Bant draw-go Control

[Tittliewinks22]

Been tinkering with this deck for a week now pretty successfully. Was trying to port the draw-go shell of miracles over without going the midrange strategy. I don't play mtgo, but within my playtest group it feels heavily favored vs fair matches but unfavorable g1 vs combo (as expected).

The deck:
4 Flooded Strand
1 Forest
4 Island
1 Karakas
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Plains
2 Tropical Island
3 Tundra
1 Windswept Heath

2 Baneslayer Angel
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
4 Snapcaster Mage
2 Vendilion Clique

4 Brainstorm
2 Counterspell
4 Force of Will
3 Moment's Peace
3 Spell Pierce
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Ponder
2 Supreme Verdict
1 Moat
1 Sylvan Library
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Sideboard:
3 Flusterstorm
2 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Meddling Mage
2 Containment Priest
1 Council's Judgment
2 Back to Basics
1 Path to Exile

Card choices explained:
Creature Disruption
Supreme Verdict
Moat
Moment's Peace
Swords to Plowshares
Snapcaster Mage
Swords to Plowshares

Without the effectiveness that Terminus provided at low cmc and instant speed sweeper, many control decks are now relegated to playing a slower 4 mana sweeper. Against decks like Eldrazi or Elfs this is too slow to be effective at stopping them. The solution I have come to is the addition of Moment's Peace. Having witnessed my friend fend off a horde of elf's with his mono green 12-post deck relying solely on Moment's Peace I was convinced that it was the best way to ensure a control deck can stay alive long enough vs these types of aggro strategies until they can drop sweeper Supreme Verdict or lockout Moat.

Swords to Plowshares and Snapcaster Mage need little rational to justify their inclusion into any UW based control deck, and are pretty self explanatory.

Combo Disruption
Vendilion Clique
Counterspell
Spell Pierce
Force of Will

The only card of these that looks out of place is Spell Pierce. My reasoning for it's inclusion is that the decks fair matchups are already favorable, so giving up 3 slots as "bad draws" isn't that big of a problem game 1. Spell Pierce helps to slow down combo decks game one, but are still unfavorable in the long run. Game 2-3 the extra emphasis placed in the sideboard should even the playing field vs these types of decks. (of course if the meta becomes more predictable, you can swap out the creature hate maindeck for the sideboard cards)

Finishers
Baneslayer Angel
Sigarda, Host of Herons
Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Big Jace is self explanatory and most blue based control decks should be running him.
Baneslayer Angel is a card seen rarely in Legacy, but what it does is unmatched (to my knowledge) by any other creature. Against Eldrazi and BGx decks, it is a house, outside of the 1-2 Dismember copies Eldrazi runs, it's unlikely to be removed, it skirts both Abrupt Decay and Fatal Push, and vs SNT/Reanimator if you can delay long enough to get it out, it also blanks Griselbrand. The life gain provided by this card can be used with Sylvan Library to generate a lot of card advantage.
Sigarda, Host of Herons Is our hard counter for BG decks and can single handidly win vs Delver.
The CMC on these cards is a little prohibitive, but as long as the game plan of stall > sweep > drop threat (traditional draw-go style) then it is worth it to blank so much of the popular removal in the format.

Sideboard
Current sideboard is a work in progress, however I have heavily stacked it for the various combo decks in our local meta (snt/reanimator/storm/elves). Any suggestions here welcome.

Conclusion
I think that this is the most viable way to stick to the "hard control" shell that we've recently lost. I encourage you to give this a shot and hopefully we can make it turn into something great!

[Tittliewinks22]

Made some modifications based on feedback from my play testing with friends.

-2 Baneslayer Angel
+1 Vendilion Clique
+1 Venser, Shaper Savant

Helps a lot vs the plethora of SNT decks that are starting to pop up.

[icedagger]

If you're running green, have you thought of adding Mirri's Guile? That would help you setup Terminus and it would also allow you to run Predict to give you some raw card advantage.

