4cc - The Breakdown

[Outlaw]

Back a month ago, I posted a thread on the best deck to play for the summer, and in the end I chose 4cc.  Since the day I chose 4cc as my primary deck I have never looked back, the deck loves to treat me well (and I can also vouche that it can also treat you badly, much like any deck in the format.) The deck is aparently doing something right, according to Dr. Sylvan 11 4cc decks have made top 8 in 7 recent tournaments, is this a sign?

I have taken many lists together and finally come up with one that I believe is very nice, although there are many questions that will mostly be running through your head after you see the list, as many questions run through my head about my choices.

//The Mana Base (26)
4 Tundra
4 Wasteland
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
2 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
2 City of Brass
1 Library of Alexandra
1 Stripmine

1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Pearl
1 Sol Ring
1 Black Lotus

//Counter (8)
4 Mana Drain
4 Force of Will

//Draw (9)
4 Brainstorm
3 Skeletal Scryings
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Fact or Fiction

//Tutor (5)
3 Cunning Wish
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor

//Removal (3)
2 Swords to Plowshares
1 Fire/Ice

//Kill (3)
2 Exalted Angels
1 Decree of Justice

//Other (6)
1 Balance
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Gorilla Shaman
1 Yawmoth's Win
1 Mind Twist
1 Time Walk

//Sideboard (15)
3 Red Elemental Blast
2 Rack and Ruin
1 Swords to Plowshare
1 Skeletal Scrying*
1 Fire/Ice
1 Plagiarize (Kowal tech, really works wonders on brainstorms)
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Blue Elemental Blast
1 Gush
1 Coffin Purge*
1 Disenchant
1 Exalted Angel* (when I took out the 3rd angel main and put in fire/ice I kinda just left that in here)

Among other builds of 4cc there a few differences.  One is the maindeck Crucible of Worlds, I removed a second mox monkey for this because of the pure awsomeness it provides.  Continually wasting away or fetching really assists the control player in their act of well control.  Also many say that Crucible is one way to definitely stunt Fish, some 4cc players have been putting Crucible in the side, I took it to the next step and placed one main.  The main crucible has been working its magic in playtesting many times over, Savage Tech.

Also if you notice that I dropped an angel for a Fire/Ice, this is one place where I am definitely iffy.  Fire/Ice is such a great utility card, especially with Fish in the metagame (gotta love eatin through 2 curious cloud of faeries or dropping off a land of theirs) But loosing one of my few win conditions seems to hurt, this is a definite area of interest for me.  In testing it seems that sometimes when I would have a Fire/Ice in my hand I wished it to be an angel, and sometimes I really loved that it was Fire/Ice.

Lastly among the changes in my main are the introduction of the 4th Tundra, this is a place im slightly concerned about.  Earlier I was playing with 3 City of Brass', but the life loss was immense even with angel, and I would always tap it for white anyways.  I was thinking of dropping a tundra for an underground sea, any ideas?

The sideboard is a bit random right now, the cards I have *'ed were ones that I definitely am thinking of removing for something else.  Wishing for a Scrying requires a definite high amount of mana to get it off worth while, Coffin purge really hurts dragon (but it seems dragon isnt the most popular deck right now), and the Exalted in the side is just to hold a spot till I can change it.  I was thinking of taking out the 3 cards listed, for 2-3 Flametongue Kavus, or 2 FTKs and a Gorilla Shaman.

4cc is probably the best deck to take into an unknown metagame, as it has nearly an equal chance agaisnt all the decks it plays (with some slightly more favorable and some slightly less.)  Lets take a look at possible matchups.

Food Chain Goblins This matchup is definitely in favor to 4cc, countering the right Ringleader really messes up their tempo.  Fire/Ice and STP are definitely pro in this matchup, and after game 1 your game is even better (despite their REB's) You now have access to Swords, Fire/Ice, Disenchant and BEB's.  Well timed wastelands rock.  Just hope they dont combo off quickly, other than that Angel > FCG.

Control Slaver First game seems to be pretty even,  perhaps slightly in the favor of 4cc, they have large targets to drain through, and welders get r0xx0r3d by Fire/Ice.  Timed wastelands also eat their mana base alive.  Second game is definitely in your favor, introducing REBs, Fire/Ices, STPs, and Rack and Ruins, and BEB's.  Warning, watch the drop of Blood Moon! Without a single basic in the deck, dropping blood moon is Savage agaisnt 4cc. (Such evil doers.)

