Your list looks good. I would add Vendilion Clique somewhere in the 75, that card puts in serious work versus other blue decks.
and it's not JUST good against blue decks, its FANTASTIC against combo decks. I would have a lot of trouble thinking of any other card legal in modern that I magically make myself draw vs. any combo deck over a vendilion clique. you just don't get that kind of versatility in such a powerful hoseresque type of card these days. I almost want to main 1 and sideboard 2, but that seems almost too excessive somehow.
I also agree with Engineered explosives. In a LOT of spots if you have it in your opener you're very likely to win vs. bogles. There's just not that many games where they can come back from it if you land it at the right time. The timing can be really tricky though is the only thing. Hibernation was going a little deep, but still ok back when pod was a deck. I'm not sure if its gotten a lot worse, but yeah. At one point it was actually ok to do.
Both cards have their uses. Spell Pierce is more versatile, but Dispel is always live.
For the current meta I like Spell Pierce. Dispel does nothing against Junk, Affinity, Tron, Boggles and Jund, while Spell Pierce can catch them off guard. Dispel is great against twin and control, but we already crush twin.
It is a meta-call to run either card as they are both good in certain situations.
The issue is that while dispel does nothing against those decks, I don't think you'd want to board into spell pierce either for any of those matchups, except boggles. So in that sense (what does versatility of a card matter if it stays in the sideboard), its a bit more versatile, but not by that much. Junk is maybe a closer one, but if they manage to thoughtseize you and you don't have an untapped blue source, or they're on the play, they're going to be able to play perfectly around your spell pierce. For me, that, plus them running a ton of creatures makes siding into that not that appealing. The boggles one is totally legit though for sure.
I prefer dispel over spell pierce, but i can see different reasons for both. Pierce gets liliana, but not much else out of jund, which makes it fairly narrow. I'm not actually sure it getting liliana matters though since I don't think i'd side it in vs. jund/junk. I wouldn't board in dispel vs. jund anyways tho. Reason I like dispel is because it can be sided into control matchups no problem (spell pierce is a little more speculative) and its also good vs burn (pierce is too, but just not vs control as well).
Pierce does get enchantments and other things, but most of the time you can't afford to side something like that in, since statistically its usually the case that it'll be low impact or completely do nothing, (part of that is because usually decks running enchantments have a lot of other creature types of threats you care about, also pierce can turn dead in the lategame as well which doesn't do it any favors).
So with that in mind, it may appear that pierce is the more versatile card since it can potentially counter more types of spells, but the fact that you probably don't want to board it in as often as you'd think (usually you want your answers to either interact with creatures and noncreatures,Be insanely powerful, or stay in the sideboard),coupled with the fact that it can turn dead later in the game easily, I would say at least makes it a weaker card for a control deck looking to hit the late game.
Well Lordarrion you have one really good point, if we didn't get polluted delta printed, we would neeeever be talking about Sb blood moon plans as even a concept lol. Also i'd recommend maybe shaving down to 2-3 blood moons in ur sideboard just to try that out anyway, main reason is they are worse in multiples, meaning if you draw several, the first one is very effective, and the more u have the worse they get, the 4th one in ur hand does practically nothing. This is presumably why most splinter twin decks run about 2-3 in their sideboards.
I guess my thinking was, If we can rid them of the valakut combo, colorscrewing them doesn't seem super necessary since their deck's most powerful thing turns into dead draws (this is distinct from Slaughter games'ing their scapeshift, since now future scapeshift draws would be "dead draws" and not exiled). I understand that they can still cast their spells, can we not just kill their threats though? they don't seem super scary if we can just kill or counter their big bombs. I mean the deck isn't all in on the blood moon sideboard plan, it still has plenty of threats like keranos and batterskull that are good cards anyways. The downside to our disruption like Thoughtseize clique etc is that they can topdeck scapeshift, but if we shut that off with bloodmoon maybe that can be a viable path to victory?
Edit: What I really mean is, would it be a benefit to sideboard out weak cards vs scapeshift like electrolyze, bolt, etc. for cards like bloodmoon. Also when we side into the B-M plan, it always comes at the cost of siding out our ultimatum (assuming you only run one) and maybe some number of cryptics, for other cards like keranos, cliques, negates, thoughtseize, etc. So we have to consider the "Cost" of removing these cards when we side into bloodmoon. So ultimately, with that cost in mind, does the benefit of removing the "Valakut" win condition by means of our 3 mana enchantment B-M, as a benefit, outweigh those costs? I'd say that removing their biggest threat with a "3" mana enchantment might just be worth those costs. The ramp into 3 island is definitely something to consider, there may be a way to perhaps Ghost quarter one of their islands, turning off their cryptics? I also think that maybe we don't actually have to side out all our cryptics vs. Scapeshift because they can do what you say (ramp into triple blue).
