• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Magic: the Gathering |OT10| Aether Revolt - That shit that make your Soul Burn slow

Status
Not open for further replies.

Lucario

Member
this went 8-2 in constructed:

Code:
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
2 Ishkanah, Grafwidow
1 Noxious Gearhulk
2 Tireless Tracker
3 Torrential Gearhulk
2 Pick the Brain
4 Traverse the Ulvenwald
1 Negate
2 Fatal Push
3 Glimmer of Genius
3 Grapple with the Past
3 Grasp of Darkness
2 To the Slaughter
2 Disallow
1 Overwhelming Denial
3 Vessel of Nascency
2 Aether Hub
4 Blooming Marsh
2 Botanical Sanctum
4 Evolving Wilds
3 Swamp
2 Lumbering Falls
4 Sunken Hollow
2 Island
1 Forest


Sideboard:
1 Ishkanah, Grafwidow
1 Pick the Brain
1 Negate
2 Fatal Push
1 To the Slaughter
1 Overwhelming Denial
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
1 Appetite for the Unnatural
4 Grim Flayer
1 Yahenni's Expertise
1 Transgress the Mind

Delirium build focusing on control and running Torrential Gearhulk. One of the greediest manabases I've ever seen (Grasp of Darkness into Disallow!), but looks pretty sweet.



It's worth noting that most of the Saheeli builds at the PT were fairly tuned to the mirror - cards like Oath of Jace might as well be blank when you're facing down vehicles, and they were everywhere. Sideboards were full of cards like Authority of the Consuls and Dispel, and Fragmentize/Radiant Flames/Natural State/Fumigate/Nahiri were absent from most.

The pro tour 4-color Saheeli lists looked very different from their SCG counterparts: decks with winning records tended to run 3-4 copies of Elder Deep Fiend, 2-4 copies of Whirler Virtuoso, and 1-2 copies of Eldritch Evolution(!). Many players dropped Spell Queller to the sideboard, if not removing them entirely. Gerry Thompson ran a particularly sweet build with 2 Tamiyo in the sideboard and 2 Aetherworks Marvel in the main.

I've been at 4 Virtuoso w/ my build, and can confirm they're unbelievably sweet. Need to add some deep-fiends ASAP. Eldritch Evolution seems loose if your meta is heavy on Negates, but I love the idea of turning a Rogue Refiner into a Cloudblazer.

I think my favorite innovation might be the idea of running a few Tamiyo out of the board. The 4c mirror involves a lot of sitting around and waiting with dorky creatures out - Tamiyo completely breaks board stalls. I'm definitely picking up two.
 

Supast4r

Junior Member
LOL guys. Warping the meta around it is totally not the same as flatout dominating the meta (like how JTMS and Eldrazis dominated in the past). People were saying the deck is unbeatable but not only is it very beatable, it made no appearances in T8 and just one appearance in T32 despite showing up in force as the most played deck. You've got results from the SCG event and the PT now so what else is there even to argue about?

So now that aggro takes out combo, midrange will rise to take out aggro and you have the classic rock-paper-scissors balance again.

I wasn't on any side of this debate right from the start because I don't give a rats ass about Standard but just thought it's interesting how so many people have overreacted again.
Thanks for this post. Many people in here were like "copycat is going to get banned watch." When in fact it's just another tier 1 deck. Hyperbole over facts.
 

Supast4r

Junior Member
There were quite a few posts before the set release that said a severe warp was highly likely and that decks might come up to combat Saheli combo.

If you want to make the argument that format warping isn't the same as domination, I'd listen. But I'm still not down with either and still hope they ban the cat.
This post makes no sense. Why don't they ban a card from GB or from vechiles when they have done better historically... You just hate the combo existing and have no grounds for claiming a ban. 50 shades of GB are a lot more of s problem in this format imho.
 

