Standard UW Control

Hi again, and welcome to my first look at a serious constructed format on the blog! I've been playing UW pretty much constantly since Scars was released, and I'm confident now that I've got a plan against the major strategies in the format.

The driving force in my getting behind this deck was a desire to play with Venser, the Sojourner. Momentary Blink is one of my favourite cards, so having a free one each turn seems like something I want to do. There were also a number of new Scars cards that I thought would combine well with him:

In addition to the following older cards:

My first builds of the deck centred around trying to abuse Trinket Mage, fetching Everflowing Chalice and Voltaic Key. Using Contagion Clasp and Contagion Engine to both control the boards and pump up the counters on planeswalkers and Chalices. This in turn lead me towards Lux Cannon as the big finisher in the deck, pairing with Venser to remove every permanent from the other side of the board.

The first builds of the deck functioned fine, and although they had a great control matchup there wasn't quite enough early game to survive against Boros or Valakut. This meant that, despite some good match ups, it was worse against the field than the stock UW deck.

This wasn't a reason to give up. On the contrary, the strong control pairing gave me a decent platform to work from. Most importantly, the deck was great fun to play and had several powerful combinations. It was a lot like the old Super Friends deck from last season, except that the planeswalkers (both Jaces and Venser) weren't as able to protect themselves from any nasty monsters trolling about the battlefield.

The next step was to put the metaphorical band back together, with Gideon on drums and Elspeth Tirel picking up backing vocals. Ajani was unavailable to tour as he was pursuing solo projects. The Trinket Mage/Lux Cannon package was too cute and slow for the current meta, and trimmed Venser and accompanying artifacts back to a more sensible level. The key was in maintaining the themes I wanted to play, but not trying to do cool things at the expense of the underlying strategy.

The percentage against control decks dropped, but now with a game plan against ramp and aggro the deck was far better positioned. With a little more tweaking, I arrived at this current incarnation:

Steve Deck Wins (Standard)

2 Sun Titan 2 Creatures 2 Spell Pierce 2 Mana Leak 2 Negate 1 Deprive 1 Stoic Rebuttal 3 Spreading Seas 2 Journey to Nowhere 1 Contagion Clasp 3 Tumble Magnet 3 Day of Judgment 4 Jace Beleren 3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor 3 Gideon Jura 1 Venser the Sojourner 1 Elspeth Tirel 32 Other Spells

4 Celestial Collonade 4 Glacial Fortress 4 Seachrome Coast 2 Scalding Tarn 1 Arid Mesa 4 Tectonic Edge 5 Island 2 Plains 26 Lands 1 Halimar Depths 1 Spreading Seas 3 Leyline of Sanctity 3 Flashfreeze 2 Baneslayer Angel 1 Sunblast Angel 1 Elspeth Tirel 1 Day of Judgment 2 Ratchet Bomb 15 Sideboard Cards

Those are some sweet numbers, no? Let me pick up the obvious questions here.

WTF is happening with the Jaces?

There are two main decks to fight against right now; Valakut and UB Control. Against UB it is key to win the Jace war, this means that even though big Jace provides you with more advantage on the battlefield, Beleren hits earlier and allows you to protect it with a counter sooner.

Against Valakut my strategy is to land Jace Beleren turn three and use the minus ability to try and chain into another. The important thing is just to keep the cards flowing against them; tapping out on your turn four for a big Jace is terrible since they'll just land a Titan in response.

I'm pretty sure Pat Chapin thinks you're a donk for leaving out Preordain.

That isn't actually a question...

Won't Pat Chapin think you're a donk for leaving out Preordain?

One of the major problems building UW is simply fitting in all the cards you want to run. I did have Preordain for a long time, but decided that simply playing the 26th land and playing three more spells was more effective for me. I also have access to four Jace Beleren and three Spreading Seas to cover my card drawing needs while also carrying out my core plan. Halimar Depths from the side ups the land count to 27 against control, and provides a little of the missing Preordain action.

Only two Mana Leak?

I noticed that with four Mana Leak I was siding them out far too often. Against ramp they can become plain dead cards quite quickly, while good players are able to play around them with ease. Cutting the number of copies lowers the chance I have do-nothing counters late in the game, but still leaves the possibility I have it. Spell Pierce is in the same position. The main cards I am concerned about countering are ramp spells and planewalkers, so Negate is the perfect replacement. The additional singletons mean that it's pretty difficult to work out exactly how many or which counters I have.

Did you forget to de-sleeve Contagion Clasp after that last draft?

The Clasp takes the place of Journey number three in this list, and is a holdover from the more Venser-riffic earlier builds. One is probably enough as it usually only sees play late game, and there are some cool things you can do with it. A useful interaction to know is with Jace, the Mind Sculptor against UB; if they have a Creeping Tar Pit, you can fateseal them and proliferate each turn to keep Jace at parity through their attacks. With multiple planeswalkers in play it obviously becomes pretty stupid.

