Making a case for Iona, Shield of Emeria + Gifts Ungiven instead of elesh norn.
Modern forum
Posted on Oct. 23, 2016, 4:21 a.m. by Bovine073
While brewing my thopter gifts deck, I seem to have come to a controversial decision. I am currently running Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite sidebord, and Iona mainboard. Is this a good decision? I'm not sure!
Looking at mtgop8 Modern, we can get some good estimates on the current meta and see what matchups each reanimaton target are favorable in. From the top!
Affinity: Elesh Norn. Iona is useless.
Jund: Iona is favored, because she won't be removed if you name black, where elesh norn will just be Terminated or Maelstrom Pulsed. Lili can be a problem if it is on board.
Burn/RDW: I'm gonna call it a tie here, it really depends on the game. Some games your opponent will have 3x guide and a swiftspear in their opening hand, sometimes they'll just have mono-Lightning Bolts.
Eldrazi Aggro: Elesh Norn is favorable.
Zoo: Elesh Norn.
Junk: Similar to Jund, but they run 4x Path to Exile call it about even.
Hatebear: Elesh Norn.
Merfolk: Elesh Norn.
Bogles: Iona
Tokens: Elesh Norn (depends on the deck, however).
All control decks go to Iona, I think is pretty fair to say. Neither Tron or Lantern are great matchups for either of the targets, though.
Dredge: Probably Elesh Norn, but Iona can sill help.
Infect: Elesh Norn.
Toolbox: Either works.
Ad Nauseam, Scapeshift, Storm: Iona.
Elves: Elesh Norn.
Thanks, sorry for the formatting, I hope I can get some sort of discussion going on here. The main problem I can see with Iona is that it sucks against affinity and eldrazi, but elesh norn is similarly a dead card in many matchups. Perhaps this means I should pack extra colorless hate in the sideboard. Ceremonious Rejection, anyone?
Easy answer man, Elesh is by far the better MB card, and Iona in the side if you choose to only run one main and not both. I run Elesh main and have never been in a position where she was flat out bad. In the games I want Iona, I'm fine with only having her for game 2 etc...
October 23, 2016 5:22 a.m.
October 23, 2016 5:25 a.m.
ToolmasterOfBrainerd says... #5
If you're playing against, say, Jund, where Elesh Norn is bad, you shouldn't be giftsing for an Unburial Rites package most of the time anyway. My friend who plays 4c gifts plays Elesh Norn and Sphinx of the Steel Wind main and used to sideboard Iona, but never used it, so he cut it from the list.
October 23, 2016 4:23 p.m.
I think you guys have sold me on Elesh Norn MB. Curious about Sphinx, though.
October 24, 2016 6:30 a.m.
Actually, I will test Raven's idea here about running both game 1. Cheers! Will be taking a wrath out of the deck.
October 24, 2016 12:33 p.m.
Update: Playtested it a fair bit and I quite like running both! Thanks for all those who answered.
October 24, 2016 3:06 p.m.
I've liked Iona, Shield of Emeria mainboard in Gifts Ungiven over Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite and just packing more removal and lifegain.
Iona, Shield of Emeria is usually an auto-win versus more decks than Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite. Burn, Boggles, Jund, Tokens, Infect, etc. all just scoop. Everything else you can usually lock out of the game with various other piles.
The only matchup where I feel Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite is stronger is Affinity.
October 24, 2016 5:21 p.m.
sylvannos What's your reasoning for Iona>Norn vs Infect? Infect are far more likely to beat Iona than they are Norn, with it turning off pump spells and 1/3rd of their infecters, where Norn turns off every creature in their deck.
November 2, 2016 11:39 a.m.
@awphutt: They only have 1/1s they can't pump because they can't cast green spells. You're free to then Lightning Bolt/Abrupt Decay/Path to Exile/etc. everything they have.
Not only that, they can only cast Blighted Agent and Inkmoth Nexus at that point. They aren't going to race a 7/7 when they have only 8 usable 1/1s (virtual 2/2s since they're aiming for 10 infect) in their entire deck.
