TPS - still viable or just an inferior combo deck?

[Blitzbold]

TPS - still viable or just an inferior combo deck?


TPS was once the most controlish deck of the group of stormcombo decks which also contained Smennens Draw7 as well as Death Long. While Draw7 was quickly dismissed, both Death Long and TPS were able to combo out even against Stax with 4 Trinispheres, the one because of its sheer speed, the other because of its more controlish approach.

In January 2005 I tried to build an more aggressive build of TPS, whoose agreed-on list (mainly used in Italy) did not contain red anymore at that time. I wanted red back in because of additional brokeness provided by Burning Wish and, to a limit, Wheel of Fortune. Kim Kuck and I prepared for a small torunament and he also liked the idea. His suggestion was to also include Recoup which his team CAB had already used with success earlier. Gifts Ungiven was also not explored at this time and is the reason for the deck's name, as playing it in a combodeck feeled like a trickery in the film.

The Clou a.k.a TPS-r

3 Underground Sea
1 Badlands
1 Volcanic Island
3 Island
1 Swamp
4 Polluted Delta
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring

1 Memory Jar

4 Dark Ritual
4 Duress
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Necropotence
1 Yawgmoth's Bargain

4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Rebuild
1 Gifts Ungiven
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Mind's Desire
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Timetwister
1 Time Walk
1 Tinker
1 Windfall

1 Recoup
1 Burning Wish
1 Wheel of Fortune

SB 1 Hysroblast
SB 1 Stifle
SB 1 Echoing Truth
SB 1 Rebuild
SB 1 Misdirection
SB 2 Annul
SB 2 Pyroblast
SB 1 Primitive Justice
SB 1 Innocent Blood
SB 1 Cabal Therapy
SB 1 Tendrils of Agony
SB 1 Deep Analysis
SB 1 Time Spiral

The build was more a hybrid of Draw7 and TPS, but it worked out really well with Kim winning the whole thing undefeated. Shortly aftwards Germany's Iserlohn was won by an identical build which only differed in some sidebard choices and soon the deck was played by quite an amount of players. Iserlohn wasn't as defined as it is now, though.

TPS never seemed to be accepted as a good combo deck in the US despite good results were reported from Europe (and especially from Italy). I sticked to the deck for a while and was disapointed by it as well at various occasions. 'That Play Stalled' really is an accurate desription sometimes, as, for example, a Desire for 6 only revealling lands, rituals and a Duress sucks like nothing else. One of the 4 most broken cards ever, eh?

It seems that the contradicting results reported are based on

- different metagames in which a more controlish oriented Combodeck was able to perform well and not
- extremly good knowledge of the deck and it's matchups
- a bit of luck (both with pairings and during playing); this is always needed though, but I once told a friend of mine that one has to be extremly lucky at TPS's Desires 
- dismissal of the deck because of dislike of the list, own testing results and so on.

Germany's Iserlohn developed and drew more and more players. It is still a sanctioned event, though, and results are hard to compare to events allowing proxies. The tournament is the biggest regular Vintage event in Germany now and is still growing in popularity. The level of competition seems to be comparable to that of Duelmen of old.
However, the most recent Top 8 had several TPS in it. Obviously people kept on working with the deck. One deck even used Perplex from Ravnica for countering and Tutoring for Will, Necropotence or Rebuild, so there is still some kind of innovation to be found. The latest versions still differ in either using Draw 7s or more one-sided draw.

Recently Smennen placed top 4 at a SCG event by using his latest development - Grim Long. Is Grim Long the best incarnation of a Storm-based combo deck or is that a different approach? Grim Tutor is an above average card for sure and allowed Steve to play several Sideboard cards as one-of's in the Maindeck such as a singleton Xantid Swarm. On the other hand TPS has the advantage of not only containing Duress but a full set of Force of Will also and is able to use 4 to 5 basic lands on top of that.

Is TPS just out-dated and Grim Long is the new stormdeck? Can TPS evolve into a more broken deck without loosing too much of it's advantages or will it remain an inferior combodeck?

I think that the deck still wants controlish elements as a reason to choose it over other stormcombo decks. This means that the deck still wants 3-4 Duress, a set of FoW and some basic lands. However, I also think that the deck needs a bit more brokeness or better tools to find it's bombs. So one can chose to either run more tutors or more draw 7s (as my old build does). It is still questionable for me, though, wether this will improve the deck or wether Grim Long is in fact the 'better' stormcombo deck. What do you think?

[Clown of Tresserhorn]

Here's the thing, TPS just isn't as fast or as broken as GrimLong/Belcher. Why play a combo deck that wins on turn 3 when I can play Gifts and win on turn 4 on the back of Mana Drain? The other thing, like Steve said, is that manabases really don't matter. Stax only plays a handful of cards you really care about, so instead of focusing on a strong manabase, why not just win? With the speed of current control decks, I think TPS is outdated. If you want to play a deck that rides the line between combo and control, Gifts is it. The reasons to play combo are Desire, Will, Necro, and Bargain, and when TPS has a realistic chance of fizzling after resolving any of these, the deck just seems weak. Looking at your list, it's basically just +4 FoW where Long has 3 Grim Tutor, 1 Seal (there are some other differences, like the manabase and such). Is this really better?

-Bob

[rvs]

The reason TPS was so strong was that it beat up on any kind of artifact prison deck, while being really solid against regular control. Because of gifts ungiven all decks that used to be control have changed into combo-control, which you cannot beat unless you luck into Necro, which is basicly the only reason to still pick up this deck. Unless your name is Marco Kiewit(bigmac), I guess...

[Thug]

TPS is viable, has been viable for a long time and probably will stay viable for a long time.
TPS was not good because of prison heavily being played, it had a better matchup than most other non-dragon combo deck, but it's not like youre going to play TPS because you expect a lot of Prison.

I believe (and never have been proved wrong) that TPS has a good matchup against Gifts as long as you stay away from draw-sevens (if you expect a lot of Gifts you should even cut the Twister). Duress trades with Drain, and Necro Bargain and Ritual are just better than Thirst, Needle and Rebuild etc.
And you both play Gifts, but yours are just even more brutal than theirs....
Heck if you want you can even play Drains in TPS

TPS is a very underplayed deck, but everytime an experienced TPS player will pick up the deck good things will happen.

Koen

[Limbo]

TPS is a very underplayed deck, but everytime an experienced TPS player will pick up the deck good things will happen.

Whenever an experienced player picks up any decent deck (with which he has experience obv.), good things are bound to happen...

[Thug]

Quote
TPS is a very underplayed deck, but everytime an experienced TPS player will pick up the deck good things will happen.

Whenever an experienced player picks up any decent deck (with which he has experience obv.), good things are bound to happen...

Which leads to the conclusion that is still a viable deck.

[BigMac]

Having played any number of TPS builds for the last 2 years i can honestly say i still think it is a viable deckchoice. Sure, it has difficult matchups, sure it can stall. But if i play a desire of 6 and get only mana and a duress, chances are i would have gotten those 6 cards in 6 turns otherwise. Any deck that draws 5 manasources and a duress will normally lose but then it is because of a bad draw. Losing due to a bad draw does not make a deck bad, it makes your luck bad, not the deck. The same goes for stalling, it is bad luck when that happens when you have so many good cards in your deck that say you win now, as it only takes 1 of those cards to actually let you win.

Saying a deck is bad because it stalls every once in a while is also saying a deck is fabulous when a deck has a turn one win. Oh, no, that would be luck. So stalling is bad luck. As luck has a part in magic all decks will suffer bad luck and good luck during a year. Good players playing a deck well will often come on top.

I think the main reason people say this deck is a bad deck is because the lack of experience with it. I have been playing it for two years and i still miss some plays and make terrible mistakes that cost me matches. That doesn't mean the deck is bad, it means players make mistakes, and with this deck mistakes are often fatal.

