Quoted for truth.Originally Posted by Lukas Preuss
info.ninja
Fish is as much a metagame deck as Threshold.
People seem to think this deck was built to beat a specific metagame of combo and Threshold but that's not the case. Yes, the deck is extremely favorable against 2/3's of the Tier 1. That doesn't mean it sucks against everything else.
The deck has solid matchups against nearly everything and doesn't really roll over to anything in the format, similar to Threshold.
The deck may not be overly popular yet but that doesn't mean it's not been proven effective. It placed 10th on Day 2 of the D4D, the same place that B/r Sui (Red Death) got at the D4D on day 1. Should B/r Sui be removed from the Proven Forum? Of course not. Should UWb Fish have been removed from the Proven Forum? Again, I have to say no.
It's already starting to get very good placings and it has just recently started to be played by more people than just me. It's got a few Top 8 placings already at some large enough events, as well as my 10th place finish at the D4D on Day 2. The deck is good, it's getting results, I don't see how it's still "new and developmental."
I'm not sure if this was an accidental move because the of the servers being messed up yesterday or not. Either way, the mods can leave this in the developmental forum if they feel that's where it's meant to be.
So made the first place again on a 16 players tournament.
Move this to proofen :)
I think Counterspell+Duress is the way to go.
Maybe 1-2 Vindicates in the Sideboard to remove stuff that just suck and costs more then 4 Mana, because otherwise we can board in 1-2 Explosives, who are never death.
I also placed 1st (actually draw due to the store closing but it was vs IGGy) in an 18ish person.
I disagree with Duress being Mainboard, I would use Stifle instead, although I completely agree on Counterspell. I had 4 Duress in the board and I never actually boarded it in nor do I regret never using it. On the other hand, Stifle saw as much use as a counter for me and saved me more than a few games, between Stifling fetches, random crap, and my own Grunts.
I played today against:
Life - Duress was ok, picked Eladamris Call (can pick more) and abled me some good Meddling Mages
Solidarity - Same like Life, just even better because you know the good spells.
Goblins - In the first game, at least it sets Medling Mage up (also Matrone and Ringleader do this)
WB AngelStompy - Picked Removal and Equipment.
Golden Grahams - Picks discard and tutors.
Burn - 1cc Counter.
Stompy: Can pick a Gro-Spell but not that good.
Duress allows you, to see your opponents hand and to know, what your Meddling Mage should be named and what spells you need to counter. It's just so unfair to know, what your opponent can do.
I'm not denying its uses at all, and it's synergy with Mage is incredible, but it is best in the combo matchup which you can already win easily. That said if I were to add 1 more card to the deck it would without a doubt be Duress. However, to me it is a best a sideboard card, for these reasons:
Vs. Combo - Don't really need another card maindeck to weaken other matches.
Vs. Aggro - Obviously weaker, especially vs. Goblins when you'll know your facing Goblins first turn, Mage doesnt come down till at most turn 2 and this deck does need all the help vs. Gobs it can get, imo. Stifle is noticably stronger here as it: stops wastes, Vial activations, Port Activations, Matron, Lackey, Kiki-Jiki, Fanatic, basically everything but piledriver only because of pro-blue (which I never understood).
Vs. Control - You're playing the aggro here, and Stifle can be major tempo advantage. Not that theres very much control.
Also worth noting is that FoW is somewhat unreliable at 18 but at 22 I never have a situation where i can't either Force or Bstorm into a blue card.
It also doesnt accomplish much vs. Thresh.
And the main reason:
Of all those decks listed, I don't see any of them nor do I see any tier 1 decks. The only deck I can count on is Affinity and the rest is random, non aggro. While that might seem like a good place to run Duress, to help know what theyre playing, no one plays any combo worth worrying about. I still run Duress in the board but I've never needed it yet.
If I would make room for Duress it would be from Counterspell, I could never see taking out Stifle.
If it works for your strategy, then play it, those are just my reasons for not playing it.
At the risk of completely making myself look like an idiot, I will admit that I tested Exalted Angel to great success in the Avenger slot. It changes the way the deck is played slightly, but it kept my play tighter by not making me overcommit to Aggro, it provides a good game against random stuff (and Gobbos and Thresh) and while it is of course tough to get out, I find that against the randomness I face it is overall better. The lifeloss to Confidant with 2 Angels maindeck has more than evened out also. And Jitte+Exalted=gg.
I would say run Avenger in most cases, I love the card, but consider testing Exalted in the slot although I'm pretty sure most people will disagree and question my knowledge of how this deck works. The way I came about this was that I couldn't find enough Pithing Needles for my SB, so I ran an Angel for fun, and wound up boarding it in every game I think.
