I've so far been impressed with the number of things that don't adequately deal with an opposing monastery mentor. One-for-one spot removal doesn't really work.  Dread of Night seems too narrow.  I've even landed chalice@1 and had my opponent throw 5 spells into the chalice just for mentor triggers.  I mean, spells don't even have to resolve. I think basically, there's a small list of things that stop the mentor at <= 4 mana, and most of them are board wipes.


Option 1: Stop the Mentor.

They can be cast turn 1, and they can be cast off cavern of souls.  So I'd like to focus on answers that a) are 4 or less CMC, and b) aren't counterspells.

1. Toxic Deluge.  It's CMC 3.  Although you may have to pay several extra life, it seems like 5 would pretty much assure it wipes the board.
2. Supreme Verdict.  CMC 4.  Although there are many board wipes for 4-mana, I think this is probably the most playable since its uncounterable, although the casting cost is hard to accelerate into. But, wait for it, ...it pitches to force.
3. Moat. CMC 4.  Probably better than Humilty and The Abyss and friends, in some ways worse than just a wrath; in some ways better?
4. I know I'm missing something...

Narrow Answers: eg, sudden shock, dread of night, virtue's ruin, glissa the traitor, IDK what, but I'm not sure how many of these could have additional value in the format.

Expensive Answers: Elesh Norn seems like the best one of these, but at this mana cost there's probably at least a few things that stop an ever-expanding army of prowess dudes.  But outside of archetypes like Oath, I'm not sure if these are super relevant.  Pernicious Deed is interesting since it splits the 6 mana up across two turns; but still seems slow.  Also, I'd love to see a kicked Molten Disaster resolve in vintage at some point, but thats 2RRR, which again seems slow.  Maybe miracles?  Terminus and Bonfire do it cheap if you can miracle them; but Miracles doesn't work so well in vintage because mystical tutor and brainstorm are restricted.


Option 2: Race the Mentor.

Mentor kills in 2 or 3 turns, and realistically is only likely to come down on turn 2, with turn 1 being pretty rare.  So any other combo deck that reliably wins on turn 3 should be a safe option against a mentor deck.  This includes stuff like: oath, doomsday, storm, some gifts decks.  I can't really imagine some kind of creature strategy that could race Mentor, and planeswalkers are useless.  Tinker->Robot doesn't seem effective if the opponent has a free and growing bunch of blockers; but maybe blightsteel races Mentor ok?  Still, tinker is restricted.


Option 3: If you can't beat them, join them.

We could all just play 4 mentors, and then each match would be decided by who resolved the first mentor!   I hope this is where the meta game is going!


Help me out here...  How do I stop this guy?


A complete list:

Spot removal (1-for-1)
abrupt decay
sudden shock
lightning bolt
swords to plowshares
dead weight
deathmark

Sweepers
balance
toxic deluge
pyroclasm
supreme verdict
terminus
massacre
virtue's ruin
massacre wurm
elesh norn
devastation tide
starstorm
nevinyrral's disk
aether flash
sulfur elemental

Speed Bumps
Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
ghostly prison
propaganda
moat
peacekeeper
silent arbiter
orim's chant
angel's grace
fog
sphinx of the steel wind
illness in the ranks
dread of night
leyline of singularity
wing shards
echoing truth
engineered explosives

Pro-Active Answers
meddling mage
surgical extraction / extirpate

Lol, I didn't realize compulsive research targets.  That certainly helps the case for that; but is it better than gifts? thirst?  fact or fiction?  It is the right spot on the curve and "an extra land in hand" is this deck's middle name.  But, still, tapping out mainphase for this seems like a weak play.

Yeah.  I mostly land Chalice@1 and (it almost always just resolves) then watch my opponents discard swords to plowshares and pitch missteps to forces.  I just run ancestral, sol ring, and voltaic key so the opposing missteps are pretty dead; but on the other hand, I basically never get to resolve ancestral.  It seems like Chalice@1 typically ranges from "somewhat annoying" to "significant impediment" for my opponents; but it rarely just locks people out unless they're on Delver.  The decks that are seriously impeded by Chalice@1 usually deal with it eventually with disenchant, hurkyls, abrupt decay, ancient grudge, etc.  Although, if I know that's their plan it's sort of amusing to also play Chalice@2; but if I'm in a position to do that, its usually a win-more play, where basically any threat would be decisive.

