-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Hi all, I've been playing Phillip's list for about 1.5 months now (running his exact 75 until I understand the deck enough to tweak it myself, for now I'm bowing to his experience and long hours of testing :smile:) and need some help with sideboarding. In particular, the BBD-esque UWR Stoneblade decks. I've just been overloading on Blast effects (Blue and Red) and countermagic (counterspell, flusterstorm) and removing things like FoW. Is Counterbalance still included here? I notice it used to be cut against the old 4-color Deathblade decks (maybe because of Decay?) but their inclusion of REB effects seems to make it slightly less good. So maybe cutting 4 Force, 4 Balance, shaving the Swords and Terminus for a bunch of countermagic/blast effects? Thanks in advance!
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
deviant
So do you honestly think Losset having consistent success with his terrible nonponder list is because he is a phenomenal cheater / so good at magic he can give others advantage by playing a suboptimal deck / insane luck ?
From what I've seen him stream and play under camera I don't think it is any of those..
No no no man. You've got it all wrong. Even if Ein aggressively posits his list as the best Miracles list, that doesn't mean he doesn't have respect for Joe as a player. I'm sure he thinks highly of Joe actually. As for Joe's list, to each their own. Joe likes getting his advantage from good creatures. Ein prefers using broken variance reduction. If there's anyone cheating it's Ein considering his build has the most ways to stack one's deck. Every time a Miracles player casts Ponder a Judge wishes they could intervene because Ponder in Miracles is just...not...fair... :cool:
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Dragonslayer_90
No no no man. You've got it all wrong. Even if Ein aggressively posits his list as the best Miracles list, that doesn't mean he doesn't have respect for Joe as a player. I'm sure he thinks highly of Joe actually. As for Joe's list, to each their own. Joe likes getting his advantage from good creatures. Ein prefers using broken variance reduction. If there's anyone cheating it's Ein considering his build has the most ways to stack one's deck. Every time a Miracles player casts Ponder a Judge wishes they could intervene because Ponder in Miracles is just...not...fair... :cool:
That's why you don't respond to pathetic posts like the one above, just let it go.
For the record. I think very highly of Joes play skill and count him amongst the Miracle Jedi Masters. Disagreeing with his deck construction should not imply any judgment about either his person (cheating? the fuck, like really?) or play skill.
TheHeff - I still have one class at university tonight. I'll respond to your question in due manner either later or tomorrow. But let me tell you: You're not alone. Boarding vs UWR non-Miracle non-Delver is one of the biggest challenges as of now and I am still not sure I tackled it correctly. More on it later. But I'll give you a sneak-peek of my new article (about the US-journey) where I talk about this topic for a second. More will come either later or tomorrow.
"We did, however, register for the Legacy tournament that took place in the afternoon, where I soon suffered a loss from Jarvis Yu piloting UWR Stoneblade, which is a very interesting match-up. There are a lot of different UWR colored decks out there: Patriot a.k.a. UWR Delver, UWR Stoneblade, UWR Midrange and UWR Control. As soon as they play Delver it becomes unbelievably easy to crush them. Even the full-on Control lists with a lot of Delve-Draw-Spells are not that hard to overcome as a Counterbalance pretty much shreds their game plan, leaving them with little to no outs. The problem emerges from the stuff in between that could literally be anything. It is not as simple as someone would only play Rudy Briksza's Stoneblade or Brian Braun-Duin's Midrange version. While people copy decklists a lot they also make a lot of smaller or bigger changes. I saw some of them at SCG Richmond where a couple of the players, including Ben Friedman, added Sensei’s Divining Top to their UWR colored Midrange deck. This is the point where it gets tough. First you have to correctly identify which general direction they are going, then you have to decide which cards to play around and which cards you’d like to ignore (Daze, Spell Pierce, Counterbalance, Jace, the Mind Sculptor) and lastly you have to make a decision on how to sideboard. No matter how well you play or how much attention you pay, you’ll end up with a boarding plan that isn’t correct more often than not. I saw myself re-boarding between G2 and G3 more often vs the UWR versions than I normally do, and this is where the challenge in these decks lies. "
PS: When I cast Snapcaster Mage, casting Blue Elemental Blast with it, targeting their second Vortex... then I felt like cheating lol.
Greetings
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Question for Philip:
Can you explain to me why Dig Through Time has not made the final cut of your list? Have you done testing with it and if you did I assume your results were poor enough to dissuade you from playing it - can you elaborate why?
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Einherjer
That's why you don't respond to pathetic posts like the one above, just let it go.
For the record. I think very highly of Joes play skill and count him amongst the Miracle Jedi Masters. Disagreeing with his deck construction should not imply any judgment about either his person (cheating? the fuck, like really?) or play skill.
Yeah, I don't usually respond to posts like the one by deviant. However, I jumped at an opportunity to have some fun, which is all I meant by my post really. Probably will refrain from responding to such posts in the future though.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
TheHeff
Hi all, I've been playing Phillip's list for about 1.5 months now (running his exact 75 until I understand the deck enough to tweak it myself, for now I'm bowing to his experience and long hours of testing :smile:) and need some help with sideboarding. In particular, the BBD-esque UWR Stoneblade decks. I've just been overloading on Blast effects (Blue and Red) and countermagic (counterspell, flusterstorm) and removing things like FoW. Is Counterbalance still included here? I notice it used to be cut against the old 4-color Deathblade decks (maybe because of Decay?) but their inclusion of REB effects seems to make it slightly less good. So maybe cutting 4 Force, 4 Balance, shaving the Swords and Terminus for a bunch of countermagic/blast effects? Thanks in advance!
Hi there. I am not Phillipp but I've been playing his list for a little while now so I feel I can give boarding advice. First things first, there are very few creature matchups where you board out Terminus. If you're opponent is attempting to win by creature beat down, you have to have a very good reason to side it out (ex. Miracles mirror. We win by creature beat down often but Terminus is dead most of the time and it is just better to focus on stack control for this MU). Now, traditionally against Stoneblade, Esper and Deathblade, Counterbalance came out as much of their business spells were hard to counter with CB anyways (TNN, Jace, hardcast batterskull). However, BBD's incarnation of Stoneblade has a considerably lower curve than its predecessors. With no Jace and the only spells above 1 and 2 being TNN and Batterskull, this makes me want to consider keeping counterbalance in since it becomes easier to lock them out with it. However, I am not entirely sure if this is correct as I have not had an opportunity to test against these new Pyromancer Blade decks. With that said, here are the board plans I would consider:
Keeping CB in: -4 Swords, -4 Force of Will, -1 Counterspell, -1 Plains, +1 REB, +1 Pyroblast, +1 Council's Judgment, +1 EE, +1 Pyroclasm, +2 Vendilion Clique, +2 BEB, +1 Wear// Tear
Siding CB out: -4 CB, -4 FoW, -1 Counterspell, -1 Swords, Side in all the same as above
Those are the lines I would consider in terms of boarding against these pyromancer blade decks. Keep in mind that you should change your sideboarding according to how your opponent boards. These UWR Stoneforge decks are coming in all sorts of forms these days and have not yet settled into one form as Phillipp has already said. The point is never autopilot with your boarding and always adapt.
