[Deck] UW(x) Landstill

[Muradin]

So recently I've been testing Konsultant's latest Landstill build and Wafo Tapo's build that he top8ed a 500 people event with. Coming from those 2 lists I've built a Landstill list that I feel is very strong in the current metagame.

4 Island
2 Plains
4Tundra
4 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
4 Mishras Factory
2 Tropical Island
1 Glacial Fortress

The Wafo Tapo mana base is much more stable and nearly can't be screwed. I don't like Karakas, Tolaria West, Dust Bowl, Wasteland. They come in handy against opposing manlands but besides they dilute your mana base and destroy your deck's consistency.

4 Brainstorm
4 Standstill
2 Sensei's Divining Top (The deck has a relatively high land count and they help you to draw into your bombs and fix your mana.

4 Spell Snare (running less than 4 seems to be suboptimal as it hits nearly every important threat in the format)
3 Counterspell
4 Force of Will

3 Engineered Explosives
1 Wrath of God
1 Day of Judgment
1 Humility
4 Swords to Plowshares (standard removal package, seems to be rock solid)

2 Jace, the Mindsculptor (I prefer him to Fact or Fiction as I don't see myself having to spend too many resources to keep him on the table. Actually he helps me doing so with his -1 ability, ups the blue count and I have to kill of creatures quickly anyway so he is an auto include.)
2 Elspeth, Knight Errant (best card in the deck I fear)
2 Decree of Justice (Geoff Smelski's build has shown me how strong this card is. I'd feel naked without it in any Landstill build)

SB:

3 Path to Exile (additional removal to shore up the aggro matchup)
2 Negate (Catch em all answer, good in matchups where one wants to board out most of the removal mainly, comes in with Meddling Mage often)
4 Meddling Mage (More things to bring in in matchups where the removal sucks, storm combo, Burn, Enchantress, Reanimator, control mirror..)
3 Krosan Grip (Counterbalance, Shackles, Enchantress stuff, best sideboard card)
3 Relic of Progenitus (GY hate of choice)

I think the deck has already got a good matchup against creature heavy decks and thus the sideboard is more geared towards beating matchups that tend to be bad because we run a shit ton of removal and that is useless there.

[Master Shake]

For those of you that plan on playing this at the Grand Prix I have the following question: Can you play fast enough to win matches with this deck?

I know that I can, I've been piloting the deck for long enough now that much of the game just runs on auto-pilot. I can scale my pace of play up or down keeping the clock in mind. But I imagine that like myself, many of you generate wins from concessions and at the Grand Prix or other large events I'm skeptical that as many people are going to be willing to concede a game that is clearly lost, but in a matter of time. Konsultant has proved that he can weave through 7+ rounds because he plays in New England where they get those kinds of numbers. So this question is directed to a lot of you who may not have played in many large scale tournaments.

Of course, the opponent being stubborn can also work to your advantage, but that is a different matter.

I'm casually writing a report from 2 weekly tournaments and 4 trials that I was in over the last two weeks. My finishing standing was something like 20-4-8 (all but two intentional draws.) During the course of this tournament I played Two matches that ran longer than two hours and beat a lot of unsavory match-ups. There were times where I misplayed because I wasn't actively taking the role of the control deck and it cost me every time - except the game where I opened up with 3 DoJ in my hand in the control mirror: I was the aggro deck that game.

[klaus]

Here's a UBG LS list winning a 64-ppl-event [...boasting 4 Jaces]:
ACME
I know I might sound like a broken record, but he's just THAT good!
As I emphasized before he obviously needs a shell with enough cheap removal to really function (the list above meets that criterion quite well), but if he does function (meaning sticking for 2 turns), it's usually GG and by "usually" I mean 90% of the time.

[Patrick]

I thought you said you weren't too worried about killing Jace with the rest of your deck. Why don't you just kill it normally, then play Jace afterword?

If Jace was in my deck I wouldn't have Fact or Fiction, and finding my answers to Jace gets a lot harder when I can't draw 5 cards.

[Rico Suave]

If Jace was in my deck I wouldn't have Fact or Fiction, and finding my answers to Jace gets a lot harder when I can't draw 5 cards.

What is the difference between casting Jace and removing their Jace

vs.

Casting FoF and getting a 1:4 split, where you have to take the 1 pile to answer their Jace?

....

If you answered "FoF is slower and gives them another turn to draw cards with Jace" you answered correctly.

[konsultant]

I know I might sound like a broken record, but he's just THAT good!
As I emphasized before he obviously needs a shell with enough cheap removal to really function (the list above meets that criterion quite well), but if he does function (meaning sticking for 2 turns), it's usually GG and by "usually" I mean 90% of the time.

