[Discussion] Budget Worse Than Fish

[plouften]

Hi all !

I'm new to this forum and to Vintage.

SO i would build a budget deck and i watched at the results in different tournaments.

Like I'm french i watched to the French Championship and in the best Unpo deck i saw 2 Big Sh*T doing good results.

But when i saw their manabase and draw, i searched another deck for me to take ideas.

I saw then Worse Than Fish, a deck that seems to be really good and maybe buildable in budget.

So here's my decklist :

Manabase

4 Flooded Strand
4 Tundra
4 tropical Island
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
3 Mishra's Factory
2 Island

Creatures

4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Wild Mongrel
4 Meddling Mage
3 Rootwater Thief

Spells

4 Force of Will
3 Daze
4 Aether Vial
4 Standstill
3 Swords to plowshares
3 Chalice of the Void
2 Umezawa's Jitte

My side is inspired by the last reflections on the non-budget build with mystical + tinker + DSC and some Kira, needle, Naturalize//Seal of cleansing and maybe BEB.

Now i explain my choices :

Manabase :

4 Fetch Lands maybe need 1 more ?
8 dual lands
5 Wastelands for mana denial
Only 3 Mishra's Factory because i think that 4 is too many when i start with a hand with 2 manas : waste + factory
2 Island to complete this base

Creatures :

8 big fatty :  basking + Mongrel which can be pumped it's most of times the win solutions
4 meddling mage : i love into vial blocking the opponent
3 rootwater : i don't know for these i hesitate with spiketail hatchling, cloud, gaea's skyfolk .. Give me advices please
2 Ninja : good draw, effect that doesn't broke standstill, maybe 3 needed ?

Spells :

4 force : the better counterspell in budget
3 Daze : i longly hesitate on these but when they're not in my deck i fell nude ... I don't know if it's a good choice however
4 vial + 4 Standstill : the base of the deck , two very good cards with a very good interaction
3 Stp : i add white to Worse Than Fish only for it lol i think it's the best creature removal maybe 4 ??
3 Chalice : Chalice at 0 is amazing VS a powered deck
2 Jitte : for creature removal, boost on my creatures ... 3 is too much but 2 is good

So I wanna your advices concerning this deck and if something hurts you ; let me know.

Thank you and sorry for my English.

[Freelancer]

A couple of things:
1) Mishra's factory is best when used in multiples, your really need 4.
2) Swords is less needed here than in most fish decks because you have umezawa's jitte (surprisingly it does a lot of dirty work). Besides there are only a couple of worthy creatures to kill in T1, most of them can be killed already with 2 hits from jitte (welder/plats/jugs/big artifact fat/fishies) anyway.
3) If you cut a couple of swords from the maindeck you can cut the number of tundra's down to 2 or 3 and make your manabase more resilient to wasteland.
4) Why run standstill when you can run brainstorm? It just seems better here, because you have more threads you want to draw early and lots of cards you want to get rid from. You also need A LOT of mana and well brainstorm is 1 mana cheaper.
5) Chalice of the void is best used as a 4-off, you really want to see it very early in the game. As a 3-off this happens a lot less, I know you will get more dead cards (duplicate chalices) but this is offset because of the early game power of chalice. Besides you always have wild mongrel to pitch it to (and brainstorm if you decide to run it).
6) Run ninja of the deep hours, the last thing you want to do is go below 3 with this guy. He is SO insane with aether vial/mage/rootwalla and is much better than standstill as a draw engine.
7) If you run white maindeck you should definitely run ray of revelation in your sideboard, its da shiznit against oath/dragon. (probably only 3 are needed because oath is already easier with 4x mage maindeck)


PS If you don't want your post to be moved to the newbie forum, edit some more content like matchups and please use the spell check option. It really does help a lot.

[Dralock]

Please re-edit your post to make sense. Your card count and your explinations are not in synch with each other.

Also, without Ninja, your draw engine is crap. Standstills are not enough to get you through a game, and brainstorms will not do it for you either. You need more draw to fuel the mongrel.

I disagree with freelancer about swords. Swords is an effective tool, as removal is key to the aggro game. There are plenty of times I have had to swing in a creature to die just to get jitte counters where swords would have worked just as easily.

