TT Confident (a.k.a. The Perfect Pile)

[Thug]

Mana Vault vs. Dark Ritual: A Debate

Firstly, Vault is just better in the singular.  There is no reason to free up maindeck slots for Dark Ritual, either as a bad 1-of, or as a 4-of, both situations and anything in between just give you bad draws way too often.

This might be how it feels, but it's nonsense.
Theres no reason why Vault is strictly superior to Ritual if you want to fill just one spot, just because you're used to running either 0 or 4 rituals.
I think it's a pretty hard call between the both, and it depends on multiple other choices.

Right now I don't run either, because I had to make some room for some experimental cards.

---

@Thirst:

Right now I run 1, mainly to be able to fetch some card-drawing with Scroll if I have spend Ancestral already.
For this reason I don't have to run much more artifacts maindeck, and the deck is actualll taking a different approach, moving more towards my control version.

Koen

[xrobx]

[skip italicized font to read relevant info pertaining to confidant combo control; beginning info describes ideas expressed and reasoning behind deck building]

I've been following this deck since it was first posted on TMD, as I had previously been working on it the day I heard dark confidant was coming out.  I made 2 variations of the deck, one leaning towards aggro/control (fish) and one towards combo/control (this deck).  I chose to work on fish first, as I saw it to be very unpredicatble (I know that many people play fish, but not the same style whatsoever) and I saw the format spinning like a little top around tinker and yawgwill.  Hence, I decided to respond and create a sick prison-style control fish deck, which would annihilate the likes of tinker and will.  To do this, I used cards that cost 2 mana, and had ridiculous synergy with eachother, while all working together for one main goal; lock the opponent, and win.

This was accomplished quite easily, and conveniently, with the synergies of cards like waterfront bouncer, gilded drake, mesmeric fiend, withered wretch, rootwater thief, standstill, and most importantly, chalice of the void.  The idea being I will drake your creature win condition, and kill you with your own shit.  If you didn't use a creature to win, you likely used will.  If this is the case, the backup provided by wretch, theif, and challice was more than enough to make most decks topple over hopelessly.  This theory and deck worked wonderfully.  I took it to SCG rochester, and managed to scrub out at 16th, winning a couple legends boosters.  The vital mistake I made when building this deck was creating the sideboard for the tournament; I made the crucial error of using energy flux in place of null rod.  In the one game that it mattered (I was playing against metalworker+staff+MWS+stax type deck), I went first turn land, lotus, flux.  I figured I was set.  As my opponent laid a MWS and cast metal worker, I utterly realized how terrible flux actually is (atleast in this matchup).  Had the card been null rod, I would have been in top 8 contention, and likely done fabulously, as my deck was geared to beat CS, gifts, stax, and most of the prevalent archetypes.  Remember; the idea being disable yawgmoth's will and tinker.

After fishing around for a few months, I decided to play something with expensive cards, simply because $2 cards were making it take a long time to win, whereas with drains, power, and tons of options made it so much simpler to just roll people over.  Also, I was tired of playing the same deck for 3-4 months.  Without further adieu, I want to talk about confideath (as I call it) or TT confidant as some call it.

The idea of the deck being more combo-esq seems appropriate, not to say control isn't, but the deck likes to simply win with the card advantage gained from a confidant, and it's easier to 'just win' then to prolong the game and win with the wizardman himself, or a really late tendrils.  That said, up for discussion is the inclusion of dark ritual.

Ritual only makes all the sense in the world to me to run.  As many people have mentioned, it's essentially a lotus in your deck, which is fetchable by different cards.  More cards than a lotus; which is key.  I was previously testing with LED, as it served as my extra mana when willing or twisting (read on).  I cut this for ritual, as ritual can be used ANY time, LED had to sit on the board and wait for a will or twist, or sometimes I'd do neat tricks, but the majority of the time, LED sat there, doing very little (similar to mana vault).  Ritual has allowed me to win otherwise unwinnable games.  It has allowed me to get retarded broken starts, as well as powering out 2 confidants first turn on separate occasions.  Currently, I'm running ritual in my build.  This helps greatly with higher mana costing cards like minds desire, fow, memory jar, and is great with storm generation/will recursion.

It's debateable whether or not the generation of storm through artifacts and cards like hurkyl's and rebuild are better or work in conjunction with ritual, but I've seen very little drawbacks from my testing when running both.  Clearly anything that's an artifact (vault/LED)
works wonders with storm building, but again, I'd be inclined to say that LED/vault are more of a dead card than a ritual, and ritual is much more easily accessible.

