Standstill > Ancestral Visions?

[detroitpro]

I assume I am missing something here but....Why is Standstill better then Ancestral Visions? Do they serve diff purposes?

Thanks.

[edgewalker]

It's kinda obvious. Who wants to wait 4 turns and have their opponent draw a response just so they can draw 3 cards. Standstill not only nets you 3 cards, it can stop some unexperienced opponents from playing any spells for a few turns.

It's better because it can work as a soft lock.

[hungryboi]

It's a sorcery and wont be played during your first 3 turns since you are setting up (brainstorm, top/cb, standstill, etc). Later on, when you play it, waiting 4 turns means that the game could have been ended by then. If not, you already may be in a good board position and therefore ancestral is a win more card.

[detroitpro]

I do like the idea of the soft lock in a "draw go" type control deck....but it costs one more, nets one less and stop you from doing anything....

How would an aggressive deck "play through" SS? just pop it early before the control play is allowed to setup?

[FoolofaTook]

How would an aggressive deck "play through" SS? just pop it early before the control play is allowed to setup?

You either have answers to Standstill (Mishra's Factory, Nantuko Monastery) or you pop it as fast as you can without doing something your deck would otherwise not do. There are a few decks that maybe should wait, like Fetchland Tendrils, for their opportunity - but that's what those decks do anyway most of the time.

There's absolutely no point in letting your opponent sculpt his hand before you suddenly give him additional card advantage. Make him play out his responses as fast as is reasonable to provoke them and you minimize the large advantage that +3 cards in hand gives. It's still a large advantage, but it's a killer when you let him provoke you into popping the Standstill when he wants it to go.

[detroitpro]

So, the consensus is that Standstill should always be used in place of AV?

[thefreakaccident]

No... it is the superior card, however, they will never be ran in the same kind of decks... you only want to be playing standstill if you run plenty of manlands, and other things that can be played around it... otherwise the card is not onesided, and therefore pointless; you don't want to have to let your opponent draw 3 cards...

[Kadaj]

Standstill and AV belong in completely different decks. Decks with manlands should almost always play Standstill due to the onesidedness of such a situation, and MUC is really the only deck that has effectively utilized AV so far. Basically, they fill the same role, but in completely different decks.

[Angantyr]

And what is Ancestral Visions good for? You always have to wait for your draw.

[Eldariel]

Ancestral Visions is good for converting one card to three cards. Yes, you have to wait, but in a deck like MUC, you'd be waiting anyways. It replenishes you when you're running out low in the midgame and allows you to overcome the opponent's onslaught.

Basically, a one-mana investment that generates 3 cards is very good in a deck that slows the game down. A 2-mana investment for 3 cards is good in the case that you can force the opponent to break it. Both are solid cards with their own decks.

[Pinder]

I think really the only time you should be playing AV is if a) You have the time to wait for it, and can control the board until then or b) You have some way to take advantage of the CMC of 0, like putting the damn thing on a Scepter or something.

Hrm....UW Scepter-Chant with AV?

[edgewalker]

You really don't even need to play standstill with manlands. You can play it in almost any control deck that has a lack in permenants, or tempo based deck used to abuse it. I remember the old Fish decks used to play standstill and cloud of faeries for a nice combo.

[FoolofaTook]

I think really the only time you should be playing AV is if a) You have the time to wait for it, and can control the board until then or b) You have some way to take advantage of the CMC of 0, like putting the damn thing on a Scepter or something.

Hrm....UW Scepter-Chant with AV?

Tolaria West tutors for it also. So maybe Scepter-Chant with Tolaria West to go look for AV, EE, Tormod's Crypt, Mishra's Factory, Maze of Ith, Academy Ruins, and other good controllish 0 CMC plays.

[Sanguine Voyeur]

Ancestral Vision is a sorcery.

Standstill is better, especially when you can develop board position without playing spells.

[Pinder]

Tolaria West tutors for it also. So maybe Scepter-Chant with Tolaria West to go look for AV, EE, Tormod's Crypt, Mishra's Factory, Maze of Ith, Academy Ruins, and other good controllish 0 CMC plays.

It would be slow, but I suppose it would be a control build...and while we're throwing around 0cc Artifacts, I suppose Trinket Mage should at least be considered. And hell, Standstill would probably be good in here too.

[TheRock]

Ancestral Visions is a card that lets you do other things with your mana other than play draw spells. MUC can use it to get the card advantage necessary for reaching the mid and late games all while playing cards that can slow down its opponent. It is also easier to protect AV with countermagic in the earlier turns.

Another disadvantage that Standstill has is that a smart player (Player B) can wait until the end step to play a weaker instant while the Standstill player (Player A) has 7 cards in their hand. It becomes very difficult to get any real card advantage this way - unless the cards that Player A discards are worthless in the matchup. This is a major problem during games two and three of a match, and there are plenty of instances where Standstill is a below average play.

