My Phid for review... still

[Milton]

This is the deck I am playing.  This deck has placed me in the top four in three bigger tournaments (25+) and I have used this deck to win a couple of smaller tournaments (12-).  I find that it is a great mix of the controling aspects of Phid with the aggro strategy of Fish.  It stands up well to aggro and can hold its own against everything else.

The Showercap, 2004

Mana - 26
5 Moxes
1 Lotus
1 Library
1 Strip Mine
4 Wastelands
4 Mishra's Factories
4 Fetchlands
2 Islands
4 Volcanic Islands

Dudes - 7
4 Ophidian
3 Gorilla Shaman

Permission - 11
4 Force of Will
4 Mana Leak
3 Misdirection

Drawing - 13
4 Brainstorm
4 Standstill
3 Cunning Wish
1 Ancestral
1 Time Walk

Board Control - 3
3 Fire/Ice

Sidboard -
1 Dominate (MVP)
1 Psionic Blast (anti-Negator)
1 Fire/Ice
1 Hurkyls Recall
1 Rack and Ruin
1 Gush (has been disapointing)
2 Red Blasts
1 Blue Blast
1 Misdirection
1 Stifle

Then, depending on metagame -
4 Null Rod

or

2 Masticore
2 Stifle

I like to be able to switch out the Misdirections against artifact heavy decks, like Slaver.  Null Rod is great against Slaver.  Stifle and Masticore are in case of a meta that is a little more open.  Masticore and Phid have nice synergy while Stifle is sort of a catch all.

Card Choices

-Misdirection
   Why no Stifle maindeck?  I haven't found them useful.  You really, really need to protect Ophidians, and Stifle doesn't do that nearly as nicely as Misdirection.  Agaisnt good aggro and good control a Misdirection can swing tempo far more than can a Stifle.  If I were playing a Phidless deck I would probabally run Stifle, though.

-Mana Leak
    Why no Drain?  Don't get me wrong, Drain is an awesome card, but I want the turn one counter ability.  I want the ability to stop or push back the early clock of the fast decks.  I also want a counter that only costs one blue.  My deck is not heavy on blue mana and playing Mana Leak allows me to opperate the tight mana of Factories, Wastes and 5 Moxes.  I have found that turn 1 I will usually have either a Mox / Land / Leak or a Force and I am usually capable of staving off early threats.  Late game Leak is still a pretty good spell because many decks are running mana-lite lately, sporting maybe only 7 to 10 non-fetchlands.  Wasteland, Shaman and Leak compliment each other nicely.  

-Standstill
    A house.  Really, this card is totally underdeveloped.  It reminds me of Gush three years ago.  The Type 1 community should seriously give more thought to this card.  It slows down the game and seriously locks down your opponent.  A first turn Standstill is usually a phenomonal play, and is relatively easy with Moxes.

The rest of the deck is pretty standard.  Fire/Ice has become a terrific card again.  It's almost never dead.  Welders, Shaman, Tokens, Boa's.  There are really no decks that are creatureless anymore, except maybe the lingering Tendrils variants.

[kirdape3]

It appears that you do not play against many Dragon combo decks - not even a Blood Moon or three in there against them.  Also, without serious hate (twin Stifle is not enough by far) they just appear to be able to roll you.  It would also appear that your metagame is very weenie-heavy and not laden with any sort of extreme fat decks such as TnT or Mask variants; you have minimal capability to deal with permanents that would otherwise be painful (without Drain, they can just throw things at your counters and eventually resolve something that will be truly dangerous).

I would think that while some of the ideas in this deck are entirely correct (Standstill is very good, for example), the deck that you are looking for is ShockWave's U/r Landstill.  In this version, I would not particularly be scared if I were piloting any of the degenerate decks in the format.

[wuaffiliate]

i would really suggest running white, with a good enough mana base(4 islands 1 plains) you can run white and moon and destroy bad matches. white add soo much for it to be ignores in phid. with swords your phids will almost always get through. infact swords is one of the best reasons to run white in phid. Ur loses to anything running phat creatures such as madness or oshawa stompy, white deals with those quite well.

just a thought.

EDIT: run FoF in your board over gush if you dont like it, ive been running it and its such a good drain sink, and its great when you are in trouble.

[Milton]

It appears that you do not play against many Dragon combo decks - not even a Blood Moon or three in there against them. Also, without serious hate (twin Stifle is not enough by far) they just appear to be able to roll you. It would also appear that your metagame is very weenie-heavy and not laden with any sort of extreme fat decks such as TnT or Mask variants; you have minimal capability to deal with permanents that would otherwise be painful (without Drain, they can just throw things at your counters and eventually resolve something that will be truly dangerous).

