The Stratagy Behind the "Strategic Slaver" Deck

[forests failed you]

The Strategy Behind the “Strategic Slaver” Deck
By Brian DeMars   

   Another year, and another Vintage World Championship has come and gone.  Of all the Vintage Championships I have had the privilege of competing in, 2008 was definitely one of the most interesting and epic Vintage events to date.  In particular, I feel that the top four decks of the event may be an indicator of the future of Vintage metagame, where on both sides of the bracket Strategic Slaver and TPS paired off against one another.  But what is “Strategic Slaver,” you might ask?  Well, in short it is the new Control Slaver variant that I ended up constructing almost by accident in the days leading up to the Vintage World Championship that utilizes the spell “Strategic Planning” from the Portal Three Kingdoms Expansion to dump artifacts into the graveyard to be recurred with Goblin Welder while at the same time digging to find land drops or important spells such as Force of Will.  In this article I would like to discuss the card choices I selected for the list that I piloted to a fourth place finish and Jimmy McCarthy finished second place with, and also discuss some of the basic strategy behind the “Strategic Slaver” deck.
   Strategic Slaver got its start completely by accident and coincidence while I was riding to Chicago with Steve Menendien and Mark Trogden.  While we were driving I was thinking at length about some of the key problems I was facing with the Slaver deck that I had been played the weekend before at an RIW power tournament.  In particular, I was completely certain that Sensei’s Divining Top was the worst card in the deck, and felt that it was directly responsible for multiple losses I had suffered the weekend before.  The problem with the Top was that it doesn’t dig through lumps of bad cards that one doesn’t want to draw, and worst of all requires far too much mana to be effective.  In addition, Top doesn’t pitch to Force of Will and it is extremely vulnerable to Null Rod.  After the RIW event I had cut back to only one copy of Sensei’s Top in my maindeck, and replaced the other copies of the card with utility spells that I felt might more directly impact the game.  After a few play test sessions with the RIW crew I was confident that Slaver was a good deck choice for Worlds, but that it needed to find more ways to see more cards quickly—certainly, Sensei’s Divining Top was not the card I was looking for.  While we were driving I began thinking about what the ideal card to fill the role I was looking for might look like, in hopes that I might think of another card that actually exists that could fulfill a similar role.  The fantasy card I came up with was the following:

1U, Sorcery:  Draw two cards.

   Obviously, that card is too powerful to see print in a modern set, but I began wondering if such a card were to see print how it would effect Vintage.  I asked Steve during the ride if he felt that card would have a ‘profound’ effect upon the format if it were to be printed.  He pondered the question and eventually said that he didn’t think it would have a ‘profound’ effect upon the format, but it would make an impact and see play in blue decks.  I later posed the same question to Rich Shay on Sunday after Vintage Worlds after Jimmy and I had unleashed Strategic Plans and his response was that it would be broken and that every single deck would play four copies of my fantasy card.  After having played with Strategic Plans (which is probably weaker than my fantasy card) I tend to agree that 1U draw two cards would be broken and would probably need to be immediately restricted.  (However, I’m not completely uncertain that Strategic Planning might eventually need to be restricted one day either). 
   A few hours later Steve, Mark, and I are all sitting around in our hotel room hanging out complaining about the Tigers trading Pudge, while Steve is going through random boxes and binders of his Magic card collection.  As Steve is flipping through a small binder of cards he stumbles across his playset of Strategic Planning, and at the sight of them says:  “Strategic Planning is sort of like the 1U draw two you were looking for, have you considered playing with it?”  I had never heard of the card before and ask what “Strategic Planning” even does.  He hands me a copy of the card and I read it:

1U, Sorcery:  Look at the top three cards of your Library.  Put one of them into your hand and the rest into your graveyard.

