UBx control

[siqatzi]

http://magiccards.info/scans/en/ktk/36.jpghttp://magiccards.info/scans/en/isd/105.jpghttp://magiccards.info/scans/en/ai/42.jpg

Dig Through Time, as well-costed instant-speed draw/search, seems great for control arvhetypes in legacy. I wanted to build on its synergy with Liliana of the Veil's +1 ability, allowing you to fill your graveyard for delve while disrupting the opponent's hand. Given this idea, I think there's a relatively obvious core (the numbers of Ponder and Liliana might be cut down with testing):

Core (20)
4 Dig Through Time
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Ponder
4 Liliana of the Veil

Beyond that, the control options would be some combination of
more counters (Counterspell, Spell Pierce, Spell Snare)
more hand disruption (Thoughtseize)
more one-for-one removal (Innocent Blood, Lightning Bolt, Swords to Plowshares)
sweepers (Wrath of God, Terminus, Toxic Deluge, Damnation, Bonfire of the Damned)
disruptive creatures (Snapcaster Mage, Vendilion Clique)
more planeswalkers (Jace)
The list would need to have some means of getting card advantage in addition to Dig Through Time - sweepers are the most obvious way to do this. I quite like the idea of running Sensei's Divining Top+Terminus or Sensei's Divining Top+Bonfire of the Damned for this purpose, as Top seems synergistic with Liliana, allowing you to treat the top three cards of your deck as an undiscardable extension of your hand. A different means of getting card advantage would be to run Countertop, but I think that probably the dissynergy between Dig Through Time and Counterbalance rules this out (I mean, how many 8 mana spells are you likely to need to counter?)

You also need some way to win - Jace, utility creatures or manlands are the obvious options.

So here's a back-of-an-envelope list, working with a few of those options:

Core (20)
4 Dig Through Time
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Ponder
4 Liliana of the Veil

Removal (8)
4 Lightning bolt
4 Bonfire of the Damned

Extra counters (4)
2 Counterspell
2 Spell Pierce

Card advantage (6)
4 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Lands (22)
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
4 Polluted Delta
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Wasteland
3 Island
1 Swamp
1 Mountain
1 Creeping Tar-Pit


I'd appreciate any thoughts on the particular list or the more general thoughts! Is anyone else brewing anything controlling in UBx with the new delve draw spells in mind?

[wcm8]

Misdirection seems like a good option to play along with the Delve cards. Maybe as a 1 or 2-of.

[FoolofaTook]

Think about D&T, Elfball, Burn and Delver lists and how you will match up against them. That's probably 33% of the meta at this point and you'll need to be faster than the current list is to deal with those archetypes. Miracles works because Terminus is so cheap and StP removes all creatures that don't have Shroud or Hexproof.

[somethingdotdotdot]

A couple of issues I have with your idea is:

1) DTT is a very expensive card to delve. Taking 4-6 cards out of your graveyard for each of them you cast severely limits your capacity to cast the next one. Even tempo delver decks traditional run 2 tombstalkers (comparable cast) and they still occasionally have trouble finding the gy to sustain them. At most I think the deck can support 3, as having 2 in hand in the early game will do nothing but clog up your hand.

2) The red splash feels strictly inferior to the white splash in the context of your deck. You don't play a fast deck where bolt/bonfire to the face is a viable method of closing out the game. Instead you're running a very slow control oriented build that looks to gain advantage out of DTT in the mid-late game. In these decks, I can't see why bolt/bonfire would be superior to swords/terminus.

3) You lack win conditions. I understand that this is a control deck and you aim to win on the back of a few win-cons. However, you only have 3 ways to actually end the game (I'm not counting the bonfires/bolts as you have no other source of damage and I'm not sure spending 20+ mana into bonfire is a viable win con). Even miracles has about 7-8 (3 jace/2 entreat/X snap/X Clique) ways to end the game; and from experience, I have had times where I've dug and dug only to find more lands as my opponent draws enough threats to end me.