I love this deck except for the fact there are so many one of or two of

MadLuckKing Lol for a split second I thought of how cool it would be to play UB tempo pirates because I love me some tempo UB Rogues (back in Shadowmoor, and in EDH)...but yeah, NO!!! Back to business lol.

Haha Aetherborn, I knew I was going to get that question! Ok check it out: against Aggro he's the perfect staller/lifelinker, and he's the best thing in the way of Tyrrant (either they attack into him and trade 6CMC for 2 CMC and 2 life - or they straight up don't attack!...). The only match-up he wasn't good was VS Flying Pirates. Now you might ask why 4? Well we used to have a lot of board presence in 2 Titis + 2 Kalis + 2 GGDs to put in the way of Aggro but now I'm just running God and Hulk!..

No Strikes because I don't need the burn, It's more important to clear the board so I'd rather be able to kill artifacts with Abrade or be able to hit bigger threats with Harnessed.

Hehe good eye for Azcanta! I hadnt even initially realized it when I doubled up on it! But yeah that card is sooooo good. Automatic 2-of.

Vampire_Lord I often debate this. The thing is, the metas and threats lately are too varried to have a few cards do the job well enough against all archetypes. Disintegration has the best removal card stats wise BUT aslo too slow VS supper aggro decks. Harnessed/Abrade are awesome cards but lose a lot of use VS bigger decks...counterspell wise it is similar, Spell Pierce is awesome VS smaller decks running powerful noncreatures but so-so VS creature-heavy midrange decks. So by splitting my answers I can more easily tweak the deck post game 1 and have a good match VS all of the field.

May I suggest finding room for one or two copies of Fatal Push and adding a couple more Evolving Wilds? It seems like a really clean answer to a lot of the creatures in the meta and also would help colour fixing if needed.

Ok so if the manabase is good enough, you are just never going to run tapped lands, and in the case of Evolving Wilds; unless you are on something like a landfall gimmick. It just so happens that the checklands are back!! So the manabase is VERY GOOD right now!! :D Almost nothing is coming in tapped. I could probably get rid of the one copy and still be fine btw.

But even if I had to run 4 E-Wilds, I'm not sure I would run Fatal Push because unless opponent is running 1-2 CMC dudes, it's pretty much a dead card in our deck whereas Abrade is still relevant even VS creatureless decks, and Harnessed can still be used VS decks that run big creatures.

Depending on your build, if you can rather consistently turn on Revolt, then sure go ahead man! Or maybe your local meta is all weenie and aggro, then again sure! But since yesterday on MTGO, I've been facing a lot more midrange than aggro and I'm doing ok VS aggro.

Guess I should start playing around with Ixalan, I might be going to GP Portland in november. (Main event is Standard).

MadLuckKing Get on Cockatrice, stop fucking around! :P

By the way, what's the match-up like against temur energy? I'm expecting a fair bit of it at the tournament I plan on taking this to, so I would appreciate any advice you can give.

I haven't faced any worthy ones, but then I just haven't faced enough of them yet. Seems like the ones I faced were just a variation on the Dinos. I'll let you know if have any problems with them.

From the games I have played against and seen played so far, I'd say that Temur Energy hasn't changed much besides the addition of Lightning Strike and Carnage Tyrant. I haven't been losing against them much since they like to use their removal on The Scarab God to hold him off for a few turns, instead of using it on the reanimated Rogue Refiner or, even better, Bristling Hydra

Isn't Chandra torch of defiance probably a bit stronger than bolas? Like if you go to play bolas and it gets removed or countered then you are tapped out and will lose while Chandra you can play late game and keep some mana for response and it can be immediate ramp into removal or something. She seems like more guaranteed value. I'm by no means an expert of control so I'd like to hear what u think.

Chandra is one of the cards we talked the most about in here. We want to playing everything we can at instant speed, so ramping for 2 to use during our turn is not appealing. The 4-damage mode is also not needed, we'd rather just use any other cheap removal, or if really needed Unlicensed/Vraska's Contempt.

Bolas is there as last-resort finisher, usually dropped when opponent is all out of stuff, pretty late in the game. He's been doing great, the 3 modes are relevant and I've never lost after dropping him. You do have to be smart timing-wise though but he has won me games against all kinds of decks.

Bolas is a boss. True about what ability to use at a given point when he comes out.

It's seriously hard to lose once he's out if you don't poo down your own leg and eat it for dinner.

Hes the only threat a deck REALLY needs.

Thx :)

90% of the time, my opponents scoop up once Bolas resolves. He's that damn sexy.

True dat, he's simply too sexy for the Multiverse!

When he walks in, Let the bodies hit the floor, and let planeswalkers cower as he is 3 steps forward and they're 2 steps back

So how have matchups been?

Hey! I'm planning to take this to a large tournament soona and was wondering whether you had any ideas to shore up the RDW matchup? I've been thinking about things like essence extraction and the like but haven't been sure what to cut. I have to do something though, as I expect a large portion of the field to be aggro.

HEY YALL! Description has been updated! :D

Vampire_Lord Very good, which is why I was comfortable updating the description since I haven't made changes in a few days. I'm happy with the current balance, for now!

eragon795 It's kind of too early to say, when is your tournament? Against RDW usually I go something like this:
+2 Gifted +2 Magma +1 Spell Pierce
-Bontu -Hour -Disallow -1 Unlicensed -Vraska

EastsideRock The tournament is the week after release. I managed to win last season with straight UR control (splashing for Bolas) but in this standard that won't be nearly as good because of enrage and carnage tyrant and the like. Therefore I'm changing to Grixis, but need more cheap removal main deck because of RDW (I want to have at least a shot at it). What do you think I can change? I'd be adding things like Magma Spray or Fatal Push.

Also if you think there's any room for one more disallow I've been really wanting to play one (maybe instead of the spell pierce)

I can't wait to see what I get in my prerelease kit tonight.

This should be fun, hopefully I'll get some cards I've wanted to plug into my grixis control deck.

I think though, that this will end up being a "let's get Pokemon kids to play magic" set.

eragon795 The list I make is based on what I face in my own micro-meta along with my own style, you can definitely tweak it to better suit your environment! I don't see a problem with you swapping Spell Pierce for another Disallow although in my experience Disallow is one of the first spell I board out against fast decks!..

dthoreson813 Pirates and Dinos are definitely pokemon kids material! But our game stays the same so I'm happy with that. The matchups have been exciting, looks a very well designed set, fun environment which is well represented by Aggro, Midrange and Control....nevermind Combo though...we all got enough of that in the last metas anyway lol....