Suggestions wanted on semi-competitive Oath deck.

[AngryPheldagrif]

Warning The following post is rated PG-13 and may contain instances of:

Extensive playtesting
Good grammar
Explained card choices
Vampiric Tutor in the maindeck
Basic Forests
Nemesis uncommons
Profanity
Sufficient content

Please do not read if you are opposed to any of the above.



Basically, I will soon be attending a large 0-proxy tournament. While normally my decks are fully powered, my brother will be attending this one and he will be using our set. Luckily, however, I will have access to as many as I need of every card ever printed except for 5th Dawn. Since my deck could theoretically be worth well over $1000, I didn't feel that the Budget forum was terribly appropriate for this. Also, the card choices are designed to let me take the randomness that will inevitably come into the tournament. I'm not anticipating being able to take Tier 1 decks such as 7/10 split or Hulk, just to put up a decent fight and maybe steal up into lower prize range on a little luck. I also wanted to play something a little more interesting, which is why I didn't choose LandStill or Dragon. Without further ado, the deck:

2 [card]Mishras Factory[/card]
1 [card]Library of Alexandria[/card]
4 [card]Mana Leak[/card]
1 [card]Vampiric Tutor[/card]
1 [card]Demonic Tutor[/card]
2 [card]Wooded Foothills[/card]
2 [card]Forest[/card]
4 [card]Windswept Heath[/card]
4 [card]City of Brass[/card]
4 [card]Bayou[/card]
4 [card]Tropical Island[/card]
4 [card]Force of Will[/card]
4 [card]Duress[/card]
2 [card]Skeletal Scrying[/card]
4 [card]Brainstorm[/card]
3 [card]Null Rod[/card]
1 [card]Gaeas Blessing[/card]
1 [card]Krosan Reclamation[/card]
2 [card]Verdant Touch[/card]
4 [card]Living Wish[/card]
4 [card]Oath of Druids[/card]
2 [card]Darksteel Colossus[/card]

Sideboard:
1 [card]Morphling[/card]
1 [card]Strip Mine[/card]
1 [card]Maze of Ith[/card]
1 [card]Plated Slagwurm[/card]
1 [card]Phantom Nishoba[/card]
1 [card]Akroma, Angel of Wrath[/card]
4 [card]Pernicious Deed[/card]
1 [card]Volraths Stronghold[/card]
1 [card]Gemstone Mine[/card]
1 [card]Xantid Swarm[/card]
2 [card]Sleeper Agent[/card]

Odd choices:

Mishra's Factory[/u]: This was deemed necessary during testing, as it let me beat under an Oath while my opponent sat helplessly, unable to play a creature. Marginally improves my 7/10 matchup
The control stuff[/u]: I don't run enough blue to adequately support Mana Drain, nor do I have pretty much any mana sinks for it. Having the 8 counters and Duresses keeps Powered control on its toes, even if it does obliterate me most of the time.
No artfact mana[/u]: I really just don't have anything I need to cast with Sol Ring and Mana Crypt, and I prefer to run only the Null Rods for artifacts at all, since the Darksteel Colossuses can be welded out, which is really annoying.
Verdant Touch[/u]: Lets me Oath against creatureless opponents. Unlike Animate Land, this actually works!
Gaea's Blessing and Krosan Reclamation[/u]: Mostly just so I don't run myself out if I get something annoying like WW packing tons of Swords to Plowshares. These are also useful against stuff packing Welder to get rid of Null Rods in the yard to protect my Colossus.
Pernicious Deed[/u]: I swap these in for the Null Rods against most random aggro. They're my panic button, and are nice for clearing the board in preparation for dropping Oath, since Colossus takes 2 turns to kill and can't save me against a swarm of Elves and such.
Sideboard of creatures and stuff[/u]: Some of these, like Xantid Swarm and Sleeper Agent, are wish targets, but the rest are for sideboarding in against different decks running different stuff. When my opponents are pulling StPs like there's no tomorrow, it's nice to be able to throw in a Plated Slagwurm or a Morphling and watch them sweat. Also, decks like Sligh may be able to kill me before I can kill them with Colossus, so I have things like Phantom Nishoba to deal with them. Basically, just a lot of bullet cards to optimalize post-sideboard. The lands are mostly situational stuff to Wish for, such as Gemstone Mine as a mana fixer and Maze of Ith as an emergency card against Togs and such. Volrath's Stronghold is a bit of odd tech to reclaim lost Sleeper Agents and other creatures that I've wished in.


I did get in a decent bit of testing against a variety of decks both random and powered. I've been able to map out my matchups pretty well.

Tier 1 stuff:
4cControl - Pretty much an autoloss for me except on the few occasions I can get them Duressed well enough to sneak a Colossus in play with a counter for their StP. (Plated Slagwurm and Morphling go in over the DSCs post board, but I still lose most of the time.)

Hulk - Horrifically in Hulks favor, though the few times I've been able to get a Colossus in they've lost. Pretty much like the Keeper match, but without StP. (No sideboarding changes.)

7/10 split - I daresay that this matchup is not as bad as I would have thought. Still in their favor, but I was able to give them a run for their money more than once. (I usually dump the Null Rods for Deeds simply because of the Welder thing, doesn't make much of a difference, though Deed for 1 can be a gamebreaker against them in a stall situation. They're also vital against Chalice for 2.)

Control Slaver - Not a very fun matchup, but it mostly hinged on whoever got the most counters and disruption. The Duresses were gamebreakers here. This was probably the closest to an even match that I got among all of the tier 1 decks. (No sideboarding changes. The Null Rods are just way too necessary.)

