What's the strategy vs Jeskai Tempo? Bobby boards out amulets and scouts, and boards in threats, dismembers and swan songs. Dismember didn't feel great to me, but I can't think of a better strategy. If you don't bring in dismembers and try to keep up with tempo, they'll just swing a couple times and then helix/electrolyze/bolt and snap back to close the game. You can't sit back and find your cavern and cast threat after threat to dry up their removal, because you're taking 3-5 dmg per turn you don't do anything. I think Ruric has to be a big part of this, but I'm not smart enough to know the answer. Help appreciated, thanks.
I've played all versions of Jeskai control in the current meta and might have some insight here, but the strategy all depends on the list your opponent is running. The most competitive and common list at the moment is the 'new flash' list packing 4x Spell Queller alongside some amount of Geist of Saint-Traft and Vendilion Clique as the main-board creatures. They will also run close to the full playset of bolt/helix/electrolyze, and usually 4 of Mana Leak / Logic Knot / Remand. In the first 3 turns of the game these are the cards you need to anticipate. After sideboard Jeskai will possibly bring in up to 2 Ceremonious Rejection and up to 2 Wear // Tear for the MU and maybe a Supreme Verdict if they have one or two in the board. Shadow of Doubt is less common but a good card they can play against Amulet.
Dismember is great against Spell Queller but useless against Geist of Saint Traft. Unfortunately this leaves the amulet player in an awkward position of wanting to board in both dismember AND kozilek's return/pyroclasm, but neither of the latter spells competes with Spell Queller's 3 toughness. Cavern of souls also does not help against Spell Queller. If the Jeskai player does not play Geist of Saint Traft then it's less complicated since you will not need a sweeper. HOWEVER if they do tap out on turn 3 for Geist this opens up a huge window for the Amulet player, but that window is not there if you have boarded out amulets.
My general advice would be;
- always bring in dismember if you see spell queller. You can actually gain tempo Vs. Jeskai if you leave 1 mana open for dismember and then play a spell you know your opponent will Spell Queller. Immidiately kill the queller and then force your opponent to deal with your resolved spell in his turn (further opening him up by making him tap in his own turn).
- never board out amulets as they do not have any main-deck answer to a resolved amulet and only have 1 and pssible a second sideboard answer for a resolved amulet
- only bring in Kozi's Return / Pyroclasm if you are sure they are running a 4x geist list, otherwise plan to use their 3rd-turn tap out to land massive titan value.
- board out all Sakura-Tribe Scouts as they will eat this card with a lightning bolt or electrolye and get further ahead on tempo
- consider boarding out 1x or 2x Azusa for this same reason. However Azusa is keepable as it can ramp you before they get priority if you have the right lands. If you play explore then boarding out azusa is more viable. Explore is actually great in this MU.
- board in any creature with toughness over 3 if you can make room. Even Obstinate Baloth is decent in this MU as burn is half their plan and to be able to gain 4 life and block geist of saint traft / snapcaster is valuable. Thragtusk is a house too as the trigger for gaining the beast token is 'when Thragtusk leaves the battlefield' rather than 'when Thragtusk dies' which is important considering Jeskai run so many exile effects (path, anger, etc).
- unless the opponent is tapped out and you can 1 hit KO, it is almost always correct to search or simic/tolaria for your first titan resolution. This is because you can expect your opponent to deal with your first and probably second titan, however, Jeskai Flash lists contain exactly zero card-draw spells and rely on cantripping through the deck instead. This means that it is harder for Jeskai to beat a titan chain than say Esper or UW control. Jeskai also runs few to zero Wrath effects unless it's the Draw-Go version.
- Ruric is good here.
- Graveyard hate works well the longer the game goes on.
I had missed this one. 24th place GP Sao Paulo. Felipe Gasparini with a spicy list with Lightning Angel instead of Geist. Why that choice and in which MU is the Angel better than Geist? I still have to think about it, but definitely interesting.
