So, I know this looks to be a dead archetype compared to straight UW, but I figured I would get ahead of the rotation (Sphinx's Revelation and Supreme Verdict sliding out) with the only variant that has comparable card advantage in Steam Augury and sweepers Anger of the Gods. Even so, I'd still like some pointers with building/piloting this (I've always played midrange/aggro, never control) in today's meta.
Anyways, enough rambling. Here's my to-be decklist:
Have you tried playing the deck? How does it feel?
For one, it looks like there's no early/cheap card draw and cantrips to smooth out hands w/ low land counts. It also seems like you could end up with virtual mulligans when you start games with any of the multiple win conditions in hand (Keranos, Elspeth, Assemble and Prognostic Sphinx).
I've yet to get any real playtesting in. Come Friday, that should be a different story. The reasoning behind the 4 win-conditions is that Slaughter Games is actively played in my local meta, meaning Elspeth has a very real chance of being ripped from the deck.
As far as early game card draw to smooth out rough hands, I thought Izzet Charm could fill that role.
Is Slaughter Games played in your local metagame's main decks? My opponent interactions with the card typically have them naming Sphinx's Revelation to shut off card draw or Dissolve so that they can resolve their own spells. They don't typically name win conditions. If you're worried about win-cons being stripped away, you probably should only run one copy of Elspeth.
You might want to goldfish the first few turns to see how the land drops/card draw work out. I don't think casting Izzet Charm to loot is where you want to be in the early game because you would be down cards early on.
Is Slaughter Games played in your local metagame's main decks? My opponent interactions with the card typically have them naming Sphinx's Revelation to shut off card draw or Dissolve so that they can resolve their own spells. They don't typically name win conditions. If you're worried about win-cons being stripped away, you probably should only run one copy of Elspeth.
You might want to goldfish the first few turns to see how the land drops/card draw work out. I don't think casting Izzet Charm to loot is where you want to be in the early game because you would be down cards early on.
The jund player at my LGS always named Revelation. Even if you still have win conditions it doesn't matter if you're dead from running out of answers/life. As for izzet charm looting, sometimes you just have to do it to hit land drops. The looting mode is great late game when you're drawing above maximum hand size regularly, but is generally something I don't do often in the early game.
Wins were Red Midrange, UR Tempo, and RB Aggro.
Losses were RUG Combo (see below) and Naya Hexproof.
The RUG Combo deck used Generator Servant to power out threats. The blue was there for Ensoul Artifact (usually on an Ornithopter or Darksteel Citadel). He also had Springleaf Drum and Mistcutter Hydra maindeck. Anyway, game 3 he goes:
Turn 1: Yavimaya Coast, Elf.
Turn 2: Mountain, Generator Servant.
Turn 3: Land, sacrifice Generator Servant, play Kalonian Hydra. Attack for 8.
Turn 4: (I have two untapped scrylands and an Island, and nothing castable but a Deicide) He attacks for 16.
HOW THE HECK ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DEAL WITH THAT?!?! This deck is just dead to it without Azorius Charm or Celestial Flare in hand. The only things I could think of were Magma Spray for the Generator Servant, and Celestial Flare for the attackers. The guy even had the gall to tell me after the game that he specifically built his deck to beat U/x control variants. "I hate blue," he said. There are a whole boatload of players with similar sentiments at the LGS.
Now flash forward to Naya Hexproof. Game 3. I have 2 Supreme Verdict in hand, am at 8 life, he has 6 power of mobs on board. He has one card in his hand. I Verdict. He plays Boros Charm and saves his mobs. Okay...no big deal...he now has no cards...I can just Verdict again next turn and stabilize at 2. So I go to Verdict again, and the guy had ripped an Ajani's Presence off the top. WTFFFFF
The night was filled with crap like this. I don't think I built my deck badly, but I sure had some rotten luck. Actually, allow me to rephrase: my opponents had some stellar luck.
