Fox, what is your thinking with running Portent over Ponder? Is it just to miracle Terminus on their upkeep? Or is because you can target them and hopefully stick them with running dead draws? Or something else that I'm totally missing? Thanks.
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Fox, what is your thinking with running Portent over Ponder? Is it just to miracle Terminus on their upkeep? Or is because you can target them and hopefully stick them with running dead draws? Or something else that I'm totally missing? Thanks.
Aether Vial is legal, so Vedict is uncastable (vs DnT it costs ~6 mana, dead by turn 6), thus Terminus. As you've noted, Portent is better for setting up a Terminus than Ponder. We can spend a moment to note that New Teferi can turn on Ponder-Terminus, but this is a little bit magical christmas'y (also at that point we should be nearing 6 mana, and just +1 New Teferi and instant-speed hardcast Terminus).
Fringe benefits of Portent:
-Draw through Leo/Narset/Labyrinth
-Enter opponent's turn with 8 in hand
-Magical christmas New Teferi +1, respond to discard spell by casting [last card in hand] Portent
-Opponent on the draw mulls, scry to top -> Portent target opponent, shuffle (or dunk)
-Big Teferi -3 -> Portent target opponent, shuffle
-Has text vs Sterling Grove/Lim-Dul's Vault/Personal Tutor-type effects
Ponder can look for a land [most often] and play it that turn. Being turbo-linear makes Ponder a more powerful card, but it has pretty much zero off-label uses (at least without New Teferi on board). Ponder will favor combo (to include Counterbalance combo, aka miracles), and/or lower land count decks needing to find land #2 and play it on curve. In the same way JTMS favors lower land decks with dead combo/combo-ish draws (ex. redundant CB, Myth Realized in the midgame, SnT pieces), while Big Teferi favors higher land count, draw-go control. Just going to quickly re-emphasize that a UW MythStill build is a better home for Ponder + JTMS, and I'd still recommend Terminus there.
While my build is about as draw-go control as you can get in UW, it has a very specific force multipliers it is trying to hit - namely that Big Teferi, Azcanta, and Standstill all find eachother. Once they all meet up you're potentially out-drawing an opponent 7-to-1 (draw step, +1 tick, double Azcanta activations, Standstill crack), in a UW shell that is designed to not deck itself. Big Teferi is the most difficult piece to open up with, and Portent allows me (at 5 lands) to set up & then cast Terminus on their turn, untap/draw and play Teferi. Ponder has more variance at this stage in the game, not only because of the 1/2 turn delay - it also would require 6 mana on the turn I would ideally like to go for Big Teferi (+1 from Terminus). Once you get to late game, even Portent just used as blindly draw a card + force opponent to topdeck their worst card will win games that Ponder can't.
Thank you for the insight
@Fox Oh I see. Thank you very much for the good explanation !
Failed to fire another win-a-dual series due to entry costs discouraging regulars unfortunately. Luckily another store in town was hosting $5 legacy around the same time so I got 4 rounds in.
-R1 vs casual/budget mill deck (2-0) both games ended with Teferi ult. New player to the format, great personality and seemed to genuinely enjoy his first legacy experience; hopefully he sticks with it and buys into the format.
-R2 vs DnT (0-2) mulls to 6 and 5 to find any land in either game.
-R3 vs Burn (2-1) game 1 Mentor gets there with 1 life left. Game 2 pretty sure I died on like turn 3. Game 3 flash bear (C. Priest) and Factory get there, aided by their Vortex.
-R4 vs Sneak and Show (2-1) opponent has bad opening hand luck all three games; mulls to 6 and 6 and 5. Game 1 he got there, but in games 2/3 he runs into too much hate and generally died to Humility (either in play or being priced into FoW E-Tutor since I'd hold it in hand waiting for SnT to resolve).
While testing new Teferi (loss of 2x Blessed Alliance) probably means I have to find room for CoP:Red in the board. That said, I'll probably be trying -4 slot SBs once Vista is out (+1 Mountain, +3 REB effect). New Teferi is good enough for further 1/1 split testing, but the board is going to be getting pretty congested. I really dislike the idea of CoP:Red, but I don't know if there's a better option with the SB space, so open to suggestions there.
I think my record is something like 1-84 against Burn.
It's mostly unwinnable in my mind, so I've been really tempted with CoP:Red or something like Aegis of Honor.
Impressed you were able to even get one game win in, let alone the match.
Do you think Hall of Heliod's Generosity is worth a colorless mana source? Recurring Standstill seems super awesome, but I'm worried it's greedy and only serves a winmore role when it does work. Losing a Search to countermagic or a Wasteland and having an option to return it isn't nothing also.
I already have a copy of Noxious Revival, and it does come up to let them crack the Standstill, counter their threats, deploy my own and recur the Standstill to lock them out with the advantage.
Any thoughts?
