[MCD] Mass Bounce Spells

[TheGildedGoose]

So, I'm tinkering with my Nicol Bolas list and every time I do so I see I'm running both Evacuation and Aetherspouts, which feels like a grievous error. They perform slightly different roles, but I tend to prefer Aetherspouts because it tucks/lapses which is relevant when your commander makes people discard cards. Of course, Evacuation hits all creatures, which is nice, but at that point the instant speed feels less relevant if I'm using it as a board wipe. There's also the fact that it only hits creatures. I think I want to run something a bit more all-encompassing.

I've been eyeballing Devastation Tide, as 5 mana is a decent rate for everything to be returned and the Miracle is delicious gravy. With two topdeck tutors, it's also a life saver in a pinch. Coastal Breach is also attractive since it costs only 4mv early in the game when everyone is still playing, and later in the game when your mana is well-developed you don't mind paying the higher costs, especially if you're using the rocks you'll return to pay for it anyway. Finally, the spiciest option is Flood of Tears. Of course, 6mv puts it on the high end of the cost spectrum, but being able to place either Nicol Bolas, the Ravager or Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God into play after getting rid of everything else seems pretty okay. Worst case scenario, you get a free mana rock out of it, which defrays the cost a little bit.

Besides Cyclonic Rift, what are your favorite mass bounce spells in the format?

[Serenade]

I still throw Kederekt Leviathan into decks every now and then. Two uses and a body is good. Or you can discard it away, and people forget about him in the bin.

If I have a deck I expect to use for singles, I'll include River's Rebuke.

My Charix deck understably uses Whelming Wave and Engulf the Shore.

I need to test Flood of Tears and Consuming Tide. The latter one feeeels like it will incur less salt…but I still don't like giving my opponents a choice.

[folding_music]

I like the rescue element of these mass bounce spells and haven't ever wanted to play Aetherspouts or other mass-tuck things. would sooner play Waterspout Elemental <3 Devastation Tide looks fantastic, kinda wanna grab for a possible deck with either Korlessa, Scale Singer or Imoti, Celebrant of Bounty! Wash Out is my eternal fave for costing four and being so programmable

(I love Evacuation in decks packed full of little comes-into-play guys... at one point I had a Gadwick EDH deck going where you just spent the game picking up yr own wizards repeatedly. but as that deck got more and more solipsistic I stopped wiping the board and started playing hyperfocused stuff like Mark of Eviction and using Gadwick himself paired with stuff like Merfolk Trickster to flood out an opponent's chances of winning via creatures, if it got rolling.)

[pokken]

Evacuation is pretty great with archaeomancer effects. So that's something to consider.

I tend to not like sorcery speed mass bounce preferring more permanent answers. I'll run a flood of tears now and then I'm am omniscience deck so I could see that being ok. The tough part really is that you struggle to take advantage of the tempo gain if you do mass bounces at sorcery speed. Someone usually is eating less tempo loss than you are for paying 6 for something.

In grixis colors it's tough to deal with noncreature permanents ahem permanently so I tend to rely on letting as many go as I can and countering the ones that beat me, and playing devastation tide only if I can reliably set up miracles. Top, scroll rack, brainstorm, etc.

Usually I favor another method of finding rift (e.g muddle)

[TheGildedGoose]

Evacuation is pretty great with archaeomancer effects. So that's something to consider.

I tend to not like sorcery speed mass bounce preferring more permanent answers. I'll run a flood of tears now and then I'm am omniscience deck so I could see that being ok.

In grixis colors it's tough to deal with noncreature permanents ahem permanently so I tend to rely on letting as many go as I can and countering the ones that beat me, and playing devastation tide only if I can reliably set up miracles. Top, scroll rack, brainstorm, etc.

Yeah, for sure, learning what and what not to counter are the biggest hurdles facing blue players in the format. The problem is when you go up against, say, enchantress or artifact decks where a critical density of them makes a mass removal spell necessary. I'm already on All Is Dust and I guess I could consider Oblivion Stone instead, even if it means taking out my own rocks.

