so what's up with Painter.dec

[Liam-K]

Alright, I keep seeing various lists labeled as "painter" top 8ing.  They never look the same.  Reports never seem to read the same.  Broad and narrow strategies seem pretty different and the only useful thing I can gather is something along the lines of a comparison to flamevault gifts.  I want to hear about how people are approaching the design of this deck and what they think makes it a strong choice.

I'm particularly interested in the increasing tendancy to eschew REB.  I have read a few times that they compete for slots with Duress which is a super meta choice against all the combo, but I'm having difficulty seeing the validity of the Painter without it especially without support from Gifts allowing smaller amounts of combo pieces.  Time Vault at least had some cool tricks it could do by itself, if I'm missing something with Painter I'd love to hear it.  As far as Grindstone goes outside of your opponent casting a topdeck tutor into it I'm pretty confident in saying it's dead outside the combo.

Is the plan pretty much draw cards, cast mana drains, and eventually resolve two cheap spells just because you have lots of them then deck your opponent?

Does a single sideboard Gaea's Blessing just win against this deck?

Is 6x combo piece, in terms of mana and turns before they're assembled and activated, really better than, say, 4x goyf 2x negator, especially without REB?

Is something along the lines of the RB list Vroman posted reasonable, or is mass REB just too dependant on Painter?

How retarded is the mirror?  Oath level retarded?  Is this a mitigating factor in the deck's potential slice of the meta?


Basically I would love to hear some comprehensive analysis on painter's servant decks especially from people who have taken it to tournaments.

[demonic effect]

to me the problem with painter stems from the various decks that are starting to accumulate that share similar focal points or use cards that mitigate painter's ability (goblin welder as a prime example).  Various decks are trying different strategies based upon how they can best compete against these decks.  Painter has 3 options it can go... it can go the control route involving the REB plan, it can go combo withe all resources attempting to set up the combo, or it can be thrown in as another out.  Ultimately, the problem is that painter turns into a mere 2/2 w/o REB or grinder which, because of the limited # of cards that abuse it cause vast differenes in the game play of the archetype due to player preferences.  w/o more variety or a stronger power play than what it currently exhibits then painter becomes an unpredictable archetype.

[Mdizzle4life85]

to me the problem with painter stems from the various decks that are starting to accumulate that share similar focal points or use cards that mitigate painter's ability (goblin welder as a prime example).  Various decks are trying different strategies based upon how they can best compete against these decks.  Painter has 3 options it can go... it can go the control route involving the REB plan, it can go combo withe all resources attempting to set up the combo, or it can be thrown in as another out.  Ultimately, the problem is that painter turns into a mere 2/2 w/o REB or grinder which, because of the limited # of cards that abuse it cause vast differenes in the game play of the archetype due to player preferences.  w/o more variety or a stronger power play than what it currently exhibits then painter becomes an unpredictable archetype.

Painter's servant is a 1/3. also i never liked the deck because bomberman just seems better in terms of combo/control. another thing is will the increase of null rod this deck just gets worse, my feeling is most of the painter top 8's were just good players with good pairings.

[rikimaru75]

Being a painter player, I feel that it depends heavily on 'how' you want to use painter based on your metagame.  For my metagame (Baltimore region), I was aware of the fact that there were many control players about as opposed to aggro players, so it seemed obvious to me to abuse REBs and Pyroblasts.  Going the control route also let me pitch whatever I needed to Force of Will if need be.

[Liam-K]

Being a painter player, I feel that it depends heavily on 'how' you want to use painter based on your metagame.  For my metagame (Baltimore region), I was aware of the fact that there were many control players about as opposed to aggro players, so it seemed obvious to me to abuse REBs and Pyroblasts.  Going the control route also let me pitch whatever I needed to Force of Will if need be.

This sounds like you went into the tournament intending to play painter.dec and your meta descision was the inclusion of the REB package.  Why did you decide to play painter in the first place?  CS generally posts bad matchups against TPS, to start with.

[A.-1.]

I have taken Painter to three different tournaments using three different builds. The second time I played it, I made top eight at Blue Bell and just recently split the finals at TMD 12.5. This was the list that I was running at TMD 12.5:

4 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
5 Moxen
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Lotus Petal
3 Underground Sea
3 Volcanic Island
2 Island
4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
2 Red Elemental Blast
2 Pyroblast
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Echoing Truth
1 Time Walk
1 Brainstorm
1 Ponder
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
3 Thirst for Knowledge
3 Trinket Mage
1 Pithing Needle
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Grinstone
3 Painter's Servant
1 Tinker
1 Darksteel Colossus
1 Yawgmoth's Will

Sideboard:
4 Duress
2 Extirpate
2 Engineered Plague
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Lava Dart
1 Blue Elemental Blast
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Ingot Chewer
1 Rack and Ruin
1 Engineered Explosives

I really like the control-heavy builds with Tinker -> DSC as a backup plan and Trinket Mage/Painter beats as yet another backup plan. I'm not saying this is the definitive build, but it is the build that I'm most comfortable with. I think that is what draws so many players to Painter.dec. There may or may not be a perfect build, but because there are so many variants there's bound to be a build for just about every style of player.

Painter by itself doesn't do anything spectacular. Other than the obvious that it allows you to pitch any card to Force of Will and turns REB and Pyro into one mana Vindicates/Counterspells, it also lets you find any instant with Merchant Scroll. Grindstone is also quite weak by itself unless you have a Tormod's Crypt in play.

Gaea's Blessing can be Extirpated with the trigger on the stack.

I can't really comment on whether vroman's list is reasonable nor can I say if a deck running 4x Goyf and 2x Negator is strictly better. I haven't had time to test either extensively.

