Round 1: W 2-0 vs Nahiri Jeskai
* This was the same person I played in my previous report, and once again Game 1 took a ridiculously long time (43 minutes). I missed my 4th land drop for ~3 turns and still managed to claw my way back into the game, dealing with multiple Nahiris and eventually grinding out his hand while I had a full grip and multiple Colonnades. Game 2, however, only took 5 minutes. He fetched / shocked himself to 14 life and I responded by flipping a Thing in the Ice extremely quickly, followed up by 2 quick swings for the game. TitI finally proved itself to be undoubtedly worthy of its inclusion in the deck.
Round 2: W 2-0 vs Amulet Titan
* My opponent was playing the new version of the Summer Bloom deck with Azusa. He was able to get his ramp on pretty quickly, but I had counters and Paths to make sure Primeval Titan / Hive Mind stayed off the board. The main deck Tectonic Edges were incredibly useful in this matchup.
Round 3: W 2-0 vs Naya Burn
* Game 1, he literally had me at 3 life facing down an Exquisite Firecraft, so obviously I won that game No, seriously, I used Snapcaster Mage to flash back a Sphinx's Revelation for x=2, went to 5 life, and then took Firecraft down to 1. My Ancestral Vision then resolved, I drew a bunch of cards, held up a bunch of counterspells, and eventually gained some more life back using Ojutai's Command until eventually I was able to apply pressure and kill him. Game 2, I countered almost every burn spell he played and dealt with every creature he played. Timely Reinforcements was just back breaking; he was at 16 with Keldon Marauders on board while I was at 15. Believe I ended up flipping TitI and killing him with that.
Thing in the Ice definitely does some real work in the deck in conjunction with Ancestral Vision. Whereas before we needed Wall of Omens to help keep our hand full, Vision removes this requirement and lets us play a 2 drop that's much more aggressive. The list is pretty much exactly where I want it right now, wouldn't change any numbers of anything at the current time. It's ridiculously good at grinding games.
I'm not trying to be a hater but honestly this deck looks super clunky. I can see why its good in grindy games with 2 sphinx's rev, 3 av and 2 elspeth and a jace aot. The question is why are all these grindy cards in our deck, I have to imagine it just makes our aggro matchups go from very favorable to even or perhaps losing game one. There is absoloutely no reason for 3 AV 2 rev and a jace aot. Those are 6 slots for cards that do nothing for a very good time until they eventually draw u more cards. Between those, 2 6 drops in elspeth (which is essentially a mulligan when u open it) and 26 lands I'm just not sure how this deck sustains itself in the early game. Do we just mulligan every hand without path or spell snare? Are we just always on the play? Like i'm really confused. I think the idea is pretty interesting and is similar to biavia's shell a bit with jace vyrn's prodigy and ojutais command but I dislike the thing in the ice over the wall in the omens at least the way you have the deck constructed. You mention flipping thing in the ice early in your report, how is it getting flipped early exactly? Theres no cantrips like serum visions or probe or whatever and really there just appears to be no proactive spells you can cast to flip it that easily outside of path. Again I'm not trying to hate, I am glad you are seeing sucess with the deck i'm just baffled about the construction and wanted some explanations. Tec edge over GQ is also interesting to me, and I feel the mana base might want more fetchlands or some source of untapped blue mana turn 1 for av/snare? Like perhaps even seachrome coast or something. Maybe thats too deep though. Let me know whatcha think
Valid points on the tec edge for sure, and i guess just your meta in general. I tend to see more aggro than I do jund/jeskai style stuff so perhaps thats why my perception is off a bit on your build, if your meta is more of the former I can understand a bit more. I feel like liege is a really good idea out of the board, has it been panning out for you in testing? I still don't get how the deck flips thing in the ice early on though thing just seems really clunky in this shell to me. And the 2 revs stabilizing your life total doesn't seem to realistic to me, perhaps against jund or what not since you often can make it to turn 6 + against that matchup but i feel the super aggro stuff like burn puts such pressure on you that rev is nigh dead in the matchup as you wont often be at turn 6+ where u can rev to regain at least a bolt's worth of life back (not to mention rev actively hurts you getting to turn 6+ when u see it early). Again this is probably a meta thing but I'm just curious and trying to start some discussion since this thread has been almost dead lately haha
I'm wondering if you guys on the Resto-Wall-Finks plan have tested the Kiki-Chord matchup at all. I'm currently 0-4 against the deck and I'm not sure what I can do to improve it.
