[Deck] Monobrown 2004 for review

[MaxxMatt]

Hi all,
during these weeks, we  ( me and my team ) tested a lot this build against all the tier decks in our Post Darksteel prevision of the metagame shift.

"Twister" aka Filippo Grigatti is one of the first of us to see how well all the Tools of this deck can work in a better way if coupled with the new 3Spheres. He dropped his usual Workshop.dec build, with Welder and Meditates and fall in love of "this thing"

This is the test build:

( Lock Components: 16 )
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Trinisphere
4 Smockstack
4 Sphere of Resistance

( Available Fats 12 )
4 Juggernaut
4 Su-Chi
2 Karn the Silver Golem
1 Triskelion
1 Masticore

( Avalialble Mana 32 )
4 Metalworker
4 Mishra's Workshop
4 Ancient Tomb
4 Petrified Field
4 Wasteland
1 Stripmine
7 SoLoMoxen
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Vault
1 Mana Crypt
1 Grim Monolith

Proposed Sideboard:
4 Damping Matrix
4 Tormod's Crypt
3/4 Null's Brooch
3/4 Metagame Slots



The deck is astonishingly Brutal. No manipolation. No card drawers. No way to find any card in the deck. His redundance let us realize that this is a "little" ( really not joking ... it is little) problem for a deck that usually need to  resolve only one or two bombs to win.The test showed up that it  usually have the capability to put so much pressure in the first 2 or 3 turns that you can't "run" as fast as it.

[Why Monobrown PostDarksteel "seems" better than others Workshop.dec]

While L&S or WelderMUD need some times and playing turns on setting their perpetuus winning lock ( with 3 or 4 of his lock pieces as Wires, Welders, SmockStack, Sphere ),  this build need only 1 Treat in play and maybe one among the 16 Lock Components to slow down a bit the entire game and WHILE it is winning.
While any other Workshop.dec is really difficult to pilot and requires skill and great knowledge of the opponent's deck, this one can ignore him and try to resolve spells after spells waiting the fatidical moment when it is with his pants down.. . Even a bad palyer can win a lot with this deck. Any card in the deck can kill the game it self.
While any other MW.dec require a "coral" work to win, this one can midlessly empty his hand, without thinking at all,  in 2 turns and win.
With anyother MW.dec you have to think a lot in a tourney and you can do errors. Maybe lethal errors. If you fail about something with it... simply... "a new Weapon Appear in your hand and you can resolve that new one to win"...  
-Shortly:
Brutal way of winning.
No time to deal with all his treats.

[How much the deck is forced to Mulligan?]
To being able to answer this question we testify so much this deck that we can state that it need to Mulligan "more than others", but for different reasons in different situations:

I'll explain it better:

Monobrown agaisnt a KNOWN opponent. (Monobrown goes first): Our test underlined that if we want an explosive hand we have to mulligan "medium powered hands" at least the 20% of the games. Of course, I'm taking out from the count all the initial hands that cannot be played for Screw or Flood. I'm referring to "playable" hands to mulligan because it may contains not so much specific treats for the specific opponents. Mulliganing in a better one appear to be a consistent choice with a rate of ~70% .

Monobrown against a NOT KNOWN opponent.. You mulligan only hands with a tremendous screw or flood. This appeared to be necessary the 15% of the times. ( of course we didn't considered an "hand to mulligan" an hand with only MW AND a Metalworker, even if a FoW and a Wasteland can shut up your entire deck. It is a risky hand that usually wins you too much games to be mulliganed into another usually less explosive one ).

Monobrown agaisnt a KNOWN opponent. ( Opponent goes first ).
This is a not so bad initial position even if some of your "Automatic" First turn Spells usually lose a lot of their lethal impact in the game ( 3Sphere and CotV ). Usually is a good choice to mulligan if your initial hand doesn't contain a Smockstack or a Waste or a CotV.  You can't keep slow hands leaving him the possibility to take advantage from his initial turn. Mana denial AND a fat is the sequence to follow to win this game.
 
Monobrown against an UNKNOWN opponent ( Opponent goes first ).
Luckily for us, he usually don't resolve all his mana acceleration in his first turn, at least if not needed, and you can usually keep hands with anyone of your lock component and some denial components.
 

Talking about Monobrown and his Absolute Mulliganing Rate, a deck that have only broken lands and that at least half of his deck consist of fast mana, usually didn't need to mulligan a lot as our test is underlining.


Which are his results against top level dekcs?

