If that is the case, wouldn't Ivory Mask be good against discard spells?Originally Posted by SpencerForHire
Honestly, I really feel that discard is something more easily played around, and less easy to side against. Just get your hand out of your hand and on the table ASAP and you should have more than a strong enough gameplan against any discard deck. This is especially true if you can get an early Chalice of the Void against them.
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I think we are all thinking way too outside the box here. The reason Stax doesn't like discard so much is because Stax is at the mercy of its opening hand because outside of Horizon Canopy, we have no card draw / card filtering.
Stax needs a relevant play turns 1-2 (3 at the latest), and a simple Thoughtseize can take your lock piece you were banking on and a Hymn can randomly ruin our mana base.
In my experience against any discard heavy deck, my priority is resolving Crucible of Worlds and praying they don't Grip it immediately. If you can stick a Crucible in play and survive their early hate, you should be able to win the war of attrition as long as you have ways to stop Tombstalker from doing you in.
If only Sensei's Divining Top had been properly costed at 3 mana...
... it'd suck and nobody, not even Stax would play it :D
You can try Scroll Rack, especially if you have a splash/fetchlands/KotR, but I doubt it's worth the investment.
None of these cards help in such a matchup (as discard). I would almost say focus on more popular matchups because focusing on a corner case seems kind of pointless. If you are running into a lot of this deck in your meta and find that you simply cannot win the matchup this might just be the wrong deck right now for such a meta.
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Very true, fighting discard with crappy answers like Ivory Mask or Runed Halo is pretty stupid, it's all about winning the resource war via Crucible.
Now the REAL problem is those decks packing discard + DEED and then the Krosan Grips from the side...
Bottled cloister and spiritual focus work very well against discard....I really like cloister because it is a total house if they don't remove it and you draw extra cards. Spiritual Focus is something I came across when looking for a good SB card against discard when playing enchantress and works really well in here save the cmc 2 but at least it isn't awful like runed halo at double white. And runed halo doesn't name more than one card and as such you're still vulnerable to discard spells other than the one you named.
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Spiritual Focus seems like a particularly nice option but Bottled Cloister on the other land... How is this not worse than just Chalicing/Trinisphering/playing your threats out. I think 4 mana is a stretch when you are trying to resolve something that is going to by large, protect you from discard (even in this deck).
Team Technology - Think it's good? Prove it.
Spiritual focus is a nice card but it's discard specific. On the other hand halo is more versatile.
I'm thinking on playing the deck with 4 magus as unique creature + full lock pieces...is it crazy??
And has anybody thought in evilness like Cloister + Confinement or cloister + E. Bridge??
Last edited by GoldenCid; 11-11-2009 at 08:55 PM.
I've been testing a Blue splash for Thirst for Knowledge- another possible option is Meditate. It gives the deck some desperately needed filtering quality.
//Land
4 Ancient Tomb
4 Plains
3 City of Traitors
4 Wasteland
3 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Island
1 Tundra
3 Flooded Strand
// Creatures
3 Magus of the Tabernacle
2 Baneslayer Angel
// Spells
2 Oblivion Ring
3 Crucible of Worlds
4 Armageddon
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Mox Diamond
2 Smokestack
3 Ghostly Prison
4 Trinisphere
4 Thirst for Knowledge
Is this a possible direction for the deck instead of the green splash?
anything is possible I suppose, however, you loose access to choke, which is BROKEN... and KotR if you choose, blue doesn't seem to be a strong splash to me.
Forgot the 2 Mishra's Factories in the list above.
I actually rather like Thirst For Knowledge from the testing I've done. Its really nice to be able to dig three deep and the casting cost is perfect for splashing. I've had to cut 1 Smokestack and 1 Crucible for it, as well as an Oblivion Ring and a random Elspeth I was running. I don't feel bad about cutting Smokestack because its increasingly the weakest card in the deck. 2 is enough to draw into for the long control matchups where Smokestack is good. I do feel bad about running only 3 Crucible though, although it is true that multiples are redundant and TfK can find it faster even with 3.
On another note Baneslayer continues to rock house. Stax desperately needed a win condition that didn't require you to have the full lockdown. I've raced everything under the sun with Baneslayer.
