Beating Mono Black - part 1

[MolotDET]

Beating Mono Black - part 1:  a Combo/control Players Radical Ideas.

Every combo or control players worst nightmare is that they will be pitted against several Black decks in their next tournament.  As this is one of the hardest match-ups for any control or combo deck, these fears are well justified.  But how do they lose to Black decks that suffer from such an identity crisis.  Black decks don’t run enough creatures and/or damage spells to truly be called aggro, and they don’t run enough disruption/control elements to be called control.
     The diversity of black’s attack is what makes it such a hard match for combo and control.  Because they say, “not only am I going to deprive you of cards and mana, but I am also going to beat on you with the big fatties.  When you think about black decks, they tend to run creatures with casting costs that no other decks would think or running.  To this end the reason that black does so poorly against aggro is because its attack isn’t focused and its creatures will likely arrive after two turns worth of beating.  Besides who is going to block with a Negator?
     So outside of running lots of side board hate for black or changing main deck cards to compensate, how do you do well against Black regularly?
     In this series of articles I am going to explain a few things that I do against Black decks that most people don’t seem to agree with.  But may times I can point back at these things as what gave me the upper hand in a game.


     When thinking about many of the problems I have had against monoB, I have come to the conclusion that I could solve most of them by not allowing a monoB deck to have three mana on first turn.

     When thinking of the things that a Black deck can do with 3 mana on first turn:

Negator
Hypnotic Specter
Duress/Hymn
Duress/Null Rod
Duress/Sink Hole
Duress/Shade
Carnophage*/Shade
Carnophage*/Hymn’
Carnophage*/Null Rod
Carnophage*/Sink Hole
Pox
Necropotance
DRit, DRit, DRit, Mind Twist.

(*- any other one cc creature, i.e. Sarcomancy, or what ever.)

     Now, while the last one seems pretty unlikely, anyone who has played enough games against monoB has seen that at least a few times.


     So my question is: why, when you know what a deck is capable of with three mana on fist turn, would you allow it to have the three mana?  Understandably, if you have nothing in hand to protect it does not make sense to counter, but if you are sitting on Ancestral?  Or even something that will get you it in a turn or two.

     For any control or combo deck the worst case scenario is Duress/Hymn.  Many people have told me that it doesn’t make sense to counter because they will just be able to cast on their following turns but, with only two mana on their next turn, they will be forced to cast one spell and than the other on third turn.  As you are playing against an aggro deck you should realize that stopping their first turn explosiveness is important.  Also since you are playing card advantage, you know that allowing two or three cards to be striped from hand is a bad thing.  While allowing someone to know what is in your hand is never a good thing, on first turn this could be devastating.
     Another thing I don’t understand is: Why would you allow someone to cherry pick the card they know can stop what they are casting next?  In the case of a second play permanent they will pick the Force, or in the case of a targeted sorcery the MisD.  Even if this leaves you with a Force and you use it, they have still managed to get the same effect as the Duress/Hymn if you counter.

     The single drops on the list are easily countered themselves.  The problem is that once the Dark Ritual goes off the mana can be used to cast anything on the above list.  The truth is that given the ability, anything on that list would be something you want to counter.  So why not keep them from playing it.

     I think this goes along the lines of mana denial.  While this is not destroying a mana producing permanent, black decks do count Rituals among their mana sources.  So countering the source of three mana makes the black mage wait until they have three land or another Ritual to cast what ever they want to cast.  So, in the case of another Ritual, this is no longer card disadvantage.  And if they wait for the three land, this is tempo advantage.  This coupled with Misdirection on a Sink or a Hymn or a well placed Teferi’s Response can often swing the tide of a game to your favor.

[hulk3rules]

I agree with what you are saying here.  as both a blue/black player i decided a while ago that it is always best force of will the opening dark ritual.  Yes, it's costing you 2 cards to stop their 1 card which only produces mana, but if you don't counter it you will usually lose 3 cards, or a card and a land.  plus, delaying them just one turn will allow you to get that all important second island out next turn, and drain their ass next turn.

[dandan]

Disrupt would be very good against monoblack if only I could find room for it.
Hymn, Hymn I win
Hymn - Disrupt, Hymn - Disrupt You win

Alternatively IF you see a lot of monoblack and monoblue Dandan is a laugh.