We tested a lot against Keeper, Hulk, Dragon, Lock&Stock, Madness and TPS. The builds of the gauntlet used are the same that usually Top8ed in America and/or in Europe during these weeks and that make an appearance in this forum.

TPS is one of the most broken decks among them but all the hate that monobrown packs in the maindeck usually didn't let it "go off". CotV AND 3Sphere AND Waste AND Fats put the deck in a clock fast and heavy to deal with. 3 Sphere AND CotV for 1 AND Smockstack are usually the nemesis for TPS and they that can easily seal the game. TPS usually can't keep hands without a Duress if he go first and/or a FoW if MonoBrown goes first. Usually the problem is the ability of Monobrown to resolve a double lethal treat in his first turn and this is game for a deck with only 4 FoW and no removals

Keeper is one of the best equipped decks among the gauntlet's ones to deal with Monobrown, but I ( sadly ) can't state that he has an "edge" over it... . Keeper have cheap removals for first turn Workers, it can counter the other treats and can use Wasteland to slow him down. Unluckily Monobrown against Keeper can procede with  the "9 Wasteland Mode" and easily screw you so much not to be able to resolve any one of your bombs in hand. A simple Su-Chi or Juggy can conclude the game without problem in a lot of situations and very shortly.

Hulk has Duress and FoW instead of Removals and FoW and if it goes first, the match isn't so critical. A golden hand for Hulk should be with either Duress and FoW and with 2 mana during his first turn to go around 3 Sphere during is second turn. Unluckily a resolved metalworkers is usually game. Metalworkers let Monobrown to resolve his entire hand in a single turn, blocking the Hulk's answers at all. If Hulk has manadenial ( we test either the JP's Version and the Bode's Version with similar results ), he can slow down the game a bit but it loses all the consistency derived of having 3 or 4 Island to Fetch that only the single Stripmine can touch and that stabilze a lot his mana base. BtB is too slow for a deck that can  play a lot with only artifacts in play and it isn't usually a great matchup for Hulk.


Dragon can split 50% is winning rate with this deck ( preside ). Smockstacks and all the other lock components can slow that game down, but only Wastelands on Bazaar let you say "I win". Smockstack and a Jugg in play are usually game, but Dragon usually have the capability to Draw games due to your inabilty to deal with his spell once resolved. Dragon have to mulligan aggressively to find an Answer to Monobrown's first turn treats hoping not to be locked by a Sphere plus 3Sphere, that followed by a Jugg is nearly unbeteable for it.

Madness can be considered on of the easier mathup because of the instability of his mana base and his inability to deal with 3Sphere and or Smockstack. His Fats are better than yours but of course you can lock him down without any problem while he can't touch his manabase at all leaving you with Tons of mana and Letahl spell. A first turn Mongrel and a Couple of Bazaar AND/OR Walla/Squee can ket him breath, but he can't be able to deal with your treats in a long term vision of the game and in the worst of the scenarios you can reset the board with a Smockstack before his Mongrels kill you and then restart with your own treats. The crucial point that have to be underlined about the difference about their mana development is that Madness needs a lot of lands in play to deal with Monobrown in a good way, so Somockstack hurts it a lot . On the other hand, your Workers and 1 or 2 lands are enough to produce all the mana you need, so you can recover from a Smockestack in a faster way.


L&S is one of the worst matchup preside, thanx to his Welders. If proactively you can se a CotV for 1, the game is easy for you because your 12 fatties hits the boards earlier than his 2 or 3 winners. On the other hand, his Welders are more effective than any other things against you and usually you are not able to win with fatties with him in plays. Both of the decks have useless cards ( 3Sphere, Sphere, CotV ) if not proactively used, so the ones that draw more of them usually lose.. Post side the edge over L&S can be acquired with Damping Matrix. If you can avoid him acquiring 3 mana for his Rack and Ruin while a Jugg is beating him down you usually win.. otherwise you simply lose. On the other hand, The brutal power of this deck, can overrun all these "teories and statistics" and simply lock the opponents down too fast to be stopped.


After all these words ( sorry for the English used.. ),
I hope to have interested you all showing our little work with this deck.
Any critics, hints and suggestion are welcome!
I'll add more details when our test will showed us more data.

<3 cents

Maxx




PS.

