A different look at UrPhid

[ump]

I was going to hold back on presenting this deck before fully testing it, but the other UrPhid thread inspired me to come forward a little earlier than I was ready to.

Decks have increasingly become about who has the best opening hand.  The trend in Keeper decks have been more about mana denial with shamans and a full compliment of strips/wastes.  I wanted to try to fit Stifles into Keeper to increase the mana denial but I didn't like it in that deck.  Then, I got to thinking that an UrPhiddian deck would be better able to take advantage of this and attempt a complete early game domination.  With this in mind, I modified the current UrPhiddian deck to maximize denial early on.  The focus of this deck is to go in all out denial mode early and capitalize on it as quickly as possible.

1 Strip Mine
4 Wasteland
4 Volcanic Island
2 Shivan Reef
7 Island
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
2 Gorilla Shaman
4 Ophidian
2 Morphling
1 Masticore
2 Shoreline Ranger
3 Stifle
4 Mana Leak
4 Mana Drain
4 Force of Will
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Fork
4 Fire/Ice
2 Blood Moon
1 Capsize

4 Red Elemental Blast
2 Shattering Pulse
2 Blood Moon
2 Flametongue Kavu
1 Starstorm
2 Misdirection
2 Tormod's Crypt

Strips/Wastes - A full compliment to increase the likelihood of early mana denial.

Shoreline Ranger - I used to have more fetchlands in earlier builds, but have found it hard to get enough blue mana sources underneath the Blood Moon especially when the fetchlands and wastes become red.  The Ranger allows the ability to get blue sources underneath the Blood Moon and is a halfway decent creature if you already have enough mana.  Opposing Wasteland have forced me to cut back on fetchlands and go for the more stable Shivan Reefs.

Brainstorm - There are no Brainstorms in this deck.  The deck is redundant and usually can't dig to find answers anyways.  Less fetchlands also decrease the effectiveness of Brainstorms anyways.  Also, if drawing is needed, I might go with Impulses to try to get a Morphling earlier.

Stifles - They add to the land destruction aspect early by denying fetchlands.

Fork - I don't see why more people haven't used this in the past.  It's my secret weapon against Tendrils as I can use it for Tendrils killing them before they kill me or for Cabal Therapy to deny them Rectors.

Shamans/Powder Kegs - Shamans and Kegs serve the same purpose for this deck, to get those moxes.  Kegs are useful against creatures as well, but Fire/Ice can pull the slack.

Fire/Ice - There is a full set to get those random aggro decks or to just Time Walk against control or combo decks.  They get sided out for Blasts against these decks anyways.

Future Sight - This is a mid-game "I win".  I am going for a early-game "I win" with all my denial.  That is why I do not include it.

Morphling - This is an aggro deck that isn't too different from a suicide black philosophy.  It wants to disrupt early, lay down a creature (Ophidian), counter any possible comebacks, and end with the Morphling.  I am not completely convinced with the Masticore in there instead of a third Morphling, but my current metagame features more random aggro than normal.

Library of Alexandria - Don't be fooled by the countermagic in this deck.  This is an aggro deck that likes to empty it's hand quickly.  Also, the first few turns are so critical with this decks, you don't want the chance to lose a first turn Stifle or Mana Leak or Wasteland.  Later in the game, you should probably have control anyways.

Blood Moon - You might as well keep two maindeck since everybody should be using fetchlands and splashing a second color now anyways.

Control Magic - They need a creature first.  Once again, I am going for early game dominance.  Ideally, whatever they manage to cast will get countered.

Mox Emerald - This is not on the list only because I don't own one yet.  It should be on there and probably in place of an Island or maybe a Stifle.

Cunning Wish - I have tried it, but didn't like it in this deck.  There are not really that many answers in the sideboard anyways.

I actually tested this out on the last day of GenCon, but my lack of experience and lack of sufficient time got me a 0-1-3 record.  In the three draws, I had complete board control and even had the kill condition on the board two of those round, but didn't have the time to finish the game.  The loss was to a bad enchantment based game that if I didn't make numerous mistakes, I would have won.  I tried it a couple more times in the following weeks, but suicide black has been keeping me out of the top four.  However, the slight modifications that I have made since then (such as removing fetchlands to improve the red count) should help.\n\n

[Matt The Great]

Quote (ump @ Aug. 22 2003,13:55)Library of Alexandria - Don't be fooled by the countermagic in this deck.  This is an aggro deck that likes to empty it's hand quickly.  Also, the first few turns are so critical with this decks, you don't want the chance to lose a first turn Stifle or Mana Leak or Wasteland.  Later in the game, you should probably have control anyways.