Fish Simply put, drop an angel and win.  Unless their rocking some Echoing Truth (Team Maine + Savage Tech, tech.)  You got the game with an angel alone.  Also the maindeck crucible and fire/ice eat fish right through to the bone, just watch out for dazes (they always seem to bite you in the ass) With sideboard in your pro also, more fire/ice and reb's rock Fish.  

Hulk Hulk for some reason seems to be not doing all too well recently.  4cc seems to do well agaisnt Hulk, and is definitely a great game after sideboard, +REBs and yes Plagiarize! Also yet again, timing the wasteland works great.

Madness Blah!  I absolutely hate this matchup, for some reason I can never do good agaisnt madness.  The deck seems to always play really quick and drop a nullrod when I play agaisnt it.  After sideboard you have FTKs quick madness cant deal with, and a cornacopia of other things to bring in.  Watch out for the sideboarded B2B and the null rod in general!

7/10 This matchup also definitely sucks, everytime they drop a Titan its going to hurt.  Also removing the Titan hurts, your nearly gurenteed to loose land again.  One of Titans downfalls is its mana base, so try attacking that via strip + shaman.  Hang in, during sideboard you get more answers (REBs kill their draw engine, and Rack and Ruin just kills their acceleration, along with Fire/Ice killing their welders.)

So thats what I go so far, I would appreciate some feedback on what everyone thinks.  Thanks to the team (Team Savage Tech) for all the help on choices on what to remove and place in.  If I forgot about anythign please let me know and I'll sneak it in (so hopefully only you and I know that I forgot something   )  TST for Life.

P.S Id also like to thank everyone who attended the Pittsfield Dual Mox tourney I helped with recently, the turnout was great (Grats especially to Sam Antil, my children are definitely going to take after his footsteps) please be aware that we will also be hosting another tourney for at least 4 ieces of power soon (notice it keeps doubling, 1st was a mox, 2nd tourney was 2 moxes, the 3rd will be for 4, and the 4th... will be for 8?!

[TrixR4Kidz]

You put how you have such a hard time against madness, and you mentioned that you are gonna do flametounge kavu's, you have to put flametounge's in the sideboard, they make madness look like suicide black.... plagarize is useful, buttttt is it really more important than flametounge? debatable, kowal also played mono blue trix this weekend so I don't know if copying his tech is such a great Idea

[TheFram]

My personal gripe with 4cC (admittedly a small one), is that I sometimes find myself without blue cards to pitch/blue cards I feel safe pitching. This can lead to some difficult scenarios. Because of this I have started playing a single Deep Analysis in the place of 3rd Scrying.

While there are some downsides to the Deep (REB, Misdirection, Sorcery Speed, and CC), it is blue and difficult to counter in the control mirror. It is a great drain sink, and has really made me feel more secure with the blue card count. I think that Deep Anal. is the closest blue analog of scrying, and while it is not *quite* as good in terms of speed and resilience to major threats in the format, I find that it is a good replacement in general.

2 Scrying is still a reasonable amount, and Deep is a great card in its own right.

-Avi

[Toad]

Plagiarize was a joke, hehehehe :lol:

Deep Analysis is awful :/

[Matrix]

Plagiarize SB >Deep Analysis MD
Coffin Purge SB> Vamp Tutor SB
Exalted #3-4> Decree  (except in the mirror)

                             no lie!!!

Might I suggest other Kowal tech that I found to be impressive-- City of Brass #3 4L!!

[Cross]

can't take credit for echoing truth...it was pernicious dan's idea.

Might I suggest other Kowal tech that I found to be impressive-- City of Brass #3 4L!!

I have to agree with this here. You may also want to run a 4th, adding these improves your 7/10 matchup. With the popularity of the titan on the rise this is probably a really good choice.

[Gandalf_The_White_1]

I would agree with cutting the 4th tundra for the 3rd underground sea, because the black count in the deck is so high.  Either that or add another COB, but 3 might be too much pain.  4 would be way too much.  The black is just so important for the scryings; 4cc without draw engine is not cool.

Madness is way easier with sbed FTKs in addition to REBs.  (But watch out for possible gilded drake tech on your angel)

I don't want any deep anal, no thx .  Scrying is god.

