Beat elves round 1
Lost to 4 color control round 2, he just kept hitting me with blink angel and vendilion clique
Win round 3 vs scapeshift
Win round 4 vs spike feede combi
Lost round 5 to infect
Lost round 6 to abzhan company
Drew vs tooth and nail
Lost round 8 to storm
Apart from the mana and bringing creature removal online, why don't we run snappies?
Because they are mana intensive for 1. He costs a minimum investment of 3 mana to use.
2 snappcaster isnt really good once you have the lock, its just another dead card you have to mill off the top of your deck.
I use a ratchet bomb as a catch all, but also use 2 disenchants as well. I imagine chalice would be a huge pain.
I will say that reality smasher is the real deal. I ran 2 in place of a herder and a sower. I wanna put another one in there. I may drop it down to one ulamog and go up to 3 smashers. With b/w being more grindy, Ulamog as a 2 of seems iffy.
My biggest issues is the lack of marshes, I have all the current fetches, but still have trouble from time to time with mana. I also only have 3 shrines but will grab the last on friday before SCG Regionals in Seattle.
I've been on the fence with MD surgical extraction as its been a decent play, but it really is hit and miss. Not sure if I want scarbbling claws, more dismember, or doom blade in it's place. Any suggestions would be much appreciated.
I feel kind of like a broken record saying this (and please let me know, if I should stop), but I'd change a few things up in your mana base to add more mana consistancy. You're currently running 12 B sources, 12 C and only 9 W sources. I'm not counting Cavern of Souls as a W and B source here as you can only use it for 3 of the 15 cards you have that require colored mana (not includion the 3 additional cards which you can pay with phyrexian mana). Your C sources are about right, but statistically you're not hitting a black source consistently before t3 and for white it's t6, ideally these are around t1 (14 B sources) and t3 (12 W sources).
Personally I like a full set of Blight Herder and would probably cut 1 Surgical (you can always move it to the Sideboard) to make room for it.
Otherwise your list looks fine.
I have some slight issues with the numbers required of black mana. With 12 sources of black mana on turn 1 is around 80 percent. 14 is like 86 percent. Its a negligible difference. Especially if you are only on 3 to 4 black spells that need cast on turn 1 its only around a 33 percent chance you will even have the card to cast in open hand.
I generally think that a 80 percent chance at a black source turn 1 is fine if you are only running 3 to 4 1 cost black spells.
I'm curious as to what everyone's thoughts are on AEther Grid maindeck, and Pyxis maindeck (replacing one or two Ghoulcaller's Bell). I took at look at your list on tappedout, thnkr, and I'm also wondering how Noxious Revival has been performing... it's a card I've liked the idea of for awhile in this deck. I still run a bit of an outdated list since I took a six-month break from Magic and don't own Spellskites just yet, so I'm toying around with the idea of exactly how I want adjust my build of it.
I am greatly opposed to prixis, it gives slight points vs stuff like emrakul and snapcaster but what it gives up is losing our cards permanently. The cost isnt worth the reward.
Also it is worse when you need to blind mill, since you cant abuse academy ruins or burid ruins.
Grid is okay, i bounce between it and not haveing it. It is really good at closeing the game, and still one of the best cards vs infect. But is unnecessary since you are gonna win once you lock the game regardless.
As to the blind mill debate, vs most decks it is only right to blind mi ourselves when we have a way to abuse the cards, ruins, revival ect.
When to blind mill opponent? This one is a little less cut and dry. MOST of the time a blind mill is a bad idea. Most modern decks have ways to abuse the yard, flashback, delve, ooze, grim, snappy. But a few decks just have 0 ways to interact with yard like bloom or tron. I am generally okay with milling them in those regards. Why? Surgical extraction is in my deck in both of those matches. Since cards in thier yard are basically gone it allows me to top deck a extraction and surgical. Basically im preemptively fishing for surgical targets. This has won me several games vs tron and bloom. But outside of decks like that blind mills tend to be pretty awkward.
As for Kozilek's Return, i like it. I think its the pyroclasum effect we want main deck. 3 mana is sad yes, but its instant speed, tutorable with stirrings. After board id sti want my firespouts but return is clearly powerfull main deck.
Is this the right decklist, warwizard87? For some reason I thought you went 4-2 with a "burning lantern" build
I did, i didnt like the burning list all that much. I did like some of the things it did though, like the blasts. I often missed the discard and spellskites like vs jund.
So i went back to the original style list with a few blasts. Sorry if that didnt come through the post.
