[Deck] UWx Stoneblade

[CptHaddock]

19 lands is EXTREMELY greedy especially in a blade deck. Miracles and Grixis players manage to get away with this because they are effectively running 8+ cantrips including stuff like predict, strix, etc. We can probably get away with it as well but you need to be running the same.

[Malakai]

We used to play 22 to 23 lands in this deck.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

We used to play 22 to 23 lands in this deck.Some of us still do. Nothing has changed for me.

[meite]

Participated to a 84 player (7 rounds) tournament last weekend with this list:

4 Delver of Secrets
2 Snapcaster Mage
4 Stoneforge Mystic
2 True-Name Nemesis

1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte

3 Island
2 Plains
4 Flooded Strand
1 Misty Rainforest
2 Polluted Delta
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Tundra
4 Wasteland

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Spell Pierce
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Council's Judgment

Sideboard
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Back to Basics
2 Disenchant
1 Flusterstorm
1 Path to Exile
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Rest in Peace
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Sword of Fire and Ice

R1: 2-1 vs UB Death's Shadow
G1: He has too many threats and permission so that I can't keep up with it.
G2: T1 delver and 2 Wastelands keeps him off the balance long enough so that he does not have time to stabilize.
G3: He taps out for LtLH which I counter and I resolve B2B next turn. Game is basically over after this.
Sideboarding: -1 SPierce, -2 Daze, -2 FoW, +2 B2B, +1 PtE, +1 SoFaI, +1 EE

R2: 1-2 vs UR Delver
G1: His delver does not flip in like 4 turns and I manage to stabilize board with TNN + Jitte.
G2: He starts with early Guide and Swiftspears and has Smash To Smithereens to blow my resolved equipment.
G3: I have to mull 6, still a mediocre hand with cantrips. He has a nut draw with early creatures and lots of burn.
Sideboarding: -2 Council's Judgment, -2 SPierce, -2 FoW, +2 B2B, +1 Flusterstorm, +1 PtE, +1 SoFaI, +1 EE
Thinking afterwards, siding B2B is probably wrong and I should have kept 2 SPierces instead.. did not affect to the end result though.

R3: 0-2 vs Grixis Delver
G1: On the draw. I have mull to five because of starting hands with only plains and/or wastelands as my lands. I decide to keep a nolander with otherwise good hand, but scry and next 4 draws does not bring any lands but one Wasteland..
G2: Hand with lots of cantrips find more cantrips, while opponent deploys fast Pyromancer. This is not really a game at all.
Felt bad to lose to your own deck, because losing two rounds this early probably means that there is no chance to reach top8 anymore.

R4: 2-0 vs Sneak and Show
G1: Opp mulligans to 5. I play Snapcaster as an Ambush Viper and he eventually beats the opponent to zero all by himself! We have a counter war at some point which I win.
G2: Opponent drops Boseiju on his 3rd turn. I have hand full of counters and no Wasteland. Brainstorm at his end step shows 2 Wastelands and Ethersworn Canonist. Wasteland gets Boseiju and Canonist resolves. I deploy Ambush Viper again at some point. Opponent dies few turns later after playing one cantrip per turn.
Sideboarding: -4 StP, -2 TNN, -1 Jitte, -1 BSkull, -1 SFM, +1 SoFaI, +2 Jace, +2 Disenchant, +1 Flusterstorm, +1 Ethersworn Canonist, +2 Surgical

R5: 2-1 vs Dredge Zombies(?)
G1: He has some Bloodghasts, Gravecrawlers etc, but my Batterskull outgrinds them.
G2: He resolves Contamination... WUT?!
G3: I have fast Delver and RiP. He destroys RiP, but I have already resolved also TNN. 6 dmg per turn is enough that he cant keep up.
Sideboarding: -2 Council's Judgment, -4 SPierce, +2 Surgical, +2 RiP, +1 EE, +1 PtE

R6: 2-0 vs BUG control
G1: Lots of resource trading and countering, all ends after I resolve TNN and have Council's Judgmented his TNN and SPierced a JTMS.
G2: He mulls to 5. I destroy his mana development with 2 Wastelands, leaving him with lonely Island. I resolve a Jace and start fatesealing him. He is not able to recover.
Sideboarding: -4 Daze, -2 StP, +2 B2B, +2 Jace, +1 Flusterstorm, +1 SoFaI

R7: 2-1 vs Grixis Delver
G1: She gets a Pyromancer out and quickly fills the board with elementals.
G2: I try to keep her off balance with Wastelands but she always finds new lands. Game goes long but eventually I can start beating her with Snapcaster equipped with SoFai which she cant block.
G3: She is worried about Wastelands and B2B and fetches for basic Island. That is only colored mana source she is able to find during the whole game. I have a good hand with enough lands to play around soft counters and I am able to quickly beat her down with Delver equipped with SoFaI.
Sideboarding: -2 FoW, -2 SPierce, +1 PtE, +1 SoFaI, +2 B2B

So, a 5-2 record in 7 rounds. I got a bit excited since I realized that one 5-2 record will get to top8. I was 14/84 in the end results.. shouldn't have lost so early in the tournament.

Good deck. You are basically a Delver deck which has very powerful answers also to the end game.

Jaces felt that they were in the right place in the sideboard instead of main.

SoFaI is nuts, dont leave home without it!

It feels that the 4 Wasteland and 5 basic land mana base will force mulliganing quite often, but I guess that is something that you have to accept.

I wanted to play 2 Plains because I have had many occasions that I want to have Council's Judgments and B2Bs in the maindeck at the same time. Maybe could tweak the manabase to 2 Island, 2 Plains, 3 Tundra.

[malfie13]

Hi guys! I hope I prove myself as a confident Stone blade player this weekend so that I may post from this thread. I got 22nd at Eternal weekend. Pure blue white, no splash, not following anyone else's list. I intend to post a tournament report, including the two mistakes that cost me matches, and why I got 22nd instead of top 8. I love this deck, almost as much as I love mud! LOL. Hope you all enjoy my report in a few days.

[CptHaddock]

Hi guys! I hope I prove myself as a confident Stone blade player this weekend so that I may post from this thread. I got 22nd at Eternal weekend. Pure blue white, no splash, not following anyone else's list. I intend to post a tournament report, including the two mistakes that cost me matches, and why I got 22nd instead of top 8. I love this deck, almost as much as I love mud! LOL. Hope you all enjoy my report in a few days.

Congrats homedog, glad to see a blade player top 32'd.

I ended up getting 53rd with esper stoneblade with b2b. Kind of last minute decided that I would play b2b in the tournament so I didn't really have some of the cards to accommodate my changes hence the 2 tundras. In an ideal world I would have gone -1 Tundra, +1 Basic Plains and I think that might have won me maybe 1-2 games over the course of the tournament.

2 True-Name Nemesis
1 Plains
1 Batterskull
3 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Swamp
2 Snapcaster Mage
3 Island
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
1 Umezawa's Jitte
4 Ponder
2 Marsh Flats
3 Thoughtseize
2 Back to Basics
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Scrubland
2 Tundra
1 Underground Sea
1 Engineered Explosives
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Baleful Strix
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Liliana, the Last Hope

2 Containment Priest
2 Zealous Persecution
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Hymn to Tourach
1 Pithing Needle
2 Flusterstorm
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Vindicate
1 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
1 Council's Judgment

Here's what I played against. My delver opponents had delver draws and killed me, I think that atleast 2 of the games were decided by me foolishly not putting a 2nd basic plains in my list and playing a tundra. I ended up having to fetch a nonbasic which got wastelanded although I think the matches were still pretty close.

2-0 Grixis Control
2-0 Maverick
2-0 Applejacks (Naya Loam)
2-0 D&T
1-2 Grixis Delver (No pyromancers but my opponent was running 2 bbs main)
0-2 Grixis Delver
0-2 UW Miracles
2-1 UB Shadow
2-1 Grixis Delver (With vial smasher and a bunch of other fun cards)
2-1 Dragon Stompy
2-1 Dragon Stompy

[malfie13]

Eternal Weekend 2018 Tournament Trial Report

Alex Caviris - Blue-White Stoneblade, 22nd Place

Decklist:

Creatrues: 11

Snapcaster Mage x3
Stoneforge Mystic x3
True-Name Nemisis x3
Vendillion Clique x1
Venser, Shaper Savant x1

Artifacts: 2

Umezawa's Jitte x1
Batterskull x1

Sorceries: 6

Ponder x4
Council's Judgement x1
Supreme Verdict x1

Instants: 18

Brainstorm x4
Spell Pierce x1
Spell Snare x1
Swords to Plowshares x1
Accumulated Knowledge x4
Force of Will x4

Planeswalkers: 3

Jace, The Mindsculptor x2
Teferi, Hero of Dominaria x1

Lands: 20

Cavern of Souls x1
Flooded Strand x4
Island x7
Karakas x1
Misty Rainforest x1
Plains x2
Polluted Delta x1
Scalding Tarn x1
Tundra x2

Sideboard: 15

Containment Priest x1
Vendillion Clique x1
Flusterstorm x2
Path to Exile x1
Surgical Extraction x2
Disenchant x1
Rest In Peace x1
Back to Basics x2
Council's Judgement x1
Sword of Fire and Ice x1

11/1/18 Tourney Trial Report By rd

When I got to eternal weekend on Thursday afternoon, I had not yet decided to play my usual MUDpost deck, or UW Stoneblade. I was leaning towards stoneblade bu decided to play a trial just to test out where my skill level was for the sake of the sake.. I will include my first five round Trial as well as the 11 rd Eternal Weekend Legacy Champs main event.

Friday Morning, last chance trial. Overall record, 4.0.1, with a scoop last rd to go 4.1

Rd 1 vs Eldrazi Aggro win 2x0

Game 1 My opponent mulligans to 6, presumably to slam a t1 chalice. It was sight unseen for both of us, as I hadn't met her before. So, I kept a decent hand, and was on the draw. And, t1 she plays a tomb, goes to 18 to cast a chalice on one. So, my 'decent' hand instantly got worse. Mildly worse. My hand was fetch, island, stoneforge, snap, ponder, force, ak. I was in the tank for about ten seconds, but I let the chalice resolve based on the information that I had and what I had in my hand. I then went to my turn. I play my tarn and pass. My draw for the turn was a very dead swords. Her next turn she plays an eldrazi temple and a thought knot seer. That, once again, I let resolve, which felt off, but I didn't want to two for one myself and I was honestly interested to see her skill level by what she chose to take and to see if she knew exactly what I was on. She resolves the trigger and takes the force. I was actually mildly relieved. I go to my turn and choose to not upkeep crack. I am rewarded with a basic plains. I play the plains, crack the tarn for a tundra, and cast the mystic. I feel that the best route is the batterskull, so I grab it.

Next turn, sh plays mimic and swings for 4. I choose to not block, and go to 15. Most of the damage that gets done in this match, I will be honest, she inflicts on herfself via the ancient tomb. She correctly feels that she needs to close out the game relatively quickly. I draw a council's judgment on her end step with ak, and exile the tks, drawing a force off the trigger. After that she's never really back in the saddle until very late in the game. I snap back the judgment two turns later to exile the chalice, and unlock my hand. She hits a smasher off of a cavern that I exile with a swords. Ultimately, she sticks a ballista with my shields down. It was an odd play. She had several tombs in play. She played it on like 6 or so, and went to 3 life off of it. The odd part was that it was not enough to kill me, but if she had gone to 1 and put it on 7 it would have been. Magic is a tricky game, and she didn't completely math correctly. I had stuck a tnn a few turns earlier and swing lethal.

Game two wasn't really much of a game. She does eldrazi things off tempo a little. A t2 chalice meets a snare, I counter some of the more prolematic plays, like a jitte and etc. Things get dicey for a few turns towards the end where she casts two smashers through caverns. I stabilize at two life after tripple blocking a smasher with two sfm and a tnn, activating the sfm to poop in a batterskull. Long story short, it ends up equipped to my tnn, and the game is virtually over.

