UW Quinnish Control

[klaus]

[Edit: I updated the list, cutting those formerly untouchable Finks for 1 Sphinx, upping the U count to 18 and 1 POT Fields, making their STPs worthless and having a more reliable clock.]

Yeah, yet another janky deck concept of mine...
In a nutshell UW Quinn combines several elements of current Landstill approaches: basically the entire blue portion plus Elspeth, and some traditional Quinn features: namely the E. Tutor toolbox and the Scrying Sheets+Top draw engine.
Several respective core cards got cut along the way:
- Standstill (being replaced by the Sheets-Top engine)
- Painter/Stone (due to not being playable without Chant effects)
- Humility (in favor of more removal)
- Wrath got moved to the SB
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Overall the deck plays quite straight forward:
1.) Reach the late mid-game as unharmed as possible
2.) Establish control, using the extra cards provided by the snow engine
3.) Have your opponent concede or go for the throat with Elspeth, Finks or Jaces' ultimate
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One of the weak spots of the deck might be the mana base - though resilient to most mana denial strategies, there will be times when you simply don't have WW/UU and there are plenty of double mana cost spells in there. Furthermore, I'm not sure whether another kill condition is needed (I don't really count Jace and Shackles), because if my opponent manages to get rid of both Elspeth's I could be in pretty bad shape - pretty sure that worst case scenario would not be a frequent sight, but still..
Right now the deck really is in a very early stage, so I'd be happy to receive some feedback, tackling further potential problems as well as suggestions for the SB and MD.
Here we go:

CA, CQ:
4 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Brainstorm
1 Ponder

Control Elements:
4 Spell Snare
4 Force of Will
2 Counterspell
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Path to Exile

Stall, CA, Kill:
2 Elspeth, Knight's Errant
2 Jace, the Mindsculptor
1 Sphinx of the Jwar Isle
1 Pulse of the Fields
Mini Toolbox:
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Oblivion Ring
1 Counterbalance
1 Isochron Scepter
1 Story Circle

mana
4 Flooded Strand
8 Snow Covered Plains
8 Snow Covered Island
4 Scrying Sheets

SB:
3 Spell Pierce
1 Relic of Progenitus
1 Tormod's Crypt
2 Faerie Macabre
2 Ray of Distortion
1 Aura of Silence
1 Wrath of God
1 Counterbalance
3 Kitchen Finks

[morgan_coke]

A few quick questions:

1) since you're already running Top and E. Tutor, is there a reason you're not running any counterbalances main or board?

2) have you looked at Boreal Shelf for the manabase? Or is the comes into play tapped too slow?

3) also on the topic of manafixing, have you looked at Wayfarer's Bauble or Expedition Map?

4) is there a reason you're not running Eternal Dragon?

Seems to have potential, but you've still got a ways to go with it.

[AlterEgo]

One of the weak spots of the deck might be the mana base - though resilient to most mana denial strategies, there will be times when you simply don't have WW/UU and there are plenty of double mana cost spells in there - the most critical ones are Finks and Counterspell, since it's quite probable that you assembled WW and UU for the Planeswalkers by the time there are 4-5 land in play.


Exactly - I think getting out a walker after your 5th land drop is... very unlikely. You either have to change some double-cost cards for easier ones (meaning you cut Counterspells for Remand or Force Spike...) or play Boreal Shelf, which as awful.

[(nameless one)]

On Quinn, Scepter only has 8 targets: 4 Chants and 4 StPs yet the decks two. Why? Because its always good to have back up and it the chances of seeing it is increased.

Having Scepter-lock combo with counter back up would be really awesome.

Also, Moats would be good. Worse comes to worst, Humility is a good alternative (also a better meta call).

[kinda]

On Quinn, Scepter only has 8 targets: 4 Chants and 4 StPs yet the decks two. Why? Because its always good to have back up and it the chances of seeing it is increased.

Having Scepter-lock combo with counter back up would be really awesome.

Also, Moats would be good. Worse comes to worst, Humility is a good alternative (also a better meta call).

Don't forget abeyance...abeyance+scepter is a draw engine at worst...in a pinch you can also put e tutor on a stick, :D.

