Withheld decklist for FIRST? Lame.

Here's a build of post-restricting gush doomsday I've been working on. I feel its much better than a version with exploration, and it only has an extremely minor green splash for Fastbond (which is nuts with gush). I've cut Duress and Unmask from the maindeck for Gushes, Fastbond and Misdirection. This is justified by a) the fact that you run more blue cards, and b) the fact that you are almost certainly going to want to fetch out an island turn one as opposed to a swamp. I've relegated the Duress to the board for the combo/non wasteland control matchups.
// Deck file for Magic Workstation

// Lands
    3 Flooded Strand
    3 Polluted Delta
    3 Underground Sea
    1 Tropical Island
    3 Island

// Creatures
    4 Street Wraith

// Spells
    1 Mox Sapphire
    1 Mox Jet
    1 Black Lotus
    1 Lotus Petal
    1 Lion's Eye Diamond
    4 Dark Ritual
    2 Cabal Ritual
    4 Doomsday
    1 Necropotence
    1 Yawgmoth's Will
    1 Chain of Vapor
    4 Gush
    1 Ancestral Recall
    1 Time Walk
    1 Mind's Desire
    1 Mystical Tutor
    4 Force of Will
    4 Brainstorm
    1 Vampiric Tutor
    1 Demonic Tutor
    1 Imperial Seal
    1 Tendrils of Agony
    1 Research/Development
    2 Misdirection
    1 Pact of Negation
    1 Fastbond

// Sideboard
SB: 1 Chain of Vapor
SB: 4 Duress
SB: 1 Tendrils of Agony
SB: 1 Research/Development
SB: 4 Leyline of the Void
SB: 2 Hurkyl's Recall
SB: 1 Rebuild
SB: 1 Meta Slot

You just win with a tendrils stack if you remove research/development.

Doesn't Research/Development just make the deck really vulnerable to leyline?

How do you deal with the mirror?

I've been testing this deck very extensively over the past couple of days, and there's one slot that's been consistenly sub-par for me every time I've drawn it: Intuition. In the absense of even a single Deep Analysis, or Coffin Purges out of the board, it seems like the card is really out of place. I understand that it was used in IT fairly effectively, but every time I've drawn it, its been a win-more card, rather than something that I'd like to topdeck more than say, Gifts Ungiven. Has anyone experimented with a Deep Analysis in one of the Infernal Contract slots? I used it a couple of years back in some TPS builds and was rarely unhappy to draw it. Skeletal Scrying is also another possible substitution (probably the best of the three options IMO, but I will test more and get back to this thread).

How has 3 versus 4 duress been working out, especially in a post-extirpate metagame?

Other then that, this build looks really good--it definately melds some of the best aspects of TPS/IT, and Grimlong.

A question: What is your boarding plan vs Crypt? What is your plan vs Leyline? I usually find myself hard pressed to cut key components from the deck to bring in extra mana and bounce.

Brainstorm is out-of-control good in this deck. Shuffling additional Rods/Mana back into your deck and then shuffling with a fetch is tech.

What do you board out for your 6 mirror slots (jitte+threads)?

One card you didn't adress, but have been staples in Gay/R and other fish builds in the past is Mishra's factory. Why don't you run it?

The fact is, preboard, Pitch Long isn't a bad matchup at all, so running True Believer mainboard is basically overkill. In a bunch of matchups (at least with this build), you will want to fetch out your basics ASAP, which means that getting to WW for True Believer may be a challenge. My only issue with Voidmage is that the card as a whole is pretty weak without Vial, due to mana restrictions/the fact that playing him as an instant is ownage.

I've been testing UW fish for a while in the current metagame, and have had very postive results. Here is my latest list, with explanation (based off Feinstein's lists from a while back):


// Lands
    4  Flooded Strand
    2  Windswept Heath
    2  Island
    2  Plains
    4  Wasteland
    1  Strip Mine
    4  Tundra

// Creatures
    3  Savannah Lions
    4  Meddling Mage
    3  Kataki, War's Wage
    3  Jotun Grunt
    3  Isamaru, Hound of Konda
    2  Ninja of the Deep Hours

// Spells
    4  Brainstorm
    4  Force of Will
    4  Stifle
    3  Swords to Plowshares
    3  Null Rod
    1  Mox Pearl
    1  Black Lotus
    1  Time Walk
    1  Ancestral Recall
    1  Mox Sapphire

// Sideboard
SB: 3  Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 3  Seal of Cleansing
SB: 3  Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 3  Orim's Chant
SB: 3  Energy Flux

Explanation:
THe 3/3 Lions Isamaru split: I prefer creatures that don't get pwnd by Darkblast, hence the 3 Isamaru

2 Ninja: I originally ran 4/4 Lion/Isamaru, however, I found that I lacked a ton of midgame card boost, the 2 Ninja's have been working out for me in testing (due to the 6 one-drops).