”Wow,”  I say “This card is really powerful.  Can I borrow this?”  Steve says he doesn’t mind, so I pull out my deck and unsleave the sole copy of Top and replace it with Strategic Planning.  Mark Trogdon wants to play some games so we shuffle up and begin to play.  The first time I drew Strategic Planning it turns out to be absurdly busted.  I am under Crucible / Strip Mine and only have Mox Jet, Volcanic Island, and Sol Ring in play and do not have another land drop. I draw Strategic Planning and cast it.  The three cards I see are Tormod’s Crypt, Mindslaver, and Triskelavus.  I am able to use my last floating Sol Ring mana to cast the Tormod’s Crypt and knock out Mark’s Graveyard and free myself from the Strip lock.  I immediately note that had I drawn Thirst I would not have draw a land and would not have been able to play the Tormod’s Crypt that turn, and would have lost my Volcanic the next turn.  I also noted that had I have drawn Impulse instead of Strategic Planning that I wouldn’t have the Slaver and Trike in the graveyard.  I quickly point out to Steve that Strategic Planning for two mana had provided me with a quick answer to a major threat, the Strip Mine / Crucible of Worlds lock, and also given me a potential victory condition—in the form of a topdecked Welder.  The very next turn I drew Goblin Welder and was quickly able to Slaver and Triskelavus Mark out of the game.  We played several more games and I quickly realized that the only card I ever wanted to draw in my opening hand was Strategic Planning—because I could almost always cast it off a Mox and it helped me accelerate my game faster than any other card.  By the end of the night I had cut my one copy of Fire / Ice for a second planning and couldn’t have been happier about my deck. 

   The following morning I set out to purchase I a playset of the Portal Three Kingdoms uncommon from the dealers on site.  I was somewhat dismayed to find that copies of the card retailed for roughly $20.00, which seemed steep for an uncommon that I had never even heard of before.  In any event I was confident that my evaluation of the card was correct and coughed up the loot and secured four copies of the card.  I played in the preliminary Vintage event and ended up going 1-1, after losing an unfortunately match to Landstill where my opponent drew very well.  However, in the first round I utterly smashed my opponent with two quick Yawgmoth’s Wills, both fueled by Strategic Planning.  It was after that first match that I realized that Strategic Planning was not simply a filler card that ate up two blank spots in my deck, but rather that Strategic Planning should be a four of and an important part of my deck’s plan.  After the tournament I immediately added the third and forth copies of the card and the maindeck of “Strategic Slaver” was officially complete. 

Strategic Slaver
By Brian DeMars   

4 Force of Will
4 Strategic Planning
4 Mana Drain
4 Thirst for Knowledge
2 Goblin Welder
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Misdirection
1 Tinker
1 Brainstorm
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Echoing Truth
1 Rack and Ruin
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Yawgmoth’s Will
1 Gorilla Shaman
1 Sundering Titan
1 Mindslaver
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Tormod’s Crypt
1 Triskelavus
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Vault
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Ruby
1 Strip Mine
1 Tolerian Academy
3 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
3 Volcanic Island
3 Island
2 Underground Sea

Sideboard

1 Trinisphere
1 Thran Foundry
1 Pyroclasm
3 Wasteland
3 Sphere of Resistence
3 Tormod’s Crypt
2 Sower of Temptation (The Jimmy McCarthy special)

I had the deck together and was battling random games against Rich Shay, when Jimmy took an interest in the Strategic Planning Slaver list.  Rich also seemed impressed with the deck, although not enough to play the list himself in the main event—even though I shipped him the list, and Smennen offered to loan him his four copies of Strategic Planning.  The other person who seemed extremely interested in the deck was Jimmy McCarthy, who had been planning to play Control Slaver in the Vintage World Championship tournament.  When we got back to the hotel room he began to question me about my card choices, and also quickly agreed that Strategic Planning was the most insane piece of technology to come around in a long time.  He and I brainstormed for a while and polished off the last few sideboard slots—which, was rounded out with Sower of Tempation at his suggestion—an addition that won me no less that three games the following day. 

As it turns out Strategic Planning as a four of was completely the correct choice.  Out of all the Slaver decks piloted at Worlds this year the only two to make top eight, were Jimmy and I playing Strategic Planning as a four of—and we finished top 2, and top 4 respectively.  The results speak for themselves—there were two copies of the deck at worlds and both made top eight.  The most interesting part about Worlds for me this year was watching the value of Strategic Planning skyrocket from $20 to $100 dollars as the tournament progressed.  The RIW crew was keeping me updated as the tournament carried on about the price of the card as it went from fifty, to seventy five, to one hundred dollars.  And, I must admit that it was a fantastic feeling to know that I had single-handedly made a card jump $80 in price with a days work.  When it went to $100 dollars I knew that I had just broken a new card.