Piledriver's triggered ability does not have prot:blue. It can be stifled.
That's why I run both. A 3/3 split as been working very well for me.I disagree with Duress being Mainboard, I would use Stifle instead,
I think that leaving UU open is very difficult. It does a great job of answering spells later on in the game but it does not help you achieve early game control/dominance. The deck already has countermagic with the Forces. The Dazes are soft but effective nonetheless. Duress acts as a hand removal card, attacking hand resources that would otherwise be Counterspelled. The deck can remove threats with StP if they are creature based, so that can sometimes act as a Counterspell. Stifle is basically a Counterspell vs Pernicious Deed, Gempalm Incinerator, etc but it has reach in areas where hard countering doesn't and it has natural synergy with Jotun Grunt. Each of these answers cost 0 or 1 mana, whereas Counterspell costs 2.although I completely agree on Counterspell.
You can obviously run Counterspell in your build. I ran a 4/3/2 split at the D4D. I don't run them in my current build though. I constantly sided out Counterspells all day at the D4D, which is why I felt that they were the weakest link.
Duress has many functions for the deck. I have alot of discussion about Duresses appropriate role in the deck but I'll highlight some quick concepts:Duress allows you, to see your opponents hand and to know, what your Meddling Mage should be named and what spells you need to counter. It's just so unfair to know, what your opponent can do.
The deck achieves control. One aspect of this control is through draw card advantage and advantages of card quality. This can be obviously seen by Dark Confidant and the 8 cantrip, but other cards in the deck effect this as well. Meddling Mage can cut off the opponent from playing a spell, acting as card advantage... but it's also a creature on a stick, so drawing Meddling Mage can be sort of like drawing 2 cards. Back to Duress though... the cantrip increases my card quality while Duress decreases my opponent's card quality. The additional benefits of knowing how to play the next 3-4 turns can win games. Turn 1 Duress followed by turn 2 Meddling Mage wins games (usually backed by a FoW or Daze).
I would have to agree here since Duress does royally pwn combo.but it is best in the combo matchup
It is weak vs Goblins, I agree. On the play, turn 1 Duress to remove Vial can sometimes be killer. Other than that, it's usually garbage. Against R/w Goblins it can remove StP's game 1, but usually it's bad. Knowing what the opponent has in hand can sometimes be relevant, but Duress isn't the greatest card for this matchup. Luckily, I take them out post board and I bring in 4 Engineered Plagues and 3 Pithing Needles. I already maindeck 3 Stifles and 2 Jittes. This strengthens my Goblins matchup alot.Vs. Aggro - Obviously weaker, especially vs. Goblins when you'll know your facing Goblins first turn, Mage doesnt come down till at most turn 2 and this deck does need all the help vs. Gobs it can get, imo. Stifle is noticably stronger here as it: stops wastes, Vial activations, Port Activations, Matron, Lackey, Kiki-Jiki, Fanatic, basically everything but piledriver only because of pro-blue (which I never understood).
Against just about every other type of aggro, Duress rocks. It really helps to remove the opponent's Lightning Bolt out of hand before trying to resolve a Mother of Runes for a turn. It also lets you know if they have more spot removal, so you can play your threats from hand in an order that would be most favorable to you (knowing they will be using removal). It can nail Jittes or SoFI's, it can nail SoTF's and tons more. I really don't find it too weak in most aggro matchups. I board them out vs Affinity, but they aren't too bad game 1. For Affinity, I have Serenity hate, 3rd Jitte, etc. Affinity hasn't really been a problem for me. Against Angel Stompy, Zoo, RGSA, and even Faerie Stompy, Duress is usually pretty good. It's solid vs B/r Sui, but they usually empty their hand fast so it can get boarded out if something else would be better. I don't think I board in anything else besides the 3rd Jitte against B/r Sui, probably dropping 1 Duress.
Duress is very good against control. You remove the best card in their hand for 1cc, among the other uses of it. Pulling out Wrath of God saves you the hassle of worrying about saving FoW for it.Vs. Control - You're playing the aggro here, and Stifle can be major tempo advantage. Not that theres very much control.
Also worth noting is that FoW is somewhat unreliable at 18 but at 22 I never have a situation where i can't either Force or Bstorm into a blue card.
I run 22 blue spells, I run Stifle, but I also run Duress.
I have to completely disagree with you their. The opponent will spend turns cantripping to get a FoW or StP in hand. Simply paying 1cc to reduce their card quality is amazing. Duress is sick in the "mirror." Usually, black based control wrecks blue based control. Attacking the hand is very vicious. The opponent will rarely FoW the Duress, and then get their FoW remove so that you can cast Jotun Grunt sucessfully. I board in the 4th Duress vs Threshold.It also doesnt accomplish much vs. Thresh.
