- Gideon is bad against this deck, which is odd considering that he shines against creature oriented decks, but he will lose to a Conscription swing and if that is a Rhox hammering it is even worse. The board he comes down on will rarely be beneifical enough in my personal experience to be anything other than a five mana fog that lets you alpha strike next turn for the win.
I mean, that's kind of an important point to make with Gideon against other creature decks. You also get some removal out of his taunt, too, as you safely block whatever you can with multiple First Strike creatures or one equipped with a Basilisk Collar.
As for the comparison to Vampires, I think WW is a lot alike them... in that it's generally a good deck but simply a dog against one of the top tier decks (UW-based Control decks in our case, Jund in the case of Vamps). Also, they're both mono-colored.
I'm a bit late to the party -- didn't feel like responding previously -- but Spreading Seas actually helps your permission-heavy deck. Manlands are an issue for all control decks but especially so permission-based ones because they can't be countered. Spreading Seas is great tech against them, plus I hear it's good friends with Tectonic Edge and, as Jazzy stated, it can set them back early-game enough to the point you might actually counter something that otherwise would've slipped in under the radar.
If my own Esper Control deck has taught me anything, it's that Chalice and Martial Coup are actually the weakest cards in the deck, not Spreading Seas. Coup is too slow to be an effective board sweeper and it's unnecessary as a win-con. Chalice is perfectly fine, especially since it can still power up a big Mind Spring (which my Esper list doesn't use) in addition to just simply ramping, but the fact is they don't actually do anything on their own. And hey, you don't necessarily have to run four copies of Seas either.
Path to Exile is only "contrary to Spreading Seas" if you're actively trying to color-screw the opponent in the opening turns. Well, chances are you already failed at that if they have a credible enough threat on the board you're considering Pathing it. ;/ It still doesn't make it any less of a threat to manlands and it's never a dead card, since you can always just "loot" it away for 1U even when it isn't useful.
My initial impression was exactly the same as above. "Looks pretty good LC, a lot like Conley Woods list but you managed to keep the Spreading Seas in which is nice." Heh! I currently run 3 O-Ring, 2 Path main in my deck, Mortox, and it hasn't really hampered me. Obviously, two is less than three but it's a far cry from running zero.
Now, that said...
LC, what's with the four Deprive SB? Considering its drawback, you usually don't care about having it in the opening turns anyway. Did you flub the list and those should actually be Negates or what?
Zero Duress SB makes me sad too, though I like the three Jace1.0. That's kinda why I play more PWs in my personal list. Besides bringing in the Negates, one of the best ways to beat other control decks is to dominate the PW battle, and what better way to do that than to play more of them? Personally, I think you could do with the fourth copy of TMS and at least one more Elspeth before I worried about shoehorning in Jace Beleren but maybe that's just me.
Telemin Performance has been bunk every chance I've ever even had to use it. If your control opponent doesn't board out their Walls, either as a concession to TP itself or because they have nothing better to side in, it's useless. If they're maining Baneslayers and don't board them out, it's okay but not really worth using. The same applies if they board in SoJI, Calcite Snapper or whatever. It's basically a pre-emptive Mind Control then (which also dodges Shroud), which is nice and all but that isn't the reason you play the card. Preference call on this one but it's just never sat well with me personally. *shrug*
...And the only issue I've had with lacking black mana occasionally is when I want to activate a Tar Pit early. Arcane Sanctum isn't even necessary, it's just unneeded black sources at the cost of always being a tapland. More basics gives you more untapped lands and lets you use Glacial Fortress as color-fixing for your more relevant Blue/White. Maybe I could fit in a single Drowned Catacomb (or AArcane Sanctum) in place of a Plains or Fort but other than that I'm very happy with how it runs now.
Though keep in mind, INS, neither of us are running Tectonic Edge. ;/ Tec Edge is nice in conjunction with Spreading Seas -- occasionally you get free wins just locking them out of the game -- and it's uncounterable with regard to killing manlands, but it makes the mana base unstable (too greedy) and Path usually replaces it fine while also being desirable in general against non-control decks.
Also, I ran a single ID in maindeck for a while, currently back in SB as I main two Negates. (Will probably put them back in SB, though...) I always kinda liked it because it's usually the first thing you'll want to tutor up with Liliana. It punishes aggro for playing around DoJ and it punishes control for obvious reasons, so it's rarely a dead card except against RDW.