Have you ever discarded stuff you want to keep? Have you tried Compulsive Research? Sorcery-speed doesn't seem like a bad deal. CResearch is worse at drawing land but you need three mana to cast it in the first place. CResearch obviously synergizes with Crucible, but once you're at a certain stage, you'd rather have more artifacts than land. Depends on what you use it for, I guess.
I would never advise anybody to play anything less than 4 Crucible. I'd play 5-6 if I could. You even have TfK to get rid of excess copies you draw later. Of course, I still play 4 Smokestack because it's brutal against everything if it comes down early so I can sacrifice excess copies. (It's also pretty important against combo so as not to give them the time to assemble a hand that can win through the lock pieces or solve them via Serenity or some such. Hell, I've beaten Belcher that way. He had two lands and a Belcher, I had Chalice @0 and 1. All he needs is ESG/SSG/Desperate Ritual. After a turn with Smokes, he needs double ESG/SSG. After that, triple. Aaand gone.)
It's also the (maindeck) card that gives us the most advantage against blue in the long run and thus among the more likely to be attacked.
Crucible is also often important in the early game. Recurring just a single Wasteland once is back breaking early, much less so later. Crucible/Geddon t3/t4 is another, as is Crucible/Smokestack. Some hands aren't even keepable if you can't recur lands early (City/Diamond) - especially if you have Baneslayers. You can't do those things if you have to dig with TfK first (except maybe for Baneslayer, but I'd rather play another lock piece with four mana available).
Since you cut two Smokes, I guess your Crucible synergies are not what you're going for. (Your remark about BSA seems to confirm this.)
However, I don't know if you're not just diluting the game plan. It's frustrating to lose with a bunch of prison pieces and no win condition, or losing because you haven't drawn enough pieces. People often try to include card advantage and better win conditions but I have always returned to the base engine.
I'm not saying this is a flawed approach, just that it changes the dynamic a tad. I'm always curious about results for that reason.
The deck already has a very limited amount of card advantage engines available. Crucible is the one that's always included. Apart from that, Stax gets its CA mostly from disruption, including all the lock pieces plus Geddon.
Since there's a very limited number of slots left after accounting for those, win conditions, and Crucible, every change bigger than 2-4 cards will make the deck worse in a different area (again, not as such a bad thing).
However, I'd prefer a draw (or card advantage) engine that has a better synergy with the pieces already in place.
For example, cutting three Magi and two Baneslayers from your deck and replacing them with four KotRs and a Tabernacle will give you two more Tabernacle effects and two more beaters. They don't work as lock pieces vs. aggro via lifegain, but they potentially allow to cut a few lands for better mana and to get utility lands when needed. Also, you have one more land for Diamonds - and KotR is, for obvious reasons, just better than Magus when your opponent is beating with a single Goyf/Stalker or waiting to assemble a combo (unless it's Dredge). It's potentially worse than Baneslayer (five mana's a lot) but you can play more of them because they double as Tabernacles and beaters - or both, withholding an attack.
The loss of Choke hurts, too. It's the single best virtual CA engine against blue that Stax has avilable. Another lock piece also makes it much easier to bait vs. counters, which most blue decks have only a limited amount of. And to shut out EE.
Oh, and it's a permanent for Smokestack if you need one.
I'll definitely try Compulsive Research. I never thought of it and it sounds better than TfK for the reasons you listed.
The "problem" with Crucible is that you often have better things to do the first turns and you quite often find yourself going "well... I can't Geddon now because I want to lay down Crucible.. and then I need to Armageddon... and then..." etc and those two critical turns are just too much in some cases. And Armageddon is plenty good on its own without Crucible since you easily break the symmetry with Flagstones and Mox, plus holding back 2 mana lands. I've lost plenty of games doing cute tricks with crucible while getting my face smashed because crucible by itself isn't a lock or a win condition. Wastelock can be awesome when it gets going but it doesn't happen that often.
