Great article, especially the advice on how best to FoW the deck into submission.

One very minor criticism: be consistent with male/female pronouns.  I understand giving respect to the female gender, but the inconsistency made it interrupt an otherwise very fluent read.

Please write more.

-Luke

I'm not really enjoying it too much right now, and Mike Flores' (Premium) article The Limit of Interactivity really coalesced my feelings towards it.

I understand that Vintage is always going to be the most uninteractive format.  If you enjoy brokenness you enjoy shutting the other player out of the game.  However, the level of interactiveness for the whole format is at an all time low.  In the past, whenever a single deck reached this level of uninteractiveness, it was removed from the metagame, e.g. GAT and Long.

Every decent deck wins very early, or has powerful effects that lock out an opponent's possible interactions.  Decks with interactive primary strategies just don't win:  4cc, Fish, EBA for example.  I really feel that at least one interactive strategy should be top notch for us to have a more fun format.

-Luke

Hahahaha.

I remember the old song.

"And I said...oh it's you...."

Hanno, I forgot to collect all my Lim-dul's Paladin for you.

PM me your addy and I'll send them out to you.

-Luke

I find this a boring, utterly mainstream art choice.

I liked #1, it was very different and interesting.

I guess art is like that though

-Luke

Do you have Windows Media Player for Mac?  If you try "Save As" in Safari, it should work.

And Steve spends five minutes without playing a spell.

-Luke

I asked one of these questions in #mtgjudge yesterday.  I asked how long is a reasonable time before calling a judge, and while they couldn't answer hard and fast, they all thought that five minutes was too long.

And I'm absolutely against bending the rules to allow more time because one player is playing a "harder deck".  For a start, there's not really any evidence a priori that you're going to win earlier.  What you're really saying is: "I play such and such deck, so I deserve more time to think".  Why is that fair?  It'd only be fair if we used chess clocks, and those are just not suitable to 99% of M:tG games.

Anyway, there is no excuse for holding priority for five minutes without putting a spell on the stack.  If your deck is too hard for you to play in a timely manner, then don't play it.

Finally, whether you're playing Smmenen or Zherbus or Kowal or some kid, just call a judge if you think they're playing too slowly.  Otherwise they have no incentive at all to speed up their play, and you'll be the one who looks foolish if you get angry with them.

-Luke

Man, that was the forum owner who said that.

How incredibly weak.  But Londes.com rips off articles all the time.

-Luke

Food Chain Goblins.

It is the fastest one, it can actually benefit from being budget (ESG and Ancient Tomb get around Trinisphere), it has access to REB and Artifact Mutation, and it runs Gempalms as uncounterable removal for Goblin Welder.  It also runs 5 strips.  If I was forced to run aggro, that's what I'd play.

-Luke

The pics don't seem to work for me either :-/

To follow up on what JACO said, try changing the upload to "Binary" rather than "ASCII" if that is the problem.

I second this.  The report seemed pointless.

I've been running the Will-based goth slaver for some time... I don't think it really gives me too much, and am planning on changing back to U/R.

Smmenen, what's stopping you from talking about this in depth? :-/
He has to write the meandeck tendrils primer first, and that is a hard deck to teach.
-Jacob

Black Earl Grey, no sugar.  Just bergamot goodness.

I enjoyed your report.  Ahhh to actually be at one of those things!

Just one thought, are you sure the poker tournament is worth the risk?  I think you should check it out and make very very sure that it is legal.  Your justifications might work, but then again, they might not.  A criminal record is DEFINITELY not what you deserve.

-Luke

The whole deck is about playing the probabilities.  If Consulting for a restricted card will win or almost certainly win the game this turn and there was no better target and I had a roughly full library left, I'd do it.

-Luke

I don't think there's anything wrong with taking advantage of information gained if the opponent is silly enough to show me his hand.  It isn't really hard to hold the cards upright or even angled towards you.  Often in casual games I'll just start naming the cards in my opponent's hand as a friendly way of letting them know what they've accidentally shown me.  If the opponent shuffles their own deck badly and I get to see cards, that's their problem as well.  Of course, I deliberately look away when I shuffle my opponent's deck.  Sneaking peeks that way is cheating.

Scouting is something I do, but I only try to take advantage of public information.  I won't ask people what deck they're playing before a tourney, or fish for information.  I at least say stuff to imply I'm playing something other than I am.  I had a Mox tourney the other week and I switched from Slaver to Tog for it.  I encouraged people to assume that I was still playing Slaver.  If I told them "oh I don't want to say," then even that is a clue that I've switched.

I think it would be quite a nice idea for the big Vintage tourneys to follow DCI premier events and allow decklist inspections before the finals, so as not to disadvantage those who couldn't scout.  Of course, it doesn't effect me because I live all the way over here in Australia.

