Nice control deck Epochalyptik.

Have you ever considered using Curse of the Swine for targetted exile? it might be good with all the ramp.

can you let me know how you made that +1 button? I want to use it for my EDH Stax Primer

Curse of the Swine is an expensive sorcery that doesn't progress this deck's gameplan (combo quickly) and is not very reliable in terms of disruption, as sorcery speed only gets you so far and leaves you unable to use your countermagic. Take this deck itself, as an hypothetical example: It uses creatures to combo, yet they almost always come into play the turn they are used to combo, so Curse would offer no disruption against that (except for cornercases involving Leyline but that's irrelevant). So i don't think that card is qualified for a competitive deck like this.

What's your opinion on tidespout tyrant? With two mana rocks you can go infinite.

That is true Emzed, I was just trying to suggest something. I know there was a targeted blue exile spell that cost 2 and might have been an instant I'm just blanking on the name. It was released in the tarkir block and it had manifest mechanics too.

Also you aren't tempted to turn someones things into piggies? R U EVEN HUMAN!!!

@Perfect_Phyrexia You are thinking of Reality Shift,

And not everyone wants bacon during their EDH games

lemmingllama: That's a pretty bold statement. Bacon is among the finer things in life. The only reason I could think to turn down bacon during an EDH game is that it might get your hands and cards greasy.

@NarejED I'd much rather have my Avacyn, Angel of Hope than a side of bacon. Of course, I'd always love both. Someone just needs to Donate me a pig or two.

You have a nice deck. I just see that in my meta there are very diffrent decks. When a Torpor Orb or Humility resolve you can't win anymore and you have only one Nature's Lore. I would play at least a Maelstrom Pulse just to be save.

There is also Cyclonic Rift as an answer to whatever permanent causes problems. Besides, i think Beast Within or Krosan Grip are usually better than Maelstrom Pulse if you want another effect like that.

@xavrr: Telepathy is theoretically useful, but I'm not convinced that it's worth including in the deck over other cards. I would have to playtest to know for sure, but it seems to me like a Mana Web sort of card. It's a cute control effect that paints a target on itself and doesn't necessarily win the game.

@Emzed: I sort of see where you're coming from with Jace, Vryn's Prodigy  ^Flip, but I don't think it's as close a comparison to Snapcaster Mage as you argue. Snapcaster Mage is in the deck because it provides instant value and also interacts with the combo. Jace, Vryn's Prodigy  ^Flip does have a similar function, but it's slower and its other abilities aren't really relevant. I concede that the loot effect is more appealing in the Vancouver mulligan environment, but I question whether it's worth it to staple that effect to a Snapcaster Mage at the expense of speed and safety (summoning sickness leaves it vulnerable for a turn before I can get any value out of it).

In all likelihood, I'd probably be able to loot with it and it would then be attacked before I could get more than one loyalty ability out of it. Although most competitive multiplayer decks don't focus on combat, utility creatures can still do damage, and I'm not about to lose a Deathrite Shaman to keep Jace, Telepath Unbound alive for a +1 activation the second turn it's out.

As for Dark Petition, I have mixed feelings about it as a card. It's certainly playable in casual and semi-competitive decks (in much the same way as Increasing Ambition or Diabolic Tutor), but the cost is very steep for a sorcery-speed tutor. It's likely that I'd be able to get two cards with it at the point at which I could afford to cast it, but I don't think it's more effective than using, say, Demonic Tutor and leaving mana open for a counterspell the next turn.

@Perfect_Phyrexia: Emzed's response is pretty much on point. Curse of the Swine is a slow and expensive form of removal. At the point at which I need to remove multiple creatures, Toxic Deluge and Damnation are both superior. I'd sooner play Pongify if I needed more removal. Indestructibility isn't super prevalent, so I'm comfortable taking the low cost over the flexibility to answer more kinds of threats.

@atgarnett: Tidespout Tyrant is one of those combo-only cards that I tend to eschew in decks like this. I'd rather the combo cards be functional as utility cards if necessary. The fact that it doesn't depend on Palinchron or Deadeye Navigator is a plus, but I hesitate to include a tangential card just for the sake of having an out that I'll only need once in a great while.

@Mr_M03: Admittedly, one of the weaknesses of this deck is the lack of removal available for threats on the board. I tend to favor counterspells because they're a more flexible and preemptive measure that can prevent more things from happening (the caveat being that they have immediate resource demands and are useless if not enabled every turn). I tend also to dislike expensive and/or slow removal spells because they're so often dead cards.

Can you explain how Intuition works in this deck?

The running joke is that Intuition is largely based on intuition.

For example, if you can combo next turn and you need a way to protect the combo, you could search for the three free counterspells or others as appropriate. You could also search for three tutors if you want to lower the risk of someone knowing denying what you actually want. Finding cards with redundant effects is one of the more effective ways of using Intuition.

You could also use it to find combos (e.g., find Deadeye Navigator, Phantasmal Image, and Ghostly Flicker because they're (roughly) interchangeable. Some people find Strip Mine, Wasteland, and Crucible of Worlds to answer lands.

Thanks, couold you also explain how Ghostly Flicker wins?