3 Kataki: Ridiculously solid against shops, has tremendous synergy with Null Rod.

3 Grunt: Grunt is ridiculous. Enough said. I don't run 4 because I rarely find myself wanting to see more than one per game.

Null Rod: One of the more dubious calls, I currently like Rod more than Chalice in this build, because a) I don't run Vial, b) Kataki+Rod=ridiculous.

4 Stifle: Stifle is absolutely nuts in the current metagame against anything running fetchlands, as well as shops.

SB: I havn't deviated from Feinsteins SB, as it has been working out pretty well for me.

The real points of contention in this deck are a) should UW fish run Vial/Chalice? b) Is this even the optimal fish list (in view of the gencon results), given that it doesn't run Dark Confidant?

It's spelled 'ridiculous' from the root 'ridicule' as in what I will do to you if you continue to spell this wrong.  Also, moved to Vintage Improvement given this is only barely more than just a decklist.
-Kowal[/color]

How do you counter the "naming ritual, coupled with your other mana denial elements, stops them from going broken" argument?

My plan in the UW fish matchup vs Pitch Long is to shut off their mana via Chalice/Rod/Stifle/Mage. Putting your first mage on Tendrils of Agony, seems most of the time to be a terrible play, given that it is NOT a must answer, as you state.

With all due respect, the last time I checked, Pitch Long has at 3-6 turns before you beat them to death with your creatures (after you cast mage on derf, tendrils). Thats 3 turns where they can Brainstorm, Tutor, and set up a huge Will with Force backup. Sometime during that huge Will (or Desire, or Bargain) turn, they will (derf derf) tutor for CHAIN OF VAPOR, bounce your mage, and lay a huge tendrils on your ass.

Assuming you manage to lay a Rod, Chalice, or Kataki (in some cases) earlier, you've cut off their artifact acceleration. Why name tendrils when they will go broken on your ass with 3 rituals and a Will with force backup (this is oversimplification, but you get what i mean). My point in the original post, is that if you don't execute your mana denial plan against pitch long effectively, you will get pwnd by yawgmoth's will/rituals. Once long casts 10 spells (as you say, through WIll, Bargain, Necro, Desire, Jar, Twister, Windfall), it usually doesn't matter what is on the other side of the board (in my experience from piloting the deck against fish).

Is this some sortof joke, or what... naming Tendrils with your first Mage is almost always borderline retarded... they will just outbroken you, bounce/massacre your mage, and win the game. Depending on how far the game has come along, my mage almost always names Dark Ritual, Tinker, or Will.

How do you deal with Darkblast when playing this deck? I ran across it in testing yesterday and got completely destroyed. Everything else about the deck is solid though--Remand is absolute gas every time i draw it.

I know the Eternal community is all up and arms about this (for good reason), but I honestly can't see at all why this is a bad decision for Wizards on the corporate and profit end.

By creating distrust in the secondary market for and curbing speculation on very old cards, they are hurting the secondary market. HOWEVER: hurting the secondary market in old cards will not cause any damage to Wizards profits, and in fact, a very convincing argument can be made that drawing the secondary market focus away from older, expensive speculative cards and back onto newer cards will in fact increase Wizards' booster and pack sales. I'm not going to offer this argument, as I'm not qualified to discuss the effects of the secondary market on Wizards sales (and for any non-Wizards/Hasbro employee to claim any conclusions regarding the effect of the secondary market of old cards on Wizards sales would be nothing but speculation), but I'm fairly sure that someone at Wizards made this argument convincingly, thus the errata decision.

