Now I would like your help, I think of changing the list into small things:
- 2 Nightveil Sprite
+ 1 Warkite Marauder
+ 1 Dive Down
And I thought of adapting the side similar to Nassif but with Surge mare, what do you think?
I would go the full playset of Warkite Marauder and Dive Down. There are a lot of flyers seeing play these days, and the Marauder makes attacking so much easier. I love the surveil as much as the next person, but you just aren't beating Izzet Drakes without a Marauder. Dive Down is just sweet. It trades up on tempo with everything.
The most suspect cards to me are the main deck Essence Scatter and Exclusion Mage.
Out of the side I think you want:
Flexibility for your counter load out.
Anti-aggro cards.
Tempo plays for racing.
Niv-Mizzet protection.
For me Surge Mare is the best anti-aggro card, Deep Freeze is the best anti-Mizzy tool, and the 2/2/2 counter split gives you what you want. That leaves the tempo plays, which is where you can get creative. Sleep, Selective Snare, Entrancing Melody, Time of Ice, and Exclusion Mage are all fine options. Just comes down to what you prefer.
I think Chemister's Insight is not what we want to be doing.
I need ideads to play mirror, at the moment my plan would be:
- 3 Dive Down
- 2 Spell Pierce
- 1 Opt
+ 3 Surge Mare
+ 1 Exclusion Mage
+ 2 Sleep
Surge Mare's not great in the mirror. No evasion and can't block well. Typically you're going to bring in your essence scatters and your full tempo suite here. Trim on opt, spell pierce, and dive down. I do like to keep a miser's dive down or two because there's still a decent amount of creature targeting going on.
I've noticed the same thing. I wish there was a cheaper Hard Counterspell that could stop these early type of plays. Is Syncopate good enough to replace Spell Pierce? Or at least do some sort of split?
"To keep things 100, anything I state is an opinion and not intended to be a fact. Any and all suggestions I give are a 100% opinion. If you need further clarification take the conversation to a PM. I am not in the business of assuming things. I'm only interested in 1 business and that business serves 2 things, Cold L's and Hot Dub's."
"To keep things 100, anything I state is an opinion and not intended to be a fact. Any and all suggestions I give are a 100% opinion. If you need further clarification take the conversation to a PM. I am not in the business of assuming things. I'm only interested in 1 business and that business serves 2 things, Cold L's and Hot Dub's."
"To keep things 100, anything I state is an opinion and not intended to be a fact. Any and all suggestions I give are a 100% opinion. If you need further clarification take the conversation to a PM. I am not in the business of assuming things. I'm only interested in 1 business and that business serves 2 things, Cold L's and Hot Dub's."
For me, Warkite is at a better time on meta, mainly because of UR Drakes and mirror.
In IRL i use 4 Warkite Marauder and 0 Nightveil Sprite.
In MOL, i no have option, so i use 2 and 2.
This is the chance of a 0 Island hand with 20 Islands in 60 cards, from 7 cards
40/60 *39/59 *38/58 *37/57 *36/56 *35/55 *34/54 * 100% = 93963542400 / 1946482876800 *100% = 4.83 %
Chance of a 1 land hand with 20 Islands in 60 cards, from 7 cards
40/60 *39/59 * 38/58 *37/57 *36/56 * 35/55 * (20/54 * 7) * 100%
= 2763633600 / 36045979200 * (20/54 * 7)
= 386908704000 / 1946482876800 * 100%
= 19.88 %
Combined, that mean 24.71 % Mulligans for first 7 cards
Playing with Opt, (and keeping 1 land hands) means those 19.88% might be keepers.
For any of those 6 cards to be an opt, and not caring if more than one is an opt :
Drawing an opt (or more) is going to happen 49.25% of the time when Mono Blue draws only 1 Island in the opening 7.
Since 19.88 % of the time Mono Blue draws exactly 1 Island, playing 4 Opt makes those 'Keepers' 49.25% of the time, or 9.79% of total initial draws.
Conclusion :
No Islands = 4.83%
1 Island, No Opt = 10.09%
1 Island, with Opt(s) = 9.79%
. . .So, do you keep 1 Island hands if they have an Opt?
