Gifts VS. Uba stax, what is your game plan?

[Juggernaut GO]

I would like to get the view of many of the gifts players that browse this forum.  Playing gifts, what is your strategy when you get paired against a deck like uba stax.  Do you go for a fast tinker and pray it holds up, or can a deck like gifts afford to play control, countering every threat until you exhaust your resources.

If your playing 4 scroll/4gifts do you have the worse end of the matchup?  What do you sideboard against UBAstax, is Hurkyl's recall your best answer to the deck?

If your playing TFK gifts is 2 maindeck needles enough to ride game 1 & 3 to victory?  What is your sideboard plan?


Please do not get this thread closed by saying TFK is better then meandeck, or meandeck is better then TFK.  I want to hear opinions of the players regarding this matchup only.

[Harlequin]

Rather than give an answer, I'd like to tack on a question or two ... Seeing as how I've never brought gifts to a tourny.

Over all question: Which chalice do you dislike the most?
Clearly this is based on how far the game has progressed, so I guess I'll break down the question a bit more.

Its Game2 (your playing gifts, and you've lost game 1), You know your opponent is playing Shop and chalice (you saw them game 1), perhapse a low density of mox monkey/karn (did not see either g1).  Do you commit your moxen to the board turn1?  Or do you hold back because you want them to play thier chalice for 0.

How do you board against Shop Chalice?  I noticed that the deck Kowal took to the p9 tourny had 1 RnR on the main, 2 on the side + 3 rushing river on the side... do all six of those go in against Stax? 

New example, Its game one, your on the draw.  Your opponent goes shop -> chalice for 1.  You have force in hand and say brainstorm and mystical tutor as your only 1cc cards in hand.  Do you force? or do you like that your opponent cannot play welder.

How bad is a resolved chalice for 2? off the top of my head, Drain, Recoup, Timewalk, DT, Timevault, Merchant Scroll, Hurkyls?, echoing?

How bad is a resolved chalice for 3 (both post side and preside)?? Tinker, Will, Rebuild, RnR, Rushing River.

[Disburden]

How bad is a resolved chalice for 2? off the top of my head, Drain, Recoup, Timewalk, DT, Timevault, Merchant Scroll, Hurkyls?, echoing?

How bad is a resolved chalice for 3 (both post side and preside)?? Tinker, Will, Rebuild, RnR, Rushing River.

I think the question regarding chalice settings is rather a matter of which build of gifts you play. Don't expect Gifts means Brassman gifts all the time. People play Meandecks version. Meandeck's list has a mana curve that basically starts at two. I would fear that setting more than anything. Brassman gifts has a curve more blended between a curve of 1 and 2, The setting to 1 can hurt a lot when playing pithing needles Vs Stax. Naming Wasteland/ strip with needle is great. With a first turn Chalice @1 though, it becomes merely thirst food (this is, of course, if COTV resolves.)

With a side that consists of:
2 Rack and ruin
2 Shaman
1 darkblast
3 Pithing needle
1 Hurkyl's recall

Also I run one Rebuild, one E truth, and one Hurkyl's Recall main.

I really don't fear the match up all that much. I have played Stax since the U/R days though, so I know how the deck works. Sometimes this is an advantage.

[Gandalf_The_White_1]

With a side that consists of:
2 Rack and ruin
2 Shaman
1 darkblast
3 Pithing needle
1 Hurkyl's recall

Also I run one Rebuild, one E truth, and one Hurkyl's Recall main.

I really don't fear the match up all that much. I have played Stax since the U/R days though, so I know how the deck works. Sometimes this is an advantage.

Are you really siding all of that?  What do you take out?

[Hydra]

Well, I play a Diceman style Gifts list personally.  Before I start discussion, I'll post my current list so we're all on the same page:

4 Brainstorm
1 Tinker
1 Darksteel Colossus
4 Force of Will
4 Mana Drain
1 Time Walk
1 Ancestral Recall
3 Thirst for Knowledge
3 Gifts Ungiven
3 Pithing Needle
1 Rebuild
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Echoing Truth
1 Skeletal Scrying
1 Burning Wish
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Recoup
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Will
7 SoLoMoxen
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Lotus Petal
1 Tropical Island
2 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
1 Library of Alexandra
1 Tolarian Academy
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
3 Island
1 Snow-Covered Island

Sideboard
2 Duress
1 Tendrils of Agony
4 Oath of Druids
4 Forbidden Orchard
2 Morphling
1 Razia, Boros Archangel
1 Akroma, Angel of Wrath

Between the three Pithing Needles, multiple maindeck bounce spells and multiple basic lands, this version of Gifts seems more suited game one to handle the threats UbaStax produces compared to the other builds.  Needles offer up simple answers to Welder/Bazaar that don't get hurt by the denial package generally run in UbaStax outside of Gorilla Shaman.

Game one is completely dictated by what my opening hand is.  If the early Tinker/Colossus presents itself and I can protect it via either counters/Pithing Needle/Skeletal Scrying (if they attmept to Weld out Colossus, just use Scrying in response to remove all artifacts from your graveyard), I'll definitely go for it.

If I can't go for the early Tinker, I'll just focus on building up a solid mana base with basic land and trying to get Tinker, Rebuild and/or Echoing Truth in my hand and a Needle or two on the board.  As long as the UbaStax player can't Uba Mask lock, ramp up a quick Smokestack or Crucible/Strip lock me out of the game, I can usually wait until I'm ready and then go for the win.

