Meandeck Gifts - Spring 2006

[Smmenen]

By Stephen Menendian

4 Gifts Ungiven
4 Merchant Scroll
4 Brainstorm

4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
3 Misdirection

The Combo
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Time Walk
1 Recoup
1 Tinker
1 Darksteel Colossus
1 Burning Wish

1 Ancestral Recall
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Rebuild
1 Chain of Vapor

1 Tolarian Academy
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
5 Island
3 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta

1 Black Lotus
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Sol Ring
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Sapphire

Sideboard:
1 Tendrils of Agony
2 Red Elemental Blast
2 Pyroblast
1 Rack and Ruin
1 Rushing River
2 Hurkyl's Recall
2 Pithing Needle
2 Pyroclasm
2 Old Man of the Sea

There it is.  Ok, so its the same list I played at Gencon with one change: I am now using Chain of Vapor over Echoing Truth.

This deck is really amazing.  There are some really great reasons to consider playing this right now:

1) This control deck has the best game against combo. period.  Of any control deck out there.  You have the ability to find  Force of Will faster than any deck since Grow.   Against Combo, the best play is Turn one Mox, Land, Scroll for Force of Will.  You also have Misdirections in case IT or Long tutors up Ancestral and plays it.

2) This deck has Misdirections, whicih are INSANE in this metagame of Gifts and Slaver and IT.

3) The Mana Base is SO good.  You won't care about Fish. 

4) This deck is extremely fast.  If you aren't goldfishing the deck by turn four, try again. 
Learn the deck by goldfishing it. 

This deck has a really high learning curve.  It may be one of the hardest decks in the format to play next Grim Long because every single major card in your deck is a tutor, thus you have inf. decisions or as I say "So many insane plays." 

I REALLy wanted to add Vampiric Tutor, since that card is so good in this Duress heavy environment.  However, the only one Underground Sea and the fact that I would not cut a Misdirection ro a Scroill means that I would have to cut Mystical, which I'd rather just keep as is. 

Some other notes:

SBing:  Against Slaver,
They can try to use cards like Gorilla Shaman, Red Elemental Blast, and the like to stop you.
You will want to sideboard in Pithing Needles and Red Elemental Blasts - as many of both as you can muster. My advice it to sideboard out Mystical Tutor, Demonic Tutor, two Merchant Scrolls, and the two bounce spells. Demonic Tutor adds pressure to your mana base because you will want to fetch out Underground Sea. To support your impressive Red Elemental Blasts, Volcanic Island is the only thing you should be fetching out. Pithing Needle should come into play only after a threat reaches the table in order to maximize its effect. However, the card is incredibly potent. It can shut off Tormod's Crypt, Goblin Welder, Mindslaver, and even Gorilla Shaman, among others. I think you want at least three.

Just naming Goblin Welder is sufficiently strong because the Control Slaver player has to seriously contemplate how the game is going to play out. Without the ability to take advantage of the Thirst For Knowledge drawback, their whole game plan has to be rethought.

So:
- DT
- Mystical
- 2 Scroll
- 1 Tinker
- 1 Colossus
- 1 Rebuild
+ 1 Tendrils
+ 4 Rebs/Pyros
+ 2 Pithing Needle

Against the BSGifts:

+ 4 Rebs/Blast
+ 1 Tendrils
- 1 Colossus
- 1 Tinker
- 1 Chain of Vapor
- 1 Mystical Tutor
- 1 Merchant Scroll

Against IT:
See above except - 1 Rebuild and keep a Mystical in. 

Against Stax

Uba
At a minimum, I would board in 2 Hurkyl's Recall, 1 Rack and Ruin, and 3 Pithing Needle. I would sideboard out 1 Mystical Tutor, 1 Demonic Tutor, 3 Misdirections, and one other card which, on the draw, will often be Mox Pearl. One word of caution: do not, under any circumstances, sideboard out more than one Gifts Ungiven.

[benthetenor]

Why is Misdirection insane against IT? The only card that I see that targets and matters, aside from Tendrils and counterspells, is Ancestral Recall. By that logic, Misdirection is insane against blue decks.

Post board, you do seem to become BBS 2K6, of sorts. Good job. Seems to me that a competant combo player can still bait your counterspells and win through the hate, but then maybe you're not worried about facing competant combo players.

