Suggestions for my Mono Brown

[A Black Lotus Buddy]

Recently I got 1st place at my local tournement (which is powered for the most part) and I used this deck:

1x Trinisphere
4x Smokestack
4x Tangle Wire
3x Orb of Dreams
4x Crucible of Worlds
4x Metalworker
3x Staff of Domination
3x Grafted Skullcap
4x Chalice of the Void
2x Karn, Silver Golem
4x Juggernaut
1x Memory Jar

5x Moxen
1x Black Lotus
1x Sol Ring
1x Mana Vault
1x Mana Crypt
4x Mishra's Workshop
3x Ancint Tomb
2x City of Traitors
1x Strip Mine
4x Wasteland
SB
4x Defense Grid
4x Sphere of Resistance
4x Tornod's Crypt
1x Jester's Cap
1x Platinum Angel
1x Orb of Dreams

My Matchups were:
AuriOath W
G/U/W Aggro Control L
WW W
Drag4on W
Oath W
Fruity Pebbles W (upset of the day :lol:)
Meandeath D for drop

in the finals, I beat both the Oath deck and the G/U/W deck.  How would this deck do in a more competitive metagame, and how could I make it better?

[einlanzer625]

firstoff: congrats on your first place, id like to see more of an indepth report from this deck, since it really seems like the old WelderMUD decks, and i liked them .

against a more diverse metagame, id consider bringing a jester's cap to the maindeck, and nixing one crucible, i mean do you really need four of them? most decks that run the waste/strip/crucible lock usually run 2-3 at very max and if you bring a jesters cap main, it will make the random combo decks that much easier to beat (take out belcher's belchers, or their severances if its monoblue, remove TPS's burning/cunning wish, tendrils, or just take their necro/bargain/ancestral recall, etc.  nuke doomsday's win conditions, take out the slavers against drain slaver) these are just some of the good reasons to run a cap or two maindeck as well as that one in the board .

so heres my thinking:
-1 crucible
+2 jester's cap
-1 staff of domination maybe?

board: (if you cant take anything out for the second cap
-1 sphere of resistance
+1 Jester's Cap

[A Black Lotus Buddy]

The day's kind of hazy.  I remember getting loads of turn 1 smokestacks (which are devestating against aggro), I got the combo off a few times and against Oath I hit some Chalices for two.

I really like the Cap idea, because Jester's Cap is great against a lot of things and because it is the first rare I have ever gotten in a pack.  It was worth a lot of money at the time

[Sean Ryan]

With the restriction of Trinisphere Mono-Brown Mud is the strongest option for the prison archetype.  Similiar builds have enjoyed success in Europe where combo has been more prevalent - a trend that should be hitting the U.S. shortly.     

I have a few comments on the list you posted, as well as a few questions.

1) Mana Sources: you should be running Academy & another city.  One of the advantages to runnning Mono-Brown is the explosiveness of your first 2 turns which really require at least 29 sources (including Metal Worker).  Besides waste/strip you run 11 lands that produce 2 or more mana making your Spheres much less symetrical.

2) Lock: My initial question is how has Orb of Dreams been treating you?  I have yet to test with it but it seems like it may be too dependant upon Smokestack & Tangle Wire which can function alone and asymetrically. 

3) Win Coditions:  Currently I'm running 1 Karn, 1 Sundering Titan, & 2 Staff of Domination.  I would like to hear some of your opinions on this b/c. it has been the area of most difficulty.  The Juggernauts appeal to my inner aggro player but I left them out for the Spheres and main deck Jesters Cap as was mentioned earlier.  Jesters Cap is one of the most powerful effects in the current Vintage metagame with most of the decks packing less than 4 real kill conditions - I run 3 in the main myself

4) Matchups:  I haven't tested enough to speak with authority on most matchups, except to say that if Mud is going first it can hang with just about anything due to its shere explosiveness.  Game one of the Slaver match can be rough, especially if on the draw, Welders are obviously bad news.  However, games 2/3 I bring in Defense Grid & Damping Matrix. 

If "Maxx Matt" from Itally is out there it would be benificial to hear what his grouphas been doing with Mono-Brown  Mud latley.

Thanks
Sean

[A Black Lotus Buddy]

1. I do run Academy, my list should be -1 Wasteland (which was on the board instead of Platz) and +1 Academy.

2.  Orb of Dreams has been a bit useless at times, but Sphere of Resistance wouldn't do much better in its place.  I chose the Sphere because it is great against Drag4on.

3.  Since the deck does not play Welders, if the Golem gets forced it's a lot harder to win (even if the combo goes off).  Sundering Titan is also not as good sans the Welders.  Juggernauts can give Control, Aggro and Stax major headaches.  I'm planning on using Jester's Cap in the future.

