Hey fellow Alex. Currently testing Orzhov -> Opt, Snapcaster -> Cyclonic.

Flash hulk wise, there are a few minor changes too. Overall in a blind meta his is better, but mine is better into a meta with stax and blood moons. I run Gilded Drake now, so you can steal an enemy linvala in your hulk pile, or other problematic hate bears, then sacrifice them to your cabal therapy or dread return.

Flash of insight is cool, but everyone counters the Flash and not the dread return. I don't like it much either.

How about you?

Snapcaster for Cyclonic. Interesting choice. I may have to try that one as well. So for my Hulk list, I actually removed Cabal Therapy for Bazaar of Baghdad (I have a real one, how am I not going to use it haha), and then put in Dark Confidant, Preordain, Gitaxian Probe, and Summoner's Pact in place of some tech cards that didn't do much for me. Good call on the Gilded Drake. Flash of Insight was dead draw, Deep Analysis is better as Angel of Glory's Rise, and I found that Avacyn's Pilgrim made the cut too. His list has Gaea's Cradle, but I found it didn't do much most of the time, and another land was better. What are your thoughts?

Well against stax pieces, snapcaster's not great. Against taxers your mana costs become significantly higher, and one spell per turn effects turn him into just a 2/1 with flash.

I really like cabal therapy in hulk, it lets you discard pieces like dread return that get stuck in your hand, sacs protean hulk if needed, removes interaction for your combo for a B and a creature. It also works in twister loops, to remove opponents' hands.

I think cradle is too slow for the really fast hands where you can't afford to play a creature pre-flash.

Ill have to give Cabal another try then. I definitely see the use there. Bazaar has been really handy as well, so Im down for two of the same effect! Snapcaster was definitely feeling like more dead draw, especially because Zur has become much faster in its combos, and as you said, Stax really hurts its casting. Im into Cyclonic Rift for more interaction, and especially against troublesome hatebears.

Damn dude, the foiling is looking good! The Grim Monolith took me an eternity to find. Are you thinking of making the Cyclonic Rift/Opt changes? I've been playing with them, and so far they've been great.

I'm playing Zur in a non staxy meta again, so I don't need to make those changes anymore :D

I will update the primer for those as potential changes, though!

sparkles

Alexdagreat I ended up making the snapcaster swap after all, rift is really good

Nice. Yeah, Snapcaster was feeling dead a lot, especially in opening hands. Still no permanent Opt swap?

Not just yet, but I will work it in

So I saw Whir of Invention in Dans list. Interesting inclusion. What are your thoughts?

So I saw Whir of Invention in Dans list. Interesting inclusion. What are your thoughts?

I think UUU is kinda tough and am not really a fan, but I can see it in a budget build

Hi there, I am currently building this deck as a transition from Jeleva Storm. I am only missing the candelabra, instead of which I put paradox engine (I know, I know, I may use that slot for an extra cantrip or stifle), timetwister and the 2 white duals. I was wondering what is your reasoning behind including scroll rack instead of, say Grim Tutor?

I just realised you can scroll rack all of your necro cards if you don't like em at instant speed before discard.

Yeah, filtering through large numbers of cards (esp. through Necro cards) is why it's in there. You can also bounce/untap and do it again after a shuffle effect

Have you considered running phyrexian unlife as a second target for Zur? Or if you already have necro out/play ad nauseam.Also, I see no snapcaster mage in your list, even though its in the primer, what would you cut to include Snappy, or is he not that important for the shimmer lines?Have you considered cutting negate for, say, trickbind/stifle? I think I will include the former in my list since almost every game there is a flash hulk or a remora. Plus you can trickbind others people's aetherflux/isochrons.Final question - given that Candelabra is out of my price range, do you think running paradox engine is worth it for the shimmer lines, or should I use that slot for an extra 1cmc counterspell (stifle?) or cantrip (Opt)?

Hey, thanks for looking at the deck! I hope you like playing it. Here's an old comment on why I cut it:

Phyrexian Unlife went because it was always a dead card in hand and IMO a terrible Zur target. The main use case would be a naus on your turn, which is not always good. If you have the mana to cast both Unlife and AD Naus in the same turn you would get better results from Ad Naus, play fast mana/rituals, tutor for Yawg Win, recast rituals, recast tutor for AG, win with AG/Ad Naus, or just Ad Naus into DD.

Unlife is also a pretty bad Zur target in that either Necro is the main line, or you are under heavy stax and you need removal. You'd pretty much never play Zur with an Ad Naus in your hand, so the only good time to have it would be if you naturally drew Ad Maus the turn Zur can attack. I don't think I've ever wanted to tutor for this card or to see it in hand, so it was cut.

The fringe case people advocate for is to tutor it out when you have low life, from being attacked/failed lines, etc. That's too fringe to justify the card, IMO.

Snapcaster was cut for cyclonic rift. It's an OK card, but plays terribly into stax. Negate is far too good to cut since it hits the large majority of wincons. Stifle is cute for hulk, but it's unproductive for remora. You stop a single card draw, but will just draw them a card from your stifle cast, and stifle won't stop future card draws. Trickbind hits future activated but not triggered abilities. Negate stops both flash and remora, as well as many other cards you don't want to resolve.

Candelabra -> Dispel Opt is fine, IMO. I'll try to update the primer this weekend

Hi mate love the deck and have most cards besides Chanda/Twister and was asking what you would use as replacements. I also unfortunately am missing LED. Is it integral to the deck because of Doomsday? Its pretty expensive and i dont use it in any of my other decks thats why im asking.

Thanks!

For Candelabra, probably Opt or Dispel. People have been cutting it from their Zur decks lately, and it's not a mandatory inclusion.

LED is nice for the cheap DD piles, but the DD lines themselves are only plan C. Some of the faster mana lines are unfortunately lost, this can become Opt/Dispel/Etherium Sculptor for better storm, depending on the meta.

Twister is hard to replace, there are no directly similar effects. This can become a value card like the other two. With only one wheel, Notion thief becomes worse and may be better as a dark confidant.

Hi thanks a lot for your answer!

Would Time Spiral work as a replacement or is that not good enough?

Are you still playing the deck and whats your favorite cEDH deck atm?

Im also building Jhoira and have a CVT deck. What would you say are the best decks in the meta currently?

Time spiral was cut a while back, I don't think it comes back in.

I'm actively playing all 4 decks on my profile: This, Breakfast hulk, Sisay, Jhoira. My favorite at the moment is Jhoira, it's just so hateful. Over a third of the deck is just hate and removal.

I think some Thras/Tymna thing is the best at the moment (choose your hulk variant), followed by Food Chain Tazri. Zur is still a solid tier 1, so is Grixis storm. Chain Veil Teferi is up there too.

Oh nice i have to check out your Jhoira deck for sure!

Love your content, your primers are just so good! :D

Yeah im not so big on Hulk as i dont really like creature based greenish decks.

I think i try to complete Jhoira/Teferi first as they have many cards in common and build Zur when i can invest a couple hundreds again, unfortunately card prices are exploding and i already spend a couple grand on some RL cards this month to get some EDh staples.

Still missing some Duals/LED tho :(

I have to say though, the Tainted Pact list you came up with holds its own right alongside of Hulk. Dan from the Lab Maniacs agreed as well. That thing is just disgusting.

Thanks very much guys! The tainted deck is pretty spicy, and it's very slowly going through more testing. LED might actually come out of the deck for something better.

@HighOnBuffs The Jhoira list is very budget friendly for sure. There's only one dual which isn't critical to the deck, and timetwister can easily become windfall. Nothing too crazy is in there which can't be cut for a budget replacement.