Night's Whisper Control Slaver

[Harlequin]

I dissagree with your analysis of the "flow"

If you turn 1 Mystical for Ancestral, turn 2 Ancestal .. Unless you hit Saphire or Tcad your going to not have drain up on that turn 2.  Night's whisper does not interfer with turn 2 drain/thirst.

Think about sitting in front of an opponent playing slaver.  What is scarier?
-- They have 7 cards in hand and open (meaning they have drain or thirst mana open, and potential for FoW)
or
-- They have 7 cards in hand and only haveing open with a tapped land.  With thier ancestral recall in thier yard, the worst they could do is brainstorm into some force of wills.  No worries about thirst or Drain.

[Kowal]

The thing that bothers me about these sorts of arguments are all of the abstract terms that get tossed around to justify choices. This isn't a personal attack, Kowal, but to use your post as an example, you're basically just saying "All those reasons you actually bothered to think out, describe and explain the implications of logically don't matter, because I'm worried about Flow."

In general, I agree with what you're saying here.  I have a tendency to despise that sort of terminology since I see it as little more than confusion to newcomers.

That's neither here nor there however.  This thread was created as an exploration from Rich's theory on flow.  Like it or not, we have to adhere to it or we're starting a new discussion.  Rest assured, when my article goes up (it will likely be submitted this weekend) I will be doing my best to avoid using terminology unless absolutely necessary.

I would retort the Mystical vs NW thing, but Harlequin already said exactly what I was going to.  Though, to take it a bit further...

Let's pretend you're on the draw against another control deck.  They lead with a blue source and maybe something else (welder maybe?  a mox?)
You lead with Night's Whisper.  Nobody in their right mind Force of Wills it, and if they do then you've bled two useful cards from their hand which is just as good as drawing two of your own.
They drop their second source.  Depending on the player and their hand, you can expect either they cast Thirst for Knowledge, or they leave Drain mana up.  If they cast Thirst and your hand is gassy enough to Force it without losing anything terribly necessary, you have that option and you're more likely for it to be a realistic one given you've now seen 10 cards to their 8.
If they leave Drain mana up, you go to your turn and now have Drain online, presumably with another land in hand so you won't miss your next turn's land drop if they continue to play the Drain game.

With Mystical?
They open with a source or two.  You open with land and some other play.  They now have two sources and can cast Thirst for Knowledge, but considering Mystical does nothing right now, you're effectively carrying a 5 card hand to their 4 with Thirst on the stack, which is much better.  When you untap after Mystical, you have Ancestral without Drain backup, against a player who is either holding 6 cards or holding 5 with Drain online.

This does apply on the play as well, but obviously Harlequin covered that already and it's not as catastrophic.  The real argument against NW, as I see it, is that you won't always have a mox in your hand.  Though if you don't, you still have an adequate card advantage spell that quickly becomes better ones, and there has to be a reason you kept the hand (perhaps so many forces it doesn't matter so much that your hand is slow, or you're already holding ancestral)

[WildWillieWonderboy]

My entire argument has been based on the idea that the pros and cons of the two, focusing purely on the early game make them approximately equal in power, whereas in any other circumstance MT is just better.

Great! Now we have a concise argument to destroy. Night's Whisper is never bad. You draw it, you play it, and it gives you cards. That's it. You maybe even get to play a land, or even some moxen followed by more spells. Here's how Mystical Tutor works: pass the turn. See how bad that is? Don't make your land drop, don't see more cards, just do the real sneaky EOT Mystical for whatever you want to have countered. Savage, you drew Yawg Will/Tinker, and now it's going to your graveyard because your opponent, who is not an idiot, has been playing lands and drawing cards and has the force and the drain. You see, the thing is that you seem to believe that Whisper is only good in a very narrow set of situations, when that's actually what Mystical is for. Mystical is for those times when you look at your hand and you say "man, if mystical were some other instant or sorcery, I could win or not lose right now", and then you use the ability conveniently printed on the card to change it into that other instant or sorcery, and you win or don't lose. That's the rare occurence, because it happens almost without exception no more than one time in any winnable game. Needing to draw cards is not a rare occasion. In fact, needing to draw cards is a situation that this format happens to exist inside of, not the other way around.

I'm not sure of the specifics of what you've been saying about playing Mystical for Ancestral in the early turns, but let me just say what others may have flinched from: that's a bad play. That's right. It's bad. Even with Merchant Scroll, a card advantage-neutral tutor, good players very rarely look for Ancestral except when all other possibilities have been exhausted.

