[Deck] UW(x) Landstill

[Serbitar]

I believe it was their lovely 'Take Possession' they had in their tutor package board. They also discovered how good Decree of Justice is in the deck finally and took out those terrible Repeals. They still don't run Cunning Wish which is a giant mistake. Not a fan of their build. Gerry and Drew ID'd in round 8, our best guess is to avoid top 16 and their deck list being posted but I was standing there through their 'match' and saw most of their list. Was unimpressed compared to a Master Shake special but I'm biased.

How is Take Possession an answer to Thrun? My guess would rather be something that also answers Progenitus etc, like Phyrexian Metamorph or Tariff or the aforementioned Peacekeeper.

[Mark Sun]

How is Take Possession an answer to Thrun? My guess would rather be something that also answers Progenitus etc, like Phyrexian Metamorph or Tariff or the aforementioned Peacekeeper.

It isn't, as Take Possession has to target.

I talked with Drew before the event, but I'll respect the fact that they wanted to keep the decklist hidden.

[GGoober]

How is Take Possession an answer to Thrun? My guess would rather be something that also answers Progenitus etc, like Phyrexian Metamorph or Tariff or the aforementioned Peacekeeper.

Don't forget that GT and Drew aren't really building good control decks (as opposed to many other Landstill players who have been in the archetype for years, take Master Shake for example). All they need to do is to build a metagame'd control deck that does well in the last few rounds of the SCG circuit. This is a huge factor to consider and for most parts, people should not be netdecking their lists to other tourneys without carefully considering the strategies they were employing when designing their variants.

This is obviously not trolling, but rather to let others be aware that the 'unique' lists that you see floating around in the SCG circuits ranging from UW Repealstill, Ugr Misernought (lol slight troll here :P), are all metagamed decks that exemplify good deckbuilding skills and anticipation on a metagame. However, sadly, Top 32 SCG metagame isn't going to be representative of a Legacy metagame where you are intending to play out all or most of the rounds.

[OurSerratedDust]

I've been experimenting with this deck lately. What is this deck's worst matchup, besides merfolk? It sounds to me like if you can solidify the fish matchup, you are in a position to do decent against almost anything (although, the mirror looks a little weird.)

I'm probably wrong about that though.

[Neuad]

I guess I skipped the Thrun part sorr, I had just driven for 6 hours, but I tried my best to get a look as Gerry and Drew were playing. I guess I didn't see the super secret tech they had, because I have no qualms spoiling it to the rest of you.

I know their list included

Dust Bowl
Celestial Colonnade
Decree of Justice - About time

No more repeals.

I saw Drew was rocking a Moat, but no Elspeth or Humility that I saw

Their Enlightened Tutor package included

Take Possession
Wheel of Sun and Moon
Seal of Cleansing
Pithing Needle
Crucible
Energy Flux
Oblivion Ring
Threads of Disloyalty

[conboy31]

It isn't, as Take Possession has to target.

I talked with Drew before the event, but I'll respect the fact that they wanted to keep the decklist hidden.

As mentioned, Tariff makes sense as it has been in and out of the vintage metagame to answer tinker bots. Essentially thrun would be the decks hard casted "robot".

And, the new kid on the block, phyrexian metamorph which is like a cheaper duplicant at answering show and tell/natural order and thrun.

I would admit a little surprise if they had an answer that was clearly better than either of these choices. Though I have not put too much thought into coming up with ideas.

[Neuad]

I'm going to laugh when their 'super secret techy answer' is something real Landstill players have known about the whole time, like Humility, or Decree.

[GGoober]

Take Possession is cute, but is in everyway a huge narrow card against a deck with Jace. If you can hit the mana to play Take Possession on an opposing Jace that has been spending tons of turns to generate advantage, I think you must be in a overly winning position or your opponents suck. I mean sure you get their Jace but they have a ton of cards/advantage while you spend over 10 mana to gain a Jace. Seems pretty bad, but I mean Drew and Crew are the ones full of tech right? From Repeals to the newest tech Decree..

