Gat and it's niche

[the boogie man]

    Since the restriction of trinisphere, control has resumed the role of "archetype to beat", with control slaver, oath, 3cc, severance belcher, auriok control, and to a lesser extent, sensei sensei and tps. some of the other  commomn decks right now are combo decks, too, including deathlong, belcher, meandeck tendrills, and dragon. Inluded with the restriction of trinisphere, Gat lost its most potent hoser, barring a very early smokestack. wth that, I give you Gat. I think that it is a viable contender in this metagame, with all of the combo and control.

the decklist:

4 polluted delta
3 underground sea
3 tropical island
2 island
2 wasteland
1 strip mine
1 flooded strand
1 swamp

5 moxes
1 black lotus

4 quirion dryad
2 psychatog
1 darkstell collosus

4 brainstorm
4 nights whisper
2 sleight of hand
2 cunning wish
1 tinker
1 mystical tutor
1 demonic tutor
1 vamp tutor
1 ancestrall recall
1 time walk
1 gush
1 yawgmoths will

4 force of will
3 duress
3 daze

1 ghastly demise
1 skeletal scrying
1 berserk
1 naturalize
1 tranquil domain (could be replaced by something else that is a lot better against oath)
3 ground seal
2 hydroblast
2 hurkyls recall
1 rushing river
1 misdirection ( could be replaced by duress)
1 engineered explosives ( could be replaced by duress)

here are some card choices:

first, the sideboard:
duress: pretty obvious. the fourth one is an addition onto the sideboard that i would llike to change(  <<did anyone notice the two l's in like?). they are a bomb against control, especially oath, since you can snag oaths,  counters, draw, or the occasional blessing.

rushing river: this card is a huge tempo booster, and it can take care of two oathed up creatures at a time, and stuff like that.

hurkyl's recall: this is a house against workshop, which is one of the bad matchups this deck has. having to replay all of its permanents sucks, espaecally when you do it and the end of turn and they have to discard a bunch.

misdirection: this serves as an additional counter against oath, or as a tempo booster to misdirect a random rancor or tendrills copy, but i do't know how useful this has been. may end up being cut for the last duress.

engineered explosives: this is another card that seems borderline. it also may be too reactive. but it does destroy a plethora of things, including multiple welders, oaths, fishies, chalice >0, and stuff, but costs a lot for multiples sometimes, and is a permanent. i am wondering if it is worth it.

berserk: kill card with tog or collossus.

ground seal: a superstar against dragon, cs, ca, or auriok control, and it allows you to board out sleight of hands without giving up card selection. really cool.

tranquil domain: just in there for oaths and animates and chains, as it cannot be misdirected. but i may cut it in favor of more things that deall with oath better.

naturalize: a catch-all.

skeletal scyring: this is in the side board instead of fact or fiction, because it draws a lot more, and it can be cast early for card advantage(r). the disynergy with tog and will is negligible, because you rarely run into a situation where multiple lands in the graveyard will serve you better than cards in hand.

ghastly demise: instant speed non-tog removal for the randomn creatures that pop up.

hydroblast: For welders and dragon and goblins. 1 could be cut for something, because it seems that sometimes i have too much hate for these, and i need some more for other decks.

 now on to the main deck:

tinker>>>>>>collossus: with all the artifact acceleration in the form of moxes, there is hardly a time when i can't cast the tinker for te win. collossus can be berserk and trample over for a stupid amount of damage. is also indestructible. i side this out for the control matches, because it is a very nice drain traget, is card disadvantage, and because i don't need to win too early.

sleight of hand: if there was any other better cantrips, these would probably get cut for them. they are useful, though, as they can get around chains and uba mask, and are easily sided out.

cunning wish: sometimes you wish you had more of these, and sometimes they sit around. i don't know whether or not to add more, because you can also just easily tutor them up with the three tutors in the deck. the full compliment of moxes help thow thesew out there early, too.

vamp tutor: the reason that i like this is because you can tutor up a land or a threat, not just draw or will. but you still can if you want.

nights whispers: card advantage cantrips. really awsome.

daze: for early game counterwars. i really lke it.

wastes: just to randomly screw the oponent with there colors, coll cool. works well with daze.

5 fetch: allows me to run basics and reliably draw the fetches. with brainstorm this is an awsome combo, and you also thin your deck like crazy, almost insuring a good topdeck.

i don't have match analysises(?) yet, but combo is really simple, because you run a good amount of disruption. please post comments on the deck and critize all you want.

[Stupid_Newb]

tinker>>>>>>collossus: with all the artifact acceleration in the form of moxes, there is hardly a time when i can't cast the tinker for te win. collossus can be berserk and trample over for a stupid amount of damage. is also indestructible. i side this out for the control matches, because it is a very nice drain traget, is card disadvantage, and because i don't need to win too early.

