Just a note: I dunno if an Oath player would side these in, but SSS (Simic fatty) doesn't get slowed by Duplicant or Maze. Given this, is there a relevant game plan besides blow up the world with Smokestack?

Ok, well recently I've made a switch from Gifts over to Control Slaver and have been very happy with it. My list was based mostly of Shay's List from Day 1 of Richmond with a couple of changes:

// Lands
    3  Flooded Strand
    1  Strip Mine
    2  Polluted Delta
    2  Underground Sea
    1  Tolarian Academy
    4  Volcanic Island
    3  Island

// Creatures
    1  Gorilla Shaman (1)
    1  Darksteel Colossus
    3  Goblin Welder
    1  Duplicant

// Spells
    1  Echoing Truth
    1  Mystical Tutor
    1  Yawgmoth's Will
    1  Demonic Tutor
    2  Mindslaver
    1  Fire/Ice
    1  Mox Sapphire
    4  Force of Will
    4  Mana Drain
    1  Mana Crypt
    1  Mana Vault
    1  Sol Ring
    1  Mox Emerald
    1  Mox Jet
    1  Mox Pearl
    1  Mox Ruby
    1  Black Lotus
    1  Time Walk
    1  Ancestral Recall
    4  Brainstorm
    4  Thirst for Knowledge
    1  Tinker
    1  Mind Twist
    1  Fact or Fiction
    1  Merchant Scroll

Most notably, I'm playing Mind Twist. I am TOTALLY in love with Twist in this deck. It is insane at any point in the game, and, unless ur playing against MDG, Mis-D isn't around to ruin your day. I have yet to come to a point in a game where I was not happy to draw/have it.

The Second major differance is the Duplicant over Trisk. I really dislike losing to Oath and random Exhalted Angels... yes... my meta is strange at times. Machine-Gunning Trisk isn't needed as much as getting rid of individual threats. Simply a Meta-call, It's the kinda call I make on the day of the tourney.

Moving on, I hate losing to Fish and Goblins which are fairly big decks where I'm from. They make up 15-25% of the field here and it's something that has to be thought about. This is why I'm trying out a Transformational Sideboard. (Also as a means of dodging hate post-board). So what Sidboard am I talking about?... Oath. The deck already has a strong permission base with loads of draw power to find what you need. The engine for Oath fits into Slaver with ease, and it doesn't require much effort in boarding. My board look like this right now:

4 Oath of Druids
4 Forbidden Orchard
1 Akroma
1 Razia
2 Duress
1 Darkblast
2 Open Slots

and when using the board, it generally looks like this:

+10 Oath/Orchard/Angels

-3 Welder
-2 Slaver
-1 Duplicant
-1 Gorilla Shaman
-2 Volcanic
-1 Island

It's a really surprize in Game 2. Artifact hate becomes mostly useless, and all of a sudden the deck has serious aggro starts. This can even exploit slow hands that would other wise be acceptible, giving you an insane advantage. Cons... Jesters Cap sucks.

I'm going to test out the idea more today, and I'll post how things go later or tomorrow sometime. Hopefully this is helpful. If it's been already tried, then I apoligise. If not, it'd be great to get some feedback on it.

Just a thought on the whole RnR vs Mox Monkey question:

I've made the switch from Gifts to Slaver, and I was curious: Has Meltdown ever been tested? It could be an exelent target for Burning Wish, destroys needle/chalice/null rod for only 3 mana, and if u drain anything Vs. Stax u should be able to wipe their entire board. Obvious downside is that u won't have any Welder fodder left either, but thats why we play Will.

Top album for me has to be:

"What to do when you are dead" by Armor for Sleep, amazing concept album written entirly from the POV of a ghost.

top song? hmmm...

Big Shot by Straylight Run
Sic Transit Gloria Fades by Brand New
or
Anthem of our Dying Day by Story of the Year

Interesting Note:
Saw a couple of people mentioned Bittersweet synphony by The Verve: I've been listening to Richard Ashcroft's new solo stuff and it's all pretty solid stuff. It's worth the cd price, more then worth the download price

I sometimes counter walk in the control mirror to prevent Mana Drain comming online depending on how aggressive my hand is. (IE: Ancestral)

I guess the over-all question you have to ask is if your drain is better then then card they draw and the turn they get. If you have larger worries, or more so specific cards to worry about, it's most likly better to hold it back. If you just want to stall it's probally a safe bet to Drain it. I normally only drain something like that if I'm sitting on Gifts/TFK/FoF. This is, of course, assuming nothing on the board changes anything.

