Match 1: (2-0) Naya Zoo
Almost a mix between aggro and midrange. Was based off the deck that I had played against him pre-rotation... I dropped it for a reason. Didnt even need to sideboard anything in.
Match 2: Mono Blue Aggro (2-1)
Game 1 I have a great game. Game 2 he sides in 12 spells against me while I can only put in 2 Yoked Ox and 2 Last Breath in place of Quicken and 3 divination. Game 3 I side in 2 Negate and 1 Gainsay to counter what he sided in. Usually win 2-1 against Mono Blue Aggro.
Match 3: B/W Midrange (1-1-1)
Game 1 I stomp him. Game 2 he gets himself down to 9 life but has so many things to side in to destroy my hand that its hard for me to generate card advantage, he also had Underworld Connections.. which I really should've d-sphered. Game 3 we didn't even have enough time to get started.
Match 4: RDW- Devotion Style (2-0)
Game 1 I get to about 8 life but eventually I remove all of his threats, he started drawing into land and i ultimated Jace, Architect of Thought. Game 2 he was a little better positioned but I had sided in Yoked Ox which blocked his Burning-Tree Emissary and he had to waste a shock on it. Once I had stabilized, Elspeth, Sun's Champion come in and there was really no competition with her ultimating.
Wouldnt change a thing about the deck or the sideboard.
Played the second gameday. Went 1-1-2
Match 1: Esper Control (1-0-1)
He eventually beats me the first game due to having Thoughtseize and Hero's Downfall. Game 2 was quite the match because he is known as the best control player there and I have my freshly unveiled "Champion" play mat staring him down. Drew quite an audience. In the end Elspeth's tokens got him down to 1 life when we hit turn 5 after time was called. Very close.
Match 2: Esper Control (1-1-1)
Game 1 I win pretty easily. Game 2 he wins after a bit of grinding. Ashiok. Nightmare Weaver ended up milling all of my wincons expect a Jace, Memory Adept. Which was quickly killed with a downfall. Game 3 we didn't even have enough time to start and agreed to tie.
Match 3: Rakdos Aggro (2-0)
At this point with a loss and a tie I played one of the lesser decks there. The guy overcomitted to the board and theres really no point in going in depth.
Match 4: Grixis Control (1-1-1)
Game 1 I killed him with Elspeth's ultimate. It was a race because the turn before that he had stolen my other Elspeth with Psychic Intrusion, which I was very surprised to see. Game 2 he won with intrusion, duress, thoughtseize, etc. Game 3 we agreed we didn't have enough time to start and tied.
What I learned is that this deck is great against most decks, with a 70/30 shot of winning game 1, and a 60/40 shot at games 2&3.
Against another U/W deck its 50/50 all 3 games.
Against B/W Midrange its 60/40 the first game but 40/60 in games 2&3, due to them having thoughtseize, sin collector, duress, and even lifebane zombie.
Against Esper (or even Grixis, although i dont see it doing very well overall) I say Game 1 is 50/50, and games 2&3 are 30/70.. by far my worst matchup.
The moral of the story is that black is bad due to Hero's Downfall and having hand disruption.
I will continue to play this deck for a long time, especially now that i have an amazing Elspeth play mat to go with it!
On a side note, my dad won the second gameday with an original B/W Midrange build we had made the night before. I focused on the main and getting the curve right.. trying to balance the right amount of removal and wincons, while he worked on the sideboard and figuring out all of the card interaction with other decks. Piloted it very well and was victorious.
We handled gameday as a father/ son team and came out on top.
Round 1 - Esper Control (0-2)
G1: I land and early Mutvault, hitting him for a few turns cutting his health in half. I drop an Elspeth using my Dissolve to counter his. While I'm tapped out, he lands an Ashiok milling over 2 of my Detention Spheres and Hero Downfall's my Elspeth. I'm never able to find an answer to his Planeswalkers and he kills me with a MD Jace, MA.
G2: I start to stumble on finding lands around turns 3-4 and was never really in the game to begin with. He kills me with Jace, MA again.
