The purpose of this thread is for anyone, be they Adepts,...

[Azhrei]

The purpose of this thread is for anyone, be they Adepts, newbies, or whomever else, to ask me questions. I will do my best to answer them by using the edit function and adding my responses within your original post in bold. That way, each post remains self-contained and the integrity of the thread will be maintained.

This is not for posts like "Fix my deck" or the like. If you have specific strategy questions, desire clarification on game theory or why certain ideas work and others don't, or specific card choices for various metagames, I will do my best to share answers with you, and if I don't know an answer I will do my best to find them. The more information you give me in your question, the better I will be able to answer it. This is not a deck clinic, but is aimed at improving the fundamental understanding of Magic, specifically of the Vintage format.

Bear in mind that I will likely not be able to get to everything immediately, but I will make my best effort. Evidently I will have help from zealous moderators.

A word of warning: I will generally respond to intelligent, well written questions far more readily than if it looks as if someone fell asleep on their keyboard.

A second word of warning: If I make a mistake about something, please PM me so that I can correct it. If you disagree with me about something, feel free to PM me your reasoning but do not clutter this thread with endless rebuttals. I will be liberal in deleting posts that are not conducive to the atmosphere that I wish to create.

I am placing this in the Unregistered Forum so that the maximum number of people will have access to it.

Thank you, and good day.

[PucktheCat]

Alright, I will try to get this started.

I would like it if you discussed some of the theoretical issues surrounding deciding how many of a card to run in a deck.  Smmenen made the comment in his thread on Black Mask that a Type 1 deck should be constructed in fours and ones.  Do you agree with that statement?  Under what circumstances would you run a card as a three-of?  Two-of?  Would you ever run a card as a one-of if it wasn't restricted?

I agree with the statement on a superficial level, but understand that it is by no means a rule. The idea being that optimal deck construction seeks to maximize redundancy-- therefore, all 4s and 1s means that you have the most of a certain card possible so that you have the highest likelihood of having each game play out in the same fashion. Mask is an excellent example of a deck that is helped by this methodology.

However, the real deciding factor must always be how often you want to see a particular card in your opening hand, in the mid game, and in the late game as well. For example, four copies of Force of Will is a must in a blue deck, just as most black decks will want four copies of Duress. However, there is a point where redundancy begins to break down as a result of card similarity. For example, Keeper traditionally ran Demonic Tutor, Mystical Tutor, and 1-2 copies of Merchant Scroll. Later it would add Cunning Wishes and move Vampiric Tutor to the sideboard. These are all different cards, but they serve the same function because of similarity. Demonic, Mystical, Merchant Scroll, and 3 Cunning Wishes are six tutor slots, not three 1 ofs and a 3 of. Similarly, Hulk ran 2 Intuitions, a Merchant Scroll, 3 Cunning Wishes, a DT, and a Mystical... and only three Psychatogs, two Deep Analyses, partially because of tutors, and also because of repetitive draw effects. With Brainstorms and AKs, Hulk could expect to see more cards in a game and could therefore afford to run fewer copies of needed but situational cards.

Mask, on the other hand, has tutors that rely on redundancy and is otherwise running off the top ten cards in the deck. By turn 4, conversely, Hulk was able to expect having drawn at least ten extra cards if not more. If you consider that running 4 copies of a card gives you a 40% chance of seeing it in your opening hand, it makes sense to use 4 ofs if they are cards you want to see early and often-- like vital combo pieces, cheap draw spells, or cheap disruption. If you have those types of cards in as 4 ofs already and can expect to see significantly more cards than are normally allowed in Magic's base rules, then the cards that do not draw, disrupt, or fuel your deck do not need to be at 4 copies.

Finally, testing will generally show you what you can and cannot get away with. I personally do most of my deckbuilding on paper and will generally not change more than a few cards once actual playing has happened. There is a certain sense of intuition involved (Are two DAs enough? Do I need a third Cunning Wish?), but I think the best prescriptive method for general deck buildingis to figure out which cards you NEED to have four copies of, and then figure out about how many mana sources you need and then add 2. This will give you room to cut later if need be. Then add in everything you WANT in multiples of 4 (or 1 if restricted). Then, remove cards until you are down to 60. The reason for adding the extra mana sources is that it makes getting down from 61 or 62 cards a lot easier. Purely psychological, but I used to do that.

