temple is one of the pillars of the deck. Playing Eldrazi ahead of the curve is what the deck is designed to do and this does it the best. This land should be prioritized for obvious reasons, so you better have a good reason for mulliganing hands with it.
Cavern of Souls
Cavern is the trump card for counterspell based matchups and is found with Ancient Stirrings allowing you to consistently make a lot of their cards dead. If you are not playing against a deck with counterspells then the only card it produces coloured mana for is Eldrazi Obligator. In these cases you can name Human, Elf, or Ooze to cast all of your coloured creatures easier.
Kessig Wolf Run
Bringing it back like it's 2012, Wolf Run presents a pretty unique win-condition for the deck. It is a manasink that helps get the last few points of damage through. It is uncounterable, and draws some landhate away from Eldrazi Temple.
Mountain & Forest
Basics are always important because everyone hates Blood Moon and Path to Exile. 2 Forests and 1 Mountain is standard. Always play more Green sources since it is the most important colour in the deck and it will be rare when you need to search up a Mountain.
Proven Sideboard Cards
Ancient Grudge & Seal of Primordium & Natural State
Artifact, and to an extent Enchantment, removal is a must in Modern. Green has access to the best cards for this, and Red also has the best Artifact removal. Ancient Grudge is played as premier removal to combat decks like Affinity, KCI Eggs, and incidental hate for Tron variants, Aether Vial decks, BR Hollow One, and any other random artifacts like Damping Sphere.
Seal of Primordium and Natural State are more catch-all cards to deal with a variety of threats. Natural State is cheaper and hits basically any card that Seal does, but Seal of Primordium interacts better with Bloodbraid Elf and an empty board. If you are entering an unknown metagame then Enchantment removal isn't often heavily included, so either card is fine.
Pyroclasm & Kozilek's Return
Sweepers interact unfavourably with Noble Hierarch, but the payoff for clearing the board vs Humans or Affinity is well worth it. If you are expecting to play against Thalia then Pyroclasm works better as the cheaper option. Kozilek's Return has a few things going for it, such as Instant speed allowing it to hit manalands, and Devoid means it can be found off of Ancient Stirrings and also damages Etched Champion. The deck doesn't play anything with converted mana cost 7 or greater so the second has of Kozilek's Return will never happen.
Crumble to Dust is the best way to deal with Tron lands (Urza's Tower, Mine, and Power Plant). With Noble Hierarch you can cast this on Turn 3 before they can untap with Tron and cast Karn. Devoid allows you to find it off of Ancient Stirrings making only 2 in the sideboard more than enough to consistently beat Tron.
Damping Sphere
Damping Sphere is Tron hate and combo deck hate all in one card. Tron will have to destroy it in order to cast their spells, and UR Storm or KCI Eggs won't be able to combo off with it in play. Do note that it is not all upsides, as it turn off Eldrazi Temple, taxes the cascade from Bloodbraid Elf, and taxes casting the card you find with Ancient Stirrings. It is best played in the midgame once you already have pressure on the board. Just playing Sphere and hoping to win is recipe for disaster.
Engineered Explosives
Engineered Explosives is the catch-all answer to a lot of decks while being searchable off Ancient Stirrings. Although the deck only has access to R and G producing lands, Noble Hierarch can add W and U for higher values of X. There are many things to remove at every converted mana cost meaning the card will never be dead and can adapt to almost an matchup.
Chalice of the Void
Chalice is the best way to try and cheese wins. If you can play it on Turn 2 there are many decks that will be crippled by it. Death's Shadow, Burn, Boggles, Living End, Zoo, Elves, Infect, Delver, UR Storm, and Ad Nauseam, and discard decks all are costed on the lower end of the curve and heavily rely on 1 converted mana cost cards. However, it is risky to play since you lose Noble Hierarch, Ancient Stirrings, and Lightning Bolt.
If you aren't happy with what is presented in the maindeck then how about going reeeally deep into the Modern card pool and seeing what it has to offer. All of these cards have their own strengths, but will be taking away from the core concept of the deck. Still it is good to consider them and always have them in your back pocket for any times they may be relevant.
Spellskite
Spellskite offers protection against all of the removal in the format. Even though all of the Eldrazi creatures have some kind of built-in protection, a bit extra couldn't hurt if you have a particularly hostile metagame. Spellskite is extra strong against Boggles, Infect, and Burn decks, so keep that in mind if you are facing those decks often.
Eldrazi Mimic
Mimic makes the deck even more aggro by adding a more aggressive Turn 1 or 2 play that wants you to chain Eldrazi together on curve. Including it means that you may not be playing Hierarch on Turn 1, so you will be relying extra hard on Eldrazi Temple. Even if you play a Turn 1 Hierarch then you would rather be playing your 3-drops on Turn 2. The main drawback is that it drops off by quite a bit in the late game, especially when in topdeck mode. It can be included in the deck, but a better home is in the Colourless Eldrazi Aggro deck that plays Serum Powder since it can mulligan aggressively for Eldrazi Temple.
