help me with my weird keeper

[Anonymous]

i have been running mirari and arcanis in my keeper deck and they have been virtual game breakers if they come out i am going to upgrade it with cunning wishes and some more fetch lands and more moxes (pearl and emerald) do you think i should remove the arcanis and mirari?
 
my deck is as follows

mana
1 underground sea
1 tundra
3 city of brass
2 grand colleseum
2 gemstone mine
2 reflecting pool
1 flooded strand
1 polluted delta
1 tropical island
1 mox sapphire
1 mox diamond
1 black lotus
1 lotus petal
1 sol ring
2 tropical island
1 library of alexandria
1 tolarian academy

blue
1 ancestral recall
1 timetwister
1 timewalk
1 timespiral
1 fact or fiction
1 braingeyser
2 morphling
1 arcanis

black
1 demonic tutor
1 vampiric tutor
1 chainers's/ diabolic edict
1 yawgmoth's will

white
1 moat
1 balance

red
1 shattering pulse
1 fireball

green
1 regrowth
1 sylvan library

artifact
1 mirari
2 masticore

if you have any other sugestions lmk thanks       

[j_orlove]

Uh, that deck is 46 cards.  

[Peztacular]

keeper without the ability to counter a spell = tech!

[Jebus]

I'm no expert on Keeper, but I've played against it on several occasions.

First, your deck is under 60 cards, which makes it illegal.

Remove Arcanis and Mirari.  Arcanis is quite expensive and Mirari just doesn't seem nescessary.

No Counterspell?  Mana Drain? Force of Will? Misdireciton?

Masticores probably aren't really needed.

The Abyss?  Swords to Plowshares?

Mystical Tutor.

May want to try Fire/Ice as well.

[Davido]

Moat and masticore don't have a very good synergy. Also, like the others have already pointed out, any control deck really needs counters; it's mandatory...

Tolarian Academy with only 6 artifacts + 2 masticores is suboptimal (2 of them are sacrificing artifacts)

Shattering Pulse MD is not the best option. Try Disenchant/D-Blow as a more flexible option or use the normal strategy: move Pulse and Allay to the SB and add a couple of wishes in the main board.

Fireball MD with no Monolith/Power Artifact combo looks really odd. Mind Twist should be there instead.

Just some suggestions.

Davido

[Anonymous]

Quote (Davido @ Feb. 04 2003,04:15)

sorry i completely forgot about the counters it was late when i wrote this my mind was off in neverland

[Anonymous]

Quote (Guest @ Feb. 03 2003,17:35)

heres the real deck i'm much more alert right now

mana
1 underground sea
1 tundra
3 city of brass
2 grand colleseum
2 gemstone mine
2 reflecting pool
1 flooded strand
1 polluted delta
1 tropical island
1 mox sapphire
1 mox diamond
1 black lotus
1 lotus petal
1 sol ring
2 tropical island
1 library of alexandria
1 tolarian academy
2 mishra factory
blue
1 ancestral recall
1 timetwister
1 timewalk
1 timespiral
1 capsize
1 fact or fiction
1 misdirection
4 force of will
4 mana drain
1 braingeyser
2 morphling
1 arcanis

black
1 visara
1 demonic tutor
1 vampiric tutor
1 chainers's/ diabolic edict
1 yawgmoth's will

white
1 moat
1 allay
1 balance

red
1 shattering pulse
2 fireball

green
1 regrowth
1 sylvan library

artifact
1 mirari
2 masticore

[Anonymous]

Well in the spirit of Socrates and the spirit of the newbie forum I will not just post a deck list of paragon or trinity keeper.

I will instead as you some questions about your build and ask that you ponder them.  I am merely trying to help you analyze your own card choices.

first your mana base:

1 underground sea= good, might 4 be better?

1 tundra= good. again might more be better?

3 city of brass=good.  do you think 2 might be enough?

2 grand colleseum=is this really better than city of brass?  is it better than having more dual lands?

2 gemstone mine=these will only last 3 turns each.  combo decks run these.  Can you kill in 3 turns?