Well obviously meta considerations come into mind when building a deck. My deck is trying to anticipate a metagame similar to the D4D, or basically what I should expect to see at GP Columbus.Of all those decks listed, I don't see any of them nor do I see any tier 1 decks. The only deck I can count on is Affinity and the rest is random, non aggro. While that might seem like a good place to run Duress, to help know what theyre playing, no one plays any combo worth worrying about. I still run Duress in the board but I've never needed it yet.
If I would make room for Duress it would be from Counterspell, I could never see taking out Stifle.
If it works for your strategy, then play it, those are just my reasons for not playing it.
As for playing Exalted Angel vs Goblins... I'm not convinced that the manabase can support a 3cc + 4cc investment. Wasteland and Rishadan Port can be nasty. Supporting the deck itself isn't too bad, supporting Engineered Plague can sometimes be an issue, but morphing an Exalted Angel seems unlikely. I'm sure that when it does flip, it's going to change the game state. I'm just not sure if the deck can produce an Exalted Angel reliably vs Goblins. It seems really like that's where you'd really want it. For me, Jitte has always been the decks heavy hitter/finisher. It costs 2cc + 2cc, or 4cc as opposed to the 7cc investment of Angel. You can run here but I find Serra Avenger to be much more reliable than Angel. However, you said you play alot of randomness so some minor details may be less important.
What also is REALLY important: Serra Avenger has Vigilance.
This fact saved me some games. You can attack with him + Jitte and can block at the same time and pump it.
It's allready not that easy to equip a creature, attack for counters AND equip another creature. So Avenger does the job very well.
Also, revealing Exalted with Confidant will hurt you againt goblins and maybe kill you.
This is in response to everythign that was said, first regarding Duress.
Basically at this point it boils down to Counterspell vs. Duress, I think we agreed on the usefulness of Stifle.
Counterspell Pros:
Hard Counter for late Game
In a slower meta, a hard counter is necessary because a lot of random cards are played without "cheating" them in.
Significantly better topdeck than Duress after turn 2-3.
Pitches to FoW
Duress Pros:
"Hard" Counter vs. most decks, early game.
Plan out your strategy for the next few turns.
Synergy with Grunt/Mage (although counterspell has the same synergy with Grunt)
Significantly better to see in the opening hand than Counterspell.
Its basically meta considerations from there, although whatever you don't mainboard I would put in the SB.
The one thing I didn't mention about Duress is that I don't particularly like to play a Sorcery first turn, (except Serum Visions with a 1 land hand). I'd much rather leave the mana open to StP/Stifle/Brainstorm or whatever I need to first turn, which is when you optimally want Duress. It's also when Stifle is at its best. Im sure we can agree Stifling a Wasteland or a Fetch first turn is much more damaging than a resolved Duress. The exception to this is when i want to go turn 1 Mom, turn 2 Mage/Confidant/whatever, but generally I find that there are better things to cast than Duress turn 1. And after turn 1, Duress quickly depreciates in value until about turn 3 when its near useless imo.
Again this is coming from the point of view of a random meta with little to no netdecks, few wastelands, no Goblins, and about 1/4 of the field is Affinity.
On to Angel over Avenger, this is how I look at it. Avenger is an awesome turn 4 drop, works well because turn 4 is when i want to either be playing or equipping a Jitte most likely, which gives me 4 mana. The drawback doesn't really do too much as I would rarely find myself needing to drop on earlier. As was said, Vigilance is key. Angel on the other hand is tough to get out, but when resolved pretty much seals the win, especially with Jitte. Again I don't play vs. Goblins or LD so I dont have to worry too much about reliably getting the mana, and while it does tie me down it is imo worth it as it keeps my play tighter since I won't be overextending before I drop an Angel, and wins me games. Last time I kept on in the SB and brought it in against pretty much all the randomness I faced, and it did extremely well for me.
About flipping one to Bob, I havent run into it being an issue but it is a valid point.
Also regarding a SB strategy, this is what I have come up with for the Meta that I previously described.
2 Serenity
1 Disenchant (could be 1 more serenity but sometimes I want the targeted destruction)
2 Eng. Ex. (takes care of a lot of randomness)
1 Pithing Needle (cant get more atm)
3 Duress
4 Wasteland (I board out Serum Visions when I can tell this will wreck someones day game 2)
2 Disciple of the Vault (I see Affinity ALOT so I figured I'd jack one of their cards to help me out. Replaces Mom nicely vs. Affinity).
Another note, has anyone tested Spell Snare in the counterpsell slot? While more narrow is is another solid counter considering the number of cards at the mana cost in most decks, and solves the issue of leaving UU open, although like Duress gets continually worse as the game progresses imo/ Just a thought.
