[Discussion] Stax now-a-days

[onelovemachine]

After testing this deck extensivly I've come to the conclusion that pentacolored Stax sucks, or more precise, Gemstone Mine sucks under Sphere of Resistance. Why?

Imho, the reason mine sucks is because the deck must now play with crucible which is, again imho, overrated as a lock piece.  Granted the deck that plays mine has access to crop rotation, vamp and demonic all for strip mine but aside from crucible/strip I feel crucible is weak in the current 10 basics/fetches format or meta.  We all also know that mine is somewhat synergistic with that crucible but the deck wants to create a solic lock not play around with recurring lands that produce all colored mana.  I think red/blue or mud are solid choices based on the lock components used and other powerful spells included.

[Rancor1]

Sure it can, but the point is that you can stall on mana, not becasue you don't haveenough lands, but because you have to replay your Gemstone Mines instead of dropping new lands.

Well, in your example, you didn't have another land anyway, and as your other source was a workshop, you weren't playing the welder (not like you needed it in that situation anyway.) The point is, Gemstone Mine is still the best option, and Crucible makes it better before it's worse.

[andrewpate]

Agreed.  The only other 5-color on a reasonable power level is Forbidden Orchard, which is horrible negergy with Smokestack.  The others (Tarnished Citadel, Grand Colliseum, etc.) are all really terrible.

The one other land that I might experiment with some in place of Gemstone Mine would be Tendo Ice Bridge.  Has anyone tried this?  It casts a Welder or Meditate only once, but it taps for colorless as well.  In the earlier scenario, a Bridge would solve the problem completely since you don't need to use the counter to cast your artifacts.  It has been in and out of my Stax lists of late, although I haven't been testing them as much as some of you.  I'd like to hear some thoughts on it.

[Clown of Tresserhorn]

Imho, the reason mine sucks is because the deck must now play with crucible which is, again imho, overrated as a lock piece. Granted the deck that plays mine has access to crop rotation, vamp and demonic all for strip mine but aside from crucible/strip I feel crucible is weak in the current 10 basics/fetches format or meta. We all also know that mine is somewhat synergistic with that crucible but the deck wants to create a solic lock not play around with recurring lands that produce all colored mana. I think red/blue or mud are solid choices based on the lock components used and other powerful spells included.

You're missing a bigger picture. Smokestack + Crucible is amazing. It lets you keep your board position while screwing over theirs. By itself, it's not very good, but even the threat of wasteland + crucible makes me play it. Not to mention the synergy it has with the rest of the deck.

Without going into specifics, stax isn't necessarily about creating that hard lock. Without trinisphere, you must play stax in a different way. Each lock spell you play slows down your opponent. In this way, you slowly take your opponent out of the game by attacking on multiple fronts. You got basics? Okay, I'll play shaman, no moxes? cool, I'll play wasteland. Keep in mind, with decks only running 5 basics, it's only 5 permanents. The chances of them drawing multiple basics to your disruption and smokestack aren't very good. Every spell in the deck is designed to slow your opponent down enough so you can deliver the final blow. Coverage of Kevin's performance at Syracuse shows this (or atleast I think so). Because of this, I still haven't switched to UR or monbrown. Simply put, the cards you get from 5c are way more important than the little added consistency of UR.

With that in mind, the best non-city 5c land is still gemstone mine. Tendo ice bridge really really sucks. In a 5c build, colored mana is just as important, maybe even more so, than colorless mana. The deck has no trouble reaching 3-4 mana early game, but hitting that 1 colored mana is very important. Plus, postboard, you'll need to bring in things like choke, rack and ruin, or REB.

-Bob

[juzam2]

have you tested orb of dreams insted of sphere resistance. the effect of this card is amazing in workshop decks, while you cast smokestack and other artifacts your oponent only plays a spell for turn. this is an amazing advantage for you in decks as can be stax, W- Slavery (i have tested it in this deck in the side, when you eliminate mindslaver and other some cards for 4 copies of orb of dreams and Bosh, iron Golem) welder mud, 5/3... try it

[Machinus]

have you tested orb of dreams insted of sphere resistance. the effect of this card is amazing in workshop decks, while you cast smokestack and other artifacts your oponent only plays a spell for turn. this is an amazing advantage for you in decks as can be stax, W- Slavery (i have tested it in this deck in the side, when you eliminate mindslaver and other some cards for 4 copies of orb of dreams and Bosh, iron Golem) welder mud, 5/3... try it

Orb of dreams buys you one turn. Actually it doesn't even buy you a turn since your opponent still gets to drop all their acceleration and cast free spells.

