[Deck] U/G Madness

[Caelestis]

First Place (and 4th), Columbus 03/04/04, by JP Meyer (and I assume the rest of Team Mean Deck)

Maindeck:
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Sapphire
3 Null Rod
1 Ancestral Recall
4 Aquamoeba
4 Brainstorm
4 Circular Logic
2 Deep Analysis
4 Force of Will
1 Gush
1 Time Walk
2 Wonder
4 Arrogant Wurm
4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Wild Mongrel

Lands:
3 Forest
3 Island
4 Polluted Delta
1 Strip Mine
4 Tropical Island
4 Wasteland

Sideboard:
3 Back to Basics
4 Oxidize
4 Stupifying Touch
3 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Wonder

This looks like an amazing deck, but I have a few questions concerning it.

1) (Directed mostly at JP) Is this what your "Keeper" deck (the one posted on the article the other day) turned into over time? Or is this an extension on the madness decks that exist now?

2) What advantage does this have over Hyperion's Virtual Insanity (or whatever it is called now, sorry for not checking)? You have adapted a much more Aggro-Control base, with mana denial packed in, but not using the Bazaar-Squee engine as well as the loss of Anger and Removals appears to me as quite a blow. Does the sb Sword of Fire and Ice pull enough weight on the Aggro matchup against other Aggro decks out there to warrant inclusion?

3) As a continuation from the last problem, if the Sword of Fire and Ice is good enough to be included, why no Mana Crypt as an acceleration source? I understand that this decklist looks extremely tight, and the mana denial component of Null Rod is against the use of Mana Crypt. However, with things like Arrogant Wurm and co. with so much colorless mana cost, as well as the possibility of speed up the deck further more, I thought Crypt would [almost] be an automatic inclusion into the deck.

4) Reading into the budget forum, I saw that there were attempts to budgetize this deck. Do you think that this can be a viable budget deck? U/G in other formats is known for its ease to build, while not losing much power. It appears to me that this has a good chance for budgetizing. If you were to budget the deck, what would you possibly include?

5) How well does Brainstorm compare with Careful Studies? It appears to me that with the apparently more controlling direction this has took over madness as we know it that it will be quite good. However, lacking in shuffling, it can also guarantee that your next draws will be bad. Is this enough to warrant more shuffling effects, or perhaps inclusion of a different draw engine?

6) Roar of the Wurm looks like it has taken a hit due to its relative high cost (even when flashed back) in a deck like this, but I believe that it still has merits against areas where aggro might be more prevailant. Is the lack of it just a metagame choice, or an attempt to shift the deck more to Control?

Thank you very much for putting up with my rambling and pointless questions.

[Hyperion]

2) What advantage does this have over Hyperion's Virtual Insanity (or whatever it is called now, sorry for not checking)? You have adapted a much more Aggro-Control base, with mana denial packed in, but not using the Bazaar-Squee engine as well as the loss of Anger and Removals appears to me as quite a blow. Does the sb Sword of Fire and Ice pull enough weight on the Aggro matchup against other Aggro decks out there to warrant inclusion?

It has a better matchup against Slavery (I tested it some this morning and the difference is very apparent) and a stronger mana base, and the ability to run both Null Rod and Back to Basics makes the Landstill matchup better too.

I actually think the more relevant comparison may be this with Fish... obviously the main difference is the creature base - bigger guys versus guys that enable Standstill to function as part of the deck's engine - but other than that the skeleton of both decks is similar in that they are aggro/control decks with FoW and Null Rod.

5) How well does Brainstorm compare with Careful Studies? It appears to me that with the apparently more controlling direction this has took over madness as we know it that it will be quite good. However, lacking in shuffling, it can also guarantee that your next draws will be bad. Is this enough to warrant more shuffling effects, or perhaps inclusion of a different draw engine?

Careful Study isn't as good here because there are much fewer pitchable cards (only Rootwallas, DAs and Wonder) whereas Madness with Bazaars would also have Anger, Fiery Temper and ROTW.

6) Roar of the Wurm looks like it has taken a hit due to its relative high cost (even when flashed back) in a deck like this, but I believe that it still has merits against areas where aggro might be more prevailant. Is the lack of it just a metagame choice, or an attempt to shift the deck more to Control?

With fewer moxen and no Sol Ring and LED it wouldn't come out nearly as fast here. I think it may be partly a metagame choice too but I don't know the Columbus meta as well as people that played there. Also, with only Mongrel and Aquamoeba as discard outlets it doesn't hit the graveyard as reliably, and with Strips you won't ramp up to 4 mana as quickly.