1-0

G2 Miracles, 2-1 Win

This was one of the four times I went to close to time all weekend. I hate hearing that UW cannot close out a match. It kinda bugs me. It has more to do with the players, their pace, and their familiarity with their lines than the colors of the deck, in my opinion. My opponent towards time in rd really seemed to decide drawing was his best line for making some tickets. I took the choice out of his hands. I am going to skip basically to g3. It became a fairly technical match of when to and not to utilize accumulated knowledge in a mirror where both people were using them. I tended to be much more proactive on playing them out of my hand as long as I had counter backup for the ramifications. I had sided into two vcliques to respond to miracle triggers, ofc sided in flusters, and kept every piece of one for one permission and two forces. I was on the draw g3. On the friday trial I also had a hydro in my sb, in place of an rip. I had chosen to not side it in, as I was unclear if he had sided in any pyros or even ran red. Anyway. As I said, the game was a serious clinic in using ak correctly in the current meta. I tended to be aggressive casting out of hand and reactive when sngwould tend to counter it if I could and garnered more than two cards, but if he were to try to snapcaster them, I would snapcaster mine in response so that I could always draw minimum one more coard than he did. I am not sure he ever caught on. About five minutes out from hitting turns, I got the distinct impression I had him shelled up against a wall and he had resigned to try to play defensively and draw. We were the last two to be playing so we had everyone else watching us, too. I pushed that out of my mind, although it did register that the element of surprise was dead for the rest of the tournament. Oh well. I had an active tnn with a batterskull on it. He used his third terminus to push it to the bottom. I had a stocked hand of 7 cards, but I allowed it to happen so that I wouldn't die to a my endstep miracled entreat. God, I played my friend Charlie too many times. I soul read him. I try to look sad and go to discard with 8 in hand. These were my 8. Snap, vclique, venser, snare, fluster, brainstorm, fetch, force. I announce discard. He plays a brainstorm and attempts to miracle an entreat for 7 angels, leaving open some amount of open mana. I allowed the brainstorm to resolve already, knowing full well that he would have the entreat with the trigger in his hand for me to vclique, but I wanted to make him use maximum resources to accomplish this. So, I cast Venser and bounce the entreat. He recasts another brainstorm, and I assume entreat is now back on top of his library. We go to his draw step, and he again hits entreat for what would be lethal. This time we go to war. I cast vclique to get the entreat out of his hand in response to the trigger. He fetches and casts a snapcaster, I assume to counter the vclique, so I snare the snapcaster. He looks at his mana and realizes that he is almost entirely tapped out at this point on turn zero. He also only has 2 cards in his hand. He casts ak with his last two open mana, it would have been for five, so I fluster it. He does not have the mana to pay for it. The stack resolves and I claim his entreat. He resdraws on his draw step with two cards in his hand, and passes to my turn. I have left in my hand, snap, bs, force and fetch. This was the end of t2, at this point I realize. I have four open mana. I consider my options and cast snapcaster. He sighs and taps his third from final open land to cast snare. I force pitching brainstorm. Lol. I get to redraw 6 cards. I refill my hand by snapping back ak for six. I go to my turn refilled. My board is now almost certainly lethal I assume with my opponent with one card in hand, which, during my upkeep he casts. It's his final ak. God. Freaking. Damnit. We are on t3 of turns. I consider my options I am untapped with an almost lethal board. I have a vclique, a snap, some other garbage...and my own last ak. Sigh. It was incredibly tricky to let an ak resolve for full value, so I snap back one of my aks in response, and draw five more cards. I look at my hand which is now overloaded with good stuff and pass priority. Bc life is strange, his first draw is a miracle blind terminus, and he puts the trigger on the stack and finishes drawing his three other cards. Once again I am presented with a difficult situation to navigate. I can clique his terminus like I did his entreat, or I can play around it. In my and after my own ak, in addition to what I had already, I now had a tnn and my sword of fire and ice. I sigh, AND I let the terminus resolve and go to my draw step with 8 cards in library. I cast tnn, and it resolves. He brainstorms on my endstep with a snapcaster/bs, and I swords his snap to test for any thoughts of countermagic. The swords brings him to exactly 7 life. Lolz. So, I go to discard, and pass turn. He miracles an entreat on his draw step for 4. It's t4 anyway, and he probably thinks he has successfully drawn the game. I allow it to resolve. He casts jace and brainstorms. He disenchants my batterskull. He goes to endstep, and I clique him to see if the path is clear. He had around 14 cards in library and four in hand. I have 7 in library, and 7 in hand. Odd life. I resolve clique and he lays down his hand. He has force, pierce, snare, bs. Oh, that's some stuff. I clique his bs. I don't want to deal with the unknown. I consider drawing all the cards left in my deck with my last ak, and then think better of it. So. T5 is my turn. Untap, upkeep, draw. Oh look. That snapcaster is back. I think I had every mana producing land in my deck on the field and a dead fetch. Here's how it went. First. Thing. First. It is possible that I clicked him into a fluster, so I cast my sofi to bait the counterwar. He pierces first. I assume that means he has fluster. It was worse. I go ahead and force with my second of two forces the pierce, he casts force pitching snare, I fluster the force. Fluster resolves. I realize later I SHOULD HAVE flustered the original spell, but it wound up not mattering. He casts snap to fluster, I assume, which was his last card in hand. I cast snap in response and snare his snap. He extends his hand as I have a bunch of open mana when the sword of fire and ice resolves. 3/1 tnn, plus two from sword plus two from shock equals exactly 7 damage on t5. I got a round of applause for navigating that clogged situation.

2-0

Match three: Death and Taxes

I don't remember too much about this match, to be honest. It is overwhelmingly likely I was going on instinct after that draining game vs miracles. I played d and t like three times over the course of the weekend, and was never impressed with how it lined up vs my deck. I feel like I do a better impression of what it tries to do, and run a zillion basics. I even found that back to bascis locks them out hard even though they're technically a mono colored deck. Looking at the life totals in my pad, it doesnt look like my opponent ever got much going.

3-0

Match 4: Grixis / 4c Control

Match 4 also went to time. In fact, of the four timed I went to time all weekend three were on Friday. The majority of the reason why this match went to time was a general lack of ways to deal with a resolved liliana g1 in the deck if the board got too stalled and he could manage the tnns. G2 and 3 were much less in his favor. I sided in my second judgement, my sofi and 2nd clique to add more evasion and a gideon to spam the board and keep edicts from being as effective, and ways to hit fast and hard. I got a scoop in turns after keeping his board eitherunder control (g2), or just putting on way too much pressure that couldn't be edicted to deal (with gideon) game 3. Overall I was still a little tired, but felt that I did generally ok.

4-0

Match 5: Lands.

I had previously played this lands pilot last year in my win and in with mud. He remembered me and I remembered him. He was a deliberate and honest player. I had basically already made up my mind that if I couldn't win cleanly I would scoop bc I had dreamcrushed last year, and I liked him, and didn't feel like doing it again. G1 was a grind. I feel like g1 vs lands I am very much an underdog if I cannot navigate with the utmost of control elements and keep tight lines. I was actually able to do that, though. I tended to be more disrutptive than anything else. I didn't counter recursive spells, unless they were able to disrupt me. I fetched for the correct lands at the correct times, and kept constant pressure on with tnns, until he had no choiec but to play lands and fetch for a glcial chasm with no exploration. It was a grind. G1 the winning sequence was on his endstep to venser his chasm back to his hand. He predictably staged his chasm. He was well within lethal range. He had to repeadly pay for chasm, and had been beaten down by tnn for several turns. I then play karakas for turn, bounce venser, bounce his thespians staged chasm and swing lethal. G1 took like 38 minutes to win tho. Ick. G2 was like 3 minutes long. He stuck his second tracker. It got big. I never saw a third land to snap a swords, and i died. We only had like 4 minutes for g3. We both push hard into the pace. When we hit turns, he had tapped out for a tracker, I swordsed it, untapped and slammed a back to basics. That said, there would have been a long stall in the board. I scooped to him so he could have the byes. I felt like it was the correct thing to do.

Technically, 4.0.1. I discovered that I hated going to time. I only did once in the main event.

I will put a full main event report in the report section in the next couple of days.

[malfie13]

My main champs matches were:

2-1 vs 4c Counterbalance Pile

2-0 vs Grixis Control

0-2 vs Grixis Control

2-1 vs Kieth 12 Post

2-0 Win vs 4c Pile

2-0 Win vs Steel Stompy

2-0 Win vs D and T

2-0 Win vs Mono Red Prison

1-1-1 With UW Miracle

2-1 Win vs Lands

1-2 Loss to Elves for my win and in

Overall, I felt that my opponents were gentlemen in victory and defeat. All the mistakes were on me. I don't blame any judges or opponents. I definitely can suck at life sometimes, but it is nobody's fault but mine. Lol

[ventouza6969]

Congrats Malfie
Your sideboard is 13 cards and i imagine that swords are 4.
Are you happy about vendilion venser karakas cavern?
The luck of counter magic was a problem for you at all?
Could you give us your sideboard plan against these decks?

[malfie13]

Congrats Malfie
Your sideboard is 13 cards and i imagine that swords are 4.
Are you happy about vendilion venser karakas cavern?
The luck of counter magic was a problem for you at all?
Could you give us your sideboard plan against these decks?


Whoops! Lol. Let me check my list for what the other two cards are. And yea, 4 stp.

1 Containment Prient
1 Clique
2 Flusters
1 PTE
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Disenchant
1 RIP
2 BTB
1 Council's Judgement
1 SOFI
1 Gidz, ally
1 Supreme Verdict

I definitely loved the Karakas with Venser, anyway. I more included it as a removal spell than as a combo with verser tbh. I did get to endstep venser a glasical chasm, untap, play karakas, bounce venser, bounce a staged chasm, win game. Was funny. It's in the prelims report.

[malfie13]

Not sure what you meant about the luck of counteragic, though? Mine or my opponents? I had a really good account of finding the correct counters, usually. Helped that I drew a zillion cards. If you mean my opponents, lucky removal was more paralyzing some games than lucky counters.

[ventouza6969]

Not sure what you meant about the luck of counteragic, though? Mine or my opponents? I had a really good account of finding the correct counters, usually. Helped that I drew a zillion cards. If you mean my opponents, lucky removal was more paralyzing some games than lucky counters.

yea u are right not entirely luck of countermagic but 4+1+1 counters arent so little against show n tell or storm deck? i know from side we have clique rip surgical and priest for these deck but i wanted to ask you! Would it be easy for you to give a sort sideboard path at least from the tournament mus?

[malfie13]

yea u are right not entirely luck of countermagic but 4+1+1 counters arent so little against show n tell or storm deck? i know from side we have clique rip surgical and priest for these deck but i wanted to ask you! Would it be easy for you to give a sort sideboard path at least from the tournament mus?

Ah. Gotcha. Yes, s and tell ive basically conceeded g1 by not having the flusters and a counterspell main. Obviously i cut like a preordian, and two counters and or a sofi from the main deck for the aks, which made all my control and fair midrange and non blue combo matches better.

[malfie13]

I saw the request for a sb guide on the reddit site too. I'm going to try to write one up in the next day or two. I have a fairly decent (and lucky) show amd tell player in my local meta so i can tag that on in the end with a couple of other addictions.

[keepflyin]

I'd be interested in hearing malfie13's thoughts on it, but figure that everyone could contribute.

What is the thought on running Weathered Wayfarer in the main. A lot of our threats start materializing on turn 2. Is the turn one cantrip filtering that important? A turn 1 Brainstorm feels pretty poor when you can't immediately shuffle away the chaff.

Definitely not a 4-of. Probably a 2-of at most.

My thought with Wayfayer is that it lets us immediately have a threat against a control deck that they need to answer. It would be a reliable way to find Karakas in the matches where it matters, and an additional ability to spend mana on during the opponent's endstep rather than just SFM.

[CptHaddock]

I'd be interested in hearing malfie13's thoughts on it, but figure that everyone could contribute.

What is the thought on running Weathered Wayfarer in the main. A lot of our threats start materializing on turn 2. Is the turn one cantrip filtering that important? A turn 1 Brainstorm feels pretty poor when you can't immediately shuffle away the chaff.

Definitely not a 4-of. Probably a 2-of at most.

My thought with Wayfayer is that it lets us immediately have a threat against a control deck that they need to answer. It would be a reliable way to find Karakas in the matches where it matters, and an additional ability to spend mana on during the opponent's endstep rather than just SFM.

Lmao

[keepflyin]

Lmao

If you don't want be constructive then don't contribute. Decks get better by continuously trying out new cards and re-evaluating old ones.
WW has significant strength in a m/u against a control deck and if you don't realize the power it brings to a deck maybe you have't lost to it recently enough.

Having a threat on T1 that will draw us a card every turn of the game can be huge. Even if it is only drawing lands (which isn't bad) we can put them back with BS/Jace.

And on the play, we can fetch out basic, and then respond to our own t2 fetch with wayfayer in their end after they play a second land-drop. At which point they couldn't even fetch and fail to find to counter it. Because WW only restricts activation, unlike tax which checks on resolution of trigger.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

Well, ponder costs half as much and often does the same job of finding that next land. This concept feels like it's effect is replaceable, and by doing so reduces awkward early game decisions of "do I jam stoneforge or do I activate WW?" The other thing is that its effect is not always available to activate. DSDelver can operate on a single land. You will never get to activate it versus it and at least a couple other lists.

