Fierce Empath?
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Fierce Empath?
So now that cruise is banned, I expect Wastelands to re-emerge. Do we need to MD more needles now? With you guys not running Force of Will MD, what's the plan against combo game one? Just hope for the best and move on to game 2 as fast as possible?
If you're playing the UG, then I'd consider playing Stifle main; there's more than enough targets for this kind of thing. The same goes for Needle, which would merit going back to a Trinket package.
Personally I'm more worried about Hymn to Tourach re-emerging than wastelands. I've been hosed multiple times by the randomness of that card.
If your really worried about wastelands, you can always play Teferri's response. When it lands, it's such a blowout its hilarious. I moved away from the card because it's very narrow.
I picked up playing 2x trinisphere a few weeks ago. ANT must duress it, abrupt decay it or echoing truth it. It's buys a lot of time against that deck, also buys time against Omni-show. Unfortunately, it's not the best against sneak and show.
...And then there's dragon-animator. There's a lot of people working on that deck btw. Of course, no one thinks its good though.
Ever think of trying divert for targeted discard?
divert is great in theory, however it's too limited. Spell pierce is better overall because it has more applications. Don't get me wrong, diverting a hymn to touch is hand rape. Additionally, when diverting a thoughtseize the opponent chooses the card they discard which isn't that great. Furthermore, Divert does not work against anything that says "target opponent."
Not looking forward to playing BUG Delver again. I think that is our worst match up. Hymm, Liliana and Wasteland with big goyfs. Definitely going back up to 3 Needles with 1 or two Trinket Mages.
Is Ugin main deckable? I tried Karn and didn't really like him. Hard to resolve through spell peirce and would kill one thing and chump die often. Ugin wipes things though so is better in the regard but harder to resolve.
I'd say storm is a lot worse, but about bug delver: aggressive use repeals, you'd be amazed how quickly you can take their gass by bouncing flipped delvers and goyfs. Ugin is an absolute house against anything fair, because you literally have won the game when it resolves. Play around spell Pierce and go for it!
I've been playtesting Ugin in standard this past week and if it ports to legacy like I think it does, it will be nuts. Here's a couple things I learned.
1.) There is a very fine line between plussing him on arrival and deeding immediately. It's a lot harder to use than Karn. Karn's equation usually is....if opponent has red plus on arrival, if no red, minus land or best permanent.
2.) He exile doesn't kill artifacts. That is HUGE for 12 post, candles & needles live past the deed effect.
3.) I got to ultimate him last night...plus, plus, ultimate on a clogged board state. If you have cards in hand, you can put 7 permanents from your hand into play, its not the 7 you just drew. I suspect there are ways to sculpt your hand to drop posts and candle(s) and win on the spot. In comparison, after an ultimate in my standard games, I triggered conselation 5 times in one turn. It felt like basically cheating.
The issue I see with it is you can't make the deck too top heavy and there's some decks that don't care about it. I think its a better SB card than maindeck in a combo rich format. Modern...maindecking him alongside Karn. :)
I'm on the Ugin on all formats plan.
Testing this list the last few days. Some very impressive results. Still working the sideboard kinks out. Small kinks though 1-2 cards.