If we have some sick enchantments like humility to bring back, i'd totally be down to play it. Just bringing back standstill actually sounds almost good enough. Assuming of course that you're control elements are doing their jobs.
It's probably not really worth it but if you plan on building on Hall of Heliod's Generosity more you could also try Soul Snare which has been discussed for U/W Landstill again and again because it allows to drop Standstill even in unfavorable board states. Hall might be a reason to give this some serious consideration.
If you're dead-set on using Heliod's, I'd pick an enchant that deals with TNN + Mother of Runes over Soul Snare; preferably one that can also kill >1 thing, or keeps them from playing a second threat (Porphyry Nodes). In terms of what you can get away with in terms of colorless lands, you have 6 slots at most to work with (3x are Factory). Add in Heliod's and you're either not playing any Wasteland, or you're only playing 2x (which isn't that reliable). The matchup against Dark Depths will worsen significantly. I still think I'd rather have recursion potential sitting on the 1x Noxious Revival since it can buy back the wincons (PWs), offer interaction, be recurred with SCM, and be found by Azcanta.
Hi everyone, I got into Magic again after a very long break (~10 years), my favourite deck back then was UW Landstill with counter-top combo. After checking new cards and sifting a bit through this thread I tried to assemble a new list considering some budget constraints (no dual lands, tabernacle, etc).
A pretty interesting card is Narset, Parter of Veils, perfect for mirror matches with other control decks, and can help Counterbalance in case of a missing Top. I tried to board a flexible amount of removals both for creatures and other permanents, a couple of enlightened tutor would definitely help to pick the best artefact in every scenario but I can't decide what to exclude.
Going to the miracles, Terminus is very interesting and surprisingly bad when not instantly played, I just keep it for aggro, whilst Entreat the Angels is a perfect wincon for this deck.
Both Teferi, Time Raveler and Ashiok, Dream Render are on my watchlist, at least for the side.
Lands (23)
3x Island
2x Plains
4x Hallowed Fountain
1x Steam Vents
4x Flooded Strand
2x Polluted Delta
1x Academy Ruins
1x Karakas
4x Mishra's Factory
1x Wasteland
Counters (10)
3x Force of Will
1x Misdirection
2x Spell Pierce
2x Counterspell
2x Counterbalance
Artifacts (6)
2x Sensei's Divining Top
1x Crucible of Worlds
1x Engineered Explosives
1x Ratchet Bomb
1x Vedalken Shackles
Removals (8)
1x Detention Sphere
2x Wrath of God
1x Terminus
4x STP
Misc (13)
1x Fact or Fiction
4x Brainstorm
3x Standstill
2x Mission Briefing
2x Jace TMS
1x Entreat the Angels
Mate,
Top is now banned...
Bye
Played some legacy tonight with a few modifications to old list:
+1 new Teferi, -1 Mentor
+2 Snare, -2 Cspell
+1 basic Island, -1 Tundra
+4 Vista, -4 [not-Strand] Fetch
SB changes:
+1 Ashiok, Dream Render, -1 new Teferi (moved to main)
+2 Hydroblast, -1 Disenchant, -1 Surgical
+1 Aegis of Honor, -1 CJ
There's a lot I don't like with Snare (mainly SnT), but we're at a point in legacy where you kinda can't not play it b/c Dreadhorde/Goyf/Wrenn/Snapcaster. Snare is at least friendlier to higher land counts and/or less mana-intensive payoff cards (a card like SFM for example). Snare probably a good deal less useful in a deck like miracles which has paired lower land counts [with >8 cantrips] and high cost payoffs - they have a more pressing need to cantrip towards that mana (i.e. tapping out of Snare on turn 1).
Cutting down to one Mentor definitely makes the solitary Mentor better (+1 prowess generating card), but the lowered odds of finding it will eventually cause losses to Burn and TNN. On the plus side, it's a little less miserable to only have one in the face of Plague Engineer's recent popularity. Getting new Teferi #2 in this slot has the benefit of turning Factories into better maindeck PW assassins. The prevalence of Wrenn necessitates the 2x Hydroblast, so I just threw the last slot into even more anti-burn w/ Aegis rather than having a random anti-TNN singleton (thanks for suggestion @PirateKing).
Vista is absurdly overpowered, and you're just racking up statistically significant losses by not playing it with this deck. Pairing this change with -1 Tundra has also noticeably reduced death by Tundra opening hands. As long as Wrenn is clogging up legacy, it's probably incorrect to try 2x Strand/2x Tarn/4x Vista + SB Mountain & REBs configurations.
Ashiok is mostly a test card, but my games against newer iterations of value piles turn rapidly into meaninglessly long, tedious, and boring affairs which generally end in one player milling out. The yard nuking and mill on Ashiok might be one of the more useful tools to speed these games along. Bonus utility vs GSZ/KotR, Reanimator, Loam, and Infernal Tutor/PiF/Cabal Rit. Between all the removal, Karakas, and maindeck permission, I figure that CP and RiP's absolute hate is probably good enough for Reanimator.