Supast4r

Junior Member
You can't have answers to the set's theme anymore, dude, Pithing Needle, really? Next you'll want Tormod's Crypt together with Innistrad.
I can't tell if serious. Innistrad, widely considered one of the best sets ever, had TONS of hosers in to deal with their busted graveyard cards. Plus m13/ravnica had tons too. Imagine if graddiggers cage, Rest In Peace, pitching needle, ground seek, tormods crypt weren't in that standard. Lingering souls/snapcaster Mage/unburial rites/undying wouldn't have had proper answers and would have likely been banned. Printing answers/hosers is a great thing.
 
I can't tell if serious. Innistrad, widely considered one of the best sets ever, had TONS of hosers in to deal with their busted graveyard cards. Plus m13/ravnica had tons too. Imagine if graddiggers cage, Rest In Peace, pitching needle, ground seek, tormods crypt weren't in that standard. Lingering souls/snapcaster Mage/unburial rites/undying wouldn't have had proper answers and would have likely been banned. Printing answers/hosers is a great thing.
it's not serious. Just making a jab at Wizards' unwillingness to print answers.
 

OnPoint

Member
This post makes no sense. Why don't they ban a card from GB or from vechiles when they have done better historically... You just hate the combo existing and have no grounds for claiming a ban. 50 shades of GB are a lot more of s problem in this format imho.
Honestly yes, I do hate the combo. Decks have to be tuned specifically to account for it. It is the tentpole problem in Standard to be concerned with right now. If you can't see this then you obviously don't understand how format warping works. My guess is someone will find a way to make it work too well -- I just don't think they've got there yet. Feels like it's only a matter of time.

They have just three major tournaments under their belt this standard -- one of which was dominated by Saheeli combo -- and you're going to cite 'history' to me? The Pro Tour was engineered around either playing or beating the combo. Again, blatant format warping.

I'll just agree to disagree with you for now. We'll see where it shakes out at the end of this iteration of Standard.
 
If you want to make the argument that format warping isn't the same as domination, I'd listen.

I mean, it trivially isn't. Copycat is fundamentally different from a lot of historical decks that have required bannings because it's not actually that good against opponents who can play to the meta. The problem is more that all its matchups are much too one-sided; it absolutely crushes the decks that aren't well-suited to beating it, and folds to the aggro decks that cut underneath. That's why the RPS metagame can't develop: Mardu Vehicles has a normal loss rate against its predator decks and a great win rate against Copycat, while whatever slower deck would normally prey on Vehicles has just a normal win-rate over its target and an atrocious loss rate to Copycat.

All of that's not to say not to ban it, but just to be clear that it's a fundamentally different kind of issue from the ones where everyone does in fact just wind up running that particular deck.
 

OnPoint

Member
I mean, it trivially isn't. Copycat is fundamentally different from a lot of historical decks that have required bannings because it's not actually that good against opponents who can play to the meta. The problem is more that all its matchups are much too one-sided; it absolutely crushes the decks that aren't well-suited to beating it, and folds to the aggro decks that cut underneath. That's why the RPS metagame can't develop: Mardu Vehicles has a normal loss rate against its predator decks and a great win rate against Copycat, while whatever slower deck would normally prey on Vehicles has just a normal win-rate over its target and an atrocious loss rate to Copycat.

All of that's not to say not to ban it, but just to be clear that it's a fundamentally different kind of issue from the ones where everyone does in fact just wind up running that particular deck.

I wasn't saying they're the same thing. But I appreciate the breakdown.
 

bigkrev

Member
Hasbro Q4 fiscal notes http://files.shareholder.com/downlo...ro_Q4_FY_2016_Earnings_Management_Remarks.pdf

-"more than 80% of Wizards of the Coast" business is done in hobby stores, and they single out MTG in that statement. (this one jumps out to me- I assumed that most Dungeons and Dragons sales were through Amazon and traditional bookstores)
- Magic had it's 8th straight year of growth, but was behind something called "Pie-Face" in the Hasbro game line
-Digital was good for Hasbro, but no mentions of any Magic related property (Duels/MTGO/Puzzle Quest/Digital Next) in that section

-Not fully MTG related but interesting- starting this year, they are no longer reporting earnings with the categories of "Boys, Girls, Games and Preschool", and instead go with "Franchise Brands, Partner Brands, Hasbro Gaming and Emerging Brands"

-They had a "Selling, Delivery and Administrative" decline of 20%, which they attributed to investments in Magic the Gathering
 
- Magic had it's 8th straight year of growth, but was behind something called "Pie-Face" in the Hasbro game line

Cue Price Is Right fail horn over all those speculative graphs of Magic sales plummeting into the toilet.

