[Discussion] Black Lotus or Mox Sapphire in U/R Fish?

[Sawse]

Cliffnotes: Run Sapphire and Lotus becuase tempo advantage in Fish is key.

Longer more boring version:
I believe that lotus should be run in Fish because of the tempo advantage it can bring, but it does depend on your decklist (If you run Voidmage (I personally don't think you should) then it is definately worth running because of how much mana you need to dedicate to Voidmage).
You cannot justify running lotus by simply listing god hands that you are not going to get every draw. Overall I believe that Sapphire is the stronger card in Fish because Fish does not run high cost cards, but the tempo advantage is hard to leave behind. U/r fish should run both Mox and Lotus simple because of explosiveness of it and the tempo advantage, not because once in a blue moon you get a broken draw.

[wuaffiliate]

you are wrong.

voidmage would rather have PERMANENT mana sources, than lotus. gayr needs to build up its fragile mana base, lotus doesnt help ANY of gayr's weaknesses.

plus i dont even like voidmage in gayr, ive gone back to my razorfins, shaman and firewalker. because they deal with threats much more efficiently.

[walkingdude]

This doesn’t bear directly on the debate about if lotus is good in fish, but I want to clear up something that a bunch of people have been saying that’s dead wrong. As a matter of basic theory and practice NO deck wants to play a slow game.  There are decks that want to force their opponent to play a slow game, but every single deck would win on turn one if it had the chance.

As an example, if you played old school keeper against sligh and ever got the lotus, sapphire, mystical, sol ring, ruby, pearl, balance hand you never said, “well Keeper wants to play a slow controlling game. I think I’ll wait till I’m getting beat down before casting this balance.� You just tutored for ancestral cast balance and won on turn 1.

Every deck wants to win the first chance it can safely win. There a decks where the first chance they can safely win is fairly late, but this doesn’t mean winning late is ideal, it just means that is when it realistically happens. I feel like some of the people in this thread are so used to winning in the mid game that they seem to think that its something that’s good rather than something that’s necessary.

To summarize, and this should be obvious. If lotus makes you win more games in total then you should play it even if it doesn’t “work with the goal of the deck� since “the deck doesn’t want to do broken things on the first turn.� I’m not saying lotus is a good idea, but if a card leads to plays that are outside of a decks general nature and also win rounds then its good. The question really shouldn’t be does lotus fit in fish, but does fish with lotus produce better numbers.

[wuaffiliate]

to be honest this is all useless discussion. Lotus isnt proven to be needed in testing and practice. In the many tourneys its been played gayr hasnt been hindered by not playing lotus. it still placed top8 ALL the time, and WINS.

fact remains that lotus is a tempo card, its fast mana, its great in decks that can abuse it. gayr runs 10x colourless mana sources 10! and in a mana base of 24 total. how can you people even think of adding it into a fragile mana base like that?

do you drop a business spell for it? do you drop tempo gaining creatures or disruption which are obviously more important to the deck than fast mana.

do you drop an island/fetchland? so you have a harder time getting consistant permanent coloured mana? in a deck that can be hurt by mana disruption consistantly?

sapphire and ruby are permanent, if null rod is axed by the opponent, you still have mana sources. lotus just loses you a permanent source to play a grim and a spiketail(type situation) turn1...which is more often than a broken play would happen.

i would much rather see ruby in the deck. but i wouldnt even run that because im happy with the mana base. infact i would rather run more razorfins or stifles than lotus.

walkingdude: i didnt mean to express gayr plays a slow game, in fact its not slow. it just seems that way . but the deck just slows the opponent and just glides to a win. sure it may seem like 1/1s are slow, but when 5 are attacking and they can each disrupt the opponent. thats more inevitability than slowness.

also saying lotus "wins you games" with fish, is incorrect. i disagree, it infact hurts because you either weaken your mana base for a lucky turn 1 standstill/rod or you remove disruption weakening your tempo advantage.

[Petko]

On the debate of the merits of Black Lotus is Gay/r, well, I really don't see any.

Just because a Black Lotus is a Black Lotus doesn't essentially mean that it belongs in every deck. Gay/r is a deck that requires a constant flow of mana. It really doesn't benefit from one-shot mana sources. It is a deck that requires a constant flow of mana. You will always be popping up new critters a turn and always dumping mana into manlands. You also have the Voidmage Prodigies to worry about. A basic Island, I believe, is much better suited to handle such a thirst for mana.

[PucktheCat]

wuaffiliate, I think you and I are on the same page.

I crunched some numbers that I think are revealing.  All this is based on PTW's most recent public build because it is well know, but it applies directly to almost every good build.

