I feel like Rite of Replication is a total boss, although it's entirely possible that I just have to lean on it far more heavily than others might, due to the fact that I still lack a good-ish number of key components in this deck.
In any case, getting to play a kicked rite on an Acidic Slime to blow up 5 of one of my opponent's lands, setting them back to about 3 mana and taking them out of play for the majority of the game, and then Eternal Witness-ing Rite a few turns later, and then getting to play it kicked on Acidic Slime yet again, blowing up 5 of my other opponent's lands was just awesome. Were it not for that advantage, I probably would've lost the game.
That's anecdotal, however, and doesn't go very far towards justifying it's place in the deck, but I think that I'll keep running it for a long-ish period of time.
Rite of Replication is a house, I have it on the Card Options due to that and it is really cheap to get a copy of.
I have my own issues with the card but it is still a good card. If it were easier to tutor up and abuse then I would probably be running it myself. I also sort of see a lot of spot removal though so it makes it sort of worse.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
I feel like Rite of Replication is a total boss, although it's entirely possible that I just have to lean on it far more heavily than others might, due to the fact that I still lack a good-ish number of key components in this deck.
......
That's anecdotal, however, and doesn't go very far towards justifying it's place in the deck, but I think that I'll keep running it for a long-ish period of time.
Don't sell this card short. It has so many amazing applications. I personally find it to be a blue staple. It's a strictly better clone because of your ability to kick it. This gives it both early game and late game relevance. The double blue, I never really find to be an issue. Play this thing on just about any creature (non-legendary of course) and you are guaranteed to profit. Even with the major cards that go in this deck (Which I believe I have purchased all of them), this card is most definitely a keeper. If there is an argument, I would love to hear it (not to be inflammatory), but I think this card holds so much valuable utility, which this deck lives on, that it is part of the core strategy of this deck.
Don't sell this card short. It has so many amazing applications. I personally find it to be a blue staple. It's a strictly better clone because of your ability to kick it. This gives it both early game and late game relevance. The double blue, I never really find to be an issue. Play this thing on just about any creature (non-legendary of course) and you are guaranteed to profit. Even with the major cards that go in this deck (Which I believe I have purchased all of them), this card is most definitely a keeper. If there is an argument, I would love to hear it (not to be inflammatory), but I think this card holds so much valuable utility, which this deck lives on, that it is part of the core strategy of this deck.
I guess ISB's right in that it's hard for the card to be "part of the core strategy" if it's not something you can count on reliably tutoring up and having in your hand every game at the right time.
Don't sell this card short. It has so many amazing applications. I personally find it to be a blue staple. It's a strictly better clone because of your ability to kick it. This gives it both early game and late game relevance. The double blue, I never really find to be an issue. Play this thing on just about any creature (non-legendary of course) and you are guaranteed to profit. Even with the major cards that go in this deck (Which I believe I have purchased all of them), this card is most definitely a keeper. If there is an argument, I would love to hear it (not to be inflammatory), but I think this card holds so much valuable utility, which this deck lives on, that it is part of the core strategy of this deck.
No problem I will give a quick rundown on why I dont run it. Lets do a quick compare of it vs say Phantasmal Image which I would say is the inferior of the two clones that I currently run.
The token doesn't die to being targeted like the illusion does.
Cheaper $$$ wise for budget players or people just getting into playing the deck.
Up until you go to kick a Rite of Replication it is strictly worse than most every clone out there in a deck like this. Rite is harder to abuse and harder to tutor for. It targets so it can fizzle if the target is removed and it cant target shroud / hexproof of your opponents. When you look at the difference between Rite of Replication and Phyrexian Metamorph rite looks even worse off... Generally speaking in a list like this anytime you can get the same functionality out of a creature as a spell the creature will be better every time. You can tutor for, rez, and equip a creature which you cant a spell. Even though rite gives us a creature off of resolving it is not a creature itself making it harder to work with.
I'm 100% with ISBPathfinder on this one... and aside from the very clear reasons he listed, we already have two clones, and Gilded Drake is sort of a functional clone. And again, as someone mentioned above, because a sorcery like Rite of Replication is not tutorable, it's difficult to consider it for the core of the deck.
It's a good card, and redundancy is always awesome, but I'm not sure we need another clone.
In other news... in my testing so far, Ixidron has been solid, just as an update. Tutoring for a wrath is something this deck really likes. And sometimes cards are less dangerous on the battlefield than in the graveyard, like Acidic Slime or Terastodon. And flipping over titans so they can't trigger or be cloned is very favorable sometimes.
Just general game playing tips as well -- I'm finding myself always wanting to tutor for Skullclamp (over a sword) when I'm using Stoneforge Mystic, and if I do choose a sword, I'm generally favoring Feast/Famine over Fire/Ice.
I'm 100% with ISBPathfinder on this one... we already have two clones, and Gilded Drake is sort of a functional clone. And again, as someone mentioned above, because a sorcery like Rite of Replication is not tutorable, it's difficult to consider it for the core of the deck.
It's a good card, and redundancy is always awesome, but I'm not sure we need another clone.
In other news... in my testing so far, Ixidron has been solid, just as an update. Tutoring for a wrath is something this deck really likes. And sometimes cards are less dangerous on the battlefield than in the graveyard, like Acidic Slime or Terastodon. And flipping over titans so they can't trigger or be cloned is very favorable sometimes.