The mana base used in the test didn't satisfied me at all. I worked a bit around it and my own test showed me that this one woks better:

4 MW
3 Petrified Field
3 City of Traitors
3 Ancient Tomb
4 Wasteland
1 Strip
1 Academy
4 MetalWorkers
XXX all the other mana acceleration

It is a bit more consistent and a bit less Self-Damaging. I don't want to mulligan because of 3 or 4 petrified field in my initial hand.. Cityies AND Tombs speed up my entire first turn and let me resolve my 3 or 4 cc spell more often than any other land configuration. I didn't want to take out all the Petrified Fields because I see Wasteland making apperarence anywhere, so some form of Mana Recurring is needed to this deck.

[Grand Inquisitor]

First, great job on the write up.  The matchup analysis is extremely helpful in understanding how the deck plays compared with other Workshop decks.

I do have a few questions though:

While L&S or WelderMUD need some times and playing turns on setting their perpetuus winning lock ( with 3 or 4 of his lock pieces as Wires, Welders, SmockStack, Sphere ), this build need only 1 Treat in play and maybe one among the 16 Lock Components to slow down a bit the entire game and WHILE it is winning

I agree that your fat (Jugg/SuChi) come down faster than a Slaver or Karn.  However, you could argue that the latter kill conditions actually end the game faster.  This puts less of an emphasis on the lock components (which is how these decks are built).  At the opposite spectrum is something like Kevin Cron's list at the most recent Ohio tourney.  His deck was completely devoted to the lock, with no win condition except welder beats.

Where I see problems with your list, is if you get the 'all fat' hand, with no way to disrupt your opponent.  While Jugg is certainly a fast clock, most control decks can handle it in stride (note to mention that combo and aggro can race it too).  Since you have no hand-fixers or card draw, decks like Hulk can set up to combo you out before you draw into your second wave of disruption.

I also noticed that nothing in your gauntlet runs null rod.  My other concern with your deck, is how it faces off against a deck that can match your fat, and can disrupt your mana base just as much.  Neo-stompy, for example, has a strip-proof mana base, and can take out your workshops and artifact acceleration.  It can also trade creatures with your fat.  I think the spheres really slow them down, but your main weapon, tanglewire, is no longer available.

[MaxxMatt]

@GI. Sorry for the time needed to answer you, but I tested your ideas and now I'm ready to say something to you.

As you noticed, I builded a version that is streamlined to do extremely well against Combo and Control,  winning without so much problem against Old or Bad Aggro but of course having problem about winning against BigO or to a First Turn Lackey, Second Turn Siege Gang Commander... .
Among the deck that I have intensively and extensively tested I found that BigO was the only one. He can work around 3Sphere with ESG and his creatures can block and maybe survive if the Bazaar/Squee engine is working untouched.

On the other hand, while BigO have all the weapons to handle a deck like that one, I realized that I OWN in my maindeck a great answers to his hate ( ROd, Maze, SotF, Squee, ESG and so on.. ): SmockStack.

Even if he resolve Rod during his first turn, I can resolve a second turn Smockstack if I went first or third turn Smockstac if I went second, that can reaset the board often quickly. I can use my Waste for his Bazaars and stop his recurring engine.
Smockstack in play is always Game. I can save/recicle my lands with Petrified and even the One Shot Use of MW and Ancient Tombs can be enough to recover from a Smockstack reset. I see that usually if he have 3 or 4 permanents on his 3 turn, I can easily have a better board position ( 5 or 6) in the same turn with consistency. So Smockstack is golden.

Testing the matchup I found that preside ( and with this build that isn't streamlined to face aggro as BigO ) I won a mean of 3 of 8 matches ( I won every game I go first ). Post side I can use the free slots that I have in my side to rise the winning rate. I'm thinking about more Triskelion or Serrated Arrows to get rid of Weenies or Wires to slow them down whiel beating.

The other superficial but not stupid point is: How many players would change or rearrange the maindeck configuration to face ONLY minor ( in number not in power ) decks when the deck is so strong against all the other? I'm really satisfied about the winning rate of this deck against all the other decks. If possible I would be happy only to lose to a good Player with a good BigO


Speaking about an "all fat hand" I think that I can say to you that it isn't an automatic mulligan against every deck.

