Also, i forgot to post it above, but i'm finding 4 Snapcaster Mage a little too much. I found myself having extra copies in my hand sometimes, or having to take care of Delve too much. I were to go the Bauble+Whispers route, i would definitely cut at least 1 Snapcaster.
I feel like that as well. Sometimes it seems like we're too constrained on mana or wanting to be more proactive for Snapcaster. Though I'd never get rid of them all, cutting down one or two might be good? Some person posted a primer on Esper Delver-Shadow that was only playing 2 and that felt pretty okay in my testing of that deck.
I haven't really tested other than on Xmage, but I think the Delvers are the way to go. Street Wraiths enabling us to pump the DS and cycle through our deck is nice, but I often felt fairly threat-light in the "traditional" Grixis Delver list. I don't always find it that easy to delve for Tasigur or Angler if my hand doesn't line up correctly and getting it removed right away feels like such a tempo loss. I'll be testing out the DS + Delver version with some Liliana's mained when they get in. I think the +1 is helpful for casting our big threats and the -2 for recurring our DS or Delvers seems great in testing.
Yikes, anybody privy to main cause for the jump of Mishra's Bauble? I finished building a Suicide Zoo deck back in April, so I know it's a 4-of there, but unaware of other decks/formats where it sees play. I'm curious if Suicide Zoo performed well in a recent event or if the spike is more so related to Bauble only being printed in Coldsnap? Hell, probably both; I'm just interested as to why it spiked now and whether you folks think it'll sustain price or dip back down and settle somewhere above it's previous cost.
It did very well in a bunch of the WMCQ's last weekend. Either spiking due to bandwagon jumpers or a related buy-out, I'd guess. I just finished building a full version of it, so I'm glad I got these first as I had a feeling they'd spike after some time.
They won't ban lightning bolt. Ever. This is on par with 'ban tarmogoyf because it's expensive' arguments.
If tarmogoyf starts showing up in almost half of the competitive decks I bet you they would ban it.
And no, this isn't on par with saying 'ban tarmogoyf because it is too expensive'. Its ban a card because its too oppressive.
Which decks are suppressed from being tiered by bolt?
I personally don't care if anything gets unbanned. However I REALLY think (and I may be the only one) that Lightning Bolt should be banned. My reasoning for this is that it is warping the format. Statistics show that it is in 44% of all the top placing decks. The next closest most played non land card is Path to Exile at 24%. Of the seven tier 1 decks three will always play it as a 4-of (Burn, Jund, Jeskai control) and now Tron decks (also a tier 1) are running 4 bolts over sweepers like pyroclasm or firespout.
I believe that banning lightning bolt will reduce thoses decks dominance with out completely destroying them and will allow the emergence of newer architypes and a more diverse tier 1.
Thoughts?
#banlightningbolt
Banning bolt would only make linear aggressive decks like Affinity and Infect better. What decks besides those would benefit from the lack of efficient removal/reach?
I don't think any Grixis decks will end up playing Chaos Reveler. It's not really a huge clock and prowess doesn't seem to be that great in a deck that's mostly reactive and not proactive? Drawing 3 while hellbent or discarding a bunch of cards that aren't great sounds awesome, but that probably won't be the case most of the time. I could be 100% wrong though
You could try a pseudo-storm build with YP and Titi but Painful Truths seems better than AV if you do this. Other options include to keep all scours and run more Delve dudes. Or you can run more value creatures like some mix of Vendilion Clique, PKN, Kalitas, Tasigur, Olivia Voldaren and GDD.
So for the pseudo-storm keep in Delver, Tasigur and Angler, but slot in some Painful Truths and TiTi? The other option with Clique, PKN, etc. sounds like more of a midrange-y option, which doesn't sound like a bad idea either.
So I just finished building most of a Grixis Delver deck, but I'm missing the Snapcasters, which hopefully I'll be picking up some in the next couple months or so. Any ideas on how I could build around not having them for now? I I basically put in 4 Young Pyromancers in place of them, despite not playing the same role at all. I'm wondering if a full playset of Thought Scours is worth it if I don't have the Snapcasters?
Thought Scour is there to power out Turn 2 Tasigurs and Anglers more than to feed snapcaster.
Yeah that's what I figured. I thought about doing 2 Scours/2 Probes, but I figure I take enough damage from my own lands, and Scour gets more in the GY, that a Probe doesn't seem as good. Feels a bit bad to mill some needed answers without being able to get them back with Snap though.
So I just finished building most of a Grixis Delver deck, but I'm missing the Snapcasters, which hopefully I'll be picking up some in the next couple months or so. Any ideas on how I could build around not having them for now? I I basically put in 4 Young Pyromancers in place of them, despite not playing the same role at all. I'm wondering if a full playset of Thought Scours is worth it if I don't have the Snapcasters?
Any thoughts on this new card for the deck?
I feel like that as well. Sometimes it seems like we're too constrained on mana or wanting to be more proactive for Snapcaster. Though I'd never get rid of them all, cutting down one or two might be good? Some person posted a primer on Esper Delver-Shadow that was only playing 2 and that felt pretty okay in my testing of that deck.
What is everyone's opinion on Delver in this?
I think this is too reactive of a deck to consider discarding our hand for three random cards and we won't get to get full use of the prowess ability.
It did very well in a bunch of the WMCQ's last weekend. Either spiking due to bandwagon jumpers or a related buy-out, I'd guess. I just finished building a full version of it, so I'm glad I got these first as I had a feeling they'd spike after some time.
Which decks are suppressed from being tiered by bolt?
Banning bolt would only make linear aggressive decks like Affinity and Infect better. What decks besides those would benefit from the lack of efficient removal/reach?
4 Death's Shadow
4 Monastery Swiftspear
3 Steppe Lynx
4 Street Wraith
4 Wild Nacatl
Spells
3 Become Immense
4 Gitaxian Probe
2 Lightning Bolt
4 Mishra's Bauble
4 Mutagenic Growth
4 Temur Battle Rage
3 Thoughtseize
1 Godless Shrine
1 Arid Mesa
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Blood Crypt
4 Bloodstained Mire
1 Stomping Ground
2 Verdant Catacombs
4 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Ancient Grudge
1 Deflecting Palm
1 Dismember
1 Forest
1 Forked Bolt
1 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Hooting Mandrills
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Natural State
1 Pyroclasm
1 Ranger of Eos
1 Traverse the Ulvenwald
http://www.mtgmintcard.com/articles/writers/mtg-mint-card/deck-spotlight-deaths-shadow-aggro
Sigarda's Blessing
W
Enchantment
You may cast Aura and Equipment spells as though they had flash.
Whenever an Equipment enters the battlefield under your control, you may attach it to target creature you control.
So for the pseudo-storm keep in Delver, Tasigur and Angler, but slot in some Painful Truths and TiTi? The other option with Clique, PKN, etc. sounds like more of a midrange-y option, which doesn't sound like a bad idea either.
Yeah that's what I figured. I thought about doing 2 Scours/2 Probes, but I figure I take enough damage from my own lands, and Scour gets more in the GY, that a Probe doesn't seem as good. Feels a bit bad to mill some needed answers without being able to get them back with Snap though.