anyone tried buiding a deck around meddling mage?

[apple713]

One of my fav cards printed is meddling mage. Ove wanted to build something around it since it has supporting cards like nevermoore now.

I would imagine the deck would include cards like

Meddling mage
Phantasmal image
Phyrexian metamorph
Nevermoore
Detention sphere
peacekeeper
Surgical extraction
Thoughtseize
Inquisition of kozileck
Vindicate

Some form of counterspells to protect your mages
Fow
Daze
Counterspell


A counterbalance shell might be good with this.

Anyone have ideas or comments?

[Tempus]

The big question is what to name with Meddling Mage. Also building a deck around a card, that shuts one card of requires to know what the other guy is playing. In Vintage there was a Noble Fish list with Gitaxian Probe to choose an appropriate card.

So let's say we go for a Fish deck too. So we're on Aggro Control, means we want to keep the board clear of big creatures.
From the DTB section we can identify cards we don't want to resolve by archtype:
Omniscience: Show and Tell (Burning Wish) we don't care about anything else
Goblins: Well they have Vial so Meddling Mage isn't the tool we want
Blade Control: Mystic (and Jace/Elspeth) are their strongest threat, so that be about it. On the draw Meddling Mage will be too slow though
Dredge: Cabal Therapy and Dread Return are big spells, Read the Runes, Careful Study and Faithless Looting can be played before a Meddling Mage hits
Merfolk: Vial again. Also 3 Lords to name. Other than that Silvergill Adept is a good target or maybe Standstill
Maverick: So there is Knight as a big Beater and maybe Scryb Ranger. Combine that with GSZ.
Miracle: Terminus, CB, Enreat the Angels, but the last one doesn't really have to matter.
RUG: Goyf, maybe Bolt the rest doesn't matter that much for Aggro Control
Reanimator: Any Reanimate Spell or any Bin Spell. You have to choose, but they have 2-3 with different names in both categories.

So over all Meddling Mage is not stelar in most match ups.

If we're still trying to go with 4 Mages maybe this:


4 Tundra
4 Underground Sea
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
2 Island
1 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Chrome Mox

4 Force of Will
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Spell Pierce
3 Inquistion of Kozilek
3 Cabal Therapy
4 Brainstorm
3 Gitaxian Probe
4 Meddling Mage
4 Dark Confidant
4 Dimir Cutpurse
2 Snapcaster Mage

Chrome Mox is awesome with Confidants and to a lesser extend with Mages.
This list dies horribly to Goblins and Merfolk (and Maverick) so you might want to fix that with the SB. (Peacekeeper/Moat and Jace might be a good start)
Then with Surgical Extractions you'd have a pretty decent Combo and Control MU aswell.

Overall your incredibly slow and Aggro, or any EE/Deed will kill you. Apart from that, you should tear up Combo and Control.

[Jenni]

Meddling mage is a solid card for some matchups, especially on the play, but it's very situational.
Like the previous poster said, a lot of decks have too many different "Big" cards that you would want to name, or the mage is too slow to stop the cards you care about on the draw.
I've run it in my standstill sideboard when I knew I was going into a metagame full of decks with only one or two "I win" cards - naming Blue sun's zenith vs high tide, Tendrils vs an ANT deck, Show and Tell vs Show and tell(duh), but again, this was a case where I had played these people and their decks before and I knew they had been cutting down the number of kill spells in their decks.

I've used them in aggro-control type decks, naming things like Swords, or Wrath of God as a way to protect my threats for a while, but leave them out against decks like goblins and merfolk where they just don't matter much, they can definitely be effective defensively when you are worried about a sweeper or something of the sort, and being a 2/2 is not irrelevant.

They are more of a sideboard card, though, since they are just bears in some matchups, and you need to know what you're up against to get much use out of them. Main-deck requires you to know the metagame you're playing in really well, but they can be devastating game one if you do know what to name.

[Octopusman]

Meddling Mage is also one of my favorite cards.

The bad thing is when their removal is so diverse that you might as well not name any removal at all unless you're sitting extremely pretty and have everything else that must be stopped first covered.
Protecting Meddling Mage seems easiest with Mother of Runes and is on curve. Even with diversified removal, having a removal spell named and a Mother of Runes in play makes it extremely hard for them to kill your dudes.

