Stone Rain, Clique, and Thoughtseize aren't too bad against it. You have to treat it as a combo deck, where the combo pieces are lands. Bouncing Cloudposts with Cryptic Command is not a bad idea. Clique and Thoughtseize will strip ramp spells and fatties for you, but you have to be quick, because they can just slow-roll you.
The manabase for this deck is surprisingly difficult to balance. I don't want to use too many shocklands but I want all my colors early. I think that was the drawback to this deck when it was played in standard, right? I hope lots of card drawing helps out with smoothing land draws.
edit: tweaked my mana base a little bit. it does seem to work a little bit better without the vivid lands here. Also, replaced the night's whispers with into the roil in maindeck. Peer and card drawing from Roil seems to do ok so far.
the manabase posted by the OP at the beginning of the thread seems to be working fine. not a lot of cipt, and not a lot of pain/shock either, mostly fetches and the coreset lands in conjunction with the scars lands, and for me it works fine
however, what are your guys thoughts on something like sphinx of jwar isle as an evasive and untargetable finisher?
yeah I got the template for both mana bases from old deck list. they could need to be tweaked a bit depending on spells you running. As for SoJI he is decent, but most of the time you should wait till after an ultimatum to play your win conditions.
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Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity.
Ensnaring bridge is "tech" against 12post, as long as they don't hit it with Ulamog.
Other good cards include plow under, generalized land destruction effects, control magic effects, as well as simple hand disruption.
By the way, a little birdy told me that maindeck timely reinforcements is really good vs. zoo in a deck that runs very few creatures .
I've gotta see what my zoo game looks like before i go that far...although it also helps against RDW/burn and jund........could be nuts.
Also bribery vs 12post
In life all we can do is try to make things better. Sitting lost in old ways and fearing change only makes us outdated and ignorant.
Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved by understanding.
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Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity.
Ensnaring bridge seems really awful in 5color. You always want a full boat with this deck. If you want a better zoo matchup i would suggest wall of omens/bolts/paths. After that use esper charms aggressively to put them in topdeck mode early, followed by a cruel.
Ensnaring bridge seems really awful in 5color. You always want a full boat with this deck. If you want a better zoo matchup i would suggest wall of omens/bolts/paths. After that use esper charms aggressively to put them in topdeck mode early, followed by a cruel.
he was talking about it as eldrazi tech, although bribery is better. Can you imagine the look on your opponents face when you grab his emrakul?
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Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity.
Ensnaring bridge seems really awful in 5color. You always want a full boat with this deck. If you want a better zoo matchup i would suggest wall of omens/bolts/paths. After that use esper charms aggressively to put them in topdeck mode early, followed by a cruel.
Look at the post i was replying to. Ensnaring bridge is bad, unless you're playing against 12post, where it stops every single creature they have from attacking, leaving them to win by either mindslaver lock, or finding some way to kill your bridge with ulamog.
I'm not saying that bridge is traditionally good vs. all archetypes, but it IS good against 12post, which is a deck that cruel control would naturally have a bad matchup against.
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Look at the post i was replying to. Ensnaring bridge is bad, unless you're playing against 12post, where it stops every single creature they have from attacking, leaving them to win by either mindslaver lock, or finding some way to kill your bridge with ulamog.
I'm not saying that bridge is traditionally good vs. all archetypes, but it IS good against 12post, which is a deck that cruel control would naturally have a bad matchup against.
hopefully i can dedicate about 9 slots in my sideboard for it.
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I might actually try this deck, considering it may be the only good blue-based control deck we'll be seeing in this format for a long time.
That was my thought. I can almost guarantee a win against zoo.
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What kind of list are you playing that can stand up to zoo that well?
A new list that I'm testing. It still has 4 path and 4 bolt. It has 3 firespout and 4 main board timely reinforcements. as well as a few other changes. I'll post it after a bit more testing.
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Cruel control is solid, but it'll hardly be the "only" good blue based control deck.
Believe it or not, there were lots of good blue control decks before Jace was around. Lots of them centered around Thirst for Knowledge, Gifts Ungiven, Mystical Teachings, and other various card advantage engines.
BTW, I was toying with a few small gifts packages in Cruel Control and came up with a really cool gifts package.