PIE-FACE is a game where you put whip cream on a spring-loaded hand and get pied in the face.
 

bigkrev

Member
Cue Price Is Right fail horn over all those speculative graphs of Magic sales plummeting into the toilet.

PIE-FACE is a game where you put whip cream on a spring-loaded hand and get pied in the face.

Wizards put out 6 booster products last year in addition to a variety of other products. If there had actually been a decline, it would have been very worrying.
 

red13th

Member
I can't tell if serious. Innistrad, widely considered one of the best sets ever, had TONS of hosers in to deal with their busted graveyard cards. Plus m13/ravnica had tons too. Imagine if graddiggers cage, Rest In Peace, pitching needle, ground seek, tormods crypt weren't in that standard. Lingering souls/snapcaster Mage/unburial rites/undying wouldn't have had proper answers and would have likely been banned. Printing answers/hosers is a great thing.

Not serious.
 

Santiako

Member
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/pro-tour-aether-revolt-by-the-numbers

Saffron Olive's usual excellent numbers analysis of the Pro Tour. It shows how absurdly dominant Mardu Vehicles was.

Let's start with the elephant in the room: Mardu Vehicles at Pro Tour Aether Revolt has a solid argument for being the single best deck at any Pro Tour in the mythic era of Magic. Let that sink in for a moment. By the numbers, we witnessed history this weekend with an almost unheard of dominance. A couple of years ago, during Pro Tour Magic Origins, the breakout deck was UR Ensoul Artifact, and we were writing about how its performance was Caw Blade-level good. The thing is that UR Ensoul Artifact was played by only 33 day-one players, and many of them were among the best in the room (Team ChannelFireball). Mardu Vehicles at Pro Tour Aether Revolt posted similar numbers to UR Ensoul Artifact and Caw Blade, but it started with 96 players, which means the average skill level of a Mardu Vehicles player was almost certainly far below that of UR Ensoul or Caw Blade.

It's also important to note that, in saying this is the best Pro Tour performance ever, we aren't talking about number of Top 8 berths. While taking up 75% of the Top 8 is certainly impressive, it's also true that Mardu Vehicles was the most played deck at Pro Tour Aether Revolt, so it naturally has a leg up at putting players far in the tournament, so this isn't really a good measure. Instead, what makes Mardu Vehicles so great is its numbers in other areas (which are controlled for by the number of players with the deck). For example, just under 45% of day one Mardu Vehicles ended up performing well enough to have their list published on the Mothership, which is an absurd rate, and 30% got at least seven wins in constructed (which is even more impressive considering only 75% made it to day two, which means about 95% of Mardu Vehicles players who did well enough on day one to make day two ended up with at least seven wins in constructed). Basically, by every measure, Mardu Vehicles had an all-time great Pro Tour performance and backed this up with the "soft" numbers of making up 75% of the Top 8 and more than half of the 8+ wins decks. Not only is Mardu Vehicles the winner of Pro Tour Aether Revolt, it's the only real winner of the event.

Crazy.
 
I'm curious to see how the continual decline of FNM may or may not affect things.

Yeah, I mean, it's not like there are no challenges or areas of concern, but we're not anywhere close to a catastrophic situation.

Zur the Enchanter Promo os falling quickly, might settle where Nekusar is right now at ~4-5€

Yeah, because people who play Zur the Enchanter decks have no friends.

Ugh, I'd hate if this meant Felidar Guardian wasn't going to be banned. I was all set to start buying into Standard (maybe) if it was.