2 reflecting pool=what happens if this is the only land you have in your opening hand?  what happens if have two lands out and you opponent wastes the other and all you have out is the lone reflecting pool?

1 flooded strand=good, might more be better?

1 polluted delta=see above

3 tropical island=Do you even need to run green?

1 mox sapphire= stays

1 mox diamond= do you think you are running enough land to be pithcing them?

1 black lotus= stays

1 lotus petal=might another mox or dual land be a better solution than a one shot, one mana artifact.

1 sol ring=stays

1 library of alexandria=stays

1 tolarian academy=what if you have no moxen or artifacts out?  Is it really better than another dual land?

2 mishra factory=interesting and they run very will in OSE (see the extreme vintage) but do you think you might want more colored mana sources?  Also might it have a tad bit of bad synergy with moat.

blue

1 ancestral recall=stays

1 timetwister=not a bad card by any means, but do you really want to give an aggro deck all the cards you just countered back and then give them 7 more cards.  This is a good sideboard card vs discard.  You could use a burning wish and put it in the sideboard.

1 timewalk=stays

1 timespiral=see argument for timetwister only double the mana cost.

1 capsize=with cunning wish wouldn't his be run in the sideboard?

1 fact or fiction=stays

1 misdirection=stays

4 force of will=stays

4 mana drain=stays

1 braingeyser=stays

2 morphling=stays

1 arcanis=he's kinda expensive isn't he?

black

1 visara=kinda expensive

1 demonic tutor=stays

1 vampiric tutor=stays

1 chainers's/ diabolic edict=I would recomend chainer's in the main deck and a diabolic in the sideboard that you could cunning wish for.

1 yawgmoth's will=stays

white

1 moat=great card I totally agree that it should be in the maindeck once again. stays

1 allay=against aggro decks don't you wish sometimes this was something else.  Maybe this could be in the sideboard too, and cunning wish could get it when you need it.

1 balance=stays

red

1 shattering pulse=see arguement for allay.

2 fireball=good alternate kill condition.  maybe this could be in the sideboard too adn you could burning wish for it if you needed it.

green

1 regrowth=good card but does keeper really need it enough to add another color?

1 sylvan library=same as regrowth, do you really need the green?  And if you are going to run sylvan wouldn't it be better to run 4 fetch lands so you can shuffle you library and make sylvan more effective?

artifact

1 mirari=how many spells do you have that you really want to copy?  Is there any benefit to casting multiple counter spells?  Copying ancestral is good.  It just seems to tie up too much mana.

2 masticore=in a deck that wants to draw lots of cards and wait with counter spells in hand, does a card that makes you discard one a turn really seem like the best choice?  Also masticore and the moat are not really good friends.

Here are some other thoughs.

I notice you are not running any wastelands or stripmine.

I also see you are missing what alot of other people consider to be stable cards.  I'm not saying that your cards are bad, but there are alot of cards that might be better.  Keeper being a 5 to 4 color deck can often be overwhelming since there are so many possible card choices.  A 5 color deck can run anything it wants.  So Keeper wants the best.  Here are some of the best that the different colors have to offer that are often chosen in keeper and OSE.

BLACK

The Abyss-staple main deck card.  It does a better job clearing house than the masticore and doesn't cost any mana or cards in hand

Mind Twist-this card was banned for a long time for a very important reason.  It is really good!

Duress-I've seen OSE run this in their sideboard.  Proactive counter spell.  Stops the card before they play it.

Ebony Charm-rapidly becoming a staple sideboard card vs decks with alot of graveyard mechanics.

Haunting Echoes-local area tech.  Great against almost anything.

WHITE

Swords to Plowshares-the best spot creature removal in the game.  The fact that your opponent gains life it not enough of a drawback to not use it.  Run STP.

Celestial Dawn-good tech vs non basic land hate.  Rapidly becoming a staple sideboard card and could possibly make its way into the maindeck.

RED

Fire/Ice-card advantage.  Can kill 2 weenies all in one card.  And you tap out one of their permanents to "cycle" it when you don't need it.

Pyroclasm-very good sideboard card vs fast weenie decks.  It will kill sligh, stompy, zoo, and suicide.  