On your manabase:

4 Flooded Strand
4 Tundra
4 tropical Island
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
3 Mishra's Factory
2 Island

This should be:

4x Flooded Strand
2x Tundra
3x Tropical
4x Waste
1x Strip
4x Mishras
2x Island
1x Plains

If you cannot get any moxen to help you out. I am taking it your tournament does not allow for proxies. You should be fine with only 2 tundra.

There is already a thread for WTF right now, so I would probably stop this one here and go post over there. I posted a deck very similar to yours on that thread, so it shouldn't be closed.

[Freelancer]

I disagree with freelancer about swords. Swords is an effective tool, as removal is key to the aggro game. There are plenty of times I have had to swing in a creature to die just to get jitte counters where swords would have worked just as easily.

Reread my post, I said you should cut it down to about 2 or 3 copies. Because it is redundant and not necessary as a 4-off (and probably as a 3-off), better stuff can be run in its place. This is not a creature heavy format, and jitte takes care of A LOT. Besides I rather have jitte that takes care of a thread than swords, because swords decreases my clock and jitte increases my clock. Jitte is just more versatile and stronger than swords in this deck, I am a strong advocate of swords but not as a 4-off (and probably not as a 3-off either) in here. It also makes your manabase a lot weaker in the progress.

Disadvantages swords (compared to jitte) in this deck:
- Requires W mana on the board
- Little creatures in T1
- Doesn't increase the clock or gain life (compared to jitte)
Advantages:
+Cheap
+Removes anything
+Doesn't need to deal damage to be effective (compared to jitte)
+Isn't legendary (compared to jitte)

The way I see it is that the advantages of jitte (clock/versatility) are more important in here than the advantages of swords (cheap/removes anything) because with vial you got mana to spare (vial produces insane amounts of mana in here) and the W mana is actually more prohibitive than the double collorless. (you don't have to fetch a non-basic/plains) Also jitte is a lot stronger against fish variants and (small) aggro decks.


I think its quite possible to cut the plains in your manabase because you only need W as a one shot manasource (for a mage or a swords, and mage can be casted with vial) and you need your U mana more than your W mana. This is just theoretically speaking though, I have no idea how often you will get screwed by running a plains (IE plains but no U mana). (note to self; Manabase needs to be tested )

[Marco]

There is already a thread for WTF right now, so I would probably stop this one here and go post over there. I posted a deck very similar to yours on that thread, so it shouldn't be closed.

No, Jacob asked us to "please stop spamming up" his thread with budget WTF deck lists, and I wholeheartedly agree. Although, I would have preferred the budget WTF thread to have started off on a better foot.

Let's take a look at Jacob's most recent (?) WTF deck list:

4 Aether Vial
1 Black Lotus
4 Chalice of the Void
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Sapphire
2 Umezawa's Jitte

1 Ancestral Recall
2 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
3 Ninja of the Deep Hours
4 Standstill
1 Time Walk

4 Gaea's Skyfolk

4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Wild Mongrel

4 Flooded Strand
2 Island
4 Mishra's Factory
1 Polluted Delta
1 Strip Mine
4 Tropical Island
4 Wasteland

The cards in bold are the cards that would obviously not be considered “budget�. That leaves us with 5 slots to fill. I think the purpose of this thread should be to discuss the optimal budget, non-proxy WTF deck list. I also think we should focus on the U/g version of WTF. Kowal’s version with the white splash (4 Meddling Mage and 3 Rootwater Thief) is better suited to a fully-powered metagame than the U/g version.

I think the Black Lotus, Mox Emerald, and Mox Sapphire should be replaced with mana sources, namely basic Islands, keeping the mana source count at 23:

4 Flooded Strand (possibly 3 Flooded Strand, 2 Polluted Delta)
5 Island
4 Mishra's Factory
1 Polluted Delta
1 Strip Mine
4 Tropical Island
4 Wasteland

Other (probably inferior) options include Lotus Petal, Mana Crypt (good if you’re playing with Tinker in the main deck), Sol Ring, and Elvish Spirit Guide.

I think the Ancestral Recall and the Time Walk should be replaced with 2 more Brainstorms, bringing the Brainstorm count up to 4.

The majority has also determined that Standstill is not very good in WTF. I think these should be replaced with 1 Darksteel Colossus, 1 Umezawa's Jitte, 1 Mystical Tutor, and 1 Tinker.

I think Tinker/Colossus is even stronger in budget metagames and deserves to be in the main deck. I included a third Umezawa's Jitte because it too is even stronger in budget metagames with more random creature decks. Rushing River or possibly Echoing Truth are other options.

