What Is Grixis Lacking?
Modern forum
Posted on Dec. 9, 2014, 8:46 p.m. by CanadianShinobi
I suppose this is a relatively straight forward thread. I've always loved the idea of Grixis. Personally it's my favourite shard and I would play it if I felt it was viable enough, but it isn't. At least not in terms of Control. And that's my question to the Modern community. What does Grixis need to become a viable control deck? I suppose a valid win con would be a start.
I am aware Cruel Control is a thing, but it isn't exactly viable in my opinion.
Honestly, it needs a compelling reason to go into black.
While discard is pretty nice, there's just not a lot else on offer in black for a control deck. The ability to kill creatures isn't that lacking in other color combinations, and it's not a super deep color beyond that in terms of what a Modern control deck is looking for. The Grixis color pairing also leans heavily on its counterspells for dealing with certain non-creature permanents - for instance - black, red and blue offer no clean answers for say an enchantment. Whereas a more common color pairing of UWR gets you access to whites plethora of awesome sideboard cards.
It would probably take something like Hymn to Tourach or a way to make Bitterblossom more viable to really make black worth it.
December 9, 2014 9:09 p.m.
rockleemyhero says... #4
as a control deck, for one thing i could guess that the lack of exile removal Path to Exile is heavy hitting. I think that BUG control would have a stronger chance in modern than grixis because of Abrupt Decay. Unfortunately, the format is too fast for Cruel Ultimatum. And even if you did land it, its not as devastating as it used to be back in its days in standard.
December 9, 2014 9:14 p.m.
VampireArmy says... #5
I've always been a fan of Rise/Fall and Sedraxis Specter
December 9, 2014 9:17 p.m.
fluffybunnypants says... #6
I think it really comes down to card selection. R/B, U/B and U/R don't really play nice with each other in Modern. Frankly, probably solely because of Goyf and Abrupt Decay, Black plays better with Green than it does with Blue in Modern. It's even apparent in the distinct lack of Esper decks in the format. If you're going to run U/B the third color is probably better off as Green for the aforementioned cards and if you're going to be running G/B splashing either White for Lingering Souls/Siege Rhino/Kitchen Finks or Red for Lightning Bolt/Huntmaster of the Fells Flip/Chandra, Pyromaster just seem like the stronger plays. If you're running U/R.... well, U/R Aggro is currently really strong, but if you really want to splash a third color, Green for Goyf and Huntmaster of the Fells Flip seems pretty gold. I mean, you could also add White for that classic control or Geist of Saint Traft midrange.... I mean, it's sad, but the best removal spell in Modern is White (Path to Exile) so do you really want to splash Black just for discard? Will your deck have any synergy with that discard?
Maybe I could see Grixis as aggro. Something like Delver of Secrets Flip, Monastery Swiftspear and x creature that's not Bob plus, but possibly Young Pyromancer, Liliana of the Veil and a metric fuckton of burn, but it'd probably be better suited for Legacy because lolBrainstorm and 4 Color Delver already is basically just Grixis Delver with lolDeathrite Shaman and Edric, Spymaster of Trest, but it's doable. I mean, the black splash would basically solely be for Lili and maybe a few Thoughtseize... and you don't want to get too involved in the control game when your main plan is punching your opponent in the face like you're in a hockey fight, so why not just go U/R Delver?
TL;DR: Too many better options exist.
December 9, 2014 9:39 p.m.
VampireArmy says... #7
fluffybunnypants you basically summed up exactly why no one plays mardu in modern...actually i think that kinda sums up why exactly only those decks see play.
December 9, 2014 9:55 p.m.
TheLitchKing says... #9
It's also too painful with the manabase and discard spells. To play on curve you're going to need to fetch and shock and with Thoughtseize it adds up. This means you're already at a disadvantage against aggro decks while you're just getting your mana online. Batterskull helps with lifegain but that usually comes down too late to save you when you've been under the gun all game.
December 9, 2014 11:40 p.m.
VampireArmy says... #10
TheLitchKing : always fetch basics when you can. It really helps with that problem
December 10, 2014 12:09 a.m.
It does way too much damage to itself for one, especially with U/R delver and burn being more prevalent than ever, Grixis is in a worse position than it's ever been and it wasn't in a great place to begin with. Too slow as well. Also as somebody else stated before me, just better options, for a control deck in modern. Terminate is nice and so is the standard discard suite, but it's just better to have white for cards like Wall of Omens and Path to Exile instead honestly.
