[CaNGD Reject] Quietus

[Nihil Credo]

Well, now that I've settled on a final submission (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8619), I thought I might as well put in N&D a few other concepts that showed some potential but which I failed to bring up to competitive levels. After all, it hurts nothing but my reputation to check whether I might have missed some blatant way of improving the deck.

The first one, a base-White combo-control deck, does bear some resemblance to Karach; indeed, it was born as an attempt to explore the potential of Enlightened Tutor in Legacy.

Going for it: Great draw/tutoring engine, G1 combo finish.

Problems: Fragile, and what's worst unable to run Force of Will for much-needed protection.

Overall, I think the concept as a whole may just be inferior to Zvi's pseudo-Landstill deck (geez, base-White is worse than base-Blue; whoddathoughtit?). The issue is that Enlightened Tutor costs you an entire draw step, so for that price you want to get real bombs, like Moat and Counterbalance, not simply useful stuff.


Anyway, here it is:

// Lands
1 [TSP] Academy Ruins

4 [ON] Flooded Strand
4 [PR] Tundra

1 [MR] Ancient Den
3 [UNH] Plains
1 [TSP] Flagstones of Trokair

5 [UNH] Island (1)

3 [TE] Ancient Tomb

// Win conditions
2 [SC] Eternal Dragon
3 [JGC] Exalted Angel (2)
2 [LRW] Hoofprints of the Stag
1 [A] Time Vault

// Control
2 [FD] Engineered Explosives
1 [MR] Chalice of the Void
2 [10E] Pithing Needle
4 [4E] Swords to Plowshares
1 [LRW] Oblivion Ring
2 [FD] Vedalken Shackles

// Draw and tutoring
3 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
4 [PR] Brainstorm
4 [6E] Enlightened Tutor
4 [MR] Thirst for Knowledge
1 [LG] Moat

// Assorted utility
1 [LRW] Rings of Brighthearth (3)
1 [FD] Crucible of Worlds

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [TSB] Tormod's Crypt
SB: 1 [UL] Defense Grid
SB: 1 [NE] Seal of Cleansing
SB: 1 [8E] Circle of Protection: Red
SB: 4 [JGC] Meddling Mage
SB: 4 [CHK] Ghostly Prison
SB: 2 [OD] Karmic Justice
SB: 1 [TE] Humility


Notes:

(1) Even though the deck has only eight blue cards (plus Academy Ruins), its mana base it still slightly edged towards blue in order to get decent Vedalken Shackles activation. This wasn't an issue - I never had problems getting double White.

(2) I tried just about anything in this slot: Abeyance to get some protection for the bombs, Counterspell to get protection that doubled as disruption, Counterbalance for the same reason even though the curve is insanely screwed up (two cards at cc=2; in other words, Counterbalance doesn't work for the same reason that Ancient Tomb does). The last option explored, with mixed results, was Exalted Angel, which is sort of a white-blue deck's way of running Tarmogoyf even though it has nothing to do with the gameplan, just 'cause it wins games fast on its own and sometimes pulls you out of the gutter.

(3) While Time Vault is dead on its own, that isn't true of Rings. Rings of Brighthearth comboes with: Flooded Strand (free Untamed Wilds), Sensei's Divining Top (one-sided Howling Mine), Hoofprints of the Stag (doubled Stag production), Eternal Dragon (free Sylvan Scrying). Still not a bomb, but a solid card.


Have fun; or, at least, enjoy the lesson on why a deck may not work. I'll be watching this thread, but don't plan on doing any more work on the concept unless some radical new idea emerges.

[Maveric78f]

It looks like a hoofprint centered deck: brainstorm, top, TfK and ring are all plain crazy with hoofprint. Hoofprint should be *4 to my opinion.

Then I would remove all the bad kills you play vault/dragon/angel. I think that shackles and hoofprints are enough kills when you play academy ruins. You could play also the words of wind / top combo. Since you play already 3*top (which should be 4*).

And you talk about counterbalance but I can't find it in your list. It's also a must have I think.