. . .
The chance of draw Zero Islands if playing 21 lands is
77519922480 / 1946482876800 *100%
=3.98256 %
Compared with 20 Islands @ 4.83 % . . . Hmmmmm
.
So, When a 1 lander with an Opt is kept, How regularly does Mono-U just crash and burn?
Crash and burn is defined as no 2nd land on turn Two.
(Obviously just drawing them would be great)
On the PLAY . . . . No 2nd land when 1 Island, with a single Opt.
Turn 1 Cast Opt, Scry "Not Island", Draw "Not Island"
Turn 2 Draw "Not Island"
53 cards still in deck at start. 19 land and 34 Spells
Scry "Not Island" 34/53
Draw "Not Island" 33/52
Turn 2 Draw "Not Island" 32/51
= 34/53 * 33/52 * 32/51
= 53904 / 140556
= 38.35 % - No 2nd Land
On the draw . . . . No 2nd land when 1 Island, with a single Opt.
Turn 1 Draw "Not Island"
Cast Opt, Scry "Not Island", Draw "Not Island"
Turn 2 Draw "Not Island"
53 cards still in deck at start. 19 land and 34 Spells
6 Islands & 5 Islands are also probably Mulligans too.
Maybe I'll figure those too, but I figuring they will total maybe 3%.
.
I think that means on the play, maybe toss it, but keep 1 landers with an Opt on the draw.
And definately Keep 1 Landers after a Mulligan.
. . .
Initially, I worked out the Chance of a 1 land hand with 20 Islands in 60 cards, from 7 cards
= 19.88 %
Among those is the distinct possibility that One lander is actually a power-draw.
Island + Curious Obsession + (Stormy / MC Herald)
Especially on the play, this significant amount of hands, seems strong.
Including an Opt doesn't seem to improve, or replace the turn 1&2 plays.
If exactly 1 Island & at least 1 Curious Obsession is drawn, the chances of getting a Stormtamer or Herald is VERY high.
8 cards out of 39, 5 times racks up quickly.
Sure, the opponent may Dead Weight / shock, but, that's magic.
On the play, lightning strike might still get countered.
.
The problem with Tossing 1 land hands, is, what is better?
After a Mulligan, obviously, 2 Islands & 4 spells is best.
And, 1 land again is actually better since that 7th card might be a land, and scry-ed away if it aint.
All 6 Islands is Trash.
5 cards and a Djinn is BAD.
4 Islands seems like a slow loss.
3 Islands seems OK.
Only 2 islands from 6 seems obviously better, maybe 3.
Final Thoughts -
Take a really serious look at your 1-Land hands before throwing them away with this particular deck.
Does it have an Opt?
Does it have Curious + 1-Cost Creature?
Warkite vs. Nightveil comes down to meta. Warkite is brutal vs. UR Drakes and RW Angels. Nightveil doesn't die to GCW and it's all in all better vs. control. But with RDW fading fast in the meta, the 1/2 body is not long that relevant anymore and control is a easy match up to begin with.
I am still waiting for my Djinns to play this deck, but I would (in the dark obv).
mulligan 5 and 6 landers, and bad 4 landers (no obsession+target or djinn)
keep 2 landers with a creature
keep 1 landers with 3 1-drops, or 2 if they are 1xU creature+opt on the play.... not sure on the draw, probably depends on the whole hand.
I am still waiting for my Djinns to play this deck, but I would (in the dark obv).
mulligan 5 and 6 landers, and bad 4 landers (no obsession+target or djinn)
keep 2 landers with a creature
keep 1 landers with 3 1-drops, or 2 if they are 1xU creature+opt on the play.... not sure on the draw, probably depends on the whole hand.
It's interesting, because the deck mulligans well if you mulligan into a curious obsession. Otherwise it mulligans poorly. It also draws out of mediocre hands pretty well. Note that it's terrible at drawing you out of bad board states, but I have had a lot of mediocre hands come together very nicely after a few draw steps.
