[Deck] Ultimate Walker

[MattH]

Actually that sounds like a ton of fun. The synergy with fetches and Top are obvious, but man oh man would it be sweet to start copying Wastelands!

[luma]

Just played the deck at a 26 player tournament to a 4-1 record and 2nd place with this list:

3 Tundra
3 Volcanic Island
1 Underground Sea
1 Plateau
4 Flooded Strand
1 Polluted Delta
2 Plains
2 Island
2 Wasteland
3 Mishra's Factory
1 Academy Ruins
1 Tolaria West

3 Jace Beleren
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
1 Ajani Vengeant
4 Force of Will
3 Spell Snare
2 Counterspell
4 Ancestral Vision
3 Brainstorm
4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Engineered Explosives
2 Cunning Wish
1 Humility
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Decree of Justice
3 Lightning Helix

61 cards

SB:
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Path to Exile
1 Volcanic Fallout
1 Extirpate
1 Dismantling Blow
1 Pulse of the Fields
4 Meddling Mage
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Tormod's Crypt
2 Firespout

Here's what I remember and scribbled down during the tournament:

Round 1, Baseruption
I counter second and third turn Goyfs with Spell Snare. Lightning Helix takes down Confidant and a third Snare kills third Goyf. He kills my Jace and Elspeth with Vindicate, but the lone token is enough, 1 damage per turn. Before second game, he gets a game loss for illegal decklist. Sad, but no can do. We still play with sb for fun, he wins game 2 quite easily, and we don't finish game 3 before the next round starts.

1-0

Round 2, UW Merfolk
I have something for all his little fish. Adept gets Snare, LoA Stop and Mutavault Wasteland. He resolves a Reejerey after we trade FoWs, but I have a Humility, and Elspeth and Jace come down to win the game.

Game 2 he starts with Vial and 2x Adept. I get a turn 5 Visions, but he has one counter more when I cast Humility. I draw enough removal and Elspeth to stabilize at 3 life, and he scoops from 22 life.

2-0

Round 3, Train Wreck
He starts game 1 with three Hymns and two Duresses. Ouch. I hide an Elspeth with Brainstorm and make some tokens before he kills her with a big Consume Spirit. I stop his Korlashes and kill him with tokens and Factories.

He has again Hymn and Duress, but Jace draws me cards and Elspeth's tokens chump Korlash. The game goes on and on, but I have counters for his lethal Consume Spirits. I almost give the game away, when I try to EE his Korlash, only to find out he regenerates. In the end, Elspeth-boosted tokens and Factories take him down. He almost gets a draw by Oblivion Stoning Elspeth on his last extra turn (everything else was indestructible), but I have another in hand and kill him on the 5th extra turn.

3-0

Round 4, Red Sligh

What should I do against Sligh / Burn? I just couldn't do anything before getting burned out (2x Price of Progress in Game 1 and everything else in game 2). Even a wished Pulse of the Fields didn't do enough, with only 2 plains on the battlefield. Any suggestions to beating these matchups? A fellow landstill player suggested a single CoP:Red for tutoring.

3-1

Round 5, Tempo Threshold

I didn't make any notes in these games, but here's what I remember: I lose to "assisted manascrew". I don't resolve a single Visions, he has Stifles for them all. I get eaten by an angry Mongoose.

Game 2: I can't remember a thing, but the lifetotals look like a single Factory kills him, and a 6/7 Goyf has attacked once before moving to plow the fields.

Game 3: I keep a high-risk, high-gain hand: Tundra, Factory, 2x Vision, 2x Elspeth, Relic. The risk pays off, I find a Brainstorm and the lands I need. He counters my first Vision and Elspeth, but the second ones resolve. Firespout, Relic and recursive EE keeps his men out of the way, while Elspeth and Jace win the game for me.

About the deck: I'm not quite sure about the Wishes. Mostly I wished for P2E to kill a guy, once I got to kill a Top with a kicked Blow. How about replacing them with something else (I was thinking along the lines of E. Tutor / 2nd Humility / P2E), and using the wishboard slots for maybe red and blue Blasts? The Helixes were great against aggro and Confidants, but did absolutely nothing against Threshold (and other control-style decks with no killable creatures). Maybe it depends of the metagame, I expected quite a lot of aggro and decided that the Helixes are mainboard-worthy. Aiming bolts to the dome is really pointless. Any suggestions or comments?

[TFD]

I play Electrolyzes instead of Lightning helixes. At first I played Fire // Ice, but found I was hardly ever using Ice and I could cast electrolyze very often with the amount of lands in this deck. I cut the decrees for forbid, and I kept the wishes in but I'm thinking of replacing them with something. Maybe Exalted Angel? It seems like it would be good vs. zoo and gobbos, but it would break the whole "creatureless" thing.