Edit:  Follow up question: To what extent, and in what ways, does a card being "useless in multiples" effect this decision making process?

To follow up that theoretical question here is a more concrete one.  Dragon.dec's combo is very vulnerable to Blue Elemental Blast.  However many Dragon players sideboard in Verdant Forces pretty much at random to keep people on their toes.  How would you deal with this issue when sideboarding?  Would you avoid bringing in the BEBs because they might be dead in your hand when the Verdant Force comes?  Would take the chance that they will win the game for you if the Dragon player goes for the win unprotected?  The deck I am thinking of in particular is Fish, but I imagine this situation comes up with a wide variety of Blue-based decks.

Fish is a harder case because the most obvious answer to Dragon is Swords to Plowshares or Coffin Purge in terms of targeting a combo bit. BEB is pretty much something that you still need to bring in to stop the combo as support for your already extant countermagic. Were I making a Fish deck modernly and feared facing a Verdant Force very early on like that, I would probably run Boomerangs in the sideboard as well as they would also be useful in that same matchup.

Of course, there is always the Tormod's Crypt plan, but that is not as good against everything else, whereas BEB and Boomerang will help against other decks as well.

I feel compelled to chime in with a note that Stifle not only stops the dragon loop, but also hits the animate card trigger if they go after Verdant. If you're really concerned about Dragon, Stifle is solid and flexible.
-Jacob

Dammit, my cut and paste failed me! That's what I get for not previewing my posts.

Also, someone mentioned Seal of Removal, which is also a fine choice to bounce with and is immune to discard.

I hope these questions get your project off to a good start.

Thanks!

-- Azhrei


Leo

There was an article by Jon Becker on SCG a month or so ago on a similar topic.  Basically, it said that you run 4's of cards, then 0's of cards, then 1's of cards.  3's are for shaving, and 2's should almost always be avoided.  Also remember though that these don't apply to cards which are there for redundency.  You're not running 2 Misdirections, you're running 6 Forces.

--jpmeyer

About the fours and ones thing.  I think that decks of fours and ones are generally ideal - one's becuase of the restricted list, and fours becuase of redudancy of the best cards.  Take a look at Long, Stax, and Mask - all fours and ones.  But there are legitimate reasons to run threes of something - look at Dragon.  Although it has 3 Animate and 2 Dances, it really just has 5 Animates and 3 Necromancies.  Ideal construction should start with 4s and 1s and should then mutate to fit certain exigencies.  For example, Keeper may go from one shaman to two becuase shaman is so good right now.  

Stephen Menendian\n\n

[TimeBeing]

I have another dragon.dec Sideboard question, just a simple one

With its growing popularity. Why not side in 2 Gaea's Blessing and more or less have an auto win against them. or at least buy you a few more turns to find a crypt or swords or something.


Generally speaking, it is in your best interests to disrupt a combo before it gets going rather than to try and counteract it once it has started. I prefer to choose the battle to prevent an infinite mana loop from occuring-- even if the Blessings trick were to be effective, they only work AFTER the Dragon deck is pretty much doing whatever it wants.

Also, bear in mind that Dragon decks will often bring in a Verdant Force, which is an alternative path to victory. Boarding in Blessings would be useless against this new threat, so Blessings would only be optimally helpful in game one... and Blessings are too weak in general to maindeck.

-- Azhrei

Also, if the Dragon player has Compulsion they can search up Ancestral and then deck you with that in response to the Blessing triggers

--jpmeyer

Thanks Jp. I didn't think of that. I would think it's still a nice suprise factor. If they don't know they are in your deck. How are they going to know to get the Recall befor they set the Animate on the Ambassador. Vedent force need 2 or 3 turns to kill you. Its the Sliver Queen sideboard I would be worried about. But you did both make good points about it not being the greatest idea.

Thanks again, i like this Thread idea.

Also, you might still be able to draw the game (provided that there are no other non-Dragon creatures in the graveyard and you have a second Animate Dead) and then sideboard in your Crypts/Stifles/etc.  If you know that the person might have them, either from scouting or because they just cast an Oath of Druids, you can always just try to go straight for the draw so that you can sideboard.

--jpmeyer\n\n

[Josti]

Why is it, that fish mostly has a SB with some (Mostly 3) Arcane Laboratory's in it. Doesn't a lab hurt fish also a lot when you play them, or is it just a card that you have to time when playing him??