[Seraphix]

I'd consider Krosan Grip and/or Engineered Explosives to get a bit more value out of the Green splash.

I think Baneslayer Angel is generally a superior bomb to Sigarda in a control deck. While easier to remove, Baneslayer is much better when you're behind.

[Nicklas]

Why would you play Krosan Grip over Naturalize/Disenchant?
Would add up to 2 copies of disenchant effects for sure though.

[bigbobbobber]

I question only two Ponder and three Spell Pierce. One of the strengths of Miracles was its consistency, and Ponder helps with that. Spell Pierce is a trap in control, since you are looking to enter the late game, where Pierce greatly looses value. Either more hard counters or card advantage might work better here. Also, I agree with Baneslayer being the better finisher.

[twndomn]

You're Not a tempo deck. The tempo you gained from Pierce does nothing. I would run 1 Pierce max.

Moment's Peace is Not even Legacy competitive. There're so many other cards worth considering before you even get to that card, Path to Exile is one example. The 2 Ponder makes little sense, just run the typical 4 BS 4 Ponder package, no reason to be cute.

[bigbobbobber]

I disagree about Moment's Peace. I too have seen 12 Post players use it to stave off early aggression until the Eldrazi bombs or Ugin land. Being able to blank damage several turns in a row can be all that's needed until JTMS or Baneslayer can start running away with the game. The fact that it has flashback creats psuedo card advantage. It's no Terminus, but it might be one of the best ways left in Legacy to invalidate the opponent's creatures.

[Tittliewinks22]

The thought process on the spell pierces is to help make the combo matchups better, its not terribly great vs fair decks, but it has some applications such as chalice of the void or a fast liliana. A argument could be made to run spell snare I suppose, I'll do some testing.

Moments peace takes up very little deck space and helps tremendously to get to the later game vs creature decks.

The amount of Ponders is because I cant figure out what two cards to cut to fit two more in.

I will be swapping back to the baneslayers, in practice, the venser and extra clique were less helpful in stabilizing. Definitely need to add some disenchant to the side, dunno how I overlooked that.

Thanks for the input so far, I'll post some "results" and synopsis of matches next test session. (Should be later this week)

[mgrinshpon]

If the deck is already using Moment's Peace, has anyone considered a more graveyard-oriented strategy by adding things like a Life from the Loam package (LftL+2 Lonely Sandbar+Wasteland and LftL+Academy Ruins+Engineered Explosives)? This also gives reason to try to cast instant speed card advantage spells like Fact or Fiction, plus Lonely Sandbar's cycling happens at instant speed.

Rather than using Baneslayer Angel, maybe Centaur Vinecrasher could be the finisher in such a shell.

[Nicklas]

You mean Intuition package, not Life from the Loam package, I assume.
Doesn't fit too well in a Bant shell though. Cards such as P.Fire or Lingering Souls come to mind...

[mgrinshpon]

You mean Intuition package, not Life from the Loam package, I assume.
Doesn't fit too well in a Bant shell though. Cards such as P.Fire or Lingering Souls come to mind...

Nope, I mean exactly what I mean. Here's an example decklist I jammed together (though black may just be flatly superior than white here). The numbers are subject to change and are basically meaningless, but as an idea this might work.


1 Academy Ruins
4 Flooded Strand
1 Forest
3 Island
2 Lonely Sandbar
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Plains
2 Tropical Island
3 Tundra
1 Wasteland
3 Snapcaster Mage
1 Centaur Vinecrasher
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Vedalken Shackles
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Life from the Loam
3 Ponder
2 Supreme Verdict
4 Brainstorm
3 Counterspell
1 Fact or Fiction
4 Force of Will
1 Intuition
3 Moment's Peace
2 Spell Pierce
1 Spell Snare
4 Swords to Plowshares

Sideboard:
2 Containment Priest
1 Council's Judgment
1 Disenchant
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Flusterstorm
2 Meddling Mage
1 Ray of Revelation
3 Surgical Extraction
2 Vendilion Clique