My take on the burning bridge deck, it's really really good vs anything that is heavily creature based, lobbing bolts and blasts at dudes on the first couple turns is nice, it also closes games exceeding quickly. Won a couple games on the back of blast you, sac shredder blast you. But i felt i was already in the driver seat of those games anyhow.
I think we need a blance of burn vs our control elements since they are complementary, but packing 4 bolts and 4 blasts definitely feels like over kill and sets us in bad positions vs decks like jund since we dont lose to thier creatures we lose to thier hate cards.
(Also blood moon was insane when i got it, jund just flooted mana and decayed it though bad times.)
Went 4-2 at fnm this week (9th-16th) we had 33 people. Missed top 8 on breakers. Only one 4-2 got in. Lost to burn and jund. Beat 2 abzhan company, grixis delver, some 5 color reanimator.
Went with a really burn centric build, 4 bolts, 4 blasts, 3 charm and 2 slagstorm main .
Really liked the blasts, the bolts bot as much. Blasts just has so mucb more utility.
Slagstorm was a wrecking ball. Id go anger in the normal build if it wasnt 1rr so firespout is clearly where i want to be.
Played in a 13 player, 5 round, cut to top 4 Grand Prix Trial today and the report is as follows:
Round 1: Abzan Midrange, 1-2
I don't remember much from this match except for the fact that game 1, I hit an early lock and won quite easily and then in games 2 and 3, I kept sketchy hands at best in addition to sideboarding poorly in game 2 (he was telling everybody he was on Abzan Company before the tournament and even after not seeing Collected Company in game 1, I still fell for it, all of which resulted in a round 1 loss.
0-1
Round 2: Ad Nauseam, 2-1
Game 1 on the draw, my opponent plays turn 1 Temple of Deceit into Lotus Bloom; dead give away. I iquisitioned my opponent on my turn1, revealing an Ad Nauseam, a Temple of Deceit, an Angel's Grace, a Pentad Prism and a Lighting Storm. I took the Grace and passed. My hand had an early bridge, a surgical and a bell and that's about it. A few turns of pass/go and I drew a Thoughtseize. I thoughtseized, took an Ad Nauseam, then surgicaled it and we were off to game 2. I took out 2 bridges for game 2, then promptly died to a turn 3 Grave Titan off a Lotus Bloom... Game 3 I put an extra Bridge back in, assembled the lock on all his key pieces (Needle on Lightning Storm, Bridge for Grave Titan, all Angel's Grace Surgicaled and all Phyrexian Unlife in the yard) GG.
1-1
Round 3: Esper Control, 2-0, Pair Down
Not much to see here, his deck was a bit unoptimized with Battlelands instead of shocks, as well as no Snapcaster Mages and it cost him the match essentially.
2-1
Round 4: Infect, 2-1
Kept a bad hand and I got infected. Game 2, I got an early bridge and he couldn't punch through the last 3 poison. Game 3 was very back and forth with my opponent having both the infect an regular damage wins in hand if not for 2 key top decks in a bridge to stop the infect and an abrupt decay to stick at 1 life from a stupid Noble Heirarch plus some pump, but I got there.
3-1
Round 5: Affinity, ID
We actually had to play 35ish minutes of this match before we knew we could draw in and we did. I guess sometimes a long winded deck has its benefits; I want Affinity in the top 4 anyway
So the top 4 at this point is:
Lantern
Affinity
Affinity
Burn
Semi-Finals: Same Affinity Guy, 2-0
I just crushed him the way we often crush Affinity; Needle Ravager, Plating and Overseer, keep him off Signal Pest, win. Although, he did get me to 8 poison before finding a Bridge in game 2. He kept some very sketchy hands for being in the Semi-Finals as well as being the 3 time SCG State Standard Champion, shrugs.
Finals, Burn, Opponent Concession
Opponent asked me if I was going to Pittsburgh, I said, "If I get the byes." He says, "I found out earlier I can't go, so I concede." So I have 2 byes for Pittsburgh,
Amazing afternoon and now I have to start planning for GP Pitt!!!!!!
Well done, wish could go to pitt, but alas work. Want that playmat so bad though
I would not do it just because i like the ability to bave redundant protection. But at fnm i might do like complete disregard, lose hope, or induce despair but definitely never at anything higher to mucj is rideing not to be redundant.
Round 1 vs ad nauseum
Game 1 i mully to 5 keep a 2 land spellskite, lantern, bell hand. I get smashed on turn 4.
Game 2 in comes 3 leylines,1 needle,1 claim
Out4 bridges and a spellbomb.