I can see that control Magic is also a pain for new Monoblack.
Suicide would have laughed at you taking a zombie or Reaver.

[Hyperion]

I wholeheartedly agree with this tactic (countering Dark Ritual). I have had it used against me several times, and it is very effective since it will often set me back a couple turns and give my opponent the necessary window of opportunity to stabilize/go off, depending on the deck, obviously.

[Max, the Mana Drainer]

It really depends on my opening hand. If I don't have much counterspells, I won't risk my only FoW on his Rit just to slow him down.


Max, the Mana Drainer

[wicketsnatcher]

I have considered stopping the 1st turn Dark Rit, but never could fully justify it.

The only thing that it really stops is that turn 1 three drop critter (or Necro).  The other things (read: the majority) that can be played 1st turn are a combo of a 1cc and 2cc spell.  I think if you Force the Dark Rit you are giving THEM the advantage.  Second turn, so long as they are holding another land (which is likely) that's the second Hymn (after their Dark Rit was essentialy a Hymn) or the Sinkhole, holding you off from your 2nd Island.  And if they don't drop the second land, they Duress you anyway and still have the other 2cc spell in their hand to play at their leisure.

Unless you have an outstanding hand with backup for the second turn (i.e. Land + Mox + Mana Leak or Counterspell/Drain (if the mox is a sapphire) or Arcane Denial (though I think this is a bad card) - or went first with another Island + Drain/Counter in hand) I don't think it's a good idea to waste your counter on the Rit.  

If the plan is to put out a Necro/Hypnotic/Negator then you can use your Force on that, as opposed to giving them the advantage of waiting for another rit or 2 more lands when you may not have that crucial counterspell anymore (because they'll probably follow up with some more disruption on turn 2).  

If it's one of the discard combos, well you're hurting and I'm sorry, but you would be in a bad situation even if you countered it, but at least they don't have the spells in their hand anymore to make the following turns as brutal.

-J:tD

[MolotDET]

@Dandan - not sure what you are saying here, try to stay on topic.

@Hyperion - While you agree, I do know that this is not the greatest play against Black, it is just something that shifts the tempo for a turn or two.

@Max, the Mana Drainer - as I said at the beginning of the essay.  This depends on your hand.  What you have in hand might not be worth saving, but you must remember that you don't want to waist your Force.  So, allowing it to be Duressed from your hand is waisting it.  What I am talking about is allowing you to drop your first or second land, and playing your jewlery, Ancestral, Timewalk, Sylvan.

@wicketsnatcher - the idea behind this is to stablize your mana, so that you might be able to cast a counter on their next turn.  And as I said above, to get some of your more powerful spells into play.  And I will repeat, as I said in the essay, if you don't have a good hand (i.e. one worth saving) than the point is moot.
   And making them wait til third turn or for the second Ritual to get the Necro/Hypnotic/Negator out is what I am talking about.

[spin13]

While I can see where you are coming from to an extent, there are very few cards worth protecting.

For control, Compost, Sylvan, Ancestral, Mind Twist (and mana), and Balance are just about the only things I can think you could justify protecting.  This essentially limits this decision to Keeper (over Mono-U or OSE or whatever), as well as a good hand (meaning the protected card is going be to cast next turn to good effect).  This essentially is more about protecting a god hand, rather than general strategy.

For combo, this does make a lot of sense.  The draw where you have something worth protecting is much more common with draw sevens, and a few select cards that are near requirements for the deck's functioning, making this sound advise for combo.  Then again, you have to consider the same reasons in the decision to completely remove a card from the game to Force something.  Control at least has a few more expendable cards (Morphlings, counters, etc).

Essentially, this is a conditional idea, that while not invalid, is something that should come to players as they increase in skill with whatever blue based deck they are running.

 -Eric

[MolotDET]

Thank God, Finally someone that gets it!

I love you Spin...