I thought the same thing about the M10 duals, though I didn't say anything before. With only four basics to set up the Fortress (not including fetches) and three to set up the Catacomb coming in untapped, it destroys the purpose of using them. A playset of Arcane Sanctum would color-fix better while allowing more basics in the land base for untapped goodness.
Hey now, I've played a Jace more than once off douchebags who have tried to lock me out of White sources by playing Seas on my Plains. Speaking of possibilities, maybe Geo-Jund should go all the way with this whole abusing blue mana thing. Sedraxis Specter could have a new buddy...
Their kill condition being what, Jace's Ultimate? ;/ When I played Jacerator pre-WWK, it was usually a supplementary Archive Trap that put the opponent's library under my own. From there, they can just grind you out naturally. You can't "remove" drawing out your deck, and siding in Mythic Eldrazi will only punish the guys who forgot to update their deck post-RoE. Not that anyone is playing TurboFog right now anyway...
You can play blue without Jace, just like you can play white without Baneslayer, or green without Noble Heirarch, or black without Malakir Bloodwitch. Decks in those colours can still function without their 'best' cards - but if you want to play competitively, you'll need a pretty good reason not to use them.
Indeed. Just as someone already mentioned Jacerator as the one blue deck that might not care about lacking Jace TMS, both WW and many control decks won't necessarily run Baneslayer. True Elfball decks won't use Hierarch because it's Human and UG Polymorph decks won't run it for obvious reasons.
Sorta drawing a blank as to why any deck running black wouldn't be siding Bloodwitches, though. Sort of a consequence of every competitive deck in current Standard (except Jund) being part-White, the best hard removal spell and the most versatile catch-all answer card being White, Baneslayer being White...
I would rather take the card that makes any one of our creatures finishers than a fairly subpar finisher that just makes our deck even more top heavy.
If you have the ramp, or spawn production, available to reliably cast these threats, it's honestly not so bad. During the pre-release I was running three Ulamogs (two Crusher... and Mr. Gyre) and playing them quite readily, along with a Disaster Radius and Brimstone Mage. (Granted, Brimstone Mage isn't quite "top-heavy" since the massive cost of getting him online is split, but you get the idea.) Seemingly "top-heavy," the deck actually ran quite smoothly with lots of burn and cheap creatures on the low side. No burn here but we do have multiple Battlements.
That said, I easily decided Crusher. If we had taken the last Crusher, I'd be willing to concede that Cleaver would be equally good here (threat diversity, if you will), but nooooo we took Lord of Might-not-even-play-it-and-arguably-isn't-even-better-than-Crusher-anyway.
The next thing I notice about your opponent is that he's played Wall of Omens post sideboard, which is IMO a fairly weak play against mirror, this is definately an indication that he may not be an experienced player as WoO is one of the first picked side-out cards.
Some people keep them in as a concession to Telemin Performance. Some also keep them in because they have more MB anti-aggro cards than they have SB anti-control cards to bring in and, if you're still gonna have a couple dead cards in your library anyway, at least the Walls cantrip.
What does passing the turn do other than tell him you have negate? If he is any sort of decent player (which he may very well not be), he will not play jace when you have 4 mana up. And if you miss a land drop, and he doesn't, he has almost timewalked you which is just as bad as him countering your jace.
Any decent control player knows to always keep mana untapped to bluff a counter, whether or not they actually have one in their hand. After all, we don't know if the opponent even has one right now and it's about a 50/50 shot either way. (57% to have a Negate with four copies but also considering they may not run four copies.) Sure, if you tap out and they don't Negate, you're good. But you're screwed if they do counter, as now they get a PW of their own down uncontested and you're in danger of missing land drops. Even if it isn't Jace TMS, it could be Jace-B or Elspeth and he's still in deep poo.
Now, if you offer the opponent the first chance to drop a PW, you can Negate it and basically win the game immediately unless the next eight cards of your library are all nonland. ;/ If they don't bite, you're still on-track if you hit a land in the next couple turns or they themselves falter on land drops.
tl;dr the way I see it is:
1) Play Jace.
-- Win% ++ if it's not countered.
-- Win% -- if it's countered.
2) Pass turn.
-- Win% +++++ if they run a PW into your counter on their turn.