Hope this was helpful. Ein, if you have anything to add or correct me on let me know.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Personally, I cut Dig Through Time for Snapcaster Mage after testing my list time and time again. When you cast your first Ponder, or Brainstorm, or Swords to Plowshares, or REB, you significantly up your chances of seeing your second by playing a pair of Snapcaster Mages than by playing Dig Through Time, and that's what you're doing with this card. You are finding your second copy. You will very rarely find yourself casting Dig with less than 4 Lands in play, but I have tapped out for a Swords to Plowshares on T3 before now, and expect to do it again and again. Snapcaster Mage also blocks, and blocks well. It trades with a myriad of Creatures, including them trying to get a free 1 in with Delver of Secrets, or a T2 Ponder -> Swiftspear. Dig Through Time is often just too slow. I love the card, and I could well quote myself in a month's time saying "Remember when we were all playing less than four Dig Through Times?", but right now I just don't like the look of the deck with it. You have so many cards that just do nothing, and it's the reason I lost to Jund in my T8 match yesterday; I had Ponders and Tops, but I just didn't have enough actual interaction (or mana, but that's another story).
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
It is apparent my arrow missed its mark, so to speak.
Carry on on your high horses then.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
I think I'll just stick to UW with 1-2 mystic gates until I can afford more duals. With that color restriction how would you make a sideboard since so many of the standard sideboard cards are red.
Right now I'm thinking
2 Flusterstorm
2 Containment Priest
2 BLEB
2 Meddling Mage
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Council's Judgement
2 Relic of Progenitus or RIP?
1 Spell Pierce
1 Pithing Needle
1 Baneslayer Angel
Any thoughts?
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Dragonslayer_90
Keeping CB in: -4 Swords, -4 Force of Will, -1 Counterspell, -1 Plains, +1 REB, +1 Pyroblast, +1 Council's Judgment, +1 EE, +1 Pyroclasm, +2 Vendilion Clique, +2 BEB, +1 Wear// Tear
Siding CB out: -4 CB, -4 FoW, -1 Counterspell, -1 Swords, Side in all the same as above
Those are the lines I would consider in terms of boarding against these pyromancer blade decks. Keep in mind that you should change your sideboarding according to how your opponent boards. These UWR Stoneforge decks are coming in all sorts of forms these days and have not yet settled into one form as Phillipp has already said. The point is never autopilot with your boarding and always adapt.
I am on the side of keeping CB in. This is the overloading approach. I would like to overload as many blue spells and permanents as possible. If they want to Blast CB, that means I can play my Snapcaster more reliably. I'm not a fan of getting rid of 4 StP completely. You are not even allowing yourself to have a chance to flashback StP.
As to BEB, I question its usage.
If we use BEB to get rid of red permanents like YP and Vortex, why not just use Celestial Purge? If your intent is to get rid of these stuff either on stack or in play, the bottom line is that you want your removal/counter to resolve. Why do we play a SB card like BEB that can be vulnerable to opponent's REB/Pyro?
If we use BEB to manipulate stack by countering Red spell, I guess the primary red spell target is REB/Pyro, followed by Lightning Bolt. In that case, doesn't BEB just expose itself to another REB/Pyro? If you're that concerned about the Bolt, then I'm sorry, BEB is better than Purge due to your preference.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Moa
Sorry to interrupt the high level discussion, and guide on how to ruin guru lands but I have a somewhat pressing question.
I'm a pretty new miracles player and have access to only one tundra as far as ABUR dual lands go. With that constrain how would one adapt a ponder list to be as strong as possible. My main issue is with sideboard cards because the red splash provides a lot of critical cards like REB and Wear//Tear, I'm having difficulty deciding if I should still try to splash red with basics, or abandon red and play pure UW and if I do that what cards I should include in my board. My immediate thoughts are a stoneforge package, meddling mage, or something like Back to Basics to attempt to flip my disadvantage.
How would you experienced pilots build a 75 if you could only play one tundra?
10 fetches, 1 tundra, 5 island, 3 plains, 1 mountain, and youd probably have to run a single mystic gate. far from optimal but it could work. remember that you dont have 1 tundra, you have 11. you'll just be playign every game like you're playing against wasteland. rishaden port will hurt you more then it should, but you can work with that
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
deviant
It is apparent my arrow missed its mark, so to speak.
Carry on on your high horses then.
I got your point. Just ignore the constant insinuations that you're an uncivilized idiot to not run 4 copies of Ponder in your deck and the whole thing will wash over once people have had their fill of praise/Kool-Aid. Every archetype in Legacy has multiple versions; there's never going to be a consensus "best version".
Quote:
Originally Posted by
twndomn
If we use BEB to get rid of red permanents like YP and Vortex, why not just use Celestial Purge? If your intent is to get rid of these stuff either on stack or in play, the bottom line is that you want your removal/counter to resolve. Why do we play a SB card like BEB that can be vulnerable to opponent's REB/Pyro?
If we use BEB to manipulate stack by countering Red spell, I guess the primary red spell target is REB/Pyro, followed by Lightning Bolt. In that case, doesn't BEB just expose itself to another REB/Pyro? If you're that concerned about the Bolt, then I'm sorry, BEB is better than Purge due to your preference.
BEB is 1 mana. I wouldn't board it in against UWR "Pyroblade", but against UR Delver you really can't compare it to Celestial Purge. I like playing sideboard cards that are hard for your opponent to interact with, but that trait is reserved to the expensive spells that serve as card advantage/positional advantage engines of some sort, like Baneslayer Angel. It doesn't matter that your opponent can interact with your BEB; it only costs 1 mana so there's no way they can generate an advantage in a 1 for 1 exchange (extenuating circumstances, withholding). On the other hand, when you trade it for their 2 mana Pyromancer, you get a hell of a boost by playing multiple spells in an early turn on them.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
The UWR dilemma:
In recent time there has been an enourmous upswing in UWR colored decks. Previous to Treasure Cruise there were practically two UWR colored decks, being Miracles and Patriot with the MU between these two being hilariously lopsided. Miracles was favored by a huge amount of percentage points. Things have changed, however. Despite URs prevelance in numbers it appeared to be UWR that was best suited for TC, not only due to its kind-of-edge in the kind-of-mirror against UR. So now we have UWR dominating the numbers, and nobody can tell you whether this will stay or not. Maybe it's just a popularity issue and the decks aren't that good? Well, that's not the point now. We now have the following decks that utilize Volcanic Island and Tundra.
1) Miracles
2) Gold Digger
3) Stoneblade
4) Pyromancer Midrange
5) Patriot
These are the 5 general directions that you can take in the modern metagame, each and every giving you a distinct advantage in one special field. I will not talk about how to play the Mirror nor will I touch on Patriot, as these approaches didn't really change and are still rather easy to execute. This leaves us with Gold Digger, Stoneblade and Pyromancer Midrange to talk about. These decks differ greatly on the surface, but aren't that much different when it comes to actually playing them. Let's see what they share before developing sideboard ideas:
A) Delve Draw
All and every single approach utilizes a combination of Treasure Cruise and Dig Through Time. What does this mean? Well, basically that we have to try really hard to not fall too far behind in the card advantage section. We are already doing this by the way my deck is built (21 lands) but this isn't enough. We have to utilize Counterbalance as much as we can while trying to make sure they'll never counter Snapcaster Mage with a counter that we could have played around while also giving our Jace the highest priorities ever. All these things might sound obvious but just remember to squeeze out the most of your deck possible to combat the Delve spells that will resolve sooner or later. Oh, and also utilize that fact that you play less/same amount of lands (if same = with more library manipulation). Try not to play the 10 land control deck, Gold Digger is way better at this. Try to play the role that allows you to have just enough lands to cast all your counters.
B) Creatures
How do they win? They don't have Entreat which will simply blast your opponents face off, if unchecked. They try to attack with something, a creature that is probably one of those:
Stoneforge Mystic + Batterskull
Young Pyromancer + Anything
True Name Nemesis
No matter how aggressive or controlling they are, they will attack, sooner or later. They strength, however is closely associated with A. They have the CA and will therefore use their counters aggressively (in the lategame) to protect their creatures, which wasn't really the case before. This leaves us with the option to utilize our powerful removal spells, thank god. But it also means that we might have to keep some sort of removal in vs decks that we wouldn't keep them in, generally.
