[Deck] UW(x) Landstill

[Felidae]

Played a 72 people tournament today, going a rather disappointing 4-2-1 (placed 17th, one place away from price support).

A short report:
R1: 0-2 vs UWr LS: He got Crucible online at turn 3 G1 so I quickly conceded this one. G2 we had a long battle, I ended up with 4 tokens which slowly raced him down from 17 to 3 life, then he got the DoJ for 5 to finish the game.
R2: 2-0 vs WW: He played Disenchat on Standstill game 1...
R3:2-1 vs UW Fish: G1 I got beaten up pretty badly by multiple Spellstutter Sprites and Ninja of the Deep Hours. G2 I get 2 Preachers online taking a ninja and a Stoneforge Mystic wich beat him to death. G3 was similar to G2.
R4:1-1 vs CAB Jace/38Lands Homebrew: G1 took forever as both of us killed 2 Jaces, but after some time he got his Loam engine rolling and I conceded sonn after. G2 he got steamrolled by Elspeth and Jace. G3 wasn't really a battle against his deck, moreover a battle to find a decend wincondition in a short armond of time.Needless to say that I didn't found anything.
R5:2-0 vs DNT:G1 I played a Humility on turn 4 with Force backup to deal with his ORing. Elspeth took the win soon afterwards. G2 went similar, as an early Jace got an ORing so Humility got trough once more. After destroying his Ring with Explosives he concedes.
R6:0-2 vs 38 Lands:After a couple of turns he looked me out of the G1 with recuring Wasteland and Ports. G2 I made a horrible mistake, loosing my Relic to a Krosan Grip (I played the Relic in order to remove his lonly Life from the Loam). As usual my opponent finds the 2nd Life and starts to filling his grave. I was able to resolve a Jace and Brainstorn over 5 times, but after 5 rounds of Brainstorming and shuffeling through Flooded Strand I still didn't saw a second piece of hate.
R7:2-1 vs Enchantress: He got 2 Argothian and 2 Pressence at turn 4, well i lost that one... G2 i could stick an early Jace who made the distance to 13 loyality. G3 I got an oponing hand of 3 Forces, Standstill, Mishra,Tundra and Flooded. He was forced to break Standstill turn 3, as he was stucked on on Forest, equipt with 2 Utopia Sprawls. Elspeth took him down soon afterwards.

Jace was amazing as a 2-off the hole day, I still didn't really got the feeling that I want him as a 3-off as Elspeth is still superior to him in the aggro matchup. I also got the feeling that, wtihout Fact or Fiction, I'm loosing an edge in the controle mirror.

The list in short:
23 Lands
4 Swords to Plowshare
2 Path to Exile
2 Wrath of God
3 Engineered Explosives
1 Humility
4 Force of Will
3 Counterspell
3 Spell Snare
4 Brainstorms
4 Standstill
2 Elspeth
2 Jace2.0
2 Decree of justice
1 Eternal dragon

Board:
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Tormnonds Crypt
2 Firespout
2 Hydroblast
2 Negate
2 Preacher
3 Meddling Mage

[GoldenCid]

Could you be especific with your mana base?

[Felidae]

4 Tundra
2 Island
2 Plains
1 Glacial Fortress (amazing card, I didn't expected it to be that good)
1 Volcanic
1 Plateau
4 Flooded Strand
2 Scalding Tarn
4 Mishras Factory
2 Wasteland

[Reagens]

@Konsultant

Thanks for the answer. I know most people here are preparing for Columbus and want to keep as much information to themselves as possible.