Tumble Magnet? Couldn't you play real removal?

Tumble Magnet is one of my favourite cards in the deck, it plays a different role depending on the opponent's deck. Against aggro you're obviously concerned about keeping the most threatening attacker down each turn until you cast Day of Judgment. Against ramp you can suppress their early acceleration creatures or Chalices.

Surprisingly, it is most useful against control. Sorcery speed removal doesn't cut it against Gideon Jura, Celestial Collonade or Creeping Tar Pit, but Tumble Magnet contains all three of them. Sometimes the mere presence of Tumble Magnet means your opponent won't activate a manland, so you get the effect without even using a charge counter.

What do you do against [DECK NAME]?

How kind of you to ask!

Valakut

The Plan: The strategy I've had most success with is to use Spreading Seas to try and keep them off green mana sources. The aim is to push back the turn they are able to cast Titan on and have Tectonic Edge ready to deal with any Valakuts. I never counter mana creatures, as the risk of an early Summoning Trap into Primeval Titan is too great. I usually aim to counter the first Khalni Heart Expedition/Cultivate/Harrow (live the dream!), then play Jace Beleren and hope to ride him into more Seas and counters for their ramp spells. If you can keep them from getting more than one active Valakut eventually you can start recurring Tectonic Edges with Sun Titan.

Sideboarding: Big Jace isn't as useful in this fight, so I tend to remove one or two of them. Mana Leak and Spell Pierce can quickly become dead cards. Contagion Clasp, Tumble Magnet and Venser can all be replaced depending on the Valakut build. I bring in the fourth Spreading Seas, Leyline of Sanctity and Flashfreeze. Depending on the creature threats they have I'll bring in a combination of the removal; Ratchet Bombs for Avenger of Zendikar, Baneslayer for Gaea's Vengeance and so on.

U/B or U/W Control

The Plan: Control matchups are largely the same; you want to stop them getting a Jace into play and try to land your own. The game is usually a case of hitting as many land drops as possible and trying not to blink first. Spreading Seas should be saved for Tar Pits or Collonades for preference, although it is sometime possible to keep them off their second colour. Try not to expose your Tectonic Edges to theirs if possible. Conversely, it is often right to destroy opposing Edges when the opportunity arises.

Sideboarding: This depends a lot on what they have, although going up to 27 lands with the Halimar Depths is standard. The Leylines are good against UB, which will be bringing in targeted discard, but less useful versus UW where it will only mess with Gideon and Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Elspeth is universally great as a hard to answer threat, while Spreading Seas serves as a removal spell in this match up. Ratchet Bomb is a cheap answer to both zombie and angel tokens, Luminarch Ascensions and planeswalkers (given enough time).

If the first game went long it is also possible to just bring in all the angels, and turn into a tap-out deck that hopes to play threat after threat until they run out of answers.

Boros

The Plan: Boros is a tight matchup, but not unwinnable. Turn one Goblin Guide is awesome as always, but sometimes you can just get them with a Spreading Seas and buy enough time to bring Gideon online. Don't worry about protecting either Jace against attackers or burn spells, you are pretty much hoping that they're lifegain spells in this matchup. Tumble Magnet is important to keep your life total high and get them to over extend into Day of Judgment. If Goblin Guide is attacking, remember to use Jace, the Mind Sculptor correctly to get the free land draw. Fetchlands also gain the ability to Scry 1, so you can wait to see if you have a land on top before cracking it.

Sideboarding: There are plenty of sideboard tools depending on how they play. In any case, our main concern is surviving until a five mana bomb comes to save the day. They will usually have Koth of the Hammer in game two, so it's important not to give them an early window to resolve it. We can safely cut big Jace, Spell Pierce, Spreading Seas and Venser for butt-loads of removal and Baneslayers.

Vampires

The Plan: Similar to Boros, I just want to survive to five mana and control the board with a planeswalker. This can be tough if they have Vampire Hexmage main deck, but Spreading Seas is excellent against them and can often buy you the time you need. The key threats to deal with are Bloodghast and Kalastria Highborn.

Sideboarding: Unlike Boros, Spreading Seas is very good here. Leyline of Sanctity is also strong to counter their discard spells and the ability of Kalastria Highborn. Baneslayer Angel and the various Wrath effects can also come in, Elspeth provides cover from Gatekeepers. Again Venser doesn't provide any defence and I usually remove some number of Jaces too. Spell Pierce and Negate don't do enough to keep you alive in the early turns.

Well, that's about as much as I have for now. The deck is competitive against most of the format, with no completely hopeless match-ups. The most important thing is that it's incredibly fun to play with so many planeswalkers and you can frequently have three or four in play at once. Good luck if you try this out, unless it's against me!

Steve