[Deck] The Gate

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Originally Posted by gustha

I have to admit my deck shone in that round, drawing nearly everything. G2 I had some nice tricks (brainstorm to make you believe I hid force) and all, but topdecked all my wincons after shuffling with ponder or fetch. G2 you also screwed and Ajani did his job, and it was really unexpected for you. The fact is, if you don't land bob o aren't able to protect him via discard you can't do very much. Pithing Needle only slows me down a little since I have more wincons than you have needles or extirpates. However, the round before a player had sided against me Dystopia, and it really hurted, getting rid of ajani vengent (when it had 8 counters on it, damn!) and elspeth (after having bolt a token). Since it is very unlikely that I bring disenchant effect against you, maybe dystopia can be a good strategy. Contamination may have a spot too.

Besides this I love this deck, too bad I don't have the cards to build it!

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I also sided Dystopia against you, but didn't see it. Anyways in that game I was under a train, had really no chance of doing anything. I was also thinking of Contamination + Bitterblossom yesterday getting home..

P.S. I also forgot I got screwed against you as you told me. I will add 1 more Swamp. 22 lands...

I have been playing this deck a lot recently. The list i have been using is as follows,

4 Abyssal Persecutor
4 Vampire Nighthawk
4 Hypnotic Specter
4 Gatekeeper of malakir
4 Dark Confidant

3 Jitte

4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Innocent blood
4 hymn to tourach

17 Swamps
4 Wasteland

4 Faerie Macabre
4 Leyline of the void
4 spinning darkness
3 chainers edict

the decks that normal show up in my meta are ANT, MUC, Reanimator, Solidarity, Dreadstill counter-top thopter goblins merfolk eva-green, thresh and there is one 43 lands player.

That looks more like SuiBlack than The Gate (by maxing discard, running Rit+Hippie).
Just try out the list in the OP.

I don't see the advantage of Dark Ritual over Bitterblossom and also i dont think that 4 Innocent Blood + 4 Gatekeeper is enough removal hence the Gatekeeper is @ casting cost 3.

Any hints on how to improve the Control MU?

I will also try and add the 22nd land, I got screwed to many times. I just hate it. It can happen, but not that often. Any hint on what to cut?

Btw I have to say that the weakest card in the MD was Bitterblossom. It was good and so on, but nothing exceptional.

Has anyone thought of a small green splash for Berserk? It's another way to remove persecutor and the game ends faster, a good thing in certain situations.
And green gives Krosan Grip..
Not sureit's needed though..

Has anyone considered the following sentiment: Bone Splinters > Innocent Blood? Of course there is a time when creatures have some type of protection against targeting spells, but I recently faced an opponent's Phyrexian Dreadnought along side a much less scary vanilla creature and only held an Innocent Blood. I'm sure an argument could be made similar to Hollywood's defense of Deathmark that names the commonly played targets that are immune to Bone Splinters. Of course the Show and Tell / Sneak Attack monsters immediately come to mind. However, Bone Splinters appears to generally be a much better card.

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Originally Posted by TheyCallMeTim

Has anyone considered the following sentiment: Bone Splinters > Innocent Blood? Of course there is a time when creatures have some type of protection against targeting spells, but I recently faced an opponent's Phyrexian Dreadnought along side a much less scary vanilla creature and only held an Innocent Blood. I'm sure an argument could be made similar to Hollywood's defense of Deathmark that names the commonly played targets that are immune to Bone Splinters. Of course the Show and Tell / Sneak Attack immediately comes to mind. However, Bone Splinters appears to generally be a much better card.

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Let's say your opponent started and you are facing a Goblin Lackey. You can play Innocent Blood, but not Bone Splinters. Thus Innocent Blood is stronger. And you can replace Deathmark with Smother as I did or with Ghastly Demise if you want to.

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Originally Posted by pippo84

Let's say your opponent started and you are facing a Goblin Lackey. You can play Innocent Blood, but not Bone Splinters. Thus Innocent Blood is stronger. And you can replace Deathmark with Smother as I did or with Ghastly Demise if you want to.

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No shit, once again I am retarded. However, there is an upside to sacrificing as part of the cost. Such as when you need to lose your Abyssal Persecutor and your opponent has counterspells. Does playing a combination of Innocent Blood and Bone Splinters make sense as opposed to running Deathmark or other suggested replacements?

