So im not sure when vintage became super creature heavy but with all these creatures roaming the field is it time for the abyss to make a return? all of the shops style decks are playing eldrazi instead of lodestones which means they don't dodge it anymore. and while it might not deal well with infinate tokens it can at least help if your able to remove the token generator.

does anyone have a strong idea about this? or has played the abyss in the meta recently? im currently considering it in my storm sideboard so i can lose less to thoughtnots and thalia's personally but i feel like it could just be a good meta call atm.

*on an unrelated side note why hasn't the world rule gotten changed to be like the legendary rule? if both players can have a jitte clearly theres no reason we can't both have an abyss.

Re: Enchant World rules, as @tabakrules on twitter. Good point; that rule is confusing and not needed.

But it is probably too difficult to get into play vs. a thorn, and TKS is going to be in play before you can deploy this.

The abyss is not viable. It's too expensive and has no direct effect for removing the creatures that you want removed as well no effect against Shops. Not to mention it's pitiful against tokens. So if the purpose is just to remove Thalia or Eldrazi, then there are better options.

Edit: you may have overlooked the fact that you don't get to pick which creature is destroyed; so in fact the tokens would die long before the generator.

The Abyss is one of my favourite cards ever. I tried my best to make it work very recently. Unfortunately it's just super clunky in a metagame with a bunch of tokens. It's not bad versus Thalia and such, but if you're only using it for that matchup, I'd strongly suggest using a sweeper like Toxic Deluge and such instead, since casting Abyss through Thalia and Thorn will be a nightmare.

@desolutionist and what is the better option of killing a 3/2 white human a 2/1 artifact creatures a 4/4 colorless eldrazi a 3/3 devoid eldrazi and a 2 mana sphere of resistance with a single card? they share almost no types half are colorless but not artifacts and 1 of these things isnt even a creature. short of casting upheaval how are you removing all of these things?

@Hrishi you want to cast a 3cmc+1/2 sorcery when your lands come into play tapped that you also have to pay 4 life to when your already getting beat down for 6 dmg a turn? how is that any easier to acomplish than the abyss?

@snowydude It's not. But all the conditions you laid out also affect casting The Abyss. At least if you ever get to cast Toxic Deluge, you can immediately combo off. Abyss makes you wait till it kills everything.

Think of it this way, the time it takes for The Abyss to kill off everything translates into roughly similar amounts of life loss.

Massacre is another option that is "free", but does not deal with TKS. On the bright side, you don't have to kill TKS in order to combo off, just the Thalias. You can also use Balance, but it's restricted of course.

That's why I've played Pack Rat

You've questioned me on Pack Rat before, and these are exactly the scenarios that you would want it for since there just simply isn't another good option.

@desolutionist well its quite hard to activate pac rat without a black source because of thalia or against a revoker and its also bad vs displacer. all of these things were in play which means pac rat would still have been aweful in that game which results it still not being good. at no point in any of the games that i have played would pac rat have actually been good. it might help if i didn't mull to 5 but thats entirely besides the point.

i think the abyss is a better option than pac rat is against eldrazi anyways. they play 1ish creature a turn that probably dies to it and generates almost no advantage on the board if it dies. it even gets aaround smashers counter tet because its an ability and not a spell.

when the worst thing the abyss kills is some thalia varient i think its doing its job pretty well.

@snowydude said:

@desolutionist and what is the better option of killing a 3/2 white human a 2/1 artifact creatures a 4/4 colorless eldrazi a 3/3 devoid eldrazi and a 2 mana sphere of resistance with a single card? they share almost no types half are colorless but not artifacts and 1 of these things isnt even a creature. short of casting upheaval how are you removing all of these things?

4+3+3+2=12
4+3+3=10

12+10=22, you would die before The Abyss eats all of the opponents creatures.

And with one less creature...

4+3+2=9
4+3=7
4=4

9+7+4=20

@spook revoker is an artifact he can't pick the 2/1 to die. but yea you see the problem here. i can cast something like ingot chewer to kill the revoker and block. or pyroclasm to leave the 4/4 around. or take 12 then cast deluge for 4 and be at best 4 life probably less because of fetches/probes/vamp tutors i had to use to get it. im probably still just dead.

the reason i like the abyss is partially because i can just ritual it out on turn 1 orr 2 and it effectly blanks every creature in the deck that doesnt have haste.

it also doesnt kill 11/11 infectious robots.

Well, I finished 2nd in the NZ Eternal Weekend this past weekend, going undefeated until the finals on Storm. My board included 2 Engineered Explosives, 1 Balance and 1 Chain of Vapor. I also played Tinker + Blightsteel in the maindeck. I was happy with that configuration.

Maybe its time to use Drop of Honey since it dont target, can be used in multiples, and costs one. And can hit artifact dudes.

@Serracollector Not a bad idea! I preferred white for my colour splash because I wanted to play Serenity, but this gives a compelling reason to go for green.

@Hrishi how on earth are you casting balance in storm? i was considering EE as well. how were they? being able to jam it through a thron+thalia seems strong. tinker robot main is also my go to plan B. glad im not the only 1

@Serracollector but your opponent can jsut not cast a creature for a turn and it dies. i would almost cast moat before drop of honey. almost.

@snowydude I played 3 colours in my storm deck? UBw colours so I could play Balance and Serenity. EE was pretty good, was clutch against shops.

@Hrishi interesting. if your in white moat might be better than abyss tho. as far as uncastable 4 mana enchantments anyways. what other white cards were you playing besides balance/serenity

The tournament report along with decklists will be up soon I think, but I didn't really play any other white cards. White gave me the option to EE for 3 fairly easily, but a situation where it was necessary never came up.

It was only a light splash. Going too heavy on splash colours can lead to colour screw at times. Plus, most of your cards are already going to be blue or black!

@Hrishi said:

@Serracollector Not a bad idea! I preferred white for my colour splash because I wanted to play Serenity, but this gives a compelling reason to go for green.

There is a W version of Drop of Honey, it was color shifted, Propery Nodes or something.

@spook Oh god you're right! This is definitely something I want to test. Thanks a lot for that.

@spook noted.porphyry nodes its also not a world enchant so you can have more then 1 in play at a time. not sure that its relavent to have 2+ copies in play but its possible. still this just leaves the opponent to take a turn casting cantrips or such and just not cast a creature to destroy it.