White Lightning

[Bastian]

For those interested, here's the update on the classic WW deck. It's not that's as good as many other decks on the current environment, but it still gives some of them a good run for their money.

Beggining with the basis of the new White Lightning deck I decided to come up with a version of my own. After tweaking the original deck a little and testing it and tuning it here’s what I come up with:

White Lightning
14 Plains
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Pearl
3 Ancient Tomb
2 City of Traitors

2 Devout Witness
4 Ramosian Sergeant
4 Savannah Lions
4 Soltari Priest
4 Silver Knight
4 Whipcorder
3 Exalted Angel
1 Masticore

4 Land Tax
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Null Rod
1 Enlightened Tutor

SB:
3 Tormod’s Crypt
4 True Believer
4 Seal of Cleansing
3 Dust to Dust
1 Devout Witness

Unlike the original White Lightning, which packs the mana acceleration to use more expensive spells, I decided to keep the normal base of my monocolored WW and instead of wastes/strip I decided to use the tombs/city just to make the deck faster.

It doesn’t have as many expensive spells as its former incarnation has. Here are some of the card choices:

No Battle Screech simply because I will just be attacking with the birds a turn later:

With Exalted Angel:
Turn 1: plains
Turn 2: tomb, face down angel
Turn 3: plains, morph angel, attack

With Battle Screech I should just start attacking a turn later...

Turn 1: plains, lions
Turn 2: tomb
Turn 3 plains, screech, tap three white creatures, flashback screech
Turn 4: attack with bird tokens

Ramosian Sergeant and Whipcorder: in some games you go turn 1 plains and on turn 2 you have nothing else to play other than a city or a tomb. In these games you can go turn 1 sergeant and then, if you don’t have a plains to play turn 2, you can recruit a whipcorder. I’m not very fond of the onslaught soldier, but it has been game saving in a match vs psychatog, and that’s more than I can say about any of the creatures the deck packs, even the angel.

Masticore: the lonely masticore may end up being replaced by something else, but so far it’s there because it can make use of the mana acceleration and add to give more creature kill to the deck and another finisher.

Enlightened Tutor: some monowhite versions of WW pack it and some don’t. In this case I pack it mostly because it can search for the lonely Masticore.

The rest of the deck is self explanatory.

Sideboard choices:

Hulk
-4 Silver Knights
-2 Devout Witness
-1 Masticore
+3 Tormod’s Crypt
+4 True Believers

Stax
-4 Null Rod
-3 Exalted Angel
-1 Enlightened Tutor
+4 Seal of Cleansing
+3 Dust to Dust
+1 Devout Witness

Masque
-4 Land Tax
+1 Devout Witness
+3 Tormod’s Crypt

Sligh
No changes whatsoever

Suicide Black
-4 Silver Knight
+4 True Believer

Keeper
-4 Swords to Plowshares
-4 Silver Knight
+4 True Believer
+4 Seal of Cleansing

Straight white WW doesn't offer as much of a chance as a WW with a splash does, but that doesn't mean it can't be a good deck, and that it can't be improved and made better than already is.

EDIT: the deck idea (or at least its name...) should be credited to Carlos el Salvador, the member who presented the deck in the 1.5 forum and the Mike Glow, who introduced him to the deck.\n\n

[Bastian]

There were some typos there. I posted it and was making the review of my post when I noticed that the sligh match SB replacements weren't there and neither were those for the keeper match.\n\n

[Matt The Great]

Would Soltari Priest be better than Silver Knight? In the Hulk matchup at least, it's better than both Silver Knight AND True Believer. It is worse vs. Triskelion, though.

[Bastian]

Quote Would Soltari Priest be better than Silver Knight? In the Hulk matchup at least, it's better than both Silver Knight AND True Believer. It is worse vs. Triskelion, though.

You mean Soltari Monk, right? Because Soltari Priest is already there... In case you're talking about the monk, yes, it would be better than True Believer or the Silver Knight for that match, but since I face a lot of Sligh silver knight's a must maindeck and I'm not taking out True Believers.