Recently I posted a horrible list while musing about a possible gideon jeskai build, and, horrible as it was it seems to fun of an idea to give up on so I'll throw this list up and see how bad or decent you guys think this might be. I've been meaning to pick up my final 3 copies of Nahiri, the Harbinger and really have been wanting to give a Nahiri list a try, so upon Ixalan release I will be mucking about with something like this;
With the main idea being to wall of opens/disrupt/cantrip on turns 1 and 2, and curve Gideon of the Trials emblem into Nahiri, the Harbinger with Pact of Negation back-up.
The most crazy thing is of course the whopping 0 burn spells... red is literally splashed for Nahiri and sideboard cards. The list takes a more UW-centric early game, focusing on cantriping and disrupting rather than keeping the board clean with spot removal. I think the sparsity of spot removal is of course made up for by the 4x Gideon of the Trials and the main-deck Supreme Verdicts and Wall of Omens. Needing very little red mana also opens up a UW-style mana denial package of Ghost Quarter, Tectonic Edge to combine with Spreading Seas.
Looks hilariously fun to me and might have some hidden potential? Or maybe it's just a pile of trash. It'll be my pile of fun trash later this month
Yep both the points about grudge / K-command and turn 0 viability make sense and I knew this in the back of my mind. It's just something I've never tested so was wondering if anybody had! Probably bad enough on paper that it's not worth testing.
I am quietly excited about Settle the Wreckage, as it hits both Eldrazi Tron and Dredge hard. Both these are tricky match-ups for Jeskai, no matter how many copies of Ceremonious Rejection or Rest in Peace you pack into the sideboard. How effective this will be remains to be seen of course but I can imagine this replacing some amount of sweepers in most Queller lists and being great.
In the EldraTron match-up, one of the most difficult decisions I often encounter is whether or not to Verdict/ Dusk // Dawn for 1 or 2 'smaller creatures' or waiting for a smasher. Of course you can't afford to wait because the smasher has haste and you can't afford to let the rest of his board keep attacking, but tapping out for any verdict knowing your open to a smasher or worse is often a scary moment in a game. Settle the wreckage has the potential to regularly wreck an existing board AND the smasher the turn it's played while keeping mana open. I'm feeling this could swing more match-ups against EldraTron in jeskai's favour than Dusk // Dawn or even Supreme Verdict.
I do agree that Dusk // Dawn is sometimes a trap and often too clunky - but I view it as a sideboard card against EldraTron only, and in that light its a fine card but unfortunately still not quite good enough IMO. I do board it in against Death's Shadow but it most often feels underwhelming in that MU. I think any lists playing Dusk // Dawn would be well served dropping it for Settle the Wreckage when it's released since it hits EldraTron harder and more efficiently than Dusk // Dawn and then wrecks Dredge too. I'm sure that being instant will make it relevant in a wider range of MU's and scenarios.
On Jeskai builds and strengths;
I have to agree that Jeskai feels at it's strongest when being pro-active. I would count Nahiri as a proactive strategy, but maybe slower and less flexible than a geist/queller style. I did test Draw-go and I would imagine (as mentioned) that Esper is the better draw-go deck. However, Jeskai draw-go has more recent results than Esper (correct me if I'm wrong) so take from that what you will.
@TheAller on Nahiri. I don't play Nahiri but must say that the deck seems strong and has pedigree, and if a strong deck can be tuned for a certain meta then that's a good reason to play it. I notice bearscape is playing with Quellers, Geists, Vendillion Clique AND a Nahiri Package in his 75 at the moment, and this seems to be a good reflection of an attempt to tune a list to be able to take on a tempo role when desired either in main or side-board. I guess a more revealing question would be which MU's is Nahiri more favoured in than Queller/Geist? I probably am not qualified to answer that.
Good work davius, bad luck on hitting that MU for your quarter-final! In regards to Leyline of Sanctity, i don't believe that it was necessarily incorrect to run 1 copy. Have you (or anybody else for that matter) tested a one-of witchbane orb instead? It can be found of stirrings and we can cast it with ease, rather than with difficulty for double-white if we ever top-deck it.
I would be impressed if Spell Queller had a Tasigur or Gurmag Angler under it.
It certainly would be OP! haha. I do mean shadow only, I always think of tasigur/angler as 1 or 2 drops.
