Modern Deck Brewing Advice

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ebMusicMan
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Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby ebMusicMan » 16 Mar 2016, 08:21

Hello everyone, I hope this is copesthetic here. I searched for a sticky thread, or something specifically for modern but came up empty.

I have recently returned to the game for the first time since the Zendikar/Scars standard format and was looking at getting in to some modern. Looking through the new cards my attention was grabbed by Omnath, Locus of Rage. Red and green? My favorite colors. Giant stopmy creatures? Yes please. Game ending landfall trigger? Let's go!

So I searched around the card database and came up with this idea: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/08-03-16-QBY-gruul-landfall/ and thought I would turn to my LRR friends for advice!

I doubt this will be very competitive, but I'd like to get good enough to at least win me some packs at FNM if possible :D Please let me know if you have any suggestions!
PS - This is what part of the alphabet would look like if Q and R were eliminated.
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square1
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby square1 » 16 Mar 2016, 08:47

Hi!
Welcome back to the game :)

Modern advice is going to largely hinge on whether Eldrazi are still the menace they currently are after the next B&R review.

That said, your deck looks interesting, and I like the idea of trying to get landfall to work. It seems like Omnath is kind of incidental to this deck though, rather than the centerpiece. Omnath lends to elemental tribal by turning all your elementals into lightning bolts and letting you use many of the lorwyn cards that reward that, like Incandescent Soulstoke. An elemental tribal deck with sacrifice outlets could be interesting with omnath. In a purely landfall deck Omnath seems subpar, since landfall better rewards early aggression. Cards like Plated Geopede for example.

Your build actually looks closer to a Scapeshift/Valakut deck; maybe that'd be in line with your interests?

For more RG Gruul aggro beats, I might suggest Burning-Tree Emissary and Ghor-Clan Rampager.

I hope that helps, and best of luck at your FNM!
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby chetoos » 16 Mar 2016, 12:39

Something else that helps Omnath be his Omnathy self is evoke. All the cards with evoke are elementals, and they do enter the battlefield, so they do die to be able to bolt something.
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby fantôme » 16 Mar 2016, 14:46

Yeah weirdly we don't seem to have a Modern thread.

Sylvan Caryatid is the first thing that springs to mind. Evoke & Scapeshift definitely worth looking at, as above. Avenger of Zendikar let's you go very wide indeed. And suggestion that is probably really terrible: Flamekin Harbinger, tutors for Omnath, and let's you run a toolbox 1-of sideboard - Eyes of the Wisent, Mindsparker, Ignot Chewer, Stigma Lasher, Tunnel Ignus (for the mirror-match?).

Sideboard depends on what you're expecting to find that your deck is weak against, any idea what your local meta looks like? Otherwise just run a bit of everything. Also Blood Moon.
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby ThePasserby » 16 Mar 2016, 15:47

ebMusicMan wrote:Hello everyone, I hope this is copesthetic here. I searched for a sticky thread, or something specifically for modern but came up empty.

Omnath, Locus of Rage. Red and green? My favorite colors. Giant stopmy creatures? Yes please. Game ending landfall trigger? Let's go!


Hmm, if you want, you can try running a variant of this sort of list, though just FYI it is still being worked on. Ignore some of the weird cards, like that Cauldron of Souls.
http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/genesis- ... caterhoof/

Like, your list seems to make him incidental, if you want, you can make him the focus. Strip out the other big things(maybe not hoof), keep the Akroma's memorial, and put in a full set of Omnaths and a free sac outlet creature.

The result is, if you can Genesis Wave off for something huge, and recur it with new lands and devotion, you can do something cute.

Like, say you G-Wave for X is 10 and get all four omnaths, the memorial, and five lands.

Omnath all enter at the same time as G-Wave is resolving, along with the lands, then stack your ETB triggers. The result is all the Omnaths enter, than the lands, you get 20 5/5s with Haste, Trample, First Strike, Vigilance, and Flying, and when the Legend Rule kicks in, you will get three free lightening bolts.

The backup plan is Garruk's Over Run and Kessig Wolfun.

It's definitely not tier 1 or even 3, but it does fill nice getting all those tokens.

Like I once used this list with two Omnaths, and I wound up getting over 20 tokens. Though it was against a Soul Sisters deck, so I just got there before they got me. Like no counters? Awesome! :P

Edit: Stats

Off hand, I think it is usually a coin flip when I play, leaning towards more losses than wins, though to be fair the LGS I go to is pretty competitive, like I am not surprised to go up against a tier 1 deck usually.