What are some solutions to these decks/strategies? Strangely I did not fold to R/x aggro at all tonight. The Rams were good and so were the Turn//Burns and Warleader's Helixes. (Helices?)
Some single card observations...
Warleader's Helix was better when you could at least count on seeing turn 5. It did sit in my hand while I was getting gang raped by goblins.
Turn//Burn is really good and I will probably go up to 3 maindeck. It solves early aggro a bit and deals with Stormbreath.
Azorius Charm probably needs to be 3-4.
The days of Izzet Charm being absolutely stellar seem to be a memory. ::tear::
Deicide main is a gamble. Will be moving it to sideboard.
Syncopate should be 1 or 0. Not 2. This deck is not pure UW. 4 Dissolve should be enough with other countermagic out of the side.
Why did I not think of Magma Spray in such a hugely fast aggressive format?!?! Sadly, my wins came down to "Can I Verdict on turn 4?" I need something quicker.
I would definitely add Magma Spray, but I use Magma Jet in place of it because the scry is usually useful and my deck is slightly different. Also, I would consider Reprisal for super big, non-pro/white creatures (at least out of the sideboard). It's helped me a ton with Polukranos, Obzedat, etc.) Maybe Izzet Charm is useful for you, but every time I've played it, I've always wished it were an Azorius Charm.
I think automatically adding 4 Azorius Charm is an overreaction. It's good, but really the best part about it is that it replaces itself in the worst case scenario (that it's a dead card). Sometimes you really just need that card to be an answer.
Magma Sprays and Fiendslayer Paladin in the sideboard will help a lot in seeing a turn 5-6, also it looks like you guys are missing out on some of the best reasons to play UWR in the first place, Keranos and Assemble the Legion. I run Keranos as a 1 of main and 1 assemble in the side, both are the nuts vs mono B, and are strong plays against many other decks. If you land a Keranos against black or a planar cleansing control, there is nothing in their deck that removes it. I'd also have to say I disagree with all the hate against izzet charm. In the current meta, its almost always a 2 mana shock, with the added bonus of looting into land drops if necessary, or countering a turn 2-3 domri or xenagos before you have dissolve mana. I'm taking my UWR control to the TCG 5k tomorrow, I'll try to remember to post my results here after. I think its a very strong meta choice right now.
Magma Sprays and Fiendslayer Paladin in the sideboard will help a lot in seeing a turn 5-6, also it looks like you guys are missing out on some of the best reasons to play UWR in the first place, Keranos and Assemble the Legion. I run Keranos as a 1 of main and 1 assemble in the side, both are the nuts vs mono B, and are strong plays against many other decks. If you land a Keranos against black or a planar cleansing control, there is nothing in their deck that removes it. I'd also have to say I disagree with all the hate against izzet charm. In the current meta, its almost always a 2 mana shock, with the added bonus of looting into land drops if necessary, or countering a turn 2-3 domri or xenagos before you have dissolve mana. I'm taking my UWR control to the TCG 5k tomorrow, I'll try to remember to post my results here after. I think its a very strong meta choice right now.
Keranos didn't impress me at all. I used to use him but he sat in my hand a lot when I would rather be playing other spells. Then, he came down on an already controlled board.
He's always done pretty good work for me. He can completely swing games vs mono B and U/W cleansing control and isn't bad in most match ups, from what I've seen.
Keranos is amazing! I don't know why any UWR wouldn't run it. I automatically assumed that you just left it off. How can you not be impressed? In the aggro meta that seems to be everywhere, it craps on a ton of things or digs until you find answers. In control mirrors, it becomes a clock of sorts AND card advantage. I will say, however, that after adding Keranos to my deck when it came out, I felt Assemble the Legion has been better out of the sideboard. Mostly, I rely on Elspeth, Sun's Champion to win, but I have just beaten opponents into submission with just Keranos on the board.