There are reasons that MUC's matchup against Goblins isn't terrible. One of them is Ancestral Visions.

[raharu]

Ancestral Visions is a card that lets you do other things with your mana other than play draw spells. MUC can use it to get the card advantage necessary for reaching the mid and late games all while playing cards that can slow down its opponent. It is also easier to protect AV with countermagic in the earlier turns.

Another disadvantage that Standstill has is that a smart player (Player B) can wait until the end step to play a weaker instant while the Standstill player (Player A) has 7 cards in their hand. It becomes very difficult to get any real card advantage this way - unless the cards that Player A discards are worthless in the matchup. This is a major problem during games two and three of a match, and there are plenty of instances where Standstill is a below average play.

There are reasons that MUC's matchup against Goblins isn't terrible. One of them is Ancestral Visions.
You're still keeping 7 out of 10 cards. That's just rediculious.

There are reason's that Landstill's Goblin's MU isn't terrible (sidenote: Kadaj has admited that unless you specifically tune your MUC build for Goblins that's it's going to be dismal, and the best it's going to get is 50/50). It's not just it's draw mech, just like Ancestral Visions doesn't win the Goblins mu.

[thefreakaccident]

....Landstill's MU isn't terrible against goblins... Whoever says otherwise is a fool.

UWb landstill actually boasts a positive MU against the little green bastards.

[TheRock]

You're still keeping 7 out of 10 cards. That's just rediculious.

There are reason's that Landstill's Goblin's MU isn't terrible (sidenote: Kadaj has admited that unless you specifically tune your MUC build for Goblins that's it's going to be dismal, and the best it's going to get is 50/50). It's not just it's draw mech, just like Ancestral Visions doesn't win the Goblins mu.

I think you've misunderstood me.

7 out of 10 when you already have 7 and you're still losing a card saccing Standstill is not a very good trade AT ALL when you don't have considerable amounts of dead or mediocre weight to pitch out the door.

I never made any mention about Landstill or how bad Standstill is. It's just that "SS > AV" is not always correct. Simple. Period.

[raharu]

I think you've misunderstood me.

7 out of 10 when you already have 7 and you're still losing a card saccing Standstill is not a very good trade AT ALL when you don't have considerable amounts of dead or mediocre weight to pitch out the door.

I never made any mention about Landstill or how bad Standstill is. It's just that "SS > AV" is not always correct. Simple. Period.
With that logic you could say that Brainstorm i a bad card if you aren't sandbagging lands or don't have any dead weight in hand. It's till 7 out of 10 cards. Yeah, you end up with 7 still, and you had 7 before, but if they're letting you refill your hand by waiting to break Standstill, AND you get to keep the best 7 out of 10 cards, that is still strong, correct?

[Mister Agent]

Obviously Standstill is the superior card I mean landstill is still a deck to beat because of standstill. I don't think there is much you can compare both cards are entirely different.

I think it will be more realistic to compare ancestral visions to draw spells like fact or fiction, jace, or meditate instead. But even so I'd still rather run the draw spells I just named in place of AV if I was playing general blue based control. It's better to take control of the game now instead of later especially in a format like Legacy.

[TrialByFire]

With that logic you could say that Brainstorm i a bad card if you aren't sandbagging lands or don't have any dead weight in hand. It's till 7 out of 10 cards. Yeah, you end up with 7 still, and you had 7 before, but if they're letting you refill your hand by waiting to break Standstill, AND you get to keep the best 7 out of 10 cards, that is still strong, correct?

Not as strong as say, just straight up drawing 3. Playing against Standstill this way (the strategy I use) negates the card advantage of Standstill and turns it into card filtering.
Think of it this way: Would you rather play Ancestral Recall, or the activated ability of Cephalid Colisseum?

[Srovex]

Since this thread is about different card advantage engines I thought to post this in here instead of creating a new thread for it:

This (http://mtgsalvation.com/846-vintage-30-the-silver-age.html) article at MtgSal mentions that Mystic Remora is pretty good in vintage, how well do you think it would fare in Legacy?
Obviously there are a lot more creature based decks and tactics, but the truth is that in this format there are mostly decks that play none to very little creatures. Even most creature based decks play alot non-creature spells. It would also be beating against combo (unless they have managed to resolve Chant before, comboing through 4x FoW and 4x Daze is going to be hard enough. Not to mention Extirpate and other disruptive instants if you have the mana open for it.) even only as SB option.

Downside of MRemora is obviously the cumulative upkeep. But face it, which blue-based controllish legacy deck can't draw the mana for it like a champ? They all (or atleast should) play ATLEAST brainstorm + fetchlands and SDT + fetchlands or Ponder. Having remora to help in there seems really good to me. So it pretty much negates its own drawback.




Disclaimer: I HAVEN'T tested Mystic Remora in ANY legacy decks so the whole post is just some quesswork. Please don't flame on me for this.