WotC do understand the concept of decks hating each other out of the metagame (they've commented on that explicitly in past ban announcements) and I think if anything the fact that this Pro Tour was so hideously lopsided to a single deck that was designed to prey on Copycat makes the ban more likely.
 
Yeah, because people who play Zur the Enchanter decks have no friends.

Necropotence >>>>>> Friends


I'm curious how many cards I'll ruin trying to make this (shopped together as proof of concept)
kZ6miJo.png
I tried a rough foil peel of a random foil I had lying around and in theory it works. Just need to find a way to cut really precise and stitch it together nicely.
Judge promo nekusar is a couple bucks so I'd preferably only use 1 of the 2 I'm buying for a friend. Alternatively I could order 3 and just paste the foil layer on top of another.
 

Hero

Member
Did the people who played Copycat just not test against Vehicles? Or did they just think that not enough people would play it to matter?

Probably both? It seemed like the really good players identified that Copycat was public enemy number 1 and meta'd hard against it.
 

Santiako

Member
SCG Modern Regionals top 8 deck lists are up:

Lists Here

30+ decks represented in the 10 locations. Infect almost out of the picture, no Death Shadow or Dredge at all . Actual diversity thanks to the bans. Nice.

EDIT: That BR Pack Rat deck is some spicy shit.
 

OnPoint

Member
SCG Modern Regionals top 8 deck lists are up:

Lists Here

30+ decks represented in the 10 locations. Infect almost out of the picture, no Death Shadow or Dredge at all . Actual diversity thanks to the bans. Nice.

EDIT: That BR Pack Rat deck is some spicy shit.
Nice!

My friends and I brewed up a delightful little Modern brew this weekend and played it a bunch on MTGO. It uses these cards to hilarious effect.

Liquimetal%2BCoating%2B%255BSOM%255D.jpg
Myr%2BLandshaper%2B%255BDST%255D.jpg

Ancient%2BGrudge%2B%255BISD%255D.jpg
Splinter%2B%255BBOK%255D.jpg

Sometimes it didn't work and we got run over. But man, when it worked, it was freaking amazing.
 

Santiako

Member
Nice!

My friends and I brewed up a delightful little Modern brew this weekend and played it a bunch on MTGO. It uses these cards to hilarious effect.

Sometimes it didn't work and we got run over. But man, when it worked, it was freaking amazing.

That's some jank ass jank. I love it.
 

Firemind

Member
Necropotence >>>>>> Friends


I'm curious how many cards I'll ruin trying to make this (shopped together as proof of concept)

I tried a rough foil peel of a random foil I had lying around and in theory it works. Just need to find a way to cut really precise and stitch it together nicely.

Judge promo nekusar is a couple bucks so I'd preferably only use 1 of the 2 I'm buying for a friend. Alternatively I could order 3 and just paste the foil layer on top of another.
Shit that would look legit amazing. Isn't there an oversized nonfoil Nekusar?
 

OnPoint

Member
That's some jank ass jank. I love it.
It's stupid fun. Sometimes people thought it was hilarious and we had good chats. Other times people ragequit the client so we'd have to time out for the win. I really wanna put a version together that's more consistent than the current build for laughs, but I don't think it's ever going to win anything real.
 
SCG Modern Regionals top 8 deck lists are up:

Lists Here

30+ decks represented in the 10 locations. Infect almost out of the picture, no Death Shadow or Dredge at all . Actual diversity thanks to the bans. Nice.

EDIT: That BR Pack Rat deck is some spicy shit.

That Sultai Delver list looks sweet. Also lol at Gifts storm running Baral in the main.
 

OnPoint

Member
Alright I'm gonna post this here. Please feel free to pick this apart.