So, got absolutely crapped on at FNM tonight. Hasty creatures hurt a lot. Never really bothered by Desecration Demon and the like, but Stormbreath Dragon and other hasty stuff hurts. Might need to start running Quicken while it's still format legal.
Also, I made a conscious decision with the decklist going in, and not playing Sphinx's Revelation kind of neuters this deck. Unless Khans brings us some crazy card advantage to replace it (not to mention another 4 CMC Wrath effect) I can't see any UWx control list being viable.
And how can you guys not love Keranos, God of Storms? Lightning Bolts or card draws every turn for free? What's not to like?
Edit: One more thing! Are you guys psyched to see some Jeskai toys in a few days? Should push some more people towards this build instead of the Esper shell.
When it resolved, I won 80-90% of my matches. Usually, I searched Syncopate, Cyclonic Rift (1of) and Sphinx's Revelation with it. All cards are pretty nice, when you have 7 Mana or more.
But 7 Mana is a thing. When you draw it and you are on 4 or 5 Mana, you don't want to see it and it is a dead card. I changed it for Jace's Ingenuity. We loose our matches, when we are at 4, 5 or 6 Mana... ...when we hit 7 Mana, everything is already pretty okay, so Firemind's Foresight is a "winmore", but we can do it without.
Good reasoning. I will disclude it. This is what I'm thinking:
I went 3-0-1 (officially) on Friday playing essentially Floch's deck with red sideboard options. Changes from his list other than manabase are -1 quicken, -1 dissolve, +1 counterflux, +1 Elspeth. The Chasm Skulker was just something I threw in for fun since I opened a foil and should probably just be another nyx-fleece ram or other win condition. The only maindeck red card is a singleton counterflux.
Round 1: G/U devotion similar to Reid's list: This went about as expected with verdicts and cleansings sealing the game. My opponent did get a thassa game 1 which was problematic due to the lack of maindeck removal. In game 2 I survived through three mistcutter hydras and went with a combination of keranos, elspeth, and chasm skulker to close out the game. My opponent ran aetherling straight into counterflux both games.
Round 2: GW aggro: Game 1 my opponent kept a very bad hand consisting of 6 lands and voice. I had the last breath and that was pretty much the game since I was able to freely build up resources. In game 2 after trading a mutavault on turn 4 and veridct on turn 5 I went all in on a turn 6 Assemble the Legion which shut my opponent out of the game.
Round 3: Rabble Red: Game 1 was very close with a timely Stoke the Flames topdeck finishing me off. In game 2 I stabilized and eventually played Elspeth. To be safe, I used azorius charm for lifelink the turn before I was going to make the emblem. My opponent got off to a very slow start in game 3 after a mulligan to 5. I was originally planning to hold my nyx-fleece ram until after the boardwipe so it gained more than two life, but when he played nothing on turn 3 I went for it. The slow start allowed me to resolve Assemble the Legion on turn 5 and hold verdict until turn 7. The increasing stream of soldier tokens closed out the game.
Round 4: Drew with the other 3-0 and split (he was on mono b aggro). We played anyways since we had to wait for the end of the round. Game 1 was pretty bad for me since I didn't draw into the removal I needed. In the second game, turn 4 and 6 boardwipes depleted my opponent's resources and a rev for 4 closed it out. Game 3 I followed up supreme verdict with Keranos which is unanswerable for that deck.
Hey guys I've tried to run uwr as my return to standard and had a really bad time of it so i ended up splitting it into a u devotion deck with a splash of w and a r devotion deck....
with the new set coming out theres an oppertunity to do uwr superfriends which is what i wanted to do in the firrst place. my problem is the local meta is full of thboughtseizes mutavaults and 4+ toughness creatures.
I thinks there's like 5 g devotion
4 g/b
1 r/b
1 u/w control
1 r/w
and afew other scattered one
but i don't know how to handle most this since its just overflowing with green beats and black removal. So I figured I'd wait till rotation but i need to start planning. what can I do with the cards that will survive rotation/the spoilers so far to be able to handle this stuff?