As for twister, has anyone else tested it?  I've tested it and had decent results.  It gets my will back if need be, and often works just like a jar and allows me to combo off.

The other consideration, and card I've tested with positive results, is darkblast.  I know it doesn't theoretically make sense to include this card in a combo deck, however, since the format is based on will and tinker, welder is always going to be around, as will confidant, many fish archtypes running 1/2 toughness critters, gorilla shaman, and the likes of various other small idiots.  Hence, running a single darkblast allows you to deal with these problems as they arise.  Blast also has some cool synergy, and use with oath tokens, shutting of your own confidant (in case of near fatality), and dredging to set up a huge will.

Thoughts and suggestions are encouraged and welcome.

[Cross]

I was 9th with this deck in the NY p9 tourney, going 4-1-1. Basically I should not have drawn last round, because for a short time I was under the impression that I would make it in. Basically it was my own fault for not making it in.

I used the 4 brainstorm, 1 top configuration, and it exceeded my expectations. Too often top is underwhelming, and brainstorm is too often amazing.

I don't see any reason not to run vault and ritual together, they are both amazing.

In respons to xrobx, I don't see any reason to run twister. Both players draw 7 cards, and somebody wins (but it might not be you).

Darkblast seems underwhelming to me, it doesn't kill meddling mage without tons of card disadvantage, and he's your worst enemy. Chain of vapor deals with him, and sideboarded echoing truths deal with him. Remember you only need to win once, so just bounce the mage and win. The only card I would consider running this against is welder, who is problematic for this deck if you have taken the control route. Rebuild/hurkyl's make welder look stupid, but you need to be able to dodge heavy lock components, and sometimes that's difficult.

Gush is amazing with team card disadvantage tutors. I would not have won a couple of games if it was not for the ability of being able to mystical with just enough mana for a tendrils, and gush for free to get that tendrils.

[adrienger]

i would like to know in which match up your combo version is better than the controlish one you have also posted...what kind of reason would make you chose a version rather than the other one to a tourney?

great deck BTW 

[Jawman16]

I played a build of TT Confidant to a T8 (4-2) finish at the Cleveland Mox Tourney this weekand.  The field was tough w/ 6+ Meandeckers and some other notable players (35ish total).  I was rusty as I had not played in a tournament for over 8 months.  I had not even played a live game until one week before the tourney so I cannot be too dissapointed with the finish. 

That said, I have some thoughts on the deck and am looking for some feedback because I liked my list but feel it could be improved upon.  
(Credit to Thug for the inception of the deck.  I am a mere thief of ideas)

4 Confidant
1 Yawg Will
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
2 Tendrils
1 Dark Ritual (I stand by my earlier statements.  It is good)
1 Darkblast

4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
4 Brainstorm
2 TFK
2 Gifts Ungiven
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Ancestral
1 Time Walk
1 Mystical
1 Rebuild
1 Hurk's Recall
1 Chain of Vapor

4 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
3 U Sea
4 Island/SC Island
2 Swamp/ SC Swamp
1 Tolarian Academy

5 Mox
1 Lotus
1 mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Lotus Petal
1 Sol Ring

SB notables
2 Tinker/ Titan (awesome in the matches it should be)
2 Massacre (not very good against fish)
3 Annul (wanted a card that doubled against Stax and Oath but it was not very good against either)
1 Library

0 Tops here.  Everytime I drew it in testing it was underwhelming.  I cut it for Merchant Scroll which is more powerful.  I did not want to lose to Wasteland and Stax so I cut LoA and added Swamp #2.  It was the right call and I never got Wastelanded (when it mattered that is) all day.  In fact, the second swamp won me a match against Uba stax in round 6 to put me in top 8.  My opponent had Wastelands in play and some artifacts but the Snow Covered Swamp let me keep my mana on the table to dig for, and subsequently cast, Hurkyl's Recall ftw.  I didn't miss LoA b/c you already have 4 of them against control which is a solid matchup anyways.  I am torn on the Darkblast because at times it was shitty but it was strong against the two welder decks I played. (obviously)  I don't know if the slot would be better suited as more business.  I cut all the jank such as Desire, Gush, Frantic Search etc...  Gifts was strong in testing so I cut TFK #3 an added another one.  It was strong all day as it finds cards that win in most any situation.  TFk was subpar but I could not think of what to replace it with before the tournament.  I tried more merchant scrolls but found that to be even worse.  Spending three mana on TFK really is not all that impressive unless you have dumb robots and welders.  Plus the only cards to pitch are your storm and mana generators which sucks at times.

