I'm pretty sure SSS has worse match up against UWR than Pyro, it's close to unwinnable because UWR plays a better instant speed game. At least with Pyro sometimes you can ride 1 Pyro to victory... can't do that with Sprites. SSS also lacks the Serum Visions for digging sideboard cards and the Gitaxian Probes to formulate a game plan against UWR, which is loses to late game since it doesn't run any specific sideboard hate.
Uwr is very tough for the sss version. I read somewhere that a person put 2 neurok commando in their side board for uwr.
Are we allowed to speak about a more burn oriented version of this deck, or is it strictly UR Pyro? I feel like that UR Pyro is the only deck that's to be talked about in this UR Delver primer.
I would post it and see where the discussion leads. The spellstutter version is a drastically different deck and the consensus was to move it to a different primer.
There is a little less activity on this thread than I had hoped...Until it picks up I'll hold off on fleshing out the primer. Anyone interested can just follow the links in the first post. Hopefully some pilots will bring results and more people will be interested in the deck soon. I will keep brewing and testing with it myself...the main thing I am stuck on is the swords seem awkward too often.
I've considered this, and what I've found is that it will not make an impact often enough to warrant a slot. If we were playing a grixis deck with discard, it might make sense. However, ensuring you don't see a 2nd of something isn't always the best gameplan as they might not ever get to the 2nd one and you've spent a card/mana/life getting rid of it.
Basically this. If you're spending 2 life and a card to do something that doesn't affect the board, it'd better be worth it.
I'd be hard pressed to find a match up where I want to bring it in.
Combat tricks vs. tarmogoyf
gifts ungiven
anything with snapcaster mage
vs scapeshift alone or in combination with land destruction
vs tron alone (mono u only) or in combination with land destruction (gr or u)
vs scavenging ooze
vs storm (maybe?)
It does not seem the most versatile of sideboard cards however there are a handful of winning modern decks that have included it in the sideboard.
I tried one of Jeff Hooglands lists in a local tournament and had some success. (3-1 got me to top 4, and then lost in the finals) The deck was a lot of fun to play and I think I'll be running it again later.
The deck seemed quite weak to a resolved Vedalken Shackles however. This is a card that can pretty effectively hate us out, since it makes it almost impossible to keep a threat on the table without trading a lot of resources for it. So my question to you more experienced pilots is this: why is there so little artifact hate in the sideboard? I'd imagine Ensnaring Bridge, Defense Grid, Batterskull and to some degree Torpor Orb and Sword of Fire and Ice are also pretty bad if they resolve.
Resolved artifacts can certainly be difficult to deal with. I would add oblivion stone, wurmcoil engine and mindslaver (especially with academy ruins in play) to your list of problematic artifacts in the format.
The number one name of the game is to not let these cards resolve. Our abundant counter magic makes this possible much of the time. Most of the cards you name are not run in mainboards or as 4-ofs, so that is in our favor.
Since we already have such a stellar matchup vs affinity I don't think we need to splash green for the free flashback of ancient grudge. I think something like shattering blow is preferable, especially in the U Tron matchup. Perhaps Ratchet bomb or engineered explosives are not too slow for the 2-drop artifacts you listed.
What would your deck look like if you added 1-2 artifact hate cards?
I'd like to paste this post over here from the young pyromancer version primer. It is a good as explanation as any when asking why that card is not in this deck. Should I change the title of this primer to "UR fae"?
One of the best parts of the old primer was the sideboarding advice. I have not played this deck enough to really contribute to this -- I just switched over from the Fae version, which I knew really well, but this deck seems to perform better so I wanted to try. I also am not sure when to be aggressive or when to hold back. Do I pretty much need YP or Delver in an opener to keep?
What I've noticed is it looks like this deck has a worse matchup with almost everything than Fae. Pod was a really good matchup for Fae, and does not look so with this. What are you sideboarding in? I rarely see magma spray in sideboards, and it's an all star against pod, hatebears, merfolk, and affinity, all decks that I want to side in more removal for countermagic. Is combust for UWX, mainly for manlands and resto? What do you do against goyf? Would love to see more info. This also seems worse against jund/rock post board. Also with less countermagic, seems worse against storm.