Well locally we've been playing 13-proxy vintage for some time. It started out with the theory that you can proxy up full power and a set of something else (normally Drain, shop, etc.) We've had a lot of scess with that number. It may seem awkward at a glance but it really isn't. As a matter of fact, I believe it was chosen by a note made by Steve about 2 years ago.

With today's Twister-less lists it means you have a slot remaining for something random. Whether it be, a simple hard to find uncommon/rare, or obscure peice of tech, it's a bonus and helps in sideboarding. (If I remember right when U/G madness was played, a few of the players had to proxie Stuptifying Touch)

I'm all for proxie events, I'm power-less (have my drains and duals) but I refuse to play neutered decks. If I wanna play a normal format, I'll play standard or extended.

The thing is that Uba Mask is there as a Draw engine with Library. Interesting note that with Uba in play, multiple Libraries stack, "drawing" 5 cards a turn.

I agree with you about the Null Rod.

The deck isn't meant to act as a prison deck. It simply uses artifacts as additional threats to help overcome the defences of other decks.

Just a thought, but is Blurred Mongoose a relevant enough threat? It can't be countered, but can he apply enough pressure to warrent it's inclusion?

I think the W splash is better then a B splash. W allows u to cut Baloth for Lododon Heirarch and lets u play 2-3 copies of StP.

B would allow u to play tutors and disruption, but you need to remember that this deck tries to ramp it's mana with Elves then drop it's threats. If you play duress/therapy it slows your developement down.

Here's an idea Dj, since u arn't MDing Null Rod, how about Sword of Fire/Ice? u have tonnes of Mana elves, and turning them into a 3/3 that shocks and draws cards is pretty good.

lol Sylvan Library makes it pretty busted.

I'm glad u guys are liking the list. A couple of notes..

Zealot might not seam like much but he really is a house. Also he might seem mana intensive, but when you consider that the deck plays 8 "attacking Moxen" the deck generally has a lot of mana.

I think Land Grant should be in here.

The hardest thing about this deck is trying to pack enough hate to allow for attacking to be relevant, meanwhile trying to make it as un-specific as possible. How about that "G" spell from Torment? the one that makes your next creature spell uncounterable? That means the Drain player has a 1cc spell they can Drain. It draws u a card. And then unless they have another counter, your threat comes down anyway. Seems like it has potential.

Here;s a thought... there is a LOT of hate available to a Mono-G player.

Seeds of Innocence. lol

I kinda built the deck a while ago. Essentially The deck runs off the assumption that Lannys are like Moxen, that can attack, and a big creature threat is something that the fish deck s@ the time had trouble dealing with.

Oh and Treetoip Villiage pwns Landstill.

Chalice is an amazing peice of disruption and My origional version also played 4 Trinisphere. These could be replaced by SPhere of Resistance.

Uba Mask is great against Gifts as we all know.

Dawn Strider is a great card vs. Colossus.

I found myself likeing Troll less and less. Prehaps that would be a good cut for Root Maze. You mentioned to me earlier cutting some elves for ESG....here's my question... what does this deck NEED to play @ a 2cc number? They otherwise don't speed the deck up @ all and actually reduce your permanant count against smokestack.

The deck could use Null Rod Main.

How about Dosan from CHK?

My list was actually Mono-U... allowing for it to play minimal mana base, while making it resistant to hate.

I havn't been able to test my Masknought build in a proper event, mostly cause I'm playing with a 5c Gifts build. However, if anyone still cares here it is:

8 Island
4 Flooded Strand
1 Academy
5 Moxan
1 Lotus
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Vault
1 Mana Crypt
1 Lotus Petal


1 Colossus
4 Dreadnought

4 Force of Will
4 A.I.
4 Brainstorm
3 TFK
1 Tinker
1 Time Walk
1 Ancestral
1 Rebuild
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Mystical

4 Mask

3 Pithing Needle
3 Chalice of the Void
1 Tormod's Crypt(really want a second MD)
1 Sensei's Top

I'd like to point out that I don't think Masknought lend's itself to being a control deck effectivly. I tested out the deck as such, and I came to the conclusion that you rarly want to play that control game. FoW is key, and so is disruption. However, I think that you have to be wary of creating an identity crisis for the deck.