What makes this deck so good is the fact it is so darn constant. I for one have won far more matches with this deck than i lost. This is not because of my brilliant play, but mainly because i know how to use the brokenness of this deck to the fullest extend. If you encounter a bad constructed deck, TPS is the deck that will walse over such a deck with ease. This together with the fact you have a fighting chance against any deck out there gives me the conviction this will be a viable choice for tournaments for a long time. Anybody stating otherwise, just beat me and prove me wrong. (although i do play other decks every now and again)

[Liam-K]

I agree with Clown of Tresserhorn in that TPS seems to be getting the short end of the trade-off when compared with a Gifts list.  Both decks have the same basic gameplan, stop important threats and then combo out, but Gifts seems much more adaptable in a game setting.  While being slightly slower matters, so does having better control elements, a better long game, and more applications for you cards.

I also suspect that in the current metagame, with combo being hybridized into everything and GrimLong a serious consideration, that TPS is vulnerable to splash damage from sideboards.  Storm decks are easy to hate out, and that hate's going to be in peoples' sideboards anyway.

[MaxxMatt]

@Blitzbold

These are my only changes to your list.

-1 Undeground Sea ( only 27 mana fonts ).
-1 Wheel of Fortune
-1 Windfall
-1 Chain of Vapour

+1 Gifts Ungiven
+1 Darksteel Colossus
+1 Cunning Wish
+1 Fact of Fiction

These changes aren't made only by looking at your list, but are the ones that we ( me and my teammates ), usually play in our daily tests.

Our sideboard looks a bit more different because I tend to use less Sorceries and more Bouncers/Blasts/Drawers than you.
I found this configuration pretty decent, universally speaking:

1 ReB
1 Mis-D
1 R. River
1 Chain of Vapour
1 Echoing Truth
1 H. Recall
1 Rebuild
1 Skeletal
1 Darkblast
1 Brainfreeze

1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Deep Analysis
1 Eye of Nowhere

2 Tormod's Crypt




@@@Obsolete Deck?

I can laugh really hard at those words.

Better combo decks?
Bah! I almost have 1 mulligan over 12-14 games played and it is TEH strenght of TPS.

Faster combo decks?
Yeah! sometimes other combo decks can pull out a faster kill. How many times, compared with fizzles and mulligans?

New combo decks or new unstoppable opponents?
Nah! the only thing that I see is the HUGE amount of players playing with Control-Gifts instead of TPS-Gifts. Not because they are really sure about the real value of BOTH the decks, but because it is the deck of the moment.
I would like to hear aboout TPS vs. Control decks, talking with good players of both the categories.
TPS can both overhelm and lose against any deck
Good players piloting TPS can usually overhelm any opponent and they have difficult time playing against other Tier1s because of the value of good opponents
Great TPS players are the ones that can be able to pull out a lot of wins EVEN against those last ones opponents.

I know a lot of people switching from TPS to Dargon to Gifts to Atog to C-Slavery to anything else.
They are the ones that usually judge a deck as "good" or as "bad" to use.

I know a few people putting large attention to what is played, to opponent's actions and ALL the possible interaction between himself and the TPS.dec

Those people usually can win with it.


Anyone who is going to compare Rituals to Drains and Merchants to BlackBombs can simply stop talking because they are always wrong.
Even comparing "Absolute Speed" is useless and frightening.
In the real world I have to play against other players.
That absolute speed   value is ALWAYS corrected by the value and the interactions with the opponent.
I can consider my TPS' build, one of the "less interacting ones" ever presented by us.
On ther other hand, in order to win, I HAVE TO LOOK AT MY OPPONENT's FACE any second but not because my deck is fragile or bad, but because I have to use all my experience to master it and win during EVERY GAME.


...Considering a deck obsolete or bad because of its inherent difficulty on being mastered and played with decent results, is THE first thing to regret.
Think ahead and try to win ALWAYS in a different manner.
Leave you Y Will deep in the deck and find alternatives ways of dealing with opponents' threats.
...It wouldn't be so difficult ...at least after 6 months of hard pratice in real life gaming situations


Maxx

PS. I can assure you that "fizzling with TPS" is really difficult when you aren't relying on pure drawers but you are going off with tutors and bombs.




EDIT.
@Liam-K

While Gifts rely on Gifts to win, TPS rely on Gifts and Black Spells and some Draw7 in order to win.
While Gifts can die to Blue hate, TPS has a lot of inherent different ways not to be hated out in the  same way
While Gifts can rely both on DSC and Storm mechanic for the win, TPS born to abuse of them
While Gifts have to wait a couple of lands' drops to achieve a better board position and win, TPS alternate 1turnkil to 10turnkill without too much troubling.

Call me blind, but TPS have MORE resources and different plays WHERE Gifts shows solidity and a strong ( but flat ) game plans.
...And I'm talking from the perspective of "a Gifts player that constantly win and lose against good TPS' players".

[Anusien]

One of the issues seems to be the decline of Trinistax.  TPS loved seeing lots and lots of bad artifacts on the other side of the table, since it would often cast Rebuild on its path to Tendrils.  However, Rebuild is no longer sufficient in order to go off; Gifts Ungiven versus Stax shows this.  I account this to the two main types of Stax.  First, Uba Stax's namesake, Uba Mask, makes it hard for you to hold a Rebuild in order to combo off at your leisure.  The other issue is Stax builds that like to run nasty enchantments that Rebuild doesn't deal with.  It seems like an In the Eye of Chaos or a Chains of Mephistopheles makes it very very difficult to combo you off.  That and you're going to risk a lot of splash damage from Gifts decks that are starting to look very very similar.

[Pyromaniac]

One of the issues seems to be the decline of Trinistax.  TPS loved seeing lots and lots of bad artifacts on the other side of the table, since it would often cast Rebuild on its path to Tendrils.  However, Rebuild is no longer sufficient in order to go off; Gifts Ungiven versus Stax shows this.  I account this to the two main types of Stax.  First, Uba Stax's namesake, Uba Mask, makes it hard for you to hold a Rebuild in order to combo off at your leisure.  The other issue is Stax builds that like to run nasty enchantments that Rebuild doesn't deal with.  It seems like an In the Eye of Chaos or a Chains of Mephistopheles makes it very very difficult to combo you off.  That and you're going to risk a lot of splash damage from Gifts decks that are starting to look very very similar.

I'm gonna have to agree with this.

TPS was adapted to be able to beat Stax (the "bad" artifact deck) by running lots of basics and maindeck Rebuilds. And it worked. The deck really is good against any deck with lots of permanents, preferably artifacts. This was also the time of 4 3sphere, which it nicely eluded by running basics as opposed to other combo decks. Notice, btw, that Dragon also did (and does) this.

The problem TPS faces now isn't so much of different Stax decks, even though they are less broken and have fewer "Time Walks" in their decks, it's the fact that there are now other combo-control decks, which have the same speed as TPS, but can run Mana Drain and a better blue base. The problem with Ritual isn't so much that it is bad or anything, it's the fact that it's a Mana Drain without the counter effect, and as such isn't used to it's max in a somewhat slower deck. Gifts abuses Drain to it's max I think and does a better job at playing the combo-control deck then TPS.

Seeing we face fewer Stax decks these days, and not having to worry as much about other decks killing off our lands, it's probably a better idea to run a more diverse manabase OR run a different deck. The other Tendrils decks have better/more threats and have answers in all colors (Swarm, Seal of Cleansing etc) which TPS doesn't have access to, because of the mana base it's running.

I'm not saying TPS is obsolete, what I am saying is that imho, it either has to run a 'better' manabase for better answers and threats, which pushes it towards Long. If you really want to play a deck with lots of basics, it might be better to just run Dragon instead.

Hero

[BigMac]

The problem with Ritual isn't so much that it is bad or anything, it's the fact that it's a Mana Drain without the counter effect, and as such isn't used to it's max in a somewhat slower deck.

I know this discussion is of a whole other sort but i want to say something about this remark. The biggest difference between dark ritual and manadrain is activity. Ritual is active as you will play your own game almost not concerning what your opponent plays. Manadrain is proactive, as you will be waiting for your opponent to make a move. The longer you wait the better your opponent will have build his position. I know this goes both ways, but as an experienced TPS player i can say this. It is not so much about drain versus ritual for the speed and for the win. Drain is mainly a protective spell you abuse when used right. As is FOW. TPS uses FoW and duress for the same. Sure, gifts can use duress but almost never more than 2 anymore. When i know i play a blue player (an island usually is a good hint) i normally start the combo with a duress so i know what to expect or i start with a Fow backupplan. Then the choice is the proactive player, do i counter the duress or does 1 of my counters gets removed to the graveyard and in doing so giving my opponent information about my hand. I may actually go lookfor a duress or a FoW to accomplish this. Every counter will count towards my storm kill count and this is something a lot of people forget. I may use counters to actually kill an opponent.