December 10, 2014 12:40 a.m.
CommanderOfBolas says... #12
So ere is what I think on the situation (I know, im probably not the most qualified speaker on anything grixis). Cruel Ultimatum is just too slow. Grixis lacks a solid finisher. they don't have access to Lightning Helix, the removal is less efficient (Dismember vs. Path to Exile) and you tend to take a lot more damage with the decks available vs. a jeskai control list, which isn't really good against the agro decks out there. That being said, I have been working on a more efficient Control deck, utilizing Gifts Ungiven for value, along with Keranos, God of Storms and Batterskull as the main win conditions. I think it has potential, but I haven't had the opportunity to test it much yet. It could be pretty good against the agro decks out there, but I find that Grixis tends to be the "jack of all trades" type of deck. It can do pretty good against most things, but doesn't do fantastic against anything. So overall, I would say the biggest issue is lack of life gain to help stabilize and lack of efficient removal is what brings it down
December 10, 2014 1:15 a.m.
To be honest you probably could do Grixis in the current meta.
Regarding deficits
Everyone moaning about the manabase being too painful needs to remember that Abzan is doing fairly well, as is Pod. These are both three colour decks that can be extremely tough on mana. Certainly three colour decks are doing decent amount of work at the moment. It's definitely not worth scrapping a deck because you need a lot of fetches / shocks.
Discard spells, even those that damage you are absolutely fine. Taking 2 damage off Thoughtseize to remove a Lightning Bolt is a gain of 1 life. Taking 2 damage off Thoughtseize to remove a Delver of Secrets Flip is potentially a lot more. Thoughtseize is actually really interesting against aggro because a lot of the time you get an immediate benefit that equates to gaining life. Using Thoughtseize against Goblin Guide, for example, is a MASSIVE play a lot of the time. Besides, Inquisition of Kozilek is now more in fashion and Duress is doing decent work.
Losing white is pretty painful, sure. You lose access to decent amounts of life gain, and Path to Exile. It's worth remembering that Path to Exile is a horrible, horrible card against tempo decks that play around 19-20 lands. An early path can mean certain death because an extra land to a burn deck is super useful. Every land a burn deck has equates to around 3 damage done to you. It's an interesting conundrum. Likewise, against delver it can make life difficult too. There are plenty of life gain options available in other colours too. Batterskull has always been a popular choice because vigilance and lifelink is great.
Without green you lose Abrupt Decay, a bit more life gain from things like Obstinate Baloth, and Tarmogoyf. Abrupt Decay can be replaced. It's fantastic but it's not completely unique in its function. Tarmogoyf is fairly easy to replace. You won't find anything as mana efficient but there are good wincons out there.
Where do we go?
Everyone's getting hung up on what grixis lacks, but when you face a problem its better to look for solutions rather than deficits.
In grixis, you have efficient sweepers in Drown in Sorrow, Pyroclasm and Anger of the Gods. You have efficient removal in Lightning Bolt, arguably Tragic Slip, Smother, and lots of others. You have efficient card draw in Think Twice, Serum Visions, Dig Through Time and Treasure Cruise. And you have efficient finishers in Keranos, God of Storms, Phyrexian Obliterator, Batterskull and many more.
Against the current meta RB is a fantastic combination because it can trade efficiently with a lot of the aggro decks out there. Every 2-for-1 you get with Drown in Sorrow or some other sweeper brings you that little bit closer to victory. Splashing blue in order to recast those cards with Snapcaster Mage is horrifically fun. 8 Anger of the Gods in one deck - lol yes please. You also get a way to fill your hand in a painless fashion - something that Abzan is lacking at the moment. This is super, super important because in order to beat a deck like delver you have to keep up with them. They refill their hand with threats, and you refill your hand with answers. Blue is a really elegant answer for midrange / control decks because it just gives you the answers you need, when you need them. Dig Through Time could do hefty work for you here.
Conclusions
You can imagine a deck shell immediately in Grixis: Drown in Sorrow, Pyroclasm, Anger of the Gods are all fantastic choices to combat the current meta. We're in a fast creature-orientated phase of modern and therefore 2 and 3 mana sweepers are extremely effective. It answers pod, it answers RDW (most are creature orientated to some degree), it answers affinity, and it answers delver. These are good cards.
