[Discussion] Hate-bear hierarchy

[GGoober]

So I'm curious to find out the opinions from the Source (preferbly from combo players) which hate-bears (namely Gaddock Teeg, Ethersworn Canonist, Meddling Mage, Aven Mindcensor, Vendilion Clique) are the most dangerous to the combo player. Since there are many types of combo decks, I'll try to write down my opinions on which hate-bear combo archetypes detest the most. Note that this discussion isn't going to be about other cards such as FoW/Pierce/Leyline of Sanctity/Null Rod/Nevermore etc, it's specifically about creature combo-hate.

TES/ANT/Belcher:
1. Gaddock Teeg
2. Ethersworn Canonist
3. Clique
4. Meddling Mage
5. Aven Mindcensor

Teeg stops AdN/Tendrils/EtW i.e. win-condition but does not slow down the combo player significantly enough. They will need to find 1 bounce/removal and going off will be easy again. Canonist is pretty devastating since it slows down their ability to cantrip and find outs. However, Canonist doesn't stop artifact mana from going Petal/Chromes/LEDs into AdN. It does however disallows the storm player to ever resolve AdN and bounce it (they would have to take 2 turns or AdN EOT).

Clique and Mindcensor are often too slow against the faster TES/ANT/Belcher decks. But they are still better than Meddling Mage since these decks have many ways to win outside of AdN. Mage is stronger against ANT since there are less paths to victory outside of AdN in ANT.


Solidarity/Spiral Tide:
1. Meddling Mage
2. Vendilion Clique
3. Ethersworn Canonist
4. Gaddock Teeg
5. Aven Mindcensor

Tide decks have to rely on Tide to win, so naturally, Meddling Mage has its strength by completely slowing down the initial combo phase. Clique functions the same way since Tide cannot go off without a High Tide. Clique is more devastating against Solidarity since Clique on their turn would disable them the ability to win on the stack. Canonist comes in next being able to significantly slow the deck down. I'm not sure if Canonist is more powerful than Mage in this combo matchup, but I would like feedback/opinions.


Show and Tell:
1. Meddling Mage
2. Vendilion Clique

Mindcensor/Canonist/Teeg are somewhat irrelevant against Show and Tell. Mage is ebtter because it comes down faster. If the Show and Tell deck is a variant with Natural Order/Entombs etc, then Aven Mindcensor and Canonist could become more valuable and Teeg is relevant against NO.

Thoughts/opinions? I'm feeling for most parts that despite Canonists' inability to shut off a specific card/strategy, the amount of time she buys is quite significant, given these combo decks usually have to cast multiple spells a turn to find an out or win.

[Chikenbok]

As a ANT/Doomsday player (depending on my mood) I'd say my least favorite card out of all of those is probably clique. Not only does it mean that the rest of the deck is probably 80% blue (Or I've already been hymned twice), but a good player will always hold to resolve that damned thing when they know it'll hurt.

Teeg is more or less a joke and can be dealt with in a variety of ways - only problem with teeg is it usually comes out in Zoo and that has a fast clock to support it.

Cannonist on the other hand always seemed to be partnered up with a mom which really is the most obnoxious thing in the world. Mind you, it usually means you have time to set up and figure a way out of the horrible situation (no fast clock against you) but it's still a pain in the ass to deal with.

[lordofthepit]

From my experience with Storm combo, Ethersworn Canonist is the most annoying. Not only does it prevent you from going off, but it also prevents you from effectively searching for answers; plus, it renders your discard useless if they have counter backup.

Vendilion Clique is extremely annoying too when your opponent manages to get up to three mana. If it's well-timed (and especially if you're too reliant on Infernal Tutor), it's almost a Mind Twist with a quick clock.

[Mostly_Harmless]

I play a lot of TES and Doomsday. I'd agree with everyone else that Ethersworn Canonist and V. Clique are by far the most dangerous. Clique is slower, but can be devastating if you get caught with your pants down. Also, the worst feeling in the world is to face canonist, mom and vial on two. I've taken to boarding in Hurkyl's Recall against pretty much all white aggro decks.

Teeg is a joke for most good decks. He might slow you down by a turn, but without a huge clock he doesn't do anything.

[Shax]

At some locals yesterday first round I played Zoo and he stuck a turn two Teeg while I was on TES. He managed to aggro me out in time for the first game. Rest assured games two and three were pretty much blowouts after I knew what his hate was.