Keep in mind I'm skewed towards Fae. I know Fae and Pyrodelver are two completely different decks, but I need to know how to change my mindset playing them.
@Normalsaline154: Many many thanks for starting this thread since we can finally start to focus on the SSS version. Nice to see it all gathered here.
I must admit I'm one of the guys that is lost to the dark side. I always love to play Serum Visions to flip me some delvers or to find;not find mana sources. In many occasions I'm glad with the results it gives me.
I find it really good when I start on turn 3 (with 3 land) so I can spend one mana on Serum Visions and keep 2 open for e.g. remand or mana leak.
Also, with spell pierce and spell snare it is ok to use at turn 2.
At the moment I'm also interested in Magma Jet though I do not want to cut my Serum Visions for it (yet).
I can tell you want to be saved! Let's examine the possibilities. First off since serum visions draws a card first, you run the risk about a third of the time of drawing a card that would have flipped your delver. Ugh. Next, with your turn 2 example holding up Pierce, this would cause you to misplay mutavault and hold it back for another turn so you could use UU to play your visions and hold up Pierce. So the card is dead in your hand for the purpose of delver flipping until turn 3, and it takes what would have been your 3rd chance at flipping to replace itself, so you already would have flipped the delver about 70% of the time regardless of using visions. Unlike magma jet you can't snapcaster visions to win the game on the spot.
We play 22 land in the deck but 4 of those are really just extra threats, so even when we "flood" we have a good chance of flooding with lands that are really just more threats.
If you really feel the need to set up your draws the cantrip for you is Telling Time. At least this lets you play the rest of your cards normally, and doesn't have the risk of screwing up a delver flip.
In this tempo style deck though spending time using visions is often a tempo loss at an important time in the game.
Thoughts on having one Primer for the UR Delver decks or two?
UR Pyro would be under Established (Modern), UR Fae would under Modern Deck Creation because it has posted 0 results in the past 6 months, online or in real life.
I've started the UR Fae primer over there in modern deck creation. It definitely has more than zero results, although it does not qualify for established at this time.
1) Why not just play the established deck? (It's here!)
2) Young Pyromancer seems like a pretty good auto-include, any reason he was left out?
3) Without Serum Visions are you getting reliable Delver flips? I've never been a fan of Delver without some set up and I'm curious as to whether it's working here
Great questions, thank you for bringing them!
1. The discussion on the UR Delver established thread was to have this UR tempo version be in its own thread. There are 27 cards different in this deck than the main one being discussed in that thread, and the two decks have different play styles and meet different forum criteria at the moment. Additionally since the playstyles and maindeck card choices are so different, the sideboard concerns are considerably different as well.
2. Young Pyromancer was left out because it is worse than Spellstutter Sprite for the style of play this deck is going for. The sprite plays at instant speed, is disruptive, and works well with mutavault. If YP was played we would be more tempted to play the dead cards Gitaxian Probe and Serum Visions which would adversely affect our tempo plans.
3. Serum Visions is no Ponder or Preordain. Without it, Delver still flips albeit the math is probably a bit worse. Not to worry - you still have some options to remedy this and still stick with the tempo style of play -
Use the flexible slots for up to 4 Magma Jets. This is a Shock and scry 2 for 1R at instant speed rather than a card and scry 2 for U at sorcery speed. I'd rather snapcaster the jet back than the visions!
Replace the Delvers altogether with Scion of Oona. I didn't get a chance to put this in the primer yet but this is the reason I titled it UR tempo rather than UR Delver. Scion causes additional problems for your opponent such as protecting your other threats in response even to Abrupt Decay and your Mutavaults from Tectonic Edge or Spreading Seas
Yes, thank you... That link can also be found through the link referenced above. He has about 5 articles on the deck that we should reference somewhere...
This post reserved for future use. I am looking for help bringing this deck primer to the MTGSalvation community, so if you have experience with the deck please, chime in!