[RoadTrippin]

In reference to your question, this is definitely, and has been ever since the Odyssey Block, and excellent budget deck for Type One. It was particularly great at the time because T2 players could play a competitive T1 deck for the price of a playset of duals and Null Rods.

[Chaos Blade]

I think a budget version of this would be awesome. Take out the Moxes for a Island and Forest. Dont know what to remove for the others though. Maybe two Stifles and another mana producer?

[Caelestis]

@ RoadTrippin'

What sort of replacements would you suggest for the power pieces? Will pseudo accelerators like Chrome Mox (or Crypt) be options? I am quite aware of Madness' cheap nature, but I am just confirming it.

@Hyperion

Careful Study isn't as good here because there are much fewer pitchable cards (only Rootwallas, DAs and Wonder) whereas Madness with Bazaars would also have Anger, Fiery Temper and ROTW.

I had figured that, but Brainstorm doesn't appear to me as that much of an improvement either.

With fewer moxen and no Sol Ring and LED it wouldn't come out nearly as fast here. I think it may be partly a metagame choice too but I don't know the Columbus meta as well as people that played there. Also, with only Mongrel and Aquamoeba as discard outlets it doesn't hit the graveyard as reliably, and with Strips you won't ramp up to 4 mana as quickly.

Well, I phrased my question a bit bad, I concentrated more on just Roar, but I really aimed to ask whether the whole phasing toward control (which resulted in cutting of Roar among other things) is just a metagame choice.

Also, which one (U/G or Virtual Insanity) would you rather pilot in a random metagame? It looks to me that U/G has more options, but I am open to what you all have to contribute to this matter.

Thank you both for answering my questions.

[Chaos Blade]

Could Roar Of the Wurm have a place in the budget version? Also dont the 4 touchs seem as overkill?

[Caelestis]

IMO 4 Touches was due to the Columbus metagame (just a guess), as you see multiple Tog/Slavers in the T8, where Touches own.

[RoadTrippin]

Roar of the Wurm is actually even worse in the budget version. I'd definitely run Crypt, and might even consider Ancient Tombs in the budget version. ESG's are also an option but I can't see them being very effective. If you check out my thread called Togs 'n Dogs a few lines down, there's a section about "budgetizing" a similar deck.

Edit:
Concering 4 Stupefying Touch- I'd run 4 as well. In the New England metagame, Togs and Welders are all over the place.

[The Atog Lord]

Roar of the Wurm is a very risky card to play in Type One because of Mana Drain. Unlike Arrogrant Wurm, which can be cast during a control player's end step, the Roar must be cast during the main phase, which makes it very susceptible to Mana Drain. Because Draining a Roar provides seven mana to the control player, having a Roar Drained often costs the Madness player the game.

Andy's right about the Control Slaver matchup being much better for the UG Madness deck, at least based on our rather limited testing. Yes, the deck is often slower and less explosive than Virtual Insanity. However, Null Rod and countermagic combine to hinder the Control Slaver's game plan, often buying UG Madness enough time to win. However, it is worth noting that, maindeck, it seems that UG Madness is unable to deal at all with a resolved Platinum Angel.

Virtual Insanity and UG Madness are very different decks. They both use some of the same cards, but approach their matches very differently. VI is a pure beatdown deck, whereas UG Madness is aggro control. I don't know about a random metagame, but if Mindslaver is a popular card in your particular metagame, UG Madness might be better to play than Virtual Insanity (Andy, no offense).

[kirdape3]

In no particular order.

1.  This deck is indeed a refined version of the Fish-derivative variant in his article.  We found that FTK was a real bitch for this deck, so we finally axed Curiosity for Arrogant Wurm and added Wonders - making it the Extended variant with Moxes and Force of Will :p.

2.  Bazaar sucks balls when your whole strategy against Mindslaver decks is to deny them the mana to play their ridiculously enormous spells.  It costs 8 slots as well and keeps you from running Wastes.  No sir, not for me.  I won the top 8 match against Fiends (I REFUSE TO CALL THAT DECK ANYTHING ELSE, FUCKING N00BS WHO CALL IT EBA) by having an Aquameoba two-fist a pair of Swords then mauling him with Wonder over his Moat.  Derf on him for boarding it in, but I didn't show him Wonderf the first game.