So you got me thinking when you reffered to Jace as a win condition. It got me to think of him not as an accidental "oops I win" type of win condition but as a "hey i'm gonna fucking kill you with Jace" type of win condition. I have tested Jace extensively but until I read your remark the light never popped in my head to consider running Jace MD and still run FoF. Obviously space is at a premium especially at the 4 mana slots but I said fuck it let me try it out. So with no real testing I showed up at my local with this bastardized version of the UW list I had been running and Speedstill. On a sidenote I have followed Speedstill ever since you came up with the concept what must be a year or two ago now, I've always liked the deck alot but I don't know how well it would fair in the states. It seems in every event here you hit some Tribal Deck or Survival where your only hope to win is Wrath and a heavy removal package with strong Decrees as a finisher otherwise i'd probably try running it at an event. Anyways I threw some shit together and showed up at my local.

Round 1 vs Tes: win 2-0
Jace was irrelevant here outside of a higher Blue count but I'm not really looking to beat Tendrils with Plainswalkers anyway.

Round 2 vs Hypergenisis: win 2-0
I faced my teammate with a list I helped him assemble, since he was running Iona and Emerkul I admit it was nice having multiple Jace MD although he never actually resolved Hypergenisis because I drew very heavy countermagic hands plus multiple Factories to go aggro quickly both games. Once again not expecting to beat this deck with Plainswalkers but having them in the deck can be very useful situationally such as against either Iona or Emerkul.

Round 3 vs Merfolk: win 2-1
I have no idea what he is playing and I open a heavy counter magic hand, needless to say I get obliterated game 1. Game 2 I destroy his hand by forcing him to FOW 2x Preachers and break the game by resolving a FoF. Game 3 I finally get Jace online, now in my previous assessment of only comparing him to FoF I would argue that I would have won just as easily by resolving a FoF and I can pretty much say that with certainty. However when you have Jace and FoF together shit gets retarded. The importance is this, we don't win until we resolve card advantage, by treating Jace as a win con we able to increase the number of card advantage spells without decreasing the number of win conditions. I do like the base of the deck that I have been running amd will not definetly not be straying very far from the classical UW control list but I will be going back to the drawing board some as the only losses I have had in the last 2 events have been from either Iona or my opponents Jace. If I can fit them into the list without losing anything that I need for other match ups the end result could be a very strong list.

Round 4 vs Pyscotog? lose 0-2
Ok to be fair I worked a 11 hour day before starting this event and was now in hour 4 of playing Magic AND had only gotten not even 2 hours of sleep the night before, so I was definetly not on my A game against a good player running some home brew deck. From what I saw he was running UGB Tog, Goyf and Bob with FOW, Counterspell, Counter Top and Jace plus he was running Waste plus Loam with manlands. Game one he hits me with a couple wastes early and resolves a Jace through my double counter. He sticks it with nothing in hand. It takes everything I can to kill the damn thing with my Factories and the final turn I kill the thing he rips Intuition and gets 2x Cycle Lands plus Life From the Loam to go with the Wastes he already has in yard. He destroys my mana base and stops my threats with counter magic until he resolves another Jace and I pick up. This is where I made an aweful mistake and Side boarded terribly. Like I said I just kinda threw the list together and showed up with it, I didn't have all the sb cards I wanted with me so my SB was fairly hodgepodged and in a giant brain fart I misboarded. I underestimated his mana denial as I only saw Loam and Waste game 1, I walked my ass right into Stifle for the loss game 2. He did open a strong hand with Stifle and 2x Waste and he played it perfectly hitting every land I had execpt a Plains and Karakas and I ended the game with 7 blue cards in hand.

So this was only one small event plus the few hours of testing I got in since then but I have concluded this, First and foremost I will not be playing this deck without FoF pretty much ever. Secondly the "Jace Fan Club" exists for good reason, in the right circumstances he is 4 mana win the game, although I do say the same about FoF. I am going to continue tinkering with a way to keep both in the deck WITHOUT losing the Landstill inherint cards. If it came down to Decree or Jace I will side with Decree every time, right now I am taking a page from Klaus and running a faster removal package to pair with Jace to create an additional synergy within the deck ontop of the traditional Landstill synergy of the deck. If it wasn't for the popularity of Jace and the existence of things like Iona and Emerkul I would be sticking with my traditional build without doubt. Attempting this is based soley of meta gaming but as results keep racking up for Jace it is going to become increasingly important to be able to deal with him. I like what I have together now, perhaps even enough to run it at the last large event before the GP. If I get any substantial results from it I will post what I am working on.

