Musings on fish...

[Phantom Tape Worm]

I recently had a discussion with Shikari about the need for the transformation from Gay Fish to Gay/r.  Why did this happen?  And what are the advantages of one vs the other?

When you look at these two decks you recognize that they are obviously very similar, using essentially the same skeleton, same draw engine, similar mana curve, similar game plan, etc.  And then you start to see the differences, the primary one being the inclusion of red...but for what?  Lavamancer.  Is that it?  Is that card alone worth splashing an entire color (which is of course a disadvantage now that wastelands are back en-vogue)?  If so why?  Keep in mind the rest of the changes (spiketails, daze, kai) could be accomodated through a mono-u mana base with out the problems associated with running multiple colors.

Lavamancer provides amazing board control, he can take out welders, sligh creatures, opposing fish creatures, etc.  But can this be done without the splashing red, ie. in a mono-u build?

My discussion spurred a theoretical decklist.  This is something i typically don't do, but I'm going to post an UNTESTED COMPLETELY HYPOTHETICAL decklist which i have NOT YET USED TO WIN ANYTHING.

14 creatures
4 flying men
3 spiketail hatchling
3 kai
4 suqata fire walker

22 spells
4 Force of will
2 misdirection
2 stifle
4 curiosity
4 standstill
1 merchant scroll
1 ancestral recall
1 time walk
3 null rods

24 mana
4 mishra's factory
3 faerie conclave
9 island
1 lotus
1 mox sapphire
1 Library of alexandria
4 wasteland
1 stripmine


I'm posting this without a thorough explanation just yet (i'll give my reasoning a bit later) but just as a decklist to start discussion.  

Gay/r is a great deck but right now, with wastelands being much more prevalent then they have been in previous times, the splashing of red may be the wrong direction to go.  This theoretical list tries to keep the strength of lavamancer's board control via suqata fire walker, but within a mono-u frame.  

Now I open the floor to discussion.

[Jhaggs]

PTW,

   My initial reaction to your mono blue build is a little aprehensive due in large part to the fact that you essential increased the casting cost of you creature base espically through the exclusion of cloud of faeries.  Adding more control with a mono blue version is an interesting avenue to purse but it looks like you have also slowed down your draw engine which inherently goes against mono blue control's premise:  Constant refilling of control cards.

   If wastelands is such a problem, wouldn't it be more prudent to address this with a solution rather than a deconstruction?  Hell, maybe it is something simple like adding basic mountains.  I personally feel that red is now a fish mainstay.  To me, Grim IS worth the red splash.  Further, red opens up the SB as you well know.  Again, my problem with your inital post is that your build definitly suffers from a loss of tempo that fish normally has.  At least, these are my inital thoughts...

[Raven Fire]

It seems that the deck is being pulled in two directions.  Flying Men seems to lead towards a more important first turn, while Firewalker is geared to a slower pace.  Which way would you rather see the deck go?  IMHO (which doesn't count for much), the red splash is worth it because Lavamancers' ability to deal 2 damage is significantly better than pinging for 1 and REB, Rack and Ruin, Fire/Ice in the sideboard are nice options.  If you wanted to stay mono-blue, what about returning to the roots of the deck and using Rootwater Hunter as another fish?  It has the same cc as Firewalker (and while it isn't immune to red effects, it has synergy with Lord of Atlantis).  And if you really wanted more direct-damage, you could also add Psionic Blasts.

[jazzykat]

I have been meaning to play gay/r for a while (I just can't put my tog down). To me, the inclusion of the mancer is the most synergistic thing I have ever seen, in a deck besides the interaction of restricted cards. To protect the Volcanics, more stifles can be left in the board or move another one to the MD(Helps with lando as well...fetches, and can screw a MUD player by stifling the sac ability with more than one counter on a stack...etc.)