...

wastes: just to randomly screw the oponent with there colors, coll cool. works well with daze.

On Tinker/Collossus, with so many Welders running around, is something like that really a good idea? I can see where you're coming from with an early 11/11 beatstick, but Welders just screw you. And with lots of StP's being run to stop Oath, that also carries over to this. Plus, if you draw Collossus, it's almost always a dead card (unless of course, you can draw a Brainstorm into a Tinker).

And on Wastelands, I'm not so sure. You run 0 Crucibles, MD or SB, and you run a mere three basics. I'm not saying take them out, but is your manabase resiliant enough with them in? Three basics and 0 Crucibles doesn't seem so hot to me.

[onelovemachine]

Tinker-collosus is terrible.  It just helps you lose vs slaver and won't save you vs oath. 

[JuJu]

You mentioned 3cc, Oath, TPS, Sensei Sensei and all those other decks. So I'll ask, why is this better then those other control archetypes?

[the boogie man]

what i'm trying to get at is that this deck generally has a good games against control. and i agree on the tinker>>collossus, i might remove that to put in an island and another spell, maybe sleight of hand. any suggestions? I might just cut the tinker collossus for sleight of hands, because the mana count is already too high. I might cut the wastelands altogether, put 1 island in, and then add the fourth duress, what about that? that leaves 22 mana, 4 basics, i lied, i need the third tog, so ill put in 1 sleight and a tog instead. need to keep the threat density up.

[JuJu]

In case you haven't noticed, my question hasn't been answered. Threads like these tick me off; if you're going to play something, state why it's better then what else is already out there.

[the boogie man]

Well, what I was saying was that it has both good games against combo and control, so i was just saying that this could be a possible contender in the overall metagame, and there is no reason to be upset. I just wanted help on the decklist. sorry if I offended you.

[onelovemachine]

what i'm trying to get at is that this deck generally has a good games against control

You are incorrect.  Psychatog, as in hulksmash, has a good game vs control.  Gat has poor draw capabilities in comparison to every other control deck in the format and has a slower win condition (takes multiple turns). 

[the boogie man]

But it does have a higher threat density than most control decks and it runs enough disruption, especially for the early game, to get one of it's threats through. and if the first threat gets countered, then it isn't too hard to dig for another one.

[warble]

I'm sorry, but did you cut Mana Drain?  It would appear so.

Please explain how this makes the deck better.  Every deck that does not run mana drain currently has a massive combo to back up that decision.  Psychatog does not, so why did you screw over both your mana base and your counter base simultaneously?

I'm at a loss.

[Ultima]

what i'm trying to get at is that this deck generally has a good games against control

You are incorrect.  Psychatog, as in hulksmash, has a good game vs control.  Gat has poor draw capabilities in comparison to every other control deck in the format and has a slower win condition (takes multiple turns). 

Actually, in point to fact, GAT (when done correctly) does have a good game against control, but again it must be done correctly and played aggressively.

[the boogie man]

I decided to cut the mana drain because I often cannot use the mana. but it may prove useful to add a couple, and throw in a merchant scroll. but so many of the spells in the deck are at such a low casting cost that it proved too painful to run a playset of. maybe i should add two, though, so the list at the top would look like this:

-1 tinker
-1 darksteel collossus
-2 wasteland
-1 daze
+2 mana drain
+1 sleight of hand
+1 merchant scroll
+1 psychatog

that would improve the win conditions against control, add some mana acceleration, add some draw, and add some turn 2 disruption, and a little bit more stability at the cost of some turn 1 disruption, some mana denial(probably a bad choice anyway), and some brokeness. that would leave me with 21 mana sources, which is alright. what are your thoughts on the scroll? if that doesn't cut it, ill put an island in.

the problem that I have running the drains is that it makes the deck play much more reactively, and turns when you want to be casting threats sometiimes you have to waste holding on to the drains. It also hurts a lot to topdeck this with no hand, but I suppose that its better than the daze. comments?

[warble]

I decided to cut the mana drain because I often cannot use the mana.

the problem that I have running the drains is that it makes the deck play much more reactively, and turns when you want to be casting threats sometiimes you have to waste holding on to the drains. It also hurts a lot to topdeck this with no hand