When Zherbus posted his origianl list, he said that he was the only one Gush was working for.  How have you found it?

I'm not sure about 3 cunning wish.  Whenever I play 3 seems to be too much.  I'm dropped down to 2 and it seems to work better now.

Edit: Sorry Zherbus

[Zherbus]

My name is 7 letters; it's not that difficult.

Also, card choices or whatever aside, what is the point of this thread really? If it's the specific card choices, I recommend sticking to them and stop fluffing the thread out with 'fucking-duh!' stuff. If there is more to it, I suggest you keep the discussion on track.

[heiner]

gush is sooo good:

-for getting two white
-save your lands
-draw 2 cards for free

I am still trying to play without City of Brass though but with 5 fetchlands. There are no stifles around right now (german meta) and the fetches do work really nice together with scrying and crucible in contrast to CoB.

[Whatever Works]

I have been playing 4cc for a long time now and have found that running 4 tundras and 2 undergrounds is the correct play. On paper it looks awful, and makes people wonder...wtf he wont have enough black with all the strip effects! The explanation for why i run this mana base is a simple question... If you were playing against 4cc and your opponent has a sol ring... a mox ruby... 2 tundras... and a underground sea in play... and you play a wasteland, would you waste the tundras preventing double white, or waste the black sourse? Talking to alot of players most said they would take out one of the tundras. People are parenoid about double white when playing against 4cc, and i know you could argue they would drop the black sourse to prevent scrying but at the last 4 tournements people never take the black sourse.

About Crucible, I find that running 1 in the maindeck is a mistake. It is fairly inconsistent and i tend to sideboard it out alot... i have found that just running 1 in the sideboard is more then enough and 2 being overkill. A maindeck Crucible does not help any off your tuff matchups (accept fish game 1), and can be completely worthless vs. any type of storm deck that can be a tuff matchup for 4cc or any type of belcher.

Some people have been dropping the # of angels in the deck which i disagree with... i like having 4 kill conditions because its consistent, and i hate having tempo/control and not having a kill card in hand. I find that dropping an angel can make some of your better matchups FCG (very favorable) not nearly as curtain or predictable. I also am probably the only person who fears Jesters Cap.

Fire/Ice is the most consistent card in the deck, but it is also the card you most consistently wish you didnt draw. I have been looking for a replacement, and i have been considering a 2nd gorrilla shaman.

Have people tested running only 2 skeletal scrying? The idea sounds bad, but looking back at my tourney  reports/results i have done much better when only running 2. The reason for this is that 2 is more consistent, and running more sometimes can get you flooded with them early game, or you will have them in your opening hand way to often. Having three is great in any type of control or mirror, but its just a thought that i dont exactly expect to be taken incredibly seriously. Asking people to consider changing the sacred #3 is not going to happen, but just an idea that has played out very well for me. It may be just from coincidence that my results were better, but i not going to argue it like the guy who got flamed a few months ago who said 4 Cunning Wish was better then 3.

[Gandalf_The_White_1]

Dude wtf is with jester's cap?  It seems so useless in every match but combo and it sucks alot of mana also.  (In combo if you play and activate it you have probabably already won anyways, also)

Relying on your opponent to go for white instead of black all the time is relying on them being a bad player.

The shamen instead of a fire/ice would be useless in the fish matchup, but in other matchups shamen can do a similar thing (eating the artifacts vs welder decks or denying mana vs control decks).  Against combo the shamen is better because of the mana denial thing and the uselessness of fire/ice in that matchup.  So, it's probably a meta choice.

I have found that I don't mind seeing scrying unless I draw all 3 in the first few turns, which has happened to me but is quite unlikely.  Usually I WANT to see 2 scrying in a longer game, which would be unlikely if 2 was all that I ran.

[MaxxMatt]

If you were playing against 4cc and your opponent has a sol ring... a mox ruby... 2 tundras... and a underground sea in play... and you play a wasteland, would you waste the tundras preventing double white, or waste the black sourse? Talking to alot of players most said they would take out one of the tundras.

It is a really stupid move, even not knowing about the amount of black mana you have at disposal.

The broken cards in our decks are almost Black.
The only White one didn't have WW in his cc.

People are parenoid about double white when playing against 4cc, and i know you could argue they would drop the black sourse to prevent scrying but at the last 4 tournements people never take the black sourse.

