[Deck] Dutch Stax

[Mordel]

I have been going for absolutely no splash and have been happy with the deck over all. The deck has basically exchanged the traditionally less favorable aggro control matches of geddon stax for slightly less favorable swarm aggro matches, which seem to be rare anyway.

If this deck manages to somehow make matches against random jank and aggro good, we will have a definitive best deck in the format basically, which I find unlikely.

I think the deck is about as good as it is going to get. Explorations seem extremely awkward in that if you actually need to get a one point CotV on the table, you will have four dead cards in your deck, which seems to really go against the grain for me. Sylvan library seems like a good potential card to run, but I really don't like the idea of any kind of splash really. I would sooner run Well of Lost Dreams or Scroll Rack than do a splash thus far.

[Skeggi]

In regards to the green splash, did you ever try running Sylvan Library? I noticed you said you tend to set Chalice@2 first instead of @1. Is this why you'd favor Exploration over it or is it simply the idea hadn't come to mind? All in all, I enjoy the deck thoroughly and look forward to any improvements it might have.

The green splash plays really janky. Often it just doesn´t work. I can advise against it. So far, no splash and red splash have proven best for me. And yeah I did think of Sylvan Library, but indeed with regards to Chalice@2 it would be unplayable. I did try a blue splash a while ago, but that was with normal Armageddon Stax. Perhaps I could revive the idea for Dutch Stax, see how it goes.

[Mordel]

Well of Knowledge may be something I goof around with. It is really hard to figure out what to take out for it though.



The opponent being able to use it seems like a very minimal drawback considering that it needs to be done during their draw phase and opens up them up for play errors and wasted turns.

I am not really expecting much from it, but it seems like an interesting card to use because I often find myself with far more mana than I need around [my] mid game and burning two mana during my turn to draw more pieces or a win condition while my opponent is trying to deal with a CotV and/or 3sphere with a smoker or whatever seems like something I may want to explore a bit.

Again, I don't think this is amazing tech or anything, it is just a card that I noticed that fills the draw gap without needing a splash, is uneffected by 3sphere and CotV and can create problems for an opponent...it should be noted that it uses the same amount of mana as crucible and land card(tired atm) too.

Time will tell if I ever get the balls to test it, but even in a situation when I don't have much going on and may be in a losing position, the deck's mana base is likely to be better-suited to use it without much difficulty casting whatever is draw after.

[keidot]

Dutch Stax places 2 in a field of 24. The list can be found here. I have nothing to really comment on it as it follows the general idea outlined by Skeggi. The only item that really caught my eye was the Dust Bowl for a Wasteland. I can see the effectiveness of it when you draw heavy land for a pseudo waste-lock but it still seems weak.

[Skeggi]

Nice find. That list looks pretty solid. I love how he still managed to keep the 4 Trinispheres maindeck. He also cut to 3 Crucible of Worlds; seems to be working for him. I can understand the preference of 1 Dust Bowl over a Wasteland if you dropped a Crucible.

[Mordel]

I thought it was a japanese list at first with the singleton bullets with no method of searching for them.

Looks like a pretty good list otherwise, but I hate seeing people basically wasting sideboard slots on singleton cards.

[Anusien]

Have you considered Winter Orb? It's a card I love in a lot of similar decks.

[SuperBean]

I'm messing around with a very minor green splash right now, and it has proved to be great through testing so far. Anyway, here is my list if anyone is curious:

// Spells

3x Armageddon
1x Life from the Loam

// Enchantments

3x Humility
3x Moat
2x Oblivion Ring

// Artifacts

4x Mox Diamond
4x Crucible of Worlds
4x Chalice of the Void
3x Smokestack
3x Trinisphere

// Lands

6x Plains
3x Flagstones of Trokair
3x Ancient Tomb
3x City of Traitors
3x Mishra's Factory
3x Wasteland
2x Savannah
2x Horizon Canopy
2x The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
1x Dust Bowl

// Plainswalkers

2x Elspeth, Knight-Errant

// Sideboard

3x Krosan Grip
3x Pithing Needle
3x Tormod's Crypt
3x Sphere of Resistance
1x Trinisphere
2x Suppression Field

[Mordel]

The converted casting cost of two is a bit sketchy for a main deck card and I have incredible problems fitting extra copies of smokestack, 3sphere and such into the deck and still manage to have a few geddons to boot.

