Abrupt Decay

Instant

This spell can't be countered.

Destroy target nonland permanent with converted mana cost / mana value 3 or less.

Discussion (49)

legendofa on Bringing Turbo Fog to the …

1 week ago

TL;DR: I want to make Turbo Fog better, but I'm not sure how.

I like the philosophy of Turbo Fog, and I've had some success with it in FNMs and casual tournaments. I'm trying to push it up into at least low-tier competitive, but I think it's gotten left pretty far behind. It hasn't really gotten any new toys recently to get it above casual tables.

Basically, Turbo Fog is a control deck that tries to avoid taking any damage by neutralizing the opponent's attacking creatures and avoiding or removing harmful spells. It's a similar line of thought to Lantern Control or prison decks.

Starting with the Fog part, there are a few ways to go. Spore Frog and Kami of False Hope are cheap creatures that are easily searched and recycled, but there aren't many other creature options. The old-school method is instants like Darkness and Ethereal Haze, but while they have more options, they don't have as many ways to search or recur them, with Isochron Scepter and Snapcaster Mage probably being the best. Finally, there are the enchantments and artifacts. Leyline of Sanctity takes care of a lot of the non-damaging effects, Ghostly Prison is good but offers a workaround, and Ensnaring Bridge needs a little too much dedicated support, in my experience. Turbo Fog isn't big on emptying its hand.

Next up is the Turbo. The traditional draw engines are Howling Mine and Phyrexian Arena, and Stormfist Crusader is a mixture of those two. The Royal Scions and Jace Beleren provide some Planeswalker support. Teferi, Hero of Dominaria does pretty much everything a Turbo Fog deck wants.

For removal, I generally look at all-purpose stuff, like Abrupt Decay, Assassin's Trophy, and Counterspell. The Fog effects provide pseudo-removal against attackers, so it's the utility creatures and other effects that pose problems. All the same, a good Supreme Verdict is always welcome. Engineered Explosives and Nevinyrral's Disk are other mass removal options.

Finally, and most importantly, the win condition. The three main approaches I've seen and/or tried are draw damage, semi-passive mill, and simply attacking with a big creature. For the draw damage, there's cards like Fevered Visions, Runeflare Trap, Fate Unraveler, basically anything that might see use in a Wheels EDH deck. Semi-passive mill comes from symmetrical drawing, while recycling cards through Blessed Respite or Elixir of Immortality. For big creatures, my headliners are Kefnet the Mindful and Sigarda, Host of Herons--5 power, evasive, and hard to kill. Honorable mention goes to Nexus of Fate, just to completely lock out the opponent.

I've poked through a lot of cards and tried a lot of variations, but I'm still not sure I'm not overlooking something. It's very color-heavy, but every color offers a unique option that's hard to replace in at least one category. I'm currently leaning toward or . Of course, it may just be unable to compete at a higher level with the tools it has now. What does Turbo Fog need to get into the competitive boards?

TheNinjaPhoenix on squirrel attack

1 week ago

Hey! I like the deck, but one major thing to note is that your Commander has Green/Black colour identity.

You can utilise a lot of good black removal spells as well as cards like Abrupt Decay as an example.

Polaris on When can I cast spells …

4 weeks ago

Diluvian Primordial, Vindicate, Abrupt Decay

Diluvian Primordial triggers once when it enters the battlefield. When the trigger goes on the stack, you select a target card in each opponent's graveyard. Players can now respond, either by countering the ability or removing one or more cards you targeted from the graveyards (they can also remove Primordial but the ability will still resolve).

When the ability resolves, you cast all of the target cards cards that are still there. They go on the stack with their own targets selected, and players can now respond again.

So no, they can't respond in between your casting the spells, but they can respond after you announce which spells you'll be targeting to cast and they can respond between any of those spells resolving.

JacobAGrossman on Glittering Company

1 month ago

Ok, well let me take a step back and go the other direction, and explain my current sideboard choices:

Cartel Aristocrat, Good-Fortune Unicorn, and Kitchen Finks are the combo pieces.

Dina, Soul Steeper replaces Murderous Redcap, Conclave Mentor, and Cruel Celebrant as m, "what to do if infinite life isn't enough," card.

Abrupt Decay and Despark cover literally all single target removal possible.

Humiliate is the best hand interruption, and sometimes that counter placement can be the next piece of the combo puzzle.

Fiend Artisan and Knight of the Reliquary are my big beaters that also can look for other pieces if they're big enough to survive, which is why I would wish for them. Especially the Artisan, if my opponent is blowing up my creatures.

Athreos, God of Passage is if I can get ahead of creature removal and punishment my opponent for it.

Revival / Revenge is for when removal or mill or counterspells have gotten the better of me.

Vexing Shusher is so counterspells don't.

Impromptu Raid is for when I have infinite green mana on the board, and a Wish in my hand. Made all the more confident by the inclusion of Endurance. Also replacing a want for Wheel of Sun and Moon.

Dromoka's Command is for the Blood Moon slot, when fetching for basics isn't working and I don't have a Swamp for Abrupt.

Kambal, Consul of Allocation is for control or artifact decks thinking they're fancy.