Duress isn't just good on the 1st turn. It's best on turn 1 but it can still be a good play during the mid-game. It can be good later on in the game too, especially against Control or Combo, but I agree that it does depreciate in value after a while. Usually, cantrip helps to get rid of Duress mid-late when they are of little value. It's also nice that it does fill the graveyard better than Counterspell, since it doesn't require precise timing... but that point for it is pretty narrow.
All in all, if you'd rather run Counterspell over Duress, that's fine. I don't think it's going to make a huge difference in a random metagame, since they are both good spells.
In a large tournament, it can be nice to know what your opponent is playing as early as possible so that you can make better cantrip judgements (what to shuffle away or put to bottom, etc.) and other judgements, where I think Duress really shines, but that's just a minor tidbit.
I haven't tested Spell Snare but I don't like how narrow it is. I would probably sideboard Disrupt instead if I wanted to deal with B/r Sui, where I see Spell Snare being most useful.
One quick note:
I've had tremendous success with Shikari+Greaves (Leonin Shikari + Lightning Greaves). It works better than mom in most cases as well as giving you guys haste which has proven more useful than you'd think not to mention the awesome synergy w/ Jitte. You may want to consider working this in... I played it over Mom, Avenger (I don't have any, and 2 white seems tough), and one Confidant (once you get one out, they're a dead draw pretty much).
I'm actually pretty excited to try out this deck now for next week's Legacy tourney. I'll let you guys know how it goes. Right now there the meta is burn and g/r beats.
One question I have is Jotun Grunt a must for this deck or are there better alternatives putting into account Confidants.
Jotun Grunt is a cornerstone for the deck because it is a 2cc 4/4 fattie drop, and the deck needs the extra muscle. Not only that, it gives the deck control over an opponent's graveyard, removing anything from Cabal Therapy to Wasteland (vs Crucible lock) to Life from the Loam to Threshold to you name it. He's one of the major reasons this deck has such a favorable Threshold matchup.
However, you can replace him with Rotting Giant if you don't like Jotun Grunt.
Hello all, I was just working on a straight U/W fish list and I found the U/W/B list, sounds interesting, just a quick couple of questions, what happens when you confidant up a force? Do you just say “ouch my but hole?” in addition, as any one thought about Aether veil? I was testing it out, it relieves a lot of your mana to run stronger counters besides dais, which becomes really week as the game progresses. Have you guys considered condemn, if swords is not enough? Also it seams that azorius first-wing should at least find some spot in this deck, as it is a very strong 2/2 beat stick. Could mask of memory take the place of dark confidant? It seems that the damage you take will hurt many mach ups such as goblins and threshold when they swing in for the game.
Just a couple of thoughts, hear is my list if any one cares.
Creatures (16)
3 serra avenger
3 spike tail hatchling
4 meddling mage
4 Azorius first wing
2 serendip efreet
spells (26)
4 force of will
3 counterspell
4 swords to plowshares
2 condemn
4 Aether Veil
2 stifle
4 brainstorm
3 Jitte
lands (18)
4 tundra
4 flooded strand
6 island
4 plains
The SB is obviously meta intensive
^
I dont see how Aether Vial fits into this deck.
Well, at the very least, you can put Avenger into play a turn earlier. :P
By running an increasing amount of 2 drop creatures, it allows you to hold back mana that can be used for hard counters like counterspell. Veil helps your mana base by making your creatures easier to cast. Also you can do mean tricks like veil in a hatchling and sack to counter. If you really have question about it, try it out, I was surprised to see how well it worked in combination with counters and or jitte
I'd like to know your thoughts on the UGW-******** match-up.
What plays by you/(your opponent) make you usually win/lose, pre/post -board?
The above question is, of course, an over-simplification; you and I know that there are a lot of factors that influence the outcome of a game (e.g. the builds you and your opponent play, play errors, luck, etc.). I'd like to know your opinion wether you choose to include these factors or not.
Thanks in advance for your answers
In my experience this is a good matchup. Mom takes care of Goose, Jotun Grunt=Werebear in size but also makes their stuff smaller, and plus you have Jitte, and more CA with Confidant. You're running similar strategies but your deck is able to exploit their weakness (reliance on the graveyard) better than they explot yours (manabase, although they have similar mana issues).I'd like to know your thoughts on the UGW-******** match-up.
What plays by you/(your opponent) make you usually win/lose, pre/post -board?
The above question is, of course, an over-simplification; you and I know that there are a lot of factors that influence the outcome of a game (e.g. the builds you and your opponent play, play errors, luck, etc.). I'd like to know your opinion wether you choose to include these factors or not.
Thanks in advance for your answers
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