Lets say you have a mox and a fetch. You could do either play (NW or MT). This is a good hand. Now, lets think for a minute. Do we want to play land, mox, go, or do we want to play land, mox, draw cards? Do you want to face your opponent's threats with 5 cards or 7? Ok, that's an obvious question. Lets assume you're onto something and press ahead assuming that drawing cards on the first turn is bad. At the end of the opponents turn, we do the super cool mystical for ancestral play. Then, on our turn, we play a land (how lucky!) and Ancestral. We have 4 pathetic little cards in hand to our opponents 6 or 7 (depending on who went first). Even if we have force for the opponents force, we only end up with exactly as many cards in hand as him (or exactly as many as he will after he draws if you're on the play). Keep in mind that if you do not have force, this play is completely unviable. Your opponent is liable to have Force or, even worse, Misdirection. You will lose. The Yawg Will THAT YOU WILL NEVER GET TO RESOLVE would probably have been amazing. Too bad you played Mystical for Ancestral.

[wraith985]

The 'classic' Demonic vs. Ancestral debate also doesn't really have an answer in the abstract. Sometimes you want to be tutoring for the best spell in your deck, and other times you just need more stuff in your grip. They're both very good cards that address very different issues.

The way I see it, Control Slaver wants to play for the long game. If it gets there, its game-breakers will ruin any deck out there. Night's Whisper helps that goal by digging two cards deeper to find that crucial third land, or another blue source, or even a Force of Will . More importantly, it does all of that on turn 1, without costing you a draw step, with very little chance of it being Forced, and without sacrificing Drain backup on whatever spell you dig up for turn 2 with Tutor. In the midgame, it's far from useless; also, if you've gotten there, odds are that you've already established a decent control of the game. In the late game, the deck's draw suite should be enough to find the win condition independently of Mystical Tutor or Merchant Scroll.

I find that the mid- and late-game arguments just aren't persuasive because that's not the hole that this particular slot seeks to fill. Slaver's late-game is pretty much second to none, and its mid-game is very strong as well. It is at its weakest in the early game, where it needs to find Drain mana and Force ASAP to lock down the fort until the big guns come online. Especially with all of the Misdirections coming out of the woodworks (Pitchlong, MDG), it seems suicidal to run out turn 2 Ancestral. Night's Whisper, as Brainstorm Proxies 5-7, fits into Slaver's early game very well without being dead later, and it even increases your hand size as a bonus. It doesn't cost you a draw step, it doesn't interfere with turn 2 Drain mana, and it doesn't force you to pass the turn to get extra cards early.

I played two Night's Whisper in my Slaver build in a small tournament last weekend (the third was replaced with a Rack and Ruin for the expected metagame...that didn't turn out so well), and I would gladly run a third. I don't think I ever wished that Whisper was a Mystical Tutor, and I definitely don't think Tutor in place of Whisper would have helped me in any of the games I lost. By contrast, when I was able to cast Night's Whisper on turn 1, it was amazing. I like this choice a lot.

[Jacob Orlove]

Thread cleaned up.

pyr0ma5ta received a warning for a now-deleted spam post, UniversalSnip received a full warning for flaming, and WildWillieWonderboy received a verbal warning for flame bait. Let's try to keep further discussion productive and on-topic.

[TD]

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[jazzykat]

Lord of the Atogs,

You are truly one of the awesome personalities of magic. Not only are you a cool dude, but you still share your tech with the community even though you have a good team behind you and you don't need to.

On an unrelated note, sorry to hear you didn't make it to the Legacy top 8's. I guess UG and that port of Waterbury really did have something going

Best,
JK

Please use the PM function for these sorts of messages in the future.  Verbal Warning for violating Rule 6, Prohibited Action (personal message).  -DA

[pyr0ma5ta]

I actually had this idea last night while messing around with MDG on MWS.  The main difference between MDG and BMG is that MDG has sacrificed the draw engine to play the extra pseudo-tutoring power of 4 Merchant Scrolls so that it has something to do on turn 1 to dig up a Fow against combo or set up future turns with AR, Gifts, FOF, whatever.  BMG seeks to simply outdraw and hope those cards are good enough.  The reason I was thinking about this at all was I was somewhat disappointed the the draw in MDG, namely, a whopping 2 cards (AR and FOF).  I was thinking about what card I could add as a singleton MS target for draw, and I thought of TFK.  That naturally reminded me of CS.

