Rector Void

[netherspirit]

Stax, while an awesome deck and an old time favourite of mine, is actually becoming boring to me. I love the deck but I need something that has a similar effect but works differently.

So I was thinking about a new route to take with Stax and the first thing that hit me was using Nether Void... But the more I thought about it the more I realised that Nether Void would just be overkill, not the focus of the deck.

After a bit of thinking I decided I could go for a deck using Academy Rector; now, my first idea was to use Flash, but I thought adding a third color would be to much, so I decided to use Cabal Therapy instead.

Anyway, here's the list! The idea is to disrupt your opponent's hand, hurt their mana base and get Nether Void and Trinisphere into play.

Mana Base:
1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Sol Ring
4 Scrubland
3 Swamp
1 Plains
3 Polluted Delta
2 Windswept Heather
1 Flooded Strand
1 Strip Mine
4 Wasteland

Discard:
4 Duress
4 Cabal Therapy

Draw/Tutor:
1 Demonic Tutor
4 Street Wraith
4 Academy Rector

Mana Denial:
4 Nether Void
4 Sinkhole
3 Null Rod
1 Balance
1 Trinisphere

Acceleration:
4 Dark Ritual

The Kill:
2 Decree of Justice

Sideboard:
4 Orim's Chant (for Tog and storm),
3 Children of Korlis (for storm),
4 Leyline of the Void (for Ichorid, Flash, graveyard based decks; also can help against Tog),
2 Seal of Cleansing (to stop Leyline of the Void),
2 Disenchant (same purpose as Seal of Cleansing but isn't hosed by Pithing Needle)

So there's the deck!

I think most of the cards are quite self explanatory, so I won't go into huge detail about them; however, I will list some cards I would like to add.

Smallpox - I can see this replacing Sinkhole or Cabal Therapy.
Entomb - Gets me a Cabal Therapy in the graveyard.
Vampiric Tutor and Imperial Seal - I really want to add these to help with consistency, but I don't know what to cut!
Mishra's Factory - Another win condition and a way to stop early attackers.
Swords to Plowshares and Diabolic Edict - Two of the best spot removal cards available.
Decree of Pain - The cycling ability gets around my Nether Voids and Trinisphere and the card itself could then prove very useful for late game creature destruction.

Anyway, what do you think? Comments, criticism and suggestions would be appreciated!

netherspirit

[Methuselahn]

Stax, while an awesome deck and an old time favourite of mine, is actually becoming boring to me. I love the deck but I need something that has a similar effect but works differently.

Anyway, here's the list! The idea is to disrupt your opponent's hand, hurt their mana base and get Nether Void and Trinisphere into play.

There is a fundamental problem here.  Stax doesn't really care about disrupting the opponent's hand.  Stax wants to prevent you from playing your spells entirely.  If you can't play your spells, it reallly doesn't matter if they sit as dead weight in your opponents' hands.

As for Nether Void; it's a bad stax card and strategy right now.  It's very expensive and thus, slow.

4 Duress
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Street Wraith
4 Academy Rector
4 Dark Ritual
2 Decree of Justice

The above cards are all horrible stax cards.

Honestly, this is the most blatant misuse of Rector that I've ever seen.  Designing a deck to fetch Nether Void with Rector, without even comboing it with Flash, is cruel and unusual punishment on my eyes.

[wethepeople]

Why dick around and set up locks when you could just Flash-combo with Academy Rector, and win?

[Jacob Orlove]

More importantly, why are you paying 4-5 mana to "cheat" a 4cc enchantment into play, especially when you can play turn 1 Land Mox Ritual Void, but not turn 1 Land Mox Ritual Rector (and you still don't have Therapy cast yet, in that case).

If you want to get Nether Void on the table, Rector just seems like it would slow you down.

[The Demon]

At the last COD event that I went to I made the top eight with a black stax deck.  I would put a link in this comment but it isn't really that noteworthy.  Nether Void is never a win more card, it is simply a win now card.  Stax and staxesque prison decks where very playable and highly underrated, the problem with them came when flash appeared and when Ichorid got all the new toys and tools. Nether Void is a great card when your deck is filled to the brim with lock pieces so you A. wont totally get blown out of the water when you cannot resolve a Nether Void for any reason and B. have those lock pieces combine with your Void so that they literally can do nothing.  Sinkhole is a fine and dandy card....in legacy.  The format is filled with mana acceleration in all forms, and nothing is going to ruin your day more when in games two and three your opponents sits on their fetches at inopportune times  for you.  The other issue is that it looks like your deck just rolls over to any deck that can resolve creatures with power two or more.  Fish is going to be an absolute beating for you, and GAT and Bomberman both have the ability to drop some dudes and just keep tapping them. Because of that I think that massacre has to be an auto include in your sideboard, and I think that you would benefit from diabolic edicts in your board as well. Even with those changes and some more lock pieces I just happen to think that your deck is not very playable. I understand that therapy is in their for the saccing of Rector, but when you actually play t he card your going to be saying force of will so you can resolve that rector while your opponent finds time for answers or just flat out wins.  I don't mean to be a negative Nancy,and I think that this deck of yours will be much more viable if/when Flash or Merchant Scroll gets restricted. 

[netherspirit]

Thanks for the feedback!

Yes, I know that going Rector --> Therapy --> Nether Void may be slow, but I can usually get this OR a hardcast Nether Void by turn three; until then I focus on disrupting my opponent's hand.

I think that I will replace Sinkhole with Smallpox as it will help me control the board and disrupt my opponent's hand further.

@wethepeople: I really don't like Flash decks; I just don't enjoy playing them.