That build has 14 spells that want 2 mana first turn:
4 Standstill
3 Null Rod
4 Spiketail Hatchling
2 Voidmage
1 Time Walk

14 that want 1:
4 Curiosity
4 Grim Lavamancer
4 Cloud of Faeries (with only 1 land in play they cost 1)
1 Gorilla Shaman
1 Ancestral Recall

and 32 that want none:
24 mana sources
4 Force of Will
2 Daze
1 Stifle (actually wants a mana, but not off a Lotus)
1 Misdirection

That is an average mana requirement per card of 14x2 + 14x1 + 32x0 / 60 = 42/60 or roughly somewhere between 2/3 and 3/4.

A playable opening hand with Lotus will have five random cards, one blue source and the Black Lotus.  That means the average mana requirements of the opening hand will be somewhere around 3-4 mana.  Black Lotus + a land = four mana first turn.  That means everything in your opening hand will be cast first turn and next turn you will be left topdecking.  That isn't a bad thing in itself, but do you want to spend a card putting yourself in that situation?

With the low mana costs in the deck you will usually cast everything in the first few turns anyway, and without the Lotus you will have one more thing to cast.

As an additional problem the above stats don't take into account two factors that are particularly annoying with Lotus.

1.  Several of the cards included above don't really do much more if cast first turn than second.  Cloud of Faeries and Curiosity in particular are sometimes hurt as much as helped by the acceleration.

2.  Colored mana costs aren't represented above.  The 1cc red creatures are very difficult to cast efficiently using Lotus.

walking dude is absolutly right that it is absurd to say this deck "wants" to go slower.  But this deck doesn't want to spend any more cards speeding itself up than it already does.

All this isn't to say that there aren't good reasons to run Black Lotus.  Against a number of deck's casting Null Rod first turn off Mox Sapphire is a good play.  If that is common for you, Black Lotus will do just as well.  

Leo

[xaos]

OK, I don't think anyone's mentioned this, but the fact that this deck often relies on Null Rod to win against Slaver/etc game one is key.  Dropping a Lotus first turn, to resolve Rod & whatever is meaningless when they drop Welder, and give you a Lotus in place of that Rod.  I've tested both with and without Lotus/Sapphire/Ruby, and I must personally say the deck is the most sound without any artifact acceleration.  What are the percentages of getting Lotus/Moxen first turn?  What are the percentages that you've already played 1 of 3(ish) Null Rod by the time you draw it/them?  I don't think its worth the redundancy of this deck to make it semi-explode once in a while turn 1-3.

[Kowal]

Also take in to consideration Grim Lavamancer is an answer to your own lotus in the graveyard.

[OPColby]

Wuaffiliate, I never said Dragon was a consistant first turn kill.

Anyway...

Give me one other good deck that doesn't run Lotus.  Can you think of one?  I can't.  You know why?  Because Lotus is the bomb.

In fact, give me ANY deck, aside your belief in U/R Fish that couldn't be benefitted with the addition of Lotus.

You can even make one up if you want.

It's like making a blue deck without Ancestral Recall.

Anyway:

If you're all talking about consistant manabases and the like, don't run any moxes and no lotus.  The mox sapphire is clearly inferior to the black lotus before the null rod hits.

The discussion is not, "Is Lotus good in this deck?" although it is certainly evolving into that.  it's, "Which is better in this deck?"

If you want a no-mox, no-lotus gay/r fish deck, then I guess that's cool.  You can be individual and lose to the mirror deck with the lotus and mox.

[wuaffiliate]

Give me one other good deck that doesn't run Lotus.  Can you think of one?  I can't.  You know why?  Because Lotus is the bomb.

you are quite clueless. read over the thread again. play some games, most of you basic users never test, thats why you're basic users. you compare landstill to gayr earlier in saying you had experience. thats like comparing control slaver and shop slaver they are not even close to being the same deck.

lotus works with grim, so do fetches. but fetches are get you basic lands, or red sources. they help you establish a mana base to keep you tempo through out the game.

there still are no reasons that are good enough to run lotus, sapphire is an auto inclusion because its on colour, and a permanent source of mana.

you should really listen to PTW, he has more hours in this deck than anyone on the face of the earth. but i guess he must be wrong.

[JuJu]

If you're all talking about consistant manabases and the like, don't run any moxes and no lotus.  The mox sapphire is clearly inferior to the black lotus before the null rod hits.

The discussion is not, "Is Lotus good in this deck?" although it is certainly evolving into that.  it's, "Which is better in this deck?"

If you want a no-mox, no-lotus gay/r fish deck, then I guess that's cool.  You can be individual and lose to the mirror deck with the lotus and mox.

