That is a very good point about winter orb and other MLD. That’s the kind of insight I was hoping for. I can think of plenty of decks that don’t care about MLD. Our deck gets quite hosed by it though. Plus it negates the value of our big draw spells if we can’t play. Still I can’t help but think orb is a lockout for us most of the time.
Zulaport doing damage conditionally is great, but would something like gruesome fate or price of progress not just be better since they deal the same damage unconditionally? (well much less conditionally) I suppose the lifegain might matter if we have a necropotence or ad naus and the opponents wipe the board, but that seems narrow. Zulaport can come down before a wrath unlike the burn cards, but we are still likely in topdeck mode with no board in that situation so I don’t know how much the punishment matters there.
I would like to hear opinions on a few cards that I haven’t seen discussed much on here.
springleaf drum and paradise mantle: I can’t get a read on how these would perform. They seem like a trap. Cutting a land for them doesn’t seem right. Say I miss my land drop on turn 5 (and we arent even guaranteed that much), these only put me ahead on turns 3-4 so land seems better since it makes mana without tapping my dudes. Pretty sure they aren’t good enough to cut a nonland and risk flooding out either. Also a land is a better draw when we have no land in hand.
Winter Orb: There's no reason this shouldn't work in here right? Do we not just win if it isn't answered quickly? ISBP discussed it before. Perhaps I misunderstood him, but I got the impression that he thinks orb is good. He just doesn't run it because it is unsavory and he dislikes that it keeps him from playing.
Selfless spirit: Anti-wrath. Seems like a better answer to wraths than zulaport cutthroat at least (I understand zulaport has additional utility but his primary purpose is wrath-punishment no?) Two mana doesn’t slow us down and it can be cast pre-emptively, unlike eldrazi monument for example which may be too late. Also kinda a combat trick. He is obviously not hard to remove though (like zulaport), so I think this is probably the bottom of the barrel.
Thanks for the reply, and I would like to respond to a few key points:
First of all, the list you linked to is quite unimpressive to me. I do not know how you figure that it is the most competitive build of Edgar Markov. Combo does not mean more competitive. From reading the primer, I looks like it is trying to do what other decks do better, and by that I mean with fewer cards, fewer points of failure, costing less mana to pull off, and often with control elements to protect their combo which Edgar lacks. I would much rather play Kess, Zur, or Breya versions of Doomsday than Edgar Markov. Moreover, it feels like a waste of the Commander itself. Outside of Razaketh, the Foulblooded, there is no reason to use Edgar over the other options. If people enjoy it, then great, but if I want to play combo competitively, which I do, then I have better options. I play Edgar Markov as the most competitive agro deck I have ever seen. It can straight beat decks down in no time.
Second, concerning Scapegoat, it still resets your board. The point of a wrath is to clear the board, and without any haste enablers (which this deck does not have), you still have to recast your hand of Vampires and want for another round at the table and more potential Wrath effects to resolve without Scapegoat in your hand any longer. How is that better than something like Boros Charm? I know that the difference between one and two mana is a big deal in competitive magic, but I would think that the difference between surviving a Wrath while the rest of the table lost their board and having to recast my hand and wasting a full round at the table is a larger setback. Maybe I am wrong.
Let’s just agree to disagree about the deck i posted. Nobody on this thread would want to read our discussion about combo or cEDH, so I should not have linked it in the first place.
You’re right that scapegoat is not ideal because: it takes up all your mana the next turn, you cannot attack next turn, and a second wrath may be played. However IF you feel you need a direct answer to wraths it is in my opinion the best option in mardu colors for the following reasons:
1. It works against everything
2. It is the lowest mana investment for a half-decent answer to wraths(unless of course you use it), which is extremely important when racing is the priority
3. There is always a turn in the early/midgame where you’ve loaded up the board to the point that someone may cast a wrath. If you have something like eldrazi monument or teferi’s protection in hand, you have to wait until the following turn to use it, at which point someone may have already wrathed. However with scapegoat you can hold up one mana and have insurance on that critical turn.