Now, this recent discussion on NW in CS has led me to think that Merchant Scroll might actually be not too terrible in CS.  The advantages of MS over NW:

1) Tutors for Fow.  This improves the combo matchup, something Rich Shay and others have been struggling with.
2) Blue.  No need to fetch USea.  Pitches to Fow.
3) CS has an actual draw engine in TFK, and MS->TFK, while mana intensive, isn't all that horrible.  Obviously the first choice for draw is AR, and MDG can pull off MS->Gifts or MS->Fof.  Shouldn't be a problem with all the mana both decks pack nowadays.
4) No life loss (better against fish...?  storm?)

Disadvantages of MS over NW:
1) Blue.  Red Blastable.
2) Not actually card advantage.

Has anyone tried multiple MS in CS?  Just a thought.

[The Atog Lord]

While the comparison between Mystical/Vamp and NW has been discussed, there is one key issue that I would like to discuss. One of the most common Mystical/Vamp targets early in the game is Ancestral Recall. However, casting Night's Whisper is very very close to casting Vampiric Tutor and getting Ancestral.

Vamp for Ancestral Recall nets you the same number of net cards as Night's Whisper, while costing you 2 life in both cases. Night's Whisper is a sorcery, but it costs 1B instead of UB, which can be significant. It also does not walk into Misdirection, a card seeing more and more play. And unlike Vamp tutor, it draws card right away, not the next time you would draw a card. Further, and perhaps most of all, Night's Whisper leaves Ancestral Recall in your deck for you to draw, instead of moving it into your graveyard like the Vamp-->Ancestral play.

[Vegeta2711]

MS is pretty much terrible in CS. Rich used to run is as a 1-of for a long time and I basically always laughed everytime I saw in in testing.

The problem I have with MS is two-fold.
1. It's not drawing me cards, unless I fetch AR, in which case I've paid for a slightly better TFK.
2. I always feel like I'm wasting time whenever I use MS. I rather have cards that do things personally. It's why I had no problem with Mystical being cut in some lists and why Night's Whisper feels acceptable. I pay 2 and I draw my 2 cards -right now-.

[bigstudlysherm]

I ran the Night's Whisper Slaver build at the last NorCal Vintage tournament in Berkeley to a 1-1-2 record.

I believe the record to be due to my inexperience with the deck in a tournament setting and not necessary this particular build or the viability of slaver in the current metagame. Also, sometimes things don't work out as planned.

I attribute the draw I had to the sideboard plan of 4x Sphere of Resistance against combo. I think the deck wants 4x Chalice 1x Big Platz there instead.

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

But to be relevent to the current discussion of Night's Whisper, I found it very strong against the drain decks and against combo *if played turn1* and would not cut it for what essentially amounts to welder/bob hate in the main - Fire/Ice or DBlast.

You clearly board it out against Stax, but you have great cards to bring in for that matchup so you don't mind.

The question that came to my mind while reading this thread is Night's Whisper vs. Merchant Scroll.

Night's Whisper has the advantage of pulling you ahead on the spot. While merchant scroll gives you flexibility, is easier to cast on turn 1, and pitches to FoW (and gets countered by REB..or more often...what it gets is).

The other advantage of Scroll is that it gets broken cards involved. Even IF the ancestral/FoF/Wish or w/e it gets does get countered, those cards are still in grave ready to be willed back. Its a slight advantage, but its something.

For next time, I'm going to add basic swamp to the deck in order to allow the turn1 Whisper against SS/Kudzu/Stax and run the current config as is.

Thanks for the awesome commentary and strategy discussion up until this point. I'd really like to hear your ideas on Scroll vs. Whisper and your sideboarding strategies.

[The Atog Lord]

I like Merchant Scroll as a card. It is an inexpensive tutor that fetches some of the best spells in the game. However, I think that Gifts is a much better deck for abusing Merchant Scroll than Control Slaver. I've run Scroll as a one-of before, and here are my findings:

Merchant Scroll is a great set-up card if you plan on trying to win the game next turn. Then, being able to fetch up a Force is a strong play.

Merchant Scroll is fine to cost if you have little mana and need to get a counter for your opponent's next turn.

