I think the plan of just running 1-2 Chromatic Sphere's to blank removal is a much better plan than trying to slot in a whole different package. What I like about this deck is it's a 2 card combo, (Similar to painter), that is in mono blue, so you get to run all the best answers to their answers. Splashing in a secondary win plan tends to lead to drawing Emrakul + Thoughtlash, or Lab Man + Show and Tell. I think trying to stay hyper focused on one game plan, and executing it the best we can is the way to go. People already have no idea what you are up to, there is no reason to add in more "craziness" just because you want to confuse people.Originally Posted by Jakobian
To that end, I really like Long Term Plans in the deck. Although not the best tutor in the world, there have been many a game where I can drop a Skill Borrower, and then just LTP + Top a Kiki into the win. It's great when you have the Skill Borrower, but not the Thoughtlash, and instead of haveing to tutor up the lash, and cast that, you can just win instead.
Also Swan Song has been AMAZING! I really reccomend people test it some. They fact that there is zero downside once you want your Thoughtlash makes it so strong.
Hey,
has anyone kept toying around with this deck?
I haven't played Magic for a long time and wasn't active during the Treasure Cruise/DTT era at all.
Damn, DTT would have been perfect for this deck. Not only does it dig for Thought Lash, it also puts Laboratory Maniac on the bottom of the library while doing so.
That being said, I'm thinking about cutting the secondary Skill Borrower plan completely, because it seems a bit clunky and slow.
Swan Song looks really good, thanks for bringing that up!
Here's the new streamlined list I'm thinking about:
4 Thought Lash
3 Laboratory Maniac
1 Intuition
4 Serum Powder
4 Force of Will
3 Misdirection
4 Swan Song
3 Counterbalance
4 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Brainstorm
4 Gitaxian Probe
3 Ponder
2 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
3 Scalding Tarn
7 Island
2 City of Traitors
3 Ancient Tomb
Sideboard:
3 Culling Scales
3 Defense Grid
4 Leyline of the Void
3 Repeal
2 Mirror of Fate
The list is completely untested, so I don't know if Thought Lash can be found reliably enough via Serum Powder and Intuition or if the number of Intuitions has to be increased.
Mirror of Fate helps to circumvent Needle effects postboard and has nice synergy with Thought Lash, Lab Man and Serum Powder.
Perhaps, I'll be able to attend a Legacy event in a few weeks. If yes, I'll let you know how it went ;)
I actually was playing with it at the GP (testing) and recently at local events. Still on the skill borrower plan. It is SO good.
Nice! Can you share your experiences? Did you play the list you've posted on the second page at the GP? How was Griselbrand?
How did you cope with needle effects postboard?
I started working on this list a few months ago but it seemd like a mono blue combo deck that wasn;t Omnitell (ie = bad). weeks ago. Took it a local Weekly Legacy tournament this week. Comboing out of nowhere and being strong control against other combos was fun.
3-1 in about about a 20 man field.
4 Thought Lash
3 Laboratory Maniac
4 Skill Borrower
4 Brainstorm
3 Ponder
3 Impulse
4 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Culling Scales
1 Chromatic Sphere
4 Force of Will
2 Misdirection
3 Swan Song
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
8 Island
3 Polluted Delta
3 Flooded Strand
3 Ancient Tomb
2 City of Traitors
1 Cavern of Souls
1 Mirror of Fate
2 Long-Term Plans
SB: 1 Griselbrand
SB: 3 Counterbalance
SB: 1 Back to Basics
SB: 2 Ratchet Bomb
SB: 1 Aetherling
SB: 1 Relic of Progenitus
SB: 1 Phyrexian Devourer
SB: 1 Echoing Truth
SB: 1 Flusterstorm
SB: 1 Devastation Tide
SB: 1 Defense Grid
SB: 1 Nevinyrral's Disk
S/B was a bunch one of's/experimental at this point.
I was just playing around with the list, didn't expect to do anything, so no notes. Will do matches and highlights from memory
Round 1: Storm 2-0
Game: He mulls to 5, play petal passes. I think turn two he sac'd petal, ponder, which I instantly force. He never gets land going, I borrower/Kiki.
Game 2, He starts to go off, I give him the bird, he beats me down with it for quite a few turns. I still have flusterstorm in hand if he tries again. Eventually lab maniac/thoughtlash. Deck showed real strength this game for the match-up.