[Ferrismonk]

It seems to me that you seem to sideboard in the true believers for a lot of your matchups, wouldn't they do better in the main?  I'm not sure what you would take out though...  I think the vast amount of main deck sligh hate is a good choice.  I played a WW at Gencon and was hosed by a sligh deck because they didn't need more than one land to operate.  It sucked.

-Travis-

[illuminati]

Since your basically taking my 1.5 list of white lighting, you might as well see the current one.

// White Lightning
// 1cc
4 Savannah Lions
4 Mother of Ruins
4 Action Javalenear
// 2cc
4 Crusade
3 Seal of Cleansing
// 4cc
4 Battle Screech
3 Masticore
3 Armageddon
3 Parallax Wave
// 6cc
4 Exhaulted Angel
// Land
4 City of Traitors
3 Ancient Tomb
17 Plains

// Sideboard
4 Honorable Passage
1 Seal of Cleansing
4 Tangle Wire
4 Humility
1 Parallax Wave
1 Armageddon

This version however isn't applicable to type 1 in its current form and not in your form either.  The thing is this is metagame purely at a more creature oriented format (1.5) than a control oriented format (t1).  If I were to run it in type 1, it would look something like this.

// White Lightning
// 1cc
4 Savannah Lions
4 Mother of Ruins
2 Ication Javalenear
4 Swords to Plowshares
// 2cc
4 Crusade
4 Null Rod
// 4cc
4 Battle Screech
2 Masticore
4 Armageddon
// 6cc
4 Exhaulted Angel
// Land
4 City of Traitors
2 Ancient Tomb
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Pearl
16 Plains

// Sideboard
4 Honorable Passage
3 True Believers
4 Tangle Wire
4 Dust to Dust

You also don't want to many WW casting cost spells in this deck since the mana base relay isn't designed to play it.  Also the rebel chain is not only slow but a waste of your mana.  The whole point of this deck is to make a turn 4 clock out of white wheenie.

Also you have 4 Honorable Passage / 4 Swords / 4 Wires / 4 Geddons verses tog to help prevent him from running you over as well as very fast development of speed such as Battle / Angel / Core or Lion w/ Crusade.

Mike\n\n

[Matt The Great]

They should just unerrata Waylay. That would be sweet.

[Bastian]

Ferrismonk: without any kind of creature pump (which I think it's useless since there aren't as many weenie aggro decks right now and the creatures you see in type 1 too big for crusade to make a difference) In most matchups I'd rather have the believers in the SB since they're easily killed and I'm not going to want them maindeck at all times, even if they improve my matchups vs one of the most difficult archetypes: combo.

Mike: First of all... besides using the same name (which I used for originality sake and because of the idea I took from your deck of using the 2 mana lands) doesn't mean that the deck is meant to work the same way.

WW is meant to be an aggro deck based on cheap efficient weenies and the versatility of white to deal with any kind of permanents. What you have is a deck that runs about 10 4cc spells (without counting the angels, which morph for four mana as well), while my deck runs about 4 finishers: masticore and three angels and uses the extra mana the land gives not to play more expensive spells but to improve the performance of the monowhite WW.

Thus the extra lands I pack are there to:

-keep a low land count for land tax
-cast devout witness, masticore, angel sooner on
-make use of the sergeant's recruiting ability and bring whipcorder sooner on

Have you ever faced Hulk Smash? Do you know that it's one of the two worst matches for WW? It's more certain that they go off even before you finish them off. So what you have to do is to lock them before they can go off and kill you.

Two final things: crusades are BAD. Ok? Bear with me... bad. You're packing 10 white weenies, angels don't really need crusade and masticore won't benefit from its bonus. Is it there for Battle Screech? Battle Screech should be good on its own without the need of crusade. Crusade makes you lose a turn to play it and it doesn't pump them enough to make it as good as empyrial armor, nor resistent enough to hold back the threats that we now find in type 1: tnt, psychatog, stax, combo... You'd rather have some ww creature there.