I'm not saying it's a bad idea, I'm saying its not clear if it's even useful, and if it is, if its remotely good enough.

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

[Grizzlenasty]

If you don't want be constructive then don't contribute.

Oh boy, this makes me think, you're rather new to the internetz :D

Jokes aside, I actually like the idea of WW. At first I thought: "What would I even want this for?"
But then I read this:


we can fetch out basic, and then respond to our own t2 fetch

..and remembered we are also a wasteland deck. So I can definetly see some cute lines of play with it, that put you considerably ahead.

Also I don't see that problem of awkward early game decisions as Secretly.A.Bee stated. I have to decide between STM, leaving mana open for Counterpell or for brainstorm fetch or, or, or... I rather think more possible lines of play and more strategies are great.

But do we desperatly need this in our 75? Probably not, as Blade has one of the most resilient and consistant manabases already. With all the cantripping going on, I find myself dropping a land every single turn already. So it's pure card advantage. While this perfectly fits into the concept of traditional Blade lists, the question is: Do we need even more of that?

I guess most people who want to slam something turn one, will simply add Delver. They are doing it already.

Personally, I can see me giving this card a try, next time I have a chance to play.


Definitely not a 4-of. Probably a 2-of at most.

I have a strong feeling, you're absolutely right on this.

[First_Revenge]

Realistically probably not. Legacy has too many decks that can operate off 1 or 2 lands. I can see it being a blank in a lot of cases. I also don’t necessarily like this card more than any of the other cards that are getting tossed into stoneblade shells these days. So I’m not sure what I would cut to make room.


If I really wanted to make this work I’d try exploring utility lands. The grindier decks of the format like grixis control/miracles generally have a hard time dealing with utility lands. IMO academy ruins is a prime example of a card that I’d love to have more consistent access too but can’t. And academy ruins can set up loops with strix, equipment, or engineered explosives that decks like grixis control are really going to struggle to answer. Other utility lands I’d try would be volrath’s stronghold, karakas, and maybe a manland or two?

Perhaps the best example of the power of utility lands is joe losset’s stoneblade list:
https://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=19841&d=328098&f=LE
The deck could probably benefit from a more consistent way to reach the utility lands it needs. But then again I don’t think wayfarer is good enough to cut anything from that list.

[Isre Morn]

On the utility land topic I'd like to mention Riptide Laboratory, which could add lines of Snapcaster abuses next to Venser & Clique. But they already profit from Karakas. Nonetheless anytime I'd like to try that one out.

[QKisMyName]

I'd be interested in hearing malfie13's thoughts on it, but figure that everyone could contribute.

What is the thought on running Weathered Wayfarer in the main. A lot of our threats start materializing on turn 2. Is the turn one cantrip filtering that important? A turn 1 Brainstorm feels pretty poor when you can't immediately shuffle away the chaff.

Definitely not a 4-of. Probably a 2-of at most.

My thought with Wayfayer is that it lets us immediately have a threat against a control deck that they need to answer. It would be a reliable way to find Karakas in the matches where it matters, and an additional ability to spend mana on during the opponent's endstep rather than just SFM.
Lol, you can’t be serious

[keepflyin]

I played about 30 matches in the past couple of days testing out the WW as a 2-of, Riptide, and a Kjeldoran Outpost.

I shaved the Teferi, kept a main Venser, and upped the Clique count to 2 in the main. My thought which felt correct while playing was that the Teferi is really our 'big mana' end game. Since even BS we can typically cheat in with SFM, so we are trading that top end for the Riptide+Snap/Clique/Venser topend. To fit the 2ed Clique, I only swapped one of the TNNs from main to board for the Clique that was in the board.

My cantrips kept the same 4 ponder 4 bs, and I have been running the AKs as well.

After testing through it (and while it wasn't the most rigorous testing with the small sample size) while I think there may be a deck there, maybe with a standstill package or in a maverick build with Knight (who can further abuse the fetch hold priority WW interaction), I don't think that stoneblade is the right shell for WW+Utility lands. If we really really needed a way to hit more lands in the control, the answer is probably add in 2 more cantrips.

[CptHaddock]

After testing through it (and while it wasn't the most rigorous testing with the small sample size) while I think there may be a deck there, maybe with a standstill package or in a maverick build with Knight (who can further abuse the fetch hold priority WW interaction), I don't think that stoneblade is the right shell for WW+Utility lands. If we really really needed a way to hit more lands in the control, the answer is probably add in 2 more cantrips.

Wow! I am shocked that a 1 mana 1/1 did absolutely nothing.

[QKisMyName]

Wow! I am shocked that a 1 mana 1/1 did absolutely nothing.
Lol, ded

[keepflyin]

Wow! I am shocked that a 1 mana 1/1 did absolutely nothing.



I mean, a 1 mana 1/1 that has the potential to draw a card every turn of a control game.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

I mean, a 1 mana 1/1 that has the potential to draw a card every turn of a control game.Would it be better post-board for the control mirror?

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

[malfie13]

I'd be interested in hearing malfie13's thoughts on it, but figure that everyone could contribute.

What is the thought on running Weathered Wayfarer in the main. A lot of our threats start materializing on turn 2. Is the turn one cantrip filtering that important? A turn 1 Brainstorm feels pretty poor when you can't immediately shuffle away the chaff.

Definitely not a 4-of. Probably a 2-of at most.

My thought with Wayfayer is that it lets us immediately have a threat against a control deck that they need to answer. It would be a reliable way to find Karakas in the matches where it matters, and an additional ability to spend mana on during the opponent's endstep rather than just SFM.

Ww seems a little greedy. Like I imagined it would be a bolt the birds scenario. Much of the deck has flash and that's by design. If you ran toolbox lands like a UWg Mavericks style deck then maybe as knight 5. I don't think UW or UWX necessarily wants it. Sorry about the delays. Holidays are nuts.

[malfie13]

In other news I cut teferi for now. I still really like the him, but my meta has a painter player and a couple of decks with an pyres. Tap five, get blown out by a one drop feels awful, obviously. Lol. I'd still run it maybe sh in an open large meta tho. I love me the aks though, even still. Card is boss. I replaced teferi with a spell pierce for now. I'll post my current list when I have a fee more minutes. I have to resleeve anyway.

[malfie13]

Joe could also just cut a couple of creatures and maybe one piece of permission for aks to draw cards. I tend to not have issues finding my utility lands with the cantrips and draw spells. That said, I would love a second venser, but 4 mana seems steep even for a blowout card like vender. I mean. I don't necessarily think I know more than losett, I just think about the most key issues in the deck differently.

[J_K_F]

Joe could also just cut a couple of creatures and maybe one piece of permission for aks to draw cards. I tend to not have issues finding my utility lands with the cantrips and draw spells. That said, I would love a second venser, but 4 mana seems steep even for a blowout card like vender. I mean. I don't necessarily think I know more than losett, I just think about the most key issues in the deck differently.

Would love to see your current list if you have time to post it up! Thanks

I'm new to the deck and have been trying out this list PVDDR played a while back:

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1511818#paper

[Fgi_88]

Hi Guys,
last week end i've played in a Big Event here in Italy, 180 players, and i've ended 6-2 with the following list

3 Snapcaster Mage
3 True-Name Nemesis
3 Baleful Strix
3 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
3 Thoughtseize
2 Spell Pierce
4 Force of Will
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Council's Judgment
1 Counterspell
21 lands

Side

2 Kambal
2 Flusterstorm
2 Disenchant
3 Surgical Extraction
2 Zealous Persecution
2 Containment Priest
2 Vendilion Clique

Played against this field
r1 2-0 ANT
r2 0-2 Miracles
r3 2-0 Grixis Delver
r4 2-1 Shadow
r5 2-1 Slow Depths
r6 0-2 ANT
r7 2-0 Grixis Control
r8 2-0 Grixis Delver

Deck felt great and i was just unlucky against ANT in r6 cause he just topdecked everything

[FlinkerMomonga]

Hi Guys,
last week end i've played in a Big Event here in Italy, 180 players, and i've ended 6-2 with the following list

3 Snapcaster Mage
3 True-Name Nemesis
3 Baleful Strix
3 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
3 Thoughtseize
2 Spell Pierce
4 Force of Will
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Council's Judgment
1 Counterspell
21 lands

Side

2 Kambal
2 Flusterstorm
2 Disenchant
3 Surgical Extraction
2 Zealous Persecution
2 Containment Priest
2 Vendilion Clique

Played against this field
r1 2-0 ANT
r2 0-2 Miracles
r3 2-0 Grixis Delver
r4 2-1 Shadow
r5 2-1 Slow Depths
r6 0-2 ANT
r7 2-0 Grixis Control
r8 2-0 Grixis Delver

Deck felt great and i was just unlucky against ANT in r6 cause he just topdecked everything


What 21 Lands do you play?
I'm considering this archetype and I want to take your list for first test games.

[Fgi_88]

What 21 Lands do you play?
I'm considering this archetype and I want to take your list for first test games.

4 Polluted Delta, 4 Flooded Strand, 1 Marsh Flats, 1 Scalding Tarn, 2 Island, 1 Swamp, 1 Plains, 3 Underground Sea, 3 Tundra and 1 Scrubland

[First_Revenge]

Question, how did you feel about the two kambals?

It’s a card I want to try, but I just can’t justify it. While it’s obviously good in the ANT matchup, I’m unsure of its applications outside of that.

Exactly what matchups did you play it in?

Thanks!

[TLK]

Took this Japanese list that placed 3rd out of 109 players to my local weekly Legacy event.


1 Arid Mesa
4 Flooded Strand
5 Island
2 Plains
1 Polluted Delta
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Tundra
3 Wasteland

3 Pteramander
3 Snapcaster Mage
3 Stoneforge Mystic
3 True-Name Nemesis

4 Brainstorm
1 Council's Judgment
1 Counterspell
4 Force of Will
4 Ponder
2 Predict
1 Spell Pierce
2 Spell Snare
4 Swords to Plowshares

1 Batterskull
1 Dovin, Grand Arbiter
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Umezawa's Jitte


1 Containment Priest
1 Council's Judgment
2 Counterbalance
1 Detention Sphere
2 Disenchant
2 Flusterstorm
1 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
2 Monastery Mentor
1 Pithing Needle
2 Surgical Extraction


Round 1 vs D&T:

Won a long game 1 trading TNN + Batterskull hits for Flickerwisp + Jitte + SoFaI hits. I finally draw into a StP and Snapcaster to clean up his board and ride TNN to victory. Game 2 I'm able gain tempo despite being on the draw by casting Council's Judgment on his Stoneforge before Batterskull comes in. I win off my own Stoneforge from there.

1-0, 2-0

Round 2 vs RUG Delver:

I win game 1 via True-Name. Game 2 he overwhelms me with Mongeese. Game 3 is grindy, but I eventually get there with TNN walling his large Goyf and Pteramander adapting into a 5/5.

2-0, 2-1

Round 3 vs Mirror:

My deck did its thing w/Stoneforge before my opponent. Game 2 was won via Monastery Mentor and Jace.

3-0, 2-0

Round 4 vs MUD:

Opponent didn't want to split, so we played it out and it wasn't pretty for me. Both games he had 3-4 Cloudposts, Trinisphere, Metalworker, etc. Too many high impact things to counter, and with me stumbling on lands under a Trinisphere, it was over quickly.

3-1, 0-2

Deck felt great all night except for the final match. Never cast the 1-of Dovin. The board seemed good, though given my meta I'll probably replace Flusterstorm as there really isn't any combo. The Spell Snares main were OK. I could see them becoming something else.

[bluediamonds]

Has anyone else tried using the Grixis control mana base with Hymns and bring more 'proactive' with discard

Esper list, won a small event (Updated list)

1 Scrubland
2 Swamp
2 Tundra
2 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
1 Plains
2 Marsh Flats
3 Island
4 Flooded Strand

1 Liliana, the Last hope
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Batterskull

3 Hymn to Tourach
4 Thoughtseize

1 True-Name Nemesis
3 Stoneforge Mystic
3 Snapcaster Mage
4 Baleful Strix

4 Ponder
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm

Sideboard
2 Vindicate
1 Zealous Persecution
2 Disenchant
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Supreme Verdict
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
2 Niphil Spellbomb
2 Fluster Storm
1 Bitterblossom
1 Spell Pierce

[MinosSnt]

Hey Guys

I played this following list at a tournament this sunday. Splah red and Pyro MD because of the fiel (7 UW Miracle and Stoneblade for 26 decks).