Lets move on to the "precedent" issue, one that Smemmen in particular has highlighted. Given that these erratas are now in current wizards policy (or so we can assume), if someone is going to provide a convincing argument at all for a reversion of this policy, they are going to have to show twothings:
1. That there is an issue with the policy (eg arbitrary erratas for "intention reasons") that hurts Wizards sales and profits corporately,
2. That a return to the status quo is going to prove beneficial for Wizards profits and sales,

The main issue with any argument against Wizard's new policy is in the first step: issuing arbitrary errata on OLD CARDS THAT NOBODY BUYS FROM WIZARDS ANYMORE is not going to hurt Wizards sales (primarily/almost exclusively in the paper world from T2 and Limited). Period. The fact is that the Vintage and Legacy community may be extremely vocal, and Mark Gottlieb may recieve a fair amount of hate mail, but guess what: this policy change isn't going to hurt Wizards outside of the Vintage and Legacy communities (which are not very large, and the amount of profit WIzards gets from them is exceedingly low). I think from this it is easy to conclude that this isn't a bad move at all for Wizards in terms of their profits, and in fact may prove beneficial to them in the long run.

That was you? Yeah those games were sortof random. I don't think I quite won as early as you contend. I believe we played 4 games. One game i had a retarded turn one win that consisted of casting tendrils will tendrils on an academy lotus mox vault opening after you opened with lotus into double confidant (after a mulligan I believe so I wasn't scared of force). The other game i drained a turn 2 confidant into a turn 3 bargain win. The other game i lucked out after i desired into land force force drain drain and you didnt draw any gas. Because confidant isn't really relevant in the mirror, or the combo matchups in general, i tend to try and play very agressively.

I'd use it, if it was actually well publicized. I'd suggest talking about it over on the SCG forums, so that people actually use it.

nothing new yet?

Question: Why have a third color splash at all? The only matchup it really makes a whole lot of sense in is the Oath matchup (against stax, rebuild is just so much better than undermining your mana for a white splash). It seems like a good option (especially if you are up against a lot of drains) is to just cut the Tundra's for Annul as suggested, and bring in more bounce from the SB. This deck seems a little bit like TPS, and one of the best features of TPS is the mana stability.

In addition, in my testing, Mind's Desire has been much less than optimal: the turn that i get 4-6 spells out is the turn i have set myself up to win with tendrils/will anyways, and without academy, desire is not as castable as i would like it to be. I rarely find myself "going for it" with this deck, I just set up and win when I have achieved massive card advantage and have counter backup. Minds Desire 90% of the time in this deck (I would speculate) reads "pitch to force of will." I would suggest cutting it for Vampiric Tutor, or a blue card such as Fact or Fiction, as with confidant on the table, the card disadvantage tutors become that much better.

Another thing that I have noticed while playing this deck is its fair amount of vulnerability to mana disruption. Would fitting 2 or 3 Pithing Needle in the board (for Uba Stax, Dragon, Oath, Stax) be effective? This deck already has massive amounts of game against drains, and if you cut the white from the board, you could fit these in rather easily.

End Of Turn Fact Or Fiction You Lose Teh Game

I always thought it was EOTFOFYLTG

Isn't there a copyright issue attached to using paper printouts of actual cards? I thought this was the primary reason why SCG doesn't allow printout proxies, aside from the thickness issue.

I dispute the fact that SCG has been taking losses on the P9 events. They make so much from buying up power and staples at these events that a low turnout rarely hurts their profit. In fact, it is a perfectly reasonable assumption to make that if the scg events had not been turning a profit, they would not be continuing.

I'm looking to sell out what little i have invested in the game and was wondering if anyone knew of any dealers/buyers in the chicago area who will give me good prices for my cards (duals/fows). Thanks. (mods feel free to close this if you view it as advertising)

Max

What did he play? Post list?

SCG chicago in downtown chicago would be pimp.

If this is a turn 3/4 combo deck, why is it better than tps?

My vote goes to ass. The play module is WAY too complicated and the system for joining games (mwsplay etc) is absolutely anal. At least they managed to get rid of the "pass button." Thoughts?

EDIT: @ jacob, if you have mws on your computer, just go to "autoupdate" and it will automatically install the new version, along with new card sets, etc. The differences arent so profound that they would be extremely evident on a screenshot--better for people who already have mws to DL and comment.