The deck is weak to control and burn, as well as early hand attack, but against non-interactive decks, it is usually a race to see who's wincon hits the table first. But it is funny, and it has a fighting chance in some case. And if the local meta doesn't know what to do, the chances increase.
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby chetoos » 16 Mar 2016, 16:54

Actually, because 4 omnaths are seeing 3 omnath's and/or elementals die, then you get 12 bolts, which is enough to kill someone who's gotten up to even 36 life.
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby ThePasserby » 16 Mar 2016, 16:56

chetoos wrote:Actually, because 4 omnaths are seeing 3 omnath's and/or elementals die, then you get 12 bolts, which is enough to kill someone who's gotten up to even 36 life.


You're right! Man. I missed that. I am not that great stacking triggers and I keep forgetting them.

So, what say you ebMusicMan? You want to get on that bad ideas train?
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby ebMusicMan » 17 Mar 2016, 19:00

ThePasserby wrote:So, what say you ebMusicMan? You want to get on that bad ideas train?


I love bad ideas! Especially when they are awesome bad ideas :D

From the replies I've gotten (THANK YOU to everyone!) it sounds like maybe I need to consider two different types of decks: Gruul Aggro and a Tribal Elemental theme wrapped around Omnath. Since there are an abundance of Gruul Aggro decks everywhere I look I guess I'll focus on Tribal Elemental for now.

I'll work on putting together a list and put it up hopefully sometime this weekend.
PS - This is what part of the alphabet would look like if Q and R were eliminated.
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby ebMusicMan » 20 Mar 2016, 19:00

Ok, well here's what I've come up with so far:

http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/omnath-tribal-3/

It doesn't seem super great, but what do ya'll think? It's a bit lacking on the green, but I couldn't find much that went with the elemental theme in green :-/
PS - This is what part of the alphabet would look like if Q and R were eliminated.
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby chetoos » 20 Mar 2016, 19:32

Brighthearth Banneret. You forgot that. Also, Briarhorn is a good evoke creature in green, and a great combat trick, since it lets your elementals trade with something up to 9 toughness above their power.

Edit: Maybe a 1 of, the cauldron that lets you give any number of creatures persist? That way you can double up on your evoke triggers.

edit 2: FERTILID! ramp, elemental death triggers, it was made for this deck.
For that matter, generator servant
those both would definitely beat out the flamekin spitfire
Something else to look for would be a sac outlet.
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby fantôme » 20 Mar 2016, 21:56

ebMusicMan wrote:Ok, well here's what I've come up with so far:

http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/omnath-tribal-3/

It doesn't seem super great, but what do ya'll think? It's a bit lacking on the green, but I couldn't find much that went with the elemental theme in green :-/


Love it. Absurdly aggressive, Nova Chaser + Harbinger combo, and Omnath triggers all over the place.

Agree with chetoos that a bit of ramp would be good. Fertilid seems very slow to me, and I'd want to keep the deck as red as possible to keep ball lightning easy to cast. My picks would be +4 Generator Servant and +4 Smokebraider, probably cutting Hound, Soulstoke (although I do like that combo), and Spitfire. Leaves you with 4 slots for a little more land and/or more supporting burn spells.

Speaking of land, no harm in replacing a Mountain with a Valakut if it's so heavily red.
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby Tinfish » 20 Mar 2016, 22:11

Agreed with Fantôme, this deck looks like good clean hyper-aggressive fun-times. And it probably does need some ramp, to get Omnath out faster. As Fantôme says, Smokebraider and Generator Servant seem like good choices.

I'm liking the idea of tapping Smokebraider to cast Nova Chaser championing the Smokebraider on turn three, turn four attacking with the Nova Chaser and then Flinging it for lethal. I'm liking it a lot.
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby ebMusicMan » 21 Mar 2016, 10:49

Ok, ok, I'm getting more of a feel for this now. Here's the changes I made this go around: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/omnath-tribal-3/

In the mana base I swapped 4x Cavern of Souls for 4x Wooded Foothills this will help me get my two green mana out and adds some fun double landfall triggers for Omnath. Cavern of Souls seems to be strictly better than Primal Beyond, but for now my wallet is a little to thin for a $200 playset, if I ever get my hands on some I'll just swap them in. Next up I swapped 4x Mountain for 4x Cinder Glade, I'm willing to listen to reason about Cinder Glade v Stomping Ground I wasn't sure which was better. Finally I dropped 1x Primal Beyond for 1x Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle. Looking at it I am considering doing 2x of each instead, thoughts on that?