4 Stoneforge
3 Snapcaster
1 Clique
3 Nemesis
4 STP
4 BS
2 Pierce
2 Counterspell
4 FOW
1 Pyroblast
4 Ponder
1 Council's Judgement
4 Ponder
2 Back to Basic
3 Jace TMS
1 Jitte
1 Batterskull
2 Plain
6 Island
1 Arid Mesa
4 Misty
4 Flooded
1 Karakas
1 Volcanic Island
2 Tundra

SIdeboard
2 Containment Priest
1 Clique
2 Disenchant
2 Flusterstorm
2 Sugical Extraction
1 REB
1 Pyroblast
1 Council's Judgment
1 Suprem Verdict
1 EE
1 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar

I won against UB Shadow and D&T but lost again Infect (2 times) and Dark Depth... I couldn't do anything. I was mostly dead on turn 3 or 4 against these decks.

Do you have some idea to improve de combo match up please ?

I didn't play at all against them except using pierce and Fow but dead anyway the following turn if it's not in the same :( :(

[Jesture]

Hey Guys

I played this following list at a tournament this sunday. Splah red and Pyro MD because of the fiel (7 UW Miracle and Stoneblade for 26 decks).

~Decklist~

I won against UB Shadow and D&T but lost again Infect (2 times) and Dark Depth... I couldn't do anything. I was mostly dead on turn 3 or 4 against these decks.

Do you have some idea to improve de combo match up please ?

I didn't play at all against them except using pierce and Fow but dead anyway the following turn if it's not in the same :( :(

Can't speak for Depths, but you should be approaching your Infect matchup like its a Delver deck rather than a combo matchup. I'd look to play safely, fetching basics wherever you can and playing around Daze/soft permission to the best of your ability and within reason. The matchup revolves around Umezawa's Jitte so try to make plays and sequence cantrips in a way that maximize your chances of equipping a creature with Jitte and connecting with it.

Given your list, I'd sideboard something like this:
-1 True-Name Nemesis Don't love this card, but we need something to carry Jitte
-3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor Too slow, also doesn't bounce Inkmoth
-1 Pyroblast Not versatile enough, only hits cantrips, FoW, and Blighted Agent

+2 Disenchant Good way to deal with Inkmoth and problematic permanents (Sylvan Library, Pithing Needle)
+2 Flusterstorm Cheap interaction is your best friend in this matchup
+1 Engineered Explosives Good catch all that's difficult for Infect to interact with
You could feasibly board out a few more cards (FoW's, more TNN's) and bring in a few others (Clique, Supreme Verdict) but this -5, +5 should be what you're boarding out/in at a minimum.

Regarding play patterns, I'd avoid tapping out for high cmc threats if at all possible. My dislike of anything that costs more than 2 mana in this matchup is probably evident from my sideboarding preferences, but it should really be understood that the best thing you can do when you have a weak hand is pass turn and pretend you're holding a grip full of relevant cards. Don't deploy a TNN or a Jace on curve just because you feel like you're falling behind and want to be making plays. Often times investing a lot of mana into a slow sorcery speed threat that doesn't immediately impact the board is exactly the green light Infect needs to try and go for the kill.

[malfie13]

Would love to see your current list if you have time to post it up! Thanks

I'm new to the deck and have been trying out this list PVDDR played a while back:

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1511818#paper

I am unbelievably sorry. I only just realized I never answered this. I'll post my list either later tonight or tomorrow, although there may be some...significant changes incoming, lol.

[malfie13]

Last update looked like this:

Deck: Legacy UW stoneblade 3-3-19.dec

Counts : 60 main / 15 sideboard

Creatures:11
1 Lavinia, Azorius Renegade
3 Snapcaster Mage
3 Stoneforge Mystic
2 True-Name Nemesis
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Venser, Shaper Savant

Artifacts:2
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Batterskull

Sorceries:6
4 Ponder
2 Council's Judgment

Instants:19
4 Brainstorm
2 Spell Pierce
1 Spell Snare
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Accumulated Knowledge
4 Force of Will

Others:2
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Lands:20
1 Cavern of Souls
4 Flooded Strand
7 Island
1 Karakas
1 Misty Rainforest
2 Plains
1 Polluted Delta
1 Scalding Tarn
2 Tundra

Sideboard:15
1 Containment Priest
1 True-Name Nemesis
1 Vendilion Clique
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Flusterstorm
1 Path to Exile
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Disenchant
2 Back to Basics
1 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar

[malfie13]

I have currently got zero teferis, but new cards being new thevlist will alter with war. Lavinia is likely a better sb than mb card and if I went to a larger event would swap her with the tnn in the board. I still like 5 mana teferi Walker, but I've been into pushing the pace a bit and refilling off the aks. Plans been good this far.

[First_Revenge]

I’ve been changing up my stoneblade list a lot, and have finally landed on a list I like and probably won’t change for a while:

Lands-20
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
2 Marsh Flats
2 Island
2 Plains
1 Swamp
2 Underground Sea
2 Tundra
1 Scrubland

Creatures-11
4 Stoneforge Mystic
3 True Name Nemesis
3 Snapcaster Mage
1 Palace Jailer

Spells-25
4 Brainstorm
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Force of Will
3 Thoughtseize
2 Ponder
2 Preordain
2 Spell Pierce
2 Zealous Persecution
1 Council's Judgment
1 Spell Snare

Planeswalkers-2
2 Jace the Mind Sculptor

Artifacts-3
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Batterskull


Sideboard:
3 Containment Priest
2 Zealous Persecution
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Dovin's Veto
2 Bitterblossom
2 Flusterstorm
1 Disenchant
1 Palace Jailer

Some thoughts:
Palace jailer is very good. I wasn’t a believer before, but over 3 weeks of testing he’s been an invaluable tool. If you’re playing white you should probably be including some number of him in your 75.

Zealous Persecution is nuts. It can be game ending vs a lot of aggro decks. And as midrange continues to devolve into TNN wars this card’s value cannot be understated. It also useful as a combat trick or pushing the last unexpected 2-3 damage over the line. 4 is probably overkill, but I love the gotcha situations this card creates. I wouldn’t leave home without at least 3 copies though.




This week’s Matchups:

Pox(Featuring new ashiok)
Game one he curves into LoTV and LtLH. However, I have enough basics to curve into and resolve a JTMS. JTMS brainstorms into TNN and protection. It’s enough to put the game away.

Game two he keeps a wasteland heavy hand but I have enough basics to see me through. Bitterblossom resolves to make his removal irrelevant. Jailer comes down to establish my draw engine. Game formally ends a few turns later.


Nic Fit(3x Academy Rector and 3x Arena Rector Split)
Game one I manage to stop his living wish with a spell snare and follow up with SFM+batterskull. After that cantrips find me the countermagic I need and I kill him before he manages to go off.

Game two he gets stuck one or two lands for a few turns. I’m thinking I have this game wrapped up with SFM+skull applying pressure. And then the double thoughtseizes me taking two important pieces of countermagic and then resolves eureka the following turn. He dumps about 4 walkers on the board ending the game.

Game three goes grindy. I fend off his initial combo attempts and push us into the late game with SFM+Batterskull again applin pressure. On his second to last turn with 6 lands in play he thoughtseizes me with two cards in hand, land and FoW. He takes the force. On my turn I thankfully top deck another FoW. Batterskull+SFM swing in and put him to 5. On his turn he makes his land drop and hard casts cruel reality which I FoW. Game ends in my favor thanks to a very fortunate top deck.


Eldrazi
Game 1 he does eldrazi things and I just get flattened. I don’t feel that I could have done anything differently.

Game 2 was a non game unfortunately. He kept a greedy 7 and got stuck on one land.

Game 3 was interesting. I keep a bitterblossom/TNN hand and basically hope to stall him for a while. His leadoff blast zone complicated that plan however. I still resolved bitterblossom though, I figured that ticking up and detonating blast zone to deal with blossom would tie him up for two full turns. In the meantime I would resolve TNN and jailer. He ultimately opted to not tick up his blast zone, I suppose he came to the conclusion he wasn’t willing to take two turns off to kill a bitterblossom. He instead tries to resolve a Chalice on 1 and a Chalice on 2. I decide to let the chalice on 1 slide, my hand had mostly 2+ CMC spells anyway. I do counter his follow up chalice on 2 which would have really ruined me. On my turn jailer comes down to lock up an oblivion sower allowing my TNN and faeries to attack. He top decks a reality smasher to trample over my blockers and takes back the monarchy and his previously detained sower. It’s too late though. My next turn TNN+3 Faeries swing in for 10 with the help of a zealous persecution, putting him to 1. I leave back chump blockers and have a pretty secure 14 life, I’m almost certain his only out an all is dust. He doesn’t have it.

[malfie13]

How'd you like the mb palace jailor?

Has everyone been experimenting with a narset or teferi? I've currently got a 1x1 split mb, and they've been generally pretty good. I don't know that I like them and 2 pieces of permission more than aks. Also, has anyone tried sb reb and pyros off a volc? How have you liked that?

[alvoi]

Love Narset, she is great. I don't know about lil teferi, it seems to me to be not enough powerful to make the cut. I would probably play 2 narsets over the split 1/1. Narset is so good at doing that lovely chains/leovold thing

[First_Revenge]

How'd you like the mb palace jailor?



Loved it, IMO it should probably just be in every blade deck going forward.

In a vacuum if you just compared jace to jailer, jace is better.

Jace however has a lot of liabilities that jailer doesn’t. Pyroblast is a huge problem. Getting a jace pyroblasted is among the most miserable experiences I’ve had as a blade pilot. Whenever I get paired against a red deck my jaces just never feel safe. The addition of cards like assassin’s trophy also haven’t helped.

Jailer really rewards you for controlling the board. Stoneblade in general is really good at doing this. Between batterskull/TNN/STP you can make a profitable attack basically impossible for your opponent. Not to mention jailer comes down and takes a creature from them. Typically two or three turns with the monarchy is enough to put a game away.
Jailer is also surprisingly really hard to counter because it’s a creature. Daze is one way, but you’ll have plenty of heads up and its easy to play around. Counterspell is perhaps the cleanest answer, but it’s just not played that frequently. Force of will is the other answer, but you still get to 2-1 the opponent.

My build does build around jailer quite a bit, the most noticeable example being 4 zealous persecution across the 75. It’s a fantastic board control spell and does a great job keeping the monarchy safe.

[malfie13]

Awesome arguement. I recently cut mini teferi for a jailor, and it's a 1x1 split, mb sb. Card is definite gas. Couldnt agree more.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

This seems pretty decent with TNN and Jitte.https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20190525/502ab01c56d968f8c98998a4fbee7b7f.jpg

Edit: and Jace and Elspeth and tons of other possibilities to boot.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

Looks like its happening now...https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20190526/2929af1ab78be5975fc1978f878e4f61.jpg

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

[malfie13]

Looks like...

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


Yes. Yes it is.

[Aumaan]

This seems pretty decent with TNN and Jitte.https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20190525/502ab01c56d968f8c98998a4fbee7b7f.jpg

Edit: and Jace and Elspeth and tons of other possibilities to boot.

I don't see it tbh. Isn't this card win more? It heavily relies on other cards for its effect to be good. The protection colors are amazing ofcourse. But i don't see myself running this instead of anything else.

How necessary do you guys feel the red splash is nowadays with all the narsets around? Or do you think its not as needed as in miracles.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

TNN: 3/1, +2/+2 from sword. First attack deals 5 damage and gives it a +1/+1 counter and proliferates it. TNN is now a 5/3 with +2/+2 from sword. Second turn he swings for 7, gets another 2 counters and swings the following turn for 9. Thats a 3 turn clock on a creature that is normally a 7 turn clock, and actively protects TNN from one of only a couple ways to get rid of him in the form of -x effects.



You may not see it, but it seems a mistake to not test it adequately before dismissing it; pro blue pro white is, on its own, simply wonderful outside of TNN.

They were certainly mindful of how powerful this sword could be if they were not careful.

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

[Qweerios]

SoFaI is also a 3 turn clock on TNN and draws cards in the process. All the swords protect from -1/-1 effects.

Honestly if you want a "protection" sword I think SoLaS is better and provides some decent card advantage.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

Of course it is, I wasn't trying to compare swords, only speak to this one's viability and application - the card draw on Sofi is imho often winmore due you already playing 4 bs + x ponder and other options; it matters more in dnt by a lot. I disagree with Solas being any good at all. Honestly, I would test this new sword if it had no abilities past the protections and the +2 stats.

Maybe I'm more into it because of DnT. I often don't share the same viewpoints about equipment and creatures in this deck as those who play this stoneforge list but not DnT.

I am very sure this card gets some play in a legacy format still lousy with miracles and tnn.

