Blue Danube Waltz

[Archae]

Here's a deck I've been playing for the past few years with pretty strong results. It has changed over time with the printing of new cards and shifts in the metagame, obviously. First, here's the list:

Sources:
1 Island
1 Swamp
3 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Academy Ruins
3 Mishra's Factory
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Sol Ring

The Rest:
3 Chalice of the Void
3 Sphere of Resistance
3 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Pithing Needle
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Null Rod
1 Crucible of Worlds

4 Force of Will
1 Flusterstorm
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Tinker
1 Sphinx of the Steel Wind

3 Baleful Strix
3 Trinket Mage
3 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Propaganda


Sideboard:
3 Ghost Quarter
1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
1 Tormod's Crypt
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Baleful Strix
1 Extripate
1 Chains of Mephistopheles
1 Engineered Plague
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Flusterstorm
1 Progaganda



Alright, so some discussion. The idea of the deck is to switch roles from prison to beatdown without going full brown so that we can still run Force, Tinker, Ancestral, and Time Walk. This deck wants to play disruptively, then drop a bigger threat and close out the game quickly (Tinker or Tezz). It is also equipped to go long with recursion from Crucible and Academy while chipping away at life totals with Revokers, Strixes, Mages, and Factories. Most matches are close, grindy games. I will occasionally get blown-out by broken hands or quick threats backed up by removal (e.g. Mentor+REB), and it will occasionally blow out other decks, dropping Chalice+Sphere+Waste with Force backup. Variance exists in Vintage.

Null Rod and Propaganda have been huge in the current metagame, and have stolen a lot of otherwise unwinnnable games. Otherwise, Trinket Mage serves as a bullet finder, from Chalice to EE to Needle to Cage.

One thing to note is the lack of a draw engine. The deck wants to generate card advantage in other ways, with Baleful Strix, Trinket Mage, and invalidating your opponent's deck with Chalice and Rod. Second, like MUD, Hurkyl's effects are a beating and the deck does not defend against it as well as I want it to. That said, the opponent's life total is often low enough that they are forced to fire Hurkyl's at inopportune times, making it less back-breaking.


Some matchups:
This deck loves to face Dredge and MUD all day. In game 1, it has access to 5 strip effects and maindeck dredge hate. After boarding, it gets up to 8 strip effects and more dredge/shop hate. MUD usually involves locking them under their own spheres, countering the important threats, and delaying their attacks with Strix and Factory.

Blue control with Tinker/YawgWill/Key-Vault is generally favorable as well, since all of the lock pieces put the further behind, and take time away as they look for answers. That said, this deck has failed to exist as much in the current metagame, but it is worth nothing that this deck has a positive matchup against big blue (Turbo Tezz/Jace control/Storm variants).

Oath and BUG Fish I view as similar matchups, since they both have access to Abrupt Decay, which this deck hates seeing. Most of the ways in which this deck tries to stop the opponent's deck from interacting are nullified by Decay, which allows that deck's gameplan to function better. Therefore, against Oath it needs to see multiple Cages and back them up with Revokers/Strixes (which are surprisingly effective at fighting against Grislebrand in tandem). Against BUG Fish, mana denial is harder without dealing with DRS, but Trygon is the only big threat really.

This deck is similar to Bomberman in the sense that is can move from control to beatdown easily. It lacks the combo finish that Bomberman touts, but that finish is easily disrupted usually. By having strong defense in Stix/Chalice/Mage, this deck can slow down the board while gaining eventuality if you know what threats to neutralize in any given matchup (take away Bomberman's planeswalkers or combo finish and they only have the creature game, which is not enough to fight through a Tezz with men that trade with theirs). This is the axis along which we fight midrange decks like Noble Fish, Humans, etc.

Delver can be tough, since it makes you overextend on strategy. This deck can balance the two by dropping Chalice on 1/getting down a sphere and following it up by invalidating their threats (with Strix, Propaganda, EE). It can be awkward at times because EE blows up Chalice, but post board having Plague, Deluge, 2 Propaganda, Chalice and Spheres gives the Delver pilot a lot of trouble. Getting down a Needle or Revoker on Dack and stabilizing usually leads to victory here. Delver is also mana tight, so well-timed Wastelands and Spheres are not to be overlooked.

