Counterspells vs. Discard

[Iron Buddha]

Counterspells vs. Discard. Blue vs. Black. Who has the better disruption?

This is what Tom Martell said in the GP Day Two Coverage:
"I asked Josh Utter-Leyton why he was playing UW instead of this deck. He said he'd rather have Counterspells than Thoughtseize and Inquisition of Kozilek, and I completely disagree. I'd rather be proactive and know what's in their hand. Having perfect information is very powerful in this format. I want to know that I can run my Batterskulls out there without fear of a Spell Pierce. When each spell is so much good, like in Legacy, getting one countered can be devastating."

The funny thing: He prefers discard because he fears counterspells.


Discuss

[nedleeds]

When you are in a superior or winning board state, counter magic is generally better.

Middle or late game in a neutral board state counter magic is generally better as all you are going to pull with discard is the other guys counter magic.

Decks with early threat range (I.e. hope to win by turn 5 or 6) can better leverage discard. If you are going to win with a Juzam turn 2 then only the first stp in his hand matters, not the other 3 buried in his deck. He'll be dead before he digs another up.

(had to fit juzam in)

Neither help much when you are in an inferior board state.

[Phoenix Ignition]

Generic countermagic stops the random topdeck that blows you out. Hand hate can never do that.

Also, most counterspells are "free" so you don't have to slow down your board progression to do it, whereas hand hate costs 1-2.

Lastly, Brainstorm.

[Iron Buddha]

Especially if they totally rely on topdecks manipulating them with Brainstorm, SDT and Ponder.

[bruizar]

The reason why counter magic is so good is because you let your opponent commit mana first. With discard, you never let them invest that mana to try and get the spell through. That said, I think discard trumps counter magic, so it's good to have a mix of both.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Discard is generally more powerful in terms of disruption relative to mana cost. Hymn to Tourach does a lot to proactively fuck up an opponent's game plan, instead of forcing you to sit on a Counterspell.

However, discard can't stop things off the top; in anything but a combo you really want to pair it with some strategy that forces them to keep cards in hand to get more use out of it, whether the mana denial route or Pernicious Deed to convince them to keep their threats back.

More importantly, though, I think, is the massive tempo disparity in Legacy counterspells vs. Legacy discard. Even though the playables cost only 1-2 mana, your opponent doesn't spend any mana on the cards he's discarding; so you're at a net tempo loss and hoping to make up for that by disrupting a linear strategy, which is going to fail if he has more business in his hand or is running a less linear strategy.

Compare that to a spell like Force of Will or Daze or even Spell Pierce or Spell Snare, where your opponent may spend two, three, even four or five mana to cast a spell you can stop without paying anything.

This disparity is compounded by the rise of combo decks that have a strong way of recovering their hands. A while ago combo decks generally needed every card in their hand to go off, but since the addition of Ad Nauseam to Tendrils decks and the unbanning of Time Spiral, that's not really the case. You can tear apart these players' hands, but if they can just cast their key card all your work is rendered irrelevant.

That's not to say that discard is unplayable right now, but these are the reasons why it's generally worse than countermagic.

[death]

Especially if they totally rely on topdecks manipulating them with Brainstorm, SDT and Ponder.

This. You answered your own thread.

"Counter" spell > discard spell.

This discussion is not limited to mid-range and control decks, but to combo decks as well. While it's true having the perfect information via a discard spell is a powerful tool, that isn't always the case. For example, Duress/Thoughtseize/Inquisition in ANT/TES can be negated when an opponent BStorms and hides the Snare/Spell Pierce/Stifle in response. Even against non-blue, sure you take out their GSZ, pass. Their turn top deck Teeg/Thalia FTL and plays it. Blue-based combo decks have the luxury of playing Force of Will/Counterspell/Pierce/Flusterstorm on the other hand and are in a better position in combating hate because they have the power to answer only "must-answer" spells. Simply put, discard spells are weaker than "counter" spells because they can hit just nothing.

[Julian23]

A quite common application for Discard these days is taking a Batterskull/Jitte/Sword from their hand after you couldn't counterspell their Stoneforge Mythic. I really like the inclusion of both in Martell's deck. I'd much rather have 1 discard + 1 coutnerspell against e.g. combo than 2 of either.

[Gheizen64]

I've found that BS is a pretty strong argument for counterspells against discard. I can't count the times i've cast Therapy only to be brainstormed in response and basically get the spell countered while he still dig 3. Feel so bad man.

Discard would fit better in an aggressive shell because it's proactive, but in reality it fit in those strategy worse than countermagic do because it actually cost mana whereas FoW and Daze do not.

[DrJones]

In legacy and vintage, discard is inherently weaker than countermagic in all fronts. But that's because the counterspells that see played in legacy are severely undercosted.

