Nameless Inversion wants Traverse the Ulvenwald, but now we are getting away from ourselves. I have had a lot of good moments from replacing one Push with a Cast Down, get those Gurmags and Crackling Drakes out of here.
Thank you for allowing me a little leeway to complain, a very tough couple of weeks ordered around $1k in NM modern cards from various venues, most who have had a lot of business from me in the past. This was the worst stretch ever of receiving garbage cards advertised as NM.
Am well trained to assume there is not a creature on EBay that knows the meaning of NM, and am pleasantly surprised if otherwise.
Do a lot of business with the big houses, CK, TCG, ChannelFireball. TCGDirect grading has been pretty reliable for me with CF not far behind, and Card Kingdom bringing up the rear and not claiming to be otherwise, and at least reliable within their grading. But last 2 weeks, got bad hits from all 3 houses, multiple bad hits from CK and TCG. Meanwhile, I trade in cards in far better condition than any of the NM I receive and never get more than LP. Am ordering cards intentionally from sets that are known to have good original card quality, do not foil anymore, and regularly mark orders with respectful requests for best available conditions. Have had a range of experiences with SCG as well, and nice folks at all these places.
Some folks will no doubt want to get into acquiring cards via different avenues, but am a working family man with barely anytime to play MTG much less trade, buying and selling is the only avenue I can fit in to the schedule. Not even worried about cost, just want real NM cards.
Anyway, mostly interested to hear from others if quality from the big houses has gone down... or ideas how to ensure better experiences. Thank you.
Thanks for the all the discussion, definitely an exciting time. Am noticing that a lot of discussion are around inclusions that help in midrange grindfests, and am definitely looking forward to seeing how that refines over time with hundreds of matches. But in general, we know the type of matchup BBE will be good in, what I notice in with Jadine and Reid is their attention to the matchups outside of the JTMS sphere... the decks that will try to go under for example.
With an expected uptick in bolts across the board, running Confidant, or against Burn, cascading TS can be a game ender. In a grind down to topdecks, expect to often not have a real TS target and just get shocked, and another percentage where IoK would have served. Am definitely going to try more CB, tag some commands, breach and shift, etc. and shore up the burn matchup. For other tough matchups, CB very good against Dredge, removes Merfolk lords. Not super confident in CB, but definitely worth a try. Storm is an interesting concern, where you really want the discard, and BBE may never matter, but CB is pretty good there too. This is where Scavenging Ooze is so important, getting at Game1 Storm (am currently listing 2). Postboard you are going to drop so much removal, and not an unreasonable place to find more discard and ways to deal with tokens (Rakdos Charm?!).
On another note, am playing 25 lands, and have not seen a situation where Twilight Mire is better than Urborg, and have gotten twisted by TM enough to matter. With four+ creature lands, not too concerned about flood. A singleton Blooming Marsh perfectly fine, can't see complaining flipping that turn 4, and not any of the extra copies of Cliffs or a manland... turn 4 may not be the best turn to drop BBE anyway (Komplarens).
Grim Flayer is so enticing, not only setting up BBE, but likely a good hit off BBE as the likelihood of delirium by then is high... but it was nearly impossible to jam a few before with Dark Confidant (abzan), even though those two play perfectly as well. There just is not enough flex at the creature slot !
The price of SC has been steadily dropping since the printing of Blazing Hope, so probably no need to reprint, and you will need to find another wincon.
In looking at RD's list, he is going very aggressive, dropped his 5th pure removal spell (murderous cut) for Grim Flayer (going to guess he went this way after playing Traverse Shadow in a fast build and feeling that). That 2nd Grim is the slot for the singleton PtE with a second PtE sideboard, and I very much like the idea of Celestial Purge in that sideboard slot, since it covers some of Pulse territory as well. He used to keep the 4th souls sideboard, but has put the 2nd LLH in it's place (would be great to hear his line on that). I like that he confirmed Nihil Spellbomb as the bomb.
A general claim of Pulse >> Path is ?? based solely on instant v. sorcery.
Love Nihil Spellbomb, and play them over Baubles any day. Sorry dredge, sorry goryo, disables a snapcaster, witness, rallier, stops storm cold, kills a finks, shrinks an opposing goyf or flayer in the mirror, forces kolaghan's selection. Not even a bad late game draw as you will likely have the mana to cantrip it if necessary.
Stoneforge would fit more into an Abzan Liege shell, no? They already have a different primer.
Path is an excellent card in modern despite what RD says, and you will notice he will not argue with anyone. Watch him just 8 months ago fetch for white on turn 1 to hold up path, something that makes no sense to me whatsoever. The other white card that has made my SB at times is Blessed Alliance, but mostly that has gone away with Bant Eldrazi and Infect, but it's one of few tools to deal with Emrakul. Have also carried Hallowed Moonlight specific to our meta which has 2xStorm, Goryo's decks, Dredge and 3x Coco decks, and... deals better with Emrakul. GrafCage more versatile, but doesn't deal with Breach and Warrens
Prefer Nihil Spellbomb in the slot, very useful against so many decks, and can set it up to draw off a Flayer attack setup if it's not serving other purposes or sac anytime to add a type to your graveyard to save a Goyf or Flayer.
This year I have played about 3-months each of Abzan, Traverse and Rock, and my best results by far were with Traverse. That said, it doesn't feel like the most powerful of the decks, might just be the meta at the time. It might have been the most fun. I love this shell for its ability to adapt so quickly to changing meta.