-Luke

This article is in response to the new Meandeck Tendrils deck.  To make things clear, my position is that Dark Ritual should be restricted and that player interaction should be encouraged in this two player game.  However, I don't intend to let my bias influence this analysis.  When I assume figures, I'm going to try to assume them in the combo deck's favour.  This is simply because it makes my logic more solid.

What is a coinflip deck?  I define a coinflip deck as an ultrafast combo deck that aims to have no interaction with the opponent at all.  While the deck may require a lot of skill to play, essentially any matchup turns into a biased coinflip, either the deck goes off, or it crumples in a heap.  I think it is safe to call Meandeck Tendrils and the Goblin Charbelcher deck coinflip decks.

Why is playing a coinflip deck bad?  I think they are bad because while the deck requires playskill, it doesn't really reward playskill.  I think you're only really rewarded for playskill when you are playing a deck that interacts with an opponent.  Here's why:

Meandeck claim that their Tendrils deck has a 70% first turn goldfish rate.  Now, pretend that this directly corresponds to a probability of 0.7 of winning any matchup.  0.7 is probably too high an estimate, but this is okay, because I contend that 0.7 is not high enough.  I also assume that this matchup probability is when the deck is played optimally ALL the time.

Now, why is 0.7 too low a match win probability for a coinflip deck?  Well take Waterbury.  To get into the top 16, you had to achieve 6-2 or better (it is a little harder than this to get into top 16, but again, this overestimates the chances of top 16, which is good).  By the binomial theorem, the probability of this coinflip deck getting to the top 16 (by going 6-2 or 7-1 or 8-0) is:

p = C(8,6)x0.7^6x0.3^2 + C(8,7)x0.7^7x0.3 + C(8,8)x0.7^8
p = 0.2965 + 0.1977 + 0.0576
p = 0.5518

So your probability of getting into the top 16 is 0.5518, IF you play perfectly and IF your chance of winning any match is 0.7 (which, of course, is likely an overestimate).

Now if you have (say) 11 players playing the same deck, and assume that they all have an independent chance of top 16 (which in a big event is fairly likely... I recall hearing about only one mirror match for Meandeck Tendrils), then the chance of the coinflip deck having at least one member in the top 16 is:
1 - (1 - p) ^ 11
= 0.9999
So the coinflip deck is virtually guaranteed a top 16 participant, although individually, the chance isn't that great (though better than average).

To summarise, coinflip decks force the outcome of any game they play into an exercise in statistics.  As there is no (or minimal) player interaction, there is no real way to outplay the opponent.  You play optimally, and either win or lose, at random.  There is no possibility to take advantage of opponent mistakes, or outplay them in anyway.  Although the (high) coinflip value I chose did make the chance of top 16 more likely than not, if that rate dips to just 0.65, then the chance of top 16 falls to only 0.4278.

-Luke

It is old tech.  You replace the Pentavus with Crucible of the Worlds and get an infinite Slaver lock by welding out Darksteel Citadel for Mindslaver then replaying the Citadel.  In some ways it is better than Pentavus because Pentavus requires two Welders, and it's generally preferrable to topdeck Crucible than Pentavus.  Of course Pentavus is a handy beater, as well.

---
Ultima, well done.  Did you contemplate cutting a Welder for Will?  Did your teammate who came first play Intuition Slaver or Shay Slaver?

-Luke

The deck idea looks interesting, however, I have a couple of criticisms.

First, you really don't give a valid reason WHY this deck should be played.  WHY should I try this out instead of playing Meandeck Oath, which can devote less of its deck to the kill, and thus dedicate more to protection and disruption.  Why Slave when you can just attack for two to three turns and win?  Since the Akroma/Spirit of the Night configuration usually wins two turns after casting Oath, this version doesn't actually seem any faster.  Your Bringer is much more vulnerable than those dudes.

Also, your deck really needs a Slaver when you Oath.  Surely you should play four Slavers to maximise your chance of milling them with Oath?  I'd even think about putting in one or two Possessed Portal, as these are going to be game almost as much as Slaver recursion will be.  

Another thing.  It may be better to run a one Bringer and one Darksteel Colossus configuration, you don't need more than one Bringer.  This also enables you to run Tinker, which in any deck with big artifacts, should certainly be played (IF YOU RUN SoLoMoxen!!).

Finally, your deck doesn't run SoLoMoxen.  So your best hope to win is to tap out for Oath turn TWO, and tap out for the Slaver activation turn FOUR.  This is way too slow, and you need the mana open to protect your win condition.

Unless you think of some reason why this combo is really better than Meandeck Oath, it won't really attract much attention.

-Luke

I presume you're meaning non-Intuition Slaver, because there's absolutely no room for more draw in the Intuition version.

Read the Runes might dig, but it's actually card disadvantage.  You don't want to be discarding any more cards than necessary, and there are generally not many permanents you want to sacrifice.  Artifacts you want to weld for Slaver, and I find I always want mana.