------
R1 vs TES (2-0): game 1 there is a questionable Thoughtseize taking Teferi over a FoW; of note his Empty for 8 gobbos was dealt with by Azcanta ramping to hardcast Terminus mana. Game 2 he mulls to 5 and will never have time to get out from under 3 Wastelands and Powder Keg killing Petal/Chrome Mox/Mox Opal.
R2 vs Maverick (1-1): game 1 opponent can't recover from 2x Terminus but plays about 10 fairly pointless turns until Mentor forces the concession - were this competitive REL, I would have held Mentor and elected to win by Teferi ult into using Teferi to never deck while they either conceded or milled out without any permanents. Game 2 opponent plays very well and is able to keep me from finding a window to cast Humility effectively.
R3 vs DnT (2-0): game 1 they have double Vial hand, but can't draw a Flickerwisp (or Recruiter) and concede to Teferi ult. Game 2 opponent's draws are really poor, and I have Karakas vs his Thalia; he concedes once Azcanta goes live.
R4 vs 4c Wrenn Delver: split and head home.
Hey Source Landstill Pilots
Came over here from mtgsalvation since the Landstill thread over there is literally non-existent. Thought I had lost my box of competitive decks and my binder almost 10 years ago; turns out it was just my binder and I found the box with my old MonoR Burn and UWr Landstill deck. Unfortunate that my story sounds like the other new guy and our lists our similar.
I'm hoping to put together the new primer for that site, as well as update my deck for the next month's Knight Ware event. Given that my knowledge and tech is woefully out of date, I'd love hear some feedback.
Manabase - 23
3x Tundra
1x Plateau
1x Volcanic Island
4x Flooded Strand
1x Arid Mesa
1x Scalding Tarn
2x Island
2x Plains
3x Mishra's Factory
3x Wasteland
1x Tolaria West
1x Karakas
Denial - 11
4x Force of Will
3x Counterspell
3x Spell Snare
1x Fact or Fiction
Draw - 10
4x Brainstorm
4x Standstill
2x Jace the Mind Sculptor
Removal - 11
4x Swords to Plowshares
2x "Sweeper"
3x Engineered Explosives
2x Humility
Utility/Creatures - 4
1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2x Vendilion Clique
1x Eternal Dragon
1x Crucible of Worlds
Having looked at Fox's list and his posts, my most immediate changes would likely be:
- 1 Dragon
- 1 Fact or Fiction
- 2 4cmc Sweepers (Are Wrath, Day of Judgment, and Supreme Verdict considered that inferior to Terminus?)
+ 3 Terminus
+ 1 Azcanta
I'd love to include Teferi, Time Raveler, but I'm loathe to cut Elspeth, which seems the most likely candidate to be replaced to my old eyes. Probably just nostalgia. Anyways, any feedback would be appreciated, I've enjoyed reading and catching up on 1.5, even if my pet archetype isn't around as much anymore. Have lots of other questions but this post is long enough as it is for now. Cheers.
- cm
Manabase:
-if 3c Fetch x9 = 4x Vista, 2x Strand, 3x Tarn -> basic Mountain in SB. Extra Fetch comes from Wasteland cut.
-If 2c Fetch x8 = 4x Vista, 4x Strand.
-Tundra down to 1x -> +2 Island
-Volc and Plateau out
-cut Tolaria West, land count to 22.
[+1 slot]
Counterspells:
-3 Cspell, +2 FoN
-Snare to 2x
-cut FoF
[+4 slot]
Draw:
-Portent x4
-JTMS is fine, but 5cmc Teferi is more in-line with the goals of hard control.
[+0 slots]
Removal:
-Humility to 0x
-EE to 0x
-Wrath up to 3x. While Verdict is a better Wrath, you can't ever cast it against DnT's Port (and there is no room for the Astrolabe stuff, thus Terminus)
[+4 slots]
Utility/Creatures:
-Remove all 5 cards you had.
-Snapcaster x3
-Mentor x1
[+5 slots]
5 extra slots = 2x Teferi (3cmc), 2x Azcanta, 1x free slot. If you really love the Crucible, it lives in the sideboard and we put a Karn in the maindeck.
The two things that really matter to winrate are nuking dual land numbers down to 1 and adding 3x Snapcaster. Just doing these things will add ~10-20% winrate immediately.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Thank you for all the advice. I particularly appreciate the tidbit about the biggest bang for the buck change I can make is adding in SCM and Vistas. I'm guessing that this is because SCM offers virtual card advantage by virtue of reusing spent Instant/Sorceries and essentially reads as "1U, ambush target attacking creature", and the prevalence of non-basic hate? Would love to hear the insight behind some of the card choices.