Round 2 - RG Aggro (2-1)
G1: My opponent doesn't find a Green source of mana until it's too late. I take advantage of this by dropping an early AEtherling.
G2: On a mull to 6, I miss a couple land drop. Able to deal with his first Mistcutter Hydra with a Supreme Verdict, but the 2nd one I had no answer for.
G3: My opponent attacks and early Mistcutter Hydra into a Celestial Flare. The 2nd one gets hit with a Ratchet Bomb. My opponent didn't really play much else that was threatning. I was able to win late game with a Elspeth and many tokens.
My opponent only drew 1 Stormbreath Dragon during the match, which I countered. I suppose the match would've been much different had he drawn more.
Round 3 - BG Midrange (2-0)
G1: Not really knowing what he was playing, I was countering a lot of his early threats (Reaper of the Wilds, Desecration Demon) and was able to D-sphere things like Vraska. I eventually won with an AEtherling, through the many removal spells that he kept drawing.
G2: I drew all of my counterspells, and just eventually grinded him out in card advantage with a large Sphinx's Revelation. Landed a late Elspeth that just took over the game.
(One thing I learned is to not Pithing Needle Underworld Connections, but to name the land that it is attached to.)
Top 8 - Mono B (0-2)
Never playing this match-up before, I didn't really know what to expect. I blame this loss on my lack of knowledge for this matchup.
G1: An early Pack Rat, forces me to Supreme Verdict 3 Pack Rat tokens away after holding him off a bit with a Jace, Architect of Thought. He proceeds to land both Underworld Connections and Liliana of the Dark Realms with my 0 counterspell hand. With a Liliana threatening to ultimate, I chose to D-sphere it instead of the Underworld Connections. (?) He ends up draining me with 2 Gray Merchants.
G2: I mull to a bad keep of 6. I proceed to miss land drops. He drops a Whip of Erebos and with my 3 Supreme Verdict hand it was very akward to play around. Never drawing D-sphere for any of his non-creature threats he easily took over the game.
Over all, the deck seemed okay. I haven't really done any play testing but I feel with more practice I can get more familiar in these match-ups I haven't played against enough.
Saturday.
Round 1 Vs Wr Wennie 2-0
Round 2 Vs GW Aggro 2-0
Round 3 Vs GR Monsters 2-1
Round 4 Vs UW Control ID
Semifinal Vs GW Aggro 2-0
Final Vs GW Aggro 2-1 (same from the second round)
Sunday.
Round 1 Vs RDW 2-0
Round 2 Vs UW Control 1-2 (duo to a HUGE mistake from my part )
Round 3 Vs Wr Wennie 2-0
Semifinal Vs RDW 1-2
Saturday.
Round 1 Vs Wr Wennie 2-0
Round 2 Vs GW Aggro 2-0
Round 3 Vs GR Monsters 2-1
Round 4 Vs UW Control ID
Semifinal Vs GW Aggro 2-0
Final Vs GW Aggro 2-1 (same from the second round)
Sunday.
Round 1 Vs RDW 2-0
Round 2 Vs UW Control 1-2 (duo to a HUGE mistake from my part )
Round 3 Vs Wr Wennie 2-0
Semifinal Vs RDW 1-2
Any advice or criticism would be appreciated
well similar to what I'm running. I've actually considered splashing black just for 2 Doom Blade and 2 Thoughtseize. I like it a lot.
well similar to what I'm running. I've actually considered splashing black just for 2 Doom Blade and 2 Thoughtseize. I like it a lot.
Consider far//away instead of doom blade. If you don't get a black source, you still have a playable card. I wouldn't play thoughtseize. It normally needs to come down fairly early which requires a much higher dedication to black.
My previous Hard Control UW during the Game Day went really bad (not only bad luck/draws, but paired twice against UB Control was a unwinable matchup). Also, being so reactive is the weakness of this deck.
That's why i twisted to a more proactive game with more creatures. This is the list i will test during this week, and post the results on weekend.
My previous Hard Control UW during the Game Day went really bad (not only bad luck/draws, but paired twice against UB Control was a unwinable matchup). Also, being so reactive is the weakness of this deck.