I know we've done this a few years back playing Bob in the SB, but I've tested it again in the SB and he's been pretty amazing. The initiation came from The BoM5 1st place BUG Jacestill list. I don't agree with 8 creatures in the SB but I'm sure the main creature he was intending to board in was Bob (not Goyf).

Regardless, I've tested over 20 postboard games (not enough but limited time) with my buddies and Bob is pretty amazing against non-aggro based decks and/or decks with very little creatures e.g. Team America/Tempo. For most parts, my opponents mentioned that they will board out all removal for control-hate cards, leaving only removal if they can no longer board anything. The list with MM allows for Bob to ride some games to easy victory. Once he has drawn 2 cards, the game is usually over soon.

Here's the list that I've tweaked over the past 2-3 months that's been doing very well for me.

Lands: 23 (+1Edragon could be 8th fetchland instead)
1 EDragon
4 Strand
2 Delta
1 Marsh Flat
3 Tundra
2 Sea
1 Scrub
2 Plains
2 Island
4 Factory
1 Wasteland
1 Ruins

Cantrips/Draws: 11
4 Brainstorm
3 Top
4 Standstill

Permission: 12
4 Mental Misstep
4 Counterspell
4 FoW

Removal: 9
3 EE
4 StP
1 Disk
1 Humility (Moat could be here but Humility is stronger these days, against TA)

Win: 5
2 Jace
2 Elspeth
1 Crucible

SB: 15
1 Misdirection/Relic/Negate/BEB (flex slot)
3 Counterbalance
3 Dark Confidant
2 Extirpate
1 Relic
2 Perish
3 Peacekeeper

Notes:
3 Top:
2 Top is usually the right call, but there were games in the past where I will usually ETutor for a Top instead of Standstill (due to board position) and Top will win games. Top is backbreaking against mid-range/control decks and is still powerful against aggro decks. With 7 fetches, you can usually avoid ever drawing multiples. In a format with Misstep, the 3rd Top ain't too bad either to force itself through. 3 Tops allow for a powerful SB of Counterbalance + Dark Confidant against mid-range/control/Junk/discard decks. 3 Top is also inherently my answer to 2cmc Hymns and other attrition decks since I've cut my Spell Snares (since Top beats discard strategies very well).

4 MM: I'm not a huge fan of MM. But I've come to the conclusion that MM helps power out turn 2 Standstills strongly. I originally ran 13 permission suite of 3/3/3/4 MM/Snare/CS/FoW which was incredible but I've decided on this configuration. It involves shifting gears in playing the deck i.e. I have to handle 2cmc drops with StP/EE/FoW/Counterspell, but the trade-off is that I get a stronger setup to STandstill, and postboard stronger setup with Bob/Countertop when needed. Testing will show if I go back to the 3/3/3/4 split. I do enjoy having 4 Counterspells.

The only bad matchups that I currently face are:
- Turbodrazi (fuck this deck)
- Merfolks (I have a 50-50 or better matchup postboard now. I board in Bobs + Peacekeeper to win the permission war resolving Peacekeeper. I am pretty confident in this matchup but Merfolk has so far drawn super-above-average hands v.s. me that it's annoying the shit out of me).
- Burn (fuck this deck too, CB helps a bit postboard)

I used to play Meddling Mage over Bob, since Mage is incredible against NOShow and Spiral Tide. However, I realized that the card advantage of Bob over these 2 matches are what decides games, for NOShow the maindeck of Humility/Disk/Jace/Peacekeeper and permission with postboard Perish is surprisingly strong, so the only other bad matchup is Spiral Tide. Bob is slightly weaker than Mage in this matchup, but I think for every other control/mid-range matchup, Bob is going to win you the game easily. It's almost like playing Vintage when your opponents board out removals.

I really would love a 3rd Jace but in general Crucible is much more powerful than the 3rd Jace, troll on, control players would know how invaluable Crucible is to an eventual winning game plan. I can't seem to cut any ratio of Counter/Draw/Removal though. The other most likely cut is -4th Standstill for the 3rd Jace.
In game 3, they can board back removal, but you just cut down to 2 Bobs or no Bobs, and you have a superior deck fighting against their deck with dead cards.

