Learning from your Mistakes: Pitch Long vs. Gifts

The following is an article that I submitted to SCG on 12/1/06. It was never published so I thought I would at least post it in the forums.
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Going into any premier Vintage tournament, Gifts and Pitch Long are two decks that you can expect to play against. Knowing how these decks operate and interact with one another should give insight to both players using the decks and those looking to beat them. In this article I'm going to go through a few sample games both pre-board and post-board, talk about sideboarding strategies, and also discuss the matchup from the Gifts player's perspective.

For this article I will be referring to the Pitch Long list that I used to win day 1 of the last StarCityGames Power 9:

Day 1 SCG: Roanoke 1st Place Deck List
http://sales.starcitygames.com/deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=20135

My examples are test games against Gifts being piloted by Michael Hetherington using the list he rode to 2nd place on day 1 and 4th place day 2 at SCG: Roanoke. This deck differs from Meandeck Gifts by three maindeck cards (-1 Misdirection -1 Gifts Ungiven -1 Chain of Vapor +2 Repeal +1 Dark Ritual).

Day 1 SCG: Roanoke 2nd Place List
http://sales.starcitygames.com/deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=20136

I am going to go through a few of the more interesting games that occurred in our best of 10 pre-board matches. Gifts wins the die roll and will be playing first.

Game 1 – Gifts on the play

The opening hand that I keep with Pitch Long is:

Lotus Petal
Dark Ritual
Mox Sapphire
Brainstorm
Cabal Ritual
Sol Ring
Polluted Delta

Turn 1

Gifts: Underground Sea tapping for Mana Vault.

PL: I draw Tendrils of Agony for the turn. First play is Mox Sapphire into Brainstorm drawing Imperial Seal, Yawgmoth's Will and Brainstorm. I put Brainstorm and Sol Ring on top and then sacced the Polluted Delta to get an Underground Sea. Tap Underground Sea to cast Dark Ritual then Cabal Ritual and then sac Lotus Petal for B. So right now there is BBBBB in the pool and storm 5. I cast Yawgmoth's Will with BB floating and it resolves. After that I replay the Rituals and Petal from the graveyard and cast Tendrils for lethal damage.

Analysis:
Theres not really a whole heck of a lot to talk about in this game except that despite the fact that I had the turn 1 win with minimal decisions I still made a mistake. Before casting Yawgmoth's Will I did not need to sacrifice my Lotus Petal. The following plays would be the optimal for that game.
Mox Sapphire -> Brainstorm
Dark Ritual -> Cabal Ritual -> Yawgmoth's Will with B floating.
Replay Dark Ritual and Cabal Ritual to have BBBB in pool and storm 7.
Play Petal sac for Imperial Seal and cast Tendrils of Agony for exactly lethal.
If you make this play then you get to keep Lotus Petal if they have the Force of Will for your Yawg's Will and it will make your Imperial Seal regroup much better.

As a side note to this game Mike would have had a turn 2 win because his grip had Dark Ritual, Black Lotus and other insane cards. Oftentimes when you have a turn 2 win with Gifts you make the sacrifice of not having disruption. Obviously hands like the one that Mike had are much better on the play because it only gives your opponent 1 turn to win the game.

Game 2 – Pitch on the play

Starting 7:

Swamp
Force of Will
Yawgmoth's Will
Tinker
Mox Ruby
Mana Vault
Grim Tutor

I decided to toss this hand back because I was on the play and would need to topdeck a Ritual or blue mana source in order to do anything. Even if I did draw one of my outs I would still lose to Force of Will so the risk didn't seem worth the reward. It's too bad the Swamp wasn't any other land because it would have been a potential turn 1 win (Tinker for Lotus etc.).

Next 6:

Brainstorm
Brainstorm
Demonic Tutor
Tinker
Misdirection
Memory Jar

Mulligan to 5:

Tendrils of Agony
Polluted Delta
Demonic Tutor
Grim Tutor
Mystical Tutor

Turn 1

PL: Polluted Delta pass.

Gifts: Tolarian Academy, Mox Pearl, Time Walk.
On the Time Walk turn Mike plays an Underground Sea. On endstep I crack Delta for Underground Sea and cast Mystical Tutor for Ancestral Recall.

Turn 2

PL: I cast the Ancestral Recall which is countered by Mana Drain. I pass the turn.