I know a lot of people will still scream that manadrain is better. And i also know this is a very personal feeling. I think it has not to many problems either way and i think in the hands of a good player both can be very good. The most important thing with gifts as well as TPS is playing it right. I for one am far more comfortable playing actively. So ritual is for me. A lot of people play better proactively, so gifts, or any drain deck for that matter, is good for them. And then there is Steve.

It is a serious judgement call what you are more comfortable with. But saying TPS has outlived its days in my oppinion is very short sighted. It would not still be doing so good when it was not viable anymore.

[MaxxMatt]

I would argue some deeper instances about TPS and todays metagame.

I would talk about NON-broken hands.
Playing against a Duress+Drain+FoW+Stuff.dec is really hard for that combo deck.
Playing against a Drain+FoW+Stuff.dec is really different and a lot of plays and valuations are easier to do.
Playing against a Drain+FoW+MIs-D+Stuff.dec is close to playing against a control deck without Duresses.

TPS should avoid the opponent's intrusion in his hand, because it would help the opponent's more than you can think.

Our usual Tog-builds have better matchups against TPS rather than Gifts.dec because the opponents can carefully weight their moves thanks to Proactive and Reactive defences.

Usually played Gifts.dec ( such as mine with Shamans and Furnaces and other reactive spells ) have worst matchups against TPS, because they have to build their mana base as fast as they can to survive to the usual Duress+Bomb+FoW sequence of spells.

Duresses give you time.
Brainstorms can help the wise TPS' player to avoid that nasty discarding effect but it isn't always enough.

From that precise perspective, barring out good Gifts starts with UU open and going first, I can feel really difficult to out draw or outcounter TPS when it is played right.

Duresses come out faster than Drains
Mis-Ds cannot counter anything by themselves
Merchants for Gifts are strong plays but strictly connected to a good mana development.
While Gifts cannot transmute mana into won through a couple of Duresses and FoWs, TPS can play mana to win with uncounterable Storm's spells.

With TPS, you have to play tricky games and try to pull out the maximum results to limited resources that can suddenly produce DEADLY effects.
A lot of Gifts and TPS' hands are both almost unbeateable.
This way of reasoning perfectly fits the choices of what should have played, basing them only through attitude and style.

Feel you free to think that Drains are better
Feel you free to think that Rituals are better
Both of them are inherently strong but in the end, the ONLY cards that let you win are Gifts, Necro, Bargain, Desire and Y Will.
Both the decks have 4-5 of them.

On the other hand, while it seems to repeat myself more than needed, I'm sure that focusing on comparing Rituals to Drains is ALWAYS wrong.




Compare Apple with Oranges.
Both of them produce huge satisfaction when ate.
Both of them are really good.
But...
...Would you exchange or confund themselves when comparing fruits functions and merits?

Maxx

[Komatteru]

Here are my opinions on why TPS just isn't good enough any more.

1) Stax has adapted.  We seem to have forgotten that Workshop Aggro, and not Stax, was why Trinisphere was so popular.  Stax was not the "4 Trinisphere deck" that everyone bitched about, since Stax never relied on Trinisphere nearly as much as Juggernaut.dec did.  As such, Stax just had to do some adjusting to make up for the lack of 3 Trinispheres (or in Kevin's Syracuse build, 2 Trinispheres), which really turned out not to be a big deal.  It is my opinion that Stax is more powerful now than it was when it had 4 Trinispheres.  It just has too many weapons that waste time against TPS: SoR, Chalices, etc. All that stuff buys time for the inevitable.  No longer do you have people keeping "Turn 1 Trinisphere" hands that did little else.  TPS just isn't fast enough to outrace Stax anymore, so what was its best matchup has turned the other way a bit.

The ways to beat Stax are to either outrace it, resolve one huge bomb that wins, or slow down a bit and play defense.  Long opts for option #1, Belcher takes both #1 and #2, Oath and Dragon take #2, and Mana Drain takes #3 with a bit of #2 mixed in for good measure.  TPS aims to win at the time where it is most vulnerable to Stax.  That's a problem.  Workshops are no longer the "auto-win" they used to be.  TPS's Stax match isn't as good as Belcher's, Oath's, or Dragon's.  In fact, Mana Drain really does better since it can disrupt Stax a lot better than TPS can hope to.

2) Mana Drain decks are infinitely scarier now.  TPS no longer handles them as it did.  Slaver is very, very powerful, much more so than when TPS was in its prime.  Slaver wasn't as understood then, and there hadn't been nearly as much work done on it as there has been now.  Now, Slaver is dramatically better than it was back in February, but TPS has remained about the same.  Gifts decks are nearly as fast as TPS and just pack more disruption than TPS can handle.  Without green for Xantid Swarms, the matchup doesn't get any better after boarding, and if anything, it gets a lot worse, as Mana Drain can bring in Chalices/Tormod's Crypt/insert card here.  It's not so much that Mana Drain is bringing in cards that "beat" TPS, they just slow TPS down by a turn or two.  Since the Drain decks are only that much slower than TPS, the hate cards buy enough time for Mana Drain to win.  Meanwhile, TPS has few things to bring in to stop Mana Drain.  If it played green, it could use Xantid Swarm like Long and Belcher, but no such luck.

Draw7s are a huge liability against Mana Drain, so you can toss those out.  That leads you back to Necro, Bargain, Desire, and Will winning your games.  Long plays those cards too, and it gets them out faster than TPS does.  In addition, it's Desire and Necro are more broken.

3) Dragon is the same speed with a more powerful draw/search engine, and Belcher and Long just kick the hell out of TPS.

So where are TPS's good matches?  It doesn't really have any.  Most of its matches are mediocre at best, and the deck has fizzling issues that the other combo and Drain decks just don't have.  I've been convinced that TPS has been just "eh" since Trinisphere's restriction.  I've played storm combo continuously longer than pretty much anyone else in the format (in spite of my recent string of success with Belcher), and I don't even consider TPS when I pick a deck anymore.  If I want to storm, I'll take Long any day, with Grim Tutors or Death Wishes.

[BigMac]

Here are my opinions on why TPS just isn't good enough any more.

1) Staxx has adapted.  We seem to have forgotten that Workshop Aggro, and not Staxx, was why Trinisphere was so popular.  Staxx was not the "4 Trinisphere deck" that everyone bitched about, since Staxx never relied on Trinisphere nearly as much as Juggernaut.dec did.  As such, Staxx just had to do some adjusting to make up for the lack of 3 Trinispheres (or in Kevin's Syracuse build, 2 Trinispheres), which really turned out not to be a big deal.  It is my opinion that Staxx is more powerful now than it was when it had 4 Trinispheres.  It just has too many weapons that waste time against TPS: SoR, Chalices, etc. All that stuff buys time for the inevitable.  No longer do you have people keeping "Turn 1 Trinisphere" hands that did little else.  TPS just isn't fast enough to outrace Staxx anymore, so what was its best matchup has turned the other way a bit.

The ways to beat Staxx are to either outrace it, resolve one huge bomb that wins, or slow down a bit and play defense.  Long opts for option #1, Belcher takes both #1 and #2, Oath and Dragon take #2, and Mana Drain takes #3 with a bit of #2 mixed in for good measure.  TPS aims to win at the time where it is most vulnerable to Staxx.  That's a problem.  Workshops are no longer the "auto-win" they used to be.  TPS's Staxx match isn't as good as Belcher's, Oath's, or Dragon's.  In fact, Mana Drain really does better since it can disrupt Staxx a lot better than TPS can hope to.

