Comments on: Trevor Holmes Plays MTGO Ep. 6: Grixis Delver!

By: Nathan Robinson

Nathan Robinson — Sat, 07 Nov 2015 04:19:49 +0000

After watching the deck tech, (and as someone whos had a good deal of recent success with grixis delver lately) i think many of the changes you made from stock grixis lists are sub optimal, and my theory is that your were trying to make the deck more like grixis midrange/ control because that is what you are more comfortable with. by increasing your threat density and land count, you dropped almost 5% on delver flipping, which is huge for delvers role in this matchup. listening to you talk about the deck, i also think you put to much stress on protecting delver in general. in my opinion, delver is not there to be the namesake, game winning card of this deck, like it is in legacy. youve lost to much. the other guy still has access to solid 1 mana removal, but you no longer have daze and FoW to protect against those tempo plays. delver is more of a role player in modern because of how he forces your opponent to play. he eats the removal spells and forces them into tapping out early in order to handle him, which allows you to slam a delve threat. tasigur and gurmag angler are by far the most powerful threats you run. in my experience, 4/5 times you win the game it will be on the back of those cards, and their recursion through kolaghans command. once you stop worrying about delver and young pyromancer and start focusing on playing the game around deploying your delve threats as quickly and safely as possible, i think the logical changes in the decklist will lead to a better performing build.

By: Nathan Robinson

Nathan Robinson — Sat, 07 Nov 2015 04:06:57 +0000

In reply to Tyrannon. in my experiences with the deck, Jace is sub optimal in delver because its is not proactive enough, and does not synergize well with the cheap counterspells you run to stay ahead. now, jace is extremely good, and honestly that likely means delver is not the best place to be right now as grixis, and instead a more grindy midrange deck may be ideal.

By: phil.

phil. — Tue, 03 Nov 2015 15:48:51 +0000

love you articles/videos. can you please post the decklist in the text of the article in the future? It’s nice for a number reasons:
• let’s readers look at the list if you click on the article at work or on their phone (i.e. in situation where one needs to watch the video later)
• let’s readers quickly scan the list to see if they want to watch the video
• let’s readers build/test/tweek the list themselves much easier

thanks again for all the great content!

By: Paulo Azevedo

Paulo Azevedo — Tue, 03 Nov 2015 11:09:50 +0000

As a Grixis Control play, I love playing vs Grixis Delver. I feel it’s the same deck but just slightly more aggro, which pretty much fits in the definition of a good match up for the slightly slower deck. Definitely had some good experiences in the match up so far.

By: Gero

Gero — Tue, 03 Nov 2015 07:37:38 +0000

No basic mountain, 2 basic swamps, only one Kommand, and going with a heavier creature build all seem suboptimal to me. Bring back your beaters, especially in conjunction with snap, helps push through in the late game. I like 2 Kommand, 13 creature, 3 island 1 mountain 1 swamp for basics. I think at least 1 dispel should be in the main, since it stops so many good spells and protects your creatures so well. There’s very little sorcery-speed spot removal at the moment. Even though young pyromancer is a great card, I think you could afford to shave that to get the spell count higher for delver.

By: DustyNomad

DustyNomad — Tue, 03 Nov 2015 06:30:30 +0000

Please play affinity next.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 03 Nov 2015 00:26:58 +0000

Some of the reasons I stopped playing Grixis Delver was based on the same issues you touch on; Delver doesn’t flip consistently and more often than not the game grinds on. Games without delver are very different from games with delver and some cards simply become dead when that happens. Giving up the tempo cards and converting it into a midrange control fits that sort of game plan much better.

I’ve gone over to Temur Delver greatly inspired by the list from Ashtonkutcher and been very happy since. If you ever decide to do a followup on the delver archetype, I’d suggest taking Temur Delver for a spin.

By: Tyrannon

Tyrannon — Mon, 02 Nov 2015 23:49:50 +0000

I feel you went a bit creatureheavy in this deck. But i have another suggestion.

Isn’t there a way to abuse Delver the way the FlipJayce is abuse in Standard right now? I mean, playing a Standarddeck, that plans on bringing back the Delver over and over again. That way you could play less creatures and more Spells. Ojutais Command and Delver just look awesome on Paper.

By: Marc-André Cayer

Marc-André Cayer — Mon, 02 Nov 2015 19:58:58 +0000

I’d love to see you try the new UW Titan Control deck, seems a lot fun to play.