The most important thing, however, is that having Iona, Shield of Emeria as your main target means you have a better game 1 against a wider range of decks. Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite is likely better overall in the Infect matchup for the reasons you listed. However, Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite is objectively better only against Affinity.
Because Infect will just scoop to both, it's more important to use the one that does better against a wider field IMO.
November 2, 2016 7:38 p.m.
I'd argue that Bogles and Tokens are far less relevant than, say, Dredge and Merfolk, both of which are less likely to beat Elesh Norn than Iona.
I'll also point out that Iona entering the battlefield vs Infect does not win you the game, Elesh Norn does. They are far more likely to be able to just attack past/through Iona than they are to, what, double Dismember Elesh Norn?
November 3, 2016 7:27 a.m.
I'm probably the only one here who ACTUALLY plays a gifts style deck as my main deck and my advice is stick with Elesh main, Iona in the board. Especially in the current meta, but generally speaking as well, as Elesh is just better overall and Iona is a card you only want to bring in when you know it will do its job. I have an amazing win record with my deck and I have never wished that Iona was in my main...in fact I rarely bring her in post board except for very specific matchups.
This is all assuming you are only speaking about modern...as in a legacy Iona becomes much better.
November 4, 2016 3:50 p.m.
Sk0oMa "I'm probably the only one here who ACTUALLY plays a gifts style deck as my main deck"
What an odd assumption to make.
November 4, 2016 5:42 p.m.
awphutt not really, there is a relatively small active community of dedicated Modern players on this sight, and among them I'm probably the only one that runs a gifts style deck almost exclusively, so I know what I'm talking about. For example if you wanted to know about how to play a Grixis deck, you'd want to listen to ToolmasterOfBrainerd, etc etc...
November 5, 2016 2:44 a.m.
Sk0oMa I would say the assumption that you know all of the active Modern players on the sight and all the decks they play is a very odd one to make, i.e I'm an active Modern player, and of the two decks I play in Modern, one of them is Esper Gifts.
November 5, 2016 6:07 a.m.
awphutt I never see you in the Modern community discussion page, I've not seen you participate in any of the tournaments we have here on tappedout...you may be an active Modern player, but your not an active member of the tappedout modern community as far as I can tell, so it's not really an odd assumption for me to make. If you play Esper gifts then that's great, a LOT of people do, and I'm surely not the only one qualified to give advice, but of the main active members in the group, I am the only one I have really ever seen that plays it.
November 5, 2016 2:42 p.m.
ToolmasterOfBrainerd says... #18
Sk0oMa I've dabbled in gifts quite a bit, but it's by no means anything I have expertise in. slovakattack is a gifts master, but I haven't seen him in awhile. Glistneragent knows gifts pretty well I think, but he knows literally every deck really well. But for active community members that play gifts, I gotta back up Sk0oMa here.
November 5, 2016 9:43 p.m.
slovakattack says... #19
Thanks for the shoutout, ToolmasterOfBrainerd. I have to say, I do check in from time to time, but it's been a while since I've really had time to invest in the community like I used to =(
I think it's time, however, to update my posted Gifts list for the more recent meta, as it hasn't aged perfectly. I'll hopefully have the reworked update soon =)
On the subject of Elesh Norn vs Iona, I've been partial to running both in the past, but if I had to choose one it's Elesh Norn, no contest.
The only point I can add that hasn't been already said is:
Elesh norn is excellent in your worst matchups (highly aggressive ones), while Iona favors your more 50-50 matchups (control). Certain decks, such as Affinity, literally cannot win with an Elesh Norn in play without having a very specific board state.
I've taken a bit of a break from Modern to play around with Legacy a bit, but I think I'm going to rebuild my Gifts deck and get back on the Modern train...
November 6, 2016 12:48 a.m.
Sk0oMa I would point out you said "I'm probably the only one here who ACTUALLY plays a gifts style deck as my main deck", not "I'm the only one who regularly comments on threads and participates in community stuff on this website that...".
But in any case, we've probably derailed this thread quite enough.
The_Raven says... #2
What makes you not run both?
October 23, 2016 5:17 a.m.