4. It has additional utility outside of wraths if need be.
Again like you said when used scapegoat is not ideal but it still puts you in an excellent position compared to the other players.
boros charm is not a terrible answer either, and it can really be a blowout when it works. Only issues are that it doesn’t work against everything and you cannot always reasonably hold up the mana for it during that critical turn I mentioned. Holding up the mana each turn after that is not nearly as taxing as you might think.
In a recent game of mine, someone used aetherspouts of all things, and I had boros charm mana held up. That was extremely frustrating. If I had had scapegoat, I probably would have won.
I am not saying to run scapegoat or any cards devoted to wraths. You need to consider how many wraths you see in your meta. If that number is low, anti-wraths cost you a card and mana to do nothing. If you see a lot of wraths, I tell you from experience that they will really up your win percentage.
I have returned to this thread after several months to maybe a year (has it been that long? I don't think I have posted much since Rivals of Ixalan.)
Well, last I remember reading, Scapegoat was a card being tested. What has the verdict been? Is it really all that good, especially in a more competitive meta?
I like keeping up with the most competitive form of the list even though I am using a more casual build. I have actually powered my list down, cutting fast mana rocks and cheap tutors and replacing them with Burst draw and color fixing 2cmc rocks. In my playgroup of my wife and friends, Edgar was becoming opressively fast. Now it is a threat which wins some and loses some. The inclusion of the new Liliana and Dolman Gate since I was last here is interesting and has been added to my buy list.
I hope you reopen this thread wherever we all end up going once MtGSalvation shuts down. If possible, please link us to a new thread when it is available.
As for scapegoat, I have a lot of experience using it against fairly good decks. The one mana per turn is nothing and doesn't slow you down. I have never cast it against a wrath and still lost the game that I can remember. It has won me at least two games. I actually tutored for it once just to be certain I would win since I didn't need a finisher at the time. And whaddaya know, somebody cast a wrath which I stopped, winning me the game. In my experience, the most common reason this deck loses is wraths, and stopping one increases the odds of winning drastically. I will never cut scapegoat.
You're completely right, I use 1 CMC vamps for bodies and since we produce so many then a little aristocrats strategy finds home here. Changelings I agree are amazing and I'm currently thinking about adding the colorless one. W vampires seem to be a little better since they have or gain flying and evasion is a key.
About 2 drops: Blood Seeker is good casual card and meta call for creature-oriented environments - besides that if your meta is more about control and players use few creatures then sure it gets cut (but I'd still consider one as Sideboard, just in case), Bloodghast is just pure value since it can come back a few times throughout the game just because you play lands so you that's just incidental value. Bloodthrone Vampire I'm strongly against cutting since it's FREE sac outlet which comes with 1/1 token on it's own. Sure Viscera Seer is 1 CMC but we need more effects like this to machine gun opponents in a pinch (or when game's about to end anyway). The rest sure is sub-optimal but recently we've got replacements for these like Cordial Vampire.
Purphoros, God of the Forge - you're NOT wrong, I'm recently thinking about it just like you. That's because Impact Tremors exists - half the cost, half the effect, much lower $$$ price and less damage from Ad Nauseam. The only downside here is that Tremors can be destroyed, while Purphoros can only be exiled or bounced, which is very specific. I just wish there would be vampire like this with maybe BR casting cost.
EDIT: changed my opinion about bloodthrone vampire not being as good as a one-drop. She has too much value to ignore for one more mana. I’d say bloodghast isn’t worth the extra mana if you’re deck isn’t equipped to destroy/discard him consistently, but even then he’s bearly worse. Vampire interloper and Olivia’s Bloodsworn are not worth it though. Flying is good but not 1 extra mana good. If we can’t attack then these dudes getting in there for 2 doesn’t do much to help the situation.
I kinda don't like impact tremors either since both it and purph are somewhat unreliable. Plus tremors doing half the damage means gruesome fate or throne of the god-pharaoh (both questionable cards) would likely hit just as hard or harder without needing to come down early and stick.
Speaking of lands, has everyone here automatically added silent clearing and sunbaked canyon? I'm finding it hard to quantify the value of the cantrip ability myself.