I like the idea of running tempo crushing spells like remand, memory lapse, and bounce. Often, you will just not get a mage down in time. Setting them back with bounce or counters and following up with mage once you have knowledge seems great.

Moar mages seems super fun. I like Cackling Counterpart because it's instant but will fizzle if they can respond by removing your target. More Moms seem pretty good too. Not sold on metamorph even though it may be the best clone.

If you like hard counters...
I really like the idea of running snapcaster and surgical extractions. They will start to run out of threats and removal when you have 4-8 mages and 8 extractions. Counterspells make this strategy very exciting.

If you really want to have a deck like this, it might be worth moving to new and developing deck forum. I'd love to play a deck like this.
We just need a mage with hexproof ;)

[apple713]

4 Meddling mage
2-3 Nevermoore
3 Detention sphere
4 peacekeeper
3-4 mother of runes
2-3 Surgical extraction
3 Thoughtseize
4 path to exile
3 Inquisition of kozileck
4 Fow
3 Counterbalance
3 Senseis divining top

10 fetches
2 Underground sea
2 Tundra
3 Cavern of souls (all the creatures ive listed share "human" creature type)
Island
Plains
Swamp


These are the cards im considering and still havent decided on a win con yet

Mother can protect creatures really well

Counterbalance top provides even more protection but takes longer to set up and i probably wouldnt run both

Path to exile because swords to plowshares will be named with mages

detention sphere to provide answers to misc problems

Peacekeeper answer many agro decks single handedly (merfolk) and many others if you mage their removal or surgial extract it.

Also considering the following cards

Snapcaster mage
Dark confidant


Ill add to this later cause im getting car sick

[Sloshthedark]

add vial, Snapcaster, Confidant, Mystic, still the Meddling mage would be the weakest spot...

maybe something rogue like this could happen

http://www.thecouncil.es/tcdecks/dec...1&iddeck=53364

[apple713]

the win condition I am missing is jade the mind sculptor. Jace and peacekeeper pretty much lock the game if you can keep peacekeeper alive. This is where meddling mage comes into play.

[Octopusman]

the win condition I am missing is jade the mind sculptor. Jace and peacekeeper pretty much lock the game if you can keep peacekeeper alive. This is where meddling mage comes into play.

Here's the list I ran at the last SCG San Jose. Pretty sure I was 3/2/0. The games I lost were pretty close tbh. Nothing like having someone straight up scoop the moment Magus of the Moon resolves.

Main
Duegar Hedge-Mage 2
Meddling Mage 4
Brainstorm 4
Mother of Runes 4
Magus of the Moon 4
Peacekeeper 4
Jace the Mind Sculptor 4
Swords to Plowshares 4
Red Elemental Blast 4
Umezawa's Jitte 1
Pithing Needle 3

Mountain 1
Scalding Tarn 4
Arid Mesa 3
Karakas 1
Maze of Ith 1
Flooded Strand 4
Island 5
Plains 1
Plateau 1
Tundra 1

Sideboard
Echoing Truth 4
Thalia 3
Blue Elemental Blast 4
Ethersworn Canonist 4


So fun to play. Yes, the manabase is awesome as it easily allowed me to resolve spells through magus and drop Jace all day.
Nothing like seeing people's faces when you run REB and Peacekeeper main.

Mom + Medding Mage + Peacekeeper is pretty awesome. I lost a round because after running out of time, on turn 5, the guy digs super deep and digs just deep enough to get a sulfur elemental, resolves it, allowing him to swing for the kill. Amazing. Most fun game of the day.

Kind regards,

[apple713]

Here's the list I ran at the last SCG San Jose. Pretty sure I was 3/2/0. The games I lost were pretty close tbh. Nothing like having someone straight up scoop the moment Magus of the Moon resolves.

Main
Duegar Hedge-Mage 2
Meddling Mage 4
Brainstorm 4
Mother of Runes 4
Magus of the Moon 4
Peacekeeper 4
Jace the Mind Sculptor 4
Swords to Plowshares 4
Red Elemental Blast 4
Umezawa's Jitte 1
Pithing Needle 3

Mountain 1
Scalding Tarn 4
Arid Mesa 3
Karakas 1
Maze of Ith 1
Flooded Strand 4
Island 5
Plains 1
Plateau 1
Tundra 1

Sideboard
Echoing Truth 4
Thalia 3
Blue Elemental Blast 4
Ethersworn Canonist 4


Kind regards,

Why reb in main?