And it's "Exalted". \n\n

[illuminati]

First you know I can't spell worth shit, that's a given .  At least I made a 'attempt' and spell checking it which is more than normal.  Any ways this deck needs to keep up its speed and have disruption to stand a chance in type 1.  The problem with making a rebel chain is that you relay slow your deck down to the point where it can't go turn 4 like the version I listed can.  The deck is all about abusing the 2 mana lands with Battles and Angels doing things they relay shouldn't on turn 3.  It also has the ability to drop masticore on turn 3.  

The reason this isn't as bad as normally white wheenie verses hulk is that it has 20 must counter mana denial / removal threats that attack hulks mana base and kill condition.  Tangle Wire / Null Rod / Geddon attack there mana base and Swords / Passage attack there ability to kill.  Keeping the deck at a turn 4 clock is also extremely important verses them as is resolving Angel on turn 2 and morphling it on turn 3.  This deck was built to beat Hulk in 1.5 and it does that, or at least it did till hulk evolved some more, now its acceptable both ways.  

Also I relay like Crusade + Battle in this.  Crusade makes all the 1cc guys insane, and makes battle / angel broken, as far as mono white can be broken anyway.  Battles are basically a white deep analysis for this deck, and it acts as smoke stack protection and goes on line turn 3.  Crusade has a lot of advantages.  It turns angel into a 5/6 that kills morphling, turning battles into deranged hermit, turns your 1cc guys into non 2-1 fire / ice targets, and speeds up your clock in general.  I realy like Crusade in this.

Also Land Tax while looking good relay does nothing for this deck, sure it combo's with Geddon and such but relay this is white stompy not white wheenie as you knew it.  Its just stompy / Goblin Sligh with more toys and no burn or pump.

Oh btw, I call it white lightning just cause it sounds cool, this goes a step up on the evolution chain far above anything they were doing back in the day.  Its accelerated white wheenie almost to the point of stompy.

Hope this helps.
Mike\n\n

[Kerzkid11]

Aren't there already mutiple WW posts going?

Edited by the grammar police!\n\n

[Bastian]

Quote The deck is all about abusing the 2 mana lands with Battles and Angels doing things they relay shouldn't on turn 3.

Your deck may be about what you want it to be. White Weenie is about an aggro deck that tries to win through white spells' versatility and small efficient creatures.

Playing Crusade just to make the 1/1 bird tokens slightly larger won't help the deck become a lot better. Playing Crusade to make the angel a 5/6 doesn't make the angel "broken", nor much better than already is. If it fits your play style to use crusades, go ahead. I think they're useless in WW and could be replaced by a nice set of 2cc creatures instead. True Believer, Knights, Orders...

Land Tax is a MUST in WW and, for that matter, in just about any monowhite deck.

The two mana lands allow you to play with fewer lands in play up to a maximum of three lands (a couple of plains and a two mana land), which works great with land tax.
Land Tax thins your deck every turn up to three cards. It's cheap, it works against land destruction and discard and shuffles your deck. It provides with cheap card drawing and card shuffling where there should or would be none.

That's how good land tax really is...

Kerzkid: there's another WW thread some threads down which discusses the viability of the deck in vintage right now. This is a totally different discussion which, if I posted on the former one, would have gotten a lot less attention, not to mention this is a new deck I'm posting and has little to do with the other thread's discussion\n\n

[ZoneSeek]

Why are you boarding out Null Rod against Stax? That seems fairly counter-productive. Furthermore, why are the True Believers coming in against Hulk? Do you fear a random Mind Twist? I don't see Duress being THAT strong against you ...

Just curious.

This is probably one of the more interesting White Weenie style decks I've seen in a while. As a fish player, Angel scares the hell out of me. Go type 2 cards! Looks like a lot of fun.