[Nessaja]

Phyrexian Metamorph is a good Dredge and SnT hatebear.
Gaddock Teeg is a good Dredge hatebear as well
Ooze is a good Dredge hatebear as well.

Neither Gaddock Teeg, nor Canonist can win the game on their own. But both Gaddock Teeg and Canonist need to be dealt with which makes their inclusion wortwhile.

[Finn]

DnT players have found Phyrexian Revoker to be a good generic hate card that hits combo mana like Lions Eye Diamond, Lotus Petal and Chrome Mox.

[Amon Amarth]

It's important to note that Clique is also in the same color as Daze, Pierce, FoW, etc. It's a decent clock and a non-embarrassing MD card. It's miles better than the other hate-bears.

[dahcmai]

Clique is mostly good due to the decks that play it and the assorted other things you don't want to see. Alone, it's annoying, but hardly as good as Canonist. It's on par with being Thoughtseized except you might get a draw if you had something worth taking obviously. The clock it provides is the biggest worry.

Canonist is the one I don't want to see the most. It's a pain to play around. Your only way out is typically Grapeshot off of some artifacts if you don't have a bounce for it. That's only if there's no mother out.

Honestly, I've never had an Aven Mindcensor played against me. Can't say much about how it would affect things other than it sounds annoying. Though TES I doubt would have too much problem with it since Burning wish is fine with one out and that's typically how you're going to kill it anyway. Seems like a fair enough stall tactic, though not an overly amazing one.

Teeg is a joke sadly. I can picture that UB Tendrils have some problems with it since it doesn't have much aside from bounce, but TES could care less. You can kill people with him out just fine. Grapeshot is a typical way to win anyway.

Meddling Mage is all about what they name. Naming Tendrils is obviously worthless, but naming something like Ritual or Rite of Flame can catch you in bad positions. Brainstorm isn't a bad target either. It's annoying to be sure.


Canonist definitely takes top honors for biggest pain in the rear at least in my book.

[JustPAT4]

Against Sneak Show and NO Show Show and Tell builds, Meddling Mage on Show and Tell takes top spot. Teeg does however function as a Meddling Mage for the other combo route. Generally, V-Clique is very very strong and SnT decks. Especially in Response to a Show and Tell or Sneak Attack it can be a total blowout. Aven Mindcensor is also truly great against these strategies as they tend to utilize Intuition as a tutor and have land light mana bases that can be crippled by a Mindcensor in response to a fetch.

Against Show and Tell strategies I'd rank it this way:

1) Meddling Mage
2) Vendilion Clique
3) Aven Mindcensor
4) Gaddock Teeg
5) Phantasmal Image

[Klazam]

Gaddock Teeg is a quite annoying card against Dredge. Teeg shuts down Dread Returns, which means the only route to victory is through Ichorid and zombie beats, which can be slow.

Canonist, like other people said, just makes me want to put my head through a wall if I'm on storm combo. It often singlehandely delays the combo for 2 or more turns. (Tutor, next turn, kill it, next turn, go off)

[Sempra]

I guess i will give my two cents, as an adept spiral tide player.

One of the strengths of spiral tide, is that a lot of players are very unsure on how to handle the matchup.
But for arguments sake let’s assume that your opponent is excellent at magic.

Nr 1. Vendilion Clique.
This is by far my most hated card to play against. Reason being, that the clique in essence is an instant Thoughtseize with legs. Not only do they get information, but they remove one of your key cards, AND suddenly have an evasive clock. Spiral tide, plays around counters very well, I’ve played plenty of matchups, were i comboed off even though i had to get through double FoW, Double Pierce, Daze u name it. What hurts more is discard often because, decks that run duress/inq of koz/ Thoughtseize /hymn also have a clock like goyf. And that is what Clique gives the blue decks.
Negatives: She does cost 3, which is a lot. And it is almost always clear when a clique is hitting the table, it’s a card that very easy to read. Also a lot of times players are misplaying clique vs. spiral tide.

Nr 2. Ethersown Canonist
The Cannonist, yep she is my nr 2. A hate-bear that definitely trumps Meddling Mage. On the aggro side Cannonist paired with MoM is a pain in the ass. On the control side Cannonist paired with any hard counter is excessively annoying. So you EOT cunning wish into slaugter pact? when you want to combo off. You s pact, they counter.. Your fucked. You find wipe away instead of s pact?. Trust me it’s very hard to combo off with spiral tide after you just used 3 lands to bounce a creature. By herself she slows us down a lot, only being able to cast 1 cantrip per turn, or 1 scroll and no cantrips. It suddenly becomes hard to sculpt your hand.
Negatives: The Cannonist slows both players down, but in decks like stoneblade they can still play their equipments. And being limited to one spell per turn is fine if you play a stoneforger into ravens crime sword, it’s hard to deal with as spiral tide.