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

[Nightrider]

Hello, I'm trying to play this archtype and I bring it at a local tournament last saturday (my first time piloting this deck). My list is an UW Stonblade:

Lands-20
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Marsh Flats
6 Island
2 Plains
2 Tundra

Creatures-11
4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 True-Name Nemesis
3 Snapcaster Mage

Spells-21
4 Brainstorm
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Force of Will
4 Ponder
2 Spell Pierce
2 Council's Judgment
1 Spell Snare

Planeswalkers-3
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Narset, Parter of Veils

Artifacts-2
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Batterskull

Enchantments-2
2 Back to Basics

Sideboard:
2 Containment Priest
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Flusterstorm
1 Disenchant
2 Palace Jailer
1 Narset, Parter of Veils
1 Ashiok, Dream Render
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Vendilion Clique

1° Round Vs. UB Reanimator (2-0) 1-0
Side-in: 2 Vendilion Clique, 2 Containment Priest, 2 Flusterstorm, 2 Surgical Extraction, 1 Ashiok, Dream Render
Side-out: 4 Stoneforge Mystic, 1 Batterskull, 1 Umezawa's Jitte, 2 True-Name Nemesis, 1 Narset, Parter of Veils

2° Round Vs. Goblins (2-0) 2-0
Side-in: 2 Containment Preist, 1 Disenchant, 2 Supreme Verdict
Side-out: 2 Spell Pierce, 2 Force of Will, 1 Counterspell

3° Round Vs. Eldrazi (2-0) 3-0
Side-in: 1 Disenchant, 2 Supreme Verdict, 2 Palace Jailer
Side-out: 2 Spell Pierce, 1 Spell Snare, 1 Counterspell, 1 Narset, Parter of Veils

4° Round Vs. Show&Tell (2-0) 4-0
Side-in: 2 Vendilion clique, 2 Flusterstorm, 2 Containment Priest, 1 Disenchant, 2 Palace Jailer
Side-out: 4 Swords to Plowshares, 3 Stoneforge Mystic, 1 Umezawa's Jitte, 1 True-Name Nemesi

5° Round Vs. Neoform (2-0) 5-0
Side-in: 2 Containment Priest, 2 Surgical Extraction, 2 Flusterstorm
Side-out: 4 Stoneforge Mystic, 1 Batterskull, 1 Umezawa's Jitte

I like this deck, is very solid and i want try it again in other events. May anyone help me in sideboarding better or any other advice? Thanks all for the reading...

[First_Revenge]

The starting 60 looks pretty solid.
You should probably swap out 3 polluted delta/misty rainforest and 1 marsh flats for 4 prismatic vista. It makes your mana that much more stable. It’s probably a marginal upgrade, but there’s no reason for you not to do it either.
I’d also go with 1 more jace if possible. While narset is powerful I don’t see her as a jace replacement.

Sideboard:
Narset, Parter of Veils-Do you really need a third copy?
Ashiok, Dream Render-Seem pretty eh to me. If you have a compelling reason to be playing her so be it, I couldn’t justify it though.

With regards to sideboarding:
UB Reanimator:
Stoneblade can have a real problem with combo decks, partly because it just doesn’t have a compelling clock. SFM plus batterskull is fastest clock this deck offers, and it’s still decently slow.
Which is why I disagree with subbing out your entire SFM package. You need to apply pressure with them. And if SFM+Batterskull is a slow clock, TNN’s clock is positively glacial. Plus UB reanimator doesn’t have many targeted killspells if any, so TNN’s protection clause is largely irrelevant.
Ashiok probably isn’t that good here. UB reanimator tends to be pretty land light, and entomb is a 1 mana instant. Probably not great odds that Ashiok is able to stop a relevant fetchland or 1 mana instant.

In: 2 Vendilion Clique, 2 Containment Priest, 2 Flusterstorm, 2 Surgical Extraction
Out: 4 True Name Nemesis, 2 Council’s Judgment, 1 Swords to Plowshares, 1 Umezawa’s Jitte

Show and Tell:
IMO, same story as UB reanimator, you need a clock to kill show and tell, but you’ve taken it out. I don’t know why didn’t bring vendilion clique in for this matchup, but you probably should.

In: 2 Vendilion Clique, 2 Containment Priest, 2 Flusterstorm, 2 Surgical Extraction, 1 Disenchant
Out: 4 True Name Nemesis, 2 Council’s Judgment, 1 Swords to Plowshares, 1 Umezawa’s Jitte, 1 Spell Snare

[oOOoOphidian]

I've been playing this lately and won the last few local events undefeated. Lots of fun.

https://i.imgur.com/fuiPMbH.png

Got a 4-1 in a league with it today. I'll wait until London mull is back to continue playing it on MTGO, though.
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/317317709715210240/592820538909392952/unknown.png

[Nightrider]

Thanks for your advice!


The starting 60 looks pretty solid.
You should probably swap out 3 polluted delta/misty rainforest and 1 marsh flats for 4 prismatic vista. It makes your mana that much more stable. It’s probably a marginal upgrade, but there’s no reason for you not to do it either.

That's a good point... I should buy 4 Prismatic Vista.


I’d also go with 1 more jace if possible. While narset is powerful I don’t see her as a jace replacement.

Sideboard:
Narset, Parter of Veils-Do you really need a third copy?
Ashiok, Dream Render-Seem pretty eh to me. If you have a compelling reason to be playing her so be it, I couldn’t justify it though.

I have only one Jace and I hate it, plus Narset beats opponent's Jaces. Ashiok is my tech slot, I like him versus a lots of matchups


With regards to sideboarding:
UB Reanimator:
Stoneblade can have a real problem with combo decks, partly because it just doesn’t have a compelling clock. SFM plus batterskull is fastest clock this deck offers, and it’s still decently slow.
Which is why I disagree with subbing out your entire SFM package. You need to apply pressure with them. And if SFM+Batterskull is a slow clock, TNN’s clock is positively glacial. Plus UB reanimator doesn’t have many targeted killspells if any, so TNN’s protection clause is largely irrelevant.
Ashiok probably isn’t that good here. UB reanimator tends to be pretty land light, and entomb is a 1 mana instant. Probably not great odds that Ashiok is able to stop a relevant fetchland or 1 mana instant.

In: 2 Vendilion Clique, 2 Containment Priest, 2 Flusterstorm, 2 Surgical Extraction
Out: 4 True Name Nemesis, 2 Council’s Judgment, 1 Swords to Plowshares, 1 Umezawa’s Jitte

Show and Tell:
IMO, same story as UB reanimator, you need a clock to kill show and tell, but you’ve taken it out. I don’t know why didn’t bring vendilion clique in for this matchup, but you probably should.

In: 2 Vendilion Clique, 2 Containment Priest, 2 Flusterstorm, 2 Surgical Extraction, 1 Disenchant
Out: 4 True Name Nemesis, 2 Council’s Judgment, 1 Swords to Plowshares, 1 Umezawa’s Jitte, 1 Spell Snare

I agree with about the fastest clock possible. I put 2 Vendilion and I also put Jailer because, if Sho&Tell resolves, I could exile Emrakul with the Jailer.

[NidStyles]

Sinew and Steel seems the better of the Allied swords.

[First_Revenge]

Has anyone else been tinkering with prismatic vista?

I've done a little bit of testing of 4c stoneblade with prismatic vista and its been more stable than i initially thought it would be. The prismatic vista seems to be playing a fairly large role in that. It does require the removal of spells like council's judgement which require double non blue colored mana. I'm trying an esper build splashing a mountain and a volcanic. Mostly for pyroblast effects.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

Has anyone else been tinkering with prismatic vista?

I've done a little bit of testing of 4c stoneblade with prismatic vista and its been more stable than i initially thought it would be. The prismatic vista seems to be playing a fairly large role in that. It does require the removal of spells like council's judgement which require double non blue colored mana. I'm trying an esper build splashing a mountain and a volcanic. Mostly for pyroblast effects.The only place I have considered it is as a 1 to 2 of in a UW list. Seems pretty terrible in anything more splashy.

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[oOOoOphidian]

I've been quite happy with vista as it helps you play through wastelands. I'm still winning a lot with the arcanist list and I highly recommend it. Here's my latest version:

https://i.imgur.com/jfsxsWC.png

Tonight I 2-0'd Miracles, 2-0'd Grixis Control, 2-1'd 4c Loam/Wrenn, and 2-1'd Jund Wrenn

[Secretly.A.Bee]

That picture has me guessing on a few cards. Any chance of a quick typed list?

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[koten]

That picture has me guessing on a few cards. Any chance of a quick typed list?

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Yeah, would love to see the full 75.

[malfie13]

Has anyone else been tinkering with prismatic vista?

I've done a little bit of testing of 4c stoneblade with prismatic vista and its been more stable than i initially thought it would be. The prismatic vista seems to be playing a fairly large role in that. It does require the removal of spells like council's judgement which require double non blue colored mana. I'm trying an esper build splashing a mountain and a volcanic. Mostly for pyroblast effects.

I run uw blade. 2x vistas seems great. I am currently on one volc and 2 pyro 1 reb for mirror sitcoms. Feels fine.

[oOOoOphidian]

That picture has me guessing on a few cards. Any chance of a quick typed list?

4 Flooded Strand
4 Prismatic Vista
3 Scalding Tarn
2 Tundra
1 Volcanic Island
3 Island
2 Plains
1 Mountain

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
1 Preordain

4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Lightning Bolt
1 Council's Judgment

4 Force of Will
1 Force of Negation
1 Dovin's Veto
1 Counterspell
1 Spell Pierce

2 True-Name Nemesis
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Batterskull
4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Dreadhorde Arcanist

2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Narset, Parter of Veils

SB:
1 Council's Judgment
1 Wear/Tear
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Palace Jailer
1 Blazing Volley
1 Flusterstorm
1 Hydroblast
1 Force of Negation
2 Pyroblast
1 Red Elemental Blast
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Containment Priest

[Secretly.A.Bee]

Not bad, I am using it as a starting point for myself. Thank you for sharing. I have one thing I dislike about the list, and that is it has only 2 equipment. I know how a lot of you feel, but hear me out: This is ostensibly incorrect for a couple reasons in my opinion. Arcanist has trample, so the +2/+2 allows for a much greater chance of your sword triggering even through blockers. The +2 stat buff would also allow for casting a non-zero number of CJ from the 'yard, which I find tempting.

Is the Preordain better than another bolt?

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[koten]

Not bad, I am using it as a starting point for myself. Thank you for sharing. I have one thing I dislike about the list, and that is it has only 2 equipment. I know how a lot of you feel, but hear me out: This is ostensibly incorrect for a couple reasons in my opinion. Arcanist has trample, so the +2/+2 allows for a much greater chance of your sword triggering even through blockers. The +2 stat buff would also allow for casting a non-zero number of CJ from the 'yard, which I find tempting.

Is the Preordain better than another bolt?

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I was thinking that perhaps replacing the Jitte with SOFI (or sword of your choice) by upping the bolt count to 3 or even 4. With 7-8 1cc removal spells and arcanist flashing them back, jitte doesn't seem necessary (assuming it's main mode most of the time is -1/-1).

[Secretly.A.Bee]

I don't think I will be comfortable with that idea, but to each his own. I'm dropping a Jace for it.

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[H]

I don't think I will be comfortable with that idea, but to each his own. I'm dropping a Jace for it.

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In the old days (of running things like Lingering Souls), it was not uncommon to drop Batterskull to get more "realistically equipable" pieces in there. But Batterskull might be too needed now for stabilizing in some of the worst match-ups. Although, considering how many decks are in Red now, 4 mana Blues spells might indeed be a liability.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

In the old days (of running things like Lingering Souls), it was not uncommon to drop Batterskull to get more "realistically equipable" pieces in there. But Batterskull might be too needed now for stabilizing in some of the worst match-ups. Although, considering how many decks are in Red now, 4 mana Blues spells might indeed be a liability.Its also important to note that Jace loses a lot of value when there are so many Narset about. I am aware of the negative effects it has on Sword (no extra draw) but Sword is also an answer to Narset, whereas Jace is a veritable brick.

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[NidStyles]

Told you the other Ally sword was better. Narset is just too annoying to leave on the board for any deck.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

I don't recall agreeing with you. Further, I see no one playing it, and I am at the black gathering point of GP: Denver right now. This deck has several answers to Narset, I can't imagine that makes SoSaS good, only slightly useful, and CJ is better in that slot. Besides, until you include SoFI, I can't see including SoSaS over it.

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[NidStyles]

So don't play it then.
Reread my comment, not sure why you're so hostile. I don't want to be a Bee.I am fine not being associated with you.

What answers are those? I don't see them outside of spending a turn attacking into a resolved Narset. Countering, sure. Seems like a waste of a counter.
Council's Judgement? I don't care for the card. You'll never see it in any of my lists. Efficiency wins games.