[Gabethebabe]

2 Old Man of the Sea
2 Pyroclasm
1 Rushing River

I find these slots unimpressive. As you state: you don't care about Fish, so why dedicate at least four slots to them?
1) Instead of two Pyroclasm I would surely run 1 Pyroclasm and 1 Fire/Ice. F/I is scrollable, which is important.
2) You don't run any Tormod's Crypt. I find Crypt pretty good in the current Meta. It is a lot bigger headache to IT than MisD is. It is good against Dragon, Dredge.dec, mirror.
3) You don't run any Annul. Annul rocks when going first against shops (and better than Drain when going second, especially when they run Wires), it is great vs Oath and Dragon and very decent vs various combo decks like Belcher. It can easily be scrolled up as well.
4) Rushing River. What for? You already have Chain and 4 Scrolls to find it.

So instead of these 5 cards I would run:

1 Old Man of the Sea (the first card I would cut to e.g. add a second Annul/Crypt)
1 Fire/Ice
1 Pyroclasm
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Annul

[Smmenen]

Why is Misdirection insane against IT? The only card that I see that targets and matters, aside from Tendrils and counterspells, is Ancestral Recall. By that logic, Misdirection is insane against blue decks.

Post board, you do seem to become BBS 2K6, of sorts. Good job. Seems to me that a competant combo player can still bait your counterspells and win through the hate, but then maybe you're not worried about facing competant combo players.

Because you can Misdirect their FOWs and Remands and Misdirection for you becomes FOW 5-7 90% of the time and the rest of the time, it becomes I take your Ancestral.  Which is insanely good. 

I am a competent combo player, perhaps one of the better ones out there...  after all I *created* the long variants, including Grim Long and Top8ed with original Long, Death Wish long, Grim Long three times at SCG events, and Doomsday at SCG Chicago.  This deck is well equipped to combat combo mostly on the back of Scrolling and how aggressive it is. 

2 Old Man of the Sea
2 Pyroclasm
1 Rushing River

I find these slots unimpressive. As you state: you don't care about Fish, so why dedicate at least four slots to them?
1) Instead of two Pyroclasm I would surely run 1 Pyroclasm and 1 Fire/Ice. F/I is scrollable, which is important.
2) You don't run any Tormod's Crypt. I find Crypt pretty good in the current Meta. It is a lot bigger headache to IT than MisD is. It is good against Dragon, Dredge.dec, mirror.
3) You don't run any Annul. Annul rocks when going first against shops (and better than Drain when going second, especially when they run Wires), it is great vs Oath and Dragon and very decent vs various combo decks like Belcher. It can easily be scrolled up as well.
4) Rushing River. What for? You already have Chain and 4 Scrolls to find it.

So instead of these 5 cards I would run:

1 Old Man of the Sea (the first card I would cut to e.g. add a second Annul/Crypt)
1 Fire/Ice
1 Pyroclasm
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Annul

When I said this deck isn't worried about fish, I meant game one.  Game two, I'm extremely worried about fish - I think it is the decks worst matchup, honestly.  That's why I have all that hate for it.  The Rushing River could become something better, but I'm gonna keep two old man and two clasm so I can gifts for them

[Dante]

...
You don't run any Annul. Annul rocks when going first against shops (and better than Drain when going second, especially when they run Wires), it is great vs Oath and Dragon and very decent vs various combo decks like Belcher. It can easily be scrolled up as well.
4) Rushing River. What for? You already have Chain and 4 Scrolls to find it.

So instead of these 5 cards I would run:
...
1 Annul

Not to sidetrack the thread about Annul, but it seems  the only reason to run annul is because it costs U and it's up turn 1 (or possibly turn 3 when you can have drain and annul mana up), which means you need to see it turn 1 consistently to make it worth running.  If you're only going to have 1, possibly 2, then it seems to miss the mark.  It seems to me this is either a 3- or 4-of or you shouldn't run it at all.

[benthetenor]

Why is Misdirection insane against IT? The only card that I see that targets and matters, aside from Tendrils and counterspells, is Ancestral Recall. By that logic, Misdirection is insane against blue decks.

Post board, you do seem to become BBS 2K6, of sorts. Good job. Seems to me that a competant combo player can still bait your counterspells and win through the hate, but then maybe you're not worried about facing competant combo players.

