@7he5haman: Good luck bud! Once you figure out this deck, it's pretty amazing.
In other news I asked a friend (real Tron player there) to come and test some G1s (pre-side) against my list. The outcome was quite unreal:
G1: On the play, I have natural GQ + Crucible which I ramp out with Needle backup to answer his O-Stone, GG. 1-0.
G2: On the play, I ramp out a T3 smashing Tezz met by his O-Stone, for which I have Whir for Needle + GQ to disrupt him more next turn, GG. 2-0.
G3: On the draw, I have an Ensnaring Bridge hand. I would crush aggro. Now T5 Ulamog eats me up. 2-1.
G4: On the draw, he gets to Tron and casts T3 Wurmcoil, on my T3 I Whir for Bridge. He follows up with O-Stone. Then I second Whir (he doesn't respond) for Needle and he's blown out. Lesson learned, he said. He digs for an answer, I cast my last card in hand: Tezz. Digs me into Map. I see a world of possibilities there. He topdecks the Ugin to kill Tezz and start spitting out senseless fatties. It's a downward spiral from there. 2-2.
G5: On the play, my most valuable play was to T2 Brutalize and take his Sylvan Scrying which resulted in him never assembling Tron! From there I had all the leisure of T3 Mapping into GQ to be followed-up next turn by Tezz beats FTW. 3-2.
G6: On the play, I dont know what the **** happened by I ended up out-Tron'ing the Tron guy by having T3 6 mana up lolz (actually this was T1 Capsule, T2 Prism for two and Opal, T3 land drop = 6. So I causally Brutalize him off Path to Exile and smash him with Tezz minions on T3. Ah but then, he also had triple Karn, and natural Tron. I died. 3-3.
G7: On the play, my T2 Foundry into T3 Sword is met by his T4 Tron and Eugene which I answer Whirling for a Needle. I'll keep pumping out Thopters through his Relic of Progenitus attempt to disrupt me (yay built-in resiliency!) and kill him in a couple of turns. 4-3.
G8: So lesson learned from that Brutality line I took sooner which turned out an MVP. On the play, I do again: T2 Brut shows his ultra land-light hand but with Stirrings and Scrying. I tank for a while and, since I got Whir to answer his Planeswalkers if he reaches Tron, I elect to go all-in and take Ancient Stirrings as it is really the enabler of his whole game right now. So T3 I Prism into T4 smashing Tezz and keep dropping disruption on his head while he's slowly cantripping out of this, just long enough to get him to zero through 2x Path to Exile. Last turn I'll even Bauble him, see a Star, cast Needle on Star to allow me one more bashing turn. And this was the win. 5-3.
Call it a night. I guess I won't scoop on sight G1s, then.
If anyone's interested I've got the Cockatrice replays, games were quite awesome. Maybe I can figure out how to put them on YouTube. Or send them to @Racing089 so he puts 'em up on his account.
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MODERN Blue Lantern, UBx Tezzerator. OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
Radouf, I am an experienced Tron player, should you need more testing, i could probably lend a hand. What is your cockatrice handle? I play mostly on MTGO so we could do that as well if you have that.
I'd be careful, your testing in g1s is a very small sample size. I still think we're more disadvantaged in this matchup than you let on. Against hands like karn ostone+tron(or ways to get it) we are dead in the water I think. I'm even thinking about playing a fountain main over the map as i find it pretty lack luster and swapping gq4 from the board for academy ruins. Thus night be wrong because of all the k commands in the format though.
I think we are actually not as terribly positioned Game 1 if we know we are facing tron as we have really good tools maindeck to deal with it. We are playing GQ+Crucible main with some meaningful interaction in IoK and Pithing Needle. Problem is a good vs tron hand with natural GQ+Crucible or GQ+Lands+Whir+Tezz is abysmal against a deck like DS jund, burn, Dredge, or really any fast deck. If you sit down blind against an unknown opponent and keep a Push, Brutality, Bauble, Bridge, 3 lands hand you are going to be in for a sad game if they turn one Urza's mine expedition map, even if it would likely be a good hand against most of the format.