Playing those alongside Serum Visions and Treasure Cruise or Dig Through Time sounds good to me. You get fuel to refill your hand. Fourth using Snapcaster Mage to double up your copies of sweepers means that you can 2-for-1 creature based decks for days. The current meta seems to be low on steam. Explosive starts but somewhat poor ends. By granting yourself extra copies of efficient removal you give yourself extreme efficiency.
Finally, you finish off with Batterskull because vigilant lifelink laughs at aggro. Or Keranos, God of Storms so that no draw is a dead one. Your choice. It's important to find something around 4 or 5 cmc that can stick to the board and hassle your opponent. Grixis has this.
Matchup Thoughts
Delver - Red / black sweepers do well. Current delver lists run between 4 and 6 counterspells which isn't enough to stop you consistently. Something like Batterskull can dodge Lightning Bolt and gain you massive advantage in the late game.
RDW - Again board clear is decent. Lack of life gain makes you vulnerable to burn. Sticking a Batterskull is useful but could come out too late. Dragon's Claw is one of the most sideboarded cards at the moment for a reason though. Would work really well because you're playing red spells as well as your opponent! Super lifegain.
Pod - Pod folds to repeated assaults from cards that 2 or 3 or 4-for 1 it. Damnation, Anger of the Gods, Drown in Sorrow. These are all viable choices. The rest is Essence Scatter, Mana Leak etc. A tough matchup due to Siege Rhino and Voice of Resurgence, but definitely doable.
Scapeshift - Negate, Fulminator Mage, Tectonic Edge. Seems legit.
Conclusion - grixis is value town. Drown in Sorrow / Anger of the Gods alongside Snapcaster Mage makes me excited.
December 10, 2014 6:45 a.m.
CanadianShinobi says... #14
@ ChiefBell Excellent insight as always, you've certainly have me thinking about it.
@ everyone
Overall I agree that Grixis does have its drawbacks. However, in my OP I mentioned that Cruel control wasn't viable. But, perhaps approaching Grixis from a traditional method of Cryptic Command and a dozen other counter spells has been erroneous. A shell of Drown in Sorrow, Pyroclasm and Anger of the Gods presents an interesting situation. While still relying upon a Snapcaster Mage for flashbacks, I think you can be a little more liberal with your graveyard by adding delve cards. As we've see in the past weeks, Dig Through Time and Treasure Cruise have provided excellent draw support. In a Grixis build I would lean toward Dig Through Time because it enables selection.Definitely something to consider, I guess I'll start brewing.
December 10, 2014 10:59 a.m.
You can definitely do it. Throw out everything you know about grixis from before and build something that addresses the current modern situation. I believe counterspells are too weak at the moment because a 1-for-1 against decks playing cards that draw 3 for a single blue mana is just pathetic. You absolutely need to start thinking about ways to 2-for-1 or better. I'm sure you can do this.
December 10, 2014 11:21 a.m.
VampireArmy says... #16
I can't stress what ChiefBell said enough. When I first started brewing Mardu, I was caught up on what was already built rather than what I knew worked and after about 3 months of failure I tore down the entire thing and built it from scratch. Now I'm very happy with my deck and have really good success with it.
December 10, 2014 11:25 a.m.
To summarize Modern at the moment: An assortment of U/R or U/R/x Aggro or Combo variants, and G/B or G/B/x Aggro or Combo variants. Generally, the best decks these days play with Izzet or Golgari colors. For example, Azban Pod has long been a thing, Jund and Junk decks running Liliana of the Veil are competitive, even Sultai decks can work; on the other side, UR Delver is playing well right now, Patriot Burn, Temur Scapeshift, UR Storm, and Temur Delver (for Goyfs) are all strong decks. Looking at the last major event, the 2014 World Championship, every single deck in the top 24 fit the mold of Izzet or Golgari based decks. Again, this is largely attributable to Lightning Bolt, Treasure Cruise/Dig Through Time and Delver of Secrets Flip for UR decks, and Tarmogoyf, Abrupt Decay, and Thoughtseize for the GB decks.
This is part of the reason Grixis, Mardu, Esper, etc all have trouble finding a home in modern - they don't have as much synergy as other decks, and don't have access to as many of the best cards in the format.
December 10, 2014 11:49 a.m.
CommanderOfBolas says... #18
I am very confidant that grixis could be a big deal in modern. I think that the only way to do this is to be proactive in your control techniques. Lots of value, lots of 2 for 1s and strong, hard to beat finishers.
