The Position of Smallpox against eldrazi
Modern forum
Posted on March 3, 2016, 12:43 a.m. by Decks_On.Acid
I was just ditzing around with loam pox tonight, semi-regular guy came out with his tier1 eldrazi deck and I played him just for fun between rounds (drafting).
I went first: turn 1 Thoughtseize and take an Eldrazi Mimic
His first turn was: Eye of Ugin Eldrazi Mimic
I went turn 2 Smallpox
That is a fairly average draw and any eldrazi deck that goes turn 1 mimic+eye is thinking 'ahhh yeah'.
So: thoughts on Smallpox in modern (against eldrazi specifically)?
Who cares about Smallpox...did you win?
J/k
Anything you can do to disrupt their ramp and keep the board clear right - as long as you aren't overly ruining your own ramp, why not? You're going to be pulling Loam later if you haven't already and if you run cards like Raven's Crime you aren't really at much of a disadvantage right?
March 3, 2016 12:53 a.m.
Sceadugenga says... #4
Well that requires some speculation, I think. Before OGW was spoiled, the general bans-in-modern discussions that I was a part of guessed that the format would turn into a 3.5 turn format once Twin was gone (this was a solid assumption, along with AmuletBloom getting nerfed), with a much lower to the ground, aggro vibe to it--much like the Suicide Zoo lists that were overshadowed at the Pro Tour by all the Eldrazi. Even the Mardu control lists that went 7-3 had that same low to the ground creature base.
In a deck environment like the one speculated above, Pox seems fantastic. You're taking three threats from your opponent: a creature (which incidentally deals handily with Boggles, which would likely see a resurgence in this theoretical meta), a land, which strands a card in their hand next turn, and a card. I use BG Rock LoamPox to great effect in my meta, which hasn't really changed much after OGW and the PT, since nobody bought into Eldrazi knowing bans would happen.
March 3, 2016 12:56 a.m.
Servo_Token says... #5
Unfortunately, loam pox is just a highly inconsistent deck in modern because there's no cycling lands. I mean, Horizon Canopy kind of, but no thanks.
The card Smallpox is the tits against eldrazi, but it's much better in a deck that can support it like 8rack.
March 3, 2016 1:45 a.m.
Sceadugenga says... #7
I agree that Loam/Pox is better than 8Rack, and while you don't have cycle lands, that isn't how you build modern Pox. You rely on interactive lands a la Ghost Quarter or manlands, not on drawing gas with them. They are the gas.
March 3, 2016 12:30 p.m.
Just play walker ramp into Death Cloud, I've had some amazing results online with it. Infect, Eldrazi, Esper Control, Abzan, CoCo. It's hard for the meta to recover from something like that right now
March 3, 2016 1 p.m.
Servo_Token says... #9
I'm 100% positive that I'm aware of how loam pox is meant to be built in modern, i've been trying to find an optimal build for the last 3 years. What i'm saying is the card smallpox is better suited to fight eldrazi in an 8rack deck. I'm not saying that 8rack is a better deck because it certainly isn't. But the drawback from smallpox in a loam pox build gives too much leeway to the eldrazi player because it hits you just as hard as it does them. It hits you just as hard because you lose 2 cards in hand to get the ability, and you can't recover from that the way that you would want to, or even get to that ability at all reliably, because there are no cycling lands in the format. They are what make the legacy loam decks viable at all. In modern, the other decks that you'll be playing will have just as much, of not more, card advantage as you and the loam deck can't afford to be setting itself back like that when it can't recover as easily. So Loam can't support the card smallpox in a matchup like eldrazi as well as an 8rack deck, which is stripping their hand of ways to refuel every turn. This is what I was trying to point out in my previous post.
In theory it seems like the best answer, but you need the right deck to put that best answer in.
March 3, 2016 1:27 p.m.
I'm not much of a black Mage, nor someone who deals all that much with forced discard, but is there a way to marry loam pox and 8-rack? A deck that runs a lot of forced discard, Ensnaring Bridge, Life from the Loam, Smallpox, Ghost Quarters, maybe something like Hissing Quagmire, and The Rack? Hell it could even make use of madness mechanics fairly well, unless dredge doesn't work the way I think it does with madness.
March 3, 2016 3:37 p.m.
Troy242621 says... #11
Smallpox is, hands down, my favorite card in MTG, and I've spent months trying to brew a modern control deck around it.
The issue I've run into is, without a doubt, it's a resource denial, attrition-based control deck. You have two choices in this regard. You can focus on tackling their mana base or their hand.
In Legacy, this is a legitimate choice. In Modern, we don't get to pick; we can't do land destruction.
Therefore, if we try to port a hand-based Pox deck from Legacy to Modern, it more or less translates into an 8-Rack deck.
Now, having said all of this:
I'd LOVE to be proven wrong, and I'd LOVE to see a Pox deck in modern that isn't simply 8-Rack or outclassed by 8-Rack but through brewing myself and collaborating with others, both online and in person, I've been unable to do so.
March 19, 2016 7:31 p.m.
I'm toying with a simple 4 of smallpox in my budget mono-black control as an all or nothing, suicidal type deck.
Muddled results so not sure if it's a keeper yet. So far though it does usually hurt non-mono and aggro decks more than it hurts me. Except for my occasional vamp nighthawk, most of my hits don't come till close to end game. Pulling the win is a bit more difficult but I can drag things out a while. Most of my deck sits at 3 CMC or less with my wincons coming in at 4-5 CMC.
March 19, 2016 9:20 p.m.
APPLE01DOJ says... #16
theres this too Zombiepox
That I developed from this list...
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=55108
DrFunk27 says... #2
I don't think the question is how good is it against Eldrazi but rather how are the X number of matchups OUTSIDE of Eldrazi. To me, playing 1 deck that consistently beats Eldrazi, but loses to the majority of the meta isn't the right answer. Granted, Loam Pox may be good against the meta, but I don't know.
March 3, 2016 12:48 a.m.