Throne is pretty bad and rarely relevant. I am pretty sure it is a worse Time Sieve, A card I already ruled out for being too "Win More". I think this slot is occupied by expedition map right now, and map is the least "win-more" of these kind of cards.
Authority is surprisingly decent by doing a decent bridge impression. It lead to a circumstance where I could block out Hierarch beats from connecting while behind a bridge. Also theoretically in certain situations it prevents you from getting blown out by a artifact removal spell because its an activated ability vs a static effect.
I'm not sure its worth the slot as its expensive and requires mana to activate but I want to test it a bit more before completely ruling it out.
Be interested to hear if anyone is trying out any of the new released cards.
Thought I'd chime in again with some thoughts on my online play and the tweaks/tests I've been doing. After successfully running a very low-to-the-ground build with more creatures and Tezz in the side (Bridge and whir the only 3+ CMCs main deck) , I decided to go back to a build with Pentad Prism and more control elements and few creatures, just to see the difference. I haven't played Pentad Prism in a long time, but I wanted to remember its advantages/disadvantages, especially with Tezz back in the main.
I played 10 games, and man Prism feels like such a hindrance/roadblock. The ramp feels so unnecessary, in that turn 3 Tezz is only useful in a corner-case situation, where the opponent is on combo or control. Twice I made a prism a 5/5, and twice my opponent killed it and swung back to kill Tezz. Only once did I ramp to a quick whir for Bridge. Pretty much every time I saw a prism, I wished it was just an island. It gets you in even more hot water with Stony Silence. Against aggro, I never wanted it because I wanted to either interact with their board or drop foundry turn 2 to start making emergency thopters. There's just too much tempo disadvantage.
I have to say, I don't think I'll ever pilot a Pentad Prism version of this deck in any meaningful event, or much online. Has anyone else dropped this card, or tested without it?
On another note, my games against the awful matchups (tron and valakut decks) have had interesting results. I actually take a decent number of matches and games-1 against Tron. They're usually very skin-of-the-teeth wins involving Time Sieve. A Cranial Plating is really quite nice here. However, I rarely if ever beat a Valakut deck, despite running 3 blood moon in the side. Either I manage to shut down Valakut with Moon or Witchbane Orb and they beat me in with Titans, or I protect a bridge and they get around my anti-Valakut hate. Woodfall Primus off Through the Breach is like... the absolute nuts against us. This matchup is so poor (and common) that I'm thinking of running Shadow of Doubt as a maindeck answer that also has utility against a number of other matchups. Has anyone tested Shadow of Doubt or has any thoughts on the card?
Has anyone considered a spine of ish sah out of the side board? It's extremely extensive but can possibly break up awkward board stalls caused by stony silence. I think it's probably too slow and drawing it sounds abysmal but I'm curious if there have been any attempts at it.
I completely agree. The Pentad Prisms are cute, and are only win-more. We really don't need to assemble the combo on turn 3. I find Dimir Signet or Talisman better if I need ramp. I've gone to running more discard and Ancestral Visions to play the long game, then close with the combo.
What version of the deck are you playing? The deck atm is pretty up in the air with lots of variations running around, so its hard to to know whats going on unless you specify a bit more. Also I would be interested in seeing a more creature based version if you don't mind posting it.
Game one Tezz minus's are pretty weak against any B or W deck. Almost all modern decks are playing some sort of creature removal and one advantage of artifact decks is that we blank a lot of the creature removal. By rushing out Tezz turn 3 and -1 you are opening yourself up to a blowout.
The primary reason we run pentad prism is for Whir, not Tezz. It means a hand of Prism, Thopter Foundry/SotM, Whir + 2 lands + any other 2 cards will likely have the thoptersword combo on by turn 3. This almost always wins the game against "fair" decks and can put in work against some of the unfair decks.
It means a hand of prism + whir can likely hit a bridge turn 3 prior to combat, which against some decks is instant win.