-Aggro can race but usually is low on permanents. My board position is usually superior and I can leave Smockstack in play for a lot of turns, the time needed to try to win.
-Control could be EASILY beaten by a first turn Metalworker followed by 3 Fats during the second turn.
-Combo is of course the major issue. I mulligan aggressively to see at least one or two lock components, gaining time and usually winning the match
-ComboControl ( or Hulk.. ) can race with you ( and your All Fats Hand )ONLY with broken  starts. They can't win before turn 4 excluding some stellars draw and your All Fats Hand necessarily put them in a faster clock. If you consider Worker, 2 Fats and 2 Fats in 3 turns, you win in your 4 turn. If he lose "time" and cards in hand countering your fatties he can't "combo" fast ( at least generally speaking.. ).  
I have had winning agaisnt Tog if he counter my first 2 great treats ( and he HAVE to PERFECTLY hit the right one because of the great number of treats in his first 2 turns.. ), recovering soon his card in hand with some restricted. It happens but not so often.

See the results of a different version of Monobrown that placed 2° in our last huge  last week tourney.
It is streamlined to face Aggro and Control, losing a bit agaisnt Combo. It has some good choices and some bad others IMHO .



New Points Underlined from the test:

--Masticore is horrible and extremely situational. So I think that it could become Triskelion number two.
--We are testing Serum Powder in this deck. The major problem of this deck is his inability to recover from a bad mulligan. Serum Powder can take care of this situations, leaving you with your initial 7 cards and not losing too much due to the great redundancy of the deck. We try this build:
+3 Serum Powder
-1 Grim Monolith
-1 Lotus Petal
-1 Masticore

Under 3Sphere ( that is usually one of the goals of the deck ) resolving a Mox or a Serum Powder have no differences. So we trade 2 mana fonts for another 2 mana fonts with the great mulligan improvement gained from the S.P. abilities. The loss of a treat isn't so crucial due to the fact that you usually can be broken enough to win THANKS to the new hand.

--I takedoput from the side the Null's Brooch. Usually they aren't needed and they lose you too much time.

--The side tryed for a Real Life tourney and a mixed metagame should be this one:

4 Damping Matrix
4 Tormod's Crypt
3 Winter Orbs / 3 Tangle Wire
2 Triskelion
2 Sword of Fire/Ice

[Rico Suave]

With no Welders to recur threats and no card-draw to refuel, this deck has a bad match against anything with removal.  That includes but is not limited to Artifact Mutation, Serenity, Pernicious Deed, Nevinyrral's Disk, Rack and Ruin, StP, Disenchant, Oxidize, Naturalize...

Hopefully you get my point.  This deck runs out of steam very quicky.

[MaxxMatt]

With no Welders to recur threats and no card-draw to refuel, this deck has a bad match against anything with removal

Removal cost mana and often you can't play them. Keeper or Hulk vs. Monobrown are Good matchup. And they pack Counter AND Removals AND Waste.

That includes but is not limited to Artifact Mutation, Serenity, Pernicious Deed, Nevinyrral's Disk, Rack and Ruin, StP, Disenchant, Oxidize, Naturalize...

This deck usually could WIN before anyone of the spell you referred to could be played. If the lock work well you can play AT LEAST one of them and when you'll probably will be able to do it, should be too late.

While it is locking you, fats win.


Shuffle a bit and test it. You'll notice without possibility of misunderstooding about what I'm saying.  This deck can win without problems agaisnt anything.
If you'll go first you have CotV, 3Sphere and Sphere and smokestack
If the opponent go first you'll have at least CotV and Sphere and smokestack.
A simple Fat usual can end the game.

Hopefully you get my point. This deck runs out of steam very quicky.

Yes. Infact treats can be added in the specific matchups ( from the side ) when they are needed to improve the topdeck in the eventual midgame

[Vegeta2711]

This deck usually could WIN before anyone of the spell you referred to could be played

Riiiiiiiight. Except many of those anwsers cost 1 or 2 mana and hence can be cast on the first or second turn. This is esp. crippling if your going second. I beat MUD for the specfic reason I can cast Artifact Mutation and I see no reason why I suddenly wouldn't be able too against a deck like this. You don't even have Tangle Wire or Welders.

Keeper or Hulk vs. Monobrown are Good matchup

Maybe Hulk, but I can't imagine Keeper as a good match here. Unless by good you mean split at the best.

And on a slightly more constructive note, have you ever considered Sundering Titan? I found running a few of these guys with such huge amounts of mana was rather useful.

[DavidHernandez]

Hey all,

remember username "Toast"? He no longer has a full account, so he can't post in this thread.  He has spent a lot of time and effort on a build that really belongs in this thread, so i am putting his the info he sent me (via email) here for your review.

