How does this deck fare agains Sneak and Show? I would think Sneak is the favourite because of the high number of counters, cheap win and of course 4 maindeck Emrakuls. How does this deck win agains Emrakul?
Usz
@Arzar:
I would strongly recommend playing the Tropical Island main. It will open up a sideboard slot, and will almost never hurt you, since if you are playing against a wasteland deck, you can fetch your basics, and worst case scenario brainstorm it back.
I'm currently playing two Volcanic Islands main, and have been wastelanded once - and I used that land to cast the initial high tide, so it didn't even matter.
The sideboard slot is much more important than the .05% risk of wasteland killing you.
Two options:Originally Posted by mulder
- You make S&S draw to death with a Blue Sun's Zenith at X=50+. It takes a bit longer to set up than the classic Storm kill, but is totally manageable.
- Some players run a Surgical extraction in SB (so you can Wish for it): You play Brain Freeze with about 25 Storm and when the first Emrakul appears, you Surgical it in answer to the shuffle trigger. Shuffle still occurs, but at least you got rid of the 4 Emrakuls.
More globally about the MU:
The MU is pretty much a counter war. We both play key cards that "You have to counter". They have a lot a counter, but we also have a bunch of them: Usually 6-8 MD + 4 Scrolls to get them. (And most lists also play 2/3 more counters in SB). So High Tide usually ends up being the control deck. The Real problem is of course Sneak Attack as it just laughs at your flusterstorms... (even if Swan Song kind of helps)
There is something really important about S&T: You can drop a land. For High Tide, a free land drop may just as well be a time walk: You can combo one turn earlier. The situation often happened to me: playing High Tide OTP, my opponent casts S&T turn 2. He get an Emrakul with summoning sickness, but on my third turn, I have my 4 Islands and can comfortably combo.
Hello high tide fellows,
High Tide is slower than the other combo decks (I was wondering why play high tide over show and tell variants for instance ? Because of oblivion ring ? (not played) ). Therefore, we thought that it has to take a control role in this metagame.
How do we get there ? Is the instant or the sorcery version more suited to that purpose ? Do we need a splash ? (B for dread of night/massacre ? - R for Burning wish/Past in flammes ?).
This list (http://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=9013&d=251348&f=LE) packs a maindeck CB top lock.
Capsize + Candelabra is also a very powerful tool that doesn't need Time Spiral to kill. Sensible to the hate postboard, a control deck can still deal with anti artifact Spells (eot Turnabout) or permanents (eot bounce).
So here is a first sketch of our high tide control deck :
9 Island
9 Fetch (miracle ones)
4 Ponder
4 Brainstorm
3 Sensei's Top
1 Intuition
2 Dig through Time
3 Cunning wish
4 Scroll
1 Turnabout
2 Candelabra
3 Time Spiral
4 High Tide
3 Counterbalance
1 Jace, the mind sculptor
4 Force of will
3 Flusterstorm
SB :
1 Underground sea
2 Massacre
2 Wipe away
2 Grafdigger 's cage
1 Jace, the mind sculptor
1 Capsize
1 Blue sun's Zenith
1 Turnabout
1 Meditate
1 Hurkyl's recall
1 Flusterstorm
1 Brainfreeze (is this really necessary ?)
or
2 Vendilion Clique
Any Suggestions ? :)
EDIT : another route is -1/2 time spiral +1 Candelabra +0/1 preordain/land/repeal. Time spiral becomes a 1-of that can win on the spot, fetchable with dig.
Last edited by Jizz; 03-06-2015 at 07:50 AM.
This situation will only arise against very very bad Sneak&Show players that have no clue whatsoever how to play a combo mirror. Sneak&Show is a bad matchup for us. It always has the threat of a fast combo and has A LOT of permission, not in the least red blasts and flusterstorms. When Sneak&Show is omnipresent in your meta, Spiral Tide is not the right deck to play.
Unless you are splashing red, in which case jamming Counterfluxes is amazing. I used to play two (one board one main), though I've cut to just one sideboarded since S&T has fallen in popularity. Flux, Wish for Flux x2 and just watch the color drain from their face. You'll get enough land drops that their pierces don't matter, and then they're just dead.