I think I'm the only person on the planet right now, other than my teammates, that think that Bloodmoon is far overrated.  Fetchlands made Bloodmoon obsolete.  It's just that simple.  I loved the card!  Its time has past, though.

Am I worried about Dragon?  Not really.  I don't see it very often and I have found that three Stifles in the board help a bunch.  If Dragon becomes a problem I go to four Stifles.  But, Dragon is a different animal.  It's the kind of deck you prepare for, but it's not the kind of deck that you gear your entire board around.  It will beat you, and it can stall out searching for answers around your counterspells.  It runs a very tight mana base and is always discarding land to Bazar, so Mana Leak is very, very good against Dragon.  Bloodmoon is certianly not the way to beat Dragon.  A 3cc red spell that makes it hard for you to counter their Duresses when you need to protect Stifle, in effect making it easier for them to Duress you, all the while hurting your mana base and only really limiting Bazar allowing Dragon, a mostly black deck, to better use their basic swamps...  It's too damn slow.  A first turn Leak is better.  

TnT?  How is that a problem.  An early Factory can kill a Juggeranught easily enough.  Fire/Ice is crucil for keeping Welders off the table.  Counters work on Survival.  Clearly if a Survival enters play it's a tough game, but any deck has a tough time against TnT if they cast Survival.

I have never once lost to Mask, and Mask is everywhere in my meta.  I own it.  Dominate is sooooo good.  Shaman rock agasint Masks.  Misdirects are phenomonal for those decks still running Hymn (which is a pretty good card again because no one is playing Misdirect anymore).

What fat creatures are out there that I should be worried about?  I have the artifacts creatures taken care of.  I can chump with Factories and kill most anything, especially in conjunction with Fire/Ice.  What more do I need?  Seriously.  What are you seeing?  There are a few Ravanous Batholith's here and they can be a problem, but I can usually counter them.

[wuaffiliate]

ever play vs madness or oshawa stompy? OS is gaining alot of popularity, Ur phid auto loses to it.

[Jake]

Well, Milton, the thing I like most about your deck is how focused it is. There's no random crap and there's a reason for every card in the deck. And I know personally that it is a good deck. I played against you once and you crushed me, and I wasn't playing a bad deck.

But, where do you want to take your deck from here? Are you hoping to improve it somehow? What decks do you consider to be a bad match-up? If you're consistently top-8'ing with it, what do you think is keeping you from going all the way with it?

[Milton]

wu- Don't see too much Oshawa Stompy here.  Sorry.  Thanks, though, for that constructive criticism.  

Jake - I am considering the sideboard, more than anything.  Also, what about dropping to two Cunning Wish and opening a slot for a big dude, like Morphling?  What about maybe cutting Cunning Wish altogether and making more of a transformational board?  What about finding something that I can replace the Misdirections with against decks like Dragon or Welder variants?  Stifle?  Is it good enough?  Also, I posted this deck so it could be part of the public record here at TMD.  I know that most people won't take the deck seriously, but I figured I'd give it a try.

[Methuselahn]

I've always liked this deck, despite having been it's victim in the past.

Understanding that one won't face any well built Dragon or Madness in the Minnesota area, and that Slavery, fish, gobbos, and RG beats are now in full bloom,(waSP and I taking the Finals in the last power tourney with a RG mirror match last month.(<-shameless self promotion))... have you considered any type of mass removal?  Oh, and I'm not too sure about their being alot of mask around anymore.  

To be honest, I don't see the logic in adding Misdirections for handling things such as what Mono-Black would throw at you.  The Slavery, fish, goblins, and Beats all punish these decks for you.  Despite the RR in something like Starstorm, would that be worthwhile?  It is afterall a cycling card, which compliments your focus on playing with Standstill.  Have you tested it?

Maybe I would just have to test this deck alot to understand why you need to protect your phids at all cost when you have Standstill as well.

Do you really need to add a Morphling or other faster clock?  Your deck is geared to nibble away at your opponent with massive draw to protect it.  Plus, I don't have to tell you that you are not running drain to facilitate getting said fatty out.

[Spizzard]

Is three Gorilla Shaman really necessary?  I understand you want to get them early, but they are often dead in multiples.  Perhaps one in the side would be better?  If you cut this, you could gain merchant scroll or mystical.  (i'd probably run scroll over mystical.

IMO, by running factories, you take yourself away from the biggest strength of U/r, Blood Moon.