Also, if they cut off your red, then your man lands are left to run rampant. And you are also breaking their lands

[Gbj]

I have found an interesting list about mono blue "fish" on www.magic-league.com
This deck have made a pair of final in t1 online tournament:

//NAME: Sheepstealer Fish
SB: 1 Waterfront Bouncer
SB: 3 Energy Flux
SB: 4 Suq'Ata Firewalker
SB: 1 Null Rod
SB: 3 Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 3 Maze of Ith

3 Null Rod
1 Time Walk
1 Ancestral Recall
2 Misdirection
4 Curiosity
4 Standstill
4 Force of Will
4 Cloud of Faeries
4 Rootwater Thief
3 Waterfront Bouncer
3 Gilded Drake
4 Flying Men
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Strip Mine
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Faerie Conclave
4 Wasteland
9 Island

I playtested this list a bit and found very good. For me Suq'ata Firewalker is a sideboard card, it is not so strong to maindeck.
Waterfront is an interesting idea to work, can solve the problem of aggro match for fish (in combination with drake)

[Jacob Orlove]

Online tournaments generally ban wishes, severely weakening control, and to some extent combo, and strengthening aggro and workshop. Only when your IRL environment matches up with that would bouncer/drake be a good plan.

[Mathman07]

Magic-League.com uses MWS which DOES support wishes.

Also, if wishes were banned, Gay/R would be better because of Lavaman and R&R.

[bebe]

What goes around comes around. As you know, Suqatas and Sea Sprites were both in out of my early Fish decks that I worked on with you. Certainly I would pay the cost of the Sprites over Flying Men with the number of Fire/Ices and even FtKs (at least here) showing up in the environment.  
What is noticably missing from your mono blue build are Psionic Blasts which is useful with the amount of fat we see now. At the very least I would like to see a few Mazes main deck.
I was a fan of the mono blue build until I tested 'one fish two fish' and rather liked the addition of red. But as you say, the meta has changed. I don't know that blue lacks answers to artifact decks so why are we including red now?

[Gbj]

Psionic Blast is nice, but bouncer/drake is nasty against aggro with the exception on sligh (that is heavily hated in side).
Bouncer is good against Dragon too, so you don't need Stifle maindeck (that is strictly superior obviously, but less versatile).

[Moxlotus]

Red also gives REB, Rack & Ruin, and Fire/Ice.  All excellent cards which combined with the Lavamancer make the red splash worth it.  Also Grim+curiosity=awesomeness

[Chaos Blade]

Im currently split up in this matter to.. Grim solves alot of problems vs Sui, aggro etc. Also red gives you more power and tools. If destablizing your manabase to give you a better match against the whole field then ill take it. But I want to see how this deck preforms first to.

[BreathWeapon]

Why not just up the Stifle count to 4 and call it a day? Ofcourse, this is easier for those of us who don't own a Time Walk or Ancestral Recall ofcourse.

As far as alternate creature bases go,

4 Cloud of Faeries
4 Flying Men
4 Waterfront Bouncer
4 Guilded Drake

... seems like an optimal list given the amount of Aggro and Combo running around. I've always liked this creature base a lot. Its highly metagamed, but right now is the very metagame its deseigned to deal with.

[Thissa]

Posted: Mon Feb 09, 2004 4:08 pm    Post subject:    

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
I have found an interesting list about mono blue "fish" on www.magic-league.com
This deck have made a pair of final in t1 online tournament:

//NAME: Sheepstealer Fish
SB: 1 Waterfront Bouncer
SB: 3 Energy Flux
SB: 4 Suq'Ata Firewalker
SB: 1 Null Rod
SB: 3 Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 3 Maze of Ith

3 Null Rod
1 Time Walk
1 Ancestral Recall
2 Misdirection
4 Curiosity
4 Standstill
4 Force of Will
4 Cloud of Faeries
4 Rootwater Thief
3 Waterfront Bouncer
3 Gilded Drake
4 Flying Men
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Strip Mine
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Faerie Conclave
4 Wasteland
9 Island

I playtested this list a bit and found very good. For me Suq'ata Firewalker is a sideboard card, it is not so strong to maindeck.
Waterfront is an interesting idea to work, can solve the problem of aggro match for fish (in combination with drake)

Heh, I'm Jenneke on Magic-League... i've gotten top 3 three times with that deck in prized tournaments there... that is one instance of it

----

Firewalkers are insane... I actually have considered running them maindeck before. The lotus works nicely with them...

as for the 4x bouncer 4x drake base, this is waaay too much. 4x Bouncer is definitley a possibility, but 4x drake will leave you will more drakes than you need. Of course, this allows you to drake a creature then drake your drake, but this is fairly minor, and you have enough card draw so that 4 is just overkill.