I really do like to see all the dead opposing missteps.  That's pretty awesome.  Also, when my shops opponent does chalice@1 on the play against me; that makes me smile.  OTOH, its rough to build the deck around 2+ and 3+ CMC spells; particularly the lack of filtering.  Its possible a bunch of Impulse would be really good.

Eh, don't you run enough counters to protect it?  IMO that's a reasonable line of thinking.  Don't go for it (and expect it to win) w/o a misstep or misdirection.

I think its really chalice of the void that's well-positioned in the VSL metagame.  Chalice@1 kills most of the decks; Belcher loses to Chalice@1 and additionally Chalice@0. 

It's kind of a corollary to the "Play 1000 missteps" argument.  When its appropriate to play a deck full of missteps, another option is to next-level the meta and play Chalice@1.

Six people braved the snow and crappy transit service!  Clark took it home with... I'm gonna call it Grixis Control.  Several new people there, too.  I think if this snow clears up sometime, we'll have 15-20 people.

Thats a fascinating perspective, ChubbyRain.  Thanks for the testing!

I basically agree that there's another way to go within this framework, which is to drop Show and Tell for Mana Drain.  I'd suggest something like:

-3 show and tell, -2 ancient tomb  --> +4 mana drain, +1 fetch

Which basically gives the more-controlling version, similar to your list.  And, further, if you drop the ancient tombs, then I think you probably drop some chalices since the plan probably revolves less around a turn-1 chalice@1.  But then if you're giving up on chalice, you might want some number of missteps.  In this case, I'd broadly suggest:

-3 show and tell --> +3 mana drain
-2 ancient tomb --> +1 fetch, +1 trinket mage
-3 chalice of the void --> +2 missteps, +1 sensei's top
(leaving 1 chalice maindeck)

that also frees up the arcane denial slot for something (tinker bot, or additional trinket mage artifact; EE maybe) and the lim-dul's vault can go back to a vampiric tutor.

I think that's basically the other major way to develop this archetype.  It's a way that probably has less game against traditional delver lists, but probably more against, say, Oath.

I also briefly considered impulse; It's interesting you found it good!  that's pretty cool, I dunno if impulse has been played much lately -- obviously its good in a mana drain list where the goal is to have UU open during the opponent's turn for drain; but then EOT impulse is good if they don't play something you need to counter.

Also I'm tempted by the white version; I had initially tried that, because I wanted to be able to hard-cast sphinx of the steel wind and elesh norn if I really had to.  But, I had trouble with shops w/o ingot chewer and my god, I can't drop Dack Fayden.  That guy is just so good.  Although, I suppose, Jace is a decent replacement if you can't splash red for Dack.    I will say containment priest is a pretty tempting sideboard option.

Wusses.

I'll be there. Snowmageddon don't stop Vintage in Boston three times!

I'll run it if Craig can't make it.

@Rickster:  Thanks for the testing report!  What matchups did you play against?  I'd love to hear more about your experiences with the deck.

I've come to more or less the same conclusion re: dig through time.  I think Gifts is better, as Xouman pointed out.  As the meta moves further away from a 50%-60% delver domination, there might be some adjustments required.  So far, I'm liking:

-1 arcane denial, -1 dig through time;  +2 gifts ungiven

Gifts is stronger draw/value and it can lead to to setting up the various combos (S&T + Sphinx, cavern + thief, vault + key).

-1 sensei's divining top;  +1 lim-dul's vault

Rich Shay made this suggestion; the lim-dul's vault is a pretty good replacement for vampiric tutor that doesn't die to chalice@1.  lim-dul's vault usually costs 2 or 3 life, anyway.

-1 sphinx of the steel wind;  +1 timetwister

the tinker->bot play has only been good against RUG delver; I think the tinker bot is fine in the sideboard, or perhaps left out altogether if the meta moves toward monastery mentor decks.  Timetwister, as Serracollector pointed out, is a real combo-piece here.  Your opponent cannot let it resolve if you have sphinx/thief.  Plus, its good early-game in this deck with all the fast mana, like it is in traditional storm.  AND, it's fine mid-game if you're stalled out, since your chalice@1 and chalice@0 prevent your opponent from going nuts with the fresh 7 you give them.

-1 echoing truth;  +1 chalice of the void

I think going all in on the chalice of the void plan is the right idea.  I thought about leaving that strategy; but its just too strong against too many decks.  Echoing Truth seems to be at its best vs. Oath, but, I can't quite figure out how to win that matchup yet, anyway.