Early Game, Merchant Scroll can get Ancestral. However, tapping out to get Ancestral isn't really that strong. Your opponent now knows that he needs to get a counter online, or better yet a Misdirection online. He also knows that now is the time to cast Duress. Worst of all, tapping out to get Ancestral with Scroll means that you have to wait until you untap to get your cards.

The main reason I want a card in that spot -- either Scroll or Night's Whisper is for the early game, for the first couple of turns. The nature of the metagame is that Control Slaver almost always wins the long game. The trick is getting it to survive until that point. Merchant Scroll is simply not as good as Night's Whisper in being an early mana-fixing spell which can jumpstart an otherwise mediocre hand. Scroll is good if your hand already has threats to cast, as it can help those threats resolve. However, Night's Whisper has been, in my experience, better at turning a bad hand into a good hand. And that's really what I want the card in that slot to do.

[bigstudlysherm]

The main reason I want a card in that spot -- either Scroll or Night's Whisper is for the early game, for the first couple of turns. The nature of the metagame is that Control Slaver almost always wins the long game. The trick is getting it to survive until that point. Merchant Scroll is simply not as good as Night's Whisper in being an early mana-fixing spell which can jumpstart an otherwise mediocre hand. Scroll is good if your hand already has threats to cast, as it can help those threats resolve. However, Night's Whisper has been, in my experience, better at turning a bad hand into a good hand. And that's really what I want the card in that slot to do.

Ok, so if you follow the argument up until this point, then:

Say its game 1, you're on the play, and you've scouted so you know your opponent is on Stax/Fish/SS/Kudzu. Do you run your Sea out there for the Turn1 NW in the name of "spending mana every turn" and pumping up your hand to deal with their turn1?

Walking into wasteland here is unacceptable, thus my thinking on the MD Swamp.

What are people's thoughts on the MD swamp if you've followed the argument to the point of agreeing with NW as the proper card for the slot? You're weighing the ability to have another non-wasteable source to cast your NW, DT, VT, and Will vs. another non-U source that threatens the turn 1-2 Drain Mana.

[Vegeta2711]

Walking into wasteland here is unacceptable, thus my thinking on the MD Swamp.

Why is it unacceptable? Do we only run 11 lands or something now? Does it matter half the time if they want to waste their first turn playing Wasteland and returning to a null-game state when I've just used it to cast Night's Whsiper already?

To top if off, if they don't have the waste, you've just fetched a non-blue making land. Not fun.

[seer]

The wasteland problem isn't so much of a problem. This is because Slaver, unlike Gifts, does not need every last bit of mana to "combo out". Slaver is capable of using all of its mana (in fact Slaver might use Mana Drain Mana better than any other deck) but can usually get by with less.

With Gifts I would say a wasteland in that spot would be a bigger problem.

[pyr0ma5ta]

My biggest concern with CS, Rich, is something that you've said before, and I've heard others naming it as the sole reason that you, the diehard CS player, are not playing CS right now.

Storm Combo (of all flavors, in my experience) wrecks your face.

In my testing, there are several reasons MDG is able to handle combo much more efficiently than CS.  The number 1 reason is that it has fewer dead and slow cards (Mindslaver, Trike, Welders), and the number 2 reason is that MDG runs 4 Forces, 2/3 Misd, and 4 turn 1 tutors to go get them.  Having a heavier presence in the earlier turns gives MDG a better chance of surviving to turn 4.  Thus, to shore up that flaw in CS, I suggested MS.  It seems that Team Reflection has taken this into account and tried this and rejected it, however, so I'll just trust that you CS specialists have already concluded it's not good enough.  Seems counterintuitive to me, but I'm certainly not going to presume to lecture Rich Shay on how to build his CS deck.  I can understand where the "MS sucks, play NW" argument is coming from, I just don't necessarily agree until I can test it for myself.

[marcb]

If this is off topic, then please ignore it.

  There was an earlier discussion about the more abstract concept of "mana flow" where it was argued that CS did not use all of its mana in the early game leading to poor mana flow at the onset of the game. Since this does not maximize usage of all available resources, CS is not maximizing its chances to cast  spells, obtain card advantage, and basically win.  It was then argued that NW is a great card to overcome this obstacle (correct me if I misunderstood the argument). I agree with this argument for the most part, but I would like to make an addendum. I would argue that the mana flow or even the card advantage a spell bestows to its caster depends not only on the spell's effect on the caster but also on its effect on the opponent.  For example, a spell like mindtwist provides card advantage not by netting the caster drawn cards, but by forcing the opponent to draw negative cards (ie discard). I don't see why mana flow is any different.  We can obtain mana flow by playing cards that allow the caster to use his (or her) mana more efficiently (ala NW) or cards that prevent our opponent from using his mana effectively, for example through mana denial. I know many people will immediately respond with the comment that CS is not a deck that tries to deny mana, so it doesn't make sense to consider mana denial, but theoretically from the "mana flow" perspective, I think it does. In light of the recent GenCon T4 CS list with Wastelands, do people think that denying the opponent mana may be a way to improve one's own "mana flow"?