[Michael Keller]

Mystic Remora is a really good card. The thing is, in Legacy, there isn't a plethora of broken artifact mana where you can continually pay the cumulative upkeep on Remora and have extra mana to play spells to make it relevant. If you're being beat-down by a horde of dudes, what good is it? It's not bad, it's just not good enough.

[Opterown]

Haha, if you'd want to pay cumulative upkeep, you could combo Braid of Fire and Mystic Remora. Two cards, easily hated, both enchantments, U and R...
*goes off to test a crap deck*

[Jak]

Has anyone tried AV in an aggro-control deck? Maybe take the place of Predict in Thresh?

[Jak]

Me.
In Gro.
With Dryad.

One of the most boring decks I ever played. Much more boring than usual NQG list. I stopped the testing after about ten games.
Yes, AV (and the deck...) was very strong. But I did not play any Magical Gatherable Cards (TM), because I was totally occupied with all those shuffling, fetching, dazing, forcing, toping, revealing, brainstorming, pondering, accumulating, ancestraling and dryad+hoofprint counters.

Lol. But it was still strong, so it is worth looking into. I wouldn't stray to far from a regular Thresh list, because you shouldn't need to add cute things to make drawing 3 cards good.

[Team-Hero]

Playing against Standstill this way (the strategy I use) negates the card advantage of Standstill and turns it into card filtering.

Do you Hymn to Tourach as you break the Standstill? I'm just wondering how you get around the enchantment.

[Jak]

Do you Hymn to Tourach as you break the Standstill? I'm just wondering how you get around the enchantment.

Play something like Brainstorm on the opponent's end step and they draw 3, but usually have to discard down to 7. It makes it so they don't get to keep 7+ cards in hand during their turn. They still get to filter through the crap, but it is a better strategy.

[FoolofaTook]

Since this thread is about different card advantage engines I thought to post this in here instead of creating a new thread for it:

This (http://mtgsalvation.com/846-vintage-30-the-silver-age.html) article at MtgSal mentions that Mystic Remora is pretty good in vintage, how well do you think it would fare in Legacy?
Obviously there are a lot more creature based decks and tactics, but the truth is that in this format there are mostly decks that play none to very little creatures. Even most creature based decks play alot non-creature spells. It would also be beating against combo (unless they have managed to resolve Chant before, comboing through 4x FoW and 4x Daze is going to be hard enough. Not to mention Extirpate and other disruptive instants if you have the mana open for it.) even only as SB option.

Downside of MRemora is obviously the cumulative upkeep. But face it, which blue-based controllish legacy deck can't draw the mana for it like a champ? They all (or atleast should) play ATLEAST brainstorm + fetchlands and SDT + fetchlands or Ponder. Having remora to help in there seems really good to me. So it pretty much negates its own drawback.




Disclaimer: I HAVEN'T tested Mystic Remora in ANY legacy decks so the whole post is just some quesswork. Please don't flame on me for this.

Mystic Remora is really for two scenarios: turn 1 on the play against a theoretical play of 3+ cards on your opponent's part (mox, mox, something) or against a deck that you think is going to try to combo out by playing spells at some point pretty early. At least that's how it used to be used in the single format. I can't imagine that it has not just become more of all that in the last decade.

It's valuable in decks where you'd really like to slow the game down a bit so you don't care if your opponent just watches you pay cumulative upkeep for a few turns.

[TrialByFire]

Play something like Brainstorm on the opponent's end step and they draw 3, but usually have to discard down to 7. It makes it so they don't get to keep 7+ cards in hand during their turn. They still get to filter through the crap, but it is a better strategy.

This

[Illissius]

This

is the stupidest meme ever.

[xsockmonkeyx]

I think really the only time you should be playing AV is if a) You have the time to wait for it, and can control the board until then or b) You have some way to take advantage of the CMC of 0, like putting the damn thing on a Scepter or something.

Hrm....UW Scepter-Chant with AV?

Um, you can't stick it on a Scepter

[Pinder]

Um, you can't stick it on a Scepter

Oh man, I forgot how totally a sorcery that card is.

Good catch.

[mercenarybdu]

Visions can't be played for three full turns and in three turns anything could happen unless you enjoy the wait.

Standstill leaves forces the players to rethink how they are going to make plays while trying not to give the opposing faction three more cards.

[xsockmonkeyx]

Oh man, I forgot how totally a sorcery that card is.

Good catch.

Plus, if you could stick Vision on a stick, then it would have been done a LONG time ago.

[SpatulaOfTheAges]

Has anyone tried AV with Izzit Guildmage? Is there a way to make that good?

re: Remora - It's been tried now and then in Enchantress. It's good against Threshold and black aggro-control. But it's in, at best, your tertiary color, and Multani's Presence is in your primary, even if does nothing vs. black.

I'm not sure how many other decks can afford to keep it around long enough for it to be relevant.