2) Mana Drain decks are infinitely scarier now.  TPS no longer handles them as it did.  Slaver is very, very powerful, much more so than when TPS was in its prime.  Slaver wasn't as understood then, and there hadn't been nearly as much work done on it as there has been now.  Now, Slaver is dramatically better than it was back in February, but TPS has remained about the same.  Gifts decks are nearly as fast as TPS and just pack more disruption than TPS can handle.  Without green for Xantid Swarms, the matchup doesn't get any better after boarding, and if anything, it gets a lot worse, as Mana Drain can bring in Chalices/Tormod's Crypt/insert card here.  It's not so much that Mana Drain is bringing in cards that "beat" TPS, they just slow TPS down by a turn or two.  Since the Drain decks are only that much slower than TPS, the hate cards buy enough time for Mana Drain to win.  Meanwhile, TPS has few things to bring in to stop Mana Drain.  If it played green, it could use Xantid Swarm like Long and Belcher, but no such luck.

Draw7s are a huge liability against Mana Drain, so you can toss those out.  That leads you back to Necro, Bargain, Desire, and Will winning your games.  Long plays those cards too, and it gets them out faster than TPS does.  In addition, it's Desire and Necro are more broken.

3) Dragon is the same speed with a more powerful draw/search engine, and Belcher and Long just kick the hell out of TPS.

So where are TPS's good matches?  It doesn't really have any.  Most of its matches are mediocre at best, and the deck has fizzling issues that the other combo and Drain decks just don't have.  I've been convinced that TPS has been just "eh" since Trinisphere's restriction.  I've played storm combo continuously longer than pretty much anyone else in the format (in spite of my recent string of success with Belcher), and I don't even consider TPS when I pick a deck anymore.  If I want to storm, I'll take Long any day, with Grim Tutors or Death Wishes.

So every deck can adapt, and not TPS.

1) staxx is a hard matchup, i know that, it always has been and it always will be. But staxx has been a hard matchup for most decks, its weakness though is the lack of reactive disruption. If staxx does not play a card in his hand you can pretty much do whatever you want during its endturn and during your own turn. That still has not changed and as far as i know that pretty much is its biggest weakness. If you are able to take advantage of that you will win any time of the day against staxx whatever deck you play. I know it is not that easy, but at the core what i say is true. And TPS can still pack a lot of anti staxx sideboard cards.

2) mana drain decks are scarier, i will give you that. But it is still a contra active card. It waits for the mistake of the opponent. I have yet to lose a game against slaver so i think it is a very good matchup for TPS, but you need to know how to play it. As for gifts decks. I do not see any gifts deck has more bombs than any TPS deck. Sure it has more tutors. But in the end, if you do not get the time to get mana drain online fast you will lose to duress. I have lost against gifts, but not many and won many more. Perhaps partly because people do not know how to play gifts, but the two i lost was once due to a judgecall and a manaflood (could happen to everybody) and the second time due to my own playing errors. So i always had a chance and won more than i lost, to me that is a good matchup.

the draw 7s you play are more often a win now card than most people think. But the crux on these cards is timing. When your timing stinks you will lose.

3) Dragon is such a hard deck to play i hardly ever lose to it anymore. Next to that, if you know what to do against it you will have a pretty good chance against it. Belcher and long can crap out just as easily as TPS, more so perhaps as they pack way more mana accelerants. The reason i won against long was because he crapped out twice against me. The reason i didn't win the one tournament i played long was due to errors and it crapping out on me. Next to that those decks are way easier to disrupt than TPS and as such are way less stable. those matches are hard but still winnable if you manage to hang in there and realise the role you need to play in those matchups. TPS will be the control deck then, so play it that way until you see the window of opportunity you will win with.

TPS will kill FCG, fish and any random deck thrown at him because of the sheer strength it has. So it has many easy matchups.

[Note] I need to say that my TPS differs from most builds as i love to play with a transformational sideboard. This increases my chances against decks i would usually have a lot of difficulties with. As well as the surprise factor that all disruption thrown at me will not work.

[MuzzonoAmi]

I hate to just agree with JD, but he's right. We had this debate between the two of us about a month ago, and I left to test the deck, and after testing, I agree wit him. Stax has not only evolved into a more powerful position in the matchup, it also runs cards that are more difficult to hate, especially in the maindeck because of the increased enchantment count. The matchup cannot center around resolving Rebuild to clear SoRs or a Trini and combo out, and the deck has gotten better at attcking basic lands. It's fairly clear that TPS gets out controlled by most control decks and can't risk racing because it simply isn't consistently fast enough to combo on Gifts, and can't switch gears against Slaver (which just rapes the deck as it is) if the early combo gets stopped.

3) Dragon is such a hard deck to play i hardly ever lose to it anymore. Next to that, if you know what to do against it you will have a pretty good chance against it. Belcher and long can crap out just as easily as TPS, more so perhaps as they pack way more mana accelerants. The reason i won against long was because he crapped out twice against me. The reason i didn't win the one tournament i played long was due to errors and it crapping out on me. Next to that those decks are way easier to disrupt than TPS and as such are way less stable. those matches are hard but still winnable if you manage to hang in there and realise the role you need to play in those matchups. TPS will be the control deck then, so play it that way until you see the window of opportunity you will win with.

The problem with your argument here is that Belcher and Long make up for the ease of crapping out by 'just win'-ing with greater frequency, and having better control and Stax matchups. Dragon being hard to play is not a justification for saying that TPS is a better deck. If you are better than your opponent and the matchup isn't horribly lopsided, you should win anyway.

[Thug]

I think TPS should look very close to gifts right now, there's a reason why I call if Gifts-TPS when I play it.
Why play with a 3cc sorcery that might win you the game, but is bound to lose you the game if you dont win it, when you can play a 4cc instant that will win you the game. Twister and Jar are the only playable draw-sevens, but should not be auto-includes at all.

Gifts-TPS might even be the next step Gifts will have to make.
It's for a reason why I've heard from many players that played meandeck Gifts that Drain was the weakest card in the deck.
Gifts almost outraces it's own drains; why drain that grizzly bear on turn 2 when you could also be casting Gifts Ungiven??

Here's a raw list of Gifts-TPS:

1 Academy
4 Sea
4 Delta
1 Strand
2 Volcanic or 1 Volcanic / 1 BADlands
2 Island

7 Solomox
1 Crypt
1 Vault
1 Petal

4 Ritual
4 Duress
1 Vamp
1 Demonic
1 Will
1 Necro
1 Bargain
1 Tendrils
1 Skrying

4 Brainstorm
4 FoW
3/4 Gifts
1 Ancestral
1 Walk
1 Tinker
1 Mystical
0/1 Twister
1 Rebuild/Chain of Vapor

1 Recoup

1 Collosus
0/1 Jar

(one thing I want to try is running some Drains in here, maybe something like
-1 Duress
-1 Ritual
-1 Jar / Gifts
+3 Drain)
---

3) Dragon is the same speed with a more powerful draw/search engine, and Belcher and Long just kick the hell out of TPS.

So where are TPS's good matches?  It doesn't really have any.  Most of its matches are mediocre at best, and the deck has fizzling issues that the other combo and Drain decks just don't have.  I've been convinced that TPS has been just "eh" since Trinisphere's restriction.  I've played storm combo continuously longer than pretty much anyone else in the format (in spite of my recent string of success with Belcher), and I don't even consider TPS when I pick a deck anymore.  If I want to storm, I'll take Long any day, with Grim Tutors or Death Wishes.

The only card that fizzles in TPS is desire, and without draw-sevens you shouldnt play it.
It doesnt have any walkover-matchups, but it can compete with every deck out there, with Fish causing most troubles (but Colossus fixes a lot)
The fact that you don't consider TPS says something about you, not about TPS.
Heck I have never ever considered running Belcher, does that mean the deck is bad? (it's not like I'm unexperienced with Storm decks..)

Koen

p.s. People saying Slaver rapes this deck I can't take serious

[Komatteru]

It doesn't have any walkover-matchups, but it can compete with every deck out there, with Fish causing most troubles (but Colossus fixes a lot)

That's just it.  You don't look forward to any match in particular.  With Long, I always looked forward to Mana Drain (maybe a function of me personally, but I had an amazing win % against Drains).  With Belcher, I look forward to...pretty much anything that doesn't play Null Rods, except maybe Fish, because Mages are obnoxious.  I think not having any matches that you really want to play just makes the deck unattractive.