Post sideboard, it generally looks like this:

-1 Burning Wish
-1 Recoup
-3 Gifts Ungiven
-2 Volcanic Island
-1 Library of Alexandria
-1 Underground Sea
-1 Fact or Fiction

+4 Oath of Druids
+4 Forbidden Orchard
+1 Akroma, Angel of Wrath
+1 Razia, Boros Archangel

If you're expecting Jester's Cap, I'd also recommend cutting either a Mana Drain or a Yawgmoth's Will for a Morphling so you don't scoop to the Cap.

Post board, Oath of Druids makes it much easier to race their locks, while still allowing you to have access to the same gameplan as game one if need be.  Duplicant is still a threat, but not one that's impossible to manage between counters and Pithing Needle on Welder.  Usually if you can win game one winning the match itself isn't particularly hard if you can get down and protect an Oath of Druids in games two and three.

Onto the Chalice question, it depends on the situation.  In my list, Chalices shut off the following:

Chalice for 0 = Moxen, Loti, Mana Crypt (no more threatening than Null Rod in this scenerio)
Chalice for 1 = Pithing Needle, Ancestral Recall, Brainstorm, Mystical Tutor, Sol Ring, Mana Vault (More painful than a chalice for zero, but not game ending)
Chalice for 2 = Merchant Scroll, Mana Drain, Echoing Truth, Demonic Tutor, Time Walk, Recoup, Burning Wish post board: Oath of Druids (Probably the most dangerous "realistic" Chalice, one that can severely hinder Gifts' gameplan)
Chalice for 3 = Yawgmoth's Will, Rebuild, Tinker, Thirst for Knowledge (really hard to pull off early on, but shuts off all the win conditions

Chalices 1-3 are all painful, and Chalices set at 2 and 3 will win the game for the Stax player if they can manage to resolve them, although either alone along with other lock pieces can end the game as well. 

Against Chalice one should always commit their Moxen to the board before the Chalice hits, as if they're playing Chalice generally speaking they're not playing Null Rod, meaning you only have to worry about Gorilla Shaman or Karn effecting the Moxen.  As long as you have a staple land base, drawing out Shaman means they're tying up their mana eating unimportant Moxen instead of playing out more lock pieces.  If they don't have Shaman, then hey, you get Moxen to use.

Bonus grab bag:
Cards I fear from UbaStax:

Active Goblin Welder
Turn 1-2 Uba Mask
Crucible/Strip
Ramped up Smokestack

Generally speaking, the other lock pieces are just annoying and can be played around, but any combination of those can win the game against Gifts.

[Harlequin]

OK, So chalice for two is pretty good.  This leads me to i guess my most common delema...

Ok my opponent playing gifts, Im playing stax (doesnt really matter wich version).  My opponent opens with Fetch, off color Mox go.

I'm holding...  Shop, Mox, Chalice, Sphere of Resistance, Card, land, Card.  Doesnt really matter, lets assume for example 1, I have no red mana and no welder/monkey in hand.
Option 1 - Play chalice for 2, this cuts off the drain next turn
Option 2 - Play claice for 1, and Sphere of Resistance.  this hampers their play ... but ultimately does not effect Mana drain (even for NEXT turn).

Lets now add in a Barbarian Ring and a welder! (so hand is now... Shop, Mox, Chalice, Sphere of Resistance, Welder, B.Ring, Card (no bazzar).
Option 1 - Play chalice for 2 this turn, then Welder next turn.
Option 2 - Play chalice for 1 and sphere ... and forget about welder.
Optoin 3 - Play Welder this turn, and then Play either option 1 or 2 next turn.

As a gifts player what do you think I should do?

[Disburden]

Against the list of Gifts that I have been playing lately (Meandeck's), I would fear Chalice for 2 over all of the other plays. Not only would I lose Drain (if resolved), but I would lose Merchant Scroll as well. Merchant Scroll if have of my deck's engine besides Gifts itself. If you can read opponent's well I would probably try to see if they have Force OF will in hand before considering the Chalice @2 drop.

Baiting with Welder would be a good play to make a player Force. A lot of players would force a first turn Welder. This also plays a role into the fact of if the Gifts player mulliganed before the match-up. The difference in hand size greatly determines if your opponent carries Force or not.


@ Gandalf,

This is my current sideboard in my list:

2 Rack and ruin
2 Shaman
1 darkblast
3 Pithing needle
1 Hurkyl's recall
3 Red elemental blast
2 Tormod's crypt
1 Tendrils of agony

I never see Oath in my meta, so Rushing River isn't included. I didn't mean in my earlier post that all the items listed from my sideboard would be auto-in Vs. Stax. Sometimes it matters on the build of Stax. I don't fear moxen Vs. Uba as much as I do Vs. 5c Chang Stax. So Shaman wouldn't be in for the Uba Matchup. Especially since they use Null Rod and shut off their own moxen anyway verus Gifts. Vs Chang's list I would probably side like this

-2 Merchant
-1 Gifts

+ 3 pithing needle

- 2 midirection
+2 Rack and ruin

and maybe side out a single slot for my other Hurkyl's Recall.

[Clown of Tresserhorn]

This matchup is very tricky and depends greatly on the competency of both players. I've only tested MDG vs. UbaStax, so keep that in mind.

1) Mana development is KEY. Uba Stax really punishes you for keeping non-basic/mox heavy hands. An ideal hand would be something like island/fetch/mox/brainstorm.

2) I run hurkyl's recall/chain of vapor/rebuild. This bounce package has been AMAZING. It lets you fire off an early bounce spell without worrying too much about getting locked again. Running 3 means I can Gifts for them if worse comes to worse. Uba stax really doesn't have many hard lock pieces outside of crucible/strip (which, without tutors, is extremely hard to pull off) and smokestack. Bouncing a smokestack literally buys you like 2 turns.

