Highlander Finnish Nationals

[pyyhttu]

Hi,

No time to write long stories, but about a week ago we held nationals here at Finland. Just finished adding the deck lists:

http://mtgpulse.com/event/16954#239677

Source: http://mtgsuomi.fi/keskustelu/index.php/topic,68623

[Tabris]

I just love your meta

[MMD]

  This is what I call a control meta. One-two drop zoo and aggro control should do very well in it.

If there would be a fast combo deck it should also do its work IMO.
@ Council: Do the Imperial Seal job

@ pyyhttu: Thanks for sharing

[Nastaboi]

There were several red aggro decks and Academy decks that were firmly in contention after 3-4 rounds, but failed to make top 8.

I don't think fast aggro or Ux aggro control are foils to UW. UW already has all the tools to fight them, and is just more consistent. And even if they posessed a real threat against UW, the control deck could just change a couple of cards and even the odds. UW is definitely the deck to beat. As you can see, the lists posted were already more or less metagamed against the mirror.

[MMD]

cheap/hasting creatures, burn and some silverbullets are not favorable against UW  
Accelerated threats plus counter/discard does not work against UW  

...At least I made different experiences.

Btw, the UW's do not look teched out to a control meta to me. OK the show a lot of countermagic and libary manipulation but I count one discard spell in the Top 8 control decks and zero Loam´s  

...and yes, UW(x)(x) is ONE of the DtB at the moment.

[Maqi]

Of course I have to mention that there's a serious lack of 4c Blood!

A strategy based on Discard, Hatebears, Planeswalkers, hard-to-kill threats (Obzedat, Falkenrath Aristocrat etc.) in combination with serious pressure poses a real problem to UW.

My personal experience shows that the MU is about 6:4 in favor of Blood. May vary between exact lists. Basically UW needs a very streamlined hand of tempo counters/early removal, a WoG-type effect and then a way to blast ahead (à la Revelation or a Walker) all the while not missing land drops. Alternatively they can have B2B.

When UW doesn't get those hands it loses.

Sweet lists though. Always interesting to see different takes on HL and to get a glimpse of differing metas.

[tonytahiti]

call me a hater but i am not impressed by these lists. these results looks like results from 2009 (and no, we have not come full circle back to this): pattern, ug aggro control, teachings. very little innovation (the emrakul deck is the exception here). when players said that the free mulligan should "create new archtypes" and "shake up the metagame" i don't think they meant traveling back to times where ohran viper was viable.

[so_not]

As nastaboi pointed out UW has very good matchup against fast aggro. As I have said before, control decks greatly benefit from the mulligan change. And I can't really see how aggro decks could compete at the moment against the monster of a deck the uw currently is. Unbanning of Mystical was just the last nail. Actually so much that we realized in testing that full set of wrath effects aren't really needed (see Soloviev's list).

As for 4c blood, well, it just loses to back to basics and even to it's own impossible manabase.

As for teching against control mirrors. Loam was indeed considered, but that would either mean adding a color or cutting one. What would you cut? Green doesn't really give anything else. Then again you can see decisions like cutting wog effects, playing more counters, cutting bribery and even playing predict. Again, what kind of decisions would you make to improve mirrors without worsening other matchups too much?

[MMD]

My view of possible mirror techs are:

-   G splash for loam engine (+Oath for the other matchups)
-   B splash for discard/(tutor) spells
-   Artifact ramp for accelerating threats (mostly PWs)

I am currently looking to include them all with a small Tezzeret theme and disregard the BtB plan (I am currently missing about 15 slots  ) One basic each plus all the talisman/signets should be OK against opps BtB and you can fight back with Winter Orb. But if RDW is another dtb in your meta this could become problematic...

But even if you want to stay UW. Why do you think artifact ramp is bad? Accelerating is always a useful thing to me. Why most of the finish players think otherwise?