Epochalyptik would you ever want a Nevermore like effect in this deck, because Declaration of Naught can really screw some people over if it resolves.

That's covered in the primer.

You use Ghostly Flicker + Eternal Witness + Palinchron/Peregrine Drake to make infinite mana by bouncing the creatures and recurring Ghostly Flicker, netting mana each time.

Declaration of Naught can be alright in certain scenarios, but it typically just forces a counterspell or removal spell, needs to be played preemptively, and only affects one card at the table once it sticks. I'd rather just cast Counterspell at the correct time and then use the time that it takes the opponent to reset to win the game for myself.

True True, I'm currently trying to change from a more casual edh mindset to one thats more competetive and cutthroat so i'm just adjusting to some of the cards I liked experimenting with in the past

Not sure if this has been asked in the past, but: I understand from the Primer that the deck is typically meant to be played in an environment in which you are allowed to make partial mulligans. But under Vancouver mulligan, how does your consideration for cards in the opening hand change, if at all?

Also, just wanted to say that this is a gorgeous deck. Much respect for the amount of time you've taken to put the deck together, updating it based on constant testing, and responding so promptly to comments on this post. Not only does it help me maintain my own deck, but the answers you give are great peeks into the mindset of how to play this deck at a high level. Keep up the good work!

I am curious. I have read your primer and was reading through your win con. Is your only win con Milling?

I play at my LGS, at like to play a few games or so, for a couple hours. Unfortunately, I am still new to magic and only have this deck assembled. I have been working on a Lin Sivvi, but it's either annoying, doesn't work, or people won't play due to inexpensive but still in test mode proxies.

So my question is, what would be considered some other win cons I could look into while still maintaining the board control aspect of the game? I feel this deck would get stale after 2 games by just milling the entire deck, and could be played maybe 5 - 6 times before it's shelved for a while.

I am a fan of the colors for sure, and am a fan of the card draw which is why I choose her. Also, her artwork is just gorgeous.

Also, what do you do about someone having a Kozilek, Butcher of Truth? With the Blue Sun's mill, the mill would never end, especially with that hitting the graveyard, and to my understanding from my game store explaining it, you couldn't target or exile a graveyard once Koz hits the graveyard, causing an infinite loop where a turn wouldn't end.

Am I wrong about this?

Blue Sun's Wins off the rule that says "If you would draw a card while your library is empy, you lose the game instead". That's the paraphrased version, anyway.

If I have 60 cards and get hit with an infinite blue sun's, I lose before those cards ever hit the grave.

Ah, my bad, I thought the ruling, and it seemed that's how the people at my store played, if you would draw a card on your turn. Thank you for that clarification.

@Perfect_Phyrexia: Understandable. Depending on your particular meta, you might get away with some unusual choices here and there. A lot of the deck should still be optimized, though.

@OhMyGodImOnFire: I haven't done much testing with the Vancouver mull. One of the issues I've been seeing, though, is that it's harder to get a good balance of lands and low-cost cards in the opening hand. This is, of course, a problem for all decks now, but the fact that this deck relies on some fairly expensive combo pieces means that there's a chance that one of the cards you'll have to keep (or that'll make you pitch a hand) will be one of those high-cost pieces.

And I'm always happy to be of help. I'm glad people are still looking at the deck.

@Ishio: As Silverf1sh explained, the deck doesn't really win through mill. What you do is you force people to draw more cards than there are in their library, which causes them to lose as a state-based action immediately after Blue Sun's Zenith resolves. As a result, reshuffle effects have no impact on this deck's win condition.

Because the deck is designed to win consistently, efficiently, and effectively, I'm not too concerned with variety in the approach. I don't mind winning through Blue Sun's Zenith ten games in a row.

The deck does, however, have a backup win con in Venser, Shaper Savant. It doesn't technically win the game, but putting your opponents' boards back into their hands usually causes them to scoop.

Some people prefer to run isolated combos like Mikaeus, the Unhallowed + Triskelion, but I don't really see a need to do so. I find that it actually decreases the deck's reliability.

If you're playing in a semi-competitive environment rather than a highly competitive one, you could probably get away with a few changes in the name of variety (as I mentioned in my response to Perfect_Phyrexia). For example, you might add Exsanguinate if you wanted to actually kill people rather than win by decking them.

I have, when I first built the deck, ran the Exsanguinate combo with infinite mana, I tried to stay away from Mike and Trik, as from a semi-competitive standpoint I don't think that's entirely fair to the other people, especially with how easy it is to tooth and nail ramp into it turn 3.

Thank you for explaining your win-con a bit more. It was an option I didn't think of before.

I am still trying to find something to bring in as a backup in case my infinite mana combo can't happen. I currently only have DEN, Palichron, and Phantasmal Image. I will have to try and get the other three creatures as back up.

What's your view Dryad Arbor? One combo I run is just that or Treetop Village, Intruder Alarm and Squirrel's Nest right before my turn. Usually as it's never really expected.

However, that said, my deck lacks consistency, and now that I kind of understand your win-con a bit more, I can figure out how to make mine more consistent instead of random.

Thank you.