For me, the rule of thumb is something like:
From seven cards:
Keep two and three land hands
Keep all but the worst four land hands (double dive down + spell pierce, stuff like that)
Keep five land hands if they have a djinn
Keep one land hands if they have one drop + obsession + (protection or opt)
From six cards:
Keep two, three, and four land hands
Keep one land hands with an opt
Keep one land hands with a one drop plus an obsession
I'm a little more willing to mulligan on the play. It might be wrong to keep the one land seven card hands but when they come together it's almost an auto win. I think it helps to play the deck if you have a little bit of a gambler in you.
In other news, mono blue put two 6-2 finishes together in the MOCS:
We see one list cut most of the two drop fliers in favor of Chart a Course. The other ditched Opt completely and was satisfied with just two Chart a Course for card draw.
No Deep Freeze in either 75. It looks like Joy1's plan for Niv-Mizzet is to tempo out the game with four copies of Exclusion Mage. The gooroom list kind of looks like it's just hoping to dodge Mizzy P.
Seems to be two groups of thought on decks that use Opt vs ones that don't.
though I figure as the meta moves on this will change.
My initial thought is that decks using Opt will not use Chart a course, and decks that do not use Opt take a 2/2 split on Nightveil Sprite and Chart a course but hmmm this pattern isn't consistent enough though.
"To keep things 100, anything I state is an opinion and not intended to be a fact. Any and all suggestions I give are a 100% opinion. If you need further clarification take the conversation to a PM. I am not in the business of assuming things. I'm only interested in 1 business and that business serves 2 things, Cold L's and Hot Dub's."
My initial thought is that decks using Opt will not use Chart a course, and decks that do not use Opt take a 2/2 split on Nightveil Sprite and Chart a course but hmmm this pattern is consistent enough though.
I could see Sprite as an Opt substitute.
What we see in those two decks is just a split in approach though.
Joy1 also has one more Essence Scatter and one more Sleep in the main.
To my eye the Joy1 list looks much more prepared to fight through Angels and Drakes in the main deck. gooroom is set up for more consistency and some non-creature based card draw.
I'm starting to come around on trimming a Spell Pierce or two from the main deck for Sleep or bounce. Both flavors of the Boros menace (angels and weenies) make spell pierce look pretty sad. Although there are some high value targets between History of Benalia and Heroic Reinforcements.
I don't know. The online meta is wild right now. I managed to pick up a 5-0 today, and the gauntlet was:
Mono-red aggro (2-1)
Bant turbofog (2-0)
Selesnya tokens (2-1)
Izzet phoenix (2-1)
Boros aggro (2-0)
I can say that Warkite Marauder is very very good against drakes and against almost every deck with white. Almost all Boros decks will have Aurelia, the Selesnya decks pack their playset of Shalai, and the more midrange decks will have their fair share of Resplendent Angel and Lyra. Being able to attack right through a big flying angel is huge.
I'm aware it's not a place to ask, sorry in advance, but I figure I'll get probably the answer first here:
Did anyone experiment with this deck in modern since we have 8x Curiosity effects there? With creatures like Invisible stalker, Delver or faeries package it could potentially work. Also disrupting shoal could find a home there since we're all blue. Just a quick thought don't mean to hijack the thread
That is really something you should work on in modern, and modern operates under a whole different meta.
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"To keep things 100, anything I state is an opinion and not intended to be a fact. Any and all suggestions I give are a 100% opinion. If you need further clarification take the conversation to a PM. I am not in the business of assuming things. I'm only interested in 1 business and that business serves 2 things, Cold L's and Hot Dub's."
Joy1 also has one more Essence Scatter and one more Sleep in the main.
To my eye the Joy1 list looks much more prepared to fight through Angels and Drakes in the main deck. gooroom is set up for more consistency and some non-creature based card draw.
I'm starting to come around on trimming a Spell Pierce or two from the main deck for Sleep or bounce. Both flavors of the Boros menace (angels and weenies) make spell pierce look pretty sad. Although there are some high value targets between History of Benalia and Heroic Reinforcements.
I don't know. The online meta is wild right now.