It helping land a turn 3 Tezz is more relevant in the unfair combo decks as we need to finish ASAP against these deck and is more of a secondary interaction.
Lol. Yea your dream hand of exactly the right cards against zero disruption does work. In a field where most black decks are running 7-9 discard spells maindeck, you just really don't get that happening.
Its not like the hand I detailed is anything insane for this deck to do. You generally are running 4-5 copies of Thopter/sword and 4 copies of Whir along with a ton of cheap artifacts and 4 prisms.
Either way a full prism adds 3 CMC to a whir while a talisman or signet adds 1 for the same CMC cost. That alone means prism is likely better than talisman as we aren't even trying to ramp, we are trying to accelerate.
I very seldomly -2 thenfirst tezz anyway. If i was id feel bad about running him too. I find +ing him finding a piece (a 0 artifact at worse) and threatening to ult next turn is far better than jamming a 5/5 and getting blown out.
On Orb: I've been an unconditional fan of Talisman of Dominance in Tezz for years. T1 action spell into T2 Talisman and one more action spell was my bread an butter. I had noticed that Prism had potential but the full set of Citadels we were rocking then made it very hard to capitalize on. Now when Whir of Invention was printed, I tested the Whir in my previous Talisman of Dominance shell, and it really, really felt like the sluggish-est tutor around. I eventually cut down to 3, then 2, then just dropped it. Until the Prism tech came to light.
I suggest you give Prism more than 10 games to fully grasp its role in the deck. I understand the disappointment of staring down at an empty Prism, stuck on too few mana. However if you manage things right (including mulligans, of course; there are good and bad Prism hands ofc), I noticed that you have to use Prism / Prism will most often accelerate you into some play that will make up for the lost »card» (traded off for massive «tempo»). For instance:
- Prism into T3 Tezz with one mana up to Push opponent's threat upon attack, +1 Tezz and get back to card parity with a pumped-up walker now;
- Prism enabling T3 Whir into Bridge (but Foundry or Sword or a silver-bullet also), will buy you some more tempo, and cards to follow-up and make up for the now-empty Prism;
- Last but not least, backed-up by some form of disruption, T2 Prism into T3 guaranteed already-smashing Tezz was such key in beating Tron in my limited testing. It's very valuable IMO. This is not a line that existed before we were using Prism; it was then conditional to you having a second artifact to Ensoul, but also you not using said artifact for velocity (Bauble cantripping you into more disruption for example; cracking Map to get them off Tron...) or risking losing your precious Needle if they have the removal. Hey, I've never, ever even dreamed of having the third of such a positive record against Tron. And I think we owe some of this to Prism, not only Whir. Prism is your explosiveness. We have the power, it's even better when its sped-up.
Anyways, I for one can't see myself dropping Prisms any time soon. Most successful lists back up this. It is however a hard card to play off, I'll give you that. This, all the lines available from Whir of Invention, the blind cantripping for Bauble, really make this deck hella hard to master. But I believe you should try a little longer, it might just reward you.
On Shadow of doubt: tried, main and side. More often than not disappointing. It looks like a cantripping-Sinkhole but in practice the opportunities you have to use it as such before you opponent's third turn are few and far between. By all means, give it another shot if you like but I've tried it many times over the years. As for the Titanshift match-up, we sure are under the gun but I've been having success there as well, just:
1. Use all the discard (including Brutality) to strip him off Scapeshift (threat A) or through the Breach;
2. Land a Bridge and protect it with Jars etc.;
3. Whir for Witchbane Orb, which you have to protect too (or win before they get to Vandalblast);
4. Also, GQ + Surgical on Valakut is game-winning;
5. And Quicksilver Fountain keeps them off repeatedly bolting you off their land drops.
/edit: 6. Breach variant: Bait and Whir for Executioner's Capsule to answer Emrakul for maximum troll factor ::p
Am I missing something?
@Kleronomas :
Lol. Yea your dream hand of exactly the right cards against zero disruption does work. In a field where most black decks are running 7-9 discard spells maindeck, you just really don't get that happening.
