Memory Jar and Fact or Fiction in Control Slaver

[NULLROD]

What card is one supposed to cut for jar? Anymore than 4 big artifacts is kind of clunky, is it not? Just a question.

[fitz712]

fact or fiction

[JACO]

I'm just shocked that the entire community has jumped on Jar in like, 48 hours. It's kind of amazing.

I have to ask this question over why everyone's popping a boner over Jar overnight.  Why would you Tinker for Jar when you could just Tinker for Slaver?  Why would you ever weld in Jar when you could just Weld in Slaver?  To get a good use out of jar, you need the mana to actually cast the good stuff you draw--but why not just completely bone your opponent with a Slave?  Hell, or it could be a Titan to completely bone your opponent.  These things have a bigger immediate impact on the game than Jar.  I don't think it should be Jar vs. Fof.  It should be Jar vs. other big artifacts you could be Tinkering/Welding.

Quoted for goddamn truth. I know Kowal has a big list of reasons why you don't always get Mindslaver with Tinker, as you shouldn't always. But running Jar in Control Slaver is so 2003. You know, before the game changed and people started playing things you have to worry about.
1) If you make it to the midgame against Ichorid, why in Christ's name would you Tinker for Jar OR Mindslaver? Just get Tormod's Crypt and end the game.
2) If you're playing against GAT their deck probably sucks, and you should just get Mindslaver anyway, since they can't do a damn thing about it once you have Tinkered.
3) If you lack mana to operate, there are usually better things to get in any situation (Sundering Titan and Jester's Cap come to mind, which both effectively end the game as well when they resolve in so many different situations).

I used to run Jar in Control Slaver (circa 2003 and 2004), and it was sometimes broken WHEN YOU WERE ALREADY WINNING THE GAME OR HAD CONTROL, but most of the time I would rather have it be something else (like Mindslaver, Crypt, Jester's Cap, Triskelion, Darksteel Colossus, Sundering Titan, or even fucking Duplicant or Memnarch). A lot of times my opponent would just Force whatever good spell I drew off the Jar activation anyway, Brainstorm whatever good shit they wanted to keep on top of their library, and fill up our graveyards anyway after giving me like a whopping 1 Mox worth of acceleration, when I could have just won the game with something else anyway.

The reality is that while it might win you the game if you already have control of the game and are going to resolve something like Yawgmoth's Will anyway, there are only so many slots for big clunky artifacts in the deck. This is aside from the fact that most people are only playing shit like 3 Goblin Welders so they can add a random bullshit card here or there, like a Lotus Petal or Memory Jar. That is like Oath playing 3 Oaths. Really, you people are only going to play 3 Goblin Welders when that's what the fucking deck runs off, so you can play another mostly useless singleton?!  You have got to be fucking with me. It's like Christmas came early.

I also disagree about the whole Fact or Fiction issue. If you unrestricted that card, there would be no reason to play anything else in the format other than 4x Fact or Fiction based Control Slaver. It would be disgusting, and I can't see how you people would even argue with that. In fact that is pretty much my main argument for why that card should never be unrestricted. The synergy and card advantage with Goblin Welder is off the chain.

[Cr0v4x]

@ JACO

You're absolutely right with saying that there are situations when tinkering for Memory Jar is less efficient or efficient to the same degree as it is to tinker for Slaver/Titan/whatever. I think this entire argument should not only be based on arguing if should tinker for Jar or for something else. Effectively Fact or Ficiton has been cutted so that you can play Memory Jar (or you might argue that Mystical Tutor vanished to make room for Jar and consequently Ben Kowal replaced FoF with Tormod's Crypt).

If we now take this fact for granted we have to consider wheather Jar is better than FoF. You'll supposedly cast both of them off Mana Drain mana. The advantage of FoF refering to this issue is that you can cast it at instant speed. FoF nets you 5 cards basically and you get to choose the specific pile which helps you in a situation. By using Jar you will most likely have to waste a main phase and that means you waste an entire turn casting it (assuming hardcast). Nevertheless Jar gives you 7 cards to do extremely stupid and broken things most likely involving Yawgmoth's Will. Consequently you might be able to set up the game-winning conditions such as playing Welder and getting Mindslaver either in your graveyard or into play directly. Consequently we can conclude that a resolved Memory Jar is a lot more powerful than a resolved Fact or Fiction.