I'm gonna correct my previous statement. There seems to be two schools of thought. Decks that want to run Opt and when they run it they tend to run all 4 copies. When they don't run Opt there seems to be a split that involves Nightveil Sprite. It is a bit hard to pin down the consistency through the decks but what things I do think are consistent.
decks that use Opt run all 4 copies
decks that use Chart a Course only run 2 copies
That was based on looking at all the decks vs. the most recent ones. I would say consistency in that statement is around 85%.
"To keep things 100, anything I state is an opinion and not intended to be a fact. Any and all suggestions I give are a 100% opinion. If you need further clarification take the conversation to a PM. I am not in the business of assuming things. I'm only interested in 1 business and that business serves 2 things, Cold L's and Hot Dub's."
First run with the maindeck Sleep was unbelievably awful. Lost two matches I would have won if it was a Spell Pierce and never cast it for value (except to stem the bleeding after my opponent resolved a March of the Multitudes through my one open island in a game I lost anyways). I don't think we can go below a certain threshold of countermagic.
Next experiment will be a couple of Lookout's Dispersal for Spell Pierce. With the Marauders I now have an even Wizard and Pirate count and I've been feeling the need to counter creatures more often recently.
First run with the maindeck Sleep was unbelievably awful. Lost two matches I would have won if it was a Spell Pierce and never cast it for value (except to stem the bleeding after my opponent resolved a March of the Multitudes through my one open island in a game I lost anyways). I don't think we can go below a certain threshold of countermagic.
Next experiment will be a couple of Lookout's Dispersal for Spell Pierce. With the Marauders I now have an even Wizard and Pirate count and I've been feeling the need to counter creatures more often recently.
Might take a few rounds to get used to main deck sleep.
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"To keep things 100, anything I state is an opinion and not intended to be a fact. Any and all suggestions I give are a 100% opinion. If you need further clarification take the conversation to a PM. I am not in the business of assuming things. I'm only interested in 1 business and that business serves 2 things, Cold L's and Hot Dub's."
[quote from="jacobk »" url="/forums/the-game/standard-type-2/deck-creation-standard/799704-mono-blue-tempo?comment=148"]Might take a few rounds to get used to main deck sleep.
I don't want to be too results oriented but it was exactly the problem I was afraid of (reduced consistency) popping up exactly the way I feared. At least with the Dispersal you have overlapping effects and can work around the differences in casting cost.
I have tried the Dreamcaller Siren a couple of times instead of sleep.
It has worked in one game, total.
(In a 2nd game it sort-of worked in that the opponent killed it because they did not read the card. He didn't realise I couldn't block anyway.)
Given the choice, I think Mystic Architect would sorta do that job better.
1- Block and die, draw two cards
2- Or draw 2 cards, play a blocker (repeat?)
Both of which has happened for me.
It is really surprising how often Mystic draws 2 cards.
But, sleep just seems hopeful, and seems really unlikely to work.
If our clock was MUCH faster, maybe.
Sleep is terrific in the right matchup. A race where you're one turn behind, especially against flying creautres. You just maneuver until you need two attacks to win the game and that's that. The problem is that it's not much use in matchups where, for exmaple, their bombs don't care about taking a turn off from attacking or where the main issue is keeping your creatures alive long enough to win. Classic sideboard material.
Yes. Sleep is terrific in the right Match up.
What is that match up?
And, 1U for a 2/1 Wizard aint 'Just Bad'
This deck does suffer from Mana floods sometimes, and does just die when it happens.
This deck has no Long game.
5 mana is a flood. Against U/W, or 1000 year storm, Mystic A rocks.
Against Creatureless, Mystic A is "Classic sideboard material."
This deck can't recover, or fight B/G long term, except maybe through Mystic A.
Against creatureless, would you prefer Exclusion Mage or Essence Scatter?
Increasing the number of counterspells means a board standstill can and does happen.
Two tournaments ago, in 3 of the 4 rounds, Mystic A activated his ability.
Mystic A's ability has won me games, admittedly when playing 3 more land, but even so, if you think he is 'Just Bad' you obviously have never played him.
If you are solely focussed on the 'Rush', then sure. Hope it always works for you.
Mystic A is not about just the charge approach.