Rotation talk probably not a good idea in the competitive forum. The best place to talk about rotation is in New Card Discussion or Standard Deck Creation
Rotation talk probably not a good idea in the competitive forum. The best place to talk about rotation is in New Card Discussion or Standard Deck Creation
I don't think anyone is developing this deck anymore. This is a stupid rule.
Rotation talk probably not a good idea in the competitive forum. The best place to talk about rotation is in New Card Discussion or Standard Deck Creation
Anyway, Magma Spray or Mizzium Mortars?
It depends on your local metagame. If you get run over by the likes of RabbleRed, Boros aggro and company, I suggest Magma Spray. Magma Spray handles that much better than Mizzium Mortars. Mizzium Mortars was really popular IMO because it's one of the few spells (not named Supreme Verdict) we have that deal with Blood Baron of Vizkopa or Stormbreath Dragon.
Anyways, enough rambling. Here's my to-be decklist:
4 Supreme Verdict
2 Mizzium Mortars
Spot Removal:
2 Aurelia's Fury
4 Detention Sphere
4 Banishing Light
Card Advantage:
2 Keranos, God of Storms
2 Chandra, Pyromaster
4 Steam Augury
Counters:
4 Dissolve
3 Izzet Charm
2 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
1 Assemble the Legion
Land:
4 Temple of Epiphany
4 Shivan Reef
4 Temple of Triumph
4 Battlefield Forge
4 Temple of Enlightenment
3 Island
3 Plains
3 Nyx-Fleece Ram
4 Negate
2 Dispel
1 Assemble the Legion
1 Ætherling
1 Elixir of Immortality
1 Jace, Memory Adept
2 Warleader's Helix
Constructive criticism would be much appreciated.
For one, it looks like there's no early/cheap card draw and cantrips to smooth out hands w/ low land counts. It also seems like you could end up with virtual mulligans when you start games with any of the multiple win conditions in hand (Keranos, Elspeth, Assemble and Prognostic Sphinx).
As far as early game card draw to smooth out rough hands, I thought Izzet Charm could fill that role.
You might want to goldfish the first few turns to see how the land drops/card draw work out. I don't think casting Izzet Charm to loot is where you want to be in the early game because you would be down cards early on.
The jund player at my LGS always named Revelation. Even if you still have win conditions it doesn't matter if you're dead from running out of answers/life. As for izzet charm looting, sometimes you just have to do it to hit land drops. The looting mode is great late game when you're drawing above maximum hand size regularly, but is generally something I don't do often in the early game.
1 Aetherling
Planeswalkers (6):
2 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
4 Jace, Architect of Thought
Artifacts & Enchantments (4):
4 Detention Sphere
1 Elixir of Imortality
Instants & Sorceries (23):
2 Azorius Charm
1 Deicide
4 Dissolve
2 Izzet Charm
4 Sphinx's Revelation
4 Supreme Verdict
2 Syncopate
2 Turn // Burn
1 Warleader's Helix
4 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
3 Hallowed Fountain
2 Sacred Foundry
3 Steam Vents
4 Temple of Enlightenment
4 Temple of Epiphany
4 Temple of Triumph
1 Aetherling
2 Anger of the Gods
2 Counterflux
1 Deicide
2 Negate
4 Nyx-Fleece Ram
1 Turn // Burn
2 Warleader's Helix
Wins were Red Midrange, UR Tempo, and RB Aggro.
Losses were RUG Combo (see below) and Naya Hexproof.
The RUG Combo deck used Generator Servant to power out threats. The blue was there for Ensoul Artifact (usually on an Ornithopter or Darksteel Citadel). He also had Springleaf Drum and Mistcutter Hydra maindeck. Anyway, game 3 he goes:
Turn 1: Yavimaya Coast, Elf.
Turn 2: Mountain, Generator Servant.
Turn 3: Land, sacrifice Generator Servant, play Kalonian Hydra. Attack for 8.