Other horrible scenarios are if your queller has a K-command under it that they use to immidiately return their verdict creature to their hand + profit, or if it has a thoughtsieze and you're holding a nahiri.
I would be impressed if Spell Queller had a Tasigur or Gurmag Angler under it.
It certainly would be BM! haha. I do mean shadow only, I always think of tasigur/angler as 1 or 2 drops.
Other horrible scenarios are if your queller has a K-command under it that they use to immidiately return their verdict creature to their hand + profit, or if it has a thoughtsieze and you're holding a nahiri.
Spell Queller is basically the card that is responsible for Jeskai's top finishes in the last 6 months, as well as Jeskai pilots becoming smarter and more attuned to the metagame.
You can run queller and verdict in the same 60 but you have to be very smart about your sequencing and timing, and also have to hope that luck stays with you and doesn't force you to verdict when you have a shadow/angler/tasigur sitting under a queller.
On Dusk // Dawn the card is a house if your main-deck involves some number of Geist and Queller, otherwise verdict is always better. The cannot be countered clause is huge.
I think cutting burn VS GDS is crazy, I finish almost every game VS. GDS with burn to the dome. HOWEVER I can see some merit in 'putting all your eggs in the nahiri basket' and cutting bad removal spells like bolt.
I can see how cutting the 2 cryptics makes sense.
You can only cut nahiri if you keep all your quellers as you still need a win-con and don't pack enough burn to go full burn/control.
I also think it's not ideal to board out only 2 quellers, if you are going to board out any at all, then board them all out, they are much, much better in multiple copies.
[quote from="Bearscape »" url="http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/tier-2-modern/728834-jeskai-control?comment=3176"]So here is my updated list that I will take to a large tournament soon
List looks tight, can't comment much on the interaction between Queller/Nahiri. Coming from a non-nahiri player keep in mind. Against GDS with this list I would go;
-4 spell queller
-1 v clique
-1 spell snare
+3 rest in peace
+3 supreme verdict
Geist of Saint-traft is excellent against GDS as well but unfortunately is awkward with verdict. So you could potentially put the geists in for the MU. If you end up adding celestial purge then that is an auto include as well. Dispel, as discussed above, can be great in some cases but sometimes is dead. I probably would try to bring it in as it will help resolve a Nahiri through a stubborn denial. When I play with queller/geist lists against GDS i do NOT board out quellers but i do use Dusk // Dawn and fewere Verdicts out the SB, and I have a higher burn count and no Nahiri.
I assume your playing a queller list like me currently so that's the angle I'm looking at your sideboard from. What MU's are you bringing in staticaster for? I feel like it's good in our positive match-ups and overlaps with EE, which is why I only run EE.
I'm thinking if it's for CoCo and Affinity then it's un-necessary in a queller list since those are both great match-ups for us. Apart from that it looks pretty tight, the other changes I could suggest would simply be preference rather than efficiency.
Yeah I get what you're saying now, if a GDS player has land, land, thoughtsieze, thoughtsieze, street wraith, shadow, tasigur it's useless! But if the game does grind it will always find a valuable target.
Yeah 2 Stony 2 Wear // Tear may be overkill but if he drops purge he only has 1 out to a resolved moon.
I think I've noted 5 top tier decks that dispel is an amazing against, so I'll have to disagree with you on the card! Against DS it stops - K Command, Stubborn Denial, fatal push / terminate on spell queller. Great card.
Are 2 Leak and a Knot better than 3 Knots? I feel like even with so many cheap spells 4 Snap and 3 Knot is just unrealistic.
Is the Elspeth in the board better than a Staticaster?
The two Relics and could be two Surgicals, and I'm not sure which to play.
Thanks a lot, guys. You're lifesavers.
Elspeth, Sun's Champion is a powerhouse against E-Tron and other midrange decks like Jund. You are already committing to 2x Dusk // Dawn for E-tron so the elspeth slot could be flexed. Then again, E-tron is probably the toughest match-up for the list so I don't mind the fact you run both. If you end up replacing Elspeth I would head straight for Engineered Explosives over Izzet Staticaster.
Relics are more versatile than surgical's so usually I would give them a nod. I actually prefer RIP as my graveyard hate, and since you are running 1 RIP also I should point out that having the RIP in play will render your surgical extractions useless.