EDIT: I have done some research and it really should’ve been obvious to me that these lands are incredible. If you already run the ABUR duals they are better than shocks. If you can run sacred foundry you can run sunbaked canyon (unless you can’t afford plateau and then sacred foundry becomes much more important for its fetchability).
The issue is not that one drops aren't good. It's that even an optimized edgar manabase can't reliably manage R or W on turn 1. Stromkirk noble is a good one drop and so is worth the risk of casting issues for now in my opinion. Before that some 2 drops need to go. For the current list, it would be better to cut tithe drinker, blood seeker, probably stromkirk condemned, and possibly even bloodghast or bloodthrone vampire. Opinions will vary and depend on the decklist but those are my picks for the weakest vampires that most players still run.
Side note, is it absolutely wrong to cut purphoros, god of the forge? (hear me out). He's the best thing imaginable when he works but if we don't draw him at the perfect time under the perfect circumstances he is awkward, slow, and unimpactful. For example, what if we have little or no vampires left to cast when we draw him? What if the game state demands immediate action and he's too slow? What if we are mana-hosed? It can also be awkward to draw multiple noncreatures or high-cmc cards. He is also terrible if countered or removed since we spend the first few turns doing nothing so we have vampires to cast after. Also I've always felt he was lacking if playing fewer than three opponents. Opinions?
In general I agree that cards that require a whole turn in play are bad. But in this case it’d argue it's useful to our game plan. I think Entity is good because it's the only 3 drop vampire that can turn a small board into a significant force. This forces your opponent to have an answer. I'm perfectly happy playing two one drops and an entity and seeing what happens. If I get to untap I can probably swing for a good amount of damage and if I don't I only lost three cards. My point here is that we are facing board wipes very often and Entity helps to not over extent into them.
That's true but you should also consider that the smaller your board is, the less significant the force you have, and you're still paying a great deal of mana for it. Another consideration is that even if he sticks for a couple turns, if he gets spot removed you will be behind on board compared to the players you weren't attacking, since you spent multiple turns dumping mana into entity. Also, entity might force your opponent to play a wrath when you could have dealt with the wrath had it come down later. Finally, if you don't skimp on tutors, you probably won't need him as a wincon.
That said he is a wincon and a vampire, so its not wrong to run him if you decide he is worth it. He was good enough to almost be universally run in the competitive 1v1 duel edh edgar decklists. The question you should really be asking to decide whether to run him is "Can i get away with it?"
Let's unpack this
* In an uninteractive meta, Jazal is actually better. Mirror entity's ability is much more interactive because it can be used immediately after it drops.
* mirror entity is a vampire that costs 3 that's also a wincon. jazal is a cat that costs 4 that is also a wincon.
* Mirror entity can be cast for 3 and then pass the turn, and if someone removes it they remove it - you still got a vampire. Then you untap and kill everyone with your pile of mana. *or* it can be cast for 3 and then activated.
* You can choose how much mana to invest. Making all your 1s into 2s might be enough to be worth doing. Jazal requires a hefty 5 mana investment to be used at all, and only rewards you for having lots of attackers
* Mirror entity, furthermore, can defend your team against damage based sweepers and random ping effects in a pinch
Generally speaking I think entity is probably overcosted for this approach to edgar. Stuff like Shared Animosity is probably much better. Doesn't require a continued mana investment and works after the creature dies and continues to work well with just a few creatures.
But there really is no comparing Jazal to Mirror entity. And surely running both is not good.
You have convinced me that mirror entity is better. Thinking about it now, even if you only have 5 mana available, you are likely to activate entity the turn he comes out and plus you get a token, so you get value out of him no matter what. Honestly Jazal is risky even in an uninteractive meta because he does actual nothing if he is removed. If I'm willing to play risky cards there are better options, like perhaps coat of arms.
But you have to admit neither Jazal or Entity are good if you don't expect to untap with them.
Darn, guess all our other off-tribe creatures are unrunnable too then. No but you're right, not being a vampire can certainly matter. Still, if I play one of these two creatures and they survived until my next turn, I would prefer it be Jazal in most cases.