December 10, 2014 12:13 p.m.
Not saying it's impossible, just difficult. I suppose a Grixis deck sculpted to beat all these UR Aggro or Scapeshift, Twin, and Storm decks could be great. Grixis does give you access to most of the best answers and removal in the format.
December 10, 2014 12:32 p.m.
CanadianShinobi says... #20
@ vishnarg I'm making an attempt. Probably not tier 1, but Modern is great because so long as you pilot the deck properly and can make the proper adjustments you have a chance. Wasn't it just last month that a treefolk tribal made a top 8?
December 10, 2014 1:16 p.m.
APPLE01DOJ says... #21
I think if u want to play Grixis & Control in modern then 8Rack is that deck. 
& 
give a really strong splash.
Red gives Blightning Rakdos's Return & Rix Maadi, Dungeon Palace
Unfair gives Spellskite, Academy Ruins and a plethora of 
counters to choose from.
I would also advise including 1x Overgrown Tomb or Godless Shrine in the mana set up because some type of Erase or Naturalize is pretty much mandatory on the decks SB for Leyline of Sanctity
December 10, 2014 3:03 p.m.
*JexInfinite says... #23
APPLE01DOJ 8-Rack is really bad against Treasure Cruise, though. Aggro decks make it really hard to win, and Burn is a difficult matchup. It can be pretty decent against control, and you have access to mainboard Shadow of Doubt to screw with Pod in game 1 and piss on everyone's fetchlands.
December 10, 2014 8:17 p.m.
APPLE01DOJ says... #24
Not true and 8rack can afford to run up to a full play set of Bojuka Bog to combat cruise and snappy.
December 10, 2014 9:18 p.m.
JexInfinite says... #25
If you're running more than 4 lands that enter tapped, you will run into mana issues at least somewhat frequently.
December 12, 2014 3:31 a.m.
APPLE01DOJ says... #26
JexInfinite I don't know why u feel the need to correct me with incorrect information based on theory constantly but here is to u! Have fun overcoming Treasure Cruise!!! :)
8Rack has a game plan of discarding their excess lands to Raven's Crime so Dakmor Salvage Lavaclaw Reaches and Bojuka Bog aren't as big of hindrance at they would be to other decks., I don't suggest u run beyond 3 but if Cruise decks are thick in your area 8Rack can run 4 without hiccups, it can actually support 8 copies of the card since Infernal Tutor can grab it Glittering Wish style.
I'd also consider Burn one of the easier match ups with 8Rack. If that match is hard either your deck isn't built right or I'm not sure what your doing.... They dump their hand for u.
December 12, 2014 12:16 p.m.
I've never had many problems with treasure cruise playing 8 rack. Especially not with repeatable liliana and ravens crime.
December 12, 2014 12:35 p.m.
Grixis Cruel Control is awesome in Modern! Like others have said, Grixis-style control decks are more about killing opponents' threats as opposed to preventing them from being effective.
I have been working very hard to get my deck competitive and I have been having a great time winning as the underdog. I do actually play a Cruel Ultimatum, and cast it often. Even if the card doesn't end the game, and it usually does, it demoralizes your opponent a lot.
Black gives us access to great sweepers, discard for the sideboard, and cool multi-colored spells like Terminate and Countersquall. Seriously, using Countersquall on a Lightning Helix is the greatest thing ever.
December 13, 2014 2:31 a.m.
SarcasticMagi says... #30
So, I kinda made a Grixis deck awhile back. It uses Bloodchief Ascension and Mindcrank to infi-mill as a win con. never got much feedback on it. but maybe it's something like what you're looking for? I'm honestly not sure if it could compete as I've never watched how quick the top decks actually play out (save for scapeshift since my friend proxied one)shameless self promotion, vvhttp://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/08-09-14-mindcrank-ascension/
JexInfinite says... #2
It's hard to put my finger on what it is lacking, but there is definitely an empty space.
Jeskai, the most successful control deck, has burn as its thing.
Gifts has a way to search for cards, and has a combo to win on the spot against a lot of decks.
Scapeshift has a lot of stalling, and some acceleration, as well as the ability to Dig for their win condition.
So what is Grixis missing? What does it lack? It should have everything required to be a good deck. It has removal, burn, Cryptic Command and Cruel Ultimatum, along with Batterskull.
December 9, 2014 9:08 p.m.