Miracle Control

[pokezel]

Interesting list - 4th place from Cardkingdom 1k - http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...l=1#post966973

Greg Mitchell (Omni/Miracles) - 4th Place

4 Scalding Tarn
4 Flooded Strand
1 Misty Rainforest
5 Island
1 Plains
1 Tundra
1 Volcanic Island
2 Ancient Tomb
1 City of Traitors
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
2 Preordain
3 Predict
4 Show and Tell
4 Omniscience
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
4 Cunning Wish
4 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Counterbalance
2 Terminus
4 Force of Will
1 Split Decision
SB: 2 Monastery Mentor
SB: 1 Disenchant
SB: 1 Eladamri's Call
SB: 1 Firemind's Foresight
SB: 2 Flusterstorm
SB: 1 Pyroblast
SB: 1 Red Elemental Blast
SB: 1 Release the Ants
SB: 1 Surgical Extraction
SB: 2 Swords to Plowshares
SB: 2 Engineered Explosives

[eoinmoners]

Question is why would you want to steal Aether Vial when you can Wear//Tear it? Wear//Tear is way better in the CB curve in addition to being a target for Snapcaster Mage so you can just wear and tear like a boss.

Also the ultimate is more of a nice to have than need to have. The deck is stronger if you stick to the gameplan. Think that pretty much sums it up in terms of good ol' Dack.

I hear you. I really like Wear/Tear too, just stretching hard for extra shenanigans! I think Dack's utility is so strong in grind-y games but if we're grinding it's not usually against the types of decks that run artifacts either I suppose.

Back to your Vintage folder Mr. Fayden...

[chaosjace]

I am off the energy field kick, and am torn between Strictly UW for b2b and legends version as I really like venser and clique.

Anyone have success with Keranos? I have seen it SB in some top 8s as well as a random future sight, very interesting.

[Minniehajj]

Interesting list - 4th place from Cardkingdom 1k - http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...l=1#post966973

Greg Mitchell (Omni/Miracles) - 4th Place

Pile of magic cards

Spoke to Greg about this, deck was super fun and cool, but EXTREMELY soft to decks that 2-for-1 you via discard. Shardless BUG especially comes to mind, or any other Hymn/Lili/Daze deck.

[WinterRat1]

Hi All, new Miracles player here.

Played Legacy on and off over the years but I definitely consider myself a rookie, experience-wise, so apologies in advance if I say anything stupid. I used to play UW Control back in the Revised days and since Miracles is the premier control deck of the format it was a natural choice for me as the deck I'd like to learn and become most comfortable/familiar with.

One question I've been working on is Back to Basics vs. Blood Moon.

I've seen both show up in various builds enough times that I cannot clearly identify if one is the consensus choice. I have tried them both a couple of times but not enough that I definitively have a preference for one over the other.

Additionally, I have seen Moat show up enough times in decklists that I'm not surprised to see it, but I don't know if I've seen it enough to call it a required/standard part of the deck.

So my questions:

1. What are the pros and cons of Back to Basics and Blood Moon, and which do people prefer?

2. Is Moat still a worthwhile card in the 75, and if so, should it be in the Main or the Sideboard?

If it matters, I have experimented with various Miracles builds to see which I prefer and am currently leaning towards the 4 Ponder/Snapcaster/Entreat build with Mentors in the SB for when I need a fast clock. I do enjoy the Land Destruction/Limitation of Back to Basics and Blood Moon though, so I am open to switching to another Miracles build (e.g. Lossett's Legends/Wizards Build) if it is a better shell for those cards.

[mike1987]

22 LANDS
2 Arid Mesa
4 Flooded Strand
4 Island
1 Karakas
2 Plains
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Tundra
2 Volcanic Island

4 CREATURES

2 Snapcaster Mage
2 Vendilion Clique

23 INSTANTS and SORC.

4 Brainstorm
1 Council's Judgment
1 Counterspell
2 Entreat the Angels
3 Force of Will
3 Ponder
1 Spell Snare
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Terminus

11 OTHER SPELLS

1 Engineered Explosives
4 Counterbalance
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
4 Sensei's Divining Top

SIDEBOARD

2 Flusterstorm
1 Counterspell
1 Force of Will
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Rest in Piece
1 Containment Priest
2 Wear/Tear
1 Izzet Statiscaster
2 Monastery Mentor
3 Pyroblast

I still kinda dig the old fashion days in miracles being a more "control-ish" deck and change back from mentor miracles to the above. I have cut a jace for an EE main to deal with delver and chalice shenanigans.