It really looks like dropping to two colors might be the way to go, since I was only in R for the sake of REB/Pyroblast and Firespout to deal with Fish and Gobbo decks, and EE @ 3. What am I missing that's worth splashing R for?
I see how Portent is great for setting up an opponent turn Miracle or potentially disrupting their draw.
Dropping Humility seems scary to me as it has always felt particularly back-breaking against anything creature based, and because of how it lets us outclass most things with a Factory, but I guess I can put that into the leftover free slot. Are we at the point it's simply a "win-more" card, as opposed to something that can help us catch up?
Monastery Mentor I can see as a cheaper Elspeth, along with being a faster win-con, so that makes sense. Small Teferi and Azcanta in particular are cards I previously would have never considered, so reading up on those takes was neat.
EDIT: Where do Legacy players test builds these days? Way back when, Cockatrice was the platform of choice, but it was shut down.
If you play SCM x3 with 4x Swords, you're just going to win a lot of games of legacy regardless of the other 53 cards in your deck. On top of this, SCM is one of the best threats to have when followed up with Standstill; they lose a dude to flashback [usually] and then have to discard a removal spell to deal with SCM, if they have it, when you go to cast Standstill [which means Factory is that much harder to deal with]. You can do the ambush blocks as well, but the removal/wraths make the need for this play pretty uncommon.
Red would only be for the SB Mountain + 3x REB trick, and maybe a sideboard EE. There's so much going on at 2 mana though that Snare main and Hydroblast in board is going to be fine on 2c.
Portent also is just way better in a late game (screwing up opponent draws or shuffling off a [-3] big Teferi activation), and it invalidates Narset (and this is on top of 3cmc Teferi + manlands which can easily murder Narset).
Humility costs 4 mana & isn't blue; it also lacks text against a lot of decks. The card is fine, but it should live in the board so it's never drawn in a matchup it can't impact. What it's doing in game 1 is pretty well covered by Terminus, and Snapcaster recasting Plow (turning off SCM with Humility is higher variance). Once you get to the board there is no shortage of derpy artifacts and white cards. You have Deafening Silence [soon], Ethersworn, RiP, EE-type card, Humility, and others - it's just not that hard to play 1x of these and add 1x E-Tutor to the board to virtually manipulate numbers. Play big Teferi and you have zero incentive to not have a 1x B2B (and you also stop caring about wasting any resources on a Choke, remember you also have blue mana coming off Azcanta).
Other than paper, I don't think there is a way to test for free. I guess you could find someone to play with over Skype, and point webcams at playmats. :tongue:
This makes sense. The more I read and think about the inclusion of Teferi, Time Raveler and SCM, the more I realize how ridiculous the synergy it has with SCM is. Or rather, just how absurd SCM is.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Gonna assume you mean Narset, Parter of Veils. Is this a common hate card against control-archetypes, and who runs it?Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
This point brings up a great point; as a whole, is the Legacy-meta no longer dominated by creature-based decks? My understanding is that CB/Top Miracles did a fantastic job choking a lot of those out, but with the banning of Top, I would have thought they, or at least U-splash tempo decks would make a comeback (in line with what Delver.dek seems to be). It seems like the quality of creature cards only seems to have improved overall during my absence, so I'm interested in what you think your "average" metagame would look like.
EDIT: Disregard the above, spent some time in the main forum, am currently reading about how:
GB Depths
BR Reanimator
RUG Delver
Bomberman
ANT
seem to be the major players at the moment.
On to the "Karnboard" as I've come to call it; you've already mentioned CoW in the SB. Any other particular artifacts that you find particularly helpful that Karn can bring in?
Sideboard
Grave Hate
3x Faerie Macabre
1x Grafdigger's Cage
Storm Hate
2x Ethersworn Canonist
3x Spell Pierce
Other?
1x Enlightened Tutor
1x Humility
1x Crucible of Worlds
1x Back to Basics
2x Engineered Explosives
Appreciate your input as always. Expecting to get washed next month, but hopefully I'll be able to post some useful insights on my experiences there. I'll post up the list I eventually take and the results.
Hi Fox, do you happen to have a list you’re running currently? Tried to piece it together from your previous comments and having trouble doing so. Thanks!Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Island x4
Plains x2
Tundra x1
Karakas x1
Strand x4
Vista x4
Mishra's Factory x3
Wasteland x3
SCM x3
Mentor x1
small Teferi x2
big Teferi x2
Standstill x4
Azcanta x2
Brainstorm x4
Portent x4
Plow x4
FoW x4
Terminus x3
Spell Snare x2
FoN x1
CJ x1
Noxious x1
SB
E Tutor x1
B2B x1
RiP x1
Humility x1
Canonist x1 (change to Deafening Silence)
C Priest x2
Hydroblast x2
Powder Keg x1
Disenchant x1
Ashiok x1
Sacred Ground x1
Spiritual Focus x1
Aegis of Honor x1 (last 3 here change often)
Haven't played this deck since Scroll of Fate became legal, recent printings dictate UW Dreadstill is better positioned (better able to maximize small Teferi).