C) Something unexpected
Your UWR Midrange opponent casts Sensei's Divining Top and Counterbalance? Your Stoneblade opponent goes for Keranos? Your Gold Digger opponent casts Young Pyromancer after utilizing Academy Ruins and Engineered Explosives? The list goes on and on, and it isn't going to get easier. This means that there is no easy default plan that you can do round after round, expecting to win. You have to be flexible when it comes to sideboarding, and more importantly: re-sideboarding. Shape your deck according to your opponents cards.
The plan
So how do you board against any of these UWR decks? Well, I am not going to give you a plan for these three decks, because they don't exist in a nutshell. What I will give you are my opinions on how to board when you see something. You should then be able to put together a decent boarding plan against the UWR opponent that you will encounter.
1) Counterbalance
Is good against any of these decks as it will allow you to do two things: a) Generate card advantage to combat Delve spells. b) Slow down the game. This is all we need and synonymous with winning.
Don't board this card out.
2) Swords to Plowshares
The card is a necessary evil if your opponent plays more than just Stoneforge Mystic plus a handful of Snapcaster Mage, Vendilion Clique and/or True Name Nemesis. Should they go with these cards above you are fine with 4 Terminus 1 EE and 1 Pyroclasm. If you are, however expecting Young Pyromancer alongside these cards you need to keep Swords to Plowshares in. All of them because Terminus would work overdue if you didn't.
3) Blue Elemental Blast
While bringing in Blue Elemental Blast in order to counteract Red Elemental Blast is no bad idea it's not what we want to be doing in this very match-up.
4) Jace, the Mind Sculptor
Can be trimmed to 2 if you suspect the opponent to have Daze. Other than that, keep all of them.
Okay, changed my mind, I'll try to give a very basic idea on how to board vs UWR.
-4 Force of Will
-2 Swords to Plowshares
+1 Red Elemental Blast
+1 Pyroblast
+1 Engineered Explosives
+1 Pyroclasm
+1 Wear//Tear
+1 Council's Judgment
If it's Gold Digger, cut the Swords and the Plains for Counterspell and Flusterstorms. Also make Room for Cliques by not bringing in Pyroclasm and trimming Terminus.
If it's Young Pyromancer based, don't cut the Swords. Cut the Counterspell and one Jace, the Mind Sculptor instead.
If it's Stoneforge Mystic Control based you might decide to leave it at that (and as I see this version as the most popular one I posted the plan above). If it's controlly Stoneblade you can cut the Plains and the Pyroclasm for 2 Cliques. Depending on whether you expect Young Pyromancer or Counterbalance.
If you think that they'll bring Counterbalance, make sure to include Vendilion Clique.
I know it's tough, but I hope that these guidelines help you board correctly as soon as you've taken a decision on what the opponent is. If unsure, go with the boarding plan above.
On Dig Through Time: I didn't test this as much as I tested... like pretty much everything due to not really having enough time. But here's what I found:
Dig Through Time has to replace either Jace, the Mindsculptor, Snapcaster Mage or Ponder. (are you mad?!) In a format that is as sped up as Legacy is right now and with a deck-mechanic (Miracle) that is as clunky as it is I think cutting Ponder for it is madness, while cutting Snapcaster Mage puts you in danger of not being able to react fast enough vs aggressive decks (UR) or Combo. It's important to have a reload-button after you've wasted/used your first Swords on their creatures or Red Elemental Blasts on their Show and Tells. Dig Through Time will find them, you tell me? Show me how you cast it reliably T3 and re-use Swords/REB/Brainstorm.
It also doesn't block.
Cutting Jace for it is alright. It's better than Jace in a fast format. But hold your breath for a second, didn't I just say we need things to survive in a fast metagame? Well, correct: That's why we have 4 Ponder and 3 (I wish I could play the 4th) Snapcaster Mages. They allow us to survive. If we're into the lategame we want something that is amazing, not just a slightly better Snapcaster Mage. We need something that will take over the game and fucking win. Not every opponent will concede. Jace does just that while also adding in the utility to being a good way to delay/beat Batterskull in the Mirror/Stoneblade-matches.
Summing up. It's too slow as an answer to make it to the lategame (Ponder+Snapcaster are better) and it's not good enough to replace our good cards for the lategame (Jace and Entreat). So sadly, there is no spot in this list at this day. If things change, I could change my mind. But for the time being, Nope.
As usual, I tried my best to answer your questions, should you disagree with anything or find any mistake (I am somewhat tired) let me know and I'll try to make sure everything is clear. I hope I could help.
Greetings
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Hello Philipp,
i have indeed a general question to this, although may be not especially to the UWR Matchups: Why do you not play the 4th snapcaster (at least in the sideboard), since you yourself see the qualities in him and the advantages he has in many match ups? And if your answer is the 15 cards limit, then why is he not better, then the pyroclasm, one blue elemental plast or the counterspell in your sideboard?
Greetings Laza.
P.S. This question is interesting enough for me, to actually register in this forum ;-) Thanks in advance.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Laza315
Hello Philipp,
i have indeed a general question to this, although may be not especially to the UWR Matchups: Why do you not play the 4th snapcaster (at least in the sideboard), since you yourself see the qualities in him and the advantages he has in many match ups? And if your answer is the 15 cards limit, then why is he not better, then the pyroclasm, one blue elemental plast or the counterspell in your sideboard?
Greetings Laza.
P.S. This question is interesting enough for me, to actually register in this forum ;-) Thanks in advance.
because, in general, you look for specific answers to troubling problems in your sideboard, not more consistency. you all have to be careful you're not cutting to many snapcaster targets.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Laza315
Hello Philipp,
... Why do you not play the 4th snapcaster (at least in the sideboard), since you yourself see the qualities in him and the advantages he has in many match ups? And if your answer is the 15 cards limit, then why is he not better, then the pyroclasm, one blue elemental plast or the counterspell in your sideboard? ...
Hey, and welcome to TheSource!
Your question is one of the toughest one I had to answer in quite a while, and this is due to several factors:
1) We discussed this topic in the Miracles Chat quite some time ago and couldn't agree whether a sideboarded Snapcaster Mage would be of any good use.
2) We didn't come to a conclusion.
3) I don't know.
4) This will be the next thing that i'll try. Thank you very much for the idea!
Damnit, your first post was a good one. You got me, you got me good. :D
Sorry for not being able to answer this in any manner... But, and I am repeating myself, that's a good idea that warrants testing. More than I did before. :)
Greetings
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
So I was totally wrong to board like this with your list vs BBD's list :O?:
-1 CS
-4 FoW
-3 Jace
+1 Explosives
+1 REB
+1 Pyroblast
+2 Blue Elemental Blast
+1 Wear//Tear
+1 Council's Judgment
+1 Pyroclasm
I won pretty much every game this way.. Even thought it was the correct approach (ye well, I admit I should keep at least 1 Jace in, like you always did vs RUG right). The blue blast is amazing as an extra answer to Pyromancer or a tool to get your CB through by blasting your opponents red blast. I know You might end up going in time without Jace.. But nothing get's through with this postboard, and with your list you will find your Entreat eventually :\ right ^^?
But I will try to keep 2 Jace and don't side the blue blasts. I just think it won't be easy to stick vs counters, blasts, Pyromancer tokens and such....
Btw, my first post in a while. Congratulations with your second awesome top 8 finish :D Pretty sure you had a big shot to win the event if the top 8 structure was a little different.. But at least you've won the mirrors this time =)!
