I think the main draws to RG for Eldrazi decks are Bolt, Tarfire, Tarmogoyf, and Traverse. Over half of those cost one mana, so you can’t really accelerate into Chalice. Guide is just accelerating like a dork, then, but only once. Having a dork on the board just makes you so much faster over the course of a game that I think Hierarchs are better in this kind of build than Guide. Not to mention Hierarch is frequently the only creature opponents will want to spend early Bolts on, meaning they help achieve delirium and grow Goyf to reasonable for turn two if they do die. Guide offers none of those synergies.

Yea I remember that, but curious if it would work in a RG shell, instead of a colorless one. I assume it would since the general strategy is the same.

Sure have. Check out my ritual-based Moon and Eldrazi decks.

The Colorless Eldrazi deck from last season is actually a great example of how much more powerful tempo is in this format than card advantage. That deck would regularly mulligan down to 4 or 5 and be throwing Simian Guides around to impact the board more effectively early on.

While it can be underwhelming to draw lands off Oath, in the early-mid game that’s usually what I’m looking for with the card. I didn’t count how often I resolved it with this deck, but out of about 50 games last week, I completely whiffed with Oath twice. Not sure if my experience lines up with the exact math on the card, but those are good enough odds for me to keep running it. Keep in mind that Oath has a bunch of other functions in this deck, including helping with delirium affinity and enabling Liliana of the Veil.

Sure, but since we’re in those cards anyway, the benefits are just huge.

It does seem to fit the criteria of “unplayable on [its] own and need a bunch of great cards to work”. Without delirium/Goyf, it’s just Shock and is completely unplayable.

No, since dealing two damage to a creature or player for one mana at instant speed in Modern is already playable. Even the 60-good-cards posterboy Jund has been known to sleeve up Seal of Fire and Tarfire. Same can’t be said for Boon Satyr.

The point is not TTB Emrakul, you want to cast it if the game goes long. You have more than enough mana to hardcast it and generally get the game. It’s the perfect late game draw. You could TTB it to finish someone but it’s not the goal of the deck. You can win by TTB primeval titan easily, but if something is going wrong, it’s still nice “alternate” win.

and you don’t consider tarfire cute?

Who are you and what have you done with Jordan?

Nope, you got it 8)

Hey, when it works it works. I just don’t love creatures like Boon Satyr that are unplayable on their own and need a bunch of great cards to work. Goyf and Stubborn are already good on their own, so I’d rather fill out the rest of a skeleton with other strong cards than dip into extra synergy. Decks like Jund make sure anything too cute never gets off the ground.

I’ve had ok results with boon satyrs in goyf w stubborn denial decks. Sometimes you can bestow a dork or token eot to force removal, other times you can flash and protect w denial, other times they kill it and feed the goyf an enchant. And sometimes they just don’t have it and you get to clock them down with four dmg swings

It is my imagination, or is the answer to “How do I build around Traverse?” turning out to be “Play red”?

I don’t get the point of TTB’ing the new Emrakul, other than she guarantees you 13 damage. Is that usually enough? It seems a lot better to cast her and plus off the trigger.

I agree, Traverse turns out even sweeter than I initially thought every time I build a deck with it. It’s rapidly becoming my favorite card to build around (after Goyf, but the two happen to be best buds anyway!). Nameless pumping creatures is pretty interesting, but I still think it’s leagues worse than Tarfire. Boon, Fleshbag, Sculler, Capsule, and Shriekmaw seem unplayable to me as Traverse enablers – just not efficient enough. As for Looting, I don’t think Traverse is a card you want to play on turn two unless you’re looking for Eldrazi Temple, so probably better to stick with Thought Scour and aim for a longer game. Good luck brewing!