What's the right play?

[ELD]

This happened in a touranment last night.  I was running Control Slaver vs a deck 3 color control deck.  This was game 2, and my only real kill in the deck is triskelion, as I had boarded out collosus.  2 slavers are still in the deck.  His deck killed with exhaulted angel and decree.  It featured bombs such as scrying, will, twist and balance.  I give this situation to the community to see how others would handle it.  Please PM me with your answers. 

My board

tolarian academy
underground sea
volcanic island
island
mox sapphire

my hand
brainstorm
brainstorm
force of will
echoing truth
goblin welder
volcanic island
Triskelion

top 3
flooded strand
island
mox emerald

his board
mox pearl
mox sapphire
underground sea
tundra
tundra
tormod's crypt

his hand
balance
???

My opponent casts balance tapping the moxes.  With him only having one card in hand, I need to decide the best play.  What do you do?

EDITED: I had my hand incorrect.  I couldn't remember if I had sapphire or sol ring and I listed both.  Sol Ring has been removed from the equation. 

[MoxMonkey]

My hand Game 2 was Balance, and Two other cards.  After you get  good number of replys I will post what my hand was and we can see what others thought the best play was. 

I had Two cards in Hand with Balance on the stack.  Thats what determined the match.

[M.Solymossy]

I would have force of will'ed removing 1 brainstorm.

IF he mana drained it, i would hold JUST the goblin welder, and attempt to play it and get trike in.  if he force of will's back removing his hand, i would respond by  brainstorming TWICE to dig down as far as humanly possible and set my top as triskilion and flooded strand, so i could shuffle him in and attempt to tinker him out if that were the case,

[Limbo]

I see this going the "After he baited with Balance, he went Yawgmoth's Wild on me." route.

[Dante]

what's the graveyard status?

[ELD]

His yard was stocked with lotus and will certainly would have been game. 

[JDawg13]

Is your knowledge of the top three cards of your library available to you before you cast a brainstorm?  The way the question is presented, I would assume so, but it doesn't make much logical sense to me.

[ELD]

No the top 3 cards were not known, but I did brainstorm and found out. 

My hand Game 2 was Balance, and Two other cards.  After you get  good number of replys I will post what my hand was and we can see what others thought the best play was. 

I had Two cards in Hand with Balance on the stack.  Thats what determined the match.

He had 2 cards in hand.  Balance and one unknown.  Please disregard his post as he does not remember the game accurately.

[Tobi]

I would have brainstormed. This seems like the obvious first answer to Balance. If this gives you another counter - fine - counter with Force backup.
Since I have a total of 8 mana available I can then choose to brainstorm again for another chance to find a counter, and to finally set back the cards I want to draw later. This would be Triskelion and possibly Welder or Brainstorm, if I don't brainstorm twice. I would probably keep the second Brainstorm and leave it as the top card, followed by Trisk.
Let Balance resolve, keep Force of Will in hand with 6 mana open. Next two cards in library are Brainstorm and Trisk.

--> I can counter whatever he still has in hand.
--> I am able to brainstorm next turn, therefore getting away from topdecking.
--> I can present him a threat a turn later.

[ELD]

I started with a disappointing brainstorm.  From there the play I made was to bounce the mox pearl in response to his balance.  Bouncing Crypt would not be good, as he could crypt in response.  Giving him 2 cards in hand allowed me to have force and a blue card for his unknown card. 

If the other card was a mana source, he would have played it before the balance.  If it was a brainstorm he would have cast it first and put the good cards on top hoping to draw a playable card making balance mindtwist.  I felt that the card had to be a counter or a bomb.  Countering back at the balance would have been terrible if it was a counter.  We'd end up with no hands as opposed to me having a brainstorm and a force vs his single mana drain.  That would be throwing away a gaurenteed favorable position once balance resolved. 

The other card, I determined was most likely a bomb.  Now I'd need to figure out what card it could be.  Scrying would not be a problem, as I'd untap before he could cast it for a serious amount.  Decree would not be an issue as it would not be able to be cycled and make guys.  Angel would be a possibilty, and it would have to be forced as I had planed on winning with triskelion.  Will was easily the scariest of the possibilities.  It would have won the game practically on the spot, as there was mana acceleration and card draw in the yard. 