-- With no information on what the opponent is holding, the potential for manascrew is a minor downside but overall the situation is still basically neutral.
...and so I'd rather pass turn.
Surprise third option "play Mind Spring" is also reasonable, only because they're less likely to counter it. You're still screwed if they do choose to counter it and Jace is better to stick if they're not holding a Negate, so the only reason you'd play Mind Spring is because you think they're holding it but will choose to save it for a PW later. I'd rather chance sticking Jace since, if they read your "Mind Spring for 2" as a signal of fishing for land, they'll counter either card if they have it... and I'd rather pass turn than chance sticking Jace. Yeah.
Keep in mind that Spreading Seas doesn't "only" colorscrew opponents on a land-light draw, even though sometimes you just get free wins by locking them out of the game (especially in conjunction with Tectonic Edge). It also deals with manlands of every sort, which are problematic for control decks because they're immune to Sorcery-speed removal and you can't counter a land drop.
But if you insist, you should be running Essence Scatter anyway. Good luck countering a T2 Putrid Leech or RWM with Cancel/Negate and LOL Deprive then.
I feel that basilisk collar is the best equipment stonforge offers so when I axed her I dropped my other equipment and made my collar count three, it should show up often enough and the slots taken by the mystics can be replaced by more aggressive creatures.
I'm slowly trimming back the mystics to make absolutly sure whether or not I want them, it is likely if I keep trimming I will make an additional Sigil out of one, and possibly keep 1 in there to be copy 3 of each. There is also potential to turn the last one into a 4th squire.
If you continue to up the count on Equipment... Well, that's exactly why you use Stoneforge Mystic instead.
1 Basilisk Collar + 1 Sigil of Distinction plus two Stoneforge Mystics is almost like having three copies of each... except you're only taking up four deck slots instead of six, two of those "equipment" cards are actually an additional body, and they're whichever equip you need more at the time. Sometimes having a second Collar is nice "just in case" but otherwise there's no point in carrying multiple copies of the gear you like. Stick with Stoneforge Mystic. (And personally, I prefer my second/SB equip to be Gorgon Flail, in case their answer to Basilisk Collar is Pithing Needle rather than destroy effects or O-Ring.)
Plus, while Stoneforge Mystic is "only" a 1/2 body, just the fact she's a creature at all is fairly relevant. She can equip the very gear she tutors up, if you don't have any better options at the time, and she's still a chump blocker against an opponent's bigger creatures. You can't equip a Basilisk Collar with a Sigil of Distinction on an empty board.
No Spreading Seas is also odd, even if the 4x Path to Exile can be used on manlands. The potential for color-screw isn't entirely dismissable and the extra cantrips go a long way to ensuring the deck's consistency. Not that I oppose maindecking 4x Path, mind you...
I'm not a fan of Chalice in our Esper baby here (UW permission is another story) but I like that he attempted to take full advantage of them, packing both a pair of All is Dust (Chalices don't wipe!) and Mind Spring (to take advantage of the ramp). It seems like he could stand to drop a land or a Chalice, though. His number of mana sources is simply overkill, even with the full suite of manlands and still using a 2-of Tec Edge. Maybe drop a Chalice and the Mind Shatters, 3x O-Ring? ;/
Also, wherever the deck tech was posted, what's the exact layout of the lands? I'm interested in how many basics he ran, how many M10 duals, Sanctums or not...
I don't know where you got the idea that Polymorph is anything less than absolutely horrendous for WW but please purge that thought from your head immediately. It's so braindead obvious that it shouldn't even need explained, but...
Anyway, in response to some previous posts, RE: Oust.
Oust isn't bad against control because it gains them three life when you use it. Oust is bad against control because when you Oust a Wall of Omens and they re-play it... it just re-cantrips into what they were going to draw anyway, with zero tempo loss. (Well, two mana to re-cast Wall...) Oust still has lots of potential against other creature-based decks but it just isn't worth using right now.
I hate to be a wet blanket here but WW does not have a good or even a reasonable matchup against Mythic. What they lack in removal, they make up for with a ton of huge creatures and a laundry list of tricks. It takes conscription one turn, just one turn, to break a game. It also has a lot of ways to prepare for that one swing win. Smarter conscription players would bide their time before swinging for the win. They will wait until they can protect their lone attacker. Only an inexperienced consciption player would walk right into a path without something to back up his or her attacker. Moreover, good luck trying to hold back that path while their creatures wail on you.