Round 2: Grixis Pyromancer/Anglers/stuff 2-1
Game 1: Good friend of mine, but not the Grixis deck I'm used to him playing. He has double cabal therapy with flashbacks. I managed to get one of my two maniacs on deck after he stripped both thoughtlashes from hand. I top deck another thoughtlash and kill my next draw phase. I cop to have a ridiculous top-deck.
Game 2: Sideboard poorly cause I still think he's grixis control. Didn't side into counterbalance or ratchet bombs, leave in borrowers/ side out lab man. I think this is where we have one of the craziest stacks I've seen: Him - Therapy, M brainstorm, H - extraction on brainstorm (after resolved), M-misdirections on therapy, H brainstorm; not biggest, just wild. Get beat by stuff anyway. Only match I started to hate swan song, that bird token combos too well with therapy. Should probably side out swan song against non-combo therapy decks.
Game 3: Side in counterbalance. ends up being very key. Early multiple discard rips my hand apart, and he slowly builds a board. He gets active deathrite, pyromancer with some tokens, a bird, and I think a liliana (I remember no being able to keep anything in hand) and two cards in hand (yup, was FoW plus blue card); I have a Relic of Progenitus, Counterbalance (ain't been working cause no deck manip) and a labman, 0 cards in hand. I ponder, draw a fetch land, and put thoughtlash on top and force under it, pass, he knocks me down to I think 4, with untapped deathrite and very dead on board. Draw Thoughtlash, play it; he forces, I flip FoW to counterbalance. He's stunned. That fetchland gives me one last mana and look, I have a relic of progenitus and exactly one mana; sac it to draw a card, in response thoughtlash library away, and lab man wins it for me on my last turn.
Round 3 - Miracles 0-2
Game 1: pretty sure this is a bad matchup. Leave one blue untapped early game, swan song his counterbalance. I attempt combo, he has Force plus blue card and counterspell and untapped islands. Get beat by bird and something else.
Game 2: Don't remember exactly but stuck on two lands well past turn 5, get going but he has way too many Red blasts, too mana efficient and can't fight back. Try to devastation tide when he gets mentor going, but it gets countered.
Round 4 - Storm 2-1
Game 1: he tries to go off, gets a bird. Bird trades with a lab man. I recast lab man and beat down. He tries to go off again, I let all the mana resolve and force the tutor, I was pretty sure he didn't have discard after rebuilding. Lab man gets there for all 20 (or minus a few fetches/probes). He can't believe he lost to a 2/2 for 3.
Game 2: got the combo so I keep without thinking. My first draw step realize the mistake of keeping a hand with no disruption against storm. First three draws are lands.
Game 3: I think I countered an early dark rit or brainstorm. He duresses, I have devourer/borrower combo in hand, just need a brainstorm to combo out. Hand is also double thoughtlash. He says something like what is going on. He takes a thoughtlash, to reduce available blue cards for a force. He rebuilds in a turn or two and combos out for 10 goblins. Play a third land, borrower, go, take 9. Play forth land, drop thoughtlash. He realizes that thoughtlash does something incredibly relevant besides dumping my deck into exile. He says go, I find Kiki, make a million borrowers and my wizards swarm over his huddle of goblins on my next combat step. Get yet another comment of 'What just happened here?'
Surprise factor is definitely big, people weren't sure how to sideboard or attack the deck.
After thoughts
Maindeck: Culling Scales got switched to main deck for Griselbrand, who I saw not totally thrilled with in testing. Scales got forced right away when cast against delver (would have been awesome) and did some good work against Storm 2's chrome mox and lotus petal and I get the top/scales soft lock going all game. Gonna keep this for now. The ancient tombs definitely hurt, but were crucial at other times, might adjust city/tomb balance more toward cities.
SB: Note#1: defense grid sucked, it lost me game 2 vs: grixis delver when I couldn't misdirect something that killed my combo due to my own grid. I run to many maindeck counters (which is what beat storm). There may be better matchups for this, but I'm getting rid of it.
Nevinyrral's disk: wanted to fire this card when it was pointed out it doesn't hit planeswalkers (happened when I was getting wrecked by Jace). Cute that it can go off the turn flipped by a borrower, but probably doesn't do enough.
