UBg Fae

[personalbackfire]

Well in testing for the Grudge match I decided to try a different strategy that I am not used to in vintage... Fighting with a bunch of dorks! I have long been excited to try and test out a Fae list but never gave it the time of day since I don't test for vintage all that often. This is what I arrived at.

4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
1 Bayou
3 Underground Sea
5 Fetch
2 Island
1 Tropical Island
1 Black Lotus
3 Mox
4 Force of Will
4 Spellstutter Sprite
2 Bitterblossom
4 Dark Confidant
3 Vendillion Clique
2 Sower of Temptation
1 Ancestral Recall
1 TimeWalk
4 Thoughtseize
3 Stifle
3 Spell Pierce
3 Null Rod
3 Trygon Predators
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Diabloic Edict

4 Leyline
1 Pithing Needle
2 Jailer
1 Planar Void
3 Natures Claim
2 Duress
1 Tinker
1 Sphinx of the Steel Wind

I remember someone from bluebell playing a Fae list a while ago  but didn't look up his list so I am not sure how close these are. I also kno Rob from Long Island did well with a list opting for Chalice of the Void and Aether Vial over Null Rod and Bitterblossoms,aside from some other slight changes.

I got to test the deck against UBJace Control Vault/key.dec, Expresso Stax, and Drain Gush Tendrils. I didn't put a ton of time in the testing only playing a few games in each matchup but I found that the deck was competitive against all of my small gauntlet. I won about half of the games in each set. (Note: they were all game ones, the sideboard is untested). If I weren't into playing as many broken spells as I do like to play, I would give this more of a shot. I am far from a "fish" expert but I will talk about some of the card choices.

2 Bitterblossom: I essentially wanted to give my Spellstutter Sprites more value. That is to say I didn't want them to only be able to counter 0 and 1 casting cost spells. Bitterblossom also has the added benefit of being completely fine against Workshop decks creating perms every turn.

3 Null Rod: Null rod is exteremely underplayed and I am not sure why. One of the early lessons I learned in vintage is that for Fish to have a chance it needs Null Rod. I don't know if this is correct since I don't play fish all too much but it seemed like a good card to just kinda auto include since I am not really familiar with these decks.

3 Stifle: Going along with the mana denial plan Stifle fits in perfectly. Although it is easy to play around once they know you have it it does compliment the mana denial strategy and have the added bonus of hitting an asortment of other cards like smokestack, jace, ect.

2 Sowers: I am not really sure if one or two is the correct number. They are used to steal Bobs, Sphinxes, Lodestones, anything really. The fact that its 4casting cost means that it does hurt off a Bob flip.

One thing I have noticed in testing this particual list is that life loss does matter between Bob, Seize, and Bitterblossom.

1 Demonic 1 Edict: I wanted a some other way to deal with creatures. I wasn't sure if I wanted two removal spells or a tutor and a removal spell. I like the ability that Demonic has to search for timewalk, which is nice in this deck. It also has the added benefit of helping to find Tinker post board.

The board is set up to beat Ichorid and workshops, and provide support in any Blue matchup. I also think that Tinker/Sphinx is the best thing you could have against Fish decks so that is why it is there over more removal spells. This of course is coming from someone who mostly plays "big blue" or combo decks so I could be way off base.

Anyways, I would suggest testing the list out if you are looking for a fun deck that in my opinion has decent matchups against Blue decks and Shops.

[voltron00x]

I'd really like this strategy to be viable; do the Trygons give it enough play against Shops?  This would be an annoying deck to try to beat with Oath, I think.  It looks solid.

The top 8 was Wolsky, FWIW:

Blue Bell 03.07.2010
- 34 players
8. John Wolsky

Maindeck (60):
Spells (41):
1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
3 Bitterblossom
4 Dark Confidant
1 Demonic Consultation
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Diabolic Edict
4 Duress
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Brainstorm
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
3 Spell Pierce
4 Spellstutter Sprite
2 Stifle
1 Time Walk
3 Vendilion Clique

Lands (19):
1 Flooded Strand
2 Island
1 Misty Rainforest
4 Polluted Delta
1 Strip Mine
2 Swamp
4 Underground Sea
4 Wasteland


Sideboard (15):
1 Darkblast
4 Energy Flux
3 Scion of Oona
4 Tormod's Crypt
3 Yixlid Jailer

[DubDub]

I messed around in this area a while ago (before the printing of Spell Pierce), at that time I liked having Drain in the deck in order to drain into either Sword of Fire and Ice or Glen Elendra Archmage.  Resolving Archmage can be essentially game over depending on the opponent, which is incredible.  Null Rod and Stifle do complement Spell Pierce much better if you go that direction.