[Shikari]

Hi.

The problem with LezFish. Ok. For some time, we've been trying to improve the mana base. We're restricted ourselves to changing the mana sources. Lavamancer, being the only red card maindeck, was causing all these mana problems. So, you all are thinking, why not change the mana base to improve it. These are rules you all self-imposed upon yourselves when u all tried to improve it. So since changing the mana base isn't really that effective, i now ask u, why not change the creature base?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Well, uping the amount of Stifles isn't really that appropriate. This is because of a few reasons, mainly a) not enough slots b) chance of it being a dead card c) not having the mana open to play it. Most of the time, in the early turns of the game, you will be tapped out. That's when the wastelands will hit. Yea. IF they waste my lands, your man-lands can run rampant. Not really. Knowing the amount of blue sources in this deck, you won't get much blue mana if they keep wasting your conclaves and volcanic islands. You won't have much mana to activate your man-lands. And they'll die easily to bigger creatures or removal spells. Activating man-lands while being low on lands is really dangerous, as a Swords to Plow becomes a 1 mana stone rain. If you're low on lands, and you still waste their lands, u'll get yourself into more trouble. And further more, they're running moxes and sol rings. you're not. Ok. 1 single mox sapphire. but that doesn't really count.

This deck was designed to go around control decks, mainly Keeper, OSE and builds like that. Flying men were chosen over cloud of faeries because of 2 reasons. 1) they can be played on turn 1, which allows you to start drawing card 1 turn earlier from curiosity, and putting pressure early. 2) Flying men provides a smaller mana drain target.

The Gilded Drakes won't really work well. Bouncers are often required in to be in play before the Drakes become really effective. The bouncers, being 1/1s are easily killed. Also, this deck seems to be built specially to hose Mask- decks. The Gilded Drakes are weak against other decks. Also, against really good aggro decks out there, you just don't really have the time to set up this combo.

Now, LezRed's mana base was very unstable. Often, you'll find yourself without a red source of mana even if you have grim lavamancer in play. The lavamancer, also being a 1/1 isn't really helping. The deck often falls prey to Fire, getting a 2 to 1, or even 3 to 1 card disadvantage. Lavamancer requires an activation cost of tapping and 1 red mana. Also, it requires graveyard cards. The main advantages of lavamancer is its speed. However, speed isn't really useful if you don't have the mana open to use it. And ontop of that, if you're running 1 drop blue creatures, you must choose between that or lavamancer.

The firewalker's main advantage is its immunity to burn spells. This solves ALOT of problems. Ontop of that, its blue, which smooths out the mana base greatly. Against LezRed and Bi-Fish, I would say this deck has the upper hand, as the Firewalker won't die to the Lavamancer.

Most of the time, you'll be thinking if i use LezRed and play a turn 1 lavamancer via fetchland, volcanic island. It'll be good right? Not really. Against the control deck match-up, you'll open yourself firstly to stifle. If not, he'll waste your volcanic island. Now you must be thinking, ok. He traded 1 land for 1 land. So we're fair right? Same tempo disadvantage. However, i got a creature in play, so i got the upper-hand. Not really. The control decks often run ful Moxen and artifact mana sources like Sol Ring. They pack many solutions to your lavamancer. So they can like turn 2 wasteland, mox, sol ring. So that means they got 3 mana open. And you got 0. You might try a Null Rod, but i don't realy think it'll resolve that easily.

