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igri_is_a_bk
08-23-2013, 10:34 AM
// Lands
4 [SOM] Seachrome Coast
2 [DIS] Hallowed Fountain
2 [GP] Steam Vents
1 [RAV] Sacred Foundry
2 [EVE] Rugged Prairie
2 [EVE] Cascade Bluffs
1 [UNH] Island
2 [UNH] Mountain
2 [UNH] Plains
4 [WWK] Halimar Depths

// Dig
4 [ROE] Wall of Omens
3 [DIS] Court Hussar
4 [FD] Serum Visions

// Ramp
4 [TSP] Lotus Bloom
4 [FD] Pentad Prism

// Engines
4 [SOK] Enduring Ideal
3 [DGM] Possibility Storm

// Enchantments
1 [DKA] Curse of Exhaustion
2 [NPH] Phyrexian Unlife
2 [SC] Form of the Dragon
1 [SOK] Meishin, the Mind Cage
1 [DIS] Dovescape
1 [RTR] Detention Sphere

// Add'l Defense
4 [IA] Pyroclasm

// Sideboard
SB: 3 [CHK] Boseiju, Who Shelters All
SB: 3 [M11] Silence
SB: 1 [DK] Blood Moon
SB: 4 [M11] Leyline of Sanctity
SB: 1 [RTR] Rest in Peace
SB: 1 [ISD] Stony Silence
SB: 2 [RAV] Suppression Field

I've been trying to make a legitimate Enduring Ideal deck for the past few weeks, and after I made top four at my LGS with a completely new brew, I decided to stick with it. I want some input though since I am pretty new to modern yet.

The primary plan is to resolve Enduring Ideal. Depending on the situation, you get an enchantment that will let you survive another turn. If you do that, your opponent will likely be locked out of the game. Most commonly after Ideal, the order of enchantments is 1) Dovescape, 2) Phyrexian Unlife or Meishin, 3) Form of the Dragon, 4) Form of the Dragon. Obviously there are times you have to deviate from this line, but that's the best sequence typically. In case you haven't seen it, Phyrexian Unlife + Form of the Dragon is a combo that stops you from taking damage. Since Dovescape shuts off any spells in their hand from hurting me, they usually have to rely on the attack step. That's good news since all that damage will resolve simultaneously which means Phyrexian Unlife will keep us alive at a negative life total with zero poison. Then we bounce back up to five at the end of the turn thanks to Form. There are ways they can get around this, like double strike if the first strike damage hurts us more than 5. That's very rare though. The creature has to fly in the first place, then have double strike and I can't have a free turn to shoot it down. Just very rare.

The secondary plan is to resolve Possibility Storm. Then play Serum Visions or Pyroclasm and hopefully flip Ideal. You can also just cast enchantments into it and see what you get. While this sounds janky as hell, it also disrupts your opponent's plan pretty well. Once you do flip Ideal, if you aren't dead next turn on board, you can get Curse of Exhaustion to lock your opponent out of the game. Following this route actually provides more protection compared to Dovescape. Possibility Storm is extremely fun, but I'm not sure how competitive unless you build around it exclusively. This is an area I can see improvement.

Halimar Depths is very strong in this deck since we do not want to draw our enchantments. First turn Depths + Bloom is easily the strongest play.

The mana base lacks fetches for Suppression Field in the sb. I actually want to fit this card in the mb since it screws so many decks and is completely one-sided. The rest of the sb is pretty obvious. Silence and Boseiju to stop counterspells. Blood Moon for Tron primarily. Leyline of Sanctity for burn and discard. RiP for any Loam or Retrace or Persist or whatever. Stony Silence for Pod and Tron and Affinity.

Any and all thoughts welcomed.

Phoenix Ignition
08-23-2013, 01:03 PM
Have you thought of using something like Ethereal Usher instead of Possibility Storm? PS just seems bad in a lot of cases, as you still need to luck into the spell you want and it gives the opponent at least one turn to try to do something broken with it (I'm thinking Blue Tron playing a Solemn Simulacrum and finding Emrakul, or elves cycling through 1cmc creatures until they hit a fatty). The other option would be trying something like Peer Through Depths and finding that or one of your other spells with it. You could have some hilarious sideboard tech against Tron decks with Bribery to make that card even better, but that may not be worth the slots.