That's why i twisted to a more proactive game with more creatures. This is the list i will test during this week, and post the results on weekend.
Your deck is just begging to be preyed upon by blood baron and only one creature (aetherling) has any protection from removal. If you're playing more creature-heavy, I'd recommend looking at prognostic sphinx rather than AoS as it is protected from removal and scrys through your deck incredibly fast while also blocking blood baron. Fiendslayer paladin, frostburn weird, and archangel of thune may also be worthy of consideration.
Blood Baron eats all kinds of removal (verdict, hybridization, flare, essence scatter). AoS is a bomb against Midrange and recycling your creatures. Prognostic doesn't pump a possible Heliod as AoS.
Finally back to this thread! Been busy playing/practicing limited for the PTQs and GPs coming up in my area.
I've made a ton of changes since the original decklist, but alas, my deckbox w/ deck and board was stolen at the last PTQ I played at. It's unfortunate, but that had a lot of my value in it, and thus, I can no longer continue to play any constructed format, for the foreseeable future.
Blood Baron eats all kinds of removal (verdict, hybridization, flare, essence scatter). AoS is a bomb against Midrange and recycling your creatures. Prognostic doesn't pump a possible Heliod as AoS.
In my experience (I've been testing a similar build), verdict is a nonbo when you have creatures in play. I find myself wanting to scry it to the bottom once I get a couple creatures out (enter the sphinx).
Essence scatter isn't an argument for a resolved baron (He's likely to resolve right after you've resolved one of your numerous creatures). This leaves you with 3 real answers which isn't so good overall when Esper and WB are running 2-4 copies.
As to AoS boosting devotion. If you have AoS on the field and they don't have an answer, animating Heliod is just win-more. With you only playing one heliod it's not going to see play a lot of games unless you have a chance to dig. Prognostic helps quite a lot with this.
I've made a ton of changes since the original decklist, but alas, my deckbox w/ deck and board was stolen at the last PTQ I played at. It's unfortunate, but that had a lot of my value in it, and thus, I can no longer continue to play any constructed format, for the foreseeable future.
This stinks massively, but seems to be pretty common based on what I read here on the boards. I wish you a swift recovery!
I need advice on the SB part, i tried the regular SB cards but none of them are working as I really wish.
Actual Meta: MU aggro, RG beasts, BW midrange, Esper control, Monored/gw aggro/boros aggro, Junk Midrange.
The aggro decks should be easy as you would only side in the ox and the last breath (or glare if facing facing gw, as LB isn't very good against them). Side in captain, dispel and negate against control. Dispel and Negate aren't too shabby against BW either has they might have underworld connections and/or whip. I also see you run captains main, I would take them out vs junk, bw, and possibly rg (not sure if they have any small creatures worth blocking)
How do we feel about approaching UW with more of a tapout sense of mind, eschewing counters (like dissolve and syncopate), in favor of spells like Azorius Cluestone and Divination (running 3-4)?
I feel like what we are playing is the best thing we can be doing so doing that a turn early save for things like jace (wheres that 2 mana signet??) must be even better. Dropping a turn 5 Elspeth or a turn 6 Aetherling while still leaving up seems pretty powerful at the moment.
Thoughts? Could I be on to something or am I crazy?
What is this unhealthy fascination with cluestones lately?
If you wan't ramp, which I'm of the opinion that you don't even need and drastically worsens your reactive plays early on...then just play keyrune already.
Cluestone is just not a very good card.
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I had no idea people were already trying cluestone lol.
However I feel that the cluestone is better than keyrune because it lets you cantrip if you need it, you cannot do this with keyrune and we honestly don't need another manland type card since we already have access to 4 mutavault.
What are YOU cutting to include Cluestone in your list because I can almost guarantee that whatever it is, that it is better than the cluestone itself.
You don't need a 5 mana cantrip. If more draw is what you feel you need just play Inspiration.