That all makes sense. So...why is LoA still in the decklist?

[ump]

Quote (Matt The Great @ Aug. 22 2003,14:02)

Quote (ump @ Aug. 22 2003,13:55)Library of Alexandria - Don't be fooled by the countermagic in this deck.  This is an aggro deck that likes to empty it's hand quickly.  Also, the first few turns are so critical with this decks, you don't want the chance to lose a first turn Stifle or Mana Leak or Wasteland.  Later in the game, you should probably have control anyways.

That all makes sense. So...why is LoA still in the decklist?

Sorry.  Fixed the deck list.

[Bastian]

Matt won't let you make a mistake without him noticing, but then again, that's what so great about him  

[Mon, Goblin Chief]

If this deck is that aggro, might 4 Serendib Efreets help you getting your kills inside the time limit? Instead of the 2 Morphlings, Fork and a Mana Leak maybe?
/edit: Forgot to mention it: Fork shouldn't give you any Storm-copies, as it is already played, when it gets storm through copying tendrils. Therefor the storm-ability should never trigger.\n\n

[Saucemaster]

Quote Fork - I don't see why more people haven't used this in the past.  It's my secret weapon against Tendrils as I can use it for Tendrils killing them before they kill me or for Cabal Therapy to deny them Rectors.

Perhaps this should go in the rules forum, but I thought Fork didn't work that way against Tendrils.  I thought you didn't get Storm copies if you Forked a Tendrils.  Rules clarification, anyone?

[MoreFling]

If you're going the mana denial route, why aren't you just playing Keeper?

Also, you have to many "finishers." 1 Morphling and 1 Masticore is already too much when you're running SR's in my opinion.

[Dante]

Quote (Saucemaster @ Aug. 22 2003,15:08)

Quote Fork - I don't see why more people haven't used this in the past.  It's my secret weapon against Tendrils as I can use it for Tendrils killing them before they kill me or for Cabal Therapy to deny them Rectors.

Perhaps this should go in the rules forum, but I thought Fork didn't work that way against Tendrils.  I thought you didn't get Storm copies if you Forked a Tendrils.  Rules clarification, anyone?

You don't get the storm copies of the other person, that's correct.  That would only work if the other person was at 2 life, or if you played a counter/instant before that (I think the Forking player would get storm copies if they have played other spells during the opponents turn such as counterspell, naturalize, etc..) But you definitely don't get the other person's storm copies.

Dante

[Matt The Great]

Storm keys off the total number of spell played that turn, not just your own. If you cast 10 spells, then a Tendrils, and I respond with a Fork, Storm-11 is still in effect. Whether Fork copies the storm-ness of its target is the only question here. If it does, you get a copy for every spell played that turn. If it doesn't, you get only one.\n\n

[Dante]

Quote (Matt The Great @ Aug. 22 2003,15:29)Storm keys off the total number of spell played that turn, not just your own. If you cast 10 spells, then a Tendrils, and I respond with a Fork, Storm-11 is still in effect. Whether Fork copies the storm-ness of its target is the only question here. If it does, you get a copy for every spell played that turn. If it doesn't, you get only one.

502.30a Storm is a triggered ability that functions while the card is on the stack. “Storm” means “When you play this spell, put a copy of it onto the stack for each other spell that was played before it this turn. If the spell has any targets, you may choose new targets for any number of the copies.”

I don't think the "stormness" of the target should matter.

I.e. player A plays 5 mox 4 dark ritual and a tendrils.  Player B responds by Forking Tendrils.  Since there were 10 spells played before that ( 5mox, 4 ritual, 1 tendrils), player B should get 10 more tendrils on the stack.  Why does it matter what went on the stack due to player A's tendrils.....

i guess we should move this to the rules forum.

Dante

[Saucemaster]

Quote i guess we should move this to the rules forum.

No need, it's already been done:  Forking Storm

Sir Kötter is right, You don't get the Storm copies.  Sorry to clutter the thread!\n\n

[Dante]

Quote (Saucemaster @ Aug. 22 2003,15:48)

Quote i guess we should move this to the rules forum.

No need:  Forking Storm

You don't get the Storm copies.  Sorry to clutter the thread!

yes, but the person who answered it wasn't a judge and was just looking at rules.