[pokken]

Yeah, for sure, learning what and what not to counter are the biggest hurdles facing blue players in the format. The problem is when you go up against, say, enchantress or artifact decks where a critical density of them makes a mass removal spell necessary. I'm already on All Is Dust and I guess I could consider Oblivion Stone instead, even if it means taking out my own rocks.

One thing I've found is that if you kill the enchantresses or artifact payoffs it's usually enough. But Ostone academy ruins lock is legit in a mostly blue deck and worth considering.

The need to wipe everything is part of why I lean white for control shells and why I lean toward brought back package for ramping. In grixis I think the spells are efficient enough to just make sure you hit your land drops. Or take your lumps and blow up your signets whichever .

I cannot wait to find a farewell deck I tell ya that card is nuts.

[TheGildedGoose]

Yeah, for sure, learning what and what not to counter are the biggest hurdles facing blue players in the format. The problem is when you go up against, say, enchantress or artifact decks where a critical density of them makes a mass removal spell necessary. I'm already on All Is Dust and I guess I could consider Oblivion Stone instead, even if it means taking out my own rocks.

One thing I've found is that if you kill the enchantresses or artifact payoffs it's usually enough. But Ostone academy ruins lock is legit in a mostly blue deck and worth considering.

The need to wipe everything is part of why I lean white for control shells and why I lean toward brought back package for ramping. In grixis I think the spells are efficient enough to just make sure you hit your land drops. Or take your lumps and blow up your signets whichever .

I cannot wait to find a farewell deck I tell ya that card is nuts.

In my experience, even with a single enchantress they can rebuild and restock very quickly, but I think the enchantress player I encounter sometimes is just a great player and knows to not overcommit and get greedy. O Stone Ruins is something I had completely forgotten about, actually, so that's an easy swap for Aetherspouts.

As for white being the best control color to complement blue, well, yeah. I agree. But outside of Phelddy, there really aren't any UWx commanders that excite me. Elsha of the Infinite is fun, but even without a cost reducer the deck is basically "find Top, go nuts" which got old, fast. Maybe Chun-Li, Countless Kicks when she gets printed in non-SL form, but that's not exactly a control deck. I really like Nicol Bolas, the Ravager // Nicol Bolas, the Arisen as a card. Great stats to cost ratio, solid value ETB, decent at offense and defense, and of course, the ability to turn into a planeswalker right before you board wipe is a good feeling. It's such a versatile tool in a control deck's arsenal. It speaks to me.

Farewell is brutal. I think it's the best wipe in white by a big margin.

black teferi's protection but with "you lose half your life, rounded up" added on when

[pokken]

I love bolas for being a one card finisher basically. He's cool. And I am not lobbying for you to switch colors or whatever lol just agreeing about the grixis challenges.

I like Inalla best for grixis control (even just turning spellseeker into a one card combo is grotesque) but she's not for everyone

But that's a bit off topic. I did use ostone lock in inalla and it was very good.

[Sinis]

My go-tos are Wash Out and Aetherize. I tend to play fewer colours, so Wash Out is usually completely asymmetric at a bargain , and Aetherize can be incredibly punishing, especially against alpha strikes.

[Jemolk]

If I'm running mass bounce, it's either because it's instant speed or because I have some specific synergy for that specific spell. Instant-speed boardwipes are very powerful, and Evacuation does extremely well on that front. Aetherspouts and Aetherize also act as deterrents to attackers, especially once you get a reputation for having instant-speed blowout responses. Bluffing an Aetherize is far more potent than bluffing a Cyclonic Rift, because the correct answer to a Rift bluff is almost universally to immediately call it with an all-out attack at you. If you need to use it defensively, after all, you can't use it offensively, and they're going to get their stuff bounced regardless if you actually have it. Rift is one of those cards that's so powerful that I feel like threatening it automatically raises your threat profile by a large amount and lowers your odds of winning. I actually quite dislike it and never play it as a result. And I don't think I'd run Devastation Tide in a deck that doesn't do a lot of topdeck manipulation. Coastal Breach is even worse. Don't think I'd even consider running it outside of mono-blue, just because sorcery speed on synergyless temporary removal is that bad in my eyes. Wash Out is at least likely to be asymmetrical, but even then, I'd prefer either instant speed or longer-term removal over asymmetry.