[gustha]

I'm atm testing this list for a local tournament (besided prevision of 45+, i don't expect more than 25 players, sadly). Too bad i don't find room for humility/3rd wrath/3rd decree. Expecting merfolk, zoo, goblin, ugr faeries, some other landstill, New horizons, no relevant GY-based deck. I had some testing and the deck seems linear, but I'm not really satisfied with the numbers...

6 fetches
4 tundra
1 glacial fortress
2 volcanic
1 plateau
3 mishra
3 wasteland
2 plains
2 island (room for academy ruins?)

3 standstill
4 brainstorm
2 fof (fof is such gamebreaking... though some times I feel I need some cheap manipulation in the form of top)
3 jace 2.0

2 elspeth
2 decree
2 wrath (should be 3/3... slots?)
4 stp
2 path
3 EE

4 fow
3 cs
3 snare

I think that's all...
SB:
3 kitchen finks
3 lightning bolt
3 meddling mage
3 negate
1 reb
1 crucible
1 fracturing gust (if there's an enchantress/monolith.deck)

Real problem is siding out! :)
Another option would be -3 wasteland +1 mishra +1 ruins +1 tropical, rearranging the sb (-bolt +reb + finks) and running MD firespout (-2 wrath -2 doj +3 FS +1 humility/path), though wastelands is pretty good vs faeries and merfolk to fight through their standstills... Need some help...

[Jak]

You have a ton of win conditions. I know Elspeth is good, but I don't think it is better than Jace and it doesn't have the synergy of Decree. I think cutting her for slots for another Wrath, Counterspell, Standstill, Jace, etc would be better.

[klaus]

You have a ton of win conditions. I know Elspeth is good, but I don't think it is better than Jace and it doesn't have the synergy of Decree. I think cutting her for slots for another Wrath, Counterspell, Standstill, Jace, etc would be better.

this.
Yeah, 4 weeks ago, I would never have even dared to ponder about cutting that sexy Errant - now I just dunnit.
With Combo.dec decreasing a fast clock (which she definitely provides) has become less relevant, and Jace is simply better at dominating control mirrors, while pitching to FOW (lolz). No, honestly I do enjoy the fact that you can actually go down to a single basic Plains without her, adding a basic mountain for reliable Firespouts feels good too.
For reference here's my current list:

4 Standstill
4 Brainstorm
4 Jace, the Mindsculptor
4 Counterspell
4 Force of Will
3 Spell Snare
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Path to Exile
2 Condemn ------------------------ not completely settled (could be Firespout x3, -1 PtE. It's a meta choice, basically)
4 Engineered Explosives

4 Flooded Strand
2 Misty Rainforest
1 Windswept Heath
4 Tundra
3 Tropical Island
3 Island
1 Plains
4 Mishra's Factory
1 Academy Ruins

SB:
4 Rhox Warmonk
4 Relic of Progenitus
1 Tormod's Crypt
3 Spell Pierce
3 Krosan Grip
---

[Hanni]

I think people are forgetting just how strong Elspeth is against aggro decks...

[rayaj]

If you cut elspeth then you lose a win condition, and even adding jace doesn't make up for it. The ablility to generate a blocker every turn is essential against decks like zoo and new horizons. Even with the amount of spot removal you run, I feel like you're going to have issues with aggro decks. I don't really like 4 JtMS in the deck, even if he his a bomb. I still like konsultant's build the most, it seems most stable to me and I think its going to be something like what I'll play at a GP if I get the rest of the cards together

[klaus]

I think people are forgetting just how strong Elspeth is against aggro decks...

She really is a fantastic Planeswalker and should be run in various LS shells. I apreciate the fact that she forces your opponent to overextend, basically giving WoG a power boost. In the list above, however, I don't pack any sweepers, which ultimately diminishes Elspeth's impact.
Cutting her also pretty much blanks opposing creature removal.
(As I said before, I came to view Mishra almost exclusively as a means to force your opponent to break Standstill.)

[Shawn]

She really is a fantastic Planeswalker and should be run in various LS shells.

He's not saying you shouldn't run Jace, he's saying you shouldn't cut Elspeth.

Cutting her also pretty much blanks opposing creature removal.

This is a non-issue, if they kill a 4/4 token, just make another Soldier next turn. You're up a card and still have an active Elspeth.

[Master Shake]

I wanted to think of a witty way to say "Firespout is almost never Wrath of God." But I decided to settle for this so that way no one would really be able to misinterpret what I'm saying.

I wish I got to play in the fantasy metagames that some of you play in where Goyfs never get larger than 2/3 and no one ever plays Knight of the Reliquary or Rhox War Monk. Or where Merfolk or Goblins never messes with your mana or has a Vial.