Thanx, Josti

This serves two main functions. The first is that it can act as an anti-combo card with moderate usefulness, as Fish is generally too slow to put it out fast enough to be a true hoser. However, consider the later game versus a control deck. Fish will have manlands to play as well as creatures already in play, possibly with a Curiosity on one. From there, it is simply a matter of overwhelming the control player's inadequate defenses by drawing extra cards, playing additional, uncounterable threats that can then be protected without fear of a counter (StoP v. FoW as the only spells that turn). Fish tends to be a slow, grinding deck without any big turns but many smaller good turns over the course of a match. This is not something that can be just thrown out at the earlier opportunity, but requires proper board position and setup to use effectively.

-- Azhrei

[Ric_Flair]

While not as big an issue now that we have fetchies, how does one go about determining how many mana sources of a particular color need to be in a deck?  I see lots of tournament regulars making color source mistakes when building their decks.  What do you think the right proportion is?  How do Moxen fit into this equation?

I generally decide this by first deciding how many mana sources I want to have in play by turn three. This will allow me to determine how many actual sources of generic mana are needed. Keeper, for example, really wants to have 4-5 mana in play by turn three, so it requires a number of sources high enough to be very unlikely to miss a land drop *and* pull out a Mox or two. The most commonly accepted number for this was 28, with 7 slots for the artifact mana and 21 for land. That meant that in the first ten cards, about three to four of them should be land (21/60 is about 1/3, or 3/9, which fudges to 3-4/10 easily enough) and slightly more than one of them should be an artifact source (7/60 is about 1/10), so we have a minimum of four mana sources in play by the third turn in most instances. This methodology will work for most decks and is repeatable. Stompy, for example, operates best on 12 mana sources (mostly Forests, artifact sources depending on availability and whether or not Chrome Mox is restricted) 4 ESGs, and 4 Land Grants because you actually don't want to draw more than 1-2 permanent sources of mana in a game.

It is worth noting that most players accept the hypothesis that two Brainstorms are equal to one land in terms of count, as they require mana but allow you to view additional cards.

To determine color ratios, first examine the makeup of the deck itself. If there is not a clearly dominant color (ignoring Workshop decks, as they will generally be more focused on their support colors and can easily cast their colorless spells with Workshops and anything else), then it might be time to go back to the drawing board. Hulk is a four color deck that only runs 4 of two land types, so I will use that for this part of the discussion.

This was the mana base I was using going in to GenCon testing:

2 Island
3 Volcanic Island
2 Tropical Island
4 Underground Sea
1 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
1 Sol Ring
1 Library of Alexandria
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald

The basic color of the deck is blue, and it is reasonably mana hungry, so there are 16 lands that can all be used to produce blue mana, plus 7 artifact sources and the Library of Alexandria for a total of 24 mana sources. In addition, there are four Brainstorms in the deck, so the deck will act as if it has 26 mana sources-- but since it also runs four Accumulated Knowledges it can expect to see more cards by the third turn, so it will in fact often have better mana development than Keeper, which traditionally ran four more mana sources.

I will generally say that any deck needs at least 16 producers of its main color, not including artifact mana. That number is based on the idea that you want to have two sources of the primary color as soon as possible (I'm someone who has used Mana Drains since 1997, so that thinking is somewhat ingrained in me, and my other deck needed BB for Sinkholes and Hymns to Tourach), so 16/60 is 4/15, or slightly less than 2/7, which is your opening hand with no additional cards drawn. Factor in the mox and your odds increase-- include Brainstorms and it looks even better, and that's just your main colored lands. The number 16 is not written in stone, but the math used to arrive at it in this example is. A deck may require more or less than 16, but the reasoning is unchanging.

So, if 16 land is about the minimum we can use and still see XX on turn two, then the secondary color, which only requires 1 colored mana to use (assuming proper deckbuilding is in evidence) should need about half as many. See the Hulk ratios coming into play here? You want to be able to cast Duress on the first turn, so I have 4 Underground Seas and 5 Fetchlands to increase my odds closer to a guarantee. Factor in the artifact sources, and you have 11/60, or basically 1/6, so in every six cards you should have one source of black-- while this makes BB less likely early on, it makes the important B for Duress almost a guarantee-- without Brainstorms factoring in.