Hopefully that will shed a little light on my thoughts, and why I went with what I went with. Sorry if I was a little abrasive earlier, didn't realize what you meant. Now hopefully we are on the same page :D

JacobAGrossman on Glittering Company

1 month ago

Well, good morning, nbarry223 and zapyourtumor! You are both pulling on my heart strings with this Blood Moon talk. That card still gives me horrible flashbacks haha. It is still one of the decks biggest problems, and especially with Urza's Saga for some reason not being banned yet, it's presence is bigger than ever. For the most part, I do okay just making sure I have a basic and a fetch in the first few hands, so I'm good to cast whatever I need, generally speaking. Skyclave Apparition is my best main board answer for sure, and if I'm in a position where I can Glittering Wish for Abrupt Decay, I'm probably able to just play around it. And that's what I try to do, really, especially with insistence on four basics, is just play around it. There have been awkward things I've done in the past, like Harmonic Sliver, if I just have G and W and can Wish, but it never really feels right. Always a constant battle with that card.

Manamorphose doesn't really feel right, either, it would still have the same problem as everything else. I would need at least two mana, from non basic lands, and multiple spells that work with each other.

All of those other suggested creatures are badass for sure, but they only target artifacts or enchantments. Skyclave Apparition is a main board mainstay because it can target anything, and they don't get it back.

The situation is rather complicated to say the least, and am definitely open to figuring out if there's an answer out there :D

plakjekaas on Using the graveyard as a …

1 month ago

MTGesus90X "Best removal" is removal that deals with the most dangerous permanents in play for the lowest price. My Wrath of God killing 12 creatures for just 4 mana and 1 card will leave me more to work with to try and win the game than the opponent who had to cast a Murder, an Assassin's Trophy, an Abrupt Decay, a Doom Blade, a Ravenous Chupacabra and a Swords to Plowshares for half that effect, now tapped out and empty handed. It's very simple math.

Magic is a game of resource management. Denying yourself resources that are easily available at low opportunity cost, is a surefire way to reduce your chance of winning compared to the other players who did run Bala Ged Recovery  ^Flip. It's not forcing anything, if you don't need it, it's a land. If you do need it, it's a late game Exsanguinate for the win, in the best case. So how does it not make sense to run the card in almost every deck you can play it in?

wallisface on Sultai Hulk

2 months ago

Some thoughts:

• How have you found Shardless Agent? My initial thoughts reading through this list, is that it's a card which has heavily restricted what control options you can play, because you're trying to avoid hitting stuff like Counterspell, Spell Snare, Thoughtseize, Opt and the likes. Without many fast/efficient ways to deal with your opponents early game, I'm wondering whether having Chalice of the Void in your mainboard makes more sense (i.e. I see more matchups where you'd want to bring this in rather than leave it out).

• I'm worried that without any way to mill your opponent, Drown in the Loch might be hard to find value from in some games. Though I do get that most of the time it's not a big issue, as modern is a fairly self-graveyard-filling meta in general.

• I'm not sure Cackling Counterpart is worth it, when it could just be copies 3-4 of Abrupt Decay. Intending to copy Torrential Gearhulk feels far too much like "win more". You also can't get the cascade trigger if you copy Shardless Agent, because the token isn't "cast".

• The full playset of Torrential Gearhulk feels excessive. With your decks card draw, and the fact it costs 6 mana, I would have thought 2 (or maybe 3?) copies more reasonable. Drawing a second one is probably a dead card in hand a lot of the time. With 3 copies, you're still very likely to draw one before you drop your 6th land.

zapyourtumor on Pioneer Jund Midrange

2 months ago

Always nice to see more jund lists in pioneer! I agree with a lot of what the two users above me have said about the deck.

That said, I have three general observations about this list that I think should be tweaked a bit.

1) Your curve is pretty high. Currently, you are running 2 5-drop threats and a whopping 6 4-drop threats. I don't think stuff like Rekindling Phoenix is good enough for the 4 mana it costs. Elder Gargaroth is a very strong card, but not having an immediate board impact makes it a lot worse, while Glorybringer can immediately attack and kill off an enemy creature.

2) You don't really have any great card advantage engines (that can play the role of Bob in the deck) which are crucial in long games. Two suggestions I have for this slot are Chevill, Bane of Monsters and Tireless Tracker. The first helps against aggro and usually requires some support from removal, while the second is more mana intensive but plays double duty as an engine and a threat.

3) A lot of your removal is sorcery speed. Excluding the 4 stomps, you only have 3 other instant speed removal spells. Stuff like Angrath's Rampage is versatile, but a 2-mana edict effect is just not that great against a lot of decks. I think it fits better in the sideboard. Bloodchief's Thirst and Dreadbore are both good cards but I think you should cut them to 1-2 copies each. 2-4 Fatal Push is definitely a must, even without the fetchlands of modern it is one of the best spot removal spells in the format. Similarly, I'd recommend some mix of 1-2 Abrupt Decay, 1-2 Assassin's Trophy, and maybe a Kolaghan's Command to round out the removal suite and replace the sorcery speed removal. Bontu's Last Reckoning also would probably do better in the sideboard against highly aggressive go-wide strategies - the card just feels like it would hurt you more than the opponent in a lot of other matchups (don't want to make the combo matchups even worse than they already are right?).