Because you can Misdirect their FOWs and Remands and Misdirection for you becomes FOW 5-7 90% of the time and the rest of the time, it becomes I take your Ancestral.  Which is insanely good. 

I am a competent combo player, perhaps one of the better ones out there...  after all I *created* the long variants, including Grim Long and Top8ed with original Long, Death Wish long, Grim Long three times at SCG events, and Doomsday at SCG Chicago.  This deck is well equipped to combat combo mostly on the back of Scrolling and how aggressive it is. 

I wasn't questioning your competence as a deck-builder, or as a combo player. You've put up serious results, almost exclusively with combo decks, and if you think that there's a person on the planet who doesn't know of the decks you've designed, well, that's just crazy. But personally I don't care if you're competent with combo. You'll very rarely be playing against yourself. IT has far more disruption than any of the combo variants that you've designed, with even more post-board, which gives the deck (a "standard" build with a "standard" sideboard, as customizable as the deck is...) between 7 and 10 cards meant to stop counterspells specifically, in addition to it's limited but not insignificant range of must-counter spells.

You'll have to forgive me, but as someone who cut his teeth in this game by baiting out counterspells, I'm not sure why you think that adding more counterspells accounts for an insane combo match-up, especially when a good portion of them can't or don't target the most pivotal card in any Tendrils deck. If a combo deck is sufficiently broken, in any format, then the rock-paper-scissors metagame that predicts control beating combo no longer holds. While modern variants aren't even close to the sick levels of old school Long, I believe that they're sufficiently broken to give skilled players an unbeatable edge. I'd assume you agree, since you've done almost all of your high-profile winning with a combo deck of one kind or another.

[Gabethebabe]

Not to sidetrack the thread about Annul, but it seems  the only reason to run annul is because it costs U and it's up turn 1 (or possibly turn 3 when you can have drain and annul mana up), which means you need to see it turn 1 consistently to make it worth running.  If you're only going to have 1, possibly 2, then it seems to miss the mark.  It seems to me this is either a 3- or 4-of or you shouldn't run it at all.

If they run Wires, Annul is pretty good, also after the initial turns. Wire taps your stuff, you drop a land and have Annul up. Try that with Drain. Drain is very good if it resolves, but against stax and agains fast (combo) decks you have Annul one turn earlier on-line, which may be  crucial to disrupt them. Yes, if you run Annul, better run 2-3. That makes them more reliable. But I disagree that it is a 3/4 of or a 0-of. If Annul is good in a certain matchup, then 2 is better than 1 is better than 0.

[Smmenen]

Why is Misdirection insane against IT? The only card that I see that targets and matters, aside from Tendrils and counterspells, is Ancestral Recall. By that logic, Misdirection is insane against blue decks.

Post board, you do seem to become BBS 2K6, of sorts. Good job. Seems to me that a competant combo player can still bait your counterspells and win through the hate, but then maybe you're not worried about facing competant combo players.

Because you can Misdirect their FOWs and Remands and Misdirection for you becomes FOW 5-7 90% of the time and the rest of the time, it becomes I take your Ancestral.  Which is insanely good. 

I am a competent combo player, perhaps one of the better ones out there...  after all I *created* the long variants, including Grim Long and Top8ed with original Long, Death Wish long, Grim Long three times at SCG events, and Doomsday at SCG Chicago.  This deck is well equipped to combat combo mostly on the back of Scrolling and how aggressive it is. 

I wasn't questioning your competence as a deck-builder, or as a combo player. You've put up serious results, almost exclusively with combo decks,

Does top8ing with  meandeck Ichorid, Oath, Gifts, mono blue, stax, groatog, etc not count?

and if you think that there's a person on the planet who doesn't know of the decks you've designed, well, that's just crazy. But personally I don't care if you're competent with combo. You'll very rarely be playing against yourself. IT has far more disruption than any of the combo variants that you've designed, with even more post-board, which gives the deck (a "standard" build with a "standard" sideboard, as customizable as the deck is...) between 7 and 10 cards meant to stop counterspells specifically, in addition to it's limited but not insignificant range of must-counter spells.

How does that not make Misdirection good against IT? 

You'll have to forgive me, but as someone who cut his teeth in this game by baiting out counterspells, I'm not sure why you think that adding more counterspells accounts for an insane combo match-up, especially when a good portion of them can't or don't target the most pivotal card in any Tendrils deck.