Fetchlands also allowed me to run the bare mimimum of producers for the splash colors. Tropical Islands were only really useful for Berserk, so I used two in case one was destroyed early on-- I could always just fetch the second one in time to win. By the time I was ready to Berserk I could expect to have drawn an extra 10 cards, so I'd have seen at least a full third of my deck-- which means that between two Tropical Islands and a Mox Emerald, I had a high chance of just drawing what I needed in that amount of cards. Include the Black Lotus and 5 fetchlands, and it's no mystery as to why I had green mana whenever I needed it.

Volcanic Islands fit here at three copies simply because while I would only ever need one in play for the most part, I would want it as soon as possible. Therefore, it became a fit in between the one shot Tropical Island and the absolutely vital Underground Sea.

The two basic Islands are there because Hulk operated best with at least three mana in play. A single Wasteland-proof land in play and an artifact source meant that in the face of land destruction, the Hulk player could topdeck a land and do whatever was necessary within that turn cycle.

I factor artifact sources, colorless sources, and so on into my overall mana count, but treat the lands independently when fixing mana ratios. I think I've explained that reasoning adequately, but if I have not been clear enough feel free to let me know.

-- Azhrei

[Abbadon Khaine]

Sideboarding being the flavor of the moment, I would like to ask a few questions about sideboard composition and usage.

1) How many sideboard slots do you feel a deck should devote to any given matchup?
2) How many cards are too many to remove when sideboarding?
3) How does one determine which cards are safe to remove from the maindeck before it becomes too diluted?

I play Chalice Keeper, with a build very similar to Zherbus', so examples keyed more twards this deck would be most helpful.

In general, your maindeck should be "really good."  The second important point is that the power level of the cards that you are siding in are less important than the level of power gain that you are getting from siding them in.  This pretty much answers all three questions.  If you try to side in too many cards, you end up having to take out cards that are probably of a similar power level to the cards that you are trying to add in, wasting your sideboard space.  I made a topic in the EV forum about this a couple months ago that covers this in more detail.

--jpmeyer\n\n

[ump]

I know this question has been asked a bunch of times in the past, but I'll ask it again.  What is the minimum number of blue cards that you can run in a deck to make sure your Force of Wills are reliable?  Do you include cards that you probably never want to pitch such as Ancestral Recall in that count?  Thanks.


This is probably a different answer than Darren might give so I'll chime in - but it depends on what you are using Force of Will for.  If you are playing a Control deck in which you intend to use most of your Force of Wills you'll need alot more than if you are playing a combo deck which intends on using Force of Will only once.  That's why alot of 1.x decks and decks like Dragon can get away with 13 blue spells.

Steve Menendian\n\n

[Dr. Sylvan]

Continuing with the sideboarding questions, what kinds of metagame do you think make transformational sideboarding appropriate?

Do the advantages of Wishing make transformational sideboards a thing of the past?

Specifically, I am thinking of control decks, since aggro and combo are both so focused that trying to adjust their strategy from the sideboard is difficult if not impossible.

Actually, combo decks are the best candidates by far for transformational sideboards.  Because they run on engines, you basically are forced into an all-or-nothing proposition.  Otherwise, since you can only really sideboard in a few cards at the most without diluting the deck, it ends up making the deck waste sideboard space.  In the case of control decks, transformational sideboards used to be a good idea for this very reason, until Cunning Wish stepped up to the plate to amplify this effect even more (again, see my above EVF thread.)

--jpmeyer\n\n

[shadowspawn]

Considering this hasn't seen much attention today, I feel obligated to keep it moving. Considering a Dragon Mirror, What Would You SB in and out? I ask this because The deck is so tight and there is no autowin against it. Also My build is that of DicemanX's primer to help you. Thank you In Advance.


The Dragon mirror is incredibly complex - I hope Diceman does indeed answer this bringing to bear all his experience and knolwedge - which is after all the best thing to have for answering this question.

The first thing you have to keep in mind is that you can animate your opponents Dragons for the win - the significance of this is that depositing Dragon's in the opponents Graveyard is a huge risk.  So your SB decisions, may in part, come down to what you think your opponent might do.  For example, AndyStok made the point that he actually SBs out his Dragons in the mirror for Verdant Forces.  This would make incoming Stifles much weaker in terms of their hosing effect.  As you can see, I've barely scratched the surface of trying to understand the Dragon mirror, and its already a nightmare.  And I haven't even yet addressed the question of what to take out.  If you are SBing in Stifle, then you can risk taking out Compulsions (unless you think your opponent is bringing in Gaea's Blessings) and maintain your blue count.  So to answer in brief, Compulsion and Dragons would probably be what I'd take out for Stifle and Verdants - and possibly even some Swarms (it then stops Stifle and FoW of the opponents) - 7 cards.  Diceman and Shockwave, please feel free to elaborate.  

