FerociousDoshi

Those games, by the way, on Friday:

Round 1: Loss: RDW.

Round 2: Win: Jeskai Tempo: This was pretty hilarious, I had to go totally proactive and he was responding to all my things. It was weird.

Round 3: Win: RDW: Basically the same deck as Round one. Better hand, I guess.

Round 4: Win: Bant Midrange: Actually a draw because we went to rounds and ran out of time, but he conceded to me so I'd get a pack on the condition that I give him a kickback of sorts from my reward. We went to rounds game 2 and I'd won game 1.

That last game I totally forgot to side in Clever Impersonator, but I did manage to Infinite Obliteration twice naming Ojutai and Monastery Mentor which was most of his win-cons haha. He eventually won with a well-defended Seeker of the Way.

Cool! I'm scared to give up the green. Thought many times of going to Esper or just Black Blue. But, feel that I will struggle with all the enchantments out. The addition of Green is soo powerful in mirror matches and control. Just torn with the direction I want to go with my deck right now. I like the Dragons theme and running superfriends- before they rotate out.

Honestly, The card I hate losing to most- is tutelage. Charms and sideboard good for that- with Green.

That's part of what I'm thinking of going Esper for- Utter End is totally a thing. A thing that also hits Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger. Plus the 4 turn clock of Dragonlord Ojutai is nice, and I've figured out that the thing with his conditional hexproof is like "Hexproof and a blocker until you untap so you have counters/removal to do things with."

Very true. The reason I put in Dromoka- it cant be countered and saves my spells for their turn. A big bonus to that- Lifelink. My problem with Dragonlord Ojutai is it dies to languish. On that note- that's why I am not running Icefall Regent. Might make room for Tasigur, the Golden Fang.

Yeah, that is a thing. I remember people talking about Languish as "The nearest thing to Damnation that standard is going to see for a long time."

Well, it isn't Damnation. But it's about as effective. Basically only difference is that one gets around indestructible, and one gets around toughness 5+

My problem with running Dromoka is that I would required haven to cast her (Him? Her? Pronouns. Do reptiles even have gender in the same way mammals do?). Do you find you can reliably have it when you need it? I feel like it would all too often result in a dragon being kind of dead in hand.

So. What Ive noticed, personally... If its in the graveyard, you can bring it back with Tasigur, the Golden Fang or Haven of the Spirit Dragon. Mana Confluence works wonders. I only have one- between that and the Havens- I haven't found it hard at all. With all the draw ability- I could draw and discard- if need be. For you, with your dragons- I might run Crux of Fate.

Let me know how you do this week, plz. I'm not ready to give up Sultai just yet.

For the record, Sultai whip decks still have promise for the next 3 weeks or so

I'd agree with Crux of Fate if my meta weren't 85-90% aggro. When rotation happens I may at least temporarily replace drown in sorrow with it though, maybe permanently.

But will do! I'll definitely report in on how it does Friday.

FerociousDoshi

I went 3-1 last night.

Roud 1: Win: RDW

Round 2: Loss: RDW

Round 3: Win: RDW

Round 4: Win: RDW

There is a lot of RDW in my meta.

yknow......a green splash would allow for Feed the Clan, and a white splash would allow for Dragonlord Ojutai/Healing Hands

Good job. Wow. RDW RDW RDW... Exquisite Firecraft is a thing.

Don't have that much in my meta- but some.

I have had a busy week, haven't been able to play. Ill keep watch- to see if you make any adjustments.

Good luck

Thanks.

lordmalphas, once BFZ comes out I'm going Esper. But I want to make the changes with a knowledge of the entire set, so for now I'm just leaving this as is. I'll start making changes next week.

Needs more lands. I ran 25 with scrylands in standard and a low curve, but this might need 26. Other than that, Anticipate is a very nice piece of filtering at instant speed, and Dragonlord's Prerogative isn't that great against non-control opponents. Also, Self-Inflicted Wound is a very nice piece of sideboard material.

I mostly disagree about Dragonlord's Prerogative. I feel like people see the uncounterable clause and then fail to recognize that it refills your hand. The uncounterable thing is nice, but isn't what makes it a good card in my opinion. That clause is hardly ever going to be relevant. I used to run both Anticipate and Self-Inflating Mattress, and I don't really like either of them. I do think I should maybe add another land, and since I do always side out 1 prerogative against aggro (which means pretty much always) anyway I'll drop one of those for another land.

I am seeing a multitude of lists running Ultimate Price over Murderous Cut and am growing curious as to why. Would you be so kind as to explain this to me?

I think because of the following:

Ultimate Price can be used turn 2 & 3. Especially relevant against aggro, which in my meta anyway is the thing that your deck has to be able to beat.

Dig Through Time food

Tasigur, the Golden Fang? I guess, mainly the first two.