Note:  Despite the above argument I currently play NWCS, and haven't played Strip/Waste in a very long time. Just want to hear the pros comment.

Thanks in advance,
Marc

[bigstudlysherm]

Why is it unacceptable? Do we only run 11 lands or something now? Does it matter half the time if they want to waste their first turn playing Wasteland and returning to a null-game state when I've just used it to cast Night's Whsiper already?

1) It's rarely ever wasteland, blow up your thing, go. It's usually: bad things + waste. What I'm saying is that when they waste your land, they don't necessarily waste their turn...dig?

2) It puts you another turn away from hitting TFK, and winning. You'd rather they didn't i.e. getting wasted is something you want to avoid (can't believe I said that).

3) If you don't run the swamp, then you can't keep the 1 land, Whisper hand, which could end up being pretty hot depending on the Whisper.

To top if off, if they don't have the waste, you've just fetched a non-blue making land. Not fun.

Agreed, but hey, its still out there and not in the bin. And you can then go get basic island from there on out if necessary. It's also not just that they can waste it immediately...its at any point in the game they can kill it. You can run a deck of no basics and say, "Only 50% chance of them having waste in opening 7," but not many people follow that logic...I wonder why?

[The Atog Lord]

Great questions.

pyr0 --

You have a great point, that Scroll seems to work in Gifts, so why can't it work in CS? The answer is that the two decks aren't able to use Scroll in quite the same way. First, Meandeck Gifts has more blue cards than Control Slaver, so that casting a Force of Will is less painful in MDG, because it is less likely to cost you your only available draw. The second reason is that while Gifts is able to use its Merchant Scroll to disrupt the opponent, Control Slaver, due to its high number of "dead" draws, often needs to use Merchant Scroll to draw cards. To put it another way, Control Slaver is less likely than MDGifts to be able to function well after using Scroll to get Force and then pitching a blue spell. Meandeck Gifts is built around Merchant Scroll, and has been designed to be able to use it better than Control Slaver has been. This is the opposite of how Control Slaver is much better than Gifts decks at using Thirst for Knowledge.

marc --

Wasteland and Stripmine are mana removal, but neither actually helps you get more mana on the table than the opponent. Let's say that my opponent has out 3 islands and I have 2 swamps. If I play another swamp, we both have 3 mana available. If instead I play Strip Mine and hit his land, then he and I  both have 2 mana available. Strip Mines do not help you get more mana than the opponent. Rather, they work on the theory that the strip-mining deck is better able to deal with having fewer land than the deck being hit with the strip mine. That's why Strip Mine isn't really even a factor when considering flow, I don't think.

[Liam-K]

Wasteland and Stripmine are mana removal, but neither actually helps you get more mana on the table than the opponent. Let's say that my opponent has out 3 islands and I have 2 swamps. If I play another swamp, we both have 3 mana available. If instead I play Strip Mine and hit his land, then he and I  both have 2 mana available. Strip Mines do not help you get more mana than the opponent. Rather, they work on the theory that the strip-mining deck is better able to deal with having fewer land than the deck being hit with the strip mine. That's why Strip Mine isn't really even a factor when considering flow, I don't think.

While this seems logical at first I am going to disagree.  Would you also argue that a deck running Duress is better able to function on fewer cards in hand than the victem deck?  I imagine you'd prefer to clarify, if not outright object to, such a statement.  While I hate simplifying it down to "everything is a time walk" strips are about making your opponent pass the turn after doing less stuff.  "Tempo" and "flow" sound suspiciously identical, and arguing you're not worried about passing the turn because you have less mana since you have moved more smoothly towards executing your gameplan sounds unsupportable.  If you're more turns away from winning, you are not closer, even if you are holding more of the right cards.