Just general game playing tips as well -- I'm finding myself always wanting to tutor for Skullclamp (over a sword) when I'm using Stoneforge Mystic, and if I do choose a sword, I'm generally favoring Feast/Famine over Fire/Ice.
Ohhh also Winding Canyons into a flash clone is totally sexy!!! One more point for the actual clones.
Ixidron, I have been meaning to test him out... At the same time though I feel like I might need to cut into my wraths to include him.... Any thoughts on which one I should test him in place of? I was sort of thinking of putting him in for Oblivion Stone to give him a shot... I will wait to commit him to the OP decklist until I see some results but I really need to try him in somewhere...
As for my equip tutoring, I find myself going a bit differently depending on my setup. Skullclamp is always profitable but between fire and ice and feast and famine I haven't found one or the other to be preferred overall. The situation sort of dictates still for me. I love beating my nin player up with Fire and Ice lol.
Yeah, definitely give him a shot. Just from the fact that you're not immediately turning him down is a good sign, because we've gone through so many card suggestions together that have just gotten negged so fast. It's a very situational card -- but that's what all wraths are.
I'm not sure I'd want to cut another sweeper for him yet, because Hallowed Burial and Austere Command both have their places. And the Oblivion Stone is recurrable with a Sun Titan and Academy Ruins. Plus Tezzeret can find it. All stuff you already know.
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Since the decks creation I think I've only went for something other than fire and ice once with my stoneforge. Feast and Famine is great, and I love getting the free untap. However if I'm counting on being able to do two things in a turn, or do one thing then untap to be able to hold counters and someone pops it midstream I'm generally a bit sour. Being tapped out when I play Jenara is just bad news for me, as it's generally a 3-on-1. I know the idea with F&F is to not rely on it, and when it happens pray because a miracle just happened. But the poor thing goes boom too often
Yeah, definitely give him a shot. Just from the fact that you're not immediately turning him down is a good sign, because we've gone through so many card suggestions together that have just gotten negged so fast. It's a very situational card -- but that's what all wraths are.
I'm not sure I'd want to cut another sweeper for him yet, because Hallowed Burial and Austere Command both have their places. And the Oblivion Stone is recurrable with a Sun Titan and Academy Ruins. Plus Tezzeret can find it. All stuff you already know.
I've been regretting my cut on O-Stone for a bit now, I wish I knew what to cut.
OH! I remember mentioning that I cut Consecrated for Recurring Insight just to give it a whirl. However if I end up keeping things that way, I might just cut Uthuun for Consecrated. Thoughts?
Yeah, definitely give him a shot. Just from the fact that you're not immediately turning him down is a good sign, because we've gone through so many card suggestions together that have just gotten negged so fast. It's a very situational card -- but that's what all wraths are.
I'm not sure I'd want to cut another sweeper for him yet, because Hallowed Burial and Austere Command both have their places. And the Oblivion Stone is recurrable with a Sun Titan and Academy Ruins. Plus Tezzeret can find it. All stuff you already know.
I know I really hate the thought of cutting a wrath to include him however I also feel bad just adding more wraths to my list. I am also running Knowledge Exploitation now which is sort of situationally possibly a wrath if need be which I didnt cut a wrath for... Well I will try to figure it out for my games yet tonight. I love all of the wraths I run in here and cutting any of them seems crazy to me but Ixidron has more means of tutoring him, I could flash him in with a Chord of Calling / Winding Canyons, I could recur him for fun times and it just seems like a lot of broken things you can do with him...
I will keep tinkering with the thought of him and what I might end up putting him in for some testing with. He seems like he could have some great times all in all.
As for going for Fire and Ice, Generally speaking I agree with Jason. I find it is usually more of my go to as I know that the card draw + removal of that utility guy will pay off whereas untapping is a bit more uncertain however I am generally quite happy drawing Feast and Famine.
EDIT: I was also thinking about testing Mirri's Guile in place of Brainstorm as someone suggested a few pages back. It would make the third topdeck manipulation effect in this deck however the fact that it triggers for free is really nice and when I have one of them in play I don't really need to draw into the others as I can just push around them.
Mirri's Guile seems a bit weak since it's card disadvantage that you have to wait to use.
Sensei's Divining Top is also card disadvantage technically, but it offers a lot of tricks that we are all aware of, and you're not restricted to the upkeep, so you can dig on your main phase or on your opponent's turn to attempt to dig out a counter.
Sylvan Library is also card disadvantage as well, but the second you untap with it, you take two extra cards and you immediately become ahead. And you get to do this every turn.
I don't run Brainstorm in my list currently, but I would think it's probably a bit better than the Mirri's Guile.
If anyone is having a good experience with the 'Guile, let me know.
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On the topic of wraths and whatnot, it's too bad Magus of the Disk comes into play tapped, given all the synergies he would have in this deck. After that first time around the board, sitting behind him is like sitting behind a Oblivion Stone, but it's that first time around that kills ya (or him).
On the topic of wraths and whatnot, it's too bad Magus of the Disk comes into play tapped, given all the synergies he would have in this deck. After that first time around the board, sitting behind him is like sitting behind a Oblivion Stone, but it's that first time around that kills ya (or him).
I don't like Nev's disk for exactly this reason. Seems too weak to destroy / exile effects before it can even be used. If it sticks and can be untapped, it's certainly a political card at that point but it has the option to be 2 for 1'd too easily for my liking.
I personally don't like having too many of those "small things" like Brainstorm or Mirri's Guile, simply because the deck starts to feel less like an EDH deck. That's probably just my playstyle, but that's how I go about it.