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Why would you play Jace?
That build seems like it has too much control, not enough combo. With only 1 Turnabout and 2 Candlesticks, you're going to have a lot of rough spirals where you draw a bunch of countermagic but no additional mana/card draw. You have 11 Counters (including CB), 3 Tops, Jace, and 18 lands, all of which (other than the first top or Jace) do nothing post-spiral. That's more than half your deck, and its worthless after spiral. And then you suggest cutting Spirals? How do you figure that Spiral "wins on the spot"?
To give a corroborating personal anecdote, this evening I was playing tide with 8 counterspells, one of which was pitched to force. I spiraled into 4 lands, 3 counters. Fizzling is a real possibility, and the more we dilute our deck, the more likely it is.
Now don't get me wrong, I like counterbalance - I gave feline the idea in knoxville, and it played out pretty well. But it feels much better coming out of the board, and really wants a main-deck capsize as well as multiple turnabouts to generate enough mana to go infinite and draw deck with Top. Mana is a real constraint before you go infinite in Countertop variants, and sometimes you can't spare the three extra mana to go "Scroll-Wish-Capsize" instead of "Scroll-Capsize". You are even less likely to have the extra mana if you are cutting turnabouts and Candels.
I suggest the following: -1 Jace, -1 Dig, -1 Wish, -1 Force, -1 Island, +1 Candel, +2 Turnabout, +1 Underground Sea, +1 Capsize. I would really like to add the 4th Spiral in, but I'm not quite sure where to slot it in.
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I also have an issue with the use of Wipe Away in general. There are only three different scenarios that our bounce spells are useful. Against Miracles, against Mother of Runes, and against everything else. Split Second is only useful if the miracles player is bad - good players will float a 3 drop on top to protect against Wish and Wipe Away. Against Mom, Wipe Away is a terrible card anyways - they will almost assuredly have more than one hatebear. And against everything else, they won't have relevant responses. Therefore, a better plan would be to play Capsize only and find other forms of fighting Miracles and Hatebears.
Speaking of decks with Wasteland, can we please agree to stop putting lands in our sideboards? If your opponent is playing Wasteland, don't fetch your dual! If you draw it, brainstorm it away or save it for when you really need it! Sideboard slots are too important to waste on stuff like that.
Last edited by iGrok; 03-08-2015 at 01:51 PM.
Hello guys,
After 10 months without any tournament, I found time to make one :D
I picked up High Tide and played this:
1 Underground Sea
8 Island
3 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Scalding Tarn
4 Time Spiral
4 High Tide
4 Force of Will
4 Ponder
4 Preordain
4 Turnabout
4 Brainstorm
4 Merchant Scroll
2 Dig Through Time
1 Pact of Negation
2 Candelabra of Tawnos
1 Blue Sun's Zenith
1 Swan Song
1 Wipe Away
2 Flusterstorm
SIDEBOARD
3 Thoughtseize
1 Wipe Away
2 Grafdigger's Cage
3 Defense Grid
1 Snap
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Mystic Remora
1 Hydroblast
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Pact of Negation
For a long time, I felt that the 3 CMC cards, Meditate and Wish, were being too slow. In addition, the Wish box was taking too much of the side board. I decided to follow the Wishless route that was proposed recently. Since I have very little time to play, I decided to test a black splash at the same time. I know testing 2 things at the same time seems conterproductive...
I had the impression that the deck is getting stronger with these changes in the main deck (not sure about the splash). Unfortunately, I could not test extensively these changes since I played twice against Elves and once against Sylvan plug. I won against the first Elf and lost against the second (2 missplays from my side), and well, lost against plug...
Against Elves I did:
+2 Cage
+2 Seize
+1 Sap
-1 Wipe Away
-1 Pact of Negation
-1 Preordain
-1 Flusterstorm
-1 Dig through Time
I would like to hear what you think about these changes. The idea behind the black splash is that it can help against Miracle and combo match-ups, and since we play only 1 sea we hardly get punished by wasteland. A green splash looks interesting as well with cards like Moment's Peace and Krosan Grip for example.