Turn 4: (I have two untapped scrylands and an Island, and nothing castable but a Deicide) He attacks for 16.
HOW THE HECK ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DEAL WITH THAT?!?! This deck is just dead to it without Azorius Charm or Celestial Flare in hand. The only things I could think of were Magma Spray for the Generator Servant, and Celestial Flare for the attackers. The guy even had the gall to tell me after the game that he specifically built his deck to beat U/x control variants. "I hate blue," he said. There are a whole boatload of players with similar sentiments at the LGS.
Now flash forward to Naya Hexproof. Game 3. I have 2 Supreme Verdict in hand, am at 8 life, he has 6 power of mobs on board. He has one card in his hand. I Verdict. He plays Boros Charm and saves his mobs. Okay...no big deal...he now has no cards...I can just Verdict again next turn and stabilize at 2. So I go to Verdict again, and the guy had ripped an Ajani's Presence off the top. WTFFFFF
The night was filled with crap like this. I don't think I built my deck badly, but I sure had some rotten luck. Actually, allow me to rephrase: my opponents had some stellar luck.
What are some solutions to these decks/strategies? Strangely I did not fold to R/x aggro at all tonight. The Rams were good and so were the Turn//Burns and Warleader's Helixes. (Helices?)
Some single card observations...
Warleader's Helix was better when you could at least count on seeing turn 5. It did sit in my hand while I was getting gang raped by goblins.
Turn//Burn is really good and I will probably go up to 3 maindeck. It solves early aggro a bit and deals with Stormbreath.
Azorius Charm probably needs to be 3-4.
The days of Izzet Charm being absolutely stellar seem to be a memory. ::tear::
Deicide main is a gamble. Will be moving it to sideboard.
Syncopate should be 1 or 0. Not 2. This deck is not pure UW. 4 Dissolve should be enough with other countermagic out of the side.
Why did I not think of Magma Spray in such a hugely fast aggressive format?!?! Sadly, my wins came down to "Can I Verdict on turn 4?" I need something quicker.
Anyway, all input is appreciated.
I think I'm going to start from the top when it comes to spell choices here. I no longer believe it is good to cut any Azorius Charm. 4x auto.
Also, I made a conscious decision with the decklist going in, and not playing Sphinx's Revelation kind of neuters this deck. Unless Khans brings us some crazy card advantage to replace it (not to mention another 4 CMC Wrath effect) I can't see any UWx control list being viable.
And how can you guys not love Keranos, God of Storms? Lightning Bolts or card draws every turn for free? What's not to like?
Edit: One more thing! Are you guys psyched to see some Jeskai toys in a few days? Should push some more people towards this build instead of the Esper shell.
I've never really liked it for one reason: What would you get with it that matters in any matchup?
Good reasoning. I will disclude it. This is what I'm thinking:
1 Aetherling
Planeswalkers (6):
2 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
4 Jace, Architect of Thought
Artifacts & Enchantments (6):
1 Banishing Light
4 Detention Sphere
1 Elixir of Imortality
Instants & Sorceries (21):
4 Azorius Charm
4 Dissolve
2 Izzet Charm
4 Sphinx's Revelation
4 Supreme Verdict
1 Syncopate
2 Turn // Burn
4 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
3 Hallowed Fountain
2 Sacred Foundry
3 Steam Vents
4 Temple of Enlightenment
4 Temple of Epiphany
4 Temple of Triumph
1 Aetherling
1 Anger of the Gods
3 Celestial Flare
3 Magma Spray
3 Negate
4 Nyx-Fleece Ram
Feedback welcome and encouraged.
Round 1: G/U devotion similar to Reid's list: This went about as expected with verdicts and cleansings sealing the game. My opponent did get a thassa game 1 which was problematic due to the lack of maindeck removal. In game 2 I survived through three mistcutter hydras and went with a combination of keranos, elspeth, and chasm skulker to close out the game. My opponent ran aetherling straight into counterflux both games.