Having played and watched some ridiculously stupid Oath mirrors, my opinion is that the Painter mirror is not nearly as horrendous.

[Tin_Mox5831]

I've been testing several different configurations, and I have to say that I have had pretty good results with a U/B variant. It's fairly similar to the list featured in this report: http://www.themanadrain.com/index.php?topic=36367.0

I do have a heavier mana commitment to black and I currently run an ever-changing configuration of 7 cards that are either Duress or Thoughtseize. It's been playing fairly well, but I honestly win over half of my games with Tinker -> Darksteel Colossus. Quite often, my combo pieces end up becoming extra Duress effects by drawing their counters and I simply play control until my Iron Giant comes trampling through the red zone. The Trinket Mages are cute, but in the end, I don't think they're quite right in this deck. They seem like such a no-brainer inclusion, but I've been very underwhelmed most of the time when I resolve one. As far as the Tarmogoyf/Phyrexian Negator decision is concerned, I guess it could work. I don't know if it's the right direction to move in, however. I think that the right mindset is to assume the control role early while constantly looking for an exploitable gamestate to lock it up rather than forcing the issue and fizzling/giving games away.

Just my thoughts.

Later,
Dave

[beder]

Sorry for my english, message from france.

IMO, the point is that the painter/stone combo is made of pieces that have little or big synergies with many archetypes/colors.
Both painter and stone are artifacts and not expensive ones : it allows you to put that in nearly any deck and they have the classical artifact synergies (welder, tfk, tinker, ...).
Grindstone can be found with trinket, painter increases blue classics power - fow/misd and merchant, transform red elemental from a sideboard card into an ultimate disruption card, ...
Finally, the main synergies are with cards in the 1st and 3rd colors most played in vintage (blue and red).

As a result, there are many many possibilities to use those 2 cards. IMO, that's why so many build seem to be viable and competitive.

For instance, here is the one i use right now and that I like pretty much. It is in the same family as the one vroman proposed but somehow different.

// Lands
    4 Bloodstained Mire
    2 Polluted Delta
    3 Badlands
    2 Underground Sea
    1 Swamp
    1 Mountain

    4 Bazaar of Baghdad

// Creatures
    3 Squee, Goblin Nabob   
    4 Painter's Servant
    4 Dark Confidant
    2 Goblin Welder
    1 Sundering Titan
   
// Spells
    1 Black Lotus
    1 Mox Ruby
    1 Mox Jet
    1 Mox Sapphire
    1 Lotus Petal
    1 Mana Crypt
    1 Sol Ring

    2 Grindstone

    4 Red Elemental Blast
    2 Pyroblast
    3 Thoughtseize
    3 Duress

    1 Demonic Tutor
    1 Vampiric Tutor
    1 Yawgmoth's Will
   
    1 Powder Keg
    1 Darkblast

    1 Ancestral Recall
    1 Time Walk
    1 Tinker

I am still hesitating about
- the number of bazaars (3-4)
- the number of squee (3-4)
- the number of painter (3-4) and the number of grindstone (2-3)
- adding a second sundering (or another big robot : triskell, ...)
- the ""powder keg" slot : animate dead could be a nice silver bullet

But as it is, it is already efficent and works pretty well against many decks.

This is another road to use the painter/stone combo and its synergies.

[JACO]

Painter + Grindstone is an efficient, compact combo, and can be fit into a bunch of different shells. I've written about this here:
http://mtgsalvation.com/834-painters-grindstones-and-blasts-oh-my.html
and here:
http://mtgsalvation.com/837-combating-painters-servant-in-vintage.html

I played an aggro-control version of painter to Top 4 at the last ICBM open here:
http://www.themanadrain.com/index.php?topic=36170.0

Basically you can just tailor your deck to face whatever you expect to see at a given tournament. This means the colors, mana base, and support cards should change along with it. That's why you end up seeing so many different versions of Painter floating around. There is no 'best practice' to apply towards it, because the shell should be tailored to beat what you expect to play against at a given tourney.

A-1's version, like Owen's at GenCon, is extremely cool I think, because the metagame is shifting towards a Mana Drain and TPS landscape at the moment, and this can really exploit those matches by gaining tempo with cheap spells and answers like Duress and Red Elemental Blast, while at the same time forwarding their own game plan.

[rikimaru75]

This sounds like you went into the tournament intending to play painter.dec and your meta descision was the inclusion of the REB package.  Why did you decide to play painter in the first place?  CS generally posts bad matchups against TPS, to start with.

Well, just recently I found myself getting back into magic (February 2007) and was reaccustoming myself to playing again by playing some Type II at the time.  When Shadowmoor came out, I observed how many saw great success with abusing Painter's Servant, so I decided to try the deck out for myself. It was a simple deck to learn and play, and I really didn't need to wrack my brain on the various decisions that are required for TPS and Drain Tendrils for example.  Also, seeing how I had most of the components to build it in the first place really helped matters too.

[Liam-K]

So I'm gathering the deck is pretty much a variable hate list with a win combo that's easy to slip through?  Seems better in that light.  Meta.dec can have strong game position but difficulty capitolizing on it due to non-objective-strength strategy, adding "oops, I win" makes sense.

Also seems kind of like it might logically eventuate in a type of Slaver, from another angle.  How is Welder in painter, possibly as a sideboard card?

I'd like to get some higher order analysis going here but I really can't initiate it.  Anyone interested in giving a lengthier rundown of good options or thoughts on how to start tuning a list towards something that feels more... focused?

[Purple Hat]

I like welders in painter combo since it allows you to discard painter to thirst or get it countered, then weld it back with the grindstone activation on the stack.