About a month ago I tried to build a mono red deck for vintage, and i took a very different route. I don't remember the whole list, but it did very well in testing. Here are the things I remember

4 Waste
1 Strip
4Magus
4 Magma Jet
4 Lightning Bolt
6 REB/Pyroblast (my metagame has almost no ichorid/non blue decks)
2 Shattering Spree
0 Shop
2 Blood Moon
4 Chalice
2-3 Rods

In testing, the deck often managed to disrupt long enough for a magus to resolve and the beatdown/burn to kill the opponent. It would not work in a meta that isn't heavily based in blue decks, which may be a problem now that gifts has been restricted. (more players playing other decks) It had an incredible fish matchup, and also destroyed slaver. Overall, the idea of the deck was simply to kill the opponent as fast as possible. control decks don't have enough counters to stop all the burn spells, and they deal significant amounts of damage to themselves, so this deck was wonderful against them.

IMO mindsenscer is great. Unlike arcane lab or rule of law, it doesn't completely stop combo in it's tracks. However, in order to win, they have to deal with this card (provided they aren't holding recall, twister, or their entire combo already). Also, it is probably easier for gifts and long to deal with labs because they go EOT instant speed tutor, mainphase removal. But for them to deal with mindscenscor, they can't tutor for an answer most of the time. It is easier to remove because of pyro/massacre, but it takes far more of their resources to play those cards than it would to bounce labs.

However, the cc is a downside and with combo becoming faster and faster, the game may often not last long enough for this to hit the board. with stifle's, their gameplan is slowed down because their fetches come slower, but some other form of disruption would have to slow them down more the next turn (meddling mage, null rod, tbag). If those hit the board turn two, they have to deal with those threats immediately. I agree that this will be great in bomberman, but playtesting will tell for fish.

Burning wish is a problem. Storm can't be countered, but it can. Also, it makes it more difficult for you to storm out. I am always tempted to run wishes, but they don't work for getting Storm. I would cut severance/belcher and run 2 storm cards, and i would cut academy ruins for an island.

In playtesting I have taken out Twister and Furnace. It has had mixed results against combo but does better post-board because of Arcane Lab.

4 Brainstorm
1 AR
1Vamp
1 Demonic
1 Time Walk

4 Delta
1 Strand
4 Underground Sea
2 Island
1 Swamp
1 Sapphire
1 Lotus
1 Jet
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine

4 Trinket Mages
4 Bobby
3 Cutpurse

2 Chalice
1 Pithing Needle
2 Stifle
1 Trickbind
4 FOW
1 MisD
4 Durress
2 Extirpate
1 Hymn
1 Aether Spellbomb

Average cc: 1.33

I'm thinking about cutting something for an obvious EE but i'm not sure what yet. Haven't had many mana problems in playtesting. My sidboard is still a work in progress but I am fairly certain about another Crypt, an Arcane Lab, a Darkblast and a pithing needle. I will be taking this to the tournament in IL on 4/29.

Ok, I have been working on a UB fish deck that disrupts well enough to win in todays combo heavy enviornment. This is the list that i have been playing with, and any feedback would be appreciated.

Mana:

4 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
1 Flooded Strand
2 Island
1 Swamp
1 Lotus
1 Sapphire
1 Jet

4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine

Disruption:
2 Stifle
1 Trickbind
2 Chalice of the Void
4 Duress
3 Extirpate
1 Phyrexian Furnace
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Hymn to Tourach
1 Shadow of Doubt

Creatures:
4 Trinket Mage
3 Dark Confidant
2 Dimir Cutpurse

Control:
4 Force of Will
1 Echoing Truth
1 Misdirection

Draw:
4 Brainstorm
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Timetwister

Since the printing of ETW, Slaver has become less and less of a competitive archetype. Some say this is because ETW makes Meandeck Gifts much better. Others say that it is simply because more of the top players are playing with MDG.

As demonic stated, decks move faster and faster, and the slower decks tend to fall to the side. Right now, the fastest decks are Gifts and Storm decks (TPS, Long variants, etc.) These decks rely on "going off" as quickly as possible, and for the most part they can ignore their opponent's threats by using theirs.