Here's my current deck configuration as a reference:
Sideboard's a mess due to me wanting to test out a variety of cards at the moment.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
EDH GWSelvala and the Return to HumanityGW UWDragonlord Ojutai, Control's Elder DragonUW UBGTasigur, the God-Pharaoh's Gift to EDHUBG UBRNicol Bolas and his SuperfriendsPawnsUBR
Modern UWUW Control/Midrange/Bad JundUW WUBRGHumansWUBRG BGMidrangeBG
This match up doesn't seem awful to me.Not an easy one but not terrible either. I didn't practice a lot against the kiki-chord deck but in my testing, this is the kind of match ups where you have to play your interaction very conservatively. Try to save your countermagic for Collected companyor Chord of callingand don't waste your Path to exile. Of course, the match up can be rough without red removals. I see you don't play any 2 manas counterspells maindeck, I would suggest some Mana leakand Negatewhich are quite useful in this match up. Wrath effects are also quite good against them.
How have you approached the match up so far ?
Game 1 usually comes down to me trying to race them due to my limited ability to interact. Basically I just want to pressure them with Finks/Clique/Resto, Verdict when I need to, and keep Cryptic/Path handy for their combo if possible. Game 2 and 3 I become a little more controlling with my added interaction (Dispel/Negate/Flashfreeze/etc). Surgical and Relic come in as well to try and snipe away their Chord slash turn off E-Wit and Lark shenanigans.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
EDH GWSelvala and the Return to HumanityGW UWDragonlord Ojutai, Control's Elder DragonUW UBGTasigur, the God-Pharaoh's Gift to EDHUBG UBRNicol Bolas and his SuperfriendsPawnsUBR
Modern UWUW Control/Midrange/Bad JundUW WUBRGHumansWUBRG BGMidrangeBG
I started with a similar list, but I found Jace's to be a bit lackluster as well. When he flips he does nothing with your counterspells so he's really only useful for recasting Path, Verdict and Revelation. These aren't bad cards to be recasting, but I don't know if it's enough to warrant running Jace. I've since replaced Jace with Kitchen Finks. This would play in to your idea of cutting another snapcaster or two for Restoration angels. It would also free up two slots in your sideboard by cutting Lone Missionary as they aren't going to be as needed when you are main decking Finks.
Obviously you'll play the cards you want to play and I can't control what you find fun. But for clarification, you don't always have to jam Finks on turn 3. If your opponent is giving you time to play draw go, you can definitely hold Finks until you have counter back up, or a Restoration Angel in hand. Finks plays so well with your Verdicts and Angels that he's tough to beat. He's also a pretty reasonable clock on his own.
You're right. The two lists in discussion are probably different builds. I was just making suggestions off of this quote though.
But there are some things I dont like as well, especially after playing some games: The list really doesn't run enough low mana cost spells to play 3 snapcasters and the graveyard doesn't really fill quick so jace is sometimes just sitting there cycling 3 turns (maybe play more fetches?)
Anyone had some similair experiences... or not?
I feel like 2 snapcasters could be 2 restoration angels, but having to many 4 mana spells, i'd cut 1 ojutai's command for some low curve spell
He mentioned Snapcaster and Jace not living up to their potential. He also considered cutting a number of Snapcasters for Angels and then cutting down on Oujtai's command. This is what influenced me to suggest a Finks build.