Besides, root maze does the same thing for G, and look at how much play that gets.

[andrewpate]

have you tested orb of dreams insted of sphere resistance. the effect of this card is amazing in workshop decks, while you cast smokestack and other artifacts your oponent only plays a spell for turn. this is an amazing advantage for you in decks as can be stax, W- Slavery (i have tested it in this deck in the side, when you eliminate mindslaver and other some cards for 4 copies of orb of dreams and Bosh, iron Golem) welder mud, 5/3... try it

I have to agree with Machinus on this one:  Orb of Dreams is really terrible.  I'll admit that it adds a bit to Smokestack, since they are playing everything tapped and then sacrificing some of it.  But that is nowhere near enough to justify inclusion and even if it were it wouldn't be over Sphere of Resistance.  Sphere shuts down mana acceleration, where Orb only delays it by a turn.  Orb shines in matchups against decks that win by putting out a lot of permanents, which is basically just random aggro and Dragon.  There are much better hosers for Dragon, and Stax owns random aggro as it is.

That said, I must also point out that Bosh sucks in Stax.  Maybe if this were Extended, but here, just no.  I don't even run Karn, Silver Golem, and that card is both cheaper and stronger than Bosh.  You mention Welder MUD and 5/3... I don't think your card choices are any better in those decks, but, despite also having Mishra's Workshops, they are so different from Stax anyway that you might as well say that Oath needs to run Thirst for Knowledge because it is good in Slaver and both decks have Mana Drain.

For me at this point, the lock components bearing consideration are:

Tangle Wire
Sphere of Resistance
Smokestack
Crucible of Worlds
Chalice of the Void
Trinisphere

Does anyone see anything else as needing to go on this list?

[Rapalaman1]

Regarding Orb of Dreams:
It certainly has a spot in the deck, but I think that spot is the Sideboard. This card has several uses but the reason it has 3-4 copies in my SB is because it single-handedly beats dragon. It fundamentally destroys the deck, every time their permanents come back into play they come in tapped. No floating mana or drawing cards via bazaar.

[Clown of Tresserhorn]

Orb of dreams is terrible. Why would want to waste a turn casting an expensive artifact? You say it's awesome vs. dragon, but so is wasteland and Tormod's Crypt. Last time I checked, these cost nothing and are actually GOOD against other decks.

[defector]

I've been stuck in Russia for seven moonths now and not played in type 1 so if this is coplate whack let me know.  Why not drop the one 3sphere, as a one of I belive its dead.  Let that go and either run a 4th medititate(also a lock component in my opinion), or a welder(which is a lock compontent, not a cructh as anyone who had had a wire inplay and in the yard can attest to).  I don't see a need for 4 welders, but aty least 3.  You nly need one, and 4 meditates is nice.
defector

[Conan_barberarn]

Orb of Dreams from the sideboard vs Dragon is not a good idea. They will just side in Caller of the Claw and then it doesn't matter if his perms won't untap, he'll win next turn with inf 2/2:s.

/Gustav

[Rancor1]

@Defector: The single Trinisphere is really good. With Smokestack or Welder/Tangle Wire it is a hard lock (unless he has ESGs, but your odds are still damn good.) I Ttinker for the Trinisphere a lot, even in the late game.

I could also see playing Glimmervoid if you hate Mine that much, as its a bit better than the other alternatives, but it's still not as good as Gemstone.

[andrewpate]

I've been stuck in Russia for seven moonths now and not played in type 1 so if this is coplate whack let me know.  Why not drop the one 3sphere, as a one of I belive its dead.  Let that go and either run a 4th medititate(also a lock component in my opinion), or a welder(which is a lock compontent, not a cructh as anyone who had had a wire inplay and in the yard can attest to).  I don't see a need for 4 welders, but aty least 3.  You nly need one, and 4 meditates is nice.
defector

A single Trinisphere is not a dead card.  It is as good as ever on turn one (better, given that people will be preparing for it less), certainly, but it has never been a dead draw.  A player might be fighting to get out from under a Crucible of Worlds/Smokestack lock, and a Trinisphere can be back-breaking there.  And even if it does not establish a hard lock, it shuts down anything Storm based and seriously inconveniences just about everything not packing Mishra's Workshop.  It is still the best prison piece we have, we just have to plan our deck around usually not having it.