The other card was infact yawgmoth's will.  He cast it and I forced pitching my brainstorm.  I went on to draw my fetchland, which i had placed on top of my triskelion.  From there I shuffled, as I was not ready to draw trike.  I wanted to build up an card advantage, which i eventually did on my way to a win.  Throwing your only win condition out there vs a deck running swords and disenchant is not the best option when I will pretty much alwasy in the long games.  My mana base would allow me to play whatever I'd be drawing in the future, which was a bunch of card drawing. 

[Liam-K]

I started with a disappointing brainstorm.  From there the play I made was to bounce the mox pearl in response to his balance.  Bouncing Crypt would not be good, as he could crypt in response.  Giving him 2 cards in hand allowed me to have force and a blue card for his unknown card. 

This was my descision as well, though you don't specify what you put back.  Trike and welder seems most obvious.

[goblinkid]

I would brianstrom and grab the featch. then featch play welder then i would probally wait it out untill he plays balance then you should drop trike and have force back up also with other jank you have accumealetd over the passed turns.

EDIT: sorry did not read the whole thing! brain storm counter the balance drop welder and trike!

Don't double post. -Klep

[The Chosen One]

I see this going the "After he baited with Balance, he went Yawgmoth's Wild on me." route.

that's cold, so cold

I would have force of will'ed removing 1 brainstorm.

IF he mana drained it, i would hold JUST the goblin welder, and attempt to play it and get trike in. if he force of will's back removing his hand, i would respond by brainstorming TWICE to dig down as far as humanly possible and set my top as triskilion and flooded strand, so i could shuffle him in and attempt to tinker him out if that were the case,

I would have to agree with this play

[pyr0ma5ta]

I would brianstrom and grab the featch. then featch play welder then i would probally wait it out untill he plays balance then you should drop trike and have force back up also with other jank you have accumealetd over the passed turns.

EDIT: sorry did not read the whole thing! brain storm counter the balance drop welder and trike!

Yes, but what if he drains your counter?  Then you're up shit creek without a paddle, because you get to discard your hand to the balance.

[freakish777]

Holding just Welder and dropping Trike into the yard isn't an option.

Your opponent has Tormod's Crypt down.

ELD's play was correct.  I missed bouncing an artifact after not finding another counterspell.

[CCClark]

I'd have just Forced with the Etruth, then stormed into the mox pearl, then stormed again into Shaharazad and showed it to him.   Then my opponent would concede when he's sees I'm playing that accursed card. 

[Smmenen]

A) I haven't read this thread word for word
b) I just saw this thread

But in my opinion, ELD, you screwed up pretty bad way before you reached that point.

I'm going to make some suppositions.

First of all, he had a three card hand indicates either that

1) He had a ton of mana on the board or 2) you have massively outdrawn him or 3) you had a counter war you won and now you have recovered faster.  Since he had less mana than you, I eliminate option one, which means that optoino 2 and three are it. 

I don't care which of those is the case, your hand, in my view, is absolutely wrong.

I know what Rich says about holding Brainstorm, but this isn't 2004.  If you won't a counter war, I would have moved quickly to consolidate my gains and used a Brainstorm way before that.  The only time I'm EVER holding two brainstorms in my hand is:

1) opening hand and I'm a luck sack

2) I brainstorm into another Brainstorm.

The fact that you had two brainstorms in hand says to me taht you screwed up.

My game plan would have been simple: find broken shit quickly.  I would probably brainwtsorm back the Trike and even the E. Truth possible (except to pitch it to FOW) and dig out a slaver and force him to Crypt me. 

The actual win condition, in my view, is pretty irrellevant becuase you should have been way ahead at that point.  Once you get way ahead, you let him spend his pathetic answers however he pleases and then you shove more threats at him and win.   

It's like a snow ball.  You had the best packing snow and the perfect makings of a monster avalanche, but you failed to pick up the snow when you should have, imo. 

Finally, if you are still not convinced that you should have played a Brainstorm, I'll tell you why you should have.

If you are holding seven cards and one of them is not Mana Drain or at least two FOWs, something is wrong.  I would have Brainstormed to get into a position to hardcast one FOW and be able to pitch cast the other.  I would have expected that maybe he'd be holding REB, Mana Drain, and a bomb.  What do you do then?

[Revvik]

I would have expected that maybe he'd be holding REB, Mana Drain, and a bomb.  What do you do then?

His deck killed with exhaulted angel and decree.  It featured bombs such as scrying, will, twist and balance.

[Smmenen]

Yes, but the point I was making is that ELD's mistake was already made. 

He had a full grip that could have been turned into a snowball of draw within a turn or so and he sat there holding win conditions and Brainstorms.