This leads to the discussion introduced in the beginning of our entire discussion. Which card is easier to cast?!
FoF: 4 Mana, instant, (blue card)
Jar: 5 Mana (only colorless), sorcery-speed

Concerning Jar: As Memory Jar is an artifact and Slaver is a deck built for the purpose of doing stupid things with artifacts we can take advantage of this. Thirst for Knowledge is a discard outlet for Memory Jar and Goblin Welder can get this discarded Jar into play so that we do not have to spend 5 freakin' mana to pay for it. Furthermore we can simply tinker for Jar which only costs 3 Mana at sorcery speed which isn't that bad. If it is the right play in a specific situation is not to be discussed at this point. You might also put Jar into your GY by playing Intuition/Gifts but let's be honest: you'll more likely set up the win instead of trying to get Jar into play.

Conclusion: I personally like the idea of playing Memory Jar. You can get it into play quite easily. Furthermore imo Jar is way more powerful than FoF. I'll test this card definitely again. If FoF really has to be removed from the list has to be tested. Maybe there are other possibilities.

[Methuselahn]

The reality is that while it might win you the game if you already have control of the game and are going to resolve something like Yawgmoth's Will anyway, there are only so many slots for big clunky artifacts in the deck. This is aside from the fact that most people are only playing shit like 3 Goblin Welders so they can add a random bullshit card here or there, like a Lotus Petal or Memory Jar. That is like Oath playing 3 Oaths. Really, you people are only going to play 3 Goblin Welders when that's what the fucking deck runs off, so you can play another mostly useless singleton?!  You have got to be fucking with me. It's like Christmas came early.

Oath wins by playing an Oath. Slaver wins by stalling and then casting a Yawgmoth's Will, not a Goblin Welder.  

Memory Jar is better than ever, and personally, I think it is due to recent trends of fish/aggro control not running Null Rods.  Now they run full moxen and other trinkets.  Save the Oath and Stax decks, there are few Null Rods out there right now, so Jar is awesome.

I think people are also rediscovering that Jar is often the safer win in a field where every deck runs an answer to DSC, now that he is an established part of the metagame.

[JACO]

The reality is that while it might win you the game if you already have control of the game and are going to resolve something like Yawgmoth's Will anyway, there are only so many slots for big clunky artifacts in the deck. This is aside from the fact that most people are only playing shit like 3 Goblin Welders so they can add a random bullshit card here or there, like a Lotus Petal or Memory Jar. That is like Oath playing 3 Oaths. Really, you people are only going to play 3 Goblin Welders when that's what the fucking deck runs off, so you can play another mostly useless singleton?!  You have got to be fucking with me. It's like Christmas came early.

Oath wins by playing an Oath. Slaver wins by stalling and then casting a Yawgmoth's Will, not a Goblin Welder.  

Memory Jar is better than ever, and personally, I think it is due to recent trends of fish/aggro control not running Null Rods.  Now they run full moxen and other trinkets.  Save the Oath and Stax decks, there are few Null Rods out there right now, so Jar is awesome.

I think people are also rediscovering that Jar is often the safer win in a field where every deck runs an answer to DSC, now that he is an established part of the metagame.

If you are relying on winning the game with Control Slaver by just casting a Yawgmoth's Will, then why are you not just playing combo? It does it far better than Control Slaver. If you have an active Goblin Welder you should be well on your way to winning the game, unless you kept a wack hand or cast Goblin Welder at the wrong time. Control Slaver attempts to gain minor advantages here or there until it can resolve and activate Goblin Welder. This is part of what is meant when people say 'Control Slaver can win small.' It doesn't need to just resolve Will to win, or chain off multiple Thirst For Knowledges or Night's Whispers. Sure that helps, but any time you resolve Will you should just win, so the above statement is totally pointless.

[Vegeta2711]

This is aside from the fact that most people are only playing shit like 3 Goblin Welders so they can add a random bullshit card here or there, like a Lotus Petal or Memory Jar. That is like Oath playing 3 Oaths. Really, you people are only going to play 3 Goblin Welders when that's what the fucking deck runs off, so you can play another mostly useless singleton?!  You have got to be fucking with me. It's like Christmas came early.

...you do realize the deck has been running 2-3 Welders for like over a year now right?

On an side-note, telling someone whose on a team with pretty much all competent CS players how the deck is being played = hilarity.

@everyone else
It's not really 'the community' that suddenly likes Memory Jar. It's more like, 'The CS players on Reflection really like the card and re-added it into the deck and because apparently nobody can do anything except copy Rich Shay whenever the fuck he makes a tiny change to his deck and it's now "the community suddenly likes Memory Jar".'  It's like a total of 4 fucking people. If you disagree, run the deck the way YOU LIKE IT, that's half the idea of CS, it's customizable for different metagames! Of course the number of players that bother to fucking do this is like... ten of you? maybe? like for all the shit people give Ugo Rivard, at least he adds his own metagame stuff to the deck.

