Matchup Analysis - RB Scam 2024

Key Cards: Sigarda’s Aid, Urza’s Saga, Surge of Salvation, Forge Anew

Problem Cards: Grief + Rebirth Effect, Blood Moon, Kolaghan’s Command. Post-board: Engineered Explosives, Hidetsugu Consumes All (HCA), Brotherhood’s End

Key Points/Objectives:

• Grind them out, mitigate the effect of the scam with Saga Constructs
  • Without Blood Moon, it is incredibly difficult for them to overpower an Urza’s Saga.
• It can often be correct to play “land, go” on turn 1.
  • Surging in response to a turn 1 Grief scam is such a blowout, that it is very reasonable to hold it up rather than developing on turn 1, especially if you have 2-3 additional lands in your hand.
• Stick a SFM with protection to Kaldra them
  • BR decks aren’t good at killing indestructible creatures. Considering they often damage themselves with Fetches and Thoughtseize, Kaldra can usually race just about anything.
  • The addition of Surge of Salvation means that we can even protect ourselves from getting the Kaldra ripped from our hands.
• Get an Aid into play ASAP, but be aware of Molten Collapse as an out to it.
  • Getting an aid into play means that you can play the instant speed game and force them to interact on your terms.
  • Remember that your cards (especially non-creatures) are safer on the battlefield than in your hand, so deploy them accordingly.
• Keep Functional Hands, even if they aren’t great.
  • Mulling vs the Thoughtseize/Grief Scam deck is a fool’s errand, and usually just having the extra physical material matters more than the specifics.
  • That said, make sure you have at least 2-3 land.
• Keeping a reasonable hand that also has Saga is a recipe for success
  • Especially with the removal of Fury, it can be very difficult for Scam to race a Saga hand.
• Forge Anew is a fantastic tool.
  • Not only will it rebuy equipment that have been destroyed/discarded, but it is a repeatable equipper that scam can almost certainly not address.
• Emeria’s Call can be a bit awkward.
  • When you know you are playing against scam, it is reasonable to deploy your call as an early land to avoid it getting discarded (unless your hand functions without it). Not only does this ensure that you hit your land drop, but it also guarantees that they can’t randomly cast it off of a Dauthi.
    • That being said, if you can afford to hold the Call, I generally like to since it is one of the best cards to pitch to a solitude, and sometimes the games go long enough to just cast the thing.
• Orcish Bowmaster is largely very medium against us.
  • It only kills 3 things: Esper Sentinel, 1/1 Saga Construct, and Inkmoth Nexus. Oh, and Memnite if you’re inclined to play the card.
    • As a side note, this is a reason to run out a cheap artifact if your main plan is to grind out with Saga Constructs. Making your first construct a 2/2 instead of a 1/1 immediately can make a huge difference.
  • The blockers that it generates aren’t super relevant against us either, as the game usually ends in a landslide one way or another, and even a medium-sized construct with a spear runs over these tokens.
  • “But Travis, what about Paladin triggers!” - This one is easy; if you are concerned about the trigger from bowmasters mattering, simply decline to draw a card off of paladin. The trigger is optional, after all.
• Molten Collapse is also something to keep in mind, but largely is a sorcery-speed terminate most of the time and gets fully answered by Surge.

SB Strategy and highlights: Solitude and Surge are both incredible tools.