[Cruel Ultimatum]

I had made a decklist for ubg fae a while ago as well. When I talked to Rob before him t8ing the event he was playing ub fae and after a chat with him he splashed green for goyf and trygon. After talking with Nick Detwiller he felt as if a deck with bob, goyf, and claims was a deck he was afraid of, not to mention bitterblossoms. I can try and find the list i had worked out but I am not sure i still have it.

[xouman]

I have played lately a Ug fae deck, Ugr last time. While it does not have black, being a fae deck seems somewhat alike. Note that it is unpowered, because I don't have access to P9:

creatures-12
4-spellstutter
3-tarmogoyf
2-vendillion clique
2-cloud of faeries
1-mistbind clique

counters-12
4-fow
3-mana drain
2-spell pierce
2-spell snare
1-mindbreak trap

 instants-10
 2-intuition
 2-rebuild
 2-ancient grudge
 1-echoing thruth
 1-life from the loam
1-brainstorm
1-gifts ungiven
1-mystical tutor

planeswalkers-1
  1-jace

 artifacts-1
 1-crucible

 lands-23
 1-riptide laboratory
 1-cephalid colisseum
1-strip mine
 2-wasteland
 2-mutavault
 2-lonely sandbar
 1-cloud of faeries
 3-polluted delta
 2-flooded strand
 2-tropical island
2-volcanic island
1-barbarian ring
 3-island
 
 sideboard
 2-nature's claim
 2-annul
 1-hurkyl's recall
 2-mindbreak trap
1-tarmogoyf
2-reb
1-pyroblast
1-Rough-Tumble
1-life from the loam
1-ancient grudge
1-umezawa's jitte



I played it in the LCV finals (a 50-60 people league, played monthly in Catalonia, Spain). I lost first match to Tezz, draw against vial fish, win against Tezz and then lost to MUD.


The deck is based in these principes:

-Loam if the best card in the deck. Intuition goes nearly always for loam+two lands (strip+wasteland, mutavault x 2, lonely sandbar x 2...). With lonely sandbar you are drawing 2 extra card each turn at the cost of 1GUU, not bad.

-Spellstutter sprite is the next best card in the deck. Really synergic with cloud of faeries (a bad card, but decent in this deck), Vendillion, mutavault and riptide laboratory.

-Spells should be played as instants when possible. Cloud of faeries and rebuild are cycled lots of times, but cloud sometimes allows great T2 opens and rebuild is really needed against tinker or mud. Tarmogoyfs are needed against aggro decks and jace/crucible are just great.

Problems:

-Mud usually crushes this deck (as usual with any unpowered deck). Golem, tangle, COV (at 2, or 1 postboard). Grudge + intuition fix it a lot, but I couldn't see any against it :p

-Other fish decks could be a hassle. Barbarian ring is key here with crucible/loam, and tarmogoyf obv shines. Most victories came after playing intuition for loam+wasteland+strip, since its manabase is fragile.

-Oath pairing it's at 50% after more than 10 games. It's quite difficult for them to resolve oath between counters, spellstutters and SB's claims.

-Tezz/gush decks are good pairings. We have more counters and can draw at the same pace in the long run, while attacking with tiny creatures.

-Ichorid is untested, but feels awful. In my metagame there are really few ichorids (0-5%).


I was planning adding black instead red, in order to have bitterblossom online (but I don't like getting tapped in my turn). Then I would play tutors + volrath stronghold, nice with loam and intuition.

A powered approach should have key+vault+sensei+ancient ruins, instead cloud of faeries and tarmogoyfs.

[StanleyAugust]

I love faeries and I think there are a myriad of directions a deck like this could go.

At the moment I'm testing out an U/B Landstill/faerie build looking like this:

Lands: 21

4 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
4 Wasteland
4 Mutavault
2 Island
1 Swamp
1 Wasteland
1 Scalding Tarn

Creatures: 8

4 Spellstutter Sprite
4 Ninja of the Deep Hours

Sorceries: 5

3 Thoughtseize
1 Time Walk
1 Demonic Tutor

Instants: 14

4 Force of Will
4 Spell Pierce
3 Daze
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Diabolic Edict

Artifacts: 5

2 Skullclamp
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire

Enchantments: 7

4 Standstill
3 Bitterblossom

It's doing OK so far running very smoothly. It's not something I would recommend though, I'm just testing out some ideas, as Standstill does have some great synergy with the build.

[honestabe]

Ninja of the Deep Hours seems really, really good in a list running Bitterblossom.