[MaxxMatt]

@Clown

Orb of Dream is "terrible" if played alone.
I suggest to another synergy to the deck adding both Orb of Dreams AND Winter Orb.

While you can simply tap a single MW to achieve a good plateau of 3 mana - and not considering the other forms of accelerations -  any other deck can't abuse of nothing of his own deck, especially if you are considering the other ongoing locking-components.

The only consideration that could be done is IN WHICH build add a combination of cards like this one.

In a multicolored Stax-like deck, there aren't many opportunities and slots to free to add them and the deck is extremely ( colored ) mana  intensive. I'll see them coming up in the players favour when the new MUD's build that we are testing and tuning would be released.

Regarding the list of 5C-Stax proposed here, I think that CotVs are needed while there are some choices that could be excluded from the maindeck ( Spot removals and situational spells such like StPs and Crop )

The build that I would play would have

( 16 ) 4x of Smokestack, CotVs, Wires, Welders
( 09 ) 3x of CoW, Meditates, Spheres
( 10 ) 1x of Ancestral, Walk, Balance, Y Will, Demonic, Vampiric, Tinker, Trinisphere, Karn, Triskelion
( 25 ) Mana Fonts


Even with a build like this, there are good percentages of losing against Storm Based deck, because of their basic lands and your ability of dealing with them only with Strip and Smokestacks.

On this porpouse, I would like to find some space for a third winner ( Sundering Titan ). The Titan is effectively your only good way to get rid of their lands in a quick and productive manner. The build has at least 3 direct ways to tutor for it and a lot of drawers to ctively dealing with opponents counters and defences.



The sideboard should run Defence Grids for the control matchup and the slots freed by maindecking CotVs can be used for them and other tools.
The StPs can be placed in the sideboard to get rid of Oath's creatures and opponents Welders


The deck was extremely good BEFORE Trinisphere and CoW were printed, so working a bit around it, should totaly revamp this forgotten and ligthly played tier1.

[defector]

OK Ill take your word for it, I need to get back and do some testing.  I love stax, and am sure it will survive this setback.  I something to say on the chalice question, I loved chalice, but with the drain decks packing welders, it may have to sit back for now.  Its a brutal card but for the two little red men, the goblin and gorilla.  If they decline, than chalice should be a four of.
defector

[Wollblad]

Regarding the list of 5C-Stax proposed here, I think that CotVs are needed while there are some choices that could be excluded from the maindeck ( Spot removals and situational spells such like StPs and Crop )

The build that I would play would have

( 16 ) 4x of Smokestack, CotVs, Wires, Welders
( 09 ) 3x of CoW, Meditates, Spheres
( 10 ) 1x of Ancestral, Walk, Balance, Y Will, Demonic, Vampiric, Tinker, Trinisphere, Karn, Triskelion
( 25 ) Mana Fonts

Even with a build like this, there are good percentages of losing against Storm Based deck, because of their basic lands and your ability of dealing with them only with Strip and Smokestacks.

On this porpouse, I would like to find some space for a third winner ( Sundering Titan ). The Titan is effectively your only good way to get rid of their lands in a quick and productive manner. The build has at least 3 direct ways to tutor for it and a lot of drawers to ctively dealing with opponents counters and defences.

The sideboard should run Defence Grids for the control matchup and the slots freed by maindecking CotVs can be used for them and other tools.
The StPs can be placed in the sideboard to get rid of Oath's creatures and opponents Welders.

A very good contribution indeed except that as Clown has already stated: 28 mana sources are in the lower limits, you'll probably need 29 and I cannot see how on earth you think that you will get away with only 25

Regarding the Titan, I have cut it with the reasoning that nowadays, everyting is about the first few turns, and there, Sundering Titan is too slow unless you draw a Tinker (you won't have time to tutor for it).