I think there's some real potential in reworking the manabase a bit to fit more basics and then running Blood Moons main. They are very good against Tron and control decks if they don't see it coming, and those are 2 decks I imagine you could have some troubles with (since you can't interact really with Tron while they set up a Karn or something). Many of the decks that it doesn't affect are ones you probably don't care about, like white weeny.

If you wanted to include something along the line of Curse of Death's Hold, you'd have a good way to shut down another large swath of decks in the format, and have insta-kills for any dove tokens.

Oh, you might also want to consider Torpor Orb sideboard, as it stops a ton of things you don't want to see (Harmonic Sliver, any Twin combos, etc.).

Yellowsmiley
08-23-2013, 03:12 PM
I don't think you can consider Possibility Storm as a engine (as mentioned above) (Although I can see how in some situations it can be) however I think it is good after you have a resolved Enduring Ideal as with Curse of Exhaustion it makes it so your opponent can not cast spells (pretty cool combo). Also why not sleight of hand? Its good filtering. You could side board the pyroclasm and put 4 of sleight instead.

igri_is_a_bk
08-23-2013, 04:50 PM
Have you thought of using something like Ethereal Usher instead of Possibility Storm? PS just seems bad in a lot of cases, as you still need to luck into the spell you want and it gives the opponent at least one turn to try to do something broken with it (I'm thinking Blue Tron playing a Solemn Simulacrum and finding Emrakul, or elves cycling through 1cmc creatures until they hit a fatty). The other option would be trying something like Peer Through Depths and finding that or one of your other spells with it. You could have some hilarious sideboard tech against Tron decks with Bribery to make that card even better, but that may not be worth the slots.

I think there's some real potential in reworking the manabase a bit to fit more basics and then running Blood Moons main. They are very good against Tron and control decks if they don't see it coming, and those are 2 decks I imagine you could have some troubles with (since you can't interact really with Tron while they set up a Karn or something). Many of the decks that it doesn't affect are ones you probably don't care about, like white weeny.

If you wanted to include something along the line of Curse of Death's Hold, you'd have a good way to shut down another large swath of decks in the format, and have insta-kills for any dove tokens.

Oh, you might also want to consider Torpor Orb sideboard, as it stops a ton of things you don't want to see (Harmonic Sliver, any Twin combos, etc.).

If Ethereal Usher were seven mana, then I'd be all over it. Unfortunately, there are no seven mana Transmute cards. I'm sure there are instances that Possibility Storm will bite me in the ass, but I need a redundant engine spell. I'm open to suggestions for it.

Peer Through Depths is probably the best dig in the format, but it doesn't find each type of card I may need. It could find Enduring Ideal, Serum Visions, and Pyroclasm, plus any other Peers added. The main thing missing from that list is a ramp spell. If Seething Song were still in the format, I would say Peer is an auto-include. Until there is an instant or sorcery close in power to Song, I don't think Peer makes the cut.

Blood Moon would definitely improve MUs that are currently pretty rough game one. That would likely make me switch to fetch lands to find my basics. I'd have to drop Suppression Field in that case, which may be fine if Blood Moon is that good.

Curse of Death's Hold is very strong. I don't even think I would need black mana to support it thanks to Prism and Bloom. It has a much more reasonable casting cost than Meishin. I'll try that out.

Torpor Orb is nice, that's for certain. It shuts down the creature side of Pod, and in conjunction with Stony Silence likely spells game over.


I don't think you can consider Possibility Storm as a engine (as mentioned above) (Although I can see how in some situations it can be) however I think it is good after you have a resolved Enduring Ideal as with Curse of Exhaustion it makes it so your opponent can not cast spells (pretty cool combo). Also why not sleight of hand? Its good filtering. You could side board the pyroclasm and put 4 of sleight instead.

For every sorcery added, the odds of flipping Ideal from a Possibility Storm trigger decreases. That's why I'm playing seven creatures that dig and only eight non-Ideal sorcery spells. I figure that puts me at flipping Ideal just over a third of the time. Pyroclasm in the mb has been great. There are a lot more value creatures compared to fatties in the format from what I've seen.