Gifts: Casts a Brainstorm, uses the 1 colorless mana from Drain to cast a Sol Ring. Tolarian Academy and Sol Ring tap for CCUU and Merchant Scroll is cast for Gifts Ungiven leaving UC in the pool. The remaining blue mana is used for Ancestral Recall. After that he plays a Mox Jet and Mox Ruby and burns for 1.

Turn 3

PL: I draw Dark Ritual for the turn. I cast the Dark Ritual into Demonic Tutor for Infernal Contract. With only 1 mana source in play and since Ancestral was already used there are not many good choices in the deck. The other main option would be Black Lotus. Ancestral Recall plays a special role in combo because it is a huge threat card and amazingly efficient. After burning for 1 I pass the turn.

This play is very greedy and probably a mistake because I could always go find Brainstorm but I felt that I needed to get really lucky to win the game.

Gifts: Mike plays a Lotus Petal and taps Academy for UUUUU, uses Mox Pearl and Sol Ring to cast Gifts with 4 blue still floating. Gifts yields Black Lotus, Recoup, Yawgmoth's Will, and Dark Ritual.

Between these cards and the second Gifts he cast for artifact mana I'm sure Mike could have generated enough mana to Burning Wish for Fireball and kill me with it on his Time Walk turn. Needless to say I lost this game.

Analysis:
Despite mulliganing to five I would have had decent shot to win this game if Mike didn't have Drain mana up on my second turn. In games where I mulligan to 5 or lower I usually make it my mission to resolve Ancestral Recall or Timetwister as soon as possible because otherwise the loss of cards will make it extremely difficult to win. I was very happy with everything about my 5 card hand except for the Tendrils which gets worse and worse in the opening hand the more you mulligan.

Game 3 – Gifts on the play

Opening hand:

Brainstorm
Brainstorm
Imperial Seal
Flooded Strand
Underground Sea
Tendrils of Agony
Force of Will

Turn 1

Gifts: Black Lotus, Mox Jet, sacrifice Lotus for UUU playing Fact or Fiction.

I respond with Force of Will removing Brainstorm and the Force resolves countering Fact or Fiction. After that Gifts plays a Polluted Delta for the turn. Running out Fact or Fiction with no protection seems fine because theres only around a 40% chance they will have the Force of Will and blue card to pitch.

PL: I draw Tinker and then play Underground Sea passing the turn.

There is really no benefit to casting the Brainstorm mainphase because it would need to draw Mox Jet, Lotus Petal, or Black Lotus along with other accelerators in order to have a chance at winning this turn. On the end of my turn Mike plays Repeal on his Mox Jet.

Turn 2

Gifts: Flooded Strand pass.

On his end-step I go for the Brainstorm and Mike casts Ancestral Recall in response drawing three cards. Brainstorm resolves revealing Mana Crypt, Swamp, and Vampiric Tutor. I put Tendrils of Agony and Swamp on top.

PL: On upkeep I cast Vampiric Tutor for Black Lotus. In my mainphase I cast Mana Crypt and play Tinker sacrificing Mana Crypt, Mike Brainstorms in response. Tinker resolves getting Memory Jar after that I play the Flooded Strand in hand. I play Black Lotus saccing for BBB to play Imperial Seal. Imperial Seal finds Demonic Tutor which goes on top. I sacrifice Memory Jar with BB floating and draw Demonic Tutor, Polluted Delta, Swamp, Flooded Strand, Grim Tutor, Mox Sapphire, and Misdirection.

I play and tap the Mox Sapphire and use a B floating to cast Demonic Tutor for Brainstorm. I sac the Flooded Strand in play for another Underground Sea and cast Brainstorm into Dark Ritual, Yawgmoth's Bargain, and Chain of Vapor. With only B floating and having played a land there are no good targets for Grim Tutor so I put Dark Ritual and Yawgmoth's Bargain on top in a desperate attempt to win in two turns.
I Demonic Tutored for Brainstorm instead of Ancestral Recall for two reasons; 1) It can't be misdirected, 2) It lets me keep cards from the Jar hand.