After having played the event with Strategic Planning I can confirm that it is every bit as busted as I had initially hoped.  So, Vintage—you’re welcome, I found you a $400 replacement to your missing Brainstorms!

[BreathWeapon]

It's a great card, I've been using Strategic Planning and Careful Study in Titan and Slaver decks for awhile, just curious why you never bothered to increase your robot or welder count while you had the extra outlets tho' ?

Have you tried a Deep Analysis, Intuition and Strategic Planning package?

[IthilanorStPete]

Unrelated question: What's the difference, if any, between TPS and Pitch Long?

[Smmenen]

TPS is slower and more disruptive.   Pitch Long has a high turn one kill percentage.  TPS does not.

TPS list from 2004:

http://www.morphling.de/top8decks.php?id=229
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
4 Dark Ritual
1 Demonic Tutor
4 Duress
1 Necropotence
2 Tendrils of Agony
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Yawgmoth's Bargain
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Ancestral Recall
4 Brainstorm
1 Cunning Wish
1 Deep Analysis
1 Echoing Truth
1 Fact or Fiction
4 Force of Will
1 Gifts Ungiven
1 Mind's Desire
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Rebuild
1 Time Walk
1 Timetwister
1 Tinker
1 Flooded Strand
2 Island
4 Polluted Delta
2 Swamp
1 Tolarian Academy
4 Underground Sea

It's pretty much identical to the deck that TK came up with a few weeks ago, but originally called pitch long

[Harlequin]

Unrelated question: What's the difference, if any, between TPS and Pitch Long?

The differance is: Semantics

At the end of the day, they are all Ritual-Combo decks.  Pitch-Long, Intution-Tendrils, Drain-Tendrils, GrimLong, TPS, ... the list goes on for miles.  Bascially they are all the same idea: A Storm combo deck that is just non-linear enough to be competative, versitle, and consistant.  All the differant variations are results of metagame pushing and pulling.  There are mutliple stratigies to picking appart combo, but for every stratigy combo has a counter-stratigy.  However, every time you make a change to compensate for some force in the meta - you are required to rename your combo deck.  Then you should also prepare your points about if your deck is a will deck or not.

[Grand Inquisitor]

***Right, so all these posts about storm decks are really inappropriate; take it to PM guys.***

Congrats on the finish guys.  While your playskill and a two person sample don't completely sell me on strategic planning bringing you to the T8, I'm very interested to try this card.  A few questions:

1) Unlike brainstorm, this seems like a 'see it, play it' search card.  Are there any incentives to hold it, or nuances to the timing of playing it?

2) Slaver is the king of win small, but, as mentioned, you actually went away from more robots welders (possibly to make room for all four SP's?).  Are there further revisions to the list to help mitigate this and abuse welders more?

3) I'm a huge fan of decks that leverage early YawgWills, but did you ever run into bottlenecks in the face of grave hate?  It seems it would force the deck more strongly into reliance on Tinker and hard-casting bots, neither of which are attractive in some matchups.

Thanks for taking a look!

[Ufactor]

...The first time I drew Strategic Planning it turns out to be absurdly busted.  I am under Crucible / Strip Mine and only have Mox Jet, Volcanic Island, and Sol Ring in play and do not have another land drop. I draw Strategic Planning and cast it.  The three cards I see are Tormod’s Crypt, Mindslaver, and Triskelavus.  I am able to use my last floating Sol Ring mana to cast the Tormod’s Crypt and knock out Mark’s Graveyard and free myself from the Strip lock.

So that is to say that, Strategic Planning: Control Slaver:: Bazaar of Baghdad: Uba Stax

...and this is also the most helpful analogy that I can use to explain (mostly to myself) why Crucible of Worlds is in the deck.

...In particular, I was completely certain that Sensei’s Divining Top was the worst card in the deck, and felt that it was directly responsible for multiple losses I had suffered the weekend before.  The problem with the Top was that it doesn’t dig through lumps of bad cards that one doesn’t want to draw, and worst of all requires far too much mana to be effective.  In addition, Top doesn’t pitch to Force of Will and it is extremely vulnerable to Null Rod.  After the RIW event I had cut back to only one copy of Sensei’s Top in my maindeck, and replaced the other copies of the card with utility spells that I felt might more directly impact the game.  After a few play test sessions with the RIW crew I was confident that Slaver was a good deck choice for Worlds, but that it needed to find more ways to see more cards quickly—certainly, Sensei’s Divining Top was not the card I was looking for.