[rologa]

Well, the wasteland problem can be a serious problem or not, it depends on the situation. If you primary goal of casting NW is to find the third mana and you fetch an underground and is wasted, if you found the third mana next turn you will have only two again and if you don't find it probably you have lost the game.

I have tested NW and sometimes is fine, it makes the deck to flow better but sometimes you draw expensive spells and have fetched vulnerable mana and put you in a bad position. Against fish and workshop isn't the best spell you can do, against control is good, card adventage is always good in control mirror and against combo is average. It can find a force when you need it but it can force you to tap in your turn and make easy the decisions of the combo player.

I try it and for me didn't pass the cut. Isn't enough good to put that pressure in my mana base in the early game. I prefer a more stable mana on the board. When I put NW in my deck my intention was to have more cards like brainstorm, that could fix my hand in the early game. But NW fail to do this more times than I like to see. To fetch an underground so quickly is very bad when you play half the day against fish and workshops.

More testing revealed me that if I like to have a 5th brainstorm the best card I can choose is Sensei's Divining Top. It's not card advantage but it helps to try to find the third mana, it is an artifact that have a lot of synergy with the deck, and it allows some little tricks against combo decks that abuse duress. I don't want to add more than one, but I think that this one is very good in the deck. For one of the other two slots I prefer 1 Merchant Scroll for his versatility. But I play a CS deck more combo oriented, more similar to the deck ForceFieldYou posted some weeks ago and it has more important targets for MS (chains and rebuild). It is a more streamlined deck, with less dead draws in the starting hand. If I can pilot it to a decent position in the next tournaments in my area I will comment more about it.

[marcb]

Atog Lord,

 marc --

Wasteland and Stripmine are mana removal, but neither actually helps you get more mana on the table than the opponent. Let's say that my opponent has out 3 islands and I have 2 swamps. If I play another swamp, we both have 3 mana available. If instead I play Strip Mine and hit his land, then he and I  both have 2 mana available. Strip Mines do not help you get more mana than the opponent. Rather, they work on the theory that the strip-mining deck is better able to deal with having fewer land than the deck being hit with the strip mine. That's why Strip Mine isn't really even a factor when considering flow, I don't think.

In the situation you proppose you are right that you do not obtain more mana then your opponent, however this situation is unlikely. Let's suppose one player is playing your deck (NWCS), and the other is playing your same deck with the modification -3NW +2waste/+1Strip. The mana denial in his deck are taking up card spots. Overall the second deck has much more land in it then the first. In other words while NWCS might draw two land and 1 NW in the opening hand. This new deck will draw 2 lands plus 1 wasteland. When he trades his wasteland for one of your lands, then NWCS will be down to one land, while the other deck still has two in hand. All else being equal, the other deck will wind up with more mana than his opponent (2 lands to 1). Things of course are not equal because NW allows your deck to draw more cards then the opponents deck allowing you to potentially draw a land and not miss the land drop.  To me this would be an example of NW gaining positive "mana flow", which offset the negative "mana flow" incurred by the opponents wasteland.
Despite this argument that mana denial belongs in the discussion of mana flow just as much as NW, I still believe that NW offers more than just mana smoothing (card advantage and synergy with LOA for example), which is why I think it is a better alternative to waste/Strip in CS. The reason I bring up waste/Strip at all is because I wonder if COW, which would allow Waste/Strip to function as more than negative mana flow for your opponent could possibly allow it to compete with the overall functionality of NW. Plenty of people have used COW, and Sundering Titan along with Waste/Strip such as Brian Demars' Burning Slaver or the recent GenCon CS list to allow CS to affect the mana flow of the opponent.  Additionally, waste/Strip allows for a nice way to handle Bazaar, and COW allows you to use fetchlands repeatedly to create virtual card advantage by thinning out your deck. I could go on with the analysis but I'd rather hear more of what you have to say. Have you tried playing Waste/Strip with the intention of monitoring how this card affects "mana flow" or simply your ability to survive into the mid to late game in the same way you've looked at NW? If so, what have you found?

Liam K,
  I agree that "mana flow" and tempo seem to sound very similar. In fact, I can't find a difference.

