[Innistrad] - Snapcaster Mage

[serracollector]

Since most decks don't try to go off until turn 3, if I were playing snapcaster/High tide, I would run 1 Emrakul as my win condition.  Can't be countered, is only 15 mana, and wins the turn you cast him (essentially).  Just my 2 cents.

[Troy_Costisick]

Since most decks don't try to go off until turn 3, if I were playing snapcaster/High tide, I would run 1 Emrakul as my win condition.  Can't be countered, is only 15 mana, and wins the turn you cast him (essentially).  Just my 2 cents.

Perhaps a singleton Show and Tell as well?

[serracollector]

@Troy:  That is not a bad idea, and with the use of cards like:

Frantic Search
Idea's Unbound (an unused card, that it BLOWS my mind its not used, BUT with Hightide, this becomes a psudo ancestral....)
Gush
Fastbond
Hightide
Snap

This can become a very lethal deck by turn 3-4.

[Daenyth]

I think one problem with High Tide is that it makes the blue control matchup worse for a storm deck by accelerating the opponent's available mana to oppose you. Flusterstorm and Mindbreak at at a high right now, not to mention the fact that Tide is great Misstep bait.

[serracollector]

@ Daenyth:  This is true, but think of it this way:

1 Acall
1 Time Walk
4 Gush
4 High Tide
1 Mystical
1 Merchant scroll
1 Show and Tell
1 Brainstorm
3 Frantic Search
4 Snapcaster mage
1 Fastbond (if u choose to splash green)
1 Timespiral/twister
1  Emrakul (which is uncounterable, so if they save thier trap/fluster for your Storm spell they think you are building up to....)

This leaves you room for 16-20 counters of your own, including up to 4 x Misstep, 4 x Fluster, 4 x Force, 4 x Trap, or some mix of.

[DubDub]

1  Emrakul (which is uncounterable, so if they save thier trap/fluster for your Storm spell they think you are building up to....)

Just to be rigorous, Trap wins against Emrakul.

[Troy_Costisick]

Fringe card. All of these applications and dream scenarios are marginal.

What???

SCM + Brainstorm
SCM + Mystical Tutor
SCM + Ancestral
SCM + Spell Pierce
SCM + Mental Misstep
SCM + Mana Drain
SCM + Dismember
SCM + Vamp Tutor
SCM + Dark Ritual
SCM + Time Walk
SCM + Tinker
SCM + Timetwister
SCM + Thoughtseize
SCM + Demo Tutor
SCM + Duress
SCM + Ponder
SCM + Preordain
SCM + Imperial Seal
SCM + Yawgmoth's Will (that got countered/discarded)

How is any of this marginal?

All of those cards are terrible when you add 1U to the cost, except ancestral. And considering it is restricted, you will only get to use this guy once. Cramming 4 in your deck is certainly wrong. Cute, useful, but overhyped.

So how do you like it now?  http://www.themanadrain.com/index.php?topic=43545.0

[diopter]

4 snapcaster decks:
- 3 ran 4 Dark Confidant which is really the driver of results
- Of those 3, 2 ran only 3 Snapcasters
- The 4th non-Bob list  looks very similar to the list that put KCron in top8 at Waterbury but forced BDemars out early

[Onslaught]

You're just making it harder on yourself. Once the initial results of Snapcaster rolled in around the Waterbury, you could have just admitted that you made a mistake and severely underrated its potential power. It happens sometimes, no big deal (there were people who were adamant that Jace TMS would not be Vintage playable). But to continue denying the usefulness of the card after it has been available for testing for months (do you test at all?) is just silly. If results similar to the latest LCV keep rolling in, how long can you continue your delusion? It's the best creature in Vintage, period.

[diopter]

Waterbury also "showed" the "power" of Riptide Lab which continues to be good for a laugh (and a handy dividing line).

It's ok. I'm sure rec recurring Noxious Revivals is still working out just fine in the games you don't mulligan to 5 or get rolled by better game plans.

[bluemage55]

It's the best creature in Vintage, period.

I'd argue that title still belongs to Bob, but it's definitely up there, along with Lodestone Golem.