So, Sensei's Divining Top is still dog shit, even in the deck that it's supposed to be awesome in - gotcha.  IMHO Top doesn't belong anyplace in Vintage except as a 1-of with Trinket Mage.

[zeus-online]

I wonder if extirpate just got even better against slaver....

Why no gifts? That question has haunted me ever since i saw the decklist!

Was LoA considered? and if so, why didn't it make it?

/Zeus

Edit: I wonder how it would have played against the Gush-decks, my guess is that i'd get crushed
Double edit: Would you consider strategic planning equally, less or more powerfull then thirst?

[forests failed you]

In response to a few of the questions.

LoA is still too slow and it doesn't make blue mana to cast Mana Drain.  Blue mana is even more important than ever in Slaver because Strategic Planning is a Sorcery, and on turn three you want to be able to play Planning off a Mox and leave up Mana Drain. 

Crucible was included mainly as a maindeck bomb against Stax and Fish.  Both decks use Wasteland to attack our Mana, and Crucible gives us inevitability in those match ups if we can ever find it.  Also, there were three Wastelands in the sideboard, which makes Crucible an autowin against Landstill.

We didn't want more Welders and Robots in the deck--Welding big monsters really isn't the plan against many of the best decks in the format.  Particlarly against Long and Ichorid that plan is simply too slow, and the Strategic Plannings basically help you dig for countermagic and broken cards.  The great advantage of Strategic Planning is of course the way that it pads your graveyard for Yawgmoth's Will.  If you think about it, every time you put a Mox in the yard off planning you are going to be able to make one free mana when you cast Will.  The Welder-Robot plan is basically the plan against all of the bad decks in the format; ie, the hate decks:  Fish, Workshop, Landstill, et cetera.  In which case, the games go much longer and a pilot is much more likely to have time to abuse the recursive powers of Goblin Welder. 

Once again, the reason that Strategic Planning is so good is the fact that it is unrestricted, costs 2 mana, and gives Control Slaver an efficient way to optimize its hand that is easily castible at any point in the game--turn one forward.  The card Strategic Planning, in my opinion, is much more powerful than Ponder...  That is to say the amount of bang one gets for his or her buck is greater.  I would not be surprised if we saw Strategic Planning make an appearance in the Dark Ritual decks at the next SCG>

[The Atog Lord]

Well done on the build, Brian. This deck is darn good.

[AngryPheldagrif]

I would not be surprised if we saw Strategic Planning make an appearance in the Dark Ritual decks at the next SCG>

Already working on it.

[Smmenen]

I asked Brian what he would cut for a third welder, and he said Misdirection.   That would be one direction to go if you wanted to up the Welder count, which I probably would if I piloted the deck.

Another comparable card is Impulse.   During the course of our conversation which uncovered SP, Brian also mentioned a like of Impulse.  Although Strategic Planning is a Sorcery, it does what Impulse really should do, creating a lot more synergy at the cost of one less card deep.   For those of you who enjoyed playing with Merchant Scroll (and to answer GIs question), the feel on turn one is somewhat similar.  Turn one, Mox, Land, SP. 

[AngryPheldagrif]

I would not be surprised if we saw Strategic Planning make an appearance in the Dark Ritual decks at the next SCG>

Already working on it.

The combo version of this is basically looking like a midrange control/combo that uses Planning to stack the graveyard towards a fatal Will, possibly abusing Cabal Ritual and Recoup. I think I can probably come up with something that does Drain Tendrils' job but more efficiently. More on this later.

[Smmenen]

We were also joking how insane SP is with Goyf.   Turn one Goyf, turn two SP, GG

[Watanabe]

We were also joking how insane SP is with Goyf.   Turn one Goyf, turn two SP, GG

Lol 

[LordHomerCat]

This deck was insane for me all day.  Planning dug me into spells I cared about (like Mana Drain) and let me toss out robots and extra lands and moxes for later replaying during Will turns.  It also let me do something before casting thirst on like turn 3.  Brian built one monster of a deck, and I have to agree that I don't think its a coincidence that the only 2 Slaver decks in top8 were Strategic Slaver.  Not only is plans good, but that Sideboard was probably the best sideboard I have ever played with in an event.  I was 3-1 vs. TPS, with my only loss coming against Paul, with a Control Slaver deck of all things.  How many people can claim that after a big tournament?

