Mono Blue "Grow": Delver + Snapcaster + Talrand

[civet five]

The synergies between these 3 cards seems pretty high, and can lead to a "Grow" style deck where you sit back and counter/bounce/kill their stuff, and get rewarded for it with another 2/2 Drake.

Taking inspiration from Miracle Gro and U/R Delver, here's a draft for version 0.1:


4 Dark Confidant
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Snapcaster Mage
3 Talrand, Sky Summoner

4 Brainstorm
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Ponder
3 Daze
3 Force of Will
3 Vapor Snag
2 Ghastly Demise
2 Preordain

5 Island
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Polluted Delta
4 Underground Sea
3 Ancient Tomb


Any other good ideas for directions to take this?

[Burnt-toast]

I would like to see spell pierce in the MD some how, maybe drop a ponder and a probe for 2 in order to help have a counter in hand, or maybe drop 2 land. Your CMC is pretty low and you're only really worried about getting to 4 land. With all the cantrips you're running getting a turn 4 land drop shouldn't be too difficult only running 18 land. Maybe drop 2 fetches since they work against you more with an active Bob on board

I think I like innocent blood better than ghastly demise because with your ability to crank out tokens when you cast it keeps your board state stable while diminishing theirs. Plus it will take out a show and tell or sneak attacked Emrakrul on the spot.

[jedi_gof]

http://www.essentialmagic.com/Decks/View.asp?ID=941369

is my take on a very similar list.

Dont think the ancient tomb does a lot of good since it only powers out talrands. Otherwise it throws of your colors, adds damage and does nothing. If you want them in your list, think about a card like future sight that benefits from sol lands, or even jace.

[Poron]

just Wizards and no Cavern of Souls??

[HPB_Eggo]

just Wizards and no Cavern of Souls??

All the spells have a color requirement, so it would literally be there ONLY to put out wizards. While one or two might be all right with all the cantrips, you'd probably have to up the land count to include it and still reliably have a blue source in your opening hand.

In related news, I've been running a similar deck lately, although it focuses a bit more on black. The tempo in it is great, though...

4 Delver of Secrets
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Baleful Strix
2 Talrand, Sky Summoner

4 Brainstorm
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Gitaxian Probe
3 Unearth
4 Force of Will
1 Daze
2 Spell Pierce
2 Vapor Snag
3 Innocent Blood
2 Ponder

4 Wasteland
5 Island
1 Swamp
4 Polluted Delta
4 Underground Sea
1 Academy Ruins
1 Creeping Tar Pit

A couple things I think are really strong here...

Unearth + Snapcaster. Casting Unearth on a Snapcaster and then Unearthing either Delver or Baleful Strix is very strong, and nets you a total of four creatures with Talrand.

Cabal Therapy + Gitaxian Probe + Talrand lets you see what they have, strip at least two cards, and end up with two more creatures than you started with. All that for one mana, too. Even without Talrand, using Probe + Therapy on your first turn is very good in many cases.

Baleful Strix is just an amazingly good card in general.

[rufus]

Is Talrand really better than Jace? :u::u::2: is a pretty huge cc in Legacy.

[HPB_Eggo]

Is Talrand really better than Jace? :u::u::2: is a pretty huge cc in Legacy.

It's certainly worth looking at. Think of it as making every spell you play also create a 2/2 flier. I personally think that could be very strong in the right deck, although I have yet to see a deck list that really breaks its potential, and there may never be one created.

My personal favorite play is to cast Talrand, play something that would normally trade one-for-one before passing priority, and then countering whatever removal they try to toss at him for a great deal of simple CA.

I will admit, Talrand is pretty poor against straight control or prison decks, while Jace is not, but Talrand seems much better against Tempo and Aggro decks. At the very least, I might try putting one or two in the SB in something like Stoneforge and seeing what happens when I replace Jace with them against something like Maverick. Being able to go StP -> Snapcaster/StP with Talrand out seems like it would put them in a pretty poor position most games, while Jace often doesn't do much besides eat up some damage against Maverick.

[Pastorofmuppets]

You might have too much life loss in this deck.
6 cards that chunk you off Bob, Probes, Tomb, Force, and 8 Fetches. I have a feeling that by the time you drop Talrand most of the time, you'll be pretty low on life.
You should run Umezawa's Jitte in the main. It'll help you stay alive against fast Aggro decks early game, and game-winning pumps late game.