Also, in testing, I found that the deck has two things it wants to do... play mask-nought... or find mask-nought. This means that early game you want to be tapping out and applying pressure and castign threats in order to force when you need into play.

Also what is your meta like? Do you expect much Stax? Gifts? Your mana base looks like it wants to make baby jesus cry... no offence... but... Badlands? Can you deal with Uba Mask? I'm not trying to be rough or anything... it just seems like Stax is a headache and a half for you, and I don't think any deck can afford to have a bad Stax match and hope to do well in a diverse metagame.

just a thought, but dark confident has some petty good synergy with divining top. it might be worth testing, since it also allows for a steady stream of threats.

aside; sorry for the typing,  my shift key is broken.

Umm Stax has a VERY hard time dealing with Sacred Ground.

How often do you run out of steam? Would the addition of Fastbond serve to accellerate or make your combo any more reliable?

Hey guys, I left this thread a lone for a while so I could do some testing, and try to make the deck more focused and give it some better tools for beating the environment.

Some things I learnt:
1) Welders=bad, so does Mox Monkey
2) Almost winning and then getting pwned by Tendrils isn't much better
3) If I have 2 mana I shouldn't be passing my turn so I can cast Mana Drain/Leak, I should be playing a threat.
4) Minus the Bear is an Awesome band, and Armor for Sleep is even better (Hooray for whoring music)
5) Artificer's Intuition should be abused as much as possible, considering it wants to be Survival.

So here's my current testing list. I'll talk about some of the points following it.

Lands:
1 Academy
8 Island
4 Strand


Artifacts:
5 Moxen
1 Lotus
1 Petal
1 Crypt
1 Sol Ring
1 Vault
4 Mask
1 Top
1 Tormod's Crypt
3 Pithing Needle
3 Chalice of the Void

Creatures:
1 Darksteel Colossus
4 Dreadnought

Sorceries:
1 Time Walk
1 Tinker

Instants:
4 Brainstorm
4 Force
3 TFK
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Hurkel's
1 Recall
1 Mystical

Enchantments:
4 Artificer's Intuition

So firstly, Pithing Needle is AMAZING. It's won me so many games that I upped it to a 3-of. This involved me reducing my fetch count and also going to a single type so I could name delta whenever possible. This also allowed me to reduce my mana base as was suggested to 23. This has become a very good number and I feel confident with it.

Next, is Chalice. I cut my additional counters for Chalice, the theory being that it's stronger vs Storm combo, since currently you can't out counter them and also it damages Gift's Mana Base quite good. Also it's Fetchable with Intuition and it's Pitchable too.

Final change was cutting Hurkel's Recall. I realized that my deck had NO answer to Chalice for 2. Not too good. So I added both a Rebuild and a Chain of Vapor. The Rebuild has become good for not only refilling my hand with Fodder to pitch to A.I., but also solves my Chalice for 2/Null Rod dilemma. Chain of Vapor also fixes Chalice issues and a bunch of other things. I've loves this card for a while... which reminds me, I need to find a foil one

Well I'm looking forward to hearing some more thoughts. A deck is never finished, but hopefully this one is getting closer.

If you are in a Stax dominant Meta, which I'm not so I havn't been able to test it, but could Annul be an option? Also against fish it can easily keep Chalice and Vial off the Table as well.

All I mean is that you havn't stated how you deck can be effective against any of the Teir 1 decks. Also these decks are normally meant to be optimal, which in most cases includes all 5 Moxen, etc.

I'm not trying to be hard, but I just don't see where you intend your deck to travel, and you should be careful when building a deck to be as 2 dimensional as you've designed your's. Sometime you won't have enough butter to cover your toast (w00t analogies!!)

I can see ur list as being fun, however I find it difficult to believe that it can solve any metagame issues. Your list is trying to do too much @ once, and that can be a big problem diluting the focus of the deck and resulting is some resource management issues with the deck. However if you like a deck you like a deck. I just don't think that it may be said to be better then other options.