All the other 2 drops are better in most other match ups on turn 2. Obviously.
Mystic A is the last card you play, Like Sleep, or it can be a pinch hitter at 2 cost.
In Mono-U Tempo, he is obviously not a 4 of in base deck, but, a singleton could be a good call.
Two tournaments ago, in 3 of the 4 rounds, Mystic A activated his ability.
Mystic A's ability has won me games, admittedly when playing 3 more land, but even so, if you think he is 'Just Bad' you obviously have never played him.
If you are solely focussed on the 'Rush', then sure. Hope it always works for you.
Mystic A is not about just the charge approach.
All the other 2 drops are better in most other match ups on turn 2. Obviously.
Mystic A is the last card you play, Like Sleep, or it can be a pinch hitter at 2 cost.
In Mono-U Tempo, he is obviously not a 4 of in base deck, but, a singleton could be a good call.
A one toughness creature that lets you pay five mana to draw two is not a long game. In the rare matchups that drag on for double digit numbers of turns it is going to die immediately. In most matchups it will be a vanilla 2/1. The basic Curious Obsession/Dive Down shell is strong enough to win some matches almost no matter what you put around it, but that doesn't mean we should actively pile on the jank.
Five mana is great. I actively want to hit four mana in every game so I can play a Djinn and protect it. Against control I want to get to five so I can play a Djinn and hold up a retort. I have won plenty of games where I had four, five, and six lands. Things start to get sketchy when you get to 7+ in your top 15, but even then we deal better with flood than, say, a white weenie deck.
The solution to having problems with Golgari in the late game is to win before it gets to that point. Trying to keep up with their 6 mana bombs with a Mystic Archaeologist is a joke. A seven mana Chart a Course is not where I want to be with this deck.
This made me so happy. I'm glad the Mare is working out for you.
I would go the full playset of Warkite Marauder and Dive Down. There are a lot of flyers seeing play these days, and the Marauder makes attacking so much easier. I love the surveil as much as the next person, but you just aren't beating Izzet Drakes without a Marauder. Dive Down is just sweet. It trades up on tempo with everything.
The most suspect cards to me are the main deck Essence Scatter and Exclusion Mage.
Out of the side I think you want:
I think Chemister's Insight is not what we want to be doing.
Surge Mare's not great in the mirror. No evasion and can't block well. Typically you're going to bring in your essence scatters and your full tempo suite here. Trim on opt, spell pierce, and dive down. I do like to keep a miser's dive down or two because there's still a decent amount of creature targeting going on.
Don't believe so the cards that come to mind are
Admiral's order
Wizard's Retort
Negate
Yea unfortunately, cards like Unwind and Chemister's Insight are too rich for our blood.
-Stay Frosty
20 Island
Creatures (22)
4 Merfolk Trickster
4 Mist-cloaked Herald
4 Siren Stormtamer
4 Tempest Djinn
3 Storm Fleet Aerialist
2 Warkite Marauder
1 Dreamcaller Siren
4 Curious Obsession
2 Chart a Course
4 Dive Down
1 Essence Scatter
2 Spell Pierce
4 Wizard's Retort
1 Sleep
4 Exclusion Mage
3 Negate
2 Syncopate
2 Sleep
2 Blink of an Eye
2 Crafty Cutpurse
Opt is the only notable cut.
I know people are out on Nightveil Sprite and this build seems like a justification for it's removal.
I do like Dreamcaller Siren being played against the backend, it allows for extra tempo plays in the late game.
-Stay Frosty
I'm testing the following list in MOL:
20 Island
4 Mist-Cloaked Herald
4 Siren Stormtamer
2 Nightveil Sprite
2 Warkite Marauder
4 Merfolk Trickster
4 Tempest Djinn
4 Dive Down
2 Essence Scatter
2 Spell Pierce
4 Wizard's Retort
3 Opt
1 Chart a Course
1 Chemister's Insight
2 Diamond Mare
2 Disdainful Stroke
1 Entrancing Melody
2 Exclusion Mage
1 Selective Snare
1 Sentinel Totem
2 Sleep
3 Surge Mare
In mol i only have 2 Warkite Marauder and I can not spend 10 tix at that time lol
-Stay Frosty
In IRL i use 4 Warkite Marauder and 0 Nightveil Sprite.