Mentor/other Young Pyro decks are difficult as well, and a lot of the same strategies are important: Chalice/Spheres really hampers their progress, EE cleans up tokens, and post board we have Plague/Delgue/2 Propaganda/Tabernacle. The recent Mentor decks are more stable with their manabases, so that angle of attack is harder to execute than it is against Delver. I have found these Mentor decks to be generally light on threats, so Extripate is really strong against them (I have extirpated a Mentor before and seen only Jace as a win condition, just as I've Extripated Volcanic Island against a Delver/YP deck leaving them with no way to win).



So that's the deck in a nutshell. I'm happy to write more about the playstyle it wants or to hear constructive feedback. Try it out if you want a fun deck that requires fluid role changes, proper sequencing choices, knowing and evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of your opponent's deck, and so on. Either way, thanks for reading!

[xouman]

Congrats on having your own deck, and having it performing well for you!

I have thought lots of times of playing chalices with trinkets. The problem is that they come too late to be really useful as mana denial, and to be played at 1 or 2 without problems, I think that the rest of the deck should play around that (and I see you can play quite well with cotv1 in play, well done).

Null rod is often a tremendous card for mana denial, but often you will be more f*cked than the opponent (6 artifacts+factories). Depending on your meta, can be maindeck material, but in lots of metagames it belongs to the side I think. It would open space for sdt and maybe another explosives.

3 tezzs seem a lot. I'm not denying it's a key card, but you want it later than sooner.


And now few questions:

-How do you usually won? Via tinker? Does your opponent concede after having 0 mana sources after turn 8?

-Would standstill make sense here? This deck already has similar playstyle and some cards in common.

-Academy ruins is a good card here? I have played it in the past and normally was an underperforming card.

-A deck with tezz 2.0, trinket, demonic, tinker... usually plays key + vault. Is it not an option after side, for some pairings?

[Archae]

A bunch of good questions and observations there, xouman.


First, Chalice is such a powerful card, and can certainly steal games when it comes down early, but is also nice later on in the game I've found. Setting it at 0 is not bad later on (I'm talking turns 3, 4, etc.) especially against storm and draw 7s.

Null Rod used to be split 1 maindeck/1 sideboard, but I have moved both to the maindeck because it is good at slowing mentor decks and tightens up G1 matches against Blue and Shops.

At one point, I was thinking of having 4 Tezz (this is when I was playing with Vault-Key as well), but it wasn't where I wanted to be. 2 seems too few right now because it makes the threats even lighter, so 3 is where I'm at right now.

I don't usually win via Tinker, actually. I have Tinkered for things other than Sphinx a fair number of times as well: Metamorph, Crucible, Null Rod have all been Tinker targets. That said, against more creature-y decks like Delver, Fish, Humans, etc., Tinker is a good gameplan. More often than not, I would say that I lock up the board and grind with mini dudes or ultimate Tezz.

Standstill isn't where I want to be either with the lack of countermagic. This deck wants to play lots of permanents, which is anti-synergistic with Standstill. I can function with a Standstill in play and wait for an an opportune time to break it, but that's not my strategy. At least that's my take.

Academy Ruins is a recent addition to recur threats (most notably EE against Delver/Mentor). That slot used to be a second Island. That is one change I haven't been sure of yet. Most other changes (besides Propaganda, which used to be Deluge MD) are in the board (Chains, Extirpate, Propaganda).

I also had Key-Vault in the board for a while, but with CotV on 1 a lot and Null Rod as well, it wasn't suited for maindeck. I could certainly imagine a list more interested in being aggressive and comboing out. Putting them in the board is also a good idea, but suffers from the problem of making more threats that are artifacts, which the opponent will be looking to deal with post-board. Without many artifacts with tap activated abilities (read: SDT, Mana Crypt, etc.), the marginal utility of Key goes down, making the two cards only useful in tandem. With the lack of card draw/tutors in the deck, I found those slots better used by other answers.

[StanleyAugust]

I really like the deck. I've netdecked it some time ago and it was really fun and challenging to play. And actually worked quite nice. I'm surprised that there's no Trinisphere in the SB? It's such a good card against Storm and Delver.

[xouman]

All your statements make totally sense. And I haven't thought of that before, but StanleyAugust is right and trinisphere surely deserves a spot

[Ten-Ten]

I really like this deck. Like stated before, it plays like  bomberman. The version of this deck I last played had no shops and no sphere of resistance, instead I ran Sensei Top, Trinisphere and the fourth Tezz, AoB. Also, I like MOX opal instead of pearl.