TW
ps: I am seriously considering cutting the Wipe Away main deck.
That looks pretty sweet! Similar to my own list (though I'm Ur not Ub).
If you're splashing Black, why not play Massacre out of the board for D&T?
Yes, that's exactly what people told me... but half of my cards were in another place, including my Massacre. In addition, I am afraid to fetch Underground Sea to get it wasted, so I am not 100% behind this, even though a test would be neeeded. Anyway, that would be an extremely narrow sideboard slot and I remember D&T being a rather positive match-up.
Then don't fetch it until you need it :). If you lose a land, but they lose a Thalia, you're even. If they lose a Thalia, Mom, and Canonist, you're waaay ahead. Massacre also comes in against Meddling Mage decks.
Played a 4 round event today, not too much to report but here goes. I was playing 2 volcanics, with a single burning wish main, and a sideboard with 2x pyroclasm, 1 REB, 1 Counterflux, and a shattering spree. I was also short a High Tide (I had pulled one out and forgot to put it back in!). I run Brain Freeze main, and USZ side (with a single cunning wish to get it)
Round 1 I had a bye. Looking around the room, these were the decks:
Fish
Cephalid Breakfast
Oops
Belcher
Reanimator
Show and Tell
Burn
Jund (my friend)
So, I got ready for a very interactive day of magic!
Round 2: Burn
Game 1 I mulled to 5, but I was able to represent miracles while getting burned out. This led to him boarding improperly for game 2.
Game 2 I countered two eidolons, then dug into the combo.
Game 3 was more interesting. he started with a pair of pithing needles (on Candel and Top), I had a hand of countermagic, capsize, and candel, so I let the needles resolve. We traded cards for a couple turns, and he stuck a sulfuric vortex. At the end of his next turn, he had three cards in hand. Its important to note that up to this point I had seen 0 Chain Lightnings or Fireblasts. I was set to combo on my turn, so I cast Capsize on the needle naming candel. In response, he skullcracks me, leaving R open. I am at 7. So, if I Force, I go to 6, then vortex puts me at 4, in fireblast range. If I don't force, then I go to 4, then 2, and I'm dead to bolt or blast. So I force, and it turns out he has blast in hand :(. I think that I made the right play, but sometimes you get punished for that.
Round 3:
Cephalid Breakfast.
Opponent concedes -_-
I borrow ANT from my friend and goldfish while watching him die to Oops.
Round 4:
Belcher
This round made the night totally worth it.
Game 1 (on the draw): Keep FoW, Merchant Scroll, 2 blue cards, candel, 2 lands
T1 FoW
T2 Scroll for FoW.
I play Draw-go for a while, and eventually combo off.
Game 2: I board in two pyroclasm, and board out both wishes. I don't yet realize my mistake.
We play the longest game the belcher player has ever played. Since I only have 3 high tides, it takes a long time to find one - especially since I always need to scroll for counterspells. Multiple times, I have 4 Time Spirals in hand, brainstorm two of them away, and then draw them again over the next few turns. Eventually I just start pitching them to Force of Will to stop his combos. At some point, I realized that I didn't have any access to non-brainfreeze wincons... since I'd boarded out my wishes and didn't bring in USZ...
I end up with a Brainfreeze, turnabout, turnabout, force of will, Time spiral, Snapcaster in hand, while he has been drawing up a hand. He went for empty the warrens, so I did my best Solidarity impression! Turnabout>Turnabout>Force a copy of Empty the Warrens>Brainfreeze. He ended up with 5 cards in his library, so I untapped and cast snapcaster>brainfreeze. One of the more memorable games in a while.
Overall, I didn't learn much, but I had some fun games, and everyone likes tournament reports :)
I have trouble believing this. If their hand is juiced enough to try and win, it has to be good enough to stop you from winning.
A good enough hand for S&T to try to win against you is something like combo+pierce+REB/Flusterstorm, or 3 counters if they're really nervous. Counterflux can't even be misdirected if you pay 1 extra, and stops all copies of their flusterstorm when you try to combo yourself.