I would like to add that I'm a bit scared without RIP right now. I've seen 'Gold Digger' lists with Punishing fire (not that RIP wouldn't beat their 4 DIG's and 2 Cruises already), and also Dark Depths is gaining some populairity. But I know Priests is worth the 2 slots, so it's hard to play both.. Will RIP ever find its way back into your sideboard Phillip? I must say your list changed quite a bit for this TC meta!
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Hey Lans,
thanks for the congratz. And yeah, all I basically wanted this time around was the title. Well, maybe next time.
I wouldn't say that your plan is wrong, it's just different. You just have 4 cards that produce a lot of CA while also having access to 2 counters that are good protecting it. I prefer having more spells that are actually better if drawn later than having additional counters/removal. I guess 10 removal spells are more than enough vs his Pyromancer and all the other creatures. And then I'd rather have a few more win-cons to fight against TC than having more overly conditional counters or even more removal. But it's not a bad approach, i just thinks it's somewhat inferior.
Gold Digger with P.Fire? Well, that sounds like a tough MU. We will see how things shape up, but as of now it's just inferior to Miracles and if a few people play that list with P.Fire, sure. If it catches up, we'll see.
Sorry, pretty tired alright. May respond yet another time tomorrow. :D
Greetings
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Einherjer
3) Blue Elemental Blast
While bringing in Blue Elemental Blast in order to counteract Red Elemental Blast is no bad idea it's not what we want to be doing in this very match-up.
do you feel this is different if you know they have young pyromancer? or do you think you'd rather have additional swords.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
I think that the 3rd Jace in Philipp's 75 is just too much currently. Replacing one Jace with Dig through Time is better. Of course it's only slightly better, because Jace is still Jace and it's only 1 card replaced by another.
With 4 Ponder and all the other card selection and the 1 Dig Through Time one shouldn't have problems, finding a Jace when he becomes good. Problem of a 3rd Jace is that he is simply too clunky/ bad in too many MU's, like all the URx Delve/Delver decks, Infect, Combo, the mirror etc.
Dig Through Time really shines at finding the missing piece of the Softlock combo or by simply gaining card advantage and great selection against the fast decks, where Jace is unbelievable bad (f.ex. UR Delver, Infect).
I have lots of testing results on Modo with some Dig Through Time, 3-4 Ponder (depending on the list, sometimes a Pyroclasm MD is better than the 4th Ponder against all the cancer delver decks) and both cards are really amazing. Ponder at doing the stuff it is supposed to do and Dig Through Time is great at getting cheap card advantage in MU's where you don't have time/ mana for Jace.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Adryan
I think that the 3rd Jace in Philipp's 75 is just too much currently. Replacing one Jace with Dig through Time is better. Of course it's only slightly better, because Jace is still Jace and it's only 1 card replaced by another.
With 4 Ponder and all the other card selection and the 1 Dig Through Time one shouldn't have problems, finding a Jace when he becomes good. Problem of a 3rd Jace is that he is simply too clunky/ bad in too many MU's, like all the URx Delve/Delver decks, Infect, Combo, the mirror etc.
Dig Through Time really shines at finding the missing piece of the Softlock combo or by simply gaining card advantage and great selection against the fast decks, where Jace is unbelievable bad (f.ex. UR Delver, Infect).
I have lots of testing results on Modo with some Dig Through Time, 3-4 Ponder (depending on the list, sometimes a Pyroclasm MD is better than the 4th Ponder against all the cancer delver decks) and both cards are really amazing. Ponder at doing the stuff it is supposed to do and Dig Through Time is great at getting cheap card advantage in MU's where you don't have time/ mana for Jace.
I used to play 2 jace, 1 dig. I actually found that, Dig is best by being in the top3 cards with top, to counter TC and other Digs. 3rd Jace seems better than 1st Dig.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Quasim0ff
I used to play 2 jace, 1 dig. I actually found that, Dig is best by being in the top3 cards with top, to counter TC and other Digs. 3rd Jace seems better than 1st Dig.
Yeah 100 % agree that Jace is better than Dig against a lot of decks if you already have Countertop and actually winning is academic (and a lonely Squirrel is enough to win the game) but i would say that Wurmcoil Engine is also better than Dig in that spot.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Adryan
Yeah 100 % agree that Jace is better than Dig against a lot of decks if you already have Countertop and actually winning is academic (and a lonely Squirrel is enough to win the game) but i would say that Wurmcoil Engine is also better than Dig in that spot.
My point is that, I never wanted Dig over the 3rd jace when I played it.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Seconded. I tried the same thing and went back to running Jaces. I still have the full playset. I think Einherjer made a good point about Jace filling the win condition slot, and Dig Through Time being a turbo-powered cantrip. I personally think Jace's biggest utility may be giving you Brainstorm 5-8 to put those miracles stranded in your hand back on top of your deck. Is a 4 mana Brainstorm playable against UR? It is if it's putting Entreat -> Terminus back on top of your deck. If this is Jace at his worst, that's fine by me.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
There was a period of time RUG Delver's everywhere. I consider RUG Delver fairly fast and aggressive. Is RUG Delver any faster than UR Delver? Back then, do people run 3 JTMS? My point is that, when people want to take out the 3rd Jace, is it because the speed of the format, or is it because people are looking for justification to try new cards?
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
twndomn
There was a period of time RUG Delver's everywhere. I consider RUG Delver fairly fast and aggressive. Is RUG Delver any faster than UR Delver? Back then, do people run 3 JTMS? My point is that, when people want to take out the 3rd Jace, is it because the speed of the format, or is it because people are looking for justification to try new cards?
RUG Delver is slower than UR Delver and slamming Jace with Countermagic in hand was not as a bad idea than it is now, because well what could go wrong if you taped out on your turn? No dangerous spells, only permanents that were 1-2ofs like Sylvan Library or Vortex could hurt. Nowadays URx Delver decks have a pseudo Ancestrall Recall and you'll feel pretty stupid when your opponent just dazes your 4 mana spell, untap play Recall, draw more ressources, while you have a REB in your hand.
Against RUG Delver protecting a resolved Jace was a lot easier, because they couldn't pressure/ kill Jace that easily etc. I could write a hundred words, but if you just look at RUG Delver and URx decklists and play a lot of games, you will realize that Jace does really suck against UR delver and is only good when you're opponent is already dead anyways.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
twndomn
There was a period of time RUG Delver's everywhere. I consider RUG Delver fairly fast and aggressive. Is RUG Delver any faster than UR Delver? Back then, do people run 3 JTMS? My point is that, when people want to take out the 3rd Jace, is it because the speed of the format, or is it because people are looking for justification to try new cards?
After people tried jamming the Delve draw spells even in Storm (which obviously would neuter Cabal Ritual) you can can bet, that the intent to squeeze DTT into a permanent-based deck like Miracles is nothing but riding the hype-train.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Lemnear
After people tried jamming the Delve draw spells even in Storm (which obviously would neuter Cabal Ritual) you can can bet, that the intent to squeeze DTT into a permanent-based deck like Miracles is nothing but riding the hype-train.
It's not about squeezing them into Miracles, DTT fits into Miracles because it is a tutor for part of your Combo, additional counters, removal, or other cantrips. It is always good and with 4 Ponder you don't have troubles casting it on Turn 4 for UU. After prague and in preparation for GPNJ, which i sadly couln't attend, i immeadiately tested DTT, and they were never bad. In at least 100 competitive tournament machtes, they always found something useful.