Are you shitting me? I've played Fish for a week, stopped because it was slow. All I noticed was that Black Lotus was bad. You need permanent mana sources. If this Board wasn't maintained so well I'd rape you anally with a lightning rod and a 2x4

[dicemanx]

The burden of proof lies with those that choose *not* to include a broken, tempo breaking card like Lotus in any deck, and I'll be damned if there's a single person in this thread that has any conclusive evidence that Lotus is a poor inclusion in gay/r. And in case you're tempted, success of Lotus-less versions in tournaments hardly constitutes any kind of proof. I know that PTW and wu play this deck a lot, but I've tested it heavily as well and I've played the deck in tournaments, and frankly I cannot remember many instances when I was disappointed in drawing a Lotus in my opening seven. On the contrary - the Lotus typically resulted in a significant early game boost that was critical in getting my game plan in motion against the faster decks in the format. Mid game, drawing a Lotus instead of an Island hardly ever mattered, and if I had a Standstill or Null Rod down (for those that wish to use the non-synergy argument), I was doing quite well because, dammit, I had a Standstill or Null Rod in play...

Being disappointed by drawing a Lotus and wishing that it was an Island in some mid-game instances is "proof" that I don't remotely buy. I could argue, for instance, that 50% of the time that I've drawn a Strip Mine I wished it was an Island or a fetch instead, which could lead me to conclude that the Strip is not optimal in the deck. Of course, such an argument is totally ridiculous.

[Smmenen]

Thank you voice of reason.

Steve

[wuaffiliate]

you're welcome spidy

[OPColby]

Wuaffiliate,

two things:

1.  I believe Smmenen was talking to dicemanx who backed up JDawg13's (and my) point that Lotus is a fine inclusion in the deck.

The burden of proof does remain on the people who say that a Lotus isn't good in a deck.  You still haven't named a deck that does better without Lotus than with one.

2.  Once again, you've misinterpreted something I've said.  First, it was by saying that I thought Dragon was a consistant 1-turn kill.  You said that Dragon can't kill on turn 1, which I disproved.  Now you've said that I compared Landstill to Fish, which is not true at all.  I said that I've been playing Landstill and _using the Standstill engine_.  Both decks use the standstill engine.

Both of which you've manipulated to take shots at me being a newbie, 'basic user,' or whatever else aimed to make me look like I don't have any experience with Type 1 in the slightest.

The simple fact of the matter is this:

1.  You thought Dragon couldn't pull off a turn 1 kill.  That shows your lack of experience with the metagame.  You accuse others of things which you lack.  Similiar to how some closet homosexuals are extremely homophobic or a man with a small penis talks incessantly about size mattering.

2.  Zherbus could dominate Richard Garfield in a game of magic, proving that experience (or amount of time playing a certain game or deck,) does not create ability.  I'm also sure LeBron James could dominate Michael Jordan in a game of basketball, regardless of James being a rookie.

And I'm taking the best there, Michael Jordan.  Let's talk some washed up pro who was never 'the best,' or anywhere close to it but has been playing in the NBA for 15 years for one reason or another.

I could be saying the right things, while PTW could be saying the wrong.  It's not a diss against him, and I've got nothing against the guy for believing that Lotus sucks in the deck.  I just think he's wrong.

I don't take shots at him.

[st00mie]

Wait, did you honestly just compare yourself to Zherbus and LeBron James?

[TheRock]

I suggest that everybody start re-reading other people's posts that have said that Black Lotus is BAD in this deck again.

This topic is still right on track.  It's just that people don't understand why Lotus isn't used in this deck and because of that, they cannot answer the question properly.

Almost every post in this topic has been about whether or not mana stability or tempo is more important.  Your deck is about synergy and Lotus offers no help in that department.  I would like to hear how a deck with only 23 permanent mana sources is getting Faerie Conclave to work at all.

Now wait a second.  Faerie Conclave is a key card in getting Standstill to be as productive as it is.  So by removing lands, you are making Standstill WEAKER by making Conclave much harder for you to use.  I could go on, but I won't.

The fact that we are talking about Standstill so much is making me wonder how many of you actually know what the real card-drawing engine in this deck is.  And Lotus users, it's NOT Standstill.

To answer your question and be fair, Mox > Lotus.

[Sawse]

Curiosity on the Razorfin makes for fun card drawing against control-- especially with the standstill. I only find standstill to be effective when you have established some kind of control on the board and your opponent needs an answer, so I have to agree with you, Standstill is not an engine, its a situational Ancestral and it confuses bad opponents into making the wrong move.

[PucktheCat]

dicemanx, and those who have used the phrase "burden of proof" - what would constitute proof to you?

Testing?

Experience?

Rational argumentation?

I don't know about everyone in this threat but I would be willing to bet that the bulk of the first two is in favor of not running Lotus.  PTW built the damn thing, and I know from reading wuaffiliate's other posts that he has been playing it for a long time.  I know that I have been playing since it was first posted on the old site, testing variants and trying to refine it.

More to the point I have put in a good amount of time testing Lotus itself.

As for the third, well . . . look back at the thread.  The first post presented a decent argument for Lotus's inclusion, but after that it seems to me that best we have gotten is "But it is tempo - TEMPO!!!!!!!," or, even more productive, Smmenen simply stating that including Lotus was "intelligent" without a bit of argumentation.