Abrupt Decay. Lightning Bolt. Two reasons. SoFaI just gives a Shock unless you attack into the Narset. I prefer to think and reason through why to play a card, rather than copying what others do.

[NidStyles]

So did you win?

[Secretly.A.Bee]

So did you win?I played a Dreadhorde Arcanist version of this deck in one 3 round side event. No, I did not win, but never was there a time that SoSaS would have been even marginally good.

Hostility is often elicited by statements that smack of "I told you so," especially when there isn't even anecdotal evidence to support said statement, let alone any actual evidence.

20 lands was too much all day. Flooded out hard and often.

-ABC

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[Nostra]

Anyone having any luck or have any insight on the current variation of delverblade with Nivmagus Elemental?

[Johanovich]

Played in a local tournament with esper stoneblade, finishing second after losing to miracles in the finals. Didn’t get to fulfill my goals of eot lingering souls or thoughtseizing in the draw step, but teferi overperformed regardless by bouncing stuff like delver and gurmag angler (providing carddraw and tempo) and forcing my opponents to spend their turn answering him or be unable to interact.

Played against
R1 ANT-win 2-0
R2 Hogaak mill – draw 1-1-1
R3 Death and taxes – win 2-1 (went into time, but my opponent was a friend who scooped after turn 5 because I was most likely to win due to the boardstate)
R4 UB shadow – win 2-0
R5 ID (against 4C control)

Qf Blood sun eldrazi (with punishing fire) – win 2-0
SF UR delver – win 2-0
F UW miracles – loss 0-2 (close game 1 where he drew a jace the one turn where he had a window to play it, finding counters for both my teferi and jace the following turns. Game 2 I lost to mentor getting out of hand after erroneously siding out verdict)

4 flooded strand
3 polluted delta
3 prismatic vista
2 tundra
2 underground sea
1 scrubland
3 island
2 plains
1 swamp

3 stoneforge mystic
3 snapcaster mage
2 true-name nemesis

4 brainstorm
4 swords to plowshares
3 force of will
2 spell pierce
1 dovin’s veto
3 thoughtseize
3 ponder
1 council’s judgment
1 lingering souls
1 supreme verdict

1 batterskull
1 umezawa’s jitte

2 narset, parter of veils
2 teferi, time raveler
2 jace, the mind sculptor

SB:
2 vendilion clique
2 surgical extraction
2 flusterstorm
2 zealous persecution
1 palace jailer
1 disenchant
1 ethersworn canonist
1 gideon, ally of zendikar
1 council’s judgment
1 force of will
1 sword of fire and ice

I think the manabase could potentially support a back to basics in the sideboard for greedy matchups like 4C control. Also never drew palace jailer so can’t assess how good the card would have been. I missed additional gravehate against the Hogaak matchup, but considering this is a fringe deck I don’t think it warrants extra hate.

[NidStyles]

I played a Dreadhorde Arcanist version of this deck in one 3 round side event. No, I did not win, but never was there a time that SoSaS would have been even marginally good.

Hostility is often elicited by statements that smack of "I told you so," especially when there isn't even anecdotal evidence to support said statement, let alone any actual evidence.

20 lands was too much all day. Flooded out hard and often.

-ABC

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lol! Okay. I don't wear my heart on my sleeve. Too many over sensitive children here.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

lol! Okay. I don't wear my heart on my sleeve. Too many over sensitive children here.Those are certainly words you can put in front of each other. Good job.

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[CptHaddock]

Those are certainly words you can put in front of each other. Good job.

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Why are you like this homie?

[Secretly.A.Bee]

Why are you like this homie?That's quite the open-ended statement. Probably something to do with my childhood? Idk, not a shrink.

I was just discussing magic and then this.

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[Nightrider]

Lands-20
4 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
4 Prismatic Vista
6 Island
2 Plains
2 Tundra

Creatures-11
4 Stoneforge Mystic
3 True-Name Nemesis
3 Snapcaster Mage
1 Palace Jailer

Spells-21
4 Brainstorm
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Force of Will
4 Ponder
2 Spell Pierce
1 Council's Judgment
1 Spell Snare

Planeswalkers-3
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Narset, Parter of Veils

Artifacts-2
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Batterskull

Enchantments-2
2 Back to Basics

Sideboard:
2 Containment Priest
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Flusterstorm
1 Hydroblast
1 Disenchant
1 Palace Jailer
1 Narset, Parter of Veils
1 Ashiok, Dream Render
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Vendilion Clique

Little changes in my original list... any advice to baet 4C control with wrenn & 6?

[First_Revenge]

A few thoughts on your list:
I was high on palace jailer a month or two ago, but given the advent of narset, it’s probably not good enough anymore. I advocated for him because he was a non-pyroblastable source of card advantage that was good in control mirrors. Narset is almost a perfect answer to jailer in a lot of ways. She’s cheaper, gives card advantage and quality, and turns off jailer. Additionally, she’s showing up in tons of UWx control decks which are the matchups jailer was once really good in. Jailer’s in a rough spot.
IMO this should just be narset #2 in the maindeck. In the sideboard you could maybe turn that jailer into a hyrdroblast to combat the W6 meta?

How to fight W6 meta:
I’m not sure yet, IMO the lowest hanging fruit is probably reconstructing our GY hate packages. I think a lot of stoneblade decks are still running the same GY hate suite they did before W6. But now that W6 is really pushing even fair decks to lean super heavily on the yard we really need to revisit both the type and quantity of GY hate cards we play.
I think that going forward we probably want at least 5 GY hate slots, I’ve seriously contemplated going up to 6. That aside, the type of hate probably needs to change too. Given how W6 decks seem to work, some serious sledgehammer graveyard hate like RIP maybe warranted over cards like containment priest.

Besides the GY, cards like spell snare or hydroblast also seem pretty good right now. Hydroblast in particular seems to be in a better place than it’s ever been, given that it takes down both W6 and dreadhorde arcanist.


Personally, I’m going greedy with 4C stoneblade in response to the W6 meta. The addition of prismatic visa/arcum’s astrolabe has made mana fixing super reasonable. Even without W6 I haven’t hated the mana base. I’ve tried to design my manabase such that it can function off only basics, but it really does well once even a single astrolabe gets in play. If two astrolabes stick the world is your oyster colorwise.
Here’s my super rough list for reference. Played it a weekly or two so far with promising results, needs lot more tuning though.

Lands-20
4 Flooded Strand
4 Prismatic Vista
1 Polluted Delta
1 Scalding Tarn
3 Snow Covered Island
2 Snow Covered Plains
1 Snow Covered Swamp
1 Snow Covered Mountain
1 Tundra
1 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island

Creatures: 10
4 Stoneforge Mystic
3 True Name Nemesis
3 Snapcaster Mage

Spells: 22
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Thoughtseize
2 Spell Pierce
2 Ponder
1 Preordain
1 Lightning Bolt
1 Zealous Persecution

Planeswalkers: 3
1 Narset, Parter of Veils
2 Jace the Mind Sculptor

Artifacts: 6
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa’s Jitte
4 Arcum’s Astrolabe

Sideboard:
1 Containment Priest
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Flusterstorm
3 Pyroblast
2 Disenchant
2 Price of Progress
1 Zealous Persecution

[Qweerios]

Has anybody contemplated Bant Stoneblade with snow basics and the new Coatl?

There are a few things that green bring to this archetype that I think are really strong like Sylvan Library for instance. Library works nicely with life gain and Counterbalance. A few Neoform sounds pretty good when swapping out a Coatl for a 4/2 TNN or simply as a way to transform a Snapcaster or SFM into a threat.

[CptHaddock]

Is the W6 meta even that big of a problem for stoneblade? I have just been killing people with tnn + equipment which does not really care about the card. You can always play purge/rip in your board if you want a little more security. I just think that the cards are just a bit too narrow.

[First_Revenge]

Is the W6 meta even that big of a problem for stoneblade? I have just been killing people with tnn + equipment which does not really care about the card. You can always play purge/rip in your board if you want a little more security. I just think that the cards are just a bit too narrow.

I think i agree. My primary concern about the W6 decks is actually the plague engineers that often accompany it. Engineer is probably the cleanest answer i've seen to TNN in a long time, and now its appearing maindeck.

[malfie13]

I decided to play UW blade at eternal weekend this past week. I didnt do great for various reasons, so I'm not going to put my observations in the official tourney reports section. That said imma put it here. I'm first going to post some sb thoughts and a deck list. I'll then be creating a match specific analysis for the last chance trials and main event. I didnt really do that with sunday although I will try to remember my matches and offer observations there as well. I did some tweaking to the list for Sunday too. Not sure I remember all of them so honestly Sunday is less important. Here we go.

First the list, followed by observations:

Deck: Legacy Stoneblade 11-2-19.dec

Counts : 60 main / 15 sideboard

Creatures:11
3 Snapcaster Mage
3 Stoneforge Mystic
3 True-Name Nemesis
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Venser, Shaper Savant

Artifacts:2
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Batterskull

Sorceries:6
4 Ponder
2 Council's Judgment

Instants:16
4 Brainstorm
2 Spell Pierce
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Dovin's Veto
1 Force of Negation
4 Force of Will

Others:5
2 Teferi, Time Raveler
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Lands:20
4 Flooded Strand
6 Island
1 Karakas
2 Plains
4 Prismatic Vista
1 Scalding Tarn
2 Tundra

Sideboard:15
1 Containment Priest
1 Brazen Borrower // Petty Theft
1 Palace Jailer
2 Supreme Verdict
1 Flusterstorm
1 Hydroblast
1 Path to Exile
1 Celestial Purge
1 Disenchant
1 Force of Negation
2 Mystical Dispute
2 Rest in Peace

So top line observations:

Matches:

Over the course of the weekend

Turbo depths x1
Dredge x2
RUG Delver x3
4c Control x1
Grixis control x1
Omnishow x1
Mavericks x1
GW Depths x1

We beat a lot of the matches we were supposed to and lost some of the matches we shouldn't have. That said, it was a long drive in pouring rain which extended a 6 hour drive to a 10 hour drive. I definitely punted twice quite visibly. Happens. More details to follow.

Rug delver we had an overall record of 2.1 vs. We beat it in the main event and lost the one time we played it in a last chance side event.

Side board observations.

Best cards vs delver were definitely in the sb, unfortunately. Was in serious debate about running some number of supreme verdicts main. Definitely should have and will in the future if the meta doesn't change.

Brazen borrower was super boss. Should be a 2x, without doubt. Both just flashing in a flying blocker and or bouncing a planeswalker about to ult were relevant modes.

Force of no is also super good.l, but only in matches where they matter. Tagging a pfire, loam, looting, etc is so good it cannot be overstated. Also probably good vs storm, although I didn't actually play vs storm all weekend for whatever reason.

Rest in peace was super underwhelming. The matches I saw it vs dredge was a mixed bag bc one game was game ending and the other it ate a natures claim and didn't do much. It was a non factor vs rug delver. They just sided out mandrils and wound up running into hexdrinkers and flipped delvers or tnn instead. I feel like surgical is largely more impactful where we need it now having jammed rip in this tourney.

Mystical dispute was always an ok draw. Rarely was it game breaking, but it was always ok when I saw it. I sided it in sparingly. Might be better as 2x fluster and 1x dispute rather than the alternative. I sided in dispute vs any tnn or control deck, and also vs show and tell. Having a formay where you win on small margins it was largely pretty good.

Fluster is a staple and continued to do what it always has and came in for the same old reasons.

Idk what I think about Hydroblast. I'd almost rather it were another council's judgement or celestial purge. They both would have served me better in matches where I ran hydro. Granted I didnt play any burn and rug sides in 3 red blast effects, but really it was usually wtv.

Path to exile is a pet card. It offers another out vs big creature decks. I'd never leave home for a big open meta tourney without it. At home I'd probably just run a second disenchant.

Disenchant is another just old favorite. Its largely used in the same matches it always has been.

Containment priest and palace jailer are always good in the matches you'd want them. 10/10 Wouldn't remove either.

Changes to the board? Probably -1 hydro, -1 mystical dispute. Mandatory, +1 brazen borrower, +1 flusterstorm if I play this deck in the near future instead of shifting to a red splash. More on the fence about shifting back from rip to surgical. I also think that has become correct. I really like magmatic sinkhole. Card looked impressive in all my buddys' decks over the weekend (one on grixis, one on jeskai miracles).

More info to follow. I'm currently in the waiting room of a doctors office. Lord knows I may have time.