At the end of turn I discard Polluted Delta, Swamp, Flooded Strand, Grim Tutor, and Misdirection. Mike discards Force of Will, Misdirection, Dark Ritual and plenty of Moxen. After that he reveals a hand with Mystical Tutor, Rebuild, and Yawgmoth's Will so I just scoop to save him the effort of casting all of his Moxen multiple times and then putting Tendrils of Agony on top with Mystical Tutor.

Analysis:
The Imperial Seal for Demonic Tutor was my big mistake of the game. I had Black Lotus, Mana Crypt, Vampiric Tutor, and Brainstorm in the graveyard so I only need to draw any artifact mana or Ritual to go off with Yawgmoth's Will. The other six cards from the Jar need to be Force of Will or Misdirection and a blue card to pitch in order to have protection on the Yawgmoth's Will. Storm was near lethal before the Jar so the Draw 7 needed to be pretty bad, which it was. Another option for Imperial Seal was Tendrils of Agony since the storm count was already six before going into the Jar hand and I only needed to deal 18 damage.

The situation of Vampiric Tutor or Imperial Seal before Memory Jar has happened to me many times. I have found whenever I put Black Lotus on top or Yawgmoth's Will I lost the game due to either to much mana and no threats or no protection on the Will. While Demonic Tutor does nothing particularly well in a Jar hand it does a good job in filling in any gaps there might be. Despite previous games lost by putting Yawg's Will on top it would have been the correct choice in this game. So long as your graveyard is fairly loaded Will is generally a fine choice in this situation.

I would also like to mention that I believe you should always play lands before casting Draw 7's because if you miss a land in the 7 cards it can stop you from winning. In the past people have stated that you should not play lands before Draw 7's because of hitting Academy but the odds of drawing Academy, Mind's Desire, and a lot of Moxen are much less than missing a land drop.

Half Time recap
We played a total of 10 games before sideboarding and the final result was Gifts on top with 6 wins and Pitch Long pulling out 4. I think this was a pretty accurate assessment of the matchup because the longer the games go the more it begins to favor Gifts. This means that normally solid Pitch Long hands of Brainstorm, fetch, Brainstorm go down in value because it's giving the Gifts player more time to setup. Playing combo is all abound Risk vs. Reward and I think in the pre-boarded matchup it is better err on the side of taking Risks.

If you are on the play with Pitch Long against Gifts and have the capability for the Turn 1 win with no backup it is best to go for it because by letting them go they can easily cast turn 1 Merchant Scroll for Force of Will. It is also a good idea to go for the turn 2 win with no backup before Gifts has Mana Drain mana up. Not only will Drain answer your threat but it will allow them to play an expensive spell and swing the tempo of the game in their favor. Other than the one game mentioned above Pitch Long won one game by Misdirecting a turn 1 Recall, turn 2 Yawgmoth's Will with Misdirection backup, and turn 2 Timetwister + Mind's Desire for 13. All of the games that it won were in the early turns so playing to win the long game should not be your game plan.

Mike's Thoughts
The matchup is close to the 60/40 that the games showed. As the Gifts player you really want one of three opening hands. You are looking for either a completely busted hand that can win on turn 2, the control hand with cheap card drawing and a pitch counter spell or early drain plus some business spell. Don't ever run Ancestral Recall out there unprotected unless they have no hand, you’re pretty sure they have no counterspells, or you have to in order to have a chance to win. You can’t play totally defensively, even with the infinite counterspell hand because if you don't get a good card drawer they can win through you. The biggest thing to watch out for when you play the counter magic-heavy hand is fatal Tendrils mana or Minds Desire mana because either can wreck you. This match is all about slowing their combo and out drawing them or comboing out before they can.

Post-board Games

Here is how both decks sideboarded for this matchup.
Pitch Long
-1 Imperial Seal, -1 Rebuild, -1 Timetwister, -1 Swamp
+3 Xantid Swarm, +1 Bayou

Gifts
-1 Recoup -1 Fact or Fiction -1 Rebuild -1 Mana Drain/Merchant Scroll (Drain gets boarded on the draw and Scroll on the play)
+4 Duress

Knowing what to bring in for different match-ups is the easy part but knowing what to take out can be a challenge. In the past when Gifts sideboards were running 4x Chalice of the Void I would keep in Rebuild but that seems to be old news so it’s safe to take out the Rebuild. I'm not the biggest fan of Draw 7's against Drain decks because it gives them more opportunities to hit counter magic so this is why I board out Timetwister. The only downside is if Yawgmoth's Will gets hit by Duress theres no way to recur it. The average Gifts sideboard only has 2 Duress so it should be interesting to see how they affect the matchup when there are 4. Unlike other disruption, Duress doesn't care if Xantid Swarm hits the table. Since I know exactly what Mike is bringing in I could take out Chain of Vapor but in a tournament setting that would be far too risky. It feels really bad to lose to random things like Platinum Angel and Arcane Laboratory.