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If you're playing ramp, play keyrune and drop the mutavaults to make your manabase more consistent. As for myself, I'd rather that 3cmc card be a dissolve. It plays the same turn,probably counters their entire turn, gets a card out of their hand and puts me in almost the same position manawise as if I had played the keyrune.
Yeah, I've seen Cluestone pop up in Trading Post lists, which makes sense, but even there it's probably too cute. Definitely doesn't do enough for a traditional U/W Control list. If you need to draw cards, you have Azorius Charm, Divination, Jace, and Revelation to do that.
See, if I wanted to play counters, I would play them but I feel right now that they aren't doing much when we can let them drop as many creatures as they want then verdict away. I'm okay with that. I feel that with 3 essence scatter main, with 2 dispel and 2 negate in the board, I'm in a good place with my counterspell suite.
As for cutting mutavault? Not gonna happen, the card is too good against control and just helps get that incremental damage in. Plus running UW lets you just play them without much worry. I couldn't imagine running UW without them.
I also didn't say I would just be using cluestone to be drawing cards, it's mainly just for ramp THEN if I need to, it can draw cards. Don't you agree that a turn 5 Elspeth is better than a turn 6 one?
Feel free to disagree with anything I say, I'm more interested in just testing myself and seeing where it takes me. I was just posting to see if others shared some of my own thought process. Guess not.
See, if I wanted to play counters, I would play them but I feel right now that they aren't doing much when we can let them drop as many creatures as they want then verdict away. I'm okay with that. I feel that with 3 essence scatter main, with 2 dispel and 2 negate in the board, I'm in a good place with my counterspell suite.
As for cutting mutavault? Not gonna happen, the card is too good against control and just helps get that incremental damage in. Plus running UW lets you just play them without much worry. I couldn't imagine running UW without them.
I also didn't say I would just be using cluestone to be drawing cards, it's mainly just for ramp THEN if I need to, it can draw cards. Don't you agree that a turn 5 Elspeth is better than a turn 6 one?
Feel free to disagree with anything I say, I'm more interested in just testing myself and seeing where it takes me. I was just posting to see if others shared some of my own thought process. Guess not.
This deck needs counter magic to even stay in the game. There are still many noncreature spells that can't be answered unless we have a counter. Cutting down on them doesn't seem like a good idea.
See, if I wanted to play counters, I would play them but I feel right now that they aren't doing much when we can let them drop as many creatures as they want then verdict away. I'm okay with that. I feel that with 3 essence scatter main, with 2 dispel and 2 negate in the board, I'm in a good place with my counterspell suite.
As for cutting mutavault? Not gonna happen, the card is too good against control and just helps get that incremental damage in. Plus running UW lets you just play them without much worry. I couldn't imagine running UW without them.
I also didn't say I would just be using cluestone to be drawing cards, it's mainly just for ramp THEN if I need to, it can draw cards. Don't you agree that a turn 5 Elspeth is better than a turn 6 one?
Feel free to disagree with anything I say, I'm more interested in just testing myself and seeing where it takes me. I was just posting to see if others shared some of my own thought process. Guess not.
Esper only runs 3-4 counterspells because they have answers to EVERYTHING in to format. The counterspells are saved for game changing cards like AEtherling/Whip etc. UW doesn't have this luxury. Our only pieces of removal are D-sphere and Supreme Verdict. Because of this, we run more counterspells to deal with threats before they hit the board. Essence scatter is fine as a 2-3 of, but it definitely can't be the only counters you play. If I were only going to play one type of Counterspell, it'd definitely be Dissolve.
Personally I run 6 counterspells 2/2/2 Dissolve/Syncopate/Essence Scatter. I've really liked this number. Might consider going to 3 Dissolve/1 Syncopate.
As for the clue stone, you really shouldn't be ramping anyways. Ramping into Elspeth seems fine, but anything other than that is just pointless. The clue stone isn't card advantage, which is what we're looking for. The card just replaced itself. If I wanted a card like that, I'd just play Quicken but instead we play Divination to give is actual card advantage.