We can disagree about playing DTT over Jace, but we can't disagree about DTT being better than Jace against f.ex URx, Combo, the mirror and Infect. That's just a fact, and only requires simple understanding of the MU's.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Adryan
It's not about squeezing them into Miracles, DTT fits into Miracles because it is a tutor for part of your Combo, additional counters, removal, or other cantrips. It is always good and with 4 Ponder you don't have troubles casting it on Turn 4 for UU. After prague and in preparation for GPNJ, which i sadly couln't attend, i immeadiately tested DTT, and they were never bad. In at least 100 competitive tournament machtes, they always found something useful.
We can disagree about playing DTT over Jace, but we can't disagree about DTT being better than Jace against f.ex URx, Combo, the mirror and Infect. That's just a fact, and only requires simple understanding of the MU's.
The point is that Infect, UR Delver and combo in general are realistically able to kill you before turn 4, so arguing with these matchups to justify DTT is highly questionable.
Edit: you wanna tell me you played "100 compeditive tournament matches" with that setup since the release of DTT a few weeks ago? Seriously?
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Lemnear
The point is that Infect, UR Delver and combo in general are realistically able to kill you before turn 4, so arguing with these matchups to justify DTT is highly questionable.
Edit: you wanna tell me you played "100 compeditive tournament matches" with that setup since the release of DTT a few weeks ago? Seriously?
I didn't wrote that DTT is the best card in these MU's. It's just better than Jace in these MU's and both cards have a similar powerlevel. I think we two can just agree on disagreeing, i mean your Storm list seems highly suboptimal to me, so i don't think we will reach a consensus in any aspect of Legacy.
I think i brought up some good points a lot of times f.ex. like playing 3 Volcanic Island over the stupid 1 Basic Mountain, or Keranos being a great card in a BGx Midrange metagame etc, and mostly the people on this thread disagreed with me, bringing silly arguments. I'm fine with that. The majority of readers here, are silent ones, who don't post here. Time will show, how good DTT is.
On Modo it's not hard to get 8-10 (Daily Events, 8mans (if they fire), some 2mans) competitve matches a day. The players are better than the average Day 1 GP/random tournament player, so i think you'll get good testing results.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
@Einherjer
If you did not splash red for blast and opted for a U/W list... What would that list be?
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Adryan
We can disagree about playing DTT over Jace, but we can't disagree about DTT being better than Jace against f.ex URx, Combo, the mirror and Infect. That's just a fact, and only requires simple understanding of the MU's.
I do disagree.
Combo: I board out Entreat and am left with Counterbalance and Jace as CA engines. Cliques and Snapcasters give you clocks, but you don't pull ahead without Jace or Counterbalance. Counterbalance is always vulnerable to their Abrupt Decays/Krosan Grips, and I think it's easy enough to be killed in the midgame with just countertop in play. Dig and Jace for me are both Force fodder early turns, with Jace being a better card to play for on 4 or 5 mana. Perhaps running 4 Ponders fuels the card better, but for me it took time to get Dig active.
Delver: Jace sucks against UR and RUG Delver, but I'd much rather have him against UWR or BUG. I could be wrong here.
Mirror: Come on...you seriously think Dig is better than Jace, here? I played Cuneo on MODO when he was testing his UWR Jersey deck and it was a slaughter. Not that the UWR Countertop deck without countertop ever had a chance, but he resolved multiple Dig Through Times and nothing happened. A bird in the hand is worth 2 in the bush, and the man that resolves Jaces while the other man is resolving Digs is going to come out on top. The mirror is won off of positional advantage. I think your mistake is assuming that the two cards are both simply draw spells.
Infect: I've only played this matchup a few times but I think I want Jace over Dig here. They both are easily rendered irrelevant by a fast start, but if I can resolve just one of these I'd much rather it be Jace, who can bounce creatures and set up Terminus the turn it comes into play. I don't expect to cast Dig on turn 4, anyway, with this deck.
Basically, I tested with Dig for maybe 10 matches at most, and it just felt like a really expensive draw spell that would then require me to a) find what I want and then b) pay even more mana to cast it. People call it double Demonic Tutor, but since I'm not turboing my graveyard it felt like double Diabolic Tutor.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Just wanted to drop in with my 2c here, I'm still fairly new to the deck but have played with and without DTT. No one's arguing it's a powerful card, but it's yet one more card in an opener (or first few turns) that I never want to see. In a long tournament, you want the deck to be as streamlined and as consistent as possible. In a deck with 3 Snaps, you don't want to be chewing apart your graveyard anyway and one unintended side effect of trying to pump the GY quickly is prematurely cracking fetchlands. I'd rather have a slightly higher threat density with a slightly higher efficiency rather than adding an extra dig card to a deck that is already chock full of them (4 Brainstorm, 4 Ponder, 3 Snapcasters, 4 Top, 3 Jace). The one clearcut advantage of DTT is that it can counter Cruise or another DTT off of Counterbalance, but it just doesn't seem worth it.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
TheHeff
Just wanted to drop in with my 2c here, I'm still fairly new to the deck but have played with and without DTT. No one's arguing it's a powerful card, but it's yet one more card in an opener (or first few turns) that I never want to see. In a long tournament, you want the deck to be as streamlined and as consistent as possible. In a deck with 3 Snaps, you don't want to be chewing apart your graveyard anyway and one unintended side effect of trying to pump the GY quickly is prematurely cracking fetchlands. I'd rather have a slightly higher threat density with a slightly higher efficiency rather than adding an extra dig card to a deck that is already chock full of them (4 Brainstorm, 4 Ponder, 3 Snapcasters, 4 Top, 3 Jace). The one clearcut advantage of DTT is that it can counter Cruise or another DTT off of Counterbalance, but it just doesn't seem worth it.
This is the last thing that made me cut it. I had one in the deck at the last minute, and decided I'd just rather have a real Spell. (For the record; it was a Red Blast I went with, and I ended up playing 2 Blue decks all day, both of which were Affinity, so I would've been happy with the Dig, but it's still not correct. There were also 3 Cloudpost decks in the room. It was a weird day.)
As you said with your last point; we play a good deck with Counterbalance, and figure out what we can counter with it later. We don't include an 8 to beat 8's.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Anyone know where i can find a guide to the death and taxes and nic fit match ups?
I have a plan against nic fit, but against death and taxes i really am at a loss.
All my cards seems terrible against that deck.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
As the last piece of my primer series for SCG was never published because of Spoiler Season I feel like I can simply share the part about DnT here. The list is somehwat outdated and I did not (!) double check if I still stand by what I wrote. But I suppose it's better than nothing.
The next deck I want to touch upon is something very special. It’s commonly known as Death and Taxes. This deck has some sweet history and one of the most unique and sticky names in Legacys history. It refers to a quote by Benjamin Franklin saying:” ...but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” Even though Death and Taxes might look like a White Wheenie deck at first glance it’s way more than that. It utilizes taxing effects such as Thalia, Guardian of Thraben in combination with mana denial just as Wasteland and Rishadan port to suppress any acts of free will by forcing the opponent to pay the overdue taxes. The next step is the attempt to achieve death at the opponent’s side by attacking with the tax collectors.
Punting aside, Death and Taxes is proactive Controldeck that consists of creatures. Strange, isn’t it? Additionally, it doesn’t even play blue, in fact it doesn’t splash a single color to its base color white. How and why does this work? Despite the fact that I cannot give you an exact breakdown why this deck is good I’ll give my best to get across the general idea of this deck before delving into how to break this very strategy from the Miracles side.
To clarify what we are talking about it might be a good idea to look at the deck Thomas Enevoldsen used to win GP Strasbourg with, with another, nearly identical, list in the Top4 that was piloted by his friend Michael Bonde.