My sideboard looks for the moment like:
3 Winter Orb - against control
3 Swords to Plowshares - mirror, Slaver
3 Seal of Cleansing - mirror, Oath, Mono Blue
1 Triskelion - mirror, FCG
2 artifact removal, for example Viashino Heretic or R&R or Gorilla Shaman
3 Chains of Mephistopheles - against combo
a lot against the mirrormatch becasue you want to side out most of the lock components. Winter Orb makes much of the work Defense Grid makes, but in harmony with the rest of the deck hindiring your opponent from making things on his turn as well as on your turn.

[Greistal]

In the meanwhile, I've played a version of 5C-Stax in a 126 people Italian TAL tournament going 5-2. A friend of mine piloted a slightly different build to second place.

Here's what he played:

// Lands (20)
    4 Wasteland
    1 Strip Mine
    4 Mishra's Workshop
    1 Tolarian Academy
    4 Gemstone Mine
    4 City of Brass
    2 Mirrodin's Core

// Artifact Mana (8)
    1 Sol Ring
    1 Mana Crypt
    1 Mox Emerald
    1 Mox Ruby
    1 Mox Pearl
    1 Mox Sapphire
    1 Mox Jet
    1 Black Lotus

// Creatures (8)
    4 Goblin Welder
    1 Karn, Silver Golem
    2 Triskelion
    1 Sundering Titan

// Colored Spells (9)
    1 Vampiric Tutor
    1 Demonic Tutor
    1 Balance
    1 Ancestral Recall
    1 Tinker
    3 Chains of Mephistopheles
    1 Seal of Cleansing

// Artifact Lock (15)
    4 Smokestack
    3 Tangle Wire
    3 Crucible of Worlds
    1 Trinisphere
    4 Sphere of Resistance

// Sideboard (15)
SB: 2 Fire/Ice
SB: 4 Swords to Plowshares
SB: 2 Seal of Cleansing
SB: 2 Rack and Ruin
SB: 2 Jester's Cap
SB: 3 Choke

The deck requires more colored mana that he found in Mirrodin's Core. I did not play them with a more traditional build, but I did not top8.

Bye,
Greistal

[Changster]

Hey guys,

I've been on a little hiatus due to massive amounts of school work, interviewing for jobs, and trying to graduate.  Now that i've gotten that out... I'd like to mention something about Stax... It's still very viable.

This past weekend, I went to the Columbus All Proxy Mox tournament and won it.  I was specifically told not to post a decklist, so I will respect those who did not want me to.  If you would like a decklist, PM or IM me.

A few things that I have found (without revealing my whole deck):

*The Crucible Lock is a HOUSE!
*Crop Rotation to a Strip Mine while Crucible is out there = win.
*Trinisphere was useful, but it's only just as good as a SoR if you don't have another threat like Smokestack on the board.  (aka.  Overrated)
*SoR is still quite good against combo, but very weak mid/late game versus many other decks.
*1st turn Smokestack against Oath is very strong.

I hope this solidifies some of your testing results.  All of my opponents at this tournament were very respectable and competitive players.  I will be keeping up with this post, so keep the ideas flowing

Trinistax v.  0.25 will be revealed post-SCG P9 Chicago.

-Roland

[andrewpate]

Did you have Chains of Mephistopheles?  And if not, did you face Tog?  I'm assuming from your assertion that you run Crop Rotation that you are using the 5-color mana base--did you not have problems with Gemstone Mine and Sphere of Resistance?  I'm curious because my two main problems right now seem to be beating blue-based control without Chains (Sideboard Choke, perhaps?  Seems slow.) and making sure that I actually have access to colored mana at any given time.

@Greistal
Your build is packing a ton of cards (Sundering Titan, Triskelion, Balance, etc.) that are all dead against Storm, and no interesting options in that regard in the sideboard, either (Jester's Cap is unappealing, since you need to hit Tendrils of Agony, some combination of Death, Burning, and Cunning Wishes, and on some rare occasions Brain Freeze as well).  Do you have a combo-light metagame, or are you just relying on early Sphere of Resistance and Chains of Mephistopheles to bog them down until you can get a pile of lock parts together?  If so, how well has that worked?