What "laundry list of tricks" do they have that gets around a Student or KotWO (for example) equipped with a Basilisk Collar? Short of the obvious, usually-singleton Seriji Steppe to tutor up with an active KotR, they don't have any tricks at all. Huge creatures? Even a 24/24 KotR doesn't swing through a 2/2 White Knight with Deathtouch and swinging in for a one-shot-kill isn't all that simple when WW gets going quick enough to avoid losing a lot of life in the initial turns. Frankly, the only "reliable" way Mythic can win, once a Basilisk Collar hits the field, is to stick a Baneslayer Angel long enough to have it run over a couple Kor Skyfisher en route to victory. That's easier said than done when neither deck has any card draw (Jace not being a reliable engine in this matchup) but WW likely has two removal spells to each one BSA, assuming a playset of Path and O-Ring. Granted, this is also contingent on the WW player getting their Deathtouch gear on the field, but I never said it was a good match-up... I said it was reasonable.
I'm not pulling this out of my ass, this is the result of many a matchup against various Bant players, as well as Naya and Ally decks. (Of course, Ally decks just walk through with Kabira Evangel if a DoJ doesn't hit before critical mass... *ahem*) All of them try to play the role of "Fatties.dec" with little-to-no removal and then frequently lose when "generic WW First Striker equipped with Basilisk Collar" clogs up the board until I find a win-con, typically swinging over the top with Elspeth or a geared Kor Skyfisher until they lose. That said, the "Mystic package" is absolutely required in WW for it to hang with other creature decks. White's weenies only work against the big boys because half of them have First Strike and the best Equipment card in Standard grants Deathtouch. ;/
UW Control is bad, though, and Polymorph is virtual auto-bye. With the relative lack of results in post-RoE major events, Poly will probably go back to being a rarely-seen rogue deck fairly soon, but I can't very well dismiss the other problem. WW is to UW Control as Vampires is to Jund. Could revisit the token builds to give it more game against control decks but then Mythic blows it out instead. -_- Lose/lose eh? Well, that's why it's a no-show lately.
Nonetheless, I think the complete lack of attention paid to it, even by its past proponents, stifles what metagame advances it could be making.
I mean, that's kind of an important point to make with Gideon against other creature decks. You also get some removal out of his taunt, too, as you safely block whatever you can with multiple First Strike creatures or one equipped with a Basilisk Collar.
As for the comparison to Vampires, I think WW is a lot alike them... in that it's generally a good deck but simply a dog against one of the top tier decks (UW-based Control decks in our case, Jund in the case of Vamps). Also, they're both mono-colored.
If my own Esper Control deck has taught me anything, it's that Chalice and Martial Coup are actually the weakest cards in the deck, not Spreading Seas. Coup is too slow to be an effective board sweeper and it's unnecessary as a win-con. Chalice is perfectly fine, especially since it can still power up a big Mind Spring (which my Esper list doesn't use) in addition to just simply ramping, but the fact is they don't actually do anything on their own. And hey, you don't necessarily have to run four copies of Seas either.
Path to Exile is only "contrary to Spreading Seas" if you're actively trying to color-screw the opponent in the opening turns. Well, chances are you already failed at that if they have a credible enough threat on the board you're considering Pathing it. ;/ It still doesn't make it any less of a threat to manlands and it's never a dead card, since you can always just "loot" it away for 1U even when it isn't useful.
Now, that said...
LC, what's with the four Deprive SB? Considering its drawback, you usually don't care about having it in the opening turns anyway. Did you flub the list and those should actually be Negates or what?
Zero Duress SB makes me sad too, though I like the three Jace1.0. That's kinda why I play more PWs in my personal list.
Telemin Performance has been bunk every chance I've ever even had to use it. If your control opponent doesn't board out their Walls, either as a concession to TP itself or because they have nothing better to side in, it's useless. If they're maining Baneslayers and don't board them out, it's okay but not really worth using. The same applies if they board in SoJI, Calcite Snapper or whatever. It's basically a pre-emptive Mind Control then (which also dodges Shroud), which is nice and all but that isn't the reason you play the card. Preference call on this one but it's just never sat well with me personally. *shrug*
Use the fourth Tar Pit!