For creatures I added in 4x Blighthearth Banneret, 4x Generator Servant, and 4x Smokebraider cutting 4x Hound of Griselbrand, 4x Flamekin Spitfire, and 4x Spitebellows. I chose to drop the Spitebellows instead of Incandescent Soulstoke but I'm not too sure on that. It seems just plain wrong to have a Tribal deck without a Lord, but Spitebellows Evoke is more removal. Currently the only other removal options are Lightning Bolt and Fling, but using Fling for removal feels like a waste. One question along that line: would playing it as Evoke trigger Omnath's bolt?

Other suggestions that were made were Fertilid and Cauldron of Souls. I chose not to include Fertilid because a single green spell seems kinda durdely especially if the point of including it is for ramp. Blighthearth Banneret, Generator Servant, and Smokebraider seem to fill the ramp quota nicely, maybe even too much? Cauldron of Souls sounds like a good idea, however a 5 CMC price tag seems just a little too high. On top of that I couldn't figure out what to cut for it. Perhaps a sideboard card or replacing one of the aforementioned ramp creatures?

After hearing thoughts on this version I think I will assemble it and give it a try next Monday night. Thank you everyone for your thoughts, this is why I love the LRRmunity!

Edit: As a side note, I'd also like to discuss AEther Membrane. To me it seems really friggin sweet, and while I don't think it really has a place in this deck I'd like to hear other player's thoughts on its place in midrange Gruul decks. Am I just over-valuing it? I know it says defender on it... but it's a 5 body with reach that bounces whatever it touches. I have a hard time not windmill slamming it!
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby chetoos » 21 Mar 2016, 11:07

Yes, evoke does trigger the bolt from Omnath, which is why I suggested the briarhorn for pumping. The creature enters the battlefield and is immediately told to sacrifice itself, which does trigger the ability from Omnath. The other reason I recommended fertilid is for the fact that it gives landfall triggers. Also, to keep you from running out of cards, maybe elemental bond? It's garruk's packleader as a 3 mana enchantment.
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby fantôme » 21 Mar 2016, 12:45

For a moment there I entirely forgot that Omnath had a landfall ability, good call on the fetches.

Smokebraider/Servant actually give you 5 mana on turn 3, so something like Inner-Flame Acolyte might be a good use of that spare mana after a Nova Chaser?

It could just be me, but Soulstoke isn't really doing much for the deck. His tap ability was only really good with the Hound, and his buff seems like a drop in the ocean - I don't think you're going to have any trouble getting to 20 damage if you can connect.

Cavern of Souls, wow yeah that thing is expensive - really good against counterspells though, maybe consider Gutteral Response as a sideboard alternative.

Speaking of sideboard suggestions: Fulminator Mage is an elemental!

On AEther Membrane: defensive strategies in modern only really work with combo or prison decks (I think). In a midrange deck it is a card slot that could be removal or aggression. It sure does block all day though!

Anyway, just my two cents. Looking forward to the final product and finding out how it fares. Good luck!
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby ebMusicMan » 25 Apr 2016, 10:35

So wow, it's been a while since I touched this.

So after FINALLY getting my cards (never EVER order from Troll and Toad!) I have had a few outings with my deck. It didn't do great. I've done a little bit of playing around and here is where I'm at currently:

http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/24-03-16-PCL-elemental-tribal/

The mana base is a mess currently, I just haven't had time to adjust it. Suggestions there are welcome, but I am more interested in spells currently.

I have two double strike spells (Assault Strobe, and Armed / Dangerous) which leaves two slots open for pump spells (assuming I go with 4 of each) and a final two-of which Lightning Bolt currently fills.

My short list of good Red / Green pump spells is: Giant Growth, Become Immense, Groundswell, Vines of Vastwood, Rancor, and Might of Old Krosa.

My questions involve: are there other spells that belong on this list, and which two should I maindeck?
PS - This is what part of the alphabet would look like if Q and R were eliminated.
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Re: Modern Deck Brewing Advice

Postby chetoos » 25 Apr 2016, 12:14

Since all of your elementals are "sac at end of turn" guys, maybe a 1 of Omnath, locus of rage wouldn't be remiss? If you get to 7 mana, he's good at helping you close the gap.
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