Devourer: Seemed good in testing as it provides a one turn faster kill against creatureless/combo decks than kiki since if skill borrower already on field, long term plans devourer, spin to top card of library, stack devourers activations, and alpha-strike with borrower. Got stymied by many goblins (which completely suck against thoughtlash so not really a bad point against devourer)
Back to Basics: stayed in my hand, I refused to cast it, even 4 color grixis delver fetched a pair of basics; everybody too paranoid about wasteland/bad moon. Imagine it's killer in some match ups. Not sure worth the slot yet, cause it hurts my sol lands.
Ratchet Bomb: seemed slow and clunky when I drew it. It does hit planeswalkers.
Aetherling: If I had been able to draw any land game two vs. miracles, would have been the killer draw. It also keeps skill borrower unkillable.
Griselbrand: Didn't use; I preferred having Devourer for storm matchup as second borrower target. Should be great in show and tell match, but not seeing much of that anymore. Not sure about keeping him.
Flusterstorm: Gave me a warm fuzzy feeling every time I drew it against storm. Win-more maybe, but I'd have a hard time cutting it.
In general sided borrower out to bring in counterbalance, and sided lab man out to bring in artifacts or other stuff.
I want more Planeswalker kill, preferably usable with Skill borrower, but mine current S/B didn't work. I would probably go with more bounce, not synergistic, but should get the job done.
Read ph. Devourer errata, milling is a cost now... and been that for a while :-)
I'm wondering about this too, how do you feel it's _SO_ good?
Thanks, I hadn't checked for errata on devourer; I should have as they errata a few things to have sac being part of the cost. It didn't come up in game anyway. So back to Griselbrand and second borrower target and stay with mirror for when there is a pithing needle on thoughtlash.
Did have someone question me on the Impulse errata and he looked up Oracle on that. In this deck, errata may be beneficial as we like knowing what's on bottom.
Regarding Technics comment, my sense was that Skill borrower was the more versatile combo part -well, except for beating down storm with regular damage
Hey,
here is another direction in which you can take the deck:
4 Thought Lash
4 Laboratory Maniac
4 Serum Powder
2 Mirror of Fate
4 Force of Will
3 Misdirection
4 Swan Song
4 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Brainstorm
3 Gitaxian Probe
4 Ponder
2 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
3 Scalding Tarn
7 Island
3 City of Traitors
3 Ancient Tomb
Sideboard:
3 Culling Scales
3 Counterbalance
4 Leyline of the Void
2 Repeal
2 Flusterstorm
1 Chromatic Sphere
Ways to victory:
A) LabMan+Thought Lash+draw
B) LabMan+ Mirror of Fate+draw
C) Mirror of Fate+Thought Lash+draw
The synergy in this list cannot be overlooked. In contrast to the list featering the Skill Borrower/Kiki and the Thought Lash/LabMan combo, in this list every combo piece pairs well with each other combo piece.
Serum Powder digs 7 cards deep for Thought Lash/Mirror if it is in the opening hand and exiles LabMans for plan B) while doing so.
It also helps to power out Mirror and to pay for Daze and Spell Pierce.
To be discussed:
3 or 4 LabMans
2 or 3 Mirrors
3 or 4 Probes
19 or 20 lands
Sideboard
Huh. I ended up with this:
4 labrotory maniac
4 thought lash
4 sensei's divining top
4 gitaxian probe
4 brainstorm
4 ponder
2 jace vryn's prodigy
1 spell pierce
1 flusterstorm
4 force of will
2 misdirection
4 counterbalance
2 daze
4 flooded strand
4 polluted delta
10 island
sideboard
2 energy flux - meta call
2 echoing truth
3 grafdiggers cage
3 back to basics
3 mystic remora - this card is bonkers on the combo turn, only loses to kgrip
1 flex
I ended up crushing all sorts of stuff but consistently losing to decks with port. seeing how we usually have 2-4
people on lands and 2 people on d&t in a weekly twenty person room. I decided the deck was garbage in my meta.
Maybe yours is different?
If you are having troubles with Port decks, how about running a few Teferi's Responses in your SB?
Maybe Pithing Needle on Rishadan Port could work? It tends to be pretty decent against decks with port. I think your island-only mana base is a lot easier to port down than a mana base with sol lands, too.
Re: Eldritch Moon and Emrakul
I'm skeptical in regards of Jace, Vryn's Prodigy in this deck. It will eat removal all day long. I don't think that the fact that it clears the way for Laboratory Maniac is enough to justify its slots.