You play Gifts for Grave Titan, Cruel Ultimatum, Noxious Revival, and Torrent of Souls. If they give you Torrent and Noxious, you eot noxious for cruel, then play Torrent of Souls on Grave Titan, which swings for 16 damage, and gives you 4 zombies for a measly 5 mana.
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Cruel control is solid, but it'll hardly be the "only" good blue based control deck.
Believe it or not, there were lots of good blue control decks before Jace was around. Lots of them centered around Thirst for Knowledge, Gifts Ungiven, Mystical Teachings, and other various card advantage engines.
I have played with all of the above cards in several formats. I actually have primers that use every card on your list. My only Problem with other blue based builds that I have tried is that I needed jitte,chalice,mental misstep, and/or ancestral visions for the decks to be good. I have played upwards of 200 games with various control decks, and I have like a 25% win rate....maybe even lower.
BTW, I was toying with a few small gifts packages in Cruel Control and came up with a really cool gifts package.
You play Gifts for Grave Titan, Cruel Ultimatum, Noxious Revival, and Torrent of Souls. If they give you Torrent and Noxious, you eot noxious for cruel, then play Torrent of Souls on Grave Titan, which swings for 16 damage, and gives you 4 zombies for a measly 5 mana.
Thats a pretty funny idea, although drawing any of the cards outside of using it for a gifts package would suck. I don't think I would throw gifts in here unless I had a bit more interaction with my graveyard.
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In life all we can do is try to make things better. Sitting lost in old ways and fearing change only makes us outdated and ignorant.
Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved by understanding.
Albert Einstein
Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity.
I have played with all of the above cards in several formats. I actually have primers that use every card on your list. My only Problem with other blue based builds that I have tried is that I needed jitte,chalice,mental misstep, and/or ancestral visions for the decks to be good. I have played upwards of 200 games with various control decks, and I have like a 25% win rate....maybe even lower.
Thats a pretty funny idea, although drawing any of the cards outside of using it for a gifts package would suck. I don't think I would throw gifts in here unless I had a bit more interaction with my graveyard.
I don't see any reason why playing Gifts as a 2-of would be that much of a problem. In a deck like this, you resolve it, and you'll win.
As for other types of decks in the format, I've won tons of matches with my Bant based Gifts control deck. That being said, it got a lot better after the bannings when it didn't have to deal with trying to stop 4-5 different combo decks that went off turn 3, aggro decks that win turn 4-5, and 12post decks which are getting emrakul out whether you have countermagic or not. Pre-Ban, I would have agreed with you, but post ban-list update, Control decks can be a lot more focused and not rely on a huge string of narrow answers for a grouping of 20+ different archetypes.
So I'm not sure if you're just building suboptimal builds for your non-cruel control decks, but they're definitely viable, especially now that all the format really requires is a control deck to be strong vs. aggro, and have answers to 12post.
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Currently Playing
UTron
Tahngarth, Talruum Hero
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Legacy: UB(R/G) Storm UB(R/G)
Vintage: UBG Gush Storm UBG
4 Mulldrifter
2 Wurmcoil Engine
2 Kokusho, the evening star
Other Spells:
2 Spreading Seas
2 Into the Roil
1 Peer through Depths
4 Preordain
2 Cruel Ultimatum
3 Damnation
2 Slagstorm
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Blightning
4 Lighning Bolt
2 Terminate
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Reflecting Pool
1 Cascade Bluffs
1 Graven Cairns
1 Steam Vents
1 Watery Grave
1 Blood Crypt
2 Dragonskull Summit
2 Drowned Catacomb
3 Island
3 Swamp
2 Mountain
3 Pithing Needle
1 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Molten Rain
1 Blightning
2 Pyroclasm
4 Smallpox
The manabase for this deck is surprisingly difficult to balance. I don't want to use too many shocklands but I want all my colors early. I think that was the drawback to this deck when it was played in standard, right? I hope lots of card drawing helps out with smoothing land draws.
edit: tweaked my mana base a little bit. it does seem to work a little bit better without the vivid lands here. Also, replaced the night's whispers with into the roil in maindeck. Peer and card drawing from Roil seems to do ok so far.
yeah I got the template for both mana bases from old deck list. they could need to be tweaked a bit depending on spells you running. As for SoJI he is decent, but most of the time you should wait till after an ultimatum to play your win conditions.