Bebe, I have to disagree with you when it comes to the intuition and the silver bullets. The Crypt and Needle have won enough games for me in testing that I can't warrent cutting them. I'm going to test out the Daze's and Leaks and Slights, and prehaps that will speed the deck up to a point where the bullets are no longer necessary but I'm going to leave them for now.

The A.I. I'm going to leave @ 3 copies. I've not been having a problem finding them, nor have they been getting sitting in my hand, so it feels like a good number. Prehaps with the addition of Slight over Thirst this may change, but I'll know after some testing.

Keep the comments rolling

The problem with Opt and Slight is that the deck requires cards in hand to fuel Intuition. This is where the TFK came in handy. Previously, I found that the deck couldn't activly run TFK until I up'ed the mana count (the damage of Strip effects was too great) and the additional lands ensure that I have the blue mana avaible to activate Artifiacer's Intuition.

Daze is an amazing card for punching througha key spell (Mask or Intuition). I'm going to try to figure out some way to fit them in as well.

I HIGHLY suggest fooling around with Artificer's Intuition. It's incredibly good in this deck and the ability to search out a couple of Silver Bullets is too good to not utilize. It ensures that a Goblin Welder isn't almost an auto loss. It means I have more game against CS and Gifts Game 1 too. Hell you can even try to play a Chalice if you are worried about Storm Combo. My main problem so far is that I'm not playing enough Pithing Needles. These cards buy a lot of time which this deck can easily abuse as you know. 2 turns is a lot as you know.

I origioinally played Mystical, but I ended up cutting it. It may or may not have been a bad idea, however it seemed to create a suicidal game plan where I had to be sure it would resolve otherwise it was a game loss.

As before I really appreciate the comments. I thought of testing out Slight of hand and Opt when I was looking for relevant draw spells, but I didn't persue them because Sensei's Divining Top does essentially the same thing.

I would like to know what mana sources you would cut though. Of course my current version has a higher opperating cost/mana curve so I'm not overly sure how good it would be. I'm kinda partial to my mana base as is, with the exception to maybe cutting a single Seat for another Pithing Needle.

Thanks I really appreciate the comments.

Currently I'm in a stage of testing the deck as Mono-U, and it's looking like this:


Lands:
1 Academy
8 Island
4 Delta/Strand
4 Seat of the Synod

Artifacts:
5 Moxen
1 Lotus
1 Petal
1 Crypt
1 Sol Ring
1 Vault
4 Mask
1 Top
1 Pithing Needle
1 Tormod's Crypt

Creatures:
1 Darksteel Colossus
4 Dreadnought

Sorcery's:
1 Time Walk
1 Tinker

Instants:
4 Brainstorm
4 Drain
4 Force
4 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Rebuild
1 Ancestral Recall

Enchantments:
3 Artificer's Intuition

Most of my testing has been against Stax, the mono-R Vroman variety, but today I was testing against a version of the 5cc Dragon deck form Gencon and between the Pithing Needle and Crypt MD, It went around 65-70% in my favor. Essentially, if I resolved Artificer's Intuition I won.

Also the Crypt and Needle also came handy in my Stax Match-up.

I like the idea of a transformational Sideboard, however, I think that doing so could seriously hurt mana base by adding addition colours and thus making my Stax Match-up so much more difficult. As a matter of fact, when I was playing Black in the deck, I thought of a transformational board into some crazy Tendrils based Kill, setting up a will turn by dumping Moxen, then going off for the win.

With the exception of Null Rod, The deck shouldn't have much trouble against the random decks which play Null Rod. 12/12's make Fish cry.

I guess as far as Null Rod goes, I'm playing 1 MD Rebuild, 1 Board and 2 Echoing Truth.

Here;s a question: Is anyone else COMPLETELY unsatisfied with Engineered Explosives?

The deck isn't fully refined and that was the purpose of my thread: to get some opinons and see if it's possible to refine the deck to a point where it's competive.

When I considered running some MD anwsers to randomness, I thought it would dilute the deck too much. However, I'm starting to question my own logic. Maybe these could be fit into the deck:

2 Pithing Needle
1 Aether Spellbomb
1 Tormod's Crypt

I thought of playing the deck with Gifts Ungiven, but it would require the retooling of the mana base and I simply had no idea what to cut for it.