Nuthands happen. We die to them, we win with them. Haven't you ever? So your argument is that if it happens, it's possible that our opponent interacts with it...? Plus: dismissively lol'ing at a fellow's argument is not very nice.
Thanks for the reply, radouf. For reference, I ran a prism build on xmage as soon as whir was spoiled, for many games. Then, when I switched to MTGO, I went away from prism for 110 total matches in the 5 match competitive leagues for a 66-44 record, which I feel is decent. So while I'm probably not as adept at using prism in every situation, I understand its role. Turn 3 bridges off whir is nice, but I ask you how often that play leaves you with 4 or so cards in hand, or in other words, how often a turn 3 bridge would be the same result as a turn 4 bridge.
The play of Turn 2- Prism, Turn 3- Foundry, Turn 4- Whir for Sword with two mana up for combo is nice. But how often would this play be the same: Turn 2- Foundry, Turn 3- any 0 CMC artifact and whir for Sword, Turn 4- have combo with 4 mana up. (Both scenarios assume making land drops). In these two scenarios, with a hand of Foundry/Whir, a single 0 cmc artifact does the job of prism. But a 0 CMC artifact has utility after the ramp it provides. I agree that prism into turn 3 smashing Tezz (as you elegantly put it) is the real play that prism enables, which is why I mentioned it, but that play feels too conditional to justify having prism.
I will give prism a few more games before writing it off, as you suggest. I would also suggest cutting prism from your list, but not altering your list heavily, and see how it runs.
Thank you for your insight on Shadow of Doubt. It does have that feel of a trap card, where the actual in-game situations it is useful does not correlate to its perceived strength. I will still probably give it a few games to test, probably with 3 Brutalities in an attempt to mitigate when it's a dead card.
I posted my more creature-based list on page 8, but here it is again
Note - while I have had the most success with this list, I am not advocating strongly for courier. It is an all right card that pulls its weight in certain matchups (like control or DSJ), but gets boarded out against creature-heavy decks. I just like that it's a 1 drop (so it doesn't feel bad when bolted), has haste, gets back swords from the grave, and can sometimes provide card advantage.
The play of Turn 2- Prism, Turn 3- Foundry, Turn 4- Whir for Sword with two mana up for combo is nice. But how often would this play be the same: Turn 2- Foundry, Turn 3- any 0 CMC artifact and whir for Sword, Turn 4- have combo with 3 mana up. (Both scenarios assume making land drops). In these two scenarios, with a hand of Foundry/Whir, a single 0 cmc artifact does the job of prism. But a 0 CMC artifact has utility after the ramp it provides.
Ok, one small interesting thing right off the bat: in the Prism scenario, I would really not sequence things this way if I was going to Thopter-Sword. I would keep mana up and Whir for Sword at the end of T3 (if not forced to go for a counterplay; silver-bullet style). Then I'd open T4 on Foundry with mana up for activation in case opponent has any answers. I don't think there is a downside to going for Sword first but the upside is that when you cast Foundry, even if your opponent has an answer, you get some value out of it by activating the combo a couple times in response. Also, very bad opponent can try to remove the sword haha. This being said, both scenarios indeed look like they pack a pretty similar endgame, although Whir allows us to slowroll the Foundry (thus protecting it better).
I agree that prism into turn 3 smashing Tezz (as you elegantly put it) is the real play that prism enables, which is why I mentioned it, but that play feels too conditional to justify having prism.
But this, remember I've talked about finding % points where they matter most? Well I think running Prism enabling this play for us could be a concession to this principle. --However, I'll devil's advocate myself; in light of your suggestion, I could perhaps consider running a third Welding Jar but, that would really feel overkill as far as utility goes. And then what? Stretch into the fourth Mox Opal? This also feels like a bit of a stretch. So, maybe it boils down to this question: what other artifacts would you run in these slots? And what are the expected outcomes?
Oh and lastly: Herald of Anguish, really you're not running it without Prism, right? We've heard lots of people praise this card.