• Surge of Salvation is arguably the best card in the format against scam. Preventing their discard from working, as well as the ability to blank any targeted and/or damaging removal spells, and being able to surge prior to animating an inkmoth can all be game-winning plays.
  • Keep in mind that Surge prevents all damage from Red/Black sources to creatures you control that turn, regardless of if that creature was in play when Surge resolved. That means that if they TS and you surge, then they attack with Ragavan, you can freely block with a new construct, or by animating an inkmoth. The damage will be prevented, and you’ll get to eat their Ragavan for free.
• Solitude is an excellent tool. Not only does Solitude give you meaningful interaction against a Grief scam turn 1 on the draw, but it also gives you the ability to exile an early Ragavan. Since an unanswered Ragavan can run away with the game, this is a great emergency button. Finally, Solitude gives you a very powerful card as the game goes longer.
  • Additionally, many scam variants are favoring Magus of the Moon over Blood Moon, which conveniently lines up for Solitude.
• Sanctifier En-Vec has protection from their entire deck (except for EE and the occasional Pyrite Spellbomb and Path of Peril. Additionally, her graveyard clause shuts off the undying/rebirth effects since all their creatures get exiled instead of dying. One thing to note is that a good scam player can race Sanctifier with a scammed grief and/or Dauthi Voidwalkers. Sanctifier is good, but unless you are also equipping her with a Hammer, she is not good enough on her own.
• Blacksmith’s Skill is solid, but largely replaced by Surge of Salvation. The exception is that Skill can protect 1 permanent from a sweeper (EE, Brotherhood’s End, HCA)
• Pithing Needle is in here almost exclusively to name Engineered Explosives. Needle is markedly better against Scam when you know that their sweeper package is all EEs. With Scam shifting to playing a diverse package of EE/Brotherhood’s End/Hidetsugu Consumes All, as well as K Command/Molten Collapse to tag Needle, I am much lower on the card than in previous versions. ***Adjust accordingly to what you expect/see from your opponent.
• Mana Tithe is also a fantastic tool in a lot of spots. Scam will almost always be tapping out in their ~20-land deck, so tithe will almost always convert for another card.
• Engineered Explosives, Blood Moon, and HCA are additional problems post-board. Here is how you beat them.
  • EE: Both Needle and Skill do a great job at softening/beating an EE. If you have a 0 drop or a 2 drop and an aid in play, your OP has spot to pop the EE when you flash in a hammer. They can do 1 of 2 things:
    • 1. Pop it with the hammer on the stack. You Skill the Aid. EE resolves, your hammer comes in and attaches.
    • 2. Pop it with the aid “attach” trigger on the stack. You Skill the Hammer, it gets equipped, and they die.
  • Blood Moon: Make sure to fetch basics early and often if possible (if you are splashing). Since we are often boarding out some of the drums, this is even more important post-board.
    • Additionally, look at the lands your OP is fetching/playing. It is less likely that you get Mooned if they are only grabbing non basics.
      • With that said, unlike UR Murktide, they only need a single black to function for the most part. As such, they can bait you by playing 2 nonbasics and then on turn 3 play/fetch a basic swamp and slam Moon.
      • Since it is harder to get an early read on if they will moon you than against UR Murktide or Rhinos, it is often correct to play around it and get 2 basics into play in the first 2 turns (or 3 if you are on the play) if possible
  • Hidetsugu Consumes All: Honestly, it is very difficult to beat an HCA without also playing too conservatively.
    • The best you can do is try to create enough pressure to force them to play it if they have it. You can do this by either creating a couple constructs and holding your cheap permanents in hand, or by deploying multiple cards in the same turn.
    • Additionally, you can play it similarly as you would an EE. Stick a hammer to a 2 drop (SFM, Sanctifier, Paladin), and protect the hammer with a Skill.
    • Baiting your OP into playing an HCA to kill a hammer, then slam Forge Anew on your turn is a great way to mitigate the effects of the powerful saga.
• Chalice of the Void is a card that I’ve seen some Scam players bring in. Generally I’m quite happy for Scam to play chalice on 1 against us, since it shuts off their most efficient removal, and between Stoneforge, Saga, and Forge Anew, we have a variety of ways to continue our gameplan under the Chalice. It also gets blown up by Brotherhood’s End as well as HCA, so there’s that.
  • SFM can activate to put in a Hammer under a Chalice
  • Saga tutors 1-drops directly into play without casting them.
  • Forge Anew allows us to cast a Hammer, have it countered, then FA reanimates it into play.

TL;DR: Saga and a timely Surge can single-handedly carry this matchup. Minimize your mulligans, and do your best to play around Blood Moon.