This deck is a blast to play. It is a highly interactive deck that rewards good play & knowledge of the format and your deck. It has strong match-ups against aggro, combo, and random stuff. UWR control is the highest tier deck that is a difficult matchup.
1. Overview and History
The most prominent and vocal advocate for this deck is Midwest Grinder Jeff Hoogland. Jeff traces the orgin of the deck back to late 2012, where central Illinois LGS brewer Matt Norton had been working on the deck. Jeff keeps his current deck iteration here, along with links to his various articles & primers on the deck as well as relevant video content. There is a metric ton of content put out by him on the deck, including extensive video archives of the deck in action online. I enjoy the deck so much I wanted to bring a primer to this site for the community here, despite the existence of the content elsewhere. Since the initial Top 16 at Grand Prix Kansas City 2013 by Hoogland, various pilots have found success with the deck as you can see here and here.
2. Card Choices
Place your left hand over an unopened pack of Worldwake, raise your right hand and repeat after me the Tempo Deck Oath:
I do solemnly swear (I do solemnly swear), that I will never ever ever (that I will never ever ever), place or suggest to be placed (place or suggest to be placed), a dead do-nothing durdly card (a dead do-nothing durdly card), into this deck (into this deck), so help me Jace (so help me Jace).
First we start with the core card selection. Adjust these at your own peril.
The above core selection leaves us with 8 more cards to fill the deck. Beware the Dark Side that wants you to fill these slots with Gitaxian Probe and Serum Visions! Don't do it! There is nothing worse for this deck than drawing a card that does nothing!
Instead use these 8 slots to tune the deck to your meta-game. Here is a generic way to fill these last slots
3 more counter spells: Spell Pierce is probably the best choice here, although an extra Spell Snare could be good meta call.
2 swords:
a 1/1, 0/2, or 2/0 split ofSword of Light and Shadow and Sword of Fire and Ice work well here. Try and pick something that is in your curve and is guaranteed (or nearly guaranteed) to give you card advantage no matter the board state.
Sideboard
No funny transitional business is going on here. The name of the sideboard game for this deck is to strengthen our core plan against the metagame we expect.
More exile-style removal: Magma Spray is what we need here. Persist / undying things are solved by this , and it can also mess up Arcbound Ravager lines of play.
Land disruption: Spreading Seas and a Blood Moon fit the bill nicely here, although thinking of snapcastering a Stone Rain makes me drool. As fantastic as Blood Moon is, more than one is probably too greedy - because drawing more than one in the same game is not cool.
Spellskite. The number one card in the format is Lightning Bolt, so Spellskite in the board works out well. Affinty and Twin are affected by this card to varying degrees as well.
4. How to Play
This is going to be a long section.....
You are the aggro deck...but you are also the control deck...but you also have the sweetest non-infinite combo in the format in the form of bolt-snap-bolt. Your lands are threats and your removal is reach...do you get the point? To play this deck you need to know the format almost as well as your deck so you can switch roles as needed throughout your game/match/tournament. You've got game against nearly the entire meta.
Nearly ever card plays at instant speed. This is a huge advantage that you should seize whenever possible.
Yes, some one did post in the last primer about that. Unfortunately that is not the same as a winning or top 16 finish. I am not sure I guess of the goals/scope of this primer.
Uwr is very tough for the sss version. I read somewhere that a person put 2 neurok commando in their side board for uwr.
I would post it and see where the discussion leads. The spellstutter version is a drastically different deck and the consensus was to move it to a different primer.
Cheers!
Combat tricks vs. tarmogoyf
gifts ungiven
anything with snapcaster mage
vs scapeshift alone or in combination with land destruction
vs tron alone (mono u only) or in combination with land destruction (gr or u)
vs scavenging ooze
vs storm (maybe?)
It does not seem the most versatile of sideboard cards however there are a handful of winning modern decks that have included it in the sideboard.
Resolved artifacts can certainly be difficult to deal with. I would add oblivion stone, wurmcoil engine and mindslaver (especially with academy ruins in play) to your list of problematic artifacts in the format.