[TheWhiteDragon]

It's the best creature in Vintage, period.

I'd argue that title still belongs to Bob, but it's definitely up there, along with Lodestone Golem.

Poor goblin welder...the forgotten menace

[Onslaught]

I'd put Bob behind Clique in most matchups, which is a scary thought. Blue having good creatures is so unsettling...

[diopter]

"Clique over Bob in most matchups"

Ohh this is the kind of "testing" you are referring to. Guffaw! Thanks for the laugh!

How does this make your point in a better fashion, or logically show why his is weaker?  This kind of language is unnecessary. - Prospero

[bluemage55]

Poor goblin welder...the forgotten menace

I don't think he's forgotten so much as his menace is greatly reduced in a world with Misstep, abundant grave hate, fast Gush decks, and restricted BS/TfK.

[diopter]

It appears I should make my point more plainly.

Onslaught sez: "Clique > Bob in most matchups".

This is an absurd claim. It is easily refuted by serious testing - there are literally entire classes of common opening scenarios (most mulligans, most double mulligans, most one land hands, many two land hands, most no-gas hands, most games against Shops of any variety, most turn 1's in any blue mirror) where Bob is king and Clique is literally textless cardboard. In fact playing Bob gives you a huge strategic advantage - since he is so good in mulligan hands, you can mulligan much more easily - which informs your mana configuration and the relative weighting of your deck's gameplans.

Your "testing" has led you to this erroneous conclusion ("Clique > Bob") that is literally impossible to arrive at when you do enough serious testing. You can understand, then, why it becomes that much more difficult to take your other testing-based claims (Snapcaster is the best? comon) seriously.

And you have the nerve to question other people's testing. Please look inwards first.

[Onslaught]

In Drains vs. Drains, I'd much rather draw a Clique turn on 2 or beyond than draw a Bob. Of course Bob is a better overall card due to added resiliency vs. Shops, Fish, etc.

However, >65% of my matches are blue vs. blue. Bob is a bad Night's Whisper if a blue vs. blue matchup goes 4 turns. Clique is a house in these matchups, and testing bears that out. When blue vs. blue has a critical turn of 3 or 4, which card would you rather have in your hand? Even a turn one Bob doesn't go beyond replacing itself until turn three, and at that point I may have played an endstep Clique that took a counter or drew out a counter, then untapped and won. When there is action going down, I wan't something in my hand that is immediately useful. Clique in response to a threat to clear the way for your FOW is good. Clique endstep to clear the way for your own threat is good.

Clique also deals with Jace, pitches to FOW, clears BSC from your hand - all of these are far more relevant in the early turns of the game than "1B - do nothing and pass the turn." Flash is a huge asset, as you are fighting over who has more mana open for Drains/Flusterstorms beyond turn one. Flash (and flying) also makes Clique a more viable backup beatdown win condition in drawn out control matches, since the increasing number of creatures being played in Vintage (such as Snapcaster, which despite your objections is slowly taking over several metagames) can get in Bob's way.

I don't want to badmouth Bob because I've played Bob control decks for years, but his strength is in the overall hardiness he adds against Shops. In blue vs. blue though? I'd take Clique over him almost every time.

I don't even think Clique > Bob in this matchup is an uncommon position, so I just ran a quick search.

Clique was OFTEN better than Dark Confidant.  I'm huge on the card.

My experience with Clique leads me to strongly agree with this statement. So when you say my testing leads to erroneous conclusions, you're also saying that you know better than someone who played Clique to great success in a huge tournament. What better "testing" evidence is there than results?

[nineisnoone]

I don't know if I would say that Clique is better than Bob, but I do think that Clique is in a better position than Bob is right now. Bob is more long term attrition while Clique is trying to maximize the plays immediately available. With the options that blue has available, Clique strategic viewpoint is much stronger and as such the synergies with other strats/cards is better than for Bob. However, while Clique works for a stronger strategy, it's application within that strategy is much narrower. Snapcaster on the other hand has broader applications.