Also, some people play Disciple of the Ring

For me it's mainly the first one.

Interesting, thank you!

No problem!

I don't think running 28 lands would be wrong in this deck, I'm not even sure running 29 lands would be insane, well, it might be if you're mostly facing aggro decks. Control decks are always hard to theorycraft before going into a format, but I'd play 4 Polluted Delta and at least 2 Flooded Strand to fuel Delve, along with a number of Prairie Streams and Sunken Hollows to let you fetch for the colour you're lacking. With a manabase that strong, you can more freely incorporate white cards in the sideboard, and if you want more flood insurance, you can even build that into the manabase with more Shambling Vents. After that, it really depends on what kind of aggro you're facing up against, you build control decks to suit the meta you expect, and then you test the hell out of them, the spells you have here seem reasonable if you're expecting aggro.

Fibbe, thank you very much for the input. The reason behind not including those lands is that I want to trade for them, not buy them... But honestly, I just... don't like White in BFZ. I mean, in addition to Shambling Vent, I do like Planar Outburst... But Roil Spout, not a bad card, has its equals or betters... And sure, Stasis Snare is cool, but doesn't hit plansewalkers like Ruinous Path, and the isn't something I want to be held up to. I just feel like U/B will serve me better sheerly because of the land base simplicity, while sacrificing very little.

I do totally agree though, once I can I'm totally getting deltas and hollows, but by trades preferably.

So, I'm going back to U/B.

AngelOfDivinity, U/B control splashes white for Dragonlord Ojutai all the time, and with the stronger manabase you get access to cards like Utter End out of the sideboard to stop problems you cannot handle as straight U/B.

Though now that I think about it, there are decks you can go that benefit from being three-colour, if you play white, you get to play Jace, Vryn's Prodigy  ^Flip, Ojutai's Command, and more. You can play Hangarback Walker in that deck, it'll be much more of a tap-out control deck, but with some very strong options, especially for dealing with aggro, and the U/B deck will likely fall under a weaker version of this, unless it wants to give up Ruinous Path as a removal spell and rely solely on counters and more narrow removal as you seem to have done already.

So far Angel, the deck looks pretty cool, but I've got a few problems with the deck, that I'll write about below.

1. Shambling Vent needs to go. This card doesn't block well. The lifelink might be nice, but you're better off running any other land, as this will most likely trade with a 1 drop, or a burn spell, and then you'll be out a land.

2. Horribly Awry is probably better suited as a Despise, or Transgress the Mind. These cards are much more active, and allow you to get more information on what your opponent is looking to do, and take their best creature (or planeswalker) out from under them.

3. Whether or not Eldrazi are a thing in the new standard, Ultimate Price should definetly dropped for Ruinous Path. The removal with a late-game creature stapled on is really useful.

4. I think that you should at least consider Scatter to the Winds, the card does late game stuff, and another counterspell is always welcome in Control. Especially when that counterspell does rad stuff like giving you creatures (sure it's extra mana spent, but a beater's a beater, no matter where it comes from).

Respectively:

1. I dropped white.

2. I see where you're coming from, but in my meta Transgress the Mind wouldn't really hit a lot, and the problem with Despise is that after a certain turn people in my meta tend not to have hands and just always play whatever they topdeck, so while it would be better for the first few turns it would be dead mid-late game, which is why I prefer the counter.

3. Good thinking. Since I'm running 17% less dragons now, I instead cut 2 Foul-Tongue Invocation and 2 Ultimate Price for it. Plus there is almost nothing with hexproof in BFZ, so hopefully the advantage that comes from the sacrifice won't be relevant.

4. It's a 2 of now.

To be entirely honest with you, I've been considering running Sultai Control, and you could probably consider it too.

Kiora, Master of the Depths keeps your creatures from being tapped for too long, helps ramp you up to your end game stuff, and fuels Dig Through Time and Tasigur, the Golden Fang.

Nissa, Vastwood Seer  ^Flip definetely doesn't look like a control card either right? But her +1 when she flips is so useful. She also forms Elementals for you to add to your small army of creatures.

So the two cards I'm recommending give lots of land. With this much land, you'll be able to filter through your library in no time, getting to all the juicy spells in your deck, and drawing cards all the way. But where does all the excess mana go while I'm digging through my library? It all goes into Villainous Wealth, which lets you dig through your opponent's library for all their best stuff.

So no, there's not a whole lot of stuff to splash green for, but what is there is surely pretty looking pretty good, I know I'm excited at the very least. Honestly, with the new lands in standard, I doubt you'll have any trouble's getting 3 colors on the field. You also get Woodland Wanderer. I mean, come on.

This deck used to be Sultai, actually, and I took 1st place at FNM one week with that, but I concluded that really everything I had in green I had options for in U/B... just like my conclusion now with White.