-1 underground sea; +1 basic island

I think this is correct; it provides 3 basics post-board to fetch up vs. shops.


Gifts so far has been really strong (also that's one reason to leave in the singleton arcane denial and dig through time as gifts targets).  Usually just piles like (demonic, time walk, sphinx, force of will) or similar is enough.  Other times you can work out a pile of tutors that let you assemble vault-key or twister-sphinx, which end the game.  Tinker has been ok without the robot; it leads to plays like: tinker away the Chalice@1 to get the vault and then play the key from hand.  Similar plays like tinker away the chalice@0 to find lotus and play yawgwill are also strong.  And Timetwister has basically just been fantastic.

EDIT: also, Rickster, to your earlier suggestion, Thirst is really strong in this list.  I've tested it before, but not specifically as a DTT replacement.  I think, however, switching the one last DTT for a Thirst is probably correct, which should give the deck better early plays at the cost of slightly weaker later plays.  The deck is already bonkers strong late-game.

Snowmageddon is all fun and games until my vintage event gets cancelled. 

Re: Oath.

While oathing into Consecrated Sphinx is a decent idea, I think oathing into griselbrand is a better idea.  But maybe I should outline the differences I see between this deck and Oath decks.  Basically, in the Sphinx deck, 1) you can cast your big fatties.  Hard-casting Sphinx (sometimes off cavern!) is totally do-able, thanks to a couple tombs and the trinket mage -> lotus play.  2) you can run Trinket Mage and the trinkets in the deck; which you can't do in an Oath deck, because you can't run any other creatures apart from your oath targets.  3) Chalice of the Void is good in this deck @1; but in Oath you probably need to run a number of 1-CMC cantrips in order to assemble orchard-oath.

Oath decks are a tough match-up for the Sphinx deck, I've found.  I think, basically, Oath is trying to do more broken things than Sphinx is.

Sphinx Tribal is really good against decks trying to play fair, because those fair decks try to stop broken decks with CMC=1 spells.  Sphinx is also good against anything else that dies to chalice of the void and tries to outdraw you, which include a lot of combo decks (and, likely, many new gifts-based builds).  Sphinx is also good against control decks that can't stop an uncounterable consecrated sphinx.

+1.

Makes the deck look very good, and also fun to play.  Also the video makes Steve seem approachable and reasonable.  Imagine that!   

Oops.  That's right.  What card am I thinking of?  I must be confused.

There's no target opponent to choose 2 of the 4 cards, so all 4 go into the graveyard.  Which is pretty close, yeah.

Well, my goodness.  Thank you, I'm glad you like the deck.

Also, thanks to MrFoote for the support earlier, too.

Re: Draw 7's: I don't know if these are win-more or not.  I sort of think they are.  I hardly ever have trouble closing out a game after a sphinx is in play - although sometimes the sphinx is too little, too late, which can happen against faster aggro decks (like, of course, delver).  I'm not convinced the draw 7's fix that.  But maybe they do?

Re: WhiteLotus: 4 mana drains and 4 trinket mages... that sounds like mono blue control.  I've played that, at any rate.  This deck is a little different; instead of just using counterspells as answers to stuff, it also uses chalice of the void, dack fayden, and echoing truth.  And if that stuff doesn't work, I do like having the vault-key plan to fall back on.

Re: Dangerlinto: Yeah, its possible my win rate with this deck will decrease as people get better at playing against it.  But, getting to six mana to cast a sphinx isn't real hard here.  I usually have six mana by turn 4, w/o using a trinket mage for lotus.  It's true sometimes that's too late, but if you're trading blows through the first three turns, the sphinx sometimes just resolves on 4 and takes it home.  Also, it turns out people use a lot of conditional counterspells that don't hit creatures, so against a lot of lists all you have to worry about is force of will.

Re: Elesh Norn:  Yeah, this or massacre wurm is really needed against delver/pyromancer.  If your whole meta is pyromancer decks, you can main-deck this guy.  And maybe stick another in the board.

Re: vs White Hatebears: It's possible that's a tough matchup, but as near as I can tell those decks have been pushed out by delver lists.  Although, I can tell you that spirit of the labyrinth isn't that great, since you can still draw 1 card off sphinx during your opponent's draw step.  So instead of drawing 3x the cards, you're only drawing 2x the cards your opponent is.  That deck tends to have such weak plays the 2x card advantage is more than enough.  Weak plays meaning, you know, bears.