This deck has a tough time with any aggro and Ritual based combo.  My losses were to U/W Fish (1-2), Grim Long (1-2) and Affinity/Stax (0-2; T8).  I put a good beating on the control decks I played, 2-0-ing Gifts, Slaver and Oath.  I also beat Uba stax 2-1 as said before.  The matches I lost though were disheartening because I never felt in the games due to no early Bob.  And when I did get him against Ravager in the T8 he killed me just as much as the dorks across the table (Could be my bad luck in flipping over FOW in both games). I found that I had a hard time coming from behind without the early card advantage of Confidant regardless of my opponents deck.  As I explained above, I tried to cut the situational combo pieces for cards that are always useful but when my opponents pressured me early I had a tough time recovering.  Any ideas on how to deal with Fish (?) as I feel U/W to be one of, if not the, worst matchup. 

That said, when the deck does get turn 1 confidant you have a very high win %.  There really are no dead cards in the deck minus the 2 tendrils when it comes to your opening hand which is another strength.  I post the list because as it stands I don't think the deck is strong enough to win a tournament and thus needs improvement.  T8? Yes. Win? I dont think so.  Thoughts? Comments? Suggestions?

[Cross]

I think you have taken the deck in an interesting direction. I have not tried gifts yet, but it may be better than desire. I can see why it would be good, but I have gotten lazy with testing the deck because my version has brought me much success. Cutting top also makes sense to me, as it is as you said underwhelming at times. I would not want to cut gush, as I have only found it to be amazing with all the instant speed tutors, and it's freeness.

I try to shy away from merchant scroll because of the huge amount of card disadvantage it provides. WIth the high number of blue instants in the deck it definitely makes sense, but it bothers me that the cards you get with it are easily countered. Also imperial seal seems infinitely better to me, because it is faster at getting ancestral, and it can fetch things like yawg's and even confidants.

I find myself pitching land to thirst for knowledge rather than storm spells or cheap artifacts. Maybe that's my playstyle, but I really like thirst and find that the high land count in the deck allows me to use it in this way. I am also still running a top, so I do have slightly higher artifact count, but the percentage is probably very small.

Against fish I have been using colossus, and it works sometimes. It really shows its colors against non-white fish style decks, like fcg, the mountain wins again, u/r fish, etc. I find that white fish has like infinite ways to remove the colossus, so it usually just becomes a stream of life for 11. Most of the time against fish, I find myself just building a winning hand up to the turn before they kill me. If I can put off death as long as possible, I can get out of situations by bouncing whatever hate they have and going off at low amounts of life. This is where having expensive spells like mind's desire and gifts bothers me, because fish has become very adept at attacking resources on multiple levels, and clunky spells like gifts can clog up your hand. I find that cheap bounce spells like chain/e truth/hurkyl's to be the best against fish.

[adrienger]

I toped 4 with a deck quite similar to yours two weeks ago...since i used to play gift i kept my old gift list and tweaked it a bit to fit confidant.



3 Island
3 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
4 Polluted Delta
1 Flooded Strand
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Library of Alexandria
1 Swamp

1 Darksteel Colossus
3 Dark Confidant

1 Demonic Tutor
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Yawgmoth's Will
2 Gifts Ungiven
1 Tinker
1 Time Walk
4 Mana Drain
1 Black Lotus
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Pearl
4 Brainstorm
1 Sol Ring
4 Force of Will
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
3 Duress
1 Recoup
2 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Rebuild
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Merchant Scroll

SB: 1 Duress
SB: 2 Chain of Vapor
SB: 2 Pithing Needle
SB: 2 Rack and Ruin
SB: 1 Darkblast
SB: 3 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 2 Pyroclasm
SB: 1 Sundering Titan
SB : 1 Gush

don't blame me for the side, it sucks indeed but i decided to play the deck a couple days before the tourny...gush is the best example for "oops, i need another card in my side".


I went twice 2/0 against slaver, 2/0 against stacker, 1/2 against grim long and ID to top 8.
In quarter I went 2/1 against kobold (in game one he killed me on turn 2 after a duress and a FOW :shock:).
In semi i lost 1/2 because the deck totally failed me in two "worst ever" mana death...all the same i was one turn away from wining if he didn't top deck the vampiric =>bounce to get rid of my 11/11.


the gift engine was amazing and each time i lost 4 hp to get it, I won the next turn or was able to survive (IE against stax : 4 permanants).

this deck totally destroys control since it draws a lot by very different ways (hard to hate), can totally win without any bob (I haven't seen them in half the games) and has a lot of disruption.

against stax it has a good chance thanks to its pretty stable mana base (swamp is tech ).

fish can be tricky but the 7/10 should Finnish the game.

oath is a great match up...a 3 turns kill is just too slow but a turn one orchard/oath can complicate things.