If you want to stay away from Finks though, consider this build. This was a build I ran that started to gain popularity during Eldrazi Winter. The original build ran Jace, but I could just never get behind him in UW. I think he's much more suited to Grixis builds when you can recast things like Kolaghan's Command.
You mentioned you really like Ojutai, and I think he could easily replace the Planeswalkers if you want to keep him around.
I think Snapcaster works a bit better in this build. There are still some 4 mana counters which can be expensive, but instead of maindeck Negate and Dispel, you have the more universal mana leak. Leaks can be replaced as needed for games 2 and 3.
I'm just excited to see a bit of activity on this thread! I really enjoy this deck as well. For reference, this is the build I'm currently on. This was stolen and tweaked a bit from watching Paul Cheon stream a few weeks back.
Nice list. I like it, except the serum visions that I don't really like in this kind of build, with 4 colonnades. I think such a card belongs more to a shell who wants to find specific answers, either a combo shell or an even more tap-out/midrange shell who wants to dig for fatties or key cards. I prefer CA over QA in decks like UW, but I know several UW players who are happy with serum visions so maybe I'm wrong. I would play think twice instead. I also ended up cutting remand from the list. The card is great as a tempo cantrip (it always feels strange to me when people compare remand with mana leak since these cards are so different in their goals), but I wanted to make room for other cards, and in my opinion, the deck could have some trouble to take advantage from the tempo that remand gave.
Maybe Serum Visions could be Ancestral Vision, but I don't have those. Either way I've never been disappointed to see Serum Vision, though I may try out your suggestion of Think Twice. And I've gone back and forth on Remand myself. I could see cutting the Remand to fit in a Gideon Jura and an Elspeth main. That would also give me the option of having access to two Elspeth, or freeing up that board slot for something else.
I agree that some number of mana leak is probably necessary in a deck like this. It does get worse as the game goes on and is a nonbo with path, but like Bluesfan said, it's a universal answer which is perfect for game one. Negates, dispels or whatever you need can be brought in to replace them if you feel like the game will go long.
I must say I am very pleased with how this is doing.
The card that stands out most would probably be modern's Force Spike --> Mana Tithe . I have been testing this card over Spell Snare and honestly it will not leave the list unless someone manages to convince me otherwise. I've taken many people by surprise with it and its presence alone makes your opponents play around it. Last point....countering turn 1 Discard spells is sweet and even when they resolve on the play and you happen to have a Tithe in hand,...opponents 4/5 times take Tithe on turn 1.
"But Yesiamaruban, .... in the lategame it's simply a dead card"
Yeah sure I would say but so is Spell Snare in my opinion and Mana Tithe counters that turn 2 play (not just 2 cmc card) just as well. My final argument for Mana Tithe is that it plays really well with Remand
First off, I testing the hell out of Ancestral Visions and Sphinx's Revelation and while I like the cards and especially revs....I cut them both main and sided 1 Rev and added the 3 think twice and opened up spots for more stuff I wanted . Both other options are simply too slow and in the case of revs I hated casting it for 1 or 2 and it rarely resolved vs control decks in the late game. Another card that has been relatively easy to deal with but annoying nonetheless is Reality Smasher and pitching Think Twice to it feels great
The lack of Crucible is simply because I haven't found a way to actually play it and the decks that are on Xmage I usually can beat without it even when they are ramping and or Tron. It's either that or I am the better player every single time which I doubt is the case.
Lastly for now, I am not sure if I should play 1 mana leak 2 logic knot or as I have it right now 2 leak 1 knot. One thing is for sure though, Logic Knot has been amazing!
On the other hand, Bluesfan2, you could also consider the fact that Mana Tithe is arguably better early game than spell snare, and as we know; it's the early game that is the trickiest to navigate for control decks. I've had many times where my Spell Snare has been useless vs decks with ramp, or just not lining up properly with their threats. Mana Tithe hitting a 3, 4 or a 5 drop on curve is brutal.
