It started as a joke.
Someone was in my stream and I was talking about trying to get to Vegas for the GP.
“I’ll give you 400.00 if you make this a 24 hour stream, starting right now. You have 15 seconds to decide.”
I stopped immediately. I took a quick inventory of the things I had to do the next day, and had to unfortunately decline. I then thought about how much preparation I would have to do to accomplish something like that; clear the schedule, get the wife to agree to it, sleep a lot before hand, and ultimately plan out the stream details. I kind of just put it out of reach for me. The next morning over coffee, I brought it up to my lovely wife, and she was shockingly on board. I took that and ran with it, putting together all of the necessary details to fire off what I wanted to be one of the best full day streams in MTG history. I told my stream about it on the Thursday night before, and they all agreed that I should run a 25 hour stream on the Sunday of Valentine’s Day weekend. One more hour than the norm, and another way to set it apart. I poured over the daily event schedule, and determined that I could pretty easily play in Standard and Modern Dailies for almost all of the stream, with two windows which I would have to fill with some limited play.
Modern was covered. I knew what I would be playing for those events. If you have been following my content for any amount of time in the last year and a half, it should come as no surprise that TeamGeist would be riding high for these events. SCG Baltimore is this coming weekend, so I was looking forward to the testing. Here was the deck I had for reference:
#TEAMGEIST by Team Geist
[deck]
[Lands]
2 Arid Mesa
4 Celestial Colonnade
3 Flooded Strand
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Godless Shrine
1 Hallowed Fountain
2 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
1 Sacred Foundry
3 Scalding Tarn
2 Steam Vents
1 Sulfur Falls
1 Watery Grave
[/Lands]
[Spells]
1 Batterskull
2 Electrolyze
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Lightning Helix
4 Path to Exile
4 Remand
1 Valorous Stance
[/Spells]
[Creatures]
4 Geist of Saint Traft
3 Restoration Angel
4 Snapcaster Mage
1 Thundermaw Hellkite
3 Vendilion Clique
[/Creatures]
[Sideboard]
1 Celestial Purge
2 Counterflux
2 Engineered Explosives
3 Lingering Souls
1 Negate
1 Sphinx’s Revelation
3 Valorous Stance
2 Wear // Tear
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]
For a full breakdown of the deck and how to play it, check out my last article.
Modern as a format has been changing a lot since the Pro Tour. Burn is everywhere on MTGO right now, and you need to be prepared for it. Making your way to the top of the daily events also would demand that you face at least one player wielding the mighty Abzan Midrange deck, but it’s very possible that you play 2 to 3 Burn opponents on the way to the top also. I played against Burn in easily 50% of all of my Modern matches throughout the stream, and was very frustrated by it towards the end of the night. So much so in fact, that I have actually started to test out some copies of Kor Firewalker in the sideboard. My matches against Burn are undefeated since adding these happy little people to the 75, so if I expect Baltimore to be similar to the MTGO meta, then you can be sure I’ll have them with me.
Standard on the other hand, was a bit of a mystery for me. I needed to find a deck that I would be able to be successful with, and enjoy playing for multiple hours over the evening. In-game decisions being made simpler would be very attractive also. The last time I played Standard was with the 4 Color Delve list, but I think that the meta has shifted a bit too aggressively for the deck to be optimal in its current configuration. This point was clearly showcased during my stream with KYT posted here below in case you were interested in the deck.
I was pouring through coverage of the GP and the SCG events which were happening that weekend, and narrowed it down to a couple of lists; Chromanti-Flayer, Jeskai Tokens, and an outside third options was GR Devotion, as Devotion in general was doing very well at both tournaments that weekend. I asked Canadian turned Floridian John Cuvelier about the Chromanti-Flayer list, as Frank Lepore touted him as the source for the list. Frank had been finding great success online with the deck, which was appealing, but also had appeal as a build your own Akroma for 2 mana on turn 3 type deck. John had some nice things to say about the deck, but when I asked him about the GR Devotion deck which I knew was very popular in the Florida PTQ scene specifically, I knew that I should be playing it. He shipped me a deck list which he had been testing which was very close to the one which Tannon Grace did well with at the SCG that Robert Berni ended up winning.
Here is the list:
GR FLORIDA DEVOTION By John Cuvelier
[deck]
[Lands]
7 Forest
1 Mana Confluence
1 Mountain
4 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
2 Rugged Highlands
4 Temple of Abandon
1 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
[/Lands]
[Spells]
2 Crater’s Claws
3 Xenagos, the Reveler
[/Spells]
[Creatures]
2 Arbor Colossus
4 Courser of Kruphix
4 Elvish Mystic
3 Genesis Hydra
4 Polukranos, World Eater
4 Rattleclaw Mystic
3 Shaman of the Great Hunt
3 Voyaging Satyr
4 Whisperwood Elemental
[/Creatures]
[Sideboard]
2 Arc Lightning
2 Briber’s Purse
2 Hunt the Hunter
2 Nissa, Worldwaker
2 Nylea’s Disciple
2 Outpost Siege
1 Setessan Tactics
2 Wild Slash
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]
I put up a significant winning percentage with this deck, making 3-1 or better in every event I played it in. The deck was very powerful when the draws came together, and with the nice mix of accelerants and threats, that happened pretty regularly. I have always enjoyed playing decks in which Xenagos, The Reveler is a good card, and with most people that weekend leaving their Mantis Riders at home, it was sure to be a good weekend for this list. The true power behind this deck however is unequivocally the addition of Whisperwood Elemental. The traditional weakness of the Devotion strategies is the presence of board sweepers like End Hostilities and the recently printed Crux of Fate. Devotion only works with a lot of creatures on the table, and Whisperwood Elemental protects your board state from those effects nicely. There is another innate issue with Devotion strategies, and that is traditionally an inability to draw cards or to reload after running out of gas. Thankfully, this list has a few tools to fight against that too. Whisperwood manifests a card off the top of your deck every turn, adding to your board state. With fetchlands and Courser of Kruphix, you can often use this ability to clear useless lands into 2/2 beaters/blockers, or also upgrade late game mana accelerants into reasonable threats. Shaman Of The Great Hunt also gives your wide board of threats some good ways to become more powerful, as well as provides you a way to use the massive amounts of mana which the list can generate to draw an impressive amount of cards at instant speed.
I would definitely suggest this deck to anyone playing in a Standard tournament, and I will definitely have this updated list with me in case I need it on Sunday in Baltimore. Come on out and say hi if you are in the area! I would love to meet all of you and say thanks for your support for the stream. Here is the link to my Twitch profile, and I have made highlights of all of the 25 hour stream. Some of it is muted since the music in the background causes that.
A HUGE thank you to all of you that helped out with and supported the 25 hour stream. I could not have done this without all of you. Special thanks to all of my guests online, and of course to Tyler and Jacky who stopped by to make sure I kept awake. I had a TON of fun during the stream, even if the flood afterwards was terrible. I would definitely do it again!! (with the wife’s permission of course…)
See you all soon!
@MrScottyMac
twitch.tv/mrscottymac