On April 15 2014 11:18 Whole wrote:
turns out you can Melira pod combo with Atheros

So do y'all think Atheros would be a good 1 of (side or main) in Melira Pod?

I'm not sure that you've read Athreos correctly.

Whole

United States6046 Posts

April 15 2014 03:50 GMT

#10602

this is what a local judge had to say:

Athreos's triggered ability is not a replacement effect, because it's a triggered ability. Persist and Athreos trigger at the same time, so you choose the order. That is, you get Finks back via undying first, or see if your opponent really doesn't want you to have Finks first.

Rules text for persist:

702.78a Persist is a triggered ability. "Persist" means "When this permanent is put into a graveyard from the battlefield, if it had no -1/-1 counters on it, return it to the battlefield under its owner's control with a -1/-1 counter on it.

Risen

United States7927 Posts

April 15 2014 04:01 GMT

#10603

Which means there is no real choice and he's therefor not really doing anything, right?

"I'm going to place my triggers so you choose whether athreos's ability goes off first."

Umm... ok well you clearly have me dead with melira combo so I'm sending him back to your hand or you don't have me dead to the combo and I'm going to let it back onto the board.

"I'm going to place my triggers so persist goes off before athreos's ability."

Umm... ok well he's back on the field already and I don't get a choice now.

With athreos on the field you aren't giving your opponent a choice at anything. You're simply giving yourself the opportunity to throw.

Shotcoder

United States2316 Posts

April 15 2014 04:02 GMT

#10604

Edit: I'm a dumbass

Risen

United States7927 Posts

April 15 2014 04:08 GMT

#10605

So it's even worse than I thought? O_0 Like... it says when it dies which in magic speak means when it goes to the graveyard, right? Which means you choose the order of persist/god right?

caelym

United States6421 Posts

April 15 2014 04:18 GMT

#10606

Athreos is insane in pod... Basically when you want persist to happen, you just stack athreos first. For everything else, you get back creatures to replenish the chain or get a free lava spike. This is such ridiculous value, holy shit.

Risen

United States7927 Posts

April 15 2014 04:20 GMT

#10607

I suppose I'm only thinking in terms of the combo and persist creatures. Those that don't have persist become much better with that on board I guess

Edit: The deep and interesting things that occur in TL mtg skype chat http://i.imgur.com/Ag3Njao.png

MoonBear

Straight outta Johto18973 Posts

April 15 2014 04:51 GMT

#10608

Athreos is a lot of value for Pod and a 1-of seems correct. The main thing I think of though is that hitting devotion is going to be a bit hard in Pod and you want to turn Athreos on in order to sac him if you want to get the infinite combo going. I guess it just makes things like Scavenging Ooze and Rest In Peace even more important? And maybe more people will be packing stuff like Deglamer in their sideboards which means incidental Boggles hate.

I can see you wanting to board him out in a several of matchups though. Against an aggro deck like Affinity or Zoo you'd rather have an actual body that doesn't need Devotion and the aggro deck won't care about the 3 life most of the time (and possibly against some mid-range decks too?). It dodges Path before Devotion turns it into a creature which is nice I guess. Still it does irritate me even more that GW Ajani is unplayable. Also, I want Terminus to be a thing in Modern.

Whole

United States6046 Posts

April 15 2014 04:54 GMT

#10609

I think the applications outside of the combo are pretty awesome considering most Melira Pod games, from my understanding, aren't won by comboing. When you're trying to become the beatdown, Poding a Birds or a Hierarch then bolting them seems like pretty good value...and if they bring it to your hand, cool more things to Pod. And the scenarios where this becomes a creature aren't too difficult to imagine either. 1 Finks and 1 Redcap only requires one more devotion to turn Atheros on.

I think it's at least worth a shot.

Also, could I get into the TL skype chat?

caelym

United States6421 Posts

April 15 2014 04:58 GMT

#10610

Athreos improves Pod's midrange and control matchup even more. I feel it's almost like Anger of the Gods or bust now.

MoonBear

Straight outta Johto18973 Posts

April 15 2014 05:10 GMT

#10611

Clearly the solution is to play Storm.

