[Question] Mental Note

[kabal]

I have been testing out a pure version of threshold (Goyf, Mongoose and Bear). Wondering what sorts of strategy do people employ when running Mental Note? Do you wait until you have insight into the top of your library? Or do you just go all out and risk removing useful cards?

[Bardo]

have been testing out a pure version of threshold (Goyf, Mongoose and Bear). Wondering what sorts of strategy do people employ when running Mental Note? Do you wait until you have insight into the top of your library? Or do you just go all out and risk removing useful cards?

It depends on the cards in hand, your board, game state (life totals, etc.) anything you've seen on the top of your library with SV, Brainstorm, etc. Your question is a benign and seemingly simple one, but a proper response deserves at least a 1,500 answer.

You will have to get by with the "less than proper answer." :)

Basically, turn 1: fetchland / Island -> EOT Mental Note ("MN") w/ or w/o Daze is usually a fine play; though fetchland / Island -> SV is better if you have it.

The benefit of the turn 1 MN is that you can usually deploy a 3/3 Mongoose or 3/4 or 4/5 Tarmogoyf on turn 2-3.

Basically though, blind MNs are fine and never worry about what you're dredging away.

Quoth Richard Feldman:

Magical Myth #1: Milling Away Good Cards

"John is playing Dredgeatog against Affinity. He lost the first game, but in the second game he's managed to stabilize at a healthy sixteen life against an unimpressive attack force of Frogmite and Blinkmoth Nexus. Both players have no cards in hand. John decides to use this opportunity dredge up his Life from the Loam. He has a couple of fetchlands and a Barren Moor in the graveyard, so this choice is well-justified.

"'Dredge my Life from the Loam,' John announces. The cost of dredge Millstones away, in order, Smother, Counterspell, and Counterspell.

"'Ugh!' he says. 'Look at all that juice! Worst dredge ever. Thanks a lot, Life from the Loam.'

"John plays Life from the Loam, cycles the Barren Moor, and draws Pernicious Deed. He slams down the enchantment, destroys his opponent's entire board, and wins the game a couple of turns later with Psychatog.

"Meanwhile, in a parallel universe, the exact same game of Magic is taking place... Except in this one, John decides not to dredge that Life from the Loam. Instead, John draws the Smother that is on top of his library. The Affinity player draws and plays a Cranial Plating, attaches it to the Frogmite, and attacks for seven damage.

“'Ouch!' John thinks. 'I could really use a Pernicious Deed about now.' John draws Counterspell — the same Counterspell that was milled away by Life from the Loam in the alternate universe. “Bummer,” he says. “That's not a Deed.”

"The Affinity player draws and plays an artifact land, so John takes eight damage. He enters his draw step at a precarious one life and rips another Counterspell. Facing certain death, John extends his hand in defeat, signs the match result slip, and flips over the top card of his library — just to see what was coming up next.

"Pernicious Deed.

"He slaps his forehead. “Of course it was the next card. God, I hate Magic.”

"'Thanks a lot, Life from the Loam' indeed.

"My point is this: Milling away “good cards” means nothing over the course of your average, medium-length game of Magic. All that matters in most games is the specific card waiting on top of your library when you reach your draw step. Since your deck is randomized, you have just as good a chance of drawing any one of your cards in any one of your draw steps.

"Yes, it's demoralizing when you Mental Note away two cards you really wanted. But, it's no reason to get angry and think about cutting the Mental Note entirely from your deck. The Note had a chance to peel away two lands you didn't need and move the card you were looking for from “four draw steps away” to “right on top.” People tend to remember the bad mills they get, and overlook the good ones. Unless you're setting up your deck with cards like Sensei's Divining Top, it's all completely random.

"A lot of people were afraid to play Commune with Nature during Kamigawa Block Limited. “What if I put my Dance of Shadows on the bottom of my deck? That would suck!” Well, what if your Dance of Shadows is already on the bottom? That turn 1 Commune is the only way you'll ever see it.

"Seriously, folks, don't freak out about this stuff.

...

"Milling past random unknown cards doesn't hurt you one bit. Don't worry about it!"

Source. (http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/10898.html)

Words to live by, more or less.

As the game drags on (turn 4+), it's not unusual to Brainstorm into MN, in which case you can EOT or Upkeep dredge useless lands, etc. This is helpful if you don't have an uncracked fetchland on the board. It happens.

At other points in the game, you can sandbag them to recover from a Crypt/Shaman activation, just pitch them to FoW, shuffle them away w/ BStorm + fetchland, etc.

Mental Note is a subtle card that is much worse on paper, or goldfishing, than in actual performance.

