26 Land or 25 land and another think twice?
Standard forum
Posted on April 3, 2013, 11:58 a.m. by Demarge
After realizing that I'll need several hours of playtesting against a good Junk Rites player to be good at playing the mirror I've decided I'd try making my Jace, Stealer of Staffs more effective against fast aggro decks (without losing too much of an edge against the slower decks). One of the problems I've always gotten with the deck is that it often mana screws me even when it's running 26-27 land. I'm mostly wondering if I should keep the land count at 26, or if I should up my Think Twice count by cutting a plains and hope the extra card draw smooths out my mana issues.
theemptyquiver says... #3
I always run 24 lands, unless my CMC is < or = 2.5
I don't think you'd be any worse trying 25. it's just preference.
think twice is nice, though and will help you burn through cards.
April 3, 2013 2:25 p.m.
KrazyCaley says... #4
That deck will be fine with 25 lands. It's two color and tops out at Staff of Nin ; 25 seems about right.
April 3, 2013 2:56 p.m.
detentionsphere says... #5
Control decks should ALWAYS have at least 25, if not 26, lands. To help with flooding cut the Gideon and Staffs and a Blind Obedience for 2 more Sphinx's Revelation and 2 more Think Twice . The thing about Think Twice that's great is it's good if you're mana screwed AND good if you're not. Revelation allows you to convert all your lands into cards and life.
April 3, 2013 11:19 p.m.
I already run into the issue of having beaten my opponent, but am unable to find the wincon. Upping my draw spells would make the problem less of one, but I don't enjoy increasing my reliance onto less wincons, I have played against some control decks with such heavy reliance, it was very entertaining to hear them admit their deck no longer had a way to win, also the meta's around me have even the card shops out of stock of revelations.
On a similar note, the popular esper control decks are starting to run only 24 land, probably due to their now heavier use of Thought Scour and bant control will sometimes run 24 land with the combination of Farseek and Think Twice to smooth out their draws and mana.
April 4, 2013 12:08 a.m.
detentionsphere says... #7
...why would Esper Control run Thought Scour ? I assume you are talking about Esper Flash. Also, yeah, finding wincons is a problem, but with 4x Think Twice and 4x Revelation it really shouldn't happen too often.
JoeyMako says... #2
I've always played with 24/23 lands, and 24 should be fine for your deck.. Anyway, 25 lands and Think Twice would probably work better than 26 lands. I run a 20 lands Gruul and the best cards against this kind of aggro decks are Blind Obedience , Detention Sphere and Supreme Verdict . Rapid Hybridization is good, and an overloaded Cyclonic Rift would do well against weenie.
April 3, 2013 1:21 p.m.