A UW control deck for Arena Historic.
Currently tracking bo1 Historic Event wins/losses here.
Card choices:
Main Deck
2x Gideon's Reproach - The worst card in the deck. Tried Seal Away at first but kept having it stuck in my hand vs Questing Beast. Will likely change it out at some point.
1x Narset, Parter of Veils - Really good card, may try to find room for a second copy.
1x Castle Ardenvale, 1x Castle Vantress - Good cards, but only one each. We need extra basic Plains for The Birth of Meletis, so only one Ardenvale. Vantress is less important than in standard because we have Search for Azcanta
.
1x Fae of Wishes - Since this is best-of-one, Fae of Wishes allows us to utilize our sideboard. We can use it to grab match-specific answers, situational cards, or just powerful finishers.
Sideboard
The sideboard is a built as a singleton wishboard for the Fae of Wishes in the main deck. I'll explain the card choices here.
Ashiok, Dream Render - Graveyard hate against the decks playing Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath, Underworld Breach, and/or Emry, Lurker of the Loch. Often nuking the graveyard once or twice is enough to cripple the decks enough to allow us to stabilize.
Commence the Endgame - Card draw for the mirror. Uncounterable, instant speed, and adds a threat to the board.
Dawn of Hope - Stabilizer against aggro, game winner vs a lot of black decks.
Deafening Silence - Hate against Underworld Breach and Emry, Lurker of the Loch decks.
Dovin's Veto - Sometimes you just need one more counter.
Elspeth Conquers Death - Arguably the best card from THB, absolute powerhouse. Fantastic in the main, fantastic as a wish target. Has targets in every deck I can think of at the moment. From Tempest Djinn to Bonecrusher Giant to Teferi, Time Raveler.
Emergency Powers - Often a win-the-game button in combination with Narset, Parter of Veils. Cast it in your opponents' draw step to completely empty their hand.
Finale of Revelation - Another card that can win you games against the over-the-top value decks as well as a late-game shuffle in the control mirrors.
Heliod's Intervention - Versatile card against artifact/enchantments and red/gruul aggro.
Ixalan's Binding - A catch-all answer to permanents that the deck can find hard to beat, be it Witch's Oven to Adanto Vanguard.
Mass Manipulation - Reasonable against decks trying to play value creatures and planeswalkers, often UG and bant decks.
Sorcerous Spyglass - Hits walkers, Witch's Oven, Emry, Lurker of the Loch, even the occasional Dream Trawler.
Soul-Guide Lantern - Pretty much the same as Ashiok, Dream Render, but the instant-speed activation makes it a bit better against combo, while the one-time use makes it a bit worse against the value decks. Also only costs a single mana, so it's a great option when you really need a cheap answer to an imminent threat.
Teferi, Hero of Dominaria - Best card in the deck. I put the 4th copy here in the board to help lower the curve in the main deck, and if you find yourself with Fae of Wishes but don't know what to get, this is a fantastic choice.
Time Wipe - Kills everything with the minor upside of bouncing your Fae of Wishes.
2020-03-04
-1 Chemister's Insight, +1 Realm-Cloaked Giant - I found that I wanted another sweeper more often than I wanted more card draw, so I swapped out a card draw spell for a 5th sweeper. I chose Giant over Time Wipe for the time being because the only giant you really see is Bonecrusher Giant. If that winds up being more relevant than playing our Giant as a blocker/finisher followup to the sweeper, I'll swap in Time Wipe.
I think Settle the Wreckage might be worth trying out as well, but the land-fetching aspect and not being able to cast it against Gruul Spellbreaker are both very notable downsides.