Burning Wish-lets you grab juicy sideboard cards like pyroclasm, haunting echoes, timetwister, etc.  Stuff you don't have room for in the main deck.

Red Elemental Blast-this is what lets keeper do really well vs other control decks.  You have 4 counter spells for 1 mana that counter blue spells and kill blue critters.  They are also good against back to basics

Gorilla Shaman-shattering pulse can often be better than the mox monkey, but against other decks running power the monkey shines.  Eats up all of the guys moxen and artifact toys.


Blue

Cunning Wish-think of this as a tutor for your sideboard.  Shattering pulse, diabolic edict, allay, and ebony charm would take up 4 main deck slots and not be good in all match ups.  The wish takes up only one main deck slot and can be any of those other cards you want.


Stroke of Genius-if you love braingeyser, you'll love this.  The instant speed lets you cast this at the end of your opponent's turn so you are not tapped out during their turn.

Brainstorm-popular in the paragon builds because of the shuffling effects.  That way you are not just redrawing the same cards next turn.  And it can hide cards back in your library against discard.

Merchant Scroll-lets you get all the other blue instants in your deck, cunning wish, any counterspell, ancestral, stroke, and fire/ice.

Mystical Tutor-lets you grab all the broken goodness that is keeper.  Yawgmoth's Will, Mind Twist, Swords to Plowshares, etc.

GREEN

Hollistic Wisdom-can be brutal when it starts going.  pitch a land everyturn to drop a wasteland every turn.  Drop instants to ancestral recall every turn.  Pitch merchant scroll to time walk again.  Its abuses are endless.  If you are going to run green this is a good one.

Oath of Druids-good green sideboard card when coupled with gaea's blessing.  Lets you transform into oath against fast aggro.

Gaea's Blessing-staple recursion card.  It is the engine behind oath, but in decks other than oath it is often not that good.  Blessing was a power house in keeper when it coudl run 3 fact or fictions.  Pick the stack with the blessing, it goes to the graveyard from your library and you get all your counter spells back.

ARTIFACTS

All the Moxen (plural for mox!)-if you run a color, you should run its mox.  Paragon does not run emerald and Trinity keeper runs emerald but does not run ruby.

Powder Keg-control's budget disk.  Great vs fast aggro decks like stompy and sligh.  Some builds run this in their sideboard and it is almost never a dead card.

Nevinyrral's Disk-great board sweeper, really good in OSE, not really so good in keeper but it is never a bad card.

Zuran Orb-good life gain

Ivory Tower-good life gain

Tormod's Crypt-kills graveyards dead, nothing is faster.

LANDS

Stripmine-kills any land dead

Wasteland-kills lots of lands dead and can cut off multicolor decks from colors they need.

Dustbowl-the wasteland on a stick.  Turns excess land later game into wastelands.

Again try to see if the cards in your main deck are any better than the cards in the list above.  Which cards do the most.  Which ones are dead against the most match ups.  Which ones are the most useful.

really long post but I hope this will help you.  I don't want to just post a paragon list.

[Anonymous]

Quote (Guest @ Feb. 05 2003,15:24)

awesome reply and i totaly agree with most of it       the abyss is already in i just forgot it when writting :

[MoreFling]

Mirari is fine card to play in Keeper, great in the mirror, and in general fun to play with.

If you are interested, check out the Extreme Vintage thread on Paragon keeper, and read some reports on www.morphling.de, you might find those interesting.

Maybe future sight and Holistic Wisdom are nice additions, but I think WhiteThrash already said it all.

[Anonymous]

White Trash did a good job summing most of it up.  But, he seems to be against green in Keeper where as some still stick with it, it just depends on what you prefer.  If you are going to play with green make sure your mana base can handle it, that is really the only argument for not playing it.  I would def cut the grand colleseum it is too slow, on the other hand I do like gemstone mines maybe one or two would be ok but only if you are playing with green.  Cut the reflecting pool, it would be horrible to see two of them in your opening hand with no other land and they are very suseptable to waste/strip.  I think you should also add in an undiscovered paradise, it will often help bring you up to 7 cards for the library to function and will help out in smoothing your mana out for green.  The big clunky creatures will only slow you down too...ditch them.  White Trash covered the rest well on what you should sideboard add and cut.