Didnt running swords main cause problems when you wanred to name swords to protect against removal.


Would pithing needle be better substituted for phyrexian revoker?

Did you ever wish u rean counterspells?

[Octopusman]

Why reb in main?

Didnt running swords main cause problems when you wanred to name swords to protect against removal.


Would pithing needle be better substituted for phyrexian revoker?

Did you ever wish u rean counterspells?

All great questions.

Why REB in the main? I looked at the state of the format. I don't want counterbalance to resolve. It answers that early enough since I need to make my best effort to stop it especially if I'm on the play. Show and Tell is more popular in my area than it seems to be elsewhere. Delver is prolific. The decks that do not run these cards or other blue spells that I can stop aren't so problematic that I'm in deep trouble for having 4 dead cards main. Having 4 blasts dead main and 4 plow dead main against something like miracles, combo, etc are easily handled with Meddling Mages, echoing truths, thalia and canonist.

Regarding STP: Depending on the situation, I did name swords which shut mine off. Fair trade considering aside from miracles, swords was usually the only spot removal in decks running it so if I could keep peacekeeper alive long enough to Jace them out... I'm good with that. Against miracles, I would rather name terminus or supreme verdict since I'm primarily creature based and wiping the board would set me so far behind it would be nearly impossible to recover before I'm swarmed with angels.

I ran needle because I anticipated there being a lot of top, mostly due to miracles. Since hedge-mage is a pretty bad answer to counterbalance, I wanted to be able to get something on the board that addressed it as soon as possible as a resolved counterbalance really hurts and is somewhat game ending. I ran it instead of revoker because on the play it would be too late. Especially when not running counters. So why not run counters?

I chose not to run counters because I've noticed that I often don't have them when I need them. Cards are so powerful these days, card disadvantage with Force of Will is becoming more and more of a problem. The list is very tight. If I don't have a counter for game-ending spells, I am in big trouble. I like needle for this reason, as it allows me to answer all of their tops without having to keep trying to counter it or counterbalance. It also comes in handy in other match ups (kotr for example). Magus wrecks a lot of decks. Peacekeeper wrecks a lot of decks. Swords is great for removal and if I'm playing a "fair" deck I would often name threats slowing them down a lot. Between mom, plow, REB, brainstorm, Meddling Mage, I'm often getting to three mana to drop a bomb in the form of magus or peacekeeper. I can gain control from there until I swing with a few hate bears (with magus out) or jace them out (with peacekeeper).

If I need an early counter spell, I had REB for the biggest problem spells. Like I said, just about anything else I can handle once I get to three mana. In the early game I want to either be keeping mana open for REB, brainstorming to sculpt my hand (I'm already running a lot of fetches anyway due to needing to be flexible enough to perform under magus and to cast jace), dropping needles, or moms. I can get basics easily which I usually tried to do as soon as possible since Jace does get much harder to cast if I get unlucky and don't get more than 1 island before dropping magus.

I understand it seems strange not seeing counters but it's basically a meta deck (my favorite) and I though I had rationalized all of the card choices and lines of play against the decks I expected to be present. Blue blasts were for burning wish, random burn (counters on enemy "removal"), goblins (faced 2 goblin decks that day), sulfur elemental, empty the warrens. Meddling Mage, Thalia, Canonist, just make fast decks cry. Echoing Truth for swarms like ETW, bridge zombies, angels.

Cheers,

[TsumiBand]

I love Meddling Mage. Problem is, against any list that has multiple points of removal basically makes MM a little worse than Tidehollow Sculler, even if it does have the potential to shut out multiples.

In my experience you'd need to be able to reliably protect it, via Mother of Runes and/or reliable counters/discard. If I wanted to roll a deck with MM I'd consider a starting point like

4 Meddling Mage
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
4 Thoughtseize
0 - 4 Gitaxian Probe

4 Mother of Runes
4 Tidehollow Sculler
3 - 4 Stoneforge Mystic + 2 - 4 targets

Something like this would give one the ability to play a series of disruptive hate-creatures; Mother counters removal, MM negates cards in hand, Sculler outright removes them, and SFM is SFM. Maybe other junk that just dicks with the opponent's ability to play things, like Thalia or Aven Mindcensor or other hatebears. I feel like by this point there's a better way to roll 3-color aggro control, but meh.