It's not even bigger than Baneslayer.
3 Island
2 Swamp
6 Plains
4 Celestial Colonnade
4 Creeping Tar Pit
3 Glacial Fortress
...And the only issue I've had with lacking black mana occasionally is when I want to activate a Tar Pit early. Arcane Sanctum isn't even necessary, it's just unneeded black sources at the cost of always being a tapland. More basics gives you more untapped lands and lets you use Glacial Fortress as color-fixing for your more relevant Blue/White. Maybe I could fit in a single Drowned Catacomb (or AArcane Sanctum) in place of a Plains or Fort but other than that I'm very happy with how it runs now.
Though keep in mind, INS, neither of us are running Tectonic Edge. ;/ Tec Edge is nice in conjunction with Spreading Seas -- occasionally you get free wins just locking them out of the game -- and it's uncounterable with regard to killing manlands, but it makes the mana base unstable (too greedy) and Path usually replaces it fine while also being desirable in general against non-control decks.
Also, I ran a single ID in maindeck for a while, currently back in SB as I main two Negates. (Will probably put them back in SB, though...) I always kinda liked it because it's usually the first thing you'll want to tutor up with Liliana. It punishes aggro for playing around DoJ and it punishes control for obvious reasons, so it's rarely a dead card except against RDW.
Deadly Recluse is a good Limited card but eww M10.
Also...
I hate you.
Indeed. Just as someone already mentioned Jacerator as the one blue deck that might not care about lacking Jace TMS, both WW and many control decks won't necessarily run Baneslayer. True Elfball decks won't use Hierarch because it's Human and UG Polymorph decks won't run it for obvious reasons.
Sorta drawing a blank as to why any deck running black wouldn't be siding Bloodwitches, though.
If you have the ramp, or spawn production, available to reliably cast these threats, it's honestly not so bad. During the pre-release I was running three Ulamogs (two Crusher... and Mr. Gyre) and playing them quite readily, along with a Disaster Radius and Brimstone Mage. (Granted, Brimstone Mage isn't quite "top-heavy" since the massive cost of getting him online is split, but you get the idea.) Seemingly "top-heavy," the deck actually ran quite smoothly with lots of burn and cheap creatures on the low side. No burn here but we do have multiple Battlements.
That said, I easily decided Crusher. If we had taken the last Crusher, I'd be willing to concede that Cleaver would be equally good here (threat diversity, if you will), but nooooo we took Lord of Might-not-even-play-it-and-arguably-isn't-even-better-than-Crusher-anyway.
Some people keep them in as a concession to Telemin Performance. Some also keep them in because they have more MB anti-aggro cards than they have SB anti-control cards to bring in and, if you're still gonna have a couple dead cards in your library anyway, at least the Walls cantrip.
Any decent control player knows to always keep mana untapped to bluff a counter, whether or not they actually have one in their hand. After all, we don't know if the opponent even has one right now and it's about a 50/50 shot either way. (57% to have a Negate with four copies but also considering they may not run four copies.) Sure, if you tap out and they don't Negate, you're good. But you're screwed if they do counter, as now they get a PW of their own down uncontested and you're in danger of missing land drops. Even if it isn't Jace TMS, it could be Jace-B or Elspeth and he's still in deep poo.
Now, if you offer the opponent the first chance to drop a PW, you can Negate it and basically win the game immediately unless the next eight cards of your library are all nonland. ;/ If they don't bite, you're still on-track if you hit a land in the next couple turns or they themselves falter on land drops.
tl;dr the way I see it is:
1) Play Jace.
-- Win% ++ if it's not countered.
-- Win% -- if it's countered.
2) Pass turn.
-- Win% +++++ if they run a PW into your counter on their turn.
-- With no information on what the opponent is holding, the potential for manascrew is a minor downside but overall the situation is still basically neutral.
...and so I'd rather pass turn.
Surprise third option "play Mind Spring" is also reasonable, only because they're less likely to counter it. You're still screwed if they do choose to counter it and Jace is better to stick if they're not holding a Negate, so the only reason you'd play Mind Spring is because you think they're holding it but will choose to save it for a PW later. I'd rather chance sticking Jace since, if they read your "Mind Spring for 2" as a signal of fishing for land, they'll counter either card if they have it... and I'd rather pass turn than chance sticking Jace. Yeah.