[frolll]

Yeah, Rivard added 2 freaking Blood Moon maindeck, is still playing with Platinum Angel over Colossus and is still the only one to play with Mana Leaks in the states...

He did win 2 SCG events and top8 at an other, and despite these achievements, everybody is playing Shay's deck...

I really don't understand why the entiere CS question is all about a single fucking card. Fact of Fiction or Memory Jar is a choice. For goddam's sake, please try to not netdeck exactly the lists if you feel like that won't suit you or if the metagame is a hell different where you're playing than in the tournament.

Shay's list runs 2 Repeal at a time. But since it wasn't at a big SCG event, nobody gives him credit. He try what he thinks is great for his deck. Just do the same yourself!

On topic: Memory Jar is a house, sure. But that's just a choice. If you feel like playing the Memory Jar kill is not suitable for your version of CS, don't. Nothing complicated. Actually I run 2 Welder, Fact or Fiction, 1 Gifts Ungiven, 1, Solemn Simulacrum, 1 Platinum Angel, 1 Sundering Titan, 1 Gorilla Shaman, 1 Crucible of Worlds, Strip Mine obv., 1 Wasteland, Darksteel Citadel singleton for slaver madness and Memory Jar, plus 1 Mindslaver 1 Tormod's Crypt and 1 Fire/Ice, with 2 Repeal instead of Echoing Truth/Rack and Ruin slot (and 4 Chalice of the Void in the sb, along with 4 Leyline of the void, and Lava Dart/Red Elemental Blast/Pyroblast/Blood Moon) and Demonic Tutor+Will+Darkblast as only black cards. Does that really make the deck a complete pile of shit?

Your answer can be Yes and it should be true, because of your skills/playstyle/metagame/very conception of what beast is CS.

But IMHO, altough not really fixed, this build is the most well-suited for me.


I would never ever cut Fact or Fiction off CS. I remember playing Mono-U with 4 FoF. This card is just ridiculous.
But, yeah, it is a choice. Purely a choice.

[AJFirst]

Finally we resolved this Memory Jar thing. I agree it's a choice, I just would never make that particular choice.

As for Ugo, I love his deck. Mana Leaks in Type One is one of my favorite plays. I made my friend playing Oath run them over Drain even though the ICBM guys disagree. Slaver's development is soley based on the metagame. The deck doesn't change by itself: it changes when other decks do.

Anyway, I think that Fact or Fiction falls in a similar boat as Jar. Sometimes it wins the game on the spot, and sometimes it's just god awful. The CS mirror makes FoF insane, but against Stax you can't cast it, and against Combo you're dead before you reach the point where it's relevent. I agree in the control mirror it forces them to counter a card on their turn (using up valuable resources), or produce insane card advantage, but it's just too randomly good.

I, playing Slaver, am the control deck 99% of the time (See: Who's the Beatdown by Flores), and because of this, I have to play the control game outright or I will lose. I want to be drawing cards and pitching artifacts, not spending four mana for a hit-or-miss impulse for the most broken card (tinker, will, ancestral), dumping the rest in the yard, and if I don't hit anything broken, then getting 3-1 CA picking up a Thirst or Brainstorm along the way.

Now I know sometimes it just is insane, but for all the times it's nuts, it's a really bad tutor the other half. That's just what I think, and it will continue to fluctuate in and out of my build until I can back this up with more real game situations.
-AJ

[JACO]

This is aside from the fact that most people are only playing shit like 3 Goblin Welders so they can add a random bullshit card here or there, like a Lotus Petal or Memory Jar. That is like Oath playing 3 Oaths. Really, you people are only going to play 3 Goblin Welders when that's what the fucking deck runs off, so you can play another mostly useless singleton?!  You have got to be fucking with me. It's like Christmas came early.

...you do realize the deck has been running 2-3 Welders for like over a year now right?

On an side-note, telling someone whose on a team with pretty much all competent CS players how the deck is being played = hilarity.

Sure I realize that most people have only been playing only 3 Goblin Welders for a while now, and I obviously disagree with that choice, because I feel it's antithetical to the deck's gameplan. But it's obviously a choice nonetheless, and I'm just stating that it's fairly fascinating. Especially fascinating when having more Goblin Welders than your opponent on the board is usually a good thing (and yes, I've heard of Triskelion so don't even be an ass and bring that up). Especially fascinating when most of the synergy of the deck, and big clunky artifacts that clog up your hand until you Drain into them, or dump them in your graveyard with Thirst, revolve around Goblin Welder.