Thanks much. 

Re: Show and Tell.  Really, and I swear it to be true, not much beats Consecrated Sphinx.  Against an unknown opponent jamming Show and Tell turn 1 for C.Sphinx is absolutely the right play.  A more subtle benefit of S&T in this list is it's mana cost, at 2U, which is just exactly what this deck is accelerating to.  It'd be unusual if you didn't have 2U on turn 2.  But, on the other hand, it's hard to have UU on turn 2.

Re: Arcane Denial.  Its nice to see some people support this card choice right away.  Dangerlinto is right: it is cute, maybe too cute. Xouman is maybe overstating the case for it here, tho: there's not enough cheap things you play uncounterably off cavern to make that line realistic.  OTOH, countering your own stuff to cycle it is fine.  TheWhiteDragon is right that the opponent's draw trigger is a "may" so they probably choose not to draw if you have sphinx/thief.  Which is a huge win, cause you still draw 1.

Dangerlinto: this isn't so much an incremental card advantage deck, as a haymaker deck that has a few huge bombs it'd like to resolve - at pretty much any cost - and then ride those bombs to victory.  I mean, once consecrated sphinx hits play, it doesn't require careful play, baiting, and spell sequencing to attain a card quantity advantage - sphinx just gives it to you.  Arcane denial is basically fine in haymaker-vs-haymaker decks that have a few powerful bombs they want to resolve (yawgwill, tinker, etc); it becomes problematic if you're using it to slow down an opponent by countering stuff that provides an incremental advantage.  That basically doesn't work.

That said, I value your input on Arcane Denial as someone who's played it seriously previously.  I think here the combination of circumstances make it better than it's ever been before, but it might still not be enough.  There's 1) the mana base that doesn't support uu, 2) the sphinx/thief plan that makes it a bonus later, 3) the haymaker deck style, 4) cycling an extra mox or similar to dig deeper into a deck that needs extra digging, 5) cycling your own stuff that is either dead to chalice@1 or uncounterable due to cavern on human.  I mean, if arcane denial is going to work in any deck, this is it.

Re: Dig Through Time:  I haven't thought about cutting this; it's very strong.  Just not super early in the game.  It's probably a turn 4 play, mostly.

Rich: thanks.  

re: Enderfall:  Yeah, arcane denial is kind of a flex spot at present.  It's good if you have sphinx in play (you draw 5, they draw 2) or notion thief.  One option is to run misdirections instead, which help resolve an early show and tell.  But I was finding that misdirection is too limited and that I needed more hard counters after sphinx was in play.  Also, if you can stick chalice@1 then a lot of what you'd commonly misdirect gets countered (ancestral, lightning bolt, etc).  I haven't tried mana leak here, although I have previously found mana leak to be...  not good.  I've previously used arcane denial and it's ok in the same way force of will is ok: if you REALLY need to counter something then 2-for-1'ing yourself is perfectly fine.  Also its best if you're facing a deck vs which you have a lot of virtual card advantage via their dead spells: like a deck with 12-20 one-drops, and you have Chalice@1; or a deck with maybe 2 possible outs to consecrated sphinx, one of which you're countering with arcane denial. Arcane denial has some side benefits, too, like countering your own stuff to draw 3; which in this deck can be done with chalice@1 for extra value.  (eg: chalice@1 in play, cast sensei's top, stack chalice trigger, hold priority, cast arcane denial targeting sensei's top, draw 3 on next turn.) This kind of play helps dig and filter through the deck, which as I mentioned, lack of filtering is one weakness. Late game, tho, with sphinx or thief in play, arcane denial becomes all upside.

re: Enderfall:  I've also played a lot of mono-blue control.  I kept wondering why I only had 2 sphinx in that list!

re: fsecco: Griselbrand vs. Consecrated Sphinx can go either way.  As ErtaiAdept said, you out draw them for 2 turns while you eat damage, and try to draw into one of your outs: echoing truth; vault-key; or a 2nd consecrated sphinx.  It's not ideal, but it's actually better than most decks vs. oath game 1.  Your gameplan doesn't automatically lose to their gameplan; Griselbrand doesn't automatically trump your deck.  But, you know, I usually side out show and tell vs. oath.

re: msg67183: it is strong.  

re: MTGFan: Yeah, chalice is awesome!  I like that there's multiple ways to use chalice in blue. Your deck is another way to go, for sure.  My feeling here is this; and this is important: Do Broken Things.  That's what I want this deck to do.  Play vault-key.  Tutor for lotus every game.  Cast huge yawgmoth wills.  Tinker for robots.  Show-and-Tell in unbeatable fatties.  This.  Is.  VINTAGE.

re: MTGFan: energy flux: Yeah, if you're mono blue this is pretty strong.  But if you're in red you get Dack and ingot chewer, which is too strong for me to resist.

re: H: Yeah, I thought about Prognostic Sphinx.  I also thought about Sharuum the Hegemon.  I think a 4th consecrated sphinx is probably better than either.  But if you try it out, let me know.