I am really curious what, if anything, could convince you.

Leo

[Smmenen]

I have already made my argument at length and I've read the opposing argument and the problem is that the opposing argument lead to the conclusion that Lotus *may* not be good in Fish - they are not definitive.  

My suggestion is that people cut Mox Sapphire temporarily for Black Lotus to get a feel for how Black Lotus operates.  They don't have to permenently cut Sapphire, but the real barrier to progress here is finding a card to cut so that people may test with it.  

Steve

[Phantom Tape Worm]

The burden of proof lies with those that choose *not* to include a broken, tempo breaking card like Lotus in any deck, and I'll be damned if there's a single person in this thread that has any conclusive evidence that Lotus is a poor inclusion in gay/r. And in case you're tempted, success of Lotus-less versions in tournaments hardly constitutes any kind of proof.

This is incorrect.  If we are to assume that the purpose behind competitive deckbuilding is ultimately to create something that wins tournaments, then the burden of proof lies with those that choose not to use my builds  



I've gone over my reasons for not including lotus in threads on the SCG forums.  I'll just cut and paste that stuff here...A quick bit of set up, CHA1N5 and smmenen had brought up some discussion and I was responding to them, so some of what's being said is as a response to their inquiries.

Quote: CHA1N5
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Could the logic that kept Ruby out of these decks also be applied to Sapphire? Conversely, could the logic that put Sapphire into both builds be applied to Ruby? Where is the line between the two drawn?


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The same logic cannot be applied to sapphire because it isn't just null rod (as you seem to be assuming) that is keeping ruby out, it's also color requirements.

The benefits of the on-color mox out weigh its lack of synergy with null rod. Being on-color is very important, mind you. It's no secret that the manabase of [obscenity deleted]/r is already strained. The deck wants consistant reusable sources of blue mana. Having 14 rather than 13 blue sources makes the deck less likely to mulligan because of color screw and therefore makes the deck more consistant; presumably you would replace a basic island with the ruby. Also, we are assuming you are just tooling with the manabase, and not fiddling with the other delicate proportions. Ugh, i could go on and on about the manabase, and how upsetting the balance there triggers changes througout the rest of the deck, but perhaps the clearest way for me to explain why ruby is not present is like this:
With mox blue you get: +speed +consistancy -synergy
With mox red you get: +speed -consistancy -synergy

In the case of mox blue the pluses have it; not so in the case of mox red.

As for lotus, welder is a good arguement by itself. Add to that the need for sustained mana combined with the lack of synergy with null rod and you wind up with the same aruement you had against ruby.
+speed -consistancy -synergy

And in this one I'm just responding to smmenen...

Quote: smmenen
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I don't agree with the first argument. If you think that Welder is in itself a sufficient argument not to run Lotus, then you are admitting that the underpinning assumption for key deckchoices - including mana base deck choices - is metagame considerations, not objective strength.


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It is silly not to consider the environment when building ANY deck. Even the least interactive of decks, long.dec, had to run duress to combat spells in the environment that could thwart its gameplan. In a metagame where fow is not played, null rod is not played, and chalice is not played, duress would be suboptimal.


Quote: smmenen
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I thought we had reached the point where we admitted that Fish was now a metagame defining deck, not metagame deck - and as such an objectively best list should be run and modifications made for local metagames, like most people do with metagame defining decks.


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Since I'm still not quite clear what it exactly means when someone says "bah, x deck is just a metagame deck", I'll just say this:

[obscenity deleted]/r is very strong. My build has not changed significantly from its original incarnation. It has not needed to, nor do I anticipate it changing significantly in the near future. I have played through what is now nearly a full year of type 1 tournaments, all of which have had 24+ people playing the latest decks. Armed with [obscenity deleted]/r, I have won or top 2 split all of them. This speaks volumes towards the deck's resiliency, adaptability, and power. You can refer to [obscenity deleted]/r as anything you like when you are playing type theory, but my experiences in type 1 have proven that [obscenity deleted]/r is very clearly a top deck that many other archetypes must either prepare for or lose.

I would also like to mention that my feces does not stink. My flatulence has the aroma of roses in full bloom. And that my urine has been known to heal the sick.


Quote: smmenen
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If anything, I am of the opinion that Black Lotus is superior to both Mox Sapphire AND Mox Ruby for the very reasons you mentioned!!

Consider: Mox Ruby and Mox Sapphire both are not reusable if you have Null Rod, and neither is Black Lotus. The Difference is that you get a much larger mana burst out of Black Lotus. If you use mox Sapphire only once like 70% of the time and twice 30% of the time you draw it, it seems to me that the Lotus would more than equal that and suggest the only logical conclusion: Lotus is better.

Steve


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My experience has not been that 70% of the time I am only using sapphire once. The plan is not "drop null rod ASAP" against every deck, nor will that even be a possiblity the majority of the time.