Z

[j_orlove]

Quote I do like gemstone mines maybe one or two would be ok but only if you are playing with green.  

Not really. Gemstone mine is really bad if you want to use it more than 3 times (  ). And next time you play keeper (without mines), use a die or something to keep track of how often you use your first and second lands. I'm willing to bet that it will be a lot more than 3!

[Anonymous]

Of course I would bet that I use my first couple lands more than three times, but I have found that multiple city of brass (for all colored land) punishes me too much that's why I have split it up into a couple cities, a gemstone or two, and an undiscovered paradise.  I think reflecting pool is too inconsistant, I think that most of us agree on that.  But too smoothe out the mana curve while playing 5 colors is tough, I like playing the mixture of the three I mentioned.  
It works for me in my environment as I see a lot of wastelands and I was experiencing that with three or four city of brass in my deck I was having every thing but the cities wasted or striped.  It was causing me to pay two or three life everytime I wanted to play a spell.  If I were playing in a more control environment I would be more apt to play more city of brass.  Keeper plays alot of land right?  I have not had problems with my Gemstone Mines dying off too quickly.

Z

[j_orlove]

Instead of 3-4 cities, try 3 of each dual and 4+ fetchlands. It just works much better.

[Anonymous]

j love, that is a good idea too.  I have been tinkering with my Keeper deck and fetchlands and am having trouble with them as my environment is playing alot of LD and by thinning my deck of land w/o actually putting more land in play I find myself wanting to topdeck land at times and that is no good.  Like I said every metagame is different, fetchies don't work for me but I know that they are beautiful in many other environments and would strongly suggest playing them if you are having trouble smoothing out your mana curve.

Z

[j_orlove]

If you really see that much LD, why not run a Teferi's Response (or 2!). You could throw in a few Factories to protect if you wanted.

[Anonymous]

I do J...I see a fair amount of sui black here, I run the response and extra misdirections in the sideboard.  It works well.

Z

[Anonymous]

Z28Camaro: I and many other people have not missed the green in keeper.  It really doesn't need it anymore. Gemstone mine is bad juju!  Nothing is funnier than someone wastelanding your other land out and you have to watch the mine go bye bye.  If you want to stop LD run either Sacred ground, or the super tech of Celestial Dawn.  Dawn makes you immune to wasteland, bloodmoon, back to basics,  and Price of Progress.  Celestial Dawn is tech.  Post your build Z28 and maybe we can help you make it a little more impervious to LD and suicide.  Pyroclasm is the tech vs suicide (ad lots of other weenie decks)


Playing Gemstone mine is keeper is almost as bad as running arcane denial.....

[Anonymous]

I wouldn't go as far as saying that Gemstone Mine is as bad as running Arcane Denial in Keeper...I think there was some sarcasm in there, at least I hope so.  

For a while I've been playing a conventional Keeper deck, Trinity to be exact with a tiny tweak or two here and there but hadn't been having success with my metagame as of lately so I'm thinking of starting over with the Keeper idea and get back to begining and not "assume" what should be in there and what shouldn't.  I've got some new ideas for Keeper but I just hate how Keeper players react to new ideas and I'm a bit sceptical of presenting them because I don't want this to turn into a flame war and a "this is better than this" argument.  I've heard them all, we all have.

So, what I'm going to do is start up a new thread here in the unregistered area (because that's what I am) with some of my ideas for a new look on Keeper.