3.  Mana Crypt, meet Null Rod.  That's how I won game 1 of the same match.

4.  This is literally now besides Food Chain Goblins the best budget deck in the format.  All the Moxes do is acclerate Null Rod.  I'd off them for probably extra basic lands (two Islands, one Forest), and Ancestral/Time Walk turns into Deep Analysis 3 and Wonder 3.

5.  Brainstorm is an Ancestral on its own because you will shuffle your deck with the fetchlands.  Also, since you only run 19 lands you really really have to have the extra search power.  Without anything to ditch really, Brainstorm ist good ya.

6.  Roar isn't really needed since you have Wonder which just says 'Race me.'

Why this deck is better than Virtual Insanity:

I get to say 'NO SIR' with Force of Will and Circular Logic
I get to run Null Rod
I get to run 5 Strips to supplement Null Rod
Wonder.  It killed a lot of stuff yesterday for JP, including me twice.

Why it may not be better than Virtual Insanity:

Anger
Bazaar is still pretty powerful, even though now you can't run the better cards in Strips.

[Caelestis]

@Kirdape3

1) Isn't this closer to the post 8th T2 version than the Extended?   Extended version is much more aggro-ish.

2) So the control-ish take is more of a metagame concern, due to Slaver running rampant?

3) Postboarding, wouldn't the acceleration of Crypt aid the use of Swords?

4) Thank you for the suggestions, I will be sure to look into it. For a budgetized version with heavy aggro, is it possible to adopt 1.x with Intuition-Roar and less strip effects?

5) I only count 4 shuffling effects, however, is that enough in your experience? Ｗｈｅｎ playing other decks somethings it feels insufficient to me.

6) Wonder-Alpha was great in T2 and 1.x, but that's when I had Roar for even more muscle. Is the control aspect of the deck enough to deny them of that? (Sorry, I didn't get to playtest yet, so I can only ask questions based on theories)

[RoadTrippin]

3) Postboarding, wouldn't the acceleration of Crypt aid the use of Swords?

4) Thank you for the suggestions, I will be sure to look into it. For a budgetized version with heavy aggro, is it possible to adopt 1.x with Intuition-Roar and less strip effects?

3) Crypt is something that should be in the maindeck, especially if you run the SB Swords of Fire and Ice.

4) As good as the Intuition/Roar "engine" is in Extended, it's way too assy for T1, especially a budget T1 deck. Don't read over the fact that a budget list can/should probably use 2 Ancient Tombs.

[Hyperion]

Also, which one (U/G or Virtual Insanity) would you rather pilot in a random metagame? It looks to me that U/G has more options, but I am open to what you all have to contribute to this matter.

Slaver changes everything, and if it weren't part of the picture I would say Virtual Insanity. But considering how big a part of the metagame Workshop and Control Slaver are right now, you can probably expect to see a decent amount of either in a random metagame so I would probably prefer U/G over Virtual Insanity until that changes - because U/G shouldn't lose to random stuff like O.Stompy is prone to doing now and then.

Why this deck is better than Virtual Insanity:

I get to say 'NO SIR' with Force of Will and Circular Logic
I get to run Null Rod
I get to run 5 Strips to supplement Null Rod
Wonder. It killed a lot of stuff yesterday for JP, including me twice.

FYI, Virtual Insanity also runs Wonder.

[kirdape3]

No, bad monkeys!

Mana Crypt is balls since well, dying to your own Null Rod is retarded.  All the acceleration does in the deck is to get a turn 1 Null Rod - why in God's name would you want to do that with a card that killed you as fast as you kill them?

The Extended decks run Merfolk Looter, which is most certainly not aggro-ish.  They also run Waterfront Bouncer, which would be insane here if it didn't die to everything and I had any cards I really cared to Madness besides Arrogant Wurm.

[jpmeyer]

4cc fatties were tried but they were really hard to cast because of the fact that you:

1) Often used your Wastelands to cut off colors
2) Often put land back on your deck and shuffled it away
3) Discarded tons of land for damage

[Caelestis]

@RoadTrippin'

3) Was supposed to mean that md Crypt also helps in using the SB Swords, my apologies for the bad wording.

@ Rest

Thank you very much for clearing up my questions concerning Roar among other things.

[Mirificus]

The Extended decks run Merfolk Looter, which is most certainly not aggro-ish.  They also run Waterfront Bouncer, which would be insane here if it didn't die to everything and I had any cards I really cared to Madness besides Arrogant Wurm.

The Extended UG Madness decks that placed highly tended to have more of an aggro-ish bent with the normal Type 2 madness core being supplemented by Waterfront Bouncers and Daze. Merfolk Looter was simply too slow and ended up being more of a liability than anything with all of the Oath, Reanimator and Tinker decks out there.

