If you hate combo, take a look!
Modern forum
Posted on Aug. 11, 2015, 11:30 a.m. by 8vomit
I am posting this in response to a rather undeveloped and bias thread, posted a couple days ago. I personally enjoy racing combo decks/shutting them down, but it appears there are a few players who really have some beef playing with and against combo decks. So i thought id help those folks have an easier time in that match up.
Two decks that were repeatedly mentioned were Splinter Twin and Amulet Bloom. I do not feel either of these decks need to get the ban hammer, you just need to know what to side in against them. So am going to give a couple cards I can think of, in each color, that shut down both of these decks. Let us start with Twin:
In black, there's Surgical Extraction/thoughsieze. These cards remove the combo pieces and leave twin with a pile of not-so-useful cards. Any removal works as well.
In white Path to Exile or Ghostly Prison. Path gets rid of their guy while Splinter Twin is on the stack, and prison makes it impossible to swing on you.
Green is a little tough, but cards like Beast Within and Choke stall the deck out hard.
In red there is Boil or Harvest Pyre maybe. Blood Moon also works if you are playing against grixis/temur twin.
Blue is pretty self explanatory. Use those counter spells! Cryptic Command is very nice.
There is also Torpor Orb.
Then there is Amulet Bloom Titian. I dont know the deck as well as i know twin, so bear with me here. I might need some help on this
In black, again, any removal can kill the Primeval Titan. Shadow of Doubt is pretty nifty too
In red, Blood Moon does wonders against prime time.
In white?
In green?
In blue?
Bloom titan players, help me out here, im struggling to come up with answers in the rest of the colors. Also, im going to be late for work if i dont get off my computer soon. I dont have all day to just think of cards, I wish..
But anyways, my point is that there are answers to every deck in every color. Some colors struggle with certain things more than others, but it is absolutely possible.
MTGTCG, im looking at you here. And everyone, feel free to tell me my suggestions are bad and leave some better ones. Im certainly no pro.
As always, thanks for looking!!
You can't forget the other anti-combo cards that have multiple uses. Rule of Law or Eidolon of Rhetoric both do good work against spell-based combos like Storm, and they mean your Grixis Twin opponent can't hold up counterspells as they attempt to resolve their Splinter Twin.
August 11, 2015 11:47 a.m.
GlistenerAgent says... #4
Beating the Twin combo doesn't beat the deck.
Against Bloom, Blue has Dispel and Remand, in addition to Shadow of Doubt. The key for any deck is to stop the Titan from getting into play or having efficient removal for it. If you don't have Terminate or Path, bounce lands or use discard.
August 11, 2015 11:57 a.m.
Problem with Amulet Bloom is Primeval Titan is only one of their win conditions. There's also the Hive Mind + any 0-mana Pact combo, which is the really nasty part of the deck, IMO. You can't simply remove the Hive Mind with regular enchantment hate, because they'll simply cast a Pact in response, the spell will be copied before Hive Mind leaves the field and you'll be screwed anyway.
These are the ways to fight off Hive Mind I can think of:
In black: targeted discard, plus Surgical Extraction if you can use it. You can also pay the upkeep cost for Slaughter Pact if need be, unless they pulled off the combo REALLY quickly.
In white: Nevermore.
In green: Krosan Grip.
In red: uh, no idea.
In blue: mostly anything that has the words "counter" and "spell" somewhere in the rules text.
August 11, 2015 12:03 p.m.
GlistenerAgent says... #7
You can't Krosan Grip a Hive Mind and expect it to work out for you. PSA.
August 11, 2015 12:05 p.m.
VampireArmy says... #8
Ya know for some decks it's much more viable to ignore certain combos and race the best they can.
August 11, 2015 12:07 p.m.
GlistenerAgent I'm confused, why can't you krosan grip a hivemind?
August 11, 2015 12:15 p.m.
filledelanuit says... #10
nemesis101 They get priority first so they would have to not have a pact in hand in which case you're probably already winning.
August 11, 2015 12:19 p.m.
GlistenerAgent says... #11
Sometimes they don't have a Pact, but most of the time they will gain priority after Hive Mind resolves and cast a Pact that you can't pay for. People normally won't just put it out there unless they don't have much going on.
August 11, 2015 12:21 p.m.
weisemanjohn says... #12
Well, it would suck, but you could Beast Within Hive Mind on green aswell. Just hope you don't get hit by double Summoner's Pact like I was...
Vines of Vastwood is my #1 main board go to way to stop combo as the pseudo hexproof only works in your favor. In addition to that, you can use it on Spellskite to make it unable to redirect spells to itself (funny how that works right?) And then you also have the kicker for +4/+4 to bash in damage.