     My assumtion here is that your opponent is going first, if you have had a chance to go already, than odds are that you have already played what you wanted to from your opening hand.  But I disagree with your oppinion on keeper, only because Keeper, I think moreso than monoU in this situation, will often have one card in hand that is worth saving.  While Compost, Sylvan, Ancestral, Mind Twist (and mana), and Balance are well worth saving, there are other cards in Keeper that, if you had in hand and were able to cast them on your next turn, would be worth protecting.  Cards like Mystical or Vampiric Tutor, The Abyss, Zuron Orb, Scrying Glass, COP:Black, Moat or even ensnaring Bridge, would be worth saving in the right hand.
     With monoU the choice to do this is harder because you don't have all those cards available, but there are specific instances when this will arise.
     And with combo, this could very well be the differance in winning the game, and should be concidered Tech.
     As I find myself presently the pilot of a MonoU combo/control deck this is just a fact of life for me.

Quote Essentially, this is a conditional idea, that while not invalid, is something that should come to players as they increase in skill with whatever blue based deck they are running.

This is what I was trying to establish.  This is sort of like a strategy session on-line, and I am just trying to help out.  I understand their are quite a few newer players here and I attempting to help educate.  While I am not fully knowledgable about every nuance of the game (like sideboarding for TnT and such), this is something that I deffenetly know about.

[Matt The Great]

Wait, how/why is Sylvan worth protecting vs. Monoblack? Just the digging effect or what? I can't see it in the same league as Compost, Ancestral Recall, or Balance.\n\n

[MolotDET]

Matt, this is only in the context of first turn casting. Dropping Sylvan on first turn is a good play against any deck except Sligh perhaps.  But in this instance it counter-acts much of the disruption by allowing you to choose the best of the three cards from you top deck.

[Rico Suave]

Sylvan may not be bad to drop early, but it still does not compare to Balance/Compost/Ancestral.  I'd FoW a Dark Ritual to protect my next turn Compost.  I would not FoW to protect my next turn Sylvan.

Countering Dark Ritual is eh.  The only time I would do it is if I knew my opponent was gonna cast two disruption spells off it and I needed to protect one of those card's mentioned above for casting next turn.  Very rare situation.

Ritual-Necro means that you would be better off FoW'ing the Necro.  If you FoW Ritual, you have less counters when the actual threat tries to be forced through.  Basically, you can let Dark Ritual through and be fine.  As soon as you start countering Ritual, you put yourself on the road to try outracing an inherently faster deck.

[MolotDET]

Ok, Balance/Compost/Ancestral are better than Sylvan.

     In the instance where you pretty much know that your opponent will be striping a card or three from you hand on the next turn, it is mighty nice to have Sylvan out though.  Besides, Mind Twist, Mystical or Vampiric Tutor, The Abyss, Zuron Orb, Scrying Glass, COP:Black, Moat or even ensnaring Bridge are also cards that you might want to have in play against MonoB.

     Not to mention Timewalk.  Would you save your Timewalk, to be able to get out your third mana before Sui has two?

Quote Countering Dark Ritual is eh.  The only time I would do it is if I knew my opponent was gonna cast two disruption spells off it

     Well if you can find a way to know exactly what your opponent has in hand at all times please share it with the rest of us.  I am sure everyone else would like to know how.

Quote  you put yourself on the road to try outracing an inherently faster deck.

    To my knowledge the only reason MonoB would be assumed to be a faster deck is because of Dark Ritual.  Sligh and Stompy are far faster than Sui.  I thought the plan was to outrace and gain control?  But as I have said, you are not trying to outrace them you are trying to slow them down.  So, even if they are trying to cast a 3cc spell, you have made them wait.

     Again, this in the instance of turn one or two casting.  Later in the game you are better off countering whatever it is they are casting.  And, this is only to protect something in your hand that is Vital to the game.

     I just think that more thing are worth saving than just Balance/Compost/Ancestral.

[MolotDET]

Wow, I was looking for this post today to see if there had been any replys. And to my suprise I found it move here to Extreme Vintage.  While I am Quite flattered by the move, I don't think that this is the kind of thing that the members here are interested in discussing.
     I posted this over 18 days ago and even though the number of looks has doubled over the last few days, no one has replyed.  Even though I thought what I have started here was good in theory.  This is not the type of thing that is not common knowledge and people either think this is a stupid idea or the most insane new tech.
     I may just delete the whole Thread.

by the way,  to whoever moved this,

     Thanks.