Here's a few links for reference:
Top 8 Decks Grand Prix Reims
Top 8 Decks 2003 Grand Prix New Orleans
2003 Yokohama Masters Decklists

Brian

[Hi-Val]

I placed 9th in the tournament on Saturday with the same deck as well. Rian and JP sent me the list and we went at it. The deck needs four touches to deal with Tog, the tough matchup. In that one, pre-sideboard, you just pray for a Wonder to fly you to victory.

This is the new deck to bring to 5-proxy tournaments.

[jazzykat]

I just put this deck together and goldfished with it (it was so much fun, I even kept the deck in my cruddy t2 sleeves). Am I right to assume that you play it almost exactly like the type 2 deck. Smash face, smash face, counter a bomb and kill your opponent?

Defend your 8 madness outlets, with your counters, and stop evil things like welders, togs, deeds, and platinum angels.

Under most circumstances don't be afraid to turn your creatures sideways and lose 1 or 2 as long as you can swing in for the win next turn.

I know these are generalized thoughts and ideas, but I am not sure how an almost untouched exended/t2 list is to be played. I have played a ton of tog but the difference between t2, extended, t1.5 and t1 were significant in play styles, especially when having berserk available and a reliable way to splash colors. The closest probably being 1.5 and 1.

[Sandster]

Stray bolts are VERY bad for Aquamoeba, which are much worse here than in T2 and extended (where they were considered weak as well).  Is there any hope for this deck against some decent Goblin/Sligh/FCG that are bound to pop up in every tournament?  Sword of F/I seems to be the only hope.

[FireFall26]

From my little testing I have done, this deck is very weak vs dragon.  Dragon can usually duress its only coutner, and go off pretty easily.  Obviously if dragon is prevelant in your meta, sb crypts would be good.

[RoadTrippin]

Blue Elemental Blast wouldn't be bad either- although it's not really needed because of the lack of NBLH ownage. Nevertheless, FCG is a tough matchup..

[TheRock]

This is the new deck to bring to 5-proxy tournaments.

After playing with this deck, I cannot agree more.  5-proxies and Fish just don't seem to mix.

After looking at the lists (and they are very good lists BTW), the first thing that caught my eye was that there was no Stifle.  Does the deck not need it because of the addition of Circular Logic?  I don't see why this deck, or any other U/G Madness build, doesn't want to keep a stable mana base at all times so it struck me as odd at first.

Then again, I usually don't have that much mana open at any time.  Still, if FCG and Dragon are bad matchups, wouldn't be sensible to have the extra support available?

I rarely play Roar in my Extended U/G when I need to race.  I'd rather keep my counterbase and Rootwallas going first.  And usually, I have four mana to be able to use and I find myself using an Analysis to do two extra damage or pumping Rootwallas to do the same.

Since my old Extended version of U/G is still together, I will just upgrade it and playtest this deck some more tonight and tell you guys how it went.

[jpmeyer]

We cut Stifle because it was weak to the point of being almost useless against Slaver decks and against Tog.

[Chaos Blade]

How would you want to open up and play against Tog an Slaver/Workshop builds? Is the touch enough? And how would you use that effectively. Thanks

[jpmeyer]

You use it by casting it on creatures

[Caelestis]

As already expressed, you Touch the creatures, you waste their manabase, and you use your flying beats to own them. Not much secret here, the deck is like made to kill Tog and Slaver.

[jazzykat]

As already expressed, you Touch the creatures, you waste their manabase, and you use your flying beats to own them. Not much secret here, the deck is like made to kill Tog and Slaver.

Aha, well that kind of kinks up my plans to play it this weekend. I don't expect to see more than 1 or 2 control slavers and 1 to 3 togs out of my weekly 15 person tournament. It is loads of fun and pounds on people (I playtested last night) but I will take a stronger overall deck to the tourney that can beat random burn.dec and the like.

[Caelestis]

Depends, as someone said earlier in this thread, this deck have a much better game against Slaver and Tog, while it does not lose randomly to scrub.dec. A slight change in the sb can probably go a long way.

EDIT: May I request for a Mod or Adept to close this thread? There isn't any productivity here.

[jpmeyer]

U/G is good against random decks because cards like Wild Mongrel, Wonder, and so on can trump the opposing deck's entire board.  The reason that we only have 3 Sword of Fire and Ice and 1 Wonder in the SB is because we really didn't need anything more against random decks.