So I've been thinking about a neat idea for Esper Death and Taxes, relying heavily on an exile game plan. I haven't taken it to a tournament yet, but have been testing online with good results. So far I've 2-0'd tron, burn and a bunch of random rogue decks like fairies and a few others. Kaya does huge work in this and I am thinking about swapping the Thoughtseize for cabal therapist once it's out. SB is kinda soft, I think it needs something but I can't tell what. The creature numbers are loose too, still ironing that out. Opinions and suggestions?
so I went 1-2 with my list at my local LGS Modern Monday.
M1- 4c Prime Speaker Vannifar. 2-0. G1 had the perfect curve of Coco on T3 and had the vial on 3 for a sweet EOT vial in Flickerwisp targeting his Voice of Resurgence token for the win. He didn't see Vannifar or Restoration Angel but did get out the Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker. G2 He didn't see any relevant combo pieces and I got the Leonin Arbiter lock on T2. I honestly didn't fully realize it was a Vannifer deck until he showed it to me after the match, but I think its a pretty favorable matchup with all the tricks we have. Vial with flickerwisp is pretty good. For G2 I sided out the Thalia's for a Surgical and two settle the wreckage's
M2-Elves. 0-2. G1 he went just went nuts and had out Elvish Archdruid and two Elvish Clancaller's on T2, making T3 lethal. G2 I sided in the two Settles in place of two Thalia's. I got the early pick on his one land hand with Arbiter on top of Pathing his Heritage druid, but he got me with a Coco into a Shaman of the Pack, and I just didn't have the board-state to keep up. This is easily one of the worst matchups as if you chose to put anything in your sideboard to wipe them out, you would be hurting yourself. Even a G2 Worship still dies to Rec Sage.
M3-Tron. 1-2. G1 I got the Arbiter Ghost quarter off early and kept him off tron with a draw step vial in Flickerwisp but still lost to Natural tron with Ugin wiping my board with no cards in hand. G2 I sided in 2 Dampening spheres, Gaddock Teeg, Surgical and the two Ramanup's, taking out 2 Vials, Eidelon of rhetoric and 3 Scavenging Ooze's. Won with Arbiter GQ and just a large creature base, keeping him off tron the whole game. G3 no SB changes. It was a very back and forth game, he got tron but I had Teeg, but he got out Walking Balista and Wurmcoil Engine and I just didn't see any other sb cards. Lost to just too much incremental advantage of Balista killing all my creatures.
Overall, I am realizing that my local meta is not the same as the bigger, overall meta. Facing two decks I wasn't prepared for at all was pretty eye-opening. I'm not sure what I will be doing next.
Blade Splicer is deffinitely better in Eldrataxes and higher blinking synergy. in specific cases it can be very good, I don't think its our case.
4 chalices seems to be the go to competitive list in GW right now, with declaration in stone and all that. I don't own Chalices so I can't really test meself, but it has been doing well on MODO lately.
Big Thalia is a tech I didnt really think about tbh, the art alone should have made me consider the card. I'll test it saturday
Sadly I have none to test. I shall await your results. It is a beautiful card. By this standard I suppose one should give the new Serra a go as well, huh?
Blade Splicer is deffinitely better in Eldrataxes and higher blinking synergy. in specific cases it can be very good, I don't think its our case.
4 chalices seems to be the go to competitive list in GW right now, with declaration in stone and all that. I don't own Chalices so I can't really test meself, but it has been doing well on MODO lately.
Big Thalia is a tech I didnt really think about tbh, the art alone should have made me consider the card. I'll test it saturday
Sadly I have none to test. I shall await your results. It is a beautiful card. By this standard I suppose one should give the new Serra a go as well, huh?
Built this list for a big tournament in Mobile, AL where top prize is a 2005 Mustang GT. I'm concerned about if I'm running too many colorless sources and if I should shove in Voice of Resurgence somehow.
I think you either run vial or CoCo tbh. Also, CoCo at 5cost because of thalia
Vial and Coco give the deck more consistency. Vial offers counterless creatures and tricks but not digging capability and coco offers digging but is more mana and deck composition stringent, using both gets the best of both worlds.
There are times I wish I could have CoCo, but it cuts into the creature count, and has the noted anti-synergy with Thalia - who is a darling, by the way.
I've thought I might try two or perhaps some number main and some number in the side. But I don't think I want four main-deck. My deck does need something, I just am not sure what it is yet. Someone mentioned Big Thalia but I haven't even looked to see if I have any yet. Militia Bugler just crossed my mind, but I'm pretty sure it's not really good enough without the Human synergy. Blade Splicer is an old favorite and just might be the right card still.
For me, Blade Splicer just seems like a big dumb stick, which I think sometimes this deck can use that, but not what I want it to do. Militia Bugler feels as bad as Lead the Stampede. Big Thalia has done work for me before but seems too slow for this meta. You'd need to run 8 dorks and 3/4 of her. I mean if you get it turn 2 on the play against Phoenix, you're gonna be ahead, but the same would be true for little Thalia too.
Built this list for a big tournament in Mobile, AL where top prize is a 2005 Mustang GT. I'm concerned about if I'm running too many colorless sources and if I should shove in Voice of Resurgence somehow.
I think you either run vial or CoCo tbh. Also, CoCo at 5cost because of thalia
Vial and Coco give the deck more consistency. Vial offers counterless creatures and tricks but not digging capability and coco offers digging but is more mana and deck composition stringent, using both gets the best of both worlds.
It may very well be one or two colorless source too many. Perhaps more importantly, you've only twelve G-sources not counting Dorks. I've got 15, 14 that enter untapped. Twelve seems thin to me. I'm sure there's a resource somewhere that shows the correct number to have to ensure a reasonable chance of having one turn-one.