Sphinx Tribal.

Are you tired of delver decks?  Me too.  Go play this deck online and crush delver, and pretty much everything else, too.

This list started out as a way to combat delver by leveraging a series of interlocking synergies that delver lists generally have no answers for.  It turns out, most decks have few answers for these strategies.

List:

3 chalice of the void
3 trinket mage
3 show and tell
1 notion thief
3 consecrated sphinx
1 sphinx of the steel wind

4 force of will
2 arcane denial
2 flusterstorm

2 dig through time
2 dack fayden

1 echoing truth
1 tinker
1 demonic tutor
1 ancestral recall
1 time walk
1 yawgmoth's will
1 time vault
1 voltaic key
1 sensei's divining top

2 ancient tomb
2 cavern of souls

1 tolarian academy
1 library of alexandria
3 underground sea
2 volcanic island
4 scalding tarn
1 polluted delta
1 island

5 moxes
1 black lotus
1 sol ring
1 mana crypt


Core synergies:

Chalice of the Void.  Play this on 1.  This list has very few 1 CMC cards.  And also, very few 2 CMC cards so chalice@2 is also a real possibility.  Chalice is an extremely powerful card, and one that blue decks can leverage if they want to.

Trinket Mage.  He can find Chalice of the Void.  Plus black lotus.  Mostly he's used as a mana accelerator in this list.  Usually you want to find lotus, and use that to power out one of the larger threats.  

Ancient Tomb.  This lets you play turn-1 chalice@1 more often, also it speeds up the turn you can play three-mana threats by 1, and frequently the six-mana threats, too.  Also, insane against shops; gives you an out to a lot of "unbeatable" hands they might have.

Consecrated Sphinx.  I've realized that this is one of the most powerful cards you can have in play.  And it only costs 6.  This deck aims to play it with lotus by turn 3.  Sphinx basically invalidates all your opponent's attempts to out card-advantage you.  There's really a pretty small list of stuff Sphinx loses to.  Also note that most removal that hits sphinx has CMC=1 (REB, swords), so Chalice@1 with sphinx in play is usually game.

Show and Tell.  This also lets you get Sphinx out quick.  There's almost nothing that trumps Sphinx that is normally played (griselbrand is sort of a wash, blightsteel can be awkward), so Show and Tell into consecrated sphinx is pretty much always safe.  (Jace is one card that's annoying vs. sphinx, but Jace can't be put into play off Show and Tell).  Although, I still side them out against oath.  Also this lets the deck run a fatty utility package, or at least Elesh Norn in the sideboard, and then use S'n'T (or trinket->lotus) to cast them.

Cavern of Souls.  This basically always names "sphinx."  I only name "human" when I'm trying to stick a notion thief.  Consecrated Sphinx off cavern is usually game over.  With a mox and an ancient tomb this can happen turn 4 pretty easily, which is soon enough in some matches.

Notion Thief.  Any deck with a cavern of souls in it should also have a notion thief.  Stealing card draw wins a lot of matchups.  Note also that this guy is protected by chalice@1 (no REB, no lightning bolt, no swords to plowshares).

Dack Fayden.  In some sense this is a combo deck; so the card filtering with Dack is critical.  Dack lets you assemble the pieces you want in the right order; discarding stuff that is no longer as valuable like extra chalices or cards with CMC=1.  Also Dack is a great combo with both Notion Thief and Consecrated Sphinx (target your opponent).  Plus it protects you against tinker bots, shops golems, and stoneforge mystic equipments.  Jace is a possibility, too, but I think that's one too many threats with CMC >= 4.  Filtering at CMC=3 is really required.