[alvoi]

Hello everyone! I'm back into Legacy after about 4 months I didn't play. So I didn't experience the W&6 meta. I would like to play Delver Blade (i.e. I would like to play a Delver deck and the only blue duals I own are the tundras) and I saw some lists from the W&6 time. Some of them had [[Nivmagus Elemental]], that's a strange tech I never considered. Is that still a viable plan? 2-3 Nivmagus + 3-4 Flusterstorm? Or was it only to have a threat with toughness greater than 1 and escape Wrenn?

Other than that, I saw some lists with [[Stifle]]. I absolutely love Stifle! So I wrote a sample list, do you like this?

4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta (they should become Prismatic Vista)
4 Wasteland
4 Island
2 Plains
2 Taiga

4 Delver of Secrets
4 Stoneforge Mystic
3 True-Name Nemesis
1 Palace Jailer

4 Brainstorm
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Ponder
4 Stifle
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Spell Pierce
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte

To make place for 4 Stifle I cut Council's Judgment, Jace, Spell Snare and the third Pierce from my last list. Is this good? Should I remove instead Palace Jailer and re-insert one of them?

[First_Revenge]

2 Taiga
:laugh:(but i know what you mean)

UW delver blade is a weird deck man.

With regards to stifle, i mean its probably worth trying. I don't think i'd ever call stifle outright bad in a delver deck.

I don't really like any 4 drop in this shell. That's part of the problem of wanting to run 4 daze 4 wasteland. In this slot i'd instead start placing the busted 3 mana walkers like narset or teferi.

Another card you could look at iis the very excellent brazen borrower which pulls double duty as a tempo swing and beater.

I think nivmagus+flusterstorm was more for a surprising really fast clock. Not being soft to W6 probably helped, but i don't think that was the driving reason for its selection.


Brutally honest though, i think that delver blade as a whole is in a really bad position ATM. The issue overarching issue right now is that mana is really difficult to punish at the moment
This is what 4C decks (https://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=23959&d=366968&f=LEhttp://) look like now. You barely have any valid wasteland targets. And ya stifle is a live card, but once one fetch gets through and they resolve an astrolabe you can't color screw them anymore.

The URx delver decks get by because they have a much faster clock that punishes these 4C piles for durdling. Delverblade is probably getting the worst of both worlds, its clearly not as fast as URx delver and it can't grind as well as traditional stoneblade. Which basically means that these basic heavy grindy decks are just going to drag you into the late game and beat you.

The potential banning of arcum's astrolabe could make the archetype more viable, but for now i'd probably play something closer to traditional UW blade.

[alvoi]

Yeah, you're right. So, I will look for better solutions, maybe just UW stoneblade (but I don't own any snapcaster). Sometimes I think I'm too poor to play Legacy, but Legacy is the best format :frown:

[First_Revenge]

I would just run UW delverblade until you save up to buy some snapcasters for UW stoneblade. From there you could even try getting into jeskai stoneblade, thanks to prismatic vista you really only need 1 tundra/1 volc to make it work.

Delverblade isn't well positioned right now, but that doesn't mean its unplayable. Legacy rewards practice, so sitting down and just playing games is really valuable.

[alvoi]

Yeah, you're right! Thanks a lot!

[First_Revenge]

As a new year’s thing, here’s a mini 2019 retrospective of my year with stoneblade. It’s more a collection of my thoughts than anything so take them for what they’re worth or discuss them below.

Esper Stoneblade:
I started off the year on Esper Stoneblade, and frankly I think the deck is in a really rough spot. Things were business as usual until WAR released and unleashed teferi and narset. Esper has always had a problem dealing with resolved planeswalkers, but prior to WAR they weren’t that ubiquitous. Now basically any blue midrange deck is probably jamming at least 4 blue planeswalkers and esper’s inability to deal with resolved walkers evolved from inconvenience to existential crisis. As a result, the thoughtseizes that esper is really built on have a lost a ton of value compared to the red elemental blast effects that jeskai gets. The printing of Oko and Veil of Summer were the last straws and finally pushed my stubborn butt out of esper into jeskai. Black(AKA the kill color) not having a way to kill off resolved walkers is just ridiculous to me, but whatever I guess.
Esper did get some new toys though, the most notable of which is probably plague engineer. That card is seriously good in creature centric metas. It’s just unfortunate that legacy has now firmly shifted more towards planeswalkers.

Jeskai Stoneblade:
This deck didn’t change that much, the biggest difference between 2018 and 2019 jeskai stoneblade is basically the WAR planeswalkers. What did happen is everyone started playing blue planeswalkers, so the power of red blasts went through the roof. IMO, jeskai is the best positioned stoneblade deck if everyone insists on jamming blue planeswalkers.

UW Stoneblade:
Honestly I’m confused why people play this deck in a post prismatic vista world. Prismatic vista in my estimation has made 3 color stoneblade decks very stable and has eroded a large chunk of the consistency barrier between 2 and 3 color manabases. I just don’t think the stability of the two color manabase outweighs the benefit of a 3rd color anymore. The deck still seems to put up results though so maybe I’m just talking out my ass.

Bant Stoneblade:
I’ve got a feeling that this is probably the best stoneblade variant, but we just don’t know it yet. Oko and Veil are really good cards and they’ve put up decent results already. Once a more optimized bant list gets put together it could give jeskai stoneblade a serious run for the crown.



Other Random Stuff:

Narset, Parter of Veils vs Teferi, Time Raveler
When WAR dropped it was immediately obvious both of these walkers were worthy of maindeck slots. Which was better was more unclear however. Having tested both, I’m now of the belief that Teferi is the better walker. Between shutting down entire lines of play, making all your spells uncounterable, and bouncing problematic permanents he’ll almost always be relevant in some way. Narset on the other hand is a narrower planeswalker, a lot of times she ended up just being an overcosted impulse. Don’t get me wrong, she’s still really good in blue mirrors and worth an inclusion somewhere in any blade deck.
If I had my way though, these one sided walkers would never have been printed. But can’t undo it now and you’d be pretty foolish to not play either of these guys.

Sword of Fire and Ice vs Sword of Feast and Famine
When it comes to a 3rd piece of equipment I’ve seen a lot of very successful decklists run either one of these. I started the year on Sword of Fire and Ice liking it for the same reasons basically everyone else does, it oozes value. Having said that, I asked a Feast and Famine pilot about his selection and liked his logic enough to try it. Basically I found what he said was true. Batterskull and Jitte are already pretty fantastic in creature matchups so no help needed in that department. The third piece of equipment is really all about killing combo decks. Fire and Ice vs combo does have some problems, tapping down 3 mana to equip the sword is a pretty dangerous shields down moment. And even if you do connect it’s far from guaranteed that the card you draw is useful. Feast and Famine on the other hand doesn’t give a combo opponent any windows. The three mana equip cost is undone once the creature connects. And forcing a discard out of your opponent while simultaneously passing the turn fully untapped puts the combo player in a much more frightening position.


Favorite Discovery:
Before legacy one of my favorite cards was gifts ungiven. The act of handing opponents an unwinnable choice is something I’ve always enjoyed. It will then come as no surprise that I love me some intuition, but I haven’t found a good way to play it. Then Anzi paired intuition with sevinne’s reclamation and finally handed me a way to play intuition without being laughed out of the room. Intuition/Sevinne’s Reclamation can end value wars on the spot and is how I’m currently choosing to win my grindier matchups. To be fair though, Sevinne’s Reclamation on its own is probably good enough, but I love intuition enough to play it regardless.

Most Underrated Card:
I think brazen borrower should have a home in stoneblade. Delver has already accepted the newcomer with open arms. The bounce ability has bought me the time needed to turn the corner more than a few times, and in the late game it becomes another evasive body that can carry equipment. It not being legendary also pushed it over the top of vendilion clique. Vendilion clique is powerful but being legendary generally restricted to a 1 of, which makes it unreliable. There’s a ton of games you’ll want it but just won’t find it.

Here’s the list (https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/2619511#paper) I left 2019 with, I’m sure it will evolve going forward.
Here’s to another year of legacy!

[Puggl3]

As a new year’s thing, here’s a mini 2019 retrospective of my year with stoneblade. It’s more a collection of my thoughts than anything so take them for what they’re worth or discuss them below.

Esper Stoneblade:
I started off the year on Esper Stoneblade, and frankly I think the deck is in a really rough spot. Things were business as usual until WAR released and unleashed teferi and narset. Esper has always had a problem dealing with resolved planeswalkers, but prior to WAR they weren’t that ubiquitous. Now basically any blue midrange deck is probably jamming at least 4 blue planeswalkers and esper’s inability to deal with resolved walkers evolved from inconvenience to existential crisis. As a result, the thoughtseizes that esper is really built on have a lost a ton of value compared to the red elemental blast effects that jeskai gets. The printing of Oko and Veil of Summer were the last straws and finally pushed my stubborn butt out of esper into jeskai. Black(AKA the kill color) not having a way to kill off resolved walkers is just ridiculous to me, but whatever I guess.
Esper did get some new toys though, the most notable of which is probably plague engineer. That card is seriously good in creature centric metas. It’s just unfortunate that legacy has now firmly shifted more towards planeswalkers.

Jeskai Stoneblade:
This deck didn’t change that much, the biggest difference between 2018 and 2019 jeskai stoneblade is basically the WAR planeswalkers. What did happen is everyone started playing blue planeswalkers, so the power of red blasts went through the roof. IMO, jeskai is the best positioned stoneblade deck if everyone insists on jamming blue planeswalkers.

UW Stoneblade:
Honestly I’m confused why people play this deck in a post prismatic vista world. Prismatic vista in my estimation has made 3 color stoneblade decks very stable and has eroded a large chunk of the consistency barrier between 2 and 3 color manabases. I just don’t think the stability of the two color manabase outweighs the benefit of a 3rd color anymore. The deck still seems to put up results though so maybe I’m just talking out my ass.

Bant Stoneblade:
I’ve got a feeling that this is probably the best stoneblade variant, but we just don’t know it yet. Oko and Veil are really good cards and they’ve put up decent results already. Once a more optimized bant list gets put together it could give jeskai stoneblade a serious run for the crown.



Other Random Stuff:

Narset, Parter of Veils vs Teferi, Time Raveler
When WAR dropped it was immediately obvious both of these walkers were worthy of maindeck slots. Which was better was more unclear however. Having tested both, I’m now of the belief that Teferi is the better walker. Between shutting down entire lines of play, making all your spells uncounterable, and bouncing problematic permanents he’ll almost always be relevant in some way. Narset on the other hand is a narrower planeswalker, a lot of times she ended up just being an overcosted impulse. Don’t get me wrong, she’s still really good in blue mirrors and worth an inclusion somewhere in any blade deck.
If I had my way though, these one sided walkers would never have been printed. But can’t undo it now and you’d be pretty foolish to not play either of these guys.

Sword of Fire and Ice vs Sword of Feast and Famine
When it comes to a 3rd piece of equipment I’ve seen a lot of very successful decklists run either one of these. I started the year on Sword of Fire and Ice liking it for the same reasons basically everyone else does, it oozes value. Having said that, I asked a Feast and Famine pilot about his selection and liked his logic enough to try it. Basically I found what he said was true. Batterskull and Jitte are already pretty fantastic in creature matchups so no help needed in that department. The third piece of equipment is really all about killing combo decks. Fire and Ice vs combo does have some problems, tapping down 3 mana to equip the sword is a pretty dangerous shields down moment. And even if you do connect it’s far from guaranteed that the card you draw is useful. Feast and Famine on the other hand doesn’t give a combo opponent any windows. The three mana equip cost is undone once the creature connects. And forcing a discard out of your opponent while simultaneously passing the turn fully untapped puts the combo player in a much more frightening position.


Favorite Discovery:
Before legacy one of my favorite cards was gifts ungiven. The act of handing opponents an unwinnable choice is something I’ve always enjoyed. It will then come as no surprise that I love me some intuition, but I haven’t found a good way to play it. Then Anzi paired intuition with sevinne’s reclamation and finally handed me a way to play intuition without being laughed out of the room. Intuition/Sevinne’s Reclamation can end value wars on the spot and is how I’m currently choosing to win my grindier matchups. To be fair though, Sevinne’s Reclamation on its own is probably good enough, but I love intuition enough to play it regardless.

Most Underrated Card:
I think brazen borrower should have a home in stoneblade. Delver has already accepted the newcomer with open arms. The bounce ability has bought me the time needed to turn the corner more than a few times, and in the late game it becomes another evasive body that can carry equipment. It not being legendary also pushed it over the top of vendilion clique. Vendilion clique is powerful but being legendary generally restricted to a 1 of, which makes it unreliable. There’s a ton of games you’ll want it but just won’t find it.

Here’s the list (https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/2619511#paper) I left 2019 with, I’m sure it will evolve going forward.
Here’s to another year of legacy!

Thanks for the recap, very interesting list!