If someone wants to chime in on why the fuck do I just not play Uwb Dreadstill, then my answer is: It's much harder to hate against Landstill's maindeck/strategy than it is to hate against Dreadstill. Landstill is a much more resilient deck, whereas the benefit of Dreadstill is being able to have very strong matchups while weaker ones in game 1. I personally feel that cards like Counterbalance/Bob are incredibly more powerful in the SB against the right matchup. For most of the time, Counterbalance these days no longer serve as a hard lock (except against relevant matchups e.g. mid-range, control mirrors, combo). I tend to view Counterbalance as being a SB card for my list to significantly beat my weaker matchups, otherwise the maindeck currently handles a ton of other matchup where Dreadstill is weaker to (e.g. Bant/Junk/TA/control-mirrors).

Also can someone remind me not to ever cut that 3rd EE? Everytime I cut it to make space for something, I tend to do worse. EE is so fucking unbelievably good. Too bad we can't run Deed in UWx landstill without splashing 4 colors, so EE is like the best thing we can have when not playing Deed. Also, the lone Disk has been very impressive that I'm tempted to up to 2 Disk dropping the Humility. It's essentially a deed, but a turn slower and a little weaker against Pierce.

[Erdvermampfa]

I wonder if you really want to prefer Counterspell over Spell Snare. Sure, Counterspell is way more flexible, but i've encountered situations in which I was unable to cast it due to too many offcolor Lands ( Mishra, Plains ) and otd it seems kind of slow in general. What do you guys think about this?

Thanks in advance

[Neuad]

Gerry wrote an article about his U/W list in Louisville. His tech against Thrun was Decree and Humility.

Way to be 6 years late on that boat, sirs.

[hyc8028]

Long time countertop player here and I decided to give landstill a try since I love playing control so much and countertop is not as good as before. I tried the BUG version and I don't like it. I decided to go with a traditional UWB list and took it to a 18 man event yesterday and got 5th after swiss. There were ton of control in the room and 0 merfolk, which seem kinda odd.

Spell: 36
4x Brainstorm
4x Sword to Plowshares
4x Force of Will
3x Standstill
3x Spell Snare
3x Counterspell
3x Engineered Explosive
3x Mental Misstep
2x Sensei’s Divining Top
2x Wrath of God
2x Elspeth, Knight Errant
2x Jace the Mind Sculptor
1x Crucible of World

Land: 24
4x Mishra’s Factory
4x Flooded Strand
1x Polluted Delta
1x Marsh Flat
3x Underground Sea
3x Tundra
2x Plain
4x Island
1x Academy Ruin
1x Wasteland

SB: 15
3x Dark Confidant
2x Llawan, Cephalid Empress
2x Peacekeeper
2x Extirpate
2x Perish
1x Enlightened Tutor
1x Humility
1x Energy Flux
1x Nihil's Spellbomb

Round 1: BW Homebrew w/MM 2-0
-3 Standstill, +3 Bob

Round 2: UW Landstill w/Mystic and Batterskull 0-2
-1 Elspeth, -2 WoG, +3 Bob

Round 3: Elves 2-0
-2 Elspeth, -1 EE, -1 Crucible, -3 Standstill, +2 Perish, +2 Peacekeeper, +3 Bob

Round 4: Burn ID
I felt like this is worse match up I could see and I was actually getting paired up, so I asked for an ID and he accepted.

Round 5: Bant 2-0
-3 Standstill, -2 WoG, +3 Bob, +2 Perish

I love swapping bob for standstill in game 2. It is just so good. People usually side out some removal and I try to not to fetch black mana in game 1 to give false info to opponent that I have black splash.

1 of Crucible is really good. Every time I drew it, I wasn't disappointed. I actually wasteland lock my Bant opponent in round 5 game 2.

One of the cards in the main that I always dispute is Elspeth. On one hand, she is really good at defense and offense. On the other hand, Elspeth doesn't put someone away immediately. It ll take couple turns and longer to do that unlike Jace. It also doesn't stop Jace across me.