Thanks again for giving me the list Brian and to the many people who lent me cards to even play, especially Steve with those Plannings.  I'd try to answer questions about the deck but I think I'll leave most of that to Brian, since he knows Slaver a lot better than I do.

[Ufactor]

I would not be surprised if we saw Strategic Planning make an appearance in the Dark Ritual decks at the next SCG>

Already working on it.

Strategic Planning is probably an auto-include for Oath as well...

[Xyre]

This result validates in my mind the rationale behind banning Yawgmoth's Will.

Considering the success of the deck (even without Slaver resolving), do you think the deck ought to move beyond Welder-Slaver-fatties and into a more devoted Will deck niche?

[forests failed you]

Yawgmoth's Will exists, there is no current reason to believe that it will ever not exist, therefore discusssions about the fairness or unfairness of Yawgmoth's Will probably belongs in a different thread.  This thread is a serious discussion of Strategic Slaver, and building/playing Slaver decks that include some number of this card, and not a soap box for banned/restriction list suggestions. Let's all try to stay on topic--thank you!

[Xyre]

Yawgmoth's Will exists, there is no current reason to believe that it will ever not exist, therefore discusssions about the fairness or unfairness of Yawgmoth's Will probably belongs in a different thread.  This thread is a serious discussion of Strategic Slaver, and building/playing Slaver decks that include some number of this card, and not a soap box for banned/restriction list suggestions. Let's all try to stay on topic--thank you!

Fine. The same question, though - do you think this will change the basic strategy of Slaver decks?

[LordHomerCat]

Yawgmoth's Will exists, there is no current reason to believe that it will ever not exist, therefore discusssions about the fairness or unfairness of Yawgmoth's Will probably belongs in a different thread.  This thread is a serious discussion of Strategic Slaver, and building/playing Slaver decks that include some number of this card, and not a soap box for banned/restriction list suggestions. Let's all try to stay on topic--thank you!

Fine. The same question, though - do you think this will change the basic strategy of Slaver decks?

If you wanted to play a straight-up Will deck, you could just play Drain Tendrils.  The problem is, you don't get any of the advantages of being able to win without Will.  In this deck, you can still just beat down with 1/1's, hardcast robots, weld in a dude on turn 3, etc.  You are absolutely not reliant on Will or Tinker and can easily win by just casting robots.  However, you are also able to abuse Will like almost no one else (save TPS basically) and just break the hell out of the best card in vintage.

In fairness, the 'strategy' of this kind of slaver deck does tend to play differently than something like a Rich Shay list.  The low number of welders and robots tends to make this deck a lot less likely to go for the stereotypical Slaver play of welder into Thirst, but allows you to exert a lot more control on the game against something like TPS.  This is definitely a lot more of an evolution of Brian's old burning slaver lists than straight up Control Slaver, and it plays a lot more like sort of a Slaver/Drain Control hybrid then a Welder-into-Thirst slaver deck.

[Dante]

So it looks like (based on Jimmy's report in the other forum) that you're bringing in 3 Wastelands against

Ritual Combo decks
Workshop decks
Fish decks
Painter decks
Dredge decks
Landstill

and not bringing it in against Slaver.

I assume you'd bring them in against Oath too.

So if you're bringing them in against so much of the field, why not maindeck?

Also, to Jimmy, you said in your report

Number of Times I used or even put slaver into play: 0

- does that have any significance?

Dante

[forests failed you]

I brought in all of my Wastelands for the Slaver mirror.  Since the games tend to go long, it ups the number of lands in your deck so that you can continue to make land drops through the midgame.  Also, you are able to dismantle their Academy on sight, which is a big deal.  IMO Academy is the single most important card in the mirror match, and having it in play for more than a few turns will usually result in a victory.

[Polynomial P]

Congrats on the T8 Brian and for the discovery of Strategic planning. My main question is why you opted not to run vampiric tutor. It seems strangely absent.

[T00L]

I brought in all of my Wastelands for the Slaver mirror.  Since the games tend to go long, it ups the number of lands in your deck so that you can continue to make land drops through the midgame.  Also, you are able to dismantle their Academy on sight, which is a big deal.  IMO Academy is the single most important card in the mirror match, and having it in play for more than a few turns will usually result in a victory.