To view Toasts original contribution to the "Stax" deck, go here:
http://www.themanadrain.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11877

I have been busy recently but have still had enough time to play around with different ideas and I was able to generate a very viable deck. I recently checked back on themanadrain and found a thread "Monobrown 2004" which contained a build very similar to my own. Much progress has been made with the deck in that thread but I still think there are a few things missing from that list and I wanted to add my two cents (but can't due to not being a full member anymore).
 
First my list:
 
4 Smokestack
4 Sphere of Resistance
4 Trinisphere
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Ark of Blight
 
4 Juggernaut
4 Su-Chi
2 Karn, Silver Golem
1 Masticore
1 Sundering Titan
 
1 Strip Mine
4 Wasteland
4 Mishra's Workshop
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
1 Tolarian Academy
7 SoLoMox
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Grim Monolith
 
SB:
 
4 Tormods Crypt
1 Gaea's Blessing
4 Damping Matrix
6 nessesary cards of your choice
 
I originally decided to play mono brown when I saw trinisphere in the darksteel spoiler. Welder is a great card but it really becomes unnessesary when you have 12 or so cards that set up a solid lock by themselves (with the help of stuff like wasteland).

The dangerous thing about welder is this: to exploit it's full potential, you must also become semi reliant upon getting one active at some point in the game, and this is a bad thing to rely on against decks that have prepared for welder with creature removal.

I do not like Metalworker for the same reason. If they can deal with the metalworker the turn you cast it then you usually are screwed (otherwise why would you be casting it to begin with and wasting a precious turn). I have found that the caliber of lock components is high enough that I no longer need red as a support color and without red as a support color my manabase is explosive enough that I do not need metalworkers as a manasource.
 
Here is my reasoning for some of my more unusual card choices:
 
No Petrified Field: simply put, Petrified Field does not generate enough mana. yeah, its great that sometimes you can recur a Wasteland with it but you still need several things to occur before you can use it in this way. You need to pull into it, you need to pull into a land with a strip effect, and you need to use the land with the strip effect. This I have found rarely happens during the crucial period of the game. You could also use it to recur something like a workshop but sacrificing 1 mana to get 3 really isn't that impressive when you could have been netting two mana to begin with. Extra mana is much more useful in my testing than the minimal versatility of the Field.
 
4 Ark of Blight: (2 mana tap pay 3 more sac: blow up any land, for those who don't want to look it up). This card would be amazing if it cost 3 and you payed 2 to blow up a land because the specificity of workshop occasionally prevents you from blowing this up the turn you cast it (e.g. casting it with a workshop and two moxen on the board) but this card still is easy to cast and easy to blow up and it really helps to ensure that your opponent's mana total is not high enough for him to start being able to hurt you.
 
1 Sundering Titan: One of the few creatures that is a must counter. It screws them when it gets into play, while it is in play, and after they find a way to deal with it (in the rare occasion that the game is not already over) 8 is a hefty price but it is affordable in the late game (turn 3-5) with the amount of fast mana in this deck; this is not much of a deterent because the late game is the optimal time to be casting this guy anyways. Great in a battle of mana or in a battle of fat. Titan can really help you get out of some of the hairier situations and often will seal the game or break a stalemate. However, Titan is a card that you really only want to see once max per game and the only surefire way to accomplish this is to run a single copy.
 
Usually when playing this deck you want to disrupt them just enough so that they won't be able to react in a timely manner and then use fat to put them on a 4-5 turn clock so that you can beat them before they even have a chance to start dealing with you. I do not consider this to be a prison deck because it does not seek to establish a hard lock, it more uses the suicide black strategy of a wave of disruption followed by a wave of beats to win. It does not need a draw engine because it the game never gets to the point where you are looking to topdeck a certain card. You either draw disruption, fat, or mana.

There is no reliance on welder (because it is not in the deck), or workshop (since I have 9 other lands that produce large quantities of mana), or juggernaut (since there are plenty of other good fatties to pull into); I don't need a trinisphere to screw you over because I can just as easily drop a sphere and back it up with a wasteland or ark or chalice.

When drawing my opening hand with this deck there is not a specific card I am always hoping to draw. I just hope for a well balanced hand and I almost always get one, which is the reason why this deck is truly special.
 
When laying a smokestack, I usually keep it set at one counter because that number is just enough to negate their land drop and I cannot do cool welder tricks with it anymore but in a bind I do not hesitate to raise it to two or even three counters.
 