By the way, how is that new banner coming along ISB?
Have you considered Teferi or Seedborn? Both on their own are pretty solid. Seedborn makes Jenny go nuts. And it is always fun to hit the trifeca Of Teferi, Seedborn and Consecrated Sphinx and drop creatures on everyone else's turn.
I am in the process of reviving my jenara deck and I may go from a less permanent heavy to more of a removal package like yours as my meta is starting to see more must answer threats. But I still want some big power plays like Blue Myojin/Eureka, Sylvan Library/Abundance, Top/Futuresight and such.
Have you considered Teferi or Seedborn? Both on their own are pretty solid. Seedborn makes Jenny go nuts. And it is always fun to hit the trifeca Of Teferi, Seedborn and Consecrated Sphinx and drop creatures on everyone else's turn.
I am in the process of reviving my jenara deck and I may go from a less permanent heavy to more of a removal package like yours as my meta is starting to see more must answer threats. But I still want some big power plays like Blue Myojin/Eureka, Sylvan Library/Abundance, Top/Futuresight and such.
Teferi is strong and I had been considering him for a while. Opponents not being able to respond to threats during your turn is huge, especially for those big plays. Seedborn is much the same in the sense that it's amazing when you get some other cards out to go with it. However I feel both of them necessitate that you have a decent amount of land in place, opponents don't have answers, and they require having other cards to work with. Whereas I feel MOST of the cards in the current list work well on their own and don't necessarily rely on anything else to be good. Short of a few things like skullclamp, the two swords, maybe birthing pod, crystal shard.
Had 2 games with Jenara last night. The first game was terrible and the second was great.
Game 1: 2HG with a total scrub teammate running a 5c Child deck with a lolz bad landbase...
Let me just sort of spell how this one went for me, Turn 5 my ally whips out a Traumatize on one of our opponents which is apparently running a control heavy list. I am like wtf is he doing but ignore it... Turn 5 opponent the mono white Kemba list peels an Open the Vaults and lolz as his ally just curb stomps us with half his deck... I forget I have Pact of Negation and I suck on the Mindslaver. My opponents essentially just dump my 5 card hand off the slaver and I am out of the game. My ally is a total tard and plays his terrible deck a while more but we both have tucked commanders and no board and no hands. I scoop just to end the stupidity.
Game 2: Thank god we are back to FFA as that scrub does nothing in this game and I am glad I dont have him on my team. I go into a turn 4/5 Primeval Titan off of some ramp and my Fierce Empath that fetched him up. I manage to swing with the titan and clone it which is nice. My opponent who is playing Riku clones my titan, drops his own titan, then clones that titan... Thankfully we wrath after that BS...
The game sort of goes long I ride some nice CA and sort of threaten all of my opponents several times but an opposing Bant list is running like 10 wraths so he just has a fistfull of them...
I kill Riku off by slamming a few creatures out and then using Knowledge Exploitation into his Insurrection to steal everything and swing at him for like 40+ damage. It wasnt a big one but I needed to kill him. He had to Misty Maze my Terastodon to live which was fun as I blew up the Bant player's landbase off the second setup with him. Riku was at like 4 life at that point so I finished him off next turn.
The wrath happy bant list recovered its manabase and did some more wrathing...
My game winning play went like this though: topdeck a Survival of the Fittest on my turn, play it and pass my turn with like 25+ land up. My opponents do some small stuff not really having much to do through all the wrathing. It comes to me and EOT this is my play:
Well that ends my opponents EOT lol. I go ahead and go and swing in with all my dudes doing like 30 damage to my opponent or something like that. I rez Snapcaster Mage into play off of the Sun Titan and then flash back Knowledge Exploitation in my second main to Catastrophe for lands. And that ends the game I would say that was a flashy finish on my behalf. Man I love my Winding Canyons.
On the topic of wraths and whatnot, it's too bad Magus of the Disk comes into play tapped, given all the synergies he would have in this deck. After that first time around the board, sitting behind him is like sitting behind a Oblivion Stone, but it's that first time around that kills ya (or him).
Even if it didn't come in tapped it would still have summoning sickness. If you are strictly looking for a white creature based wrath you can look at Myojin of Cleansing Fire however the fact that you can only get the divinity counter on him when played from hand really screws with most any way we could abuse him. The disk effects in my mind are always too slow. If someone really doesn't want you to wrath they can blow it up and stop you from doing it which sucks.
I personally don't like having too many of those "small things" like Brainstorm or Mirri's Guile, simply because the deck starts to feel less like an EDH deck. That's probably just my playstyle, but that's how I go about it.
By the way, how is that new banner coming along ISB?
He needed to extend the deadline which I am guessing is either part of personal life getting in the way and or probably more so just the fact that it is a very large banner so there is a lot of white space to fill. I am totally cool with waiting though. If you rush a good thing like art you get a half assed job and so I will wait whatever time he needs to finish it.
Here is the last update he gave me on it. It looks totally amazing and I cant wait for it. I am guessing that it will be done any day now but it is hard to tell as I havent been updated on the matter but he asked for more time this weekend sooooo I am just hoping soon but whenever I get it I will update it here.
Have you considered Teferi or Seedborn? Both on their own are pretty solid. Seedborn makes Jenny go nuts. And it is always fun to hit the trifeca Of Teferi, Seedborn and Consecrated Sphinx and drop creatures on everyone else's turn.