In MOL, i no have option, so i use 2 and 2.
This is the chance of a 0 Island hand with 20 Islands in 60 cards, from 7 cards
40/60 *39/59 *38/58 *37/57 *36/56 *35/55 *34/54 * 100% = 93963542400 / 1946482876800 *100% = 4.83 %
Chance of a 1 land hand with 20 Islands in 60 cards, from 7 cards
40/60 *39/59 * 38/58 *37/57 *36/56 * 35/55 * (20/54 * 7) * 100%
= 2763633600 / 36045979200 * (20/54 * 7)
= 386908704000 / 1946482876800 * 100%
= 19.88 %
Combined, that mean 24.71 % Mulligans for first 7 cards
Playing with Opt, (and keeping 1 land hands) means those 19.88% might be keepers.
For any of those 6 cards to be an opt, and not caring if more than one is an opt :
NO OPT in those 6 drawn cards =
= 36/40* 35/39 * 34/38 * 33/37 * 32/36 * 31/35 * 100%
= 36*35*34*33*32*31 / 40*39*38*37*36*35 *100%
= 1402410240 / 2763633600 *100%
= 50.75 %
Drawing an opt (or more) is going to happen 49.25% of the time when Mono Blue draws only 1 Island in the opening 7.
Since 19.88 % of the time Mono Blue draws exactly 1 Island, playing 4 Opt makes those 'Keepers' 49.25% of the time, or 9.79% of total initial draws.
Conclusion :
No Islands = 4.83%
1 Island, No Opt = 10.09%
1 Island, with Opt(s) = 9.79%
. . .So, do you keep 1 Island hands if they have an Opt?
. . .
The chance of draw Zero Islands if playing 21 lands is
77519922480 / 1946482876800 *100%
=3.98256 %
Compared with 20 Islands @ 4.83 % . . . Hmmmmm
.
So, When a 1 lander with an Opt is kept, How regularly does Mono-U just crash and burn?
Crash and burn is defined as no 2nd land on turn Two.
(Obviously just drawing them would be great)
On the PLAY . . . . No 2nd land when 1 Island, with a single Opt.
Turn 1 Cast Opt, Scry "Not Island", Draw "Not Island"
Turn 2 Draw "Not Island"
53 cards still in deck at start. 19 land and 34 Spells
Scry "Not Island" 34/53
Draw "Not Island" 33/52
Turn 2 Draw "Not Island" 32/51
= 34/53 * 33/52 * 32/51
= 53904 / 140556
= 38.35 % - No 2nd Land
On the draw . . . . No 2nd land when 1 Island, with a single Opt.
Turn 1 Draw "Not Island"
Cast Opt, Scry "Not Island", Draw "Not Island"
Turn 2 Draw "Not Island"
53 cards still in deck at start. 19 land and 34 Spells
Turn 1 -Draw "Not Island" 34/53
Opt . . . Scry "Not Island" 33/52 & Draw "Not Island" 32/51
Turn 2 Draw "Not Island" 31/50
= 34/53 * 33/52 * 32/51 * 31/50
= 53904 / 140556 * 31/50
= 23.77%
. . .
All Island =
= 20/60 * 19/59 * 18/58 * 17/57 *16/56 * 15/55 * 14/54
= 390700800 / 1946482876800
= 0.000201
= 0.02 %
6 Islands & 5 Islands are also probably Mulligans too.
Maybe I'll figure those too, but I figuring they will total maybe 3%.
.
I think that means on the play, maybe toss it, but keep 1 landers with an Opt on the draw.
And definately Keep 1 Landers after a Mulligan.
. . .
Initially, I worked out the Chance of a 1 land hand with 20 Islands in 60 cards, from 7 cards
= 19.88 %
Among those is the distinct possibility that One lander is actually a power-draw.
Island + Curious Obsession + (Stormy / MC Herald)
Especially on the play, this significant amount of hands, seems strong.