Since the post-board games tend to be longer I'm just going to show two sample games that demonstrated the role of sideboard cards from both sides.

Game 4 – Gifts on the play

Opening hand:

Flooded Strand
Brainstorm
Mox Jet
Mana Vault
Cabal Ritual
Cabal Ritual
Xantid Swarm

Turn 1

Gifts: Island, Mox Pearl casting Merchant Scroll for Force of Will

PL: I draw Cabal Ritual for the turn and sacrifice the Flooded Strand to find an Underground Sea. I cast the Brainstorm mainphase and draw Xantid Swarm, Vampiric Tutor, and Polluted Delta. I put Mana Vault and Cabal Ritual on top. I play Mox Jet and pass the turn.

This turn was a textbook example of when you should mainphase Brainstorm because if you held it for endstep and did not cast Mox Jet then you would be a turn behind. I kept 2 Xantid Swarms after the Brainstorm because they are an efficient threat that Gifts must deal with like Ancestral Recall.

Turn 2

Gifts: Plays Flooded Strand and cracks it for an Underground Sea.
At the end of his turn I play Vampiric Tutor finding Tinker.

The two main options for Vampiric were Tinker and Ancestral Recall. I believe the Tinker is stronger if I can punch through with one of the Xantid Swarms but Recall will be better if they are both dealt with because I can try to resolve it when he taps down for an expensive card. I'm still not sure which is better so if you want to debate it in the forums feel free.

PL: Draw the Tinker on top and fetch a Bayou with my Polluted Delta. I use the Bayou to play the Xantid Swarm which is answered by Mana Drain.

Turn 3

Gifts: Vampiric Tutor on upkeep and Ancestral Recall during the first mainphase. After that he plays Mana Crypt and Tolarian Academy tapping both to play a Gifts Ungiven. Due to the 1 mana gained from Draining Xantid Swarm Mike has a U floating after resolving Gifts. The four chosen cards are Force of Will, Merchant Scroll, Brainstorm, and Time Walk. I give him Merchant Scroll and Brainstorm and the remaining mana is used on Brainstorm.

PL: I draw Tendrils of Agony for the turn and play my second Xantid Swarm this time it resolves. So I've finally resolved a Swarm and have two Cabal Rituals, and Tinker in hand so next turn should be pretty exciting.

Turn 4

Gifts: Mike gets hit by his Mana Crypt falling to 14 life. On his second main he casts Merchant Scroll for Gifts Ungiven using Academy and Crypt leaving UC floating. The extra two mana is used to Repeal my Xantid Swarm. After that a Sol Ring is played and Mike passes the turn.

PL: I draw Force of Will for the turn replay Xantid Swarm and pass the turn again.
I decided to go for Swarm instead of Tinker this turn because he will need to either win on his next turn or use his remaining Repeal to slow me down for another turn. Waiting a turn also has the benefit of letting me draw a blue spell to protect my Tinker with Force of Will if Xantid Swarm were countered this turn. The downside of waiting is if he wins or draws into Duress.

At the end of my turn Mike plays Gifts and I Force removing Tinker and Mike casts his Force pitching another Force of Will. Gifts resolves getting Duress, Mana Drain, Black Lotus, and Brainstorm. I give him Black Lotus and Duress. Here I have a feeling that he has the Repeal because otherwise Mana Drain would do nothing so I decide to give him Duress because I already removed my main threat Tinker to Force of Will so my hand only contains two Cabal Rituals and a Tendrils of Agony. Black Lotus was not very intimidating because he already had Sol Ring, Mana Crpyt, Tolarian Academy and an army of Moxen.

Turn 5

Gifts: Mike misses on Mana Crypt, plays a land and uses his Underground Sea to cast Duress. The Duress hits one of my Cabal Rituals. After that he cast a Mystical Tutor for Yawgmoth's Will.

