Just an Idea - Restricted Thirst Slaver

[Ufactor]

Ok, so I have never actually played Control Slaver, not at a tournament, nor even at a kitchen table.  I have nothing beyond a very basic idea of how it works, just enough to play against it.  I should probably be the last person to talk about this deck.

But here is the situation: I have this idea that I can't let go.  Most likely, it involves The Danger of Cool Things, but it's been haunting me for some time now.

If there is someone who is better versed in this deck than I am, perhaps they can take the idea and run with it.

3 Bazaar of Baghdad
2 Courier's Capsule
2 Deep Analysis
4 Force of Will
4 Intuition
4 Goblin Welder
4 Mana Drain

1 Echoing Truth
3 Artifacts

11 Restricted Cards
22 Mana

[SadDubs]

interesting idea, I couldnt say if it were good or not without testing it first. Off the bat I would cut an ituition, 4 seems too many. I'd recomend squee if it were 4 years ago, but now its too slow. maybe AK? good luck with your idea.

[A_Outcast]

id add in an inkwell for the tinker option.

along what restricted cards are you thinking of using?

this deck would supply an element of suprise, not sure how it would function

[Metman]

I think there are too many conflicting plans with a build that includes all the mentioned cards you have there.  For one, Courier's Capsule was terrible in my testing.  The theory is that welding out artifacts for the capsule to draw some cards is nice but it revealed itself too slow and eventually I lost the tempo and mana resources that the moxes provided.  If you were in the mid to late game with absolutely nothing else to weld you have no business winning that game.  That's what made Slaver good was its ability to play absolutely the best artifacts in the game, be it casting them or welding them. 

Bazaar of Bagdad would be great in theory as well but is card disadvantage and takes up the second blue source slot that is essential to a mana drain deck.  I always played Lotus Petal in Slaver if only because sometimes it shows up in the opening hand with a Mana Drain.  Double blue is that important.  The same argument is made for not playing Library of Alexandria, and I would submit that Library of Alexandria is better than Bazaar of Bagdad in a control deck. 

Deep Analysis is better than Couriers Capsule yet I think is better replaced with Accumulated Knowledge. 

I dig Intuition in Slaver, prior to the Thirst restriction I was running not only Thirsts but also Intuitions because they not only fuel the draw engine but they create impossible piles with an active Welder. 

All of this is rather moot though.  Slavers problem now is that it can't feed the grave, FROM THE HAND, to utilize Goblin Welder.  Those fattys suck when you have to hard cast them.  I had been tinkering with some cards to replace Thirst.  I posted an article on just the topic on my blog which is hyperlinked below.  Pulse of the Grid and Ideas Unbound were the closest replacements I could come up with but neither blew my mind.  I really wish Ideas Unbound was an instant.  The problem I found with it was that I would want to keep Mana Drain mana open and casting Ideas Unbound sucked up my resources and sometimes would create situations in which I draw the nuts with it but wouldn't be ready to commit to playing a bomb and would have to discard it.  My conclusion was that Ideas Unbound would be better served in a more combo oriented deck and that Pulse of the Grid was the closest 1for1 replacement of Thirst but only if the situation was well played. 

[Wagner]

3 Artifacts

11 Restricted Cards
22 Mana

You have to be more precise than this. Are the 3 artifacts big uncastable welder targets? what are the 11 restricted cards? are some of them mana? are the 22 mana only lands? How many colors are you playing?

Your list comes up to 60 cards, so I'm guessing you are running 22 lands + artifact mana, so around 30 mana sources, why is that?

[theLastGnu]

3 Artifacts

11 Restricted Cards
22 Mana

You have to be more precise than this. Are the 3 artifacts big uncastable welder targets? what are the 11 restricted cards? are some of them mana? are the 22 mana only lands? How many colors are you playing?

Your list comes up to 60 cards, so I'm guessing you are running 22 lands + artifact mana, so around 30 mana sources, why is that?

I'm assuming the 11 restricted cards are Ancestral, Brainstorm, Time Walk, TFK, Tinker, and some combination of Ponder, Scroll, FoF, Gifts, Mystical, Yawgwill, DT, Vamp, and maybe Frantic Search. The 22 Mana sources probably includes SoLoMoxen and lands.

That being said, I don't think mana drain and bazaar can ever play nicely with one another.

[jaeppel]

Drain and Bazaar just dont play nice, thats been sid a thousand times before.  What im thinking, is wy not leave bazaar and cut the drains?  without the 4 TfK drain is alot less critical.  Drain is sort of traditional in slaver,  but i think a version leaning on another pillar could be just as effective.  not that i think slaver is so effective anymore.  timevault is sort of directly better than slaver by a long shot.  Why steal opponents turns when you can just skip them?  Thats a much bigger reason for slaver being off the map than restricted thirst.

going with the framework listed above, why not go -4 drain, -2 intuition, +4 duress, +2 keyvault.  still not optimal, but it could be a different direction to try.

[LennoxLewis86]

Slaver died when Brainstorm and Ponder got restricted. It got buried when TFK got restricted.

I don't want to put your idea down but you're missing the most important cards the deck needs to win. Yes, you could try building some sort of SlaverTez hybrid but I think you'd be better off using the Slaverslots to anticipate on your metagame. The reason Tez is so good is it is very flexible, unlike many decks in Vintage there is plenty of room to tinker around with different cards and colors. I think playing Welders and big artifacts isn't the way to go...
Drain and Bazaar don't work well together and a Slaverdeck's strategy is hardcore control. (which means it wants Drain mana up by turn 2 and wouldn't want to lose cards in hand by Bazaaring) So realistically, without Bazaars it is very difficult to get those big artifacts in your graveyard and besides, TV/Key is just a more efficient way to win the game.

I'd try Strategic Planning in a deck like this. It's a good way of getting artifacts in the grave without giving up cards in hand.

[gamegeek2]

My Welder Vault list, from the thread with the same name:

3 Flooded Strand
3 Polluted Delta
3 Island
3 Volcanic Island
2 Underground Sea
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Black Lotus
1 Mana Vault
1 Mana Crypt
1 Sol Ring

2 Goblin Welder
1 Time Vault
1 Voltaic Key
1 Inkwell Leviathan
1 Sundering Titan
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Tinker

4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
4 Strategic Planning
2 Deep Analysis
1 Intuition
1 Gifts Ungiven
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Brainstorm
1 Ponder
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor

1 Rebuild
1 Rack and Ruin
1 Fire//Ice
1 Time Walk

--- Sideboard ---
2 Pyroclasm
3 Sphere of Resistance
2 Tormod's Crypt
2 Yixlid Jailer
3 Pyroblast
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Rack and Ruin

It's based on Strategic Slaver, but takes Strategic Planning to a whole new level, as TFK is gone; the planning not only fuels Welder and Will, but dumps Deep Analyses into the graveyard. It has only a couple of expensive artifacts, as Vault and Key make for excellent Welder targets.