Have you considered running an AK in the sideboard instead of gush?  In certain matchups, using it as a wish target would be nice.  You could also think about teferi's response if you are trying to protect the lands.  It would provide no card disadvantage than if you used stifle for the same purpose.

[BrokenDeck]

I think you definitely need a better win condition.  Even just one morphling would help a lot, because phid's die to lightning bolt, and shamans are 1/1s, end of story.

Do you really feel the need for 3 misdirections?  In the past, most control decks felt the need to only play 2, even in aggro heavy metagames.  And with only 8 actual counters, I could see some problems with that.

[Jake]

Jake - I am considering the sideboard, more than anything.  Also, what about dropping to two Cunning Wish and opening a slot for a big dude, like Morphling?  What about maybe cutting Cunning Wish altogether and making more of a transformational board?  What about finding something that I can replace the Misdirections with against decks like Dragon or Welder variants?  Stifle?  Is it good enough?  Also, I posted this deck so it could be part of the public record here at TMD.  I know that most people won't take the deck seriously, but I figured I'd give it a try.

I think you may be onto something with cutting the Cunning Wishes. The Wishes give you a flexibility option that is undeniable, but at the cost of speed and focus. Cunning Wish has become so ingrained in blue-based control, that it's not even something that gets considered to be expendable. Lately, I've been wanting to develop a very well meta-gamed control deck that shifts away from the flexible and bastardized sideboard to a more focused and consistent sideboard. I know this seems like a step backward, but I think it can be effective if you have a good idea what decks you'll be playing against (which you obviously do).

And as far as Stifle is concerned, I am onboard. In any given match, I find no shortage of useful targets for this guy (not the least of which are Fetchlands and Wastelands). Sometimes opponents' Wastelands can just win games, and Stifle can allow you to neutralize this advantage. Teferi's Response is neat and all, but it's just too slow and narrow to be useful (at least for me).

[wuaffiliate]

i dont see why it needs to be "Ur" phid, when white adds very good SB cards, swords, decree, trenches and so on.

Urw phid has done well in large tourneys in montreal(50-70 people), it has made repeat t8s.

have you ever tried with a white splash?

[gnomicfury]

A few questions about the white splash:
How much better is swords than fire/ice?  F/I kills welders, metalworkers, and shamans just as easilly and can tap and cycle itself.  Granted, it doesn't stop big critters, but, as Milton said, there are factories for that.
Does adding white still allow the sideboarding of bloodmoon?  Fetchlands have neutered bloodmoon a lot, but it might still be a worthwhile hoser card.  If you only run one plains to keep moon available, how often will you be able to find it in time to swords through your phid consistantly?

[Milton]

A few questions about the white splash:
How much better is swords than fire/ice? F/I kills welders, metalworkers, and shamans just as easilly and can tap and cycle itself. Granted, it doesn't stop big critters, but, as Milton said, there are factories for that.
Does adding white still allow the sideboarding of bloodmoon? Fetchlands have neutered bloodmoon a lot, but it might still be a worthwhile hoser card. If you only run one plains to keep moon available, how often will you be able to find it in time to swords through your phid consistantly?

Answers:

White splash depends on meta, but I have found it to be sub-optimal.  Plow is great, but Fire/Ice is usually better.  What big creatures are hurting you?  O Stompy giving you troubles?  Then pack some white and add some swords.  But, that's really the only deck with big fat that beats down.  Fire/Ice kills everything else.  In fact, if you think Fire/Ice is bad then pack Bolts.  If you don't need Shaman, switch him for Grim Lavamancer.  Ol' Grimmy is phenomonal under a Standstill and Bolts are now better than ever.

Bloodmoon isn't very good anymore.  Really.  It's just not.  It is generally not worth a slot.

[MadManiac21]

Milton, no offense or anything, but Blood Moon is ABSOLUTELY huge. Gi-normous. Cavernous. The number of decks that it simply causes to scoop is absurd. No, fetchies have not caused the demise of blood moon. They become mountains when played after blood moon, and often players want their duals to effective cast their variety of spells they play. There is no way you could ever convince to play a red deck (that was not 3+ colors) and NOT run blood moon. Unless I was playing in a mono-color environment.

Maybe your meta doesn't contain a wide variety of decks (or players that use duals). When I played in Watervury less than 2 weeks ago, blood moon won me NO LESS than six games. Six. Games. Four of which were auto-scoops when blood moon resolved. This may be jsut from my experiences, but I'm pretty sure any Ur control player in the history of the game would call you crazy for stating that blood "Just isn't that good. Really."

In this deck it may not really fit unless it is tweaked, as you're only running two islands. If you were to drop the factories and add in more basic lands, I'm fairly sure you would be drooling all over the 2R casting enchantment.