Crucible is awesome against black-based decks running discard and sinkhole where you're playing for the long game and you desperately need recursion. It is, of course, very good in most matchups also. But against the most common kind of Canadian Thresh/Countertop matchups you face, and also aggro like Zoo or Goblins, Crucible isn't the most important piece, and certainly not early game. Recurring a wasteland early vs. Tarmogoyf simply means you just stunted your own mana development and wasted two turns while Goyf beat on you. I would never go below 3 I think, but I could consider 3 instead of 4. Because Crucible shines in the mid- to late-game, when you might need the recursion and draw, I will continue to test 3 for now.
The pieces I like to see the most are Trinisphere and Chalice, both of which are the stone cold nuts on the first couple of turns against a huge swath of decks. So even though Trinisphere really isn't that great later and is useless in multiples, I run 4 because I really want that 1st or 2nd turn sphere to give me breathing space. A first turn sphere on the play gives you 3 crucial turns, which can simply hand you the win right there.
This is the same reason Smokestack stops looking so attractive. For me Smokestack isn't a bad card and is necessary in this deck, but its necessary for a particular reason which is simply to seal the deal in a long game. Its the card that breaks the back of recovery attempts and turns a lock into a hard lock. Smokestack is really bad when you're losing, however. Not only does it go 1 full turn without doing anything whatsoever, from an inferior board position it might not even be of any benefit. Again I like it best in the long control-ish matches and 2 is enough for you to find one in those matches I feel.
The reason I like Baneslayer Angel so much is because it lets you turn a small advantage or a momentary soft-lock (which is often all you can get!) into a huge game-winning creature that also brings up your life total, which is nearly always low thanks to Ancient Tomb and getting hit by fat creatures. Also the Angel is hard to deal with once resolved, since many decks don't even run spot removal (or better yet, they board it out for grips) and if they do you can shut off StP at 1.
Last edited by FieryBalrog; 11-16-2009 at 05:47 PM.
Hm, maybe I just play fewer lands? There's only 7 Flagstone/Moxen to break the symmetry and holding back lands, and Tomb/City isn't that easy against early Wastelands. Why would I want to Geddon before t3, anyway?
Yeah, Crucible/Geddon is often not a good enough play. Then again, if you have better stuff to do, do it. I pretty much always go for Chalice/3sphere also. You can always play the insane Geddon after that.
However, Stax is a deck that must deal with long games, and Crucible in combination with other cards is one easy thing that makes it go. It is also one of the prime targets for Grips, especially in the absence of full Smokes.
I understand that you prefer a soft lock + good win condition to a hard lock. Just saying that with non-lock cards the chances for both a hard lock and a soft lock are a bit lower. Of course, if the hard lock doesn't work often enough for you, you can either try and make it better or rely less on it.
How does TfK/Compulsive Research figure into that, though? Seems to me both are mid- to lategame cards as well, so I wonder why you'd ditch Smoke for them in the first place.
Smokes are very good even on their own, except against swarm decks you couldn't stop early enough, simply because Stax has more permanents than any other deck. I regularly drive a Smoke out there t3-4 relying on not drawing 4 Geddons in a row. Plus, there are a few good synergies besides Crucible, like Flagstones and O-Ring.
It's extremely good against everything that doesn't sneeze out a bunch of tokens if you can get it out early, too, including not being useless against combo. Smokes at least does something when cast early; Angel without support does nothing (in all likelihood, it does nothing until t5 as you won't normally have 3WW available on t3).
I agree that Crucible is too slow to effectively battle tempo blue. Against CThresh and the like, however, I'd want as many early Chokes as possible, again pulling me away from a blue splash. Plus, Crucible/Wastes doesn't seem all that bad early on, and they have Stifles for your Flags/fetches/Wastes, too.
Not amazing in any way; basically you can again try to out-tempo them of force them into a long attrition battle - soft-lock, vs hard-lock. Unless you have some Baneslayers and such in your sideboard, too, I wouldn't rely on the former.
Concerning Baneslayers, I think I'd much prefer KotR for the reasons outlined. It supports the lock pieces better by fetching Tabernacle and is very adequate for beating. Hell, it can go fetch a Mishra's to pump itself and beat for two more next turn, or to block.