I would take 2 leaks and a Knot over 3 knots.
I would consider dropping the Celestial Purge from the sideboard in favour of a 2nd copy of wear // tear. Purge is good against liliana and blood moon and shadow. Liliana isn't usually a problem for us as we can counter/queller/burn her out. Blood moon will be dealt with by the extra wear // tear. Shadow is already a good match-up for this type of list IMO and you can board in your Dusk // Dawns for that MU too. The extra wear // tear will then give you better game Vs. a wide variety of artifact based problems. Alternatively, a 2nd copy of Dispel wouldn't go astray. It is your best counterspell in at least 5 top tier MU's (UW control, GDS, Counters-Company, Storm, Burn).
I've played all versions of Jeskai control in the current meta and might have some insight here, but the strategy all depends on the list your opponent is running. The most competitive and common list at the moment is the 'new flash' list packing 4x Spell Queller alongside some amount of Geist of Saint-Traft and Vendilion Clique as the main-board creatures. They will also run close to the full playset of bolt/helix/electrolyze, and usually 4 of Mana Leak / Logic Knot / Remand. In the first 3 turns of the game these are the cards you need to anticipate. After sideboard Jeskai will possibly bring in up to 2 Ceremonious Rejection and up to 2 Wear // Tear for the MU and maybe a Supreme Verdict if they have one or two in the board. Shadow of Doubt is less common but a good card they can play against Amulet.
Dismember is great against Spell Queller but useless against Geist of Saint Traft. Unfortunately this leaves the amulet player in an awkward position of wanting to board in both dismember AND kozilek's return/pyroclasm, but neither of the latter spells competes with Spell Queller's 3 toughness. Cavern of souls also does not help against Spell Queller. If the Jeskai player does not play Geist of Saint Traft then it's less complicated since you will not need a sweeper. HOWEVER if they do tap out on turn 3 for Geist this opens up a huge window for the Amulet player, but that window is not there if you have boarded out amulets.
My general advice would be;
- always bring in dismember if you see spell queller. You can actually gain tempo Vs. Jeskai if you leave 1 mana open for dismember and then play a spell you know your opponent will Spell Queller. Immidiately kill the queller and then force your opponent to deal with your resolved spell in his turn (further opening him up by making him tap in his own turn).
- never board out amulets as they do not have any main-deck answer to a resolved amulet and only have 1 and pssible a second sideboard answer for a resolved amulet
- only bring in Kozi's Return / Pyroclasm if you are sure they are running a 4x geist list, otherwise plan to use their 3rd-turn tap out to land massive titan value.
- board out all Sakura-Tribe Scouts as they will eat this card with a lightning bolt or electrolye and get further ahead on tempo
- consider boarding out 1x or 2x Azusa for this same reason. However Azusa is keepable as it can ramp you before they get priority if you have the right lands. If you play explore then boarding out azusa is more viable. Explore is actually great in this MU.
- board in any creature with toughness over 3 if you can make room. Even Obstinate Baloth is decent in this MU as burn is half their plan and to be able to gain 4 life and block geist of saint traft / snapcaster is valuable. Thragtusk is a house too as the trigger for gaining the beast token is 'when Thragtusk leaves the battlefield' rather than 'when Thragtusk dies' which is important considering Jeskai run so many exile effects (path, anger, etc).
- unless the opponent is tapped out and you can 1 hit KO, it is almost always correct to search or simic/tolaria for your first titan resolution. This is because you can expect your opponent to deal with your first and probably second titan, however, Jeskai Flash lists contain exactly zero card-draw spells and rely on cantripping through the deck instead. This means that it is harder for Jeskai to beat a titan chain than say Esper or UW control. Jeskai also runs few to zero Wrath effects unless it's the Draw-Go version.
- Ruric is good here.
- Graveyard hate works well the longer the game goes on.