4.  Chalice of the Void>EVERYTHING!!

Thanks for the help,sryan!

[forests failed you]

My teamate Windfall and I were testing a fairly similar build of $T4Ks earlier this month, and found  maindeck Orb of Dreams to be extremely effective.  It is another devistating bomb against combo decks, (especially ones that play maindeck Rebuild), absolutely owns decks playing +5 fetchlands, and is surprising effective against Oath when they put a tapped Akroma into play.  However, our list instead of Juggernaut, Metal Worker, and Staff, played Gorilla Shamans, Welder, and Winter Orbs, and a slightly different Mana base, obviously.   (Winter Orb + Orb of Dreams is nice, and Furious George is insane against Moxes and Lotus when they come into play tapped.)

I just wanted to give you props on your win and offer a few suggestions and insights of my own.

We found that the Control Slaver matchup was terrible, because they use their Goblin Welders to hit your threats long enough to stall and eventually Slaver you.  How does your deck answer turn one Welder?  If you take this deck to Star City you might consider running some sort of Welder hate at least in the board.

Also, I had a suggestion for your list.  Last year we tested out a Staff of Domination / Metal Worker deck and played with Well of Knowledge.  Since the deck plays with 29 Mana sources most of which Tap for +2 Mana you can usually abuse this card to draw into your combo or a Stax lock.  It might be randomly better in this particular build than Skullcap because you have less protection (i.e. Shamans, and Welders) to protect you from Cunning Wish for Hurkyl's or Rebuild, which unfortunately single-handedly beats active Skullcap. 

Anyways, looks good.  Hopefully something I had to say will be useful to you.


Brian D.

[A Black Lotus Buddy]

The tourney was only a tiny local so it wasn't a big deal, but thanks anyway.

There are 3 ways that this deck can effectively handle welder, 2 of which involve keeping the graveyard free of artifacts.

1.  First turn Chalice is the best way to keep Welders off the board.

2.  First turn Smokestack is good, but needs the Crucible to be truly effective.

3.  Go off with the combo before an artifact hits the graveyard.  This is also the Universal answer to everything

[Marton]

orb of dream seems definately subpar. Also, I also disagree with 4x crucible, because crucible is not a card that you want to draw twice in the same game. I would definately avoid any card that are totally useless alone (read: staff of domination) in 4x pairs. I would go to 2/3 of them should you decide to play them. You pack very few (explosive) draw cards, and even less ways of handling a energy flux.I always hated grafted skullcap, opting instead for mind's eye. Take note that I believe it is a grave mistake to cut a wasteland. Cut anything else for the tolarians, but not strip effects.

You might also take note at well of knowledge, which can do very broken things with metalworkers (tho that could easily be interpreted as a win-more card).

Personally I would much rather build a mix between the old old stax list that tried overwhelming the opponent with threats and following them with draw-7s. Metalworker helps you at throwing an absurd quantity of stuff at your opponent. Think of a minimal splash in the genre of: wheel of fortune, timetwister, tinker, (perhaps 0/2 welders), recall and perhaps some meditates (try this for fun: at your upkeep, play a meditate, in response, pop your jar. Then draw your card for that turn. Proceed to abuse metalworker in the most absurd ways). Balance and crop rotations would be in consideration for sure, but you should try and minimize the colored cards in order to maximize your metalworkers (notice also that almost all added cards are card drawers to 'make-up' for it). But you will also have the problem of screwing the mana base, which is why you will want to put as few colored spells as possible. Also, draw-7s and mind's eye if very funny as well, because god knows how unfunny it is for your opponent to have you draw like 14 cards after a wheel of fortune.

If you wish to stay mono-brown and lack even more mana accelerants, I would go as far as suggesting candelabra of tawnos in this deck.


My main gripe against your deck is that you cut the trinisphere and basically replaced them with orb of dreams, which is about the worst you could come up with. I would prefer to cut some P9, add more lands, and play null rods main deck rather than play orb of dreams. Null rod *CAN* make up for the loss of trinisphere, while orb of dreams merely helps the dragon matchup a bit (really it doesn't, since your opponent will go for the draw, but please, keep believing this card hoses dragon). However, adding null rod means essentially going back to the drawing board (just metalworker alone is really bad with it).

[Jacob Orlove]

Please read the forum rules here: http://www.themanadrain.com/forums/index.php?topic=18027.0
Take particular note of rule #4: lack of content. When you don't add basic information, you get a lot of replies to the effect of "why are/aren't you playing card X?", which you should have addressed in the initial post.

Anyway, I have to close this thread. If you want to start a new one, include more than just a decklist.