I've been tinkering away and will probably play something in the lines of this:

4x Swords to plowshares
2x Path to exile
2x Wrath of god
1x Day of judgement
1x Humility
1x Elspeth
2x DOJ
1x Eternal Dragon

4x Brainstorm
3x Standstill
2x Fact Or Fiction
3x Spell Snare
3x Counterspell
4x Force of will
2x Jace The Mind Sculptor

3x Engineered explosives


4x Flooded Strand
1x Arid Mesa
4x Tundra
1x Underground sea
1x Scrubland
3x Island
2x Plains
1x Karakas
2x Tolaria West
3x Mishra's Factory
2x Wasteland


I'm not sure on the 3rd wrath effect. It is not quite impossible that this should be a third decree. Since decree is more flexible (and makes standstill better) but on the other hand wrath makes your planeswalkers more useful.

I have setlled on an extra basic for the manabase since I have a lot of mana disruption in my metagame and I wouldn't mind getting color screwed instead of mana screwed all together. This is also why I will try the karakas + tolaria plan since both can be used as colored mana as well.

3 colors should be enough and I will probably run vindicate from the sideboard. Krosan grip is still too common a SB card to rely on oblivion ring. It could also give me acces to other hate cards (extirpate/engineered plague come to mind) but I don't think I can risk that since most decks targetted by those cards also run mana disruption.


Sideboard wil consist of meddling mage (has become a lot better of late), negate, preacher, kitchen finks, gy hatred.

I am still a bit at loss what the best gy hatred is for the moment. I don't care that much for the arti based gy hatred since most good player easily play round those things and they can always see it coming. Crypt has of course the synergy with tolaria west which would probably make it a 1-off auto include but for the other 2 slots I'm not that sure.

[mossivo1986]

Reagans: Besides for your landbase which I feel needs some additional work the rest of your maindeck is 1 card away from exactly what i'd play. With that in mind i'd cut a jace for humility number two. Humility is what wins landstill a large portion of it's games right now. krosan grip is bad right now in the national metagame so it seems that much better.

Maybe to open your mind up more, humility against the UGw Tempo deck I play is gg if it lands. You literally just start scooping unless your already close to winning, which isn't likely against landstilll.

[Reagens]

I made a mistake in the list (adapted).

Still at 61 cards though.

I could keep it at 61 cards I guess.
Yesterday I played against gobs and stoneforge mystic.deck and felt I missed the 3rd decree/ 3rd wrath quite a lot. I have looked at my older lists and I have played 8 4-drops, 3 decree and 3 vindicate running 23 lands. I suppose 9 4-drops can be supported just as well (and 2 decree) or 8 4-drops and 3 decree (I should probably start with the latter and work from there).

@Mossivo

Thanks for the advice. The manabase is indeed quite difficult to get right but I think right now the only discussion left is running an extra fetch instead of island or not.
Humility as a 2-off might do some good pre-board against somde deck (like gobs :)), but in my metagame krosan grip is still quite a presence. I'd prefer the 3rd wrath effect before considering humility.
I play 2 jace because that seems to be the consensus around here at The Source. Pre-board I wouldn't mind going to 1 most of the time but there is no space in the SB for a second one and I really want to have those against certain matchups (lands most of all).

[Yochanan]

Reagans: Besides for your landbase which I feel needs some additional work the rest of your maindeck is 1 card away from exactly what i'd play. With that in mind i'd cut a jace for humility number two. Humility is what wins landstill a large portion of it's games right now. krosan grip is bad right now in the national metagame so it seems that much better.

Reagans: I don't think cutting the third Wrath effect for a 3rd DOJ is best. Also, if you are not going to take mossivo's advice on cutting a Jace for Humility, you could cut 1 Wrath of God or 1 Day of Judgment for 1 Humility. With only 1 Humility and no access to Enlightened Tutor MD, or through a wish board, I would be very inclined to run more than a singleton. Try it out at least since it sounds like your meta packs some hate.

[Mark Sun]

Reagans: I don't think cutting the third Wrath effect for a 3rd DOJ is best. Also, if you are not going to take mossivo's advice on cutting a Jace for Humility, you could cut 1 Wrath of God or 1 Day of Judgment for 1 Humility. With only 1 Humility and no access to Enlightened Tutor MD, or through a wish board, I would be very inclined to run more than a singleton. Try it out at least since it sounds like your meta packs some hate.