[the boogie man]

I think that it really doesn't matter if the chokes are slow, control is slow (usually) and the chokes really aren't too slow at all. And chains completly hoses combo. utterly destroys it. rarely will a combo deck have all the pieces in hand the turn that they combo out.

[Changster]

@ andrewpate - to answer all of your questions:
*I did not incorporate Chains of Mephistopheles because like Kevin Cron said, "it was a metagame call."  CoM is a very strong card regardless, but I  wasn't ready to make the leap into that direction with the deck just yet.

*I did not face Tog during the tournament, although there was at least one Tog there.  The matchup with Tog is much closer nowadays, but I'll stress it again... Crucible Lock is what keeps this deck alive.

*I did not have any problems using Gemstone Mine along with Sphere of Resistance.  Granted, it may seem like the land may be a little weak, but with careful control of how your mana is spent from turn to turn, by the time it dies, you'll most likely have a lock set up.

*I dealt against combo with Chalice SB, and against control with REBs.  

The deck is not easy to play because of the weaker hands it produces without the support of 3 other Trinispheres.  However, Sphere of Resistance first turn has similar results when followed by threats.  Sphere of Resistance can still give control players headaches in the early game.

@ Willow_Wisperer
I wouldn't say "rarely" that combo has all the pieces in hand.  My loss during the Swiss rounds was to Kobold Clamp in which the guy went off first turn both games.  I tried to mulligan into something that would provide me with 1st turn disruption or Chalice for 0, but instead I ended up playing only 2 cards the whole match.  It went like this:  "City of Brass, Ancestral Recall, Go."  It might have been luck that he had consecutive 1st turn wins, but when a combo player knows his deck well... watch out!  

Dragon, in my opinion, is one of the decks to fear.  I won against it in the first round, but I got lucky.  The matchup there is rough for any stax player since Dragon packs in so many ways to win nowadays.

[Clown of Tresserhorn]

Just a quick question to all stax players...is tangle wire good enough? I'm currently running w/out them with chalice and shaman in it's place, and it's just as strong. Tangle wire just seemed really weak unless you played it after a stax, but that seems like a win more situation. Obv, if you incorporate wires, welders come in as well. Having played stax w/out welder, I rarely miss it. I'm still not 100% on what the disruption base should be. I do think that chains def. has a place in this deck, as it's pretty savage in the combo matchup, and it slows down control quite a bit, enough for you to establish your "hard lock" (crucible + Stax).


Also, if you think orb of dreams is "the hawt sawse" I advise you look at root maze. G is alot easier to get than 4.

-Bob

[Marton]

orb of dreams cost 3 to play, not 4. But it's still unplayable.

[forests failed you]

The Purpose of Tangle Wire is to stop your opponent from playing main phase bombs while you set up your board, (Mainphase bombs eg. Tinker, Oath, et cetera).  Also, Tangle wire is the only thing that stops decks that play a lot of little beaters from getting in there and killing you while you are trying to up the counters on your Smokestack.  Plus, you can buy a lot of time by welding Tangle Wires into other Tangle Wires.  When thinking about Tangle Wire you have to remember that it is one of the most powerful non-mana artifacts ever printed.  If you exclude the Wire you are tapping you only tap a total of three permanents over the course of three turns, while your opponent has to tap a total of ten.   It also keeps your opponent off Drain Mana, which is usually going to be good game.

[Vegeta2711]

Do you guys actually have a plan against Bird Shit past Balance? I've found nearly every game I could stop Balance either by holding back counters or naming Balance with Meddling Mage, I won. BS simply has a large number of counters and large beatdown men and hence I have found in testing it wasn't hard to survive typical Stax disruption long enough to live.

So I'm curious if anyone has a solution for this match, past 'cast Balance'.

[forests failed you]

I have found that play Tangle Wire and then add a counter to Smokestack is an extremely effective strategy against aggro.  It's the main reason aggro-control decks like Fish disappeared in the first place.

[Vegeta2711]

I have found that play Tangle Wire and then add a counter to Smokestack is an extremely effective strategy against aggro. It's the main reason aggro-control decks like Fish disappeared in the first place.

Actually it was 5/3 and Oath as far as history is concerned.

Also, exactly how are you getting Smokestack to resolve? That's the thing, yeah if your allowed to do whatever you want, you can win. But my problem is the BS player will typically be able to counter / stop a couple of your threats. Hence my issue with the match-up.

