Swerve doesn't actually do anything vs. Cruel Ultimatum. Since Cruel targets "an opponent", the person casting it doesn't have any valid target except you. You can't use Swerve to make a spell target something that is an illegal target (see point 2 in the card notes on the magiccards link).
I'm hoping all my Zendikar will be here on Wednesday so I can start testing a build. In the meantime, I'll be trying some stuff on Workstation.
I like your maindeck a lot, except I would run 4x both of the duals. The sideboard isn't how I would build it though. Cryoclasm seems pretty weak for this deck. It's got enough LD already and it isn't really important to have the turn 3 LD, you should beat the decks cryoclasm is best against anyway. I would rather have Annex or Goblin Flectomancer or Shattering spree there. Goblin is good against Tormod's crypt (You play him early obviously) and he's alright against burn-oriented aggro. Shattering Spree is good against decks with signets and a few other things. And Annex is probably unnecessary, but very good against control decks. Wipe Away is something you might look at as well.
What in the world is the goblin supposed to do against a Crypt? It is neither a sorcery nor an instant, so I don't understand your plan.
I've been testing Vesuva in my build, and I am sold on it. Yes, it can cost you some tempo, but I think you are overlooking some of the advantages too. I rarely want to clone a Vitu. My usual plays are to either clone a karoo in whatever colors I am short in (giving the exact same benefits as playing a real karoo), or to clone a Flagstones if I need some quick color-fixing. Although running a full set means I occasionally get painful hands, they haven't been a problem often enough to make me doubt them, especially game 2 if I know I can just clone off my opponent's lands.
Currently I'm still trying to work on my mana base, so I've been thinking about this sort of thing alot. Has anyone done testing against babybot with painlands/karoos in some of the duel-land spots? I have been playing with the mix trying to find out how much having less islands/plains against their cyroclasm is worthwhile, vs. mana stability and damage. Also, while I'm thinking about it, has anyone tried cutting Remand for Cancel (in decks using 3xcounter slots)? Every list I see has Rune Snag, Voidslime, and Remand if they have 12 or less counters. Buying an extra turn seems somewhat sub-optimal to me in a deck this slow, so I'm curious what your experiences have been. How often are you left wishing you could just make the card go away forever vs. a turn reprieve+draw.
I don't think you understand what flagstones actually does. it doesn't give you 'additional' super powerful ultra amazing white sources of mana. It gives you a plains that doesn't die...
Flagstones doens't give you extra white mana sources, I don't see where you get this concept. If I have a flagstones instead of a plains, I still have the same amount of white out... if they kill the flagstones, I still have the same amount of white in play.
The nice thing about Flagstones is that, while they don't increase the quantity of your white sources, they do increase the quality of them. In general (i.e. Blood Moon not it play or something similar) Hallowed Fountain or Temple Garden > Plain, as they are Plains+something. Flagstones lets you play it as a fake Plains, and then upgrade to Plains+ if something happens to it, at the cost of a moderate amount of tempo. Personally, I have found the tempo loss to be acceptable as I rarely NEED the extra mana in the first couple of turns, as I'm generally building to a Wrath. I also play 4x Vesuva, as the mana-fixing of first turn Flagstones, 2nd turn Vesuva is amazingly good for this deck.
I haven't really had any problems with that matchup. Typically I try to have a Voidslime ready for the transmute. Game 1 is tough if they start in on you with the void though. I have found that these matches greatly depend on how much card drawing I manage to get access to, as always having 7 (or more) cards in hand when they go to void you gives you both redundancy in your threats, and gives the other player more chances to mis-pick what matters to you. If you have 2 Fetters, a Wrath, and 3 assorted counters when they look at your hand (not uncommon for me, at least), then they don't have a good pick. I have won several of these by decking the other person after they dredged too much, but it is always a close thing. If you are running 4xHierarch and 4xFetters, you will be in a much better position for this match. I am thinking that I will be devoting SB space to Crypt, so that will make this match much more bearable.
My first thought would be to ditch the Cane. If you get to the point in a game where you need to restock your library, you have almost certainly lost anyway. I would replace them with either 2 more Wheels, or replace both Wheels and the Canes with Browbeat. Browbeat should be great for this deck as they will always have to take the 5 damage, and 1/4 of their life for 3 mana and 1 card is an excellent trade for you.
"How to deal with storm?" is going to rely on your deck type and colors for a specific answer.
If you are playing Black, the obvious answer is discard. With the reprint of Stupor, you have a good early option, and if the game goes a little longer you can beat with a hypnotic, or cast Persecute (which is a nice option, since everything you care about will be one color, i.e. red). There is also a possibility for you to use more creative strategies, like smallpox for tempo and Tendrils of Corruption to gain enough life to keep you ahead.
If you are playing Red....well, you better hope your burn>their combo. If you happen to be playing the mirror match with red, use Reiterate to copy their last Dragonstorm on the stack so that yours will resolve first and kill them. GG, thx for the storm plusses. Your other hope is to use LD, but with only 1 3cc LD, and the fact that the combo deck simply doesn't NEED that much land, you have to get pretty lucky with either yours or their draw.