1. Discard is sorcery speed.
2. There are only three "free" discard effects in the game, from which only one of them is playable, and that one requires sacrificing a creature and guessing the right card in an opponent's hand.
3. The playable discard effects are way more limited in which cards they can hit.
4. Discard becomes useless in the mid/late game.
5. Discard forces you to lose the initiative.
6. Countermagic makes the opponent spend all the resources (spells/mana/life/permanents) to cast his spell beforehand, and specially in the case of free countermagic, it also makes the opponent waste his turn. So they're in many cases better than a free timewalk.
7. It's far easier to play discard at the wrong moment than when you're using counterspells.
8. There are WAAAAAY more ways to protect yourself from discard than from countermagic, and unlike discard, those ways are actually GOOD and not übernarrow and weak.
9. There are only two undercosted discard effects in the game, and one of them is on a 3-power flying blue creature with flash.

In fact, discard is just so bad, I found out it was better to just play a good card in its place, to force the opponent to actually cast the card if he/she has it in his/her hand. Unlike discard, if the opponent doesn't have the card in hand, you actually end in a good board position.

If you aren't convinced yet, just read the posts of what the people that used to play Thoughtseize said when they tested Mental Misstep in their decks.

EDIT: I would even say Discard also turns to be worse and overcosted when you compare it with the usual card drawing spell blue gets each block, too, and they're also far harder to stop unless you happen to play blue.

In the end, there is no reason to play black in legacy unless you are playing combo. Black control pieces are severely outclassed by blue cards, and WotC keeps outclassing the good cards in other colors every block by making blue cards like Snapcaster Mage or Delver of Secrets strictly better than what the other colors get, they never print effective blue hate outside of blue, and they always give blue decks plenty of tools to stop black combo decks from winning tournaments.

Which is one of the reasons blue should be nerfed in legacy, specially on the free countermagic department. Blue currently prevents any form of black control from ever being playable.

[TsumiBand]

It's too bad that Tidehollow Sculler is probably one of the better examples of what discard 'should' look like, because it's not even a true discard effect, but honestly that's how you need to cost it; discard as an added benefit to extending your board position. Discard is a side-effect of a successful plan.

In one of those "every card is a Time Walk" functional analog comparisons, countermagic IS discard, only it costs the opponent more mana than it does you.

[Bignasty197]

This is what Tom Martell said in the GP Day Two Coverage:
"I asked Josh Utter-Leyton why he was playing UW instead of this deck. He said he'd rather have Counterspells than Thoughtseize and Inquisition of Kozilek, and I completely disagree. I'd rather be proactive and know what's in their hand. Having perfect information is very powerful in this format. I want to know that I can run my Batterskulls out there without fear of a Spell Pierce. When each spell is so much good, like in Legacy, getting one countered can be devastating."

Discuss

Funny, because he didn't Thoughtseize the guy in his Finals match and got his Jace's ultimate Stifled.

[phonics]

Funny, because he didn't Thoughtseize the guy in his Finals match and got his Jace's ultimate Stifled.

Yeah but honestly (iirc) he was so far ahead that Castor basically had no way to win.
Discard is a weaker effect, and only really strong in the early game, but the information targeted discard gives is really strong early in the game (when you want to cast discard anyways), and can dictate how you play the game out. But of course brainstorm is an exception.

[dsck]

Discard in a deck with Snapcasters seems awesome. Taking your opponents Spell Snare with Inquisition/Thoughtseize, getting perfect information to play around certain things and knowing when to tap out etc. is huge.

[Iron Buddha]

I think the primary purpose of discard is pulling off big plays. Discard has the advantage over Counterspells that you can play it the turn before and have all your mana up next turn for your bomb, except of course the counterspell doesn't cost any mana: FoW and Daze.

Counterspells also have the disadvantage that you have to keep your mana open. So if they don't walk into your counterspell, the mana remains unused except you have the instants to capitalize on them.

But on the other hand, Counterspells have the advantage that they are instants meaning that you can play them on your opponent's turn and trick him to tap himself out.

[Pastorofmuppets]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqgSO8_cRio&feature=player_detailpage#t=5s
Personally, I prefer hand hate, though.

[Hanni]

Why not do like Deion Sanders and do boph?

[Final Fortune]

It's pointless to compare the two because whether or not you use a counterspell or a discard should be based on what your deck is trying to achieve, in the case of Reanimator I can't think of any counterspell I'd bother to replace Duress with because I want to pro-actively disrupt my opponent and resolve my threats.

[Mr. Safety]

Why not do like Deion Sanders and do boph?

Hell yeah, I was waiting for someone to mention this. I play a terrible U/b faeries deck that uses both discard and counters. I have found that if I don't have a turn 1 Delver, turn 1 Duress/Inquisition is still a really solid play. Attacking an opponent's game both proactively and reactively makes for a tight control game. The only reason I leave Thoughtseize out of the mix is because of Bitterblossom pinging on myself. I have found Duress and IoK do the job just fine.

Regardless, the deck is bad. I looked at the recent deck standings...it wasn't the last deck in the list, but close. Frowny face Mr. Safety.

[nedleeds]

Compare the 'free' counter magic


Daze
Mental Misstep
Force of Will
Foil
Thwart
Misdirection
Mindbreak Trap


With the 'free' discard


Unmask


pretty depressing ... I was hoping one of the Trap cycle was going to be a Duress effect, but Wizards seems to dislike instant speed discard in general ...