I am in the process of reviving my jenara deck and I may go from a less permanent heavy to more of a removal package like yours as my meta is starting to see more must answer threats. But I still want some big power plays like Blue Myojin/Eureka, Sylvan Library/Abundance, Top/Futuresight and such.
I have indeed considered both of them and here are my thoughts on the two of them:
Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir The problem I have with teferi is that he doesnt do much on his own. He can work if you are trying to stop some counterspell wars but I think there are some better anti counter things in blue if that is your problem. He has no ETB effect and while he allows me to play things easier he is sort of a setup to get wrathed as well. If you really like him for his utility I dont see a problem running him but I have some problem with some slow building creatures in the list like this sort of thing. If you want to run a little heavier control based though he could work.
Seedborn Muse My big question being what are you going to do with the untap??? This bugger draws sooooooo much hate and what do you expect to do with her? Generally speaking in my own list one of the few things I would be able to do on a regular basis would just be to put counters on Jenara which is sort of meh. Honestly I feel like Sword of Feast and Famine does essentially what you would be trying to do with the Seedborn but with drawing a hell of a lot less hate from it and being harder to kill.
If you want to run either of them though that is fine. I just never saw much payoff with the Seedborn but if you wanted to run more mana dumping effects she could be nice. My own list just lacks the mana dumping outlets to put the spare mana into on a regular basis.
As for having big plays, this deck still has amazing plays it is just chaining several smaller things together at once. Look at my game 2 above. I literally exploded out with 30+ damage worth of creatures that I played out at the EOT that really all originated from a single Reveillark being played. As for the removal, I think that good spot removal is something that is really needed in a good meta. You can stop all sorts of stupid combo using simple removal spells. T&N can almost always be stopped by a Swords to Plowshares.
EDIT: also, I tried including Ixidron in place of O Stone last night. I got him exactly once and he would have been nice if he didnt get countered... I flashed him in off of Winding Canyons just to be told no... luckily I had other creatures and I just flashed in a few more cheap ones and chumped the incoming attack anyways. It would have been for lethal though. It was like a combined effort of 3 players trying to kill me off. Riku did like 4x Chaos Warp's by copying it with riku + a red copy spell on me taking all of my defense out then Omnath swung at me with his 21+ damage commander and the bant player countered my attempt to wrath. Luckily I still had instant speed guys to chump it. So as far as Ixidron goes.... currently I havent made any decisions yet but I just dont think I can commit to cutting one of my current wraths for him... If I can find some room outside of those to include him I will see what I can do.
Teferi just makes you the public enemy, and doesn't offer much in return. This deck doesn't need to have lands untapped on opponent's turns so what's the point of having Seedborn Muse?
This deck is much more about 187 and less about static effects.
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Teferi just makes you the public enemy, and doesn't offer much in return. This deck doesn't need to have lands untapped on opponent's turns so what's the point of having Seedborn Muse?
This deck is much more about 187 and less about static effects.
I agree with you, this deck is more about immediate results than anything. Teferi and the muse are both good cards but in the right deck. I like immediate results and fast results. Teferi to me just looks like another casualty of the next wrath. If you find yourself needing more mana in a turn then mana doublers will probably be a little more robust than Seedborn Muse.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
I know you covered Cloudstone Curio previously, although briefly; you mentioned that "everyone seems to love it for some reason". The primary reason is that it is ridiculous with ETB based creatures. I love Equilibrium more than most, but the additional 1 for each use can be problematic; yes, it's somewhat balanced out by bouncing opposing creatures, but there are rarely creatures someone else has that I want to bounce, barring my own via theft effects. I love both cards, but Curio is tailor made for a deck like this. If your meta features only opposing creatures that won't really hurt you if bounced, then Equilibrium is probably as good. Otherwise, Curio is just better and allows you to abuse what is the central idea of the creatures in your deck.
true_rizla (the artist doing the new main primer header) got back to me about the ETA for the new artwork. He put it at less than a week yet to completion. I am going to take that at there is tons of white space to fill in on it sort of an issue. Real life could be interfering as well but I think the size of this artpiece is probably primarily the issue in this case. I cant thank him enough for doing this one for me as I cant even guess how much time and effort he has already put into this one... He already has around 10 days in this one and normally he does sig work. I am glad he is doing this one for me as I can only imagine it is a hell of a lot more work than a usual request entails.
The last update he gave me around 5 days ago was here.
As for Cloudstone Curio, it can be fun however it also eats up a lot of mana replaying things and draws tons of hate. I think it could be cool but I don't really know what to expect out of it in general... I really don't like working off of bounce but it could be good. I do like that it is a 3 mana artifact as it makes it easier to tutor up and recur... Probably one of the most unique aspects of it being that a fetchland can be used to protect utility land when it is in play. I will see if I can get around to trying it but I haven't been overly impressed by bounce in here in the past.
Equilibrium I tried it in the past and never really wanted to draw it... I see too much opposing ETB type creatures as well. The Curio seems better for what I would be wanting to use it with.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Got in my weekly multiplayer EDH game today. Was hoping for several, but the game really lasted a long time. It was okay though, as it was a pretty balanced game with a lot of interactions, nothing really nasty happening, and everyone having their time to shine.
