That depends on your exact build, but I would start with a card that
a) is not that overwhelming on it's own and
b) does not interact very well with Snapcasater Mage,
and that candidate would be Spellstutter Sprite.
For 1U, you get to counter a spell with 1 or less, and if you have a Mutavault in play, you get to counter a spell that costs 2 for 3 mana. Snapcaster Mage can do the first by flashing back misstep and the second by flashing back Spell Snare, except that it's much more flexible if you don't need a counter (as you will often prefer to flashback a sword).
As far as I know, Spellstutter is only good against Hive Mind (and to some extent in the mirror against Visions), but that deck is not existend anyway. Just play Spell Pierce and/or RedBlast in the side and you should be fine, given that you can now double-cast them. You can then also switch back to the "real" man-land, as Factories are much better in the defense than Mutavault.
I agree 100 percent with you.
However, just to add, you left out a few facts:
1. What if you don't draw stp/spell snare?
2. Spellstutter sprite is a better creature because it flies, making it easier to connect with a sword. A 2/1 is no where as good as a 1/1 flyer.
I won't totally cut sprites for snappy/tiagos (we need a nickname for this guy). I think you can drop sprites to 3 and drop maybe a clique for 2 tiagos (can't get his face out of my head, his face does not jell with all that twilight innistrad crap). Tiagos are good, but should be treated more like an eternal witness rather than a sfm/goyf. You don't want to see too many, but it's nice to see a copy or 2.
The odds of you not drawing a stp, snare, brainstorm or any other cheap instant isn't very likely though. This card does feel like witness though and I wouldn't want them to clog my hand up early so I do agree with you that decks shouldn't run more than 2.
I think it's most important that one does not just go like : "I take my current UW Stoneblade list, add x Tiagos and remove x other cards for him" and expect the deck to work perfectly. Like Patrick Chapin says in his (still premium) article on StarCityGames: The only restriction is that you have to play a lot of cheap spells. So I think to make Tiago work, the current lists need to move a little more towards the cheap instant/sorcery (but mainly instant) card category.
Because I think that Snapcastaer Mage will definitely be the "natural evolution" of Stoneblade lists, and because I further think that Tiago cannot be fully taken advantage of in an UW-only list, I will try my luck with Patriot or EsperBlade.
I can see snapcasters taking the place of visions/standstill as the go-to gas card. I honestly prefer patriot as grim is such a house vs folk, no rug and stoneblade. I'd still just play 2 copies or 3 Max. I will never play snapcaster over the 4th jtms. Jace is just too good, so this limits the number or snapcasters that can be played some what. I think the ideal number of bodies for a stoneblade list is 10-12. I play 3 grims, 3 cliques and 4 sfm in my patriot list. Never have body problems with 10 dudes + batterskull honestly. Adding 2 snappies and upping my body count to 12 would be ideal.
Im planning to play this deck this weekend, but I have a few questions about current lists.
-Red Splash: Is it good to trade better manabase for blasts?
-Crucible: I dont get this card here. Is it that useful? Wasteland lock its nice, but seems clunky.
-Daze? Better than Snare?
This is my current list
3 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Vendilion Clique
1 Batterskull
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Tundra
4 Island
1 Plains
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Flooded Strand
4 Wasteland
4 Squadron Hawk
4 Mental Misstep
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
2 Mishra's Factory
3 Spell Snare
3 Cunning Wish
1 Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 2 Relic of Progenitus
SB: 1 Dismantling Blow
SB: 1 Path to Exile
SB: 1 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 1 Surgical Extraction
SB: 1 Angel's Grace
SB: 1 Misdirection
SB: 1 Hurkyl's Recall
SB: 4 Meddling Mage
SB: 2 Wrath of God
Hawks and wishes are really slow. I wouldn't play them. If you play wastes, dazes are more effective. If you play sprite/vault without wastes, snare is more effective. In general I prefer daze as it's more flexible vs hivemind, jace, natural order etc. But I'm in red and I play grims md. I have plenty of bodies to carry a sword so I don't need sprites as much. If you are going straight uw, you probably need some sprites in there.
