[Deck] Blue Skies

[DampingEngine]

This is the deck I used to make the finals of Kadilak's second Dual Land Draft. I have made a couple changes after my experiences at that tournament.

4x Flying Men
4x Cloud of Faeries
3x Sea Sprite
4x Serendib Efreet
4x Sea Drake

4x Aether Vial
4x Mask of Memory
4x Umezawa's Jitte
4x Force of Will
4x Standstill

4x Mishra's Factory
3x Wasteland
14x Island

SIDEBOARD:
4x Old Man of the Sea
3x Winter Orb
3x Chalice of the Void
2x In the Eye of Chaos
2x Rushing River
1x Wasteland

Card explanations:

Flying Men: There needs to be a 1-drop in this slot, and this is the best option being a flying creature and not having any disadvantage. It makes it possible to swing with Jitte on turn 3 along with Cloud, and late game Men can be discarded to Mask or Force.

Cloud of Faeries: Of course they just got much more exciting after the errata change, comboing with Aether Vial to give you 2 extra mana, untap Factories as a surprise, or make 2 mana out of 1 land when you're mana screwed. This isn't why they're good of course, it's because they cost 0 mana for a creature that carries equipment over the heads of most other creatures.

Sea Sprite: I actually played Skyshroud Condor in this slot at one point, but a 1/1 pro red body is often better than a 2/2 one, not to mention the fact that you can't play Condor sometimes. Besides that, blue does not have a wide array of good 2 drops, so Sea Sprite it is.

Serendib Efreet: This is really the all star of the deck. It can't be killed with a single bolt and blocks Mongoose all day among other things. One of the great undercosted creatures of all time.

Sea Drake: The other great fatty of the deck. Unfortunately it's both very hard to find and irreplacable. Its drawback can hurt, particularly if you have multiples, but with Vial it's usually not the end of the world. It can also save Factory from combat and it's drawback is cut in half if you were missing your land drop that turn otherwise, which happens quite a bit.

Aether Vial: I believe this deck abuses Vial even more than Goblins. The combo with Standstill is amazing. It also gives the ability to play and equip equipment while still playing creatures on the same turn. It also makes this deck one of the few decks where a one land hand is keepable. If my opening hand has Vial, creatures, Force of Will, and one land, I usually keep it & don't regret it.

Mask of Memory: I had forgotten the joy of playing this card until the DLD. It keeps your hand full of Force of Wills and fatties and turns dead lands and Jittes into good cards. It's rare when Mask is activated and it doesn't basically just say "Draw 2 cards", which is the nature of such draw and discard effects.

Umezawa's Jitte: This is probably my favorite card in the game currently. It's so deceptively powerful, and all 3 of its abilities come into play on a regular basis. I want to draw this every game, although I will be quick to board it out against a creatureless deck, especially one that doesn't deal damage like Solidarity.

Force of Will: Kind of a no brainer in blue decks. Why not more counterspells? it's usually easier just to draw into Forces with your draw engines than allot slots to a card that is subpar in many matches. Daze would be the only other counterspell I'd consider main deck, but at the moment, there's nothing that could be switched for Daze without making the deck strictly worse.

Standstill: The Vial-Standstill combo of Fish was the basis for my creation of this deck. Standstill is so easily castable in this deck that I have to say it's a better draw engine than Fact or Fiction or Thirst for Knowledge are in other decks. It does get boarded out against Goblins and some other aggro decks, but against decks like Threshold, you can cast Standstill at virtually any time and they'll have to break it almost immediately.

Mishra's Factory: Another combo with Standstill, this also adds another threat and occasional equipment carrier to the deck, and helps greatly against other aggro decks like Goblins by being an early 3/3+ blocker.

Wasteland: The other disruption in the main deck, it's a recent addition but one that has been great so far. The 4th Wasteland is in the board now.

14 Island, 21 total land: I feel this is the right amount considering certain one land or no island hands are keepable, if they have both Vial and Force or something similar. Standstill is the only card you actually can't play without blue mana so keep it in mind when looking at your opening hand.

SIDEBOARD: I'm not the best sideboard builder so this is all up for debate.

Old Man of the Sea: This is the anti-aggro sideboard which switches for Standstill in matches such as vs Goblins. It's a good sized creature so it can block the turn it comes into play if you're not worried about it dying, and if it sticks, it's a huge problem for aggro decks, especially Goblins where all but one of its creatures are targetable.