Anyone playing this version of miracles can enlighten me on which matchups to bring mentor in? Will you all bring it in against combo or delver decks?

[oarsman]

1. What are the pros and cons of Back to Basics and Blood Moon, and which do people prefer?

Blood Moon is a stronger card. It does more damage to the manabase of more decks. That is both the upside and the downside, because it also cripples your own deck more than Back to Basics. One example of Blood Moon's power is against decks with Abrupt Decay. If they can't destroy it instantly, then they are stuck hoping for basics, whereas a tapped out player would just need to make two land drops to get rid of Back to Basics. To illustrate the difference from your own perspective, imagine playing an enchantment on turn 3 off Island, Island, Volcanic Island. With Blood Moon you are probably not playing any white spells that game, so you may have to delay casting it. In the case of B2B, you could drop it, because any white fetchland turns on the white.

[talpa]

More important, since Blood Moon disables your fetchlands, you have no more access to those wonderful sequences of pseudo-tutoring the card you need like: look 3, fetch, look 3, fetch, look 3

Because of that, I prefer B2B; but still, I see many Miracles player more skilled and more experienced than me preferring Moon.

[Cipher]

Blood Moon is a stronger card. It does more damage to the manabase of more decks. That is both the upside and the downside, because it also cripples your own deck more than Back to Basics. One example of Blood Moon's power is against decks with Abrupt Decay. If they can't destroy it instantly, then they are stuck hoping for basics, whereas a tapped out player would just need to make two land drops to get rid of Back to Basics. To illustrate the difference from your own perspective, imagine playing an enchantment on turn 3 off Island, Island, Volcanic Island. With Blood Moon you are probably not playing any white spells that game, so you may have to delay casting it. In the case of B2B, you could drop it, because any white fetchland turns on the white.

Do you find that you're able to reliably lock out decks with Back to Basics? Are there matchups where you just use it to turn your opponent's lands into Lotus Petals? Demars used to run it in my area and I always assumed the card was just as high variance as Blood Moon without the same payoff, but maybe I was looking at it the wrong way.

[matunos]

Let's not forget about the Tsabo's Web!

[Lormador]

Re: Moat, playable MD or SB?

I wouldn't suggest MD Moat in an open meta. It's only at its best against Jund, Eldrazi, and Merfolk (Dredge and Goblins too, but that's not too important). As a lock piece, it falls far shy of Blood Moon. There are deck constraints to playing it as well, Monastery Mentor doesn't really appreciate not being able to attack. MD Moat could certainly be a stomper at the LGS if you know players X, Y, Z will be 1/4 of the field and on the decks that fold to Moat.

In the board I think it's still a contender, even in an open meta.

As a lock piece, it's not nearly as good as Moon. Moon followed by Terminus is a strong sequence.

[twndomn]

I am off the energy field kick, and am torn between Strictly UW for b2b and legends version as I really like venser and clique.

Anyone have success with Keranos? I have seen it SB in some top 8s as well as a random future sight, very interesting.

Keranos was very popular when the meta was dominated by Shardless BUG. You just need to get rid of Goyf and Tarpit, Keranos will single-handily deal with everything else. Joe once did an... unnecessary move, Cavern naming God to play Keranos. So if you run Cavern, I guess it could be a thing. In today's meta, probably not needed.

[CutthroatCasual]

Let's not forget about the Tsabo's Web!

Same idea as BTB but weaker on the scale of nonbasic hate.

Re: Moat, playable MD or SB?

I wouldn't suggest MD Moat in an open meta. It's only at its best against Jund, Eldrazi, and Merfolk (Dredge and Goblins too, but that's not too important). As a lock piece, it falls far shy of Blood Moon. There are deck constraints to playing it as well, Monastery Mentor doesn't really appreciate not being able to attack. MD Moat could certainly be a stomper at the LGS if you know players X, Y, Z will be 1/4 of the field and on the decks that fold to Moat.

In the board I think it's still a contender, even in an open meta.