[Paradigm Shift]

I play Electrolyzes instead of Lightning helixes. At first I played Fire // Ice, but found I was hardly ever using Ice and I could cast electrolyze very often with the amount of lands in this deck. I cut the decrees for forbid, and I kept the wishes in but I'm thinking of replacing them with something. Maybe Exalted Angel? It seems like it would be good vs. zoo and gobbos, but it would break the whole "creatureless" thing.

Try Control Magic, Vedalken Shackles, or perhaps the new 2-drop Enchantment from ZEN that produces Angels once it gets enough counters. These all seem like good cards to provide threats while also keeping the deck creature free. Control Magic and Shackles also double as pseudo-removal.

[TFD]

Try Control Magic, Vedalken Shackles, or perhaps the new 2-drop Enchantment from ZEN that produces Angels once it gets enough counters. These all seem like good cards to provide threats while also keeping the deck creature free. Control Magic and Shackles also double as pseudo-removal.

Shackles sounds good, but I'm not sure the 2 drop enchantment is good, as dropping it on turn 2 even means it doesn't have any impact on the game state directly until turn 7 at the earliest. Thats if your opponent does no damage each turn. It's worth a try though.

[Esper3k]

I've been wanting to test Luminarch Ascension at least as a 1 of (I play 1 Enlightented Tutor main).

With how many times you sit around playing draw/go, it looks really good on paper.

My only concern is that since it's a 2 drop, you may end up blowing it up a lot with your own EE's.

Electrolyze also looks really interesting. However, do you ever find yourself wishing it was a Fire, especially against something like a T2 Dark Confidant?

[Hanni]

With your draw package of Brainstorm, Jace, and Standstill/Ancestral Visions, Hoofprints of the Stag is likely better than Luminarch since you'll get it's effect sooner. Not as explosive as a Luminarch once it reaches the threshold, but more defensive for you when it matters. Whether it's even necessary, would be the question.

[TFD]

Sure, in that situation, fire is probably better. But its still pretty even if you;ve got that t3 land drop, even if you're going second since electrolyze cantrips.

[Esper3k]

With your draw package of Brainstorm, Jace, and Standstill/Ancestral Visions, Hoofprints of the Stag is likely better than Luminarch since you'll get it's effect sooner. Not as explosive as a Luminarch once it reaches the threshold, but more defensive for you when it matters. Whether it's even necessary, would be the question.

Hoofprints definitely has the potential to generate 1 token faster, I agree.

I think their roles are different. Hoofprints is more defensive early. Luminarch is a game ender (once you have it online, you shouldn't have any problems winning the game in a few turns).

Another nice thing about Luminarch is that you can make the tokens on your opponent's turn, saving your mana for instants, etc. Hoofprints makes you use it on your turn, which makes our deck sad.

[Esper3k]

Sure, in that situation, fire is probably better. But its still pretty even if you;ve got that t3 land drop, even if you're going second since electrolyze cantrips.

That's true - definitely something I'd like to give a test.

I've been running Fire/Ice because it gives me both removal and a blue spell to pitch to FoW (something I've had difficulties before with this deck).

Electrolyze does the same thing. The 3 cost to me is actually nice too since it dodges Spell Snare and CB more easily.

[F3lix]

Hey guys,

I've been playing with this deck since Yan placed in the SCG tourney, a lot, and I think it's a absolute powerhouse.

I want to talk about my ideas about this deck, and my philosophy about playing it and its card choices.

I see a lot of people that are trying to squeeze in BS, or dropping forbid, or playing 0-1 humility or crucible, and I want to tell them why I believe that these are sub-optimal choices.

Before I get into individual cards, I'd like to talk about the decks gameplan. Firstly, this deck will beat anything in the late game, so we want to get there. Against aggro decks, we want to maim their threats with our removal, and stay out of the redzone with helix/pulse. Eventually they run out of gas, and you just win with factories/soldiers.

Against aggro/control, we again want to stall to get to the late game. We can counter they're worst threats with Spell Snare, and FoW if we absolutely have to, more on FoW later.

Against more control-ish decks, and aggro control that we know can out counter us we play a different gameplan. I often times play the beatdown. You want to play your must counters, which are A LOT (6x Planeswalkers, 4x Recall, 2x Humility, DoJ, and Crucible/EE/Wish to a smaller extent). Eventually, you will ware them out, and you'll resolve something, and then win. Don't always wait until you have counter backup, just know what order to play the threats in so you resolve your most powerful one, usually Elspeth. Keep the pressure on them to find answers and let them 2-1 themselves with FoW, you will win this match through pure CA.