First of all, Misdirection is there to protect your counterspells.  It's the whole Prohibit argument.  People belittled prohbit when I played it in mono blue because it couldn't counter lots of spells.  What they didn't understand was how it functioned.  You prohibited the Drain and what not and used your other counters to protect the prohbit.  Same functio.  You Drain or FOW the critical spell, IT plays FOW or Remand on you, and then you Misd their fow or remand.  And IT does go for early Ancestral not infrequently.  Misd stops that plan cold. Third, I wasn't arguing that my deck is the best anti combo control deck because of Misd alone, but becuase of my spell density.  I don't play with crap like Pithing Needl.  I have four Gifts, so I'm really fast and I have 4 Scrolls which can find answers, countermagic, and draw.

If a combo deck is sufficiently broken, in any format, then the rock-paper-scissors metagame that predicts control beating combo no longer holds. While modern variants aren't even close to the sick levels of old school Long, I believe that they're sufficiently broken to give skilled players an unbeatable edge. I'd assume you agree, since you've done almost all of your high-profile winning with a combo deck of one kind or another.

Interestingly, I have actually come to the view that Grim Long is, in the control match, as good as original long.  That's because you don't have to play around LED and use crap like Chromatic SPheres. 

Take a look at this article from 2003 that I wrote on Long v. Tog

http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/5856.html

I honestly think that Grim Tutor is a better card than Burning Wish - ESP. in the control match.  I think that Grim Long probably has just as strong of a control match as original long.  But obviously much weaker everything else. 

I broke out original long a week or two after richmond and played it up against 4 Gush GroAtog just for fun.  I actually had lots of trouble playing it becuase I wasn't used to playing Around LED anymore.  I used to be able to play that deck in my sleep, but it was giving me huge headaches.  It could just be that my skills with original long have atrophied.

But you'll note that original long only won HALF the games in that article agianst Tog.  I'm pretty damned sure that Grim Long would win alot more than that. 

[benthetenor]

How does that not make Misdirection good against IT? 

First of all, Misdirection is there to protect your counterspells.  It's the whole Prohibit argument.  People belittled prohbit when I played it in mono blue because it couldn't counter lots of spells.  What they didn't understand was how it functioned.  You prohibited the Drain and what not and used your other counters to protect the prohbit.  Same functio.  You Drain or FOW the critical spell, IT plays FOW or Remand on you, and then you Misd their fow or remand.  And IT does go for early Ancestral not infrequently.  Misd stops that plan cold. Third, I wasn't arguing that my deck is the best anti combo control deck because of Misd alone, but becuase of my spell density.  I don't play with crap like Pithing Needl.  I have four Gifts, so I'm really fast and I have 4 Scrolls which can find answers, countermagic, and draw.

So basically, you're conceding that if a combo player can play around/otherwise deal with FoW and Mana Drain, then there's no need to worry about Misdirection and 4 of the 5 cards that you sideboard in? Seems to me that you're leaving yourself wide open to something like Cabal Therapy or Duress, or other proactive disruption.

Here's a secret: in a Mana Drain match-up, I'll generally board out my Force of Wills and other large casting-cost cards for Cabal Therapys and Bobs. Why? My plan is 100% to neutralize the threat of Mana Drain, and FoW has a big, fat target on it. The deck goes from about 40/60 UB to 10/90 UB, and the mana curve drops like a rock. As a result, Mana Drain goes from game-ending to a mere counterspell again, and as a side effect, Misdirection/REB become approximately worthless. One other side effect, Bob will now do more damage to you than to me on average, making him a sizable threat if your hand is clogged with the wrong counterspells and you can't get aggressive.

As for the Ancestral Recall thing that you keep talking about, I maintain that that's not a good argument against any one deck as every deck in the format that is able runs Ancestral Recall. Your argument isn't "Misdirection is good against deck X", it's "Misdirection is good against Ancestral Recall".

Now, mine isn't exactly an orthodox plan, but it's the most effective strategy that I've found for taking Mana Drains out of the equation. Maybe I should have prefaced my arguments with "this is my plan, so Misdirection is horribly horrible". I most certainly hope that you keep in your Misdirections game 2 and board in 4 nearly-dead cards.