The only forseeable way that I can see winter orb being fit in is by outright removing geddon, which I don't see as viable because while only two to three geddons are run, they are still extremely valuable to have,

What matches would geddon be shoring up? Combo can just ignore them, they are pretty easy for rock to blow up and permission decks can play around them to an extent because the way I win against them a lot of the time(just me here, not speaking on behalf of others) is playing more stuff in one turn than they can counter/deal with and winning on the wings of attrition. Winter orb seems like it would make the latter more difficult because counters are typically cheaper than the stuff I use to get them out of their hand. Maybe I am missing something though.

[Skeggi]

Have you considered Winter Orb? It's a card I love in a lot of similar decks.

I don't see why Winter Orb would be any good in this deck.

@Superbean:
How is that singleton Life from the Loam working out for you? I haven't tried it because as far as I know, the things that makes it totally broken: Eternal Witness and cycleland are unplayable in this deck. You have nothing to recur what you have dredges (besides land, duh) and you lack Chalice@2. Plus, if you drop a Geddon, you have no mana to cast it.

The low count of Humility, Moat and Elspeth are also something I'd worry about.

When splashing green, Choke is probably a good sideboard option. If you're not a fan, try City of Solitude (be careful, this stops Factories from being able to chumpblock).

Also, you don't want Suppression Field when you're playing Factory, Wasteland, Dustbowl, Elspeth or Horizon Canopy.

[keidot]

I've been picking up cards here and there to attempt to improve my deck and so far I've ended up with this.

Lands
8 Plains
3 Flagstones
3 City of Traitors
3 Ancient Tomb
3 Wasteland
2 Mishra's Factory
2 Horizon Canopy

Artifacts
4 Mox Diamond
4 Crucible of Worlds
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Trinisphere
3 Smokestack

Enchantments
4 Oblivion Ring
4 Moat
3 Humility

Spells
2 Armageddon
1 Ravages of War
1 Replenish

Planeswalker
3 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

I've been playing with Replenish for a few months (since I saw it posted in one of Skeggi's initial Dutch Stax list in the Armageddon Stax thread) and have been playing 2 Canopies since around that same time as well. While the Canopies have been great every time I draw them as various amounts of play data and deck lists have confirmed for most people, the singleton Replenish offers interesting lines of play. The times I was splashing blue for Intuition and Thirst for Knowledge, having Replenish in hand led to stronger board states from out of the blue. As well, the extra fodder it can provide to an active Smokestack allows longer stalls as well.

I had a curious thought that is fairly heretical but I wanted to pose it here amongst other players of the deck than pose it amongst my friends who dabble in eternal formats. Is Mishra's Factory needed given a configuration of 4 Moat and 4 Humility? Factory does provide a pseudo fog effect against non-trampling non-flying creatures amongst a myriad of other uses. As well, under Humility, he can block any of your opponents 1/1s with little effort on your part. With Elspeth in play, the clock provided by Factory is one to two turns faster than swinging with a soldier token. Also, it has the strength of a recurring blocker through Crucible.

With these known benefits put forth, my issues with Factory's are as follows.

Turn 2 activations for blocking purposes will most commonly occur versus goblins in response to a Turn 1 Lackey. Turn 3-5 activations means hands were kept with minimal to no prison effects and activations are made to block small men in order to stall until you can hopefully draw a relevant spell. These hands will also be fairly mana heavy in order to afford the loss of an early game mana source. Turn 6-X activations are the best quality of activations but are still problematic because activation means either an inability to draw Moat/Oblivion Ring and a chump block is needed to buy time or Humility was (possibly) played and is being used to minimize damage from an abundance of small men. If Dutch Stax gets the plays it wants, it'll optimally drop back to back Humility and Moat with the order depending on board state. With a strong board lock, the faster clock provided by Factory is irrelevant unless your opponent has a top deck which you're not prepared for.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm advocating for dropping Factories to pick up cards that are a bit more board controlling to compensate for some of the problems that Factory fails to shore up. Specifically, I'm advocating for Maze of Ith and Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale to work their ways into the deck.
I acknowledge that each of these cards fail to tap for mana which translate to hands that will be mulliganed more because an inability to dig for more mana sources and lock pieces quickly and efficiently.

In other words, an opening hand with City of Traitors/Ancient tomb, Mishra's Factory and Horizon Canopy can lead to a myriad of plays. It enables early game Armageddons, can drop all artifact lock pieces and gives you the option of using your factory to chump block while still having the mana available to cast Crucible when drawn. Comparitively, an opening hand City of Traitors/Ancient Tomb, Maze/Tabernacle and Canopy can either be very strong or very weak depending on what you're facing. In match-ups where you'd prefer Maze of Ith to be seen, you've theoretically freed up an additional mana each turn. This in turn means being able to cast Oblivion Ring and Crucible on your turn and still be able to have a strong defensive position. With Tabernacle in play, your opponents plays become heavily taxed allowing you more time to establish board state to try and control the game. Using Tabernacle as a defensive option follows the same line of thought as Maze in terms of freeing up mana to use on your turn as well.