Round 2: GW aggro: Game 1 my opponent kept a very bad hand consisting of 6 lands and voice. I had the last breath and that was pretty much the game since I was able to freely build up resources. In game 2 after trading a mutavault on turn 4 and veridct on turn 5 I went all in on a turn 6 Assemble the Legion which shut my opponent out of the game.
Round 3: Rabble Red: Game 1 was very close with a timely Stoke the Flames topdeck finishing me off. In game 2 I stabilized and eventually played Elspeth. To be safe, I used azorius charm for lifelink the turn before I was going to make the emblem. My opponent got off to a very slow start in game 3 after a mulligan to 5. I was originally planning to hold my nyx-fleece ram until after the boardwipe so it gained more than two life, but when he played nothing on turn 3 I went for it. The slow start allowed me to resolve Assemble the Legion on turn 5 and hold verdict until turn 7. The increasing stream of soldier tokens closed out the game.
Round 4: Drew with the other 3-0 and split (he was on mono b aggro). We played anyways since we had to wait for the end of the round. Game 1 was pretty bad for me since I didn't draw into the removal I needed. In the second game, turn 4 and 6 boardwipes depleted my opponent's resources and a rev for 4 closed it out. Game 3 I followed up supreme verdict with Keranos which is unanswerable for that deck.
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
3 Jace, Architect of Thought
Artifacts & Enchantments:
1 Elixir of Immortality
Instants & Sorceries:
4 Azorius Charm
3 Quicken
3 Divination
3 Dissolve
1 Counterflux
2 Syncopate
2 Last Breath
4 Supreme Verdict
3 Planar Cleansing
4 Sphinx's Revelation
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Temple of Enlightenment
4 Temple of Epiphany
4 Temple of Triumph
2 Mutavault
4 Island
4 Plains
1 Jace, Memory Adept
1 Keranos, God of Storms
1 Assemble the Legion
2 Izzet Charm
2 Negate
1 Blind Obedience
2 Nyx-fleece Ram
2 Deicide
1 Pithing Needle
1 Counterflux
1 Chasm Skulker
with the new set coming out theres an oppertunity to do uwr superfriends which is what i wanted to do in the firrst place. my problem is the local meta is full of thboughtseizes mutavaults and 4+ toughness creatures.
I thinks there's like 5 g devotion
4 g/b
1 r/b
1 u/w control
1 r/w
and afew other scattered one
but i don't know how to handle most this since its just overflowing with green beats and black removal. So I figured I'd wait till rotation but i need to start planning. what can I do with the cards that will survive rotation/the spoilers so far to be able to handle this stuff?
Anyway, Magma Spray or Mizzium Mortars?
It depends on your local metagame. If you get run over by the likes of RabbleRed, Boros aggro and company, I suggest Magma Spray. Magma Spray handles that much better than Mizzium Mortars. Mizzium Mortars was really popular IMO because it's one of the few spells (not named Supreme Verdict) we have that deal with Blood Baron of Vizkopa or Stormbreath Dragon.
1 Aetherling
Planeswalkers (6):
2 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
4 Jace, Architect of Thought
Artifacts & Enchantments (6):
1 Banishing Light
4 Detention Sphere
1 Elixir of Imortality
Instants & Sorceries (21):
4 Azorius Charm
4 Dissolve
2 Izzet Charm
4 Sphinx's Revelation
4 Supreme Verdict
1 Syncopate
2 Turn // Burn
4 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
3 Hallowed Fountain
2 Sacred Foundry
3 Steam Vents
4 Temple of Enlightenment
4 Temple of Epiphany
4 Temple of Triumph
1 Aetherling
1 Anger of the Gods
2 Celestial Flare
1 Deicide
3 Magma Spray
3 Negate
4 Nyx-Fleece Ram
Not going to bother with individual match results, but I can say the only deck that gave me trouble was GW. VoR is such a pain!