EDIT:
It occurred to me that one possible strategy for the mirror that I haven't actually explored is to try and combo out first - but I think this strategy is a doomed strategy unless you bring in Xantid Swarms.  With Swarm you ensure your opponent can't Crypt you OR cast Stifle OR Necromany as well as Force of Will.  BTW, if you bring in Crypts and you are cutting out the whole Dragon combo, you can still leave in laquatus to win by animate an opponents dragon.

Stephen Menendian \n\n

[thefram]

In building a budget deck mana base, which is the more important consideration, speed or consistency. I got into this argument (sorta) with waSP about red-rock, He was running 27 lands, i was running 22 and 4 BOP. Should the budget builder attempt to make up for the lack of P9, or just work with what they have?

This question also goes to the heart of how usefull chrome mox is in budget T1, whether or not the risks are worth the gap between powered and unpowered that it fills.

-Thefram

You pretty much need to run it.  A good comparison is Extended.  Because the artifact decks are so fast, decks like Psychatog and Goblins just need to use cards like Chrome Mox and Ancient Tomb in order to compete, even if they do lose some consistency.  It's much the same in Type 1 where your deck is just going to be 1-2 turns slower without the acceleration and that's just deadly.

--jpmeyer

So, if that's the case (which i was agreeing with in my "argument" with wasp) then what situations justify running chrome mox in a budget T1 deck? My personal criteria is that the deck needs to have an Intuition-Ak or better draw engine, or be a combo deck. Otherwise, ive found the card loss too dramatic for a budget build.

Also, T1 gobbos hasn't resorted to Chrome Mox and Tomb as far as i know, since it still has lackey.

[Smash]

With dragon having it's merry way right now, what is the best thing you can do against it? Maindeck stifle, throw some crypts in the board? I can deal with control, I can deal with combo... but I am unsure of the best way to deal with dragon.

Dragon has a lot of tools at its disposal.  Reactive cards are generally weaker than proactive cards because the deck runs 4 Force of Will, 4 Duress, and a strong draw engine to ensure that it can see enough cards to get what it needs.  Because of that, the best way to handle the deck is to try to buy as much time as possible.  Wasteland for Bazaars (and hopefully for mana-producing land) is usually strong, and the best sideboard card is probably Tormod's Crypt, since you can play it immediately to put them on Force of Will.  Coffin Purge is nice because it requires two cards to stop, but it's less strong at discouraging them from discarding multiple Squees to Bazaar, and it's less strong in that they have 8 counters but only 3 Deeds and/or 3 Stifles.

If you are using Stifle, don't expect to be able to use to on a Dragon to remove all their permanents from the game.  Just try to hit fetchlands with it or try to buy a turn against Bazaar with it (which obviously is stronger if they would be discarding Squees rather than random cards.)

--jpmeyer\n\n

[dicemanX]

Since it seems that the mods are avoiding the two Dragon questions, I will be happy to give a lot of info on match-ups, SBing, and how to deal with Dragon in part II of the primer. However, I will not release it until after December 1st, just to make sure Wizards doesn't lose their mind and restrict a Dragon combo piece.

We were leaving the SB one for Smmenen.

--jpmeyer\n\n

[Garth One Eye]

I realize that this will be a moot point since the DCI just came out with its restrictions, but right now (legally) I am playing an underpowered version of Long.dec  (I am missing Ancestral Recall and Time Twister)

My question is, are there any suitable substitutes for those two cards to make this deck a viable Long.dec clone?  Thanks.

[Dr. Sylvan]

(Thanks for bumping the thread, Garth. I was sorry to see it drift down for lack of questions.)

For a more theoretical question, how much self-inflicted damage should a control deck consider acceptable from its lands, Vampiric Tutor, etc.?