Liquimetal Hate You
1 cmc - 16
Natural State 3x
Faithless Looting 3x
Shattering Spree 3x
Vandalblast 3x
Ingot Chewer 4x

2 cmc - 11
Ancient Grudge 4x
Liquimetal Coating 4x
Isochron Sceptre 3x


3 cmc - 11
Myr Landshaper 4x
Reclamation Sage 4x
Eternal Witness 3x

Land - 22
Mountain - 2
Forest - 2
Copperline Gorge 4x
Stomping Ground 4x
Arid Mesa 4x
Wooded Foothills 4x
Inkmoth Nexus 2x

Sideboard - 15
Smelt 2x
Blood Moon 3x
Splinter 3x
Nahiri 3x
1x Emrakul
1x Plains
2x Sacred Foundry​

Couple thoughts:
- Tried to keep the maindeck 3 cmc at max.
- The Inkmoths are there for a faster win con. I'm open to better suggestions.
- The sideboard is pretty loose.
- I have a thing for transformational sideboards, hence the Nahiri package.
- Smelt is there in case you need instant speed artifact removal.
 
natural state is 1 cmc, there's what's it called that gives the opponent 4 life when you destroy any artifact or enchantment. You already have access to raging ravine colours and it kills in 3 to 4 hits.
 
Behold my super crappy attempt to try and make a new Delver flavor:

Esper Delver

Mainboard said:
4 Flooded Strand
1 Godless Shrine
2 Hallowed Fountain
2 Island
1 Marsh Flats
1 Plains
4 Polluted Delta
1 Seachrome Coast
1 Swamp
1 Watery Grave
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Fatal Push
3 Myth Realized
4 Path to Exile
4 Serum Visions
3 Spell Pierce
1 Counter Squall
2 Logic Knots
4 Remand
4 Snapcaster Mage
2 Geist of Saint Traft
3 Lingering Souls
2 Cryptic Command
2 Tasigur, the Golden Fang

Sideboard said:
1 Engineered Explosives
3 Ceremonius Rejection
2 Blessed Alliance
2 Collective Brutality
2 Countersquall
2 Stony Silence
2 Painful Truths
1 Supreme Verdict

Turns out having the best removal spells in Modern is pretty great.
 
Hey guys, I've just started playing MTG in the last few days, and i'd like a little advice with my deck?

I decided to start with Standard, and run with Ajani (Because Lion, natch).

Bought the Aether Revolt Ajani, Valiant Protector Deck, a couple of Boosters, and was given the Green/White Welcome Deck, bringing me to just under 200 cards.

I took the Starter deck and played with it a bit, and this is what i've got so far.
http://deck.tk/1pUX6aLh


Here's my full collection so you can futz with it:

https://deckstats.net/collection/2260/

As for what I want the deck to do, I'd like to Get Ajani out ASAP, and then use the whole Artifact/Revolt thing, since that's the new hotness, after all. :)

Thanks in advance, guys.
 

Violet_0

Banned
^ just a heads-up, a starter deck won't be compitetive at all in standard, they're just for casual fun magic. All the usual standard decks will cost you around 200-300+ bucks for the cards
 
Hey guys, I've just started playing MTG in the last few days, and i'd like a little advice with my deck?

I decided to start with Standard, and run with Ajani (Because Lion, natch).

Bought the Aether Revolt Ajani, Valiant Protector Deck, a couple of Boosters, and was given the Green/White Welcome Deck, bringing me to just under 200 cards.

I took the Starter deck and played with it a bit, and this is what i've got so far.
http://deck.tk/1pUX6aLh


Here's my full collection so you can futz with it:

https://deckstats.net/collection/2260/

As for what I want the deck to do, I'd like to Get Ajani out ASAP, and then use the whole Artifact/Revolt thing, since that's the new hotness, after all. :)

Thanks in advance, guys.
Nice to meet you. Do you already have a group of friends to play with? Advice we give will largely depend on your play group.
 
Hey guys, I've just started playing MTG in the last few days, and i'd like a little advice with my deck?

I decided to start with Standard, and run with Ajani (Because Lion, natch).

Bought the Aether Revolt Ajani, Valiant Protector Deck, a couple of Boosters, and was given the Green/White Welcome Deck, bringing me to just under 200 cards.

