[Deck] Imperial Painter

[oliverpool]

You did well for your first major tournament! I agree on canonist. Its a really good card to stop all the folks playing multiple spells each turn. This includes Elves, Reanimator, S&T, Sneak, Poison and Storm. Elves seems to be coming back strong.

I recalled last year in one of the SCG tournament, a R/W Painter was actually playing 3 canonist with no recruiter. Basically he tried to get Canonist on board as early as possible and then waited. Its like a deadlock situation for the opponent. Cast and you die. Don't cast you die too next turn.

His deck list was something like

3 Ethersworn Canonist
4 Painter's Servant
4 Goblin Welder

Artifact [18]

1 Tormod's Crypt
4 Mishra's Bauble
1 Lion's Eye Diamond
1 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Pithing Needle
4 Grindstone
4 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Great Furnace

Instant [12]

4 Red Elemental Blast
4 Enlightened Tutor
4 Pyroblast

Sorcery [2]

2 Gamble

Land [17]

3 Mountain
1 Plains
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Arid Mesa
3 Ancient Tomb
2 Plateau

1-0 so far at the legacy 5k
Played against some white blue enchantment deck.
Game 1 : mull to 6, turn 1 moon, he conceded turn two before I saw anything more than a triland
So I sb'd out the moons and put in trin, thorn, revoked and crypt as a catch all
Game 2: he chose to draw and leylined on my turn, then he played an enchantment that protected him from my grindstone after I played it on turn two (t1 top). He then proceeded to play enchantments that wouldn't let me attack or use graveyards (his wincon was helm rip). I got out the combo pieces, got jaya out, blasted his enchantment hate and grinded him out around turn 5 or 6. I know I started with a 1 land hand wih the combo and recruiter as well as top and a pyro last. Kept.

Round 2:2-0 against UWR delver
T1 Fow my blood moon
T2 Fow my magus and pierced my blast
T3 canonist doing work, welder taking bolts
I get a bridge out when he plays TNN
T4 painter gets bolted
T5 recruited another painter, canonist still doing work.
At some point I have painter in play and painter in graveyard with welder ready, pass to him he realized he could only play one spell and I'd just activate in response and conceded.

Game 2:
Turn 1 top
T2 welder and canonist
T3 grindstone
T4 thorn
I can't recall much of what happened later, I've been really nervous since this is my first tournament playing painter.
Kept stalling for several turns, until he conceded to the combo (had a blast on top of my deck to top for just incase)
Ethersworn is a beast!


Round 3: storm 2-1
G1 he goes first and combos off turn 2, I had nothing to stop him.
G2 kept hand with trinisphere, canonist, thorn, welder, city and petal. Put canonist out turn one, he took trinisphere with cabal therapy after he whiffed guessing Thalia. I put out thorn and then revolver next turn. Proceeded to beat down him to 8 for several turn. He adnausemed Down to 4, during my lethal attack he tried to bounce a creature and I had an REb to answer.
G3: again kept a very hate filled hand with revoked, thorn, welder in hand. Played revoked turn one with my first of two city's, he took thorn and welder, I drew a land and then I drew canonist and played it. Proceeded to beat down. Next turn I put both combo pieces on board (started with them in hand). He conceded. Oh yeah I remember turn two I tutored for the artifact land cuz I had no other lands, I kept a hate filled hand.

Round 4: 1-2 MUD
G1: t2 moon t3 bridge, stalled until he conceded when combo pieces were in play.
Games 2 and 3 I got mana screwed, could have won game two if I have manic vandal instead of hedgemage cuz I only had the artifact land and an ancient tomb the whole game. He combo'd off and won. Game 3 just had one land that got destroyed and he had chalice on 1 and 2. Gg

3-1 so far
Match 5 2-0 against cloudpost with multiple eldrazi and ugin!
T1 moon kinda sealed it off, turn 4 jaya kept her off basics. Kept the beat downs with painter and recruiter until got her to 8 life then I drew grindstone and was like sure I'll go for the combo win. Turns out she had eldrazi and so we went through the motions, which let me see her deck that had 4 eldrazi and ugin! Plus like 2-3 needles. Anyways once that resolved just continued to beat down for the win. Jaya doing work.