3) I ALWAYS counter welder. I usually let welders go in the CS matchup and fight over thirsts, but vs. Uba stax, you MUST counter the welders if you can.

4) While tinker is the easier kill, I prefer to kill with tendrils in this matchup. Most of my games end up with me casting eot hurkyl's, then a game ending will. Postboard when you bring in needles, early tinkers with force back-up does the job just fine.

Postboard, I bring in X pithing needles (surprisingly good, naming welders/bazaar/strip/maze), X rack and ruins, X bounce, depedning on what's in my board t that moment. I've been under the assumption that bounce is the best answer (it gets fetched with scrolls, and deals with all their lock pieces for one turn...Imagine if they have chalice 1, 0, rod, and crucible, you'd want hurkyl's here over rack and ruin), but if they bring in upwards of 4 REBs, rack rack and ruin might be the better choice.

I wouldn't necessarily MDG has the worse end of the deal. It's a trade off. Brass Gifts runs 3 pithing needle where MDG Gifts runs more bounce and more ways of finding them.

[Disburden]

Glad to see Bob and I are on basically the same page. I actually use your list, Bob, and it has been great.

[PucktheCat]

I play a Diceman-esque build right now, within 2-3 cards of Hydra's maindeck.  I have the following answer cards available for the Uba Stax matchup.

Main:
3 Pithing Needle
1 Rebuild
1 Echoing Truth

SB:
1 Hurkyl's Recall
2 Rack and Ruin
1 Darkblast

I think the Uba Stax matchup rewards playtesting and practice quite a bit.  UbaStax is a unique deck in its playstyle and the tricks it employs.  Gifts can counter and play around many of those tricks, but only if it sees them coming.  The key to the matchup is to stay flexible and maximize your resources so that when an oppurtunity to win the game appears you can take it.  That means you don't play for turbo Tinker, but if the tools for it appear (usually Pithing Needle on Welder and counter backup) you take advantage of it.  The most common ways to win the matchup are, of course, Tinker and Rebuild.  But committing to one or the other as your "strategy for the matchup" is wrong.  The correct plan is to use your tutors, Gifts, etc. to build up your resources (getting card draw, counterspells, Pithing Needles, mana, etc) until you have the setup to execute one plan or the other with enough backup to be sure it wins the game.

Of course, every game is different, and only practice can prepare you for all of the situations that appear.  Sometimes you have to run out a Tinker and see if they can answer it.  Sometimes you just have the god draw and win.  Sometimes you are overwhelmed and it doesn't matter what you do.

[Evenpence]

For whatever it's worth, I can provide an Ubastax perspective:

Hydra hit the nail on the head with his initial post.

Chalice for 0 and 3 are my key priorities, unless, of course, I have Null Rod in my hand.  If I have two chalices, null rod, bazaar, and enough mana to cast anything I want on my opening hand, I probably do chalice for 0 and 1, hoping to win against you by not letting you brainstorm into good stuff, while being able to bazaar my way into things that wreck you.  I can always bazaar away null rod.  The two low chalices are infinitely better than a single null rod, and I would rather have them than chalice at 2+3 at this point, and go for smokey.

Ramped Smokestack wins the game for me against Gifts.  Chalice @ 2 + 3 do as well, but that's pointless, as I've only done that once or twice.

If I have to pick between 2 or 3, I obviously go for 3, as many of you do not MD Hukyll's, or Echoing Truth, and are forced to Burning Wish for something.

Honestly, I'm really only concerned in going for 0, or 3, unless it's the play game 1 (sometimes game 2 or 3 though) and I don't know what you're playing, but sometimes even if I do know what you're playing, I'll play them if I think I can get smokey online quickly too.

Active Welder is something I never get against Gifts, for some reason.  My friend and I were playing the Ubastax vs. Gifts matchup about 50+ times yesterday, and I won about 35 of them.  My friend laughingly said he did better than he usually does, which is actually true.  My friend MD all kinds of hate against me, as well bounce at all three casting costs Chain Vapor, Echoing Truth, Echoing Ruin in the side (able to be burning wished for), and Rebuild.  One of each.  In every game I got active welder, I won, but it's obvious why that happens.

I have to play differently against him than I do against most of you, obviously.

Rack and Ruin is a HUGE threat to Stax.  I hate seeing it more than any other card, virtually.  Chalice for 3 will always be more important than Chalice for 2, if only because of this point, in games 2 and 3.  What would be tech is to side in 2cc destruction spells.

You guys also need ways to kill welder, not just to pithing needle him.  My friend has darkblast in his sideboard, and it works out EXTREMELY well for him whenever he can get it into his graveyard/etc.  I need to cast welder then chalice at 1, immediately, soaking up a chalice at 3 that could be more useful.  Especially if it's early-game, which is the only time when I'm going to do chalice@1+Welder, because late game, I'm just going to give up on Welder, and cast Chalice @ 3 and hope for smokey.

As for more about chalices, yesterday, in a game, I had Chalice @ 0, 1, AND 2 out post-board.  My friend rack and ruined my Uba Mask and my Chalice at 1, cast ancestral, then rack and ruined my 0 and 2 a few turns later.  Chalice at 3 is more key than any of these.  He eventually won the game, although I never got my hands on smokestack.

The best turn 1 play available to any Ubastax player is Workshop, Mox, Smokestack.  This must be countered at all costs by FoW.

Second, is probably chalice @ 0 + 1.  Cutting of ancestral, brainstorm, vamp, mystical, etc can be huge early game, as they are stuck topdecking until they get to a mechant scroll (fear the meandeck version) or something else at 2cc to allow them to search, like DT.

