Esper Mentor

The deck definitely lost some of its power. But I still think its a better blue-midrange/control choice than stoneblade. I don't think lingering souls is good in this deck (and I was huge fan of souls in stoneblade). We are already at a choke point with 3 drops, and don't need more of them. Jace, Vyrn's Prodigy is growing on me a bit. The fact that it gives you something to do turn 2 besides cantrip is nice, otherwise its usually worse than snapcaster (which is usually uncastable till turn 3+).

Dig through time let the deck really pull ahead in the mid-late game. Being able to do that is essential for a deck like this to work. That is why I like Jace as a replacement. Both the mindscultper and prodigy are good card advantage engines. I am not sure on my exact configuration yet, but I would like to have 2 of each I think. Otherwise, the deck does not have to change too much. Shardless BUG is really the only new threat that will have to be taken into account when creating a sideboard.

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Originally Posted by TheArchitect

The deck definitely lost some of its power. But I still think its a better blue-midrange/control choice than stoneblade. I don't think lingering souls is good in this deck (and I was huge fan of souls in stoneblade). We are already at a choke point with 3 drops, and don't need more of them. Jace, Vyrn's Prodigy is growing on me a bit. The fact that it gives you something to do turn 2 besides cantrip is nice, otherwise its usually worse than snapcaster (which is usually uncastable till turn 3+).

Dig through time let the deck really pull ahead in the mid-late game. Being able to do that is essential for a deck like this to work. That is why I like Jace as a replacement. Both the mindscultper and prodigy are good card advantage engines. I am not sure on my exact configuration yet, but I would like to have 2 of each I think. Otherwise, the deck does not have to change too much. Shardless BUG is really the only new threat that will have to be taken into account when creating a sideboard.

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Agreed. Have you thought about re-introducing Stoneforge mystic? Perhaps 2 SFM 1 Batterskull in place of the Digs? It could warrant testing again.

I think sfm is actually probably worse now that discard and lily will probably see more play. Stoneforge is still a high maintenance threat, and not something that can really be considered a 2 drop, since it will rarely be effective turn 2. I've thought more about playing top in the deck again. I love stomping, mud, storm, d&t and of course miracles with null rod, but it's not a necessary card and the upside of top might be worth it.

Any thought given to Unearth?

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Originally Posted by pnutbutr

Any thought given to Unearth?

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I love unearth as a card. I would sooner just play reanimate though. But I don't think either are really worth playing. I used to like 1 in decks like one sometime in deadguy or stomeblade but since Deathrite those effects got worse and also I don't think we have quite enough creatures to make it worth playing. Maybe of we played stuff like mental note or fact or fiction but not in the current set up.

I hear ya... That makes sense.

I've been testing this deck for a little while on MTGO but haven't figured out how to replace DTT (since the last patch, my MTGO client keeps crashing every time I open the collection screen so I c ant even edit my deck to make it legal right now lol).

Ive also thought about adding more snapcasters, a second main deck toxic deluge, or even shifting the Elspeth from the sideboard to the main deck.

I'll keep following this thread and report back if I can finally put this deck together lol.

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Originally Posted by pnutbutr

I hear ya... That makes sense.

I've been testing this deck for a little while on MTGO but haven't figured out how to replace DTT (since the last patch, my MTGO client keeps crashing every time I open the collection screen so I c ant even edit my deck to make it legal right now lol).

Ive also thought about adding more snapcasters, a second main deck toxic deluge, or even shifting the Elspeth from the sideboard to the main deck.

I'll keep following this thread and report back if I can finally put this deck together lol.

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That's what we're all trying to figure out =P

The deck has actually lost so much of it's power that I'm actually considering just putting it on the backburner for now, unless it somehow gets results in a dig-less metagame

The closest we have is this list: http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=18293&iddeck=138277

But I'm not convinced that it has what it takes to deal with the new T1 metagame.

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Originally Posted by Minniehajj

That's what we're all trying to figure out =P

The deck has actually lost so much of it's power that I'm actually considering just putting it on the backburner for now, unless it somehow gets results in a dig-less metagame

The closest we have is this list: http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=18293&iddeck=138277

But I'm not convinced that it has what it takes to deal with the new T1 metagame.

