I played to a 3-3 finish with a UBrg Snapcaster Control list. I really wasn't prepared for Workshop (cutting back on hate) and I got rolled by it twice. Also had a quite epic match against Matt Hazard, where our third game featured such plays like:

Him: Lotus, Ancient Tomb, Spirit Guide, Magus of the Moon.
Me: Resolves, draw, land, go.
Him: Attack with Magus, pass.
Me: During your end step, Lightning Bolt your Magus.
Him: Break Lotus for blue, Mindbreak Trap it.
Me: ...


Was a good learning experience, and I'll be back for the next one.

I'll be there, had a ton of fun at the last one. And to reiterate point #2... I wonder how I would have done if I wasn't paired against a player playing Legacy Affinity in R1, against my deck NOT packing any sweepers or Vault/Key. 

@ Rico & honestabe: thanks for the tips, the breakdown of the differences between Vintage & Legacy were helpful. Being new to the Vintage scene in general makes this tough, but it is Columbus, OH and I'm sure there's some Vintage looming around here. I'm bound to find a testing partner for this soon, but so far I haven't found anyone on MWS who wants to stick around for more than a minute or so, resulting in no viable testing. Sigh.

As far as the deck goes, I'm missing a lot of obvious stuff (example: Top of Library Tutor + Cycle Rebuild when the coast is clear = get your card) that obviously screws with the fluidity of the deck, and of course, that whole thing about winning. I also am having questions on threat assessment and how to deal with said threats (what do I let through? Do I use a Drain here or FoW? etc). As far as the list goes...


Duly noted on Commandeer. Scalding Tarn is ridiculous here. I think a 1/4 split of Delta/Tarn is the way to go right now, especially because the Tarns hit every land in the deck. The mana base for this deck now:


This is at least what I have on MWS at the moment.

From the previous dicussion, I took out a Lava Dart for Darkblast, which I think is a better fit here. I can understand the Rack and Ruin (ignores 3Sphere, obviously), but is Ingot Chewer a superior choice to, say, Shattering Spree? This is the board currently, for analysis purposes.



Last, I've decided Spell Pierce is a must! (After reading around ). I just have no idea what on earth to take out of the list...



Edit: Forgot about Mindbreak Trap as well.

Hmmm. I wonder if it will be beneficial to run some in the main? I think it's hard to stash any in the SB, as all of thsoe slots of devoted to the diverse metagame (I'm digging the Darkblast, though). I'm not sure what to cut, it seems like a glass cannon here. I think I should cut Petal for Mox Emerald, right? It seems like the logical choice, unless I'm totally missing something. Gah, I also want Commandeer in there somewhere, but I think I'm just being greedy at this point.

Anyhow, I'll have a functioning MWS list up sometime soon, probably over the weekend when I have more time to mess around with stuff. Testing partners/tutorials are welcome, please shoot me a PM. I think I'll make this thread my 21-day Vintage journal. *laughs*

Beats looks hilarious in the meta, and I've talked to friends about Mono Merfolk list with Null Rod/Chalice in the main. Normally, this is what I would run, but to me it feels like I would be 'cheating' a little bit by not getting the best Vintage experience. Landstill is definitely out, although I would love to run it, I believe the UR version is the one that is more potent in Vintage, but I don't know if the days of Mana Drain --> Disk are still there (that would be excellent).

I actually own some Bobs, which was another attractive part of running this deck, as I know its power in Legacy and obviously here. This is actually the list I've been looking at:

http://www.deckcheck.net/deck.php?id=26647

I took some time (in between studying) to take a look at the card selections. It's crazy, this same list (with small variants) placed T3 all three spots (same team members, no doubt).

But this list runs the FoW package and Bob + Remora to fuel the draw engine. The other thing I like about the list is Top! It's already a ridiculous card with Bob, with Remora, etc, should be even more insane, especially because some of the Tutors here place cards on Top rather than in your hand. I also took a moment to look at Repeal. Holy. Repeal a Mox? Play it again? +3 Storm?



Edit: Oh, by the way, does Spell Pierce have a place in Vintage? Seems like there's insane potential, as everything is literally noncreature, and early mana/tempo is pretty important.

@JACO: Thanks, I'm in the middle of studying for some exams and every time I take a break I head over to the Reports forum to read into some stuff.

One of the things that get me about this format are the Restricted cards and thus the singleton nature of the decklists, but it's pretty easy to categorize them into roles (Card Draw, Discard, etc). Also, with the availability of so many of the Tutors, it seems okay to run some things as a 1-of, which I'm hardly used to. It seems to be the case that most decks that are running in general have a pretty defined "shell" of Power9 (Timetwister not that prevalent), FoW, Tutors, and Tinker --> DSC, SoSW, or Inky. I also notice that Tendrils is a kill condition in a lot of decks that it normally would not appear to be, probably a Plan B in case the first part gets disrupted (or rather, probably Plan A and the other way around). I also noticed a card that I doubt has seen much of Legacy... Mystic Remora? It looks great in this metagame of mana artifacts, Tutors, Draw, etc.


@Gandalf: you posted right as I was about to ask in this reply

I took a look at deckcheck.net (similar function to Morphling.de, no?) for a better idea. Mystic Remora control looks fun to play. Thanks for breaking down some of the more popular decks, I'll definitely take a look. And yes, the SB'ing seems to be a lot more diverse with the amount of tutoring options available to the player. My plan was definitely to hop on MWS and see how matches go.

So, I want to first start by introducing myself. I'm Mark, and I have been playing Magic on and off for quite some time (in college now and started in middle school). I prefer Legacy and recently came back to the game a few months ago, but this is the first time that the opportunity has arisen for me to play Vintage. I've always steered clear of this format, not because of any particular disliking, but because it was (and still is) expensive to obtain any of the staples. Hell, it's pretty difficult for me to pick up even fundamental Legacy staples at times. I have an opportunity to play Vintage in a little over three weeks from now, at an unlimited Proxy event. No, I don't expect to sniff T8 or anything, but I don't want to go 0-2 across the board either. This is an excellent opportunity for me to at least take a peek into this format.

That said, I understand what it requires for me to switch over to a new format, and am willing to learn things in crunch time. One of the obvious things that I notice first is that Vintage has a ridiculous clock, that is matched with what seems like unlimited power in the cards (duh, that's why there's a B/R list). I am also a believer that playing certain archetypes in 'format A' can lead to a little less steep learning curve for the same archetype in 'format B.' So, being a UWb Landstill player in Legacy, how can I translate my playing ability to Vintage? How can I use what I know to reach a better understanding? I'm not even sure what to expect across the table. If anyone has advice to share, that would be great. Thanks,


--M