Hey guys,
What do you think about replacing Visions or Standstills with Dark Confidant as the card draw engine like this version of the deck: http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...p?DeckID=40722
If I'm not mistaken its player is IsThisACatInAHat in the forum but the discussion about the deck is in UWb Esper Blade topic (white-Team America).
However to me it looks more like UW Blade Control with Bobs as the drawing engine. I used to play Forbidian a lot and using Bob in a blue control list reminds of it. Also the list don't have any discard effects or additional cantrips so I think it would play close to the UW Blade Control rather than Esper Team America.
Opinions?
for my personal taste the mana costs are to high in this deck for Bob. With Jaces, Cliques, Equipments and Forces its pretty risky. Also Bob dies real quick. But is definitely playable nonetheless.
But any opinions on crucible and red anybody? This thread is really quiet.
The rise of GW Maverick decks in my region is causing me a some problems (outnumbering even Merfolk).
In most Matches I am able to stabilize after some time but it seems that they have more threats that they can draw against than we can handle consistently.
Their utility lands like Tower of the Magistrate and Maze of Ith cause a lot of problems for me as well as Thrun or even Mother of Runes.
All of these cards turn the game in their favor quite quickly if not answered immediately where on my side there are not really many cards that I can draw to lock the game in my favor.
Having played a lot against GW Maverick I am feeling the matchup to be in their favor (slightly but still on their side; Personally I am something like 40/60 % against them).
I am already running Wrath of God Pithing Needle and of cause the Path to Exiles in my sideboard. But this doesn't seem enough (or not strong enough).
Does anyone have GW Maverick specific suggestions for Sideboard cards or is it time to adept to my Meta and change the deck?
Well the thing I had in mind is to replace the Cliques in that list with Spell Pierces and thus such a list:Originally Posted by Humphrey
4 Force of Will
4 Mental Misstep
3 Daze
3 Spell Pierce
4 Swords To Plowshares
4 Brainstorm
4 Dark Confidant
4 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
4 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Batterskull
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
24 Lands
Batterskull can be used to mitigate the lifeloss from Bob if it gets too great, it has good synergy with Jace anyways and a sure way to draw cards "now" as opposed to Standstill or Visions.
I've read in other threads that a good Stoneblade player will often sideout the Stoneforge package if he expects a lot of artifact hate (i.e. Ancient Grudge, Krosan Grip)?
I don't see how this is a viable plan though. Without the equipment package, the deck is reduced to a pile of counterspells and removal with Jaces, manlands, and Faeries as win conditions. Is that really a better plan against NO RUG (for instance) than just hoping to stick and protect your Batterskulls?
I think you can't protect Batterskull from Ancient Grudge. You can't seriously double-counter it, and bouncing Batterskull all the time in response will make you so slow, since the Mystic will be killed a lot at that time. You could only try and Clique it away before you play Batterskull. However, they will have a lot of options post board: Red Elemental Blast hurts as a lot, they probably bring their own Jaces, which we have to handle. Of course, they will still be able to combo early, and apart from Force of Will or maybe Wrath of God, we are blank to NO. They even have their own Cliques to play in response to Mystic activision - and here comes a big issue I think: we cannot reliably handle 3 or 4 drops. And now we can't even do anything against a one-and-two drop (Ancient Grudge). Another thing is: I do want a pro Green sword against NO RUG, but I can't really use Body and Mind, because I will probably give them Ancient Grudge in their yard.
So postboard does not look very good if you keep SFM.
What you can do however is transform to a normal full-blown control deck. My plan is realtively easy against NO RUG: Board out Stoneforge+Equipments to blank their Grudges (having them have 2-3 completely dead cards in their deck is very good!). I will also add Elspeth from the side to add some more threat density. If you have Meddling Mages, bring them in. I will also always add 3 Spell Pierces. It handles every important spell: Natural Order, Jace, and even GSZ. I will also bring a couple of RedBlasts for Jace, Clique, Counters and Brainstorm. Last but not least, I will add an emergancy wrath and side out some swords (because they most likely cut on their Goyfs anyway).