9 Plains
4 Wasteland
4 Rishadan Port
3 Karakas
1 Cavern of Souls
1 Eiganjo Castle
1 Horizon Canopy
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Mother of Runes
4 Phyrexian Revoker
2 Mangara of Corondor
3 Flickerwisp
3 Mirran Crusader
2 Aven Mindcensor
1 Fiend Hunter
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Aether Vial
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte
//Sideboard
2 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Cataclysm
2 Rest in Peace
1 Gut Shot
1 Sunlance
2 Wilt-Leaf Liege
1 Relic of Progenitus
1 Leonin Relic-Warder
1 Pithing Needle
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Oblivion Ring
Even though it’s been a while since GP Strasbourg happened this list still stands as an example of what Death and Taxes was, is and will be for the time being. The core of this deck isn’t about to change, even though True-Name Nemesis has forced the deck to adapt a little by playing more flying creatures and adding Sword of Fire and Ice to their deck, but as said above, the underlying concept won’t change. The first element of Death and Taxes that is important to us is how their land base is built. It integrates a high amount of disruptive cards just as Wasteland and Rishadan Port but also a fair number of Karakas’ which can be incredibly tough to deal with, especially if it’s paired up with Thalia, Guardian of Thraben. As Death and Taxes doesn’t have threats that are as cheap as Delver of Secrets, how can it utilize the tempo-advantage of mana denial, you might ask? Well, they might not have Delver, but they have Aether Vial which allows them to keep putting creatures on the board without having to stop with their land-shenanigans. Their creatures are protected by Mother of Runes, our permanents are threatened by recurring Mangara or Corondor (with the help of Karakas or Flickerwisp, most of the time in conjunction with Aether Vial) all while they tax our spells with Thalia, Guardian of Thraben and threaten to kill us efficient beaters just as Mirran Crusader, Serra Avenger or Batterskull.
The challenge in playing Death and Taxes is finding the sweet spot between applying pressure, deploying disruptive creatures and utilizing the lands to do something else than tapping for mana. Aether Vial somewhat mitigates this task by allowing them to play creatures for free, but it also opens up countless opportunities when it comes to toying around with Aether Vial and cards just as Flickerwisp or Aven Mindcensor. ,
I hope I could give you a quick glimpse at how this deck operates, but let’s not get to the part as how the match between Death and Taxes and Miracles play out and which lines of play you might want to avoid.
Wasteland and Rishadan Port are, as mentioned above, cards that alter the way a game plays out. Their absence or abundance make the difference whether the game plays out like a typical match against an Aether Vial based Aggrodeck or if it looks like a slow duel of controlling decks. There are games where going all-in on Basic Lands is the right way, and this is the majority. But you shouldn’t just stick to a stigma as hieratic as this as there are games where going for Dual lands is correct. Those games are characterized by the absence of Wasteland and several Rishadan Port showing up and are also often dictated by your opening hand, which could consist of Duals and Fetches only. Should they have no option to hinder the development of Miracles in a significant way by utilizing their lands in conjunction with Thalia or Mindcensor then this match-up plays out surprisingly straightforwardly. You remove their creatures until you can cast Entreat the Angels, sounds easy enough, right?
Well, not really as it’s a very rare occurrence to play against Death and Taxes and not play against mana denial, as it’s an integral part of their deck, so I wouldn’t count on the one out of ten games where you can play this match-up just like any traditional aggro-vs-control-match. Now let’s look at how most games develop. We first have to sub-divide this very approach into the Aether Vial and Non-Aether Vial games. As you might have guessed, the value of cards like Counterbalance varies wildly between these two separated ways of how this match-up can play out. It is without any doubt to say that the match-up gets a lot easier when there is no Aether Vial in the game. But once again, you will not need any advice on how to play against MonoW then, right?
So let’s talk about the tough games, where they have access to Aether Vial and at least one piece of disruptive land also known as the real games. The first and very basic question when they place their Vial on the stack is: “Do you have Force of Will and a blue card in your hand?” – If yes, cast it. It’s just as simple, there is no reason to not cast the free Counterspell in the preboarded games against Death and Taxes as Aether Vial will not only turn off the entirety of the game, it will also accelerate the opponent a fair bit while also providing them with flashy creatures that disable linear planning and complicate everything. The existence or the absence of Aether Vial dictate the pace at which the game will play out, and naturally, you’d rather have it the slow way, enabling your Sensei’s Divining Tops to pull you ahead significantly in card selection.
Counterbalance is one of the most inconsistent cards, as mentioned above. Without Aether Vial and with an empty board this card will break Death and Taxes in half. In pretty much any other scenario, not so much. So let me illuminate you how to evaluate Counterbalance in this very match-up. The card is crap. It’s as simple as it gets. Yes the card can be good and backbreaking, but so could Vendilion Clique when it comes to dealing with Spirit of Labyrinth. But these scenarios are overly constructed and do no depict the reality as it stands. You will hardly be able to set up Counterbalance properly while getting rid of Aether Vial and prohibiting them from playing Cavern of Souls, however this might be possible.
The next card that is somewhat controversial when it comes to dealing with MonoW is Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Many people claim that he is bad, backing up said claim with arguments just as pointing out that it is very hard to achieve 2UU when playing against Wasteland, Rishadan Port and Thalia, Guardian of Thraben. All of this is correct, but the upsides of Jace, the Mind Sculptor outweigh those drawbacks. A quick sidenote here, much of what I wrote before was easily transferable to other types of Miracles, but what I am now saying about Jace, the Mind Sculptor is exclusive to versions with the full playset of Swords to Plowshares. Even though Jace may die when your opponent uses Aether Vial at the end of your turn you still have Swords to Plowshares to take care of that, which kind of mitigates this foreseeable threat. You don’t have to cast him turn 4, the game will go significantly longer. He might not be the most mana-effective spell you cast all game long, but his impact justifies his inclusion in the postboarded games, and I don’t think I have to tell you any more when it comes to Jace on an empty board, do I?
So after having dealt with the two biggest misconceptions that are Counterbalance and Jace, the Mind Sculptor let’s continue at looking how the match-up will shape up, shall we? They have two very potent late-game threats. The first one is Mangara of Corondor with Karakas which will finalize their disruption plan and leave us with very little time to find a removal spell or Entreat the Angels. I would suggest to always have at least two pieces of removal at the ready when it comes to dealing with Mangara due to one very simple fact that I havn’t really touched upon, yet: Flickerwisp. Should you be feeling safe to target Mangara with your piece of removal as soon as they target it with their Karakas in response to Mangaras ability you could very well run into Flickerwisps trap, delaying them a little, but nothing more. Getting rid of Aether Vial in advance makes dealing with Mangara a lot easier, though. Flickerwisp is a very unpredictable and devastating threat, especially with Aether Vial. Try to not be dead on board to a Flickerwisp that enters the battlefield end of turn, exiling one permanent of yours, if you can help it.
The second late-game threat is different. It’s Sword of Fire and Ice which turns any of their threats into a real threat. You cannot block it with any of your blue creautres, you cannot bounce it with your Jace, the Mind Sculptor and it kills you way faster than you’d like to. It also forces you to deal with any creature, as soon as it hits the battlefield, which is not what you want to be doing, but more on that later when I am coming to the more general ways of playing this match-up. It is however easier to deal with an artefact just as this, than with the so called Mangara lock.
