Right now with the metagame changing drastically after th...

[Chaos Blade]

Right now with the metagame changing drastically after the restriction of Gush, decks have changed alot in this past 5 months. But one deck that seems to be changing in a unknown direction is Keeper. It has changed its ways of playing to land destruction during the era of Hulk, then Mirrodin came unleashing Chalice Of Void and Isochron Scepter. At first people were seeing these cards and testing them in Keeper.

 After a  month or so and after the restriction of LED and Burning Wish, people are now leaving Chalice as it was not as powerful as it seemed it could be. Then Scepter has been tested and it did end up good in my testing and some others. Now I want to ask what is Keepers future? Is it in Isochron or without any of these hyped artifacts at all?

[Klep]

I'm fairly certain that Keeper will wind up running a pair of Scepters, and maybe even keep a couple Chalices in the board depending on the meta (Though it can and has evolved, Sligh still doesn't like Chalice, and nor does much random aggro lilke Stompy).   The Scepter is just such a great tool for the deck that it is hard to argue with.  Most of Keeper's solutions are at instant speed, and most of them also cost less than 3.  being able to re-use these solutions over and over again is well-worth the risk and the initial card disadvantage.  This won't, however, make Keeper any easier to play, as playing a Scepter is not as easy as Turn 2: "Untap, Draw, Land, Scepter, Imprint Drain, Go."  It requires thought and patience to appropriately take advantage of the Scepter.

-David 'Klep' Kleppinger, Raving Lunatic

[Dr. Sylvan]

There is no one Keeper list anymore. Keeper is a deck with a set of "mandatory" foundational cards and a group of flexible slots for metagamed silver bullets. Some versions will use Scepter, some versions will use Chalice, some versions will drop white and become OSE. The most recent Keeper threads have displayed this aptly, as everyone's results differed based on their particular gauntlet and the players participating in the testing. This was the source of much debate, particularly on the merits of Isochron Scepter. Now, the consensus appears to be that there is no consensus.

Keeper really is the most customizable deck of all time, now more than ever.

Here's what I would call the really essential core cards:
Ancestral Recall, Time Walk, Yawgmoth's Will, Demonic Tutor
4 Mana Drain, 4 Force of Will, 1 Cunning Wish
on-color Moxen (3 or 4), Black Lotus, Sol Ring
3 Wasteland, Strip Mine, 4 blue fetchlands, 8 (usually more) blue dual lands

There are many other cards which, while in almost every version, could be removed for a certain metagame. Balance is a premier example: there are conceivable metagames where it would be inferior to other cards. Brainstorm, while now a staple, might not work as well if fewer shufflers were used. The kill condition is always flexible. Basically, the 36+ cards above will be in every Keeper/blue-based-control build for the foreseeable future. Everything else adapts.

[Jakedasnake]

Right now I really think it is a mistake for Keeper builds (with some exception) to run less than 3 Stifle. The card just does so much to improve Keeper's matchups that I really can't imagine why people don't play it.

Agreed, the builds are so flexible right now, it's really pretty cool.
 

[Ivantheterrible]

I  think keeper has turned into the chronic. I think that the chronic well being the perferred deck over keeper now is to much of a different deck and therefor I would have to say that traditional keeper is dead right now and probably will be foever more unless something (restriction) happenes to scepter.

[Dr. Sylvan]

Oh no, it's the R-word!!!11!!one!!!

Seriously, if we're talking about a generalized metagame like you'll find at a large Waterbury or Dulmen, it's still all matchups. If there's a ton of Dragon and TPS then Scepter is much less awe-inspiring. If you're playing control mirrors all day long your maindeck Chalices will put you in the losing brackets more often than other cards would have.

As to Stifle, it sure fits into mana denial variants and OSE builds. There aren't many cards that are "automatic" 3-ofs, though. Tournaments will bear predictions out, and right now I'm predicting "Stifle may or may not be as awesome as people are saying". =)

[thefram]

Generally, I feel like the future of keeper is in the scepter. Chalice, while an excellent combo and aggro hoser, is just not as generally adaptable as Isochron Scepter.

In my personal experience the general strategy of Keeper has in the past always been to obtain virtual card advanatage with the games more powerful spells like Y. Will and Balance, and generate spurts of real card advanatage through Ancestral, FoF, Braingeyser, Stroke, and later Scrying and F. Sight. I feel like this strategy only worked in the past because all the other decks in the format were just not as good, and so a decent keeper player could be guaranteed 50% from most of the field. Over the past 2 years or so keeper's position as the dominant blue based control deck has diminished significantly because its lack of a real draw engine has been a real detriment. GAT, with Gush and cantrips, as well as HULK with AK and Deep Anal have far stronger engines in that respect, and can also keep aggressive pressure on.

So with that background, it becomes apparent to me that Isochron Scpeter's general reactive adaptability, as well as the ability to turn search into a real draw engine. Chalice is a nice as a hoser, but it can be phased in and out of the side board depending on the general meta.

[Chaos Blade]

I think Scepter Keeper is Keepers future. Isochron is Keepers new bomb that it was yearning to find and wield. Im trying out 2 Stifles in the sidebaord currently. And as Fram said Scepter is a fuckin Draw Engine, counter engine thingy plus a removal engine! 3 in 1! Hell yea!

[Ultima]

I would hardly say that traditional Keeper is dead. It should not be forgotten that Keeper is a highly skill-intensive deck to pilot and Keeper's strategy is hardly dead or gone in a metagame that hasn't even settled yet.  