I ran 3 jars for a while, actually, mostly for this reason; to enable more consistent and fast whirs. It sometimes was overkill, and sometimes it gave jund and grixis headaches. I've since cut down to two in order to make more room for creatures. To be honest, it rarely ever felt awful outside of a few opening hands with double jar, no opal and no whir.
You're right that Herald goes with prism. I tested 2 heralds for a while, and personally think it's too slow, though powerful. I prefer Padeem out of the board, or Vendillion clique myself.
Pentad Prism all by itself is pretty weak. That is why until Whir was printed we never even considered the card. However with Whir of Invention it accelerates your plays immensely. However, the second Prism is usually dead and you don't always need the prisms if you are deeper on zero cost artifacts.
Wall of Roots/Chord of Calling is very similar to Pentad Prism/Whir of Invention. I am going to be cutting back on the Pentad Prisms to be playing 1 less than the number of Whir of Invention that I am playing. I always want 1 in my opening hand but I never want to see a second one.
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@racing089: Thanks for the positive feedback. I used to be unfriendly while playing magic (mostly trying to play tight, and becoming jaded after bad experiences with hard-asses) and have found magic to be so much more entertaining when I stay positive and friendly during matches. It's definitely a little harder to stay patient though. Food for thought.
Regarding Pentad Prism: We are generally out of gas once the counters have been used making the lost mana irrelevant. Also, Pentad does a pretty good burning-tree emissary impression for getting bridge online in time.
The real comparison is how many times you NEED to tap talisman for mana after turn 4-5 (don't count things like thopter activations) vs. how many times turboing out bridge/thopter/whir/tezz NEEDS to happen a turn earlier to win the game. In the case of big mana/combo/super aggro decks, which are our worst matchups, the turbo effect has a much bigger impact on our win %. I always want Pentad in my opener. In the case of grindy matchups, well we're probably gonna draw into the lands we need anyways and their clock is much slower.
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In other news I asked a friend (real Tron player there) to come and test some G1s (pre-side) against my list. The outcome was quite unreal:
G2: On the play, I ramp out a T3 smashing Tezz met by his O-Stone, for which I have Whir for Needle + GQ to disrupt him more next turn, GG. 2-0.
G3: On the draw, I have an Ensnaring Bridge hand. I would crush aggro. Now T5 Ulamog eats me up. 2-1.
G4: On the draw, he gets to Tron and casts T3 Wurmcoil, on my T3 I Whir for Bridge. He follows up with O-Stone. Then I second Whir (he doesn't respond) for Needle and he's blown out. Lesson learned, he said. He digs for an answer, I cast my last card in hand: Tezz. Digs me into Map. I see a world of possibilities there. He topdecks the Ugin to kill Tezz and start spitting out senseless fatties. It's a downward spiral from there. 2-2.
G5: On the play, my most valuable play was to T2 Brutalize and take his Sylvan Scrying which resulted in him never assembling Tron! From there I had all the leisure of T3 Mapping into GQ to be followed-up next turn by Tezz beats FTW. 3-2.
G6: On the play, I dont know what the **** happened by I ended up out-Tron'ing the Tron guy by having T3 6 mana up lolz (actually this was T1 Capsule, T2 Prism for two and Opal, T3 land drop = 6. So I causally Brutalize him off Path to Exile and smash him with Tezz minions on T3. Ah but then, he also had triple Karn, and natural Tron. I died. 3-3.
G7: On the play, my T2 Foundry into T3 Sword is met by his T4 Tron and Eugene which I answer Whirling for a Needle. I'll keep pumping out Thopters through his Relic of Progenitus attempt to disrupt me (yay built-in resiliency!) and kill him in a couple of turns. 4-3.
G8: So lesson learned from that Brutality line I took sooner which turned out an MVP. On the play, I do again: T2 Brut shows his ultra land-light hand but with Stirrings and Scrying. I tank for a while and, since I got Whir to answer his Planeswalkers if he reaches Tron, I elect to go all-in and take Ancient Stirrings as it is really the enabler of his whole game right now. So T3 I Prism into T4 smashing Tezz and keep dropping disruption on his head while he's slowly cantripping out of this, just long enough to get him to zero through 2x Path to Exile. Last turn I'll even Bauble him, see a Star, cast Needle on Star to allow me one more bashing turn. And this was the win. 5-3.