I would make the following changes:

Main:
-1 Elspeth, +1 Jace TMS

SB:
No Changes

[Shawn]

I piloted UW Landstill to a 113th place finish at the GP. No Wish, no duals for EE at 3. Day two was very disappointing; I had a couple of close games where I had poor draws in pretty good matchups and my play began to diminish after those losses. The list felt fine, but I'd adjust the sideboard from what I ran. I am very comfortable with the Team America/BUG matchup at the Fish matchup with this list, I went 3-0 vs BUG and 2-1 vs Fish. (I mulled to five g1 vs the Fish deck I lost to and he Misstepp'd my Misstep on Vial g2, I missed some land drops and he crushed me) At the moment I am undecided if I will right a report or post the list; a bunch of the matches blurred together and only one or two matches were interesting.

[GGoober]

Would still love to see a list :)

Anyway, I think there's no reason to not go 3-colors. You get a more stable manabase with UW, but a lot of times, it's fetching correctly (high fetchlands = stable manabase even with 3 colors) against Wastelands. I mean look at PV's BUGstill list. It runs 4 Waste + 4 Factories and is 3-color heavy compared to most UWx builds. He still went by fine except with a couple of manascrews in the Top 8. I think UW maybe overly stable (which is a plus) but you lose out on EE@3 and a multitude of SB slots (primarily black for Perish, and other cards that people don't usually play but are decent in the current metagame e.g. Extirpate/Bob)

@Hyc8028: Nice list dude, I run almost the same with probably -3 cards off from yours. I think I'm going back to the 3/3/3 MM/Snare/CS split instead of the 4/4 MM/CS split. I think with 3 EE, you can afford to go down on MMs. MMs main function is to act like a FoW 5-8 on turn 1 against 1cmc spells. It's pretty bad when you draw it mid-late game. Snare is always going to be amazing (more amazing now as people shift to higher cmcs to get around MM)

How did the Bobs turn out for you? They were promising from my testing. I love them but I need to play them a little longer to make a verdict. They only come in against relevant matchups, which might be win-more considering that we have favorable control matchups (a little weaeker on the combo matchup but combo is on a low these days). Also, why Llawans? Peacekeeper is just everything better. Merfolks with Vials still beat Llawan. Llawan doesn't stop Emrakul/Dredge/Elves but Peacekeeper just says NO to too many aggro decks that don't pack real-removal.

[hyc8028]

Would still love to see a list :)

Anyway, I think there's no reason to not go 3-colors. You get a more stable manabase with UW, but a lot of times, it's fetching correctly (high fetchlands = stable manabase even with 3 colors) against Wastelands. I mean look at PV's BUGstill list. It runs 4 Waste + 4 Factories and is 3-color heavy compared to most UWx builds. He still went by fine except with a couple of manascrews in the Top 8. I think UW maybe overly stable (which is a plus) but you lose out on EE@3 and a multitude of SB slots (primarily black for Perish, and other cards that people don't usually play but are decent in the current metagame e.g. Extirpate/Bob)

@Hyc8028: Nice list dude, I run almost the same with probably -3 cards off from yours. I think I'm going back to the 3/3/3 MM/Snare/CS split instead of the 4/4 MM/CS split. I think with 3 EE, you can afford to go down on MMs. MMs main function is to act like a FoW 5-8 on turn 1 against 1cmc spells. It's pretty bad when you draw it mid-late game. Snare is always going to be amazing (more amazing now as people shift to higher cmcs to get around MM)

How did the Bobs turn out for you? They were promising from my testing. I love them but I need to play them a little longer to make a verdict. They only come in against relevant matchups, which might be win-more considering that we have favorable control matchups (a little weaeker on the combo matchup but combo is on a low these days). Also, why Llawans? Peacekeeper is just everything better. Merfolks with Vials still beat Llawan. Llawan doesn't stop Emrakul/Dredge/Elves but Peacekeeper just says NO to too many aggro decks that don't pack real-removal.

Thanks. Bob has been just good all day and that is one of my reason to splash black. Against stuff like Merfolk and Elves, it is just a beating for them once I land it. Against other Landstill/Merfolk deck, They pack 4x wasteland and 4x man lands. I don't think I can beat them under standstill, so bob will come in. Bob can also act as a clock since decks will take out removal to side in anti-control stuff.

