Yes. Both players need to pass priority in succession, then the top spell on the stack resolves. When you have priority, instead of passing, you can cast spells, adding them to the stack. You could Brainstorm, then cast Mystical Teachings, then counter his spell even (or even more if you'd like).
The only thing I've really ever seen Gifts Ungiven in is Blue Nic Fit, which can afford the four mana, to make piles like Genesis, Eternal Witness, Recurring Nightmare, anything. Other than that, it's hard to justify the four mana and the flexibly you get by just playing Intuition instead.
Not including Spellskite is quite clearly just wrong. It's actually in the top 5 most played cards in the format and one of the only things that can battle head to head with Lighting Bolt, the clear number 1.
You could also try Gifts Rock / Solar Flare which has a Bant feel but is actually black-based. There was a straight Bant Gifts deck that I remembered seeing a while ago (unable to find now) but it seems it's fallen out of Favor come Deathrite Shaman. It's hard to not play this card unless you're neither of those colors (UWR).
it didn't show up much during the PTQ season since Deathrite Shaman make people want to play BUG/JUNK while others gravitate toward Lightning Bolt. There's still things you can do in those colors like Sovereigns of Lost Alara and Gifts Ungiven but most haven't seen too much PTQ success.
If you think the deck that you're playing against is not interactive, maybe you're the one who needs to play a more interactive deck and stop playing combo. After all, everything is combo.
It is impossible to ban every combo. As long as there are magic cards, there are combos. You cannot stop all combos unless you ban pretty much everything. I'd imagine it would need a banned list of around 1,000 of Modern's 7,512 cards (maybe more if we're going to say all Tron decks are combo decks). That's not the point though.
It's not even possible for them to stop turn two combos. I can make bad decks all day that win turn 2. This is possible every other year in Standard even. The key from wizards is making sure decks balance speed and consistency. They've done an okay job of this thus far. I disagree with some moves but I digress.
With this move, do you start by calling anything infinite a combo, then anything arbitrarily large, and then move onto anything synergistic? At some point, Lava Spike starts looking a little too synergistic with Bump in the Night and everything has to go. Eventually people will start registering their Momir Basic decklists as the ban list is stretched to include 7,507 cards.
While obviously I mean this all slightly hyperbolically, this is what the format would degenerate to. I don't play this format to play basic lands. I play Modern to play sweet, sweet Magic: the Gathering.
For a PTQ? Burn.
Burn is one of the best decks in the format whilst the other is strictly casual. Unfortunately Burn isn't suited well for multiplayer, IMHO.
Thoughtseize
Phyrexian Revoker
Tidehollow Sculler
I think this could be tuned a little bit but it seems incredibly fun. One more vote for this.
He's just saying it would make a funny promo since there are decks that have no chance of casting Call.
It's not even possible for them to stop turn two combos. I can make bad decks all day that win turn 2. This is possible every other year in Standard even. The key from wizards is making sure decks balance speed and consistency. They've done an okay job of this thus far. I disagree with some moves but I digress.
With this move, do you start by calling anything infinite a combo, then anything arbitrarily large, and then move onto anything synergistic? At some point, Lava Spike starts looking a little too synergistic with Bump in the Night and everything has to go. Eventually people will start registering their Momir Basic decklists as the ban list is stretched to include 7,507 cards.
While obviously I mean this all slightly hyperbolically, this is what the format would degenerate to. I don't play this format to play basic lands. I play Modern to play sweet, sweet Magic: the Gathering.