Thank you for writing this. Very fun deck.

[Archae]

Trinisphere was in the SB for a while. The reason it was cut is because it is again an artifact, making their hate more potent. Going back there might be warranted in the current meta, actually; I would be more likely to put it in the main deck though. Maybe -1 SoR, +1 Trinishpere.

On the suggestion of Mox Opal: I have never played with Opal in this deck, so take the following with a grain of salt. I want Moxes and artifact acceleration to allow for early deployment of threats. I find Mox Opal to be less effective at this on paper due to the lack of full SoLoCryptMox. Late game, it would be helpful to tap for any color needed (also allowing EE to go to 3 more easily or even 4), but I am afraid of getting it in the opener and needing it to function right away (I imagine having Opal, Chalice, land and no way to play a sphere turn 1, for instance). In fact, I would prefer Lotus Petal over Mox Opal for this reason. Then again, I'm happy to be shown that is effective with limited acceleration.

[Archae]

So here's an updated list, which has been performing really nicely for me online (granted, this is only in Constructed Free Play).

Sources:
1 Island
1 Swamp
3 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Academy Ruins
3 Mishra's Factory
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Sol Ring

The Rest:
3 Chalice of the Void
2 Sphere of Resistance
1 Trinisphere
3 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Pithing Needle
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Null Rod
1 Crucible of Worlds

4 Force of Will
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Tinker
1 Sphinx of the Steel Wind

3 Baleful Strix
3 Trinket Mage
1 Notion Thief
3 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Propaganda
1 Extirpate

Sideboard:
2 Ghost Quarter
1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
1 Tormod's Crypt
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Null Rod
1 Sphere of Resistance
1 Baleful Strix
1 Engineered Plague
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Illness in the Ranks
2 Flusterstorm
1 Progaganda


Changes are minor: adding 3sphere to the MD bumping 1 SoR to SB; adding a Notion Thief to MD; moving Extirpate to MD; moving a Flusterstorm and Null Rod to SB; cutting a Ghost Quarter; adding Illness to the SB.

Illness is obvisouly for UWR Pryomancer or Mentor. Being a non-blue enchantment makes it fairly safe from a lot of removal that exists, aside from Wear/Tear.
Notion Thief MD has also been a boon, and really helps against enemy #1: Dack Fayden. (Though this is why the Factories are there, too, among other reasons.)

Anyways, hopefully some interesting ideas that will get you thinking and brewing. If you do decide to try out the deck, pay close attention to the choke points of other decks and those of this one as well. Proper threat assessment is paramount to piloting this deck to a win, aside from your This-is-Vintage-let's-do-ridiculous-things plays.

Feedback is always appreciated, and thanks for reading!

[Ten-Ten]

Can this deck function the same now that Cotv is restricted? What can we play in its stead?

[Archae]

The deck still has power, but the restriction of chalice hurts the deck's main gameplan. The landscape has changed now that shops have gone more aggro and the resurgence of storm. So we dust off Null Rods and bump up the spheres. We also modify our sideboard a bit, adding in Leyline to combat these faster decks (and throw in Helms for explosiveness of our own).
Bridge and Propaganda are good here, though we need to defend them better. I've considered skites even at this point, actually. Other thoughts include adding Tasigur or Thopter/Sword as a trump against combat-oriented decks.

Here's my current list:
1 Island
1 Swamp
4 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Academy Ruins
3 Mishra's Factory
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Sol Ring

1 Chalice of the Void
3 Sphere of Resistance
1 Trinisphere
3 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Pithing Needle
1 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Null Rod
1 Crucible of Worlds

4 Force of Will
1 Mindbreak Trap
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Tinker
1 Sphinx of the Steel Wind

3 Baleful Strix
2 Trinket Mage
1 Notion Thief
3 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
1 Extirpate
1 Propaganda
1 Ensnaring Bridge

Sideboard:
2 Ghost Quarter
1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Engineered Plague
1 Illness in the Ranks
2 Flusterstorm
4 Leyline of the Void
2 Helm of Obedience



To try to address your second question (maybe this shouldn't be in this thread, but whatever), I've been toying around with Ghirapur Aether Grid to make a deck with a similar feel but better angles of attack in the current meta. The list is very rough right now.