Lightning angel better in EldraTron and maybe even Jund MU's it usually seems. Not tested it myself.
a) Opt
b) Settle the Wreckage
c) Planeswalker Uniqueness rule change
Recently I posted a horrible list while musing about a possible gideon jeskai build, and, horrible as it was it seems to fun of an idea to give up on so I'll throw this list up and see how bad or decent you guys think this might be. I've been meaning to pick up my final 3 copies of Nahiri, the Harbinger and really have been wanting to give a Nahiri list a try, so upon Ixalan release I will be mucking about with something like this;
4x Serum Visions
4x Path to Exile
4x Remand
4x Spreading Seas
2x Supreme Verdict
1x Cryptic Command
3x Pact of Negation
Creatures (4)
2x Wall of Omens
1x Snapcaster Mage
1x Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
Planeswalkers (9)
4x Gideon of the Trials
4x Nahiri, the Harbinger
1x Gideon Jura
2x Ghost Quarter
1x Tectonic Edge
2x Celestial Colonnade
4x Flooded Strand
3x Scalding Tarn
2x Hallowed Fountain
1x Steam Vents
1x Sacred Foundry
1x Glacial Fortress
4x Island
3x Plains
1x Mountain
1x Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
1x Settle the Wreckage
1x Anger of the Gods
2x Geist of Saint Traft
1x Vendilion Clique
2x Stony Silence
2x Ceremonious Rejection
1x Dispel
1x Wear // Tear
3x Rest in Peace
With the main idea being to wall of opens/disrupt/cantrip on turns 1 and 2, and curve Gideon of the Trials emblem into Nahiri, the Harbinger with Pact of Negation back-up.
The most crazy thing is of course the whopping 0 burn spells... red is literally splashed for Nahiri and sideboard cards. The list takes a more UW-centric early game, focusing on cantriping and disrupting rather than keeping the board clean with spot removal. I think the sparsity of spot removal is of course made up for by the 4x Gideon of the Trials and the main-deck Supreme Verdicts and Wall of Omens. Needing very little red mana also opens up a UW-style mana denial package of Ghost Quarter, Tectonic Edge to combine with Spreading Seas.
Looks hilariously fun to me and might have some hidden potential? Or maybe it's just a pile of trash. It'll be my pile of fun trash later this month
I am quietly excited about Settle the Wreckage, as it hits both Eldrazi Tron and Dredge hard. Both these are tricky match-ups for Jeskai, no matter how many copies of Ceremonious Rejection or Rest in Peace you pack into the sideboard. How effective this will be remains to be seen of course but I can imagine this replacing some amount of sweepers in most Queller lists and being great.
In the EldraTron match-up, one of the most difficult decisions I often encounter is whether or not to Verdict/ Dusk // Dawn for 1 or 2 'smaller creatures' or waiting for a smasher. Of course you can't afford to wait because the smasher has haste and you can't afford to let the rest of his board keep attacking, but tapping out for any verdict knowing your open to a smasher or worse is often a scary moment in a game. Settle the wreckage has the potential to regularly wreck an existing board AND the smasher the turn it's played while keeping mana open. I'm feeling this could swing more match-ups against EldraTron in jeskai's favour than Dusk // Dawn or even Supreme Verdict.
I do agree that Dusk // Dawn is sometimes a trap and often too clunky - but I view it as a sideboard card against EldraTron only, and in that light its a fine card but unfortunately still not quite good enough IMO. I do board it in against Death's Shadow but it most often feels underwhelming in that MU. I think any lists playing Dusk // Dawn would be well served dropping it for Settle the Wreckage when it's released since it hits EldraTron harder and more efficiently than Dusk // Dawn and then wrecks Dredge too. I'm sure that being instant will make it relevant in a wider range of MU's and scenarios.
On Jeskai builds and strengths;
I have to agree that Jeskai feels at it's strongest when being pro-active. I would count Nahiri as a proactive strategy, but maybe slower and less flexible than a geist/queller style. I did test Draw-go and I would imagine (as mentioned) that Esper is the better draw-go deck. However, Jeskai draw-go has more recent results than Esper (correct me if I'm wrong) so take from that what you will.
@TheAller on Nahiri. I don't play Nahiri but must say that the deck seems strong and has pedigree, and if a strong deck can be tuned for a certain meta then that's a good reason to play it. I notice bearscape is playing with Quellers, Geists, Vendillion Clique AND a Nahiri Package in his 75 at the moment, and this seems to be a good reflection of an attempt to tune a list to be able to take on a tempo role when desired either in main or side-board. I guess a more revealing question would be which MU's is Nahiri more favoured in than Queller/Geist? I probably am not qualified to answer that.