Including an Opt doesn't seem to improve, or replace the turn 1&2 plays.
If exactly 1 Island & at least 1 Curious Obsession is drawn, the chances of getting a Stormtamer or Herald is VERY high.
8 cards out of 39, 5 times racks up quickly.
Sure, the opponent may Dead Weight / shock, but, that's magic.
On the play, lightning strike might still get countered.
.
The problem with Tossing 1 land hands, is, what is better?
After a Mulligan, obviously, 2 Islands & 4 spells is best.
And, 1 land again is actually better since that 7th card might be a land, and scry-ed away if it aint.
All 6 Islands is Trash.
5 cards and a Djinn is BAD.
4 Islands seems like a slow loss.
3 Islands seems OK.
Only 2 islands from 6 seems obviously better, maybe 3.
Final Thoughts -
Take a really serious look at your 1-Land hands before throwing them away with this particular deck.
Does it have an Opt?
Does it have Curious + 1-Cost Creature?
BGU Control
R Aggro
Standard - For Fun
BG Auras
mulligan 5 and 6 landers, and bad 4 landers (no obsession+target or djinn)
keep 2 landers with a creature
keep 1 landers with 3 1-drops, or 2 if they are 1xU creature+opt on the play.... not sure on the draw, probably depends on the whole hand.
It's interesting, because the deck mulligans well if you mulligan into a curious obsession. Otherwise it mulligans poorly. It also draws out of mediocre hands pretty well. Note that it's terrible at drawing you out of bad board states, but I have had a lot of mediocre hands come together very nicely after a few draw steps.
For me, the rule of thumb is something like:
From seven cards:
In other news, mono blue put two 6-2 finishes together in the MOCS:
4 Siren Stormtamer
4 Merfolk Trickster
3 Warkite Marauder
2 Exclusion Mage
4 Tempest Djinn
4 Dive Down
2 Spell Pierce
2 Chart a Course
2 Essence Scatter
4 Wizard's Retort
1 Sleep
20 Island
1 Sentinel Totem
3 Syncopate
2 Diamond Mare
2 Disdainful Stroke
2 Negate
2 Exclusion Mage
2 Crafty Cutpurse
1 Sleep
4 Siren Stormtamer
4 Merfolk Trickster
1 Nightveil Sprite
2 Exclusion Mage
4 Tempest Djinn
4 Dive Down
4 Opt
2 Spell Pierce
2 Chart a Course
1 Essence Scatter
4 Wizard's Retort
20 Island
1 Sentinel Totem
2 Syncopate
4 Diamond Mare
1 Disdainful Stroke
1 Entrancing Melody
3 Negate
2 Sleep
1 Zahid, Djinn of the Lamp
We see one list cut most of the two drop fliers in favor of Chart a Course. The other ditched Opt completely and was satisfied with just two Chart a Course for card draw.
Exclusion Mage appears in the main deck of both lists.
As seems to happen with every new mono-blue list, there's some creativity from the sideboards: Zahid! Entrancing Melody! Crafty Cutpurse!
No Deep Freeze in either 75. It looks like Joy1's plan for Niv-Mizzet is to tempo out the game with four copies of Exclusion Mage. The gooroom list kind of looks like it's just hoping to dodge Mizzy P.
Seems to be two groups of thought on decks that use Opt vs ones that don't.
though I figure as the meta moves on this will change.
My initial thought is that decks using Opt will not use Chart a course, and decks that do not use Opt take a 2/2 split on Nightveil Sprite and Chart a course but hmmm this pattern isn't consistent enough though.
-Stay Frosty
I could see Sprite as an Opt substitute.
What we see in those two decks is just a split in approach though.
Joy1: 3 Marauder, 2 Chart a Course, 0 Opt, 0 Sprite
gooroom: 0 Marauder, 2 Chart a Course, 4 Opt, 1 Sprite
Joy1 also has one more Essence Scatter and one more Sleep in the main.
To my eye the Joy1 list looks much more prepared to fight through Angels and Drakes in the main deck. gooroom is set up for more consistency and some non-creature based card draw.