MM was aright on Sunday, nothing amazing happen except I counter couple brainstorm. Most of the time I just pitch to FoW. Snare on the other hand is just amazing, but it get hit by MM, which happen to me in round 2.

With 3 EE and 3 MM, i don't feel vial is much of a problem. The good thing about Llawan is that even if they have vial out, it temporary reset their board, which is huge. It has a decent body, which I can use to beat as well.

Peacekeeper on the other hand is good also, but the problem now is merfolk pack dismember and echoing truth. I have lost game like I resolve a peacekeeper from counter war, only then he get bounced during the merfolk player main phrase. We have to keep in mind that peacekeeper is not
a win con, but more like buy more time, so we can take out their dudes or land a Jace and fateseal away. People in my area never scoop to peacekeeper even if they have no answer to it becuase they know it will still take a while to kill them. Another issue is time. Let say you lose game 1, peacekeeper might have keep you alive in game 2. The only win con we have when peacekeeper in play is Jace. Let say you win game 2. I don't think you going to have enough time to finish game 3. A draw in the swiss is almost equal to a loss IMO. I have play against merfolk using peacekeeper in the top 4 local tourney in the past and beside game 1 where I usually die quickly, any game involving peacekeeper just take a long time.

[Mark Sun]

I piloted UW Landstill to a 113th place finish at the GP. No Wish, no duals for EE at 3. Day two was very disappointing; I had a couple of close games where I had poor draws in pretty good matchups and my play began to diminish after those losses. The list felt fine, but I'd adjust the sideboard from what I ran. I am very comfortable with the Team America/BUG matchup at the Fish matchup with this list, I went 3-0 vs BUG and 2-1 vs Fish. (I mulled to five g1 vs the Fish deck I lost to and he Misstepp'd my Misstep on Vial g2, I missed some land drops and he crushed me) At the moment I am undecided if I will right a report or post the list; a bunch of the matches blurred together and only one or two matches were interesting.

Sorry, I was barely around Day 2 and we were pretty much gone by the afternoon. Congrats on getting to Day 2. Would love to see a report as well.

[DragoFireheart]

Why would I play UW/x over BUG Landstill? BUG Landstill has deed, which is amazing for sweeping fishes and other another permanents. What do I gain by staying two colors (other than saving money that I would need to blow on getting Underground Seas).

[Sea R Hill]

why would i play uw/x over bug landstill? Bug landstill has deed, which is amazing for sweeping fishes and other another permanents. What do i gain by staying two colors (other than saving money that i would need to blow on getting underground seas).

enlightened tutor

[The Treefolk Master]

Moat, Humility, stronger mana base, STP, Peacekeeper. It's pretty much a matter of tastes and you personal opinion about power vs. consistency though.

Sea R Hill is right about Enlightened Tutor too.

[DragoFireheart]

Moat, Humility, stronger mana base, STP, Peacekeeper. It's pretty much a matter of tastes and you personal opinion about power vs. consistency though.

Sea R Hill is right about Enlightened Tutor too.

I prefer consistency and a stronger mana base. I have a odd habit of being color screwed if there is even a small dent in my mana base. Maybe I'm just pessimistic, but to me having a stable mana base is important.

I have a few questions in regards to making the deck list:

1- I don't have a single wasteland to my name. Traded them awhile ago for Jaces. It's a decision I sorta regret, thought at the time it was a good trade. Anyways, my options for land destruction are somewhat limited. Is Dust Bowl the only good option I have for killing problem lands?

2- What is with some lists running Repeal? How has it been? It's an interesting card to say the least: you can bounce Vials that are already down or other annoying creatures, allowing you to counter them later.

3- Now that many merfolk decks are adopting Dismember, what should we do now that Peacekeeper is going to be less of a hard lock?

[Azdraël]

And, the new kid on the block, phyrexian metamorph which is like a cheaper duplicant at answering show and tell/natural order and thrun.

doesnt work with s&t.
Humility/Moat/WoG are efficient enough not to bring this shitty 7ccm Take Possession. Thrun should not be feared and metagamed at all.