New Phyrexia Cards that Matter in vintage

[nineisnoone]

I think Mental Misstep is sideboard quality for Vintage.  It's not good enough main deck because Shop is such a major player in the metagame, but that doesn't mean it's bad or unplayable. Here's an quick example of how it could be used competitvely: Put it in a Shop deck sideboard to stop Nature's Claim if its popular in your metagame (right now the card most played to hose Shops is Hurkyl's Recall, due to the amount of Blightsteel in the meta, but you get the point)

Obviously decks with easy access to blue mana have some debateably better options that will compete for that space, but non-blue decks dont usually have the luxury of playing free counterspells that actually do something relevant.

It's $5 because it's good in those other formats that really drive the prices on new singles.

I think the main problem for me is that you can't optimize it.  At the end of the day, reliability is important and if a spell is too contingent on factors that are difficult to control/anticipate, then it becomes too hard to optimize around.  If you really want to hammer a match-up, do you really want a card like this?  Or do you want a card with a focus that can be built around?  I just think that there are better hate cards and better utility cards.

[Guli]

Mental Misstep is obviously good enough to play in vintage.  If not now, maybe later.  So the real question is "Should I get 4 now or later?"

Being that they are an uncommon, and starcitygames has it on their front page at $4.99, I think the answer is obvious:

Who knows?

$5 bucks!!!  WTH?

I don't think it obviously is.  There are a long list of spells I'd pick over Misstep.  The name is pretty much ironic.

Spells that you wont be able to cast in time will not matter. The strenght lies in the fact that Mental Misstep can be cast WHILE you drop a hoser like for example Ethersworn Canonist. Being able to catch those so called 'small' spells is huge IF combined with hosers. Mental Misstep is not ment to stop the big bombs but more like disrupts the glue of their deck. It adds pressure to pressure.

No.  It doesn't add pressure.  How does not-countering-their-big-bombs add pressure? 

All you are doing is weakening your threat/answer density.

Think about it this way... if they counter your spell, then that is 1 less counter that they have to use to protect THEIR bombs.  The correct play is to draw out their counter, then counter their threat, then play another threat.  You win through attrition not by trying to power out a single spell.

You answer/disrupt their big bombs with Force of Will and creatures like Thada. My strongest point is that there is a certain flow/speed Mental Misstep gives fish. You can cast a turn 1 Qasali Pridemage and they can STP/Path/Bolt it for example. With Mental Misstep you can protect or at least draw out their Force of Will or other countermagic. You lost 2 lives and 2 cards, they lost 1 life and 3 cards. How is this not an attrition war? Spell Snare might not be played widely but I see Spell Pierce does see more play. Some lists run 2x Mana drain and 3x or 4x Pierce.

In Marske article he gives a list of cards that Mental Misstep could answer. ( http://www.channelfireball.com/home/feature-article-new-phyrexia-in-vintage ) That list is far from complete in my opition. I don't see Fastbond, Noble Hierarch, Swords to Plowshares, Aether Vial, Goblin Lackey, Goblin Welder, Voltaic Key, Dark Ritual, Remora, Darkblast, ...

Stopping any of these cards, slows down and disrupts your opponent. Over the course of the game this adds up if you maintain pressure and have a fast clock. So my point again, when you play your cards as fish, most of your spells are sitting on your hand contributing absolutely nothing. They just play their Sensei top or mystical or ritual or noble or Hierarch and you wait for them to pass the turn. What does threat density mean if you are not able to use your threats early enough? You rather keep a blue open for Spell pierce I understand. But then you have nothing on the board. If you ask me you need to drop either Confidant or Canonist with Force or Misstep backup and work from there. I would use the new probe too to adjust the playing order of your cards accordingly.

Early game Misstep buys precious time to get your strategy rolling.
Mid game it will stop stuff here and there and support your other threats.

[MaximumCDawg]

Fish decks of various stripes are great once their disruption comes on-line, but they suffer a critical vulnerability before it does.  The typical answer to this is to run Force of Will or Misdirection so you can protect yourself while powering up the creatures.  Or, as Steve worked out with the GW beatz deck a year ago, try to guarantee a disruptive t1 play like Gaddock Teeg. 