Edit: maybe Serum Visions should be Gitaxian Probe? That would allow me to play PS on turn three with Prism and Probe for a chance that turn. Probe is also really good before Ideal.

Yellowsmiley
08-23-2013, 05:08 PM
Yeah, I misread Enduring Ideal, I thought it was an enchantment and you were using PS with enchantments to dig for it. No wondering I was so confused on why it was Epic >.<. I'm not sure about GP over serum, I mean sure that nut draw can get you to go off t4 but wouldn't you want constancy over speed? Maybe 2/2 split?

What do you think of taking out some court hussars for sleight? court digs 1 deeper but doesn't trigger the PS you want. Do you think you need the extra early defense? I'm used to playing AdN so I'm used to not having any creature defense and just hoping they don't do 20 dmg in the first 4-5 turns. But personally I would think the Wall of Omens would be enough.

Phoenix Ignition
08-23-2013, 08:09 PM
If Ethereal Usher were seven mana, then I'd be all over it. Unfortunately, there are no seven mana Transmute cards. I'm sure there are instances that Possibility Storm will bite me in the ass, but I need a redundant engine spell. I'm open to suggestions for it.
Oh my, I did not notice that. I blame the card search engine I was using and not my own incompetence.


Peer Through Depths is probably the best dig in the format, but it doesn't find each type of card I may need. It could find Enduring Ideal, Serum Visions, and Pyroclasm, plus any other Peers added. The main thing missing from that list is a ramp spell. If Seething Song were still in the format, I would say Peer is an auto-include. Until there is an instant or sorcery close in power to Song, I don't think Peer makes the cut.


I guess my next question is if you've thought about using Simian Spirit Guide at all. It's even better in conjunction with Blood Moon.

igri_is_a_bk
09-01-2013, 10:12 AM
I tried your suggestion of adding Blood Moon to the main, and I'm hear to say it's been great. Unless my opponent is playing some mana dorks, they get bottlenecked so hard on their spells that I gain 3, 4, 5, etc. turns to get the mana I need for Ideal. The main issue is that I could only use four Blood Moons and I needed more disruption. Suppression Field is a strong compliment to the mana denial strategy by messing with fetches, and it is highly disruptive to about every other combo deck. The exception being storm, but it still hits their seven or eight fetches.

So this required a heavy change of pace for the deck. Here's the new list.

// Lands
4 [RAV] Sacred Foundry
2 [EVE] Rugged Prairie
4 [ISD] Clifftop Retreat
10 [UNH] Plains
2 [UNH] Mountain

// Dig
4 [M11] Crystal Ball
1 [NPH] Gitaxian Probe

// Ramp
4 [TSP] Lotus Bloom
4 [FD] Pentad Prism

// Engines
4 [SOK] Enduring Ideal
3 [DGM] Possibility Storm

// Enchantments
1 [DKA] Curse of Exhaustion
2 [NPH] Phyrexian Unlife
2 [SC] Form of the Dragon
1 [DIS] Dovescape
1 [RTR] Detention Sphere

// Disruption
4 [RAV] Suppression Field
4 [DK] Blood Moon
3 [CHK] Ghostly Prison

// Sideboard
SB: 4 [M11] Leyline of Sanctity
SB: 1 [CHK] Ghostly Prison
SB: 2 [RTR] Rest in Peace
SB: 1 [ISD] Stony Silence
SB: 3 [NPH] Torpor Orb
SB: 4 [IA] Pyroclasm

Despite this being 60/15, this is an incomplete deck. You'll notice a single Gitaxian Probe in there and that is for the Possibility Storm engine. Two life for a guaranteed Enduring Ideal seems pretty good, no? The problem is that I need to tutor that Probe and I do not want to use Dizzy Spell to do so because that requires a heavy investment in blue (UU for transmute) and because the spell itself is terrible. That, and it would mess with my Blood Moon/Suppression Field plan because I'd need fetches. Give me a happy surprise and find a way to get around an active Possibility Storm that isn't Transmute and can find a one mana sorcery out of the deck. I've tried and wouldn't be surprised if Transmute is the only option.