Ok, hello everyone first of all, first post on this forums, long run magic player. I've been playing UW control for some time now, but this week i'm willing to try something new that someone before suggested in this tread. Playing Planar Cleansing in the new meta. I've two build and since i'm looking forward to play one at my FNM tomorrow, would like your opinion on wich build should I take. Will post results later
4 Jace, Architect of Thought
2 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
2 Ratchet Bomb
4 Detention Sphere
1 Quicken
4 Azorius Charm
1 Celestial Flare
1 Essence Scatter
3 Divination
2 Dissolve
4 Supreme Verdict
3 Sphinx's Revelation
2 Syncopate
8 Plains
4 Azorius Guildgate
4 Hallowed Fountain
2 Mutavault
2 Pithing Needle
2 Yoked Ox
3 Last Breath
2 Negate
2 Glare of Heresy
2 Celestial Flare
1 Gainsay
1 Jace, Memory Adept
Went 3-0-1
Match 1: (2-0) Naya Zoo
Almost a mix between aggro and midrange. Was based off the deck that I had played against him pre-rotation... I dropped it for a reason. Didnt even need to sideboard anything in.
Match 2: Mono Blue Aggro (2-1)
Game 1 I have a great game. Game 2 he sides in 12 spells against me while I can only put in 2 Yoked Ox and 2 Last Breath in place of Quicken and 3 divination. Game 3 I side in 2 Negate and 1 Gainsay to counter what he sided in. Usually win 2-1 against Mono Blue Aggro.
Match 3: B/W Midrange (1-1-1)
Game 1 I stomp him. Game 2 he gets himself down to 9 life but has so many things to side in to destroy my hand that its hard for me to generate card advantage, he also had Underworld Connections.. which I really should've d-sphered. Game 3 we didn't even have enough time to get started.
Match 4: RDW- Devotion Style (2-0)
Game 1 I get to about 8 life but eventually I remove all of his threats, he started drawing into land and i ultimated Jace, Architect of Thought. Game 2 he was a little better positioned but I had sided in Yoked Ox which blocked his Burning-Tree Emissary and he had to waste a shock on it. Once I had stabilized, Elspeth, Sun's Champion come in and there was really no competition with her ultimating.
Wouldnt change a thing about the deck or the sideboard.
Played the second gameday. Went 1-1-2
Match 1: Esper Control (1-0-1)
He eventually beats me the first game due to having Thoughtseize and Hero's Downfall. Game 2 was quite the match because he is known as the best control player there and I have my freshly unveiled "Champion" play mat staring him down. Drew quite an audience. In the end Elspeth's tokens got him down to 1 life when we hit turn 5 after time was called. Very close.
Match 2: Esper Control (1-1-1)
Game 1 I win pretty easily. Game 2 he wins after a bit of grinding. Ashiok. Nightmare Weaver ended up milling all of my wincons expect a Jace, Memory Adept. Which was quickly killed with a downfall. Game 3 we didn't even have enough time to start and agreed to tie.
Match 3: Rakdos Aggro (2-0)
At this point with a loss and a tie I played one of the lesser decks there. The guy overcomitted to the board and theres really no point in going in depth.
Match 4: Grixis Control (1-1-1)
Game 1 I killed him with Elspeth's ultimate. It was a race because the turn before that he had stolen my other Elspeth with Psychic Intrusion, which I was very surprised to see. Game 2 he won with intrusion, duress, thoughtseize, etc. Game 3 we agreed we didn't have enough time to start and tied.
What I learned is that this deck is great against most decks, with a 70/30 shot of winning game 1, and a 60/40 shot at games 2&3.
Against another U/W deck its 50/50 all 3 games.
Against B/W Midrange its 60/40 the first game but 40/60 in games 2&3, due to them having thoughtseize, sin collector, duress, and even lifebane zombie.
Against Esper (or even Grixis, although i dont see it doing very well overall) I say Game 1 is 50/50, and games 2&3 are 30/70.. by far my worst matchup.
The moral of the story is that black is bad due to Hero's Downfall and having hand disruption.
I will continue to play this deck for a long time, especially now that i have an amazing Elspeth play mat to go with it!