I mean if their plan is to bounce the moon to cast scapeshift, then in that scenario our Cryptic is castable again once moon is bounced, and we got them to use one of their counters,
If they don't bounce it, then they have 4 dead cards in their deck (scapeshift) and we still have plenty of other ways to interact with them, having severely neutered their deck's power. It sounds reasonable to me anyways.
Last thing, blood moon is actually pretty great vs. the amulet of vigor deck, sideboarding into that, and a couple shatter effects (to slow their start down significantly) could be a path to victory in that matchup. I think as a sideboard strategy it could be pretty effective, I mean blood moon's power ceiling is bananas in modern, making it always a temptation if you're playing red.
Ever since I saw U/W Miracles control lists playing with blood moon as a sideboard card I've wanted to try a sideboard Blood moon strategy for this deck but I've always run into a couple snags with it. First you'd have to side out majority of the cryptics and cruel ultimatum, and side into things like Keranos, god of storms. Since we already play batterskull mainboard it doesn't seem super unrealistic. Second you need to run like 9 fetches or so which in a deck with not that much lifegain can be an issue.
The real issue I thought was when are you siding into the blood moon package? I could only think of vs. Junk and Tron. Damnation was also hard to cast after playing a blood moon so there becomes a consideration to also siding those out which takes a toll on the junk matchup unless you don't side them all out. I guess it seems somewhat feasible but everytime I go back to it I run into snags here and there. Is it even good against Tron? I guess if you have multiple shattering sprees in the sideboard I could see it as a strategy vs them since if they try to play something like an O-Stone after you tap out for Blood Moon you can just blow up their O-Stones and plus the excess of Red mana that blood moon creates helps replicate get more value, a small thing I guess. Idk I'll definitely think about it more again, everytime I come back to it it seems more feasible lol.
I was also thinking that if our Land destruction land is Ghost quarter we don't necessarily need 9 or so fetches since in an emergency we can GQ our own land to get our basics, then blood moon. Additionally we can also GQ their basics since most decks don't run that many (some only run 1 basic of a certain type for instance) in case they try to play around our blood moons, seems interesting.
Random question I have is how good is blood moon versus Scapeshift? I've never tried that out so I have no idea if that actually helps that matchup. I know some scapeshift players play prismatic omen are we worried about them playing that? if they can't combo with valakut does that mean we only have to kill their primeval titans and batterskulls etc? or do they still have another threat i'm not thinking about atm.
Edit: This has piqued my interest again, someone please test it :).
such a cool card, like many of the invasion block, please reprint some of them (while junk is the top deck, i doubt we see vindicate or pernicious deed )
I agree, ur example just makes me think Wizards really should realize how much we love reprints over new or functionally same cards. I just want to see a Spectral Lynx from Apocalpyse on the battlefield of a modern game, Staring down an opposing Tarmogoyf lol.
well at that point why not just play drowned catacomb since you're almost always going to be able to play it untapped given that you're not going to keep a 1 lander and almost every land in ur list makes it come into play untapped (except for 5?). Am I missing something?
Indeed, so not only do they print softer blue, they print harder blue hate.
I would think that is a pretty damning indication of what kind of play they want out of Counter spells.
not quite what i was trying to say, I was more saying
devs fear scenario A (20 counters in a deck)
They don't need to fear it because when it happened there weren't all these hate cards to keep it in check.
So, print counterspell, scenario A doesn't happen because of the hate cards.
not really damning at all.
This is also meant to address everyone saying "counterspell.dec" would be a thing. That deck is useless against these counter-hate cards, its clear to see.
well not only is the article years old, but that guy doesn't actually work for wizards anymore. You mention its not relevant the age of the article, but it actually can be something to consider. Opinions aren't set in stone and do change over time as well as exceptions being made.
Also like half the cards in that decklist aren't even legal in modern. A reprinting of counterspell wouldn't make a deck run a nightmarish 20 counters. Another thing is, Since that deck existed "counter-hate" has been printed in the form of powerful hosers to a deck like that, most notably Thrun, the last troll, cavern of souls, and Aether vial. If a deck tried to do the buehler blue in modern today it would be laughably bad against these cards.