Grim Solves ALOt of problems. Ok. What are the creature threats currently in the meta-game? Welder? Opposing Fish creatures? Maybe Madness creatures? Or Sui-Black? Goblins also. As you see, most of the threats are 1/1. The only creatures that arn't really killable by the Firewalker are those of the sui-black creatures. But Sui-Black isn't a really popular deck trype now, since there are much better aggro decks out there, like Osawa Stompy. If you're saying Firewalker can't handle Osawa stompy, then lavamancer to can't handle it. And as an added bonus, goblins will have a hard time trying to handle the firewalker.

So, basically Firewalker smooths out your mana base and provides a more secure 'pinging sources in exchange for speed. Lavamancer is bettter solely in terms of speed. Like I've said, speed isn't good if you don't have the lands to use the lavamancer. This deck is a tempo deck. Which is to say, if its played properly, it will slow down your opponent. So, is there much difference in casting a turn 3 firewalker, and have a stable mana base in return?

You all are saying address the problem. How? The mana base? its already very tight. I've even tried using landstill's mana base idea by including 1 mountain and 1 red-fetchland. Not very practical as u'll want to fetch mountain if u draw itm, which cuts off your blue sources.

Sideboard: Yes. Red gives a much lethal sideboard vs other decks. But notice the amount of reliable red sources in your deck. if they're gone, you won't have the mana to play those lethal sideboard spells. Also, before LezRed was out, you all were using GheyBlue. It had a mono-blue sideboard, and it was effective. Cards like Energy Flux, Null rod can replace rack and ruin. Problems against Stax? Waterfront Bouncer. Dragon? Bouncer and Seal of Removal. Food Chain Goblins? Chill and mainboard Firewalker. KEeper? Null Rods and stifle. BEB is also very usable. Notice how many of the spells in most LezRed sideboards were red. Not alot.

Well, here are the reasons why I think that this deck has an edge over LezRed in the current metagame.

P.S: Hi sweetie!  

[Phantom Tape Worm]

lol!  Hey there hot stuff.


ok, where to begin...

@jhaggs:

If wastelands is such a problem, wouldn't it be more prudent to address this with a solution rather than a deconstruction? Hell, maybe it is something simple like adding basic mountains.

I've gone over this is previous threads back on the old TMD that have probably been lost in the transition, but the conclusion that I came to was essentially this: the mana base is necessarily bad, there is simply too much going on with the lands for the mana base to be otherwise.  And believe me, I've tried long and hard to fix it, but it's beyond even my phenomenal cosmic powers to do anything about.  

When you play Gay/r (or lesbian red as i've heard it called by some) you are conceding this as a weakness.  Now, when wastelands are not prominent, this is a fairly marginal weakness to have.  But when every deck in the format whose gameplan is to go longer than turn 2 runs 4+ strips, this weakness becomes a big problem.

You mention solutions, but what are possible solutions?  Adding a mountain only makes the manabase more clunky than it already is.  I could see packing extra stifles to combat strips (this may be the best answer a red build can get), but as Shikari already pointed out we must assume the early game does not allow for the fish player to keep U available if he also has to play out his threats.  Teferi's response (borrowed tech from landstill) does not fit the proactive nature of fish, nor does it really help when you need it, ie. the first turn when they strip out your 1st colored source.

The possible solutions, at least in my mind, would not allow for a build that contained red.



@raven fire:

It seems that the deck is being pulled in two directions. Flying Men seems to lead towards a more important first turn, while Firewalker is geared to a slower pace. Which way would you rather see the deck go?

This is an excellent observation.  There are several contradictions in the deck.  eg. library of alexandria + black lotus.  The question is do these cards balance eachother out?  Can i have the best of both worlds?  Early game and late game or is this asking too much?  Honestly, I suspect that you can do whatever you want with the creature base and have a successful fish deck so long as the core draw spells, fow's and null rods remains intact.  (I won a tourney with a gay fish varient a while back using only creatures from the arabian nights expansion, lol).