I didn't get to test against aggro...

after testing, tinker doesn't belong to the MD...I only killed with it once against stacker and once against slaver (hardcasted :lol:).

2 tops are too much...i might even cut the last one which tends to make you wait while you have pretty much won the game. Anyway i don't fear the bob's life loss, they are just too slow!


In this deck merchant is amazing, it gets bounces (kill in its own in mid game), gifts (the same) ancestral in the first turns and even tinker via mystical against aggro deck!


I'm still concerned by :

i would like to know in which match up your combo version is better than the controlish one you have also posted...what kind of reason would make you chose a version rather than the other one to a tourney?

great deck BTW 

[Jawman16]

Running Red in this deck is a mistake.  It pollutes your mana base with duals which costs you games against tough matchups ie. fish and turns stax from slightly favorable to unfavorable.  You also have to cut down on the number of fetches thereby makeing Top less powerful.  You don't need recoup for Gifts to be game ending.  You don't even need Will.  This past weekand an opponent played Turn 1 Tormod's on me and I was quite happy to see it b/c it meant he had one less card that I had to deal with.  You simply go for tutors, bounce spells, moxes etc... and promptly win.

As far as Imperial Seal goes, I think it may find a place but does require the inculsions of Top and Gush.  Otherwise it is way too slow after turn 1.  Running a 4 spot of tutors is extremely strong with Gifts.  Even if they give you say, Seal and Mystical, on EOT you Mystical for Recall and thereby negate the drawback of Seal on your next turn.  I have cut Darkblast from my previous list because it does not fit into this deck's role.  Sure, it did help me in a few game 1's but it also costs me games as I wish it was business instead of an answer.  The deck wants to be aggressive and Darkblast does not fit this role.  Coming out of the SB, it is fine but Game 1 I believe the deck should be as fast and threat dense as possible. 

SB issues: Is Duress the deck's best answer to Long right now?  Obviously you cannot pack Arcane Labs or Resitance Spheres.  Would Cabal Therapy be a stronger card than Duress?  I have not tested Therapy yet so I am simply hypothesizing here.  I have never been a huge fan of either card as they do nothing regarding the threat that is on the stack so I may also test out mana leak.

[Cross]

Long is about as fast as dragon, tps, and this deck.  Knowing that, anything that speeds your deck up and slows them down helps, ie duress. They also seem dependant on their graveyard, so tormod's is an option here.

The best thing to do against decks like dragon and long is to get a confidant down immediately. The more answers you have to their deck the more you can slow them down and control the game until you are comfortable winning.

I did some testing with gifts in the deck, and it seemed awful. It's way too many resources to spend on something that isnt tendrils. Plus tendrils as a win condition is not suited for a gifts build; something with tinker colossus and other sorceries seem like a better win condition for a deck built around gifts. Gifts turns it into a yawgmoth's will deck and also makes you reliant on your graveyard, which the giftless version is not.

[JDawg13]

I have to disagree with Long being the same speed as this deck.  I've never gotten this thing to go off first or second turn, which happens regularly with Long.  Your best bet against Long is to try to prevent them from winning the first turn or two, as that is when the deck is most dangerous.  The longer you stay alive, the more likely you are to win, so things like Duress are probably a good choice.  Getting down Confidant should help out too, just be careful you don't get into a situation where they can sit and let you hurt yourself with Bob, to the point where they can just play a couple moxes and kill you with a small Tendrils.

[Juggernaut GO]

I've tested this deck for the past week and I have absolute 0 success with it.  I play the mirror card for card last night online and the guy had 2 turn 1 wins, 1 turn 2 win and a win after me drawing 14 non business spells in a row.  I guess the deck is capable of broken shit, but I must just be too unlucky to draw really good with it. 

[mongrel12]

That was you? Yeah those games were sortof random. I don't think I quite won as early as you contend. I believe we played 4 games. One game i had a retarded turn one win that consisted of casting tendrils will tendrils on an academy lotus mox vault opening after you opened with lotus into double confidant (after a mulligan I believe so I wasn't scared of force). The other game i drained a turn 2 confidant into a turn 3 bargain win. The other game i lucked out after i desired into land force force drain drain and you didnt draw any gas. Because confidant isn't really relevant in the mirror, or the combo matchups in general, i tend to try and play very agressively.