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Have you tested the list without digs or are you guessing? I actually thought the same thing, but seeing Romero put up results with basically the same list (jaces instead of digs) makes me think there's still something here. Is anyone brewing with this list still?

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Originally Posted by princeofperasia

Have you tested the list without digs or are you guessing? I actually thought the same thing, but seeing Romero put up results with basically the same list (jaces instead of digs) makes me think there's still something here. Is anyone brewing with this list still?

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I'm speculating more than anything else, to be quite honest. I've swapped back to Miracles for the time being, as it just feels far more powerful against something like Shardless.

I ran this list at a local GPT yesterday

Land (20)
1x Creeping Tar Pit
4x Flooded Strand
2x Island
1x Marsh Flats
1x Plains
4x Polluted Delta
1x Scrubland
1x Swamp
3x Tundra
2x Underground Sea

Creature (8)
2x Baleful Strix
3x Monastery Mentor
2x Snapcaster Mage
1x Tasigur, the Golden Fang

Instant (16)
4x Brainstorm
2x Counterspell
1x Divert
4x Force of Will
1x Spell Pierce
4x Swords to Plowshares

Sorcery (14)
4x Cabal Therapy
4x Gitaxian Probe
2x Lingering Souls
3x Ponder
1x Toxic Deluge

Planeswalker (2)
2x Liliana of the Veil

Sideboard (15)
1x Bitterblossom
1x Council's Judgment
1x Disenchant
2x Flusterstorm
3x Meddling Mage
1x Null Rod
1x Pithing Needle
2x Surgical Extraction
2x Vendilion Clique
1x Zealous Persecution

R1: Miracles 0-2
R2: Shardless BUG 2-1
R3: Miracles 2-1
R4: Miracles 2-1
R5: D&T 1-2

Liked the list a lot. Still considering giving Top another run due to it being completely bonkers with mentor. Bitterblossom was incredibly strong against Miracles, and If Miracles continue to be as popular I could even see myself trying 1 main. However, the D&T MU seems tough, I think I'll try to fit in either antother Zealous or Deluge or maybe even a Massacre

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Originally Posted by Rook1e

I ran this list at a local GPT yesterday

Land (20)
1x Creeping Tar Pit
4x Flooded Strand
2x Island
1x Marsh Flats
1x Plains
4x Polluted Delta
1x Scrubland
1x Swamp
3x Tundra
2x Underground Sea

Creature (8)
2x Baleful Strix
3x Monastery Mentor
2x Snapcaster Mage
1x Tasigur, the Golden Fang

Instant (16)
4x Brainstorm
2x Counterspell
1x Divert
4x Force of Will
1x Spell Pierce
4x Swords to Plowshares

Sorcery (14)
4x Cabal Therapy
4x Gitaxian Probe
2x Lingering Souls
3x Ponder
1x Toxic Deluge

Planeswalker (2)
2x Liliana of the Veil

Sideboard (15)
1x Bitterblossom
1x Council's Judgment
1x Disenchant
2x Flusterstorm
3x Meddling Mage
1x Null Rod
1x Pithing Needle
2x Surgical Extraction
2x Vendilion Clique
1x Zealous Persecution

R1: Miracles 0-2
R2: Shardless BUG 2-1
R3: Miracles 2-1
R4: Miracles 2-1
R5: D&T 1-2

Liked the list a lot. Still considering giving Top another run due to it being completely bonkers with mentor. Bitterblossom was incredibly strong against Miracles, and If Miracles continue to be as popular I could even see myself trying 1 main. However, the D&T MU seems tough, I think I'll try to fit in either antother Zealous or Deluge or maybe even a Massacre

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Looks interesting, how did your matches against miracles play out? And did Divert ever do anything? I've considered the card in the past but I'm not convinced.

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Originally Posted by Minniehajj

Looks interesting, how did your matches against miracles play out? And did Divert ever do anything? I've considered the card in the past but I'm not convinced.

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Very very grindy except for R1 where he just had an answer for everything I did and killed me quickly. The two other matches were dominated by Therapy and Souls. Divert was pretty dissapointing, acting as a worse Spell Pierce, but then again I only faced 1 BGx deck and it got Thoughtseized away then game I saw it. I will contine to try it for a bit, but it will be the first card to go if I make any changes.

How about the death and taxes matchup? That's a deck that I suspect will be cropping up again shortly.