Nr 3. Meddling Mage
The mage of old. It’s really not as deadly as people assume, they play it and say high tide and assume you’re just dead. While in reality I’m far from it. I can still cantrip like crazy, scroll into whatever i need. I also play 1 maindeck snap. And when i need to combo i just bounce it or slaugther pact it. If they counter back i ither let them and just wait another turn, having traded a hard counter for a snap or s pact. And try again next turn. If I’m really under pressure I just counter back, more times than not you will win the war. Since they won’t be playing 3 pacts main, with 4 FoW and flusterstorm..

Nr 4. Gaddock Teeg
I never care when they play this guy, so two cards in my deck is dead Spiral tide and Turnabout. While this might seem like a big deal it’s really not. Since you can still combo off and make tons of mana and then deal with the Teeg and win. Teeg paired with MoM is better, but tbh. I’ve never lost to it. The thing is, you often have enough resources to get two bounce spells or a bounce and s pact. You can also build the hand with more bounce as you go along as he doesn’t really restrict you. Having said that he is still not just useless, we have to deal with him in order to win. He’s not like Mindcensor which we can just ingore all game.

Nr 5. Aven Mindcensor
Yea it doesn’t do anything. I can’t Merchant scroll.. or wait i can but only top 4. I can still brainstorm and cantrip to make sure i get value off my scroll. I can’t fetch? well spiral tide doesn’t play a lot of fetch. At least i don’t. I only play 4. Land drops are often very tight in spiral tide. And you must hit them!, and using all ure cantrips to hit lands is really subpar. Aven would be a pain if we played more fetch. But since we dont.. shes quite useless.
Yes shes a 2/1 flyer and ofc she beats. but 9/10 times I’m happy that they play Aven and not a 4/5 or 5/6 goyf or Stoneforger!

- Sempra

[John Cox]

I'll second what sempra said but just point out that against most combo meddling mage and Gaddock Teeg are not a big deal at all. Against ANT/TES Aven Mind Censor is a bit more of a threat than it is to tide and I would rank it #3. Mainly due to those decks reliance on infernal tutor, otherwise he covered it all perfectly.

[ubernostrum]

I'm consistently surprised by how little respect people give to Phyrexian Revoker... until they have to play against it :)

The amount of stuff it shuts off is almost obscene, and typically if you can stick one turn two and have a good read on what your opponent's playing, it'll disrupt them more than any other general-purpose hate card.

Distant second place is Ethersworn Canonist, followed by Phyrexian Metamorph depending on the meta (in Nashville, where there were S&T and Natural Order decks all over the place, Metamorph was an MVP for me). Mindcensor fluctuates a bit; it's not as good as Stifle, but does just shut down some decks anyway.

[bowvamp]

Although this is about hate-bears, I will at least mention what the bad aspects of Phyrexian Revoker are. It can't name lands. It dies to almost all creature kill.
Now let's look at Pithing Needle. It can name lands. It dies to artifact hate (as does Revoker). It only costs one mana. That's what would put Revoker low on any hierarchy of hatebears I would make.

I like Guilded Drake against SnT, even though I don't normally try and play blue. I also like Faerie Macabre against Reanimator (and I board it in vs. dredge too, although it's much less effective in that MU)

[Richard Cheese]

True, but it's a lot easier to maindeck 3-4 Revokers. They play nice with Vial and aren't a dead draw when you don't have anything crippling to name, or in multiples. Personally I just think they fit better in an aggro/control shell, where it might be ok for them to eat removal if it gives you a couple turns of disruption, and beats for a few points of damage in the process.

[sir]

So is a Mom that survived a turn protecting them from bounces and removal? ;-) That changes things. You won't call Gaddock Teeg a joke then! I think she's the biggest hate bear of all, or at least the power behind the throne.

Thanks for everyone's posts, this is an interesting and informative thread.

[from Cairo]

While perhaps not a top tier hate bear, Yixlid Jailer is highly undervalued/played. Totally shuts off the Dredge and Flashback mechanics, while beating for 2.