There is one card in this deck that I am not happy with. Masticore. When my hand is full I have better things to play, when I am dropping fat I drop the other fat first because it is better than masticore, and when my hand is empty dropping a masticore could potentially screw me if my opponent breaks the lock. I really think that the slot should be used on a big creature (because I like my current disruption::fat::mana ratio) that has a cc of four (because part of the amazing consistancy comes from never drawing a hand full of high cc closers) but I am at a loss for a better card that fits these specifications.
 
Here is how I sideboard:
 
Vs. Dragon -4 Smokestack -1 Grim Monolith +4 Tormod's Crypt +1 Gaea's Blessing
 
I do not consider this to be a particularly bad matchup, but my matchup does get better with these 5 sideboard cards. Smokestack takes a turn to set up and dragon is a fast combo deck. Tormod's Crypt is dragon hate so it seems like a worthy replacement. Gaea's Blessing is just an added safety blanket so that I could potentially survive even if the player is successful in setting up the combo
 
vs other workshop
 
+4 Damping Matrix, -4 Ark of Blight
 
damping matrix stops ark of blight, karns living artifact ability, and masticore's ping/regeneration so by siding out the arks I am more or less unaffected by it and damping matrix shuts down welder, metalworker, all of TnT's utility, Weldermud's only kill (since my creatures can chump karn all day long and karn can't use his ability) and Slaver's two kill methods. This card makes the workshop matchup a breeze.
 
I currently have 4 Tsabo's Web in side mostly because I don't have anything better to do with the slots. Landstill theoretically will play out a bit different from other control matchups because they can dodge both kinds of spheres with their win conditions and can stifle/ counter some of the other mana denial. I don't think the matchup will be too bad because of all the fat I run but Tsabo's Web gives me extra confidence in this matchup which I have not tested at all. The other two slots I use to showcase some of my cooler beta cards...I really have no idea what to do with them. Not much hurts this deck including artifact hate because the more painful artifact hate usually never gets cast.
 
This is an amazing deck and I urge people to try it. If anybody has ideas for what to do with the masticore slot or the 6 SB slots please share so that hopefully we can find the best cards to use them for.
 
-toast

[Matt]

Toast's deck looks like it will become very strong with Fifth Dawn's Crucible of Worlds (which vastly eases the stress City of Traitors puts on your available mana).

[MaxxMatt]

Monobrown is a great deck EVEN now... Crucibile of the Worlds is another card that will blow up the number of first or second turn must counter spell.


@Hernandez: thanx for resuming the Toast'd Topic.

I noticed some little but crucial differences between our built and the Toast' build

1) The lack of Petrified Field
2) The lack of Metalworker

Since sacrificing a Petrified for a Wasteland take the same time requested by casting and activing an Ark of Blight, I don't think that the "time" issue is the most important. I think that having a mana font that CAN replace a MW ( forcing your opponent to deal with 7-8 MW instead that only 4 ) when needed or improving your Denial and Locking ability in an uncouterable way is really really helpful for a deck that is mana hungry such as this one. From the same perspective, after having emptyed his hand in 2 turns ( locking the opponent while beating him down with a fat ), it  could seal the game with his "midgame" plan ( Wasting 8 opponent's lands instead of 5 ).
From this point of view, only after playing it and AGAINST it, I have totally realized how "nearly unbeteable" is the Denial+3Sphere Lock.

Another note is. Look at this Start.
1 turn) MW, Metalworker.
2 turn) Waste or Petrified AND all the mana from the Worker to resolve other spells having ONLY to think about 1 opponent's FoW
3 turn) Win? Maybe...

He could go:
1 turn) Any Land, Ark of Blight
2 turn) Waste and break 2 lands
3 turn) Lock Parts or Fats
4 turn) Win? Maybe

One turn of difference and the amount of treats palyable in one turn  is usually crucial on rising or lowering the winning rate.


The Metalworker lack is a little strange. I think that he choose to take it out for some obvious consistency reasons. Not always Metalworker survive enough to let you "win" on your second turn, so sometimes it is useless. Toast preferred to resolve a good treat on his first turn and one or two others one on his second.

From my point of view, even if it is totally reasonable, is a strange choice.
I mean.
Playing this deck I noticed that almost ALL the good decks facing Monobrown are almost equipped to deal with a first turn treat and a second turn one.
Metalworker break this "rule" letting ( "...Breaking Magic Rules????.. OMG, Rakso is speaking for me.. AHHHHH!!  ) you to put in play 3 or 4 treat in one turn. This is huge. Noone deck could ignore 3 or 4 resolved spell of this deck. Noone! And the possibility that Metalworker will survive even only one turn to be used One Shot are always decent to warrant a win in the second turn of play.