I hate drawing Humility #2, I really do. I've decided that it is more of a win condition than a control piece (correct me if you feel that I am wrong), and I have just one in my list.

In other news, I played against CounterTop Thopter yesterday during a testing session, and I have to admit, it's pretty scary and took me by complete surprise. Turns out an Enlightened Tutor package + Counterbalance is more than enough for what they need to lock Landstill out, especially since they are running their very own 3-4 drops. That along with the fact that there are more creatureless control decks than I've seen in a while (see: Enchantress, Lands.dec, CounterTop Thopter, UGB Landstill, the Mirror) makes me wonder if the "blazing fast" style of this format is stepping on the brakes just a little bit. I might actually audible out of this deck come Friday, since the majority of the deck right now is designed to handle aggro, and that doesn't seem that great when you consider what I just said. I'll get an idea when I play in the Grinders at the GP. Just don't feel so comfortable with Landstill at the moment.

[Felidae]

Played another 52 tourney today @ Magic CLub Mol, Belgique.
R1: 2-1 vs 38 Lands: G1 he gets a turn 1 Exploration, followed by a Manabond, which got forced. We played draw - go for a whle until he fins his Loam and I quickly conceded. G2 I get 2 Meddling Mages out and beat him to death. Relic of Progenitus wins G3.
R2: 2-0 vs 4c Landstill:He plays a turn3 Standstill G1 and I fail to draw Wasteland or Mishra or Decree until he beat me to 8, so I was forced to break the Standstill and Sword his Mishra, he had the Counterspell but Elspeth and Crucible resolved in my turn and it was basicly over from this poit on. G2 I got the awesome duo of Jace and Elspeth, hard to beat them I heard.
R3: 2-0 vs Zoo: He starts with Grim Lavamancer and nothing else over the first turns. After he breaks my first Standstill I drop Elspeth and another Standstill and a couple of Soldiers beat him down soon afterwards. G2 I resolve my Humility on turn 5 and after a Decree which traded with his entire team he scoopes.
R4:2-0 vs Imperial Painter:Round 1 I Path his early Painter and Jace took the lead afterwards ( I still can't believe that he survived through 8 maindecked REB's/Pyroblasts). G2 he starts with a turn 2 Bloodmoon, but I got the Hydroblast a couple of turns later after he tapped out for a Imperial Painter. Elspeth won, once again.
R5&6: ID into Top 8

Top8: 2-1 vs Goblins: He has to mulligan to 5 on the play, and starts without Vial or Lacky so it wasn't that difficult to win this one. To make things fair I got to mulligan to 6 at G2. He starts with Vial, go. Rishdan Port and Wasteland cut me away from white mana soa pair of Piledrivers beat me down (swing for 14 in one attack is pretty sweet).G3 went much smoother, as I Sword his Turn1 Lacky, drop a Standstill Turn2 and after a long battle I took him down with Soldier token. Could have won this much earlier, but I knew that he didn't side out Incinerators so I played very safe. At least I finished with 17 life.
Top4:2-1 vs Thopter Combo:Once more my opponent has to mulligan :(, and 2 Mishras beat him down untill he's at4. He resolves a Moat but I still got my Decree and one hardcast later he faces his one turn clock and we are off to game 2.
In G2 he basicly got the nuts, dropping Balance, Shackles, Jace and Plague in a matter of seconds, nice deck....
G3 took forever, he resolves an early Jace, but I got the Vindicate for him and my own Jaces starts to Brainstorm into good stuff. The game ended a million turns later but once more the Soldiers went for the win.
Final: 0-2 vs Merfolk:Nothing much to say here, he totaly crushes me game 1. In G2 we got a decend fight and after some turns the board looks like this: I got Mishra, Wasteland (tapped), Tundra, Island (tapped) Standstill and Zero cards in my hand. He got 5 Islands and 2 Cursecathers, 1 card (lord) in hand. I was hoping to stabilize in this situation but he topd decked a Wasteland.... well sad panda is sad.