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Originally Posted by Minniehajj

How about the death and taxes matchup? That's a deck that I suspect will be cropping up again shortly.

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G1 I got completely locked out by Thalia + Wingmare combined with port/waste. G2 Mentor took over and won in 2 turns. G3 I needed to draw one of 7 outs in 3 turn but somehow missed and lost. I don't think the MU is that bad, but if you can't interact with them early you will definitely run into problems.

The D&T matchup is usually a very positive one. Zealous Perciution, snapcaster, and deluge are very good against them. However, it is very important to not keep 4 cantrip 1 land hands against them. We can use cantrips cheat on mana vs most decks, but not D&T.

Divert is much worse in practice than it looks on paper. I would rather play a misdirection in that slot. After more testing, with the loss of dig, we have trouble keeping up with shardless now and should adjust the SB a bit to improve that. I have not tested it a ton, just a handful of games on cockatrice, but this is what I would play now:

20 Lands:
1 Cavern of Souls
4 Flooded Strand
2 Island
2 Marsh Flats
1 Plains
4 Polluted Delta
1 Swamp
3 Tundra
2 Underground Sea

3 Baleful Strix
4 Brainstorm
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Counterspell
4 Force of Will
4 Gitaxian Probe
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
4 Monastery Mentor
4 Ponder
2 Snapcaster Mage
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Toxic Deluge

Sideboard:
1 Bitterblossom
1 Council's Judgment
1 Disenchant
2 Flusterstorm
1 Hydroblast
3 Meddling Mage
1 Notion Thief
1 Null Rod
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Zealous Persecution

- With more stifles/wastes popping up and the deck having a higher curve with Dig gone, I went up to 20 lands. However, it is important to remember to cut a swamp/cavern/plains against combo or control matchups for game 2/3.

- Strix is even better now with more goyfs, less pyromancers.

- I am still iffy on the manabase. It might be right to cut a flats for a 3rd sea. I still don't like scrubland in this deck. This deck really wants all the blue it can get. Unfortunately, I think the 2 non-blue basics will remain a necessary evil.

- I though persish was awful in the Delve meta, and cringed every time I saw a deck running it, but with Thresh, Team america and Shardless coming back it might be worth running again. It would probably take the Hydoblast slot in my list.

I'm much happier with that list, including the Perish change. Will sleeve it up sometime this week and play at locals!

Ran the following last night at a 51 man tourney in Seattle.

Lands (20)
4 flooded strand
4 polluted delta
1 marsh flats
1 swamp
1 plains
2 island
3 tundra
2 underground sea
1 scrubland
1 creeping tar pit

Creatures (8)
2 baleful strix
2 snapcaster Mage
3 monestary mentor
1 tasigur, the golden fang

Instances (16)
4 force of will
4 brainstorm
2 counterspell
2 spell pierce
4 swords to plowshares

Sorceries (12)
3 ponder
4 cabal therapy
4 gitaxian probe
1 toxic deluge

Planeswalkers (4)
2 jace, the mind sculptor
2, liliana of the veil

Sideboard:
3 meddling Mage
2 zealous persecution
2 flusterstorm
1 disenchant
1 vendilion clique
2 surgical extraction
1 pitching needle
1 null rod
1 council's judgement
1 bitterblossom

My rounds went like:

R1: tin fins 0-2
Game one they were in the play and went off turn two and got me way too fast with griselbrand. Game two I disrupted his hand decently at the beginning and forced a crucial brainstorm, resolved a baleful strix the turn before he got griselbrand out but then had barely enough resources to also get out emrakul and win.

R2: miracles 0-2
G1 he gets counter top up extremely fast and locks me out then resolves a mind sculptor and I scoop once it's too far gone so we don't end up doing to time. G2 got kind of grind, I was able to counter his have and on the next turn resolve a Lotv on my end, got him to discard an entreat, he ends up resolving his other entreat a few turns later for four, I CJ one and have him sac another with Lili but he gets there with two angels and a snap.

R3: silence stick 2-0
Both games I dominate with tons of hand disruption and board presence.

R4: BUG delver 2-0
Can't remember details as I was pretty tired. Pretty straight forward back and forth and I ended up being able to get board presence both games, resolving a tasigur, even a creeping tar pit was swinging.