A much stronger card in this slot is Deep Analysis (credit to one MixingMike), which has great synergy with Thirst, and actually draws cards.  The deck doesn't have to dig very deep, because of the plethora of tutors it runs.  It certainly doesn't need to sacrifice card advantage to dig.

-Luke

Even if the above is true, it doesn't really interfere with my point.  Force the opponent to Drain when you're ready.  Duress them, Cabal Therapy them.  Play a spell end of turn to tap them out then cast Yawgmoth's Will.  Mana Drain can be played around the same way that anyone plays around Control decks in any format.  Sure it's more busted and can fuel Thirst/Intuition/DA or whatever, but if you play well you can control the situation.

Also, many times I've had to deplete my hand, pitching an Intuition or Thirst to Force, then had to Drain into not much at all (especially after sideboard).  By saying what you've said, you disregard that the deck with Mana Drains has to deal with another deck that's coming hard and fast at it (whether the other deck contains Drain as well or not).

-Luke

JDizzle, Mana Drain is much more fair because it is very easily played around.  You can cast Duress, you can bait with spells played at end of turn, you can use Mishra's Factory and beat down.  You have many, many options.  If you have your own control elements, you can wait until you have mana enough to counter back!  Control is fair because if you play correctly, you CAN resolve your own spells.  You don't need to blindly cast spells into two untapped Islands.  This is true in many formats.  I don't understand why people think Mana Drain is in the same league as MWS/Trinisphere and Dark Ritual.

And to weigh into the argument, I agree with everything Zherbus said in his article.

-Luke

You have to announce targets before paying costs, so no.

-Luke

Casting it in the opponent's End Step works.

-Luke

The problem we're getting at is that you can deliberately make a procedural error and thus force the game state back to before the announcement of the spell, meaning you get a takeback because of the procedural error and not because the opponent thinks it is a nice thing to do.  Deliberately breaking the rules is cheating, though, and should be penalised as such.  An example of this is announcing Brainstorm when Chains of Mephistopholes is in play and deliberately not paying the blue, so as to cause a procedural error.  If the game was particularly close and high stakes, the opponent probably wouldn't allow the takeback just for civility's sake.

The most obvious case of cheating is to deliberately pay the costs incorrectly after using the mana ability of, say, Chromatic Sphere, and seeing a new card which causes the playing of the original spell to be suboptimal... though if that is a possibility you should just use Chromatic Sphere and float the mana before announcing the spell.

-Luke

This could be implemented by having a single thread in community named "Link to your MOTL post."

-Luke

Maybe it would help to define "accident" and "mistake" here in the course of announcing a spell... can you clarify, Jebus?  I would define "accident" to be "inadvertantly making an illegal announcement" which would be like trying to Befoul a black creature or announcing Wrath of God with only one White mana untapped.  I would define a "mistake" as announcing a spell that you CAN legally make and then realising it isn't the best play, for example announcing Brainstorm when you can pay the mana and Chains of Mephistopholes is on the table.

What I think you said is that if I announce a spell and mid-announcement find that it's a "mistake" then technically by the rules I should have to continue the announcement... the opponent is doing me a favour by letting me take it back, and if I deliberately make an illegal play like tapping mana incorrectly to force the "mistake" to become a deliberate "accident", then I'm technically cheating.  Is that right?

I run Goth Slaver with 2 Engineered Explosives maindeck (so good!)

Here's my board:

4 Chalice of the Void
1 Sundering Titan
2 Rack and Ruin
2 Lava Dart
2 Tormod's Crypt
2 Blood Moon
2 Claws of Gix (was AEther Spellbomb)

I side in the Blood Moon and Claws of Gix for AKs against Oath, leaving EE in which takes care of Oaths AND Ground Seals.

I don't like AEther Spellbomb because it only deals with ONE Oath activation, it only deals with two if you're lucky enough to have Welder as well.  I like the Claws because they cost nothing and are artifacts.  Goblin Bombardment is also a nice card to run.

-Luke

The deck is a straight control deck, in a format where those decks almost always fail.  They are just too slow.

With Smmenen's one-off mono-blue deck as an exception, every recent Control deck has a combo win, for example Tog, Control Slaver and Oath.  4CC doesn't win for the same reason.

I'm afraid I agree.  From looking at both sites, there's only one or two posters that are any good at The Source, and luckily they both post on the Legacy forums here. Also, if I want to get deck ideas from their site, I have to wallow through much more noise to get through to the good advice/decks.  Lastly, when I try to open a topic on those boards (using tabbed browsing) the topic opens in BOTH the new tab and the one I'm currently using.  This bug doesn't happen on TMD, and it's really irritating.

And some case-in-point scenarios:

Why does the [DTB] White-blue-bullshit thread have Mana Drains in the main topic post?

Why does the Pox PRIMER have a decklist featuring 4 Mindstab Thrulls.  I've never anywhere seen them suggested before, let alone their optimality in the slot discussed.

Please keep the legacy forums here, they're just better quality than the ones at the Source.