@ Moxlotus: I understand your opinion, and I think I can better explain the deck by saying this:

This issue of the draw engine being useless can be handled by saying that the deck doesn't necessarily rely on it. It uses Intuition and Top and various shuffle effects to filter your draws. Finding the peices. The Geyser is meant to supplement the filtering. I could potentially see see making these changes:

-2 Geyser
-4 Intuition

+2 Top
+4 Impulse

The problem is that cutting the Intutions restricts the tutoring power of the deck overall.

I thoguth of Mis'd but they are too conditional.

@Revvik: I dislike Scrying cause it has 2 conditions upon it's casting.

First I'd like to point out that CS is incapable of winning the game by turn 3.

Can CS win the game on turn 3?

With regards to your comment on on card drawing:

The purpose of card drawing is to create card advantage which in turn will result in a continuation of a deck's overall game plan, IE: generation of positive tempo or negate your opponent's tempo. That being said, if a deck can complete it's game plan with minimal card advantage gained (I'm not referring to virtual advantage, involving the determining of particular cards in an opponent's deck to become useless) relying as much on tempo as card advantage (be it virtual or traditional), then  it is stupidity to question the strict number of cards spent in the process. A good example of this could be the Sligh decks of x years ago.

Now I'm not suggesting this is the same style deck, however I will suggest that not in all cases should card advantage be considered to be the equivalent to a win which is what you seem to be suggesting.

Second you are questioning the stability of things such as the mana base and a lack of "utility artifact". Firstly I'd like to question the necessity of said utilities. Isn't a mask a utility artifact against Gifts? Slipping under a counter-wall and placing the pressure on the opponent to win? This means it's then the opponent's "utility artifacts" which are needed not your own.

As for mana base concerns: yes there are lands which can be eaten by monkey, and there are fewer lands in the deck. However you are examining this deck in comparison to an archtype which it isn't. This isn't designed to be a traditional control deck. It's designed to maintain control elements, providing that as a means of furthering it's plan to be a aggro deck. Both as prevention of problems, stopping the deck from losing, and , in the case of Mana Drain, a mana accellerant.

I think you should examine a decks role in a match-up, be it aggressive or controlling, before you even shuffle the deck. I've seen too many players make this mistake in all formats. Once this is determined, it is that which it can be decided if the deck can be successful in that role.

Upon seeing policehq's list and report, I decided to take a stab at my own version of the deck. I've been playing MDG for the last month or so, and I thought attacking would be fun.

My second reason for building the deck is it's success against a random field, and the fact that Dreadnought is bigger then Colossus. Where I'm from, Tinker>Fatty is more common then "Slaver you"... weird hey?

Upon first viewing, I thought that the deck is inherently weak to any disruption to it's mana base, whether it be strip effects or Null Rod. Second, Thoughtcast is a problem when the Tier 1 decks love their Mana Drain. It may only cost U to you, but... yeah 5 mana is super.

Firstly here is policehq's list:

// Lands
4  Seat of the Synod
1  Tolarian Academy
4  Underground Sea
2  Vault of Whispers

// Creatures
1  Darksteel Colossus
3  Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
4  Phyrexian Dreadnought

// Spells
1  Black Lotus
1  Chrome Mox
1  Lotus Petal
1  Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1  Mox Emerald
1  Mox Jet
1  Mox Pearl
1  Mox Ruby
1  Mox Sapphire
1  Sol Ring
1  Engineered Explosives
1 Ancestral Recall
4  Artificer's Intuition
1  Demonic Tutor
1  Mystical Tutor
4  Thoughtcast
1  Time Walk
1  Tinker
1  Vampiric Tutor
3  Duress
4  Force of Will
1  Misdirection
4 Illusionary Mask
3  Sensei's Divining Top

// Sideboard
SB: 1  Engineered Explosives
SB: 4  Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 2  Echoing Truth
SB: 3  Chains of Mephistopheles
SB: 2  Chill
SB: 3  Chalice of the Void

This is obviously an aggro/combo deck with moderate disruption elements. (Sorry if this is mundane, but this is my first deck discussion so I'm trying to be thorough). However while I was testing, I found that the disruption wasn't enough in my Gift variant match-ups and their game plan could easily supersede my own. Second, Stax was a horrible match-up. I mostly tested against Vroman UbaStax, and between the Null Rods, Chalices, Strips, and even Duplicants... well I had some bad times.