Endbringer
Endbringer was the original top end of the deck, but was quickly replaced with Bloodbraid Elf once legal. If you can untap with Endbringer it will quickly take over the game as drawing 3 cards per turn cycle is hard to beat. It also offers some last points of reach when you don't have Lightning Bolt. If you want a higher curve then consider this, but keeping the deck at a lower, faster curve is going to pay off more.
Domri Rade
Domri is the best RG Planeswalker for the deck beating out only Arlinn Kord, Samut, the Tested, and Sarkhan Vol. Although they all do similar things, Domri actively "draws" cards which separates him from the others. The deck does have a card advantage problem so being able to get an extra Creature each turn is great. Often times your Eldrazi will be bigger than opponents creatures so his -2 is also quite useful. He is great as a midrange and control matchup breaker, so if you are facing a lot of BG/x decks think of including him.
Basilisk Collar
Basilisk Collar pairs excellently with Endbringer[/card] if you are including it. If not, then it makes all of your smaller 3/x creatures able to trade with opposing Goyfs, Tasigur's, and Anglers, and when put on a Thought-Knot Seer or Smasher your opponents won't be able to race the 8-10 lifeswings each turn.
Talisman of Impulse
Talisman of Impulse is a optional inclusion in the place of the maindeck Mind Stones. The reason to consider it is that it also produces coloured mana in addition to colourless mana. This can be important if you are unable to play a Forest before a Blood Moon is played since then all of your cards will be uncastable. If you are playing in an extremely heavy Blood Moon metagame then consider this over Mind Stone, but for every other time Mind Stone is going to be the better card.
Batterskull
Batterskull is a great way to stabilize against aggro decks. It is found off of Ancient Stirrings and can be a great source of inevitability late game either by bouncing it or suiting up your Eldrazi. One downside is that there is a lot of artifact hate in Modern. Kolaghan's Command is found in many maindecks and will cleanly deal with it. Postboard, people will bring in more Artifact hate as most of your sideboard cards are Artifacts. The payoff is great, but the card is easily dealt with.
Raging Ravine
Raging Ravine is a great card since it acts as a lategame threat that doesn't take up a creature slot in the deck. It avoids Sorcery speed removal like Supreme Verdict, Damnation, or Maelstrom Pulse, things the deck can often be blown out by. The biggest downside is that it comes into play tapped, and when the deck is trying to play ahead of the curve that can really slow things down. The unlucky times you draw it could be the difference between a Turn 2 or a Turn 3Thought-Knot Seer. Lastly, a lesser-known interaction is that if you have excess mana, you can activate the Ravine twice and when it attacks it will get two counters on it.
Wastes
Wastes can be included in the deck as a way to combat Blood Moon since the deck is weak to it. The biggest problem is that you have no way to reliably search it out other than digging with Ancient Stirrings which can be a problem if a Blood Moon is played before you can get a Forest into play. Often just using manarock such as Mind Stone or Talisman of Impulse will do the same job as a Wastes but has the added bonus of acting as an additional land to ramp you.
22/05/2018 - Published the new primer! 08/06/2018 - Added more to 'About the Deck', added more cards to 'Additional Cards', and fleshed out 'Articles and Videos'.
Try putting your deck into decktags and cardtags, because a lot of people will probably just disregard your post if you don't. There is a test-fourm on the main page you can go use to try and test them out.
Then go read through this thread for some ideas. It's not exactly what you are trying to do what your big vanilla creatures, but I'll warn you now that if you ever want to try and take this deck to a tournament, that Modern is a pretty unforgiving format and you won't do well against any tier 1-2 decks.
Lastly, for some advice on your deck, maybe look at Lead the Stampede as a way of getting some cards into your hand, seeing as most of your deck is creatures. Then maybe look at Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx as a way of generating more mana. All of your cards are double or triple green so the mana Nyxthos will give you will be huge.
Lavaclaw has always been rather mediocre for me. I know Bronson and others have rode it to victory but the cases where it is a worthwhile win condition are few and far between. Treetop Village as an evasive 3/3 for less of a mana investment has been much stronger and a better threat for me in my experience. Though I guess it depends on the build of the deck, but I've always been happy drawing Village, whereas Reaches has been hit or miss. I agree, you don't need two Raging Ravines. Spawning Pool seems mediocre. What are you blocking with it that you aren't just losing in the first place? Goyf? Outside of that the creatures of Modern are getting your opponent more value than that, or are evasive and don't care about your land. On top of that, I'd rather block Goyf with my own Goyfs anyways.