Personally, I believe that Keeper is the best control deck in the format and it should be noted that I seperate Keeper from scepter and categorize scepter decks as scepter control or the Chronic.

When viewing the meta right now, i would hardly hazard a guess that scepter is the new "control" or that it will dominate.  The metagame is still in a state of flux.  Because of this I tend to think that a deck built to hand out answers on a pure reactive state is the better control deck albeit traditional Keeper.

[xrizzo]

Keeper as an archtype will not go away for a long time, if ever.  Many control decks are toying around with Scepter - they should, it is a good card.  But I think it is premature to claim control has settled on that card as a long term answer.  If there is a control bomb in the next set, I wouldn't be surprised if Scepter is one of the first things cut.  

Scepter works with other powerful cards, but isn't inherently that powerful itself.  This type of card has traditionally been one of the first candidates to get cut...

Keeper will survive, and I think be somewhere just below the top tier once the meta settles.

[Jakedasnake]

I really think that the hot streak of Scepter is just going to die. Now that people have realized that it's a good card, and some decks can use it effectively, they're going to have ways to find answers. Basing a deck around a card that has so many ways of getting removed is a bad strategy in my opinion. Not to mention that it sucks in the early game.

In my build I'm running 1 Scepter with 1 Vampiric Tutor maindeck, with is much more versatile than a second Scepter. This way, I don't have it in my hand too early very often, and I don't have to clump my deck with imprintable instants.

Plus, I easily run 4 Scepters, which improve my matchup against any of the Tier (I hate using this word) 1 decks.

[BreathWeapon]

Even in the face of considerable Scepter Hate from Fish.dec, ala 4 Stifles and 3 Null Rods MD, Goblins, 4 Vandals and 4 Tinkerer with 2 Null Rod MD and 4 Crash in tge SB, I have still posted solid results with "The Boom Stick" in several Control Archetypes. Isochron Scepter is Control's saving grace come Jan 1st, IMO.

That said, non-Scepter control is still alive and kicking. Landstill is a great deck in the new format and 4 Deed Hulk is a beast, 2 MD 2 SB.

That said, I have done a lot of testing with Stifle-Keeper, surprise surprise i'm Stifles#1 fan, and its a solid Non-Scepter path for Keeper to take. It really doesn't do anything to help Keeper out against its Aggro matchups tho'. Stifle Keeper is really the anti-Control Control deck, and its just too precise of a deck to have major success in a broader field. If your in NE tho', its worth a shot. I've got a list sitting around that i'll post when I dig it up ... its somewhere in my Physics Lab book

[Goblin Headbanger]

I'd say the future of Keeper involves competent control players looking at the environment and selecting the cards that they think will win on any given day.  Some might say Chalice is dead in Keeper with Long.dec gone, but these are probably the same people who were saying that Keeper itself was dead not too long ago.  Maybe the tea leaves didn't soak long enough.

If I think Chalice will put me at the top table of the next tournament, that's what I'll play.  Same for Scepter, DoJ, Goblin Trenches or Serra Angel.  Either way you slice it, it's still just Keeper.  That's the flexibility and power that makes it The Deck.

[Veriest1]

Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong but...

I have found that Chalice fits into Keepers strategy quite well actually as it effectivly makes dead cards in the opponents deck to create the psuedo card advantage Keeper is famous for and I wouldn't want to have less than 2 in my sideboard if I wasn't running any maindeck. With a little thought/common sense it is possible to predict where ones opponents have a cluster in their mana curve. Often this is around one or two.

Chalice also provides a way to protect a sceptor if Natralize, Disenchant, or Shattering Pulse is expected instead of Rack and Ruin since getting 4 mana with protection is obviously a lot easier than 6. Since most blue based control decks are running a mix of Fire/Ice and Swords as removal it is possible, in some situations, to side in the one with a casting cost that will not be effected by Chalice of the Void for your target casting cost in a particular matchup. Obviously against long and similiar decks 4 chalices could be quite useful and aren't terribly hard to time. Yet against other decks the maximization of the "limited" draw card in Keeper needs to be observed while at the same time getting a chalice on the board that will hinder the opponents development the most.

For example, Keeper can run Balance, Mana Drain, Fire/Ice, Time Walk, Demonic Tutor, and oft times Isochron Sceptor in the 2 casting cost range. All of those cards, with the possible exception of fire/ice, can be key to setting up a win and thusly a lot of thought must go into setting chalice at two. The plus side is Fire/Ice and Mana Drain can easily be dropped
onto a sceptor prior to Chalicing for two via the power of mana drain. Unless chalice counters the copy... I'm not sure about that.

In contrast, Chalice for 1 isn't as problematic because most of the one mana cards in Keeper can be cast for two via isochron sceptor. Once again sideboarding strategy must be developed to hamper the slower control deck in the least while stalling the faster combo/beat down/lock deck the most.

Essentially what this means is looking ahead and setting up your game has become signifigantly harder to do if chalice is ran over other cards. Despite this, however, the rewards of actually doing it can be enough to outweigh the added difficulty. Yet it makes one wonder whether or not traditional Keeper couldn't compete against the same decks if we were better players. Afterall I haven't heard Zherb. really speaking up in any of this but from what I can tell he isn't running sceptor.

Anyway, sorry I haven't contributed in a while.

::EDIT::
I went and checked the rules mill... please excuse the comments concerning 1cc spells being used on sceptor under a chalice for 1. Sorry about that.