What it comes down to is that they need to find a copy of show or sneak, and every time you stop one of those, they need to spend time and resources to find another enabler. In the meantime, you can just make land drops until you can just pay for all of their taxing counters. Once you've resolved high tide, only their copies of FoW and Flusterstorm actually matter, and you have flux to stop their flusters.
I don't know why you think they can stop us when we can just pay for most of their counters. Just be the control deck.
Just be the control deck, hit 8+ lands is pretty far from "they're just dead". Also they play Dig Through Time and sometimes Jace so it's not like they're a fish out of water in the long game.
It is "they're just dead" though, from experience. You are going to be able to go off before they can assemble a third or fourth attempt.
Obviously you can draw every single land you play, for example - sure, its possible to lose playing flux. Its extremely unlikely to lose if you are playing counterfluxes, does that sound better to you?
[Edit:] The thing is that once you've stuffed them once, they have to decide if they want to cantrips for counters or for action. If they dig action, you can combo, if they dig counters, you have time. If they have a full hand, you fight on their turn to turnabout their lands, and then they either have fewer counters or can't cast them. If they have a small hand, you can pay for the taxing counters or counter if its FoW.
If things get bad, you can spiral with nothing, and either go off or hold up a new batch of counter spells.
2 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Scalding Tarn
2 Volcanic Island
9 Island
3 High Tide
2 Turnabout
4 Time Spiral
4 Force of Will
2 Pact of Negation
2 Izzet Charm
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Preordain
3 Cunning Wish
4 Merchant Scroll
3 Swan Song
1 Intuition
3 Candelabra of Tawnos
SB: 1 High Tide
SB: 1 Turnabout
SB: 1 Pact of Negation
SB: 1 Swan Song
SB: 1 Intuition
SB: 2 Flusterstorm
SB: 2 Defense Grid
SB: 3 Wipe Away
SB: 1 Hurkyl's Recall
SB: 1 Blue Sun's Zenith
SB: 1 Brain Freeze
Splashing red for just two cards is probably too cute, but I really like the versatility of Izzet Charm esp with DNT on the rise. I tried to play DTT over Intuition maindeck, but it didn't stick.
If you're splashing red and need answers to hatebears, Pyroclasm out of the side is a beating. Has utility against Elves and Empty the Warrens too
I figure I may as well post my list, since we're talking about Ur variants:
8 Island
2 Volcanic Island
2 Polluted Delta
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Flooded Strand
2 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Candelabra of Tawnos
4 High Tide
3 Turnabout
4 Time Spiral
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Merchant Scroll
1 Intuition
1 Dig Through Time
1 Cunning Wish
1 Burning Wish
1 Snapcaster Mage
1 Capsize
1 Brain Freeze
3 Force of Will
2 Flusterstorm
1 Counterspell
1 Swan Song
SB: 1 Capsize
SB: 1 Flusterstorm
SB: 1 Turnabout
SB: 1 Counterflux
SB: 1 Teferi's Realm
SB: 1 Shattering Spree
SB: 2 Pyroclasm
SB: 1 Devastation Tide
SB: 1 Pithing Needle
SB: 1 Blue Sun's Zenith
SB: 1 Enter the Infinite
SB: 2 Blood Moon
SB: 1 Force of Will
Why are you starting with a High Tide sideboarded? Usually, the difficult card to get is Time Spiral (4 Spirals, 1 Intuition, 4 Wish for Intuition for Spiral), compared to High Tide (4 Tide, 4 Merchant Scroll, 1 Intuition). Post-board I can understand if you expect Surgicals..
Comparing the two lists, we're playing many similar things. We have different Counterspell suites (probably due to different metas), and you're on the Wish plan while I prefer maindeck action.
Our sideboards are completely different, but that's to be expected.
Went 3-1-1 at a 1k today, good enough for 9th place -_-
I got wastelanded once and it was total bullshit. Going back to mono u, -2 Izzet +2 Top.
whoahSB: 1 Teferi's Realm
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