Tao
12-26-2008, 11:07 AM
Updated list:
// Lands
3 [TE] Ancient Tomb
17 [P2] Island (3)
2 [TSP] Academy Ruins
6 Dimir/Izzet/Simic/Azorius Signet
4 [UD] Thran Dynamo
// Spells
4 [DS] Trinisphere
3 [TE] Capsize
3 [OD] Upheaval
3 [MR] Thirst for Knowledge
3 [RAV] Compulsive Research
3 [MI] Mystical Tutor
1 [LRW] Cryptic Command
1 [TSP] Spell Burst
1 [U] Braingeyser
1 [AQ] Transmute Artifact
2 [ALA] Tezzeret the Seeker
1 [FD] Vedalken Shackles
1 [SH] Ensnaring Bridge
1 [MR] Mindslaver
// Sideboard
SB: 4 [TE] Propaganda
SB: 1 [US] Sunder
SB: 2 [MOR] Vendilion Clique
SB: 1 [TSB] Tormod's Crypt
SB: 2 [B] Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 3 [LRW] Sower of Temptation
SB: 1 [TSP] Trickbind
While this deck looks a pile of junk it is very competitive. It looks random but has many synergies which I'll try to explain now.
First of all there is a lot of Mana in this deck: 22 Lands (where 3 produce 2 Mana) and ~10 Mana Artifacts (the number may vary since the decklist is not final). We play only 3 Tombs because the lifeloss of having two Tombs in play is usually unbearable. City of Traitors can't be played because we want to keep the mana on the table for card draw and other uses. We play 6 blue Signets (2,2,1,1 of each because of Cabal Therapy). We want to play them on turn 2 (or turn 1 with a Tomb) so we can get the deck going. Thran Dynamo is one sick card. It helps a lot to set up the things that I am going to explain in this Introduction.
What the deck tries to do with that Mana is to a) draw a lot of cards and b) lock the opponent out of the game.
There are 3 main lock pieces. The first lock piece is the deck's name giver, Upheaval. We try to ramp with Artifact mana and then cast an Upheaval with as much floating Mana as possible. With that floating Mana we want to cast the Artifacts again which will result in a dominating Board position.
The second lock piece is Trinisphere. Nearly all our spells are unaffected by it while our opponent's, unless he plays Stax or Chalice Stompy, are massively hindered by it. It is obviously gamebreaking against Combo and Threshold style decks but also nice against other control (see matchup analysis). The best scenario is to play it on turn 2(with Tomb)/3 off Signet and Dynamo.
Furthermore there is a great synergy between Trinisphere and Upheaval. If possible we want to cast a Trinisphere directly after the Upheaval. This will often win the game because our opponent is locked out while we can rebuild much faster with our Artifact mana or floating Mana. An example is to have 3 Mana floating after an Upheaval, then play a land, play Thran Dynamo and tap it for Trinisphere. This will give us enough Mana to go on nearly undisturbed while our opponent can't do anything.
The third main lock piece is Capsize. Capsize is a nice card on its own in a deck with so much Mana. But it also synergies with the other lock pieces. If we can ramp fast enough after the Upheaval we can lock the opponent out of the game with Capsze by bouncing their replayed lands. If we have a Trinisphere out by that time it is a hardlock (except for Ichorids and Spirit Guides). This does happen quite frequently because of the next part of deck, the carddraw and Tutors:
Compulsive Research and Thirst for Knowledge are good Card Draw spells which will usually find something unimportant to pitch.
The first Tutor is Tezzeret, which is also a decent win condition. It can find us Shackles, Trinisphere or Ensnaring Bridge (and sometimes Mana when needed). If we can't win via damage (Ensnaring Bridge in play, opponent has too much removal) then Tezzeret can search for Mindslaver which is also a lock with our Academy Ruins. Tezzeret also synergies with your Mana Artifacts because he can untap them. Especially untapping a Thran Dynamo lets you do crazy things.
The next Tutor is Mystical Tutor:
- We tutor for Compulsive Research or Thirst for Knowledge (tutor for whatever you can discard) if we lack Mana or spells in the first turns. It won't create card advantage but we will get decent card quality out of it.
- Upheval or Capsize: It can find 2 of the main lock pieces and is obviously often used for that.
- Braingeyser: Usually tutored for against nonblue Controldecks / Discard decks or when we know they can't Counter; it is really broken then but also a great topdeck in the lategame
- Transmute Artifact: Tutor for Tutor but definetely worth it. He can find all the Tezzeret targets and put them directly into play, especially Mindslaver.
- Spell Burst: good with a ton of Mana
- Cryptic Command: Not really a Tutor target, I once played two and then reduced it to one.
Matchups:
Aggro: Not so good, but winnable. Overall under 50%. Depends on the draw and what they do. If they swarm us we will lose. Elves is the worst thinkable matchup and Goblins who start with Lackey is horrible, too while Goblins that start with Vial and do Ringleader tricks is winnable because we don't care if they draw cards. Upheaval will reset it anyway as long as they let us live until then. Usually there is not much interaction. Sometimes you will just get beaten and the next game they have an unimportant one drop and you get a quick Trinisphere and win from then on. Try to Upheaval/ Trinisphere asap. Tezzeret into Ensnaring Bridge can help a lot. Siding in Propganda helps but they will also bring in very annoying cards so the matchup doesn't change too much postboard.