I suppose that if I did, I too would think that Firespout is just as good as Wrath of God.

Also, what's with Condemn? That's a page straight out of Pi4Meterftw's book. If you want something in that slot that is going to 1-1 Oblivion Ring isn't dead against non-creatures. I would also play Elspeth or Decree of Justice, but you clearly just want as much one-cost spot removal as possible. I disagree but must confess that you are allowed to build decks the way you like and it doesn't matter if I like it or not.

[Mark Sun]

I wanted to think of a witty way to say "Firespout is almost never Wrath of God." But I decided to settle for this so that way no one would really be able to misinterpret what I'm saying.

I wish I got to play in the fantasy metagames that some of you play in where Goyfs never get larger than 2/3 and no one ever plays Knight of the Reliquary or Rhox War Monk. Or where Merfolk or Goblins never messes with your mana or has a Vial.

I suppose that if I did, I too would think that Firespout is just as good as Wrath of God.

Also, what's with Condemn? That's a page straight out of Pi4Meterftw's book. If you want something in that slot that is going to 1-1 Oblivion Ring isn't dead against non-creatures. I would also play Elspeth, but you clearly just want as much one-cost spot removal as possible.

It is my understanding that you save your spot removal for stuff like Goyfs, KotR, RWM, and save the Firespouts for something else. Post-board, popping a Relic of Progenitus helps you keep the former two at bay. One of the reasons I quit playing the red splash because of RWM + CBTop, whereas with the black splash I could consistently find an answer, losing to a deck like NO-CBTop with the red splash was enough for me.

I'm guessing Condemn is in there because there are already 8 StP effects in the deck.

[Shawn]

I tried Condemn a while back, pre-Path to Exile. I didn't like it at all, it was pretty bad against black-based aggro as it won't hit a Dark Confidant if they have seen a copy already or if they discard it precombat. Also, not being able to cast it in response to things such as Counterbalance and not being able to remove blockers in the end game made it pretty bad. You don't need infinite spot removal, you just need enough to survive until your late game bombs take over.

I also don't like Relic to fight against things like Goyf or Knight of the Reliquary. It's not a permanent answer, and they can pumped back to reasonable size quickly. After board many decks also bring in Grips, which lessens it's impact unless you use it right away.

[Hanni]

I also don't like Relic to fight against things like Goyf or Knight of the Reliquary.

QFT. Actual removal is infinitely better.

[Rico Suave]

Elspeth is a 4 mana Maze of Ith against aggro.

[klaus]

"Firespout is almost never Wrath of God." [...] I wish I got to play in the fantasy metagames [...] where Merfolk or Goblins never messes with your mana or has a Vial.

I don't get the Vial part, but as for mana denial, FS trumps WoG by far, as you see, it costs one less, allowing you to cast it earlier (especially relevant against Zoo) and also making it easier to resolve facing Merfolk's Dazes and Wastelands.
As a matter of fact, FS is easily the best anti tribal aggro spell out there.

Also, what's with Condemn? That's a page straight out of Pi4Meterftw's book. If you want something in that slot that is going to 1-1 Oblivion Ring isn't dead against non-creatures.

In the face of 4 STPs and 4 Paths (plus 4 EEs) there should be very very few "BOBish" creatures that don't get handled right away. Condemn is an experimental addition, that takes care of the eventual stupid beater. with 8 STP effects the additional Firespouts traded 1-1 most of the time anyway, which is why I added Condemn.
O.Ring could be an alternative, but in a meta full of Pridemages, Grips and what not, I prefer permanent over temporary removal, while that playset of EE takes care of most non-creature permanents, barring planeswalkers.
---

He's not saying you shouldn't run Jace, he's saying you shouldn't cut Elspeth.

I wonder what makes you think, I didn't get that part ;-)

This is a non-issue, if they kill a 4/4 token, just make another Soldier next turn. You're up a card and still have an active Elspeth.

In many cases though, you do rely on tokens to protect Elspeth from being attacked and killed, that's when opposing spot removal becomes relevant (read: irrelevant if you don't play her).
Anyway, as I said before, I'm fine with Elspeth in many LS approaches, just not in mine.

[Hanni]

Elspeth is a 4 mana Maze of Ith against aggro.

Until you cast Wrath of God, and then make another 1/1 token. And then make everything indestructible. Now you have multiple indestructible 1/1 tokens to chump everything, and a 4/4 flyer thats ending the game. I don't think Maze of Ith can do that.

The power of Elspeth against aggro was something I thought was established and accepted, I'm not sure why the sudden change.