It certainly would be OP! haha. I do mean shadow only, I always think of tasigur/angler as 1 or 2 drops.
Other horrible scenarios are if your queller has a K-command under it that they use to immidiately return their verdict creature to their hand + profit, or if it has a thoughtsieze and you're holding a nahiri.
It certainly would be BM! haha. I do mean shadow only, I always think of tasigur/angler as 1 or 2 drops.
Other horrible scenarios are if your queller has a K-command under it that they use to immidiately return their verdict creature to their hand + profit, or if it has a thoughtsieze and you're holding a nahiri.
You can run queller and verdict in the same 60 but you have to be very smart about your sequencing and timing, and also have to hope that luck stays with you and doesn't force you to verdict when you have a shadow/angler/tasigur sitting under a queller.
On Dusk // Dawn the card is a house if your main-deck involves some number of Geist and Queller, otherwise verdict is always better. The cannot be countered clause is huge.
I think cutting burn VS GDS is crazy, I finish almost every game VS. GDS with burn to the dome. HOWEVER I can see some merit in 'putting all your eggs in the nahiri basket' and cutting bad removal spells like bolt.
I can see how cutting the 2 cryptics makes sense.
You can only cut nahiri if you keep all your quellers as you still need a win-con and don't pack enough burn to go full burn/control.
I also think it's not ideal to board out only 2 quellers, if you are going to board out any at all, then board them all out, they are much, much better in multiple copies.
List looks tight, can't comment much on the interaction between Queller/Nahiri. Coming from a non-nahiri player keep in mind. Against GDS with this list I would go;
-4 spell queller
-1 v clique
-1 spell snare
+3 rest in peace
+3 supreme verdict
Geist of Saint-traft is excellent against GDS as well but unfortunately is awkward with verdict. So you could potentially put the geists in for the MU. If you end up adding celestial purge then that is an auto include as well. Dispel, as discussed above, can be great in some cases but sometimes is dead. I probably would try to bring it in as it will help resolve a Nahiri through a stubborn denial. When I play with queller/geist lists against GDS i do NOT board out quellers but i do use Dusk // Dawn and fewere Verdicts out the SB, and I have a higher burn count and no Nahiri.
I'm thinking if it's for CoCo and Affinity then it's un-necessary in a queller list since those are both great match-ups for us. Apart from that it looks pretty tight, the other changes I could suggest would simply be preference rather than efficiency.
I think I've noted 5 top tier decks that dispel is an amazing against, so I'll have to disagree with you on the card! Against DS it stops - K Command, Stubborn Denial, fatal push / terminate on spell queller. Great card.
Agree that elspeth can be too slow sometimes.
Elspeth, Sun's Champion is a powerhouse against E-Tron and other midrange decks like Jund. You are already committing to 2x Dusk // Dawn for E-tron so the elspeth slot could be flexed. Then again, E-tron is probably the toughest match-up for the list so I don't mind the fact you run both. If you end up replacing Elspeth I would head straight for Engineered Explosives over Izzet Staticaster.
Relics are more versatile than surgical's so usually I would give them a nod. I actually prefer RIP as my graveyard hate, and since you are running 1 RIP also I should point out that having the RIP in play will render your surgical extractions useless.
I would take 2 leaks and a Knot over 3 knots.
I would consider dropping the Celestial Purge from the sideboard in favour of a 2nd copy of wear // tear. Purge is good against liliana and blood moon and shadow. Liliana isn't usually a problem for us as we can counter/queller/burn her out. Blood moon will be dealt with by the extra wear // tear. Shadow is already a good match-up for this type of list IMO and you can board in your Dusk // Dawns for that MU too. The extra wear // tear will then give you better game Vs. a wide variety of artifact based problems. Alternatively, a 2nd copy of Dispel wouldn't go astray. It is your best counterspell in at least 5 top tier MU's (UW control, GDS, Counters-Company, Storm, Burn).