As we all know, the first 3 turns or so are generally the most critical in type 1. Sapphire allows for acceleration throughout all of those turns rather than just a quick burst initially with a possible stunting effect (no other blue sources available) thereafter. As I argued previously, sapphire's interaction with null rod is not the only thing to consider. There is an issue of consistancy here, which I am unwilling to sacrifice for explosiveness.

The mana base of Gay/r is a balancing act.  I have found through experience that I am pleased with the land/mana configuration as it stands and no further tweaking in those areas need be done.  My evidence has to be tournament wins, because that is the only thing that truly matters in competitive magic; and the tourney wins keep coming with the current configuration.

Now, if Gay/r wasn't putting up numbers, THEN perhaps it would be time for a change.

[dicemanx]

@Puckthecat

dicemanx, and those who have used the phrase "burden of proof" - what would constitute proof to you?

Testing?

Experience?

Rational argumentation?

Here is the problem: does anyone actually understand what such "proof" would consist of, or how to go about determining whether or not Lotus is detrimental in gay/r?

Not a single person has demonstrated this so called proof, apart from saying that they have been playing the deck for x weeks/months/years and Lotus is just "not good". I want to hear details. I want you to weigh for me the benefits that Lotus brings you versus the detrimental effects it has had in your games. I want to know what builds you are playing and what match-ups you have been facing. I mean, do you have an abundance of games, when testing with the Lotus, where you lost the game because you top-decked a Lotus as opposed to the spell or mana source it was replacing? What did you remove for the Lotus in the first place? How many permanent mana sources were you running? How many of those were blue? How many red creatures were you running? Did you run Voidmages? Flying Men? Cloud of Faeries? Did you test with the sideboard to check if Lotus gave you the necessary boost to power out a quick Rack and Ruin, or the lesser seen Energy Flux or Meltdown?

I'd like you to refrain from suggesting that I will not listen to "reason" or "proof", and that I am somehow supposed to trust your playtesting or other people's playtesting, especially since I have done my own and find evidence to the contrary. Instead of being condescending, perhaps you can introduce more substance in your post rather than flaunting how much "testing" you or others have done or give theoretical spiels on how a Lotus is inferior. I can in turn give you the same kind of theoretical babble on how Moxes are inferior to duals in many decks because of Null Rods, Trinispheres, Gorilla Shamans, or because they create mana inconsistencies in color intensive decks. I myself haven't provided any proof from my testing apart from anecdotal evidence because like I said, the burden of proof is not on me, and furthermore I operate on the principle that there better be a damn good reason why I'm not including broken, tempo breaking cards in my deck.

PTW built the damn thing, and I know from reading wuaffiliate's other posts that he has been playing it for a long time. I know that I have been playing since it was first posted on the old site, testing variants and trying to refine it.

This is not proof of anything. People test decks for years and they can miss the simplest things, or not come to the right conclusions. If you all want to stick to your guns, and you trust your testing and choose to omit the Lotus, then by all means go for it.

My evidence has to be tournament wins, because that is the only thing that truly matters in competitive magic; and the tourney wins keep coming with the current configuration.

The problem is that the evidence is confounded by two factors:

1) You are a good player,and will most likely succeed even with less than optimal builds.
2) A single substitution (one card for a Lotus for example) will not automatically result in a noticeable difference. Even after a year of play the stength of the Lotus might not be evident. Furthermore, in all those tournament games, I assume that none of those included the Lotus? So citing the success of a deck that omitted card X does not mean that card X would not be a strong inclusion.

[Smmenen]

PTW straw manned me.  Becuase that post included not yet fully formed arguments.  Go to my Article Running the Vintage Gauntlet for what I consider to be a more fully formed critique of not running the lotus (which appears to have motivated the first poster to post in the first place).

Steve

[rakso]

Allusions to Buehler's 8-knight Necrodeck without the Dark Rits (due to the banning of Specter in Extended) come to mind. Whether they apply...

[dicemanx]

Here are the two relevant sections from Steve's article:

With respect to successful gay/r builds:

It is difficult to tell, but there is a real possibility that this deck is misbuilt. The deck's success may have reinforced design errors that might have been caught had the deck not been so successful. In other words, when a deck works, why fix it? While that saying is mostly true, in that there may be nothing to "fix" per se, there is nothing wrong with trying to make something great even better.

With respect to Lotus in gay/r:

...the alternative hypothesis remains real: that this deck is simply misbuilt.

I have a very strong suspicion that this is true when Black Lotus is not included. This deck runs Mox Sapphire for obvious reasons despite being reliant in many matchups upon Null Rod. While the deck may be mana hungry enough that once in a while it would prefer a more stable mana supply, the fact of the matter is that Black Lotus is the ultimate tempo card in a strongly tempo-based deck.

