Urphid without ophidian

[Team-Judgement]

The decklist first, then the rest

4 mana leak
4 fow
4 counterspell

4 ak
3 impulse
3 swords to plowshares
2 disenchant
2 fire/ice

2 bloood moon
4 isochron scepter

2 - morphling, decree, or masticore

1 timewalk
1 ancestral recall

1 black lotus
5 moxer
1 sol ring
4 flooded strand
3 volcanic island
3 tundra
5 island
1 plain
1 loa

4 reb
1 plov
2 disenchant
2 blood moon
3 Cop:red
2 win condition, decree, morphling eller masticore
1 fire/ice

Urphid without Ophidian ? I think that scepters took ophidians place, scepters is simply better, and alot of decks have dead cards in first game

Where i play there is alot of non-powered aggro, sligh, goblins, fish, and stompy, there is no good aggro decks like tnt or oshava stompy. There is four guys with power, they normally play a kind of control, hulk, keeper.
I need some help with this deck, i dont know why i keep losing to keeper decks, even with the MD blood moon. I played the deck last saturday with drains, and they arent good with scepters, i take too much many burn.

Need help

/Rasmus

[Necrologia]

Seeing as how just about every spell in your deck has a few colorless in the cc and all your potential wins are near infinite sinks, I'm not seeing how you can consistently burn short of draining a turn 2 Draco or something. Even then, burning for a few points is generally worth it for the amazing amount of tempo it gives you. Mana Drain is much better than counterspell in this deck, so if you've got it run it.

Why the white splash? If it's really just for Swords I don't think that justifies ruining what should be a rock solid mana base. I'd rather keep the deck straight U/R, and throw in some Cunning Wishes. Add some random off color instants to wish for and Imprint and you'll be in buisness. With a cleaner mana base Blood Moon should be much more one-sided. In your list, I can hardly see how you cast it without cutting yourself off from a color. By dropping white that problem should all but disapear.

The only other thing I see are the Impulses. You're running some fetches, so wouldn't Brainstorm be better here?

EDIT: Have you tried out Powder Keg? If your meta is filled with scrubby aggro like you said it should be a house.

[JACO]

First of all, if you are playing against lots of cheap aggro in your local meta, I would put in a Humility in the main deck, and make your kill condition 2 Decree of Justices (with Fire/Ice imprinted on Scepter as another possible kill). Humility is the great equalizer, and with 1 main and 1 in the board, you lose nothing (having vanilla 1/1 soldier tokens), while your opponents lose all of their fatties and neat creature tricks.

Second, Mana Drain is a must in this deck. Whether it powers a big Decree of Justice, or you use the mana to tap your Isochron Scepter (usually imprinted with Impulse or Fire/Ice), you shouldn't have a problem. You should be playing more Fire/Ice (3 main, as it's never a dead draw, and is great against aggro, and uber under a Scepter).

Third, you really want Cunning Wishes. They allow you to access bombs from your sideboard, but also help to get whatever spell you want to imprint on Scepter. Remember, *after* a Scepter has resolved, but before you imprint, you have the opportunity to Cunning Wish for that game breaking spell you want to imprint (i.e. Swords to Plowshares, Fire/Ice, etc.). They are also a Mana Drain sink.

I'd recommend dropping a couple of the Mana Leaks (which are probably the weakest business spell in the deck), a Scepter, and a Swords to Plowshares for 3x Cunning Wish and 1x Humility. Pepper your sideboard to taste (including 1x Disenchant, 1x Swords, 1x Rack and Ruin, 1x Fire/Ice, 1x Fact or Fiction if you're not going to run it main, etc.).

Also, Brainstorms are really good in the deck as well (although not as juicy under a Scepter as Impulse or Fire/Ice).

[skecreatoR]

Maybe remove the danish words

Why run such a deck? It is purely just a control deck, with no elements of interest added. It uses different engines to support different wins - you might wanna squeese down a single win condition.

When you have the power, specialist, why not build something more fun

[Klep]

I've tried to do the same thing with Urphidian, but I have arrived at a different deck that has worked quite well for me.  Here is my list:

The Deck Formerly Known as Urphidian
By: David Kleppinger, Jan. 2004
//Manabase
5 SoLoMoxen (minus Jet and Emerald)
4 Volcanic Island
2 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
6 Island
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine

//Countermagic
4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
2 Misdirection

//Disruption
2 Stifle
2 Gorilla Shaman
2 Blood Moon

//Draw
4 Accumulated Knowledge
4 Brainstorm
1 Ancestral Recall

//Utility
4 Isochron Scepter
3 Cunning Wish
1 Time Walk

//Kill
3 Fire&Ice

//Sideboard
1 Blood Moon
2 Blue Elemental Blast
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Orim's Chant
1 Rack and Ruin
4 Red Elemental Blast
1 Shattering Pulse
1 Stifle
1 Swords to Plowshares
2 Tormod's Crypt

The reason for the lack of the other 2 moxen and a Library is because the local tournaments are proxy-5 and I only own Ancestral.  There is a heavy contingent of Dragon in my area, which is why all the hate.

The focus of this deck is obviously on mana denial in a meta that is largely dependent on non-basic land.  Gorilla Shaman eats moxes, Stifle threatens fetches, strips do what they do, and Blood Moon shuts things down.  The stick allows me to do things that would otherwise be impossible, such as draw three per turn every turn or keep a counter up at all times.