You're really just showing your inexperience with Type 1 here.  Mana Drain has risen to the top of the top because it is the BEST way to respond to a spell.  Period.  If I had to make the sickening choice of running GAT with drain or force, I would choose drain.  Nobody makes this choice, everyone chooses to run Force AND Drain.  We can get into the millions of reasons that blue enjoys drain, but a few would be:
1) Drain is a hard counterspell that costs UU (the minimum total cost of a counterspell)
2) Drain gives an amount of mana that usually correlates to the threat it has just taken care of.  For cards like Tinker, this translates directly from an opponent's Threat into a Black Lotus worth of colorless mana.
3) Drain slows down opposing decks because not only does it threaten to counter, but it forces smaller plays in the early game because the threat of giving a GAT player 7 colorless mana for draining hardcast Pentavus is too great to ignore.
4) Even if you take the mana burn, it is an amount that directly correlates to the threat countered.  When given the choice between a resolved Humility and 4 mana burn, GAT always chooses to burn for 4.
5) The amount of mana available to a player during their main phase usually is limited by the turn number.  Any card that breaks this rule (Mox/Lotus/Crypt/Sol/Drain/Workshop) is breaking a fundamental restriction of the game, and therefore gives the deck an inherent advantage over decks that do not break this rule.

Finally, topdecking a drain in the late game is one of the most beautiful topdecks in magic.  Yes, you have not responded to a threat and are not going to immediately win the game.  However, the fact is you just ensured that you will not LOSE the game.  As important as it is to win, if you cannot lose and buy yourself a turn with the card drawn, it is equivalent to a time walk.  If you drew a time walk late in the game, you're very happy.  If you draw a drain with an empty hand, you should be just as happy.  If you aren't, it probably is not due to the fact that you drew the drain, but what happened during the turns that your hand was emptied.

[onelovemachine]

But it does have a higher threat density than most control decks and it runs enough disruption, especially for the early game, to get one of it's threats through.

I would like you to compare GAT to control slaver and Oath.  Looking at control slaver, it appears that you have more threats than the slaver player.  In actuality you'll probably never want to drop a tog for fear of mindslaver.  So you end up with 4 dryads as threats and they end up with 4 welders and 1 tinker as early threats.  Vs. oath playing creatures is terrible.  Add that to the fact that you have to deal with their four threats that cost the same as your four threats but win them the game faster and you can easily identify a losing situation.  Compare draw engines:

Jeff Anand's Slaver
4thirst
4brainstorm
recall
fof
scrying

Goth slaver:
4thirst
4brainstorm
4ak
2-3intuition
recall

Shay slaver:
4thirst
4brainstorm
2-3intuition
2deep analysis
recall
0-1fof

Oath:
4ak
2-4intuition
recall
3-4thirst

Your GAT:
4brainstorm
4night's whisper
2sleight
recall
gush

While I realize that GAT is tempo based, realize that it is severely outdrawn by all of these decks and therefore has no way to stop their game ending threats.  Both of these control decks can end the game faster than a quirion dryad and outdraw the deck at the same time.

[leviat]

Forgive my cynicism, but this thread is pretty empty of any real content. All I see is a thread with Whisper GAT and Tinker+Colossus. I'm not technically a moderator so you're safe from my wrath but I'm tired of yet another thread with "XXX is gone so YYY is good again [Post outdated decklist] ". If you're going to post on the non-newbie forum, you should really try to post something worth discussing rather than a deck that already has/had a billion threads about it.

In short, innovate, not regurgitate.

Oh... and...

If I had to make the sickening choice of running GAT with drain or force, I would choose drain.

You would be wrong. Force is much more important then Drain for GAT so stop showing your own inexperience. But that's for another thread, I'm not going to waste my time explaining it to you on this thread.

[Yawgmoths_Dummy]

I have to agree with Leviat, little content on a long dead deck. Let me illustrate a very common occurance in a current Vintage match.

Me (Oath) vs you(GAT)

I win die roll, flip of coin, I'll go first.
Turn 1: Me- Play Forbidden Orchard, play Mox Whatever, tap both, play Oath of Druids, (you get a dude). You respond, FoW, (pitching whatever blue card), I respond FoW (pitching whatever blue card).
Now occasionally you might have another Force back, but that is reasonably rare, (and if you did what card would you have to ditch on the second Force???) Either something you need to draw more cards with or a Tog.

Now it's your turn, you are now way behind in both tempo and card advantage, or you're going to be seeing a flying, hasted, pro whatever, beatstick as soon as you say, "go".

And if Akroma flips, how are you going to get rid of her? Race, I don't think you have the capablilities.

Sorry but GAT's days are over, it's a nice niche deck, but 3sphere getting restricted does not make this a viable deck again. Just play it 10 times vs Oath and 10 times vs CS, currently the two most dominating decks in the format, you will see why.

[the boogie man]

It is extremely rare that oath gets that kind of hand. most of the time, it needs to dig a lot for it. not to mention that i run a lot of disruption, and I run a lot more threats than you do. and by the way, control slaver often only runs 8 disruption, and there are plenty of wish cards that I can grab to get rid of a lot of the threats that it plays.
vs. cs
i run 11 disruption, 7 threats, 0 dead cards.
they run 6-7 threats, usually 2-3 are hard to cast, and 8 disruption
but yeah.