August 11, 2015 12:25 p.m.
electromancer says... #13
@vishnarg, I think the point of this thread is to point out that there are plenty of good ways to deal with combo decks and if don't come prepared to disrupt combo, you're either playing a less fair deck or your simply unprepared (a nicer way of saying "your deck sucks, fix it").
August 11, 2015 12:34 p.m.
For Splinter Twin and Storm, I play Rakdos Charm. I think it should be an automatic 2 or 3 of in any 
sideboard.
I added to 8-Rack specifically for this sideboard and Kolaghan's Command in mainboard.
For Amulet-Bloom, Amulet of Vigor is powerful, but easily removed, so stopping an early Summer Bloom is usually the real difficulty... stop this, and you have slowed the deck down drastically (those bounce lands become a real hinderance) - Unless they have a second one in hand, you can usually just race them.
August 11, 2015 1:46 p.m.
VampireArmy says... #15
I hate when people use Rakdos Charm vs twin :c . The chances that it works is so unbelievably low.
situation 1 : They know you're playing red and black. They know Terminate is already a potential threat so they've waited until they have counter back up anyways.
situation 2: they know Rakdos Charm is a thing. They spawn enough guys to kill you but not enough to kill themselves
August 11, 2015 1:49 p.m.
Anybody have thoughts on hate cards for Storm? A couple guys at my shop play it and it's just the most miserable game to play against It's just like watching someone do math.
August 11, 2015 1:54 p.m.
GlistenerAgent says... #18
White: Rule of Law, Canonist, Thalia
Blue: Counterflux, cheap counterspells
Black: Decay, discard
Red: Destructive Revelry, Eidolon
Green: Krosan Grip and such
I'm definitely forgetting stuff.
August 11, 2015 1:58 p.m.
electromancer says... #19
@kmcree Rule of Law, Eidolon of Rhetoric, Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, Leyline of Sanctity, Rest in Peace
August 11, 2015 2:02 p.m.
I already play RIP. Do you guys think Rule of Law or Eidolon is better?
August 11, 2015 2:06 p.m.
electromancer says... #21
Rule of Law is strictly less removable but I have no idea.
August 11, 2015 2:08 p.m.
kmcree in my experience a couple RIP's should be enough to effectivly fight storm. They might still be abke to kill you if they bring Pyromancer Ascension online before you cast it, but it's pretty unlikely. I don't like Eidolon or RoL, they're just too narrow, RIP actually does something against other decks as well.
August 11, 2015 2:16 p.m.
UrbanAnathema says... #23
They're free to not like whatever they don't want to like. As a combo player I don't feel the need to defend what is a clear archetype of the game to someone that may or may not like to play against me. Learn to play better. Pretty much as simple as that.
August 11, 2015 2:28 p.m.
The thing is, I run 2 RIP, and I bring in 2 Wear / Tear for Pyromancer Ascension. I still haven't had any success. I know it isn't a great idea to commit too many SB slots to one matchup, but I've just gotten so fed up with Storm that I'm willing to do just about anything. Lol
August 11, 2015 2:37 p.m.
electromancer says... #25
@UrbanAnathema, Agreed, but haven't there been emergency bans in the past in response to players disliking or over-hyping certain cards? I think its a bit goofy to make a whole forum in response to another forum but at least this one's more informative.
August 11, 2015 3:42 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #26
Bans are used to address imbalances in the competitive environment. They are not used to cater to whiners.
Also, this is a thread, not a forum.
August 11, 2015 5:15 p.m.
electromancer says... #27
My bad. However the banning of Memory Jar was a direct response to the players. WOTC won't keep cards around if it means they risk loosing business.
Source: http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/arcana/brief-history-standard-banned-list-2015-07-13
Given, banning it definitely sounded like the right decision.
August 11, 2015 5:37 p.m.
JexInfinite says... #28
I'd just like to point out that Twin isn't really a combo deck; it's a control deck with a combo kill. Then there's Grixis Twin, which is a control deck which has a midrange plan, but always threatens the combo kill.
August 12, 2015 2:12 a.m.
I know it's very VERY narrow, but you can counter YOUR copy of the pact with Nix. Normally if you try to counter your copy of the pact Hive Mind will copy your counter for the opponent, so they can counter your counter with their counter. However, if you use Nix which costs one mana, they can't target it with their counter. That means that unless they counter their own pact they have to pay or lose. Another option is to counter your own pact with Last Word, but that's very mana intensive and unlikely to happen any time soon.
August 12, 2015 3:51 a.m.
I think the best sideboard tech for blue against amulet bloom is Trickbind. You can counter the triggers from Amulet of Vigor, Hive Mind, Primeval Titan and their Karoos. They never expect it, and it can actually kill your opponent if you counter Hive Mind's triggered ability when they don't have the mana next turn to pay up.
GreenGhost says... #2
In white path works well if they don't have prime time they can't kill you with it.
August 11, 2015 11:42 a.m.