I'm starting to come around on trimming a Spell Pierce or two from the main deck for Sleep or bounce. Both flavors of the Boros menace (angels and weenies) make spell pierce look pretty sad. Although there are some high value targets between History of Benalia and Heroic Reinforcements.
I don't know. The online meta is wild right now. I managed to pick up a 5-0 today, and the gauntlet was:
That is really something you should work on in modern, and modern operates under a whole different meta.
-Stay Frosty
I'm gonna correct my previous statement. There seems to be two schools of thought. Decks that want to run Opt and when they run it they tend to run all 4 copies. When they don't run Opt there seems to be a split that involves Nightveil Sprite. It is a bit hard to pin down the consistency through the decks but what things I do think are consistent.
decks that use Opt run all 4 copies
decks that use Chart a Course only run 2 copies
That was based on looking at all the decks vs. the most recent ones. I would say consistency in that statement is around 85%.
I could see trimming Spell Pierce based on the meta. Interesting that Admiral's Order hasn't made it into the Chart A course based decks.
-Stay Frosty
Next experiment will be a couple of Lookout's Dispersal for Spell Pierce. With the Marauders I now have an even Wizard and Pirate count and I've been feeling the need to counter creatures more often recently.
Might take a few rounds to get used to main deck sleep.
-Stay Frosty
I don't want to be too results oriented but it was exactly the problem I was afraid of (reduced consistency) popping up exactly the way I feared. At least with the Dispersal you have overlapping effects and can work around the differences in casting cost.
It has worked in one game, total.
(In a 2nd game it sort-of worked in that the opponent killed it because they did not read the card. He didn't realise I couldn't block anyway.)
Given the choice, I think Mystic Architect would sorta do that job better.
1- Block and die, draw two cards
2- Or draw 2 cards, play a blocker (repeat?)
Both of which has happened for me.
It is really surprising how often Mystic draws 2 cards.
But, sleep just seems hopeful, and seems really unlikely to work.
If our clock was MUCH faster, maybe.
Mystic Archaeologist is just bad.
What is that match up?
And, 1U for a 2/1 Wizard aint 'Just Bad'
This deck does suffer from Mana floods sometimes, and does just die when it happens.
This deck has no Long game.
5 mana is a flood. Against U/W, or 1000 year storm, Mystic A rocks.
Against Creatureless, Mystic A is "Classic sideboard material."
This deck can't recover, or fight B/G long term, except maybe through Mystic A.
Against creatureless, would you prefer Exclusion Mage or Essence Scatter?
Increasing the number of counterspells means a board standstill can and does happen.
Two tournaments ago, in 3 of the 4 rounds, Mystic A activated his ability.
Mystic A's ability has won me games, admittedly when playing 3 more land, but even so, if you think he is 'Just Bad' you obviously have never played him.
If you are solely focussed on the 'Rush', then sure. Hope it always works for you.
Mystic A is not about just the charge approach.
All the other 2 drops are better in most other match ups on turn 2. Obviously.
Mystic A is the last card you play, Like Sleep, or it can be a pinch hitter at 2 cost.
In Mono-U Tempo, he is obviously not a 4 of in base deck, but, a singleton could be a good call.
A one toughness creature that lets you pay five mana to draw two is not a long game. In the rare matchups that drag on for double digit numbers of turns it is going to die immediately. In most matchups it will be a vanilla 2/1. The basic Curious Obsession/Dive Down shell is strong enough to win some matches almost no matter what you put around it, but that doesn't mean we should actively pile on the jank.
Five mana is great. I actively want to hit four mana in every game so I can play a Djinn and protect it. Against control I want to get to five so I can play a Djinn and hold up a retort. I have won plenty of games where I had four, five, and six lands. Things start to get sketchy when you get to 7+ in your top 15, but even then we deal better with flood than, say, a white weenie deck.
The solution to having problems with Golgari in the late game is to win before it gets to that point. Trying to keep up with their 6 mana bombs with a Mystic Archaeologist is a joke. A seven mana Chart a Course is not where I want to be with this deck.
I don't usually go above 10 total. The split in the sideboard is to let you pick the best counters for each matchup.