Shardless Value
Modern
1 COMMENT | 1168 VIEWS
MF Colombus Changes —Nov. 19, 2019
Alright, here we are, MF Colombus closing in.. these are likely the final major play pattern big changes to the list until after Columbus (unless there is a clear change that makes the deck better.)
MD
+4 Serum Visions
+2 Liliana of the Veil
+2 thought scour
+1 Maelstrom Pulse
+1 Search For Azcanta
+1 Thief of Sanity
+1 Drown in the Loch
-4 opt
-1 vendilion clique
-1 murderous rider
-1 Oko
-1 force of Negation
-3 AV
The Rationale: From the top! The biggest change in my opinion was Removing AV as well as adding LOTV, a card I personally don't like. Anyway, with the removal of AV a kind of fundamental change happened with the list... It no longer has raw card advantage. Only virtual card advantage through card selection... With the loss of raw advantage we needed to add better selection... Income replacing Opt with Serum Visions.. this deck needs a way to filter it's draws Serum Visions is just the best one Mana cantrip available for that. Adding the additional Search was a product of two things, wanting more filtering and realizing some of my best/favorite opening sequences almost always included turn 2 search or an early Tasigur... Speaking of early Tasigur I've decided to just go up to 6 one cmc cantrips because an early Tasigur feels great. Dodging push is huge in the GDS match. Generating card advantage and being a mana sink is a huge bonus when the board is gummed up. So adding the two Thought Scour was a no brainier as it can be a non-essential engine card in the list, meaning it's not necessary, but when we have it the deck seems to hum a little better. However it's not my favorite cantrip as it doesn't provide selection and with no Snaps milling over valuable spells could be more harmful than helpful. The addition of Scour also came after a bit of testing with Drown in the Loch. Card is great I personally love it as a single copy, two felt a little awkward... As Decay and drown occupy much of the same space. I much rather draw drown as a counter than a removal spells in this list personally as we have decay to handle much of what drown handles early.
Another favorite play pattern I enjoyed was Turn 2 Grim Flayer. Turn 3 attack. However the deck not being a dedicated Delirium deck, can't really turn him on on curve without the help of some discard from our opponent. So I wondered what 3 cmc things can I be doing to make Flayer better... Income LoTV and Maelstrom Pulse. LoTV is probably just the theoretical best follow up either removing a lone blocker and subsequently setting up the game for Flayer to take over or getting us one more card towards delirium. Also being able to turn two her in this list. It's golden. I personally never really liked the play pattern of Lily because my deck, while it has it's proactive elements is still pretty reactive and I want to be holding as many cards as possible. Lily does not lend herself to those style of games. Hoping that SfA and Grim Flayer smoothing the draws makes Lily feel better than I feel she is. Pulse takes the place of Murderous Rider as I noticed the deck struggled against Urza and it's ability to flood the board with thopters. So being a removal spell for Urza and other problem permanents and a boardwipe for thopters sold me on it.
Thief of sanity makes a return... I had one slot open in the list, wanted it to be a creature. Didn't want it to be V-Clique... Remembered that in the games where I connected with Thief I've rarely lost. Decided to shoehorn it in and try.. being solid against control and Midrange makes it serviceable as a single copy it shouldn't come up much except in the long games. Where it shines.
Drown in the Loch... I was originally a hard no on this card, and LoTV, due to the requirement you HAVE to run Thought scours next to it to make it feel truly worth... With the addition of tasi and scours, I added drown as a 2.. in the games I did play with it, it felt more like extra copies of decay that couldn't hit random permanents as opposed to a 2cmc counter. And I wanted this card more for the latter as opposed to the former. So I trimmed it to one... In the early game it's fine as a 5th decay vs creature-centric decks while also being fine against more 1/2/3cmc spells matter decks... In the late game it's just a hard 2 Mana counter which I like. It also has the benefit of sometimes just turning on because of your opponent and it's a solid turn 2 counter.
The removal of Clique was simple. Recognizing we don't have bolt to quickly close out games made me realize the power in clique comes from games where tempo matters and needing that extra turn can be the deciding between winning and losing. The only time that matters for this deck is against Tron.. it's also serviceable vs control as a peek to clear the way to resolve a planeswalker. So we move Clique to the side and call it what it is...
The removal of the third Oko came at the understanding that him and Lili will fill a similar space in this list. Basically removing the biggest threat from the table. She doubles as combo and control speed bumps.
Murderous Rider removal from the deck came from another conclusion... Hero's Downfall is overcosted. How often do I NEED the 2/3 lifelink? Almost never? Only against burn? Cool! Easy cut. Replace it with a more versatile removal spell.
The third Force was removed because the lack of card draw/advantage makes it worse.
AV was removed because the overall power-level of the deck felt too fair to truly feel the power of a straight draw 3, and the inability to free cast it means basically it's good against control and control only. But with Teferi and Narset running around it's not even strong there.
On to Sideboard
-1 EE
-2 Bitterblossom
-1 disdainful stroke
-1 Plague Engineer
-1 Nissa Vital Force
-1 dispel
+1 Nissa, Steward of Elements
+1 pithing needle
+2 Stubborn Denial
+2 dead of winter
+1 Tomebound Lich