Black Lotus, in my opinion, is the best card in Magic because it functions in every deck. Every deck can use Black Lotus because it is not color specific. Not every deck uses Ancestral Recall, but every deck can use Black Lotus. While this deck is certainly not power-based, the functionality of Black Lotus is too compelling in this deck to pass up. Turn 1 Black Lotus, Mishra's Factory, Tap Factory, Cloud of Fairies, Tap Factory again, Curiosity, Null Rod or Standstill is simply too good to pass up. There are numerous other possibly excellent turn 1 plays with Black Lotus.

The primary arguments against Black Lotus appear to be that success without it suggests that it is not needed, that there is a premium on reusable mana, and finally, that it negates Null Rod against Goblin Welder. The first two arguments I have addressed already, and the third is simply to address. If you anticipate facing Goblin Welder at all, the obvious solution is to metagame and not use Black Lotus, or, if you expect enough Welders, to simply sideboard out Black Lotus. Either scenario is perfectly reasonable. In my experience, potential deck building errors such as this may only be resolved through very careful analysis of the deck - an analysis I admittedly, as of yet, would be ill-equipped to conduct.

[PucktheCat]

dicemanx, before I start, I want to say that I honestly don't want to condescend to you or anyone else on this board.  I respect you a great deal, especially for your contribution to Dragon - which is bascially all I know about you.  However, I do feel there is a failure of communication in this thread.

Not a single person has demonstrated this so called proof, apart from saying that they have been playing the deck for x weeks/months/years and Lotus is just "not good". I want to hear details. I want you to weigh for me the benefits that Lotus brings you versus the detrimental effects it has had in your games. I want to know what builds you are playing and what match-ups you have been facing. I mean, do you have an abundance of games, when testing with the Lotus, where you lost the game because you top-decked a Lotus as opposed to the spell or mana source it was replacing? What did you remove for the Lotus in the first place? How many permanent mana sources were you running? How many of those were blue? How many red creatures were you running? Did you run Voidmages? Flying Men? Cloud of Faeries? Did you test with the sideboard to check if Lotus gave you the necessary boost to power out a quick Rack and Ruin, or the lesser seen Energy Flux or Meltdown?

See, this is where I feel there is a disconnect.  Did you read the part of my post where I listed exactly what build I was referring to?  I added Lotus as a 61st card to PTW's recent build and tested it in the opening hand in 40 goldfishes and around 15 opposed games, mostly against Hulk.  I also have been drawing six card hands from the deck and seeing what Lotus would do for them a LOT.

That isn't a tremendous number of games, but games with Lotus in the opening hand are the most favorable testing groud for Lotus, and only 1 in 6 naturally has it, so this is the equivilent of around 240 goldfish games and 90 opposed games with Lotus randomly appearing.

For the record, I went into this testing truly expecting to find that Lotus needed to go in, and my testing method have a strong pro-Lotus bias, since the effect of Null Rod is effectively removed by having Lotus in your opening hand.

As for what effect it has, I think that has been described in fairly good detail as well.  It gets the creatures out a turn or so earlier at the cost of having less of them.  Since it can't replace a blue source (you have to mulligan hands with just Lotus, so if you could replace a blue source with Lotus you could also replace it with another spell) it replaces a spell - and this deck is more short of spells than mana, most of the time.

Its effect post sideboard is an issue I haven't explored.  If Lotus is only strong post-sb, perhaps the Lotus itself could be sideboarded, probably to be brought in against artifact heavy decks.

Leo

[dicemanx]

Did you read the part of my post where I listed exactly what build I was referring to?

I did read your post back on page 2, but the specifics of how the testing was done were lacking. I think that just goldfishing one possible build and testing against one deck (Hulk) is insufficient to establish anything conclusive; furthermore, there are a number of possible choices with respect to the types of creatures you can run or the type of disruption you should use. For instance, I'm a believer that the deck should use 4 Null Rods and up to 4 Stifles, but that's more of a meta choice I suppose.  

In any case, as I've stated before, you have to assess the strength of the early tempo boost against a number of fast decks in the meta that won't allow you the pleasant luxury of playing 2nd turn 1/1 go, 3rd turn 1/1 go etc. Furthermore, it has to be established that there are a significant number of instances where drawing a Lotus instead of the card it replaced is *detrimental* to the success of the deck. This is key, because if it doesn't adversely affect the performance of the deck, then its a worthwhile risk to give you the possibility of an early tempo boost.

Here are my responses to your analysis:

Curiosity is stronger when cast using Lotus but not much, mostly because there is usually a target for it a turn earlier. One turn earlier means one more card, which pays for the Lotus. Basically, this is a wash, but the Lotus helps a little here.