Sure, snare is largely better late game, but control is all about MAKING it to the late game and then you should be in cruise control and not leaning heavily on a spell snare/mana tithe, true? That being said, I won't try three of course. I will swap out one of my two spell snares for one and give it a try.
The thing about the problem cards listed is that I can properly deal with them anyways in the late game. I am of the opinion that getting to the late game is far more important and Mana Tithe countering every spell early made sure that happens.
I recommend trying it. You'll be surprised how it will perform.
Hopefully you can check this out since i've had some trouble with youtube because of the music but here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJi1mOXo7r4 in the first minute you can see what I mean. Ramp decks are becoming rather popular and Mana Tithe changed my opponent's playstyle completely. If you decide to watch the whole video, just remember that list is one where I was still tweaking stuff. But by then I already was dead set on Mana Tithe as I was testing and playing.. You'll see when Mana Tithe is dead compared to Spell Snare and you'll see the application of how I use it. It's a hidden Thalia.
I am looking forward to what kind of results you have with it. Hopefully you will like it as much as I do right now. I at least am very comfortable and confident with 3-of in my list.
I think it works better in a Hard control list.
Edit: Made another video just now, this time it's vs that Boom Bust deck. Audio has issues but just mute it and play your own playlist if you wish.
I'm not trying to be a hater but honestly this deck looks super clunky. I can see why its good in grindy games with 2 sphinx's rev, 3 av and 2 elspeth and a jace aot. The question is why are all these grindy cards in our deck, I have to imagine it just makes our aggro matchups go from very favorable to even or perhaps losing game one. There is absoloutely no reason for 3 AV 2 rev and a jace aot. Those are 6 slots for cards that do nothing for a very good time until they eventually draw u more cards. Between those, 2 6 drops in elspeth (which is essentially a mulligan when u open it) and 26 lands I'm just not sure how this deck sustains itself in the early game. Do we just mulligan every hand without path or spell snare? Are we just always on the play? Like i'm really confused. I think the idea is pretty interesting and is similar to biavia's shell a bit with jace vyrn's prodigy and ojutais command but I dislike the thing in the ice over the wall in the omens at least the way you have the deck constructed. You mention flipping thing in the ice early in your report, how is it getting flipped early exactly? Theres no cantrips like serum visions or probe or whatever and really there just appears to be no proactive spells you can cast to flip it that easily outside of path. Again I'm not trying to hate, I am glad you are seeing sucess with the deck i'm just baffled about the construction and wanted some explanations. Tec edge over GQ is also interesting to me, and I feel the mana base might want more fetchlands or some source of untapped blue mana turn 1 for av/snare? Like perhaps even seachrome coast or something. Maybe thats too deep though. Let me know whatcha think
Loving this configuration... I'm assuming the 15th SB slot is Crucible?
Just answered my own question!
Here's my current deck configuration as a reference:
1 Snapcaster Mage
4 Kitchen Finks
2 Vendilion Clique
3 Restoration Angel
2 Baneslayer Angel
1 Gideon Jura
4 Path to Exile
3 Spell Snare
3 Timely Reinforcements
2 Detention Sphere
3 Supreme Verdict
2 Cryptic Command
4 Flooded Strand
4 Ghost Quarter
3 Plains
3 Island
2 Temple of Enlightenment
2 Hallowed Fountain
1 Mystic Gate
1 Prairie Stream
1 Windswept Heath
1 Polluted Delta
2 Geist of Saint Traft
2 Stony Silence
1 Dispel
1 Negate
1 Flashfreeze
1 Celestial Purge
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Disenchant
1 Pithing Needle
1 Ghostly Prison
1 Runed Halo
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Relic of Progenitus
Sideboard's a mess due to me wanting to test out a variety of cards at the moment.