Spawning Pit was just an idea for chumping Goyf, Centaurs, Finks, All of Melira Pod, All of affinity on the ground, Zoo decks, other Ravines etc etc... There are a lot of creature matchups that it could be practical in, although I agree that it will probably be underwhelming most times.
Has there ever been thought into switching too two Treetop Villages instead of a 1-1 split with a Ravine and something else? It may not be the best endgame finisher once you have stabilized, but it only costs one mana more for 2 3/3's instead of 1 3/3 with some potential to get bigger and blown out by a piece of removal.
I welcome any suggestions to making this a slightly better deck than it is already, but I do find it enjoyable as is winnable as is.
Your list seems good. The only changes I would make to the main board would be -1 All is Dust and -1 Pyroclasm and +2 Karn Liberated. He is your most reliable and practical threat and almost every list of RG Tron should be running 4 of him. Aside from that the fourth Pyroclasm could be your call if you want to take out the All is Dust for it, or maybe an Oblivion Stone.
I am only running one manland and I want to up it by at least one. I have one raging ravine, should I add a second or go with a treetop village? Im leaning toward a second ravine.
I personally run 1 Raging Ravine and one Lavaclaw Reaches which is the same as the old school Bronson Magnan list from 2012. I personally wouldn't run another Ravine, and Treetop seems good for some variance. The only thing is that it may not always be enough pressure compared to a Ravine or Reaches as the it gets to the very late game.
Another thing I though of would be the possibility of a single Spawning Pool which would give you the ability to chump for days against decks that have no reach while having a very small mana investment. Just a thought.
Running 2x Forest is better if you get hit with Path to Exile and Ghost Quarter often.
Both Ulamog and Sundering Titan work as an "intermediate threat" between Wurmcoil and Emrakul - another big monster you can cast while gathering mana for Emrakul. Ulamog is devastating to most decks, but can be dealt with by Path to Exile. Sundering Titan wrecks multi-colored decks and even using Path to Exile against it hurts, but it's not that good against mono-colored or decks with no basics/shocks (Affinity, Mirror).
The Cavern is there to ensure Sundering Titan resolves against control decks, but I don't find it really necessary, those games usually end up being closed by Emrakul anyway.
There's no real consensus on these - it's mostly meta or taste-specific fine tuning. I prefer to run Emrakul+Sundering Titan, and a single forest since I run 2x Ghost Quarter MB and don't want to go over 20 lands.
Another reason is because the MTGO Metagame right now has the largest parts of it made up of Scapeshift, UWR Control, Jund, Pod, and Twin (they are all 3 colour decks and UR Delver). Against these you are likely to run into counters, so the cavern helps get yor threats through. Then the Sundering Titan does work here basically taking out three lands on each trigger. But as Phelpssan says, it's mostly a meta call, and the meta of MTGO happens to be more blue-oriented right now (at least from what I've seen).
My bad, I saw the new cardframe on Future Sight and thought it was reprinted in Future Sight. But would you really want to take an extra turn, or three, trying to reassemble everything after you got countered once? Modern is pretty cutthroat and you don't have time to be trying to reassemble the cards you need to combo out while not protecting yourself in any way.
Anyways, I would look into Remand. It give you more temp and draw, and having stuff in your opponents hand isn't a bad thing because they wont be able to cast it anyways. Things for bounce too, such as Cyclonic Rift are good. Also maybe look into a Tron shell, sort of how the UW tron plays out maybe? If you don't then I suggest Cryptic Command as one of the best blue cards in the format (yes I know the mana is stretched).
I have been playing with 20 lands and 4x Relics for almost as long as I have been playing the deck. The upsides are that it is a cantrip and with the lower landcount you will be seeing enough cards that it shouldn't matter. Recently I have switched to 21 lands and 3x Relics because of the reduction of Melira, Jund, and Living End in my meta. I added a second Ghost Quarter which has given me some good results, but I am still not sold on the idea of it yet. I may try going down to 2 Relics and freeing another mainboard spot. I would like to look into the Mishra's Bauble route to see even more cards of the deck but I am reluctant to ever try taking out my Pyroclasms.
Well most of the cards are already payed, but off of the top of my head the ones I can think of vs are:
Twin: Spellskite, Torpor Orb, Thorn of Amethyst, Slaughter Games, Rakdos Charm (This is a stretch)
Pod: Torpor Orb, Slaughter Games, Relic of Progenitus, Grim Poppet, Grafdigger's Cage
Scapeshift: Spellskite, Thorn of Amethyst, Slaughter Games
Storm: Relic of Progenitus, Thorn of Amethyst, Slaughter Games, Chalice of the Void, Grafdigger's Cage
There isn't much in your sideboard that you are reallly missing. All of the cards for sideboarding are relatively known.
He's right, but I would like to add that I play one Chalice mainboard and one in my side. It has straightup won me more games than I can count at this point. Every deck has a cmc that it will crumble at, so a resolved Chalice really swings games in your favor. I'd encourage you to test it out.
