UBW Landstill

[skecreatoR]

For a upcomming tournament this saturday, I figured out that my belcher deck weren't going to be ready, so I had to find something else. I wanted to play some sort of control, maybe with Standstill. I liked both black, white & blue(obv.) in the deck, and after some testing an working, the following list were created:

U to the W to the B:

Threads (9):

4 Shadowmage Infiltrator
2 Exalted Angel
4 Faerie Conclave

Draw (12):

1 Demonic Tutor
4 Accumulated Knowledge
3 Brainstorm
4 Standstill

Disruption (14):

4 Counterspell
4 Force of Will
3 Swords to Plowshares
3 Stifle

Win (1):

2 Decree of Justice

Mana (21 uden Faerie Conclave, 25 med):

1 Mox Diamond
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Tundra
2 Scrubland
2 Swamp
3 Plains
4 Island
2 Underground River
4 Flooded strand

Board:

4 Tormods Crypt
4 Chill
3 Damping Matrix
4 Disenchant

Notice the enourmous lack of Duallands - I haven't got Tundra / Scrubland in any amount usable, so this is what the list ended with - and no, I cannot dig them up for saturday.

I need some comments and deck discussion, to me it seems both viable and strong enough to win against a lot of good decks, even being budget.

Thanks in advance.

-ske

[Nantuko Rice]

why black? black doesn't give any real benefit to landstill other then the tutor.

shadowmage infiltrator? they'll probably get killed 90% of the time before you see their benefit.

you laso have no board sweeper such as Nevy's Disk or wrath of god. these are sometimes vital for the landstill deck.

also, splashing the third color isn't going to help your mana base very much. exalted angelsd are going to need dual white.

[skecreatoR]

The shadowmages are truly awesome, they are both chump blockers and fetching cards at a very high rate - truly a good card, no doubt about it. The manabase isnt really that much of a problem, the deck works pretty good around it.

I wanted Balance in the deck, it is probably the best & cheapest card to clear the board. So the current list is like this:

Threats (9):

3 Shadowmage Infiltrator
2 Exalted Angel
4 Faerie Conclave

Draw (12):

1 Demonic Tutor
4 Accumulated Knowledge
3 Brainstorm
4 Standstill
1 Mystical Tutor

Disruption (14):

4 Counterspell
4 Force of Will
3 Swords to Plowshares
3 Stifle
1 Balance

Win (1):

2 Decree of Justice

Mana (20 without Faerie Conclave, 24 with):

1 Mox Diamond
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
1 Tundra
2 Scrubland
2 Swamp
3 Plains
4 Island
2 Underground River
3 Flooded Strand

I cut one fetch as they actually destroys my manabase, so Im back to three. Comments?

-ske

[TheRock]

why black? black doesn't give any real benefit to landstill other then the tutor.

That is 100% false.  Black offers a sideboard flexibility that is extremely usable in the current environment, Yawgmoth's Will, and Duress along with Tutors.  I'm sure that there is more out there too.

Right now, this is probably U/B Landstill's best time to shine, if it ever will.  Of course, that is assuming that your area does not have too much aggro and you have the proper sideboard material to handle yourself.  This deck can contend.

Finkel does not suck in this format.  Ophidian does not suck in this format either.  You might as well have said that Standstill sucks; it makes about the same amount of sense.

Since you have a very limited amount of duals, you are better off running white OR black, but not both.  Once you decide which color to run, get some Mishra's Factories and Nevinyyral's Disks if you can.

Shock Wave's Landstill primer might help you out as well.  Good luck.

[Godot]

I think you're going in completely the wrong direction with this.  Its almost like you've taken EBA and Landstill and thrown them together....and this isnt a good thing.

Brainstorms and Fetches dont work in landstill.  Creatures (Shadowmage/Exalted) dont work in landstill.  Mox Diamond(and mana crypt for that matter) is absolutely terrible in landstill.  Standstill and conclaves do not work in EBA.   Pick an archetype and stick with it.  This deck has absolutely no focus.  In this case the whole is not greater than the sum of the parts.

You cant really run good landstill without drains, so I'd suggest a more Uwb control type build.  If you eliminate the Standstills, Conclaves and AKs that will open up room to fix the manabase and run more effective cards.

I think the most glaring problem right now is the manabase.  You have
11 U -4 of which are Conclaves these should probably be Islands
6 W
6 B
(only counting permanant sources)

Yet you run 8 white cards with 2(4) requiring double white and only 4 black cards.  You definitely need more white in there.  Some extra fetches (maybe 2) and the additional Brainstorm would help.  You should probably run basic lands over the Underground Rivers so they're at least fetchable.

If you decide to change this and cut the Standstills then without Drains DoJ  is probably an inferior win condition.  Maybe look at more Angels or a Morphling.

Cards you should take a look at:
Wasteland/Strip Mine - probably wanna find room for these
Fact of Fiction
Cunning Wish
Back to Basics
Phyrexian Negator
Some form of artifact/enchantment kill

Thats about all I can think off the top of my head.  Honestly, considering your lack of duals you're probably better off playing fish or something, but if you wanna play this then you need to focus more and fix that godawful manabase.

[Machinus]

Godot is correct. You have conclaves and decree, but then you put in finkels and angels. Now, if you have any exprience with Landstill, you would know the importance of NOT casting spells on your turn, or NOT having creatures in the deck. However, I would say that this looks more like eba and you should just get rid of the conclaves. Why are you running AK? Brainstorm along with fetchlands will produce a better effect. Why are you running mana crypt and mox diamond? You cannot ulitize the mana accleration these cards provide. Landstill survives but countering and answering the opponents threat structure, by amassing a heavy card advantage; eba survives by disrupting as much as it can up front, and then cleaning up the rest later, by running efficient answers. You must choose to take advantage of either an early disruption complement, or a mid game card advantage engine. I suggest moving towards EBA, cutting the conclaves, standstills, and AKs, consider running phids with your basic mana base, and adding pikula and possibly duress.