My primary concern though is this: bringing in suqata firewalker ups the cc of the deck considerably, why are we upping the average cc of the deck if wastelands are prominent right now?  Are the presence of 9 basic islands (instead of 2 + fetches and volcanics) enough to reliably get to 3 mana when needed?



@bebe

What goes around comes around. As you know, Suqatas and Sea Sprites were both in out of my early Fish decks that I worked on with you.

Ah, the good old days.  Back when we were fighting for fishes place in the metagame, struggling for gay rights   Back then I used to sideboard my sea sprites - so good against sligh.

Certainly I would pay the cost of the Sprites over Flying Men with the number of Fire/Ices and even FtKs (at least here) showing up in the environment.

This is actually a really great arguement for the firewalker.  Fire/ice is HUGE against gay/r, and it is a very common card.

What is noticably missing from your mono blue build are Psionic Blasts which is useful with the amount of fat we see now. At the very least I would like to see a few Mazes main deck.

While it is cool to play creatures right now, maze (great as it is) still has a lot of matchups where it is useless.  I would probably keep both maze and psi-blast in the board as i hate having dead cards.  Also, upping the cc by adding fire walkers makes me a little more wary of trying to play mazes (which do stunt mana development) AND psi-blasts (which is mana intensive).  



@moxlotus:

Red also gives REB, Rack & Ruin, and Fire/Ice. All excellent cards which combined with the Lavamancer make the red splash worth it.

I never used more than 1 reb in my boards as i never felt it was necessary.  Rack and ruin can be replaced (kinda) by energy flux.  Fire/ice i shall truly miss  Blue creature removal has always been lousy, your best bet being psi blast, bounce and bouncer.  

I'm not saying that splashing red isn't good, we all know Gay/r is a total sex pot.  I'm just "musing on fish" wondering if there is another way, given that wasteland is really common right now.

[Hi-Val]

You'll have to strangle the list for Electric Alley out of bebe, but it tests as a fun and solid U/R deck. The build supports Electric Eels and Firewalkers with traditional Fish elements, though it is far more aggressive. I will say this: Firewalker with Standstill down is a no-win situation for your opponent.

[tehmajickguy]

I actually just played a match earlier tonight against this deck on magic-league, and I noticed, as stated in many different forms in this topic, that the deck seems to be VERY susceptable to U/R Landstill. With the exception of the Firewalker, every creature is very vulnerable to all of Landstill's removal, and barring a good draw filled with strips and weenies, the deck seems like it'll lose 2-0. Would it be reasonable to test out Tsabo's Web in the board? It improves your match not only against Landstill, but against any Bazaar based deck as well.

[Dante]

I actually just played a match earlier tonight against this deck on magic-league, and I noticed, as stated in many different forms in this topic, that the deck seems to be VERY susceptable to U/R Landstill. With the exception of the Firewalker, every creature is very vulnerable to all of Landstill's removal, and barring a good draw filled with strips and weenies, the deck seems like it'll lose 2-0. Would it be reasonable to test out Tsabo's Web in the board? It improves your match not only against Landstill, but against any Bazaar based deck as well.

Tsabo's Web is a great sideboard card.....against Fish or Gay/R.  Why would you play that??  The only lands of yours that will untap are Islands/Volcanics (manlands won't, nor will strips or LOA)....besides, using permanents against a deck that maindecks 4 Disks isn't so hot unless they're null rod.

Dante

[Shikari]

I actually just played a match earlier tonight against this deck on magic-league, and I noticed, as stated in many different forms in this topic, that the deck seems to be VERY susceptable to U/R Landstill. With the exception of the Firewalker, every creature is very vulnerable to all of Landstill's removal, and barring a good draw filled with strips and weenies, the deck seems like it'll lose 2-0. Would it be reasonable to test out Tsabo's Web in the board? It improves your match not only against Landstill, but against any Bazaar based deck as well.

Erm...At least your firewalker isn;'t really affected by those targeted removal spells played by U/R Landstill.