Hmmmm. Well I can see how a 4th Pyroclasm is going to really strengthen your matchups, but from looking at your list above, you could afford to drop the Staff of Nin to make a free slot. Also the list you posted has no Sylvian Scryings, are you actually playing without them or did you just forget to add them?
Aside from that, look into some sweepers like Anger of the Gods and Damnation. They will be getting more value by 1 for 3ing your opponents instead of going 1 for 1 with all the spot removal you have. Lastly, you have a big jump in your curve going from everything at 1 and 2 mana, then 4 at 3, and 4 at 4. I'd say either smooth out your curve a bit more or look into dropping the Demigod's maybe for a more efficient beater.
During the Eldrazi Winter of 2016 many different flavours of decks were present. Colourless and UR versions first showed up at Pro Tour Oath of the Gatewatch, and in the coming months UW was the dominant deck before Bant came to prevalence using World Breaker to break Worship mirror matches. During this time RG versions of the deck were tried, but always outclassed by other variants and therefor never caught on.
Fast forward to April 2016 when Eye of Ugin was banned. Bant Eldrazi quickly rose from the ashes as the only Eldrazi deck to survive the banning. It even went on to win the 2016 World Championships in the hands of Brian Braun-Duin. A few other Eldrazi variants were tinkered with during this time, but yet again nothing caught on.
Fast forward one more time to 2017. People have continued tinkering with the Eldrazi and decks like Eldrazi Tron and Colourless Eldrazi Stompy have emerged while Bant Eldrazi has fallen out of the limelight. During this time what is now the standard RG Eldrazi list was tuned by Ben Weitz, but kept secret in anticipation for Pro Tour Rivals of Ixalan. That changed when Ben took it to a 5-0 finish in a Magic Online league, resulting in the list getting published and Eric Froehlich publishing an article on Channel Fireball about the deck. This attention turned lots of pros off of of the deck for the Pro Tour, but not Grzegorz Kowalski, who piloted it to a 7-3 record in the Modern portion of the event.
In early 2018 Grzegorz played the same deck to a 1st place finish at GP Lyon 2018, proving the deck and skyrocketing it in popularity. At the very next Modern Grand Prix, GP Pheonix 2018, after the Bloodbraid Elf and Jace the Mind Sculptor unbannings, Michael Hughes piloted the deck with a playset of Bloodbraid Elf to yet another top 8 finish, solidifying the deck as a strong contender in the Modern format.
Then go read through this thread for some ideas. It's not exactly what you are trying to do what your big vanilla creatures, but I'll warn you now that if you ever want to try and take this deck to a tournament, that Modern is a pretty unforgiving format and you won't do well against any tier 1-2 decks.
Lastly, for some advice on your deck, maybe look at Lead the Stampede as a way of getting some cards into your hand, seeing as most of your deck is creatures. Then maybe look at Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx as a way of generating more mana. All of your cards are double or triple green so the mana Nyxthos will give you will be huge.
Spawning Pit was just an idea for chumping Goyf, Centaurs, Finks, All of Melira Pod, All of affinity on the ground, Zoo decks, other Ravines etc etc... There are a lot of creature matchups that it could be practical in, although I agree that it will probably be underwhelming most times.
Has there ever been thought into switching too two Treetop Villages instead of a 1-1 split with a Ravine and something else? It may not be the best endgame finisher once you have stabilized, but it only costs one mana more for 2 3/3's instead of 1 3/3 with some potential to get bigger and blown out by a piece of removal.
Your list seems good. The only changes I would make to the main board would be -1 All is Dust and -1 Pyroclasm and +2 Karn Liberated. He is your most reliable and practical threat and almost every list of RG Tron should be running 4 of him. Aside from that the fourth Pyroclasm could be your call if you want to take out the All is Dust for it, or maybe an Oblivion Stone.
I personally run 1 Raging Ravine and one Lavaclaw Reaches which is the same as the old school Bronson Magnan list from 2012. I personally wouldn't run another Ravine, and Treetop seems good for some variance. The only thing is that it may not always be enough pressure compared to a Ravine or Reaches as the it gets to the very late game.
Another thing I though of would be the possibility of a single Spawning Pool which would give you the ability to chump for days against decks that have no reach while having a very small mana investment. Just a thought.
Another reason is because the MTGO Metagame right now has the largest parts of it made up of Scapeshift, UWR Control, Jund, Pod, and Twin (they are all 3 colour decks and UR Delver). Against these you are likely to run into counters, so the cavern helps get yor threats through. Then the Sundering Titan does work here basically taking out three lands on each trigger. But as Phelpssan says, it's mostly a meta call, and the meta of MTGO happens to be more blue-oriented right now (at least from what I've seen).