On a side note, my dad won the second gameday with an original B/W Midrange build we had made the night before. I focused on the main and getting the curve right.. trying to balance the right amount of removal and wincons, while he worked on the sideboard and figuring out all of the card interaction with other decks. Piloted it very well and was victorious.
We handled gameday as a father/ son team and came out on top.
Abzan Midrange
Modern:
Scapeshift
3 Jace, Architect of Thought
2 Elspeth Sun's Champion
4 Supreme Verdict
4 Azorius Charm
3 Detention Sphere
3 Sphinx's Revelation
2 Dissolve
2 Syncopate
2 Essence Scatter
2 Celestial Flare
2 Divination
2 Ratchet Bomb
1 Quicken
4 Azorius Guildgate
8 Island
8 Plains
2 Mutavault
3 Yoked Ox
2 Glare of Heresy
2 Negate
2 Dispel
2 Last Breath
2 Blind Obedience
1 Jace, Memory Adept
1 Pithing Needle
Round 1 - Esper Control (0-2)
G1: I land and early Mutvault, hitting him for a few turns cutting his health in half. I drop an Elspeth using my Dissolve to counter his. While I'm tapped out, he lands an Ashiok milling over 2 of my Detention Spheres and Hero Downfall's my Elspeth. I'm never able to find an answer to his Planeswalkers and he kills me with a MD Jace, MA.
G2: I start to stumble on finding lands around turns 3-4 and was never really in the game to begin with. He kills me with Jace, MA again.
Round 2 - RG Aggro (2-1)
G1: My opponent doesn't find a Green source of mana until it's too late. I take advantage of this by dropping an early AEtherling.
G2: On a mull to 6, I miss a couple land drop. Able to deal with his first Mistcutter Hydra with a Supreme Verdict, but the 2nd one I had no answer for.
G3: My opponent attacks and early Mistcutter Hydra into a Celestial Flare. The 2nd one gets hit with a Ratchet Bomb. My opponent didn't really play much else that was threatning. I was able to win late game with a Elspeth and many tokens.
My opponent only drew 1 Stormbreath Dragon during the match, which I countered. I suppose the match would've been much different had he drawn more.
Round 3 - BG Midrange (2-0)
G1: Not really knowing what he was playing, I was countering a lot of his early threats (Reaper of the Wilds, Desecration Demon) and was able to D-sphere things like Vraska. I eventually won with an AEtherling, through the many removal spells that he kept drawing.
G2: I drew all of my counterspells, and just eventually grinded him out in card advantage with a large Sphinx's Revelation. Landed a late Elspeth that just took over the game.
(One thing I learned is to not Pithing Needle Underworld Connections, but to name the land that it is attached to.)
Top 8 - Mono B (0-2)
Never playing this match-up before, I didn't really know what to expect. I blame this loss on my lack of knowledge for this matchup.
G1: An early Pack Rat, forces me to Supreme Verdict 3 Pack Rat tokens away after holding him off a bit with a Jace, Architect of Thought. He proceeds to land both Underworld Connections and Liliana of the Dark Realms with my 0 counterspell hand. With a Liliana threatening to ultimate, I chose to D-sphere it instead of the Underworld Connections. (?) He ends up draining me with 2 Gray Merchants.
G2: I mull to a bad keep of 6. I proceed to miss land drops. He drops a Whip of Erebos and with my 3 Supreme Verdict hand it was very akward to play around. Never drawing D-sphere for any of his non-creature threats he easily took over the game.
Over all, the deck seemed okay. I haven't really done any play testing but I feel with more practice I can get more familiar in these match-ups I haven't played against enough.
This is my list:
5 Plains
4 Azorius Guildgate
4 Hallowed Fountain
2 Temple of Deceit
2 Temple of Silence
1 Mutavault
4 Jace, Architect of Thought
2 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
1 AEtherling
4 Azorius Charm
4 Detention Sphere
3 Sphinx's Revelation
3 Divination
3 Ratchet Bomb
2 Dissolve
2 Doom Blade
1 Celestial Flare
1 Essence Scatter
3 Last Breath
3 Negate
2 Glare of Heresy
2 Jace, Memory Adept
2 Yoked Ox
2 Rapid Hybridization
1 Pithing Needle
Saturday.