So I finished 2nd, taking home 4 Badlands and 4 Bloodstained Mire, my Opponent got 4 USeas and 4 Deltas.

List: Same as above +1 Crucible and -Plateau/Volcanic, + Scrucland/Usea (I keept the Scalding Tarns, as I currently don't own Deltas).

Board (thanks for this goes to Reagens):
2 Relic
1 Crypt
3 Hydroblast
2 Negate
3 Meddling Mage
2 Preacher
2 Vindicate

[Reagens]

I went to the same tournament as well.

Result was 4-1-1 and got stuck on 9th place.

I had an unlucky draw in my first match against some kind of stoneforge mystic deck (it's not that easy to win from)
Further down the tournament I lost to goblins (I had humility resolved game 1 with 17 life left and didn't draw any mass removal/draw spell) and the second game I lost to savage topdecking from his part and not having or finding an answer for his vial while he topdecked wasteland, mountain, rishadan port after he started the game with a single port an no other lands).

[Felidae]

Oh I didn't know that. I saw another Landstill player during my time of ID at the top tables, guess this was you :).

[Mark Sun]

Deck is officially taken apart and put away. The MTG gods shit on my face this weekend, leaving me with an 0-3 drop, pretty sure I was close to the bottom 5% people out of 1,200+). My GP experience included playing against Hypergensis/Show and Tell, Merfolk (hooray for one landers on mulls to 5!), and then Reanimator. I had done my homework on the new tech in the format, including making a freshly updated SB at 2:00 AM before the event, but the cards did not fall my way. Losing the first round sealed my fate for the rest of the tournament, pairing me with the bottom brackets, and I dropped before I decided to venture down the rabbit hole even further.

A short breakdown. Misboarded against Hypergensis in R1, G3 (I STP'ed an Emrakul G2 when I snuck in a Humility with Show and Tell), when he put in Form of the Dragon and I foolishly left out Vindicates. I had countermagic for his spells but unfortunately no FoW, and I drew most of the non-blue lands so I was not able to cast multiple ones in a single turn. Other than that I feel like the deck had potential to do what it was supposed to. Got blown out by Merfolk with MD Echoing Truth, kind of sucked but at least I was in the game. G2 I had to take a one-lander on a mull to 5, needless to say I was dead before I hit land #3. Reanimator went to G3 as well, I started with Triple FoW, Negate, but still manage to get some of my MD answers (CS, Snare) to counter the reanimation effects, I then draw about four white cards, and he plays his fifth renimation spell of the game, I have to tap out for FoW, but the card he drew for the turn (Sphinx of the Steel Wind), was the last card he needed to pitch to FoW. He had only those three cards in his hand that turn. I hung it up after that, somewhat aggravated. I ran some odder card choices in the SB, a revisit from when I went to Indy, which in the situations I was in would have worked beautifully, but only if I had drawn them.

Nice to meet some of the people who post/used to post in this thread, of course Joel (mossivo1986) crashed at my place, and we were able to meet with rockout to chat a little bit (if you read this, how did you do?). Met Master Shake as well. I did run into Geoff (konsultant), however he is apparently very elusive and disappeared quickly.

[Master Shake]

I finished 41st with Landsstill. going 10-2-4 (2 Unintentional Draws)

Day one I went 6-0-3
Day two I went 4-2-1

I have pretty good notes and intend to write a report, but until then; this was my list: (You can tell me you don't like choices, but I did pretty well with it, so I feel vindicated in all of my arguements about the deck now.) It was also validating to finish higher in the final standaings than either of the players that beat me.