Albert Einstein
Thomas Jefferson
Ensnaring bridge is "tech" against 12post, as long as they don't hit it with Ulamog.
Other good cards include plow under, generalized land destruction effects, control magic effects, as well as simple hand disruption.
By the way, a little birdy told me that maindeck timely reinforcements is really good vs. zoo in a deck that runs very few creatures .
I've gotta see what my zoo game looks like before i go that far...although it also helps against RDW/burn and jund........could be nuts.
Also bribery vs 12post
Albert Einstein
Thomas Jefferson
he was talking about it as eldrazi tech, although bribery is better. Can you imagine the look on your opponents face when you grab his emrakul?
Albert Einstein
Thomas Jefferson
Look at the post i was replying to. Ensnaring bridge is bad, unless you're playing against 12post, where it stops every single creature they have from attacking, leaving them to win by either mindslaver lock, or finding some way to kill your bridge with ulamog.
I'm not saying that bridge is traditionally good vs. all archetypes, but it IS good against 12post, which is a deck that cruel control would naturally have a bad matchup against.
hopefully i can dedicate about 9 slots in my sideboard for it.
Albert Einstein
Thomas Jefferson
UWU/W BlinkUW
BMono-Black ControlB
Commander:
GWUJenaraGWU
BGeth MBCB
RGXenagosRG
WUBSharuumWUB (retired)
Modern:
xAffinityx (starting)
Standard:
Ha! That's a good one.
That was my thought. I can almost guarantee a win against zoo.
Albert Einstein
Thomas Jefferson
What kind of list are you playing that can stand up to zoo that well?
A new list that I'm testing. It still has 4 path and 4 bolt. It has 3 firespout and 4 main board timely reinforcements. as well as a few other changes. I'll post it after a bit more testing.
Albert Einstein
Thomas Jefferson
The shell of the deck then turns into:
4x Pyromancer Ascension
Control:
4x Mana Leak
Burn:
4x Lightning Bolt
4x Electrolyze (acts as cantrip as well)
3x Time Warp
3x Call to Mind
2x Cruel Ultimatum
4x Preordain
4x Ponder
Black also gives us access to removal such as Terminate. The SB also becomes much more flexible.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?p=8122582#post8122582
Believe it or not, there were lots of good blue control decks before Jace was around. Lots of them centered around Thirst for Knowledge, Gifts Ungiven, Mystical Teachings, and other various card advantage engines.
BTW, I was toying with a few small gifts packages in Cruel Control and came up with a really cool gifts package.
You play Gifts for Grave Titan, Cruel Ultimatum, Noxious Revival, and Torrent of Souls. If they give you Torrent and Noxious, you eot noxious for cruel, then play Torrent of Souls on Grave Titan, which swings for 16 damage, and gives you 4 zombies for a measly 5 mana.
Can we please keep on topic. this is about the worst idea I have ever seen.
Thats a pretty funny idea, although drawing any of the cards outside of using it for a gifts package would suck. I don't think I would throw gifts in here unless I had a bit more interaction with my graveyard.
Albert Einstein
Thomas Jefferson
I don't see any reason why playing Gifts as a 2-of would be that much of a problem. In a deck like this, you resolve it, and you'll win.
As for other types of decks in the format, I've won tons of matches with my Bant based Gifts control deck. That being said, it got a lot better after the bannings when it didn't have to deal with trying to stop 4-5 different combo decks that went off turn 3, aggro decks that win turn 4-5, and 12post decks which are getting emrakul out whether you have countermagic or not. Pre-Ban, I would have agreed with you, but post ban-list update, Control decks can be a lot more focused and not rely on a huge string of narrow answers for a grouping of 20+ different archetypes.
So I'm not sure if you're just building suboptimal builds for your non-cruel control decks, but they're definitely viable, especially now that all the format really requires is a control deck to be strong vs. aggro, and have answers to 12post.
i am by far a HUGE fan of bribery in this deck against 12post, PED, AIR, etc...
Currently Playing
UTron
Tahngarth, Talruum Hero
TRADE ME!!!