IMHO, taking 4 slots for a card that WIN you games if it survives 1 turn are well spent .
What do you think?


@Vegeta: I play Keeper all the day long and I could assure you that this matchup can be reduced to: " Have I FoW for his 1° turn treat? or Have I 1 or 2 Fetches to protect my Mana Drain ( of course with some moxen in play to get around 3Sphere and Hoping that CotV for 1 had not hit thetable before my Shaman..  ) or have I a removal or another counter for MetalWorker? . If "yes" to all these asks so I WIN, if I lack EVEN one of them, the game could be totally ruined ( for Keeper ) by a single spell resolved. I don't see how you can see the game balanced. I played a lot preside and post side and Monobrown usually have more good starts than Keeper. So he simply win more with them.  

Sundering Titan is a 1ofs that we have considered a lot of times and that is in testing in the Masticore Slot. It worked very well and would be part of the maindeck for heavy Control Based Metagames.



The good point is ( as Rico suggested ) that the deck really run out of steam very quickly. So I think that sometimes ( expecially if I was forced to keep a "so so hand" ) I can wait one turn to try cast 2 or more treat in one turn and try to seal the game with them. Topdecking with a deck with 50% of mana and no manipulation at all is is a bit proibithive..

I noticed only now that all the spells usually used against Monobrown have place in the Side. Wishing for them during game one is really difficult if not impossible excluding games when I'm winning for other reasons. Talking about game 2, supposing that I lose game 1, I have to keep a good "speedy" hand to resolve at least one of these spells. Land, Mox isn't so difficult to obtain but can not happens when needed..


Another important note is that against all the decks that packs disruptive spells as the ones you suggest, I usually prefer to go with the Denial aspect of the deck and then trying to resolve spells after spells. The greater problem for Monobrown are Deeds, R&R and Artifact Mutation that are asimmetrical cards and that can let you just win entire games. On the other hand, all of them are a bit "off color" when used in good control decks and this is the aspect that I usually abuse to work around them agaisnt Blue Based Decks.

[Rico Suave]

This deck usually could WIN before anyone of the spell you referred to could be played. If the lock work well you can play AT LEAST one of them and when you'll probably will be able to do it, should be too late.

Listen, Stax and other dedicated lock decks have more lock components than you do.  Even those players aren't saying that the opponent can't play hate spells.  I can't take you seriously when you say something like this.

Shuffle a bit and test it. You'll notice without possibility of misunderstooding about what I'm saying.  

I did, which is why I said something in the first place.  Do not try to justify your idea by attacking me.

The good point is ( as Rico suggested ) that the deck really run out of steam very quickly. So I think that sometimes ( expecially if I was forced to keep a "so so hand" ) I can wait one turn to try cast 2 or more treat in one turn and try to seal the game with them. Topdecking with a deck with 50% of mana and no manipulation at all is is a bit proibithive..

This is my main concern with the deck.  Firstly, you are forced to keep "so so hands" way too much of the time.  Even if you do manage to resolve one threat, so what?  Do you really expect to win a game with one threat?  I also noticed your statement earlier "A simple Fat usual can end the game" which blows my mind.  What remotely decent deck loses to a simple fat?

[MaxxMatt]

I don't attack you of course...  
But I'm serious when I talk about this deck.. so maybe my use of English language could be limited and not so clear.. I'll try to explain better..

1) Monobrown isn't the "deck to beat". To have an idea of what is a "deck to beat" for me, I can say that GaT with 4Gush is that deck. from this perspective, Monobrown 2004 is only another Workshop.dec. Being a Workshop.dec and being really strong in this metagame, I wrote about our testing on it. Period.

BUT

2)The real point is that we work around this deck with a specific Idea in mind: Abuse of 3SPhere better than any other Workshop.dec.

The final work is Monobrown 2004 ( with minor changes his mana base and fats' choices due to metagame).


I played it online and in real life with different results.
Maybe the shuffle component, maybe my luck, maybe the skill involved, maybe "I don't know what", I win more than any other deck agaisnt the "good deck of the moment".

I play preside games and post side games.

If I have had these results, Why Shoud I have written different things?