[Smmenen]

As for the Ancestral Recall thing that you keep talking about, I maintain that that's not a good argument against any one deck as every deck in the format that is able runs Ancestral Recall. Your argument isn't "Misdirection is good against deck X", it's "Misdirection is good against Ancestral Recall".

Hahaha! Well put!

How does that not make Misdirection good against IT? 

First of all, Misdirection is there to protect your counterspells.  It's the whole Prohibit argument.  People belittled prohbit when I played it in mono blue because it couldn't counter lots of spells.  What they didn't understand was how it functioned.  You prohibited the Drain and what not and used your other counters to protect the prohbit.  Same functio.  You Drain or FOW the critical spell, IT plays FOW or Remand on you, and then you Misd their fow or remand.  And IT does go for early Ancestral not infrequently.  Misd stops that plan cold. Third, I wasn't arguing that my deck is the best anti combo control deck because of Misd alone, but becuase of my spell density.  I don't play with crap like Pithing Needl.  I have four Gifts, so I'm really fast and I have 4 Scrolls which can find answers, countermagic, and draw.

So basically, you're conceding that if a combo player can play around/otherwise deal with FoW and Mana Drain, then there's no need to worry about Misdirection and 4 of the 5 cards that you sideboard in? Seems to me that you're leaving yourself wide open to something like Cabal Therapy or Duress, or other proactive disruption.

Hey.  Cabal Therpay is misdirectable, let's not forget.  I think its really important to emphasize that MDG applies ALOT of pressure.  Do you realize that my plan against Dragon is to combo out first and that in practice this has usually worked?  I <3 Time walk. 

I also don't undersatnd your point about playing around/dealing with FOW or Drain.  The way you play around or deal with those cards is a) overwheliming them b) speeding by them"the blitz plan" or c) using interactive cards.  It can't do the 2nd (grim long and belcher can), IT doesn't do the first becuase it runs all these interactive cards.  That leaves (c).  Thus, their plan for dealing with your coumtermagic is Duress, Fow, Remand.  Misd handles most of those cards.  So how does that make Misd dead?  So your point about not needing to deal with Misd doesn't make any sense.

Here's a secret: in a Mana Drain match-up, I'll generally board out my Force of Wills and other large casting-cost cards for Cabal Therapys and Bobs. Why?

Including Bargain?  Hot!

My plan is 100% to neutralize the threat of Mana Drain, and FoW has a big, fat target on it. The deck goes from about 40/60 UB to 10/90 UB, and the mana curve drops like a rock. As a result, Mana Drain goes from game-ending to a mere counterspell again, and as a side effect, Misdirection/REB become approximately worthless. One other side effect, Bob will now do more damage to you than to me on average, making him a sizable threat if your hand is clogged with the wrong counterspells and you can't get aggressive.

I think you dont understand how I play MDG.  Buehler once told me that the worst card in it is Drain simply because peoplep lay around it.  I understand what he's saying.  I rarely Drain anything anymore.  My deck doesn't realy on resolving Mana Drain, even in the slightest.  I'm totaly comfortable with just tutorin up Ancestral with one of my four scrolls, drawing some mana, playing gifts and winning the game all befoer turn 5. 

Now, mine isn't exactly an orthodox plan, but it's the most effective strategy that I've found for taking Mana Drains out of the equation. Maybe I should have prefaced my arguments with "this is my plan, so Misdirection is horribly horrible". I most certainly hope that you keep in your Misdirections game 2 and board in 4 nearly-dead cards.

hahah!

[benthetenor]

I sincerely hope that you misdirect my cabal therapy. Seriously.

[Smmenen]

I sincerely hope that you misdirect my cabal therapy. Seriously.

If I'm going to win next turn, it will be my pleasure. 

[benthetenor]

I'm sorry, I forgot that you always have infinite cards in hand and infinite mana. You seem to be forgetting that IT puts an awful lot of pressure on your deck, forcing you into a defensive position from which its going to be hard to just win next turn. If you're willingly 2-for-1 ing yourself, you sure as hell had better win next turn, because you've lost all control of the game.

But then again, apparently you're always right and your deck is the stone cold nuts because you have all the answers. My bad.

[Smmenen]

I'm sorry, I forgot that you always have infinite cards in hand and infinite mana.

That's ok.  Many others have made the same mistake.