A good player can force pretty much anything reasonable to win.  Remember my "being one with the deck" philosophy from like forever ago?  There are many living examples of that.  Travis Hopkins with that Gro deck for instance.  The deck had fallen off the face of the planet almost years before because it was just an antiquated idea, but somehow, he was able to make it win.  It certainly wasn't because it was this amazing deck.  He just knew it inside out and made it win.

I did the same thing as well.  I was the only one who believed in DeathLong and continued to play it despite all sorts of criticism.  Only success was able to make people finally shut up.  I knew all its power and weaknesses as well as all its shortcomings and flaws.  Because of that, I could make the deck win.  In my eyes, it was amazing.  But would I ever really recommend that someone else play it (aside from that one time, Jim, if you're reading this)? No.  Was it a legitimately viable deck?  Probably not really.  What made the deck win?  The fact that the deck was just amazing? Or the fact that I could play it better than anyone else ever?  It seems to me that the latter is why I had any success with it.  That puts a lot of the credit to my personal skill, but I believe it wasn't the deck winning most of my games.  Belcher does indeed say "Here, win" a lot more than DeathLong ever did. There were few auto-pilot victories, and I had to fight myself more often than I did my opponent.  So, why did I play this deck?  Because I loved it.

So, maybe, Koen, the deck is great because you're playing it.  Have you stopped to consider that aspect?  Maybe you just play this deck better than anyone else ever, and that's why the deck is amazing for you.

I forgot to mention this in my post: I believe that Gifts (both variants even) is the natural evolution of TPS.

[MaxxMatt]

Today I went 1-4 against this TPS build playing my Gifts.dec

--27 mana fonts
10 artifacts' accelerators
4 fetch
4 rituals
3 undegrounds
2 island
1 swamp
1 volcanic
1 badland
1 acedemy

--9 protections
4 fow
4 duress
1 rebuild

--stuff 24
4 brainstorm
2 gifts
1 ancestral
1 fof
1 walk
1 twister
1 desire
1 necro
1 bargain
1 y will
1 recoup
1 tendrils
1 burning
1 cunning
1 tinker
1 demonic
1 vampiric
1 mystical
1 dsc
1 jar

15 side cards
1 beb
1 reb
1 mis.d
1 skeletal
1 wheel
1 tendrils
1 brainfreeze
1 stifle
1 rushing
1 eye nowhere
1 rebuild
1 h recall
1 chain
1 tormod crypt

He started three times and I started only two.
I drew FoW twice when on the draw and Brainstorm find me something similar at least once, so I had active counter on turn 1 almost 50% of the times.
I resolved Shamans and Furnaces ( coupled with TFKs, Merchants and Gifts ) in the early game and still lose to the right combinations of opponents cards.

He won in different ways:

1) He played Land Pass, Land, Additional Mana, Gifts with FoW backup. His Gifts are always better than mine
2) He played Land Duress, Land, Fast Mana, Desire for brokeness at zero cc
3) he played Land Duress, Land Brainstorm into something fresh. Additional Duress and Necro. A couple of turns to stabilize and two little ToA finished me off.
4) I won because of his mulligan to five. I opened with brokeness from my side.
5) I ate all his mana accelerations and barred myself behind a Drain. He had cards in hand and a single Land. He ritualled, I forced he forced, I wished for Mis-d but he forced again resolving a mid-size Y will. Then he went over burning-wishing for it again to finish me off.

At some point of one of the game we produced this stack.

His EoT. A lot of mana from both the side of the board.

Me.     Ancestral
TPS.    Resp, stacking his own Ancestral
Me.     C. Wish for Mis-D targeting me with his own Ancestral
TPS.    Gifts for FoW, Brainstorm, Wish, Y Wiill. I gave him useless spells in this situation: Y Will and    Brainstorm. He brainstormed into somthing. he FoWilled my Mis-D. I Drained it back he FoWilled my Drain again.
Me.     His Ancestral resolve. Mine too.
 
I untapped and played some slow board control and Brainstorm into nothing of consequences .
He played Duress and Win.

Retrospectively thinking, giving him both Brainstomr and Y Will was not a play error of course. Taking out FoW from the contexr, with Brainstorm and C-Wish ( for MIs-D ) he would have had another way to counter my own Ancestral and draw three cards, leaving me totally without gas.

This brokeness from bothe the side are a testimoniance of playing with HIGH SPEED and HIGHLY COMPETITIVE decks.
When TPS would go first, feel free to fear of being a full turn later on ANYTHING you are going to play.
When you are on the play and you are not playing Duresses, feel free to play UU faster than anything else or you are going to face too many problems for being satisfied by playing some Gifts Ungiven.


This test can say nothing to you, but I would like to point out that different players SHOULD test DIFFERENT interactions with DIFFERENT deck before talking too easily of what could be done by a deck, epsecially if talented and experienced players are referring them that there are a lot of "escamotages" and safe plays that can let you win thorugh the pletora of Merchants for Drains, FoWs or Gifts.

For reference this is my Gifts list.

15 lands
10 artifacts accelerations
4 drains, fows, brainstorms
3 gifts, tfks, c. wishes,
2 merchants, shamans, furrnaces
1 demonic, mystical, tinker, dsc, ancestral, fof, walk, recoup, ywill,
side with rebs, drawers, mis.d, removals, grave removals, artifact removals, brainfreeze and a titan.
best gifts.dec played since a while, especially against control and control-combo.decs.

Maxx

[Vegeta2711]

Here, I'll solve the thread for everyone.

1. TPS lost it's best matches, it now has no good matches, save crappy aggro.
2. TPS is slower than Long and Belcher, yet no longer faster than the control decks available (CS and Gifts).
3.  5 Games is not a relevant sample. Just saying is all.

To answer the original question.
Yes, TPS is viable. Why? Because it runs so many broken cards.

Now the relevant question that should be asked. Is TPS worth playing over other decks?
Rarely. It lacks the useful 'I win' matches, isn't more powerful or consistent than similar combo-control decks and lacks as many broken starts as other combo.

In simple terms, it needs to evolve or simply be left in the dust. If not, it may continue to do well in isolated incidents, but it won't become a power anytime in the near future.

[BigMac]

Here, I'll solve the thread for everyone.

1. TPS lost it's best matches, it now has no good matches, save crappy aggro.
2. TPS is slower than Long and Belcher, yet no longer faster than the control decks available (CS and Gifts).
3.  5 Games is not a relevant sample. Just saying is all.

To answer the original question.
Yes, TPS is viable. Why? Because it runs so many broken cards.

Now the relevant question that should be asked. Is TPS worth playing over other decks?
Rarely. It lacks the useful 'I win' matches, isn't more powerful or consistent than similar combo-control decks and lacks as many broken starts as other combo.

In simple terms, it needs to evolve or simply be left in the dust. If not, it may continue to do well in isolated incidents, but it won't become a power anytime in the near future.

How is this solving anything. This is your oppinion and if you would read my post again you would see that there are no bad matchups for TPS. You can win any matchup. Other decks can just die and roll over to certain cards. I have been playing it for two years now and it is still evolving and still doing well getting me into top 8 almost every time i play it. (say 80 percent of the time) If nobody in the states is able to play combo well (except JD and Smemmen perhaps, as it seems they are the only two that do well with it) it does not mean a deck is bad or not viable.

As for deckchoice, that is personal. I for one am very confident with the deck and know how to play it right, so i will keep on playing it untill some deck arrives that is an autolose for TPS. Untill then i will keep doing well.

[Liam-K]

Very few established decks have unwinnable matchups.  That's because decks that roll to something suck.  So we've established that TPS does not "suck."

TPS is capable of winning tournaments, because it is not an awful jank deck.  That does NOT mean its strengths compared to other decks in the meta make up for its weaknesses compared to other decks in the meta.  We KNOW that on a scale of good to bad, TPS comes down closer to good, what matters now is whether it's worth taking TPS to a tournament over something else, assuming you can play "something else" as well or better.