GWSelvala and the Return to HumanityGW
UWDragonlord Ojutai, Control's Elder DragonUW
UBGTasigur, the God-Pharaoh's Gift to EDHUBG
UBRNicol Bolas and his Super
friendsPawnsUBRModern
UWUW Control/Midrange/Bad JundUW
WUBRGHumansWUBRG
BGMidrangeBG
Game 1 usually comes down to me trying to race them due to my limited ability to interact. Basically I just want to pressure them with Finks/Clique/Resto, Verdict when I need to, and keep Cryptic/Path handy for their combo if possible. Game 2 and 3 I become a little more controlling with my added interaction (Dispel/Negate/Flashfreeze/etc). Surgical and Relic come in as well to try and snipe away their Chord slash turn off E-Wit and Lark shenanigans.
GWSelvala and the Return to HumanityGW
UWDragonlord Ojutai, Control's Elder DragonUW
UBGTasigur, the God-Pharaoh's Gift to EDHUBG
UBRNicol Bolas and his Super
friendsPawnsUBRModern
UWUW Control/Midrange/Bad JundUW
WUBRGHumansWUBRG
BGMidrangeBG
BLiliana, Heretical HealerB| |GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
GWBDoom Plane EnchantressBWG
BLiliana, Heretical HealerB| |GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
GWBDoom Plane EnchantressBWG
He mentioned Snapcaster and Jace not living up to their potential. He also considered cutting a number of Snapcasters for Angels and then cutting down on Oujtai's command. This is what influenced me to suggest a Finks build.
If you want to stay away from Finks though, consider this build. This was a build I ran that started to gain popularity during Eldrazi Winter. The original build ran Jace, but I could just never get behind him in UW. I think he's much more suited to Grixis builds when you can recast things like Kolaghan's Command.
You mentioned you really like Ojutai, and I think he could easily replace the Planeswalkers if you want to keep him around.
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Wall of Omens
2 Vendillion Clique
Planeswalkers:
2 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
1 Gideon Jura
Spells:
1 Detention Sphere
3 Cryptic Command
4 Mana Leak
2 Oujtai's Command
1 Sphinx's Revelation
3 Spell Snare
4 Path to Exile
3 Supreme Verdict
4 Island
2 Plains
4 Celestial Colonnade
4 Flooded Strand
4 Ghost Quarter
2 Glacial Fortress
3 Hallowed Fountain
1 Mystic Gate
2 Polluted Delta
1 Crucible of Worlds
3 Timely Reinforcements
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Celestial Purge
2 Stony Silence
2 Disenchant
2 Dispel
2 Negate
1 Jace, Architect of Thought
I think Snapcaster works a bit better in this build. There are still some 4 mana counters which can be expensive, but instead of maindeck Negate and Dispel, you have the more universal mana leak. Leaks can be replaced as needed for games 2 and 3.
BLiliana, Heretical HealerB| |GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
GWBDoom Plane EnchantressBWG
4 Wall of Omens
3 Kitchen Finks
3 Restoration Angel
1 Snapcaster Mage
1 Vendilion Clique
Spells:
3 Spell Snare
4 Serum Visions
2 Cryptic Command
2 Remand
2 Mana Leak
4 Path to Exile
3 Supreme Verdict
2 Detention Sphere
4 Island
2 Plains
4 Celestial Colonnade
4 Flooded Strand
4 Ghost Quarter
2 Glacial Fortress
3 Hallowed Fountain
1 Mystic Gate
2 Polluted Delta
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Dispel
2 Negate
2 Stony Silence
2 Condemn
1 Celestial Purge
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Rest in Peace
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
BLiliana, Heretical HealerB| |GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
GWBDoom Plane EnchantressBWG
Maybe Serum Visions could be Ancestral Vision, but I don't have those. Either way I've never been disappointed to see Serum Vision, though I may try out your suggestion of Think Twice. And I've gone back and forth on Remand myself. I could see cutting the Remand to fit in a Gideon Jura and an Elspeth main. That would also give me the option of having access to two Elspeth, or freeing up that board slot for something else.
