I'm not sure about gifts ungiven. add unburial rites that might make it viable to make a 4 card package that would put an opponent into a bind when choosing between titan, rites, and 2 lands..... I'm really not sure, I'll have to try this.
If I used this to fetch other things it might flunk. such as if I have hive mind grab 3 different pacts and it lets and opponent leave you with the pact they can pay for. in theory.....
if we had more than 2 mana acceleration effects, it might work for making a land fetch package, but at 4 mana were only 1 Bounce-land away from 6 mana and a game ending threat!.....
I wnet 4-1 tonight.
I was pretty sure I was going to cut tolaria west from my deck, but last match up was against JUNK and tolaria west for recurring engineered explosives won me the game game 2. It allowed my titan to carelessly attack, while my opponent kept losing his spirit tokens pumped up by 2 intangible virtue. I would have been sunk without multiple engineered explosives.
I now pause before cutting tolaria west after experiencing this result.
my sideboard didn't run leyline of sanctity tonight as it was a FNM Modern. but I do wonder if that might be the right choice at a pptq. or similar event.
I replaced it with an extra chalice and 2 karn liberated. only the extra chalice got used tonight as the only match up I wanted it against was burn. I brought it in against junk thinking there was path to exile.
using it against discard sort of works. but a lost of decks that run thoughtseize are desperate to knock us off amulet... which is where leyline of sanctity feels like a better answer than chalice at 1? not sure about going with out leyline. how do others feel about going in without leyline?
it says I search for "up to 4" different named cards. but also says my opponent chooses 2. then chosen cards go to graveyard.
I was wondering If i find 1 card! can my opponent not choose it since there isn't 2 cards minimum to choose?
would they still choose the most cards possible according to the rules?
I think it's interesting how many of these decks are showing up in top 8 lists and most of them are just budget brews.
To me it really showcases how much potential the deck truly has. The guy in Ohio wasn't even playing fetchlands. From what I can tell the fetches speed the deck up tremendously on turns 2-3. Sometimes it's the difference between cascading and not cascading.
Also, I find it odd how he's running 16 posts and no Wispmare in the board. I'm guessing he ran into the guy who finished 1st and lost to Stony Silence. It's impossible to tell but that's just my guess. With 1/4 of the deck being weak to SS I don't see how he'd recover after turn 2.
Haunted Plate Mail seems like an interesting choice. For just 1 more mana Batterskull is better. Plate Mail might be better if it evaded but it doesn't so it's not that good.
Ral Zarek seems like an interesting choice for planeswalkers. Not sure how I feel about him. I think Keranos would be better in his spot personally.
I think the true power to his build is Blood Moon. I imagine he won more than a few games after a Moon hit the board and then he Balanced, or vice versa. Currently I run 2 mainboard just like he does but maybe 1 or 2 in the board would be good as well. Food for thought.
I am glad that more people are picking up the deck to toy around with. Hopefully some of the veteran players pick it up and put some better cards into it and we can make this thing Tier 1.
While updating the Modern Nexus top decks page, I came across this list that got 8th at the Ohio States event. No idea how many players were in attendance, sadly:
thats an interesting list to top 8. I really thought 11 land mana bases for the deck was a thing of the past. (as in horrible choice).
Haunted plate mail, it sort of makes sense if your going to cast multiple restore balance. I use Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker (as a preference) so I can see the value in a 0 cost turn into creature effect. But I don't like how plate mail is vanilla. If restore balance is keeping people off creatures, thena vanilla is fine, but I prefer wait for 1 mana more.
ral zarek he's viable, but isn't always having the most effective "effect" every turn. (other brain: hope that makes sense as you read it.) Crunkyeah I agree with that keranos, god of storms might be better, but I personally favor mogis, god of slaughter as he constantly duresses your opponent to sacrifice a creature or take damage. which taking damage every turn is the priority post restore balance! (when i said duress back there I didn't mean the spell!) (p.s. be an ******** once in a while to other people, you'll quickly figure out how to actually duress a person!)
@crunkyeah your first sentence is sounding puralized, like you've seen other restore balances take T8, any other lists come to mind you could link?
can help but feel like that brew finally got some vindication now that someone from CF took notice.
I've gotta say, it was a real treat to see LSV pick the deck up and mess around with it. I may not personally play the Twin combo in my Living End deck, but I'm starting to come around on recognizing the addition of Twin as a legit take on the deck.