There's a significant difference between getting the Curiosity engine going on turn 2 vs turn 3. Gay/r is a deck that is quite dependent on its draw engines, because it needs to promptly cycle through the deck to find its disruption elements. Seeing as much of your deck as possible can mean the difference between winning and losing. The cost of this is that you might find yourself temporarily mana shorted, but having a Curiositied creature can very rapidly alleviate this problem; and this is only a *possible* issue if you replace a mana source with the Lotus to begin with.

That leaves the creatures. This is what I was a bit surprised to find in my testing - for the most part the creatures suck with Lotus...Here is the real kicker though - accelerating out the creatures doesn't DO much. In most cases it gets an extra 1-2 damage. With Spiketail it may disrupt your opponent somewhat. It may get a Lavamancer ready a turn earlier. None of that particularly impresses me.

This isn't that much of a relevant point, because if you are not initially drawing your draw-engine spells or Null Rods (which the Lotus is supposed to help you accelerate out in the early game), you will most likely lose, Lotus or no Lotus. Going turn 2 1/1, turn 3 1/1 sucks just as bad as going turn 1 two 1/1s. If you're accelrating out your creatures with the Lotus, at least that gives you the opportunity to take better advantage of any top-decked card drawers.

Now, having done that work, let me clairify what people mean when they say this deck wants "permanent mana sources." I think this statement is true but I also think that it is misunderstood. I know I didn't understand it until I did some testing. What they mean is: this deck wants as few mana sources as it can possibly get away with, and to do that all of them need to be permanent.

In my opinion and experience, 23 permanent sources + the Lotus is plenty for a deck whose curve tops off at 2 while running 9 cheap card drawing spells. In fact, it could be argued that 23 is 1 source too many.


With respect to the cards you would consider cutting for the Lotus:

If you replace a blue source then you hope to keep hands with the Lotus and no other blue source. That simply doesn't work - this deck can't reliably draw into another U source in one turn even with a Standstill.

The other option is to replace a spell, in which case you will mulligan hands that have only Lotus for blue mana. In this case you will use a card to accelerate out all your spells and then . . . what? Many times you will have simply accelerated out everything you have and you will prematurly enter topdeck mode. That wouldn't be bad, except you used up a card to get there.

I disagree with presenting such hypotheticals, because I could present you with equally viable hypothetical examples where there are no downsides. It's easy to get confused by testing regarding this matter; gay/r wants many things at once, including wanting to run many blue sources but at the same time wanting to minimize the mana source to spell ratio. In one game you will find that you are mana shorted, but adding more permanent sources might be pointless if it leads to a flood in the next game. It might simply come down to this: is it worthwhile to take a small risk in terms of mana consistency to allow yourself the opportunity to quickly bust out of the gates and steal games that you had otherwise no business winning?

This is a damn hard question to answer, but without any hard evidence I will always side with running the most broken cards afforded to me to give me an increased probability of a broken start.

And finally:

There is only so much card quality you can lose to mana efficiency before you simply don't have the quantity of effect needed to win a game of magic, and Lotus takes Gay/r from having just enough, just in time, to having too little a bit faster.

This is much too drastic a view in my opinion. You believe that the difference between 23 and 24 permanent sources is some sort of breaking point where dropping down to 23 is all of a sudden not good enough anymore.

[PucktheCat]

There's a significant difference between getting the Curiosity engine going on turn 2 vs turn 3.

The difference between getting Curiosity going turn two and turn 3 is exactly one card.  Lotus is exactly one card as well.  That is why it is a wash.  Whatever you draw with the Curiosity turn two simply replaces the Lotus.

This isn't that much of a relevant point, because if you are not initially drawing your draw-engine spells or Null Rods (which the Lotus is supposed to help you accelerate out in the early game), you will most likely lose, Lotus or no Lotus. Going turn 2 1/1, turn 3 1/1 sucks just as bad as going turn 1 two 1/1s. If you're accelrating out your creatures with the Lotus, at least that gives you the opportunity to take better advantage of any top-decked card drawers.

Don't forget disruption.  If I have a very disruptive hand without draw I will sometimes keep it.  A hand with Lotus is a hand with one less random card - that card might be the disruption or draw spell that makes the 1/1s playable.

In my opinion and experience, 23 permanent sources + the Lotus is plenty for a deck whose curve tops off at 2 while running 9 cheap card drawing spells. In fact, it could be argued that 23 is 1 source too many.

If that is true, couldn't you simply run more disruption in place of the extra mana source?

With respect to the cards you would consider cutting for the Lotus:

If you replace a blue source then you hope to keep hands with the Lotus and no other blue source. That simply doesn't work - this deck can't reliably draw into another U source in one turn even with a Standstill.

The other option is to replace a spell, in which case you will mulligan hands that have only Lotus for blue mana. In this case you will use a card to accelerate out all your spells and then . . . what? Many times you will have simply accelerated out everything you have and you will prematurly enter topdeck mode. That wouldn't be bad, except you used up a card to get there.