The number one name of the game is to not let these cards resolve. Our abundant counter magic makes this possible much of the time. Most of the cards you name are not run in mainboards or as 4-ofs, so that is in our favor.
Since we already have such a stellar matchup vs affinity I don't think we need to splash green for the free flashback of ancient grudge. I think something like shattering blow is preferable, especially in the U Tron matchup. Perhaps Ratchet bomb or engineered explosives are not too slow for the 2-drop artifacts you listed.
What would your deck look like if you added 1-2 artifact hate cards?
I can tell you want to be saved! Let's examine the possibilities. First off since serum visions draws a card first, you run the risk about a third of the time of drawing a card that would have flipped your delver. Ugh. Next, with your turn 2 example holding up Pierce, this would cause you to misplay mutavault and hold it back for another turn so you could use UU to play your visions and hold up Pierce. So the card is dead in your hand for the purpose of delver flipping until turn 3, and it takes what would have been your 3rd chance at flipping to replace itself, so you already would have flipped the delver about 70% of the time regardless of using visions. Unlike magma jet you can't snapcaster visions to win the game on the spot.
We play 22 land in the deck but 4 of those are really just extra threats, so even when we "flood" we have a good chance of flooding with lands that are really just more threats.
If you really feel the need to set up your draws the cantrip for you is Telling Time. At least this lets you play the rest of your cards normally, and doesn't have the risk of screwing up a delver flip.
In this tempo style deck though spending time using visions is often a tempo loss at an important time in the game.
I've started the UR Fae primer over there in modern deck creation. It definitely has more than zero results, although it does not qualify for established at this time.
Great questions, thank you for bringing them!
1. The discussion on the UR Delver established thread was to have this UR tempo version be in its own thread. There are 27 cards different in this deck than the main one being discussed in that thread, and the two decks have different play styles and meet different forum criteria at the moment. Additionally since the playstyles and maindeck card choices are so different, the sideboard concerns are considerably different as well.
2. Young Pyromancer was left out because it is worse than Spellstutter Sprite for the style of play this deck is going for. The sprite plays at instant speed, is disruptive, and works well with mutavault. If YP was played we would be more tempted to play the dead cards Gitaxian Probe and Serum Visions which would adversely affect our tempo plans.
3. Serum Visions is no Ponder or Preordain. Without it, Delver still flips albeit the math is probably a bit worse. Not to worry - you still have some options to remedy this and still stick with the tempo style of play -
Yes, thank you... That link can also be found through the link referenced above. He has about 5 articles on the deck that we should reference somewhere...
1. Overview and History
The most prominent and vocal advocate for this deck is Midwest Grinder Jeff Hoogland. Jeff traces the orgin of the deck back to late 2012, where central Illinois LGS brewer Matt Norton had been working on the deck. Jeff keeps his current deck iteration here, along with links to his various articles & primers on the deck as well as relevant video content. There is a metric ton of content put out by him on the deck, including extensive video archives of the deck in action online. I enjoy the deck so much I wanted to bring a primer to this site for the community here, despite the existence of the content elsewhere. Since the initial Top 16 at Grand Prix Kansas City 2013 by Hoogland, various pilots have found success with the deck as you can see here and here.
2. Card Choices
Place your left hand over an unopened pack of Worldwake, raise your right hand and repeat after me the Tempo Deck Oath:
I do solemnly swear (I do solemnly swear), that I will never ever ever (that I will never ever ever), place or suggest to be placed (place or suggest to be placed), a dead do-nothing durdly card (a dead do-nothing durdly card), into this deck (into this deck), so help me Jace (so help me Jace).
First we start with the core card selection. Adjust these at your own peril.
Core Creatures
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Spellstutter Sprite
2 Vendilion Clique
Core Spells
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Pillar of Flame
4 Mana Leak
4 Remand
2 Spell Snare
Mana Base
4 Mutavault
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Steam Vents
1 Sulfur Falls
1 Mountain
5 Island
The above core selection leaves us with 8 more cards to fill the deck. Beware the Dark Side that wants you to fill these slots with Gitaxian Probe and Serum Visions! Don't do it! There is nothing worse for this deck than drawing a card that does nothing!
