Bricking on spiral is always a fear, and the answer I've seen is that you have to live with it a bit. You've increased your odds of spiraling into a draw spell, but I don't think the mana is actually that relevant. You could equally run serum visions. The usual number of lands is around 18, and you've cut to 17, so you might've actually optimized your deck a bit through cutting.Originally Posted by antimatter
My personal jank solution right now is trade routes which is very mana intensive but can eliminate bricking to lands.
Pore over the Pages has the same cost as Serum Visions under one High Tide, digs equally deep (3 cards), gives more card advantage, gets rid of spare lands in the deck, and actually becomes a mana producer after the second HT. Both cards are sorcery so they can't be taken with scroll. Serum vision is better pre-combo but that should not matter, as serum vision is worse than our worse cantrip (preordain) already, and you should run the full 12 cantrips anyway. If you want to run an offbeat card, potp's the best you can have imho.
Another 4-1 today on league with the list above. Lost the one to BUG control with double hymn G2 + G3. That's a tough matchup, but I sideboarded incorrectly too. Brought in defense grid - I think he was actually playing more discard than counters so it did nothing. Bringing in surgical for snapcaster and stocking up on flusterstorm would have been better there!
How did you sideboard? I haven't played HT in a couple of weeks but I remember experimenting with cutting force of will vs grindy/fair blue decks to some success.
I have not tried that. My thoughts are that even though it's card disadvantage I'd often rather force hymn than let it hit (depending on hand ofc). Here's my sideboard at the moment:
So not much to bring in even if I take out a force. For the grindy BUG deck I faced above with snapcasters and hymns I'd probably go -1 High Tide -1 Preordain -1 Candel +1 Flusterstorm +2 Surgical.Code:Chain of Vapor Flusterstorm Brain Freeze Echoing Truth Hurkyl's Recall Back to Basics Meditate Teferi's Realm Wipe Away Blue Sun's Zenith Surgical Extraction x2 Grafdiggers Cage Defense Grid x2
I haven't been impressed with back to basics, but I'm not sure what to replace it with. I'd like form of draw or filtering for grindy matchups - top would have be perfect. I like the idea of mystic remora but feel I'd need to dedicate a couple slots to them.
Ok, so let's discuss the maindeck first. How has Pact of negation been? PoN is a lot better with gitaxian probe than without but personally I haven't even cunning wished for that card in a year. As a scroll target it's faster, but also a pretty loopsided pre-board card. I Think with enough maindeck flusterstorms it's not really needed. One of the weaknesses of the deck is that it's slow and flusterstorm is similar to PoN the turn you go off but can also be used to stop our opponent from disrupting/killing us. Your example with hymn is spot on. Forcing it is better than letting it resolve, but flusterstorm is one card less and also "uncounterable". I would switch PoN with the Sb flusterstorm for starters.
In the sideboard I am curious about your reasoning behind Chain of vapor over the more commonly played Snap. I don't like the back to basics. I Think we rather ignore the opponent as we have no way to permanently deal with the board. Making them not untap lands doesn't help us survive a delver, for example.
How has surgical been as a way to combat snapcaster? It seems ambitious but I honestly haven't tried it. It's a nice way to play around Snapcaster->flusterstorm but SE is not Worth a card in a lot of other situations.
so with your maindeck (-1 PoN +1 flusterstorm) vs "grindy bug" (assuming leovold, countermagic, surgical extraction, hymn and possibly artifact hate) I would board;
-1 force of will (you need answers to leovold but other than that there's nothing great to FoW).
-1 candelabra of tawnos (unless they have a lot of spell pierce/flusterstorm/early pressure)
-1 intuition -1 high tide (standard anti-surgical package).
+1 meditate (replacing intution and also a good card to just cast turn3)
+2 defense grid
+1 snap (for leo, still one wish-answer in the board)
I don't recommend cutting cantrips vs any deck besides stuff with chalice of the void.
How do you like the probes? Is the Life-loss relevant?