Call it a night. I guess I won't scoop on sight G1s, then.
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
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@Imborj: Thank you pal! Keep in touch. Although I'm pretty satisfied with where we landed at last
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
I think we are actually not as terribly positioned Game 1 if we know we are facing tron as we have really good tools maindeck to deal with it. We are playing GQ+Crucible main with some meaningful interaction in IoK and Pithing Needle. Problem is a good vs tron hand with natural GQ+Crucible or GQ+Lands+Whir+Tezz is abysmal against a deck like DS jund, burn, Dredge, or really any fast deck. If you sit down blind against an unknown opponent and keep a Push, Brutality, Bauble, Bridge, 3 lands hand you are going to be in for a sad game if they turn one Urza's mine expedition map, even if it would likely be a good hand against most of the format.
Throne is pretty bad and rarely relevant. I am pretty sure it is a worse Time Sieve, A card I already ruled out for being too "Win More". I think this slot is occupied by expedition map right now, and map is the least "win-more" of these kind of cards.
Authority is surprisingly decent by doing a decent bridge impression. It lead to a circumstance where I could block out Hierarch beats from connecting while behind a bridge. Also theoretically in certain situations it prevents you from getting blown out by a artifact removal spell because its an activated ability vs a static effect.
I'm not sure its worth the slot as its expensive and requires mana to activate but I want to test it a bit more before completely ruling it out.
Be interested to hear if anyone is trying out any of the new released cards.
I played 10 games, and man Prism feels like such a hindrance/roadblock. The ramp feels so unnecessary, in that turn 3 Tezz is only useful in a corner-case situation, where the opponent is on combo or control. Twice I made a prism a 5/5, and twice my opponent killed it and swung back to kill Tezz. Only once did I ramp to a quick whir for Bridge. Pretty much every time I saw a prism, I wished it was just an island. It gets you in even more hot water with Stony Silence. Against aggro, I never wanted it because I wanted to either interact with their board or drop foundry turn 2 to start making emergency thopters. There's just too much tempo disadvantage.
I have to say, I don't think I'll ever pilot a Pentad Prism version of this deck in any meaningful event, or much online. Has anyone else dropped this card, or tested without it?
On another note, my games against the awful matchups (tron and valakut decks) have had interesting results. I actually take a decent number of matches and games-1 against Tron. They're usually very skin-of-the-teeth wins involving Time Sieve. A Cranial Plating is really quite nice here. However, I rarely if ever beat a Valakut deck, despite running 3 blood moon in the side. Either I manage to shut down Valakut with Moon or Witchbane Orb and they beat me in with Titans, or I protect a bridge and they get around my anti-Valakut hate. Woodfall Primus off Through the Breach is like... the absolute nuts against us. This matchup is so poor (and common) that I'm thinking of running Shadow of Doubt as a maindeck answer that also has utility against a number of other matchups. Has anyone tested Shadow of Doubt or has any thoughts on the card?
What version of the deck are you playing? The deck atm is pretty up in the air with lots of variations running around, so its hard to to know whats going on unless you specify a bit more. Also I would be interested in seeing a more creature based version if you don't mind posting it.
Game one Tezz minus's are pretty weak against any B or W deck. Almost all modern decks are playing some sort of creature removal and one advantage of artifact decks is that we blank a lot of the creature removal. By rushing out Tezz turn 3 and -1 you are opening yourself up to a blowout.
The primary reason we run pentad prism is for Whir, not Tezz. It means a hand of Prism, Thopter Foundry/SotM, Whir + 2 lands + any other 2 cards will likely have the thoptersword combo on by turn 3. This almost always wins the game against "fair" decks and can put in work against some of the unfair decks.