Aggro Control:
The Threshold / Team America matchups are slightly positive. They have to use their few hardcounters for Trinisphere and playing around Daze is possible. Team America's Mana Denial will usually not work if you can resolve one Artifact. They are often not fast enough to kill you before you can lock them out. But you get problems when they have a fast draw with much Disruption backup.
The matchup against other Chalice Stompy is brilliant. We can crush them because we don't care much for their Chalices, Mooons and Trinispheres. FS FoW is the only disruption piece we care about. We can ramp and draw unhindered and they are not fast enough to kill us and except for Trinisphere all of our cards are disturbing them massively: A tutored Bridge ends the game, Capsizing their few big Critters buys a lot of time and Upheaval ends it.
Sower of Temptation from the board will come in.
Control:
The best matchup. If you play against Counter Control you have to play smart: You don't have that many spells that kill them so you have to find ways to sneak them through. Unless they deal much damage to you somehow you can play it slow. If you have ramped some Mana you have to try to overwhelm them: Play Trinisphere: they will either have to counter it or get problems to play more than 1 Counterspells in one turn (especially FoW). Throw Capsizes at their lands which they have to counter, too, and because of your Mana advantage you can eventually usually force something important through. A resolved Upheaval will usually end the game.
Nonblue Control is usually a very good matchup. Deed is not as bad as you might think. If you see Bayous and not much pressure just don't empty your hand. Two Artifacts should be enough and if you resolve an Upheaval they are usually dead. Same against Quinn the Eskimo: Scepter can be bounced. They will usually chant you in response so don't float yourself dead. Chant in response won't be a big problem then. You can still recover much faster then them because you get the first land drop and should have your best Artifacts, a Trinisphere and an Ancient Tomb waiting to overwhelm them. Remeber that with a Trinisphere in play using Scepter costs 5 Mana.
Side in Vendilion Clique and the Sunder against other Control decks.
The matchup against other Stax list is also great. They play a lot more dead cards (Magus Tabernacle, 3-Sphere, Crucible Chalice etc) than us and we have a much higher mana count. Furthermore we play card draw.
Combo: not good; you have Trinisphere which is great but if you expect Combo you have to adjust your SB
- If possible don't play a land before casting Upheaval so you don't miss your first land drop.
// Lands
3 [TE] Ancient Tomb
17 [P2] Island (3)
2 [TSP] Academy Ruins
6 Dimir/Izzet/Simic/Azorius Signet
4 [UD] Thran Dynamo
// Spells
4 [DS] Trinisphere
3 [TE] Capsize
3 [OD] Upheaval
3 [MR] Thirst for Knowledge
3 [RAV] Compulsive Research
3 [MI] Mystical Tutor
1 [LRW] Cryptic Command
1 [TSP] Spell Burst
1 [U] Braingeyser
1 [AQ] Transmute Artifact
2 [ALA] Tezzeret the Seeker
1 [FD] Vedalken Shackles
1 [SH] Ensnaring Bridge
1 [MR] Mindslaver
// Sideboard
SB: 4 [TE] Propaganda
SB: 1 [US] Sunder
SB: 2 [MOR] Vendilion Clique
SB: 1 [TSB] Tormod's Crypt
SB: 2 [B] Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 3 [LRW] Sower of Temptation
SB: 1 [TSP] Trickbind
While this deck looks a pile of junk it is very competitive. It looks random but has many synergies which I'll try to explain now.
First of all there is a lot of Mana in this deck: 22 Lands (where 3 produce 2 Mana) and ~10 Mana Artifacts (the number may vary since the decklist is not final). We play only 3 Tombs because the lifeloss of having two Tombs in play is usually unbearable. City of Traitors can't be played because we want to keep the mana on the table for card draw and other uses. We play 6 blue Signets (2,2,1,1 of each because of Cabal Therapy). We want to play them on turn 2 (or turn 1 with a Tomb) so we can get the deck going. Thran Dynamo is one sick card. It helps a lot to set up the things that I am going to explain in this Introduction.
What the deck tries to do with that Mana is to a) draw a lot of cards and b) lock the opponent out of the game.
There are 3 main lock pieces. The first lock piece is the deck's name giver, Upheaval. We try to ramp with Artifact mana and then cast an Upheaval with as much floating Mana as possible. With that floating Mana we want to cast the Artifacts again which will result in a dominating Board position.
The second lock piece is Trinisphere. Nearly all our spells are unaffected by it while our opponent's, unless he plays Stax or Chalice Stompy, are massively hindered by it. It is obviously gamebreaking against Combo and Threshold style decks but also nice against other control (see matchup analysis). The best scenario is to play it on turn 2(with Tomb)/3 off Signet and Dynamo.
