I play Standstill. Then I play my Factory or hope to race it. If necessary I will break my Standstill EoT to begin a fight once I'm forced to.
I'm ok being whittled down while we both sculpt hands. I can very easily and readily race a Bob. DRS takes awhile to become a threat as well. Now if we're talking t1 Goyf or something irritatingly large then yes, I have to change my plan. Otherwise I lock the game down, make my drops and hope to stabilize underneath the standstill. Breaking it isn't the end of the world. Also, I do play a bevy of cheap/free counters to try and combat the early starts that could threaten my early Standstill, with the intent of getting it into play and living off the CA generated.
Wow, in that case, I think our in-game experiences differ drastically. I would wager that playing a T1 Standstill over a Bob (without having a factory) will lose you the game about 90% of the time. If you have a factory, I'd say you still lose about 70-80% of the time against a typical blue control deck. Also, I can't see how you can reliably make land drops with such a low land count.
We'd have to analyze a bit deeper as to how they resolved their Bob, why we chose to let it resolve, what our hand is doing, etc. I'm significantly more comfortable sitting back and developing a board if our hand is land heavy. Otherwise, how did this t1 Bob hit the field? We have a bevy of cheap/efficient counters that should be able to fight over it. If I have a Factory, hiding behind it while they die to their flips and then get forced to push into the Standstill is a positive thing. I don't think we can let them press their advantage for free if they have Bob and we don't. Also, I can't assume my opponent will stall the game. Several times I've had players just try to push through the Standstill immediately, essentially just giving me the Ancestral. I've certainly felt a lot more comfortable than a 90% dog facing down a Bob. How are they putting you away so consistently? Hitting every land drop is significantly harder for me than some more traditional builds, certainly, but we don't need to do much more than get to UU and have a Factory in this case, right? That's not too hard at all. Now I agree I won't be building out to 5+ lands without additional effects like Crucible unless I have the privilege of them cracking my Standstill, but that's the trade off I make when trying to combat Gush by shaving lands to keep closer in the land department.
Tangle Wire to keep up Drain. Forgemaster to stop Tinker. Griselbrand to stop draws. Silvergill to stop draw. Factory/Mutavault activation. Factory pump. Wasteland. Fetchlands. Jace ultimate. Jace brainstorm. Tezz -2 for TV. Welder. Hellkite. Storm trigger on Flusterstorm. Storm trigger on Tendrils, Dack -2 on my Crucible.
Yes, those are all relevant uses of Stifle. I guess the better question to ask was --- if those 3 slots were used for a different card (for example, Spell Pierce, Lightning Bolt), would that improve your matchups overall?
I'm sure that they would be impactful in certain spots, certainly. Overall is a much tougher question though, as Stifle has also been very impactful in a bevy of situations that have won me games as well where the cards mentioned wouldn't have helped at all. My belief is that no, they wouldn't. The mana advantage generated from it alone has won me games, let alone the blow out plays that opponents have gone for that were only stopped by Stifle.
EE chops off artifact acceleration as well for 2 mana. I'm not really sure how much better the static effect of Rod is versus the 1 shot of EE, especially when compared to the other uses for EE.
EE definitely has advantages over Rod, flexibility being the obvious one. It also can provide a mana denial element, but it is nowhere near as effective as Rod in this department. The difference is that EE doesn't actually prevent your opponent from casting anything, whereas Null Rod can completely lock your opponent out of the game.
I don't think Null Rod is unequivocally superior to EE. I think either is a fine choice. It's just my personal preference to run Rod, and in your particular build, EE is likely a better fit.
I think EE is more effective than you imply. The only way that Rod outshines EE in terms of mana denial is when/if they find additional mana rocks beyond the first use of EE or if they have a Sol Ring/Mana Vault(?). It also relevantly stops TV + K. Granted, those are real things that need to be considered, but they aren't exactly constant occurrences. I agree that EE fits my build w/ the Dack sub theme to take rocks, but how do you feel in a world of True-Name + Cavern? It scares the daylights out of me and one of my concessions to it is EE. Otherwise I'd almost feel obligated to splash black for Deluge and more reactive answers to a card that single-handedly puts me under immense pressure.
He's been working out very well. I just top 4 split the TDG event this weekend with it and Dack was a critical component.
That's great news. Theorizing is good and all, but if you're getting results with that particular build, that's all the proof you need that you're on the right track. Congrats on the result.
Thanks, it was great to get the affirmation in the event.
I have always played a lower land count than most in Landstill. My personal belief is that it is better to have faster ways to interact with opponents as opposed to bolstering longer games. Free counters and tempo cards like Stifle perform better than the guaranteed land drops. Additionally, a lot of my choices when mulliganing are understanding that I built the deck to have decreased mana sources. I have to value my Crucible higher and be wary of using Wastelands without first checking if I need their mana. I included Ruby to enable more early Standstills but you're probably right in wanting Barbarian Ring over the course of longer games. It's a card I tend to avoid, but others have had success with.