There has been some discussion over the usefulness of Chalice of the Void in un-powered, budget metagames. I think that Chalice of the Void for 0 is still useful against cards with a 0 casting cost that are played in such a metagame: Kobolds, Lotus Petal, Mana Crypt, Ornithopter, Shield Sphere, Welding Jar, Zuran Orb, etc. And if Chalice of the Void for 0 is not useful it can be Tinkered away for a Darksteel Colossus.

This gives us the following budget, non-proxy WTF deck list:

4 Aether Vial
4 Chalice of the Void
1 Darksteel Colossus
3 Umezawa's Jitte

4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
1 Mystical Tutor
3 Ninja of the Deep Hours
1 Tinker

4 Gaea's Skyfolk

4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Wild Mongrel

4 Flooded Strand
5 Island
4 Mishra's Factory
1 Polluted Delta
1 Strip Mine
4 Tropical Island
4 Wasteland

Fleshing out the sideboard can come next.

[Nastaboi]

Some of the basic islands could be Tundras. This way we can use Ray of Revelation on board more efficiently. Another thing is that Mystical Tutor gets much, much worse without Ancestral or Time Walk to fetch for. I hate drawing it when I don't have three mana or artifact on table, and best card I can get on the situation is Brainstorm. I have one bounce spell MD to be tutored so that Mystical doesn't suck so hard. Somebody suggested single Ideas Unbound. It really is rather situational, but it might be a perfect Mystical target when Tinker is not an option. Thoughts?

[Smmenen]

I don't get it.  Worse than Fish already is a budget deck.  It only has like, what, 5  pieces of power, at most?  What's the point of a separate thread?  We never had a separate thread for UR Fish for "budget."  It's redundant redundant.

[Marco]

the purpose of this thread should be to discuss the optimal budget, non-proxy WTF deck list.

[Meanee]

This is not a creature heavy format, and jitte takes care of A LOT.

How can vintage not be a creature heavy format? Of course there are different metas, but even the tier one decks all kill with creatures (exept of coure for som gifts decks, and the sad couple of tps that is still out there). The most recent kill-condition in todays vintage environment is a little sweety called "Tinker -> Colossus" I would like to see you kill a colossus with a jitte! Swords kill colossus! And therefore it is worth to play - AT LEAST as a 3-of. Swords also wrecks dragon, oath and som artifactbuilds...
Cards worth swording: dragon, angel, colossus, mongrel, meddling mages (this can also easily be jitted to death), juggernauts and so on.

All in all I think it is quite difficult - and even wrong - to claim that vintage is not a creature heavy format - right now, it is VERY creature heavy...

- meanee

[Mark_Story]

But there is a problen in trying to play 3 colours with no proxy decks. 

It's really hard to do, and makes for somewhat shaky mana bases.  Sure swords is great against colossus, but in the gifts match, your swords is going to get countered/misdirected.  Furthermore, I think WTF is a deck that wants to be dropping threat after threat, and forcing your opponent to be reactive.  That's one of the reasons that jacob and kowal gave for the removal of standstill.  It didn't win.  neither does swords.  Swords stops you from losing, it doesn't win.

Including reactive cards in a proactive threat dense deck seems counter intuitive, and in theory will wreck the decks intense aggro strategy.

[Kowal]

I would like to see you kill a colossus with a jitte!

You should have gone to Rochester.  I did it TWICE.

Tinker-Colossus is interesting in that you can typically race it if your opponent has no other blockers to declare.  You can ask Rich Shay, whom I raced with a pair of Wild Mongrels and a Jitte, or Scott Limoges, who tinkered up a Colossus on turn two, and ended up at -7 life before he could swing twice.

It's very good in the mirror because you can hold trash cards like Meddling Mage or Rootwater Thief back to block their Mongrels, and still swing in with the Colossus every turn.  The Colossus packing control decks can't do that, and either have to hope you don't draw enough junk to kill them, or wish for Pyroclasm.

As far as budgetizing the deck goes...

There are two moxes I run (the pearl is garbage despite my splash) and they can easily be replaced with lands.  Island and another Tropical would work fine here.
The lotus could be replaced with land, but that actually makes the deck land-heavy.  I'd advise a blue spell here, perhaps Daze or Stifle or Misdirection.
Ancestral and Time Walk can be replaced with whatever you want.  Personally, I'd run two maindeck Oxidize, or even Sacred Ground.