If they crushed the black mana consistently you would have won a lot less that you did...

About Crucible, I find that running 1 in the maindeck is a mistake. It is fairly inconsistent and i tend to sideboard it out alot... i have found that just running 1 in the sideboard is more then enough and 2 being overkill. A maindeck Crucible does not help any off your tuff matchups (accept fish game 1), and can be completely worthless vs. any type of storm deck that can be a tuff matchup for 4cc or any type of belcher.

I'm totally with you about this argument.
If I would change my mind about CoW as a maindeck card it would be only to balance a lot more my mana base against MUD and maybe against other forms of control decks with massive denial in it.

Some people have been dropping the # of angels in the deck which i disagree with... i like having 4 kill conditions because its consistent, and i hate having tempo/control and not having a kill card in hand. I find that dropping an angel can make some of your better matchups FCG (very favorable) not nearly as curtain or predictable. I also am probably the only person who fears Jesters Cap.

I tested 3 (2Angels and 1 Decree) , 4 ( 2 Angels and 2 Decrees )and even 5 ( 2 Angels and 3 Decrees ) winners intensively to try to realize in which situations a precise number would shine.

I'm usually playing with 4 winners, but for my specific metagame ( you can read about it in my weekly reports ) there is not a "better" choice.
After all my test, facing more combo and control decks forces me to drop the number of winners to add solutions and spells, while against aggro or aggro-control decks, dropping more than a single treat is key to win in almost any case.

It is all about proper metagaming and good luck with the pairings.

Fire/Ice is the most consistent card in the deck, but it is also the card you most consistently wish you didnt draw. I have been looking for a replacement, and i have been considering a 2nd gorrilla shaman.

I tried 1 StP and 2 Fire/Ice. If Madness and DARgon is not your more frequent matchup it should be a good configuration. Otherwise not.
Cutting the second Shaman is the worst move worth considering. It is KEY against all the tier1 decks. I was thinking about adding the third in my side for some special matchups ( Slavery, Belcher, TPS ). They perfectly fit the denial plan against them ( with the help of CoW's in my side ).

Have people tested running only 2 skeletal scrying? The idea sounds bad, but looking back at my tourney  reports/results i have done much better when only running 2. The reason for this is that 2 is more consistent, and running more sometimes can get you flooded with them early game, or you will have them in your opening hand way to often. Having three is great in any type of control or mirror, but its just a thought that i dont exactly expect to be taken incredibly seriously. Asking people to consider changing the sacred #3 is not going to happen, but just an idea that has played out very well for me. It may be just from coincidence that my results were better, but i not going to argue it like the guy who got flamed a few months ago who said 4 Cunning Wish was better then 3.

Anytime I lower the number of drawers in my maindeck for something else, I started to !!!!consistently!!!! lose to better draw engine ( Hulk and Slavery comes in my mind as example ).  The deck too frequently started to draw to lands in the middle of the games. This fact is always a game over for you. HAving more massive drawers let you bypass a bit this problem.


@@@@
IMHO, the inability to smooth enough the deck fast enough to be prepared to the possible topdeck in the middle game, something that is perfectly realized in decks like Drain-Slavery and or HulkSmash!, is one of the best reasons behind some of my losses. And because i feel to doom the decks extremely well and his mechanics in his foundamentals, I think that without change "his entire structure", it could not be improved more than this. 4C-C is the best build available for any control Players and sometimes IT ISN'T ENOUGH to be considered "just too good".


If you look at the definitions of "Sistematic Errors" and "Casual Errors", from a Statistical and Mathematical point of view, even excluding and lowering the number of possible Casual Errors, IMHO 4C-C seemed to be affected by a "Sistematic Error": His inhability to topdeck REALLY WELL in the middle-late game, mostly because of the high number of lands and his Denial Plan, that involve the use of 5 Strips and other situational cards.
 
If we dodn't want to consider WHEN and WHY 4C-C fails during some match.. so, it is perfect as it is.




MAxMAtt

[Whatever Works]

I still believe that people (especially playing Fish) really worrie about seeing 2 white sources on the board, because Angel/decree single handedly wins the game vs. Fish most of the time. The mana base for me has been steady, but to combat the huge ammount of 7/10 split going around Connecticut it might be definetly worth raising the # of City of Brass to three. Having an extra land that wont be whiped out is really helpful, and increases the chance of recovery.