You seem to be going in two directions here. You say you play 3sphere as a full set 'cause you want it t1-t2; but then you say that it's really bad when you have an inferior board position - which is the same for multiples of 3sphere which you can cast just a turn earlier. I'd strive to put Smokestack into action as early as possible - but after Chalice/3sphere obviously.This is the same reason Smokestack stops looking so attractive. For me Smokestack isn't a bad card and is necessary in this deck, but its necessary for a particular reason which is simply to seal the deal in a long game. Its the card that breaks the back of recovery attempts and turns a lock into a hard lock. Smokestack is really bad when you're losing, however. Not only does it go 1 full turn without doing anything whatsoever, from an inferior board position it might not even be of any benefit. Again I like it best in the long control-ish matches and 2 is enough for you to find one in those matches I feel.
Smokestack is, after all, one of the things that make Trinisphere so good. 3sphere buys a few turns over the course of the game, but followed with Smokes it's basically a Time Vault combo. T13sphere, t2 Smokes is one of the strongest plays of the deck, whether or not it was followed by Crucible (as long as you didn't have CoT so you can actually cast your topdecks).
If you get it out when your opponent has seven permanents, it still gives him the wiggle room to draw into something and be able to cast it. In other words, the later in the game, the slower Smokes is relative to the tempo development - which seems antithetical to the Angels plan.
Apart from that, Smokes is another Geddon effect, that, while slow, has the benefit of killing nonlands. Granted, it's not like you choose if your opponent sacks land, but that's just an argument for casting it early - just a Smokes and nothing else on the board will force your opponent to play a suboptimal Deed or EE; but only if they have few lands.
As mentioned, it completely murders slow draws because you will have enough topdeck stuff to fuel it while your opponent won't.
You're right of course, if you didn't somewhat grab the game Smokes basically sucks. At such a point, however, I find Angels and Compulsive/TfK to be a bit of a lottery as you need five mana for Angels and luck as well as a probably a full turn to draw into random cards. I mean, yes, if your opponent is off balance, you will kill him with your Angel - if you drew one at the right time. How often will he be the card you drew instead of Smokes/Crucible to complete a soft- or hardlock, though? How often will you draw him with a hardlock already in place, which makes him win-more, how often will you not be able to cast him in time, how often will he be killed by spot removal aimed kept in for Magi because your Chalice plan didn't work?
(Hell, I don't know, you tested it, so you be the judge ;) )
btw i was wondering about playing exile (alliance) against some deck
could it be effective? always nice to kill a boosted pildriver / marit lage / dreadnought / tarmo / tombsltaker / reanimator ... and earn that much life
on the other hand the only thing it could replace would be oblivion ring i guess
anyone tested it ? or is it just less effective than those Orings
i am talking about specific match ups not MD.
Main you want lock pieces and the O-Ring is in only as much needed catch-all that Exile just isn't. Exile isn't swingy enough to warrant a sideboard slot. If you're worried about losing to random (or not so random) big dudes, the full set of O-Rings will be a start; then, I'd start adding Prisons/Magi if they're not already at full. Then, strengthening the mana denial element in some way, as Prisons/Magi/O-Ring/Smokestack are more than enough if you can keep their land count low (although this may not be that simple as you can only play so man Wastes and probably don't want to afford Ravages of War).
The other problem about Exile is that it isn't a permanent. If you want to test removal, I'd start with Journey to Nowhere, although I'd probably even prefer a blue splash for additional Propagandas.
well ok that was just a thought, but i guess it s indeed not that effective
and btw ofc i am playing Prisons/Magi/O-Ring/Smokestack so i guess u right exile is just redundant and not that a locker anyway.
i ll stick to OR
I used Faith's Fetters to some effect before O-Ring was printed, too.
But generally, big dudes Stax randomly can't handle because it draws the wrong lock pieces or not enough to prevent an opponent from playing around them is one of Stax's accepted weaknesses. That's one reason why O-Rings are in there.
You could tune Stax to avoid such situations reliably, but it's probably not worth the effort outside of skewed metagames.
Oh yeah, Maze of Ith and Kor Haven. Personally I'm plaing a singleton of the latter because it really doesn't hurt much and is a force at stopping that one big fat jerk that your opponent could afford to pay upkeep for.
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