Originally Posted by
KO Bossy
Well I figured I'd be playing LDV after Omniscience hit the table anyway, so the black mana in the cost wouldn't be an issue. By looks alone, it seems strong. Again, haven't tested it since I don't have the deck. However, it seems that I can dig right to the bottom of my deck, if need be, to find what I need and not mill myself (since the cards go to the bottom of the library). Brainstorm, Ponder, Preordain and DTT all dig as well, but DTT doesn't allow cards to be put back on top, and the other 3 don't dig that far.
But you make a good point-unless Omniscience is in play via SaT, its a dead card. Either way, both are really inexpensive, so I can pick up both, test them and see how well they work.
As for RtA vs Emrakul, if you're in the clear to combo off, Emrakul is pretty much a winner, yes. However, there are times when an opponent will have over 15 life and you can't finish them in 1 turn. Once the Annihilator 6 hits, its pretty much game over from there, but its not always a 100% win. Against decks like Storm or some other crazy, one turn combo, that turn could be the difference between a win and loss. RtA, if you combo off with that, that's a win that turn.
Not to mention, if you're just going to forgo the RtA finish, why have Omniscience at all? Just SaT Emrakul in and do it that way.
RtA and Emrakul are alternate finishers. I guess that's why the deck is so good. You can win with one or the other. What if an opponent has Meddling Mage naming Emrakul? Without RtA, that's a loss. You can counter it, but there's probably going to be more than 1. You can CW for Wipe Away, but since Mage would only be going back to our opponent's hand, it'll just get cast again. If you counter it, you could wish for Surgical Extraction and exile all of them, I guess, but that leaves you open to other threats that Extraction won't be able to answer.
Either way, I do want to stick to a mono blue list. Maybe some day I can expand into something else, but Underground Seas, Volcanic Islands and company...outta my price range. Even FoW is stretching it, but I can make 100 or so bucks per copy work. 250-300 for one land...doesn't work right now. Plus, with FoW, while its pretty important for T0 countering, I can at least replace it with Spell Pierce, Flusterstorm or something to tide me over. Without dual lands, splashing a color isn't going to work out to well. I could just fetch basics, but that would slow me down way too much.