It means a hand of prism + whir can likely hit a bridge turn 3 prior to combat, which against some decks is instant win.
It helping land a turn 3 Tezz is more relevant in the unfair combo decks as we need to finish ASAP against these deck and is more of a secondary interaction.
Its not like the hand I detailed is anything insane for this deck to do. You generally are running 4-5 copies of Thopter/sword and 4 copies of Whir along with a ton of cheap artifacts and 4 prisms.
Either way a full prism adds 3 CMC to a whir while a talisman or signet adds 1 for the same CMC cost. That alone means prism is likely better than talisman as we aren't even trying to ramp, we are trying to accelerate.
I suggest you give Prism more than 10 games to fully grasp its role in the deck. I understand the disappointment of staring down at an empty Prism, stuck on too few mana. However if you manage things right (including mulligans, of course; there are good and bad Prism hands ofc), I noticed that you have to use Prism / Prism will most often accelerate you into some play that will make up for the lost »card» (traded off for massive «tempo»). For instance:
- Prism into T3 Tezz with one mana up to Push opponent's threat upon attack, +1 Tezz and get back to card parity with a pumped-up walker now;
- Prism enabling T3 Whir into Bridge (but Foundry or Sword or a silver-bullet also), will buy you some more tempo, and cards to follow-up and make up for the now-empty Prism;
- Last but not least, backed-up by some form of disruption, T2 Prism into T3 guaranteed already-smashing Tezz was such key in beating Tron in my limited testing. It's very valuable IMO. This is not a line that existed before we were using Prism; it was then conditional to you having a second artifact to Ensoul, but also you not using said artifact for velocity (Bauble cantripping you into more disruption for example; cracking Map to get them off Tron...) or risking losing your precious Needle if they have the removal. Hey, I've never, ever even dreamed of having the third of such a positive record against Tron. And I think we owe some of this to Prism, not only Whir. Prism is your explosiveness. We have the power, it's even better when its sped-up.
Anyways, I for one can't see myself dropping Prisms any time soon. Most successful lists back up this. It is however a hard card to play off, I'll give you that. This, all the lines available from Whir of Invention, the blind cantripping for Bauble, really make this deck hella hard to master. But I believe you should try a little longer, it might just reward you.
On Shadow of doubt: tried, main and side. More often than not disappointing. It looks like a cantripping-Sinkhole but in practice the opportunities you have to use it as such before you opponent's third turn are few and far between. By all means, give it another shot if you like but I've tried it many times over the years. As for the Titanshift match-up, we sure are under the gun but I've been having success there as well, just:
1. Use all the discard (including Brutality) to strip him off Scapeshift (threat A) or through the Breach;
2. Land a Bridge and protect it with Jars etc.;
3. Whir for Witchbane Orb, which you have to protect too (or win before they get to Vandalblast);
4. Also, GQ + Surgical on Valakut is game-winning;
5. And Quicksilver Fountain keeps them off repeatedly bolting you off their land drops.
/edit: 6. Breach variant: Bait and Whir for Executioner's Capsule to answer Emrakul for maximum troll factor ::p
Am I missing something?
@Kleronomas : Nuthands happen. We die to them, we win with them. Haven't you ever? So your argument is that if it happens, it's possible that our opponent interacts with it...? Plus: dismissively lol'ing at a fellow's argument is not very nice.
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
The play of Turn 2- Prism, Turn 3- Foundry, Turn 4- Whir for Sword with two mana up for combo is nice. But how often would this play be the same: Turn 2- Foundry, Turn 3- any 0 CMC artifact and whir for Sword, Turn 4- have combo with 4 mana up. (Both scenarios assume making land drops). In these two scenarios, with a hand of Foundry/Whir, a single 0 cmc artifact does the job of prism. But a 0 CMC artifact has utility after the ramp it provides. I agree that prism into turn 3 smashing Tezz (as you elegantly put it) is the real play that prism enables, which is why I mentioned it, but that play feels too conditional to justify having prism.