Time to crank out the sarcasm.
The other major difference is that if you have say, 6-7 mana, you can cast mirror entity, turn everybody into 3/3s or 4/4s and win that turn. Jazal requires untapping. If you happen to have a haste enabler Jazal requires 9 mana still, but you have one fewer attacker because entity triggered.
And yet another minor difference is you can use Mirror Entity to sac your board (activate for 0) if you need to defend against an exiling or tucking sweeper for some reason.
The other kinda minor quirk to Jazal is that people can kill him after you've done things in your main phase if they desire and you can't respond because it only works on attackers).
Jazal is not good.
Sorry the sarcasm wasn't intended to be malicious. My point was less about comparing Jazal to mirror entity, but more that if you play in an uninteractive meta that lets you get away with mirror entity, you might as well add Jazal as one more wincon. Like I said entity can be better, but its generally when you have at least 7 mana available and have nothing better to do with the other 4 after casting entity. Or if you had a nykthos, shrine to nyx out. Could you imagine?
Darn, guess all our other off-tribe creatures are unrunnable too then. No but you're right, not being a vampire can certainly matter. Still, if I play one of these two creatures and they survived until my next turn, I would prefer it be Jazal in most cases.
So for those who run mirror entity, you might consider running Jazal Goldmane as well. In a typical situation Jazal will hit much harder and for less total mana invested.
He is bad for all the same reasons as mirror entity (and can be worse for sure), but in an uninteractive meta, I think its a strong card.
Interested to hear what ISBP thinks the weakest two-drops are in the current list, aside from stromkirk condemned which he has expressed disappointment with before.
ISBP, I would like to hear your thoughts about an underdiscussed topic, the manabase. Ill start by asking about lands you run and then talk about lands you don’t.
1. Cavern of Souls: has this helped enough to justify causing casting problems for noncreatures, particularly necropotence? Also nonbos with filterlands. Any reason not to run unclaimed territory too then?
2. Vault of the Archangel: how often do you use this? For me its been nonbasic wastes thats occasionally a combat threat, since I have not once used it.
3. Rugged Prairie: since the deck is so heavily black, does the nonblack fixing justify the downsides (may force you to filter a black source into a nonblack one, colorless sometimes, nonbasic)
5. Bond land cycle (tapped unless 2+ opponents): would you recommend despite them being bad in 1v1 and sometimes lategame?
6. Prismatic Vista from modern horizons: swamp is better 80% of the time but that 20% could make a huge difference. Autoinclude?
7. Modern horizons cantrip cycle (horizon canopies for enemy color pairs): Very torn on this. The mana ability alone is awful. We don’t run painlands for similar reasons. Is the cantrip ability worth the pain? I think probably not in this deck because we could use that life to dig several cards deeper with suicide draw.
List is 95% the same as isbp, budget is unlimited. I am even using OG duals, crypt, and an imperial seal. I rarely have trouble recovering. Its just that in the lategame everyone else has bigger flashier plays to make than me and I lose the race. It seems that whether I gun for the best deck at the table or the player who will probably wrath, that player wraths before I can kill anyone as he is worried about me killing him (so I tend to go for him when I get the chance). I find that piloting the deck is pretty straightforward. Although I admit I have never tried playing nothing until a wrath was played. In theory that may work but in practice I think losing our tempo would just result in a loss to mid-late-game- oriented decks.
Another possible anti-wrath card is warping wail. With isbp's manabase roughly 25% of the mana sources can produce colorless so it should work pretty consistently. Probably on par with boros charm, probably better than teferi's protection or other 3cmc anti-wraths
I am really thinking that thoughtseize and friends is the way to go here honestly. Will probably try that out and report back if its successful.