Z

[Anonymous]

Quote (Guest @ Feb. 03 2003,17:35)i have been running mirari and arcanis in my keeper deck and they have been virtual game breakers if they come out i am going to upgrade it with cunning wishes and some more fetch lands and more moxes (pearl and emerald) do you think i should remove the arcanis and mirari?
 
my deck is as follows

mana
1 underground sea
1 tundra
3 city of brass
2 grand colleseum
2 gemstone mine
2 reflecting pool
1 flooded strand
1 polluted delta
1 tropical island
1 mox sapphire
1 mox diamond
1 black lotus
1 lotus petal
1 sol ring
2 tropical island
1 library of alexandria
1 tolarian academy

blue
1 ancestral recall
1 timetwister
1 timewalk
1 timespiral
1 fact or fiction
1 braingeyser
2 morphling
1 arcanis

black
1 demonic tutor
1 vampiric tutor
1 chainers's/ diabolic edict
1 yawgmoth's will

white
1 moat
1 balance

red
1 shattering pulse
1 fireball

green
1 regrowth
1 sylvan library

artifact
1 mirari
2 masticore

if you have any other sugestions lmk thanks       

after thinking about all your advice and playing some type one games last night i have made the following changes  


mana(26)
1 lotus
1 lotus petal
1 mox sapphire
1 mox diamond
1 sol ring
2 underground sea
2 tundra
2 tropical island
3 city of brass
2 flooded strand
1 polluted delta
2 island
1 maze of ith
1 planes
1 strip mine
2 reflecting pool
1 library of alexandria

blue(16)
1 ancestral recall
1 fact or fiction
1 braingeyser
2 morphling
4 force of will
4 mana drain
1 mystical tutor
1 timetwister
1 arcanis

black(5)
1 demonic tutor
1 vampiric tutor
1 yawgmoth will
1 abyss
1 mind twist

green(1)
1 regrowth

white(6)
1 moat
4 swords to plowshares(will switch a few to sb when i get the wishes
1 balance

gold(4)
4 shadowmage infiltrator

artifact(6)
2 masticore
1 zuran orb
1 tormods crypt
2 chaos orb (yes i know there band but i'm only a casual player and untill i get the cunning wishes these are my destroy everything)

sideboard(15)
1 stroke of genius
1 allay
1 shattering pulse
1 diabolic edict
1 misdirection
1 capsize

1 gorilla shaman
3 dwarvan blastminer

1 perish
4 powder keg


I know the first thing your gonna say is the deck is over sixty cards and i know that. i have trouble cutting cards and in my environment fast decks kick my keepers butt.  i am going to add 2 cunning wish and some burning wish and some wastelands so i can move some stuff to the sb but right now the build above is working very well. lmk what you think  

[Anonymous]

Well I am not one to discount a card simply because it is not the standard "net deck" build.  If no one tried new cards new tech would not be found.  Alot of people though loosing green in keeper was stupid.  Sylvan and regrowth are powerful, why cut them.  In Parfait soldevi digger used to ba a must.  Now no one that I know even runs it.

  But there are diffinately things in your deck that can go.  There are lots of good cars.  But a lot of your good cards do not go well together.

Masticore + Moat = Bad...
Shadowmage Infiltrator + Moat = Bad...
Shadowmage Infiltrator + Abyss = Bad...
Arcanis + Abyss= Bad...

Shadowmage needs to have a deck built around them.  Like a Ubphid but with the finkels instead.

Is there any benefit to running:

2 underground sea
2 tundra
2 tropical island
3 city of brass
2 flooded strand
1 polluted delta
2 island
1 plains
2 reflecting pool

How about:

4 underground sea
3 tundra
3 Volcanic Island
4 polluted delta
1 City of Brass
1 Undiscovered Paradise
2 Island

this gives you more lands that you can actually use.

Since 60 is the minimun cards you must run, it is also the maximun you want to run.  Look at it this way, every card above 60 is another turn that you will not draw into something that you need.  Trim till it is 60 on the dot.  

You are running only one green spell (regrowth) yet you are running alot of red in your sideboard with 3 City of Brass your only lands that can make red on their own.

Again look at all the posts on keeper decks.  They represent the work of many players and hours and hours of playtesting.  
Look at their lists and ask your self if any of the cards you have are better than the cards listed.  See what cards work well together and which ones do not.  

Elitist attitudes seem to abound here, despite the forum's own  prohibitions against them, but desipte the feeding if egos, the builds you see for Azhrei, Zherbus, and JP "Polluted" Meyer (master of fleshreaver.dec) represent probably the most tuned and refined builds of keeper out there.  Take their versions very seriously.  

(if I left out anyone's names for keeper builds it is not intentional)