I'm running Skill Borrower instead which has a lot more synergy with the rest of the deck (moved away from the list I posted above).
How was Counterbalance?
I would cut the Dazes and add Swan Song - it 's really good.
You should definately run 4-6 sol lands because they speed up the deck considerably and help to pay for tax effects and against Ports.
You should also try out Culling Scales in the sideboard. It wins games alone against Death and Taxes for example.
Mystic Remora is an awesome find! I will happily add it to my sideboard :)
Here's the list I'm working with at the moment:
4 Thought Lash
3 Laboratory Maniac
3 Skill Borrower
1 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
4 Force of Will
3 Misdirection
4 Swan Song
4 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Brainstorm
4 Gitaxian Probe
3 Ponder
3 Long-Term Plans
3 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
2 Scalding Tarn
7 Island
3 City of Traitors
3 Ancient Tomb
Sideboard:
3 Culling Scales
3 Ratchet Bomb
3 Grafdigger's Cage
3 Mystic Remora
1 Mirror of Fate (against needle effects)
2 Flusterstorm
Last edited by Smea.gol.lum; 02-03-2016 at 03:56 PM.
counterbalance main is completely absurd and should be SOP for every build of this deck going forward. Shutting off removal is huge, overloading decay is huge, having yet more game against faster combo is preaty good,etc. most decks kinda just lose to thought lash plus countertop lock, and even without top, counterbalance plus lash has a tendency to be virtual card advantage.
Its funny you should say replace daze with swan song, because i started with swan song and decided i wanted daze instead. this variant loves free counters.
When tiny Jace is good, its the reason i win games, but when it's bad.. i have no words. The worst is when they use karakas and don't even expend a card. I need something else. mirror looks spicy.
i'll try the scales maybe.
the problem with adding sol lands is twofold. first, wasteland becomes worse for you than port ever was, because d&t is not the only deck with wastelands. I do not want to get loam wasted out while my opponent sits there with sphere of
resistance. Yes i do have to deal with this many lands players.
the second problem with adding sol lands is that doing so i believe is a misassignment of role. You will never be as fast as omnitell. You will never be as resillient as omnitell. What you can be however, is a mono blue control deck that solves all the traditional problems of the archetype by having a series of lock pieces that your opponent has to fight through to disrupt you, more countermagic than almost any other deck in the format, a combo piece that doubles as a lock piece, a almost completely invulnerable manabase, almost the entire cantrip cartel, and a combo that once assembled can win the game at instant speed at your leisure, sometimes multiple times in the face of disruption.
That's what this variant is about.
Last edited by Wordslinger; 04-11-2016 at 11:15 AM.
Last weekend, a twelve year old boy walked into an 8 person tournament here in Austin. He borrowed this deck from a friend, yes, he had never seen the deck before, and proceeded to go 4-0. Pretty impressive. I guess I should also point the rest of us there were much older, have played for years, and I'm fairly confident we don't completely suck at Magic...
Was anyone running any countermagic..?
I was on Jund, so obviously not me. I think he went up against infect, but I don't know who else he played. Theoretically, he can still power through a counter battle, the deck has quite a few of its own.
I played smea.gol.lum's list against Storm and Tinfins for some 10-11 games and lost only once. I just took the control role and played toward not dying. I lost when I ran out of counters.
I changed it quite a bit and tested it again yesterday. -3 Swan Song -1 Skill Borrower +4 Counterbalance -2 City of Traitors +2 Island
I went 4-3 against 4c Loam and 4-2 against Lands. I actually lost TWICE when I had Skill Borrower and Thought Lash in play. Exiled Kiki on the upkeep before Borrower could combo, and also lost once when I Lashed my library to find Kiki at the very bottom... Amazing. I was very glad that Skill borrower is 1/3.
Re: Eldritch Moon and Emrakul
I think the Counter/Top package is essential. If you're already running 4 tops, why wouldn't you find room?
Yes, I think it's far too strong not to run.
Re: Eldritch Moon and Emrakul
Predict seems to be the card to fit in the jace slot.
Played a 12 man local on wedsday, went 4-0, Played against infect 2-0 Shardless 2-0 Elves 0-2 and reanimator 2-0.
infect feels like a suprisingly good matchup, but elves is terrible.
More later, My MTGO match has started.
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