Zulaport doing damage conditionally is great, but would something like gruesome fate or price of progress not just be better since they deal the same damage unconditionally? (well much less conditionally) I suppose the lifegain might matter if we have a necropotence or ad naus and the opponents wipe the board, but that seems narrow. Zulaport can come down before a wrath unlike the burn cards, but we are still likely in topdeck mode with no board in that situation so I don’t know how much the punishment matters there.
springleaf drum and paradise mantle: I can’t get a read on how these would perform. They seem like a trap. Cutting a land for them doesn’t seem right. Say I miss my land drop on turn 5 (and we arent even guaranteed that much), these only put me ahead on turns 3-4 so land seems better since it makes mana without tapping my dudes. Pretty sure they aren’t good enough to cut a nonland and risk flooding out either. Also a land is a better draw when we have no land in hand.
Winter Orb: There's no reason this shouldn't work in here right? Do we not just win if it isn't answered quickly? ISBP discussed it before. Perhaps I misunderstood him, but I got the impression that he thinks orb is good. He just doesn't run it because it is unsavory and he dislikes that it keeps him from playing.
Selfless spirit: Anti-wrath. Seems like a better answer to wraths than zulaport cutthroat at least (I understand zulaport has additional utility but his primary purpose is wrath-punishment no?) Two mana doesn’t slow us down and it can be cast pre-emptively, unlike eldrazi monument for example which may be too late. Also kinda a combat trick. He is obviously not hard to remove though (like zulaport), so I think this is probably the bottom of the barrel.
Let’s just agree to disagree about the deck i posted. Nobody on this thread would want to read our discussion about combo or cEDH, so I should not have linked it in the first place.
You’re right that scapegoat is not ideal because: it takes up all your mana the next turn, you cannot attack next turn, and a second wrath may be played. However IF you feel you need a direct answer to wraths it is in my opinion the best option in mardu colors for the following reasons:
1. It works against everything
2. It is the lowest mana investment for a half-decent answer to wraths(unless of course you use it), which is extremely important when racing is the priority
3. There is always a turn in the early/midgame where you’ve loaded up the board to the point that someone may cast a wrath. If you have something like eldrazi monument or teferi’s protection in hand, you have to wait until the following turn to use it, at which point someone may have already wrathed. However with scapegoat you can hold up one mana and have insurance on that critical turn.
4. It has additional utility outside of wraths if need be.
Again like you said when used scapegoat is not ideal but it still puts you in an excellent position compared to the other players.
boros charm is not a terrible answer either, and it can really be a blowout when it works. Only issues are that it doesn’t work against everything and you cannot always reasonably hold up the mana for it during that critical turn I mentioned. Holding up the mana each turn after that is not nearly as taxing as you might think.
In a recent game of mine, someone used aetherspouts of all things, and I had boros charm mana held up. That was extremely frustrating. If I had had scapegoat, I probably would have won.
I am not saying to run scapegoat or any cards devoted to wraths. You need to consider how many wraths you see in your meta. If that number is low, anti-wraths cost you a card and mana to do nothing. If you see a lot of wraths, I tell you from experience that they will really up your win percentage.
Fun fact: this list is far from the most competitive version of edgar markov. That would be http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/31-01-19-symphony-of-the-knight/
As for scapegoat, I have a lot of experience using it against fairly good decks. The one mana per turn is nothing and doesn't slow you down. I have never cast it against a wrath and still lost the game that I can remember. It has won me at least two games. I actually tutored for it once just to be certain I would win since I didn't need a finisher at the time. And whaddaya know, somebody cast a wrath which I stopped, winning me the game. In my experience, the most common reason this deck loses is wraths, and stopping one increases the odds of winning drastically. I will never cut scapegoat.
EDIT: changed my opinion about bloodthrone vampire not being as good as a one-drop. She has too much value to ignore for one more mana. I’d say bloodghast isn’t worth the extra mana if you’re deck isn’t equipped to destroy/discard him consistently, but even then he’s bearly worse. Vampire interloper and Olivia’s Bloodsworn are not worth it though. Flying is good but not 1 extra mana good. If we can’t attack then these dudes getting in there for 2 doesn’t do much to help the situation.
I kinda don't like impact tremors either since both it and purph are somewhat unreliable. Plus tremors doing half the damage means gruesome fate or throne of the god-pharaoh (both questionable cards) would likely hit just as hard or harder without needing to come down early and stick.