Having game-breaking cards to find in a matchup doesn't really happen game 1, but in modern its realistic to try to dig for somewhat game-breaking cards from the sideboard (like shatterstorm vs. affinity for instance), which I think makes anticipate such a consideration for modern. If sideboards in modern weren't that impactful, like in standard, anticipate would be much more meh, although still pretty decent. The fact that control decks run so many lands is a burden to them, cards like anticipate let you play with enough lands to hit a decent amount of them by the mid-game, and then filter through the excess ones still stuck in ur library that you no longer really want to see anymore. The fact that it digs so deep means it can do a better job at this than other things like telling time.
basically, the silver bullets are what make up your sideboard, making anticipate good/something to consider in a deck like this.
But when I was playing against tron, I sided in things like Rakdos Charm for their Expedition Map as well. And simple counters for green version with Sylvan Scrying and I could easily get to the 4 mana before he could assemble tron and use it. (Doesn't work if he got the godhand with all three lands inside though, but with Bo3 hard for him to get that hand twice.)
In the end, Tron is not played as much has before, so Sowing salt lost it's place.
Since charm doesn't work vs expedition map on the draw, wouldn't you prefer a 1 mana artifact destruction spell?
I agree, its for sure possible that they'll stick to 3 cmc. Although, lightning bolt was pretty much just as unexpected for them to reprint, just saying its not impossible.
when you want counterspells that cost 3 cmc or higher, you're playing incredibly innefficiently. The reason for this is usually in modern your 3 cmc counterspell will trade for a 2 cmc or less spell like a tarmogoyf. Thats not a good trade for the control player at all. This is why people play things like spell snare, it guarantees you always "trade up" since thats all it can ever do. This is also why disdainful stroke in standard is such a great counterspell, it can only ever "trade up". Also in counterwars mana is usually the bottleneck, and if all your counterspells cost 3 cmc, you're going to have a hard time winning that counterwar. Also you mentioned 2 cmc counterspells aren't great, but isn't that what this thread is about? A way to fix that by reprinting counterspell. I'm not completely clear on what you mean, maybe you mean something different. As a final point/example not all control decks have access to discard since only black gets it, and so with a control deck you're proposing, the guy above has a point. That deck is incredibly soft to cards like geist of saint traft since lightning bolt doesnt do anything, same with path or abrupt decay. Modern does have cards like this being played. Even with discard you're soft to them topdecking these things.
I hear prohibit being suggested a lot when it comes to reprinting counterspell, and its a good card, but are we even sure it would get played over mana leak? I'm not even actually convinced it would tbh.
and it's not JUST good against blue decks, its FANTASTIC against combo decks. I would have a lot of trouble thinking of any other card legal in modern that I magically make myself draw vs. any combo deck over a vendilion clique. you just don't get that kind of versatility in such a powerful hoseresque type of card these days. I almost want to main 1 and sideboard 2, but that seems almost too excessive somehow.
I also agree with Engineered explosives. In a LOT of spots if you have it in your opener you're very likely to win vs. bogles. There's just not that many games where they can come back from it if you land it at the right time. The timing can be really tricky though is the only thing. Hibernation was going a little deep, but still ok back when pod was a deck. I'm not sure if its gotten a lot worse, but yeah. At one point it was actually ok to do.
The issue is that while dispel does nothing against those decks, I don't think you'd want to board into spell pierce either for any of those matchups, except boggles. So in that sense (what does versatility of a card matter if it stays in the sideboard), its a bit more versatile, but not by that much. Junk is maybe a closer one, but if they manage to thoughtseize you and you don't have an untapped blue source, or they're on the play, they're going to be able to play perfectly around your spell pierce. For me, that, plus them running a ton of creatures makes siding into that not that appealing. The boggles one is totally legit though for sure.
Pierce does get enchantments and other things, but most of the time you can't afford to side something like that in, since statistically its usually the case that it'll be low impact or completely do nothing, (part of that is because usually decks running enchantments have a lot of other creature types of threats you care about, also pierce can turn dead in the lategame as well which doesn't do it any favors).
