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View Full Version : [Card Discussion] Spell Snare, Daze, FoW, etc.



DragoFireheart
09-24-2007, 04:13 PM
When someone is making a blue deck, what counterspells are the best pick? How many of each? Which counterspells for Thresh, MUC, Landstill and other blue decks with a light color splash? What determines what counterspells are used?

Mordenkain
09-24-2007, 04:21 PM
The answer is largely dependant on what kind of deck your designing. However heres a few pointers:

Force of Will - Best counter in the game, auto 4 of in decks that you consider playing counters in and is running 16+ blue cards.

Daze - Daze is an amazing counterspell imo. It's best used in a deck that can get around the tempo loss from bouncing up a land. That means agro-control decks where you tap out to play threats and then dazes his WoG, whatever he is casting.

Counterspell - Good old counterspell is still solid in a control shell. However, in agro control decks its not so great. Not bad, but not so great as in landstill, etc.

Spell Snare - Quite nice counter, hits surprising amount of stuff. I think this is a hate/love issue. Some people love it, some people hate it. Personally I don't like it much.

Mana Leak - Mana Leak is still around, not all that shaby. Not really great, but not the worse either.

If your looking beyond the normally played counters consider cards like Forbid, Rune Snag and Miscalculations. Counterbalance can be considered a counterspell as well if you choose to.

Not really counters, but worth mentioning in the disruption package is Stifle and Trickbind.

Oh, and remember to run plenty of cantrips to find your counters. Good luck.

Iranon
09-24-2007, 09:40 PM
Force of Wills really belong in any deck running enough blue cards to support it. It's that good.

I like to supplement them with a mix of Counterspell and Daze, because I want to be able to reliably dig for hard counters or free counters depending on the game state. A single daze also has an excellent chance of inducing misplays whenever it crops up.

FoolofaTook
09-25-2007, 01:07 AM
I'm beginning to wonder if Force of Will is really as strong as it seems on the surface. I've noticed that I win a lot of games where the opponent uses FoW early on. It's true that I'm not a combo player and I'm not looking for a 2 turn kill with most of the decks I play. So it's possible that the card disadvantage that FoW represents is magnified somewhat when it's used against low-lethality threats early in the game.

That still leaves the question of what a deck does when something annoying is cast early on and the only answer in hand is Force of Will, which is a very expensive solution to something like Nimble Mongoose or Goblin Lackey. Yes, the Mongoose might kill you and the Lackey is likely too but you're not beating either deck easily down two cards right off the bat either. Aether Vial is an obvious counter by any means necessary but there are a lot of less obvious situations.

from Cairo
09-25-2007, 01:50 AM
FOW in decks playing Blue 16-20 cards minimum.

Counterbalance :wink: in decks that can support :u: :u: and run Sensei's Top. Similar to Spell Snare only often more annoying and obscene card advantage.

Counterspell in more dedicated control decks as opposed to agro-control. Sort of expensive but a pretty solid standby since it's a hard counter and 1 for 1 trade.

Daze in agro control, decks that have permanents they want to resolve in the early game, but need to protect. I feel like Forcespike should get more credit as being decent alternative in control decks that aren't packing main phase drops for the first few turns.

Stifle versus Storm combo and various other effects, Ringleaders, EE/Deed pops, etc. Misdirection/Divert I feel like kind of falls into this spot as well as a niche answer- especially good against Hymn or in agro-control in the face of removal. Currently Stifle fits the format much better.

Spell Snare, I'm not really that into this one, but clearly it counter's some powerful cards, great sideboard card for matches you know it will pull its weight against.

Mana Leak, this card seems clunky in the format, by the time one is devoting 2 mana to answer a spell it really should be a hard counter, which usually Mana Leak is, but to me it seems slow, and there are usually better options unless you want a really huge counter base.

Tacosnape
09-25-2007, 02:05 AM
I completely agree with Cairo on Counterspell and Force and Mana Leak. Mana Leak is trash and unnecessary to keep in your collection. Force goes in if you've got 20 blue, and Counterspell is a staple for control or on occasion, aggro-control that leans more controllish.

Daze and Snare go largely in the same decks. The difference between the two is twofold.

First, Daze is ungodly on the play and blows on the draw, whereas Snare is weak on the play and incredible on the draw. If you run both, it can be beneficial to board out accordingly.

Secondly, the more aggressive your deck leans, the more you want Daze over Snare. The less aggressive, the more you want Snare over Daze.

SpikeyMikey
09-25-2007, 04:01 AM
It really depends on the deck, I wouldn't throw away my Leaks just yet. If you're running a deck with a lot of colorless lands(Factory, Wasteland, etc.), or if you're running a 2-3 color deck with a high basic count, having UU on T2 isn't always a certainty. Mono-U, years and years ago in T1, ran Leak, because it was available turn 1 with Island, Mox. Almost like a second set of FoWs.

With the way the format is looking right now, with Gobbos on the out and out, anything that's not aggressive(Fish/Thresh/Gro) is probably not going to want Daze. There simply aren't enough game ending T1 threats seeing play. I always hate getting stuck with Daze late game, when my opponent is sitting on 5-6 mana. Right now, as my basic starting configuration, a blue deck I built would probably be running 4xFoW, 3xCounterspell, 2xSpell Snare, adjusting for the decklist and the matchup %ages.

Nihil Credo
09-25-2007, 08:40 AM
I agree with Spikey, sometimes you just need some more countermagic, but can't support Counterspell's double-blue. Although I'd like to point out that 4 Rune Snags are generally superior to 4 Mana Leaks.

I disagree about Daze though. Resolving an early Mongoose or Goyf can be critical against several decks. And if you play properly, you shouldn't have much trouble getting rid of late Dazes - both Brainstorm and Force of Will have a productive use for them. Note, however, that I usually run only 3 Dazes.