I'm very interested in what your actual sideboard plan was like came out for what. Your sideboard is probably the most interesting sideboard i've seen in any format since mono blue urzatron sided in twincast and guys to beat tooth and nail

[Dante]

I brought in all of my Wastelands for the Slaver mirror.  Since the games tend to go long, it ups the number of lands in your deck so that you can continue to make land drops through the midgame.  Also, you are able to dismantle their Academy on sight, which is a big deal.  IMO Academy is the single most important card in the mirror match, and having it in play for more than a few turns will usually result in a victory.

So it looks like you're siding in the wastelands (assuming you and Jimmy have the same/similar plan) in almost every relevant match - do you not maindeck them b/c you take out substantially different enough cards?

[LordHomerCat]

I brought in all of my Wastelands for the Slaver mirror.  Since the games tend to go long, it ups the number of lands in your deck so that you can continue to make land drops through the midgame.  Also, you are able to dismantle their Academy on sight, which is a big deal.  IMO Academy is the single most important card in the mirror match, and having it in play for more than a few turns will usually result in a victory.

So it looks like you're siding in the wastelands (assuming you and Jimmy have the same/similar plan) in almost every relevant match - do you not maindeck them b/c you take out substantially different enough cards?

Afterwards, I know Brian mentioned that he was thinking about trying to get one in the main and I agree with that.  The thing is, I don't want to base my manabase on them, and I don't want to be running 27 lands in the maindeck, and you can't just cut the basic islands for them since you want those some of the time.  I can see trying to squeeze one into the main but I wouldn't cut the basics for them there, and in some matchups (like Long) they are considerably less effective when you don't have additional mana denial to back them up.

On the Slaver thing, it could be a sign that I don't really have any experience with Slaver as a deck and wasn't ever looking to set up that play (which is pretty true).  It could mean that Slaver is kinda extraneous to the strategy, but I am not willing to make that assertion and would leave that to people with more experience playing the archetype.  One thing that it does show is that you can easily win games without ever even using your namesake card, and makes me even more skeptical of running random crap to set up Slaver lock.

[forests failed you]

Yes, I board in Wasteland in most match ups--however, it is much easier to find room for them when I can board out the bullet type cards that are bad in one match up and in their place add Wasteland.  For instance, against Long you can easily board out cards like Echoing Truth, Rack and Ruin, et cetera and replace them with Wastelands.  However, you can't just not have Rack and Ruin and Echoing Truth in ones maindeck.  Basically, Wasteland comes in for the cards that are situationally bad against a specific archetype.

[misslehead3]

I have been playing this deck over the past few days and i may be going out on a limb here but i think SP is better then brainstorm, and defanately better then ponder, but when it comes to sideboarding i have never brought in the stax package against any one, by the way it seems i guess im just playing wrong so can someone tell me simple sb options to take out to add wastelands and balls. rack and ruin is the first card i reach for in allmost every match, followed by crypt then echoing.

EDIT: Is it just me or is this the same list jimmy played +1 crypt -1 petal, and the sb is only 14 cards im gonna assume the 15th is EE.

[marcb]

misslehead the 15th card is either shattering spree or another rack and ruin.

I brought in all of my Wastelands for the Slaver mirror.  Since the games tend to go long, it ups the number of lands in your deck so that you can continue to make land drops through the midgame.  Also, you are able to dismantle their Academy on sight, which is a big deal.  IMO Academy is the single most important card in the mirror match, and having it in play for more than a few turns will usually result in a victory.

I'm very interested in what your actual sideboard plan was like came out for what. Your sideboard is probably the most interesting sideboard i've seen in any format since mono blue urzatron sided in twincast and guys to beat tooth and nail

I'll have to agree. There are two major innovations with this slaver list. The first is obviously strategic planning, but the second is the sb. Most matchups will require you to put a lot of sb cards into the main making it even more difficult to decide what to take out. As the list is already paired down to the absolute essentials (2 welders for example), I think your thoughts on sb'ing with regards to what you take out in various matchups is really important to success with this deck. Any advice that you would be willing to give would be most appreciated. I must say that this probably my favorite version of slaver to date. Thanks!

Marc