In this meta with the depths decks....you need to play blood moonQuote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Um, no. No reason to turn off Karakas and Wastelands. As built, that list rarely loses to Depths.
There is no reason to destabilize my list's mana to run a card I don't even want on the table...which also allows opponent to make a Lage with land drop [Depths into Moon] + removal for Moon.
True...with 4 plows and 3 snaps. Thats plenty of ammoQuote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Those seven cards do something yes...Quote:
Originally Posted by KobeBryan
Then you add Karakas and Wasteland, then you add Portent/Terminus, then you add 3cmc Teferi (which is where the overkill begins, see also no more Crop Rot). The complete denial of Crop Rot response [Teferi] paired with Wasteland is a key difference between Standstill and any other 3x SCM/4x Plow deck. Even when those other decks [mis]use Teferi, their manabase [land count] will struggle to hardcast a Terminus at instant speed post-Teferi (ofc they also lack a plan to navigate this matchup to this point).
You get to the SB games and in come ~6 cards that are going to offer direct challenges to the Depths gameplan, on top of all the stuff the maindeck was already doing to them. Let's take a quick look over at Depths SB and make a note of how little Choke can do to an Azcanta +/- 5cmc Teferi and how useless Veil of Summer really is against 3cmc Teferi. About the only thing Depths does that can reliably matter is copy Factory and play the manland subgame...which is only a possibility if the Standstill pilot actually deploys one.
When you have discard [vs Brainstorm subgame] to try and break up Plow, Snap-Plow but you run into the Wasteland subgame into upkeep Terminus/Teferi/any number of nightmarish effects, the Depths player really has no great window of opportunity to go for it. Even if they try a Hexmage assassination, they're down 1 Lage-maker and Teferi is still alive while the ability is on the stack...so Waste your Stage or Depths, force them to make the 20/20 into Plow with locked-out Crop Rot. This build takes the opponent's skill and experience on Depths and invalidates it - it's not just that Moon is a wrong idea, but that by playing it you would be actively helping your opponent by giving them an out.
I dont think UW needs blood moon to deal with a marit lege. The deck already has swords+snap and whatever you bring in postboard. Plus they cant do anything about a baby teferi
Thanks! Couple interesting card choices, changes I would make -Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Azcantra vs Narset, partner of Veils
Big teferi vs Jace, TMS
What do you think?
Also what is noxious?
Narset has issues with tapping out, getting to Impulse, then dying to Bolt. You're also putting a card in hand for an opponent to discard. Narset is good against monarch mechanic, Grisel (if you get to this point), and enchantress. She's rather average in blue mirrors as she will likely be taken down in combat.
I think that JTMS does precious little behind a Standstill. Also, I like ignoring Choke and being able to mitigate B2B (I would not run this in the board otherwise). JTMS is always going to be fine b/c he can draw cards, but he's meant for combo decks [Counterbalance] and tap-out-and-jam [Czech Pile types: Shardless, Blade, Grixis, 4c Wrenn, etc...]. If you're playing Myth Realized or constructing a non-harmonious deck (for example playing >2 Mentor, a card which is its own worst topdeck), then JTMS is better used.
The combination of cutting Azcanta and big Teferi is a linked choice away from a strategy of getting the most out of higher land counts. This likely puts a sequence into motion where you move towards Myth Realized, and potentially also towards Verdict (i.e. the never running into DnT gambit). Once you've lost the bigger land focus, you're playing mostly the same strategy as miracles...except your deck has more variance with manlands and Standstill [which can't be spammed into any board state like a Counterbalance].
If you're running JTMS in Standstill, it kinda has to be your only viable option for payoff. That's mostly UB Standstill; it should also be noted that they just gained Murderous Rider which you can just recur to hand with JTMS [-1], so they're at a point where Jace has never been better for them.
Noxious = Noxious Revival.
Why do you believe UW is better?Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
I think we were talking about Marit Lage matchup, so going to answer why I think UW Standstill is better than any other UW deck vs Depths (though I think I answered this satisfactorily last time):Quote:
Originally Posted by KobeBryan
The other UW decks are less likely to run Wasteland, Karakas, and as many instant speed wrath-enablers (Portent and small Teferi). By itself, small Teferi butchers Crop Rot and Veil of Summer, which are responsible for boosting Depths‘ win %. Standstill has no problem running the not-Decay‘able Humility. Big Teferi + Azcanta means there is little to no reason to fight the Choke copies the opponent will be diluting deck with, and tapping out for. The end-game is big Teferi ult; if it gets to this point Depths has zero outs.