It should now seem obvious why we don't run BS, it does not give us CA (though yes it gives us card quality), and more importantly, it's not a threat. I see people are dropping their Humility/Crucible or they're quasi-functional equivalents. We want exploit the maximum amount of CA, virtual or otherwise.

As for forbid vs. Counterspell, forbid is just better in this deck, plain and simple. Forbid cannot be snared, and is hard to hit with CB, it is recur-able, and gets even more powerful with Crucible. Sure, CS comes online a turn earlier, but this deck usually doesn't counter anything turn 2 unless its being snared, or you're FoWing an absolutely game breaking spell like Blood Moon.
I find I usually only use Forbid to maintain my position late game, and I usually buyback at that point.

I also want to point out that Crucible/Humility are crucial to this deck.
A resolved Humility is usually a game winner by itself, and of course combos well with, well, pretty much every other card in the deck. Crucible can be used to its fullest potential in this deck, plus a deck relying on making it into the late game with so many wastelands in the format makes this an auto-include. Wastelocks, unlimited blockers, and never missing a land drop are all good options.

In Closing, I would like to conclude that this deck is all about card advantage and inevitability. All your cards should be related to these two concepts. I see a lot of people in this thread nit-pick single cards without thinking about this decks overall game plan. I really believe that Yan's list from Goyf-Walk is the closest to optimal. The raw power of this deck is unparalleled. And has the capability to beat any deck.

I wish I could contribute something to the deck, but I feel that Yan's last list is hard to significantly be improved upon. Of course it can and should be tweaked to different meta-games, some thing like helix for Fire and Ice/electrolyze where you don't expect much zoo, and expect a lot of control, or maybe Volcanic Fallout for Wing Shards if you expect 10/10's and 12/12's, but I'd hate to drop VF in fear of Gobbos.

Good day.

[Pelikanudo]

Well I'm plannin an approach about the deck, but mainly the different is the inclusion of green.
The main idea was : Iwant to make a control deck with those great planeswalker and intending to keep the same late game as standstill withouth standstill. Well here it is :

4 Force of Will
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 counterspell
4 Ancestral Vision
2 Jace Beleren
2 Engineered Explosives
4 Pernicius deed
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2 Garruk Wildspeaker
3 Cunning Wish
4 Spellsnare

4 Tundra
4 Underground Sea
1 Island
1 Plains
3 Dust Bowl
1 Academy Ruins
2 Polluted Delta
4 Flooded Strand
4 Tropical Island
1 Savannah


// Sideboard:
SB: 3 Meddling Mage
SB: 1 The black trap
SB: 1 Krosan grip
SB: 1 Pulse of the Fields
SB: 1 Extirpate
SB: 1 Relic of Progenitus
SB: 1 Tormod's Crypt

SB: 1 Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 1 Diabolic edict
1 Fact or fiction
etc.


The main idea is the inclusion of the 6 best planeswalker (apart from great tez)
and greatly pernicius is the best suit for them . sure this is not landstill , but sigergy between all them is great . also pernicius replace explosives in such a way.
Also its tru our mana base, but not worse than another deck with much more colorless producers..

Finally I miss brainstorm but configurations with em can also be perfomed I test the othe first,

lso D.Biowl is great replacin that card advantage
Ig2g see you

[Nidd]

Don't play Garruk. He's not that great. Ajani is much better in this deck.
His tokens are neat and his ultimate is definitely a killer, but building an army with Garruk alone is too much of a hazzle when you also plan on using his ultimate. That's the good thing about Elspeth: She gets +1 when she creates a token, Garruk pays for doing so.
And I don't think you need the ramp Garruk gives.

But keep G in there for Goyfs and a wish-able Krosan Grip.

[Esper3k]

Deed is really tempting, but it makes you have to play both Black and Green, making you really a 4 color deck with a pretty shaky manabase.

I had such high hopes that Sorin Markov would be great so that Black may become viable in this deck, but guess we have to keep waiting.

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

*list

Three Dust Bowl plus zero Crucible of Worlds = NOMBO!!!!

[Esper3k]

I'm always so tempted by Sarkhan Vol in this deck too.

To me, he seems to be the Planeswalker that reaches his ultimate fastest combined with an ultimate that will actually end the game quickly.

Sadly, his colors and other abilities aren't good for the deck (although I could see his +1 ability being useful with Elspeth).

[gustha]

I'm considering bringing somethign similar to Ultimate Walker to sunday's tournament. The meta is good for landstill and for slower control decks like White Stax, but canadian has the reach too. Expecting merfolks, gobbos, bant (those being the large part of the field), along with zoo), some tempo thresh, iona reanimator, some rock, I hope about 60-70 players.