This is always a function of both how fast your deck is and how much you worry about aggro decks.  In a field like at say, Pro Tour New Orleans, you could afford to pay like 14 life to cards like Ancient Tomb since aggro was so weak in that format with the exception of Goblins, which did like 20 damage all at once anyway.  In Type 1 right now it still needs to be seen what aggro will show up, but currently you can pay a large portion of your life to various effects.  I've played 3 Deep Analysis, 5 painlands, and had a Wish-able Lim-Dul's Vault in Tog simply because I didn't fear aggro and had a fast clock.

I know the rule for FoW is an absolute minimum of fifteen blue cards (usually more like nineteen in control), is there a similar guideline for Mana Drain sinks?

I'm not if there really needs to be one since 1) most decks running blue need to have "expensive" cards since the decks are blue and 2) if you're running 5 Moxes, Sol Ring, etc. you've already shown that you really want acceleration.  As long as you have spells in your deck that require generic mana you should never have a problem with Drain unless you hit something enormous like Fireblast.

Roughly how many non-instant slots of a sideboard should a deck with Cunning Wish have? Here I'm particularly considering the Tormod's Crypt vs. Coffin Purge choice.

Running Cunning Wish means that you're running either a control deck or a combo deck.  If you're running a combo deck, you probably only have room for like 3-4 essential Wish targets (usually an oh shit button, a victory condition, a tutor, and a card that you want access to like 5-6 of rather than 4) since combo decks usually want some kind of transformational sideboard.  In a control deck, this is reversed somewhat, although not fully since you will be running a few multiples of your cards.  You usually will have 3-4 slots taken up by REB, 1-2 with creature removal, an oh shit button, 1-2 general removal spells, a tutor, and 0-2 "random" cards.  Within each category, you basically then need to decided whether or not you need multiples and when you need them.  If you need multiples, you can probably use non-instants, like Pernicious Deed in Tog or Tormod's Crypt in just about anything.  If you need just one of the card, like Terminate in Tog or need to be able to access it at any time, like Capsize, it needs to stay an instant.

In general, it's best to use instants as much as possible if the cards are of even power levels.  Fire/Ice vs. Pernicious Deed is pretty heavily in Deed's favor, but say, Artifact Mutation vs. Gorilla Shaman is pretty even.

--jpmeyer

-Phil\n\n

[CharlesXavier]

My Question:
I play in a budget and I guess you could say aggro+burn enviroment. I need any thoughts on which card I should play in my UW Control. I currently have 4 slots to play either Ophidian or Accumulated Knowledge.

From what I know, Ophidians work nicely in powered decks since a first turn Phid is what they want. While in budget, its most likely going to be out 3rd turn(so start drawing on the 4th). But when they do enter play, they are a repeated source of card draw or in a rare case, a nice blocker. However, they need to be protected or have the opponent's creatures cleared.

On the other hand, Accumulated Knowledge is a one shot card draw, but doesn't need to have cards spent on it to protect(except if countered). It also draws at instant speed. Although, the first Knowledges are a bit slow, the last 2 definitely give you card advantage. So which one do you think is better overall?

[Comrade Seraph]

This thread is very helpful and an excellent idea - my thanks to Azhrei and the other mods.

If I might put in a word to Charles, I think you're best running scepter + AK - drops sooner, and with 1-2 intuitions the card draw can be fast and sick.

My questions -

At what point in power collecting does Keeper become a viable archetype? After drains+recall, after a couple moxes, or ?

I fully realize U/R neo-phid is the budget control deck to beat, but what I really want to play is a flexible, answers for everything style deck like Keeper - so I'm wondering when I could make the switch.

Additionally, should a low-powered budget control deck make room for Mox Diamond? (Chrome Mox seems a shoe-in).

/////


Edit: response to Charles:
Phids need to be protected too - and with fire/ice imprinted, scepter is both draw engine and a board clearer, which would be considerably better than AK in an aggro-heavy meta like the one you describe. I find once I put F/I on scepter I'm using one of its functions almost every turn. You have to go U/R to maximize that card choice though.

Perhaps you could make a new thread with a deck list, so I and other players could judge scepter's potential relative to the rest of your deck. Off the top of my head I don't know why you would go U/W with phid - disenchant/swords options??

Even sticking with white, Orim's chant is ridiculous in an aggro meta w/scepter.

[CharlesXavier]

Quote (Comrade Seraph @ Dec. 02 2003,17:59)If I might put in a word to Charles, I think you're best running scepter + AK - drops sooner, and with 1-2 intuitions the card draw can be fast and sick.