[suicide_slushy]

Null Rod doesn't do a whole lot vs Stax...

Crusade doesn't work well in WW, your better off using those spots to play more utility creatures.  

Masticore seem too slow to be maindeck, even with double mana producing lands.  He has no particular synergy with the rest of the deck, seeing as you don't even run land tax, and is really only good in a heavy aggro enviorment where WW will do well anyway.  

Ication Javalenear seems like trash, I would much rather run a utility creature like Devout Witness.

[Bastian]

Null Rods come out vs stax simply because their most threatning artifacts don't have an activation cost to be dangerous: Smokestack, sphere of resistance, tangle wire are dangerous on their own with or without null rod in play and i'd rather much more draw into any of the cards I'm siding for that match than a Null Rod.

True Believers don't do much in the hulk matchup and sure, I really don't have that many targets for duress nor am I afraid of mind twist but simply because those threats exist and the cleric does a bit more than the knight I'd rather have him in vs Hulk. Vs a psychatog it really doesn't matter wether you're using true believer or silver knight since both can be easily destroyed, so I'm better off with something that helps me a bit more than the other does in that matchup.

Suicide_slushy: don't dismiss either the javalineers or the masticore for that matter. Icatian Javalineers increase the ammount of 1cc creatures WW has (which the deck usually misses) and works as a white mogg fanatic. It can be used to kill annoying 1-toughness creatures like a 1/1 quirion dryad or, most importantly, goblin welders. Masticores fit the deck because they can come out turn 3 and make use of the 2 mana lands. They give white another efficient way to deal with creatures and a solid finisher.\n\n

[suicide_slushy]

I can see where the Javalineers could be good at killing Welders, but so does swords, and they don;t seem to have any other real use.  

On Masticore, Angel is just plain better than core in this deck.  You don't need Angels AND screeches AND cores.  Cores seem like they would be the first to go, their upkeep is killer in an aggro deck, and they are only really good vs decks you should beat anyway.

[Bastian]

Actually you'd rather keep the swords to some other nastier threat and just ping the welders with the javalineers.

Zoneseek: gotta love that avatar of yours! LOL\n\n

[ZoneSeek]

I've always seen Null Rod as a great card in the Stax matchup - landing it turn 1 does OODLES against Stax because you stop all of their acceleration, Karn and Trike, AND of course, Jar. You're fairly capable of doing so. I would be personally inclined to leave them in if I was going first, and possibly take them out when going 2nd.

And yes, boobies dot jiff is amazing.

[Bastian]

Playing a Null Rod won't make much of a difference if your opponent drops smokestack, tangle wire or sphere of resistance simply because the rod won't do NOTHING vs these artifacts, which are the ones the stax player will use to lock you down.

Although the rod stops moxen it won't stop workshops from being used which means that the stax player mana production is hardly crippled by a rod.

If I play a rod and my opponent drops...

Smokestack: it's a matter of time before I have to sacrifice the null rod.

Tangle Wire or Sphere of Resistance: null rod does nothing.

I'd much rather have a straight answer for these threats, one that allows me to destroy them, than null rod. I can't nor will take into account who goes first or not because that depends most on luck and, furthermore, it also depends on wether I draw an early rod. But that's luck... and above luck a player should use his skill, right?

[ZoneSeek]

Fair enough - you've convinced me. I'm using to playing 5 Wastes in addition to the Null Rods so they prove themseves to be stronger.

I guess my experience with a different deck is skewing my vision.

[Bastian]

If you consider the deck that way then it seems fine by me. Null Rods and wastes can be more disrupting to the mana base.

[ZoneSeek]

I've played Fish religiously for the last few months and the mana denial aspect is huge in the Stax matchup. The Rods alone aren't that great - with the wastes, they -are-. Naturally, I have Forces and Fluxes for those nasty lock artifacts.

I am fully understanding your point - you've made it crystal clear. Thank you! \n\n