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Originally Posted by TheyCallMeTim

No shit, once again I am retarded. However, there is an upside to sacrificing as part of the cost. Such as when you need to lose your Abyssal Persecutor and your opponent has counterspells. Does playing a combination of Innocent Blood and Bone Splinters make sense as opposed to running Deathmark or other suggested replacements?

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I don't think so. There are a ton of sacrifice effects anyway, the turn one is pretty important and i want stability in the first 3 turns more than i want more sac abilities. As for deathmark, i get that, meta depending of course. I just don't like the linear nature of the bone splinters as compared to deathmark.

In most cases, Innocent Blood can be your only possible turn one removal spell as Deathmark doesn't hit Goblins or Fish, Smother costs 1B and you'll have no graveyard for Ghastly Demise. In the remaining cases we simply play Duress or Cabal Therapy. True, there are alot of Cats running around out there but I think Bone Splinters may have a place in some builds, specifically those not running Deathmark.

That is precisely why I have been looking at Vindicate. I havn't have a chance to test it out yet.

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Originally Posted by Lifeless

That is precisely why I have been looking at Vindicate. I havn't have a chance to test it out yet.

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Can you elaborate? I'm not gonna give you the "it's no longer The Gate" response, but I do think that mono black is the only build for me.

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Originally Posted by TheyCallMeTim

Can you elaborate? I'm not gonna give you the "it's no longer The Gate" response, but I do think that mono black is the only build for me.

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Sorry, I mean Vendetta. I was considering it as a replacement for Deathmark since I see a whole lot more Goblins and Merfolk than Goyf nowadays.

I see. Vendetta is nice. Instant speed is good but it might hurt alot to kill a Tarmogoyf.

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Originally Posted by TheyCallMeTim

I see. Vendetta is nice. Instant speed is good but it might hurt alot to kill a Tarmogoyf.

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It's all theory craft at this point but I like it. Realistically it will cost you 3 or 4 life to kill the Goyf early, while late you have better cards to kill it. It's got all the tempo of Deathmark while being able to kill everything from Lackey to man-lands. Doubles your outs against Lackey on the draw. That's primarily why I was going to try it out.

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Originally Posted by Lifeless

It's all theory craft at this point but I like it. Realistically it will cost you 3 or 4 life to kill the Goyf early, while late you have better cards to kill it. It's got all the tempo of Deathmark while being able to kill everything from Lackey to man-lands. I can double your outs against Lackey on the draw. That's primarily why I was going to try it out.

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If you're expecting to lose that much life anyway, why not just play snuffout, where the late game you can just cast it with no life loss.

With the upcoming of Scars of Mirrodin i am expecting to see more and more "Artifact-based" decks like Affinity or Mono-Brown in my meta.
Has any one else tried the Affinity matchup? I encountered 2 people on MWS yesterday, both of which played Vial-Affinity with "Galvanic Blast" and "Mox Opal". They both stomped me into the ground without any trouble.
Aside from Gate to Phyrexia, and Pithing Needle on Ravager - what can be done about this?






PS, for those who are not familiar with the 2 upcoming cards i mentioned here, here is what they do:

Mox Opal 0
Legendary Artifact
Metalcraft - [T]: Add one mana of any color to your mana pool

Galvanic Blast R
Instant
Does 2 dmg to any target
Metalcraft - Does 4 dmg instead.

Never tested The Gate against Affinity, but I don't think it's a hard MU.. We'll see if Scars will bring good hards to make the deck playable in Legacy.

Anyways I tested again against Jace Control (aka Ubg Landeed) and the MU is really impossible. From my testings this deck is really good against Aggro and Aggro Control, it sucks against Control and never got a chance to test against Combo because it dissapeared from my meta.

So.. Changes I will try: - 1 Gatekeeper of Malakir + 1 Swamp. Got screwed many times and had to mulligan often to have lands.

Then.. Need advice on what to do with the Sideboard to improve the Control MU. Hints and advice?

What are your experiences against Heavy Control MU's? (Landstill, Jace Control..)

Good therapy/hymn use/luck. Its not an easy match up by any stretch, but not exactly impossible. I've been liking sadistic sacrament in the SB for it. You should focus on what your deck is already good at fighting, instead of bogging it down with stuff for one bad match up (unless your metagame is completely flooded with the problem deck, then by all means).

Against control and combo, how about Nether Void, or Sphere of Resistance?