I don't know if situationally free counters are more important than lands in the early game. Missing land drops before you hit Jace mana, and sometimes even Jace+2 mana can severely cripple your chances of winning a game. I personally also wasteland rather aggressively against decks like shops, bug, and other decks with all non basics, as well as gush decks to keep them off their draw engine so this may be chalked up to play style.
If Gush decks lead out with a dual I probably pull the trigger with Waste too. Anywho, I think the way I've built the deck is more reliant on Standstill. I need to leverage it to get the additional draws to make my drops and push my action cards. As far as Jace + 2 mana, that's not as necessary when you have 6 pitch counters and MBT. That's something I take into account when piloting the build
Izzet Charm is a card I was thinking of going to 3 of after the day finished. It was hyper relevant in all three modes for me. Whether killing Factory, Revoker, DRS, Bob, Lords, Cursecatcher, etc. it never was wanting for being a bolt. The only X/3's running around are Magus of the Future, Trygon Predator, and double Lords. I'll take the counterspell (used several times) and filtering (absurd w/ Crucible) for the tradeoff adding U and losing 1 damage off L Bolt. The UR CMC is challenging at times, but really only a concern against Shops where they have Wastes + Spheres. Against Fish it's pretty easy to set up the casting of it as needed. We do play Island so presenting things like Fetch + Dual or Island + Fetch isn't insane. I did also have Ruby and Lotus to use as R sources. If it's that big of a deal it always pitches to FoW or Misdirection.
I am much much more concerned with Izzet Charm costing an extra U than it not dealing 3 damage. I can't even count the number of times that bolt has set up a turn 2 standstill after killing their creature EoT. On the draw its your only way of removing that Bob or Deathrite before it gets to activate. Charm is certainly sacrificing some early game plays for some better late game plays, which I find interesting since this is contrary to your position on many other cards.
I'm significantly less concerned about their early creatures than other people seem to be. Perhaps I'm attacking the game significantly differently with the same cards. I tend to let them try to grind me out if they want to. My deck is designed to do that. Most of the other decks are tempo based and thus can't effectively do such. Therefore they either putter away turns while I stabilize or they try to tempo into my Standstill's and I use that to out leverage them in Cards. Charm's versatility is its calling. I lose out on some particular early plays and maybe I should revisit Bolt as a MD card instead, but Charm has really been performing for me over the last few months and I like to reward cards like that as often as I can.
Misdirection was only dead for me once, against Keith Seals. Against Shawn on Terra Nova in g1 I was setting up a MD on his Dismember but the game ended before I got to pull the trigger. Against any other deck it has applications. Sure, it's limited in scope and can be severely limited against certain strategies. It functions darn well despite that. It was FoW 5-6 for me several times to protect my Jace or Crucible from being countered. I got to live the dream of nabbing Joel's Ancestral in t8, but that's not why it's in the deck. Remember that we often draw up and over 7 cards because of Standstill. At times our mana can already be used for casting our threats. We need as many ways to interact when this happens as our opponents have likely been sculpting hands themselves. As such, the card is a requirement in my opinion. I've never played Standstill without the 4 FoW, 2 MBT, 2 Misd, 2-4 MM splits for this reason.
Its not simply about being dead or not. Its about whether its more effective on average than the card that it is replacing. For example a land is almost never dead in landstill, but that doesn't mean we should be running 30 of them. Misdirection was one of the first cards that I cut when I first started brewing my own variants of landstill and I haven't looked back. There are too many good cards in magic now to warrant slots to a pitch counter that only works on single target spells. If your goal is to steal a dismember you are better off just playing dismember. If your goal is to counter protect your Jaces+crucibles play flusterstorm. Both are less circumstantial and can create even greater blowouts.
It's been very efficient for me at providing additional pitch counters beyond FoW. It's a great way to force my opponent to play a 3rd spell to turn on my Mindbreak Traps. If you're having success elsewhere by all means follow that, but Misdirection has been stellar for me.
EE definitely has advantages over Rod, flexibility being the obvious one. It also can provide a mana denial element, but it is nowhere near as effective as Rod in this department. The difference is that EE doesn't actually prevent your opponent from casting anything, whereas Null Rod can completely lock your opponent out of the game.
I don't think Null Rod is unequivocally superior to EE. I think either is a fine choice. It's just my personal preference to run Rod, and in your particular build, EE is likely a better fit.
For some empirical evidence: I know morphling doesn't have a complete list by any means, but you have to date back 20 top 8's and almost a year to find a landstill list running null rod,
http://morphling.de/top8decks.php?id=1793&highlight=Standstill. It just so happens to be a version that I helped Shawn brew for that tournament. A majority of the lists however are running EE.