The game played out a lot differently than usual. Though I was drawing a lot of cards to the chubby little monk, I never drew into a tutor, a wrath, or any big creatures save Sun Titan. The game was played out by being pretty non-threatening with my board presence, countering crucial spells when necessary, stifling Sedris with Voidmage Husher, and alpha-striking with Jenara + Lightning Greaves pretty frequently. With so many people playing blue, Jenara got bounced to my hand a lot, but it was really easy to replay her hasted, pump her and get in for some before she was bounced again. Finest Hour was also on board for me ~75% of the time, and really went a long way for me in this game.
As a sidenote, I ended up losing to the Rafiq player who I took to 18 general damage within the first 4-5 turns via Finest Hour + Lightning Greaves + Jenara. I decided to leave him at 18 general damage instead of finishing him off the numerous times I could've swung in with Jenara again, as I thought it wouldn't be any fun for him to sit there for 2 hours or whatever while we finished out the game. He turned around and hit me for 26 general damage in one turn towards the end of the game :rolleyes:. So much for being the nice guy!
Got in my weekly multiplayer EDH game today. Was hoping for several, but the game really lasted a long time. It was okay though, as it was a pretty balanced game with a lot of interactions, nothing really nasty happening, and everyone having their time to shine.
The game played out a lot differently than usual. Though I was drawing a lot of cards to the chubby little monk, I never drew into a tutor, a wrath, or any big creatures save Sun Titan. The game was played out by being pretty non-threatening with my board presence, countering crucial spells when necessary, stifling Sedris with Voidmage Husher, and alpha-striking with Jenara + Lightning Greaves pretty frequently. With so many people playing blue, Jenara got bounced to my hand a lot, but it was really easy to replay her hasted, pump her and get in for some before she was bounced again. Finest Hour was also on board for me ~75% of the time, and really went a long way for me in this game.
As a sidenote, I ended up losing to the Rafiq player who I took to 18 general damage within the first 4-5 turns via Finest Hour + Lightning Greaves + Jenara. I decided to leave him at 18 general damage instead of finishing him off the numerous times I could've swung in with Jenara again, as I thought it wouldn't be any fun for him to sit there for 2 hours or whatever while we finished out the game. He turned around and hit me for 26 general damage in one turn towards the end of the game :rolleyes:. So much for being the nice guy!
I always do that with my other decks. There's been some times with my Karrthus deck where I dealt 38 damage to one player because he did 10 damage to me one turn. I let him live and hop around for a while, then when I decided to finish the game I wasted so many resources trying to finish him off that I was unable to take care of anyone else.
Well... I have been a bit less impressed by Skyshroud Claim of late so I am going to try to make a little swap for it. The claim is nice but I want to be casting it at 4 mana and beyond that I am usually less impressed to draw it. I really don't have much for ways to abuse it much less want to abuse it... It seems like it is probably time to see if I cant rotate it out. I have all of the rest of my ramp handled by creatures so I guess it is time to cut this one as well.
Time Warp is similar in mana, it can also ramp me in the early game but it has so many other functions that it works with. I can play some small creatures then use time warp to cantrip + untap all my lands. I can use it for extra combat phases, I can use it + something like a titan or sword to generate even more value. I think this will be a good swap for similar utility and Time Warp is a lot better to topdeck later on. The only time I can think of that I dont want a Time Warp is when someone has a Wild Ricochet or something of the sort. However it is easier to hold back from casting it than it is to keep 4 up for the redirect.
Also as ammo pointed out a little ways back it could potentially combo out but that is not the primary point of its inclusion. I wouldn't be against doing it if I ever set it up.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Time Warp is very good for many reasons, but I'm going to point out a very big generalization for why it's actually amazing.
Consider the following scenario: (haha, I always do these): You're playing a four player game and one player has been killed. With three players left, each having a decent board position, you know that one player might explode his hand to interact with the game state and cause major problems. You also know that if you could somehow just get TWO attack phases, you'd be able to kill both players.
This is exactly what happened to me last night. I played Time Warp. Once it resolved I knew I was free to kill one player and advance my board a tiny bit while preparing myself to kill off the final player for the win.
The takeaway? Sometimes we're just playing for an extra attack phase.
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In any case, getting to play a kicked rite on an Acidic Slime to blow up 5 of one of my opponent's lands, setting them back to about 3 mana and taking them out of play for the majority of the game, and then Eternal Witness-ing Rite a few turns later, and then getting to play it kicked on Acidic Slime yet again, blowing up 5 of my other opponent's lands was just awesome. Were it not for that advantage, I probably would've lost the game.
That's anecdotal, however, and doesn't go very far towards justifying it's place in the deck, but I think that I'll keep running it for a long-ish period of time.
R.I.P. Sundering Titan (6/20/12) and Braids, Cabal Minion (9/12/14)
I have my own issues with the card but it is still a good card. If it were easier to tutor up and abuse then I would probably be running it myself. I also sort of see a lot of spot removal though so it makes it sort of worse.
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[Modern] Allies
Don't sell this card short. It has so many amazing applications. I personally find it to be a blue staple. It's a strictly better clone because of your ability to kick it. This gives it both early game and late game relevance. The double blue, I never really find to be an issue. Play this thing on just about any creature (non-legendary of course) and you are guaranteed to profit. Even with the major cards that go in this deck (Which I believe I have purchased all of them), this card is most definitely a keeper. If there is an argument, I would love to hear it (not to be inflammatory), but I think this card holds so much valuable utility, which this deck lives on, that it is part of the core strategy of this deck.