// Mana 22
1 [TSP] Academy Ruins
2 rav shockland
4 [PR] Tundra
2 [UNH] Plains
5 [UNH] Island (1)
4 flooded
2 polluted
2 windswept

// Win conditions 7
4 [LRW] Hoofprints of the Stag
1 Words of wind
2 [FD] Vedalken Shackles

// Control 15
1 [FD] Engineered Explosives
1 [LG] Moat
1 [10E] Pithing Needle
4 [4E] Swords to Plowshares
4 [LRW] Oblivion Ring
1 Story circle
1 [LRW] Rings of Brighthearth (3)
2 counterbalance

// Draw and tutoring 16
4 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
4 [PR] Brainstorm
4 [6E] Enlightened Tutor
4 [MR] Thirst for Knowledge

Combos/synergies:
top+top+hoofprints: now a counter hoofprint costs %1
top+rings: for 3 draw an extra card per turn
fetches+rings: expand your mana base
brainstorm+hoofprints: 3 counters on hoofprints in addition to the crazyness of brainstorm
TfK+hoofprints: 3 counters too
top+WoW: for %2 bounce a permanent from your opponent's board. It can also make instant protection for your permanents
academy ruins+EE: recurrent board sweeping
shackles + rings: take control of 2 creatures
counterbalance + top: no need to make an explanation
counterbalance + brainstorm: the same
counterbalance + enlightened tutor: still the same
academy ruins + counterbalance: ...
rings + hoofprints: %4 %W for 2 angels

The deck is hoofprint and top centered. These are the 2 best cards of the deck. Once they are effective and in play, almost all tutorable card is a broken card.

By the way the curve:
0: 23
1: 17
2: 6
3: 13
4: 1

[Maveric78f]

I played 3 matches on MWS yesterday and I won all games except one against a tribal cleric combo (but I eventually won 2/1).

From the list above, I played 4*Compulsive Research instead of 4*Thirst for Knowledge. As I play all my cards (or almost) in sorcery and as I want to keep my artifacts probably more than my lands, I thought it would be better. It's indeed very strong in a 22 land deck.

My testing showed somehow that the longterm cards were weak (Words of wind, Vedalken Shackles, Story circle, Rings of Brighthearth) in MD at least. I'll do more testings before cutting anything though.

I first played against some storm combo deck.
First game, first turn I enlightened tutor a top (my opponent played only a petal so I could figure it was somehow a combo deck). On turn 2, I play counterbalance as I'm fulltaped and my opponent has no kill/tutor in hand. He decides to play 2 SSG as I have a land on top of library. The turn after I play a shackle (he has an empty hand no risk of comboing). He can attack once then he scoops.
Second game I entered 4 stifles but I won't find them. I keep a hand with counterbalance and a brainstorm (the rest is lands). Anyway he makes 12 gobs on first turn with the protection of a REB. Quite a strong hand. I play brainstorm on my turn and he does not counter it even if he could have. I'm lucky and I find the engineered explosives. I crack it on turn 2 and on turn 3 I play counterbalance. He plays magus of the moon in resp I play an enlightened tutor to bring a 3CC enchantement on top (can't remember which one). I don't remember the end of the game but I did not face any resistance anymore.

On the second match I played against a cabal coffer deck splashed green for deeds. Deed is a pain in the ass really, but once more I encountered no real problem.
On the first game he gets 2 coffers in play and 6 lands as I stack the counters over 2 hoofprints (played before I could figure he was splashing green. He deals with 3 or 4 elementals but then he has to scoop. I can't remember exactly if he played a deed in this game. He tried helldozer but my STPs and Oblivion ring made his day. He echoed me but it was too late as I already had my deadly elementals in play.
On the second game, he will play 2*deed but I'll oblivion ring the first one which was payed as he could not activate it directly. The second one is played under countertop and I don't find a 3CC enchantment neither an enlightened tutor on top library. On my turn, I brainstorm and compulsively research a stifle (he still cannot activate it right now). Which I find with only 1 land untap. At his turn he plays hymn to tourach. I try a blind couterbalance which does not match and I have to discard 2 cards on 4. I'm lucky, I keep my stifle and I own his deed. That was basically game from now.

My third match was against the cleric tribal combo (not life but academy rector into form of the dragon and the Dark Supplicant and Scion of Darkness). It looked quite good even if it's not a recognized deck. And the player looked to know what he was doing.
I don't remember exactly the games but I won the first on countertop combo and early hoofprints. I lost the second on heavy beatdown with small creatures and when I stabilized @4 life (I played moat) he looked for form of the dragon at end of my turn. That's a pity because I could have oblivion ringed it at my turn. On the third game, I almost lost to beatdown too. Then the interesting turn came:
He has a dark supplicant, an academy rector, a Reliquary Monk and a seal of cleansing into play. I play oblivion ring he says ok. I target the rector, he says ok. Then he cleansings my ring I say ok, except that I stifle the return into play triggered ability. Then I could deal with all his creatures and assemble the countertop combo.
Against this deck the games when tight because it played a lot of anti-enchantments and it played also wastelands which can be a pain because the deck requires a lot of mana.

I know I did not play against top tiers decks, but the deck looked really consistent, getting a solution for all kinds of problem.