Third is to resolve first turn Uba Mask.  This can randomly screw your opponent over, like if he turns over Colossus, or Yawg's Will.  It also stops Brainstorms from working, and makes TfK VERY ineffective (again, fear the meandeck version, as it does NOTHING against merchant scroll).

Next, however, is turn 1 red-land welder, go.  Not only does welder give me a measure of uncounterability, but he makes bazaar huge, as I don't have to actually cast spells for your drains anymore.  Unfortunely, I seem to NEVER GET first turn welder, ever.

If you do get active welder into play, and expect to have him for a few turns, try to cast low-cc spells to not just walk into drain and give your opponent the ability to demolish you.  Overcommit like crazy, as Rack and Ruin does virtually nothing with active welder.  If you have bazaar, however, cast NOTHING except for moxes and low chalices (highest you should cast is chalice at 2, unless you absolutely know he doesn't have a drain) and let Welder do all the work for you.  Don't walk into drains to accelerate your opponent, and start constricting him.  Active Smokey is again the best, and smokey should be welded in first, especially if your opponent lucks into a Pithing Needle or (eww) Darkblast next turn.

Slowroll everything against Gifts.  Always play your crap first.  Play Shaman only when your opponent has 2+ moxes.

[Clown of Tresserhorn]

1) When are you ever going to have enough mana to cast chalice 3 before i have drain mana up? Also, from a MDG point of view, Chalice 2 is the better play. You're stax, YOUR GOAL IS TO SHUT OFF MANA DRAIN. It shuts off merchant scroll completely, as well as Time walk, which can be randomly AMAZING. I'm not saying chalice 3 isn't good, I'm saying chalice 2 is a much more threatening play to Gifts. Cutting off mana drain is huge, as it's used as a mana source in this matchup. Stopping merchant scroll means I actually have to draw into a rack and ruin/rebuild.

2) You're making it sound like this matchup is very favorable for Stax when it's not the case. It's very skill dependent. I've seen Good gifts players wreck Uba stax, and vice versa.

3)

Active Welder is something I never get against Gifts, for some reason.  My friend and I were playing the Ubastax vs. Gifts matchup about 50+ times yesterday, and I won about 35 of them.  My friend laughingly said he did better than he usually does, which is actually true.  My friend MD all kinds of hate against me, as well bounce at all three casting costs Chain Vapor, Echoing Truth, Echoing Ruin in the side (able to be burning wished for), and Rebuild.  One of each.  In every game I got active welder, I won, but it's obvious why that happens.

Hurkyl's recall is THE best answer to uba stax pre-board. 2 mana is not hard to get at all, and it sets uba stax back tremendously.

Resolving a turn 1 welder makes it hard for Gifts to win, but it's not impossible. I've played against uba stax in tournaments where they've resolved turn 1 welder and I went on to win the game.

[dicemanx]

A CotV for 3 cannot be a good play against Gifts unless you know for certain what the Gifts build is exactly. If the Gifts player has Hurkyl's/Chain of Vapor, or uses Flame-Vault, you just potentially lost a key CotV and you sacrificed a turn to play it, nevermind the huge Drain you might have exposed yourself to.

If I was playing against a Gifts build without knowing the specific cards in it, I'd CotV for 0 on turn 1 on the play (if I don't have Null Rod), and barring that it would be a coin flip whether to set CotV for 1 or 2. 2 is much more effective against MDG, but against Brassman Style Gifts, which has far fewer problem 2cc cards, it turns more into a guessing game.

[Evenpence]

1) When are you ever going to have enough mana to cast chalice 3 before i have drain mana up? Also, from a MDG point of view, Chalice 2 is the better play. You're stax, YOUR GOAL IS TO SHUT OFF MANA DRAIN. It shuts off merchant scroll completely, as well as Time walk, which can be randomly AMAZING. I'm not saying chalice 3 isn't good, I'm saying chalice 2 is a much more threatening play to Gifts. Cutting off mana drain is huge, as it's used as a mana source in this matchup. Stopping merchant scroll means I actually have to draw into a rack and ruin/rebuild.

2) You're making it sound like this matchup is very favorable for Stax when it's not the case. It's very skill dependent. I've seen Good gifts players wreck Uba stax, and vice versa.

3)

Active Welder is something I never get against Gifts, for some reason.  My friend and I were playing the Ubastax vs. Gifts matchup about 50+ times yesterday, and I won about 35 of them.  My friend laughingly said he did better than he usually does, which is actually true.  My friend MD all kinds of hate against me, as well bounce at all three casting costs Chain Vapor, Echoing Truth, Echoing Ruin in the side (able to be burning wished for), and Rebuild.  One of each.  In every game I got active welder, I won, but it's obvious why that happens.

Hurkyl's recall is THE best answer to uba stax pre-board. 2 mana is not hard to get at all, and it sets uba stax back tremendously.

Resolving a turn 1 welder makes it hard for Gifts to win, but it's not impossible. I've played against uba stax in tournaments where they've resolved turn 1 welder and I went on to win the game.

I completely agree with you on most everything, Clown.  Maybe I wasn't making myself clear.  I agree with you about Hurkyll's recall 100%.  Most people that I've played don't play the Meandeck version, so I was addressing the version with TfKs more than not.  You're right though, I absolutely should have specified that.  Active Welder doesn't mean shit if you have darkblast in your deck.

A CotV for 3 cannot be a good play against Gifts unless you know for certain what the Gifts build is exactly. If the Gifts player has Hurkyl's/Chain of Vapor, or uses Flame-Vault, you just potentially lost a key CotV and you sacrificed a turn to play it, nevermind the huge Drain you might have exposed yourself to.

If I was playing against a Gifts build without knowing the specific cards in it, I'd CotV for 0 on turn 1 on the play (if I don't have Null Rod), and barring that it would be a coin flip whether to set CotV for 1 or 2. 2 is much more effective against MDG, but against Brassman Style Gifts, which has far fewer problem 2cc cards, it turns more into a guessing game.

Ubastax is a tremendously different deck than any other.  We actually did an experiment, with my friend, who is used to playing 5c Stax and Gifts w/TfK with severe hate for Ubastax primarily (he has both the decks fully assembled, and is AMAZING at playing both, and has won multiple pieces of power with them), and other friends who are big into T1 as well.

I laid out random starting hands for each of them, and said I was playing against Gifts.  A few of the hands included chalice + Null Rod, and sometimes double chalice.  All of them chose to play Null Rod over Chalice at 0, which in many cases I thought was a HUGE mistake.

Sometimes, they could have played multiple STRONG artifact locks over Null Rod in addition with Chalice at 0, but because they used Null Rod, it cut that short, because they didn't have enough mana then to cast multiple huge locks.  It was a complete misplay, but they did this with nearly every starting hand that wasn't simple.  I didn't realize until then that Ubastax's starting hands require a tremendous amount of thought, which might be the reason why people don't do well with the deck.

Null Rod is not the end-all of this deck.  It's only a 2 or 3 of in this deck, and does not wreck Gifts more than any other card.  I have made myself NEVER set a chalice at 1 against Gifts, simply because NOTHING that hurts me is at 1.  I would much rather set it at 2 or 3, (2 against MDG and 3 against TfK Gifts).  If I have Null Rod, Chalice, and enough mana to cast both with Chalice at 1, I wait.

If I can set chalice at 2 + Null Rod on the play, I definitely do that, as it shuts off mana drain pre-emptively, and because I already have that much mana, I can easily just luck into a chalice at 3 and win the game.  This scenario, however, is so peculiar and awkward that I don't think it's ever come up.  If you have Smokestack and that much mana, you play that.  I don't think chalice for 1 should EVER be played against any kinds of Gifts builds because while I take out some of your tutors and brainstorms, I have cards in my deck which hinder brainstorm (uba mask), and brainstorm itself is not a threat to me at all.  Merchant scrolling for rebuild, and draining to do funky shizzle during your turn is a huge threat, so Chalice @2 will ALWAYS be more important than Chalice @1.

[PucktheCat]

You guys also need ways to kill welder, not just to pithing needle him.

This is utterly, and completely false.  Pithing Needle is definately better than Darkblast against UbaStax.  It stops Welders at card advantage, can be cast with colorless mana, and can be tapped down for Tangle Wire.  The fact that it also can shut down Strip recursion, Bazaar, Gorilla Shaman, and so on, is just iceing on the cake.

My friend and I were playing the Ubastax vs. Gifts matchup about 50+ times yesterday, and I won about 35 of them.  My friend laughingly said he did better than he usually does, which is actually true.

Your friend needs to consider a different deck.  It's obvious that Gifts isn't his thing.  Indeed, as you said in the other thread:

Gifts is very succeptible to mana-hating, which is why Ubastax wins in most of the matchups (although it's not as lopsided as a few people take it to be, I don't think it's anything like 65-35, maybe 60-40 at an extreme, but probably somewhere in between that and 55-45)

If he is losing 70% of the time he is doing poorly by any estimate.

[nataz]

all right, all right,

Simplified, I think we have pretty clearly discribed how gifts can win the UbaMask matchup.

pathway useally starts w/

1) Match appropriate mana in the opening hand

and is followed by one of the following:

2) tutor -> recall or reuild
or
3) early Tinker backed by pithing needle/FOW to protect from welder
or
4) drained lock peice

That being said, I think we should try and identify pathways in which the UbaStax deck will win.

I have my own opinions, but some questions I'd like to see answered from a gifts players perspective are:

What are the key cards that need to resolve, and in what order?

Do versions w/ tangle wire affect the usefulness of Mscroll -> tutor?

How do different kill conditions, mana bases, and tutor packages affect question #2 

[Kowal]

Quick post:

Having tested the Thirst-based Gifts lists more than most people, I can say with certainty that I enter the Uba matchup confident.

A) Uba Stax is a deck which benefits hugely from Crucible of Worlds recursion.  When you only need colored mana once or twice in a game, providing targets for Wasteland isn't exactly on the agenda.  I win many, many games solely on the back of basic islands being in my deck.  By paying just a little bit of attention to your manabase, you force the Uba Stax player to either locate Strip Mine, or ignore the most important part of their own deck.

B) Uba Stax lacks a good clock.  While you may have a great time punishing me for many turns over, you're giving me a very high amount of turns from which to break out of the lock.  This works well with point A as well, given that your opponent has to actually resolve a Smokestack to remove the vast majority of the permanents in your deck.  You can get raped by Chalices, Spheres of Resistance, and Tangle Wires all day, but if Smokestack doesn't hit, the only pressure you're facing is 2 points of Barbarian Ringing every turn.

C) Uba Stax is very vulnerable to Pithing Needle.  As I am running three maindeck now, it's not difficult to find one and resolve it for Goblin Welder or Bazaar of Baghdad.

D) Given that so much of the deck is filling the same roll, you can boil the entire deck down to about 9 spells that are actually worrisome.  Those spells would be Sphere of Resistance x4, Smokestack x4, and Trinisphere.  If you're a couple turns in to the game, that number drops to 5 cards as Sphere of Resistance becomes less relevant.  Some hands (particularly ones with Tinker in them) can even ignore the other lock pieces as well, given that you'll win before Uba can figure out what to do about what you tinkered for.

E) Uba Mask (as a card) actually plays -nicely- with Gifts if you don't play it turn one.  If I have time to commit most of my hand to the table, it's usually a very simple matter to burn things like Brainstorm as Ancestral Recall.  In effect, you're helping me assemble Time Vault/Flame Fusillade.

F) Time Vault is hilarious against decks running Smokestack and Tangle Wire.


I feel at this point it's worth noting that I'm more afraid of the 5c Stax matchup, but even that tends to be fairly straightforward. 

EDIT:  Evidently I don't know the alphabet.  Fixed.

[Komatteru]

I haven't tested with the TfK lists all that much, but my own experiences with various builds of Gifts have more or less mirror A, B, and D.  The few times I've seen Needle played against me with Stax, it's been quite irritating, so B seems valid as well.  I think I disagree with E, as I've found the Mask itself to be quite good vs. TfK Gifts, as cards like Merchant Scroll completely negate the Mask's effect.  Cutting out the deck's primary search engine (TfK) is not really game breaking, but it is quite effective when coupled with something else.  (Kowal, did you forget Null Rod stops the Vault?)

[Disburden]

With all that has been said, I am wondering how we can further this discussion.

Bob and I basically said two of the same things:
Chalice @ 2 hurts the deck more than anything because of Mana Drain and Merchant Scroll (MDG).

Also that maindeck answers like hurkyl's Recall, Rebuild, and Chain of Vapor are in our decks, so the match-up isn't something in the Stax players favor, by a big margin, at all.

Kowal said something 100% true about Uba Stax- The clock sucks. Tinker for Sundering Titan (changs deck) is a nightmare.

Pithing Needle in my SB with Darkbast and 2 rack and ruin has been great.

I am actually wondering at this point why it was thought Stax had a better match-up.

[Hydra]

My guess is either extremely talented players playing UbaStax (read: Vroman) or people playing the deck against seemingly subpar Gifts players.  UbaStax CAN win, but it's an uphill battle for them without a faster clock.

[nataz]

My guess is either extremely talented players playing UbaStax (read: Vroman) or people playing the deck against seemingly subpar Gifts players. UbaStax CAN win, but it's an uphill battle for them without a faster clock.

See, there is a huge hole in this logic. You could just as well be playing against terrible UbaStax players/bad builds.

I am actually wondering at this point why it was thought Stax had a better match-up.

I'd assume that this is from earlier testing results where SOR was included as a 3x-4x.

SOR is a beating against gifts when you combine it with the rest of the deck. Tangle Wire may buy you 1-2 turns to play your spells, but a SOR will slow a gifts player down considerably. When Gifts costs 5, rebuild 4, recall 3, BS 2, etc, AND either Null Rod or Chalice is affecting your mana base, the Gifts players curve is all screwed up. This itself creates a gap where either UbaMask or Smokey can become a fearsome hard lock.

E) Uba Mask (as a card) actually plays -nicely- with Gifts if you don't play it turn one.  If I have time to commit most of my hand to the table, it's usually a very simple matter to burn things like Brainstorm as Ancestral Recall.  In effect, you're helping me assemble Time Vault/Flame Fusillade.

Kowal, this seems odd. BS is terrible under a mask, not only must you use the cards right away, but you also lose cards out of hand. UbaMask also forces you to rely on your board where the prison deck shines, rather then in your hand, traditionaly safe ground. When playing UbaMask you *have* to assume that mana on the board (with the exception of a basic island) is not safe. 

UbaMask means you can't just hold the Imperial Seal, you not only have to cast it, but you also have to open yourself up to wasteland with an underground. Mask forces a gifts player to be aggresive with drawn spells, forceing akward timeing that can seriously expose your board position. And tutors aside, TFK is extreamly clunky when you not only are forced to discard from your hand rather then from what you drew, but it also costs three mana leaving little left over to play whatever you did happen to draw.   

 

 

[Hydra]

My guess is either extremely talented players playing UbaStax (read: Vroman) or people playing the deck against seemingly subpar Gifts players. UbaStax CAN win, but it's an uphill battle for them without a faster clock.

See, there is a huge hole in this logic. You could just as well be playing against terrible UbaStax players/bad builds.

You're absolutely right, I could be, but I'm sure guys like JDizzle would take offense to being called a terrible player with any deck.  The earlier versions of the deck could've had a much better matchup, as I'll admit, most of my experience comes against the Tangle Wire version since that one has been all the "rage" during the time period I've been playtesting the matchup.  For all I know the original builds could completely rape Gifts, so I'm going to be playtesting more against the older builds soon to see if that is in fact the case.

[Evenpence]

So...what bad matchups does Gifts have, if Stax isn't one of them?

As an offside:

You're absolutely right, I could be, but I'm sure guys like JDizzle would take offense to being called a terrible player with any deck.

JD's build runs 3 Bazaars.

[Kowal]

E) Uba Mask (as a card) actually plays -nicely- with Gifts if you don't play it turn one.  If I have time to commit most of my hand to the table, it's usually a very simple matter to burn things like Brainstorm as Ancestral Recall.  In effect, you're helping me assemble Time Vault/Flame Fusillade.

Kowal, this seems odd. BS is terrible under a mask, not only must you use the cards right away, but you also lose cards out of hand. UbaMask also forces you to rely on your board where the prison deck shines, rather then in your hand, traditionaly safe ground. When playing UbaMask you *have* to assume that mana on the board (with the exception of a basic island) is not safe.

UbaMask means you can't just hold the Imperial Seal, you not only have to cast it, but you also have to open yourself up to wasteland with an underground. Mask forces a gifts player to be aggresive with drawn spells, forceing akward timeing that can seriously expose your board position. And tutors aside, TFK is extreamly clunky when you not only are forced to discard from your hand rather then from what you drew, but it also costs three mana leaving little left over to play whatever you did happen to draw.   

Might I emphasize the point about committing my hand to the board?  It's a fact of life that my hand won't be my hand for more than a turn or two after you cast Uba Mask.  At that point, Brainstorm reads:  Draw three cards, and put nothing back on your library.  It's specifically because of cards like Imperial Seal that make Gifts able to abuse the extra cards played on your own turn, because it lets you assemble the two cards that win without having to draw them on inconvenient turns (which are not always flamevault by the way, as needle/tinker-for-colossus is usually also just ducky)

My opinion however may be skewed, as I've been maindecking a Rack and Ruin since Waterbury, so I'm a little better suited to taking what I want after Uba Mask hits and removing it when and if it becomes an actual problem.  If you don't expect people to have maindeck answers, it might be a stronger card.  I'm not really sure since there are no decks in the format I would play without maindeck Rack or Rebuild.

[Disburden]

My opinion however may be skewed, as I've been maindecking a Rack and Ruin since Waterbury, so I'm a little better suited to taking what I want after Uba Mask hits and removing it when and if it becomes an actual problem.  If you don't expect people to have maindeck answers, it might be a stronger card.  I'm not really sure since there are no decks in the format I would play without maindeck Rack or Rebuild.

This point holds great amounts of water. One of the biggest mistakes I heard about testing was that some Gifts builds weren't packing maindeck answers like Rack and Ruin, Rebuild, E-truth, hurkyl's Recall. If you are testing against Gifts and they have nothing to do with these cards maindecked, then you aren't testing against a good build of Gifts.

[Hydra]

So...what bad matchups does Gifts have, if Stax isn't one of them?

Storm-based combo decks can be a major pain in the ass.  I wouldn't call all versions of Stax good matchups, it's a matter or whether or not they can capitalize on the tempo they gain through their spells.  The "sit on basic land till I draw Rebuild" plan doesn't work nearly as well against a 5c Stax deck packing multiple Tutors to fetch their "hard" locks and artifact fat like Karn and Trike. 

Fish can also be a pain, as they can back Null Rod up with a clock.  Meddling Mage, Waterfront Bouncer, Kataki, Dark Confidant and sometimes even things like Magus of the Unseen and Rootwater Thief all team up to try to take advantage of the tempo cards like Null Rod can buy.  The versions with Chalice and Vial can be a problem as well, but not as much since you can shut down Vial with Needles.

The matchup with Oath is usually a question of who knows their deck better.

I'll admit though, I haven't put much testing into the Gifts/CS matchup, since CS is rarer than Bigfoot in my area.

Obviously I don't speak for everyone, since I play a specific type of Gifts.  I'd have to ask one of the Colorado guys or Kowal for such information about Meandeck and Brass-style builds of the deck respectively.

[Eddie]

So...what bad matchups does Gifts have, if Stax isn't one of them?

Storm-based combo decks can be a major pain in the ass.  I wouldn't call all versions of Stax good matchups, it's a matter or whether or not they can capitalize on the tempo they gain through their spells.  The "sit on basic land till I draw Rebuild" plan doesn't work nearly as well against a 5c Stax deck packing multiple Tutors to fetch their "hard" locks and artifact fat like Karn and Trike. 

Fish can also be a pain, as they can back Null Rod up with a clock.  Meddling Mage, Waterfront Bouncer, Kataki, Dark Confidant and sometimes even things like Magus of the Unseen and Rootwater Thief all team up to try to take advantage of the tempo cards like Null Rod can buy.  The versions with Chalice and Vial can be a problem as well, but not as much since you can shut down Vial with Needles.

The matchup with Oath is usually a question of who knows their deck better.

I'll admit though, I haven't put much testing into the Gifts/CS matchup, since CS is rarer than Bigfoot in my area.

Obviously I don't speak for everyone, since I play a specific type of Gifts.  I'd have to ask one of the Colorado guys or Kowal for such information about Meandeck and Brass-style builds of the deck respectively.

Storm based combo is not very good, that's true. But not your worst matchup. You should have the upper hand if you can get your drain mana online (so survive for 2 turns). Personally, I think 5c stax and fish are bad matchups. Don't generalize 5c stax and uba stax. One is a rather bad matchup while the other is a rather good one. Oath is a total joke. Gifts shouldn't have any problems against it (and don't tell me I play against bad versions of oath or bad players). It's probably one of your best matchups. Gifts should also beat CS, but it's harder than Oath due to their natural defense.

[Kowal]

I feel less than 100% confident against the following two decks:

Oath (Picture Oath as GAT and Gifts as Tog--  One is an aggro control deck that wins two turns after 1G is available, and the other is a combo-control deck that wins whenever it assembles one enabler piece and a kill condition.  They interact in a very similar way, but Oath clogs up terribly if you answer a threat whereas GAT can replace it.  It's still slightly in Oath's favor in my opinion.)

TT Confidant (Five libraries is scary for any control deck, but five libraries along with Duress/Drain/Force/whatever is even scarier.  I don't like this matchup at all.  I hope Thug or Cross chimes in here to explain it better from the other point of view.)

[Smmenen]

I wrote this for my team boards in December.  It's a combination of two posts.  The second post makes a clearer statement of what I'm trying to say.