When it comes to the postboard games it gets a little tricky, due to the potential presence of Cataclysm which will turn your mathematics and strategies upside down. It will screw all your long-term plans, be it Entreat the Angels, Jace, the Mind Sculptor or Keranos, God of Storms. This card will additionally invalidate all the previous decisions you made when it comes to choice of Fetchtland-targets. Without any specifically tailored hate cards just as Sulfur Elemental Cataclysm will ruin your day, one way or another. This leads to a very interesting decision point. Counterspells are pretty bad against Death and Taxes, but you cannot risk to join this fight without any copy of them, so you are forced to play in a suboptimal way, which then becomes the optimal choice. Counterspells are at their best when it comes to dealing with Cataclysm, as you can pretty much assure to have UU up when Cataclysm becomes a threat. Moreover, it also doubles as a catch-all against the rest of their deck which is re-castable with Snapcaster Mage, after all. Force of Will is pretty bad by nature, but has to be kept in for two reasons. First it is there to help you deal with Aether Vial and Cataclysm, their prime threats in this very match-up. Secondly it is there to kind of solidify the choice to keep Jace, the Mind Sculptor as it enables a certain sequence of plays, which could be described as a Tempo-Jace, basically preparing the way for Jace by aggressively forcing any of their cards or protecting Jace by forcing the first spell they cast after Jace resolved. While this may sound simplified, it is true more often than not.
To finalize the theoretical aspect I will summarize what we learned so far and give a few more general guidelines as to how approach this very match-up. The first thing is, at mentioned above, Aether Vial as this card will set the tone of this very game. Dealing with it is important, both before and after boarding.
Their next step is attacking via mana denial while deploying their first threats, mostly Thalia, Guardian of Thraben. If they lack disruptive creatures like Phyrexian Revoker, which is incredibly potent against Miracles due to its ability to shut down Sensei’s Divining Top or Jace, the Mind Sculptor, they will try to apply quick pressure just as Stoneforge Mystic. Phyrexian Revoker is especially spicy in conjunction with Aether Vial as it will not allow you to use your Top any more, so you should be using your activation in response to the Vial tapping with 2 counters on it. Stoneforge Mystic is no reason to pull the trigger on any removal spell if you are not forced to, in contrary to Phyrexian Revoker which can ruin all your plans you had for the future. It is more often correct than not to wait with removing any aggressive threats until you can draw more advantage from removing them, just like a disruptive creature or Mother of Runes. Be as liberal as possible when it comes to using your life as a resource as they effectively lack reach just as Lightning Bolt or Deathrite Shaman, making it rather easy to calculate the turns that are left before they threaten lethal. I am, however, well aware of the fact that this guideline should be somewhat altered when Aether Vial or Sword of Fire and Ice are involved in the equation, just as mentioned above. Using your life total aggressively will enable you to deal with most of the cards your opponent will bring to the table, as your card-selection should be bringing you the victory after a certain amount of time, but if you just remove any creature you see it might be tough to do so, due to the fact that they might simply have one creature too much, hitting you to death. Don’t just swords any Mother of Runes or Stoneforge Mystic you see in front of you. Choose the creatures you’d like to get beaten down from, remove the ones that alter your way of playing too heavily and be patient with your Terminus.
When it comes to boarding we should be bringing out these cards:
-4 Counterbalance
-2 Force of Will
+1 Counterspell
+2 Engineered Explosives
+1 Disenchant
+1 Keranos, God of Storms
+1 Council’s Judgment
Which should be logic conclusion to the premises we acquired earlier. If you are afraid of Spirit of Labyrinth and want to include an unreliable card just as Vendilion Clique, feel free to do so and pray that you hit Cataclysm with it. Force of Will has to stay in in some numbers to deal with Cataclysm, though you could definitely keep the third Force of Will for not bringing in the third Counterspell, this is entirely up to you. Counterbalance is still too unrelieable and Keranos is an extremely strong card, once resolved. Admittedly though, it’s tough to resolve him but the wait is worth it, more often than not. Generally speaking, this match-up is one of the tougher ones and you’d be better off not playing against too many of them, but with the right strategy, which you should have acquired after reading this, it isn’t the worst opponent in the world, but a force to reckon with, nonetheless. If you are dead set on beating Death and Taxes you might want to include Pithing Needle and Sulfur Elemental to your Sideboard. I am, personally, a big fan of Sulfur Elemental and whenever I build a new sideboard I pray that I find a spot for him. Sadly though, I didn’t but this card is just incredible in so many situations, not only when facing the white creatures.
Greetings
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Einherjer
Your excellent and quick response.
One thing i don't understand: Why are you boarding Force of will out?
Æther vial is such a beating, and force of will is one of the best ways of shutting it down.
On the subject of æther vial in death and taxes - would you consider boarding containment priest in? It kills vial'ed creatures, it is pretty safe to assume that they will board plows out, and it is a surprise blocker.
Any advice on nic fit?
My plan is to board entreat the angels out+ a few swords to plowshares, board in any counterspells/liliana removal that i have and ride jace/snapcaster to victory.
I don't know if it's correct but it seems like the logical thing to do, considering how good they are at dealing with the post-board entreat (They are also quite good against pre-board entreats)
I don't think nic fit is very good, but i keep encountering it so i need a plan.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
zeus-online
Anyone know where i can find a guide to the death and taxes and nic fit match ups?
I have a plan against nic fit, but against death and taxes i really am at a loss.
All my cards seems terrible against that deck.
I can help you with the nic fit part. I played nothing but nic fit for over year and still regularly play against it in locals events. There are many subarchtypes of the deck: punishing fire, Scape-wish, BUG PW control, BUG or BWG pod, or just GBx goodstuff piles. However, the strategy to beat them is mostly the same.
If they are smart they will SB out veteran explorers against you. Don't waste removal on this guy unless its stop a therapy or scapeshift. You getting 2 lands is better than them getting 2 lands most of the time.
Unless you see some pfire, academy recotor or recurring nightmare shinanigans, dont bother with GY hate. Its usually just Vet, Therapy and maybe 1 other card like eternal witness that it will effect.
Jace is king. Batterskull is also great. Non-fire builds cannot effectively remove these cards. Karakas+legend is also near unbeatable for them.
CB is pretty weak since their curve is varied and they have deed, decay and a GSZ target to kill CB.
Entreat can still steal games, but you will have to bait out deeds first.
Keep in FoW. They have a lot of meh cards, but their haymakers are must counters and this is a matchup you will regularly be snapcasting forces.
Some nic fitters think slaughter games or surgical effects are the key to winning this matchups(naming jace, entreat or FoW usually.). Those cards are terrible, but still vary your wincons so you don't get blown out, and be aware of surgical's interaction with top/miracles.
Using Philips standard 4 ponder setup, I would board like this typically:
-4 CB
-1 Stp
-2 REB
+1 Counterspell
+2 Priest
+2 Clique
+1 Judgment
+1 W/T
Against the BUG decks you want REBS. Against scapeshift you need to treat them a bit more like combo (less removal more counters BEB and counterbalance are ok). Against Pfire, you can treat them more like Jund (GY, EE or moon are all good, maybe keep in some CB but over-rely on them).
EDIT: I should add except for punishing fire version, we are favored. That matchup is even to unfavored. The GBW lists are the easiest. The BUG lists are probably 55/45, scapeshift is closer to 60/40. I don't normally say this, but the legend build, or SFM builds are definitely better positioned. The games go super long and Batterskull or legend + Karakas are very tough for them to beat.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Cipher
I do disagree.
Combo: I board out Entreat and am left with Counterbalance and Jace as CA engines. Cliques and Snapcasters give you clocks, but you don't pull ahead without Jace or Counterbalance. Counterbalance is always vulnerable to their Abrupt Decays/Krosan Grips, and I think it's easy enough to be killed in the midgame with just countertop in play. Dig and Jace for me are both Force fodder early turns, with Jace being a better card to play for on 4 or 5 mana. Perhaps running 4 Ponders fuels the card better, but for me it took time to get Dig active.