Round 1 Vs Wr Wennie 2-0
Round 2 Vs GW Aggro 2-0
Round 3 Vs GR Monsters 2-1
Round 4 Vs UW Control ID
Semifinal Vs GW Aggro 2-0
Final Vs GW Aggro 2-1 (same from the second round)
Sunday.
Round 1 Vs RDW 2-0
Round 2 Vs UW Control 1-2 (duo to a HUGE mistake from my part )
Round 3 Vs Wr Wennie 2-0
Semifinal Vs RDW 1-2
Any advice or criticism would be appreciated
well similar to what I'm running. I've actually considered splashing black just for 2 Doom Blade and 2 Thoughtseize. I like it a lot.
Abzan Midrange
Modern:
Scapeshift
Consider far//away instead of doom blade. If you don't get a black source, you still have a playable card. I wouldn't play thoughtseize. It normally needs to come down fairly early which requires a much higher dedication to black.
9 Plains
7 Island
4 Azorius Guildgate
4 Hallowed Fountain
2 Mutavault
Creatures 11
1 Aetherling
2 Angel of Serenity
3 Hundred-Handed One
4 Precinct Captain
1 Heliod, God of the sun
3 Essence Scatter
1 Dissolve
Draw 8
3 Azorius Charm
3 Sphinx's revelation
2 divination
Removal 12
4 Supreme verdict
2 Celestial Flare
1 Rapid Hybridization
1 Spear of Heliod
4 Detention Sphere
My previous Hard Control UW during the Game Day went really bad (not only bad luck/draws, but paired twice against UB Control was a unwinable matchup). Also, being so reactive is the weakness of this deck.
That's why i twisted to a more proactive game with more creatures. This is the list i will test during this week, and post the results on weekend.
Your deck is just begging to be preyed upon by blood baron and only one creature (aetherling) has any protection from removal. If you're playing more creature-heavy, I'd recommend looking at prognostic sphinx rather than AoS as it is protected from removal and scrys through your deck incredibly fast while also blocking blood baron. Fiendslayer paladin, frostburn weird, and archangel of thune may also be worthy of consideration.
I've made a ton of changes since the original decklist, but alas, my deckbox w/ deck and board was stolen at the last PTQ I played at. It's unfortunate, but that had a lot of my value in it, and thus, I can no longer continue to play any constructed format, for the foreseeable future.
In my experience (I've been testing a similar build), verdict is a nonbo when you have creatures in play. I find myself wanting to scry it to the bottom once I get a couple creatures out (enter the sphinx).
Essence scatter isn't an argument for a resolved baron (He's likely to resolve right after you've resolved one of your numerous creatures). This leaves you with 3 real answers which isn't so good overall when Esper and WB are running 2-4 copies.
As to AoS boosting devotion. If you have AoS on the field and they don't have an answer, animating Heliod is just win-more. With you only playing one heliod it's not going to see play a lot of games unless you have a chance to dig. Prognostic helps quite a lot with this.
9 Plains
7 Island
4 Azorius Guildgate
4 Hallowed Fountain
2 Mutavault
Creatures/Win Con 11
1 Aetherling
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
2 Angel of Serenity
2 Archangel of Thrune
4 Precinct Captain
1 Heliod, God of the Sun
3 Essence scatter
1 Dissolve
Creature killers 12
4 Supreme verdict
2 Celestial Flare
1 Rapid hybridization
4 Detention Sphere
1 Spear of Heliod
3 Azorius Charm
3 Sphinx's Revelation
2 Divination
I need advice on the SB part, i tried the regular SB cards but none of them are working as I really wish.
Actual Meta: MU aggro, RG beasts, BW midrange, Esper control, Monored/gw aggro/boros aggro, Junk Midrange.