And I say no.  I say that at a similar speed you can play a deck that doesn't fizzle, is harder to hate, and packs more protection in Gifts.  I say that at a faster speed you can play Grimlong.  And I say TPS is weaker against Stax than Gifts or Control Slaver.  I can't think of a good reason to play it right now unless you're just better with it than you are with other decks (which doesn't make the deck good, it makes you good, it matters in a game but in this topic it's irrelevant).

[Thug]

That's just it.  You don't look forward to any match in particular.  With Long, I always looked forward to Mana Drain (maybe a function of me personally, but I had an amazing win % against Drains).  With Belcher, I look forward to...pretty much anything that doesn't play Null Rods, except maybe Fish, because Mages are obnoxious.  I think not having any matches that you really want to play just makes the deck unattractive.

You got to work for your games, truth, but that doesnt mean you dont look forward to them.
If I play TPS and know Im facing Slaver I know I should win the game, losing a game is acceptable against Slaver, losing the match is not. Same counts for Food Chain and basicly any kind of aggro.

So, maybe, Koen, the deck is great because you're playing it.  Have you stopped to consider that aspect?  Maybe you just play this deck better than anyone else ever, and that's why the deck is amazing for you.

I know Im experienced with the deck and vintage in general, but when discussion a deck I'm not going to take the average player in account. When you just pick up T1 you shouldnt play TPS, you shouldnt play Gifts or Slaver either. You would most benefit from running a deck with minimal interaction with the opponent, or just a very simple deck.
A beginning player would most likely do better with Belcher, Fish, Mono-U, Oath than with more complicated decks.
When discussion these deck I take a player into account with experience with vintage, knowledge of the metagame and some experience with the deck.

Here, I'll solve the thread for everyone.

1. TPS lost it's best matches, it now has no good matches, save crappy aggro.
2. TPS is slower than Long and Belcher, yet no longer faster than the control decks available (CS and Gifts).
3.  5 Games is not a relevant sample. Just saying is all.

1. TPS should have adapted to less stax by now.
2. TPS is better against hate than Long and Belcher but still outspeeds Gifts and Slaver
3. Those 5 games do bring forward a lot of things I have found too when testing the matchup.

- Being able to Gifts earlier win games
- Necro wins games
- Gifts need a very explosive hand to beat TPS

In simple terms, it needs to evolve or simply be left in the dust. If not, it may continue to do well in isolated incidents, but it won't become a power anytime in the near future.

It wont become a power anytime in the near future cause people hesistate to pick up and learn the deck, but hey I guess thats a good thing 'cause that means people wont be aiming for the deck making it an even better choice.

And I say no.  I say that at a similar speed you can play a deck that doesn't fizzle, is harder to hate, and packs more protection in Gifts.  I say that at a faster speed you can play Grimlong.  And I say TPS is weaker against Stax than Gifts or Control Slaver.  I can't think of a good reason to play it right now unless you're just better with it than you are with other decks (which doesn't make the deck good, it makes you good, it matters in a game but in this topic it's irrelevant).

Gifts is easier to hate than TPS is...
TPS doesnt fizzle...

---

I rest my case

Koen

[rvs]

How is this solving anything. This is your oppinion and if you would read my post again you would see that there are no bad matchups for TPS. You can win any matchup.

Actually, I agree with Veggies, and your statement doesn't disagree with him. Simply put, I can translate the quoted part into: TPS has no bad matchups, because this is T1, and sometimes it just goes nuts.

[Komatteru]

I know Im experienced with the deck and vintage in general, but when discussion a deck I'm not going to take the average player in account. When you just pick up T1 you shouldnt play TPS, you shouldnt play Gifts or Slaver either. You would most benefit from running a deck with minimal interaction with the opponent, or just a very simple deck.
A beginning player would most likely do better with Belcher, Fish, Mono-U, Oath than with more complicated decks.
When discussion these deck I take a player into account with experience with vintage, knowledge of the metagame and some experience with the deck.

You missed my point completely.  Let's use another great example here, Steve Menendian.  Steve rarely ever plays the same deck two events in a row.  So, when he goes to pick a deck, what is he going to choose from?  His list would likely look something like Stax, Slaver, Gifts, Oath, Grim Long, and Monoblue.  The first five are very understandable, but why the last?  He's better with Monoblue than anyone ever, and when he plays it, it's something to worry about.  Should anyone else be considering playing Monoblue at an event?  No way.  That's the point.

Also, my Belcher list isn't too complicated in game, but it's mulligan analysis is far more complicated than anything in the format.  There's a few simple rules  you can follow to keep from going insane, but there's no "this hand has Brainstorm, so it's keepable" type rules.  Mulliganing incorrectly often leads to a game loss.

2. TPS is better against hate than Long and Belcher but still outspeeds Gifts and Slaver

I disagree here, at least with Belcher.  When you just look at Chalices and say "that's nice," that's some resiliancy.  Storm decks need to remove Chalice at 1 before attempting to win.  The only cards TPS really has less issues with are turn 1 Trinisphere, turn 1 SoR (both on the play for Stax), and Null Rod.  Belcher just doesn't care about Trinisphere or Sphere of Resistance once it's had one turn.  TPS still does, as both of those cards need to be removed from play before Storming.  TPS can also be hit with Wasteland, while Belcher just doesn't play with land.

The speed of TPS BARELY outraces Slaver and Gifts.  You can't be playing Draw7s against those, lest if you pass the turn, the game is over. Sure, Slaver officially wins later in the game, but by turn 4, it can build up such a huge advantage that the game is over.  Gifts does that even quicker.  I haven't seen TPS be purely quick enough to consistantly outrace Gifts and Slaver enough.

If you say, well, you can wait longer to win and just wait it out, you're making my case for me.  The longer you wait, the more hate that comes down.  You really can't last all that long on doing purely nothing.  You can't control the board, and you can't outcontrol anything with just Duress and Force of Will, as the former doesn't stop topdecks and the latter has proven to be an ineffective control engine (c. Fish and Dragon, and why they can't control shit).  At least with Belcher, you can go aggro with ESGs or Welders (and Welder saves you against any one of the million problematic artifacts out there), and Long can do the same with its ESGs.  If you say that's bad, it doesn't matter.  When starting down Chalices at 0 and 1 and no sight of a tutor or bounce spell, the best thing you can often do is change your path to victory.  I've won my share of games off ESGs that I've resolved off Xantid Swarms.

3. Those 5 games do bring forward a lot of things I have found too when testing the matchup.

I disagree.  My testing has revealed that TPS does not beat Gifts, at least, the Meandeck version with 4 Scrolls and 4 Gifts.  It was just a massacre.  Gifts was what TPS wanted to be.  I've never tested Brassy's Gifts because the Meandeck/TPS match was so hopeless for TPS that it just wasn't worth bothering with anymore (this was back in like August or something).

It wont become a power anytime in the near future cause people hesistate to pick up and learn the deck, but hey I guess thats a good thing 'cause that means people wont be aiming for the deck making it an even better choice.

What about Splash damage from other combo decks that might be popular?  Cards that are good against GrimLong are even better against TPS since TPS gives the opponent more turns to find those cards.

[Clown of Tresserhorn]

I disagree.  My testing has revealed that TPS does not beat Gifts, at least, the Meandeck version with 4 Scrolls and 4 Gifts.  It was just a massacre.  Gifts was what TPS wanted to be.  I've never tested Brassy's Gifts because the Meandeck/TPS match was so hopeless for TPS that it just wasn't worth bothering with anymore (this was back in like August or something).

Quoted for truthery. We playtested this matchup, and unless the Gifts player was a complete idiot, Gifts just dominated this matchup. 4 duress and 4 FoW are not enough. What you are missing here is that merchant scroll for any counter is insane. TPS is very threat light, so when you put all your eggs in one basket, a deck packing 11 counters and 4 ways of putting them into your hand will give you trouble. You say duress trades with Drain, but what happens when you see Scroll/Drain/Gifts? This came up very often. If you plan on winning that turn, drain is the call. But what if you're just setting up? If you nab the drain, they still have scroll for force/drain and Gifts to back it up. There have also been games where the Gifts player would open with land, mox, scroll for force holding drain. The other thing I noticed about TPS is it's lack of an actual draw engine. Long/Belcher get away with this by just running more powerful cards and by just winning earlier.