But if you insist, you should be running Essence Scatter anyway. Good luck countering a T2 Putrid Leech or RWM with Cancel/Negate and LOL Deprive then.
If you continue to up the count on Equipment... Well, that's exactly why you use Stoneforge Mystic instead.
1 Basilisk Collar + 1 Sigil of Distinction plus two Stoneforge Mystics is almost like having three copies of each... except you're only taking up four deck slots instead of six, two of those "equipment" cards are actually an additional body, and they're whichever equip you need more at the time. Sometimes having a second Collar is nice "just in case" but otherwise there's no point in carrying multiple copies of the gear you like. Stick with Stoneforge Mystic. (And personally, I prefer my second/SB equip to be Gorgon Flail, in case their answer to Basilisk Collar is Pithing Needle rather than destroy effects or O-Ring.)
Plus, while Stoneforge Mystic is "only" a 1/2 body, just the fact she's a creature at all is fairly relevant. She can equip the very gear she tutors up, if you don't have any better options at the time, and she's still a chump blocker against an opponent's bigger creatures. You can't equip a Basilisk Collar with a Sigil of Distinction on an empty board.
I'm not a fan of Chalice in our Esper baby here (UW permission is another story) but I like that he attempted to take full advantage of them, packing both a pair of All is Dust (Chalices don't wipe!) and Mind Spring (to take advantage of the ramp). It seems like he could stand to drop a land or a Chalice, though. His number of mana sources is simply overkill, even with the full suite of manlands and still using a 2-of Tec Edge. Maybe drop a Chalice and the Mind Shatters, 3x O-Ring? ;/
Also, wherever the deck tech was posted, what's the exact layout of the lands? I'm interested in how many basics he ran, how many M10 duals, Sanctums or not...
Anyway, in response to some previous posts, RE: Oust.
Oust isn't bad against control because it gains them three life when you use it. Oust is bad against control because when you Oust a Wall of Omens and they re-play it... it just re-cantrips into what they were going to draw anyway, with zero tempo loss. (Well, two mana to re-cast Wall...) Oust still has lots of potential against other creature-based decks but it just isn't worth using right now.
What "laundry list of tricks" do they have that gets around a Student or KotWO (for example) equipped with a Basilisk Collar? Short of the obvious, usually-singleton Seriji Steppe to tutor up with an active KotR, they don't have any tricks at all. Huge creatures? Even a 24/24 KotR doesn't swing through a 2/2 White Knight with Deathtouch and swinging in for a one-shot-kill isn't all that simple when WW gets going quick enough to avoid losing a lot of life in the initial turns. Frankly, the only "reliable" way Mythic can win, once a Basilisk Collar hits the field, is to stick a Baneslayer Angel long enough to have it run over a couple Kor Skyfisher en route to victory. That's easier said than done when neither deck has any card draw (Jace not being a reliable engine in this matchup) but WW likely has two removal spells to each one BSA, assuming a playset of Path and O-Ring. Granted, this is also contingent on the WW player getting their Deathtouch gear on the field, but I never said it was a good match-up... I said it was reasonable.
I'm not pulling this out of my ass, this is the result of many a matchup against various Bant players, as well as Naya and Ally decks. (Of course, Ally decks just walk through with Kabira Evangel if a DoJ doesn't hit before critical mass... *ahem*) All of them try to play the role of "Fatties.dec" with little-to-no removal and then frequently lose when "generic WW First Striker equipped with Basilisk Collar" clogs up the board until I find a win-con, typically swinging over the top with Elspeth or a geared Kor Skyfisher until they lose. That said, the "Mystic package" is absolutely required in WW for it to hang with other creature decks. White's weenies only work against the big boys because half of them have First Strike and the best Equipment card in Standard grants Deathtouch. ;/
UW Control is bad, though, and Polymorph is virtual auto-bye. With the relative lack of results in post-RoE major events, Poly will probably go back to being a rarely-seen rogue deck fairly soon, but I can't very well dismiss the other problem. WW is to UW Control as Vampires is to Jund. Could revisit the token builds to give it more game against control decks but then Mythic blows it out instead. -_- Lose/lose eh? Well, that's why it's a no-show lately.
Nonetheless, I think the complete lack of attention paid to it, even by its past proponents, stifles what metagame advances it could be making.