Speaking of lands, has everyone here automatically added silent clearing and sunbaked canyon? I'm finding it hard to quantify the value of the cantrip ability myself.
EDIT: I have done some research and it really should’ve been obvious to me that these lands are incredible. If you already run the ABUR duals they are better than shocks. If you can run sacred foundry you can run sunbaked canyon (unless you can’t afford plateau and then sacred foundry becomes much more important for its fetchability).
Side note, is it absolutely wrong to cut purphoros, god of the forge? (hear me out). He's the best thing imaginable when he works but if we don't draw him at the perfect time under the perfect circumstances he is awkward, slow, and unimpactful. For example, what if we have little or no vampires left to cast when we draw him? What if the game state demands immediate action and he's too slow? What if we are mana-hosed? It can also be awkward to draw multiple noncreatures or high-cmc cards. He is also terrible if countered or removed since we spend the first few turns doing nothing so we have vampires to cast after. Also I've always felt he was lacking if playing fewer than three opponents. Opinions?
That's true but you should also consider that the smaller your board is, the less significant the force you have, and you're still paying a great deal of mana for it. Another consideration is that even if he sticks for a couple turns, if he gets spot removed you will be behind on board compared to the players you weren't attacking, since you spent multiple turns dumping mana into entity. Also, entity might force your opponent to play a wrath when you could have dealt with the wrath had it come down later. Finally, if you don't skimp on tutors, you probably won't need him as a wincon.
That said he is a wincon and a vampire, so its not wrong to run him if you decide he is worth it. He was good enough to almost be universally run in the competitive 1v1 duel edh edgar decklists. The question you should really be asking to decide whether to run him is "Can i get away with it?"
You have convinced me that mirror entity is better. Thinking about it now, even if you only have 5 mana available, you are likely to activate entity the turn he comes out and plus you get a token, so you get value out of him no matter what. Honestly Jazal is risky even in an uninteractive meta because he does actual nothing if he is removed. If I'm willing to play risky cards there are better options, like perhaps coat of arms.
But you have to admit neither Jazal or Entity are good if you don't expect to untap with them.
Sorry the sarcasm wasn't intended to be malicious. My point was less about comparing Jazal to mirror entity, but more that if you play in an uninteractive meta that lets you get away with mirror entity, you might as well add Jazal as one more wincon. Like I said entity can be better, but its generally when you have at least 7 mana available and have nothing better to do with the other 4 after casting entity. Or if you had a nykthos, shrine to nyx out. Could you imagine?
He is bad for all the same reasons as mirror entity (and can be worse for sure), but in an uninteractive meta, I think its a strong card.
Unrelated note, does anyone have experience/opinions on gruesome fate?
EDIT: universal automaton should be an auto-include in this list
1. Cavern of Souls: has this helped enough to justify causing casting problems for noncreatures, particularly necropotence? Also nonbos with filterlands. Any reason not to run unclaimed territory too then?
2. Vault of the Archangel: how often do you use this? For me its been nonbasic wastes thats occasionally a combat threat, since I have not once used it.
3. Rugged Prairie: since the deck is so heavily black, does the nonblack fixing justify the downsides (may force you to filter a black source into a nonblack one, colorless sometimes, nonbasic)
4. Why mana confluence but no city of brass? Worried about drawing both sometimes?
5. Bond land cycle (tapped unless 2+ opponents): would you recommend despite them being bad in 1v1 and sometimes lategame?
6. Prismatic Vista from modern horizons: swamp is better 80% of the time but that 20% could make a huge difference. Autoinclude?
7. Modern horizons cantrip cycle (horizon canopies for enemy color pairs): Very torn on this. The mana ability alone is awful. We don’t run painlands for similar reasons. Is the cantrip ability worth the pain? I think probably not in this deck because we could use that life to dig several cards deeper with suicide draw.
Another possible anti-wrath card is warping wail. With isbp's manabase roughly 25% of the mana sources can produce colorless so it should work pretty consistently. Probably on par with boros charm, probably better than teferi's protection or other 3cmc anti-wraths
I am really thinking that thoughtseize and friends is the way to go here honestly. Will probably try that out and report back if its successful.