As a lock piece, it's not nearly as good as Moon. Moon followed by Terminus is a strong sequence.

I still have my Moat in my SB. If DnT starts becoming more popular because of Chalice on a stick, I might think about changing it out for a Kozilek's Return since the decks that Moat is a house against are bad against DnT so those decks should go down in popularity/meta percentage.

[Pelikanudo]

To all experienced Miracles Players:

From a Stomer:

Do you guys have evaluated to include Prelate in your build?
Thanks in advance

[MiraclesWizard]

To all experienced Miracles Players:

From a Stomer:

Do you guys have evaluated to include Prelate in your build?
Thanks in advance

Currently no, I run legendary miracles and don't have room for it but if push comes to shove, it might find a home in the sb, but as always double white is a pain to deal with.

[Quasim0ff]

Currently no, I run legendary miracles and don't have room for it but if push comes to shove, it might find a home in the sb, but as always double white is a pain to deal with.

WW is a bitch against SnT/Storm/Lands (perhaps here, if you don't have any fetches)?

[kravkenov]

To all experienced Miracles Players:

From a Stomer:

Do you guys have evaluated to include Prelate in your build?
Thanks in advance

Against storm deck, I think this Creature-Chalice is just less powerful than Chalice or simply Counterbalance.
Post-side, Flusterstorm and REB are very strong too. And as said before, WW is a big issue if we want to keep U and R available. Against Land/Jund it could be something because @2 it blanks Punishing, Decay and Loam, we just have to manage for an Explosives. But for now I personnaly won't run it in my 75.

[chaosjace]

What do you counter vs storm? I have always thought it was simply the ad nauseum and or past in flames, I have heard it depends but I am curious how it depends.

[CutthroatCasual]

It's really situational and board-state dependent. Sometimes it's the first Dark Rit.

A good Storm player will craft a hand where you have to counter the first "business" spell, and then they follow up with another one.

[HansV]

I just started playing Miracles and have this decklist for the next turnament:

Land (20)
2x Arid Mesa
4x Flooded Strand
4x Island
1x Karakas
2x Plains
3x Tundra
4x Windswept Heath

Creature(6)
4x Monastery Mentor
2x Snapcaster Mage

Instant (16)
4x Brainstorm
2x Daze
4x Force of Will
2x Spell Pierce
4x Swords to Plowshares

Sorcery (10)
1x Council's Judgment
1x Entreat the Angels
4x Ponder
4x Terminus

Enchantment (4)
4x Counterbalance

Artifact (4)
4x Sensei's Divining Top

Staight forward decklist with Monastery Mentor and Snapcater Mage.

The big question is: Why not play 1-2 Temporal Mastery in this deck? They could possibly replace one Mentor and one Terminus.
Is this card really not worth playing in Miracles?
This is my result of trying to analyze it:
1) When in my hand it is a dead card and needs Brainstorm to put it on top of the deck, just like the other Miracle spells
2) When I draw it and have the available mana to cast it but no Monks in play and passibility to attack I will get:
- To draw an additional card (on the extra turn)
- To play an additional land
- To play a Snapcaster mage, brainstorm, ponder, swords to plowshares etc.
- To set up a Miracle for the extra turn
3) When I do have one or several Monks in play I also get:
- Boosting the Monks and generating more by the Temporal Mastery and other spells played on the first turn
- Playing more spells on the secound turn, hopefully when the opponent is tapped out and can't respond
- Boosting the Monks and generating even more
- Having an additional attack with the Monk army

It seems to me that the pros of having this card in the deck will outweight the cons when playing Monestary Mentors. I would likely not consithered the card in any other versions of this deck.
Have anyone teste this togeather with Monestary Mentor in a similar setup?

Other consitherations for this deck is that I try to keep it as easy to play as possible because it is new to me and make it agressive enough to finish 3 rounds without a draw. I have dropped splashing red and using Jace because of this.
I have also been consithering to add some Gitaxian Probes to have more boost for the Monks, but I think this will leave me with to few conterspells and get me killed more often before I get the Mentor in play.
The reason I have added 4 Mentors is that he is the main win condition and I don't get to wounerable for removal. This could be wrong...

I think 20 lands should be enouth for this deck, but will consither adding 1 or two more when I have playtested it.