Every other UW deck has Swords and SCM (except for RiP/Helm, should be no SCM there), so they‘re all on the “hope this is good enough and please don‘t Surgical my Plows“ plan as well...but they don‘t have a solved late-game they get to work towards, where they win by default. Their on-board (i.e. not-discardable) tools/prison elements are worse.
I see but do u think the dreadnought version is better right now with scrollQuote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Oh that, a little off topic for this thread but UW Standstill ran out of slots is the main issue. You can't not play small Teferi, but each one you add makes deck worse vs TNN and Burn (no more room for Blessed Alliance). You can't really cut the big mana/big Teferi+Azcanta+Standstill pieces due to need to keep pace with Wrenn*. About the only area left to cut is the Portents, which means we'd need a combination ban of Terminus and Vial, allowing us to play Verdict x3 and gain ~1-2x slots [cuts to Portent] for cards targeted at Wrenn. It's just not really acceptable to have Vial/Thalia/Port + flood the board with dudes running around immune to wrath, from a game design standpoint. The other option would be to print a wrath at instant speed so you can stop the Port nonsense (Settle the Wreckage was a whiff).
When it comes to Dreadnought + Standstill, it's just better a better deck at maximizing small Teferi's passive. Scroll of Fate + Teferi is comical, and Dreadnought is far better at playing colorless/white mana hands + pitch spells. You also get to drop big Teferi for Karn, and you just randomly destroy helpless combo and Chalice decks - and all this time you're playing around REB, without losing access to murdering lands with your PW [particularly lands that tap for say...red]. The whole Karn -> Coating -> bounce a Walker with Teferi or animate + Plow any problem permanent is just dumb. Against linear decks without shields you have more ways to just 2-tap em out of the game happening before a Mentor would have started his first attack.
Value piles have always struggled against something as simple as unending parade of EoT 2/2s. If UW Standstill had a velocity positive way of tutoring a Field of the Dead effect, maybe it would fill the void against the not-Delver Wrenn users, though even that would be high variance against the Wrenn/Wasteland stuff. As it stands a card like Dawn of Hope is nowhere near competitively-costed [and I don't like dies to Spell Snare on such a bailout-style card], but that'd be the kind of card text we'd need to see. Who knows, maybe the next Elspeth will adequately do this at 3 mana without being blue. Gideon can't pull double duty against Burn; no lifelink and 4 mana is too slow.
*This bigger mana contraption that combines to recreate virtual Griselbrand (draw for turn + azcanta + big Teferi + drop Standstill + untap and re-fire Azcanta = 7 cards) is what makes the deck the deck sufficiently different from Counterbalance combo. While Standstill is a "bad" deck (i.e. inconsistency traded for raw power), it is not a "worse" deck than something that already exists. The "worse" trap is best exemplified by every UWx Blade deck ever made, which will ever be a way to win less games than Counterbalance or Czech Pile-type deck.
Any updates post the Wrenn ban? I was looking at a myth realized build and it looks quite fun.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
@Puggl3 no updates at this time. The slots are still too tight to deal with Oko profitably. Right now the Wastelands aren't at their best, but you also can't cut really them b/c of Depths. It's really rough, but I think the best thing you can do is cut Wasteland down to 2x and add a Volc for SB Blast x3. There's maybe the option to go down to no Wasteland, add 2x Trop and play your own Okos and SB Veil, but it seems kinda sketchy. The green approach is probably better (lifegain vs Burn and UR Delver), but I feel like Oko is getting banned in like 2 announcements so I won't advise buying him (and by proxy, zero interest in misleading people to buy ~2x Trop to enable a card I think is already on the way out).
On the banning stuff, lots of people are saying "ban Astrolabe," but the issue with that is that it would be a gigantic boosting of BUG Delver to the best Oko deck; and we just banned Wrenn to 'nerf' a best Delver deck...really don't think we're going to see BUG Delver boosted to tier 1 (or possibly tier 0). Oko is the ban here, and it leads to huge downward regulation of Astrolabe, which then cascades down to no more widespread playing of Teferi [3cmc].
I really don't like the REB approach off a Volc, but yes you can do it and it won't cost $100 (or w/e the going rate on 2x Oko is). In UW Landstill you'd be heavily incentivized to counter Oko on the stack with REB (can't let him animate an Astrolabe and snipe a Teferi or get a threat before you are about to Standstill), and despite it being a red card it will still lose decisively to Veil. I think it's still Dreadstill as the best UW Landstill list at this time.