If you played LezRed, ALL your creatures will be affected by them.

[Tijnie]

in my eye's, this mono-u isn't more then just a bad illusion.

as said before, Stifle's can fight strips quite easy. I found my Stifle's to be very usefull. Dead stifle's??  don't make me lauhg, in a deck with 4 FoW and a MisD, how can a blue card be dead?? you can remove it if you don't like it.
Most decks with Strips are agrro, so stifle's are usefull here. most decks NOT running strips are Combo, Stifle is really nice here too.
You can also just run 3 v Island and 3 Islands, go fetch for a basic island faster. play the way you can take care of them. If you have stifle on hand And you know he'll waste it, don't play your grim yet, but take that strip out. yes you're a bit slower but he lost a land and you didn't. you don't like to be slow?? then why are you thinking about Mono-u then anyway?

Mono-u isn't only playing less counters, they became slower too. Voidmage+Walker takes you turn 4 to counter anything. and ALOT of mana. Grim can be sacced away turn 3 already. There are no Daze's in here, this also make's your spiketails weaker and the chance of losing a counter-war becomes alot bigger.

we took out the best creature of this deck. Cloud, though not a first turn drop and not as fast as Flying men, this guy costs 0 mana turn 2 and can be cycled under a standstill. both 1/1 and flying. but onoo, he can give your opponent 1 more mana when manadrain will de played  :shock: .......

True, prod red is nice, but gay/r is made to take care of the agrro weakness and it can beat those red decks up and we all know it can. Fire/Ice yes, really strong against gay/r. I would say this is just a must counter, you should ounter it with the mono version oo anyway, losing a flying men and voidmage isn't much better then losing a grim and cloud. yes he can't target your Walker, great he's still beating up your ass with manlands (Landstill). But this match can be won too, use your strips as a weapon against him, side in you maze's to keep his creeps off. now he'll have to make a choice, am I going to strip a manland wich will block my manland to death, or am I going to destroy a Maze wich will simply stop 1 of my attackers.

Negative
- Weaker Creature's
- Slower deck
- Less Counter
- Less Sideboard options

Positive
- 1 Fire-proof threat
- Stronger Manabase


My choice looks prety obvious, knowing weaknesses can be made less worse.

Tijnie  

[bebe]

I'm not buying your arguments. I played Electric Ave. against Petko's Gay/r Fish and had no problems at all. Why? Because I main deck four Fire/Ice and four Lightning Bolts. Gar/r is weak against a deck that carries this complement of burn. Guess what? U/r Landstill also rolls over it. Gobbo sligh is also tough.

E. Ave. is very heavy at the two cc slot. This has never been a problem for the deck. Although Cloud of Faeries is a great card, Marc is looking to shore up the deck's weaknesses which seems the best approach to me. There is little loss of tempo here. I did notice the lack of Dazes but I was never that fond of them and prefer the Spiketails as they have always proved stronger in my match ups against Gay/r decks.

As for mono u playing less counters - this is a flexible counter base. This is an initial version but I see ...
4 FoWs
2 MisDs
2 Stifles
3 Spiketails
This aside from the Kais. How much control do you want in a deck that is aggro as well?

My problem with gay/r is that it does not fully take advantage of the tools red has to offer. I use E. Ave. to attack my opponents mana base and neutralize my opponent's permanents. It does not boast any counters other than Stifle which is used primarily for fetches as nearly everyone and his uncle uses them now. Gay/r Fish relied on counters as the main weapon to back up its aggro and mono u can do this better.

[Shikari]

in my eye's, this mono-u isn't more then just a bad illusion.

as said before, Stifle's can fight strips quite easy. I found my Stifle's to be very usefull. Dead stifle's??  don't make me lauhg, in a deck with 4 FoW and a MisD, how can a blue card be dead?? you can remove it if you don't like it.
Most decks with Strips are agrro, so stifle's are usefull here. most decks NOT running strips are Combo, Stifle is really nice here too.
You can also just run 3 v Island and 3 Islands, go fetch for a basic island faster. play the way you can take care of them. If you have stifle on hand And you know he'll waste it, don't play your grim yet, but take that strip out. yes you're a bit slower but he lost a land and you didn't. you don't like to be slow?? then why are you thinking about Mono-u then anyway?

