Faux Pox

Modern* Polupus

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well that didn't go so well... 0-4 —July 2, 2017

Tried running Shrieking Affliction in place of Geth's Verdict and a 2nd Necroplasm... didn't go so well. BUT! valuable data & experience! I'm committed to sharing the good AND the bad...

• GREEN TRON (1 - 2)

Finally got to play against an experienced tron player. He had a black splash but was only in there for some Fatal Push & Thoughtseize he kept in the side, but otherwise it was pretty standard mono green tron. Game one he beat me down with an Ugin, the Spirit Dragon that I didn't take from my first Thoughtseize. I grabbed Ulamog instead since I had a rack in hand and thought I could ping down the planeswalker... nope.

sideboard: +4 Eternal Scourge +3 Extirpate +2 Pithing Needle +1 Sadistic Sacrament -3 Fatal Push -3 Dismember -1 Necroplasm -3 Inquisition of Kozilek

Game 2 went much smoother and I discarded him down enough to let the rack bring him to 13. I was about to extract one of his tron lands that got hit by Smallpox, but he was smart and scooped so I couldn't see his deck.

Game 3 was super grindy, but my suspicions about Eternal Scourge in the tron match up were confirmed! They ate 3 out of his 4 karns! I kept a really sketchy hand with just 1 land and it was Ghost Quarter with 2 scourges hoping he would slow his pace and I would draw into some swamps. He was smart and was using Relic of Progenitus on himself to protect his tron pieces from me. I put a needle on Oblivion Stone then he +4'd karn and I exiled the first scourge and it steamrolled with the racks bringing him to 3 life. Eventually he got an out by exiling the needle and sweeping the scourges and racks from a topdeck o-stone, then eventually won with ulamog milling me out.

• BANT COMPANY (1 - 2)

This deck was full of value creatures like SpellQueller and Kitchen Finks. It had a combo too with Knight of the Reliquary and Retreat to Coralhelm. His friend is an 8rack player and so he took the draw against me whenever he could. No targeted discard in any of my opening hands.

Game 1 I lost pretty badly. No targeted discard, just a Necroplasm, a Raven's Crime, and 2 Fatal Push. I killed off his mana dorks and he took my Thoughtseize with a SpellQueller. On his draw step I tried to Dismember the TS out of it, but he had another. Thankfully he misplayed with a Path to Exile in hand and Necroplasm was able to tick up to 3 counters giving me a 4 for 1... still wasn't enough. He stuck 2 creatures and finished me off.

sideboard: +2 Flaying Tendrils +2 Crypt Incursion +1 Extirpate

Game 2 I was able to Flaying Tendrils a Voice of Resurgence and Kitchen Finks then tutor for Empty the Pits and win off of 4 zombies and Syphon Life.

Game 3 was a punt. I had him with 2 cards in hand with me holding a Necrogen Mists, Empty the Pits, Smallpox and Crypt Incursion with a rack on the field and 3 lands. He was outpacing the rack with his 2/2's. I misplayed... I played the mists, then on my turn I discarded pits, drew a land, didn't play it, played Smallpox, then stranded myself with no way to cast Crypt Incursion. It would've gained me 12 life and won by racing him down to 0. Should have cast incursion first, then smallpox. Dumb.

• UWR COPYCAT COMBO (0 - 2)

This deck played like a regular UWR control deck with the Felidar Guardian combo that got banned from standard awhile back. Seems a lot like splinter twin.

Game 1 I lost pretty bad I just got a Necroplasm out while he smoothly comboed off.

Game 2 is another punt on my part. I keep these terrible hands with Raven's Crime thinking the card advantage from not mulliganing will help me or that I will draw into more lands. I kept a 1 lander and he just Spreading Seas my swamp and I just filled my hand to 8 until I was able to lock myself out of my deck by him just swinging in with Snapcaster Mages and whatnot and me just keep on discarding the Vengeful Pharaoh.

• GR ZOO (0 - 2)

This was a 7 year old kid with a pretty expensive deck. Pretty straightforward aggro, but by this point I was more interested in making him feel better about not ending up in last place and a win wouldn't mean anything to me. I sideboarded some Flaying Tendrils and Crypt Incursion but never used them. He went home happy knowing he got to beat someone. Afterwards we played aggro mirror match just for fun.

Lessons learned:

• I am far worse as a pilot than a deckbuilder. I am keeping hands that can't win and I'm misplaying left and right. Part of this is experimenting and another part is that the list is still a wip so I can't really practice with the deck.

• I think in all the matches, Shrieking Affliction was only ever triggered in one of them, which means I either need to commit more space to discard or I need to turn my focus elsewhere and cut it. The problem I have with this all-in discard strategy is that you can just lose randomly if you can't get a fast enough clock on them. The other part is I am spending life and mana to get rid of their least important cards usually. I can see why Liliana of the Veil is so important. She shores up the deck against topdecks, while still keeping them low on cards, but more importantly, the timing of the mutual discard is when you choose to have it. Necrogen Mists sometimes puts me in an awkward place. One possible work-around is to try and make the deck as close to instant speed as possible. The other is card draw. I would lean more towards card draw without running bridge, but I'm not really sure what options are out there for a monoblack control deck that isn't trying to kill itself. Waste Not and Sea Gate Wreckage seem to be the 2 prime candidates, but one is inconsistent and the other can only get me up to 2 cards in hand.

• Eternal Scourge and Empty the Pits continue to overperform. Extirpate seems better than Surgical Extraction in monoblack control. There have been plenty of occasions where my opponents have wanted to respond with Relic of Progenitus or Kolaghan's Command and I have to remind them about the split second clause.