I will give prism a few more games before writing it off, as you suggest. I would also suggest cutting prism from your list, but not altering your list heavily, and see how it runs.
Thank you for your insight on Shadow of Doubt. It does have that feel of a trap card, where the actual in-game situations it is useful does not correlate to its perceived strength. I will still probably give it a few games to test, probably with 3 Brutalities in an attempt to mitigate when it's a dead card.
I posted my more creature-based list on page 8, but here it is again
Note - while I have had the most success with this list, I am not advocating strongly for courier. It is an all right card that pulls its weight in certain matchups (like control or DSJ), but gets boarded out against creature-heavy decks. I just like that it's a 1 drop (so it doesn't feel bad when bolted), has haste, gets back swords from the grave, and can sometimes provide card advantage.
3 Bomat Courier
2 Glint-Nest Crane
1 Hangarback Walker
1 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Etched Champion
Other Permanents: 20
3 Mox Opal
3 Mishra's Bauble
2 Welding Jar
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Cranial Plating
4 Thopter Foundry
3 Sword of the Meek
1 Time Sieve
2 Ensnaring Bridge
4 Serum Visions
1 Fatal Push
2 Collective Brutality
4 Whir of Invention
Lands: 21
4 Darkslick Shores
1 Watery Grave
1 Steam Vents
4 Polluted Delta
4 Flooded Strand
1 Swamp
6 Island
2 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
3 Blood Moon
1 Ghirapur Aether Grid
1 Fatal Push
1 Collective Brutality
2 Flaying Tendrils
1 Cryptic Command
1 Echoing Truth
1 Padeem, Consul of Innovation
1 Witchbane Orb
Another note - I would play only 21 lands in a build with 4 serum visions to ensure hitting land drops.
Ok, one small interesting thing right off the bat: in the Prism scenario, I would really not sequence things this way if I was going to Thopter-Sword. I would keep mana up and Whir for Sword at the end of T3 (if not forced to go for a counterplay; silver-bullet style). Then I'd open T4 on Foundry with mana up for activation in case opponent has any answers. I don't think there is a downside to going for Sword first but the upside is that when you cast Foundry, even if your opponent has an answer, you get some value out of it by activating the combo a couple times in response. Also, very bad opponent can try to remove the sword haha. This being said, both scenarios indeed look like they pack a pretty similar endgame, although Whir allows us to slowroll the Foundry (thus protecting it better).
But this, remember I've talked about finding % points where they matter most? Well I think running Prism enabling this play for us could be a concession to this principle. --However, I'll devil's advocate myself; in light of your suggestion, I could perhaps consider running a third Welding Jar but, that would really feel overkill as far as utility goes. And then what? Stretch into the fourth Mox Opal? This also feels like a bit of a stretch. So, maybe it boils down to this question: what other artifacts would you run in these slots? And what are the expected outcomes?
Oh and lastly: Herald of Anguish, really you're not running it without Prism, right? We've heard lots of people praise this card.
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
You're right that Herald goes with prism. I tested 2 heralds for a while, and personally think it's too slow, though powerful. I prefer Padeem out of the board, or Vendillion clique myself.
Wall of Roots/Chord of Calling is very similar to Pentad Prism/Whir of Invention. I am going to be cutting back on the Pentad Prisms to be playing 1 less than the number of Whir of Invention that I am playing. I always want 1 in my opening hand but I never want to see a second one.
Sultai Midrange
Anything Innovative
Regarding Pentad Prism: We are generally out of gas once the counters have been used making the lost mana irrelevant. Also, Pentad does a pretty good burning-tree emissary impression for getting bridge online in time.
The real comparison is how many times you NEED to tap talisman for mana after turn 4-5 (don't count things like thopter activations) vs. how many times turboing out bridge/thopter/whir/tezz NEEDS to happen a turn earlier to win the game. In the case of big mana/combo/super aggro decks, which are our worst matchups, the turbo effect has a much bigger impact on our win %. I always want Pentad in my opener. In the case of grindy matchups, well we're probably gonna draw into the lands we need anyways and their clock is much slower.