[Razor]

Well, in my humble experience, I haven't seen SuiBlack beat many decks except for blue-based decks .  SuiBlack only makes finals if it gets lucky pairing versus blue-based decks, it is too brittle (ie.not versatile enough) to beat many other decks.

As for your thoughts on countering ritual, it's about time you blue players figured that out - Duress is that good.

[bebe]

Finally. I agree with Razor a hundred percent. I have    regularly beaten mono black with combo because my combo pieces are always redundant. In fact some of the combo decks I play want cards in the graveyard.
Control also will find solutions fo Sui as they stabilize. The match up is in Keeper's favor.
Now, mono blue is the exception ( not including curious fish which beats Sui). So the question is counter the Ritual or the card off the Ritual. I rarely have had something that needs protecting that much in an opening hand. I would rather counter a Hyppie, Necro or Negator in most instances. Of course if he gets a Duress off I'm not happy but he can get it off without Ritual too. So I use a FoW to counter a Ritual and leave myself with one mana and no other counters for my turn. Then next turn he Duresses me or Sinks my land.
I would rarely counter first Ritual. It would be an exceptional case and not a rule of thumb.

[LoA]

I mentioned this in an older thread, but I think MonoU needs to be looking to topdeck solutions vs. Sui rather than cards like Disrupt.  Disrupt is great, but where are you going to find room?  Is it worth the slots considering you only can really use it in the first 2 turns?  Psionic Blast and Control Magic are more reliable solutions vs. Sui.  It's still a bad matchup, but with 4 Control Magic and (critically) smart mulliganing (is that even a word?), the MonoU player can maximize their chances.

Like many other players, I would generally not counter the Dark Ritual.  MonoU is slow enough that unless I am sure of gaining significant board advantage next turn (through Morphling or whatnot), I know I'll just see the threats again and be unable to deal with them.

[Often Lost]

Combo vs MonoB
Mono Black has a better chance aginst combo if the combo deck is a non engine combo (Trix, Dragon etc). Non engine combo really on few cards to complete the combo, and it must have those few cards. A well timed Hymn or Duress really hurts these kind of decks. But here is when you can tell if the deck is a good one or a bad combo deck, if it has enough ways to draw enough cards, out counter/disrupt your opponent, and go on to combo him out. Any good combo deck should beat Sui or any other Mono Black for that reason.

First turn Ritual
I fully believe in countering the first turn Ritual. It can lead to far to many things, most deadly a Duress. Also, for a MonoU player or an Urphid player, countering a first turn Ritual is a must. It allows you to set up for a Mox-Land drop, allowing for a Mana Leak. Or you could topdeck another pitch-counter (which Urphid/MonoU have more of than any other deck). It is also a very game breaking play for the Ur/Phid player to set up a big MisD or Mana Drain play.

Negator is a big threat aginst Ur/Phid player
While Phyrexian Negator is a very big problem aginst control, it is not as bad as some people make it out to be. As a good Ur/Phidian deck has a good configuration aginst this. Mine for example, has 3 F/I (not that usefull aginst Negator, but still usefull) and 1 Psionic Blast (BANG). Also I use 2 Merchant Scroll and 1 Cun. Wish (1 Psionic Blast sb). PLus all the draw and search, that is plenty to be able to Psi. Blast a quick Negator, very well swinging the game in your favor. Understant this, a first turn Negator can very well cause game to either the mono black player or the Ur/Phid player.

Sideboard options aginst mono black, MisD or Disrupt.
What hurts a Sui/MonoB player more? Disrupt or MisD? Disrupt is mostly only really usefull in the early game, while MisD is usefull in the early and in the late. MisD can very well disrupt Sui/MonoB steam, because even if you are losing a blue card, they will atleast lose another card besides the MisD' card. While Disrupt will probably be a cute, 1 time trick. Because a smart Sui player will get wise to this after the first time. Now, what would you rather have aginst these cards:

Edict (Chainers or Diabolic)
Hymn
Mind Twist
Sinkhole

Im sure you agree that the loss of a card is well worth the cause of using MisD over Disrupt. Plus, MisD is a much better wish Target than Disrupt.