Delver: Jace sucks against UR and RUG Delver, but I'd much rather have him against UWR or BUG. I could be wrong here.
Mirror: Come on...you seriously think Dig is better than Jace, here? I played Cuneo on MODO when he was testing his UWR Jersey deck and it was a slaughter. Not that the UWR Countertop deck
without countertop ever had a chance, but he resolved multiple Dig Through Times and nothing happened. A bird in the hand is worth 2 in the bush, and the man that resolves Jaces while the other man is resolving Digs is going to come out on top. The mirror is won off of positional advantage. I think your mistake is assuming that the two cards are both simply draw spells.
Infect: I've only played this matchup a few times but I think I want Jace over Dig here. They both are easily rendered irrelevant by a fast start, but if I can resolve just one of these I'd much rather it be Jace, who can bounce creatures and set up Terminus the turn it comes into play. I don't expect to cast Dig on turn 4, anyway, with this deck.
Basically, I tested with Dig for maybe 10 matches at most, and it just felt like a really expensive draw spell that would then require me to a) find what I want and then b) pay even more mana to cast it. People call it double Demonic Tutor, but since I'm not turboing my graveyard it felt like double
Diabolic Tutor.
You definetely need to play more against Infect to see the power of Jace in this MU, when facing Crop Rotation and Inkmoth Nexus. Having all your mana available and then investing UU for a card, that gives you incredible selection and card advantage is so much better...
Jace is only a good card in the majority of games against combo, where you already are winning and you then play a card that will push you even more ahead, so you get the bias it's a good card. And you really prefer a clunky 4cmc blue (hi pyroblast) sorcery spell over Entreat the Angels, that can be played (and should be played the majority of time) as an instant and pressures your opponents life total.... F.ex. Jace is of course better against Storm if his hand is a pile of crap (f.ex only Rituals) than Entreat, because you'll make sure that after some Jacestorms he has no way to win. I just prefer cards that are good in more situations and in close games not in games i'm already winning.
I think you misunderstood DTT and Jace in the mirror. You don't cut Jaces for DTT, you cut some for DTT while still having Jace in your deck. And you can't really think that a 2UU sorcery speed spell is most of the time better than a DTT. The mirror evolves around Countertop, not Jace. Jace is a powerful card to have in play in the mirror, but it's not a good card to have in your hand, because it's not good the majority of time. Investing 4 mana for a card that can be countered by a 1 mana card is a suicide move when you don't have an abundance of mana or when you have other lines of play or simply have non FoW Countermagic in your hand. By no means Jace is a bad card in the mirror, and one shouldn't board it out there, but you'd rather want to see CB and DTT in the early to midgame than Jace.
DTT is ofc harder to cast in a non 4 Ponder build (which one shouldn't play anyways at a large tournament, because the 4 Ponder build is the best version of this deck in the current metagame), but even Oarsman played 1 DTT over 1 Jace in his zero Ponder build.
Edit:
Quote:
Originally Posted by
zeus-online
One thing i don't understand: Why are you boarding Force of will out?
Æther vial is such a beating, and force of will is one of the best ways of shutting it down.
On the subject of æther vial in death and taxes - would you consider boarding containment priest in? It kills vial'ed creatures, it is pretty safe to assume that they will board plows out, and it is a surprise blocker.
Any advice on nic fit?
My plan is to board entreat the angels out+ a few swords to plowshares, board in any counterspells/liliana removal that i have and ride jace/snapcaster to victory.
I don't know if it's correct but it seems like the logical thing to do, considering how good they are at dealing with the post-board entreat (They are also quite good against pre-board entreats)
I don't think nic fit is very good, but i keep encountering it so i need a plan.
TheArcitect and Einherjer already wrote only good stuff, i 100 % agree, so i'll only add a few sentences about Nic Fit (about DT there is nothing to add).
Non red builds are very good MU's, the Punishing Jund version is one of the hardest MU's for Miracles, if piloted by a good pilot, because a not so good pilot will make SB mistakes (like Veteran Explorer f.ex) and play mistakes that will make you feel the MU is easy. You need any number of wincons you have available in your 75 in this MU, because they always play 2-4 Slaughter Games, while having Eternal Witness, GSZ for Witness and they also have lots of removal for every threat. You need to be the agressor in this MU, because you have no way of winning a long game, because once some Slaughter Games resolved (they always seem to resolve^^) the game is over, because you have no way to win.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
TheArchitect
I can help you with the nic fit part. I played nothing but nic fit for over year and still regularly play against it in locals events. There are many subarchtypes of the deck: punishing fire, Scape-wish, BUG PW control, BUG or BWG pod, or just GBx goodstuff piles. However, the strategy to beat them is mostly the same.
If they are smart they will SB out veteran explorers against you. Don't waste removal on this guy unless its stop a therapy or scapeshift. You getting 2 lands is better than them getting 2 lands most of the time.
Unless you see some pfire, academy recotor or recurring nightmare shinanigans, dont bother with GY hate. Its usually just Vet, Therapy and maybe 1 other card like eternal witness that it will effect.
Jace is king. Batterskull is also great. Non-fire builds cannot effectively remove these cards. Karakas+legend is also near unbeatable for them.
CB is pretty weak since their curve is varied and they have deed, decay and a GSZ target to kill CB.
Entreat can still steal games, but you will have to bait out deeds first.
Keep in FoW. They have a lot of meh cards, but their haymakers are must counters and this is a matchup you will regularly be snapcasting forces.
Some nic fitters think slaughter games or surgical effects are the key to winning this matchups(naming jace, entreat or FoW usually.). Those cards are terrible, but still vary your wincons so you don't get blown out, and be aware of surgical's interaction with top/miracles.
Using Philips standard 4 ponder setup, I would board like this typically:
-4 CB
-1 Stp
-2 REB
+1 Counterspell
+2 Priest
+2 Clique
+1 Judgment
+1 W/T
Against the BUG decks you want REBS. Against scapeshift you need to treat them a bit more like combo (less removal more counters BEB and counterbalance are ok). Against Pfire, you can treat them more like Jund (GY, EE or moon are all good, maybe keep in some CB but over-rely on them).
EDIT: I should add except for punishing fire version, we are favored. That matchup is even to unfavored. The GBW lists are the easiest. The BUG lists are probably 55/45, scapeshift is closer to 60/40. I don't normally say this, but the legend build, or SFM builds are definitely better positioned. The games go super long and Batterskull or legend + Karakas are very tough for them to beat.
I mostly encounter versions featuring liliana(Their best card against miracles imho) and punishing fire, the versions i encounter without these cards are not the ones i am worried about.
I wonder about your take on the entreats: The good nic fit players are difficult to bait, my response is to board in as much removal for deed and liliana as possible, i see your point on counterbalance however...but against punishing fire i tend to keep it in?
I am playing a philips old version with -1 volc, +1 mountain...my sideboard is a mess that i need to clean up.
-
Re: [DTB] Miracle Control
Quote:
Originally Posted by
zeus-online
I don't think nic fit is very good, but i keep encountering it so i need a plan.
Usually they do cut their Explorers after boarding so don't count on free lands.
I'd go with -4 Counterbalance -2 Blast +1 EE +1 CS + 2 Clique +1 Wear/Tear +1 Councils Judgement.
If you are having a lot of problems you can still add 2 Rest in Peace to your board, as they help a lot with their recurring value cards. Usually you win by resolving Entreat end of turn, Jace is more of a value card here to wittle down their resources. Depending on the Nic Fit versions boarding may vary. Watch out for Choke and Notion Thief in the blue versions.