// Lands
1 [WWK] Eye of Ugin
1 [AVR] Cavern of Souls
1 [WWK] Bojuka Bog
1 [LG] Karakas
4 [FNM] Cloudpost
2 [TSP] Vesuva
4 [SOM] Glimmerpost
1 [IA] Glacial Chasm
7 [ZEN] Forest (5)
// Creatures
4 [M12] Primeval Titan
1 [ROE] Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
1 [ROE] Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
3 [JU] Krosan Wayfarer
// Spells
3 [UL] Crop Rotation
4 [ZEN] Expedition Map
4 [MR] Sylvan Scrying
2 [FRF] Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
2 [AQ] Candelabra of Tawnos
2 [NPH] Karn Liberated
4 [MR] Chromatic Sphere
3 [TSP] Chromatic Star
2 [LG] Eureka
3 [ROE] Ancient Stirrings
// Sideboard
SB: 4 [MBS] Phyrexian Revoker
SB: 3 [NPH] Surgical Extraction
SB: 3 [DS] Trinisphere
SB: 1 [DK] Maze of Ith
SB: 1 [LG] The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
SB: 2 [SH] Ensnaring Bridge
SB: 1 [MR] Chalice of the Void
UG hybrid
// Lands
1 [WWK] Eye of Ugin
1 [AVR] Cavern of Souls
1 [WWK] Bojuka Bog
1 [LG] Karakas
4 [FNM] Cloudpost
2 [TSP] Vesuva
4 [SOM] Glimmerpost
1 [IA] Glacial Chasm
1 [ZEN] Forest (5)
3 [ZEN] Misty Rainforest
4 [U] Tropical Island
// Creatures
4 [M12] Primeval Titan
1 [ROE] Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
1 [ROE] Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
3 [JU] Krosan Wayfarer
// Spells
3 [UL] Crop Rotation
4 [ZEN] Expedition Map
2 [FRF] Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
4 [MR] Chromatic Sphere
3 [MR] Sylvan Scrying
3 [TSP] Chromatic Star
2 [AQ] Candelabra of Tawnos
4 [FNM] Brainstorm
3 [GP] Repeal
// Sideboard
SB: 4 [MBS] Phyrexian Revoker
SB: 3 [NPH] Surgical Extraction
SB: 1 [LG] The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
SB: 2 [DS] Trinisphere
SB: 1 [NPH] Karn Liberated
SB: 4 [CMD] Flusterstorm
I've played G(r) Tron for years in Modern, so I can answer some of your questions:
Karn Liberated is a sideboard card when less than 3 (but honestly 4) are mainboarded. The redundancy lets Karn do more than remove a problematic permanent. It lets us get a vice grip on the game. I remember games where I'd minus Karn to death, play another, do the same, play a third. Multiples are never dead because Karn can have a short life span and that can be abused by the Karn player. When cutting Karns, the function changes because it adds factors of how/if Karn should be protected (side-note: from my testing with Ugin so far, the same is not true with him. One Ugin has a tendency to live longer than Karn, so running 1-3 can be sufficient. Also Ugin's minus X can do more damage than Karn's minus three... depending on the situation).
Chromatics makes casting cards easier. Testing Rock's list last night, it helped me resolve a Eureka, and in Modern, I've used them for years to filter colorless mana and dig for answers, Tron pieces, etc.
As for Rock's list, I've tested it except -1 Forest +1Cavern of Souls, and -1 Chromatic Sphere +1 Ancient Stirrings. If I could, I'd find room for a full playset of Karn to see if I could get the strength of Modern Karn in Legacy as well as find room for Ulamog somewhere in the 75 because Indestructible Vindicate is awesome at least out of the side.
New Meta reeks of combo galore, and less delver-less grindy matchups that are waste-heavy. Thus U/R is the build of choice for me. Nothing really controversial here. Sideboard could use some work, but I want 7 permanent answers to storm.
// Lands
1 [WWK] Eye of Ugin
1 [AVR] Cavern of Souls
1 [WWK] Bojuka Bog
1 [LG] Karakas
4 [FNM] Cloudpost
4 [ZEN] Misty Rainforest
2 [TSP] Vesuva
4 [SOM] Glimmerpost
1 [IA] Glacial Chasm
3 [R] Tropical Island
2 [RAV] Island (4)
// Creatures
4 [M12] Primeval Titan
1 [ROE] Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
1 [ROE] Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
// Spells
3 [UL] Crop Rotation
4 [ZEN] Expedition Map
4 [MM] Brainstorm
2 [AQ] Candelabra of Tawnos
4 [GP] Repeal
2 [US] Show and Tell
4 [AL] Force of Will
3 [NPH] Gitaxian Probe
2 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
2 [DD2] Fact or Fiction
// Sideboard
SB: 1 [FRF] Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
SB: 4 [JGC] Flusterstorm
SB: 4 [MBS] Phyrexian Revoker
SB: 3 [NPH] Surgical Extraction
SB: 3 [MR] Chalice of the Void
Well, here's your first data point for the new meta.
SCG Washington D.C. Legacy IQ Top 32 Decks
Also, if combo is such a concern, maybe play around with MUD-Post to see what you can learn from it. After all, it runs 12 permanent answers to combo main board (well... 4 and 8 complicators: Chalice, then Trinisphere and Lodestone Golem taxes). And it made top 8 in the above tournament.
Had the opportunity to test out Ugin in Mono-Green 12-Post today at a Super IQ. While I didn't make it out that well (4-3), I ended up being fairly impressed with Ugin. Admittedly, I only got to cast him once, but he was critical to winning a match against Elves. There were other times I had him but lost him to counterspells or discard (usually discard), but in those games he would've been an amazing winner if the opponent hadn't had the discard on him.