This is
1) a not so fun deck
2) a simple deck to play
3) an highly competitive deck to play TO WIN
4) a fast lock deck
5) a very good deck against all that is NOT BigO ( In real life I saw ZERO BigO here in Italy, so it is very good agaisnt ALL ).
6) i talk not in a teoretcal way of speaking. It is a real life deck that I suggest to play to all ( at least until now ).
 
What do you really feel about this deck?
I'm really curious, why do you have had so different results about consistency or muliganing?

And please.. take me serious.. I take seriously all the words that anyone wrote in this forum

----


Talking about the Hate.

Maybe you are right. Packing more hate I should have less problem during game 2 and 3

I usually pack ( playing with Keeper )

2 R&R
1 Disenchant
3 StP
1 F/I

and so on.. I have a lot of difficulties to resolve the ones with cc higher than 2 in the games during which anyone have good  possibilities of winning.
Playing agaisnt Keeper, Monobrown can play around the possible Color Screw of his mana base
Playing agaisnt Hulk his gamebreaking spells are Non Blu and off Color.

I think that Wastellanding the right color, the Monobrown's player  can prevent the Control's player to resolve his bombs in the most productive way.

Have you been always able to resolve Deed or A. Mutation without difficulties?
What is your experience?

[Thug]

This deck shares a lot with the latest mono-brown MUD versions me and Arthur have been working on lately, the lock component are the same, the difference is that you have creatures over other lock components (winter orb, keg, WIRE, rishidan port (serious, port + wOrb is some good!)) and creatures over a draw-engine (skullcap/mind's eye, jar).

Even with a deck totally geared around locking your opponent (which basicly describes MUD) hate can't be dodged, you won't always have the first turn trinisphere, nor will you prevent your opponent from dropping two moxes when he goes first.

Because of this the claim that you can stop the opponent from playing any hate is ridiculous as already mentioned by other members.

I would seriously look for options to have better protecter threats, lightning greaves is an option (not a bad one either), arcbound ravanger could also be a solution.

Don't think I'm underestamating the power of beatdown (hence, my last version ran 4 Karn because they are brutal after a trinisphere). But fact stays that it doesn't stop your opponent from building up his or her mana base, which is what often decided the outcome of games which involve prison decks.

Koen

p.s. Sorry for my sentences being long and probably hard to understand, I tend to put too much information in them.

[MaxxMatt]

I have to quote myself not to be completely considered a Crazy Cow:

I think that Wastellanding the right color, the Monobrown's player can prevent the Control's player to resolve his bombs in the most productive way

I noticed only now that all the spells usually used against Monobrown have place in the Side. Wishing for them during game one is really difficult if not impossible excluding games when I'm winning for other reasons. Talking about game 2, supposing that I lose game 1, I have to keep a good "speedy" hand to resolve at least one of these spells. Land, Mox isn't so difficult to obtain but can not happens when needed..

This deck can win without problems against anything

With my words, I showed only the things that a Monobrown have to do to rise up his winning rate. IT CAN'T do always these things. It isn't always possible to have the right sequence of spells.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now I try to be more constructive.

I'm with you about adding more Karns.
They are really powerfull and cost one less that Triskelion that is a good thing and eat artifact that are the only usual ways to go around the Lock parts of the deck.

What about this configuration for you?

4 Jugg
4 Su-Chi
3 Karn
0 Trisk ( maybe a couple of them in side )
0 Masticore

I think that this configuration could be supported not only a control heavy metagame, where Karn can eat opponent's resource, but even in a mixed meta, where you can use it to block opponents fats and win faster animating other locks components.

I was already testing Ravagers, and it is an house! it can go around the common removals and can grow up fast in a deck like this

I'm testing  

4 Juggs
4 Ravagers
3 Karn

I personally have Su-Chis and finally, when I saw Ravager, I feel that is time for them to be placed in my cards collector

----------------------------

Playing more Karns, I found that having Serum Powder ( as suggested as testing choice some posts ago ) is another good way to kill the opponent fast.
Due to the fact that Mulliganing and Bad initial hands are one of the reasons that force this dek to scoop, I tested 3 Serum Powder maindeck.
Usually the redundancy of the deck can let you Mulliganing with Serum Powder safely. It is a 3/3 if animated with Karn and under 3Sphere cost exactly as a a Mox.



I'll test your version with more Lock components and 4 Karn as winner and I'll tell you my feels about it

I have Orbs and Kegs in side for the Control Matchup. Depending on the meta, I usually fit in 3 orbs and 2/3 Kegs.