For my own Bolas deck, I will say, I've found Hour of Devastation to be quite useful. Gets around indestructible, kills a majority of the problem cards that require a wipe (rather than being more easily dealt with by spot removal), and gets planeswalkers, but leaves any of my Bolas planeswalkers untouched. I use the OG as my commander, though, so I don't have to worry about it killing him regardless of timing.

[NZB2323]

Evacuation is my favorite non Cyclonic Rift mass bounce spell. I especially love it when combined with cards like Resculpt, Pongify, Rapid Hybridization, Swan Song, and ETB creatures.

The fact that it's instant speed and hits all creatures is great.

But with Grixis you have so many cards to pick from I don't think you need 3+ mass bounce spells.

[Hawk]

Evacuation is the best after rift, but that's because I strongly value the instant speed.
I love Evac so much I've been tempted to get a few copies of Perplexing Test to, uh, test. It's just a bit too much effort for a card that is usually strictly worse (although for sure there's ways to break the symmetry of it in both controlling decks like Pheldagriff and mid-rangey token fests like Volo, Guide to Monsters).

I really want my mass bounce to be instant, so I don't usually seriously consider anything else - Aetherize and Aetherspouts are instant but very limited, Engulf the Shore is reasonable but limited to mono-blue until we get a blue Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth effect. On the sorcery side I don't despise Wash Out, Flood of Tears, Kederekt Leviathan, Profaner of the Dead Crush of Tentacles, Whelming Wave, and River's Rebuke since they all have a way to break the symmetry (or they offer no symmetry, in the case of Rebuke). I like them all in theory, but I don't run any of them anywhere currently. Profaner has made the maybeboard of a few decks, and Wash Out was once a staple that was in all my blue lists but over time it's been cut. For most I'd be looking into a very specific archetype like Sea Monsters tribal.

I have also fallen off on Devastation Tide and Coastal Breach. Sorcery speed is just really not where I want mass-bounce, and if I am going to run a sorcery speed effect I'm willing to pay 1 more to break the symmetry. I might at least consider tide in a deck that has some ways to miracle it at instant speed (it was in Phelddy for a while) but overall I'm very cool on these effects even in a combo like Simic that otherwise lacks ways to handle a large board.

[Cyberium]

Cephalid Constable and Dissipation Field

Jokes aside, Warped Devotion is awesome with a bounce Bolas deck.

[RowanKeltizar]

Warped Devotion seems like a great include for Bolas if you are using bounce spells. I think if you have a bunch of ways to force people to mass discard and you have a couple good payoffs for it, then bounces are good.

I will say that bounce spells can shine in a deck with wheels that either force opponents to shuffle or mass discard, especially if you don't have access to white or black for removal options.

The other place they shine is when you have a fairly reliable chance to cast them at instant speed with something like Leyline of Anticipation. And if you have a deck that breaks symmetry on them, great.

My experience with Consuming Tide has been positive if you really want your commander to remain on the field. The draw is nice and if you don't have a lot of permanents in the deck, you will always get the draw. It's a good fit for my creatureless Niv-Mizzet deck, where I want as many cards as possible to be providing card draw and I want Niv to remain in play.

There really aren't too many other bounce spells to mention that haven't already been talked about. Rebuild or maybe Hurkyl's Recall are cards that have become a bit more relevant with all the treasures. If you are heavy on artifact ramp, these can also be a good way to save your stuff.

I like there is a place for Leadership Vacuum if your commander has an etb.

Equilibrium is another interesting card that can get pretty annoying for your opponents but only hits creatures.