Here's that list:
2 Island
2 Volcanic Island
4 Scalding Tarn
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Library of Alexandria
2 Mishra's Factory
2 Ancient Tomb
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Opal
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring

1 Chalice of the Void
3 Sphere of Resistance
1 Trinisphere
2 Null Rod
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Pithing Needle
1 Crucible of Worlds

2 Blood Moon
2 Ghirapur Aether Grid
2 Lightning Bolt
1 Keranos, God of Storms

2 Trinket Mage
1 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Dack Fayden
1 Hangarback Walker
1 Time Walk
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Treasure Cruise
1 Dig Through Time

3 Mental Misstep
2 Flusterstorm
4 Force of Will


Hope that is interesting. Thoughts and feedback are always appreciated/

[Islandswamp]

The deck still has power, but the restriction of chalice hurts the deck's main gameplan. The landscape has changed now that shops have gone more aggro and the resurgence of storm. So we dust off Null Rods and bump up the spheres. We also modify our sideboard a bit, adding in Leyline to combat these faster decks (and throw in Helms for explosiveness of our own).
Bridge and Propaganda are good here, though we need to defend them better. I've considered skites even at this point, actually. Other thoughts include adding Tasigur or Thopter/Sword as a trump against combat-oriented decks.

Here's my current list:
1 Island
1 Swamp
4 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Academy Ruins
3 Mishra's Factory
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Sol Ring

1 Chalice of the Void
3 Sphere of Resistance
1 Trinisphere
3 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Pithing Needle
1 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Null Rod
1 Crucible of Worlds

4 Force of Will
1 Mindbreak Trap
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Tinker
1 Sphinx of the Steel Wind

3 Baleful Strix
2 Trinket Mage
1 Notion Thief
3 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
1 Extirpate
1 Propaganda
1 Ensnaring Bridge

Sideboard:
2 Ghost Quarter
1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Engineered Plague
1 Illness in the Ranks
2 Flusterstorm
4 Leyline of the Void
2 Helm of Obedience



To try to address your second question (maybe this shouldn't be in this thread, but whatever), I've been toying around with Ghirapur Aether Grid to make a deck with a similar feel but better angles of attack in the current meta. The list is very rough right now.

Here's that list:
2 Island
2 Volcanic Island
4 Scalding Tarn
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Library of Alexandria
2 Mishra's Factory
2 Ancient Tomb
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Opal
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Sol Ring

1 Chalice of the Void
3 Sphere of Resistance
1 Trinisphere
2 Null Rod
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Pithing Needle
1 Crucible of Worlds

2 Blood Moon
2 Ghirapur Aether Grid
2 Lightning Bolt
1 Keranos, God of Storms

2 Trinket Mage
1 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Dack Fayden
1 Hangarback Walker
1 Time Walk
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Treasure Cruise
1 Dig Through Time

3 Mental Misstep
2 Flusterstorm
4 Force of Will


Hope that is interesting. Thoughts and feedback are always appreciated/

That looks familiar. If you're a magic online player, I suspect you're the person who beat me with this list this morning. I have almost no experience against this type of deck and I had no idea what to do or what to expect. The main deck grafdigger's cage threw me off for sure! Good game btw.

[Archae]

That looks familiar. If you're a magic online player, I suspect you're the person who beat me with this list this morning. I have almost no experience against this type of deck and I had no idea what to do or what to expect. The main deck grafdigger's cage threw me off for sure! Good game btw.

That was me. Yea, the first game was good; I had to use two Tezz to dig for a needle after you decayed my null rod and assembled vault-key. Too bad the second game wasn't as good.

[mmcgeach]

Archae, I sleeved up your Tezz AoB list, and I loved it.  It was much better than I thought it would be.  Sphere and Null Rod are both awesome in the meta now. 

But I lost to aggro-shops.  I sided in leylines and helm, but, I never got helm online and leyline was a total brick whenever I drew it.  I can't help but think more null rods would just be better.  Null Rod is a total MVP (I was pretty impressed).