Winter Orb: This is the board for control decks like Wombat and Rifter, usually switching for Jitte. Ideally you can cast it after they tap out and surprise them, but it's a problem for them any time you cast it. Blue Skies has Vial to help work around the Orb, and Sea Drake's disadvantage turns into an advantage with Orb out. It's not a main deck option, but works very nicely with your strategy in the control matchup.

Chalice of the Void, In the Eye of Chaos: This is the hoser package for Solidarity. If you resolve In the Eye, it's almost impossible for them to win. They need 6 land in play before they can cast Cunning Wish, and they rarely have that much land on turn 6, so you'll have more than enough time to win before they can think about going off. Chalice is also good vs them, but a little more versatile. It can also be used vs Iggy Pop and some random decks like Burn. Since it's in the board, I would consider using it vs Threshold, but all my main deck cards are good vs them so I don't know what I would switch. I don't think a sideboard is necessary for Threshold anyways.

Rushing River: This gets boarded in against decks that have Exalted Angel or Reanimator decks, threats you can't deal with otherwise. I haven't tested this yet, so I can't guess if 2 is the right number or how effective it is.

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Matchups: I haven't run a gauntlet with the deck yet, but I have played it in several tournaments and can report on how I fared.

Threshold: Highly favorable. I beat white Threshold 2-0 twice at the DLD and have beat it previously as well. Equipment can be a problem for them just because of the tempo it generates, and they can't reasonably deal with all your creatures, especially if you play vial on the first turn. Without mass removal (and only two of your creatures die to Pyroclasm), they are generally just swarmed. Anything short of a 4th turn Enforcer with threshold can't realistically save them, and even then they may still be swarmed or have to deal with Jitte. I don't think any sideboarding should be done for this matchup as it would water down the deck's goals. None of your cards are really bad against them. I also tested against EBA and beat it 4-0, it seemed like it might be even more favorable than Threshold.

Solidarity: Unfavorable game 1, much better after board. I have won game 1s against Solidarity before, but it's very hard. The thing that makes this matchup better than it seems is that they're taking a big risk if they wait until you have lethal damage to go off. This is a risk because you will often be drawing extra cards off of Mask of Memory or Standstill if they wait, and drawing into Force of Will. Post board, it's a much easier matchup. Getting a Chalice will often buy you enough time to win, and resolving In the Eye makes it almost impossible for them to win.

Goblins: Probably 50/50. I haven't tried this matchup since I added the Old Men, and it could be favorable now. Previously I had been breaking even with Goblins, winning some matches and losing some. They can have awfully explosive starts, but at the same time Jitte is terrible for them as is Sea Sprite and the fatties. Standstill is really terrible vs them so at least it's a no brainer what to board out. Old Man or possibly Vedalken Shackles would be the best option here, Old Man being significantly faster but easier to destroy.

Survival: Slightly favorable. This isn't that bad a matchup since they can't block your creatures and you can often race them, which is how you win the majority of your games against any deck. Old Man can be sided in in this matchup.

Deadguy Ale: 50/50, maybe slightly favorable. They can go hymn, hymn, I win and there's not much you can do about it. However, if you get vial their land destrcution becomes bad, and if you topdeck creatures, they often have no way of dealing with them. This is another matchup where Old Man shines, since most of their threats are neutralized and their lack of creature removal becomes an even bigger weakness. I side them in for Sea Sprites.

others I have played:

5/3: I thought this would be a bad matchup since their creatures are so big, but it's favorable. I lost one game mainly due to double Tangle Wire, which is near impossible to overcome, but won the other two. One game was won by disrupting his mana, which is probably that deck's biggest weakness. The other game was won by swarm tactics, making his Tangle Wires and Smokestacks bad.

Dirt: I also won this matchup, 2-0. In fact, he did so little game 1 I didn't know what he was playing and boarded in my Old Men thinking it was a Deadguy variant. Wasteland is terrible for him as is Force of Will, since many of his spells are not must-counters. Also, Standstill is pure gold against it.

Iggy Pop: I beat this deck with my Counterspell/Disrupt sideboard, I don't know how good other cards like Chalice would be against it, but at least it's turn 1 disruption if set to 0. Force of Will is of course the best card you can have in your deck if you're facing Iggy Pop, so you at least have some advantage despite having a slow clock. Wasteland should also improve the matchup. I recently tested this matchup and went 3-0 without sideboards. Of course I had Force of Will in all three games, which singlehandedly determines whether you can win game 1 or not. I didn't get to test with board, but if you're playing first, a first turn Chalice for 0 should help a lot. If you're not playing first, the Chalice should probably be set to 1.

I hope to continue to test this deck in a tournament setting and post the results. I think it's a good choice if you expect a lot of threshold and fares well against other aggro decks.