I disagree with presenting such hypotheticals, because I could present you with equally viable hypothetical examples where there are no downsides.

This isn't a hypothetical.  Either you will mulligan a hand with only Lotus for blue mana or you won't.  If it is the former then it is taking the place of a spell, the later it is taking the place of a U-source.  I don't think the later is a real option, myself.

There is only so much card quality you can lose to mana efficiency before you simply don't have the quantity of effect needed to win a game of magic, and Lotus takes Gay/r from having just enough, just in time, to having too little a bit faster.

This is much too drastic a view in my opinion. You believe that the difference between 23 and 24 permanent sources is some sort of breaking point where dropping down to 23 is all of a sudden not good enough anymore.

The issue isn't 23 or 24 mana sources.  Whichever number is correct, I simply think Lotus has insufficient impact of the game when it is casting the spells in this deck.

As for my testing Lotus in only one build, what can I say?  I am trying to figure out whether Lotus fits in one build.  I can try to generalize my findings, but I don't feel obligated to test every possible U/r Standstill deck.  Afterall, I am testing so that I know what to play in my deck.  I chose Hulk to test against because I think it is a deck that tests most aspects of Gay/r fairly evenly.  Lotus isn't something like maindeck Firestorm or something, that is very matchup dependent.

Also, I think it is a bit unfair to critisize my testing considering the fact that I am the only person in this thread that has actually stated the testing basis of my conclusions.

Your build and metagem seems fairly different from mine, especially the four Null Rods.  It may be that these difference account for much of the differences in our conclusions.

Leo

[Shock Wave]

This is much too drastic a view in my opinion. You believe that the difference between 23 and 24 permanent sources is some sort of breaking point where dropping down to 23 is all of a sudden not good enough anymore.

Whether or not the appropriate number of mana sources is 23 or 24 I am not qualified to pass judgement on. However, given any deck, I believe there is always a definitive number of sources that constitutes an optimal manabase. If this is true, then even a slight change (1 mana source) can be extremely significant.

[dicemanx]

The difference between getting Curiosity going turn two and turn 3 is exactly one card. Lotus is exactly one card as well. That is why it is a wash. Whatever you draw with the Curiosity turn two simply replaces the Lotus.

1 card is not insignificant. It can be the equivalent of one whole turn. And the card drawn doesn't just "replace" the Lotus. It starts the process of digging through your deck, except that, as I stated, you might be a tad mana light at the start.

Don't forget disruption. If I have a very disruptive hand without draw I will sometimes keep it. A hand with Lotus is a hand with one less random card - that card might be the disruption or draw spell that makes the 1/1s playable.

If the Lotus replaced a land, this point is moot. If it replaced a business spell, then only include cards that the Lotus would substitute - so a card draw spell is out.

This isn't a hypothetical. Either you will mulligan a hand with only Lotus for blue mana or you won't. If it is the former then it is taking the place of a spell, the later it is taking the place of a U-source. I don't think the later is a real option, myself.

To say that you will get hypothetical starting hands with only the Lotus for blue mana with any appreciable frequency is what I had a problem with. We can quite easily calculate the odds of this happening.

The issue isn't 23 or 24 mana sources. Whichever number is correct, I simply think Lotus has insufficient impact of the game when it is casting the spells in this deck.

But if we're replacing a 24th permanent source with the Lotus, then it *is* the issue. Whether a Lotus in your starting hand has a sufficient impact on the game is a separate issue altogether, one that can hardly be answered so conclusively through goldfishing or testing against one deck.

Also, I think it is a bit unfair to critisize my testing considering the fact that I am the only person in this thread that has actually stated the testing basis of my conclusions.

I don't think its unfair to criticize any form of testing. It doesn't mean that you haven't made very positive contributions compared to others in this thread; however, there is nothing wrong with being subjected to scrutiny when presenting the results of your testing or the conclusions that you have reached. After all, we are mostly after the same thing - the truth when it comes to discovering the optimal build. If the criticism that I have perhaps comes across as some sort of personal attack, that is certainly not my intention, nor do I wish to single you or anyone else out.

Whether or not the appropriate number of mana sources is 23 or 24 I am not qualified to pass judgement on. However, given any deck, I believe there is always a definitive number of sources that constitutes an optimal manabase. If this is true, then even a slight change (1 mana source) can be extremely significant.

If this is true, then its certainly difficult to demonstrate in practice. For example, the number of permanent sources of mana in Dragon has always been a point of contention. We perhaps have a certain optimum number in mind, but that didn't stop the Europeans from dropping the count down to 20 or 19 some months ago and wrecking house due to the increased mana:spell ratio. The best that we can conclude from such observations is that there are probably specific optimum ratios against particular decks (or particular builds) in the field, which means that there is otherwise no single optimal "general" ratio. The other possibility is that savage luck came into play, the kind on par with Lam "I play 6 lands in my deck and crush the field" savage luck.