I have shared some ideas with klaus on the build of UW, and I'm more leaned towards his conception of the deck. This morning I woke up and decided I wanted to add another jace MD, and I cut and paste cards and finally came up to this odd mix. Testing, and F3lix's appropriate considerations on the deck, proved brainstorm and top (card quality) to be absolutely not needed campared to the quantity given by jace and vision. Cutting brainstorm left some open slot for wish and crucible, and so I decided to switch from d blow to wasteland. Non top means no sb counterbalance.

// Lands (24)
3 [ON] Flooded Strand
2 [ZEN] Scalding Tarn
3 [R] Tundra
2 [R] Volcanic Island
1 [R] Plateau
3 [UNH] Island
2 [UNH] Plains
1 [ZEN] Mountain
3 [4E] Mishra's Factory
2 [TE] Wasteland
1 [TSP] Academy Ruins
1 [FUT] Tolaria West

// Spells
4 [TSP] Ancestral Vision
3 [M10] Jace Beleren
2 [JU] Cunning Wish
4 [B] Swords to Plowshares
3 [RAV] Lightning Helix
3 [SHM] Firespout
3 [FD] Engineered Explosives
1 [FD] Vedalken Shackles
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [DIS] Spell Snare
1 [EX] Forbid
2 [ALA] Elspeth Knight-Errant
1 [ALA] Ajani Vengeant
1 [FD] Crucible of Worlds

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [IN] Dismantling Blow
SB: 4 [ALA] Relic of Progenitus
SB: 3 [U] Red Elemental Blast
SB: 4 [PS] Meddling Mage
SB: 1 [DS] Pulse of the Fields
SB: 1 [TE] Capsize
SB: 1 [M10] Negate

Considerations, doubts.
-manabase: tri-colored manabase. Only 5 fetch, basic mountain so 1 less crucible needed (though I miss the second for wastelock...). Only 5 fetch? Shuffle effects are useless because of no brainstorm/top, so it's maybe better to have 1 more basic than 1 more fetch. Double blu is important to start, otherwise I should consider the split 1 arid mesa 1 scalding tarn. The rest is pretty intuitive, I don't like so much having only 3 volcanic islands.
-removal: preferred firespout in place of humility (better vs faster decks, crushes goblins as well as merfolks, zoo; useful against tempo thresh and maybe bant, useless vs dreadstill). Preferred vedalken shackles upon the 4th helix.
-doubts: i want the 2nd forbid and the 2nd crucible. No. I want the 2nd crucible (I may go up to 61). I'd also want the 2nd forbid, but the 2nd forbid calls the 2nd crucible, and then it would be 62 cards. Somebody help me?

Sideboard: 4 mage 4 relic 3 blast 1 pulse = untouchable.
-dismantling blow: the kicker is barely needed here. I'm considering return to dust and ray of distortion, though maybe fracturing gust would be a good metacall. Undecided.
-capsize: i want a way out if they reanimate iona and name white. Could be useful against other things too...
-negate: not really fond of this... help me find something :) Maybe the 2nd forbid?!?

[Darkenslight]

Spell Pierce in the Negate slot? It'll usually do what you want Negate to do at one less mana.

[nodahero]

Perhaps someone on here could give a list of the various builds and the type of meta they are aimed at destroying? Most people have issues picking out what build is right for their meta... As an extension of that idea we could create a list of card choices and basically explain what they are good against and bad against and then allow people to make their own variations with at least some understanding of each cards options. An example for this was provided to me by a friend who asked why a shackles over a 4th Helix. Beyond Goyf I had no real reason actually. Perhaps you guys could elaborate on some of your individual card choices.

[gustha]

I'd really like to go up to 61 cards for another slot, and I'm undecided what to add: nothing? 4th helix? 2nd crucible? It is not needed for the stability of the manabase, but would help with the wastelock. Dunno.
I personally like vedalken shackles as it is a RE.RE.RE.: reusable recurrable removal, synergystic with lots of stuff in the deck, and really acts as a wincondition along with elspeth, ajani and crucible. I find it less random than the singleton decree, and is a stable wincondition vs: mirror, merfolks, bant/thresh (if you keep pridemage off the table). Has a shot vs redbased aggro too, less useful maybe. I feel I'm much more protected in the early game than yan's list. For his list, that 4th helix is truly important, because it's like a time walk to the lategame. For me, firespout already acts as this timewalk (1 or 2, actually), so I may not "need" the 4th helix (though it is a strong card...).
The meta my list is headed to is described in the first 2 lines of the post, hope it serves. I share the questions of nodahero, though, and ask a further question to answer: why playing ultimate walker over, said UWx landstill? (I have, ofc, my personal answer, but I'd like to hear Enigma's opinion: we want the MU-analysis finished! )