Instead use these 8 slots to tune the deck to your meta-game. Here is a generic way to fill these last slots
3 more instant speed burn spells:
Excellent choices are Burst Lightning, Magma Jet, or Electrolyze.
3 more counter spells:
Spell Pierce is probably the best choice here, although an extra Spell Snare could be good meta call.
2 swords:
a 1/1, 0/2, or 2/0 split ofSword of Light and Shadow and Sword of Fire and Ice work well here. Try and pick something that is in your curve and is guaranteed (or nearly guaranteed) to give you card advantage no matter the board state.
Sideboard
No funny transitional business is going on here. The name of the sideboard game for this deck is to strengthen our core plan against the metagame we expect.
More counter magic: Negate seems like the best choice here - a hard counter for Liliana of the Veil, Karn, Liberated, or anything storm does. Dispel seems too narrow and Counterflux can be awkward with 4 Mutavaults in the maindeck. Having different types of countermagic also makes the Snapcaster Mages more versatile.
More exile-style removal: Magma Spray is what we need here. Persist / undying things are solved by this , and it can also mess up Arcbound Ravager lines of play.
Land disruption: Spreading Seas and a Blood Moon fit the bill nicely here, although thinking of snapcastering a Stone Rain makes me drool. As fantastic as Blood Moon is, more than one is probably too greedy - because drawing more than one in the same game is not cool.
Spellskite. The number one card in the format is Lightning Bolt, so Spellskite in the board works out well. Affinty and Twin are affected by this card to varying degrees as well.
More removal: Ratchet Bomb, Dismember, Turn/Burn are all reasonable here.
3. Decklists
3 Vendilion Clique
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Spellstutter Sprite
Instants [21]
2 Burst Lightning
2 Electrolyze
2 Telling Time
3 Spell Snare
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Mana Leak
4 Remand
2 Pillar of Flame
Lands [22]
1 Faerie Conclave
1 Mountain
1 Sulfur Falls
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Steam Vents
4 Mutavault
4 Scalding Tarn
5 Island
3 Blood Moon
2 Dismember
3 Magma Spray
1 Negate
1 Spell Pierce
1 Spellskite
2 Spreading Seas
2 Threads of Disloyalty
2 Vendilion Clique
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Spellstutter Sprite
Instants [20]
1 Electrolyze
2 Burst Lightning
2 Spell Pierce
3 Spell Snare
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Mana Leak
4 Remand
2 Pillar of Flame
Artifacts [2]
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
Lands [22]
1 Mountain
1 Sulfur Falls
3 Steam Vents
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Mutavault
4 Scalding Tarn
5 Island
3 Magma Spray
2 Negate
2 Engineered Explosives
2 Spellskite
2 Spreading Seas
2 Dismember
2 Turn // Burn
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Spellstutter Sprite
4 Delver of Secrets
2 Vendilion Clique
Instants [20]
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Mana Leak
4 Remand
3 Burst Lightning
3 Spell Pierce
2 Spell Snare
2 Pillar of Flame
Artifacts [2]
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
Land [22]
5 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Steam Vents
1 Sulfur Falls
1 Mountain
1 Blood Moon
2 Dismember
3 Magma Spray
2 Negate
3 Ratchet Bomb
2 Spellskite
4. How to Play
This is going to be a long section.....
You are the aggro deck...but you are also the control deck...but you also have the sweetest non-infinite combo in the format in the form of bolt-snap-bolt. Your lands are threats and your removal is reach...do you get the point? To play this deck you need to know the format almost as well as your deck so you can switch roles as needed throughout your game/match/tournament. You've got game against nearly the entire meta.
Nearly ever card plays at instant speed. This is a huge advantage that you should seize whenever possible.
5. Match-up Analysis
6. Tournaments Results
Also, there are zero recent winning modern decks with delvers and goblin guides...