[Purple Hat]

I think the concept that's missing from this discussion is actually something that I've heard called "velocity" but basically is the nebuluous theory that doing more stuff is better than doing less stuff.  a friend of mine wrote a somewhat interesting article on the subject after watching me play at gencon last year but I don't believe he ever submitted it.  Basically the idea is that decks that do something every turn, draw cards, discard cards, tutor, play creatures, attack, whatever have achieved an advantage in executing their strategy.  a good example of this is a combo deck on it's set up turns.  on set up turns combo will rarely do much that contributes directly to furthering it's game plan, but the mere fact that you've done more stuff means that you've seen more cards, made more decisions, and hopefully placed things correctly.  in the example of 5 color dragon at gencon in 2005 I took a great many turns where the cards flew, I tutored, I drew, I discarded, I beat with xantid, and after 2 or 3 such turns everything was where it needed to be and I won.  In my opinion that's what Nights Whispers brings to CS.  CS used to pass the turn without making any plays.  In type one the timeline of the games is just too short for you to pass the turn with out making a significant play.  Whispers increases the velocity of Control Slaver in the early turns by allowing it to move cards around efficiently in the early game in a way that brainstorm does not.  Turn 1 brainstorm without a fetch, as has been noted will frequently lock you into 10 cards over the first 3 turns.  Nights whispers does not cause this problem, and therefore prevents you from "spinning your wheels" and allows you to place new cards.

More and more as we have learned to make use of more zones and to increase the power and precision with which we abuse those zones our decks become reliant on specific placement of our cards.  Night's Whispers allows CS to more optomally place more cards becase of the simple fact that it allows CS to see more cards.

[Liam-K]

This thread really is turning into a tempo rehash.  I support that, if we can get past everyone giving their own name and explaination for established theory.

I also agree that night's whisper is probably a reasonable choice as a tempo card.  It helps curve out the deck, is proactive, and supports the deck's infrastructure.  The wasteland issue is (as ever) metagame dependant.  What sort of mana base to run in a largely unknown field has not been settled (optimal red count needs to be sorted out first) and that's what should be focused on provided you choose to run with this idea.

What I like about the card is that it is easy to resolve and always useful.  More and more I notice that a great strength in a deck is creating dead cards in the opponent's deck by making them irrelevant.  Long does this by being too ridiculously fast for most cards to be castable when they would matter, stax just stops you from casting them, fish is practically built around the concept, good control players know what deserves countermagic.  Night's Whisper is very, very rarely going to be sitting in your hand sucking.

What worries me about the card is it is deceptively anti-tempo.  It is a sorcery which draws cards.  In the early turns when tempo matters most, you give your opponent a turn and get a card back.  You haven't actually *done* anything, other than hope.  A part of me says rather than hoping my next two cards are good, I'd rather just draw a good card instead of rip Night's Whisper (this is why I like MDG, the entire engine is about choosing cards rather than digging).  I'm not saying drawing cards is bad, at all, and I agree that CS probably doesn't have the right decklist to support Merchant Scroll in multiples, and to be honest I can't come up with something better at doing what Night's Whisper is trying to do.  But I am saying that tap out, draw 2, pass is slow.  It seems like it would be great in the drain mirror, less than stellar in the combo match and only decent everywhere else at first glance because of this.

I haven't tested the deck so I'm not going to come down hard and fast.  That's just my impression.

[pyr0ma5ta]

A part of me says rather than hoping my next two cards are good, I'd rather just draw a good card instead of rip Night's Whisper (this is why I like MDG, the entire engine is about choosing cards rather than digging).

That's exactly what I figured, and why I posted my thoughts on Merchant Scroll.  However, Rich's response makes perfect sense.  It is indeed unfortunate to pitch your only Thirst to Fow and then end up with some Mons Goblins Raiders and Mindslavers in hand.  However, would you rather just lose the game? 

See, that's my problem.  If you pitch the Thirst, you are giving yourself the opportunity to draw a card, which might be Ancestral or Thirst or DT.  But at least you know that your opponent's draw7 or will or Necro will not resolve.  If you don't MS -> Fow, instead opting to NW into 2 lands, you just get goldfished.  Surely holding bad cards and being not dead is better than holding good cards and shuffling up for game 2?

I had already mentioned the higher "relevant" (read: blue) card count in MDG as compared to CS, and it is indeed very relevant to what happens on turn 1 if you start with Land Mox MS.  However, I would argue that CS is actually not poorly set up for the merchant scroll engine, as there are 3 unique targets for turning it into a draw spell, one of which is a 4-of.  The biggest problem with MDG is the lack of draw engine, and the biggest problem for CS is the lack of consistent turn 1 protection.  Certainly you agree that you'd rather have the Force and pitch your Thirst for your opponent's first turn Bargain than say Oh, but the land and welder I drew off my Night's Whisper were pretty good!