Furthermore there is a great synergy between Trinisphere and Upheaval. If possible we want to cast a Trinisphere directly after the Upheaval. This will often win the game because our opponent is locked out while we can rebuild much faster with our Artifact mana or floating Mana. An example is to have 3 Mana floating after an Upheaval, then play a land, play Thran Dynamo and tap it for Trinisphere. This will give us enough Mana to go on nearly undisturbed while our opponent can't do anything.
The third main lock piece is Capsize. Capsize is a nice card on its own in a deck with so much Mana. But it also synergies with the other lock pieces. If we can ramp fast enough after the Upheaval we can lock the opponent out of the game with Capsze by bouncing their replayed lands. If we have a Trinisphere out by that time it is a hardlock (except for Ichorids and Spirit Guides). This does happen quite frequently because of the next part of deck, the carddraw and Tutors:
Compulsive Research and Thirst for Knowledge are good Card Draw spells which will usually find something unimportant to pitch.
The first Tutor is Tezzeret, which is also a decent win condition. It can find us Shackles, Trinisphere or Ensnaring Bridge (and sometimes Mana when needed). If we can't win via damage (Ensnaring Bridge in play, opponent has too much removal) then Tezzeret can search for Mindslaver which is also a lock with our Academy Ruins. Tezzeret also synergies with your Mana Artifacts because he can untap them. Especially untapping a Thran Dynamo lets you do crazy things.
The next Tutor is Mystical Tutor:
- We tutor for Compulsive Research or Thirst for Knowledge (tutor for whatever you can discard) if we lack Mana or spells in the first turns. It won't create card advantage but we will get decent card quality out of it.
- Upheval or Capsize: It can find 2 of the main lock pieces and is obviously often used for that.
- Braingeyser: Usually tutored for against nonblue Controldecks / Discard decks or when we know they can't Counter; it is really broken then but also a great topdeck in the lategame
- Transmute Artifact: Tutor for Tutor but definetely worth it. He can find all the Tezzeret targets and put them directly into play, especially Mindslaver.
- Spell Burst: good with a ton of Mana
- Cryptic Command: Not really a Tutor target, I once played two and then reduced it to one.
Matchups:
Aggro: Not so good, but winnable. Overall under 50%. Depends on the draw and what they do. If they swarm us we will lose. Elves is the worst thinkable matchup and Goblins who start with Lackey is horrible, too while Goblins that start with Vial and do Ringleader tricks is winnable because we don't care if they draw cards. Upheaval will reset it anyway as long as they let us live until then. Usually there is not much interaction. Sometimes you will just get beaten and the next game they have an unimportant one drop and you get a quick Trinisphere and win from then on. Try to Upheaval/ Trinisphere asap. Tezzeret into Ensnaring Bridge can help a lot. Siding in Propganda helps but they will also bring in very annoying cards so the matchup doesn't change too much postboard.
Aggro Control:
The Threshold / Team America matchups are slightly positive. They have to use their few hardcounters for Trinisphere and playing around Daze is possible. Team America's Mana Denial will usually not work if you can resolve one Artifact. They are often not fast enough to kill you before you can lock them out. But you get problems when they have a fast draw with much Disruption backup.
The matchup against other Chalice Stompy is brilliant. We can crush them because we don't care much for their Chalices, Mooons and Trinispheres. FS FoW is the only disruption piece we care about. We can ramp and draw unhindered and they are not fast enough to kill us and except for Trinisphere all of our cards are disturbing them massively: A tutored Bridge ends the game, Capsizing their few big Critters buys a lot of time and Upheaval ends it.
Sower of Temptation from the board will come in.
Control:
The best matchup. If you play against Counter Control you have to play smart: You don't have that many spells that kill them so you have to find ways to sneak them through. Unless they deal much damage to you somehow you can play it slow. If you have ramped some Mana you have to try to overwhelm them: Play Trinisphere: they will either have to counter it or get problems to play more than 1 Counterspells in one turn (especially FoW). Throw Capsizes at their lands which they have to counter, too, and because of your Mana advantage you can eventually usually force something important through. A resolved Upheaval will usually end the game.
Nonblue Control is usually a very good matchup. Deed is not as bad as you might think. If you see Bayous and not much pressure just don't empty your hand. Two Artifacts should be enough and if you resolve an Upheaval they are usually dead. Same against Quinn the Eskimo: Scepter can be bounced. They will usually chant you in response so don't float yourself dead. Chant in response won't be a big problem then. You can still recover much faster then them because you get the first land drop and should have your best Artifacts, a Trinisphere and an Ancient Tomb waiting to overwhelm them. Remeber that with a Trinisphere in play using Scepter costs 5 Mana.
Side in Vendilion Clique and the Sunder against other Control decks.
The matchup against other Stax list is also great. They play a lot more dead cards (Magus Tabernacle, 3-Sphere, Crucible Chalice etc) than us and we have a much higher mana count. Furthermore we play card draw.
Combo: not good; you have Trinisphere which is great but if you expect Combo you have to adjust your SB
- If possible don't play a land before casting Upheaval so you don't miss your first land drop.