I personally like null rods MD in anything that doesn't really need moxen. you have plenty of mana sinks, which is why I don't see why your not running mana drain. Yes, I understand mana leak, but why not run both? Almost every landstill/phid deck I've seen that has had access to mana drains, runs them. They're just too good.

[Milton]

MM - Couldn't disagree more.  Did Bloodmoon win you games that were otherwise unwinnable?  Did Bloodmoon matter, or was it good ex post facto?  Did you already have control of the game and Bloodmoon came down to seal the deal, or was it game altering?  

What match-ups are unfavorable to Phid that Bloodmoon makes better?

About Drain - UU is more expensive than many people think.  Being able to play that early Drain means not playing an early Wasteland so you can get the UU in play.  Leak is awesome in that a Mox and an Island turn 1 gives you that great first turn counter ability.  Leak has proven, to me, to be a little better right now against decks with a fast clock.  Drain is good, but it's a card that needs a little more thought than it did a year ago when people still had Morphlings in their decks.

[Jake]

Milton, no offense or anything, but Blood Moon is ABSOLUTELY huge. Gi-normous. Cavernous. The number of decks that it simply causes to scoop is absurd. No, fetchies have not caused the demise of blood moon. They become mountains when played after blood moon, and often players want their duals to effective cast their variety of spells they play. There is no way you could ever convince to play a red deck (that was not 3+ colors) and NOT run blood moon. Unless I was playing in a mono-color environment.

Blood Moon is indeed huge, when you can get it into play. But, any deck that can be seriously hurt by it has a plan (or should have a plan) to deal with it. Blood Moon is still a good card, it's just not as good as it used to be. Mishra's Factories seem to play an extremely important role in this deck, and playing with Blood Moon hurts that role.

Maybe your meta doesn't contain a wide variety of decks (or players that use duals). When I played in Watervury less than 2 weeks ago, blood moon won me NO LESS than six games. Six. Games. Four of which were auto-scoops when blood moon resolved. This may be jsut from my experiences, but I'm pretty sure any Ur control player in the history of the game would call you crazy for stating that blood "Just isn't that good. Really."

Well, the metagame up here does, of course, run plenty of duals. It's just that the decks that are doing really well up here are very careful not to let Bloodmoon wreck their day. Maybe I'm completely wrong here, but Bloodmoon seems to punish those who get greedy or don't have a plan for it, and that can, in itself, be a liability depending on where you play.

I personally like null rods MD in anything that doesn't really need moxen. you have plenty of mana sinks, which is why I don't see why your not running mana drain. Yes, I understand mana leak, but why not run both? Almost every landstill/phid deck I've seen that has had access to mana drains, runs them. They're just too good.

Mana Drain is indeed insane, but I think the real reason not to run them is the double-blue mana requirement. It seems to me that this deck skates a very fine line with the manabase, and coming up with double-blue mana could sometimes be a problem. (maybe I'm wrong here) Being able to run the deck, damn near optimally, with only one blue mana is a great advantage. Being able to drop a Mox and land with a Leak in hand is a great start also.

[Mixing Mike]

ever play vs madness or oshawa stompy? OS is gaining alot of popularity, Ur phid auto loses to it.

I remember that you ran Lavamancers in the past.  They looked fairly strong, taking care of most of the deck issues (resolved threats).  I know Fire/Ice cleans up well, but I'd like to know what made you cut them.  They make for an excellentfirst turn drop, as I'm sure you already know.

I will concur, Blood Moon is dead now.  It's not worth the room to MD it at all.  Standstill is also as awesome as he says it is.  I also do agree with the absence of Mana Drain.

Milton, I know that TPS and aggro-control decks are your worst nightmare.  I've been running 2 MD Stifles over Wishes, along with a few Lavamancers.  I'm still bending over for Mask, but first turn Leaks have been helping that department.  The choices for wish-ables IMO are fairly weak for blue and Red, though you did do a very good job.  I'd personally rather have 2 or 3 disruptive cards to bring into the MD over the Wishes.

[kirdape3]

Blood Moon dismantles Dragon and is a grave threat for Keeper and other multi-color control decks.

[wuaffiliate]

A few questions about the white splash:
How much better is swords than fire/ice? F/I kills welders, metalworkers, and shamans just as easilly and can tap and cycle itself. Granted, it doesn't stop big critters, but, as Milton said, there are factories for that.
Does adding white still allow the sideboarding of bloodmoon? Fetchlands have neutered bloodmoon a lot, but it might still be a worthwhile hoser card. If you only run one plains to keep moon available, how often will you be able to find it in time to swords through your phid consistantly?