[Cross]

Because confidant isn't really relevant in the mirror, or the combo matchups in general, i tend to try and play very agressively.

I've actually found that confidant is the best thing to play against combo, especially the mirror, where the game can come down to who gets active confidant first.

I've also found that confidant is the only way to keep up with the high threat density of dragon.

[Mr. Sligh]

Hi, i'm an italian player (so excuse for my bad english) very interested in this deck... I'm playing it from two weeks and i think it cuold be a new tier1... the only problem is aggro-control matchups... i think it's something impossibile or very very difficult... 
Well i want to show you my list to try to understand some different build choose...

MAINDECK
4 Underground Sea
3 Polluted Delta
2 Flooded Strand
3 Island
2 Swamp
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Library of Alexandria
1 Black Lotus
1 Mana Vault
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt
2 Sensei Divining Top
4 Dark Confidant
1 Mind's Desire
1 Timetwister
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor
4 Brainstorm
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Chain of Vapor
1 Rebuild
1 Hurkyl's Recall
2 Tendrils of Agony
4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
3 Thirst for Knowledge
 
SIDEBOARD
2 Pithing Needle
2 Tormod's Crypt
1 Darksteel Colossus
2 Energy Flux
1 Brainfreeze
1 Echoing Truth
2 Massacre
1 Tinker
2 Duress
1 Darkblast

First of all i prefer 3 island and 2 swamp because exspecially against aggrocontrol decks i have serious problem with the lack of double black man to cast tendrils...
Then I play 61 cards... yes i'm a token  ... because i adore timetwister and i think it's a good card to recover some 90% lost game... but i probably cut it because a semi-combo deck it must be 60 cards
Also i prefer mono-cunning wish to the second rebuild because in this mode i can add in side brain freeze and i can use it to take a buonce like echoing thruth to bounce creatures like meddling mages who calls cards like tendrils or chain of vapor in the first game...
Finally in my sideboard i prefer brainfreeze rather than the 3rd tormod's crypt and 2 energy flux rather than blue elemental blast... this beacuse, nowithstanding i think artifact matchups are ones of the easyest, in Italy there is a large number of artifact decks every tournaments in this period, and always two o three do top8...

What abuot Thug's idea of putting two merchant scrolls in this deck i think it's a correct idea, but i shuold prefer to add card like burning and recoup, and so red color in the mana base... this because red permit the use of red elemental blast, one of the most powerful cards in vintage and removal like pyroclasm or rack and ruin... even if massacre is fantastic 

Thank you so much at every anyone who read my reply and excuse again for my very bad english... i promise i study more it...
I also hope to see some replies 
Bye

[Jawman16]

@Mr. Sligh:  First order of business is that you need to cut the 4th Underground Sea and add in Polluted Delta #4.  As far as Timetwister goes, Tinker/Jar is better.  I am not a fan of Timetwister in any deck because if you don't win off the 7 new cards this turn, your opponent likely will do the winning for you on their's.  With Tinker you get the same effect as Timetister (Draw 7 for 2U) and you can pass the turn with Jar left unbroken.  In the absence of 4 Dark Rituals you usually will not have enough mana to go off the turn you cast either Tinker or Twister so being able to pass the turn, untap, and then draw 7 is much stronger.  Jar also does not refresh your opponent's hand as well as TT does.  Sure they can cast stuff EOT but say you are playing against Stax, where casting Twister is near suicide, busting Jar is basically playing Contract from Below.  Also running Tinker/Jar gives you double the threat as Jar can easily be played off Mana Drain. 

You are correct in running 2 swamps.  They have been awesome in my testing. 

I don't think you need Library.  I know I may get attacked for this statement but you should already be beating control in a 3 game match.  I have even found Library to be a curse sometimes as it encourages slow play rather than going for the throat which is what you should be doing against blue based control decks.  Peruse this thread for my arguments for including at least 1 Dark Ritual.  The card is awesome in comboing out, playing turn 1 Confidants, powering out the more expensive spells etc...

I hate TFK in this deck.  I have cut the card completely as it fills no vital role.  The deck plays in 2 ways.  Early Confidant leading to an easy victory or coming from behind with bounce spells or combo bombs ie. Desire, Jar etc...  TFK never fit into the early Confidant plan b/c you already should have more than enough cards to win and spending 3 mana on a Thirst is not that good.  TFK is also rather subpar at regaining advantage in a game compared to say Tinker/Jar. 

One more note.  2 Tops is at least 1 too many.  I am back to running a singleton but would never run 2 of them.  The effect is just not good enought to warrant 2 slots in an already tight decklist.