Draw-7 and TPS - Just a question of how many Forces I can draw. A terrible matchup. (No sideboarding changes.)
*note* I didn't get a chance to test against other combos, they're pretty much all terrible for me and just a question of if I can disrupt them enough, or else I lose.

LandStill - A real bitch based on their natural immunity to Oath and their sideboarded Mazes. The only game I won against this was blind luck. (Null Rods dropped for Deeds, Colossus dropped for Plated Slagwurm if they're white with StP, or else no creature changes.)


Random and outdated decks:
Elves! - As expected, a Colossus-laced massacre. (Boarded the Rods for Deeds.)

Ankh-Sligh - A race to win, one that I won a lot more. Simply no answer to Colossus, and no way to remove Oath. They would often try to either win without creatures, but it rarely worked. (Boarding in Akroma and Phantom Nishoba were a bit of a win-more thing, but it hardly mattered. Deeds went in over Rods of course.)

Mono-Blue - Really annoying, but I could often win off an early Duress. Other than that just a lot of sitting there. I won with the Factories almost as much as with the Colossuses. (Sideboard in extra creatures over Null Rod, Plated Slagwurm and Morphling.)


Overall it's performing about as I had expected, which I don't really mind. Some things have already been tweaked, but I figured that others would have other ideas. All constuctive critisms and suggestions are welcome, but please don't tell me that this just isn't viable. It's not supposed to be terribly innovative or Tier 1. Just to keep me alive and still able to at least put up a good fight.

Thanks for your help!
-Dan Carp, the AngryPheldagrif

[Jebus]

That's an interesting take on Oath.

I recently experimented with a semi-competative U/G/r version of Oath.  Mine was based more off the Intuition/AK draw engine.

Is one Blessing enough?

What do you have Animate Land for?

[Jacob Orlove]

Dragon Wings and Living Wish both seem very suboptimal. Your fattie already has trample, and Cunning Wish is 100% better at fetching useful cards--plus it would let you build a GOOD sideboard, instead of the awful one you have now.

Funeral Pyre seems like a more useful card than Animate Land, since it's also graveyard hate. White also offers some other powerful cards, like Balance.

You desperately need some card drawing in there, or the control decks will run over you.

[AngryPheldagrif]

Is one Blessing enough?

The one Blessing is mostly there as backup, and rarely makes much of a difference. Since I'm not running the oldschool Oath builds with Spike Feeder or the equivalent, I normally win with the first creature that I Oath out. The only things that can remove Darksteel Colossus (that see major play) are Goblin Welder and Swords to Plowshares. In order for them to remove it with Welder, they have to put in a Null Rod, which sets up a sort of damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. This also only buys them 1 extra turn since it'll pop right out again next turn. If they're running Swords, then Blessing cannot reclaim lost creatures anyways, so I don't need it. I'm not terribly worried about decking out since I can always Reclamation the Blessing back.

What do you have Animate Land for?

Living Wish for Sleeper Agent is a lot of mana and I only have 2 Sleeper Agents. Animate Land is my backup plan. For the most part, giving them a chance to use Oath is rarely going to backfire, aside from the very rare Duplicant. Or god-forbid they have no creatures in their deck and are holding Yawgmoth's Will :shock:

-Dan

[Jebus]

I still don't understand Animate Land.  Are you trying to use it to give them a creature so you can Oath or are you trying to use it to prevent an Oath?  If the former, that doesn't work.

[AngryPheldagrif]

Dragon Wings is officially gone, I'll update the list tonight once we decide on what to put in over it. I like Funeral Pyre, but I simply don't have the space or the mana-base to go 4 colors.

@Jesus: I was pretty sure the Animate thing works, since no ones ever mentioned anything before. Can we get a second opinion?

Thanks for the help guys,
-Dan

[Jebus]

I'm not Jesus.  

Oath of Druids has what is called a conditional "if" clause.  The condition for the "if" clause must be true when the ability would trigger and when the ability actually resolves (if it triggers).  

If the condition is not true when it would trigger, it won't trigger.

So, in order for Oath to trigger, a player's opponent must have more creatures in play than they they do at the beginning of their upkeep.  Once that player's upkeep has begun, if it didn't trigger, it won't trigger.

By the time you can play Animate Land to give them more creatures than you, the time for Oath to trigger has passed.

[combo_dude]

Animate Land doesn't work. The Oath trigger will only go on the stack at the start of your upkeep (i.e. before any spells are played) if they have more creatures than you.

It looks like "oath goes on the stack, in response play Animate Land, Oath resolves, you have more creatures so..." - but is actually "you have no more creatures than me, so nothing happens".

[AngryPheldagrif]

Sorry Jebus, I was going off a fairly ancient ruling. The deck will be updated by tonight to reflect the new changes. Thanks for all the help guys!

-Dan

[maddux31]

I have been playing a UGWR build of oath, where the red is only there sideboard fire/ice as well as red blast.  I have found that funeral pyre in the sideboard works very well with cunning wish.  I have also experimented with using standstills and sylvan library.  Also, I think you should try either Holistic Wisdom of Regrowth as well as replacing the Bayous with Undergrounds.  Instead of Mishra's Factory I'v used Treetop Villages

[Squirrelman]

I play U/G/W build of an Oath thought I may add black. My build uses also Intuition/AK engine, classical oath creatures (Morphling, Feeder, Weaver) and a bit 4CC style cards. I have also tried that Oathstill build which has been discussed here. It works quite well, but you could just make it complete Landstill.