I've tried that before. I must say, I'm not sure if its just me, but I find Scepter to be slow and a loss of cards if it gets destroyed. It always needs to be protected and it clogs up your mana too, since you don't get to Scepter every turn until late game.

[Ric_Flair]

Here is the question:  When does a playtest deck that is winning become more than a mere playtest deck and instead something to prepare for?

The background is pretty straight forward.  After DCI action the metagame has been changed a bit in Vintage while 1.x experienced a sea-change.  So my playtest group has begun testing to new decks for both formats.  It is to the point now where one of our decks is winning a lot.  So this brings me back to the initial question.  When does the group stand back from the results and say: "This deck is not merely a test deck, it is one of THE decks to play"?  The problem is that often times in playtest groups the results of decks are skewed by silly things and unexplainable quirks.  So, when do you know the deck is for real and you should start working on it and preparing other decks to met it in battle?


This is a great question so I'll field it since I probably do more playtesting of type one than anyone on the planet.

My approach to type one testing is what I call the "carpet bomb" approach.  Build up all the "good" decks - the powerful upper tier decks and play them.  Play them enough that I become good at them, and then test them against each other.  Well, often in the "carpet" bomb approach, you'll stumble onto a deck that you think is better than the rest.  What do you do with this information?  Three Things to keep in mind.

The first is be certain that this is the better deck.  You could be mislead by incorrect playtest results.  I think the best way to do this is not to say: Oh, I test with good players so I know we are playing right - when you play test, a) record your games so you can review them (I document play-by-play alot of my playtesting in Word using my laptop and using alot of shorthand) or if you find that impractical b) and this is key - Have BOTH players review plays you are uncertain of - or make a notation of it so that you can go back and review it for a better play - or ask your playtest partner for help - and hopefully your playtest partner will be flexible and wise enough to play the game out as if they don't know what you might need to reveal to them to find the correct play.  The more important thing is getting the right plays so your results are accurate - not that you make a play error so your opponent wins.  

 Once your sure you have the best deck is to try and describe if you can to your team why the deck is so good.  Do analysis like I did with Tog and Long.  This sort of anlaysis will reveal ALOT about the deck and give you better understanding of it than any potential opponents who might play the deck.  Both of these measures will ensure that you are playing the right deck.

Second: If you have found the best deck, do not prepare for it unless it is a deck everyone already knows about.  And I mean Everyone - a very widely known deck.  Alot of bad type one players play pet decks even if they have access to greater information.  

Third: Even if your results are the same - new decks emerge, so keep your testing fresh.  In my opinion, the decks you should have on your guanlet for January are: Dragon, Keeper, Neo-Tog (very strong), and Mud/Stax (just because).  If your deck has serious Blood Moon troubles you may need to test against TnT.

Two other decks I think are going to be strong but you may not need to test against are SpoilsMask and Academy (and Slavery of course).  This simply is because neither will be played in relevant quantities.

Your problem happens to me alot - when I came back from England I didn't plan on playing Long for that long, but it was so good that I kept coming back to it.  I know my answer was much broader than your question, but I think I need to explain in detail to sort of allude to why you may not need to be worried about tuning for that deck.

Stephen Menendian

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[Ephraim]

I hear the terms 'Tier I', 'Tier II' et cetera bandied about a lot, but I'm not really sure what they entail. I've gathered (at least I think I've gathered) that Tier I is better than Tier II is better than Tier III... However, I'm not really sure how a deck is assigned a tier. What defines the properties of a Tier I deck. How does such a deck differ from a deck of lower tier? How many tiers are generally considered to matter?

Tier structures mean whatever you want them to. ;D

Seriously though, people historically have had some VERY differing opinions on what tier to place any given deck in. Loosely speaking, however, a tier one deck is a deck which you expect to see in almost any tournament (of appreciable size - little ten-man affairs can't accurately portray a full metagame). A tier one deck stands a good chance against anything you could throw at it - it's never a pushover. It should have a fighting chance at beating anything it's likely to see, or have no more than one commonly seen deck as a "bad matchup".

Tier two decks generally come in two flavors - the first is a deck which was previously tier one but has fallen on hard times as the result of new cards printed or new innovations in other decks. For example, Welder MUD - once considered one of the elite decks on Vintage - is now starting to slip in some people's sight (most notably Paragons like Smmemen). Also, Keeper just prior to Mirrodin's release was considered by most to be tier two - a solid deck that was simply outshone by Tog.