EDH:
G[cEDH] Selvala, Heart of the StormG
URW[cEDH] Narset, the Last AirmericanURW
GWUSt. Jenara, the ArchangelGWU
UBGrimgrin, Chaos MarineUB
GOmnath, Mana BaronG
URWNarset, Justice League AmericaURW
GWUBAtraxa, Countess of CountersGWUB
GWUEstrid, Enbantress PrimeGWU
I guess ISB's right in that it's hard for the card to be "part of the core strategy" if it's not something you can count on reliably tutoring up and having in your hand every game at the right time.
R.I.P. Sundering Titan (6/20/12) and Braids, Cabal Minion (9/12/14)
No problem I will give a quick rundown on why I dont run it. Lets do a quick compare of it vs say Phantasmal Image which I would say is the inferior of the two clones that I currently run.
Pros of Phantasmal Image
Pros of Rite of Replication
Up until you go to kick a Rite of Replication it is strictly worse than most every clone out there in a deck like this. Rite is harder to abuse and harder to tutor for. It targets so it can fizzle if the target is removed and it cant target shroud / hexproof of your opponents. When you look at the difference between Rite of Replication and Phyrexian Metamorph rite looks even worse off... Generally speaking in a list like this anytime you can get the same functionality out of a creature as a spell the creature will be better every time. You can tutor for, rez, and equip a creature which you cant a spell. Even though rite gives us a creature off of resolving it is not a creature itself making it harder to work with.
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[Modern] Allies
It's a good card, and redundancy is always awesome, but I'm not sure we need another clone.
In other news... in my testing so far, Ixidron has been solid, just as an update. Tutoring for a wrath is something this deck really likes. And sometimes cards are less dangerous on the battlefield than in the graveyard, like Acidic Slime or Terastodon. And flipping over titans so they can't trigger or be cloned is very favorable sometimes.
Just general game playing tips as well -- I'm finding myself always wanting to tutor for Skullclamp (over a sword) when I'm using Stoneforge Mystic, and if I do choose a sword, I'm generally favoring Feast/Famine over Fire/Ice.
I also include discussions about cards we took out, cards we banned, and cards we might add.
Ohhh also Winding Canyons into a flash clone is totally sexy!!! One more point for the actual clones.
Ixidron, I have been meaning to test him out... At the same time though I feel like I might need to cut into my wraths to include him.... Any thoughts on which one I should test him in place of? I was sort of thinking of putting him in for Oblivion Stone to give him a shot... I will wait to commit him to the OP decklist until I see some results but I really need to try him in somewhere...
As for my equip tutoring, I find myself going a bit differently depending on my setup. Skullclamp is always profitable but between fire and ice and feast and famine I haven't found one or the other to be preferred overall. The situation sort of dictates still for me. I love beating my nin player up with Fire and Ice lol.
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[Modern] Allies
I'm not sure I'd want to cut another sweeper for him yet, because Hallowed Burial and Austere Command both have their places. And the Oblivion Stone is recurrable with a Sun Titan and Academy Ruins. Plus Tezzeret can find it. All stuff you already know.
I also include discussions about cards we took out, cards we banned, and cards we might add.
I've been regretting my cut on O-Stone for a bit now, I wish I knew what to cut.
OH! I remember mentioning that I cut Consecrated for Recurring Insight just to give it a whirl. However if I end up keeping things that way, I might just cut Uthuun for Consecrated. Thoughts?
I know I really hate the thought of cutting a wrath to include him however I also feel bad just adding more wraths to my list. I am also running Knowledge Exploitation now which is sort of situationally possibly a wrath if need be which I didnt cut a wrath for... Well I will try to figure it out for my games yet tonight. I love all of the wraths I run in here and cutting any of them seems crazy to me but Ixidron has more means of tutoring him, I could flash him in with a Chord of Calling / Winding Canyons, I could recur him for fun times and it just seems like a lot of broken things you can do with him...
I will keep tinkering with the thought of him and what I might end up putting him in for some testing with. He seems like he could have some great times all in all.
As for going for Fire and Ice, Generally speaking I agree with Jason. I find it is usually more of my go to as I know that the card draw + removal of that utility guy will pay off whereas untapping is a bit more uncertain however I am generally quite happy drawing Feast and Famine.
EDIT: I was also thinking about testing Mirri's Guile in place of Brainstorm as someone suggested a few pages back. It would make the third topdeck manipulation effect in this deck however the fact that it triggers for free is really nice and when I have one of them in play I don't really need to draw into the others as I can just push around them.
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[Modern] Allies
Sensei's Divining Top is also card disadvantage technically, but it offers a lot of tricks that we are all aware of, and you're not restricted to the upkeep, so you can dig on your main phase or on your opponent's turn to attempt to dig out a counter.
Sylvan Library is also card disadvantage as well, but the second you untap with it, you take two extra cards and you immediately become ahead. And you get to do this every turn.
I don't run Brainstorm in my list currently, but I would think it's probably a bit better than the Mirri's Guile.
If anyone is having a good experience with the 'Guile, let me know.
I also include discussions about cards we took out, cards we banned, and cards we might add.
R.I.P. Sundering Titan (6/20/12) and Braids, Cabal Minion (9/12/14)
I don't like Nev's disk for exactly this reason. Seems too weak to destroy / exile effects before it can even be used. If it sticks and can be untapped, it's certainly a political card at that point but it has the option to be 2 for 1'd too easily for my liking.
By the way, how is that new banner coming along ISB?