I land needle turn 1 naming lightning storm, needle turn 2 naming a fetch land. I control his draws and land leyline. He checks his side and on to game 3
Game 3. My hand is 2 lands, thoughtsize, noxious revival, lantern, 2 mill effects. Turn 1 thoughtsize angels grace. Control draws, noxious revival thoughtsize for more discard. Eventually mill a ad nausioum and then extract them. He concides.
1-0, 2-1
Round 2 vs merfolk
Game 1 i keep a hand with bridge and lantern and a couple millrocks, i miss the turn 3 land drop and die on turn 4.
Game 2 in 3 leylines, 3 pyroclasum out 2 surgical, 1 noxious revival, 3 needle.
I keep a hand that will let me play turn 3 bridge gurenteed but no discard or leyline.
I decide to go with it. Top deck duress, it gets spell pierced. I land bridge, he has the recall and i die on turn 4.
1-1 2-3
Round 3 jund
Great game l, i can't remember the entire thing it took 35 mins but he wont concide untill i milled his last out. Finally did and he scooped.
Game 2 in come 3 leyline and 2 jars. Out 1 mox, 1 bell, 1 revival, 1 surgical, and 1 thoughtsize.
I land leyline turn 0, and he says aww *****. I land lantern and a mox turn 1 into duress turn 2 seeing inquizition and liliana and a pulse i take the pulse. I start the slow mill, scavaging ooze controls my yard for a bit. And i cant seem to close the game or draw a 2nd bridge. Eventually he manages to get to ancient grudge and kills my skite and then my bridge and attacks for lethal as the judge calls time.
No point in trying game 3.
1-1-1 3-4
Round 4 grixiz control.
Game 1 i established the lock very fast usinf discard to eat his counters and then a surgical on snap caster so i could mill with impunity. I let him land a tasigur to speed my clock.
Game 2 2 jar 1 cage out 1 decay, 1 mox, 1 bell.
He manages a bit better to fend off my lock but i still get it set up through his counter screen. Another surgical on snappy stops his shinagins. He forces me to mill him out. I eventually hit his vandalblast and he scoops
2-1-1 5-4
Round 5 sulti delver. Can not believe this guys deck. Something like 8 expeditions, foil fetches, shocks, snappys just the most pimp thing ever.
Game 1. I land a quick bridge because of discard and needle his mana sources. Game was fast.
Game 2. In 2 jars, 2 pyroclasum 1 cage. Out 1 needle, 1 surgical, 1 thoughtsize, 2 bell.
He lands delver on turn 1 it flips, my bridge gets counterd, the next one gets sulti charmed and i die to delver.
Game 3. I mully to oblivion basicly and get stomped by goyf and delver. Sigh
2-2-1 6-6
Round 3 abzhan
Game 1, i lock up the game quickly and keep him off black almost all game. Easy game 1.
Game 2 in comes 2 jars, 3 leylines 1 claim, out 1 mox, 2 surgical, 1 spellbomb, 1 needle, 1 bell.
I lock the game up quickly with discard. The issue is, and im not sure how the hell this happend. I hit him with inquisitiom thoughtsize and duress. I three turns, i sware my sheet said lingering souls and another irrelevant card. When he finaly got white mana it was stoney scilance. I was beside myself. Really really could not figure out how that happened. He even showed me his hand and said it was in there the whole time and he never drew lingering souls. Completely befuddled me. Also tilted the hell out of me. He ended up getting to a decay before me and killed my bridge on to game 3.
Game 3 i land leyline turn 0 and lock out his discard and lilianas.
He tries for stony i have the decay. Bridge lantern and mill rocks have the game locked up, i just have to millhim.out before time expires. I mabey should milled more aggressively but i was still trying to get my mind around me not seeing stony game 2. And turns ran out with him with 6 cards left in library. Sigh
2-2-2 7-7-1
After the game, couple of my friends pointed out that was the guy who had marked sleeves at spring states and he has been known to do shady stuff. I still believe that he had lingering souls in his hand. I really really dont Remember the stony in hand. Really annoying.
Well i for 37th place yuck.
My gf got 12th place with burn and opened a temple garden expedition. So the day was good and thats the best she has ever done i was so damned proud of her. I taught her how to play the deck and wrote up her sideboard plan, from the little i was able to watch her play she played amazingly well.
begrudgingly gonna test noxious revival over grid at fnm this weekend. I get that grid dosnt do much more then increase the clock but man does it quicken the clock.
Unless something drastically changes i will most likely play lantern at scgs wv states on the 18th of October. Won spring states with naya burn, wonder if i can do it back to back.