The other sort of tier two deck is that sort of deck that often acts as a foil to one or more tier one decks. If Keeper or monoblue are at the top of the metagame, aggro-control decks such as Suicide or Fish tend to become stronger choices. Such decks are solid enough on their own, but usually will only win a tournament (or T8 at a large tournament) as a reaction to the metagame (as opposed to being in the driver's seat). When this class of decks is a good choice for a tournament, they're usually capitalizing on their position on the metagame clock rather than some particular strength.

Generally there's not much point to going past tier two, because tiers get more encompassing as you go down. Anything past tier two is pretty much destined to lose to any well-rounded metagame - technically, if your environment is 75% suicide decks, Fires might be a good choice, but in the grand scheme of things, it's a loser.

-Matt
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[mouth]

I'm not sure this fits here, but this doesn't merit it's own thread, and I'd like to get a few opinions from some seasoned players.

How do you shuffle your deck?

I ask because I constantly get crappy hands; I mulligan every 2 or 3 games at the minimum, and most of those hands consist of no land, or 6 land and 1 card. Also, my sleeves wear down much too fast.

I'm not asking for a way to cheat or anything, but is there a way to shuffle that, while randomizing the deck, keeps a fair distribution of cards?

I hope this isn't too stupid of a question, as it's really been bugging me.

(note): I shuffle by taking half the deck and "merging" it with the other half, do some split shuffles, etc., and I really do give it a good shuffle.

If I want to not mulligan, I do this:

1. Shuffle at least five times, more like eight or ten. Just good plain riffle shuffles.
2. Pile shuffle* (making little piles of cards) once. Usually I do eight piles but recently I have begun doing six, I haven't noticed any real change except that it's easier to fuck up with eight piles.
3. Repeat step one.


*This is what I mean, parts in italics are optional and not technically part of the pile shuffle:

First, the pile designations.

A G C E
H B F D

So that pile A will get the first card, the ninth card, the seventeenth card, and so on. Pile B will get the second, the tenth, the eighteenth, et cetera.

It's important to NOT pile shuffle like this:

A B C D
E F G H

because that will not seperate clumps as well. The whole point of a pile shuffle is that after the pile shuffle, no card is adjacent to a card it was adjacent to prior to executing the pile shuffle.


Once all the cards are in piles:

Put A on top of G and C on top of E. Shuffle pile AG into CE once or twice.
Put H on top of B and F on top of D. Shuffle HB into FD once or twice.
Shuffle AGCE into HBFD several times - I reccommend at least four. Now proceed to step three above.

Six piles is not noticiably better at shuffling the cards, but it is easier to do, because each pile should end up with exactly ten cards. For six card piles, I use this:

A E C
F B D



My advice is to pile shuffle in odd numbered piles.  I don't know why but the math wiz's tell me that's the thing to do.
-Steve\n\n

[Sandster]

I didn't know whether to put this as a thread or what, but I decided to post here because it's basically a question:

I have been browsing the decklists for U/r Landstill and U/r Fish, and I'm building one of the two.  I'm trying to figure out the advantages/disadvantages of each.  Here's what I have so far:

Landstill:
+ Nev Disk, Fire/Ice, Lightning Bolt are great removal
+ A ton of counters
- Blood Moon is death
- Revolves around Standstill
- Manlands weak, fragile win condition

Gay/r
+ Great drawing with Curiosity
+ Creatures are extremely versatile
- Lacks spot removal for anything with toughness > 2
- Creatures attract removal like lightning rods
- Less hard counters

Basically, Fish is more aggro/control while Landstill is almost pure control.

My metagame has many fully powered decks, and the people tend to switch switch around what they play.  I have seen very little Workshop, Mask, or Tog decks around (though there are one or two GAT).  By the way, there are a few Mono-U Fish and Landstill decks around, and they do very well.

I own no power or mana drains.  I was building Gay/r until I found the Landstill threads and got interested.  Now I'm not sure which one I should play.  Can someone help please?  It would be especially nice if Shockwave or Phantom Tape Worm answers, as I'm trying to figure out where the decks lack.  Thanks.

[Dr. Sylvan]

How do you weigh the advantages of using off-color (or even--sacrelicious, I know--on-color) Moxen for acceleration? In other words: What factors make it appropriate to cut the fifth or fourth from a decklist?