@ the deck: I know extended scepter chant ran blue...you should check that out. And w/o boreal shelf (ok probably still with) kitchen finks/counterspell aren't gonna happen consistently. The only uu card I think is worth it is couterbalance...which I'm not sure why you're not running...which brings me to running force with 13 blue spells...even with top that's not enough.

[klaus]

@ morgan coke:
CB is a cool card, but adding more than 1 seems risky to me since it's really only good if you have complete board control and then it's not as good as in other CB.decs due to the lack of sufficient shuffle effects and Brainstorm. Plus UU can be tough to assemble as mentioned before. - having a tutorable one is nice though - thanks for the suggestion.
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Boreal Shelf is awful indeed, as CIPTism is in general. Having a random one in there can't hurt though - lol.
Wayfarers Bauble and Expedition Map seem extremely slow - I'd much rather go with an entire playet of Shelfs.
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Eternal Dragon is really only good when you recur him over and over to bust out a huge Decree - UW Quinn works nicely on 6 lands I think. But I'd add 3 copies for sure if he could also fetch snow-covered islands!
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@ alter ego:
I did some minor changes, to smooth out the mana requirements a bit - was a good move, most likely.
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@ nameless one:
I will test the list some more trying to find out whether a second copy of I. Scepter would make sense.
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I'm hesitant to add more 4-drops - part of the cheap removal idea was to be able to maintain board control (8 STPs) while being able to use the snow engine at the same time.
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@ kinda:
thanks I'll check the EX lists and see what they have to offer.

[kinda]

I would do:

-1 E Explosives +1 E Tutor

-2 Counterspell +2 remand (color issue)

-3 finks +3 thirst for knowledge (drop extra tops or lands and again color issue and you actually want to play force right?)

+3 boral shelf -3 lands that are gonna get you color screwed...seriously just look at some sample opening hands.

Oh and +1 academy ruins if you can manage it...

Edit: Ray of Distortion> Return to Dust and you could put finks or pulse of the field in the board...and you want a humility md.

[klaus]

updated the list in the opening post.

[Jak]

You have 13 blue cards.

[klaus]

You have 13 blue cards.

WOW!
haha gotta fix that.
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17. Can't up it further.Gotta do...

[Jaynel]

I'm confused - this deck seems worse than both Quinn and Landstill. What led to this design? Scrying Sheets isn't really a broken draw engine.

[klaus]

I'm confused - this deck seems worse than both Quinn and Landstill. What led to this design? Scrying Sheets isn't really a broken draw engine.

First of all, It'd say it is near impossible to merge two archetypes and end up with something that's better than both.

Backed up by the little testing I got done, I can say that beating Aggro strategies does not pose a big problem due to infinite removal with counter backup, while beating control was quite doable, too. The draw engine is near uncounterable (well Top is, but BS and a little luck will surely gain you some extra cards) it's also way more broken against slow strategies than Standstill could possibly be.
Obviously, the draw engine can't get abused in the early game, while Standstill can be dropped on turn 2 - but more often than not you'll find yourself filling your hand under Standstill and getting it broken eot by an opposing Brainstorm, undermining actual CA.
What is more, you'll frequently find yourself drawing Standstill with your opponent having either Vial or 1-2 creatures in play (or even manlands of their own). Those factors make Standstill a vulnerable CA strategy.
The only weak spot of the snow engine is non-basic hate. I'm aware that Wasteland is a widespread card and I don't claim that the snow engine is generally better than Standstil - it can however draw you way more than 2 extra cards (Standstill gives you 2 virtual extra cards. not 3). Worst comes to worst it will get eaten by a Wasteland (while you're seldom forced to play it in the face of an opposing Wasteland, enabling you to set up a snow-land draw and at least 2-for-1ing your opponent).

Obviously Brainstorm and FOW are the 2 cards that made me consider a Uw Quinnish deck in the first place. Both are among the top 10 cards in all of Legacy's pool. In UW Quinn, FOW does what it's supposed to so, it's use is quite straightforward, while BS actually shines here more than it does in Landstill: not only does it help you set up cards for the draw engine, it actually let's you exchange surplus land with business spells later in the game.