For reference, here's my most recent list.

4 Wild Mongrel
4 Basking Rootwalla
4 Meddling Mage
3 Rootwater Thief
1 Darksteel Colossus

4 Force of Will
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Tinker
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Rushing River

4 Aether Vial
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Umezawa's Jitte

1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Strip Mine
4 Wasteland
2 Polluted Delta
3 Flooded Strand
3 Tropical Island
2 Tundra
2 Island
4 Mishra's Factory

[Freelancer]

How can vintage not be a creature heavy format? Of course there are different metas, but even the tier one decks all kill with creatures (exept of coure for som gifts decks, and the sad couple of tps that is still out there). The most recent kill-condition in todays vintage environment is a little sweety called "Tinker -> Colossus" I would like to see you kill a colossus with a jitte! Swords kill colossus! And therefore it is worth to play - AT LEAST as a 3-of. Swords also wrecks dragon, oath and som artifactbuilds...
Cards worth swording: dragon, angel, colossus, mongrel, meddling mages (this can also easily be jitted to death), juggernauts and so on.

All in all I think it is quite difficult - and even wrong - to claim that vintage is not a creature heavy format - right now, it is VERY creature heavy...

- meanee

Standard is a creature heavy format, vintage is not. Usually it is less creature heavy than it is now, but compared to the other formats its still a creature light format. There is practically no creature combat, blocking is almost non-existent. Reread what I said, I said that vintage is a creature light format. Not that vintage right now is a creature light format, I was comparing it to the other formats where 4x removal spell is almost standard. You already play 2/3x jitte in a creature light format (creature heavy in comparison to the past, creature light in comparison to the other formats) playing a additional 4x swords is just not needed. There are only a couple of matchups where you want 4x swords maindeck; Aggro control decks (you already win these on the back of mongrel/jitte/vial madness) and dragon. So unless your meta is like 60% dragon I wouldn't run 4x swords maindeck. I am not saying swords is bad card, just not so good for this particular deck. I would run 2x swords, but in a heavy aggro/control and dragon meta I can see running 3x swords.


Now lets see your little list of cards worth swording:
Dragon - good target jitte takes care of this as well (3 hits is not THAT hard to get, granted swords is much better here although jitte also takes care of xantid swarm)
Angel - Good target but jitte does the same with one hit (when unmorphed) or with 3 hits, you can also race it
Colossus - Kowal explained very good how you can race a colossus with a jitte or even without a jitte, for goodness sake I raced colossus with Uw fish and succeeded!
Mongrel -Good target but again jitte does the same job (beginning to see a trend here?)
Meddling mage -Good target but again jitte does it just fine
Juggernaut and other big artifact creatures -Good target but jitte does the same job

The point is jitte can deal with all creatures, and it is very likely he gets to hit a couple of times before the creatures can be dropped. You play a total of 9 mana denial cards to prevent these creatures from dropping fast and 4x force to further slow them down. This means that you are usually save of whatever creatures untill turn 3 or 4 by than jitte has probably already hit once or twice. Than after they drop the threat you can attack again and by than you have 4 or 6 counters on the jitte. This takes care of about everything on that list. It seems to me you don't understand the true power of jitte.

[Meanee]

It seems to me you don't understand the true power of jitte.

You could very weel be right about that... I havn't tested this deck, but my testing with jitte hasn't proven it so powerful (but i play in a low-power environment, and own only a sapphire myself...)

Still I like sword a lot, and I don't think I would play less than 3...

- meanee

[Marco]

Thanks Kowal. I have also found that replacing the Black Lotus and the moxen with lands makes the deck land-heavy (although you can always pitch extra lands to Wild Mongrel). At the risk of sounding like a scrub, what do you think of replacing one or two of the lands with Mox Diamond and/or Mana Crypt? (Chrome Mox sucks.)

Sacred Ground is an interesting choice. However, wouldn't Crucible of Worlds be as good if not better? (Allowing for the possibility of a Strip Mine/Wasteland lock...) I guess I'm trying to make the deck more controlish and that's the wrong direction to be going with the deck...

[urza23]

In the other thread the idea of Crucible was denied because of the mana curve of the deck. Three mana could be better spent than with Crucible. Also with the 5 strip effects it is unlikely you will need more than you draw.
Mox diamond is intersting but sets up a card disadvantage. But with the upped land count could be a good choice.