Game 2:
She played t1 expedition map. I kept a 2 city hand with furnace painter and welder revoler and petal can't recall the rest. I turn oned the revoker on map. Turn 3 moon. She got out sylvan library and kept the hand advantage. Eventually I got out 2 welder a and kept beating down till she took out the first moon. I got a second one out and protected my dudes with blasts or REB. Beat downs for the win. Could I counter grip?

4-1

Round 6
Lost both games to BG chalice deck. Never drew enough lands. Had to mull to 6 both times, almost had an early combo off game 1 but he decayed in response
I have no idea what deck this was. He has land destruction spells , chalices, deathrites, and wastelands and 4 sylvan libraries

Round 7
Lost to dredge.
G1 he combo'd off on turn 5 after a mull to 3. I didn't get anything out fast enough to stop him.
Game 2: containment priest painter bridge came out to stall the game until I could find a grindstone. Once out he went for a firestorm but realiZed he only paid enough to do 2 damage to each (thinking priest and painter were the same toughness) so she won me the game there. (Just comboed next turn) I also stalled long enough to get a rip

Game 3 my two hate pieces got cabal therapied away from my opening hand. He went on to win and I only had 2 lands.


4-3



Round 8: elves.
G1: turn 2 moon leaves him with 2 forests bouncing each with ranger and doing nothing to get more mana for a NO. Combo for the win around turn 6.
G2: he therapied my containment priest and my painter from hand (had a blast in hand as well, first painter then priest) . I revoke symbiote instead of ranger which was a mistake, he proceeds to combo off using the ranger to bounce his forests for mana.

G3: I play turn one top. He plays shaman.
Turn two I slam down painter and grindstone. He's got a forest in play, fetch in graveyard, I didn't want to get therapy'd next turn so I played them both from my hand on turn two.
His turn 2, He taps shaman removing the fetch.... For green! Woot not an abrupt decay
Tries to ramp into drawing more cards, doesn't find the answer and concedes before my turn 3.

5-3 for 33rd place - one off from cashing in :(
mud player finished top seed in top 8



Seriously if you don't have canonist main you're doing it wrong. It has literally won me every game!


My deck list was the same main as Jack's but had 3 firebolts 1 pyroclasm, and 1 containment priest instead of his 4 bolts and 2 pyroclasms
Priest got me just 1 win but she did enough I think.

[Mapson]

So with Shardless Bug and Jund coming back I kind of want to go to a 4th goblin welder. If I do I sorta want to play a gamble or two because that card is sweet...am I just crazy here?

[jandax]

Well, things can go wrong if you try to tweak Painter too hard. It's a good metagame deck, with only a few [unpopular] bad matchups. You're getting into an aggressive mono-red version, which is sweet and all, but if Jund and BUG are in your sights, why not just go up on the Magus of the Moon count? There's slightly less variance because Blood Moon is a one card combo, and I've played Gamble and while I love the card, its inherent variance can cost you the game.

[Uroborian]

If you want to go up to 4 welders and incorporate gamble that is a player choice. It may fit how you play better than straight mono red or shortcake versions. I'd say go for it and play with it. If you see no problems stick with it; sometimes by adding and tweaking you can get more attached to a deck which can improve your overall handling Of the deck. And by adding more welders you will get the ability to Recover better from hand disruption be careful as they may have grave hate and you may be more susceptible now.

[Mapson]

Having more magus of the moons won't do much against jund, it would be fine against bug but most jund decks have a forest and swamp for abrupt decay and they have lightning bolt and punishing fire to kill it anyway

[GradStudent]

I updated my last post with decklists
the G/B midrange deck rekt me.

[Mapson]

Sorry to always be the off-topic one but if you guys didn't see GerryT's daily deck for today it's a UB Painter list - http://www.starcitygames.com/article...The-Grind.html

Personally don't like it as much but I'm only $60 away so I might just try it out.

[Uroborian]

That green black deck is "sylvan plug" as noted here on the source forums. It's a green prison deck that really hits the metagame with chalice on 1 and choke. I've read up on it and it seemed it was only going to be a deck while the delver/cruise metagame was strong. I'm guessing the pilots of it probably will still play it until the meta shifts enough for them to stop having a good shot. Granted we play painter when times are bad, so I say you might need to prepare for this. No SB needs to be for it just practice the matchup if you can and make a game plan.

