You play a steeply metagamed deck when it's +EV is maximal given all factors known to you.


The issue is, of course, what the entails. A given deck may be more likely to beat (player X). It may be more likely to make it through the Swiss. It may be more likely to win IF it makes it through the Swiss.


No deck is good in a hostile environment. The 'top tier' decks all have bad matchups SOMEWHERE, and if the meta was 100% your bad matchups, then you lose.


The thing is, if you know what the right deck for given meta is, you KNOW WHAT THE RIGHT DECK IS. If you don't, it's damnably hard to work it out.

This is why the top tier are good ideas, generally. Against a bunch of people who are NOT thinking the same, the odds are that a lot of those people will be defeatable.



I'd only recommend a 'hate deck' for type one if

a) You cannot built an optimal non-hate deck.
or
b) You have a narrow local meta.
or
c) You're really freaking awesome.

...because right now? Meta-ing t1 is a horrible proposition. Too many people who go their own way.

'Hate deck' is a perjorative term. It's a criticism, an insult. 'Hating on' something is different from 'metagaming against' something. Hating implies irrationality, that you're trying to beat specific players/decks for a reason other than 'this gives me the best chance of winning'.



The line between prison, control, and hate is often blurred. All of them are disruption, and always, the objective is to delay your opponent until you can kill them.
'Speedbump Disruption': Deck runs enough disruption to buy a turn or two, then wins. (Duresses, Thoughtseizes, FoW)
'Control': Deck runs enough disruption to buy a turn or two, then gains incremental advantage and buys more turns (Drains + FoW + something else good).
'Prison': Deck runs almost nothing BUT disruption.


There's a continuum. The thing is, bits and pieces can be mixed and matched - Blue decks with chalices and FoW? Magus of the Moon paired with discard.

The issue is coherency. It's HARD to keep buying turns, because there are no wrong threats, only wrong answers. This is why Prison is typically mana denial. (Chalice/Meddling Mage type effects are similar - the key is to focus on giving them dead draws).


Mixing mana denial in with counters CAN pay off. But there are a lot of ways the two sets of disruption can end up both applying the same constraints, overlapping rather than synergizing. The key is that cumulative disruption is overall stronger. (Also, being able to capitalize on an advantageous position counts... 'I guess I keep denying you mana' < 'I kill you with tendrils') Incoherent disruption CAN be better (oops, I drew null rod against your hand with no lands at all?), but it's less consistent.



Also, no wrong threats only wrong answers. Only counterspells and denying the ability to play a given spell is guaranteed to 'always' be the right answer, and decks now have the tools to beat the universal answers... so you need more specific answers...

grargh. sleep comes soon.

Decisions made "long ago" are the kind of thing that need reviewing. The format is no longer the format it was "long ago", as proven by the fact that the direct port of an older deck I used was extremely weak.

Tell me. When was the 'final decision' made? What decks have been created since?

I've been following the format since before combo was a significant factor ("good old days" of control vs control vs aggro/aggro control...). I haven't seen anyone try to actually use it in any of the intervening years. In fact, the only mention I recall was an article that said "this is card disadvantage. card disadvantage BAD" [which ignores the fact that counterspells provide a *tempo* advantage, which is important and can be weighed against the card advantage]

I have, however, spent last Sunday watching my Mana Drains be impossibly U mana intensive in their casting cost. (Okay, technically, I didn't own them)

I also spent it cursing the lack of draw. And cursing Mana Crypt coin flips, but that's an easily soluble problem.


Duress provides half the effect of a counterspell (eliminating the particular threat), but it doesn't provide the other half unless it takes the ONLY threat from their hand (namely, blunting their tempo).

Countering your own random 0cc artifact makes it a slightly cheaper (sorcery) TFK.  Countering their spell makes it more or less a more mana intensive FoW (in terms of putting you at -1 card). Countering a chalice-locked brainstorm? Still a draw three, discard one effect.

I'm viewing it as a draw spell that can counter things if it must, not as a pure counterspell.

WRT to the other comments:


Trinket Mage would be nice to include. Especially since it does patch up that Goblins weakness (it's for 10-proxy, though, so I don't expect a huge amount of Goblins... most people who show will show because they have 50/60ths of a broken T1 deck)

Black Splash is interesting. I'd rather run Chalice than duress, though, and they do clash.


Masticore... I've found Masticore disappointing. Probably good vs. Goblins, but losing 1 card per turn is painful, particularly if there's a Goyf stopping the 'Core from swinging in, and they've boarded in Pyroblast... I prefer trike.

Karn... yeah, good point.
Scroll finds Mystical Tutor if it's not been locked out... dammit... it also finds FoF. Or a counter...
Timetwister... yeah. I had a reason, but on reflection it was dumb.

Okay, I'm sold on black.

-4 Merchant Scroll
-1 Karn, Silver Golem
-1 Timetwister
-1 Sensei's Divining Top
-2 Island
+1 Demonic Tutor
+1 Vampiric Tutor
+2 Trinket Mage
+1 Triskelion
+1 Engineered Explosives
+1 Yawgmoth's Will
+2 Underground Sea

I did some thinking about type one, after a rather poor performance at yesterday's tournament. (I have excuses, this is not the place)

I played mono blue control thanks to underestimating the quality of cards I could borrow (I could have built more standard decks, but could not find back to basics for mono-blue, and I didn't leave myself enough time... this is not a mistake I will repeat!).