[Purple Hat]

This thread really is turning into a tempo rehash.  I support that, if we can get past everyone giving their own name and explaination for established theory.

I don't see the "velocity" concept as the same thing as tempo.  to me tempo is how far along your game plan you are relative to your opponent, while velocity is simply the rate at which you move cards.  it's likely that if you're moving cards at a high rate you've achieved a tempo advantage but it's not necessary.  Additionally while velocity looks like card advantage in some cases it really isn't as there are clearly high velocity plays (TFK, Bazaar, Lim-Dul's Vault, read the runes) which result in no card advantage or minimal card advantage.  I don't think I explained it perfectly in my previous post, but this is an advantage that can be gained over an opponent that isn't always discussed.  I think night's whisper increases CS's ability to move cards and do "stuff" even if that stuff doesn't contribute to the rate at which you deploy your game plan(tempo).  Meerly shuffling cards between zones is an important concept that cs wasn't great at in the early turns.  While CS previously would make the turn 1 play of "land, mox, go" or more likely "land, go" it now makes the turn 1 play of "land, mox, night's whispers, draw two, go."  It's not necessarily true that CS has advanced it's game plan with this play.  the tempo is probably roughly neutral as CS's game plan in the early turns is "don't die" and while drawing 2 cards helps a little with that losing 2 life doesn't.  For me this play is strong in CS because it allows you to do stuff, see more cards, make more decisions.  Even if those don't put you "ahead" in tempo.  I guess what I'm saying is that I don't think night's whisper contributes "beats" in the classic sense of tempo theory, but I do think that it contributes to the deck's ability to "do stuff" every turn and have a constant motion of cards, which is another important factor.

[Liam-K]

If you define "velocity" as putting cards from your library into places other than your library, I call that setup and argue that it is a way of advancing your gameplan, albeit an unfocused one.  It gives you card selection and easier access to more cards (card selection again), which helps you set up your "I win" goal situation, like I discussed way back when in the vintage forum by finding the pieces.  I think you are also noticing that the "faster" (read: more) you draw cards, the more likely you are to hit something you want to see.  This is true and it's a fair point, especially since CS already relies so heavily on drawing cards to find what it wants.  Like I said above, it supports the deck's infrastructure.  Probably more than any other deck in the format CS relies/is built around pulling random cards off the top.

[zeus-online]

I find it weird that people talk about Card drawing as though it was bad, while at the same time talk about fetching Ancestral Recall with Merchant scroll?

/Zeus

[Bob The Builder]

I've read this entire thread and must say it holds up to the manadrain standard.

I had one thought floating in my mind while reading the entire time, although it's off-topic I'd like to share my thoughts:

I was thinking about how strange it is that NW is being promoted here as a card-draw whilst it is BLACK.  I found it strange to see how everyone here agrees on the fact that there are no blue cards that can be compared exactly with NW.
I say exactly because there have been attempts here to switch NW with impulse, MS, AK-engine, even strip/waste/cow ...  All those Ideas have been countered with various reasons...
When I started playing magic I thought each color had it's special abilities.  I thought drawing cards was a blue ability.  As of late the magiccards in general seem to have dropped the special skills that come with the color of the card.  I find this confusing, but not bad.

My opinion on using NW in CS is somewhat neutral.  CS is a deck that can be tampered with by the pilot; that much should be clear if you read all the posts here.
I'm not tempted to start testing NW after reading all this, but I'm not saying it's a bad idea.  I think the fact that people are still tampering with the deck in an attempt to get the ultimate build can only be encouraged.  It also shows us that we (people that play vintage) are eagerly waiting for a good card (in future sets?) that makes CS flow better.

Maybe the future sets should reset their focus on the original abilities inherent to the color the card comes in?

Sorry to but in with this off-topic comment, and please continue this great discusion. 

[pyr0ma5ta]

I find it weird that people talk about Card drawing as though it was bad, while at the same time talk about fetching Ancestral Recall with Merchant scroll?

/Zeus

You missed my point.  I want to fetch FOW every time on turn 1 with MS, unless I already have it in hand.  I only go for draw like AR or Thirst after I've survived the initial onslaught of bombs that my opponent has kept.  My #1 priority is to survive the first 3 turns, and then after that CS can do what it does best; overwhelm with threats.