It is essentially a way to make Threshold less of a mid-range deck, trimming the "mid-" by about 1.5 turns. It is certainly far less than ideal as a late game card, but even then, I'll just cast 'em blind and see what I get.

Its role, and this is the point I'm trying to make here, it lets White Thresh play a very aggressive game, not a more controlling game where card advantage is important and where you want to play Predict.

So, if you want to be beating down with 3/3s and large Goyfs on turn 3, go Mental Note. If card advantage and higher quality filtering is what you want, at the expense of speed, go with Portent/Predict.

What will Ponder do to Mental Note/Portent? With Portent, it will replace it. Likely so with Mental Note, at the expense of speed which will presumably be compensated elsewhere.

[kabal]

@Bardo

Awesome reply, extremely insightful. I appreciate you sending the time writing it up.

Regarding your last comment, do you feel that once Ponder becomes legal that a cantrip base for Ugr pure threshold with Goyf, Mongoose and Bear will look like so:

Brainstorm
Ponder
Predict

[boris13]

Mental note helps you in a way also. Your losing two cards off the top thats going into your graveyard along with mental note. That is three cards in the yard now which helps give you threshold and possiably boosting goyf. So running mental note as I see it wouldnt be that bad.

[Bardo]

Mental Note sucks.

Do I detect the soul of an Oxford man? Class of '46? Cheerio.

@ Kabal. I don't know.

Here's what I have sleeved up at the moment:

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
3 Mental Note
3 Sensei's Divining Top

4 Force of Will
4 Daze
3 Counterbalance

4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Pithing Needle
1 Engineered Explosives

4 Nimble Mongoose
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Mystic Enforcer

4 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
2 Windswept Heath
3 Tropical Island
3 Tundra
2 Island
1 Forest
1 Plains

Sideboard:
4 Meddling Mage / Spell Snare
3 Back to Basics / Armageddon
3 Hydroblast
3 Chill
2 Krosan Grip

I'm still playing with the numbers and how Gaddock Teeg fits in. But I like that MN can get Tarmogoyf to 6/7 easily now with the maindeck enchantments and increased artifact count.

[DragoFireheart]

After reading Bardos Myth-Busting post I tend to agree with him about that.

Each card has it's uses depending on the game happening. It's better if you can set up that Mental Note with a Brainstorm or something. However Mental Note isn't reliant on the top card like Predict is.

[Bardo]

The final thing I want to say about Mental Note is that it defines the character of a subset of Threshold variants: the ones that focus on maximum early-game speed and disruption. The Hatfield School of Threshold, focuses on a stronger late-game, where the benefits of card advantage as they apply to attrition are important. It isn't that Predict and what have you is better or inferior than Mental Note, it is just different and changes how the deck plays. The same extends to Portent, where waiting until your opponent's upkeep to draw a card is worth the superior filtering/arranging the card provides. Mental Note and Spell Snare are more about immediate gratification to apply strong and early pressure, so that the late-game won't arrive.

It essentially boils down to, do you want to play Threshold as an AGGRO-control deck, or an Aggro-CONTROL deck? Play Mental Note if you want the first, and Predict if you want the latter.

This is basically my misgiving about sticking the Counter-Top module into a version that runs Mental Note (see above). In the Note versions, I think Spell Snare is better, since (aside from lands, EE and Needle) it doesn't play any permanents that aren't devoted to killing your opponent. Counter-Top slows the deck down (which may be worth it in some match-ups), where the Bardo School of Threshold is less concerned with long-term advantage and is trying to deal 20 damage in the shortest possible time. Daze, for instance, is a superb counter, but not exactly late-game material--the same with Spell Snare, to a lesser extent.

One of the cool things about Threshold is that it allows this kind of strategic flexibility and customization.

[DragoFireheart]

I guess that brings us to the question of which is better: early, mid or late game Thresh?

[kabal]

Daze, for instance, is a superb counter, but not exactly late-game material--the same with Spell Snare, to a lesser extent.

I think Spell Spare can go either way and the same thing can be said about Stifle as well. This is where you as the caster are looking to get a tempo boast from spending the least amount of resources.

[Citrus-God]

One of the cool things about Threshold is that it allows this kind of strategic flexibility and customization.

Threshold: The GAT of Legacy (kinda), adjusted for stupid brokeness (Goyf), and different play styles (Predict/Mental Note).

[AngryTroll]

The only time you can't blindly Mental Note is when you only have one out left in a game (say, the single Engineered Explosives, or the last StP, or the second Pithing Needle, Etc). In this case, wait and set up the Note. Sounds obvious, but I've lost a couple of games, and seen even more games lost where the Thresh player makes a dumb play and Mental Notes away his last answer.