Thanks. Infect was just turn 3 ing me. And the abzhan company game 3 i just never found a bridge.
Beat elves round 1
Lost to 4 color control round 2, he just kept hitting me with blink angel and vendilion clique
Win round 3 vs scapeshift
Win round 4 vs spike feede combi
Lost round 5 to infect
Lost round 6 to abzhan company
Drew vs tooth and nail
Lost round 8 to storm
Because they are mana intensive for 1. He costs a minimum investment of 3 mana to use.
2 snappcaster isnt really good once you have the lock, its just another dead card you have to mill off the top of your deck.
I have some slight issues with the numbers required of black mana. With 12 sources of black mana on turn 1 is around 80 percent. 14 is like 86 percent. Its a negligible difference. Especially if you are only on 3 to 4 black spells that need cast on turn 1 its only around a 33 percent chance you will even have the card to cast in open hand.
I generally think that a 80 percent chance at a black source turn 1 is fine if you are only running 3 to 4 1 cost black spells.
I am greatly opposed to prixis, it gives slight points vs stuff like emrakul and snapcaster but what it gives up is losing our cards permanently. The cost isnt worth the reward.
Also it is worse when you need to blind mill, since you cant abuse academy ruins or burid ruins.
Grid is okay, i bounce between it and not haveing it. It is really good at closeing the game, and still one of the best cards vs infect. But is unnecessary since you are gonna win once you lock the game regardless.
As to the blind mill debate, vs most decks it is only right to blind mi ourselves when we have a way to abuse the cards, ruins, revival ect.
When to blind mill opponent? This one is a little less cut and dry. MOST of the time a blind mill is a bad idea. Most modern decks have ways to abuse the yard, flashback, delve, ooze, grim, snappy. But a few decks just have 0 ways to interact with yard like bloom or tron. I am generally okay with milling them in those regards. Why? Surgical extraction is in my deck in both of those matches. Since cards in thier yard are basically gone it allows me to top deck a extraction and surgical. Basically im preemptively fishing for surgical targets. This has won me several games vs tron and bloom. But outside of decks like that blind mills tend to be pretty awkward.
I did, i didnt like the burning list all that much. I did like some of the things it did though, like the blasts. I often missed the discard and spellskites like vs jund.
So i went back to the original style list with a few blasts. Sorry if that didnt come through the post.
My take on the burning bridge deck, it's really really good vs anything that is heavily creature based, lobbing bolts and blasts at dudes on the first couple turns is nice, it also closes games exceeding quickly. Won a couple games on the back of blast you, sac shredder blast you. But i felt i was already in the driver seat of those games anyhow.
I think we need a blance of burn vs our control elements since they are complementary, but packing 4 bolts and 4 blasts definitely feels like over kill and sets us in bad positions vs decks like jund since we dont lose to thier creatures we lose to thier hate cards.
(Also blood moon was insane when i got it, jund just flooted mana and decayed it though bad times.)
Went with a really burn centric build, 4 bolts, 4 blasts, 3 charm and 2 slagstorm main .
Really liked the blasts, the bolts bot as much. Blasts just has so mucb more utility.
Slagstorm was a wrecking ball. Id go anger in the normal build if it wasnt 1rr so firespout is clearly where i want to be.
List with blasts.
2 Academy Ruins
2 Blackcleave Cliffs
1 Buried Ruin
1 Forest
2 Ghost Quarter
4 Glimmervoid
1 Grove of the Burnwillows
4 Llanowar Wastes
1 Tendo Ice Bridge
// Creatures
3 Spellskite
// Spells
2 Abrupt Decay
4 Ancient Stirrings
4 Codex Shredder
1 Duress
4 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Galvanic Blast
4 Ghoulcaller's Bell
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Lantern of Insight
4 Mox Opal
3 Pithing Needle
2 Pyrite Spellbomb
1 Surgical Extraction
2 Thoughtseize
2 Firespout
1 Galvanic Blast
1 Ghost Quarter
2 Grafdigger's Cage
3 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Pithing Needle
1 Quiet Disrepair
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Unravel the Æther
2 Welding Jar
Well done, wish could go to pitt, but alas work. Want that playmat so bad though
I would not do it just because i like the ability to bave redundant protection. But at fnm i might do like complete disregard, lose hope, or induce despair but definitely never at anything higher to mucj is rideing not to be redundant.
he means the lantern player keeps hand up.
I used zacs main deck side was
3 sun dropplet
3 pyroclasum
2 welding jar
2 grafdiggers cage
1 nature's claim
1 pithing needle
(Will format in the morning using phone atm)
Round 1 vs ad nauseum
Game 1 i mully to 5 keep a 2 land spellskite, lantern, bell hand. I get smashed on turn 4.