Or maybe I'm just crazy.

Regardless, food for thought and would appreciate discussing the matter.

[Skeggi]

You have a valid point regarding Mishra's Factory. I'm doubting it as well, but I do not think simply replacing them by Mazes of Ith or Tabernacles would be the answer; since these lands don't make any mana. I think Blinkmoth Nexus would be a more viable sollution, and it also kills a Lackey . It just doesn't kill it twice unless you have a Crucible.

I like the idea of Intuition and Replenish though, although I fear it's a bit slow, the power of it is obvious.

[keidot]

I agree on the point of Blinkmoth Nexus simply for the fact that Tombstalker represents a very dangerous clock for this deck. It forces us to draw two of our three possible enchantments and either one will do little to a turn one or turn two Tombstalker unless we can respond with a following turn O. Ring or Humility. Blinkmoth gives us an extra turn to hopefully draw something relevant. However, this argument pushes us back to Maze of Ith being a legitimate card in this particular situation.

On that note, the point of Maze and Tabernacle's inability to make mana naturally is a serious point and not one fixed easily. The only plausible ways I can think of doing this would be to A) Cut a number of cards to fit in a combination Riftstone Portals and Intuitions/Compulsive Research/Thirst For Knowledge or B) Run Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth. The former is detrimental to the entire stability of the deck because it would require to cut at least five cards which inevitably are prison cards to make your utility land produce mana. However, if you're able to make three mana, there's little reason to desire this effect unless you need that additional white mana source to play Moat/Humility. Even then, this effect takes two turns to set up which could mean the difference between a win or loss. Turning to the latter, we're presented with a very different set of options. Being able to simply draw and play Urborg could mean mana jumps of 1->3 or 2->4 since it is very unlikely hands will be kept of Utility Land + Mana Producing Land. This means you can still play to Stax cost curve early and not have to waste both turns and card slots to try and set up for Riftstone Portal bolstered mana base. In support of this black 'splash', one card comes to mind that will help this deck immensely is another plainswalker, namely Liliana Vess.

Before we simply scoff at the idea of a 5cc plainswalker, let's mull the idea over in our heads for a bit. If Vess would be played in the deck, it would sit high and mighty at the top of our curve. It will most likely not be played on Turn 3 which is the earliest we would likely be able to play the card (Tomb/City+Mox Diamond+Scrubland/Urborg+Land) because it will find itself victim to creatures, turning it into a 5cc Imperial Seal. This card will be played however in conjunction with Elspeth and other key prison elements in the midgame to help Stax push into the end game with back breaking set-ups and plays. It's constantly being posted in both Dutch and Armageddon Stax that they wish for card draw because they have a problem finding lock pieces. This is partially due to the fact that Stax runs an abundance of mana sources in an effort to consistently play it's 3cc and 4cc lock elements within the first two turns (i.e. Mox Diamond). The benefits of draw are immense as it helps push plus the sometimes never ending pockets of land to find critical cards but it also serves to lock us out that turn from being able to resolve said threat assuming the proper card has been drawn. Intuition is a step in the proper direction because it gives you what you need, to some degree. Playing Intuition in Stax warps the deck into trying to utilize Academy Ruins which I feel is a bad idea as the tempo loss from Academy Ruin activation puts us back two critical turns.

A good example of this is being stuck at four mana but needing a Crucible down to set up for an Armageddon. To see the problem with Academy Ruins, we'll select a double Crucible/Academy Ruins stack and have our friendly opponent give us Academy Ruins like a champ. Assuming we haven't had a land drop, we play Academy Ruins and pass turn. During our upkeep, we'll tap our Academy Ruins to place a Crucible on top, draw it and then pass turn again because were unfortunately stuck at two mana and our draw was replaced with Crucible. The following turn, we play Crucible and, if we're lucky, possibly top decked a two mana producer, tossed it into play and played Armageddon. Otherwise, we'll be forced to pass turn again to play Armageddon which at this point took us four turns to resolve because we wanted Crucible in play so we could recover faster. However, at this juncture, it would have been better to just cast Armageddon that first turn and expect to draw more mana sources than your opponent rather then spending time getting Crucible into play because it's unlikely your opponent was sitting there twiddling his thumbs.