(I usually practice with someone else's deck, which obviously is not an option when they're playing in the event)

Anyway. Mana Drain was... underwhelming. Sure, my deck had design flaws that made it worse, but it was too easy to play around. Also, 'pay extra mana' counterspells? Underwhelming. Sometimes they have 17 mana and two cards in hand. Or at least are timetwistering while floating some mana. Or. or. or.

Duress is one option, but I _really_ liked Chalice of the Void for 1. Plus I had an idea...


Duress is good because it's proactive. You don't have to have all the mana available at once, you can just run it out there and it'll deplete their hand.

So, I thought... Counterbalance. It's like Mana Drain, in that it's a counterspell with a little 'extra', only it gives card advantage, not mana acceleration. Oh, and it's immune to various countermeasures that work on Drain. Also, in type one, having a land on top DOES hurt them. So in theory, it seems fine, and after all, it was good in Legacy Flash.

So, here's my deck idea:

R Black Lotus
R Lotus Petal
R Mana Vault
R Mox Emerald
R Mox Jet
R Mox Pearl
R Mox Ruby
R Mox Sapphire
R Sol Ring

4 Flooded Strand
6 Island
4 Polluted Delta

(-1 of the above. Island? Fetchland? Mana Vault? Or maybe Divining Top?)

4 Chalice of the Void
3 Sensei's Divining Top

R Ancestral Recall
4 Brainstorm
R Fact or Fiction
R Timetwister

R Mystical Tutor
4 Merchant Scroll
R Tinker

4 Arcane Denial
4 Counterbalance
4 Force of Will
1 Trickbind

1 Echoing Truth
R Time Walk

1 Darksteel Colossus
1 Karn, Silver Golem
1 Triskelion

It is mono blue because I couldn't decide what to do with other colours if I did want to run them. It does not need to remain mono blue.
It runs Arcane Denial because Denial is a fine counter when you're stopping combo (it resets their storm counter to zero if they can't go off, and they usually blow enough cards that the card advantage they regain is insufficient), it stops bombs acceptably (and non-conditionally) and it can "cycle" in such a way as to net drawing two cards while avoiding having to discard at EOT (even when playing a spell that your own Chalice stops).

Oh, and Trike is there because he stops Flash kills while he swings in for the win, and Karn is there to be a third win condition (the deck may be light on said; suggestions/thoughts?) that disrupts their mana.

So. What do people think?

The deck is/was my attempt to add blue to an 'artifact prison' deck, because I was focusing on beating combo. Morphling and Tinker went in because I remembered an old ratio for blue cards to FoW, and I was looking at the deck minus the last 5-6 cards and thought 'wow, I just fold to random mono-black aggro'.

I'll point out I didn't set out to make a Trinket Mage deck. I set out to play Sphere of Resistance and Chalice of the Void in a deck with FoW. The missing Salvagers is a really good point; I honestly did not even think of it when I first came up with the list.


What do the weaknesses look like being? Beyond 'almost everything'.   

Interesting how closely related some decks get...

I'm raising an eyebrow at 'bad' on the creatures though.

With this one closed (it's past the 26th) is there a new one coming soon?

I'm in a 'meta' of mostly bad decks, combo, Oath and Stax.

I've borrowed Stax decks for two tournaments and liked it, but was extremely annoyed by the match I lost to 1) Not playing first turn disruption against an opponent who had no first turn play (okay, maybe tutoring for Karn and playing was a bad idea... what can I say, I can be an idjit) and 2) a first turn kill on the draw. (this was a couple of months back)

(I've also played other T1 decks in tournaments, and so forth, and I'm interesting in the possibility of more 10 proxy)

Also, while I can't remember the name, it's a tendrils deck that has 3 lands and no resiliency, but is really fast... yeah, I was getting snippy at the end of the tenth goldfish game (as Stax, my options were play first and watch him scoop to any disruption, or go second and hope the disruption I mulled for was relevant, as I waited to see if he goldfished turn 1).

So, general summary: I wanted an artifact prison deck with FoW. I'm not sure this was the deck I was looking for, but, well, here's what I came up with (and it feels so old school it HURTS):


4 Trinket Mage
4 Aven Mindcensor
1 Karn, Silver Golem
1 Razormane Masticore
2 Morphling

1 Time Walk
1 Tinker
1 Ancestral Recall
3 Miscalculation
4 Force of Will
4 Thirst for Knowledge

4 Sphere of Resistance
4 Chalice of the Void

1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Pithing Needle

1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring

4 Ancient Tomb
4 Flooded Strand
2 Tundra
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Plains
1 Strip Mine
2 Island


I may have shoved too much blue cards in, but I wanted to be sure.

Sphere, Miscalculation and Chalice are the 2 mana disruption; that is, stuff the deck should hit first turn every game. That's why a 1U counter over Drain. I think this is essential, because of the experiences against combo I mentioned.

I kind of want Crucible/Wasteland/Smokestack in there somewhere (or maybe Braids instead of Stack... she DOES have an immediate impact, and counts as a clock), and one thing I think would be nifty either main or in off the board is actually Auriok Salvagers (recurring Crypt vs Ichorid), but that's all theory.

I'm probably going to have to put some effort into getting an actual T1 game in with this deck, so I'm looking for comments (or offers to play on apprentice) first.