And for the billionith time. Aggro. Not Agro.

[forests failed you]

Well, to be honest I have never, ever, ever, ever had any problem beating aggro control with Stax, pre or post Trinisphere restriction.  Generally, the deck should have enough early disruption via spheres and Mana denial to resolve at least some of its bombs over the course of the next three turns.  If this isn't the case you should probably mulligan, as Stax doesn't have a strong draw engine to correct poor draws.  Also, if you need reminding Stax also has that one Mana red creature that brings countered bombs (such as Smokestack and Tangle Wire) directly back into play.  Decks like Fish and BS should be the easiest match-ups for Stax simple because 85% of the cards in deck directly hose that type of strategy.  Tangle Wire is also important because it allows you time to regroup after playing through an opponent's first few counterspells.

And just for reference in the metagame where I play there were several talented Fish players who could beat Oath and even 5/3, (although it was an extremely sketchy match up), but didn't abandon the deck until players began to play Stax.  If anything Stax has a bad match-up against Slavery because they have all the same counters as other decks and Welders of their own.  A Smokestack and Tangle Wire on the table should win against any deck that wants to cast creatures and beat down with them, and it is your job to put those two into play through any means necessary.  

Also, my computer's spell check changes aggro to aggro;  if you have any further problems with my use or misuse of magic slang I would appreciate it if you did it through PM or not at all.  Thanks.

[Greistal]

@Greistal
Your build is packing a ton of cards (Sundering Titan, Triskelion, Balance, etc.) that are all dead against Storm, and no interesting options in that regard in the sideboard, either (Jester's Cap is unappealing, since you need to hit Tendrils of Agony, some combination of Death, Burning, and Cunning Wishes, and on some rare occasions Brain Freeze as well).  Do you have a combo-light metagame, or are you just relying on early Sphere of Resistance and Chains of Mephistopheles to bog them down until you can get a pile of lock parts together?  If so, how well has that worked?

We have many storm combo in the form of TPS who is played by many top players and regularly find its way to top8.

In fact - in my build - I had also Chalices in side.

My friend, who top8-ed with the build above, was paired with 1 TPS and won 2-1.
Keep in mind that Jester's Cap is strong against Italy's TPS recent U/B and U/B/g versions who only play three win condition (sometimes with a single Cunning Wish for Brain Freeze as a forth) and no Burning or Death Wish.

Against TPS we've found Sphere of Resistance to be better than we thought initially. While in theory they can go "Land, Mox, Mox, Mox," in reality they have many difficulties going off under it, and must bounce it.
This makes SoR somehow similar to Trinisphere. A plus, by respect to Trinisphere, is that Rebuild costs 4 under SoR and that SoR is not dead in multiples.

Also we found that a non-artifact lock component is required. I used to sideboard Rule of Law, but we now use Chains of Mephistopheles.
Maindecking them is a metagame call, like Kevin said, but it was right in that Blue-based metagame (less artifacts after Trinisphere restriction).

@Clown of Tresserhorn:
I find Wire useful also against counter decks. They must counter it unless they accept to be unable to use their precious Mana Drains for the next few turns.

@Vegeta2711:
My friend lost the final against an Italian version of Bird Shit called Pink Shit. To be sincere he was very unlucky, drawing almost every mana source in the first match and a weak hand on the second.
I still think that if the match would be played another 10 times he would win at least 7 of them. His sideboard is especially suited to handle blue and creatures.

Greistal

[Rico Suave]

From my experience, playing Stax against Bird Shit is difficult.  The deck plays out differently than Fish does.

The one thing they can't answer effectively is Balance.  I found that whenever I cast it, I would either win or at least provide a chance to win when there was none.  Barring that, it was unexpectedly very difficult to win.  Wire often just fades away, and Welder is not his usual self against a deck with MMage and StP so your options against their counters are more limited than normal.  Additionally, trying to play around Serenity becomes a real hassle.  

One thing that put things into perspective for me was when I lost with a Trike to double Werebear.  If I had been playing against Fish and saw 2 threats I would have easily gained control of the board long enough to find another bomb, but Bird Shit swung through.  Bird Shit sets a much faster clock than Fish, and Smokestack fuels threshold.