If your retort to that little Intuition bit was 'But Stax has 28-30 mana sources on average! This situation was far too narrow to make it a proper case study.' This is true but you have to consider this then. If you kept a hand with two mana producers or one Tomb/City, you probably should have mulliganed. You take a lot of risks with that hand and even though the you will technically have better top decks for lands at this point, you become totally top deck reliant to establish a quick lock. Logically, this is not the Stax game plan. Stax is supposed to reliably have attempts at resolving lock pieces, not gamble on draws that lack cheap efficient digging options (Brainstorm, Ponder, SDT). If your hand can make three mana and you fail to draw another source, the intuition example from above comes into play. It's a strong chance you'll have a Crucible/Crucible/Academy Ruins stack because you either played a City of Traitors or Mox Diamond and will need back all the land you can get to start resolving your other lock pieces. However, as demonstrated in the above example, this'll take time to get online. This leaves us with a final, more likely scenario. You find yourself flooded with mana due to the number of Tomb/City in the deck in combination with your other mana prodcuers and you need to start playing lock pieces immediately to stay alive. With less than six or seven mana in play, it takes two turns to grab a critical lock piece because of the need to untap and play the respective card. With an excess of mana, Intuition for a lock piece becomes a single turn play. However, let's look at those examples.

What does 4-6 mana mean to stax? Assuming we're drawing nothing but land, We're referring somewhere to turn 3-5 generally. Most games by this point are starting to look grim if we have failed to drop the needed lock pieces because an Intuition for the proper card will take possibly 2 turns to get going, meaning we won't be able to establish proper board control until turn 4-6. Regarding games where you have 7+ mana on the table, it's an estimate of turn 5+ assuming all land drops. Games that have made it this far with no locks will not look good for Stax and it is unlikely you will have the ability to control the game successfully at this point. What I mean is that assuming ideal plays from your opponents, Thresh and Standstill will have had 5 turns to search for proper counter magic, Dark Ritual powered decks will have crafted excellent hands or placed large beaters into play and Loam will have likely demolished your mana base. So, realistically, let's talk about that 4-6 mana area.

Due to the fact that draw effects can't guarantee drawing locks, Stax wants tutor effects. Tezzeret Stax is kind of a case in point for this in how Tezz will find the right tool for the right job. Intuition gives us a single time use that gives us a the right card for the right match-up. However, we still need another turn to untap and then play the card. Following this is now the problem of being able to finish the lock or draw a win condition. Every turn that drops by gives our opponent another chance to claw his way out from under the board control we present. This is why I suggest Liliana Vess.

As a two of, Vess theoretically functions the same way as Intuition does. After it's played, you will play a lock card on the following turn. However, in contrast with Intuition, it does not deplete threats from your deck and is reusable. This translates into being more resilient against counter spells as you can continually find lock pieces you need every turn until your opponents counter magic runs dry. As well, Vess falls under the same type of cards that every other card is in this deck generally. The bulk of the cards in Stax are cards that MUST be countered otherwise it helps to bury the opponent in prison effects. An good MUC player will let Intuition go and then counter the lock where as that option is not available with Vess.
---------

tl;dr

Hrm, long rant. I'll just say that Maze of Ith+Urborg+Scrubland+Vess could be good for Dutch Stax.

[Skeggi]

Wow that's a long read. Good post though, you remind me of Fred Bear .

Anyway, you pose some very good ideas, but I think that incorporating all of them would make the deck too vulnerable: there are too many complications. I think the deck would run better with some more simplicity.

Maze of Ith is good - but what to drop for it? Intuition is probably something Stax can really use. I've tried Academy Ruins, I'm not a fan, it is, as you say, too slow (and I used it with a recurring EE), but it seems like a must with Intuition. I'd prefer running Riftstone Portal over Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth.

Perhaps I could try something like this:

3 Humility
3 Moat
2 Oblivion Ring

3 Elspeth

3 Smokestack
3 Crucible of Worlds
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Trinisphere
4 Mox Diamond

3 Armageddon
1 Replenish

4 Intuition

1 Maze of Ith
1 Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
3 Ancient Tomb
3 City of Traitors
3 Flagstones of Trokair
2 Tundra
1 Savannah
1 Riftstone Portal
2 Wasteland
2 Blinkmoth Nexus
1 Academy Ruins
4 Plains

Sideboard would be something like

4 Choke
3 Compost
3 Tormod's Crypt
3 Krosan Grip
2 Oblivion Ring

Ofcourse, when you board in the Chokes, you may consider boarding out the Intuitions.