Gifts is easier to hate than TPS is...

This is just blatantly wrong. Drain is MUCH better at protecting you from threats than duress. Every good deck in the format is running brainstorm to protect itself from duress. Duress only takes the hate from their hand, whereas Drain pretty much guarantees they won't resolve a threat you don't want to see. Plus, Drain actually accelerates YOUR game plan by providing you mana. Also, Gifts is a TUTOR deck. With 4 merchant scrol/4 Giftsl in the deck, you have easy access to any bounce you need to take care of problem permanents that happened to resolve. I'd like to see TPS play around an ITEOC.

I won't say TPS is not viable. I will say however, that there are much better options to play. If you want to play pure combo, GrimLong is much better. If you want to play combo/control, Gifts is the more resiliant deck. Until the format completely shifts to workshop aggro, I don't see a point in running TPS (maybe it's the spike in me).

-Bob

[Thug]

Ok case opened again, have to respond to something of this.

You missed my point completely.  Let's use another great example here, Steve Menendian.  Steve rarely ever plays the same deck two events in a row.  So, when he goes to pick a deck, what is he going to choose from?  His list would likely look something like Stax, Slaver, Gifts, Oath, Grim Long, and Monoblue.  The first five are very understandable, but why the last?  He's better with Monoblue than anyone ever, and when he plays it, it's something to worry about.  Should anyone else be considering playing Monoblue at an event?  No way.  That's the point.

I think I follow the same route that Steve does, I rarely play a deck twice in a row (heck I rarely play a deck more than twice totall). I played about every decent archtype at least once, except the ones that just don't fit my playstyle (Belcher, Dragon and Mono-U). I think I have won tournaments with at least 10 different achtypes, from aggro (stacker) to pure combo (long) to very controllish (Ur-phid). But just as Mono-U is always an option for Steve, TPS is always an option for me.

I think that if any decent vintage player would test mono-blue non stop for some moths they would almost reach to Steve's level playing mono-blue. They might not get the full 100% but should at least reach 95% of his level. Same counts for me and TPS, I think right now there are only few people that have enough experience and knowledge of the deck to play it at top level. But if you, for example, wouldnt throw the deck away after losing against Gifts, but get to know the deck better you could also get pretty close to the top level, and get much better results.

My point is, that there will always be a difference in people playing their pet decks and people just playing the decks. Since the latter haven't put in as much effort in the deck as the firdt. But this difference is very small, and should make a top deck into an average deck.

The thing is people have emotional feelings for some decks or cards.
Lots of people will never play TPS over Gifts because they love Drain that much.
But I like Necropotence so much, that I always like decks playing it.
Etcetera.

So I know not much people will put as much time into TPS as I have, and I can deal with that
But if these people claim TPS fizzles, get slaughtered by this and that and is heavily outdated I just have to chime in.

Also, my Belcher list isn't too complicated in game, but it's mulligan analysis is far more complicated than anything in the format.  There's a few simple rules  you can follow to keep from going insane, but there's no "this hand has Brainstorm, so it's keepable" type rules.  Mulliganing incorrectly often leads to a game loss.

Just to be clear:
I'm not claiming some-one who just picked up the deck will reach your level of play immediatly, but I think he would do better with Belcher than say Gifts, compared to the maximum possibilities of the deck.

I disagree here, at least with Belcher.  When you just look at Chalices and say "that's nice," that's some resiliancy.  Storm decks need to remove Chalice at 1 before attempting to win.  The only cards TPS really has less issues with are turn 1 Trinisphere, turn 1 SoR (both on the play for Stax), and Null Rod.  Belcher just doesn't care about Trinisphere or Sphere of Resistance once it's had one turn.  TPS still does, as both of those cards need to be removed from play before Storming.  TPS can also be hit with Wasteland, while Belcher just doesn't play with land.

Chalice 1 is the only hate card TPS really cares about, and spheres when on the draw, but any deck has trouble with the latter. TPS can always find Tinker for the win, or bounce the Chalice, and off course there's FoW.

The speed of TPS BARELY outraces Slaver and Gifts.  You can't be playing Draw7s against those, lest if you pass the turn, the game is over. Sure, Slaver officially wins later in the game, but by turn 4, it can build up such a huge advantage that the game is over.  Gifts does that even quicker.  I haven't seen TPS be purely quick enough to consistantly outrace Gifts and Slaver enough.

You cant consistanly outrace them, but TPS has just more ways to decide a game early on.

- A resolved Necro is game 95% of the time.
- Will becomes a winning card as early as turn 1.
- Bargain sometimes hits the table on or before turn 2.
- With rituals you almost always can get 3U for gifts by turn 2.
- Gifts is better becuase you can add cards like Necro to it, making the choice even harder for your opponent

These little facts just give TPS an edge over Gifts, and a bigger edge over Slaver.

At least with Belcher, you can go aggro with ESGs or Welders

1/1 for R
2/2 for 2G
-- versus --
11/11 for 2U

TPS can go aggro much better, and with numerous tutors for time walk and tinker, its often a decent strategy.

------

Quoted for truthery. We playtested this matchup, and unless the Gifts player was a complete idiot, Gifts just dominated this matchup.
...
scroll for force holding drain.

The TPS was probably inexperienced and the Gifts played experienced, cause dominating just is not the case.
The description you give of the matchup shows me the TPS player played it wrong.
TPS is actually capable of beating Gifts in the mid-game and sometimes even late game.
If you see the Gifts player Scrolling for Forces and Drains, you just bleed them out of couters with Duresses and eot Gifts etc.
If the Gifts player tries to take full control that means he doesn't focus on winning, which just gives the TPS player more time.

And lack of a draw-engine...

1 Necro
1 Bargain
1 Ancestral
4 Brainstorm
3 Gifts
1 FoF
1 Skrying
1 Will

thats about as much as Gifts itself, which is filled with draw.

Koen


p.s.

I actually build a Gifts TPS using Drains and gave it a few runs.
It's a very nice hybrid between Gifts and TPS, and defenitly does better against the pseudo-mirrors.
Right now it has 3 Ritual, 3 Drain and 3 Duress. Becauce im not sure yet what the right configuration for the deck is.
I might actually play this deck in a tournament to see how it works out.

[MaxxMatt]

@JDizzle.

Let's use another great example here, Steve Menendian.  Steve rarely ever plays the same deck two events in a row.

Three categories of players/deckbuilders:

1) Menedian-like
2) Net-deckers-like
3) Ones that reasearch perfection in specific decks

The first category acts proactively. He is so good at thinking things faster than the other that he can pull out a good deck in seconds. Then his large capability of describing it well ( or better ) than it is AND winning a couple of times with it FORCE category number 2 to start acting.
The second category plays things proposed by category one. They try to mock out the behaviour and attitude on winning of the first category with a lot of problems too.
On the other hand, category one, knowing that it would be far easier playing different and unexpected things, built another deck that could smash all the people of the second category.
The third category acts without interacting with the other two, chatting with the ones of the first and considering the other simply as scrub.

During the tourney
1) Would win if he built a deck that can smash 3)
2) Would win only if playing with other 2)
If 3) could win/lose, with the deck chosen, it would win/lose regardless the interaction of 2) and 1)
1) would fear the betifull attitude of 3) for his deck and the game itself.
1) would fear large portions of people starting playing MtG as 3) usually do.
2) would not realize the trick and usually play decks that are outdated for 1), in a worse way, if compared to how 3) would have played it but that he remember that "it have been strong two weeks ago!!!!", as 1) referred into his last tourney report.
1) would play and win/lose with his new decks
3) would play and win/lose with his perfectly mastered deck
2) would play and lose with the best decks of the format.

Why Steve play monoU? both because it is "3)" with it and because all the "2)" would have chosen the deck that he suggested when he proposed himself as an "1)"

JDizzle and his confidance on Belcher and other combo decks can be easily considered as a "3)"
JDizzle and his way of reasoning around TPS could not be taken with the same authority because he ( AND OTHERS ) are dismissing things TOO QUICKLY!

I disagree here, at least with Belcher.  When you just look at Chalices and say "that's nice," that's some resiliancy.