If you want to gun for 4C leovold and miracles I Think mystic remora or simply more carddraw is the way to go. there is no Counterbalance anymore so we are not under any real pressure to go off. Fact or Fiction, Predict or a maindeck meditate are the cards I would consider. Maybe 2 gitaxian probe is enough? add one more land and one of these draw spells, perhaps.
Snap is probably better there, I will make the switch. Not sure of the reasoning behind Chain over it. I have really liked Pact. In matchups where we can struggle G1 the extra free counter really helps. I also never wished for it when it was in my sideboard, but I find I scroll for it quite often. Perhaps the difference between 2 mana for scroll and 3 for wish? It does look bad in some matchups G1, however it still pitches to forces and shuffles to BS. Flusterstorm is great however the one mana =1 turn required to cast it can cost the game.
Surgical is not bad IMO. I'm not usually that unhappy to draw it as it can cause blowouts - especially with probe in the deck.
I think my opponent was running a low-counter package therefore the defense grids seemed very bad that game. Your SB plan seems good for Leovold BUG, I'm curious about the meditate MD though - do you really cast it before your combo turn? In a deck that really wants 4 lands it seems very slow!
As for probe its an absolute house, never don't want to see it, I think 4 of is the way to go. This is probably partly because I'm a bad player, but even with a good read on your opponent you may decide to wait a turn (and thus lose to some topdeck). Probe will let you know 100% if you can win now. The life loss has not been relevant for me (haven't seen much burn...), and you can always cast it for U if you have to. As a bonus you're now playing 15 cantrips. That's why i'm not afraid to cut a preordain when SBing and also cut the land in MD (more gas in deck/post spiral).
I'm 100% with you on the draw spell and I actually sided in a Fact or Fiction after my above post, curious to see how it will perform. If it does perform well I could 100% see cutting pact for it. I don't think predict is the answer unfortunately. Miracles plays a very different game to us.
I'm thinking about picking this deck back up again now that Top is banned. I'm normally a 12 Post player, but I want a deck that I can audible in certain local metas, if I expect a lot of Dragon Stompy or Big Red and/or fast combo.
I haven't played Tide in years, so I have some basic questions about how its present incarnations perform:
1. Which major combo matchups are stronger/weaker?
2. How does it beat Chalice decks?
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ANT
G1 is okay-ish, what happens normally is that they try to grind you out with discard. Of course, they have to choose between discarding your pieces and discarding your disruption, often resulting in a mexican stallout [edit: the actual expression is Mexican Standoff, my bad] where they have combo but don't have a second discard and you don't have combo but you're full of counters. Overall not bad, i'd say 50-50. G2 is still decent, try to board out one tide and intution (against surgi) and board in some more counterspells. However, if they see Swarm, it's gonna be a stomp.
S&S
Had it only once but it's rough. G1 you gotta hope they don't understand what you play and go for Show and Tell, which you can easily flusterstorm. You have way less room for interaction (read: fow) if they go for Sneak Attack. Postside REB-effects and Defense Grid only make it worse. Plus their deck naturally shuts off the brainfreeze route.
Elves
Elves is just a nightmare in my experience. You can win G1 if you get to start and counter a key spell (glimpse/order/gsz) and they don't have a second one. G2 you get multiple therapies (because they don't really mind playing therapy and instaflashbacking it, sac'ing a dork) and NO into Ruric Thar, which is instascoop for you (wish for bounce and you've taken 12...'nuff said).
And that is all I can remember.
Chalice decks are way too diverse to provide a general answer. However, your matchups against decks that run CotV are generally not that brilliant.
1. Those decks are a minority force in this metagame and you don't have to worry too much, that's a fact.
2. You should counter CotV if possible. Yes, Thorn of Amethyst and Sphere of Resistance do not allow you to win, but Chalice also prevents you from finding an answer, shutting off your cantrips. So counter chalice because sphere effects are a lesser evil.
3. a. Against Stompy decks, you counter chalice and you hope they don't see nuts and get to win before you do. Maybe you can side in some bounce spell and scroll for it if you have a good hand.
b. Against Stax, you should Side in some bounce spell and let your hurkyl recall in the 15's so you can wish for it and cast it on the eot right before you plan to go off. Maybe playing 2 is the best option.