Specific Card Notes:

Misdirection- People have stopped fearing this.  I decided not to let them.  If your opponent isn't aware you have it, it can be devastating, and even just the threat of it forces your opponent to play far more carefully.

Fire&Ice- This isn't so much about the inclusion of this card as the non-inclusion of something like Morphling.  Simple put, I have found a more dedicated kill was simply unecessary.  When this deck establishes control, it keeps it, and at that point it no longer matters how slow your kill is.  I found myself very frequently wishing that Morphling was a third Fire&Ice when I was developing this deck.  As an additional benefit, I discovered on Thursday that opponents will often concede in the face of waiting 7 or 8 turns for you to kill them with Fire on a stick.

I played this deck (+1 Stifle, -1 Cunning Wish) in a tournament Thursday, where I took second losing to a Gay/r deck on tiebreakers.  I of course did not face the deck I was most prepared for (Dragon), but instead beat Landstill, FEB,  a Workshop deck created by forum member riggy, and a Scepter Keeper build piloted by Katzby.

The big difference between our decks is, obviously, that you have a third color.  This is probably what's giving you most of your problems.  I suspect you may be losing to Keeper decks because of the MD Blood Moon.  I suggest running no more than 2 colors or forgetting about Blood Moon.   It's just difficult to keep your colors straight and, as you can see, deprived you from access to strip effects.  My deck concentrates things into two colors, allowing me to use the full 5 Strip Mine and Wastes, which means that Blood Moon has a negligeable effect on me once it hits.

Another problem your additional color causes is that it takes the focus out of your deck.  My deck, as you can see, is rather focused on mana denial, with 5 strip effects, the Blood Moons, Stifles, and Shamans.  The rest of the deck is largely working to support this strategy and deal with threats as they arise.  Your deck is all over the place, and has far too many win conditions.   It is clear that you are trying to ensure your scepters have targets, but it is much better to move some key targets into the board and run Cunning Wish instead.  This is what I have done with my sideboard, and careful play ensures that I have something to drop on the Scepter whenever I play one.

You are quite simply wrong about Mana Drain.  I took a grand total of about 10 points of burn over the entire night, and I suspect that is not much higher than the average for other decks running Drain.  One thing to remember is that worse comes to worse, you can always activate a Scepter and not play the spell.  I employed this trick myself during one of my games to save myself two points of burn when I had a full hand.  Drains are mandatory because they are usually what allow you to play a Scepter in the first place.  If they aren't working out, it isn't because they aren't good with Scepters, it is because you aren't good with Drains.

Finally, you have far too much dedicated to the kill.  You do not need 2 kills in addtion to Fire&Ice, and in fact you should be fine without any.  If  you feel you must have the safety blanket  of a faster kill, use a single Morphling.  Masticore's drawback simply isn't worth it when Fire&Ice performs his secondary function just as well, and you really shouldn't run 3 colors with Blood Moon anyway.

Finally,  with fetchlands Brainstorm is stronger than Impulse.  This should really be a no-brainer.

-David 'Klep' Kleppinger, Raving Lunatic

[ump]

A few comments about the first decklist.

You have a lot of dead cards in your maindeck.  For example, the swords and disenchants are useless in a control matchup.  As mentioned earlier, replace some of these with Cunning Wish (maybe 3 total).  This way, you can get the instant that helps you best at that moment, whether it is a sword, disenchant, etc.  It's also ideal for a midgame Scepter so you can imprint the most useful instant.

What's doesn't work with Mana Drains and Scepters.  You can use the Drain mana to cast the scepter and save your mana to protect it.  You can use the Drain mana to activate it.  I think it will help with the Cunning Wishes because you can get the instant to imprint the scepter with and not have to imprint it with a dead card.  Try Mana Drain with Cunning Wish and then see often you will take mana burn.

COP-Reds are good, but try Chalice of the Void.  When set for one, it will really hurts Sligh a lot.  Also, it's easier to cast.

You can keep one Disenchant in the sideboard so you can access it via Cunning Wish if necessary, but try to add Rack and Ruin if you face a lot of artifact based deck.  It's hard to get scepter online in this matchup and to trade 2 for 1 at instant speed really helps this matchup.

As far as the win condition goes in your sideboard, don't discount Flametongue Kavu.  It can even trade 2 for 1 with TnT creatures (being able to zap one with it's come-into-play and then block and kill a second one).  This is also a great card if you see a lot of aggro as it can also handle Arrogant Wurms, etc. as well.  Also, don't run Masticores if you see a lot of non-powered aggro as you will probably see a fair number of Null Rods.  Again, it was mentioned that Fire on a Scepter is pretty good against these decks.

You probably want to add the Strip Mine in case they fetch an Island to work under the Blood Moon.  Usually adding 2 Wastelands to this deck is a good idea if you can fit it in, but I don't think it's necessarily a requirement.

If you run white, shouldn't you have Balance somewhere.  If you are not, then with more of a devotion to red, you can use Starstorms (in the sideboard to complement your Fire/Ice).  Your choice here which way to go.

Personally, I feel that extra Blood Moons in the sideboard are a waste of space.  Either have them in the maindeck (I maindeck 3) because you are either trying to cast it or you're not.