@ Amosw99: I think that you and I see eye to eye... and are on the same level. I appreciate you taking the field on questions on this or similar builds of impulse keeper while I was digging myself out of my freelance deadline that did not allow me to get caught up on email and posts till just now!
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@ PsychoCid: There are NO match-up that Keeper CANNOT win without impulse, but IMHO
ALL match-ups are more difficult w/out them.
Being able to find whatever you need faster is a gigantic asset, and that is what impulse helps to do... so it is valuable in every match-up.
I would say that it is best vs really really fast aggro were you need to find balance (or a tutor to fetch it) asap, and yawgwill to recur it. and worst against BBS game 1 with a B2B on the table, but is golden after SB in game 2 and 3, to stockpile counters, especially REB, and red sources... since, if the BBS is smart will attack those first.
Also, you missed another thing that impulse does better then Brainstorm, It helps you find the friggen colored mana you need when you need it, instead of having your good restrictedness being duressed out of your hand, before you find the color to cast it.
Nothing more heart sinking then brainstorming, hoping to find a white mana source, with no shuffle effects, and seeing no mana for the next 3 draws and knowing that you still need to draw through that crap before you will have a chance at getting to it!
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@ Milton:
Quote what about the Fireball? Are you going combo-Keeper so hard that the Fireball is necessary? I have long favored the use of Fireball as a very efficient creature killer and possible game ender. But, in your deck wouldn't another Swords or Morphling be a good choice for this slot? Or a Fire/Ice? Or a couple of Kegs?
The fireball has been, as you have suggested, another way to combo, an ok creature kill, and a
GREAT finisher )even w/out the combo)... as for the substitutions that you suggested for the Mophling and the fireball I feel like:
I do not want to ENTIRELY depend on going combo.. As I have already excluded the abyss, I feel that Morphling is like a similar living abyss, and I will sometimes use him simply as a removal spell, were I do not expend the extra mana to attack or pump, but only as a mana intensive Moat/ Abyss, if the combo is just a turn or so away.
I like the option of using him as a win in himself against a control player, or as a "last" resort, or "fallback" versus aggro.
Also, as Amos has stated, usually against most aggro, all I need to do is delay them a few turns and then combo them out. Obviously it doesn't always work like this, that is why I have the morph, but the additional creature kill seems like it is semi- unnecessary, and already fulfilled my Morphling and fireball, and with these 2 cards adding additional wins in themselves.
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@ ShadowLotus:
Quote I won't comment on the use of the Power Artifact/Grim Monolith combo in your Keeper build, since that's purely a metagame call, but I will make a few statements about running 4x Impulse in your MD.
First off, I don't see how your deck is able to handle decks like TnT, Mask, or Gro better w/ the addition of Impulse over Brainstorm and Cunning Wish.
This is the catch 22 of your question. With the list that I gave in the original post, I went a little removal light, but went for a faster combo kill... and in match-ups like TNT and mask, I am able to go for the combo win faster then against control (like gro esp). In that situation, I try to go for a atrophy of resources on their part, make them use pitched on removal, Morphling, and balance, long enough for me to combo, or yawgwin a Morphling.
So the answer is what you are not wanting to comment or address, is that I go into a more combo mode in most of these situations.
Quote These are some of the more challenging match-ups for a Keeper player, and I believe one has to be better prepared for these pairings, otherwise it makes taking it all in a balanced/random metagame very difficult. Sure, Impulse is good if you get it in the opening turns of a game; but after that, you simply begin cantripping into a lack of answers to fast aggro. How do you handle match-ups like this (especially when you have a sideboard that seems to be mostly anti-control)?
The only time impulse is
not good, is after you are down to like 3-4 cards in your deck, and there is nothing else good left.
Impulse finds the good stuff, and thus it is always as long as you still need good stuff from your deck, and it is still their.
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@ Vegeta2711: Thank you, those are (some of) my sentiments exactly.
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@ Fishhead: I have playtested paragon keeper for about 2 weeks, and sometimes the wish was great, but way more times then that, I felt that, my opponent was able to deny me of my resources, especially mana, or the hand, and since I had little way to quickly find mana, I found wish usually only getting a plow, and a 4cc plow is ass, Or I was unable to use it at all... or it was FOW fodder.
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@ Dave Kaplan: If you have the power artifact in opening hand, you:
1. Find the other component to have infinite mana, using all that draw/ search.
2. FOW/ MIS with it, and go for Morphling kill, or combo with just the academy
It is obviously not a great thing to have that in opening hand when your opponent gets a good start, but it happens sometimes, and is far from unrecoverable, especially with impulse to find you what you need.
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@ Rakso: Since I am preaching Impulse to increase consistency, I will never be able to convince a guy that wins EVERY game that he ever posted in his articles
Oh, and that
always has all 3
different color of mana to cast Dromar's charm,
every game
ever.
But seriously, in my experience at large tourneys (weekly 30+ person sanctioned ones) as well as the large power card tourneys I attend, consistency is
really important, and playing back to back games for 4 hours, were you NEED WHAT YOU NEED RIGHT NOW!!! Impulse has been invaluable.
Quote Oh, stop being a tool.
No one said to cut Merchant Scroll for a Brainstorm, either.
You could also try to understand previous arguments, too. Colored mana aside, it just wasn't worth it to cut Sylvan for Impulse in the pre-Onslaught builds. Sylvan is the superior manipulation card.
Cutting Sylvan has nothing to do with cutting broken cards; the primary consideration was consolidating the mana base.
This is the Extreme Forum, dude.
Without debating weather or not Sylvan > Impulse, since this is not the issue now...
Impulse will help you get you find the stuff you need on a long enough timeline, this is highly valuable, and BTW you suck at civility and subtlety.
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@-CF-:
Quote Let's cut all the one and two-OFS we want to see early then. I mean, they're not any good to us now, are they?
)
AHHHHHH!! you are always 1 step ahead of us... but seriously though... umm no.
You can always still pick up the restricted goodness from tutors, or just pick them up along the way, with impulses.
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I would like to address one thing that may not be apparent from initial glances at my
Combo-Keeper decklist.
I would like to address the Wheel of Fortune, Timetwister, and Enlightened tutor.
Mono Black is somewhat popular in my environment. Wheel allows a cheap way to refill my hand looking for fast mana, removal, and combo. Timetwister serves a similar purpose, but also provides emergency recursion. Enlightened Tutor is primarily a virtual copy of the combo, Zorb, or a mana that I need... but additionally serves as a second virtual copy of COP Red, Aura Fracture, and Tormod’s Crypt.
I think that Enlightened Tutor is another highly overlooked card for Keeper SB's as it provides a virtual copy of cops and many other useful cards.
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I appreciate all of the feedback, positive and negative... I am going to reconfig the combo keeper for a more traditional less combo version as to submit what I would play even if I wasn't playing the combo.
-Freddie