So with that in mind, it may appear that pierce is the more versatile card since it can potentially counter more types of spells, but the fact that you probably don't want to board it in as often as you'd think (usually you want your answers to either interact with creatures and noncreatures,Be insanely powerful, or stay in the sideboard),coupled with the fact that it can turn dead later in the game easily, I would say at least makes it a weaker card for a control deck looking to hit the late game.
Edit: What I really mean is, would it be a benefit to sideboard out weak cards vs scapeshift like electrolyze, bolt, etc. for cards like bloodmoon. Also when we side into the B-M plan, it always comes at the cost of siding out our ultimatum (assuming you only run one) and maybe some number of cryptics, for other cards like keranos, cliques, negates, thoughtseize, etc. So we have to consider the "Cost" of removing these cards when we side into bloodmoon. So ultimately, with that cost in mind, does the benefit of removing the "Valakut" win condition by means of our 3 mana enchantment B-M, as a benefit, outweigh those costs? I'd say that removing their biggest threat with a "3" mana enchantment might just be worth those costs. The ramp into 3 island is definitely something to consider, there may be a way to perhaps Ghost quarter one of their islands, turning off their cryptics? I also think that maybe we don't actually have to side out all our cryptics vs. Scapeshift because they can do what you say (ramp into triple blue).
I mean if their plan is to bounce the moon to cast scapeshift, then in that scenario our Cryptic is castable again once moon is bounced, and we got them to use one of their counters,
If they don't bounce it, then they have 4 dead cards in their deck (scapeshift) and we still have plenty of other ways to interact with them, having severely neutered their deck's power. It sounds reasonable to me anyways.
Last thing, blood moon is actually pretty great vs. the amulet of vigor deck, sideboarding into that, and a couple shatter effects (to slow their start down significantly) could be a path to victory in that matchup. I think as a sideboard strategy it could be pretty effective, I mean blood moon's power ceiling is bananas in modern, making it always a temptation if you're playing red.
The real issue I thought was when are you siding into the blood moon package? I could only think of vs. Junk and Tron. Damnation was also hard to cast after playing a blood moon so there becomes a consideration to also siding those out which takes a toll on the junk matchup unless you don't side them all out. I guess it seems somewhat feasible but everytime I go back to it I run into snags here and there. Is it even good against Tron? I guess if you have multiple shattering sprees in the sideboard I could see it as a strategy vs them since if they try to play something like an O-Stone after you tap out for Blood Moon you can just blow up their O-Stones and plus the excess of Red mana that blood moon creates helps replicate get more value, a small thing I guess. Idk I'll definitely think about it more again, everytime I come back to it it seems more feasible lol.
I was also thinking that if our Land destruction land is Ghost quarter we don't necessarily need 9 or so fetches since in an emergency we can GQ our own land to get our basics, then blood moon. Additionally we can also GQ their basics since most decks don't run that many (some only run 1 basic of a certain type for instance) in case they try to play around our blood moons, seems interesting.
Random question I have is how good is blood moon versus Scapeshift? I've never tried that out so I have no idea if that actually helps that matchup. I know some scapeshift players play prismatic omen are we worried about them playing that? if they can't combo with valakut does that mean we only have to kill their primeval titans and batterskulls etc? or do they still have another threat i'm not thinking about atm.
Edit: This has piqued my interest again, someone please test it :).
I agree, ur example just makes me think Wizards really should realize how much we love reprints over new or functionally same cards. I just want to see a Spectral Lynx from Apocalpyse on the battlefield of a modern game, Staring down an opposing Tarmogoyf lol.
not quite what i was trying to say, I was more saying
devs fear scenario A (20 counters in a deck)
They don't need to fear it because when it happened there weren't all these hate cards to keep it in check.
So, print counterspell, scenario A doesn't happen because of the hate cards.
not really damning at all.
This is also meant to address everyone saying "counterspell.dec" would be a thing. That deck is useless against these counter-hate cards, its clear to see.
Also like half the cards in that decklist aren't even legal in modern. A reprinting of counterspell wouldn't make a deck run a nightmarish 20 counters. Another thing is, Since that deck existed "counter-hate" has been printed in the form of powerful hosers to a deck like that, most notably Thrun, the last troll, cavern of souls, and Aether vial. If a deck tried to do the buehler blue in modern today it would be laughably bad against these cards.
basically, the silver bullets are what make up your sideboard, making anticipate good/something to consider in a deck like this.
Since charm doesn't work vs expedition map on the draw, wouldn't you prefer a 1 mana artifact destruction spell?