[Octopusman]

I love Meddling Mage. Problem is, against any list that has multiple points of removal basically makes MM a little worse than Tidehollow Sculler, even if it does have the potential to shut out multiples.

In my experience you'd need to be able to reliably protect it, via Mother of Runes and/or reliable counters/discard. If I wanted to roll a deck with MM I'd consider a starting point like

4 Meddling Mage
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
4 Thoughtseize
0 - 4 Gitaxian Probe

4 Mother of Runes
4 Tidehollow Sculler
3 - 4 Stoneforge Mystic + 2 - 4 targets

Something like this would give one the ability to play a series of disruptive hate-creatures; Mother counters removal, MM negates cards in hand, Sculler outright removes them, and SFM is SFM. Maybe other junk that just dicks with the opponent's ability to play things, like Thalia or Aven Mindcensor or other hatebears. I feel like by this point there's a better way to roll 3-color aggro control, but meh.

I like probe but after the first one it starts to hurt if you pay for it with life more than once. The cantrip is nice but I'm still messing with the possibility of telepathy or glasses of urza.

I actually used to run Wu Scout to supplement meddling mage. The cost kind of hurts since they have printed a better unblockable 1/1 in the form of invisible stalker. Still funny to swing with a jitte wielding horsemanship after seeing their hand.

Probe is probably best for not losing tempo since its free and you want to drop Mage as early as possible. I love Mage with vial as well but then he's coming down even later and it's harder to justify slots for vial these days (caverns naming wizards?).

I don't like nevermore since it is even slower and can't beat. However, when building around meddling Mage, the biggest problem I've had is consistency. Sure you can clone him, but you need one to clone one. It's not easy to realiably get a four of into play every game by turn 2 or 3. Gotta give it to Pikula for making a card that feels so white and blue. I have a feeling we'll see another Mage. I keep hoping for a 3cmc one (1WU?) that's the same or 1/1 even with hexproof. That'd make drawing one easier but landing it would be slower. It'd probably function best in a tempo shell keeping the board clear early and then shutting things off with mages and clones. FoW, Daze, spell pierce, plow, probe... I still like memory lapse and remand. The latter two are devastating with Mage because you essentially walk them while finding out why they're trying to resolve and then you name it.

I will probably make a thread in new and developing if they print another creature with the same ability.

Been tempted to not mention casual stuff, but in case you want to name every card printed:
Meddling Mage on soul foundry, intruder alarm, animate artifact/Karn silver golem/Xenic poltergeist on foundry, mana echoes. ^_^

[apple713]

They actually all share crrature type human so thats what you name with caven.

[Octopusman]

They actually all share crrature type human so thats what you name with caven.

Indeed. I'm not sure there's room in my list for caverns.
Good call, though.

When building a deck around a permanent that you need to resolve and can't tutor for, you really need 8 of to consistently have it in opening.
We'll see. What's weird is that wizards have been trying to avoid control cards. They then print stuff like detention sphere (?????). I'm waiting for another beater mage before making a prison deck that focuses on shutting off cards.

In the meantime. I'm thoroughly thrill to play mage plus surgical extraction plus snapcaster to incrementally removal possible cards for the opponent to play. Most decks run 8 threats. If you can counter 1 or 2 and then remove them from the deck, what is their win condition? Something to think about.

Kind regards,

[apple713]

Indeed. I'm not sure there's room in my list for caverns.
Good call, though.

When building a deck around a permanent that you need to resolve and can't tutor for, you really need 8 of to consistently have it in opening.
We'll see. What's weird is that wizards have been trying to avoid control cards. They then print stuff like detention sphere (?????). I'm waiting for another beater mage before making a prison deck that focuses on shutting off cards.

In the meantime. I'm thoroughly thrill to play mage plus surgical extraction plus snapcaster to incrementally removal possible cards for the opponent to play. Most decks run 8 threats. If you can counter 1 or 2 and then remove them from the deck, what is their win condition? Something to think about.

Kind regards,

this would imply using a different package of tools to accomplish this task. such as selective discard like thoughtseize inquisition and duress. I've thought about a deck like that but havent been able to fashion one succescessfully.