@Methuselahn: This is not a Stax deck, it simply has a similar effect later in the game.

Anyway, I know the Rector method of getting Nether Void into play is slow (although it's faster than I was expecting), but it does allow me to use double Cabal Therapy, giving me an opportunity to ensure the lock.

EDIT: Rather than replacing Sinkhole with Smallpox, I've replaced Street Wraith.

[Methuselahn]

@Methuselahn: This is not a Stax deck, it simply has a similar effect later in the game.

So I was thinking about a new route to take with Stax and the first thing that hit me was using Nether Void...

huh?


Defending design decisions with "I just don't enjoy playing them" is a good way to make people disregard your ideas.  Nobody is going to say "yeah, this other proven deck IS boring." and then play your deck.   People choose and design decks based more on results and not fun factors, especially on this site, in this forum.

Multiple people have pointed out serious flaws with the deck and your most recent update only has you replacing Wraiths for Smallpox, which is small potatoes.  It doesn't look like you're considering the experienced advice from all these other people.  Casting a Rector and a Therapy, twice, to find Nether Void is not a good play in Vintage, even on turn 3.

I'd bet that you'll be posting more decks in the future  (which is great)   You're likely to get more feedback if you're more receptive to others' opinions.

[netherspirit]

I am being receptive of ideas, I'm just not willing to GIVE UP on a deck because others don't think it's going to be brilliant.

As for Flash - I don't want to just play a Flash Combo deck with Rector, because it would be a totally different deck. I don't think that Flash is a viable option in this deck for two reasons:

1) It's out of color and I don't want to make the deck more unstable by adding a third color (however, if adding blue would prove a good idea then I'm willing to try it).
2) Cabal Therapy seems better because it is cheaper, disruptive AND in color.

To clarify - I'm totally open to suggestions, but a lot of the comments I've had so far just seem to boil down to "give up and play a different deck", which doesn't help with improving the deck does it?

I hope no one takes that offensively, because believe it or not I've read all your responses several times and taken them all into consideration.

[Implacable]

The point that people are making is that, if you've set things up to the point where you're sacrificing Rector, why not just win the game?  That's a valid point, yet your answer is that it's not fun.  Tournament play is about playing the best deck, not the most unique one. 

[netherspirit]

But changing the deck in that manner would totally change the focus of the deck, and probably result in me having to cut Nether Void... Which pretty much defeats the object of this thread does it not?

[Shock Wave]

But changing the deck in that manner would totally change the focus of the deck, and probably result in me having to cut Nether Void... Which pretty much defeats the object of this thread does it not?

...'tis true, but unfortunately, you may have to accept that your design is just not viable. If you still disagree with everyone, your only real way of giving this deck any credibility is to play it in a tournament and demonstrate that it can perform. The people in these forums have played Vintage for a long time and are generally very accurate when dismissing a fresh proposition. This does not happen often, because we like to discuss new decks and possibilities. However, playing Academy Rector on Turn 3 for any purpose other than winning the game (especially in a deck that does not run FoW) is just a tragically flawed idea given the state of Vintage these days. GAT and Flash and, well, almost everything else is going to make you hate your life.

[netherspirit]

Right, I want to keep this as a Prison deck, so what if I made it UB so I could Flash my Rectors? I'd have plenty of card draw and tutors to find the cards and lots of disruption to back them up.

How does that sound? I'm willing to make huge adjustments to the deck, don't mistake me on that, but I just don't want to make a Combo deck. If this works I guess it could actually be a very fast Prison deck.

Anyway, thoughts on that? I'll post a new list later.

[The Demon]

Right, I want to keep this as a Prison deck, so what if I made it UB so I could Flash my Rectors? I'd have plenty of card draw and tutors to find the cards and lots of disruption to back them up.

How does that sound? I'm willing to make huge adjustments to the deck, don't mistake me on that, but I just don't want to make a Combo deck. If this works I guess it could actually be a very fast Prison deck.

Anyway, thoughts on that? I'll post a new list later.

I think that you would benefit from adding in sphere of resistances regardless of whatever colors you are playing.  For all intensive purposes Nether Void resolving is a win, so if you can slow them down to allow yourself to get your void into play I think that your deck would become much better. I would personally cut four Street Wraiths and add in four SoRs

[petergrifindor]

              If you want a Nether Void Prision Deck, I think another option is leave the Rector idea and splash red instead of white. You can put Blood Moon and the creature with the same hability. Nether Void + Sinkhole + Strip Mine, Wasteland + Null Rod + Blood Moon looks like a strong mana denial. It won´t be so diferent that the deck you have proposed. 

[netherspirit]

Red could definitely be interesting, but I still have an issue with speed then. Sphere of Resistance is definitely finding its way in.

I tried a UB list and it was even worse, the lock was easy to establish but the kill was much harder.

So, if I go BR, how about something like this?

3 Blood Moon
3 Moon Magus
4 Sinkhole
3 Null Rod
3 Mox Monkey
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
3 Crucible
X Ritual Effects

And some others?

[The Demon]

Red could definitely be interesting, but I still have an issue with speed then. Sphere of Resistance is definitely finding its way in.

I tried a UB list and it was even worse, the lock was easy to establish but the kill was much harder.

So, if I go BR, how about something like this?

3 Blood Moon
3 Moon Magus
4 Sinkhole
3 Null Rod
3 Mox Monkey
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
3 Crucible
X Ritual Effects

And some others?

One of the biggest issues I have had when playing prison type decks is locking my opponent down just to have them slowly get out of the lock with brainstorms and the like.  Chains of Mephistopheles is insane right now, it hoses gat and all blue decks.