2 Glare of Heresy
4 Last Breath
2 Negate
2 Precinct Captain
3 Yoked Ox
The aggro decks should be easy as you would only side in the ox and the last breath (or glare if facing facing gw, as LB isn't very good against them). Side in captain, dispel and negate against control. Dispel and Negate aren't too shabby against BW either has they might have underworld connections and/or whip. I also see you run captains main, I would take them out vs junk, bw, and possibly rg (not sure if they have any small creatures worth blocking)
Hope this helps in your search for a good board.
(246-174-26)
I feel like what we are playing is the best thing we can be doing so doing that a turn early save for things like jace (wheres that 2 mana signet??) must be even better. Dropping a turn 5 Elspeth or a turn 6 Aetherling while still leaving up seems pretty powerful at the moment.
Thoughts? Could I be on to something or am I crazy?
(246-174-26)
If you wan't ramp, which I'm of the opinion that you don't even need and drastically worsens your reactive plays early on...then just play keyrune already.
Cluestone is just not a very good card.
However I feel that the cluestone is better than keyrune because it lets you cantrip if you need it, you cannot do this with keyrune and we honestly don't need another manland type card since we already have access to 4 mutavault.
(246-174-26)
What are YOU cutting to include Cluestone in your list because I can almost guarantee that whatever it is, that it is better than the cluestone itself.
You don't need a 5 mana cantrip. If more draw is what you feel you need just play Inspiration.
As for cutting mutavault? Not gonna happen, the card is too good against control and just helps get that incremental damage in. Plus running UW lets you just play them without much worry. I couldn't imagine running UW without them.
I also didn't say I would just be using cluestone to be drawing cards, it's mainly just for ramp THEN if I need to, it can draw cards. Don't you agree that a turn 5 Elspeth is better than a turn 6 one?
Feel free to disagree with anything I say, I'm more interested in just testing myself and seeing where it takes me. I was just posting to see if others shared some of my own thought process. Guess not.
(246-174-26)
This deck needs counter magic to even stay in the game. There are still many noncreature spells that can't be answered unless we have a counter. Cutting down on them doesn't seem like a good idea.
Esper only runs 3-4 counterspells because they have answers to EVERYTHING in to format. The counterspells are saved for game changing cards like AEtherling/Whip etc. UW doesn't have this luxury. Our only pieces of removal are D-sphere and Supreme Verdict. Because of this, we run more counterspells to deal with threats before they hit the board. Essence scatter is fine as a 2-3 of, but it definitely can't be the only counters you play. If I were only going to play one type of Counterspell, it'd definitely be Dissolve.
Personally I run 6 counterspells 2/2/2 Dissolve/Syncopate/Essence Scatter. I've really liked this number. Might consider going to 3 Dissolve/1 Syncopate.
As for the clue stone, you really shouldn't be ramping anyways. Ramping into Elspeth seems fine, but anything other than that is just pointless. The clue stone isn't card advantage, which is what we're looking for. The card just replaced itself. If I wanted a card like that, I'd just play Quicken but instead we play Divination to give is actual card advantage.
3 Angel of Serenity
1 Heliod, God of the Sun
2 Jace, Architect of Thought
4 Azorius Charm
2 Dissolve
3 Divination
2 Essence Scatter
2 Planar Cleansing
3 Quicken
2 Renounce the Guilds
3 Sphinx's Revelation
4 Supreme Verdict
2 Syncopate
4 Hallowed Fountain
8 Island
10 Plains
1 AEtherling
1 Celestial Flare
3 Gainsay
3 Glare of Heresy
4 Last Breath
2 Negate
1 Planar Cleansing
and
3 Jace, Architect of Thought
4 Azorius Charm
2 Celestial Flare
2 Dissolve
3 Divination
2 Essence Scatter
2 Planar Cleansing
3 Quicken
2 Renounce the Guilds
3 Sphinx's Revelation
4 Supreme Verdict
2 Syncopate
4 Hallowed Fountain
8 Island
10 Plains
1 Celestial Flare
3 Gainsay
3 Glare of Heresy
1 Heliod, God of the Sun
4 Last Breath
2 Negate
1 Planar Cleansing
As you can see I try to minimize my losses on playing Cleansing by no playing detention sphere. Thoughts