I tried FoR for a while and it just never worked for me. Perhaps I was just doing it wrongly. Have you used it yet?
Have you found four each of Vial and CoCo to coexist peacefully? I want to run some number of CoCo, but I'll drop the deck before I drop the Vials.
You can't know how pleased I am to see a little activity here. This is the most fun deck in Modern.
FoR isn't bad, I think its better than tec edge because you get to search and they hopefully don't. and I think I may cut a gavony for a forest. coco wants 30 targets in the deck, I will whiff more often than not but this is a good meta for vial IMO.
Built this list for a big tournament in Mobile, AL where top prize is a 2005 Mustang GT. I'm concerned about if I'm running too many colorless sources and if I should shove in Voice of Resurgence somehow.
Why aren't we playing mb surgical and what happened to the presence of the deck at bigger tournaments? Is it just not good in the meta or have pros just moved onto other decks? also stealing from the GDS Primer thread, is ravenous trap worth a sb slot?
https://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/huatlis-hatebears/
3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
3x Leonin Arbiter
3x Flickerwisp
2x Lavinia, Azorius Renegade
3x Tidehollow Sculler
2x Spell queller
3x Meddling Mage
3x Wasteland Strangler
2x Reflector Mage
Planeswalker 2
2x Kaya, Orzhov Usurper
Instants 4
4x Path to Exile
4x Thoughtseize
Artifact 2
4x Aethervial
Lands 22
3x Darkslick Shores
3x Seachrome Coast
3x Hallowed Fountain
2x Godless Shrine
2x Watery Grave
4x Ghost quarter
2x Field of Ruin
1x Swamp
2x Plains
2x Surgical Extraction
2x Nihil Spellbomb
1x Rest in Peace
2x Stony Silence
3x Dovin's Veto
3x Settle the Wreckage
2x Selfless Spirit
M1- 4c Prime Speaker Vannifar. 2-0. G1 had the perfect curve of Coco on T3 and had the vial on 3 for a sweet EOT vial in Flickerwisp targeting his Voice of Resurgence token for the win. He didn't see Vannifar or Restoration Angel but did get out the Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker. G2 He didn't see any relevant combo pieces and I got the Leonin Arbiter lock on T2. I honestly didn't fully realize it was a Vannifer deck until he showed it to me after the match, but I think its a pretty favorable matchup with all the tricks we have. Vial with flickerwisp is pretty good. For G2 I sided out the Thalia's for a Surgical and two settle the wreckage's
M2-Elves. 0-2. G1 he went just went nuts and had out Elvish Archdruid and two Elvish Clancaller's on T2, making T3 lethal. G2 I sided in the two Settles in place of two Thalia's. I got the early pick on his one land hand with Arbiter on top of Pathing his Heritage druid, but he got me with a Coco into a Shaman of the Pack, and I just didn't have the board-state to keep up. This is easily one of the worst matchups as if you chose to put anything in your sideboard to wipe them out, you would be hurting yourself. Even a G2 Worship still dies to Rec Sage.
M3-Tron. 1-2. G1 I got the Arbiter Ghost quarter off early and kept him off tron with a draw step vial in Flickerwisp but still lost to Natural tron with Ugin wiping my board with no cards in hand. G2 I sided in 2 Dampening spheres, Gaddock Teeg, Surgical and the two Ramanup's, taking out 2 Vials, Eidelon of rhetoric and 3 Scavenging Ooze's. Won with Arbiter GQ and just a large creature base, keeping him off tron the whole game. G3 no SB changes. It was a very back and forth game, he got tron but I had Teeg, but he got out Walking Balista and Wurmcoil Engine and I just didn't see any other sb cards. Lost to just too much incremental advantage of Balista killing all my creatures.
Overall, I am realizing that my local meta is not the same as the bigger, overall meta. Facing two decks I wasn't prepared for at all was pretty eye-opening. I'm not sure what I will be doing next.
its gonna be really really good in BW tokens, which is on the rise right now. I think mardu pyromancer can use it too, may be better than Nahiri.
Serra looks like SB at best, but I think Elspeth, Knight-Errant is better
For me, Blade Splicer just seems like a big dumb stick, which I think sometimes this deck can use that, but not what I want it to do. Militia Bugler feels as bad as Lead the Stampede. Big Thalia has done work for me before but seems too slow for this meta. You'd need to run 8 dorks and 3/4 of her. I mean if you get it turn 2 on the play against Phoenix, you're gonna be ahead, but the same would be true for little Thalia too.
Vial and Coco give the deck more consistency. Vial offers counterless creatures and tricks but not digging capability and coco offers digging but is more mana and deck composition stringent, using both gets the best of both worlds.
FoR isn't bad, I think its better than tec edge because you get to search and they hopefully don't. and I think I may cut a gavony for a forest. coco wants 30 targets in the deck, I will whiff more often than not but this is a good meta for vial IMO.
2x Aven Mindcensor
1x Eidolon of Rhetoric
4x Flickerwisp
2x Kitchen Finks
2x Knight of Autumn
4x Leonin Arbiter
4x Noble Hierarch
2x Qasali Pridemage
3x Scavenging Ooze
3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2x Field of Ruin
3x Forest
2x Gavony Township
4x Ghost Quarter
3x Horizon Canopy
1x Plains
2x Razorverge Thicket
4x Temple Garden
Artifact (4)
4x Aether Vial
Instant (8)
4x Collected Company
4x Path to Exile
2x Damping Sphere
2x Gaddock Teeg
3x Kataki, War's Wage
2x Ramunap Excavator
3x Rest in Peace
2x Settle the Wreckage
1x Surgical Extraction