I might do something like:

-4 leyline
-2 helm
+2 null rod
+1 tormod's crypt
+2 nihil spellbomb
+1 mindbreak trap

So against shops I could side something like:

-1 mindbreak trap, -1 grafdigger's cage, -1 chalice, -1 trinisphere, -2 sphere of resistance, -1 notion thief
+2 ghost quarter, +2 null rod, +1 tabernacle, +1 engineered plague...  ?

What I'm saying, is, I was sort of unhappy with the shop sideboard plan.  I wish we could run something that blew up an artifact.  Or an artifact creature.  Maybe dismember?  Or EE (even though null rod.)  Or perhaps Contagion?  There's almost enough black cards to exile.

Any insight into the shops matchup?

[Archae]

The Leyline+Helm combo in the board is a recent idea I've been toying with, and I'm glad to hear your thoughts. (I's also glad you tried the deck and liked it!)

The deck had a solid matchup against workshops pre-Chalice restriction. Since shops were less aggro then by and large, the plan was to use strip effects to bury them under their own spheres and deal with their threats with Strix, which is an all-star against shops, though SoFI trumps it.

Since the Chalice restriction, the move to Rods was necessary (to fight along the axis the deck wants to). However, decks could afford to speed up a bit by playing moxen and using the graveyard more heavily. This is why I moved to the Leylines in the board. I then decided to include helm as well both for the combo and splash damage against oath.

I think that I agree with you, though. Leyline can be a total brick, and the decks when I want Helm I usually want Rod as well. Non-bo. Null Rod is very good, though something else needs to be included against shops. I would move to something like:
-4 Leyline
-2 Helm
+1 Null Rod
+1 Silent Arbiter
+1 Tabernacle
+1 Propaganda
+1 Guardian Beast
+1 Engineered Explosives

Against shops, then, the plan would be: -3 sphere, -1 chalice, -1 trinisphere, -1 grafdiggers cage, -1 mindbreak trap, -1 notion thief; +2 ghost quarter, +2 tabernacle, +1 silent arbiter, +1 propaganda, +1 rod, +1 explosives.

Additional thoughts: maybe pull one of the cards in the sideboard to get a tormod's in there, though I'm not sure it's necessary. I tend to avoid 1-for-1 removal, especially in the current meta with creatures that will leave behind threats (ravager, hangarback, mentor). Along those lines, you could run Toxic Deluge in the mainboard or the sideboard. I think the lifeloss is relevant, so I might just put a good ol' Damnation in the board.


Hope that helps!

[mmcgeach]

Hmm, Toxic Deluge would probably be a good idea.

I did more testing and had trouble with shops in two cases: 1) they get down a 1/1 or 2/2 or something early, and then I play null rod and then rip all their land away - but eventually I die.  And 2) they play turn-1 Crucible of Worlds, then basically I can't win.  My only shot at removing a crucible is EE@3, but that doesn't work with null rod.

I also got the chance to play against junk hatebears, which, although a tier-two deck at best, is a nightmare matchup for TezzStax.  They have a ton of efficient threats, plus stuff like thalia, kataki, pridemage, abrupt decay, and a better draw engine than TezzStax in dark confidant.  Baleful strix was good in that matchup and so was Sphinx.

I think the maindeck extirpate should probably be vamp tutor.  I've come to realize the deck has a lot of one-of bombs (tinker, chalice, crucible, propaganda, tabernacle) and you want to be able to access those as reliably as possible. I think it does need more actual creature removal.

Anyway, not sure if that's super helpful or just super obvious.  :/

[Archae]

You definitely have good observations here. The list I put in response to Ten-Ten was a crude sketch; I haven't played much since the chalice restriction. So take all of this with that caveat.

The lack of vamp tutor was twofold: 1. The deck wanted to jam chalice at 1 as fast as possible, and that is no longer such a primary focus. Because of this, if imagine an updated version of the deck plays more one-drops. Maybe misstep too. 2. Vamp tutor is nice for our 1-ofs, but I didn't much like the tempo loss in most cases. It's probably worth revisiting, but I'm not sure the card is right for this deck. I'm happy to be proven wrong here.

Yes, hatebears sucks. The deck was originally designed to have good game against should, dredge, and big blue. Hatebears and oath are among the harder matchups, and decay is just a beating. In terms of removal, I have dimir charm main right now actually.

I do plan on doing a more concerted overhaul of the deck given the chalice restriction and current metagame. It would be awesome to have you doing something similar and seeing what conclusions we arrive at.