Answers:

White splash depends on meta, but I have found it to be sub-optimal.  Plow is great, but Fire/Ice is usually better.  What big creatures are hurting you?  O Stompy giving you troubles?  Then pack some white and add some swords.  But, that's really the only deck with big fat that beats down.  Fire/Ice kills everything else.  In fact, if you think Fire/Ice is bad then pack Bolts.  If you don't need Shaman, switch him for Grim Lavamancer.  Ol' Grimmy is phenomonal under a Standstill and Bolts are now better than ever.

Bloodmoon isn't very good anymore.  Really.  It's just not.  It is generally not worth a slot.

how do you do vs dragon, dryads and togs? dragon, tog and groatog are still very popular, they make phat creatures that cant really be delt with by fire/ice, bolt or lavamancer effectively.

it just seems to me that you are set in your ways, since you dont run bloodmoon there is absolutely NO reason not to simply just play Ur landstill. your deck is slowly turning into it anyhow...

[Rico Suave]

I wouldn't try to lecture Milton on the qualities of Blood Moon.  He did play Blood Moon Keeper a while ago, in case you didn't know.  I bet he knows full well what the card is capable of.

Anyway, I still don't see any advantage in dropping Mana Drain.  At this point, you're essentially giving up Mana Drain for Standstill, no?  With that comes a mana base with less colored mana and with Factory.  How good is Factory?  I can imagine you wouldn't run it without Standstill.

So, is it really worth it?  Many decks don't care about the Standstill engine anyway.  Every deck cares about Mana Drain.  Just some food for thought.  You don't even need to replace Mana Leak with it, you could play both cards side by side, which isn't a bad option either.

I see this deck as a huge metagame deck.  To be honest, Landstill fits the bill as being a deck that would wreck in the same metagame your deck is geared towards beating.  I don't mean to keep repeating what others say, just that the similarities are obviously there.  So what advantages are there for your build over traditional Landstill?  Not just that, but in what matches do you think your deck performs better than Landstill would?

[Milton]

Interesting thoughts, guys.  Really.

First, about Mana Drain.  Drain is great.  Don't get me wrong.  But, let me ask you this:

1) How important is a first turn counter?  Mox - Island - Leak first turn is very, very effective.  Drain, on the other hand, doesn't become a factor unitl your second turn, which could very well be your opponents third turn.  By that time the damage could be done and the threat could already be in play.  

2) Also, Leak is very easy to use while Wastelanding aggressively, pushing back your opponents optimal turn while you stabalize.  With Drain, you HAVE to have two blue in play by turn two, otherwise your opponent is going to have his way with you.

Now, I'll submit that decks are getting slower, what with Long leaving the meta, but the first or second turn play is still very much a threat.  Maybe it would be better for me to ask you this:  What decks are you playing against that DON'T have a credible threat on the table by turn two?  That means you have to be able to counter on your turn one.  Force isn't enough anymore.  Drain can be too slow.

Another thing to consider:  How many times does Mana Drain really say this UU - Counter target spell and lose 3 life due to mana burn.  In that case Drain is clearly inferior to a plain Counterspell.  In a deck like mine Factories are mana sinks, but I can't run Factories and Drains without cutting Moxes, which means I can't Leak on turn one.  If I want Drains, I pull Factories and I have far fewer mana sinks.

About the Standstills:

When we developed this deck originally we had Accumulate Knowledge in this spot.  We decided right away at GenCon that 12 draw spells, not counting Ancestral or Time Walk, are crucial in this deck.  Brainstorm gives me four.  Phid gives me another four.  If you are playing a Phid deck with only Brainstorm and Phid for card drawing then you are really planning on top decking.  You need 12 card drawing spells.  AK is good.  But Standstill proved to be better.

About the Mishra's:

That's my kill card, damnit!  I can't take them out.  Shaman and Phids are not enough.  Also, a first turn Factory can block a first turn Lackey all day long.  It can trade with an Elephant token, it can stall out a Negator, it can hold a Tog at bay.  It's better, in my opinion, than a Curisotied Cloud of Farries.  

What match-ups are my deck better than Landstill?  Long and Mask, clearly.  Dominate in the board for Mask has won me more games that I can count.  Really.  It sounds cheap and kind of campy, but it's true.  Cunning Wish for Dominate.  Maybe waSP can attest to this.  He plays in my meta.  

Against Long, Leak gives me an advantage because I can Mox - Island - Leak first turn, pushing back Long a couple of turns.