It was also very interesting and refreshing to see LSV pilot the deck instead of TWoo.
i missed this when I first posted.
I'm not a fan of woo, he's kind of old news.
between Sled_dog or TheRogue's posts this combo could be done with white, but as TheRogue pointed out earlier, blue is the superior color for exarch's possible tempo plays. woo sticking with white, much less kiki jiki and restoration angel only furthers that his opinion is stuck in the past when compared to LSV!
Can't say I'm a fan of this one. Mana-intensive to the point where you're almost better just hardcasting dudes. There's also Beast Within to take care of RiP.
@Hadouken: How's your list look? Are you running Simian Spirit Guide? You want to get a board presence ASAP against these guys, so speeding out cycling into cascade is very important, even one that would normally look like a pretty lame cascade. Beast Within your own lands to get extra beaters. Side out Fulminators and, if possible, Street Wraiths. It's a tough match up but I hardly feel like it's unwinnable. Normally all it takes for me is one or two Brindle Boar activations, contrary to what NegativeReview's experiences have been.
I think it was WyvernSlayer who once talked about siding out the Living Ends and siding in Heroes' Reunion to gain 7 off of every cascade while moving to a hardcasting plan with the creatures. Pretty drastic move but if it's really a continuous problem for you then you gotta do what you gotta do.
Yes yes, that was me. I didn't go out of my to recommend it because it wasn't one of my better ideas. I've gone over to Gnaw to the Bone lately (a card which I had previously been down on) and have experienced some good success bringing it in against Storm, Scapeshift, and Burn.
EDIT: Double-post merged.
I still prefer the kor firewalkers. most of living end is red so any spell we cast generates life gain as well, even is red stalls to get a skullcrack and lethal on board!
this is an expensive card to run in a deck that runs nothing less than 3cc. however there is a version of living end that not many of talk about that runs big creatures and 3cc discard effect to put those big creatures in the graveyard. that version might be able to run it. its also similar to the forgotten cascade breaking//entering deck!
even for regular living end maybe something could be done with impromptu raid, the modern idea combo for the card is congregation at dawn, stack the top 3 with creatures. it would be a solid deck stack for living end to run a congregation at dawn you pay 3 to put 3 cyclers on top and following turn or so pay 3 to cycle them into the yard! not necessary but viable! more explosive if impromptu raid were on the field.
over all I'll experiment with impromptu raid, I don't think its unviable but certainly not a necessity!
I will pick up Living Twin within the next week or so and test it out. Looks really fun.
i'd argue that its more complicated than fun, (fun when its working of course) you really gotta think ahead with it, cause each turn one of the two combos might be better than the other!
my only issue with the Living twin lists lately has been 2 things.
either
1. its not called Living twin in the decks title!!!
2. its too much twin cards in the deck! seriously some of these lists have 4 [c[deadshot minotaur[/c] and 3 pestermite. seriously put those extra pestermites in the sideboard!
collisions between minotaur and faerie macabre were annoying enough for regular living end! you don't need it when your running a game ending combo!
3. not an issue but a praise! finally we something that can kill those collected company/former birthing pod douche bags who thought gaining infinite life was a safe thing to do!
I can't say splinter twin is more cost friendly than fulminator mage, but his list didn't have fulminators in the main.
gotta cut something in the Living twin's main for mana disruption. I feel like his deck needs 3 moon effects main boarded at the least.
Somewhere along the line I've been wondering how magus of the moon would play with the deck. seemed important that as a creature he was a moon effect that could be revived.
Brindle boar is also a creature. Brindle boar can also block. It will not trade with the creature, but you don't want it to trade with the creature. Creatures in a burn deck's graveyard are bad for you if you haven't cascaded yet.
that why I prefer the Kor Firewalker plan against burn decks.
don't get me wrong, if they are naya burn that plan is much weaker to the boar option.
I know its a late thanks, but I only picked the deck back up a week ago after a while of not using griselbrand!
If I used this to fetch other things it might flunk. such as if I have hive mind grab 3 different pacts and it lets and opponent leave you with the pact they can pay for. in theory.....
if we had more than 2 mana acceleration effects, it might work for making a land fetch package, but at 4 mana were only 1 Bounce-land away from 6 mana and a game ending threat!.....
I wnet 4-1 tonight.
I was pretty sure I was going to cut tolaria west from my deck, but last match up was against JUNK and tolaria west for recurring engineered explosives won me the game game 2. It allowed my titan to carelessly attack, while my opponent kept losing his spirit tokens pumped up by 2 intangible virtue. I would have been sunk without multiple engineered explosives.
