Well after a few weeks away from modern (playing ascendancy combo in std for the past few FNMs) I decided to once again take Melira and Anafenza out for a spin, with a few changes to the deck list.
The changes made were
Maindeck:
-1x Archangel of Thune
-1x anafenza the Foremost
-1x Scavenging ooze
+3x Voice of resurgence
With the talk around the shop being a large amount of Delver/removal based decks and knowing I need to push to get in under the control decks that are often placing in the top 8. Many of the graveyard based decks had been mia for a few nights so I made some changes you'll see I would come to regret in round 2.
with all this being said, 32 people showed up, only 2 delver decks and 1 control deck showed up. Alas, hind-sight is 20/20.
Round 1: Tribal Birds? (Company 2-1)
Game 1 had me guessing what the hell was going on just long enough for a whole ton of birds to beat my face in with anthems supporting them.
Game 2 abrupt decay took care of the anthems and I was able to swing for a fairly fast win.
Game 3 ended on turn 4 with a natural murderous redcap combo draw.
Round 2: Twinning End (End wins 2-0)
This deck is a disaster every time I play it, like shake me upside-down for my lunch money disaster. Game one I was able to keep his graveyard empty with scavenging ooze with a pridemage in hand and completely forgot to cast it which had me dieing to the twin combo on turn 5.
Game 2 I mulligan-ed twice and drew into no hate conceding to a 5 creature return from living end.
Round 3: U/R Delver (Draw in game 3)
The first game went really long, to the point that I was able to activate 2 gavony township's every turn to prevent his delvers from swinging through beefy birds of paradise and a 10/14 linvala which eventually took the match.
The second game I totally forgot to play around a bloodmoon which I was well aware of and died on turn 6 with my combo in hand and just unable to cast.
Third game turned into a draw after 30 seconds of play.
Round 4: Tribal Zoo (Company wins 2-0)
Game 1 I was able to abuse kitchen finks enough to prevent myself from entering tribal flames lethal range and then a single gavony activation reset the double finks and let me swing for lethal which he hadn't planned on blocking.
Game 2 I was able to combo on turn 4 with a combo in hand on my first 7 including a redundant melira that he bolted.
Round 5: B/W Tokens (Company wins 2-1)
Game one was a blowout, anthems and zealous persecution had him swinging for lethal by turn 5.
Game 2 was a quick combo, with him trying to path my finks on my upkeep, not seeing me having mana up for chord into seer, sac'ing finks and triggering anafenza to prevent the exile.
Game 3 came down really close with him drawing only into token generators and nothing to boost them with, eventually gavony township and birds of paradise were too much value to beat and I won on turn 7.
I still enjoy playing this deck but of all the current combo decks it is quite vulnerable to permission and other combo strategies. It wins most of it's fair matchups because it transitions into a beatdown value deck so well, but it's tutoring solutions to prevent other combo decks from working is far too slow of a game-plan.
more work on the list is required, and I'm seriously debating maindecking 4 fulminator mage as another plan to slow down both combo/fair opponents.