Though I am not a big fan of running 61 cards, what would be the cut to 60?

Also very interested in knowing the reason behind 2 ponders/2 preordain split instead of 4x ponder.

Also the lack of council’s in the entire 75 is interesting as well.

Thanks!

[KobeBryan]

As a new year’s thing, here’s a mini 2019 retrospective of my year with stoneblade. It’s more a collection of my thoughts than anything so take them for what they’re worth or discuss them below.

Esper Stoneblade:
I started off the year on Esper Stoneblade, and frankly I think the deck is in a really rough spot. Things were business as usual until WAR released and unleashed teferi and narset. Esper has always had a problem dealing with resolved planeswalkers, but prior to WAR they weren’t that ubiquitous. Now basically any blue midrange deck is probably jamming at least 4 blue planeswalkers and esper’s inability to deal with resolved walkers evolved from inconvenience to existential crisis. As a result, the thoughtseizes that esper is really built on have a lost a ton of value compared to the red elemental blast effects that jeskai gets. The printing of Oko and Veil of Summer were the last straws and finally pushed my stubborn butt out of esper into jeskai. Black(AKA the kill color) not having a way to kill off resolved walkers is just ridiculous to me, but whatever I guess.
Esper did get some new toys though, the most notable of which is probably plague engineer. That card is seriously good in creature centric metas. It’s just unfortunate that legacy has now firmly shifted more towards planeswalkers.

Jeskai Stoneblade:
This deck didn’t change that much, the biggest difference between 2018 and 2019 jeskai stoneblade is basically the WAR planeswalkers. What did happen is everyone started playing blue planeswalkers, so the power of red blasts went through the roof. IMO, jeskai is the best positioned stoneblade deck if everyone insists on jamming blue planeswalkers.

UW Stoneblade:
Honestly I’m confused why people play this deck in a post prismatic vista world. Prismatic vista in my estimation has made 3 color stoneblade decks very stable and has eroded a large chunk of the consistency barrier between 2 and 3 color manabases. I just don’t think the stability of the two color manabase outweighs the benefit of a 3rd color anymore. The deck still seems to put up results though so maybe I’m just talking out my ass.

Bant Stoneblade:
I’ve got a feeling that this is probably the best stoneblade variant, but we just don’t know it yet. Oko and Veil are really good cards and they’ve put up decent results already. Once a more optimized bant list gets put together it could give jeskai stoneblade a serious run for the crown.



Other Random Stuff:

Narset, Parter of Veils vs Teferi, Time Raveler
When WAR dropped it was immediately obvious both of these walkers were worthy of maindeck slots. Which was better was more unclear however. Having tested both, I’m now of the belief that Teferi is the better walker. Between shutting down entire lines of play, making all your spells uncounterable, and bouncing problematic permanents he’ll almost always be relevant in some way. Narset on the other hand is a narrower planeswalker, a lot of times she ended up just being an overcosted impulse. Don’t get me wrong, she’s still really good in blue mirrors and worth an inclusion somewhere in any blade deck.
If I had my way though, these one sided walkers would never have been printed. But can’t undo it now and you’d be pretty foolish to not play either of these guys.

Sword of Fire and Ice vs Sword of Feast and Famine
When it comes to a 3rd piece of equipment I’ve seen a lot of very successful decklists run either one of these. I started the year on Sword of Fire and Ice liking it for the same reasons basically everyone else does, it oozes value. Having said that, I asked a Feast and Famine pilot about his selection and liked his logic enough to try it. Basically I found what he said was true. Batterskull and Jitte are already pretty fantastic in creature matchups so no help needed in that department. The third piece of equipment is really all about killing combo decks. Fire and Ice vs combo does have some problems, tapping down 3 mana to equip the sword is a pretty dangerous shields down moment. And even if you do connect it’s far from guaranteed that the card you draw is useful. Feast and Famine on the other hand doesn’t give a combo opponent any windows. The three mana equip cost is undone once the creature connects. And forcing a discard out of your opponent while simultaneously passing the turn fully untapped puts the combo player in a much more frightening position.


Favorite Discovery:
Before legacy one of my favorite cards was gifts ungiven. The act of handing opponents an unwinnable choice is something I’ve always enjoyed. It will then come as no surprise that I love me some intuition, but I haven’t found a good way to play it. Then Anzi paired intuition with sevinne’s reclamation and finally handed me a way to play intuition without being laughed out of the room. Intuition/Sevinne’s Reclamation can end value wars on the spot and is how I’m currently choosing to win my grindier matchups. To be fair though, Sevinne’s Reclamation on its own is probably good enough, but I love intuition enough to play it regardless.

Most Underrated Card:
I think brazen borrower should have a home in stoneblade. Delver has already accepted the newcomer with open arms. The bounce ability has bought me the time needed to turn the corner more than a few times, and in the late game it becomes another evasive body that can carry equipment. It not being legendary also pushed it over the top of vendilion clique. Vendilion clique is powerful but being legendary generally restricted to a 1 of, which makes it unreliable. There’s a ton of games you’ll want it but just won’t find it.

Here’s the list (https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/2619511#paper) I left 2019 with, I’m sure it will evolve going forward.
Here’s to another year of legacy!

the bant section has tested blue green white for a long time. The printing of plauge engineer makes tnn suck and makes noble suck. It also fails to kill the cheap walkers

[wcm8]

Here’s my work in progress:

19 lands:
9 fetch
1 volcanic island
1 tundra
1 plateau
1 mystic sanctuary
3 snow-covered island
2 snow-covered plains
1 snow-covered mountain

4 arcum’s Astrolabe
4 ponder
4 brainstorm
4 force of will
2 counterbalance
4 swords to plowshares
1 lightning bolt
1 council’s judgment
1 tithe
1 pyroblast
4 dreadhorde arcanist
4 stoneforge mystic
1 batterskull
1 sword of feast and famine// fire and ice
1 true-name nemesis
2 Narset, Parter of veils
2 Teferi, Time Raveler

Sideboard still being worked out.

It’s a lower CMC Aggro-Control list, with a fire and forget sort of build. The singletons work well with Arcanist, and Tithe is actually a decent form of ramp. Could be something else though.

[Mr. Safety]

Here’s my work in progress:

19 lands:
9 fetch
1 volcanic island
1 tundra
1 plateau
1 mystic sanctuary
3 snow-covered island
2 snow-covered plains
1 snow-covered mountain

4 arcum’s Astrolabe
4 ponder
4 brainstorm
4 force of will
2 counterbalance
4 swords to plowshares
1 lightning bolt
1 council’s judgment
1 tithe
1 pyroblast
4 dreadhorde arcanist
4 stoneforge mystic
1 batterskull
1 sword of feast and famine// fire and ice
1 true-name nemesis
2 Narset, Parter of veils
2 Teferi, Time Raveler

Sideboard still being worked out.

It’s a lower CMC Aggro-Control list, with a fire and forget sort of build. The singletons work well with Arcanist, and Tithe is actually a decent form of ramp. Could be something else though.

What are your thoughts on Sword of X&Y over jitte? To enable better arcanist synergy/get him through in combat?

[wcm8]

What are your thoughts on Sword of X&Y over jitte? To enable better arcanist synergy/get him through in combat?

Yeah, it’s basically that.

It could be Sword of Fire and Ice instead; but I like how Feast & Famine is actually useful against combo and control decks by forcing discard.

The deck is already pretty good against aggro by nature of its removal package.

The other important thing a Sword does is make Arcanist or Mystic valid threats on their own, and it gives them protection from GREEN (Oko), basically Red (by nature of being 4 toughness now), and Black is useful in some instances as well.

A token generating creature, e.g. Young Pyromancer or Monastery Mentor might work well in this kind of deck too.

Tithe *could* just be the 20th Land, but this deck curves out at 3 and doesn’t really need a ton of lands beyond that to operate effectively.

Tithe is probably the weirdest card in the list, but think of it as a sort of pseudo Ramp spell that can combo with Arcanist and help thin your deck of lands/improve future Brainstorms. Could just be something else though.

[wcm8]

Changes to earlier list:

-1 Arcum’s Astrolabe
-1 Tithe
+1 Land Tax
+1 Umezawa’s Jitte

Current sideboard:
2 Red Elemental Blast
1 Pyroblast
1 Hydroblast
1 Flusterstorm
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Blood Moon
1 Vandalblast
1 Fragmentize
1 Lavinia, Azorius Renegade
1 Containment Priest
1 Rest In Peace
1 Relic of Progenitus
1 Grafdigger’s Cage
1 Pithing Needle


Tithe is cute; whereas Land Tax (if resolved early) is *broken*. But it’s kind of like Sylvan Library: game-changing in the right circumstances, but not as useful in multiples.

I don’t think this deck needs Astrolabe as badly as some decks lean hard on it, but I suppose you could cut something for the 4th copy somewhere.

Jitte just adds more repeatable small critter removal, and if resolved basically can win the game against decks like Elves, DnT, Infect, etc. Plus you want something to deal with 1/1 tokens of various types, not to mention all of the various Coatl and Strix running about.

The sideboard is fairly straightforward, with some cards chosen to deal with specific DtB and others just filling in the ‘all comers’ aspect.

Legacy is in such major flux, that it’s hard to really say what an ideal sideboard would look like. Although, given the deck’s ability to lean in on the power of Arcanist, choosing 1 cmc spells (e.g. Fragmentize, Vandalblast) makes a lot of sense.

There are cards I’d definitely consider running: Grim Lavamancer; Ensnaring Bridge; perhaps some bigger planeswalkers against control decks (e.g. Gideon, Ally of Zendikar). Basically, I’d suggest if you test out this list, to modify the sideboard for your local metagame instead of just blindly copying my current selection.

[FTW]

Bosh N Roll recently brought this back: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_Yyp803A8A
4-1 League
Beat 4c ThrabenU brew, GWb Maverick Depths, 8cast, Lands. Lost to Rw Painter.

Compared to his UWr Standstill decks, I really prefer this manabase. It looks much more stable while still casting the same key UWr spells. It shows in the league. He almost always has perfect mana, doesn't get mana screwed, is able to curve out and deploy tools smoothly, and dodges nonbasic hate. It's probably safe to add 1 Karakas and/or 1 Otawara, Soaring City.


//Lands: 20
4 Flooded Strand
4 Prismatic Vista
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Tundra
1 Volcanic Island
6 Island
2 Plains
1 Mountain

//Spells: 21
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Prismatic Ending
1 Spell Pierce
1 Day's Undoing

//Planeswalkers: 8
4 Narset, Parter of Veils
2 Teferi, Time Raveler
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

//Creatures: 8
4 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Snapcaster Mage
2 True-Name Nemesis

//Equipment: 2
1 Batterskull
1 Kaldra Compleat

//Enchantments: 1
1 Back to Basics

//Sideboard: 15
2 Pyroblast
1 Red Elemental Blast
1 Hydroblast
1 Force of Negation
2 Surgical Extraction
2 End the Festivities
2 Meltdown
2 Lavinia, Azorius Renegade
1 Containment Priest
1 Sword of Feast and Famine


The 1 Spell Pierce seems sus for a control deck. Maybe that should be Minor Misstep or Force of Negation? This looks like a good deck for 1-of Sevinne's Reclamation too.

[Fox]

8x PW is egregious, and uh I guess the plan is to scoop to
Thassa? One positive thing is that it is clearly made to troll Uro midrange...but decks like Blade provide a play experience somewhere between un-fun and skill-less particularly when they run into decks with the same staples (Ponder/BS/Plow/Ending/PWs) who don't give you real Plow targets. Meanwhile you find yourself in a "mirror" where opponent gets to ruin you with Plow. I can't think of a worse play experience than running this deck into UWr [insert 2 mana not-dude; e.g. Standstill, Counterbalance, Staff].

So while it's great that Uro midrange will lose to exile effects, the Karakas [missing], Narset spam, and B2B [which will not work vs other decks with more Boseju, FoV, Haywire Mite]...at the end of the day Uro's Endurance + Dress Down is more resistant to combo and Saga, it has built-in anti-discard [Uro], and ability to overwhelm non-exile kill spells [Uro] leading to a deck with a better matchup profile vs the format.

Gotta be very careful about a deck like this in a small room, because you will hate out Uro midrange...and once you lose your Uro shields out of that room, you're asking for the discard + Sheoldred's Edict vs UWr Staff reaction. The maindeck is clearly meant to farm Uro, while the SB hits Elves, Delver, artifact spam, Entomb/SnT Grisel. Glaring flaws vs 2cmc not-dudes [except Library], Thassa, Saga, dubious vs non-Glimpse Elves, questionable vs Depths [coming with Stage copy Saga], Post, and somewhere between tedious to not great vs DnT.