If it would come faster than your 0cc and 1cc mana accelerations, those words would be 99% of the times more than like a simple.... "Huston!!! We have a problem!!! "

TPS have Lands.
Belcher have Grants and Duals.
Hate, when opponents are on the play, is FAR MORE DISRUPTIVE against Belcher/Long than against TPS.
While both of them can lose to hate, TPS can try to recover while Belcher not.
Hate, when opponents are on the draw, can be reduced to a 40% of FoW in their initial hate and nothing more for both the decks.

Let me articulate a bit more.
A situation with a fast CotV for 0 and 1 in play cannot be won by Belcher excluding unlucky opponent's draws
A situation with a fast CotV for 0 and Little-Spheres in play cannot be won by Belcher excluding some extremely lucky combinations of the 2 lands or ESG
A situation with Rod in play and some opponent's protection, cannot be won by Belcher.

While TPS and BElcher suffer the same hate, TPS have lands to start figuring out HOW to recover.
Belcher, in the same locking situations have really FEWER solutions...( if it had some... )

Your being part of the "3) category", make you a winner with Belcher.
On the other hand, this is not dependant with the inherent strenght of TPS or Belcher themselves.
A player as you make a deck stronger than it is usually considered.
I never saw anyone else winning so many games with it.
Exactly as you cannot see, around you,  a lot of people winning with TPS...


@Clown of T.

Quoted for truthery. We playtested this matchup, and unless the Gifts player was a complete idiot, Gifts just dominated this matchup. 4 duress and 4 FoW are not enough. What you are missing here is that merchant scroll for any counter is insane. TPS is very threat light, so when you put all your eggs in one basket, a deck packing 11 counters and 4 ways of putting them into your hand will give you trouble. You say duress trades with Drain, but what happens when you see Scroll/Drain/Gifts? This came up very often. If you plan on winning that turn, drain is the call. But what if you're just setting up? If you nab the drain, they still have scroll for force/drain and Gifts to back it up. There have also been games where the Gifts player would open with land, mox, scroll for force holding drain. The other thing I noticed about TPS is it's lack of an actual draw engine. Long/Belcher get away with this by just running more powerful cards and by just winning earlier.

Stop talking about MDGifts having 11 counters
Mis-D cannot counter anyone of the cards that TPS should try to resolve in the early game, excluding some REALLY STUPID USE of Ancestral Recall.
Mis-D can protect his own Gifts Ungiven and other things ONLY if coupled with Drains or FoWs.
When Duresses trade themselves with Counters or Bombs, you can easily realize that Mis-D cannot protect you any more.
Merchants are ALWAYS good when you are on the play. In this case, you can acquire another counterspell and try to protect yourself in a better way. But when you are on the draw, Duress hit you best way to deal with the TPS hand.

My route is usually Mana and Duress first AND then Bombs + FoW in the subsequent turn.
The first Duress CAN be coupled with some threats if it is the case.
How can Gifts ALWAYS deals with this speed or resilience?
And exactly as multiple Drains are available, in the same way, multiple DUresses or Bombs are possible.
But while UU + UU can be difficult to obtain in the early game, B + U3 or B+BBB or B+Ux can be easily achieved in a lot of ways.

MDGifts can easily outdraw TPS and anyother good decks when starting with strong hands.
TPS can do the same.
BUT, when both are playing MEDIUM HANDS, Duress + FoW + Bomb usually come online FASTER than Merchant + Drain + FoW, because of Rituals and because of the different way to approach the victory.

This is just blatantly wrong. Drain is MUCH better at protecting you from threats than duress. Every good deck in the format is running brainstorm to protect itself from duress. Duress only takes the hate from their hand, whereas Drain pretty much guarantees they won't resolve a threat you don't want to see. Plus, Drain actually accelerates YOUR game plan by providing you mana. Also, Gifts is a TUTOR deck. With 4 merchant scrol/4 Giftsl in the deck, you have easy access to any bounce you need to take care of problem permanents that happened to resolve. I'd like to see TPS play around an ITEOC.

I won't say TPS is not viable. I will say however, that there are much better options to play. If you want to play pure combo, GrimLong is much better. If you want to play combo/control, Gifts is the more resiliant deck. Until the format completely shifts to workshop aggro, I don't see a point in running TPS (maybe it's the spike in me).

I made a stupid example to say a real thing
I played a lot of times against Red Hate decks in my life or against decks that can pack A LOT of hate against BlueBasedDecks, be it an aggro deck or a control deck.
I had hard time winning with them while playing with Gifts while, weighting the deck's choices, I would have simply resolved "uncounterable" things against it  if I had played TPS.
Gifts is almost a MonoU decks with "some flavours" in it.
TPS is a dark deck with nearly unblastable things.

When playing with Gifts, I had problems with multiple ReBs, Pyro, Crypts, Rods, Mis-D, Duresses.
When playing with TPS, all those "control hate" can be easily superpassed thanks to the black restricted, the storm engine and the cheap threats.

In the past, a lot of people claimed that C-Slavery can be beated with 4-6 Blast in the side.
At now, Gifts have the same popoularity that Slavery had in the past.
It lose to the same things.

Why not looking at TPS as to "a way to play a really competitive deck that cannot lose to 4-6 ReBs"?
(... and you have to responde to me, a Gifts player and not a TPS player )

[Komatteru]

Read what I wrote again.  It seems I can't use anyone as an example without everyone either ignoring said name because they don't know him (Travis Hopkins) or latch onto the name itself rather than look at the heart of what I said (Steve).

It is clear you haven't tested my deck, but I've certainly tested yours.

Exactly as you cannot see, around you,  a lot of people winning with TPS...

I don't TPS has made a major American T8 since Trinisphere's restriction.  I don't think it's even been close in fact.  So there just aren't people here winning with TPS.

A situation with a fast CotV for 0 and 1 in play cannot be won by Belcher excluding unlucky opponent's draws
A situation with a fast CotV for 0 and Little-Spheres in play cannot be won by Belcher excluding some extremely lucky combinations of the 2 lands or ESG

Read my reports again.  At Springfield, I won like 4 games through a turn 1 Chalice.  At Chicago, I won 2 games in a row through Chalice 0 AND Chalice at 1, as well as two other games through Chalice at either 0 or 1, and almost won another through both Chalice at 0 and 1 (it took 3 Force of Wills to stop that from happening...3...the first two weren't enough).

In testing, I've won multiple games through even turn 1 SoR.  You forget ESG.  And you can't say that it would be lucky if I had ESG in my opener to combat SoR.  I play 4 ESGs, so if it's lucky to have one of those, then this game is all luck.  I also have a ~22.5% chance of drawing one of my lands in my opener.

Oh snap, speaking of luck.  Your argument here hinges on a "fast" Chalice for 0 AND 1, which I take to be turn 1.  Doesn't dropping turn 1 double Chalice seem a bit lucky to you?  It takes 4 cards from your hand, or 3 cards if one of them is a Shop (the odds of either configuration are about the same).

You also seem to forget that the objective of Belcher is to play and activate a Belcher.  This requires 4 mana to play, 3 of which has to stick around.  It doesn't need to play 10 spells.  It's not playing Will to win.  It doesn't care that it has to pay 5 for a Belcher.  The deck approaches the hate completely differnetly from TPS.

What are we arguing about again?  This whole thing has gotten waaayyy off track.

[Liam-K]

We were arguing about TPS's vulnerability to hate compared to gifts.  Somehow belcher got dragged into the ring with them.

However, the comparison is sort of relevant, as it brings up the issue of HOW a deck fights hate, and I think this is important here in the gifts-TPS comparison.  There are cards that both decks need to remove or expend a lot of energy to play around, or else they can't combo out.  Chalice 1 against TPS is the best example, but a Tormod's on the board for gifts or some such is just as good as an example.

So both decks can be cockblocked by hate, and both decks have tools to deal with it.  Both decks have tutors.  What's the difference?  The decks' "aggro" plan (comboing out) can't happen while the hate is down, so the combo deck MUST play the control role until the hate is dealt with.  But Gifts is a much much better control deck than TPS, so Gifts is much much better at coping with hate.