If I would play in this meta I would choose to play darkbant aggrocontrol but I would do this in every meta  

Regarding Mystical Tutor. I can only shake my head that the council unbanned this monster, especially after the game slowed down to make UW a Tier 1 deck even without this card.

[Maqi]

Mana stones in UW are pretty bad actually...

You want to make a land drop every turn and keep counter up (or fake one) and cast cantrips/draw or removal or Flash-guys EOT. There is actually never a window where manastoning is a preferred play to the aforementioned routine (it may seem so at first glance, but in reality manastones are a trap).

[MMD]

This may be correct in a unnown meta but not in a UW infested one. What do you want o counter on T2-3 in the mirror? Better be the first one who can play out is threat with counter/discard backup IMO.

[Maqi]

I disagree here.

Let's look at the following typical sequence in the mirror:

P1: Island
P2: Island
P1: Island, Azorius Signet
P2: Island

Now...
P1: Island (totalling three lands and one stone for 4 mana). Opponent has UU up. Do you want to play a 4-mana threat here? I guess it could be correct to do so, because there aren't that many 3 mana threats your opponent might deploy after countering your threat (should he have a counter). That being said, there are some dangerous plays your opponent can make (TNN, V. Clique, Jace Beleren to name the most prominent ones). BUT: How many threats will you typically have here? My guess is 0 or 1. Having two threats in this scenario would be a solid reason to play one. But if you have only one, do you just blow it into a likely counter? I guess not.

So, on the play a t2 manastone versus control might not be the absolute worst, given a multitude of threats in hand. Let's look at the reverse scenario.

P1: Island
P2: Island
P1: Island
P2: Island (opponent has UU up). Now you have to even consider the risk of playing the manastone to begin with. You could walk into all kinds trouble here. Your opponent could have Remand, Mana Drain, Memory Lapse to gain tempo, he might have a 3-mana threat to deploy while you are tapped out having played your stone. (ASIDE: Also, from now on, you have to fear Dack Fayden, who might make an appearance in UWr, UR and so on. That would be a devastating play from your opponent, outtempoing you hard, 2-for-1-ing you and getting an engine going all with one 3-mana card).

The big question is: What are you winning? I actually outlined the most convenient occasions on which to have a manastone (which is on turn 2).  Even there it is dubious they achieve something special or will grant you a big edge over the opponent. Even there, there is risk. During any other time in the match, mana stones will just be worse than a simple land drop.

I don't even want to touch the frustrating scenarios of drawing a 1-lander opening hand + stone, where you could kick yourself in the **** for not playing a land in that slot.

[MMD]

Perhaps this is correct for UW, so I give in here.

I am looking more out of the angle of UWb Tezzerator which plays not only Signets but also Moxes and 2mana lands as I prefer to be the one who asks the questions and does not have to answer it. IMO the counter magic in HL is worse in comparison to the available threats in Uwb(x) colours. This also helps to avoid running out of time on tournaments. But this is certainly another deck and topic.

[Maqi]

I'm with you here.

If your deck can get more mileage out of manastones, they can become the cornerstone of a strategy (especially what you said, like tezzereted 5/5s, Sol-lands for broken T2-Walkers, Academy etc.). That is a different deck however.

On a side note: In a metagame, where there is a heavy presence of traditional Weenie-Aggro, manastones might be needed in UW, in order to cast Wrath of God soon enough to not die and jump ahead on CA. I just don't see this meta right now. And since we were talking specifically about the mirror, I think my point stands.

[ChristophO]

I would like to point out that it is also possible to play the mana stone on T3 (or T4) to either keep up mana for countering afterwards or even before and afterwards. I am not a big fan of a few manastones only because of the midrange match-up. In dedicated artifact ramp decks you will try to either overload the control deck (2 Threats in on turn), outpace them when on the play or "counter" one of their threats with a bigger one after they tapped out. There also is a lack of counterspells with the needed powerlevel in Highlander.