Force/Misdirection/Arcane Denial/Flusterstorm.  All these counterspells dodge Chalice@1.  (Flusterstorm's storm trigger still resolves through chalice).  Misdirection is better in some metas (those with abrupt decay); Arcane Denial is perhaps one of the next-best counterspells here that doesn't have CMC=1 and doesn't have double blue in the cost, which is difficult to support with this mana base.  It's actually after Consecrated Sphinx is in play that I frequently need another hard counters, so Arcane Denial is perfect for that scenario.  If mana drain were a realistic possibility with this manabase, I'd use that.

Sphinx of the Steel Wind.  This isn't Sphinx Tribal for nothing!  Sphinx is the hardest bot for delver to deal with.  Also the lifelink is frequently helpful after all the ancient tombs.

Vault/Key.  We're playing tutors and tinker already, so vault/key is a great win-con.  Note that many delver lists are very light on artifact destruction.

Echoing Truth.  This is a good answer to a lot of things.  Griselbrand, stony silence, grafdigger's cage, omniscience, oath of druids, pyromancer tokens, jace, batterskull, etc, etc.  It's not the absolute best against pyromancer, but it does delay pyromancer a few turns, which lets this deck win with a Sphinx.  

Dig Through Time.  We're playing blue combo-control.  This card is great.


Playing the deck:

Try to stick Chalice@1.  We have literally four cards that have CMC=1.  This is a huge win against basically everything.  Don't stick Chalice=0 unless you really know what you're doing - that said, if you run into traditional storm that's a strong play.  Then try to get a sphinx in play.  Or combo with vault-key (sometimes Show and Tell is required to get voltaic key past chalice@1).  Don't worry if you get behind, Consecrated Sphinx can get you back in the game like nothing else.  Don't be afraid to cast Chalice@2 if you're playing against something with snapcasters and mana drains.

Ideal line:
Turn 1: chalice@1.
Turn 2: trinket mage -> lotus.
Turn 3: cavern names Sphinx.  Cast uncounterable consecrated sphinx.

The deck is basically very strong if it's executing its game plan.  The deck's biggest weakness is just drawing nothing for a while.  The high CMC threats require a high mana count; the Chalices make it hard to run fixing and deck manipulation.  This means sometimes the deck sort of stalls out.  But, eventually landing a sphinx really gets you back in the game in a hurry.


Some Omissions and Considerations:

4th Chalice.  It's important to have one, but probably not two of these, in your hand or in play.  So 3 has been pretty good.  If you play Chalice@1 on turn 1 and it gets forced, that's frequently good enough.  Use the next turn to cast a 3-mana threat, which is now much more likely to resolve.  Playing another chalice@1 and delaying the 3-mana threat is probably worse.

4th Trinket Mage.  He's not actually at his best here, since a lot of what you'd tutor up with him is countered by Chalice; also getting Engineered Explosives for zero removes the chalices.  Mostly he's the blue ritual that gets lotus, so the value of the next trinket mage goes down.

4th Consecrated Sphinx.  God, it's tempting.

Vampiric Tutor.  It's CMC=1.  But maybe worth running anyway.

Thirst for Knowledge.  I cut it for Dack Fayden, which I think is probably right.  The synergy Dack has with sphinx and thief is just insane.

Misdirection.  It's another free counterspell, which could be used in place of arcane denial.  Doesn't hit anything in the shops match, which is one (big) reason I cut them.

Vault/Key.  It's too bad that voltaic key gets stopped by chalice@1.  But I think its still necessary to have this kind of combo win in a lot of matchups.  Still, it's a (little) bit tempting to cut them.

Warning: Don't cut the ancient tombs.  Those are really necessary.  Otherwise this deck isn't likely to have early plays.  Every threat here is CMC >= 3.


Sideboard:

1 notion thief
1 elesh norn
1 trinisphere
1 echoing truth
1 grafdigger's cage
3 ingot chewer
1 pithing needle
2 tormod's crypt
2 hurkyl's recall
1 yixlid jailer
1 mountain

Trinisphere is a key tactic against delver and combo, and part of the reason tinker is so necessary.  Elesh Norn is game over against creature lists, and Dredge.  I had been runing Massacre Wurm, but that won't beat Monastery Mentor.  Notion thief is strong against any kind of blue control list, and can come in for the basic island.  Echoing truth I'm finding I want 2 of against anything with problematic permanents: oath, pyromancer decks, fish, shops, dredge.



As with most of my decks, this deck is a ton of fun to play.  Go forth and try it!  And beat delver!