Risen

United States7927 Posts

April 15 2014 05:12 GMT

#10612

Edit: Useless advice is useless. Check your PMs Whole. Rofl

hunts

United States2113 Posts

April 15 2014 05:38 GMT

#10613

Curious as to your opinions on this decklist, it's a white devotion with splash of blue, for standard. Goal is to be a midrange deck centred around white devotion, nykthos to help play the cards like elspeth, and of course elspeth/detention sphere to help fight vs bigger midrange creatures, spear works really well with all the possible token generation, and the sphinx's revelation to give more late game viability. I think the sphinx's revelation might be out of place though, it's too mana intensive and costs a turn.

2 Brave the Elements
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Boros Reckoner
4 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
2 Azorius Guildgate
4 Detention Sphere
4 Soldier of the Pantheon
10 Plains
2 Brave the Elements
4 Precinct Captain
2 Sphinx's Revelation
4 Temple of Enlightenment
2 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
2 Ephara, God of the Polis
3 Heliod, God of the Sun
4 Brimaz, King of Oreskos
3 Spear of Heliod

Whole

United States6046 Posts

April 15 2014 06:00 GMT

#10614

Every improvement I would suggest to this deck just moves it to U/W control. This deck is just too unfocused. You run Spear and Brave with only 16 creatures (as opposed to my Brave the Elements deck with 28). That's just not optimal. The Elspeth interaction with those two cards isn't there. The reason Elspeth is a win con is because she doesn't need help. Spear and Brave are just redundant in Elspeth's case. Also, Heliod is unlikely to have a meaningful impact because by the time you can spend 4 mana for a 2/1, the game is likely decided.

Basically you need to focus your deck. Do you want to be control or aggro? Blue white isn't a midrange color in this standard because you have a void at 4-5 mana. Compared to R/G monsters where all of their power is in 4-5 drops.

MCMcEmcee

United States1609 Posts

April 15 2014 06:23 GMT

#10615

Having an active Birthing Pod is already a winning position, Athreos doesn't really seem to improve the non-Pod positions very much. I honestly can't think of a time when I'd want to draw an Athreos without a Pod in play, and there aren't many positions where I'd want to Pod into Athreos instead of progressing my chain towards either a combo kill or an immediate value play.

I think Athreos is quite good but I'm not convinced Pod is the right home.

re: UW
Revelation is probably not where you want to be. I would recommend looking at the Esper humans/gods/"midrange" deck (ex. Mihara's deck at the Super Sunday Series event) or Josh Silvestri's articles on WW splash blue on CFB as a starting point.

mr_tolkien

France8631 Posts

April 15 2014 08:56 GMT

#10616

On April 15 2014 15:23 MCMcEmcee wrote:
Having an active Birthing Pod is already a winning position, Athreos doesn't really seem to improve the non-Pod positions very much. I honestly can't think of a time when I'd want to draw an Athreos without a Pod in play, and there aren't many positions where I'd want to Pod into Athreos instead of progressing my chain towards either a combo kill or an immediate value play.

I think Athreos is quite good but I'm not convinced Pod is the right home.

re: UW
Revelation is probably not where you want to be. I would recommend looking at the Esper humans/gods/"midrange" deck (ex. Mihara's deck at the Super Sunday Series event) or Josh Silvestri's articles on WW splash blue on CFB as a starting point.

He would be good if he could be turned on with Finks + Redcap or stg like that. If he's never active he's pretty over-costed. I don't think he has a place in pod.

mr_tolkien

France8631 Posts

April 15 2014 21:07 GMT

#10617

Is the game down for everybody ?

Whole

United States6046 Posts

April 15 2014 21:11 GMT

#10618

yep. just as i was about to win

MCMcEmcee

United States1609 Posts

April 16 2014 02:28 GMT

#10619

Also wouldn't mind checking out the Skype chat if that's ok~

Split the finals for 2HG sealed at SCG Dallas this past weekend lol. Our pool was mediocre but our opponents managed to catastrophically misplay every round. Skill game.