If you are playing White, then your plan is to gain life > than their ability to deal damage. There are a lot of cards in standard that do this with varying degrees of efficiency. The white martyr is a good choice, as is Childron of Korlis (use in response to the 4th Dragonstorm trigger). If you can move yourself out of insta-death range, then your creature control should let you survive the dragon attack.
If you are playing blue, you can either counter all of the storm copies, or trickbind and/or counter the original one. Another, and often better, strategy is to counter out their final mana acceleration spell to keep them short of 9. If you happen to be playing Blue/White and are REALLY fearing the storm combo, sideboard Swift Silence, and be happy that you have THE anti-storm card available.
If you are playing green (mono), then good luck. Your goal is to use creatures to deal fatal damage before you get combo'd out. With no counters, lifegain, or hand disruption, you are in for a hard fight. If you are multi/blue, then you get voidslime, which will make your life a lot easier.
Search for Tomorrow from TS is a really nice accelerant. You can suspend it for G on turn 1, or hardcast it on turn 3. Also, since it doesn't put it into play tapped, it has a net cost of 2, which could be a factor as well. I haven't started testing it in my constructed deck yet, but it was by far the best 1-drop I played in any of the pre-release events.
Does your deck run 4 Birds and 4 Elves? If it does, I think the advantage is clearly with the Viper, as it will be a much more consistent turn-2 play for you. If you are running Birds only, I would look at the rest of the manabase in the deck, and decide which one is more likely to accelerate out. If you aren't running Birds either, then I guess it's a toss-up, as you have said your deck can easily run either.
I'm hoping all my Zendikar will be here on Wednesday so I can start testing a build. In the meantime, I'll be trying some stuff on Workstation.
What in the world is the goblin supposed to do against a Crypt? It is neither a sorcery nor an instant, so I don't understand your plan.
Currently I'm still trying to work on my mana base, so I've been thinking about this sort of thing alot. Has anyone done testing against babybot with painlands/karoos in some of the duel-land spots? I have been playing with the mix trying to find out how much having less islands/plains against their cyroclasm is worthwhile, vs. mana stability and damage. Also, while I'm thinking about it, has anyone tried cutting Remand for Cancel (in decks using 3xcounter slots)? Every list I see has Rune Snag, Voidslime, and Remand if they have 12 or less counters. Buying an extra turn seems somewhat sub-optimal to me in a deck this slow, so I'm curious what your experiences have been. How often are you left wishing you could just make the card go away forever vs. a turn reprieve+draw.
The nice thing about Flagstones is that, while they don't increase the quantity of your white sources, they do increase the quality of them. In general (i.e. Blood Moon not it play or something similar) Hallowed Fountain or Temple Garden > Plain, as they are Plains+something. Flagstones lets you play it as a fake Plains, and then upgrade to Plains+ if something happens to it, at the cost of a moderate amount of tempo. Personally, I have found the tempo loss to be acceptable as I rarely NEED the extra mana in the first couple of turns, as I'm generally building to a Wrath. I also play 4x Vesuva, as the mana-fixing of first turn Flagstones, 2nd turn Vesuva is amazingly good for this deck.
If you are playing Black, the obvious answer is discard. With the reprint of Stupor, you have a good early option, and if the game goes a little longer you can beat with a hypnotic, or cast Persecute (which is a nice option, since everything you care about will be one color, i.e. red). There is also a possibility for you to use more creative strategies, like smallpox for tempo and Tendrils of Corruption to gain enough life to keep you ahead.
If you are playing Red....well, you better hope your burn>their combo. If you happen to be playing the mirror match with red, use Reiterate to copy their last Dragonstorm on the stack so that yours will resolve first and kill them. GG, thx for the storm plusses. Your other hope is to use LD, but with only 1 3cc LD, and the fact that the combo deck simply doesn't NEED that much land, you have to get pretty lucky with either yours or their draw.
If you are playing White, then your plan is to gain life > than their ability to deal damage. There are a lot of cards in standard that do this with varying degrees of efficiency. The white martyr is a good choice, as is Childron of Korlis (use in response to the 4th Dragonstorm trigger). If you can move yourself out of insta-death range, then your creature control should let you survive the dragon attack.
If you are playing blue, you can either counter all of the storm copies, or trickbind and/or counter the original one. Another, and often better, strategy is to counter out their final mana acceleration spell to keep them short of 9. If you happen to be playing Blue/White and are REALLY fearing the storm combo, sideboard Swift Silence, and be happy that you have THE anti-storm card available.
If you are playing green (mono), then good luck. Your goal is to use creatures to deal fatal damage before you get combo'd out. With no counters, lifegain, or hand disruption, you are in for a hard fight. If you are multi/blue, then you get voidslime, which will make your life a lot easier.