4 Flooded Strand
4 Tundra
3 Plains
3 Mishra's Factory
2 Island
1 Wasteland
1 Academy Ruins
1 Tolaria West
1 Karakas
1 Volcanic Island
1 Plateau
1 Scrubland
1 Eternal Dragon

4 Force of Will
4 Counterspell
4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Engineered Explosives
3 Decree of Justice
3 Cunning Wish
3 Brainstorm
3 Standstill
2 Path to Exile
2 Fact or Fiction
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
1 Moat
1 Humility
1 Wrath of God
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Sideboard:
2 Path to Exile
1 Ravenous Trap
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Extirpate
1 Pulse of the Fields
1 Return to Dust
1 Red Elemental Blast
1 Mindbreak Trap
1 Negate
1 Tormod's Crypt
2 Firespout
2 Relic of Progenitus

I had hoped to meet talk with Geoff about Landstill, I looked for him after round 3 but he was gone. Hung out with Joel for a good portion of the weekend and discussed a lot of things. It was cool to see Morbid again, it was great to tell the story about the Doomsday pilot.

Nooooooooooooooooo! *Dances around.*

[Reagens]

@Morbid-

Pity it didn't work out for you as well as you'd hoped. Like I said before I think Landstill is quite vulnerable in the first rounds because of random decks that are difficult to handle. I hope we'll still see you in the thread when the dissapointment has lessened a little. The deck is still viable I think.

@Master Shake

Congrats on the finish! I might be adressed in your report but I have some questions for you.

Would you change anything?
How did the karakas,tolaria west, wasteland, academy ruins toolbox go? Did you feel you got enough value out of your ruins? Did you perform well enough under standstill (I.e. did you need to break it yourself because you were rather low on manland and wasteland?)
Was having firespout instead of wrath an issue? Which would you prefer to draw against an unknown opponent?
Is moat worth it's slot?
How was cunning wish? Was it too slow in some matches? Gamebreaking in others?
How is your Zoo match-up? Do you feel you would need extra hate when a lot of Zoo would be present in your meta?

Looking forward to your thoughts...

[sdefreit8]

@ Master Shake

Id also like to ask how using both wish and FoF went. They are both rather mana intensive and can be clunky in a fast meta. Did you notice any problems?

[Mark Sun]

@Morbid-

Pity it didn't work out for you as well as you'd hoped. Like I said before I think Landstill is quite vulnerable in the first rounds because of random decks that are difficult to handle. I hope we'll still see you in the thread when the dissapointment has lessened a little. The deck is still viable I think.

I definitely agree that it was such a Russian Roulette experience. On one hand we had proxied up and tested most of the relevant matchups including of course Zoo, all Bant lists (NO-Pro, CounterTop, New Horizons), CounterTop, and TES, and the list I played produced pretty good results. I knew in the back of my head that Reanimator and Merfolk would be there always, but they were supposed to be in lesser numbers so in a less than 50% matchup, you play your best and hope to get there.

It was a... "surreal," I guess, type feeling to hear my teammates (who were mostly X-3's by the end of the day, sadly, except for one who made it in at 7-2) talk about how much they had to play against Zoo, Goblins, and Thopter. I would had paid for that kind of privilege.


@ Master Shake: "NOOOOOOO!..... hey let me tell you about my deck."

[Master Shake]

@Master Shake

Congrats on the finish! I might be adressed in your report but I have some questions for you.

1 Would you change anything?
2 How did the karakas,tolaria west, wasteland, academy ruins toolbox go?
3 Did you feel you got enough value out of your ruins?
4 Did you perform well enough under standstill (I.e. did you need to break it yourself because you were rather low on manland and wasteland?)
5 Was having firespout instead of wrath an issue? Which would you prefer to draw against an unknown opponent?
6 Is moat worth it's slot?
7 How was cunning wish? Was it too slow in some matches? Gamebreaking in others?
8 How is your Zoo match-up? Do you feel you would need extra hate when a lot of Zoo would be present in your meta?

