Comments on: Evaluating Allosurus Evolution in Modern

By: Jacob Kellogg

Jacob Kellogg — Fri, 08 Jul 2016 15:57:10 +0000

In reply to Jordan Boisvert. We can write him in, right?

By: Roland F. Rivera Santiago

Roland F. Rivera Santiago — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 16:44:57 +0000

In reply to Sheridan Lardner. Fair enough. There will be plenty to discuss when you next have the time, then. Keep up the good work!

By: Jordan Boisvert

Jordan Boisvert — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 15:38:50 +0000

Sheridan 4 Prez!!!!!

By: Patrick Casey O'Brien

Patrick Casey O'Brien — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 15:26:05 +0000

I’ve been working on Coco Kiki Chord & Kiki Chord for over a year now and have high hopes for Eldritch Evolution improving those lists. Below is where testing has led me so far but there are still a number of tweaks I believe may be necessary before I’m happy with a 75.

Creature (30)
4x Birds of Paradise
1x Deceiver Exarch
2x Eternal Witness
1x Izzet Staticaster
2x Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
3x Kitchen Finks
1x Magus of the Moon
3x Noble Hierarch
1x Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1x Reclamation Sage
3x Restoration Angel
1x Reveillark
1x Scavenging Ooze
1x Spellskite
3x Voice of Resurgence
2x Wall of Roots

Land (22)
1x Breeding Pool
1x Fire-Lit Thicket
2x Forest
2x Gavony Township
1x Grove of the Burnwillows
1x Horizon Canopy
1x Misty Rainforest
1x Plains
1x Sacred Foundry
2x Stomping Ground
1x Temple Garden
4x Windswept Heath
4x Wooded Foothills

Instant (4)
4x Chord of Calling

Sorcery (4)
4x Eldritch Evolution

Sideboard (15)
2x Avalanche Riders
1x Eidolon of Rhetoric
1x Engineered Explosives
1x Glen Elendra Archmage
1x Kataki, War’s Wage
2x Negate
3x Path to Exile
1x Sigarda, Host of Herons
1x Stony Silence
1x Thragtusk
1x Thrun, the Last Troll

The ability to goldfish non-interactive opponents on Turn 4-5 goes through the roof compared to the current Kiki Chord lists. Additionally your ability to Tutor into relevant bullets is boosted significantly.

Feedback appreciated.

By: Sheridan Lardner

Sheridan Lardner — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 14:49:21 +0000

In reply to Leander Tupper. Arbor is a nice consistency bump. Can also get Evolved into Voice or Spellskite (or other 2 CMC creatures), which is nothing to sneeze at. Ambusher is interesting but a) very conditional and b) doesn't really insulate us from removal. They can always kill the Ambusher before we Evolve it, unlike Rider or another creature cast on our turn. Still, interesting ideas worth testing!

By: Sheridan Lardner

Sheridan Lardner — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 14:47:39 +0000

In reply to Ben Roome. Glad you enjoyed it! It's always fun to produce Modern content with all the testing and examples in it; too much under-researched content already out there on the Internet!

By: Sheridan Lardner

Sheridan Lardner — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 14:46:51 +0000

In reply to Doug Linn. Agree! That said, I don't think they key with Evolution is the target. The bigger issue is the framework around which you're building the deck. This limits our depth, because even the best new Modern cards still excel in existing frameworks. They very rarely create new archetypes altogether with brand new frameworks, unless it's something like a Tier 3 jump to Tier 2. Even so, between Kiki Chord, Abzan Company, Elves, Zoo, and a variety of other strategies, there are tons of fun frameworks to work from!

By: Sheridan Lardner

Sheridan Lardner — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 14:44:10 +0000

In reply to Roland F. Rivera Santiago.

I’m sure there are more places to try Evolution (Elves, Zoo, Abzan Liege, etc.), so it’s possible the Rider synergy holds more water in another home. We’ll have to wait and see!

No metagame update this month; we’re shifting some roles and responsibilities around and that affects metagame stats timing.

By: Ben Roome

Ben Roome — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 00:23:16 +0000

Dude. I just want to say that you’re awesome. Thank you for loving modern enough to do all this work and write thoughtfully about it. This article was a great read, you covered all the bases, and I’m just generally impressed and appreciative.

By: Leander Tupper

Leander Tupper — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 00:13:35 +0000

if I may recommend two per cards:
1- Dryad Arbor: acts as a land while also being a green card we can exile, boosting consistency.
2- Qasali Ambusher: a much less stylish but immensely more pragmatic option than allosaurus rider, could slot as a package into gw hatebears. likely we would need to settle for a less ambituous finisher like old sigarda or new avacyn, but could give us some nice tutoring and inevitability. if we slot in some of the gw tango lands along with temple gardens, these guys actually become fairly solid tempo/removal in their own right, and a free three mana creature to tutor off of. has the disadvantage of being a largely dead card against creatureless decks (ad naus, scapeshift) and decks that only swing for one shot or two shot kills (tron).

By: Doug Linn

Doug Linn — Wed, 06 Jul 2016 20:27:29 +0000

The pool of selectable cards for Eldritch Evolution is tremendously deep. I know that in the next few weeks and months, we’re going to be discovering more and more. For instance, Realm Razer is probably the best target against Tron.

By: Roland F. Rivera Santiago

Roland F. Rivera Santiago — Wed, 06 Jul 2016 18:33:12 +0000

Thanks for being the voice of reason, Sheridan. I felt that this combo wouldn’t be consisent enough to truly be a contender, and having numbers that backed up my instincts is excellent.

Unrelated: Are we going to get a metagame update article soon? I’m very interested in seeing how things have changed in this month-plus.