Modern

Abzan Decklist: Notes on Developing a Sideboard

Knowledge of your meta is what will allow you to build your sideboard. Sideboards are too often thrown together at the last minute. Sure, [card]Thragtusk[/card] gains five life and is a great card, but is that where we want to be for our 5-drop in the board? Perhaps we’re playing white and Sigarda would be of greater use. We’ll never know, though, unless we understand the meta of the event we intend to play.

When developing a sideboard we should be asking “can we do better?” for all of our choices. There should never be an instance where our reasoning for playing a single card is hazy or narrow. If you don’t understand why a card is there and have no time to figure it out, replace it. Our sideboard can be our savior when built correctly and our downfall when built incorrectly. To emphasize this, I will walk you through my Abzan sideboard during the recent Face to Face Games Toronto Sunday Showdown and what my goal was for each of the cards. I will also discuss instances where they were helpful and where they fell short.

Taking a look at the deck:

[deck]
[Lands]
1 Forest
1 Gavony Township
1 Godless Shrine
3 Marsh Flats
2 Overgrown Tomb
1 Plains
1 Shambling Vent
2 Swamp
1 Tectonic Edge
1 Temple Garden
1 Treetop Village
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Vault of the Archangel
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Windswept Heath
1 Woodland Cemetery
[/Lands]
[Spells]
4 Abrupt Decay
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Liliana of the Veil
4 Lingering Souls
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Murderous Cut
3 Path to Exile
1 Slaughter Pact
3 Thoughtseize
[/Spells]
[Creatures]
2 Scavenging Ooze
4 Siege Rhino
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
[/Creatures]
[Sideboard]
1 Blood Baron of Vizkopa
1 Choke
1 Damnation
1 Duress
1 Elspeth, Sun’s Champion
4 Fulminator Mage
1 Garruk Relentless
2 Kitchen Finks
1 Obstinate Baloth
2 Zealous Persecution
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]


Why I chose the sideboard that I did:

1 [card]Choke[/card]: Choke and [card]Blood Moon[/card] are just two Eighth Edition cards that I cannot get enough of. Limiting opponents’ resources by turning off their mana lets us win the games that go long, as our decisions have less of an overall impact than theirs. While this card is great on turn three or slightly later, it is not a card we need off the top late in the game. One is included and it could be considered a fun-of. I tend to bring this in against any heavy island-based deck that is looking to play a long game with me.

4 [card]Fulminator Mage[/card]: In a format where big mana is a goal of multiple decks we need a way to meaningfully interact with them. Discard spells help, but these match-ups ultimately hinge on our ability to destroy problem lands. I included four [card]Fulminator Mage[/card]s this weekend as Tron and Amulet Bloom are fairly popular in the local meta. Tron isn’t a good match-up, but it was my hope to make it better by having these four in the board. Sadly, I only ran into one Bloom player and I never drew a [card]Fulminator Mage[/card]. I did win that match-up, but it was due to awkward draws for the opponent and a lucky game one.

2 [card]Zealous Persecution[/card]:
Affinity, how I love thee. Persecution is a perfect way to answer many of Affinity’s creatures at a low cost. Alternatively, some number can be brought into the mirror in order to help us win the 4/5 fight or save our [card]Lingering Souls[/card] while theirs depart. I only brought it in once on Sunday. It was in my round 2 match against Elves and allowed me to erase a few mana dorks. I wouldn’t say it won me the match in that instance, but it acted as a two-for one and that’s fine by me.

1 [card]Obstinate Baloth[/card]:
While now less popular, Burn once ruled the day in the local meta and this hefty life-gaining green beater is a nod to that period in time. While I didn’t see Burn all day, I did bring him in against my two Jund opponents in lieu of hand disruption. I figured maybe I could get lucky with a Liliana up-tick but instead settled for playing a 4/4 that was difficult to answer.

2 [card]Kitchen Finks[/card]:
They’re a nice way to keep the life coming in the aggressive match-ups. They’re also great in the mirror as they often create two-for-one situations that favor us. It’s another creature that I can bring in when I want to get rid of the hand disruption and become more aggressive or just gain a little extra life. I used to run them in the main but a 3/2 that gains two life is not as good as I wanted it to be in the overall meta so they were relegated to the board for select match-ups. At the Showdown they came in against both my Jund opponents and traded with their Finks in a kitchen brawl.

1 [card]Damnation[/card]: Sometimes we just need to reset. This is our panic button for the swarm decks. Sadly, I did not see it in my round 6 win-and-in against Merfolk.

1 [card]Duress[/card]: If seven main deck discard spells plus [card]Liliana of the Veil[/card] just isn’t enough it’s time to add in a [card]Duress[/card]. I brought this in against Amulet and U/W/R, though I would also bring it in against Tron as it allows us to deal with the threats in their hand that our [card]Inquisition[/card]s just can’t reach. In the U/W/R match-up our post board games went extremely long. Having access to multiple discard spells that cleared the countermagic out of my opponent’s hand while allowing me to see exactly what was going on let me resolve the spells I needed to win. Why not another [card]Thoughtseize[/card], though? I’ve thought about this, and what it comes down to is that [card]Duress[/card] is more flexible. It can come in against Burn when I am shaving [card]Thoughtseize[/card]s and I will never have to worry about taking two just to see two lands sitting there.

1 [card]Blood Baron of Vizkopa[/card]:
We might be playing a fair deck, but in the mirror we could use an edge. Blood Baron was brought in vs the Jund decks to great effect. He eventually bit two [card]Pia and Kiran Nalaar[/card] bullets in round 4 but at that point the game had gone completely downhill. In round 5 it took a [card]Supreme Verdict[/card] to wipe him away. Traditionally this slot has been an Obzedat, Blood Baron, or [card]Batterskull[/card]. I’ve tried all three and given the heavy presence of black removal in the local meta I am sticking by my second favorite vampire. My favorite, of course, is [card]Vampire Nighthawk[/card]. If it wasn’t for Lighting Bolt, I’d play him.

1 [card]Elspeth, Sun’s Champion[/card]: After talking with a local Abzan aficionado I came to the conclusion that, like Blood Baron, Elspeth was a way to quickly overpower other G/B/X or fair decks. I wish I could say that I was impressed with this card, but in the two instances I drew it, a second [card]Damnation[/card] would have been better. In one game, I had 5 lands and was staring at a school of merfolk. In the other, it was a board of creatures with power below 4. How I wished it had been our panic button and not a six mana card! If I started playing Nobles or some sort of mana accelerant I would return to Elspeth, but after her lack-luster performance I’ve swapped her out for another sweeper.

1 [card]Garruk Relentless[/card]: All-star. All day I played against other fair decks, and having the ability curve from discard, goyf, or removal into [card]Lingering Souls[/card] followed by [card]Garruk Relentless[/card] was fantastic. The only trick was getting him to stay on board after flipping. He did that, though, in a couple of matches and the pack of deathtouch wolves he began producing overpowered both my round one and two opponents. It was especially interesting to attack then use his minus one on a token to get out another Rhino. If it wasn’t for the various combo decks currently in the meta that do not care about Garruk I would play at least one in the main. Try him out. You won’t be sorry.

Conclusion:
This sideboard needs a lot of work. As Fournier noted to me, we have too many beatsticks. While you might have great ideas on your own, bouncing them off fellow players is a great way to solidify your choices. Just remember to keep asking “Can we do better?”.

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