Golgari Charm is a tough call because the enchantment mode is covered better by Abrupt Decay, and can hit tokens with Engineered Explosives and Maelstrom Pulse, and if you are playing your own Souls, then Zealous Persecution (doubles for GBx mirrors). I carried it when there were 2 Elves decks in my local meta. Its also a good card to hose Storm when they side in Warrens (and the occasional storm player still packs Blood Moon). I've never ticked the regen mode on it, for lack of opportunity and draw of a 1-of. Its certainly playable, but often doesn't make the cut.
Played Rock for a few weeks, at first it was janky and interesting and wiped Storm (Abzan pretty good at that too, but Rock better). Had better games against all variants of Tron but still lost all but one E-Tron outing. Ironically, Flayer is what I missed most even though he is rockable but better with LS. Felt very bad losing to Jund.
When I returned to Abzan, fell in love again, mostly with Souls and also with Rhino, even as a one-of. Was not long ago King Duke explained how he would go far out of his way to jam LS right now.
Ultimately, I felt Rock just ticked up a few matchups and ticked down a few others, Abzan right back the other way a few percentage points, so ultimately as usual it's what you expect to see. Unfortunately where we are that's still 30% Tron variants. The biggest positive takeaways... will play more Scooze and having played 2x Tireless Tracker so that I actually drew it occasionally, got a taste of just how good TT is.
Am well trained to assume there is not a creature on EBay that knows the meaning of NM, and am pleasantly surprised if otherwise.
Do a lot of business with the big houses, CK, TCG, ChannelFireball. TCGDirect grading has been pretty reliable for me with CF not far behind, and Card Kingdom bringing up the rear and not claiming to be otherwise, and at least reliable within their grading. But last 2 weeks, got bad hits from all 3 houses, multiple bad hits from CK and TCG. Meanwhile, I trade in cards in far better condition than any of the NM I receive and never get more than LP. Am ordering cards intentionally from sets that are known to have good original card quality, do not foil anymore, and regularly mark orders with respectful requests for best available conditions. Have had a range of experiences with SCG as well, and nice folks at all these places.
Some folks will no doubt want to get into acquiring cards via different avenues, but am a working family man with barely anytime to play MTG much less trade, buying and selling is the only avenue I can fit in to the schedule. Not even worried about cost, just want real NM cards.
Anyway, mostly interested to hear from others if quality from the big houses has gone down... or ideas how to ensure better experiences. Thank you.
With an expected uptick in bolts across the board, running Confidant, or against Burn, cascading TS can be a game ender. In a grind down to topdecks, expect to often not have a real TS target and just get shocked, and another percentage where IoK would have served. Am definitely going to try more CB, tag some commands, breach and shift, etc. and shore up the burn matchup. For other tough matchups, CB very good against Dredge, removes Merfolk lords. Not super confident in CB, but definitely worth a try. Storm is an interesting concern, where you really want the discard, and BBE may never matter, but CB is pretty good there too. This is where Scavenging Ooze is so important, getting at Game1 Storm (am currently listing 2). Postboard you are going to drop so much removal, and not an unreasonable place to find more discard and ways to deal with tokens (Rakdos Charm?!).
On another note, am playing 25 lands, and have not seen a situation where Twilight Mire is better than Urborg, and have gotten twisted by TM enough to matter. With four+ creature lands, not too concerned about flood. A singleton Blooming Marsh perfectly fine, can't see complaining flipping that turn 4, and not any of the extra copies of Cliffs or a manland... turn 4 may not be the best turn to drop BBE anyway (Komplarens).
Grim Flayer is so enticing, not only setting up BBE, but likely a good hit off BBE as the likelihood of delirium by then is high... but it was nearly impossible to jam a few before with Dark Confidant (abzan), even though those two play perfectly as well. There just is not enough flex at the creature slot !
The price of SC has been steadily dropping since the printing of Blazing Hope, so probably no need to reprint, and you will need to find another wincon.
A general claim of Pulse >> Path is ?? based solely on instant v. sorcery.
Path is an excellent card in modern despite what RD says, and you will notice he will not argue with anyone. Watch him just 8 months ago fetch for white on turn 1 to hold up path, something that makes no sense to me whatsoever. The other white card that has made my SB at times is Blessed Alliance, but mostly that has gone away with Bant Eldrazi and Infect, but it's one of few tools to deal with Emrakul. Have also carried Hallowed Moonlight specific to our meta which has 2xStorm, Goryo's decks, Dredge and 3x Coco decks, and... deals better with Emrakul. GrafCage more versatile, but doesn't deal with Breach and Warrens
Prefer Nihil Spellbomb in the slot, very useful against so many decks, and can set it up to draw off a Flayer attack setup if it's not serving other purposes or sac anytime to add a type to your graveyard to save a Goyf or Flayer.
Golgari Charm is a tough call because the enchantment mode is covered better by Abrupt Decay, and can hit tokens with Engineered Explosives and Maelstrom Pulse, and if you are playing your own Souls, then Zealous Persecution (doubles for GBx mirrors). I carried it when there were 2 Elves decks in my local meta. Its also a good card to hose Storm when they side in Warrens (and the occasional storm player still packs Blood Moon). I've never ticked the regen mode on it, for lack of opportunity and draw of a 1-of. Its certainly playable, but often doesn't make the cut.
When I returned to Abzan, fell in love again, mostly with Souls and also with Rhino, even as a one-of. Was not long ago King Duke explained how he would go far out of his way to jam LS right now.
Ultimately, I felt Rock just ticked up a few matchups and ticked down a few others, Abzan right back the other way a few percentage points, so ultimately as usual it's what you expect to see. Unfortunately where we are that's still 30% Tron variants. The biggest positive takeaways... will play more Scooze and having played 2x Tireless Tracker so that I actually drew it occasionally, got a taste of just how good TT is.