Have you considered replacing Grasp with Fatal Push? I've been testing it for the last couple of days and it seems to be working just as well in the current meta. You don't end up with the revolt kicking in often, but in the instances where it doesn't connect you've got other removal options. Just a thought.

arglebargles As soon as the full spoiler got revealed, I actually tested with 2 copies of Push on top of my 2 Grasps. I ended up never needed them as Control and Combo were much too over-represented, so I eventually swapped both copies for the 2nd Disallow and 3rd Anticipate. However it might be time to give them back another shot with all those vehicles and snakes around now. Tough call though because my sweepers also have been doing good work. It's a local meta call really; so far so good on MTGO but I definitely keep them in mind. Thx for your input, very valid.

Love this deck, was trying to make my own Grixis but I always struggle with deckbuilding! I'm going to try this at Game Day on Sunday, I'll tell you how it goes. Also, have you ever considered Crush of Tentacles? I love it, but I might be biased because it was like, the second mythic I ever opened.

Hi Chocomycocoa, thx for dropping by. One thing you should know about competitive control-deck building: Sorcery-speed is tricky as hell!! All the sorcery plays need to be guaranteed MEGA value (see Chandra Flamecaller or GDD). Crush is a cool card but I can't see tapping out for it; we naturally tend to kill everything they play and when we can't keep up we drop a 3 or 4 mana sweeper (and very importantly keep mana up during their following turn!). This means that we can play a sweeper while keeping mana up as soon as turn 5. Playing crush and not tapping out would mean dropping it minimum turn 8. I do understand being biased (I do it all the time in EDH), but I definitely try not to in Standard. If you really want to run it somewhere in your 75, I could see it as a 1-of in the side against midrange decks with lots of 4/5/6 mana nasty threats (I don't recommend it against aggro cause they are likely to drop back all the dudes the next turn anyway).

Cheers! Good luck!

Hello, first time seing this and already upvoted, this deck seems sweet. I was looking to build a similar deck and would like to know what you thought about +1 Goblin Dark-Dwellers and -1 Torrential Gearhulk? (For budget reason of course!)

Hi MalkavianKeiji, thank you much! If you are planning to eventually get the 3rd Torrential Gearhulk in the near future, I would recommend going with another higher cost instant-speed alternative instead. I typically personally like to do that because that way when I'm playing I know that if I have it in hand, I can think of it as what it's eventually going to be (I often do that when in testing mode and/or waiting for a card to drop). That said, I just had a look and there are no really good Flash-beater alternative in the current meta (save Deep-Fiend) which would be kind of clunky...hmmmm. Maybe go with Confirm Suspicions? Since Gearhulk is often used to counter something anyway it could represent that while also dig deeper for more gas. - The truth is, Gearhulk is soooooo core to our deck that not having all 3 is gonna hurt but yeah, that's what I would do. Cheers!

4-2-1 Today at Game Day, ended up in second.

Game One: UW Spirits - Was able to blow up Spell Queller often enough with removal under them to wipe the board. Won 2-0

Game Two: BR Aggro - Had counters and removal for everything he put out, and his removal was dead in hand. Won 2-0

Game Three: Esper Control - Match one he ended the game with 7 cards in deck but sticking a Gideon on the field won the day for him. Match two ended up off curve and could not get back into the fight. Loss 0-2

Game Four: GB Snake - We drew into the top 8 for the day (small turn-out) but played for fun, ended up winning with no board played. Won 2-0

Top 8

Game Five: GB Snake - Same guy as last time, same result as the draw into top 8. Won 2-0

Game Six: RW Humans - Match one he ended up getting hit by back to back Radiant Flames and Yahenni's expertise and could never recover. Match two curved right in to the Weaver of Lightning which kept board pressure up the entire time. Won 2-0

Game Seven: UW Spirits - Same guy as the first game of the day. Match one he got me down to 6 before I somewhat stabilized, ended up getting picked off by Westvale tokens right as I ultimated Lili. Match two I kept a hand of 3 unlicensed disintegration 2 Transgress and 2 tapped lands. Missed 2 land drops but was able to take the queller and Gideon out of his hand. Needed a sweeper off the top and it never materialized. Loss 0-2

I may take this back tomorrow and see what happens as It's going to be a different crowd in there. The deck performed really well against the local meta. I'm running a little bit differently than you are, 2 maindeck Yahenni's expertise, a few other small changes in card numbers. Decided against push and I don't think it hurt me in the end as no single match came down to a single removal that would have worked. Also extremely difficult to beat a resolved Gideon, I know the key is to never let it resolve, but even with To The Slaughter I find there are very few answers to him.

arglebargles AWESOME!! Thx for this report!! I love this kind of feedback regardless of the results. You did really good and definitely I'm sure you adjusted a little bit based on your local meta-call and personal feel which is really important.