I found that the deck had a tendency to want to twiddle it's thumbs with Divining Top, and Top is amazing in the deck,  but I found it did little to apply enough early pressure against the control deck [Note: this disregards random broken draws] and second, it wasn't versatile/defensive enough to hold against Stax.

So I took it upon myself to attempt to build a version, and I'd welcome criticism from the community. So onto the list:

Under a Mask of Control:

Lands:
1 Academy
2 Sea
5 Island
4 Delta/Strand
4 Seat of the Synod

Artifacts:
5 Moxen
1 Lotus
1 Petal
1 Crypt
1 Sol Ring
1 Vault
4 Mask
1 Top

Creatures:
1 Darksteel Colossus
4 Dreadnought

Sorcery's:
1 Time Walk
1 Tinker
2 Braingeyser
1 Will
1 Demonic Tutor

Instants:
4 Brainstorm
4 Drain
4 Force
1 Rebuild
1 Recall

Enchantments:
4 Artificer's Intuition

The main difference between this build and most I've seen around the internet is the presence of Mana Drain. While I am slightly biased, having bought my drains recently, it made sense to me to play them in a deck where your win condition/kombo are a pair of artifacts. Mana Drain also provides an excellent defense against Stax and can help you to force through threats against Gifts.

Next we have the fact that this deck is mostly a Mono-U deck with a Demonic Tutor and a Yawgmoth's Will. This allowed the deck to become more control focused and strenghtened it's mana base, providing a large number of basic Island. The Demonic and Will are there to abuse the interactions of the deck. Demonic for obvious reasons, but Will provides recursion for dumped moxen to the GY.

Now for the real "WTF?!?!?!" of the deck: "OMFG!?!?! He's playing Braingeyser!?!?!" Yup. This deck is a control deck, which loves it's Drain Mana. I've found that Geyser makes the best use of it's time, and also provided the best Drain sink. While Stroke and Scrying both are instants, I'd still end up playing them mostly on my own turn, or simply whittling away the mana with Top, using up :U: to get fresh shuffle effects. It's a Dangerous card though, and must be carefully played in certain match-ups, but it's been the best to me, taking up minimal spaces and still drawing lots of cards when needed.

Essentially this deck is a concept: "Why Can't Drain work in Masknought?" as it's defining principle. I feel like the deck can be inherently strong enough against Fish and other Aggro variants that I have left them unmentioned. Also as boards are mostly metagame calls, I've left it undiscussed. However, were I to play this deck tomorrow, I'd board something like this, or within a couple of cards:

x1 Rebuild
x2 Hurkel's Recall
x3 BEB
x3 Echoing Truth
x2 Tormod's Crypt
x1 Phyrexian Furnace
x1 Aether Spellbomb
x2 Cursed Totem

Well I hope I can get some discussion going. Thanks to policehq for giving me my idea and comming up with some great ones to jump start these. I hope also that comments will be kept within the boundaries of nicety. Thanks

Joe Hurley
"Wolven"
cujoeAThomailDOTcom

St. John's, NL, Canada

I've been doing a little testing of this deck and it seems as though the deck could really abuse a Yawg's Will. Considering the washing of moxen and other mana accellerants, it could provide some rather busted Will turns.

Also is a question of whether this deck could support a Tendrils as a third win condition.

Thoughts?

Just as an asided, and I hope this isn't a hi-jax of any means, but what is people's opinons on Diving Top and Tainted Pact?

I'd just like to mention something that a lot of people don't seem to meantion nearly enough...

Pithing Needle can name LANDS.

This has been a public service announcement.

Now that thats out of the way, I'd like to mention the ability to shut down Fetchs, Strip-effects, Bazzar, Library... etc. I think this will be the definingg role of Needle. There has been cards to hose activated abilities of creatures and artifacts before, however Pithing Needle shines in its ability to hose land. The added versitility is simply a bonus.