BLiliana, Heretical HealerB| |GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
GWBDoom Plane EnchantressBWG
BLiliana, Heretical HealerB| |GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
GWBDoom Plane EnchantressBWG
Here is my list.
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Flooded Strand
4 Celestial Collonade
3 Island
2 Plains
2 Arid Mesa
2 Prairie Stream
2 Ghost Quarters
2 Seachrome coast
1 Glacial Fortress
Instants 21
4 Remand
3 Cryptic Command
3 Think Twice
3 Mana Tithe
3 Path of Exile
2 Condemn
2 Mana Leak
1 Logic Knot
4 Snapcaster Mage
2 Restoration Angel
Sorceries 3
2 Supreme Verdict
1 Wrath of God
Enchantment 2
2 Detention Sphere
Planeswalkers 2
2 Elspeth Sun’s Champion
1 Pithing Needle
1 Ghostly Prison
1 Jace, Architect of Thought
1 Sphinx’ Revelations
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Celestial Purge
2 Stony Silence
2 Vendilion Clique
3 Kitchen Finks
I must say I am very pleased with how this is doing.
The card that stands out most would probably be modern's Force Spike --> Mana Tithe . I have been testing this card over Spell Snare and honestly it will not leave the list unless someone manages to convince me otherwise. I've taken many people by surprise with it and its presence alone makes your opponents play around it. Last point....countering turn 1 Discard spells is sweet and even when they resolve on the play and you happen to have a Tithe in hand,...opponents 4/5 times take Tithe on turn 1.
"But Yesiamaruban, .... in the lategame it's simply a dead card"
Yeah sure I would say but so is Spell Snare in my opinion and Mana Tithe counters that turn 2 play (not just 2 cmc card) just as well. My final argument for Mana Tithe is that it plays really well with Remand
Lack of cards present:
ancestral visions
Crucible of Worlds
First off, I testing the hell out of Ancestral Visions and Sphinx's Revelation and while I like the cards and especially revs....I cut them both main and sided 1 Rev and added the 3 think twice and opened up spots for more stuff I wanted . Both other options are simply too slow and in the case of revs I hated casting it for 1 or 2 and it rarely resolved vs control decks in the late game. Another card that has been relatively easy to deal with but annoying nonetheless is Reality Smasher and pitching Think Twice to it feels great
The lack of Crucible is simply because I haven't found a way to actually play it and the decks that are on Xmage I usually can beat without it even when they are ramping and or Tron. It's either that or I am the better player every single time which I doubt is the case.
Lastly for now, I am not sure if I should play 1 mana leak 2 logic knot or as I have it right now 2 leak 1 knot. One thing is for sure though, Logic Knot has been amazing!
Feedback would be nice, thank you.
Sure, snare is largely better late game, but control is all about MAKING it to the late game and then you should be in cruise control and not leaning heavily on a spell snare/mana tithe, true? That being said, I won't try three of course. I will swap out one of my two spell snares for one and give it a try.
I recommend trying it. You'll be surprised how it will perform.
Hopefully you can check this out since i've had some trouble with youtube because of the music but here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJi1mOXo7r4 in the first minute you can see what I mean. Ramp decks are becoming rather popular and Mana Tithe changed my opponent's playstyle completely. If you decide to watch the whole video, just remember that list is one where I was still tweaking stuff. But by then I already was dead set on Mana Tithe as I was testing and playing.. You'll see when Mana Tithe is dead compared to Spell Snare and you'll see the application of how I use it. It's a hidden Thalia.
I think it works better in a Hard control list.
Edit: Made another video just now, this time it's vs that Boom Bust deck. Audio has issues but just mute it and play your own playlist if you wish.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eajDjSNgdYw