So the best question - if you're wondering if Fish can make use of Mistep - seems to me to be, "Is there a t1 play Fish is so scared of that it should run another four FoW that can only answer that play?"  I'm not sure I know the answer.  Fish despairs of Tendrils or Shop nut-draws, but Tendrils depends on 0cc jewelry and Shop depends on 3cc artifacts.  I suppose you can stop a preordain or brainstorm by the Tendrils player, but is that worth it...?  Against other Fish, sure, you can zap Noble Heirarch, but why not just run StP at that point?  Against Blue, what are you really going to stop?  Key, I guess, and maybe spell pierce... but Nature's Claim and Red Elemental Blast (if you can support it) seem stronger.

I dunno, I gotta echo what other people are saying.  I just don't see Mistep being a huge deal in Vintage.  The kill cards (Tinker, Will, Tendrils, MUD Beatz) don't cost 1 and they don't necessarily rely on 1 drops to move into position to win.  Maybe I'm wrong and we'll see StopVampiricTutor.dec running Misteps and Mindcensors, but I dunno.

[swawagon]

Fish doesn't often run cards like Ponder nor Preordain, but in some matchups where the Fish players life total hardly matters (against blue based decks) Gitaxian Probe might be something Fish would run for it's 'free' cost, to thin the deck and to gain that peek at their hand.

In the right deck (Noble Fish?) does being able to peek at early hands for 'free' with Gitaxian Probe make playing Meddling Mage better as it could give information in deciding what to name?

[TheWhiteDragon]

No.  It doesn't add pressure.  How does not-countering-their-big-bombs add pressure? 

All you are doing is weakening your threat/answer density.

Think about it this way... if they counter your spell, then that is 1 less counter that they have to use to protect THEIR bombs.  The correct play is to draw out their counter, then counter their threat, then play another threat.  You win through attrition not by trying to power out a single spell.

So you assume that the best play is to draw out their counter with a threat, counter their threat, then play your own threat and win through attrition.  Damn, that's smart.  If only I realized to 2-1 my opponents' threats every game while maintaining a 1-1 counter parity, I'd surely win a lot more.   Note to self - always have 2 bombs and a counter to my opponent's 1 bomb and 1 counter.  Great recipe for success!  Thanks for sharing.

[nineisnoone]

No.  It doesn't add pressure.  How does not-countering-their-big-bombs add pressure? 

All you are doing is weakening your threat/answer density.

Think about it this way... if they counter your spell, then that is 1 less counter that they have to use to protect THEIR bombs.  The correct play is to draw out their counter, then counter their threat, then play another threat.  You win through attrition not by trying to power out a single spell.

So you assume that the best play is to draw out their counter with a threat, counter their threat, then play your own threat and win through attrition.  Damn, that's smart.  If only I realized to 2-1 my opponents' threats every game while maintaining a 1-1 counter parity, I'd surely win a lot more.   Note to self - always have 2 bombs and a counter to my opponent's 1 bomb and 1 counter.  Great recipe for success!  Thanks for sharing.

Uhh... Yeah, that is the whole point behind a pressure build (aggo-control).  You win through attrition as big decks tend to be threat-light, draw/tutor heavy.  If you look at fish builds, that's the purpose.  They run just as many counters to maintain parity, while trying to win by running threats instead of draw/utility.  I really don't know where you are coming from, as in any pressure build I always advocate high-threat density over tutors/threat-protection tools.  As for me, that's how I build them.

There's basically two types of decks pressure and combo.  Think of stream of water, combo decks want that stream to run smoothly.  Not necessarily fast, but always smooth.  Control-combo just want to slow draw into their win (Oath/Vault/whatever), while Combo want to accelerate the stream.  Aggro-control want to block up the stream, by throwing out threats.  These threats threaten to eventually damn the stream, so combo has to answer it.  But when they start hitting their utility/draw spells, you are hitting more threats.  If you can maintain counter parity, you can eventually block the stream and win.  If you focus too much on protecting your threats, you threaten getting over run.

I know Guli likes it as he advocates that creature where you sacrifice a land to give it shroud a lot, Slyvian something or other. I've never been a fan of it, or the theory it advocates.  And similarly in his scenario, I'm not advocating it either.Now if you have some sort of alternative theory where spending cards to protect your bears in a fish deck is the best strategy, please feel free to explain that to me. 

[Guli]

No.  It doesn't add pressure.  How does not-countering-their-big-bombs add pressure?  

All you are doing is weakening your threat/answer density.

Think about it this way... if they counter your spell, then that is 1 less counter that they have to use to protect THEIR bombs.  The correct play is to draw out their counter, then counter their threat, then play another threat.  You win through attrition not by trying to power out a single spell.

