It's the Gifts

[freakish777]

3 Tropical Island
3 Tundra
3 Underground Sea
1 Island
1 Plains
2 City of Brass
1 Misty Rainforest
2 Polluted Delta
1 Scalding Tarn
4 Flooded Strand

1 Academy Ruins
1 Voltrah's Stronghold
1 Dark Depths

4 Counterbalance
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Force of Will
1 Engineered Explosives

4 Brainstorm
3 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Gifts Ungiven

4 Tarmogoyf
4 Dark Confidant
3 Trinket Mage
1 Eternal Witness
1 Vampire Hexmage

1 Life from the Loam



Sideboard

2 Engineered Explosives
3 Tormod's Crypt
3 Pithing Needle
2 Path to Exile
3 Krosan Grip
1 Hydroblast
1 Blue Elemental Blast



This decks plays like a combination of ITF and UGbw CounterTop. But it randomly wins with a 20/20 Flyer sometimes.

[Jaynel]

Grim Discovery is pretty busted in a Gifts shell. And not bad on it's own either.

[freakish777]

Grim Discovery is pretty busted in a Gifts shell. And not bad on it's own either.

Seems solid, what would you suggest cutting?

[Anusien]

I had Gifts in my Intuition deck with Demigods, and I found that in a lot of matchups, surviving until turn 5 (Gifts on turn 4, untap and try to do something cool) is really problematic, especially through Wasteland. I am very skeptical of your ability to beat Zoo in draws where you don't open on Counterbalance. And I don't forsee you ever beating Goblins, although that's probably not an issue anymore.

Also, I don't think you actually have the tools to beat other Counterbalance decks. You don't have a Gifts pile that actually allows to beat an active Counterbalance, and your deck is full of cards that are cute but all lose to Counterbalance (Bob, Hexmage, etc).

So your Gifts pile is Volrath's Stronghold, Vampire Hexmage, Dark Depths, Life from the Loam? So in order to win you need to cast Gifts, untap and cast Loam, play Stronghold, put Hexmage on top, and then play Depths and win? So your best draw is turn 4 Gifts, turn 5 Loam, turn 6 make a 20/20, turn 7 win? This is less than exciting to me. At least Grim Discovery is a full turn faster.

[freakish777]

I had Gifts in my Intuition deck with Demigods, and I found that in a lot of matchups, surviving until turn 5 (Gifts on turn 4, untap and try to do something cool) is really problematic, especially through Wasteland. I am very skeptical of your ability to beat Zoo in draws where you don't open on Counterbalance. And I don't forsee you ever beating Goblins, although that's probably not an issue anymore.

Also, I don't think you actually have the tools to beat other Counterbalance decks. You don't have a Gifts pile that actually allows to beat an active Counterbalance, and your deck is full of cards that are cute but all lose to Counterbalance (Bob, Hexmage, etc).

So your Gifts pile is Volrath's Stronghold, Vampire Hexmage, Dark Depths, Life from the Loam? So in order to win you need to cast Gifts, untap and cast Loam, play Stronghold, put Hexmage on top, and then play Depths and win? So your best draw is turn 4 Gifts, turn 5 Loam, turn 6 make a 20/20, turn 7 win? This is less than exciting to me. At least Grim Discovery is a full turn faster.


Counterbalance is why I have 3 Krosan Grips and 2 more EEs in the board.

Actually my best draw probably involves some combination of Dark Confidants, Goyfs, and Counterbalances + Tops. Gifts Ungiven is an afterthought, otherwise it'd be a 4-of (you're not a control-combo deck, you're an aggro-control/control deck that doesn't have the "All my matches go to time" factor involved hopefully).

I have yet to test against Zoo/Goblins (however I'll point out the 2 PTEs and 2 Blue Blasts in the board as I figured these wouldn't necessarily be easy matches).

[Anusien]

Counterbalance is why I have 3 Krosan Grips and 2 more EEs in the board.
So you're planning to scoop game 1 and try to fight their game 1 configuration post-board? If you're serious about being a CB deck, you need more tools.


I have yet to test against Zoo/Goblins (however I'll point out the 2 PTEs and 2 Blue Blasts in the board as I figured these wouldn't necessarily be easy matches).
I was experimenting with a similar deck, and Brass Man made a really compelling argument. He basically said, "All these decks like Merfolk and Zoo are prepared to beat Tarmogoyf + other stuff, and you basically only have the Tarmogoyf. So of course they can beat you."

[Waikiki]

Is it me or is the blue count a bit low for force?

[Kevinandhobbes]

I didn't even realize the the blue count was low when I saw this, but it still excited me. I think that Gifts is certainly a viable card in Legacy, but hasn't found a home yet. I think that it would be more viable in a landstill type deck, but I haven't found a satisfactory list yet. Also, I don't really see any reason to paly this deck over ITF besides Bob. It seems like this would have broken the meta two years ago, but it looses to the speed that's required today. I think that adding engineered explosives main and maybe some other creature control elements, like pernicious deed or maybe even firespout (although going 5c is admittedly a bad choice, no other 3cc sweepers came to mind at the time), would make a more resilient build.

[freakish777]

Is it me or is the blue count a bit low for force?

It's a little low (17) but it's sufficient.

The other big reason to play this deck over ITF is Trinket Mage.