I like Agent a lot. This is the kind of angle of disruption that I like. Being Human and having flash makes Cavern an extra powerfull counterspell, euh, land..

Let me ask the question about Deafening Silence differently. I think the true value of the card lies in the mulligans it prevents. Obviously we do not need the card when we can open with a Cavern+Mox into something relevant.

I do understand that in the lists with Champion of the Perish & Noble and the artifact acceleration, there are is more chance to hit a turn 1 play and play a turn 2 Thalia, Prelate or Kambal. Once upon a time also helps in this regard.

So I believe the problem of being able to get a play on turn 1 (do not really want land pass, this deck really wants to develop its board) is kinda fine. But will the turn 1 play be relevant to the meta? Especially on the draw and facing decks that can consistently take a win on their turn 2 or with time walk on turn 3.

I think it is never ever wrong to play 2 Silence main deck. You do not need to play 2 more in the SB if you don't want this, but having those 2 slots in the main will improve your opening hands and in general you will have more slots dedicated to slowing down decks that rely heavily on spells to make progress and artifact mana to improve their mana base. If you don't want this main deck and also refuse to play 2 or more in SB, then you better show me a list that consistently plays out relevant anti-blue cards on turn 1.

Silence can act as a quasi 'Veil of Summer' when opponent plays an Oath and you flash in Priest or use Force of Vigor. It can be mana denial because they can't drop more than 1 mox at a time. And it is spell denial as well. The effect is a truly powerful one. I don't believe this is a matter of evaluating the card of being bad. I also don't think this is something you didn't miss or did miss. I think this is more of a matter of having enough reliable mana sources to cast this each time it is in your opening hand. The Cavern mana bases without fetchlands might struggle with this more than they would like to admit

Facing Oko is not great magic I agree, and you can't have infinite decays. Did you bring in the Pyroblasts? Decays AND Pyroblast should destroy Oath these days. On paper it looks like you have a very strong match up against Oath. But sometimes their advantage of card draw/deck manipulation and a Oko that isn't answered quickly, could result in ; them stealing a game.

There is plenty of Oath and Dredge in the mtgo metagame. Very important to have Priest around against Dredge AND Hogaak. You don't really care about the Hogaak either, there are other cards that can deal with it, the problem is that you need something to stop bloodghast & vengevine in the mid game and just to prevent too much trash coming into play. Tinker + Creature is still a play that is being used. I think 2 copies of Priest main deck and 2 copies in sideboard is a good split. Another important aspect is that Priest works really well with Palace Jailer.

It is the combination of having some amount of Priest/Jailer/Karakas that gives you a reasonable chance to find an out when it matters. Just running 1 Jailer without the other cards or just running 1 Karakas without the others is not good.

My suggestion would be to find room for Karakas and Containment Priest. Also Palace Jailer as a one off in main deck.

While it is very good for consistency and to maximize the potential synergies, you do need some amount of outs versus resolved threats.

Deafening Silence in general is a strong card that enables you to keep hands with turn 2 Thalia or turn 2 Dark Confidant but no other plays on turn 1. It is the ultimate turn 1 play if you did not get a mox or a Noble.

Keep up the good work

Hi Grisel

Could you provide us with the links of those VSL matches?

Thanks
Guli

The Noble/Dark Confidant/Thalia/Mayor core creature base for Humans designed 5-6 years ago (A_Duck and myself worked months on this) has been utterly destroyed by printings like Walking Ballista/Wrenn/Oko and more. You get punished so hard by running the 'normal' stuff.

Some answers I can think of are:
They print an efficient card that hexproofs our investments (our creature base) is to play more powered lists yourself that generate more resource than they can handle. A good example is

The problem is that this card is not efficient , at 4 converted mana cost it is a good card, but in order to be reliable as a tactic to support our strategy of 'protect the investment' it has to be cheaper. Cheaper with a price maybe but it has to be able to get in there when it matters. Similarly how infect tries to protect their dudes.

Chubbyrain has illustrated that a list with Humans and lords can get the job done: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/3167642#online

I do not know what the match ups where, and I am especially interested in the match up vs Wrenn/Drs. It seems that his list tries to put a lot of boots on the table and win by force and relatively quickly. Having access to Humans that can grow big but do not cost 3 mana (like Knight) was most likely what made life hard on all the decks that try to get rid of all your stuff. Very interesting list.

My opinion is that this is not just about Wrenn but this is about trying to beat a strategy that is simply put, superior to what you are trying to do. Even with your best draw, you will still be at a disadvantage. A couple of cards will not solve this. Wrenn/DRS/Waste combined with multiple draw / card selection and removal is just the kind of tempo play that beats 'fair' aggro control decks.

The reason for this is simple, your investment is based on creatures, and almost exclusively. The cards they run naturally answer creatures and more.

Thankfully not all the Xerox iterations are on DRS/Wasteland/Wrenn package. In my opinion, this package should actually be played by us. And there is actually a deck that Recklessmbermage is covering in the Junk bear thread that does exactly this. I still don't understand why you are not trying that out Noah. Just because some version of Xerox runs these cards, does not mean they 'own' it and they are the only ones that can run it. It does not make DRS/Wrenn a blue thing.

Combination of Wastelands/Leyline/DRS and Daze/Fluster/Force of Will usually gets you there. The threat becomes Hollow One, but you should have Dack / Grudge / Tarm for that. I run 4 Leyline and 2 Ravenous Trap. Trap is actually very good with Wasteland too.

Hi Joe

Thanks for the read. I am super happy that you put me in The Spice Corner with the 4C Baazar Humans. I actually was 3-0 things where going really great. I brew the thing together a day before, so I am sure someone else can improve on it. Expect a decent amount of turn 2 / turn 3 finishers with this deck and sometimes you even get turn 1. It all depends if you see the lotus or mana crypt early on, and preferably with Cavern of Souls. Also there is obviously a learning curve, I probably made a lot of mistakes.

What I learned: You want to hit that 3 mana + Bazaar as soon as possible. Herald is always around the corner. Also don't forget you can put Herald on stack and then activate Bazaar in response (even if there are no cards left in your hand). This might sometimes be your only play to win on the spot.

Guli