I agree with pretty much everything Cave said above.
In general I don't think you want to face combo because all of them are faster and if they pack disruption too (like ANT) a competent pilot will be very favored against you. In general vs combo you should play to our deck's strenght which is consistency. Unless you find a window for a t4 kill you should probably take the role as the control player and maximize on countermagic. Go long and hope your opponent screws up or draw multiple Griselbrand but no enabler etc. Probe really helps here since it lets you steal games in a "mexican standoff" described above.
I would like to add graveyard decks to the list;
Reanimator is one of the worst matchups. If the format is full of graveyard decks you should bring atleast 2 grafdigger's Cage and a surgical extraction to wish for. Also helps versus Dredge (which is just an ok matchup without hate).
The fair graveyard-engines are not a problem so you don't need to worry about Life from the loam and thopter foundry which makes it easier to chose Cage over most other hate cards. It also pretty much shuts down the combo-finish (and gsz for Leovold) from Elves.
There are other combo decks but those are often more fragile than sneak/storm/reanimator so only suggestion here is to be more willing to mulligan for hate since you'll get more time if you stop their first attempt to go off. One exception beeing Marit Lage-decks and I suggest you have 1 Snap to both Scroll and Wish for. This is also one of those mexican standoffs where you can assemble the combo but don't know if you live the next turn. One advice is to keep intuition for as long as possible and if you need to counter a crop rotation you can use it to find flusterstorm and otherwise search for a combopiece during their end-step. They probably run surgical extraction so it's not bullet-proof but I found myself not wanting to tap low for a merchant scroll just to have it discarded a turn later either.
@Chalice decks.
To add to Cave's suggestions. Spend your mana every turn if possible. You pretty much dig for a way to find hurkyll's recall/force of will or combo pieces but instead of maximizing the number of cards you see by holding on to cantrips you want to burn through your deck as fast as possible before they play spheres/chalices.
Sometimes it's ok to brainstorm in their turn1 endstep. Also make landdrops. Remember that if they have no clock you will win eventually so don't be afraid to Force of Will a Chandra and leave yourself vulnerable to chalice of the void if they are low on resources. Some chalice decks run a lot of hatebears/creatures and a way to deal with this is Thing in the Ice. I am not super high on that card atm since it's hard to flip vs Prelate on 1 anyway. If the meta calls for it I really like Teferi's Realm. It seems good but I don't know yet since it's been bugged on magic online for YEARS.
What's a typical MD with 4 Candelabra ?
Not really having played the deck in years (I never played a match since Time Spiral got unbanned...), I would have gone with
// Lands
4 [ON] Flooded Strand
2 [ON] Polluted Delta
12 [9E] Island (3)
// Spells
4 [FE] High Tide (1)
1 [US] Turnabout
4 [IA] Brainstorm
3 [JU] Cunning Wish
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [LRW] Ponder
2 [TE] Meditate
3 [CMD] Flusterstorm
4 [HL] Merchant Scroll
4 [US] Time Spiral
4 [M11] Preordain
1 [TE] Intuition
4 [AQ] Candelabra of Tawnos
Half-joking, you should play different fetchlands so you're less vulnerable to Pithing Needle.
On a serious note, I never played Candelabra but a big share of people who did liked to play one copy of USZ maindeck, because Candelabra makes a lot of mana and USZ's good when you have a lot mana. Maybe -1 Meditate +1 USZ? Other than that, your list is pretty stock.
I had thought about it, but basically no list on mtgtop8 shows any wincon MD anymore (unless you go back to 2014). I realize you'd be using it as "normal" card draw first in that case, but still, it seems absolutely no one is doing that.
Not that there are enough lists to consider it has been solved by the community though.
There are no lists because no one plays High Tide anymore. :/
Yeah. I've been thinking for years that Show and Tell into Omniscience is a similar but better combo, and nowadays Omnitell's a tier 1.5/2 deck at best anyway.