Game 2 in comes 3 leylines,1 needle,1 claim
Out4 bridges and a spellbomb.
I land needle turn 1 naming lightning storm, needle turn 2 naming a fetch land. I control his draws and land leyline. He checks his side and on to game 3
Game 3. My hand is 2 lands, thoughtsize, noxious revival, lantern, 2 mill effects. Turn 1 thoughtsize angels grace. Control draws, noxious revival thoughtsize for more discard. Eventually mill a ad nausioum and then extract them. He concides.
1-0, 2-1
Round 2 vs merfolk
Game 1 i keep a hand with bridge and lantern and a couple millrocks, i miss the turn 3 land drop and die on turn 4.
Game 2 in 3 leylines, 3 pyroclasum out 2 surgical, 1 noxious revival, 3 needle.
I keep a hand that will let me play turn 3 bridge gurenteed but no discard or leyline.
I decide to go with it. Top deck duress, it gets spell pierced. I land bridge, he has the recall and i die on turn 4.
1-1 2-3
Round 3 jund
Great game l, i can't remember the entire thing it took 35 mins but he wont concide untill i milled his last out. Finally did and he scooped.
Game 2 in come 3 leyline and 2 jars. Out 1 mox, 1 bell, 1 revival, 1 surgical, and 1 thoughtsize.
I land leyline turn 0, and he says aww *****. I land lantern and a mox turn 1 into duress turn 2 seeing inquizition and liliana and a pulse i take the pulse. I start the slow mill, scavaging ooze controls my yard for a bit. And i cant seem to close the game or draw a 2nd bridge. Eventually he manages to get to ancient grudge and kills my skite and then my bridge and attacks for lethal as the judge calls time.
No point in trying game 3.
1-1-1 3-4
Round 4 grixiz control.
Game 1 i established the lock very fast usinf discard to eat his counters and then a surgical on snap caster so i could mill with impunity. I let him land a tasigur to speed my clock.
Game 2 2 jar 1 cage out 1 decay, 1 mox, 1 bell.
He manages a bit better to fend off my lock but i still get it set up through his counter screen. Another surgical on snappy stops his shinagins. He forces me to mill him out. I eventually hit his vandalblast and he scoops
2-1-1 5-4
Round 5 sulti delver. Can not believe this guys deck. Something like 8 expeditions, foil fetches, shocks, snappys just the most pimp thing ever.
Game 1. I land a quick bridge because of discard and needle his mana sources. Game was fast.
Game 2. In 2 jars, 2 pyroclasum 1 cage. Out 1 needle, 1 surgical, 1 thoughtsize, 2 bell.
He lands delver on turn 1 it flips, my bridge gets counterd, the next one gets sulti charmed and i die to delver.
Game 3. I mully to oblivion basicly and get stomped by goyf and delver. Sigh
2-2-1 6-6
Round 3 abzhan
Game 1, i lock up the game quickly and keep him off black almost all game. Easy game 1.
Game 2 in comes 2 jars, 3 leylines 1 claim, out 1 mox, 2 surgical, 1 spellbomb, 1 needle, 1 bell.
I lock the game up quickly with discard. The issue is, and im not sure how the hell this happend. I hit him with inquisitiom thoughtsize and duress. I three turns, i sware my sheet said lingering souls and another irrelevant card. When he finaly got white mana it was stoney scilance. I was beside myself. Really really could not figure out how that happened. He even showed me his hand and said it was in there the whole time and he never drew lingering souls. Completely befuddled me. Also tilted the hell out of me. He ended up getting to a decay before me and killed my bridge on to game 3.
Game 3 i land leyline turn 0 and lock out his discard and lilianas.
He tries for stony i have the decay. Bridge lantern and mill rocks have the game locked up, i just have to millhim.out before time expires. I mabey should milled more aggressively but i was still trying to get my mind around me not seeing stony game 2. And turns ran out with him with 6 cards left in library. Sigh
2-2-2 7-7-1
After the game, couple of my friends pointed out that was the guy who had marked sleeves at spring states and he has been known to do shady stuff. I still believe that he had lingering souls in his hand. I really really dont Remember the stony in hand. Really annoying.
Well i for 37th place yuck.
My gf got 12th place with burn and opened a temple garden expedition. So the day was good and thats the best she has ever done i was so damned proud of her. I taught her how to play the deck and wrote up her sideboard plan, from the little i was able to watch her play she played amazingly well.