UWU/W BlinkUW
BMono-Black ControlB
Commander:
GWUJenaraGWU
BGeth MBCB
RGXenagosRG
WUBSharuumWUB (retired)
Modern:
xAffinityx (starting)
Standard:
Ha! That's a good one.
I am in the process of reviving my jenara deck and I may go from a less permanent heavy to more of a removal package like yours as my meta is starting to see more must answer threats. But I still want some big power plays like Blue Myojin/Eureka, Sylvan Library/Abundance, Top/Futuresight and such.
Teferi is strong and I had been considering him for a while. Opponents not being able to respond to threats during your turn is huge, especially for those big plays. Seedborn is much the same in the sense that it's amazing when you get some other cards out to go with it. However I feel both of them necessitate that you have a decent amount of land in place, opponents don't have answers, and they require having other cards to work with. Whereas I feel MOST of the cards in the current list work well on their own and don't necessarily rely on anything else to be good. Short of a few things like skullclamp, the two swords, maybe birthing pod, crystal shard.
Had 2 games with Jenara last night. The first game was terrible and the second was great.
Game 1: 2HG with a total scrub teammate running a 5c Child deck with a lolz bad landbase...
Let me just sort of spell how this one went for me, Turn 5 my ally whips out a Traumatize on one of our opponents which is apparently running a control heavy list. I am like wtf is he doing but ignore it... Turn 5 opponent the mono white Kemba list peels an Open the Vaults and lolz as his ally just curb stomps us with half his deck... I forget I have Pact of Negation and I suck on the Mindslaver. My opponents essentially just dump my 5 card hand off the slaver and I am out of the game. My ally is a total tard and plays his terrible deck a while more but we both have tucked commanders and no board and no hands. I scoop just to end the stupidity.
Game 2: Thank god we are back to FFA as that scrub does nothing in this game and I am glad I dont have him on my team. I go into a turn 4/5 Primeval Titan off of some ramp and my Fierce Empath that fetched him up. I manage to swing with the titan and clone it which is nice. My opponent who is playing Riku clones my titan, drops his own titan, then clones that titan... Thankfully we wrath after that BS...
The game sort of goes long I ride some nice CA and sort of threaten all of my opponents several times but an opposing Bant list is running like 10 wraths so he just has a fistfull of them...
I kill Riku off by slamming a few creatures out and then using Knowledge Exploitation into his Insurrection to steal everything and swing at him for like 40+ damage. It wasnt a big one but I needed to kill him. He had to Misty Maze my Terastodon to live which was fun as I blew up the Bant player's landbase off the second setup with him. Riku was at like 4 life at that point so I finished him off next turn.
The wrath happy bant list recovered its manabase and did some more wrathing...
My game winning play went like this though: topdeck a Survival of the Fittest on my turn, play it and pass my turn with like 25+ land up. My opponents do some small stuff not really having much to do through all the wrathing. It comes to me and EOT this is my play:
Survival of the Fittest some small 1/1 or something into Reveillark
Winding Canyons activates,
Evoke Reveillark into play, it rezes Karmic Guide, Eternal Witness. Karmic Guide rezes Sun Titan who rezes Phantasmal Image as a Sun Titan who rezes Sword of Fire and Ice.
Eternal Witness returns Reveillark
Reveillark evokes returning Fierce Empath and another small dude I cant remember who... Fierce Empath tutors into Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite who I go ahead and play.
Well that ends my opponents EOT lol. I go ahead and go and swing in with all my dudes doing like 30 damage to my opponent or something like that. I rez Snapcaster Mage into play off of the Sun Titan and then flash back Knowledge Exploitation in my second main to Catastrophe for lands. And that ends the game I would say that was a flashy finish on my behalf. Man I love my Winding Canyons.
Even if it didn't come in tapped it would still have summoning sickness. If you are strictly looking for a white creature based wrath you can look at Myojin of Cleansing Fire however the fact that you can only get the divinity counter on him when played from hand really screws with most any way we could abuse him. The disk effects in my mind are always too slow. If someone really doesn't want you to wrath they can blow it up and stop you from doing it which sucks.
He needed to extend the deadline which I am guessing is either part of personal life getting in the way and or probably more so just the fact that it is a very large banner so there is a lot of white space to fill. I am totally cool with waiting though. If you rush a good thing like art you get a half assed job and so I will wait whatever time he needs to finish it.
Here is the last update he gave me on it. It looks totally amazing and I cant wait for it. I am guessing that it will be done any day now but it is hard to tell as I havent been updated on the matter but he asked for more time this weekend sooooo I am just hoping soon but whenever I get it I will update it here.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showpost.php?p=7978997&postcount=47
I have indeed considered both of them and here are my thoughts on the two of them:
Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir The problem I have with teferi is that he doesnt do much on his own. He can work if you are trying to stop some counterspell wars but I think there are some better anti counter things in blue if that is your problem. He has no ETB effect and while he allows me to play things easier he is sort of a setup to get wrathed as well. If you really like him for his utility I dont see a problem running him but I have some problem with some slow building creatures in the list like this sort of thing. If you want to run a little heavier control based though he could work.
Seedborn Muse My big question being what are you going to do with the untap??? This bugger draws sooooooo much hate and what do you expect to do with her? Generally speaking in my own list one of the few things I would be able to do on a regular basis would just be to put counters on Jenara which is sort of meh. Honestly I feel like Sword of Feast and Famine does essentially what you would be trying to do with the Seedborn but with drawing a hell of a lot less hate from it and being harder to kill.