Intuition targets could be: Humility/Moat/Replenish or Tabernacle/Maze of Ith/Blinkmoth Nexus (if you already have Crucible in play) or Armageddon/Smokestack/Elspeth, or just Academy Ruins/Crucible/Land...or just 3 of the card you really need .

Just out of curiousity, keidot, how would you propose a list with Liliana Vess?

[keidot]

For note, my only issue of running Riftstone Portal is having only a single discard outlet in the form of Mox Diamond. As for a deck list, I think a rough deck from the top of my head would be...

Lands
4 Scrubland
2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3 Flagstones of Trokair
3 Wasteland
3 City of Traitors
3 Ancient Tomb
5 Plains
2 Maze of Ith
1 Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale

Artifacts
4 Mox Diamond
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Trinisphere
3 Crucible of the World
2 Smoke Stack

Spells
3 Armageddon
1 Replenish

Enchantments
3 Moat
3 Humility
3 Oblivion Ring
1 Nether Void

Planeswalkers
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2 Liliana Vess

I always find it hard to make a sideboard unless I have a near finalized main deck. I feel this deck should be open to a lot of debate on how this should look as I don't think I'm a Grade-A deck builder. Also, I don't mean to sound rude but who's Fred Bear?

[Skeggi]

For note, my only issue of running Riftstone Portal is having only a single discard outlet in the form of Mox Diamond.

Intuition! And you can also sac it to Smokestack.

Also, I don't mean to sound rude but who's Fred Bear?

Fred Bear is a guy who used to post in the Armageddon Stax thread. He made very long posts, but they were pretty insightful.

Nice job on that list by the way, I can see the potential. I'd be inclined to try it, but I'm saddened by the lack of manlands. Also, only 2 Smokestack is doubtful.

But these things can be overcome, however, you only have 2 win conditions in your entire deck: 2x Elspeth. You may want to think of an alternate win condition. Liliana's final seems brittle in combination with all our creature lock pieces...

[keidot]

Oh ho, but if you Intuition for Riftstone, who's to say your opponent won't put it in your hand? The scenario of being a Smokestack target does seem valid as in a possible Turn 3 Intuition for Riftstone and two back breaking cards, Turn 4 Riftstone+Smokestack, Turn 5 Sac Riftstone but I would need to play myself to know for sure. The fact that a Riftstone play of this nature would only be attempted with a Maze of Ith or Tabernacle in play means that we would have a strong board element present while we work to fix our mana base.

As for the deck list problems you had, the easiest solution is to cut an O. Ring and the single Nether Void for an additional Elspeth and Smokestack. However, I run a low count of Elspeths due to play style. I prefer to make sure I have as large a lock as possible before I lay down Elspeth. It's true with three, I can make an attempt to force one down sooner than I generally do but I prefer to play conservatively if possible. As for the manlands, I suppose beyond the points I've made, I have a personal aversion towards them. In the games I've played against Thresh, Goblins and Combo, I've never won off the back of manlands with this deck. This is just a personal feeling but every time I have them in hand, I always wish for a stronger board element or am just happy I drew a mana producer. I think that's why I feel Maze/Tabernacle plus either Riftstone or Urborg feels better to me than manlands do.

About Vess's ultimate, I don't think I'd ever use it. I always wanted to use Jace for the reusable draw with no life loss; Vess is there for generating quality draws versus the quantity draw of Jace. However, if I did use the ultimate, I'd have quite a few creatures to feed to Smokestack.

[DireLemming]

For versions running Portal and utility/non-mana lands, a Dust Bowl might be an interesting option (probably in lieu of a Wasteland).

[Mordel]

You can intuition for less than three and all cards searched up go to the graveyard.

On the topic of splashes, I honestly don't have enough problems with the rest of the format excluding combo and random jank to justify a splash, which makes me more vulnerable to getting hosed by the popular strat of attacking a non-basic land base. Running two copies of a 3bb card that tutors is one thing that could definitely go towards winning battles of attrition, however at only two copies, the card's addition to try to fix the problem of not drawing a specific peice strikes me as ironic.

It may be because I play on mws primarily, but I have gone days/matches without drawing armageddon, which I run two copies of.

If Vess is the missing puzzle piece, running something like three would probably be a lot better than two.

[DireLemming]

You can intuition for less than three and all cards searched up go to the graveyard.

That works with Gifts, not Intuition (which says: "...Target opponent chooses one. Put that card into your hand and the rest into your graveyard...").