I wanna give my thoughts and experience to some of those topics as well:)
1) Why is everyone running Nature's Claim over Natural State?? Natural State kills everything we want and the 4 life really can matter in race matchups like Affinity if you cannot Turn 4 them anymore. I would prefer it over Claim ALL the time.
You're forgetting about Leyline of Sanctity, doesn't hit one of the best hate cards against us.
As for which to play, they have both won me so many games. Gaea's Revenge was my MVP last night though. I run both in me SB. My question is, where does the new Ixilan dinosaur fit in between those two? Do we give up haste for trample and 1 less mana, or 4/4 regenerate for a 7/6 trample and 2 more mana?
I still run 2 Beast Within in the SB. The card is just so versatile. It kills Planeswalkers. It complements my SB artifact/enchantment hate. It is the card for the mirror and Tron decks for land destruction. I don't know what I'd do without this card, that I see literally NO ONE else playing.
If you look on MTG Goldfish most lists have 1-2 Beast within. It is definitely seeing play. Will 100% agree about it's usfeulness and versatility. I'm currently not sure if 1x rec sage, and 1x beast within, or 1x rec sage, and 2x beast within is correct. Especially since our SB's are so tight already....
I too have experienced this game plan from Grixis shadow. I've managed to play around it by Kommanding in response, and once Nihiling myself.. Although to be honest when it has resolved, I haven't been all that put out as traverse generally finds me the next threat.
As an aside, with decks that go wide being a weakness, as well as Dredge becoming popular again, is Jund charm not a decent sidebaord card? I haven't seen it run in any lists and I can't seem to understand why. I admit I'm on the newer side to shadow jund, so apologies if this has been discussed, but an extra grave hate card + instant speed pyro seem good to me. Only thing I can think of is that the colours are restrictive, but by my third land 99% of the time I have all three colours active. Thoughts?
Can vouch for Chandra. She has won me more games that she should have, as I was iffy on her too.. She is an all round great card, and I definitely will not be taking her out of the deck bar some insane new card that out performs her. Notable plays she has given me, killed thought-knot seers all day, killed baby goyfs, played her ticking up - soaked dmg from opponents swing - ramped 2 mana for titan (her most common play, 5 loyalty is gooood), burnt out opponents in grindy games, I have ulted her 4 times to date (one against Goryos vengeance.. Felt soooo good), won me a game 1 against lantern where opponent goes first - mills one revealing valakut, and immediately surgicals.. ouch.. I had no business winning that when bridge came down turn 3.. These are just a few of the many situations she has been great.. Yes you sometimes exile an awkward card.. No card with variance as an effect is perfect, if taking slight gambles is not your thing, Chandra is not for you.
Jace is incredibly tempting, but I still prefer snappy. Push, snap, push is still a very strong line.. Especially now with death Jund becoming so popular. Snappy has versatility as well, being an ambush viper, or EoT flash in to beat next turn, and flashing back a thoughtsieze or IoK are still perfectly fine plays. I agree about counter in the main deck.. After playing Willy Edels list a fait bit, stubborn denial either was amazing or dead in hand.. Now I understand that's the nature of the card, but I think that there were a few too many games where is was pretty subpar.. I'm currently going to test a few cards in it's slot and see how I go.
Definitely agree about what needs to happen if no discard is played, but I believe that would also warrant a a pretty big change of the rest of the deck to properly accommodate the rest of the permission suite. Also, never meant to make it sound like playing both instant and sorcery interaction in grixis is wrong, I am currently also playing both hence the "arguably". I was just trying to explain why the most popular variation of the deck has opted not to and establish that it wasn't a good comparison or reason for why we shouldn't too.
As an aside, I did some fairly small testing with Mishra's Bauble in the deck as a 2 of, cutting down on 1 thoughtsieze and 1 misty (Tough and scary call to cut that). From these initial tests, Mishra's has been great! I'm tempted to jam 1 more in somehow, maybe in place of a collective. It has helped Goyf, Delirium and Tasigur out immensely to create very quick pressure on board.
I have to say that my experience has been the opposite. Discard has been great for me, but that's not to say that I haven't topped one before and been like damn... anything but this.. That's just how discard is. So in your list you have 3 stubborns, removal (push?) and spreading seas. It just feels like there is a lack of interaction, although I could be wrong. In my experience I have dismantled combos, cleared the way for my threats, and lessened burn damage with discard.
I believe it's wrong and somewhat irrelevant to mention grixis not running discard (even though some versions do) as they are an instant speed control deck, and discard arguably has no place there. Jund sides it out when it's not relevant (rarely the case) or when in a grindy matchup as you want to 1 for 1 at every stage of the game in those situations and topping a dead card is bad. Now just because they side it out, doesn't mean discard is bad, it just means you understand when it's needed and when it's not. You mention better cards like spreading seas, which I admit is tempting (although replacing discard seems wrong), but what else do you classify as a better card in those slots?
These are just my thoughts and experiences, I could 100% be wrong.
So after testing Willy Edel's list a bit (which has been very good in testing), I'm at the stage where I'm going to tweak and test some different cards in the list. I was going to do a 2-1 split of lili of the veil and last hope, and was thinking of maybe adding something like mishra's bauble for better delirium or maybe spreading seas (relevant if it gets scoured). As was discussed earlier, I've also considered spell snare in the main or maybe even dispel. What I'm struggling with though, is finding out what to take out!! Thoughts on these ideas guys?