I took the Starter deck and played with it a bit, and this is what i've got so far.
http://deck.tk/1pUX6aLh


Here's my full collection so you can futz with it:

https://deckstats.net/collection/2260/

As for what I want the deck to do, I'd like to Get Ajani out ASAP, and then use the whole Artifact/Revolt thing, since that's the new hotness, after all. :)

Thanks in advance, guys.
If you want to power out Ajani as fast as possible you have many options there are quite a few mana dorks available right now. I don't have a grasp on what's possible with a limited pool but here's a couple cards you should be able to pick up on the cheap, talking cents here being commons and uncommons, and can get quite the leverage from. Rishkar is quite powerful and helps you ramp out Ajani faster so you got a good rare already.
Of most cards you play you'll want as many as you can put in a deck, which is 4.
 

traveler

Not Wario
Looking for some advice for GP Vancouver. Since I live nearby, I'll definitely be going, but I've never played Modern competitively or even much at all before. Everyone recommends play what you're comfortable over what's best, but I'm pretty much equally uncomfortable with everything. I will say I generally prefer playing proactive gameplans over reactive, but Grixis Control does look pretty appealing.

Assuming budget/cards isn't an issue, what deck would you recommend I practice over the next two weeks to take, given that I'll be fairly new to the format and the current metagame? (Which seems to be pretty burn/spell combo heavy?) Decks I've been actively looking at and watching replays from are Ad Nauseum, Grixis Control, Souls Sisters, and Hatebears, but I'm open to any proposal if you think there's an especially good choice atm. Merfolk looks appealing as well, but the deck seemed to be a clear tier 2/3 choice.
 

OnPoint

Member
Looking for some advice for GP Vancouver. Since I live nearby, I'll definitely be going, but I've never played Modern competitively or even much at all before. Everyone recommends play what you're comfortable over what's best, but I'm pretty much equally uncomfortable with everything. I will say I generally prefer playing proactive gameplans over reactive, but Grixis Control does look pretty appealing.

Assuming budget/cards isn't an issue, what deck would you recommend I practice over the next two weeks to take, given that I'll be fairly new to the format and the current metagame? (Which seems to be pretty burn/spell combo heavy?) Decks I've been actively looking at and watching replays from are Ad Nauseum, Grixis Control, Souls Sisters, and Hatebears, but I'm open to any proposal if you think there's an especially good choice atm. Merfolk looks appealing as well, but the deck seemed to be a clear tier 2/3 choice.

Speaking as someone who did not follow this weekend at all, I thought the Black Eldrazi Tron deck looked really sweet. I dunno how well positioned it is though. I'm also the idiot building Liquimetal Coating decks on MTGO, so maybe I'm not the best one to listen to haha
 

traveler

Not Wario
Haha np. I'm all for trying crazy brews for at least a day or so more, but I will have to commit pretty soon to actually guarantee decent reps before the GP.

I had a brew based on the aetherflux standard deck that I was trying to get going but it's definitely clunky. I imagine your erase-all-lands brew is better:

3 Aetherflux Reservoir
1 Defense Grid
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Everflowing Chalice
1 Inspiring Statuary
1 Mind Stone
4 Mishra's Bauble
3 Mox Opal
1 Tormod's Crypt
4 Welding Jar

4 Simian Spirit Guide
1 Spellskite

2 Metallic Rebuke
4 Paradoxical Outcome
3 Whir of Invention

4 Reverse Engineer
4 Thoughtcast

1 Inventor's Fair
1 Reliquary Tower
16 Island
 

OnPoint

Member
Haha np. I'm all for trying crazy brews for at least a day or so more, but I will have to commit pretty soon to actually guarantee decent reps before the GP.

I had a brew based on the aetherflux standard deck that I was trying to get going but it's definitely clunky. I imagine your erase-all-lands brew is better:

* deck *
Haha definitely don't play my deck. It's not good. Fun, sure, but definitely not good.

Yours could be sweet. I'd be half tempted to just run the new version of Cheerios. At least you know real early if you win or lose. It's too bad classic Tron isn't well positioned these days, I have such a soft spot for it.

That said, Santiako posted this earlier, might give you a good look at what's popping off these days: Stupidly long link if I don't do this
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom