GWS' IT primer (it's finally up!)

[ErkBek]

Mat Endress' article is finally up after being subitted to SCG over 2 weeks ago.

http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/11674.html

All dicussion of the deck should now take place in this forum.

[Moxlotus]

Remand – This is an excellent card against Mana Drain decks exclusively, and therein lies the problem. Control is handily a good match for IT, particularly after sideboarding, and more help is not needed from such a narrow card. 

By "Control" I assume Endress meant "Control Slaver."  The card fits in nice in the 5 meta slots if you plan on facing Drains all day.

Becker's Day 1 meta slots: Twister, Hurkyl's, Perplex, Mystical, Merchant Scroll
Endress's Day 1 meta slots: Tinker, Jar, Mystical, Merchant Scroll, Twist
Becker's Day 2 meta slots: Twister, 2 Remand, Merchant Scroll, Mystical
Endress's Day 2 meta slots:Tinker, Jar, 2 Remand, Mystical, Twist, LED (experimentint with -3 other FoW)

EDIT:  I should note that the sideboarding is Endress's plan.  Everyone else's is pretty close but varies depending on the metaslots.

[Clown of Tresserhorn]

First off, great article, and congrats on making a new savage combo deck.

I have a question though...

Why board out 2 FoW vs. stax? Seems to me, it's a card you want 4-of or none at all. Leaving atleast 3 in means you can still intuition for them in a bind.

[M.Solymossy]

Ha... Matt has SO MANY insane plays!


After all that, I STILL made slops.

The chicken pot pie DID glisten in the sun though, oh man.   Not bad, not bad.
 

------------

onto the deck. 

I@ns meta slots from ICBM:        twister, hurkyls, mystical, and i can't say for sure what else
My own:  I played rebuild AND hurkyls, as well as chain of vapor. Perlex as well and I also played twister and Mystical.

day 2, i played Tinker and jar over perplex and I can't exactly remember what else (my laptop is failing me currently)

[ErkBek]

First off, great article, and congrats on making a new savage combo deck.

I have a question though...

Why board out 2 FoW vs. stax? Seems to me, it's a card you want 4-of or none at all. Leaving atleast 3 in means you can still intuition for them in a bind.

Stax is a tough matchup to SB against, I've tried a number of different ways to SB and here is what I do

Going 1st vs stax I've decided to board out FoWs and leave duress in. FoW sucks vs on sphere, and picthing a blue card can really hurt. If the game goes more than a few turns, then FoW becomes a little better than duress, however at that point your game plan is to bounce all their shit. (this is for the 2 Remand build)

-4 FoW
-1 Bargain
-1 Twister
-1 BS
-1 Duress
+1 land
+4 Bob
+1 Tendrils
+2 Hurkyl's

Going second FoW is better than duress b/c it can be played on their first turn lock component (which is often chalice for 1).

-4 Duress
-1 Bargain
-2 Remand
-1 BS
+1 land
+4 Bob
+2 Hurkyl's
+1 Tendrils

Endress' plan is for the 3 tendrils SB which I personally don't like at all......but he wrote the article. I aslo think 1 swamp and 8 fecthes is a better configuration than 7 fecth and 2 swamp.

[Komatteru]

<3 how I made it into this article, somehow.

Anyway, an interesting thing to discuss is how MT and VT got back into the deck.  At one point, you (Eric at least) didn't have them (maybe just not VT), but after a short discussion the day before the Lotus event, apparently I "talked some sense into" Eric and convinced him to run VT again.  The arguments for it are pretty obvious, but I'd like to hear the arguments against it, and how at one point, it was thought that it didn't fit into the scope of the deck -- that would require explaining the importance and use of draw steps.  How does this deck use and abuse draw steps?

[arj]

Related to Jdizzle's question, the article does not mention anything about Imperial Seal. Why was this not included? Sorcery speed issues combined with fact that the deck already has enough tutors?

[Lost In Admiration]

Related to Jdizzle's question, the article does not mention anything about Imperial Seal. Why was this not included? Sorcery speed issues combined with fact that the deck already has enough tutors?

I think we decided that since Mystical Tutor is an instant, it is better, if only for fetching bounce spells against Stax.  Mystical Tutor barely makes the cut.

[ErkBek]

<3 how I made it into this article, somehow.

Anyway, an interesting thing to discuss is how MT and VT got back into the deck.  At one point, you (Eric at least) didn't have them (maybe just not VT), but after a short discussion the day before the Lotus event, apparently I "talked some sense into" Eric and convinced him to run VT again.  The arguments for it are pretty obvious, but I'd like to hear the arguments against it, and how at one point, it was thought that it didn't fit into the scope of the deck -- that would require explaining the importance and use of draw steps.  How does this deck use and abuse draw steps?

At the time, when I was running Vamp, all I played against was stax. Seriously, at the Chicago lotus event I played against stax all 6 rounds. I was running into a liablity of fecthing out underground sea to vamp, only to have it wasted the following turn. Vamp would also get stuck in my hand when I was locked under a chalice @1. With that said, I was overlooking vamp as the best card to help accelerate into turn 2 kills vs. drains and combo mirrors. Against drains, I didn't like Vamp for ancestral without the additional protection of remand in the deck. I didn't like vamp for lotus, since it felt like I would just play lotus and other stuff then be hit by a counter mid-combo and then lose. However, I cut the card based on a few circumstances where it was bad, rather than looking at all the times it has been great. When working with the deck, I tried to keep my my eyes open to everything (like cutting desire), so I tried alot of different configurations. At some point you mentioned that you have to look at vamp mostly as acceleration, yet is a versitle tutor. This greatly changed my veiw on the card and I have liked it ever since.

Iseal is something that Endress has been testing lately. We are still waiting on a verdict from him. Here is a post of mine in Iseal back on November 1st

-no imperial seal: Vamp Tutor and Mystical are both much better because they are instants. TPS hates to telegraph the you're gonna die next turn play, it would much rather do that at you opponents end step. For example, vs. stax mystical for rebuild during there end step is > than imeperial seal for card then pass.

I think for the most part it still is true.

[M.Solymossy]

Yes it's much better when your opponent doesn't get the "Oh snap, I'm gunna die if I Don't do something" turn.

[Moxlotus]

The only differences with TPS is 3 Intuitions vs. 3 Gifts Ungiven. Oh, and Perplex, the card that made everyone laugh hard here when they saw it. That's hardly 10 maindeck cards. Considering the sideboard, well, that's highly irrelevant since sideboards are made to be tweaked for each metagame. Nevertheless, I've seen a lot of TPS packing 4 Dark Confident in the sideboard as a setup in the Control matchups. TPS played here havent packed Tinker, Memory Jar, Windfall, Time Spiral and Wheel of Fortune for a very long while (though Tinker and Darskteel Colossus is a standard sideboard plan), that long time basically being when Gifts Ungiven got printed.

I've been playing the deck a bit to get a clear feeling about it. I used Intuitions the very same way I used Gifts Ungiven in TPS. I used the very same setups to beat Control. And after an afternoon of playing it, I still don't see why this is a new deck. Nevertheless, I've already found myself in situations where Intuitions ended up terrible and would have won me the game if they had been Gifts Ungivens instead. And I yet have to cast Gifts Ungiven in TPS and wished It was an Intuition.

I'm gonna transfer this discussion here.  IT is different than TPS for the reasons that MD gifts and GG gifts or CS and BS are different.  There are a few cards different that change how the deck plays out.  There are more than 3 cards different.  TPS decks run Gifts, 2 or 3 draw 7s, sometimes recoup, sometimes cunning wish, always desire, sometimes timespiral, sometimes FoF, sometimes Frantic Search.  Hell, I cut all draw 7s from my build.  IT is more streamlined and is cutting big business spells for tutors.  IT wins small in most of its games--usually with exactly enough storm or mana.

Intuition is better than Gifts.  Both can set up the win.  However, Gifts cannot win through Stax components.  As the article mentions,  Intuition can run over a Rod or Chalice by getting DRs, or Cabals + Lotus.  Gifts can't do this.  Gifts is also uncastable if there is a SoR on the table while you can still sometimes get an Intuition off--although I will admit it is pretty damn hard.

Also, since the first 2 lands you fetch out 90% of the time are island, swamp--Perplex is a turn 1 tutor for Will without opening up your mana base to wastes.  Its not an automatic inclusion, but it isn't bad by any means.

[Cross]

Hey, good article and congrats on the multiple pieces of power.

I was wondering whether thirst for knowledge was ever considered as an engine in the deck.

It's not mentioned in the list of potential cards and I don't remmeber it being mentioned in the article.

As one of the premier draw engines in the format it seems like you would at least want to play around with it. I have really come to like it in confidant combo, but the decks are slightly diferent. Your thoughts?

[Moxlotus]

I'm 99% sure that TFK was never tested.  3 mana for 3 cards doesn't work so well in this deck, although it does have a hard time keeping up with control's card advantage (hence a big selling point for Remand).  TFK is probably worse than draw 7s, although I can't say for sure.

[Cross]

I'm 99% sure that TFK was never tested. 3 mana for 3 cards doesn't work so well in this deck, although it does have a hard time keeping up with control's card advantage (hence a big selling point for Remand). TFK is probably worse than draw 7s, although I can't say for sure.

Isn't intuition 3 mana for 3 cards?

[PucktheCat]

Intuition is three mana for one card, actually, but you get to choose which card (mostly).  Merchant Scroll is three mana for 3 cards though.

Seems like TfK fits a similar role to Confidants.  Confidant is better if cast first turn and TfK is probably better at any point thereafter.

Edit:  One question.  Your sideboard plan seems to be almost the same in every matchup.  Take out Force and some other stuff, put in Confidant and Tendrils.  That seems odd to me.  Any explaination/thoughts?

[Moxlotus]

I'm 99% sure that TFK was never tested. 3 mana for 3 cards doesn't work so well in this deck, although it does have a hard time keeping up with control's card advantage (hence a big selling point for Remand). TFK is probably worse than draw 7s, although I can't say for sure.

Isn't intuition 3 mana for 3 cards?

Yes, but those 3 cards aren't the exact 3 cards you want every time you cast it.

  Your sideboard plan seems to be almost the same in every matchup.  Take out Force and some other stuff, put in Confidant and Tendrils.  That seems odd to me.  Any explaination/thoughts?

The first time I played in a tournament with the deck I noticed the same thing.  But there are 2 reasons for it according to people who are better at the deck than I am.  The first is that each time you usually take out something different to put in the Confidants and Tendrils.  The second thing is that the Bobs and Tendrils are there because of combo hate, and most decks don't play that until game 2--so you might as well be optimal for combo mode game 1 and change to fight the hate for game 2.

[AngryPheldagrif]

I've faced IT numerous times in tournaments and found it significantly different than any form of TPS I've run across, namely, it's better. I don't classify it as TPS because I see it as the locus of GrimLong and TPS. The deck cuts a lot of the risky things that earned TPS its reputation for crapping out and replaced them with efficient tutor and setup pieces such as Intuition and Grim Tutor. The deck is a lot harder to disrupt than traditional combo and the sideboard plan, no matter how expected it may be, is very solid. The deck is very fluid, allowing itself to win in a number of different ways, rendering many of the most common solutions virtually irrelevant.

While I don't think the deck will be so dominant once people get familiar with it and learn how to beat it (a complicated strategy that I could write an article on and still not completely elaborate) it will decrease in value somewhat. For now, it seems to be the premiere storm combo deck available.

[Gabethebabe]

I´m a little disappointed that Walk was not discussed in the article.
EVERY deck I know that runs blue, runs Walk. Also combo decks like Grimlong and TPS run it.

So why can IT do without it? It is an excellent card with Necro, it is an excellent card to just setup your combo one turn earlier.
After sideboarding when you side in Confidants, Walk gets better. I don´t think I have to explain that Walk is good when you have Confidant on the table. And don´t say: win more, because Confidant already landed. If you have ritualed out a Confidant, you need a couple of turns to start gaining advantage with Bob. Walk gives you a precious turn. And an extra attack phase.

If someone could elaborate on that.

[Moxlotus]

Walk is not included for many of the reasons its not included in Dragon.  It makes mulligan decisions hard when if Walk was ANY OTHER CARD it would be easy.  Walk is a place-filler for the next card...but I'd rather just have a different card in hand.

In this deck Walk functions as a bad card draw and a bad mana accelerant--since you can't do it while you're comboing.  Eric's said if he would play Walk, it would be in the place of a land since the only advantage of playing Walk in the deck is getting the extra land drop (no atack phase, no getting up turn 1 drain mana).  I would definitely not replace a land though. 

Pretty much, GWS hates Walk in storm combo, unless it has a DSC in there.

[flamingavatar]

Really nice article. IT's results on Day one of Richmond prompted me to buy several Grim Tutors, and within a few days the price of the cards rose $20-$30! I'm glad I lurked on the 'coverage' topic here on TMD.