A nonbo is the Suppression Field + Crystal Ball interaction, but it's not nearly as detrimental to my deck as it is to the opponent.

Admiral_Arzar
09-04-2013, 05:07 PM
Rather than worrying about tutoring the Probe, I would just replace it with a red or white sorcery that actually helps your gameplan (Pyroclasm from your OP seems fine as it deals with weenie rush, which will be your biggest issue vs. decks that are resistant to Moon and Field i.e. Affinity, mono-red, etc.). Also, now that your mana curve ignores the 1 slot, you might consider Chalice of the Void, at least as a sideboard card.

igri_is_a_bk
09-05-2013, 12:27 PM
I'm going to test Molten Psyche as a possible dig spell that can put enchantments back in the deck (only to possibly draw them again I guess) and it triggers Possibility Storm. I dunno. Maybe just more sweepers like Firespout or Wrath of God would be better to really shut down the aggro decks game one and rely on my sb for combo and control in sb games. I'm at least going to test this spell since I have no way to dig beyond it.

// Lands
4 [RAV] Sacred Foundry
4 [ISD] Clifftop Retreat
2 [EVE] Rugged Prairie
10 [UNH] Plains
2 [UNH] Mountain

// Spells
1 [DIS] Dovescape
1 [DKA] Curse of Exhaustion
2 [NPH] Phyrexian Unlife
2 [SC] Form of the Dragon
1 [ALA] Oblivion Ring
4 [RAV] Suppression Field
4 [TSP] Lotus Bloom
3 [SOM] Molten Psyche
4 [FD] Pentad Prism
4 [SOK] Enduring Ideal
4 [DGM] Possibility Storm
4 [IA] Pyroclasm
4 [DK] Blood Moon

// Sideboard
SB: 4 [M11] Leyline of Sanctity
SB: 1 [ISD] Stony Silence
SB: 2 [CHK] Boseiju, Who Shelters All
SB: 4 [M11] Silence
SB: 2 [RTR] Rest in Peace
SB: 2 [NPH] Torpor Orb

One thing I have to mention is that my opponents frequently say "magic isn't fun" when they play this deck, so I guess it's working. It was doing well with Wrath of God in those Psyche slots - I'll go back to that most likely if Pyshce sucks.

Jodahae
10-30-2013, 03:28 AM
Currently testing a straight R/W version of this deck. Ive adapted Possibility Storm as an engine for accelerating the deck. Possibility Storm is an amazing addition to the deck, allowing the deck to regain the ability to attempt a combo on turn three. A hypothetical god hand can attempt a turn 2 win. Runed halo and Chained to the rocks have been really strong additions to the deck and help give the deck the ability to play control with a combo finish.

Enduring Ideals
Win Conditions: 13
4x Enduring Ideal
3x Form of the Dragon
2x Phyrexian Unlife
3x Possibility Storm
1x Curse of Exhaustion

Tool Box Enchantments: 5
1x Blood Moon
1x Detention Sphere
1x Runed Halo
1x Ghostly Prison
1x Suppression Field

Protection: 12
4x Silence
4x Chained to the Rocks
4x Gitaxian Probe

Fast Mana: 12
4x Lotus Bloom
4x Pentad Prism
4x Desperate Ritual

Land: 18
4x Arid Mesa
3x Sacred Foundry
3x Steam Vents
4x Clifftop Retreat
1x Rugged Prairie
1x Mistveil Plains
2x Plains

Sideboard: 15

4x Leyline of Sanctity
1x Blood Moon
1x Detention Sphere
2x Pithing Needle
1x Grafdiggers Cage
2x Torpor Orb
2x Anger of the Gods
2x Boseiju, Who Shelters All
Currently the deck is configured so that you only have 8 sorceries (Probe/Ideals) 8 instants (Silence/D Ritual) 8 Artifacts (Prism/Bloom). The math on an 8 card split of any card type means that if you cast probe or any spell with 3 copies of itself and four copies of the spell you would like to hit, then you have a 57% chance to turn say a probe into a Ideals, or a silence into a ritual or prism into a bloom.