PL: I draw Brainstorm for my turn and cast it after attacking with Xantid Swarm. Brainstorm reveals Grim Tutor, Yawgmoth's Bargain, and Mox Ruby. I put Tendrils and Grim Tutor on top and tap out to cast Bargain. At 15 life I draw 8 cards which include a Polluted Delta, Mox Sapphire and Rituals to go along with the Tendrils that was on top.

I had to go for the Bargain play instead of Grim Tutor-> Yawgmoth's Will because even though I could replay a fetch land for the turn I only had Cabal Rituals in the graveyard so I had no way to generate enough mana post-Will.

Analysis:
One of the first things you'll notice is how much longer this game went than the pre-board games. Of the 10 games we played before sideboarding the average win was around turns 2-3 but post-board the average game goes much longer. This occurs because Pitch Long slows itself down a little by bringing in Xantid Swarms and Gifts slows down the opponent's combo with more disruption. In these games the added disruption took the form of Duress. This means more interaction and therefore more of an opportunity to outplay your opponent on both sides of the match.
This game also showcased the role of Xantid Swarm. For the cheap cost of one green mana your opponent must answer it or win the game. Unfortunately for me, the list Mike is playing runs two Repeals which are an excellent answer to Swarm while still drawing cards for the Gifts player.

Game 5 – Gifts on the play

Opening hand:

Flooded Strand
Mana Vault
Mana Crypt
Yawgmoth's Bargain
Tendrils of Agony
Mystical Tutor
Ancestral Recall

Before the game Mike mulligans to five.

Turn 1

Gifts: Mox Jet for Duress taking Ancestral Recall

PL: I draw Polluted Delta for my turn and play Flooded Strand.

Turn 2

Gifts: Draw-go without playing a land.
At the end of his turn I crack the Strand for Underground Sea and cast Mystical Tutor for Dark Ritual.

PL: I start the turn off with casting Dark Ritual and then playing Mana Vault with BB floating. I play the Mana Crypt and tap everything to cast Yawgmoth's Bargain with a colorless mana still in the pool. Mike plays Force of Will pitching Mystical Tutor. I mana burn for 1 and play the Polluted Delta in my hand.

During the first two turns my plays were very greedy, I wanted to cast Yawgmoth's Bargain without playing a land for the turn so that I could win turn 2. The problem with this is I then make the sacrifice of removing one of my threat cards Mystical Tutor in order to try and go off a turn faster. While there are much lower odds of him having Force of Will from a probability standpoint the odds that a solid player would keep a hand with no blue source and no Force are less so.

Turn 3

Gifts: Mike hits a land for the turn and then passes.

PL: On upkeep 3 damage is dealt from Mana Crypt and I use Crypt, Underground Sea and a newly fetched Bayou to untap Mana Vault. I draw Grim Tutor for the turn and pass it back to Mike.

Turn 4

Gifts: He rips Ancestral Recall of the top and casts it into a Duress which strips my hand of Grim Tutor.

PL: I miss on the Mana Crypt and draw Demonic Tutor for the turn. I cast Demonic Tutor tapping Mana Vault leaving CC floating which resolves getting Yawgmoth's Will. Will is cast and countered by another Force of Will removing Gifts Ungiven.

Turn 5

Gifts: Casts Mana Vault using Mox Jet

PL: I miss again on the Crypt roll and untap the Vault. I draw Grim Tutor but I'm tapped out.

Turn 6

Gifts: Merchant Scroll for Gifts.

PL: On upkeep I hit on the Mana Crypt down to 12 life. I draw Mox Sapphire on the turn and cast Grim Tutor using the Bayou, Underground Sea, and Mana Vault with two colorless floating. It resolves and I find Tinker. Tinker is then played sacrificing Mana Vault putting Memory Jar in play.

With Jar in play I now have a storm count of 3, no land played for the turn, and Mana Crypt untapped. I decide to crack it this turn because I have used Yawgmoth's Will, Ancestral Recall, Bargain, and all tutors except 1 Grim Tutor. It times like this that I wish I kept in Timetwister because its a threat card that restocks the deck. As of now, I don't know what I would board out instead though.