Hey guys, I'm new to the internet but but I've been playing Legacy for a while now, heres my current version of a more tempoish UWx Stoneblade list. The only major difference is the inclusion of Stifle which I have found really amazing in this shell. Although it is a poorly positioned card, I feel very happy with it in my 75 ATM. REBs have been sub par in the SB, as has Manriki-Gusari, but they do a job I guess...
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Mental Misstep
4 Stifle
3 Vendilion Clique
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Crucible of Worlds
4 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Batterskull
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
4 Flooded Strand
2 Scalding Tarn
4 Tundra
1 Volcanic Island
3 Island
1 Plains
4 Mishra's Factory
3 Wasteland
1 Karakas
3 Wrath of God
2 Submerge
2 Path to Exile
1 Batterskull
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
1 Spell Pierce
1 Manriki-Gusari
1 Pithing Needle
2 Red Elemental Blast
[EDIT: I've heard some sweet talk about Timely Reinforcements in the SB, Would it be better than Wrath against Zoo [and the typical field in general] or should I just stick with the current package? Anyone with some experience on this matter, chime in, would totes be sick! EDIT 2: Just to clarify, I would only be cutting a single Wrath]
Last edited by Oatus; 09-16-2011 at 04:45 AM.
@ Zunam: You could try a black splash. Perish in the sb is pretty good, and it is applicable against a number of other decks too (NO RUG, Zoo, some Rock-ish decks, basically any deck whose plan A is to beat down with green dudes). It dodges Teeg too, which can be quite relevant.
If you splash red, Grim Lavamancer should be good too, since a lot of the creatures in Maverick are small utility dudes.
Engineered Explosives with any splash could also be worth trying out, since Maverick will most assuredly bring in Choke from the sb, and EE can destroy that, while not being a dead draw if they happen to draw nothing but dudes. It is also recurrable with Academy Ruins, if you run that.
In case you don't want to splash, or you just really like off-beat solutions, you could try Linvala, Keeper of Silence. I haven't tried it myself, but it could actually just be the stone cold nuts against them. Shuts off their mana dudes, Pridemage, Mother, Knight (well, kinda. It will still be a huge beater, of course), Scryb Ranger, and Mangara or Scavenging Ooze, if they run those.
@ Oatus: I really love Stifle + Wasteland, but I would personally try it with Daze, once I get around to it. I think something like Ponder might actually be better than Ancestral Vision in such a deck, since otherwise there is a very real chance that the tempo advantage slips away before you get to win off of it. That's just conjecture, though, and likely bad conjecture, if it works for you. How do you use it? Primarily to stifle fetches, or as a tool against Stonforge Mystic, Qasali Pridemage, etc?
Also: Are there no Dredge decks in your meta? Lucky you..
Is there any benefit to running Green? Tarmogofys/KotR for more beats? Something else?
Re: Dredge
I've been finding that between Mental Misstep and Stifle that Dredge is actually containable, basically if they don't auto DDD then its usually a fairly reasonable match. [EDIT: and once i get a batterskull out I just pay 3 and return it asap to get the bridges]
Re: Daze and Ponder
I was originally running both of these cards (well, preordain instead of ponder) [mini edit: i've been writing a massive response to this part of the question, but at the end of the day... tl;dr...] but I think resolving Jace on turn 4 is way more valuable than the tempo from Daze, and Visions has beed really easy to get off if I even stifle one of their lands.
Re: Stifle
Typically I save it for V Clique trigger and Pridemage activations, but if I know that I'm playing against RUG or Reanimator, I often stifle the lands and timewalk my way to a vision (read: win) [mini edit: decks that run 16-19 lands shouldn't be getting as many wins as they are, they don't deserve it]
Most of the lists here look like they are heavily geared for the control mirror with visions and what not. If you really have trouble against gw maverick, the best solution is a red splash. Grims tend to shut down the whole deck. You stick and protect grim, they lose. Their hate bears, moms and mana dudes are all soft to grim. Check the patriot page for lists.
MM is gone =( this kinda seems bad for stoneblade. what are your thoughts for the future of this archetype now
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