Daily Dose 47 - Standard

Daily Dose of Standard

KrazyCaley

17 March 2013

2040 views

vs. Monxide

I updated Bolas AGAIN. Here's how it looks now:

Bolas for a Better Tomorrow

Standard* KrazyCaley

SCORE: 107 | 506 COMMENTS | 23119 VIEWS | IN 42 FOLDERS

Game 1

Enemy wins the toss and plays first. He keeps his opener

Caley keeps an opener of Island, Swamp, Devour Flesh, Chromatic Lantern, Counterflux, Dreadbore, Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker

Nice solid opening hand.

Turn 1

E plays Swamp and passes.

C draws Sulfur Falls, plays Island, and passes.

Turn 2

E plays Swamp and passes.

His deck remains a mystery for now.

C draws Counterflux, plays Sulfur Falls, and passes.

Turn 3

E plays Swamp and passes.

Very quiet from the other side. I am unsure as to what it could be, as of yet.

C draws Sulfur Falls. He plays Swamp and casts Chromatic Lantern, then passes.

Not too worried about leaving counter mana open since I can answer practically anything with other cards in hand.

Turn 4

E plays Watery Grave untapped and passes. (C 20, E 18).

This is representing a counterspell, or perhaps he has a Think Twice. This could still be any number of decks, but U/B mill probably wouldn't have this many Swamps this early, and Esper Control would have way more nonbasic lands.

C draws Staff of Nin. He plays Sulfur Falls and passes. End step, E casts Forbidden Alchemy, discarding Divination, Island, Dimir Charm.

Interesting. Still no solid clues as to what this deck is, though, although it obviously has a few control elements.

Turn 5

E plays Island and passes.

U/B mill, this is not.

C draws Desolate Lighthouse and plays it. He passes.

Not going to cast the Staff yet. Decks that remain ominously silent while building up mana should be treated with caution, counterspell-wise.

End step, E casts Forbidden Alchemy, discarding Sign in Blood, Heartless Summoning, Divination.

Finally tipping his hand. This is a Maniac-Chimes deck. Sam Black of Daily MTG posted this decklist from a creative Guatamalan MTG player a few days ago, and MTGO has had a few people running this idea on since then. You can go read the article here, but if you want to stay here, the basic idea is to have 4x Sphinx of the Chimes and 4x practically everything else (mostly draw spells and counterspells), then you get out a Sphinx and try to draw your entire deck, then you cast a Laboratory Maniac, draw one more time, and win. Heartless Summoning is there to let you cast Sphinx and Maniac easily while leaving mana open for other endeavors. It's dangerous and wins instantly if not responded to, and it cannot be responded to at sorcery speed. Fortunately I have the right deck for the job, as counterspells and instant speed removal should handle things well enough.

Turn 6

E plays Swamp and passes.

He must still be looking for Sphinx of the Chimes, or else be waiting for me to tap out. I'm betting the former.

C draws Mountain and plays it. He passes. End step, E casts Forbidden Alchemy, discarding Mutilate, Divination, Heartless Summoning.

Turn 7

E casts Sphinx of the Chimes and passes. End step, C casts Devour Flesh.

Daring him to try and combo out; I have counterspells.

In response, E discards 2x Dissipate and draws four. Then he passes priority, Devour Flesh resolves, and the Sphinx dies. (E 24, C 20). He discards Dimir Charm to get back down to 7.

C draws Murder. He casts Staff of Nin and passes.

This looks unconscionably risky on the surface, but I have my reasons. My thinking is that he has to tap out to cast Sphinx of the Chimes, and thus can't combo out on his own single turn, thus I'll get a chance to use Murder on any Laboratory Maniac he casts.

Turn 8

E plays Drowned Catacomb. He casts Sphinx of the Chimes and passes. Staff of Nin pings him for 1. (E 23, C 20).

Man, I am not used to dealing damage with this deck.

C draws Mystic Retrieval in the upkeep, then Dreadbore. He casts Murder on the Sphinx.

The right play may be to cast the sorcery Dreadbore instead and reserve Murder for my opponent's turn, but I am trying to encourage him to draw his entire library, or nearly so, because I can respond with Counterflux to his shenanigans and beat him. Hopefully by casting an instant, and tapping out last turn, I am telling him that I don't understand what he's doing, and he is safe to just combo out whenever he chooses.

In response, E discards 2x Sign in Blood and draws four, then does the same for 2x Dimir Charm, 2x Mutilate, and 2x Devour Flesh. Then he passes priority and the Sphinx dies. C passes.

Turn 9

E plays Drowned Catacomb, then casts Divination. Then he casts Heartless Summoning and passes. End step, C uses the Staff of Nin. (E 22, C 20). E has to discard 4x Island, 2x Watery Grave, and Drowned Catacomb to get back to 7.

He will combo out next turn. I just need to sit on my responses.

C draws Devour Flesh, then Barter in Blood. He passes, discarding Mystic Retrieval.

Sorry Bolas, but I'd be a fool to cast you here. Just sit back and relax.

Turn 10

E plays Island and passes.

He knows. He's just going to wait for me to drop my defenses.

C draws Dreadbore and Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker. He does nothing and passes. End step, E flashes back Forbidden Alchemy discarding Swamp, Forbidden Alchemy, and Watery Grave. C discards Barter in Blood to get to 7.

Turn 11

E plays Drowned Catacomb. He does nothing and passes. He discards Swamp to get to 7.

C draws Drowned Catacomb and Gilded Lotus. He plays Catacomb, casts the Lotus, and passes.