I find that the maindeck is probably the least important part of 4cc overall though. The Sideboard is what wins games, and if you have an inferior maindeck and a great sideboard your better off the the vise versa.

The Sideboard has a few cards that are basically general accepted as "correct" I find these cards to be:

1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Disenchant
1 STP
2-3 Rack and Ruin
3 REB
1 BEB (if you dont use you should)
1-2 Crucible of Worlds (Depends on # of fish decks in area or # of proxys in a given tournement)
2-3 FTK (Alot of people arent running as many yet right now i would run more with fish/aggro workshop around)
1-2 Fire/Ice (I run none accept 1 maindeck go figure)

There are a few other cards that i cant think of at the moment, and other options for metagame choices.

[Nanka]

Just a small thought that occurred to me:

With MD CoW, LoA becomes protected.  In effect (to a degree), CoW replaces itself many times over if it rescues LoA.  This will allow you to outdraw a (4cc) opponent who doesn't run MD CoW.  Maybe then in that match-up, DoJ becomes irrelevant, especially if the Type 1 metagame turns into a war of attrition over strips, which reduces mana availability.

As for the established top tier of decks, Fish is another match-up in which I see DoJ as having any effect.  The question then becomes whether 4cc with Crucible instead of DoJ is at least as effective in handling Fish.

[wuaffiliate]

4 Tundra
2 Underground Sea

3 Skeletal Scryings
2 Exalted Angels

You can remove one tundra for a sea safely. I run 2 angels and 3 scrying with a 3/3 split on tundra/sea, and its consistant. I dont really see myself running a 4th tundra unless i go with 4 angels, i really like casting scrying so seas are hot.

[Gandalf_The_White_1]

I have to agree.  Black mana is just so important for the deck, 3 seas are required, and the 4th tundra is really unessecary.

Here is my list for referance (note it contains some rather extreame meta considerations, including 3!!! md stp and the lack of the 2nd monkey).  I prefer 3 scrying and dropped down to 2 wish because I found 3 really unessesary and annoying.

26 manaz:
4 wasteland
4 flooded strand
3 tundra
3 underground sea
2 volcanic island
2 city of brass
1 library of alexandria
1 strip mine

1 mox pearl
1 mox jet
1 mox ruby
1 mox saphire
1 black lotus
1 sol ring

8 counters:
4 force of will
4 mana drain

9 draw:
4 brainstorm
3 skeletal scrying
1 ancestral recall
1 fact or fiction

4 tutors:
2 cunning wish
1 demonic tutor
1 mystical tutor

4 removal:
3 swords to plowshares
1 fire/ice

3 kill:
2 exalted angel
1 decree of justice

4 broken:
1 balance
1 yawgmoth's will
1 time walk
1 mind twist

2 other:
1 crucible of worlds
1 gorilla shamen

sb:

wishable:
1 swords to plowshares
1 vampiric tutor
1 skeletal scrying
1 gush
1 fire/ice
1 disinchant
1 blue elemental blast
2 rack and ruin
3 red elemental blast

non-wishable:
3 flametoung kavu

On the sb: I have found the 3 kavus to be AMAZING in testing vs madness.  The turn a difficult matchuo into a walk in the park post sb.

I often wish for the fire/ice in the fish matchup.  It is awsome.

Slots I am unsure about: I like the idea of wishable gush for colour fix/draw, but I don't fins myself wishing for it often.

Running 3 scrying maindeck, I almost never wish for the one from my sb, especially as it take 2 turns to set this up if you want to take full advantage of the scrying.  I really want some form of solid wishable carddraw just for security reasons, however.

Beb: I rarely wish for this.  Uses that are possible is nuking a welder without white mana available or killing a blood moon (although without a basic island to fetch out I think that wish->disichant+float is almost as good, and I don't see that many blood moons running around.

I find in testing first game against fish that null rod+their other mana denial can be really annoying and somewhat shuts down the scrying engine sometimes (also life total is very important in the matchup).

Plagerise nets you +1 card advantage when used on your opponent.  Hence, inspiration would be just as effective .

Oh and I have no coffin purge although I would probably add it when going into an unkown meta just so I could feel warm and fuzzy.

So, the lists we have are quite similar, with main change being -1 cunning wish +1 swords to plowshares and -1 tundra, +1 underground sea.