If you want to run either of them though that is fine. I just never saw much payoff with the Seedborn but if you wanted to run more mana dumping effects she could be nice. My own list just lacks the mana dumping outlets to put the spare mana into on a regular basis.
As for having big plays, this deck still has amazing plays it is just chaining several smaller things together at once. Look at my game 2 above. I literally exploded out with 30+ damage worth of creatures that I played out at the EOT that really all originated from a single Reveillark being played. As for the removal, I think that good spot removal is something that is really needed in a good meta. You can stop all sorts of stupid combo using simple removal spells. T&N can almost always be stopped by a Swords to Plowshares.
EDIT: also, I tried including Ixidron in place of O Stone last night. I got him exactly once and he would have been nice if he didnt get countered... I flashed him in off of Winding Canyons just to be told no... luckily I had other creatures and I just flashed in a few more cheap ones and chumped the incoming attack anyways. It would have been for lethal though. It was like a combined effort of 3 players trying to kill me off. Riku did like 4x Chaos Warp's by copying it with riku + a red copy spell on me taking all of my defense out then Omnath swung at me with his 21+ damage commander and the bant player countered my attempt to wrath. Luckily I still had instant speed guys to chump it. So as far as Ixidron goes.... currently I havent made any decisions yet but I just dont think I can commit to cutting one of my current wraths for him... If I can find some room outside of those to include him I will see what I can do.
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[Modern] Allies
This deck is much more about 187 and less about static effects.
I also include discussions about cards we took out, cards we banned, and cards we might add.
I agree with you, this deck is more about immediate results than anything. Teferi and the muse are both good cards but in the right deck. I like immediate results and fast results. Teferi to me just looks like another casualty of the next wrath. If you find yourself needing more mana in a turn then mana doublers will probably be a little more robust than Seedborn Muse.
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[Modern] Allies
Just my thoughts.
The last update he gave me around 5 days ago was here.
As for Cloudstone Curio, it can be fun however it also eats up a lot of mana replaying things and draws tons of hate. I think it could be cool but I don't really know what to expect out of it in general... I really don't like working off of bounce but it could be good. I do like that it is a 3 mana artifact as it makes it easier to tutor up and recur... Probably one of the most unique aspects of it being that a fetchland can be used to protect utility land when it is in play. I will see if I can get around to trying it but I haven't been overly impressed by bounce in here in the past.
Equilibrium I tried it in the past and never really wanted to draw it... I see too much opposing ETB type creatures as well. The Curio seems better for what I would be wanting to use it with.
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[Modern] Allies
My opponent's generals were Rafiq of the Many, Numot, the Devastator, Sedris, the Trator King, and whoever the mono blue chubby little monk is who lets everyone draw an extra card at their upkeep.
The game played out a lot differently than usual. Though I was drawing a lot of cards to the chubby little monk, I never drew into a tutor, a wrath, or any big creatures save Sun Titan. The game was played out by being pretty non-threatening with my board presence, countering crucial spells when necessary, stifling Sedris with Voidmage Husher, and alpha-striking with Jenara + Lightning Greaves pretty frequently. With so many people playing blue, Jenara got bounced to my hand a lot, but it was really easy to replay her hasted, pump her and get in for some before she was bounced again. Finest Hour was also on board for me ~75% of the time, and really went a long way for me in this game.
As a sidenote, I ended up losing to the Rafiq player who I took to 18 general damage within the first 4-5 turns via Finest Hour + Lightning Greaves + Jenara. I decided to leave him at 18 general damage instead of finishing him off the numerous times I could've swung in with Jenara again, as I thought it wouldn't be any fun for him to sit there for 2 hours or whatever while we finished out the game. He turned around and hit me for 26 general damage in one turn towards the end of the game :rolleyes:. So much for being the nice guy!
R.I.P. Sundering Titan (6/20/12) and Braids, Cabal Minion (9/12/14)
I always do that with my other decks. There's been some times with my Karrthus deck where I dealt 38 damage to one player because he did 10 damage to me one turn. I let him live and hop around for a while, then when I decided to finish the game I wasted so many resources trying to finish him off that I was unable to take care of anyone else.
With this one, I am ruthless. *queue laughter*
Skyshroud Claim -> Time Warp
Time Warp is similar in mana, it can also ramp me in the early game but it has so many other functions that it works with. I can play some small creatures then use time warp to cantrip + untap all my lands. I can use it for extra combat phases, I can use it + something like a titan or sword to generate even more value. I think this will be a good swap for similar utility and Time Warp is a lot better to topdeck later on. The only time I can think of that I dont want a Time Warp is when someone has a Wild Ricochet or something of the sort. However it is easier to hold back from casting it than it is to keep 4 up for the redirect.
Also as ammo pointed out a little ways back it could potentially combo out but that is not the primary point of its inclusion. I wouldn't be against doing it if I ever set it up.
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[Modern] Allies
Consider the following scenario: (haha, I always do these): You're playing a four player game and one player has been killed. With three players left, each having a decent board position, you know that one player might explode his hand to interact with the game state and cause major problems. You also know that if you could somehow just get TWO attack phases, you'd be able to kill both players.
This is exactly what happened to me last night. I played Time Warp. Once it resolved I knew I was free to kill one player and advance my board a tiny bit while preparing myself to kill off the final player for the win.
The takeaway? Sometimes we're just playing for an extra attack phase.
I also include discussions about cards we took out, cards we banned, and cards we might add.