Anyways, my questions relates to the metagame slots of the deck. What kind of environment causes you to favor 3 Grim tutors over 2? I'm guessing three is optimum, but what kind of expectations cause one to remove the third Grim over Mystical Tutor, or the 4th FoW? Thanks!

[Moxlotus]

Those slots are also just based on personal preferene too.  Much like the Mox Monkey vs. R&R debate in Slaver, its mostly personal preference and experience.  For instance, I wouldn't play with less than 3 Grims or 2 Grims and a Perplex-but I hate draw 7s in the deck.  Its a lot of style preferences--I probably play the deck more conservatively than anyone else on the team and that's why I like another tutor over a draw 7.

[Grand Inquisitor]

Nice deck, results, article.

One thing I didn't see, which is most interesting to me, is a number of strategies for using intuition in different spots.  You mention it often gets three mana pieces, or three bombs, but I'm sure there's a lot more there.  Can you guys elaborate?

[Lost In Admiration]

Nice deck, results, article.

One thing I didn't see, which is most interesting to me, is a number of strategies for using intuition in different spots.  You mention it often gets three mana pieces, or three bombs, but I'm sure there's a lot more there.  Can you guys elaborate?

The three mana or three bomb plans are defaults.  In other situations it just involves being creative based upon what is in hand.  Maybe Eric has more advice than I do, but I find that if you pull to the front of the deck anything that might be good and then try to find some synergy among three of those cards and your hand, it usually helps me to find exactly what I need.  Don't forget that it can pull three bounce spells against Stax.

It's really straightforward a lot of the time though.  For the how versatile Intuition is, most of the time abusing the versatility is cute rather than good.  Always ask “does this win me the game next turnâ€� and if the answer isn’t “yesâ€� with some confidence then you picked the wrong cards or the deck has used up all the power.

[M.Solymossy]

Intuition is REALLY versitile.  For example, at richmond, I played THIS list..


Intuition Tendrils by 13NoVa

Maindeck:
Artifacts
1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Memory Jar
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring

Enchantments
1 Necropotence
1 Yawgmoth's Bargain

Instants
1 Ancestral Recall
4 Brainstorm
2 Cabal Ritual
1 Chain Of Vapor
4 Dark Ritual
3 Force Of Will
1 Hurkyl's Recall
3 Intuition
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Rebuild
1 Vampiric Tutor

Sorceries
1 Demonic Tutor
4 Duress
2 Grim Tutor
1 Tendrils Of Agony
1 Timetwister
1 Tinker
1 Yawgmoth's Will

Basic Lands
2 Island
2 Swamp

Lands
1 Bloodstained Mire
2 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
2 Underground Sea

Legendary Lands
1 Tolarian Academy

Sideboard:
1 Darksteel Colossus
4 Dark Confidant
1 Echoing Truth
1 Rebuild
3 Cabal Therapy
1 Massacre
1 Mind's Desire
2 Tendrils Of Agony
1 Swamp


against Kevin Chron in game 3 I cast intuition for...

Hurkyl's Recall
Rebuild
Demonic Tutor


I had already echoing truth'ed a Chalice, I had tinker in hand (for Colossus) as well as Yawgmoth's Will.  I assumed he wouldn't give me rebuild, since he had a chalice in hand that he might be able to cast @ 2 and shut off my hurkyl's, but he didn't have a shop.  He ended up giving me Demonic tutor.  I tinkered for Darksteel colossus, and next turn stormed him for 6 after a swing.

In a game 2 at Richmond versus UR Fish
I cast intuition first turn with BB floating for:

Demonic tutor
Ancestral recall
Timetwister


He gave me Recall, which put me far enough ahead it didn't matter.


Sometimes you just have to play Intuition as a Demonic tutor for 1 of 3 cards you want at that time.

[ErkBek]

One thing I didn't see, which is most interesting to me, is a number of strategies for using intuition in different spots.  You mention it often gets three mana pieces, or three bombs, but I'm sure there's a lot more there.  Can you guys elaborate?

Like Endress said, most of the time it is pretty straight forward what to get. Most of the time you either need a) mana b) tutor or c) disruption. All of those are simply answered with a single card x3.

Intuition gets interesting when opponents have graveyard hate on the table in game 1. Suddenly, your giant will plan doesn't work all that well. Or maybe your will has been countered, then I'd suggest something like this

DT, Bargain, and Ancestral - If they give you ancestral, then you can work on the tendrils plan, or locate twister or necro plan. If they give you DT, then tutor up twister or necro. If they give you bargain, then just win now.