The Memory Jar hand contains:
2x Dark Ritual
2x Brainstorm
Cabal Ritual
Mox Jet
Polluted Delta

The first thing I do is cast a Dark Ritual and Cabal Ritual both of which resolve putting 6 black in the pool. I cast these to test the water for counter magic so my Brainstorm could resolve. I then played the Delta a fetched an Underground Sea. After that I cast Brainstorm into Mind's Desire, Polluted Delta, and Misdirection. I put Dark Ritual and Mind's Desire on top. I discard the remains of my hand and burn down to 3 life.

This game is starting to turn into a comedy of misplays, for some reason I was thinking of checking for counterspells by casting some Rituals first. The problem is my hand scoops to any a counter on Dark Ritual or Brainstorm unless I hit Mox Jet, Lotus Petal or Black Lotus off the Brainstorm. I should have led with the Brainstorm and then seen what my options were.

I lose this game when he gets a storm of 1 and casts the Tendrils of Agony that was sitting in his hand. If I passed the turn with my Memory Jar and tried to kill him next turn Mike had the cards to kill me on his turn.

Analysis:
This game showed two important parts of the post-board matchup. The first was how devastating Duress can be in this matchup. Against traditional counter-magic it stops the threat but it doesn't teach you anything about your opponents plan. If the Duress in Mike's hand had been a Red Elemental Blast he still would have still stopped the Recall but he would not know about how much mana my hand contained or the looming threat of Yawgmoth's Bargain. Between the two Duress he drew and the two Force of Wills, he easily answered all my threats while never even having two blue mana in play. The second thing to note is the importance of having enough threats to throw at control decks. By playing Mystical Tutor turn 1 instead of Mana Vault I committed myself to a plan where I would be trumped by Force of Will. If instead I led with turn 1 Mana Vault, turn 2 Bargain I could have upkeeped Mystical Tutor -> Tinker next turn and still had a great shot at winning the game.

Final Thoughts

So after playing 10 more games using sideboards the game count was the same as before sideboarding 6 – 4 in favor of Gifts. This was a little disheartening for myself because in tournament settings I have a good track record against Gifts post-board. I think there were two main reasons for Gifts coming out on top. First, Mike runs 4 Duress in the sideboard and that is one of the cards that combo never wants to see. Most versions only run 2 in the sideboard so they often need to include it in a Gifts pile in order to draw into it. Along with 4 Duress Mike has 2 Repeals which is one of the best answers to Xantid Swarm. This is because, unlike Chain of Vapor, it draws a card and can still be used to combo off faster. The second reason the match favored Mike is player skill. Mike is better with Gifts than I am with Pitch Long so the mistakes made in games may skew results.

When playing sideboarded games, the type of hands that you want to see involve turn 1 Xantid Swarm, mana, and other threats. If you get the opportunity to play Swarm before your opponent has Drain mana then they are either forced to counter it with Force of Will or let you goldfish against no disruption. Also when playing on the draw you do not want to keep hands that are all mana and 1 threat because if your opponent has the Duress you will be in a world of hurt. This is less relevant against builds with only 2 Duress but running 4 may become mainstream in the future.

I do believe that the post-board matchup favors Pitch Long against stock Meandeck Gifts but as nice as matchup percentages are they do not win games. Type 1 is a very skill intensive format where players are rewarded for tight play. Both Gifts and Pitch Long are solid choices that will continually get better results the more you learn to master them.

Mike's Thoughts
After board the matchup slows down quite a bit. Not only do they bring in Xantid Swarm, which means they are aiming for a 2nd turn win, but you have Duress which is an amazing tool against them. Duress gives you excellent knowledge about what cards to counter in the near future as well as removing the most relevant piece of their hand. While you shouldn't hesitate to go for early wins, it is important to keep in mind that the games tend to go longer. In the test games played the Xantid Swarms were never much of an issue. This is partially because of the 2x Repeals for them and partially because you have Duress which works through the Xantid. The reason you take out 1 Drain on the draw and 1 Scroll on the play is simply because Drain is very slow on the draw if the expected win is turn 2. Its also worth mentioning that it is much easier to play Island + Mox into Scroll for Force then Island + Mox Sapphire into Drain.

I'd like to thank my friends who looked over my article and you for reading. I hope you got something out of this article because I know I did. If you have any questions feel free to post in the forums and I'll do my best to answer them.

Jeff Folinus
Gekoratel on SCG/TMD
AnotherAimAddict on AIM