Legacy_Council (Ark4n11) streamed UWr Standstill yesterday with @TheSemiotician and myself on the group call to a 4-1 finish. League was Cat, Snake, Kraken, Cat, Elves! - loss to Snake. The VoD can be found on Twitch (can’t link on ipad) :frown:
List was:
[21 land]
4x Vista
4x Strand
4x Snow-Island
2x Snow-Plains
1x Tundra
1x Karakas
3x Factory
2x Wasteland
[3 creature]
3x SCM
[4 PWs]
2x Teferi 3cmc
2x Teferi 5cmc
[32 spells]
4x FoW
4x Portent
4x Brainstorm
4x Plow
3x Terminus
3x Standstill
2x FoN
1x Snare
1x CJ
1x Shark’nado
1x Astrolabe
1x Sevinne’s
1x E Tutor
1x Azcanta
1x Noxious
SB all 1-ofs:
C. Priest
Mentor
Deafening Silence
B2B
RiP
Snow-Mountain
REB
Pyroblast
Active Volcano
Powder Keg
Blessed Alliance
Stony Silence
Humility
Ashiok
Surgical
Ran on my UW skeleton [updated with Dreadstill tech] with TheSemiotician’s cycle-Turtle build. He was running into trouble with inability to run Wasteland with 3c (cycle-Turtle is a legend, and lots of Karakas around), so we shifted back to the hard control shell without maindeck red. The deck still has some issues with lack of slots resulting in missing tools, but as long as Oko is hating out budget Delver (UR) and Burn, and Lurrus decks being unable to beat Terminus while drastically dropping TNN and Delver’s PW use, the deck has reasonable positioning. Both of those strategies using Veil and Decay continue to keep Counterbalance and Hymn hated out of the format to an acceptable degree.
Not much room to work with, but I like dumping Mentor to the SB (since it’s a miserable topdeck against Oko ult) in exchange for Sevinne’s. Getting cantrip clause on easy E-Tutor targets (Shark’nado and Astrolabe) creates its own space with a pretty free cut to the 4th Standstill, as you can now effectively cycle E Tutor with purpose. Astrolabe noticeably decreases mulligans (Plains hands are more keepable) and does the whole build you own Gush with 3cmc Teferi. Shark’nado* enables openers of E Tutor on opponent EoT -> turn 2 Standstill with a deployable threat in hand (which happens to play around Wasteland and can block a Delver), and occasionally you get to hardcast it, thus creating what is effectively The Hive...with Sharks! So just more of that old school draw-go control feeling than Mentor ever had. The CJ maindeck and triple Blast effects from the board are there to hate out Oko as much as is possible. Here Active Volcano reminds us that Veil counter REB (so use the destroy mode) while also letting us dumpster Infernal Tutor and bounce Yorion’s enchanted Isands** (all this when it’s not saving Tundra from a Wasteland). There is also the upside of 3 differently named Blast effects playing around Surgical and saying “no” to Meddling Mage nonsense coming out of UWR Lurrus.
I like that the SB was able to get back at least 1 copy of Blessed Alliance, but the rest of the slots are kinda hard to fiddle with as long as Oko remains legal. Too many artifact and manlands running around to pass up Powder Keg for EE. Most flexible spots are probably Surgical or Deafening Silence. In the maindeck, the only other idea we toyed around with was Field of Ruin since it’s mostly about killing Karakas, and it helps mana fixing (particularly red postboard). The one new effect to most seriously consider, despite the egregious cost, is Dismantling Wave vs Counterbalance nonsense. The counterpoint though would be that at such mana totals it should probably just be a 13/13 Emmy to combo with Karakas endlessly.
*Shark’nado for x=0 kills Bridge from Below; don’t miss this line when it comes up.
**remember that casting local enchantments like Abundant Growth requires targeting, which allows Active Volcano to deny the enchant itself as well as the draw trigger....as well as the later would-be Yorion flicker for draw trigger.
I have a feeling that landstill decks need to start playing lurrus immediately.
Giving up the PW made specifically for manland decks (3cmc Teferi) is highly dubious. The enchantment version of Thing in the Ice [Ominous Seas] is still Thing in the Ice at the end of the day (this is what is seeing play in these shells). Also just do a quick count of creatures in Standstill that cause opponents to discard removal spells so that Lurrus doesn’t immediately get tagged the moment he resolves. Next, count up the mana you need to play Lurrus and get value in this deck - that’s PW mana.Quote:
Originally Posted by thefreakaccident
If you want to cheese wins off Lurrus it’s easier to spam CB into any board state and ride its infinite value as it counters all the kill spells the opponent’s hand will be full of at that time.
Played a modified list yesterday but tried to stay as close to the original as possible for testing purposes :-) https://deckbox.org/sets/2650979Quote:
Originally Posted by Fox
I wanted to test a better manabase that would allow Mystic Sanctuary instead of Noxious Revival (obvious synergy with Active Volcano :>) as well as add a Volcanic Island in order to get more virtual red than the current 6 sources. Sideboard-wise I added From the Ashes right before my event, but in retrospect it should have been this Ajani, not that it mattered anyway.