Ancestral, Bargain, and Twister - If you need to win the next turn, this may be the way to go. If your low on life, maybe grab a Lotus in place of Bargain, since giving you 3 mana is prob something that they won't want to do.

Against mega-tangle-uba stax I've a couple unique intutions. One game I distinictly remember involved keeping a "stax hand" vs. vroman conisting of 3 lands, 1 mox, 1 ritual, and an intuition (I believe it was a mulligan into something like this). Vroman had some tanglely welder action going and I played an upkeep intuition for Ancestral, Rebuild, and FoF. Vroman gave me the Rebuild. I sat there for a at least 4 turns, played an upkeep Rebuild and won (he managed to get a stack up to 2, 2x wires, and at least SoR in play). This is a really good example of why having instant speed threats is not just good against mana drains.

[oneofchaos]

I still think the deck needs to pack 4 forces or 0 forces.  I've always rolled like that, and it seems that forces are not a thing that shouldn't be played.

[Moxlotus]

I still think the deck needs to pack 4 forces or 0 forces.  I've always rolled like that, and it seems that forces are not a thing that shouldn't be played.

Now since this is your first post, I won't write a paragraph mocking the lack of substance and reasons for your opinion.  Please put more thought into your posts next time.

Why do you think this?  Sensei Sensei ran only 3 Drains.  Stax builds can run any number of Welders.  There is no rule anywhere that says some cards must be either 4 or 0.  4 forces were run for a long time and Endress and I didn't like them because they showed up too much and only pitched gas.  Then we realized that we don't have to run 4, and it ran smoother.

[RThomas]

I gave this deck a whirl at the Pastimes tournament this past Saturday, and I had a couple basic issues.  Besides not doing well due to making some really, really obvious mistakes, I found myself at a loss when the time came to Intuition for "the bomby cards".  It's obvious that you want to have Necropotence, Yawgmoth's Bargain, and/or Yawgmoth's Will in your hand most of the time, but I'm wondering how Tinker/Jar and Timetwister fit into the equation.  Endress mentions Timetwister in his article as, "a card that rotates around with other testing cards".  From the deckbuilding viewpoint, when do you feel that Timetwister  is good to play, or not so good to play?  I was wondering if some light could be shed on that. 

As far as including it into an Intuition pile, I felt really uncomfortable doing so.  How often are you winning the turn right after you cast it (or the turn that you cast it), as opposed to another draw-7 or some tutor for finding Yawgmoth's Will?  Unless you've got some really ridiculous acceleration or something, it feels like a no-go.  I vaguely remember Eric referring to it as a "reset button".  Are people playing it more as a reset button, or as a bomb that should be aggressively found?

[Moxlotus]

99% of the time there is something better to play than Twister.  I really hate that card.  The first time I played the deck it was during an 8 hour testing series with Endress when we rotated who played IT and who played other decks Twist did 2 things--pitch to Force and pitch to necro.  But then, I have seen it played in tournaments when Will got Duressed out or something and it was very useful and game winning.  It should probably only be used if the Will plan, the necro/bargain plan, and possibly the rebuild plan aren't going to work.

Bomb Intuitions can include necro, bargain, ancestral, draw 7s, and tutors.

[oneofchaos]

99% of the time there is something better to play than Twister.  I really hate that card.  The first time I played the deck it was during an 8 hour testing series with Endress when we rotated who played IT and who played other decks Twist did 2 things--pitch to Force and pitch to necro.  But then, I have seen it played in tournaments when Will got Duressed out or something and it was very useful and game winning.  It should probably only be used if the Will plan, the necro/bargain plan, and possibly the rebuild plan aren't going to work.

Bomb Intuitions can include necro, bargain, ancestral, draw 7s, and tutors.

I like twister as an out, but if there was something else than chances are I would play it.  Twister seems to be my only reset but also works.  Like moxlotus said, any duressed or countered goodies, will be available again.  Yes it's good to pitch to Fow, but so are useless blue cards clogging your hand  .  I personally havn't tested IT as much as I should but is timetwister a consideration as a sideboard card?  Or do you just play it maindeck or not at all?

Thanks sorry for my sporatic first post.  I've been reading a bit, but unlike other forums this is the best of the best.