I now pause before cutting tolaria west after experiencing this result.
my sideboard didn't run leyline of sanctity tonight as it was a FNM Modern. but I do wonder if that might be the right choice at a pptq. or similar event.
I replaced it with an extra chalice and 2 karn liberated. only the extra chalice got used tonight as the only match up I wanted it against was burn. I brought it in against junk thinking there was path to exile.
using it against discard sort of works. but a lost of decks that run thoughtseize are desperate to knock us off amulet... which is where leyline of sanctity feels like a better answer than chalice at 1? not sure about going with out leyline. how do others feel about going in without leyline?
gifts ungiven
it says I search for "up to 4" different named cards. but also says my opponent chooses 2. then chosen cards go to graveyard.
I was wondering If i find 1 card! can my opponent not choose it since there isn't 2 cards minimum to choose?
would they still choose the most cards possible according to the rules?
if they can't choose it would go to my hand?
quoting both
thats an interesting list to top 8. I really thought 11 land mana bases for the deck was a thing of the past. (as in horrible choice).
Haunted plate mail, it sort of makes sense if your going to cast multiple restore balance. I use Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker (as a preference) so I can see the value in a 0 cost turn into creature effect. But I don't like how plate mail is vanilla. If restore balance is keeping people off creatures, thena vanilla is fine, but I prefer wait for 1 mana more.
ral zarek he's viable, but isn't always having the most effective "effect" every turn. (other brain: hope that makes sense as you read it.) Crunkyeah I agree with that keranos, god of storms might be better, but I personally favor mogis, god of slaughter as he constantly duresses your opponent to sacrifice a creature or take damage. which taking damage every turn is the priority post restore balance! (when i said duress back there I didn't mean the spell!) (p.s. be an ******** once in a while to other people, you'll quickly figure out how to actually duress a person!)
@crunkyeah your first sentence is sounding puralized, like you've seen other restore balances take T8, any other lists come to mind you could link?
i missed this when I first posted.
I'm not a fan of woo, he's kind of old news.
between Sled_dog or TheRogue's posts this combo could be done with white, but as TheRogue pointed out earlier, blue is the superior color for exarch's possible tempo plays. woo sticking with white, much less kiki jiki and restoration angel only furthers that his opinion is stuck in the past when compared to LSV!
I still prefer the kor firewalkers. most of living end is red so any spell we cast generates life gain as well, even is red stalls to get a skullcrack and lethal on board!
------------------
impromptu raid?????????????????
this is an expensive card to run in a deck that runs nothing less than 3cc. however there is a version of living end that not many of talk about that runs big creatures and 3cc discard effect to put those big creatures in the graveyard. that version might be able to run it. its also similar to the forgotten cascade breaking//entering deck!
even for regular living end maybe something could be done with impromptu raid, the modern idea combo for the card is congregation at dawn, stack the top 3 with creatures. it would be a solid deck stack for living end to run a congregation at dawn you pay 3 to put 3 cyclers on top and following turn or so pay 3 to cycle them into the yard! not necessary but viable! more explosive if impromptu raid were on the field.
over all I'll experiment with impromptu raid, I don't think its unviable but certainly not a necessity!
i'd argue that its more complicated than fun, (fun when its working of course) you really gotta think ahead with it, cause each turn one of the two combos might be better than the other!
my only issue with the Living twin lists lately has been 2 things.
either
1. its not called Living twin in the decks title!!!
2. its too much twin cards in the deck! seriously some of these lists have 4 [c[deadshot minotaur[/c] and 3 pestermite. seriously put those extra pestermites in the sideboard!
collisions between minotaur and faerie macabre were annoying enough for regular living end! you don't need it when your running a game ending combo!
3. not an issue but a praise! finally we something that can kill those collected company/former birthing pod douche bags who thought gaining infinite life was a safe thing to do!
gotta cut something in the Living twin's main for mana disruption. I feel like his deck needs 3 moon effects main boarded at the least.
Somewhere along the line I've been wondering how magus of the moon would play with the deck. seemed important that as a creature he was a moon effect that could be revived.
can help but feel like that brew finally got some vindication now that someone from CF took notice.
that why I prefer the Kor Firewalker plan against burn decks.
don't get me wrong, if they are naya burn that plan is much weaker to the boar option.