[DECK] Owling Mine

[Mr. Froggy]

Here's a deck I've been having some success in the Just For Fun tab on MODO.

As Evan Erwin called the deck back in '06: http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/standard/11536_The_Complete_Owling_Mine_Player8217s_Guide.html

"It is a custom built machine. The Meta T-1000 vs. John Conner Control."

And destroy control it does pretty handily (in the Just For Fun room), I have yet to really try it out in the Tournament Practice room because not a lot of people like playing vs this deck.

Also, Owling Mine is the quintessential "tempo" deck because that's all you watch out for during your games, to show an example of what I mean by tempo, I'll quote Mr. Erwin (quoting Jacob Orlove's Putting It All Together):

“Tempo, put simply, is an increase in the value of your future turn-limited resources, relative to your opponent.”

and the easiest example to understand this concept:

"You play an Island.
They play a land.
You play an Island and Boomerang their land.
Your board is now: Two tapped lands.
Their board is now: Nothing.

Got it? Good."

Ah, Mr. Erwin, what an amazing example of one of the most important aspects in MTG.

Now enough talk, I'll show you where I'm at right now with my list.

Owling Mine (a.k.a. Meta T-1000)

Lands:
10 Island
1 Mountain
3 Steam Vents
3 Misty Rainforest
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Mikokoro, Center of the Sea

Creatures:
3 Kami of the Crescent Moon
4 Snapcaster Mage

Artifacts:
4 Howling Mine
4 Ebony Owl Netsuke

Instants/Sorceries:
4 Boomerang
4 Eye of Nowhere
3 Exhaustion
4 Remand
4 Runeflare Trap
2 Cryptic Command

Planeswalkers:
1 Jace Beleren

Now as how games play out (made up Christmas land openings);

Hand: Steam Vents, Scalding Tarn, Eye of Nowhere, Boomerang, Howling Mine, Ebony Owl Netsuke, Snapcaster
Turn 1: Steam Vents tapped
Opp T1: Godless Shrine tapped
Turn 2: Fetch Island, Eye of Nowhere their land
Opp T2: Godless Shrine tapped
Turn 3: Boomerang their land
After that, lay down Mine, Owl and you're good to go.

And after that its nearly impossible for them to come back, and if they do, well you better congratulate them.

Every game you'll feel on the back foot, but with the amount of redundancy in the deck you catch up pretty quickly.

Also, use AND abuse your Snapcasters, they feel tailor-made for this deck because of its low overall CMC, and giving double-duty to your Eyes and Boomerangs is so good its ridiculous.

Exhaustion is an AMAZING card, every time I play it it feels like a Time Walk, giving you plenty of time to catch up if you ever feel like you lost your Tempo; best example I can think of happened to me earlier today on MODO, I was playing vs BW Control, in the 3rd game my opponent got me down to 6 life and I ripped an Exhaustion (he was tapped out and had swung at my life), cast it and it was all over from there.

Tell me what you guys think of the Meta T-1000.

[Davran]

This deck seems sweet...I wish I had the cards just so I could run it at FNM for the lulz.

Do you just lose to affinity, though? Their typical start puts 4 to 5 permanents in play, and with Mox Opal the Boomerang plan doesn't seem like it would slow them down all that much. Further, you're essentially feeding them Opals and other free/cheap dorks with the mine effects. I assume you'd run some number of Hurkyl's Recall in the board...but is it enough?

I'm not sure where you'd find room...but Cerebral Vortex is another way to turn cards drawn into damage.

[Mr. Froggy]

This deck seems sweet...I wish I had the cards just so I could run it at FNM for the lulz.

Do you just lose to affinity, though? Their typical start puts 4 to 5 permanents in play, and with Mox Opal the Boomerang plan doesn't seem like it would slow them down all that much. Further, you're essentially feeding them Opals and other free/cheap dorks with the mine effects. I assume you'd run some number of Hurkyl's Recall in the board...but is it enough?

I'm not sure where you'd find room...but Cerebral Vortex is another way to turn cards drawn into damage.

G1 is rough vs any aggro deck, but that gets taken care of G2 when you board in Pyroclasm (maybe 2 Blood Moons for the Nexuses), and I know it goes against the basic gameplan, but after they all die, you just clog up their hand once more.

On a side note, an opponent of mine called this "the ultimate troll deck" and I guess I agree. :)

[Davran]

G1 is rough vs any aggro deck, but that gets taken care of G2 when you board in Pyroclasm (maybe 2 Blood Moons for the Nexuses), and I know it goes against the basic gameplan, but after they all die, you just clog up their hand once more.

On a side note, an opponent of mine called this "the ultimate troll deck" and I guess I agree. :)

Pyroclasm is a good call.

I think I like Hurkyl's Recall over Blood Moon as a nexus "killer"...although Recall does do very little against the rest of the field whereas Blood Moon is semi-useful vs. Tron. Recall is also more relevant vs. the random trinkets the affinity deck runs out, especially when you're trying to keep their hand clogged with cards.

Janky aggro decks make up about 75% of my meta (I regularly see Burn and Poison), so it's too bad things are rough vs. those decks. The kids who play them at my LGS would have no idea how to interact with this deck though...so who knows...maybe I can swing some free wins if I put it together.

[Mr. Froggy]

If your meta is roughly 75% aggro, I'd probably stay away from playing it.

As for Tron (in all its flavors) is a pretty good match-up for the deck, especially U-Tron. The only thing you need to really watch out for is O. Stone, because that one card can really ruin your day.