Mono-u isn't only playing less counters, they became slower too. Voidmage+Walker takes you turn 4 to counter anything. and ALOT of mana. Grim can be sacced away turn 3 already. There are no Daze's in here, this also make's your spiketails weaker and the chance of losing a counter-war becomes alot bigger.

we took out the best creature of this deck. Cloud, though not a first turn drop and not as fast as Flying men, this guy costs 0 mana turn 2 and can be cycled under a standstill. both 1/1 and flying. but onoo, he can give your opponent 1 more mana when manadrain will de played  :shock: .......

True, prod red is nice, but gay/r is made to take care of the agrro weakness and it can beat those red decks up and we all know it can. Fire/Ice yes, really strong against gay/r. I would say this is just a must counter, you should ounter it with the mono version oo anyway, losing a flying men and voidmage isn't much better then losing a grim and cloud. yes he can't target your Walker, great he's still beating up your ass with manlands (Landstill). But this match can be won too, use your strips as a weapon against him, side in you maze's to keep his creeps off. now he'll have to make a choice, am I going to strip a manland wich will block my manland to death, or am I going to destroy a Maze wich will simply stop 1 of my attackers.

Negative
- Weaker Creature's
- Slower deck
- Less Counter
- Less Sideboard options

Positive
- 1 Fire-proof threat
- Stronger Manabase


My choice looks prety obvious, knowing weaknesses can be made less worse.

Tijnie  

Cloud of faeries arn't nessary good. In Bi-Curious Fish, it tries to be as fast as possible. Turn 1 flying men are often required, therefore allowing u to draw cards off curiosity faster. This puts pressure onto the opponent as early as possible. Cloud of faeries however, are slower. And also, you might not have 2 lands to begin with the number of wastelands out there...

i really don't see how lavamancer can handle aggro decks now. not really useful when goblins play mogg fanatic, or if opponent has 6/6 flying hastey wurms...and when it comes to LezRed vs LezRed, the first person to play lavamancer usually wins. Also, ALOT of decks...and I mean ALOT of decks run Fire/Ice and Bolts. And trust me when i say i dun like Fire/Ice.

Over in my metagame, 90% of decks run 5 wastelands, 4 stifles, 4 fire/ice(if their color allows it). Kinda scary...some even run pyrokenisis...

[Phele]

Why not exchange the color-splash to white, what gives you more removal and Sacred Ground in the sideboard for ld protection. For Sacred Ground your mana doesn't need to be held open and with so many manlands it deserves some spots anyway. I could imagine a list like that:

4 Flying Men
4 Cloud of Faeries
4 Meddling Mage
3 Voidmage Prodigy

4 FoW
2 Misdirection
2 Stifle
2 Stp

4 Standstill
3 Curiousity
1 Ancestral
1 Time Walk

3 Null Rod

4 Mishra's Factory
2 Faerie Conclave
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
1 Library of Alexandria
4 Flooded Strand
4 Tundra
2 Island
1 Plains
1 Mox Sapphire

Sideboard:

3 Sacred Ground
2 StP
2 Disenchant
2 Energy Flux
3 Chill
3 Tormod's Crypt

I think that Meddling Mage is a much better walking counter than Spiketail is, i never liked. Meddling has the same synergy with Kai, Grim has. Without Grim, you have more mana open for casting things like Sacred Ground, Chill, Standstill, Null Rod ... Kai is more for the midgame.

With the white-splash and StP you have slots in the sideboard open, because you don't need Maze of Ith. I gave a possible sideboard list above, but this can be exchanged for metagame choices. I think, this is the way to go for avoiding land destruction things like wasteland not returning to the mono blue version. What I really dislike is the bouncer-drake-build that wastes at least six spots when facing a non-creature-build. Sacred Ground is such a bomb against Smokestack things either that it is even worth thinking about some main slots.