So you assume that the best play is to draw out their counter with a threat, counter their threat, then play your own threat and win through attrition.  Damn, that's smart.  If only I realized to 2-1 my opponents' threats every game while maintaining a 1-1 counter parity, I'd surely win a lot more.   Note to self - always have 2 bombs and a counter to my opponent's 1 bomb and 1 counter.  Great recipe for success!  Thanks for sharing.

Uhh... Yeah, that is the whole point behind a pressure build (aggo-control).  You win through attrition as big decks tend to be threat-light, draw/tutor heavy.  If you look at fish builds, that's the purpose.  They run just as many counters to maintain parity, while trying to win by running threats instead of draw/utility.  I really don't know where you are coming from, as in any pressure build I always advocate high-threat density over tutors/threat-protection tools.  As for me, that's how I build them.

There's basically two types of decks pressure and combo.  Think of stream of water, combo decks want that stream to run smoothly.  Not necessarily fast, but always smooth.  Control-combo just want to slow draw into their win (Oath/Vault/whatever), while Combo want to accelerate the stream.  Aggro-control want to block up the stream, by throwing out threats.  These threats threaten to eventually damn the stream, so combo has to answer it.  But when they start hitting their utility/draw spells, you are hitting more threats.  If you can maintain counter parity, you can eventually block the stream and win.  If you focus too much on protecting your threats, you threaten getting over run.

I know Guli likes it as he advocates that creature where you sacrifice a land to give it shroud a lot, Slyvian something or other. I've never been a fan of it, or the theory it advocates.  And similarly in his scenario, I'm not advocating it either.Now if you have some sort of alternative theory where spending cards to protect your bears in a fish deck is the best strategy, please feel free to explain that to me.  

I like your metaphor. I would like to add something and address the point you make about protecting your threats. Way back when I was using Sylvan Safekeeper the main win condition was storm. And the only removal they ran was spot removal. So when Gaddock Teeg and/or canonist (I ran Aven Mindcensor and Magus of the Moon as well to have more game changing effects) could be given shroud, their entire deck was disrupted and there 'answer' aka 'bounce' did not work either. Also things like Massacre did not work because of teeg. Since combo doesn't run wastelands plenty of land was available to protect the lock indefinitely (in a relative sense) because combo needs the momentum. That being said, nowadays we can see that their are more ways to win for combo/blue. TV, Storm and Tinker/Robot. I Believe Leonin Relic-Warder could be a strong solution to deal with TV and Tinker while being an answer to Shop and Oath as well.

The early play to go look for Ancestral Recall is not that uncommon and it gives blue decks a serious head start. I would love to have a Mental Misstep to counter the recall so early in the game to even up the odds. Also when playing Noble fish, cutting them off the extra mana and exalted will affect the course of the game in your favour. Being able to answer STP early or mid game keeps your board position stronger. These are not illusions and seem little details for some people. I don't see why to be honest. I don't like to be thoughtseized, do you? They see your hand, grab a key creature you most likely NEED. What is the argument here? You can prevent this for free dude... Sensei Top may not seem a worthy card to counter but it fixes a lot of things for our lovely blue pilots. Believe me they won't like it at all to see it countered. See it this way, you have your bombs in the form of creatures/permanents that address their bombs, and then there are the soft spells or call it glue or tactical spells whatever you may call it. Usually these are the spells that get through and are ignored by fish simply because you can't do anything about them because your threats only have an effect when they hit the board. Why not split up your threat density? By splitting I mean some work only as permanents and some work in your hand. This is already possible you say, with things like Spell Pierce and so on. I say it isn't because you don't have the mana. Having 2 mana turn 1 is good enough, you won't have 3 mana and when you try building a deck with a lot of Mana Acceleration your threat density also drops plus then you have issues running null rod and so on. Simply facts are that having 2 mana turn 1 is considered good, not lucky but still... most of the time you have 1 mana. I use Elvish spirit guides and moxes to raise the odds of having 2 mana turn 1 just to be able to cast something relevant, to get into the game. Don't you see, this is the problem all along, it is not entirely based on threat density, usually you have enough threats but you can't cast them quick enough. And playing one threat at a time, at best 2 is not enough. On top of that, Mentall Mistep is highly flexible and will always catch something against the wide field. It doesn't force you to run islands for example like Daze does or leave mana open or play a specific colour.