[The Duressed]

The problem with non-red painter decks will always be that they ignore one of the main reasons to play painter combo - main deck REBs. REB is a card that is marginally useful in any main deck, and obviously gets much better with a blue painter in play. Without a red painter in play, BEB is the actual worst. Now you're playing a deck centered around a creature-based combo kill - just play RIP-Helm or something instead.

I really like the idea of Tezzeret, and it would be sweet if it worked. But many people people playing UB Tezz tend to agree that the three-color mana base doesn't work nearly as well (including myself).


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[drude1]

The problem with non-red painter decks will always be that they ignore one of the main reasons to play painter combo - main deck REBs. REB is a card that is marginally useful in any main deck, and obviously gets much better with a blue painter in play. Without a red painter in play, BEB is the actual worst. Now you're playing a deck centered around a creature-based combo kill - just play RIP-Helm or something instead.

I really like the idea of Tezzeret, and it would be sweet if it worked. But many people people playing UB Tezz tend to agree that the three-color mana base doesn't work nearly as well (including myself).


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Funny, I thought the exact same thing when I looked at the list. Red blasts are so much better than blue blasts as a stand alone card. The other problem I have I with this list is that you don't even put painter on blue so that you can pitch a random card to FoW.


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[Uroborian]

Agreed. Painted on blue is better for the deck imo. I'd just cut the BeB and let painter just aid your FoW. I don't think just UB painter is good enough given how much better I think grixis is compared to it. As a pilot of unconventional painter decks I'm glad more variants are showing up.

[nonbasicland]

Just wanted to echo that main board Canonist has been extremely strong for me. Being able to respond to any spell with the painter activation feels very powerful. Also, who doesn't love ruining a storm player's day?

Any other painterbros going to SCG Indy? I'm pretty excited.

[Uroborian]

I'll be going to indy. Gotta increase our chances of getting a day 2 painter deck. And it is looking like our chances in this meta look nice. Wastelands coming back is a bummer as more people will have an inkling to include basics/fetch basics.

[nonbasicland]

I was worried about that too but I was surprised to find 3 wins by moon in 4 rounds of swiss on Monday. Greedy three color SFM and Delver decks will be back and hopefully continue to run light on basics.

[Sleight]

I'll be going to indy. Gotta increase our chances of getting a day 2 painter deck. And it is looking like our chances in this meta look nice. Wastelands coming back is a bummer as more people will have an inkling to include basics/fetch basics.

I just got confirmation that I will be able to be at Indy as well. Try to make people eat cake for a few days.

[UnsungHero]

I just got confirmation that I will be able to be at Indy as well. Try to make people eat cake for a few days.

I will be in Indy as well. It would be great to meet up with some of you!

[Anarky87]

I'll be rocking out in Indy as well.

[Sleight]

Awesome! I'll make sure to post when I get to the center. It would be nice to talk shop a bit.

[joef]

After a long hiatus from magic I am toying with this deck. I put together a different variation using UB... Here it is

Lands
4 x Underground Sea
4 x Ancient Tomb
4 x Polluted Delta
4 x Misty Rainforest
2 x Bloodstained Mire
1 x Swamp
1 x Island
1 x Volrath's Stronghold (bring painters back)

Spells
4 x Lion's Eye Diamond (sac to tutor or 2nd turn win)
4 x Grindstone
4 x Painter's Servant
1 x Sensei's Divining Top
4 x Force of Will
4 x Brainstorm
4 x Ponder
3 x Gitaxian Probe (check to see if they have counter)
2 x Daze
2 x Intuition (I will usually grab lion's eye or painter)
1 x Spell Pierce
3 x Thoughtseize (check to see if they have counter... and remove counter)
3 x Infernal Tutor

Thoughts? Suggestions?

I Did have trinket mage in here but the intuition's and tutors seem enough.

[RingoDeathStarr]

Not to be a jerk, because I don't hate the list, but I think you might be better served posting that list in the U/R Painted Stone thread, as the deck is a lot more similar to that list than to Imperial Painter.