I felt I needed a Pithing Needle at some point and Search for Azcanta felt very underwhelming even though I recognize its importance in the deck. But overall quite happy with the current 75. Some cards I'm considering for the sideboard:
- Gideon of the Trials
- Elspeth, Knight-Errant
- Pithing Needle
- Volcanic Island
- Meddling Mage
- Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
I'm also willing to try green instead of red to play Oko myself.
I would tend to agree with Fox here. Mostly because having less creatures than the rest of the field blanks removal. Lurrus could be a sideboard card however, where your opponent might side out said removal, but even then it doesn't rebuy enough of the deck so Sevinne's is almost always better.Quote:
Originally Posted by thefreakaccident
The thing about Noxious is that it re-ups 5cmc Teferi, and as a game goes long it turns into Vamp Tutor [effectively]. I would also rather start a game with 1x Fetch + Noxious than Fetch + Sanctuary. Noxious also has quite a bit of text vs aggressive combo, starting on turn 0. The Shark'nado also provides a pretty good cycling option for Noxious.
The play patterns of Sanctuary and WW spells leads to poor decisions of passing the turn after finding Tundra too early, locking yourself [vs enemy Wasteland] into a multi-turn window of Daze being live. Sanctuary also incentivizes you to drop Vista, which would represent a highly noticeable loss of win %. If you're adding a land, it's probably Tarn x1 as 9th Fetch.
Both Gideon and Elspeth fail the Flame-Tongue Kavu PW test (lose to Oko's 3/3s and also cost 1 more mana).
Needle is one of those cards you have to name Oko with, no matter what the problem permanent is; this card would be narrow, coming in only against Grisel and specifically DnT's Vial. Not going to rely on Needle vs Merfolk, humans, and definitely not Goblins (most maindeck Shatter effects in legacy). The deck already has Wasteland and Karakas and Teferi (3cmc) and Plow/Terminus, so we don't really need more help vs Depths strategies. Remember that R/G lands was nice enough to begin abandoning Rish Port, and FoN exiles Loam so we don't need to worry about GQ lock (also they play Oko so that's the only card we could name).
JVP would be misused, this card is for UB Reanimator and Dreadstill (decks with heavier mana denial that need the untap step). Also unlike Dreadstill, you can't EoT him with Scroll of Fate with Teferi locking opponent off the stack. Also UWstill has no way to use JVP as Ensnaring Bridge hate (face-down Dreadnought, [+1] down to 0/2, declare attack, flip, take 10 Bridge user). This is the level of utility you need to have to justify JVP in not-Reanimator.
Meddling Mage is a creature, and doubles down on losing hard to Oko. What are you worried about naming/what matchups?
Oko I've talked about in this thread somewhere, but the moment you run him you're on Astrolabe/Uro/Ice-Fang, so you've lost all your space to be Standstill, so you just play 4c Oko.
@Fox I agree with most points you've made except they're not as clear cut for me as they are for you (yet) so I'll just keep asking myself "Do I want this X to be Y?" whenever it comes up I think :-)
Needle is what I first though of against Oko mainly (since there's already a copy of Enlightened Tutor), with additional uses in other matchups, sure it will get decayed, but that would be one decay off my Teferi or Back to Basics if I decided to bring it against a Yorion pile for instance. This is how I see my hate pieces anyway, just a sum of disruption that my opponent has to go through before dealing with the functioning of my strategy. Meddling Mage would name whatever it is that I lose to, increasing by one the amount of steps my opponent has to take before winning. I like him versus combo in general and am hesitating between him and Lavinia. If I committed a slot of my sideboard to Meddling Mage for Oko, I would then name Oko. The reasoning is the same for Zirda and Gyruda matchups.
My point is that I like a diversified hate that doesn't all die to the same anti-hate my weak matchups would bring in.
Noxious Revival can act as Time Walk sometimes too but that's rare enough that I didn't mention it, more often it's graveyard "hate" as you hinted :-) I think I disagree about Oko forcing more than just 4 Arcum's Astrolabe however, I'll try and browse the past discussion before I think again about it.
Gideon is a target for Decay and this is what I dislike the most about it honestly, since you bring it for matchups where opponent will definitely side in Decays. Elspeth is a way to have a better edge against control matchups, haven't actually tested but that the reasoning behind it anyway.
I'll keep testing a little more before I make more changes regardless. Though I think I'll keep the split between Ponder and Portent since I've lost a couple games not being able to draw my land drops with Portent.
Oh you meant that Gideon, I thought you mean Gideon of the 2/2s. 3cmc Gideon is anti-storm only, but they printed a card 3x less expensive and an E-Tutor target (Deafening Silence).
On the Needle stuff, you need to be careful about going down a card to Needle Oko; you‘ve just given your opponent time to assemble 5 mana and cast a 4/5 that can draw them ~4x cards. Needle is one of those cards I wouldn‘t put in a SB without Karn in the main.