Him, in chat - "Don't you have Bolas or something?" Why yes I do, thank you.

End step, E flashes back Forbidden Alchemy discarding Swamp, Heartless Summoning, Sign in Blood. He has 1 card left in his library.

Turn 12

E casts Sphinx of the Chimes. Then he casts Laboratory Maniac, but it runs into Counterflux, and E concedes.

Per Sam Black's suggestion, he has included only one copy of the Maniac. He remarked after this game that Counterflux was really good, as his couple of counterspells did nothing against it. Look, no matter how badly you want to explain to your opponent how your deck is really cool, wait until after the match. Now I know he runs 4x Dissipate, which incidentally increases my confidence that this deck hews very close to that MTG article, which runs 4x Negate in the sideboard.

Sideboarding

C boards in 3x Slaughter Games, 3x Essence Scatter, 2x Dissipate, and boards out 4x Barter in Blood, 3x Mystic Retrieval, 1x Murder.

I didn't realize until just now that I had absent-mindedly clicked Murder instead of Dreadbore. I often board out Murder, but it is obviously not the right choice to get rid of here.

Game 2

E plays first and keeps his opener.

C keeps an opener of Watery Grave, Drowned Catacomb, Devour Flesh, Murder, Think Twice, Counterflux, Gilded Lotus.

Turn 1

E plays Watery Grave tapped and passes.

C draws Murder, plays Watery Grave tapped, and passes.

Turn 2

E plays Drowned Catacomb. He casts Sign in Blood on himself and passes. (C 20, E 18).

C draws Essence Scatter. He plays Drowned Catacomb and passes.

Turn 3

E plays Island and passes. End step, C casts Think Twice drawing Island.

C draws Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker. He plays Island and passes. End step, E casts Forbidden Alchemy discarding 2x Negate and Sphinx of the Chimes.

Turn 4

E casts Heartless Summoning and passes. End step, C flashes back Think Twice, drawing Dreadbore.

C draws Think Twice. He casts it and draws Devour Flesh. He passes and has to discard Dreadbore and Murder to get to 7.

Bad play. If he plays a land, he can combo out next turn thanks to Heartless Summoning. I was frustrated about not getting any lands (especially black to fuel my Murder, and tried Think Twice thinking that if I got a land, I could make my land drop and still have Essence Scatter up, but I got unlucky, did not draw a land, and am now vulnerable. The better play by far is just to sit on the Essence Scatter.

Turn 5

E casts Sphinx of the Chimes. He discards 2x Mutilate to draw four, then 2x Dissipate to draw four more, then 2x Dimir Charm to draw four more. This goes on for some time, then when he has under four cards, E casts Laboratory Maniac, then C concedes.

Carelessness will cost you, or me in this case.

Sideboarding

C boards in 2x Pithing Needle, out 2x Dreadbore

I neglected to notice that I still had a Murder sideboarded out.

Game 3

C plays first, and keeps his opener of Watery Grave, Island, Swamp, Mountain, Gilded Lotus, Slaughter Games, Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker.

What is otherwise an unacceptable hand is made into practically a forced win with the inclusion of a single Slaughter Games, a deadly weapon available to all Grixis control decks. He cannot escape, for the earliest he can cast a Sphinx of the Chimes is turn 4. (Turn 2 Heartless Summoning and 2 lands = 4 of the needed 6 mana, turn 3, another Heartless Summoning and a land gets you to needing only 2 mana to cast a sphinx, but with only one land open, or alternately, just playing a land gives you three mana, but with four needed to cast the Sphinx. Thus, turn four is the minimum, and I will cast Slaughter Games before he can cast Sphinx of the Chimes. Thus my victory is practically a certainty, since Slaughter Games is uncounterable.

E mulligans to six.

Turn 1

C plays Watery Grave tapped and passes.

E plays Watery Grave tapped and passes.

Turn 2

C draws Chromatic Lantern, plays Mountain, and passes.

E plays Swamp and casts Heartless Summoning, then passes.

Turn 3

C draws Gilded Lotus, plays Swamp, and casts Chromatic Lantern, then passes.

E plays Island and passes.

Turn 4

C draws Swamp and plays Island. He casts Slaughter Games and E concedes after jokingly hurling a Dissipate at it.

Saving me the necessity of naming a card. It's actually a tough choice given my hand; with more answers I'd be inclined to pick Laboratory Maniac, which absolutely prevents him from winning except by beating down with Sphinx of the Chimes, but with no answers for the Sphinx in hand, I might have picked it instead. On reflection, I think Sphinx is indeed the right call; though he does have a good bit of draw, it's limited by his mana, and I am confident in my deck's ability to draw a Counterflux or resolve Bolas prior to then. Of course, I'd also be confident in its ability to draw enough kill spells to deal with any Sphinxes, even with none in hand.

Thoughts

This is a fast, very dangerous combo deck capable of frequently winning at once on turn 4, a turn when a lot of decks like to tap out for things. However, it is very much a combo deck, and suffers to the usual weaknesses of combo decks. Counterspells, ESPECIALLY Counterflux are very bad for this deck, as is instant-speed removal, though the deck ameliorates that problem somewhat by trying to pack its own counterspells. From Bolas' perspective, this deck is easy prey, as Bolas' triple threat of Counterflux, instant-speed removal, and Slaughter Games is too much to overcome- any of the three wins easily against the combo by itself, and Counterflux and Slaughter Games do not even give the Maniac-Chimes deck a chance to defend itself. Just a bad matchup for the combo deck.

Look out, though. If you didn't see this deck at the last FNM, you may next week.