Sure, everyone knows you generally want to draw a bunch of cards, be smart about what you're countering, and edge your opponent's tempo and resources, and maybe even focus on resolving Yawgmoth's Will. You might argue that these things, along with resolving draw spells are part of the heart of playing Control Slaver, and you wouldn't neccessarily be wrong. But Goblin Welder is definitely at the heart of the deck, and I'm going to increase my odds of seeing the best creature in Vintage if I'm going to play the deck.

By the way, I am not arguing against customizing the deck to what you want to play, or feel would be good in your tournament. In fact I have always argued for customization and tweaking your own deck, and not just netdecking the latest hot build, as long as I've been writing about Magic. Control Slaver is one of the most customizable decks in the format, it seems, and different builds will continue to work for different people based on their playstyle and what they feel is important. I just know that I'm going to pump the fist in my head whenever I sit down against the mirror and I have 4 Goblin Welders in my deck, and I know my opponent only has 3.

[Metman]

JACO, for a long time I thought exactly the same as you regarding the number of Welders in Slaver.  I debated to the bone that Slaver should run 4.  Welder is the best creature in the game, arguably.  On the other hand, the less a deck relies on one specific card the better.  I think that everyone would agree on this statement.  It's the reason Dragon has evolved the way it has, same goes for Stax.  Slaver has gone the same way; the deck has changed to not rely on Goblin Welder.  It's too weak of a crutch.  It doens't win the game as soon as it comes in to play and despite what some may think it's not great in multiples.  This was something I had a hard time coming to grips with but after testing and testing and testing I realized I was wrong.  Goblin Welder requires support to be great.  The more the angles to play and resolve the bombs available to Slaver the better.  That's why we see the Welders, Gifts, FoF, 3 tutors (some more), Tinker, TfK, etc.  1/1 Red Goblins are about as easy to kill as there is.  I have settled on 3 because I hate seeing two in the two turns. 

As far as Memory Jar goes, I had never played in a couple of years ago so my recent testing with it was fresh.  I love it, simple as that.  I never felt satisfied with FoF; the reason I played it is because everybody else did and it doesn't justify it for me anymore.  Plus it justified me adding a Tormod's Cypt to the MD.  The Jar makes the combo aspect of Slaver over the top.  Now it's too easy to pull off a Tendrils kill.  I well played Jar can be nearly 100% efficient.  If they are running a deck that doesn't utilyze instants like aggro decks it's that much better.  Traditionally these decks can be tough matchups for Slaver.  So far, I have really like the Memory Jar in most matchups.  With an active Welder it's just dumb.

[CrashTest]

Here's a question:

   Is there room in Slaver for a combo kill, via Tendrils similar to what Gifts tries to do? I would think this has not been utilized since it was not needed in CS. With Memory Jar, it surely gives you some more gas for such a combo finish if one was to choose one.

            How viable would something like this be? I always enjoyed that instant-combo win aspect of Gifts, but I prefer CS now as it is a more viable deck in the current metagame. It'd be nice if it could somehow combine both elements in one, without being superflous.

[Vegeta2711]

Here's a question:

   Is there room in Slaver for a combo kill, via Tendrils similar to what Gifts tries to do? I would think this has not been utilized since it was not needed in CS. With Memory Jar, it surely gives you some more gas for such a combo finish if one was to choose one.

            How viable would something like this be? I always enjoyed that instant-combo win aspect of Gifts, but I prefer CS now as it is a more viable deck in the current metagame. It'd be nice if it could somehow combine both elements in one, without being superflous.

What would be the point? The deck already runs plenty of mostly-dead cards and has no issues actually winning the game. I can't see why you'd possibly want to add Tendrils to the deck; or even why that would be a better idea than just running Gifts.

Like have you even bothered to try this or even take real thought into adding it into the deck? It just seems sort of obvious...

[Rock Lee]

the only case where Jar->Tendrils is better than Jar->Slavescrew:aggro:control-Win is when you're down to time and in Turns.

Usually going to turns in Slaver involves
A) Slow Play on Slaver's part
B) dragging out a game they should conceed or trying to psyche out opponents and get wins through play errors. ie. Making opponents go through their combo with no way of stopping them in hopes of them 'messing it up'
C) Slow Play on your Opponent's Part, and call judges on those sons of bitches.