Slaver and Stax rely on synergy, not speed. Welder, Slaver, Triskelavus, all of them are synergistic cards that take more time to set up. Since these decks need more time to have a threat that can actually do something against fast paced storm decks, they must find a way to slow down their game plan.

Stax already does this through Trinishpere, Sphere of Resistance, and other forms of hate. However, CS does not usually run maindeck answers to combo, which is, IMO, why it often fails against Storm. I haven't playtested this idea, but I feel that Trinisphere may have a home in CS decks that don't keep storm as a backup win. The point is, in order for an archetype that moves more slowly to survive in the current meta, it will have to find a way to disrupt the fast paced storm decks that dominate the meta today.

I am running Hurkyl's recall and chain of vapor as my bounce spells and instead of repeal, burning wish. My metagame is mainly drain and fish, and it has been useful playtesting against both. In the drain mirror, I can go get ETW or even Desire if i need to. Also, if they manage to combo into ETW, pyroclasm is a great option to go get. In the fish matchup, Massacre and Pyroclasm are great wish targets. IMO, burning wish adds to what is great about Gifts, the fact that it can be so versatile.

Sorry if I take the discussion off track but I have to ask,

Has anyone tried putting extirpate in the Gifts SB? I don't think it is good enough for a maindeck slot by a longshot, but what about boarding it in against drain matchups? If one could hit FOW or drain with it, they would have a serious advantage over their opponent. I may be running it in my build at a local power tourney so I will have some idea how it fairs then but I wanted to know if anyone had tried it yet.

I always run fire//ice instead of standard burn. I like the fact that it gives me the most options. It's a little narrower in that it doesn't kill everything but it will slow them down if thats what i need

I'm working on my creatures for CS. I'm having trouble deciding whether to have 2 Pentavus or A trike and a pentavus. I like the tech of making blockers and putting them back with pentavus, but the trike is working well too. What do you think would work best in a fish heavy meta

I played 2 rounds against B/W fish, which hit my creatures with swords. One round I played some strange mono-black fishy deck which i beat. and one round was against a U/B fish deck which hit my creatures with extract after I used force of will to protect oath.

Alright. I play in a heavy fish metagame. I played five rounds last local tournament, and four of them were against fish variants. I was playing with oath of druids at the time, but only one game did I find a way to easily beat the fish. He was running mono-black fish and all his creatures were cc2. I chaliced at 2 (can't play oath) and hardcasted Platinum Angel. Every other time it was just a race and I got beat down when I didn't get lots of early power. I went 2-3 as my final record. Right now I have the cards to build Oath, Slaver, and Gifts. Which do you think has the best advantage against fish and what cards would be good choices against all the different variants of fish that exist.

When you remove the last time counter, you don't have the option. you have to play it. that means lotus bloom has to be played as a spell, even if you don't want to play it. (chalice for zero in play)

The thing you need to be careful with storm is keeping track. I played a tournament yesterday where both players in a game lost track of the storm count and resolved a mind's desire. Then, two phases later, they realized that they had made the mistake and called the judge. This is a game loss at all REL's. they both were given a game loss and told to skip to game three.

Im in the milwaukee Area. The vintage scene here is small. most people play standard, but thats boring.

Where is the footage going to go? Because I would definitely like to see it

The other problem is the fact that I am 16 AND live in WI. so even if my 4 force of will that i bought on ebay had shown up yet I wouldn't be able to.

I agree with scutakicker. It's very hard to know what Vintage is about as a new player. It's easy enough to get the general idea of stax, CS and oath but the rest are hard to figure out just by looking at a list (okay maybe i'm just dumb) but the articles I have read on what different archetypes' goals are have been very helpful.

I'm relatively new to magic but I love vintage. Other formats aren't as much fun for me. I notice that there are Amateur Standard tournaments, but are there any amateur vintage tournaments? The local weekend store tournament has gotten boring because I play against the same Oath and CS every time. I want to play something bigger, but I don't feel like drinving to a P9 tournament just to lose horribly. If anyone could point me in the right direction, I would greatly appreciate it.