Yeah, I dunno if using this on a flipped delver is the greatest thing ever.  From the mono-blue control perspective: usually you have a snapcaster or trinket mage out and can use that to block the 2/2 manifest and protect your jace - a 2/2 on the ground is a lot easier to deal with than a 3/2 flier.  Using it on a pyromancer seems better... plus then your EE on zero hits the manifest pyromancer replacement, the pyromancer tokens, and all the flipped delvers.

On the other hand, this would probably compete for (maindeck) space with repeal, which is by far my favorite thing to do to a flipped delver; but probably does find a spot in the sideboard alongside the propagandas. 

But, man, this thing hits griselbrand and blightsteel and pyromancer and damn near everything.  Maybe a good comparison is Echoing Truth?

yup!  People are there earlier for some testing and EDH, generally.

Really good way to get 3 or 4 rounds of tournament-quality vintage in against some great opponents.  Only 5 bucks!  (all entry fees get paid back out in prizes to the top 4).

I'd play this in mono-blue control.  It's better than paying 4 life for a dismember. 

MBC is probably a tier-2 deck right now; tho, thanks to a poor delver matchup.  Stellar workshop matchup, tho.

That's do-able.  But painter is ...  not the best deck.  I mean, the meta could shift and it could get better.  Still, blowing away all the land and mana artifacts using Ugin's -1, leaving you with just Ugin seems like a win.  Lol.  Maybe a better win con than grindstone in a painter build.

Wow.  This card is so much more powerful than young pyromancer, and for only 1 more mana. 

Bonkers.

Bah, there's no Doomsday in this top 8?  That's no fun. 

Oh wow.  I'd like to hear about how Keith won the match with Doomsday vs. Terra Nova On the Play.  That matchup seems horrendous.  Gosh darn shops players and their high standings and modified play-draw top-8 rule.

I made top 8 in a 30-man with this deck.  A couple changes, remarks:

I played
-1 repeal
-1 cage (still 1 in the SB)
-1 spell snare
-1 misstep
-1 mindbreak trap
+1 engineered explosives (+1 more in the SB)
+1 chalice of the void (+1 more in the SB)
+1 misdirection
+2 dig through time

Some games I won by just resolving Back to Basics.  Others I won with drain -> consecrated sphinx, or drain -> trinket mage -> lotus -> sphinx.

Biggest, bestest card was Chalice of the Void.  That is totally insane here.  I used Chalice at 0, 1, and 2 at different points.  I did chalice = 0 on the play against storm combo.  I did chalice at 1 against a grixis control list with preordains.  I did chalice at 2 against a UW deck with meddling mage, snapcaster, disenchant, and spirit of the labyrinth.  These were amazing blow-outs.  There's about six 1-cmc cards in this list and 4 2-cmc cards (mana drains), which means that I can play chalice at 1 against a lot of decks for huge value, chalice at 2 against any deck if I've already used a mana drain or two, and chalice at 0 whenever I don't want to get blown out by yawgmoth's will or tinker.  Your opponents are thinking "Chalice is annoying, sure, but I'll bring in ingot chewer against shops" - these players are NOT prepared to face chalice of the void from a list running 15 counterspells and no other relevant artifacts.

is enlightened tutor that much better than imperial seal?

Great report!  Was fun to read.  Seems like an awesome list.  I hope I don't lose to it in the finals of a big event.

Congrats on the finish.  Well-deserved.

Oh man, don't ever cut a Jace.  That's basically the only path to victory.  Dig Through Time is good because it gives you another way to FIND a Jace.

How has Dig Through Time been in this list?

I've been using it in the original list (by Miguel Angel Díaz - Mono Blue Control) as a 2-of and it seems pretty good.  Some observations from my experiences:

1) Utilizes the GY but isn't stopped by cage.
2) helps dig for the big threats (Jace, Trinket, Sphinx), which can be hard to find sometimes
3) also helps dig for sideboard cards post board.  This deck has no tutors.
4) great with the Sensei's Top plan - blows past junk on the top, finds juicy yum-yums underneath
5) not great early on, although 1 in the opener is ok cause....  it pitches to force. 
6) late-game it can be either win-more or too-little, too-late.
7) mid-game in a top-decking war, its awesome.
8) also, I never cast it for more than 2 mana.  Always for 2.

I think the closest comparison is Fact or Fiction.  It's probably better in this deck than Fact or Fiction is, cause there's no way to get stuff out of the GY. (I like Fact better in a deck with yawgwill & snapcaster).