[ashiXIII]

Here is MY Control Slaver List:

Meandeck Control Slaver

25 mana
10 Artifacts
5 Fetch
3 Island
1 Strip Mine
3 Volc
2 Sea
1 Academy

35 spells
4 Thirst
4 Brainstorm
4 Drain
4 FoW

3 Welder
2 Slaver
1 Trike
1 DSC
1 Tormod’s Crypt

1 Echoing Truth
1 Rack and Ruin/ Shaman (I prefer the latter)
1 Memory Jar

1 Fact
1 Time Walk
1 Ancestral
1 Tinker
1 Yawg Will

1 Vampiric Tutor
1 DT
1 Mystical

The primary differences are:

LOTUS PETAL.  NOt running Lotus Petal is asinine in my view.  The card is ludicrous.  I would also definately run Vampiric Tutor - I'm totallly with Vegeta on that one. 

I have to agree on the Lotus Petal point here. I think Lotus Petal belongs in any deck running Mana Drain. I can not see having a deck with 4 Mana Drains, but not running all of Sapphire/Lotus/Petal. I haven't played Control Slaver competitively, so I can't really comment on Fact belonging or not. I can say, however, that I think views that Jar is broken in *this* deck are slightly flawed, because Jar is just broken in general. I think Gifts could run Jar and it would still be a completely and utterly ridiculous card. This deck only gets to abuse it more because of Welders and Thirsts. So, to put this another way (before I get flamed): Drawing 7 cards is broken. Drawing 7 cards out of this deck is not more broken than drawing 7 cards out of another deck. Drawing 7 cards 3 times out of this deck, however, is better than drawing 7 cards out of another deck once.

[Tha Gunslinga]

Usually going to turns in Slaver involves
A) Slow Play on Slaver's part
B) dragging out a game they should conceed or trying to psyche out opponents and get wins through play errors. ie. Making opponents go through their combo with no way of stopping them in hopes of them 'messing it up'
C) Slow Play on your Opponent's Part, and call judges on those sons of bitches.

D) Grindingly slow control mirrors.  Playing ICBM Oath vs Slaver, I have gone to time in several matches.  It happens.  Often the Slaver player is playing slower than they should be, and I'm playing as fast as I can.

[FlamingCloud]

My biggest problems with finishing with CS on time are,

I will do a massive will with 10-15 mana and my opponent won't scoop and it takes 5-10 minutes.
I have to slave the opponent 10 times in a row with no clock, while I randomly search for tinker or a trike to hardcast etc.

As with my experience with stax, people only scoop up a lost game when they are 0-0 or 1-0 in the match. (although, I have a much harder time with finishing on time with 5c stax.  [4 draws in 10 swiss rounds with stax] ) People will purposely stall out the match, and it is really frustrating.  Think I need to learn to call a judge over =P

[Metman]

Or you should just play a different deck.  There is nothing a judge can do if they aren't stalling.  There is nothing in the rules that say that a player has to scoop under a Slaver lock or during a broken Will.  It's your job to finish the game and if you can't do it in time than it's your loss not their fault.  If you are playing Slaver and start going off within the first two turns there is an advantage to seeing what you are playing before he/she loses.  You can't expect people to be curtious when it is to your advantage and not theirs.

[Methuselahn]

Right, just be clear on the rules regarding stalling.

Going to time in the swiss is definitely an issue, but once you make it to the top 8, that problem is history.  CS really shines once you reach the Top 8 because it can literally slow-play the opponent to death.

[nataz]

Is there room in Slaver for a combo kill, via Tendrils similar to what Gifts tries to do?

please see demar's burning slaver.

burning wish -> tendrils as a secondary win condition

[nightmare]

i think that gifts is a better pic over fact or fiction but that is because of the menta game around boston but as long as you have a welder in play you can have a lot of fun with memory jar in tournament play i have poped it 4 time in the same turn before and with control slaver. you can have a lot of fun with that.

Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong! Failed to notice we have a set of rules over here, did ya? Every one of your posts breaks some (and in some cases all) of rules 1.2 (all lower case post), 1.3 (run-on sentences), 1.4 (no punctuation breaks), 1.5 (no paragraph breaks), 1.8 (incorrect spelling), 1.9 (excessive abbreviations), 4 (lack of content), and 6 (using red bold text). Way to earn your nickname. Consider yourself warned, and recommended for banning. Welcome to TMD!

- Bram

[T00L]

*claps* Good god give that kid a prize for that post. He was kidding right?