[diopter]

I have a healthy respect of Smennen's work but his position on Clique v. Bob is much like his position on Doomsday's workshop matchup - not rooted in reality.

Even then, you'll note he never played more Cliques than Bobs and never centered a gameplan around Clique (how could you??? It's an expensive conditional instant Duress).

Next!

[Onslaught]

I don't know if I would say that Clique is better than Bob, but I do think that Clique is in a better position than Bob is right now.

100% agreed, that's all I was trying to say.

@ Diopter

Yes, Clique is an expensive instant Duress. Right now in most matchups (since blue vs. blue is the most common match), an instant Duress is way better than Bob.

[voltron00x]

I thought Snapcaster was overrated by most people / writers, and still believe that to be the case.  That doesn't mean it isn't a very, very good card.  It isn't just the best creature, ever.  My opinion, anyway.  I will admit that Snapcaster/Bob decks are better than I expected.  They seem very strong in Europe atm, which scares me, as Europe is often ahead of the US (although, sometimes, they're just different as with Forgemaster and Madness, among others).

[diopter]

"Right now in most matchups (since blue vs. blue is the most common match), an instant Duress is way better than Bob."

This is plainly false.

[Onslaught]

Clique is a fairly subtle card, so it doesn't smack you over the head with how good it is unless you play with it for a while. So in this case, you can continue deriding it and you'll probably never have to "come around" and acknowledge how good it is. There will never be a "Clique deck," so it will be easy to dismiss successful decks that run Clique.

Unfortunately for you, there ARE "Snapcaster decks" that will only continue to get better. When the time comes for you to admit you were wrong about Snapcasters, maybe it will force you to be open minded enough to also reconsider the power of Clique.

[diopter]

I agree that Clique is subtle, so much so that it is nearly impossible to see its value, owing to the fact that it has so little value.

Even before Mental Misstep, Duress effects were often WIDELY debated in Drain mirrors for the obvious reason of extreme tempo loss. Gush obviously changes the dynamic somewhat as you can afford the tempo loss from spending B to tour opponent's 0.

But 1UU for a worse effect, a more horrific and unrecoverable way to get Time Walked? And this is better than the best modern enabler of the tried and true Corrupt Necro gameplan? That is patently absurd.

[diopter]

I'm pretty sure that if I'm going to be proven wrong about Snapcasters, it will be done by a build that doesn't run bad gameplans like "spend 3 mana on a bad Duress" or "with this bad Regrowth on a stick, I recur this bad Vampiric Regrow".

[Onslaught]

You've already been proven wrong about Snapcasters, you just haven't come to grips with it yet.

[diopter]

"You've already been proven wrong about Snapcasters"

Could you elaborate?

[Blue Lotus]

Fringe card. All of these applications and dream scenarios are marginal.

What???

SCM + Brainstorm
SCM + Mystical Tutor
SCM + Ancestral
SCM + Spell Pierce
SCM + Mental Misstep
SCM + Mana Drain
SCM + Dismember
SCM + Vamp Tutor
SCM + Dark Ritual
SCM + Time Walk
SCM + Tinker
SCM + Timetwister
SCM + Thoughtseize
SCM + Demo Tutor
SCM + Duress
SCM + Ponder
SCM + Preordain
SCM + Imperial Seal
SCM + Yawgmoth's Will (that got countered/discarded)

How is any of this marginal?

All of those cards are terrible when you add 1U to the cost, except ancestral. And considering it is restricted, you will only get to use this guy once. Cramming 4 in your deck is certainly wrong. Cute, useful, but overhyped.

So how do you like it now?  http://www.themanadrain.com/index.php?topic=43545.0

If you are going to go there, I'm going to go here  :

Here's the pic.  This guy is really good.  Wow!

[nineisnoone]

I have a healthy respect of Smennen's work but his position on Clique v. Bob is much like his position on Doomsday's workshop matchup - not rooted in reality.

Even then, you'll note he never played more Cliques than Bobs and never centered a gameplan around Clique (how could you??? It's an expensive conditional instant Duress).

Next!

FYI, instant Duress would be amazing.

[diopter]

FYI, three mana is kind of a lot.