For a more theoretical arguement: Null rod is just too poorly positioned in today's metagame. It really only out performs EE against two decks: TV/Key + Storm. Every other deck EE is at least equal or far superior. EE is amazing against pretty much every creature deck whereas rod is nearly a completely dead card, and can actually hurt you since your factories can't pump themselves with it out. EE is incrediblely efficient at removing spheres because of how sunburst works, making it generally a much stronger compliment to high end shops finishers, like Dack and formerly heretic (my peace be with the viashino). For these reasons EE has become an extremely valuable tool to a landstill pilot.
I agree that EE has a lot of punch. Thanks for putting up some data along with your position. There are some things in Shops that Rod effects positively as well however, namely Metalworker and Steel Hellkite.
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I'm loving Stifle in this deck. It sort of functions like a Hurkyl's recall against MUD as a storm player in that it can give you that critical turn or tempo boost to get you back into or develop a stranglehold over a game. Stopping Tangle Wire for a turn is one example, but you can also make smokestack decisions for your opponent by making them unable to add an extra counter or skipping your own turn worth of sacrifices. Against Oath, if you can protect it, you can Stifle Orchard to give you a window to Wasteland it or Oath to give you a window to cast/blow an EE on 2.
I'm also liking the large number of EE in the deck. I feel like with only 1 or 2 you feel like you can't afford to waste it on blowing up a bunch of moxen and need to save it for something more dangerous, but with 4 you can just plow right on ahead and break ALL the things (having loads of MD answers to chalice is also awesome). 4x EE also seems amazing with Welder, since you can repeatedly blow up moxen and weld them in for GoodStuff, then weld out one of your factories for the EE, rinse and repeat (particularly if you have a Crucible).
Don't know if I'm a huge fan of Misdirection in the deck, though. I've been playing a pair of Snares, but Flusterstorm would probably be strong in the slot, too.
Anyway, ramble over. Love the deck! Wish I could play it on MODO, but alas, $150 for Wasteland is mental and even if I could afford them, hardly anyone is selling.
Yeah the prohibitive cost of Wasteland and Misdirection has me not finding it either. The Misdirection's play a lot better than seem to be expected by most people. I'd suggest at least trying them a few times if you have access to the cards to see what I mean. Trust me, they, are very good.
This list looks great Tom.
My only question when looking things over is weather Time Walk is actually necessary. I see you stated that Time Walk is strong with Planeswalkers, which it obviously is, but it seems mostly like win more at that point. I've always found Time Walk to be basically an explore whenever I've played landstill which made me think its not worth it more often than not.
Of course you play a lot less lands than I'd ever dare to try and I don't actually know if nitpicking like that is necessary. My only suggestion would be to add more lands probably in place of that Time Walk, but you've obviously had success with your build.
I would also tend to agree with Lance where it seems like Bolt is too useful in setting up a clear board for standstill without it. Was this ever a big issue?
It is necessary to play Time Walk. The times where I've had to save Jace or Dack from dying by using Walk is very high, whether from +'s or by playing sufficient Factories. I've had to double Waste someone through Crucible to keep them off critical plays. The card is much more than Explore when applied appropriately. Sometimes you have to waste it because you're behind and need something else. I've discussed this with Josh for years and I still hold that Time Walk is needed. He disagrees, as do some others, so you have company in your opinion.
As far as the land count, it's more of a concession to Gush's position in the metagame and the need to keep up with their threat density. Each land you add dilutes your draw %'s ever so slightly. I rely heavily on Standstill to push through spell clumps. Dack also helps with it a lot. Don't forget that Izzet Charm also filters. Playing this light on lands means you have to make your mulligan decisions based on it. I kept a 1 lander (Volc) against Joel after he mulled to 6 because it had Standstill, double FoW and a Misdirection. Now, he ended up going to 3 and the game wasn't very close once I dealt with his Cavern+TNN with EE+Waste, but if I'm going to mulligan hands like those I need to retool the mana base. Rob Edwards told me he would have snap-mulled the hand. I knew that my 6 had every potential to be worse because of the land count so I held. I drew the land I needed to play the Standstill and Joel popped it for me and pushed me the rest of the way into my spells.
It never came up in my testing, but to be honest not too many decks are packing both Cavern and one drops right now. I'm sure we can construct a bevy of scenario's in which we'd really want Lightning Bolt in the main. The question for me becomes how many of those aren't solved by Izzet Charm and how many times does Izzet Charm solve something that Bolt doesn't? Then we have to figure out if the Bolt has room elsewhere. I couldn't find it outside of Stifle, and I really wanted to play that card. If you'd rather play something than Stifle; try a Barbarian Ring, a Lightning Bolt, and an Ancient Grudge.