However, if I wish it, I will never lose to Uba Stax with any Drain deck.  Now, how can I make such a statement?  How can I be so bold?  Simple: Uba Stax folds to a certain combination of cards: specifically a threshold number of basic lands and a strategy for finding and resolving Hurkyl's Recalls or some other similar bounce spell.  For example, a 2-3 Merchant Scroll decks with a Single Hurkyl's will always destroy uba Stax if you have almost all basic Islands unless they can Chalice you for 2.  Uba Stax best chance for fighting it is Red ELemnetal Blast, but I think my strategy trumps theirs.  Why is Hurkyl's so good?  I need to delve into Stax theory for a moment.

Uba Stax is a theory of lock components that are not designed to completely shut out the opponent.  Original Stax was based on the idea that the opponent could never play a card. That stax, aside from Roland Changs victories, has proven flawed.  Kevin's Stax and others like it reflect the truism that Vroman spoke on his Uba Stax primer thread which is that a soft lock now is better than a hard lock later.  In other words, constraining the opponent is the order of the day, not shutting them out.  That is Kevin's Boa Constrictor lesson. 

Uba Stax eschews Sphere of Resistence and Tangle Wire in favor of Uba Mask and Null Rod on that premise: Null Rod and Uba Mask create a better soft lock quicker than Sphere and Wire and as a result, it is a better deck.  Uba Stax constrains the opponent in a very particular and specific way.

If you can find a solution or silver bullet to the Stax deck WITHIN the boundaries of those limits - those constraints, you will always win.  It's really that simple.  Hurkyl's Recall requries two islands to play.  Uba Stax can do nothing about it.  Now, Rebuild can be stopped simply because Wastelands + Rod is enough to cut the Drain player off from the three mana.  Even with alot of islands, it is difficult sometimes to get three into play.  But two is never a problem.  That is why Hurkyl's Recall and at least 5 islands and 5 fetch will always beat Uba Stax - esp when followed by a combo strategy like Gifts has.

So what?  The point is that every deck has weaknesses.  I think that Gifts has serious weaknesses as built at the moment.  Gifts has to fight lots of REBs, fish, and vie for the top spot with lots of Drain decks.  I died to GWS Oath at Gencon with Gifts and I died to UW Fish.  I gave up on Gifts, maybe prematurely afterward.  I tested Gifts Oath before SCG Richmond after the bar exam, and just found my margin of victory either nonexistent or too slim against even Stax because it could not do what meandeck Gifts could against Stax without so many Scrolls.

2nd post

Now, Uba Stax could run Enchanments, but it doesn't.  Even if Uba Stax has alot of diversification, here is the thing and a broader point I was making:  Stax has a fundamental flaw.

Stax cannot shut the opponent down immediately because it lacks the tools to do so in a post-Trinisphere restriction environment and post 2003 Stax lists.  Stax could immediatley shut the game down in 2003 becuase most decks at the time just crumbled to turn one Wire or Sphere or Stack.  Not so anymore.  Then Trinispher ecame along and suddenly Workshop decks could ensure that their opponents never played Spells.  now that's gone.  As a result, stax decks have to have other ways to constrain besides directly attacking the mana.  They do this by playing Chains: which attacks a mechanism by which the player tries to play nmore perms: drawing cards and seeing more cards.  Uba Mask stops the opponent in one or two critical ways: first, it prevents countermagic from being useful.  Second, it removes cards like Colossus and creatures that arne't actually cast in Vintage.  That is not sufficient reason for UBa Mask to be played.  It's synergy with Welder and Bazaar is what makes it good. 

Picture Stax decks as various obstacle course tunnels.  Five Color Stax is like a really wide and relatively short tunnel with very large obstructions that are difficulut as hell to get around.  But if you do get around them, the tunnel is so wide you have no trouble getting through.   Uba Stax is a very, very narrow tunnel.  It doesn't have many unusual obstructions - it's just a very, very long and very, very narrow tunnel.  It's just a matter of squeezing yourself through with the right car.  The thing is, only one or two cards can actually pass through.  That's my point.  Uba Stax can't really stop you from playing Hurkyl's and comboing out - but it can absolutely destroy you if you don't have the right car to get through.  Most players play with too many non basics and don't use Hurkyl's.

Hurky's is one of those european gas hybrids with no trunk.  Rebuild is one of those small sedans.  Rebuild is too big to pass the UBa Stax tunnel.  Hurkyl's is the only car that can make it.  Most players don't see this because they are stubborn - they play shitty mana bases, and stupid, because they don't test.  They insist on Rack and Ruin, etc. 

All Stax decks can be beat with the right tools - Uba Stax is particularly vulnerable because it doesn't actually stop you from playing spells.  Null Rod prevents you from using cards that play spells.  Sphere of Resistence actually stops you from playing Spells.  I think the former strategy is superior, but more vulnerable to precise attack. 

Combine all this with the fact that Uba Stax doesn't have FOW - it can't stop yoru answers, and you have the reason for my judgment. 


 

[Hydra]

Oath can be dangerous because their big threat costs 2, while your big threat costs 4.  It's far easier for them to back their threat up with multiple counters than it is for Gifts to back up their's with an equivilent number.  Personally I think it's a matter of experience with the deck.  I know I can beat most Oath players with Gifts, but I also know people who know Oath inside and out will give me a major run for my money because they understand how to properly use what advantages they have.  GWS Oath in particular can be a headache as they are essentially Fish with a much better win conditiom.  They usually only need to win the one counterwar: the one over Oath.  Meandeck versions with 4 Scrolls and Echoing Truth have an easier time with answering Oath, but it's still a pain if the Oath player is as experienced with Oath as you are with Gifts.

I didn't mean for it to look like I clumped the two Stax decks together, but you're right: Uba Stax = good, 5c Stax = bad.

TT Confidant scares the hell out of me as a matchup.  Storm-based win condition with as much disruption as me plus 5 Libraries equals a major nightmare that I hope doesn't become popular in my area.