You seem to be forgetting that IT puts an awful lot of pressure on your deck, forcing you into a defensive position from which its going to be hard to just win next turn. If you're willingly 2-for-1 ing yourself, you sure as hell had better win next turn, because you've lost all control of the game. 

Not really true.  If I play drain and you play FOW pitching a spell and I play Misd, that's pretty damned good.

But then again, apparently you're always right and your deck is the stone cold nuts because you have all the answers. My bad.

You are forgiven.

We are getting way off topic, but all I'ive asserted is that this deck has the best combo match game one of the major control decks. 

[MaxxMatt]

The deck seems, as usual in the past, really good.

Against IT:
See above except - 1 Rebuild and keep a Mystical in.

Sorry to point out again about specific issues about "Control vs. Combo" matchup, but I found this argument to be the only one really different since your last MDGifts' post.


Your sideboard doesn't consider any single card that could improve or wreck this matchup.
As Benthetenor just tried to say in a couple of answers mixed of sarcasm, you aren't going to face a blatantly stalled deck, ReBs are usually a non issue and the opponent would use a lot of cheap disruption against you.

They could play around your counters both pre and post side, usually interacting with your plan of going off as fast as you can. You are, as usual, not taking into account the opponents possible moves, because, doing it, would force you to reconsider at least the Sideboard choices.

A Combo deck that abuse of Intuitions would usually set up his win against your deck faster than you wthout any problem.

Duress produce parity against Drains
FoWs are used by both of you
Your Mis-D are useless against Bargain, Necro, Y. Will, Intuition, ToA, Rebuild/Chain, Any single Tutor.

You are using examples in which the Combo player act like Jerry Lee Lewis against Steve Martin.
He seems goofy and unfocused.
It seems like he would let you win...

The important things to underline, aren't your ability to use suboptimal cards like Mis-Ds even against IT-like decks, but the consequences of not being able to side in nothing really game breaking or playing with a post side's configuration that cannot often race his speed.

Because the combo deck is the other one...
...Or are you trying to argue that your CONTROL deck is really soooo good that it would race even COMBO decks?





On a minor note, I would like a lot the side, but I found a couple of cards' choices be really redundant.
2 Old Man of the Sea are useless when you are going to play the ToA's plan against Fish ( don't tell me that you are trying to win with DSC eve post side, because I would drop the consideration that I have for you... ). They seems to me not needed at all.

You have to build up your mana base ( 4 or 5 Islands/Volcanic ), protect a single Gifts with a Rebuild in it and then rise up the storm in order to win ( contemporarily killing his CotV/Rods ). Pyroclasms would buy you really a lot of time. Needles would shut up Mishra/Wastelands. Their winnint clock would not count at all.


In the OldMen spots, I would play Tormod's Crypts instead. They can stop, at the best mana/costs' rate, all the new and old gravebased strategies, including IT's main plan.

Hey.  Cabal Therpay is misdirectable, let's not forget.

Sigh... With the only effect of forcing me to name a card that I don't have in my hand, discarding nothing. On the other hand, Smmenny player lose two blue cards in his attempt to stop (?) my Therapy with me with the priority again. I can, at this point flashback the Therapy, sacrificing my Bob and wasting your entire hand with a single spell....
What a beatiful scenario you paint....

I think its really important to emphasize that MDG applies ALOT of pressure.

....IT and other combo decks, instead, usually run a lot of cheap disruptions, 0cc counters and strong&cheap bombs/tutors to FORCE you winning faster..
O'Rly?




On the other hand, the deck improves his ToA's plan A LOT with Chain of Vapour. I'm happy to see that you finally cut  Echoing Truth for it. Good job!


MaxxMatt

[Dante]

SB vs Slaver
- DT
- Mystical
- 2 Scroll
- 1 Tinker
- 1 Colossus
- 1 Rebuild
+ 1 Tendrils
+ 4 Rebs/Pyros
+ 2 Pithing Needle

So you side out Tinker/Colossus AND both tutors capable of finding the Tendrils, but now the only way you have to get the Tendrils is to draw it (barring something like getting Burning Wish and discarding/Gifting Tendrils during a Will turn which is VERY mana intensive)....this has come up a couple times for me now testing this matchup.