Forget the storm copies that the original player A (original tendrils caster) gets.  If there were 10 spells cast before the fork (5 mox 4 ritual 1 tendrils), why wouldn't the forking player get them?  Remember his Fork of tendrils is an exact copy of tendrils (not a storm copy), so it WOULD have storm and get 10 more storm copies.....I think we need an actual judge to rule on that.

Dante

[ump]

Quote If this deck is that aggro, might 4 Serendib Efreets help you getting your kills inside the time limit?

Serendibs seem like a good idea.  I will have to try that out as soon as I acquire them (but proxy them while testing).  Mana Leak would not be one of the spells to go though.  It's really important to stop the first rush.  By the way, the time problems were only at that one tournament at GenCon.  With all the draws, and no time in between round, I had to use valuable time during the round to shuffle my deck.  Since that tournament, time has not been a problem.

Quote Remember his Fork of tendrils is an exact copy of tendrils (not a storm copy), so it WOULD have storm and get 10 more storm copies.....I think we need an actual judge to rule on that.

That's what I thought.  Regardless of whether Fork works on Tendrils or not, it probably wouldn't get to that point because it would probably be preceeded by Duress or Therapy which can both be Forked to remove that Tendrils or whatever else.  I still would like to get an official answer though.

Quote If you're going the mana denial route, why aren't you just playing Keeper?

I did start with Keeper.  However, I took the disruption of Keeper and added more with Stifles, Blood Moons, and counters and hopefully came up with a more disruptive deck.

Quote Also, you have to

• many "finishers."

I suppose if I had more digging spells, this would be true.  However, nothing is more frustrating than stopping the first rush and completely locking down your opponent and then not drawing any finishers and thus allowing your opponent the time to recover.  Instead of digging more, I went with the redundancy route.

[Toast]

The when you play this spell clause in storm is something that checks before resolution. Since fork resolves before it actually becomes a tendrils copy you only get one copy.

[SummenSaugen]

You don't need a judge, it's a very easy ruling.

The copy that is placed on the stack is not considered to have been "played". [DeLaney 2001/08/13]

Storm triggers when you play the spell, so Forking will NOT trigger Storm.  (EDIT:  Toast got to this before me, I'll get you next time you wiley baked good!)  Sorry guys.  Regardless, I've been using Fork for a while.  Here's a link for y'all.
I advocate fork

As far as the build goes, I do not advocate making the deck more agressive, perhaps more flexible, but not more aggressive.  And for land denial, I don't think you need nearly that much denial of resources.  You already run Blood Moon, that will defeat their manabase in an entirely different way, and generally in a stronger fashion.  I think this is pushing redundancy way too high to be as effective as it could be.\n\n

[Methuselahn]

Quote (ump @ Aug. 22 2003,13:55)The focus of this deck is to go in all out denial mode early and capitalize on it as quickly as possible.

Great, another thread about sui.  


The problem with 5 strips, 4 stifles, and bloodmoon is that they work against each other like Summen has noted.  Bloodmoon kills off 8-9 of your cards.  Bloodmoon is too slow for what I think you are trying to accomplish.  You want to be killing/stifling lands, shamaning moxen, holding counters, and setting up for an Ophidian attack.  Perhaps Bloodmoon belongs in the SB entirely.

How about a Timetwister in the SB for vs Sui?

I bet Ankh Sligh eats this deck for breakfast.

[ump]

Quote The problem with 5 strips, 4 stifles, and bloodmoon is that they work against each other like Summen has noted.

So how do they work against each other?  Do you advocate taking out the strips or the bloodmoon because they work against each other?  I think you would be telling a lot of people they are wrong if you are saying that.  As far as stifles go, if I can deny them fetching an Island, then it will be that much harder to recover from the Blood Moon.

Quote I bet Ankh Sligh eats this deck for breakfast.

You probably see the near useless Stifles in there and think I will easily lose.  The Stifles will be useless against most aggro decks, but my goal with them are the stop the other "better" decks first.  With the sideboard, the red should really help against aggro.  Then, I will have 4 Fire/Ice, 2 Flametongues, 1 Masticore, 2 Morphling.  Against Ankh Sligh, I can also put in the 2 Shattering Pulse and 2 Misdirections along with the maindeck Shamans.  Plus I don't run the fetchlands.  I don't think it's as lopsided as you think.

On the Fork issue, I am not saying that I was the first to use it.  I was just saying that I don't see why more people don't use it.  I can see now how it won't stop Tendrils itself, but the game should be won before it get's to that point.