This was my first time running this deck at all at a tournament and I had a lot of fun with it. I felt like I could have won the miracles matchup if I had maybe gotten a jace or more hand disruption than I did. I never drew creeping tar pit early for it to hinder me and only used it as a creature once. I was too skeptical on running a baby jace so I held off but it would be cool to play him if I see him put up some results. Everything felt really smooth with the deck and I think it has a lot of potential.

Has anyone had any luck playing Lili, tar pit or baby jace??

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Originally Posted by Deadinthestreet

Has anyone had any luck playing Lili, tar pit or baby jace??

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I run 2 Lili and 1 Tar Pit in my list (see it a couple of posts above). So far they have been very solid for me and I am always happy to see them. I can't see the need for either Jace, but I haven't tried them out yet. 4CMC for JTMS seems like a lot and I am not sure Flip Jace is better than snapcaster in this shell, but I have been wanting to try him.

I've only played about a dozen matches so far, and I'm not running Lili since she's such a nonbo with Mentor. What I AM doing is running Stoneforge Mystic - a card I ordinarily wouldn't touch - and Ancestral Vision, both of which have been excellent. Vision lets us hang in the late game with the BGx decks like Shardless, and Mentor provides an endless stream of excellent equipment carriers, meaning that both opposing Lilianas and Abrupt Decays are heavily taxed, while the Equipment offers some robustness in the face of Hymn. The Miracles matchup still seems fine, if not as awesome as it was with Dig, and the sideboard has (so far) fixed the bad combo matchup game 1.

4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Monastery Mentor
2 Snapcaster Mage

2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Fire and Ice

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
3 Ancestral Vision

4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Force of Will
2 Council's Judgment
1 Counterspell

4 Polluted Delta
4 Flooded Strand
3 Tundra
3 Underground Sea
3 Island
1 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Karakas

Sideboard
3 Meddling Mage
2 Flusterstorm
2 Rest in Peace
2 Containment Priest
2 Disenchant
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
1 Nahiri, the Lithomancer
1 Force of Will
1 Thoughtseize

The sideboard is still pretty preliminary. It should probably have a Back to Basics (with the accompanying changes to the manabase) and/or a Tsabo's Web to give something extra against Lands since A - there are three Lands players in my local meta, and B - I can't imagine a world where that matchup is particularly good.

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Originally Posted by btm10

4 Eqiupments
1 Nahiri, the Lithomancer

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This made me cringe. Sorin 3.0 or Elspeth (or JTMS) are much better than Nahrir. In non-weenie decks, any equipment beyond Jitte and batterskull are overkill at best and completely dead cards at worst. And while I don't think stoneforge is bad in the deck, but make no mistake, nothing about mentor makes equipment better. If you get to make monk tokens, you won the game. And if you dont get make monk tokens, you better hope your SFM is still alive because otherwise the deck has no creatures.

I do actually like the idea of Ancestral Visions. It does a good job of refilling without having to make any big mana investment.

Lands is indeed a tough matchup. I don't run into it too often luckily. We are actually pretty good at interacting with crazy stuff they do, STP kills Mirat lage, Meddling mage stops Punishing Fire, Surgical gets Loam. But we are pretty soft to their mana denial and a have a REALLY tough time if we dont find Mage or Surgical.

I do not think liliana is good in this deck. BB is getting greedy, and we don't want to play in topdeck mode. I also don't think Tasigur is good. If you need a pseudo-goyf, play Angler. I have an unpopular opinion that Tasigurs Activated ability IS actually really relevant in legacy, but the power difference and being a legend make angler better still.



I got some more games in with the list I posted above, and did change the hydroblast to perish. It performed very well. My doubts I was beginning to have with the deck in the post-dig meta are mostly gone now. Also, I had forgotten how much I love Notion Thief.

If anyone curious, this is what I anticipate the matchups will look like in the post dig meta. This is with my list I just posted, and its based on a small sample and theory crafting, so it is basically just my opinion/expectations:

Unfavored: Jund, Lands, Merfolk, Burn
Slightly Unfavored: Shardless BUG, Sneak and Show, MUD
Even: Miracles, URx Delver, Reanimator, Blade Control
Slightly Favored: RUG/BUG delver
Favored: Death and Taxes, Elves, Omnitell, Storm, Infect, Maverick