[Roxas]

So you side out Tinker/Colossus AND both tutors capable of finding the Tendrils, but now the only way you have to get the Tendrils is to draw it (barring something like getting Burning Wish and discarding/Gifting Tendrils during a Will turn which is VERY mana intensive)....this has come up a couple times for me now testing this matchup.

Yeah, I agree that this isn't a very good idea.  I did a very similar sideboard plan playing this deck at the October SCG Chicago and lost a match or two because I had very lethal storm but couldn't come up with the Tendrils. 

Also, siding out Demonic Tutor but leaving two Merchant Scrolls in does not seem right as all.  The only way Merchant Scroll is better than Demonic Tutor is that it doesn't cost black mana, but most Slaver builds do not run Wasteland so this isn't too big an issue here.

In addition, is bringing in Needles even worth it if you're cutting Colossus?  I suppose they're still good at stopping Mindslaver and/or its recursion, but it seems like there are better options if protecting your Colossus from Welder is no longer a concern.

[Smmenen]

Also, siding out Demonic Tutor but leaving two Merchant Scrolls in does not seem right as all.  The only way Merchant Scroll is better than Demonic Tutor is that it doesn't cost black mana, but most Slaver builds do not run Wasteland so this isn't too big an issue here.

Actually, Scroll is a blue card and DT is a black card.  that makes a diference when you have 7 pitch spells.

However, you guys are right.  Dt should stay in. 

In addition, is bringing in Needles even worth it if you're cutting Colossus?  I suppose they're still good at stopping Mindslaver and/or its recursion, but it seems like there are better options if protecting your Colossus from Welder is no longer a concern.

Needles are necessary.  Stopping Welder does alot - it makes thier whole draw engine much weaker.

Imagine: you know your welders can't do shit: can you afford to discard a Slaver or do you discard something else?  It totally changes their whole game.  Needle also turns off Crypt, crtiically.

Also, did anyone notice the Strip Mine?

I think that Strip Mine is simply too amazing to not run.  It will not only randomly win you games, but the tempo boost is and can be ridiculous. 

[Roxas]

I did notice, and do think it is a sensible replacement for Library of Alexandria when your deck does not run any way to increase its hand size outside of Ancestral.  Gifts Ungiven, obviously, is a mana-hungry card, and thus decks centered around it can utilize Academy to a much greater extent; as a result, being able to Strip the opponent's Academy can be crucial and game-winning.  Of course, it's also good for getting rid of Library, Bazaar, and other bothersome lands.

I'm not so sure about the single Underground Sea.  Sure, having access to five basics is fun and all, but what about those games where you're playing against Wastelands and the lone Sea ends up being one of the only blue sources in your opening hand?  Or those games where you didn't happen to draw Lotus/Jet/Petal yet and need to be able to cast more than one black spell in a turn?  Basically, my point is that sometimes shit happens, and I assure you that there will be times that you wish your deck had more Seas.  Sure, you can say that you rarely go off without involving Lotus, but is the fifth basic land really worth the risks of only running one Sea?

[Juggernaut GO]

I had  a  lot of success running

2 underground
2 volcanic
4 island
6 fetch
academy


The not having a 2nd underground came up once before I changed the mana base, due to the fact that I needed to make a gifts pile with 3 black sources but jet lotus petal and lotus were already in the GY, so I couldn't do flooded strand/polluted delta/underground sea due to not having a 2nd U sea in the deck.  Granted, this situation doesn't happen often, but I never had a problem running 4 basics rather then 5.

[Yare]

Not being an especially adept combo player, I must ask about the inclusion of Strip Mine (which I surmise you bolded for a reason).  It does not really seem to promote winning faster and I do not know that it by itself would be all that disruptive.  Could you elaborate on this inclusion please?

[Gabethebabe]

Steve couldn´t decide what was better: 6 fetches, 5 islands or 5/6. So he avoided this problem by going 5/5 + Strip Mine.

I don´t quite like the idea. It is kinda random and since your Demonic Tutor with so few black sources has got better things to do than find Strip Mine, I really can´t see a defense for including it. It doesn´t improve your goldfish rate, it doesn´t improve your mana base and its disruption might come in handy now and then, but the real disruption of the deck is in its countermagic.

[Smmenen]

Steve couldn´t decide what was better: 6 fetches, 5 islands or 5/6. So he avoided this problem by going 5/5 + Strip Mine.