I added numbers to clarify which questions I'm answering

1. I underestimated the number of people that would bring combo decks. Had I assessed it properly there would be one Ethersworn Cannonist in the board and I perhaps would have taken a look at another Negate. For a blind metagame, I may go -1 Relic of Progentius -1 Firespout +1 Ethersworn Cannonist +1 Negate. But it is also dependent on play style as well

2. I normally play 2 Wastelands, and I dreaded cutting the third, but support Firespout in the board I really wanted another red source. In doing so I weakened my Merfolk match, which everyone knows is pretty bad, but I felt that Firespout was going to be great against the three most common decks. Karakas bounced things all day - Gaddock Teeg, Vendillion Clique, Progenitus - and it's also a fine answer to Emrakul. I wouldn't leave home without it. Tolaria West was fine, it was transmuted a few times, but normally was an Island, it is what it is, but I had to play it with only one Wasteland.

3. Academy Ruins was amazing, as always. I play Ruins when I don't play Tolaria West because the effect is so strong. Academy Ruins nearly let me come back from Jace's Ultimate, but it simply was not to be. But, it locked people out and that is always good

4. I never broke my own Standstill, Merfolk broke theirs against me twice, but other than that I always had board superiority or they were playing a deck that really needed to play a threat.

5. Against an unknown opponent I would rather have Wrath of God. Firespout just is not Wrath of God, but I felt it would be good enough against the big three aggro decks.

6. I love Moat, some people want to play 2 Humility, I want to play a card that is situationaly better. I like that Moat + Humility is a hard lock against anyone who isn't trying to storm me out, and I like that Moat is tantamount to a win condition against Merfolk and Goblins. I firmly feel it is worth the slot, that is why I play the card.

7. Cunning Wish is really only a liability against Merfolk in the early game. I board it out against them, any other time it has applications. Against Lands I was able to Cunning Wish for Extirpate under a Port lock and take him off Life from the Loam, against Zoo I got Pulse of the Fields, against ANT I got Mindbreak Trap. There are not many situations that I don't want to see Cunning Wish as I've tailored my wishboard to answer most situations while still being as much like a real sideboard as possible, modular if you would.

8. If the metagame is filled with Zoo, there are steps that can be taken to beat it. Post board, 2 Firespout + 7 Plows + 3 EE + Wrath + Moat/Humility + 3 Cunning Wish + Counters has worked out for me, I'm generally able to stabilize and if I can generate card advantage via Standstill or Fact or Fiction then that seals the game up. You may want to play another Firespout in the board if you were to play something close to my list if you really need to crush Zoo. I'll have my boarding plans in my report along with explanations.


@sdefreit8 - Cunning Wish just packs so many answers to decks, and Fact or Fiction is just so powerful that it will draw concessions. I acknowledge the faster aggro decks by playing so many plows in the main and as many as 8 post board, But Cunning Wish really will allow me to swing the match in the mid-game.

When I first saw people using Cunning Wish I thought it was very expensive, awkward and that it would just ruined sideboards. When I first picked up a list with Cunning Wish it was literally only because Geoff had posted a list that he played that used it and since then I haven't been able to really remove it from my Landstill list. The card is so powerful, I want to see it against Zoo, Lands, Goblins, an opposing Jace, Counterbalance, Dredge, ANT, and in many worst case scenarios - it pitches to Force of Will. Cunning Wish is likely not for
everyone, but it really compliments my play style and I am always happy with it at the end of the day.


@Morbid - I can't wait for my weekly Legacy event, not only will I get to tell that story again, but I may get to act it out in a game.

[Wasteland]

You know that you can't bounce a Progenitus with Karakas?^^ Anyway, grats to ur finish

[Master Shake]

You know that you can't bounce a Progenitus with Karakas?^^ Anyway, grats to ur finish

I'm aware that you normally cannot bounce a Progenitus with Karakas. Sometimes though, even Progenitus gets mud in his face.

[Neuad]

I watched him bounce Progen.

That was one humiliated player.