Fleashreaver
Wow.This card is one of the better cards Sui/MonoB has aginst Control. A smart Sui player would play this before a Negator aginst Ur/Phid. But the fact is many player would much rather have a 1st turn Negator than a Reaver. Seriously, all Sui players listen to this: First turn Ritual, Duress, Reaver OWNS Ur/Phid. If that happens, your screwed.

A smart Sui player would save a Negator till later in the game, but many Sui players take the Ur/Phid match for granted and dont ever realize this. A later Negator Psi. Blasted wont hurt you as much as a first turn Negator F/Ied. A Fleashreaver normaly makes the path for the big ol Negator to 0wn. But, few Sui players know this.

[MolotDET]

I guess it is time for me to reply to some of the thinks that were said here...

@Razor - It's not that Sui is often in the finals, it's the swiss pairings that are problematic.  I don't think that Sui is brittle, it's just that it's attacks are unfocused (ie. running hand/land distruction, plus 2/2 creatures that have a fairly high cc.  So it doesn't control enough to beat mono colored aggro.
     Void on the other hand is a much stronger deck, and fairs quite a bit better than Sui (as far as appearances in the top8.)  and runs mostly the same card base.

@bebe - Not sure with what you are agreeing here.  Even though combo peices are redundant, you are still going to want one or two of them in hand.
     Keeper is by far the strongest match-up of the decks that could use this idea.  Still though as mentioned above, Keeper has more cards that you could benefit from this Idea with.
     A first turn Duress without a leading dark ritual means that a follow up spell will not be coming.  So, this means that only one card will be lost and so you can chose not to counter, or to counter based on the cards in hand, and whether or not you don't want to lose something specific.

@LOA - Part 1 deals only with countering the first turn Ritual.  Running other cards will be delt with in part 2, which I have almost done (but didn't post because this was not warmly accepted).
     Like I have said many times before, this is not always a good play, it is situationaly useful depending on what is in your hand.  And is much more useful to Keeper or combo than to monoU.

@OftenLost -  I guess you agree with countering first turn Dark Ritual.  As for what else you have said again part 1 deals with only that.
      Maindeck card choices will be covered in part 2 if I ever post it.

     But thatnks for the replys guys.\n\n

[doublej20]

Quote (Often Lost @ Nov. 08 2002,22:12)First turn Ritual
I fully believe in countering the first turn Ritual. It can lead to far to many things, most deadly a Duress. Also, for a MonoU player or an Urphid player, countering a first turn Ritual is a must. It allows you to set up for a Mox-Land drop, allowing for a Mana Leak. Or you could topdeck another pitch-counter (which Urphid/MonoU have more of than any other deck). It is also a very game breaking play for the Ur/Phid player to set up a big MisD or Mana Drain play.

I too have considered countering the Ritual on first turn, but have decided against it.

Let's say you pitch any random blue card from your hand in addition to Force of Will. Most likely it was a playable blue card, or it wouldn't be in your deck. That means you have just spent 2 blue cards to counter my single black mana source, and that I still have my entire hand to go off with on the ensuing turns, and you have 2 less cards with which to stop me.

Let's look at it from the opposing player's (my) perspective. I played Black/Green Nether Void in a tourney this weekend where someone countered my first turn Ritual, so second turn I double Duress them. A smart aggro player (me) is going to try to slowly strip away your hand with the Duress, so are you going to waste your second turn Mana Drain on that? Or are simply hoping I play Hymn or Shade so you can Drain for 2 mana and hopefully have Ophidian, Masticore, or Morphling the following turn? "Sure, go ahead" I would say, and then proceed to cast Diabolic Edict.

Now had you NOT countered the first turn Ritual, lets say I strip away your Force with my Duress, and cast Hymn to Tourach. You will then lose 2 cards randomly. While this could be more OR less devastating, if you had Forced my Ritual you would already be out another blue card. In another scenario let's say I drop Nantuko Shade with the 2 remaining black mana. You're down 1 Force of Will, but in a couple of turns you either blow up the Shade with Powder Keg or bounce it with your Capsize to stabilize and you still have cards in your hand.