Some friends of mine in Dülmen advocated Weathered Wayfarer for more constantly wasteland use, but I dislike that idea either, because fish always should be a proactive not a reactive build.

[Shikari]

Its too slow...Not really controlish enough. Mage is nice..but still...

The reason why we use mono-blue is cuz of the islands. We want to minimise the aount of non-basic lands in the deck, so the mana would be more stable. Splashing white is the same as splashing red. It makes the base more unstable.

Sacred ground isn't really tat practical. It costs 2 mana and isn't really useful.

[Phele]

Its too slow...Not really controlish enough. Mage is nice..but still...

The reason why we use mono-blue is cuz of the islands. We want to minimise the aount of non-basic lands in the deck, so the mana would be more stable. Splashing white is the same as splashing red. It makes the base more unstable.

Sacred ground isn't really tat practical. It costs 2 mana and isn't really useful.

Sorry, but I really have to disagree with that. Where is Meddling Mage less controlish than spiketail?? It's the smart players counterspell. You don't cast him before the second turn and when opponent has already throw down some land, you can guess what could be the best to name: Lightning Bolt, Brainstorm, Mana Drain (!), Fire/Ice, Goblin Welder, Wild Mongrel, Survival of the Fittest. There are so many targets around that are used as a four-package in certain decks.

I know for sure the difference between basic lands and non basic lands and I thought the idea of this thread is to minimize the threat of land destruction not the non basic count, what is just one way. Mono blue builds are simply not competitve anymore at all, or how do you handle madness-builds. Grim Lavamancer wouldn't work in this matchup either, where meddlings and StPs can help.

When you say Sacred Ground isn't usefull give some reasons: Two mana casting cost  isn't really an argument against it, because there are a few other spells with the same casting cost in this deck that ARE used. For example: Against Sui, where you can fear land destruction the most, you don't need the null rods at all, so you can exchange them with the Grounds. Against every build running Smokestack a resolved Sacred Ground is just game, so how is this not usefull.

Same for the argument this deck would be too slow. Where is the deck slower than Gay/r? The only thing I really miss are the Fire/Ices in the sideboard.

[TheRock]

Mono blue builds can use four Stifle against Madness.  The matchup is not in your favor but it is certainly winnable.  Mono blue builds can be just as competitive without taking the mana base risks.  It's not like I always want to see Blood Moon or Back to Basics fly on the table.  Just because it isn't as powerful in one matchup doesn't mean that it isn't more powerful somewhere else.

Against Sui, I want Maze of Ith before Sacred Ground.  I wouldn't mind having both available though.    Sui isn't the best of decks if it can't take quick advantage of its disruption.  Misdirection does wonders against Sinkhole, and Stifle will take care of Wasteland, so you don't really NEED the Sacred Ground against Sui.

Firewalker is a great card that I haven't really used only because it costs three mana to play.  That's about it.  Razorfin Hunter has done very well for me in Gay Red over the past two weeks so I'm not complaining.

Now that I think about it, I do need a boost against aggro with my own mono-blue Fish.

[Shikari]

if you use meddling mage, you're again splashing another color: White. This will bring us back to square 1.

[Chaos Blade]

Has anyone tested this deck fully yet to see if it is better then Gay Red? Also I think Cloud is needed, as it free's up mana and is very powerful in conjunction with Standstill.

[TheRock]

While I haven't gone to any tournaments with it yet and can't give you any real results, it has all been good for me.

In a metagame where Razorfin Hunter is considerable for Gay/R, this mono-U build with Firewalker is just as amazing.  The only card I really miss is Fire/Ice, but there are ways around it.

To answer your question Chaos Blade:
Is it better than Gay/R?  I can't say it is.
Is it as useful as Gay/R?  Yes.  

Edit:  Changed a few badly placed words.

[Chaos Blade]

Well has anyone considered of cutting spiketails for Cloud of Faeries?