I don´t quite like the idea. It is kinda random and since your Demonic Tutor with so few black sources has got better things to do than find Strip Mine, I really can´t see a defense for including it. It doesn´t improve your goldfish rate, it doesn´t improve your mana base and its disruption might come in handy now and then, but the real disruption of the deck is in its countermagic.

I agree now.  I was impressed by how the random strip mine would suddenly short combo or stax in the slaver match, but I don't think it has the same effect in MDG.

I think one question that MDG players are going to have to face is how this deck will cope with the introduction of Jotun Grunt into the format.   Will Grunt push the Fish matchup over the edge (a matchup I already have trouble with)?  Old Man of hte Sea and Pyroclasm cannot kill the Grunt.  FTK is an option, but clunky and slow.  Other options include The Abyss and Rolling Earthquake.  What do you think?

[Roxas]

If it turns out to be a really big issue for the deck, you could resort to some (gasp!) black spot removal.  Smother seems like the best option here.  I'd say FtK is actually your best option, though, because it's still usually a two-for-one, and isn't really too much harder to resolve than Old Man because of its more colorless mana cost.

[Eddie]

I think The Abyss is also an option worth considering. Or maybe Psionic Blast, which can be fetched with merchant scrolls. Or Rolling Earthquake?

[Anusien]

Old Man of the Sea and Pyroclasm are becoming untenable options because of Jotun Grunt's huge front and backside, but other options include Flametongue Kavu and Threads of Disloyalty.

Why is it you seem to have such a problem with Fish while playing Meandeck Gifts?  I've been on the Fish side of the matchup, and talked to people playing both sides of the matchup as well as Control Slaver, and their experiences do not seem to match yours.  It just seems like pre-Grunt that Fish didn't have the power to seal the deal.

[Smmenen]

Well, its very build dependent.  But kataki plus true believer is a huge pain in MDG's butt.  You can't even resolve gifts.  And they always have answers to colossus in something. 

[Wollblad]

I would like to argue for the inclusion of Mind Twist. To make room I would cut one Misdirection. With two Misdirections, four FoWs and mana acceleration, it is perfectly possible to cast Mind Twist for three or four cards in turn two or three. Its strength, however is when you Gifts for the first time. Mind Twist is one of those cards that your opponent cannot let you get. That will narrow their choices and turn your Gifts into an Intuition that gives you two out of three cards. The drawback is that one Island has to be exchanged for an Underground Sea. As Smmenen has already pointed out, the mana base cannot support another black card and I can only agree. People will argue that Mox Jet, Black Lotus and Lotus Petal gives you all black mana you'll ever need. That is however a false assessment when you play against decks with Chalice, Wasteland and/or Null Rod. I think however that one less basic land is a much lesser price to pay than the advantages gained from Mind Twist.

With that extra Underground Sea, black mana is abundant and it opens for the option to change one Merchant Scroll for Vampiric Tutor and one or more Duresses in the sideboard. That is however not a central issue here. I would like to hear your oppinions on the inclusion of Mind Twist?

[MuzzonoAmi]

Well, its very build dependent.  But kataki plus true believer is a huge pain in MDG's butt.  You can't even resolve gifts.  And they always have answers to colossus in something. 

I absolutely agree there. What I want to know is how your overall impression of Colossus is. In particular, Demars has had success running Sundering Titan in this slot in Burning Slaver (admittedly a much more controlling deck), and I've been running him in my MDG to improve the fish matchup, which he does handily, both by cutting them off from White and by being about a billion times easier to hardcast than Colossus.

[Liam-K]

I've run him in a couple of different drain decks.  Not pure Scroll Gifts, but slaver and hybrid attempts.  He doesn't trample, is randomly terrible by nuking your lands (on the way in or out), he requires too many attacks for the standard tinker-yawg-recoup-timewalk split to win "right now"... and perhaps most to the point, his greatest strength over DSC (weldable) is totally beside the point.  Generally speaking I just don't think he delivers.

To be honest I hate Tinker.  I almost always win with Tendrils.  Tinker is good at capitolizing on narrow opportunities because it is cheap and fast, but it isn't even slightly stable and I don't like trusting it.  If I was to add any tinker target, it would be Mindslaver (which I've had in the board off and on, but am usually to nervous to actually board in.  It's been amazing and terrible).