The godfather of BGx Willy Edel tweeted his first take on Sultai BGx yesterday. Said he went 4-1 w/it in a league. He goes with Rain of Tears over Fulminator Mage in the sideboard in the hopes of getting extra uses out of Snappy. He goes DEEP on Damnation, and has the full playset of Collective Brutality in the 75. I like Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver as a way to both fight midrange decks that are trying to go bigger as well as being a pretty great threat against control decks in my experience.
I like the manabase. The 4 Darkslick Shores incentivizes you to fetch Forest or Swamp early which is better for Blood Moon. I love Treetop Village in general, and since you're more aggressive in this build the cheaper activation is probably worth it. There is definitely some room to tune here, but generally speaking it looks good.
Tested this yesterday against a few decks (2 different Grixis lists - control and delver, Ad Naus, and a weird Zoo with bushwhacker and That new card). It feels suprisingly good, but there is definitely room for some tweaking. I'm not sure where though. MVP was grim flayer, and Stubborn. They both did absolute work. The deck flows nicely from early disruption (discard) with pressure into some late game control with ferocious stubborns. Facing threats above 4 CMC was an issue though, Lili or pulse were my only top decks that could deal. Not sure if a go for the throat is needed, or a murderous cut, but I worry cut strains the delve too much? I'm also considering testing a single Logic Knot as a late game catch all, but again am iffy for same reason as cut.
Moving onto some of my greater concerns moving forward with the list, as I didn't get to test these scenarios:
- How does it handle GY hate? I worry as a large part of our engine/resources/effects rely on the GY and cards like RIP would hurt alot!
- The sideboard lacks ways of dealing with enchantments, artifacts, burn, and GY strats (outside of the abrupts and pulse main). I realise SB's are tailored to metas and that big mana decks are coming up alot online, but there is alot left out in that proposed package. *edit* Also I realise that the list is a rough first draft! haha
Overall though, I surprisingly had a blast playing this deck, and coming from someone who was bored with jund, it somehow doesn't feel like I'm playing the same jund em out strat at all.. I dunno call me crazy.. Let's keep up the discussions!!
I love the fulminator + surgical plan against most of these decks, but is usually not so good against scapeshift/titan breach as they have to actually drop a valakut before going off, which doesn't always happen. There are still other great targets in stomping grounds and such though. Regardless, I was thinking about adding a ghost quarter to the main to help with the surgical plan against these decks, to accompany the fulminators.
You're forgetting about Leyline of Sanctity, doesn't hit one of the best hate cards against us.
As for which to play, they have both won me so many games. Gaea's Revenge was my MVP last night though. I run both in me SB. My question is, where does the new Ixilan dinosaur fit in between those two? Do we give up haste for trample and 1 less mana, or 4/4 regenerate for a 7/6 trample and 2 more mana?
If you look on MTG Goldfish most lists have 1-2 Beast within. It is definitely seeing play. Will 100% agree about it's usfeulness and versatility. I'm currently not sure if 1x rec sage, and 1x beast within, or 1x rec sage, and 2x beast within is correct. Especially since our SB's are so tight already....
As an aside, with decks that go wide being a weakness, as well as Dredge becoming popular again, is Jund charm not a decent sidebaord card? I haven't seen it run in any lists and I can't seem to understand why. I admit I'm on the newer side to shadow jund, so apologies if this has been discussed, but an extra grave hate card + instant speed pyro seem good to me. Only thing I can think of is that the colours are restrictive, but by my third land 99% of the time I have all three colours active. Thoughts?
As an aside, I did some fairly small testing with Mishra's Bauble in the deck as a 2 of, cutting down on 1 thoughtsieze and 1 misty (Tough and scary call to cut that). From these initial tests, Mishra's has been great! I'm tempted to jam 1 more in somehow, maybe in place of a collective. It has helped Goyf, Delirium and Tasigur out immensely to create very quick pressure on board.
I believe it's wrong and somewhat irrelevant to mention grixis not running discard (even though some versions do) as they are an instant speed control deck, and discard arguably has no place there. Jund sides it out when it's not relevant (rarely the case) or when in a grindy matchup as you want to 1 for 1 at every stage of the game in those situations and topping a dead card is bad. Now just because they side it out, doesn't mean discard is bad, it just means you understand when it's needed and when it's not. You mention better cards like spreading seas, which I admit is tempting (although replacing discard seems wrong), but what else do you classify as a better card in those slots?
These are just my thoughts and experiences, I could 100% be wrong.
Tested this yesterday against a few decks (2 different Grixis lists - control and delver, Ad Naus, and a weird Zoo with bushwhacker and That new card). It feels suprisingly good, but there is definitely room for some tweaking. I'm not sure where though. MVP was grim flayer, and Stubborn. They both did absolute work. The deck flows nicely from early disruption (discard) with pressure into some late game control with ferocious stubborns. Facing threats above 4 CMC was an issue though, Lili or pulse were my only top decks that could deal. Not sure if a go for the throat is needed, or a murderous cut, but I worry cut strains the delve too much? I'm also considering testing a single Logic Knot as a late game catch all, but again am iffy for same reason as cut.
Moving onto some of my greater concerns moving forward with the list, as I didn't get to test these scenarios:
- How does it handle GY hate? I worry as a large part of our engine/resources/effects rely on the GY and cards like RIP would hurt alot!
- The sideboard lacks ways of dealing with enchantments, artifacts, burn, and GY strats (outside of the abrupts and pulse main). I realise SB's are tailored to metas and that big mana decks are coming up alot online, but there is alot left out in that proposed package. *edit* Also I realise that the list is a rough first draft! haha
Overall though, I surprisingly had a blast playing this deck, and coming from someone who was bored with jund, it somehow doesn't feel like I'm playing the same jund em out strat at all.. I dunno call me crazy.. Let's keep up the discussions!!