Aaaaah Gideon, yeah he's pretty much the worst thing to see across the board. Depending on how varied opponent's threats are, I sometimes go out of my way to make sure to stop him at all cost (always keeping counter-mana open, trying not to waste Slaughter/Path on something else etc...). Definitely when I DO beat him, that's about the proudest I feel with the deck! He's really a nuisance and a bonkers powerful card - there's just no easy way to take him. Sometimes it's worth dropping a decoy Lili to try and have him swing, kill his token on end step, and rumble with Chandra/Fumarole on next turn to kill him....INSANELY ressource intensive to get rid of him...If I knew my local meta was full of them, maybe I would even go as far as suck it up and run some Lost Legacy somewhere in the 75...FUCK GIDEON!! lol

Yeah Lost Legacy is actually something that I may throw into the board, as he is fairly prevalent in the local meta right now. That would also help me against other control decks, and even GB Snake now that I think about it. Really looking forward to the next set, because Bolas = Grixis, so I know we'll get some more fun toys to play with in this shell.

arglebargles Hell yeah!! If they do it right, I don't see why it shouldn't become my favorite set!! I mean come on; top-down Bolas plane!! :D

Toys better be more exciting than Dark Intimations!! Bolas Planeswalker Spell hype!!

I took this to both gamedays. First one I went 4-0. Second one I went 4-1. my total record with this so far is 9-1-5. Only problems I had were against scrapheap scroungers, they are just hard to deal with. Sorry it's not really a detailed report but I'm kinda lazy right now.

DarkAngel367 9-1 is a good sign that everything is working as it should bro! Don't worry man a small report is better than no report! ;)

Yeah Scroungers are a problem for everyone, good thing for us we have Kalitas and the most amount of removal + counterspells in the meta :D!! But yeah in some games they WILL take over because that's just what they do. Kind of like my reply #55 regarding Gideon, just make sure you give extra attention to Scroungers to the decks running them. Also keep in mind that sometimes it's better to kill the rest of their team and contain the Scrounger with the x/4 toughness dudes we have.

Awesome and good job on your events!!

Hey I have some questions I am trying to decide between Esper and grixis Have you taken this to fnm or game day? And how has it worked out?Also what rotates out when ahmonket comes out

As well do you think we will see dark imitations become better when nicol bolas comes with ahmonkhet?

Vampire_Lord Thx for dropping by! Bolas is alway looking for poor lost souls interested in Grixis, screw Esper man! Green and White are for sissies!!

1) See DarkAngel367 comment #58, arglebargles comment #54 and #35 - they have been getting GREAT results with it!

2) Nothing rotates when Ahmonket comes out, we are back to yearly rotations at the Fall set.

3) I don't know about Intimations, my guess is no, it's quite expensive for what it does and as many have realized; it doesn't happen often that it's better than To The Slaughter. We'll see!

I actually run one dark intimations in my sideboard against control and grindy midrange decks. It works pretty good.

Word!? Haha cool, personally I couldn't switch my Summonings for that though.

Deck looks good I need help deciding between Esper and Grixis what one cuz Esper has planeswalkers but grixis us all the removal I built Esper but it's alright Grixis I have never built I jut want to win

What do you think about finding some space in sb for, maybe, 2 Flaying Tendrils?
Yahenni's Expertise into free flaying tendrils, -5/-5 to all creatures and no graveyard for anybody.

sorry to say but that would only work if a creature would die from the -2-2. If anything dies from the initial -3-3, it won't be exiled AFAIK.

Demon86RM I did think about it (especially for the possibility of recasting it with GDD) but although it's cute, there are too many 3-toughness dudes out there - Mardu Vehicles included!

Noctem also has a good point regarding the exile clause.

I don't say it's a bad card, but it's not well positioned right now.

Eastsiderock do you think this deck will last through ahmonket

Also why no shock

Noctem of course. I meant exile for all those creatures dying only from -5/-5 after flaying tendrils free-cast.

EastsideRock: i agree, it's because i'm addicted with yahenni's expertise because @game day i've cast a free lily the last hope, +1 her and finished to remove a fatty Tireless Tracker with a couple of counters on it.

vampirelord that's impossible to say for sure. One could hope that because the previous iteration of Bolas was Grixis that it might mean the colors will get more love (as if they haven't already..) in the next set. Wait for spoilers and see :)

Meant Vampire_Lord