Compared to High Tide, Omnitell still allows you play your whole deck in one turn and chain cantrips into victory, except:
- it's a whole turn faster
- it allows easy splashes (red for Burning Wish, black for Thoughtseize and Lim-Dûl's Vault)
- it's more resilient to hatebears or cotv
- it's still sorcery speed (ht's an instant but every major businness spell in the deck is a sorcery)
- it's easier to play and requires no huge spell/mana count and no calculations
- it takes less time to win
- it doesn't refill your hand, but it doesn't give your opponent room for counterplay either
- You get the occasional T2 nuts with Show and Tell into Emrakul GG WP.
I hate to say it and i know it's pretty troll to be typing this stuff in this very thread, but imho there is no good reason to play Spiral Tide over full blue Omnitell or black based storm, except if you're a fan of the combo and would play it no matter if it's competitive or not. Spiral Tide needs Frantic Search unbanned to be able to win one turn faster and be half decent in the current metagame.
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Fuck. Which one of my quotes do I drop for this?
Been playing some spiral tide again!
it's still a lot of fun and I think the deck is well positioned (slow meta).
Candelabra of tawnos has always been the worst card in the deck and often sided out. I think it's only great against the non-interactive fast decks (like burn) and that's not what I expect to play against these days. 4c Pile, miracles and combo with discard/countermagic are all pretty grindy decks. Even delver decks are on the slower side at the moment. I do have candelabras myself but it's a personal mission to spread the high tide love and not having to spend a million on those helps a lot.
4 preordain
4 ponder
4 brainstorm
3 flusterstorm
4 predict
4 high tide
4 merchant scroll
3 cunning wish
1 intuition
3 turnabout
4 force of will
4 time spiral
3 flooded strand
3 polluted delta
12 Island
Sideboard
2 defense grid
1 pact of negation
2 grafdigger’s cage
2 snap
1 surgical extraction
1 flusterstorm
1 meditate
1 blue sun's zenith
1 brain freeze
1 hurkyl's recall
1 turnabout
1 echoing truth
I played 16 matches yesterday to a 10-6 result. Not great but also not bad. Most games were close and some losses were due to time out (because I was doublequeing Leagues with the legacy challenge, silly me). cantrips, predict and flusterstorm are phenomenal together. I rarely focus on the combo and just draw cards until I have 8 and my opponent has 2-3. Game 1 is very easy vs most decks.
The sideboard I'm not sure about. I like the cards but I need to map it for the most common matchups. For example I have tried to cut 2-4 Force of will against every fair deck (including delver, miracles and pile) but I'm not sure if this is correct. The idea is that these matchups are mostly about cardadvantage and not so much about tempo/bombs. Counterbalance, Leovold and the delver-draw aside. You don't want to hymn yourself if you can precit :-)
How consistent is Predict? Have you though about shaving a land with all the additional draw?
Predict is a proven staple in Miracles at this point and I have the same setup cards in Ponder and Brainstorm plus four copies of Preordain. In that deck you also need to time the Miracle mechanic, play around wasteland etc. You get some additional help from blind counterbalance and Jace but overall I would say it's easier to set it up in this list. A big difference to miracles is that you don't need to spend mana on things like swords to plowshares etc so oftentimes you can just curve out with draw-2's. This goes hand in hand with my approach to the deck, Control-combo and keeping my guard up with flusterstorm until my opponent's end-step. An important part of that is hitting my land-drops. With 4 copies of predict as additional draw it seems like shaving a land is ok but I think it's the opposite. In fact I NEVER want to cantrip for a land if I can help it, I just dig for countermagic and predict/setup all the time unless I need a fast combo-kill. It's also a lot harder to set up a kill without candelabras when you have missed a land drop, too.
Post-spiral Predict solves the drawing of additional lands-problem ;-)
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5-0:ed a League!
Last edited by Mackan; 01-19-2018 at 07:58 AM.
And another 5-0.
Belcher (2-1)
Turbo Depths (2-0)
4C Pile with Daze (2-1)
Sneak and show (2-0)
Grixis Delver (2-0)
I love this deck!
Tried TiTi again, not sure what to think of that. Sided in vs delver in this league but have put him to good use vs dnt etc previously.
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