You Make the Play returns! This time it is Fae v. ‘Tron in Extended… So are you a metagamer or a savage miser?
It is Game Three.
Your opponent is on the play on account of you savagely destroyed him with Negate and so on in Game Two.
It is game three because even though you savagely destroyed him in game two, he made you look like a child — a child smaller than your Spellstutter Sprites — in Game One, exposing the severe inability of the Herberholz / Nassif-style Faeries / Wizards deck to deal with certain kinds of expensive threats.
Namely Mindslaver.
You conceded to Mindslaver but of course filled your deck with Negate, Annul, and Glen Elendra Archmage for Vedalken Shackles, Threads of Disloyalty, &c.
If you haven’t seen the deck (you have probably seen it because all the guys who have soap boxes to stand on have been saying it’s the bee’s knees, plus you are playing it so how could you not have seen it), here it is:
Nassif-style Faerie Wizards
3 Chrome Mox
3 Engineered Explosives
3 Umezawa’s Jitte
2 Vedalken Shackles
4 Mana Leak
3 Repeal
4 Spell Snare
4 Spellstutter Sprite
1 Stifle
4 Thirst for Knowledge
2 Threads of Disloyalty
3 Vendilion Clique
2 Venser, Shaper Savant
1 Academy Ruins
1 Breeding Pool
1 Hallowed Fountain
10 Island
4 Mutavault
3 Riptide Laboratory
1 River of Tears
1 Steam Vents
sideboard:
1 Tormod’s Crypt
1 Vedalken Shackles
2 Annul
1 Chain of Vapor
3 Flashfreeze
2 Glen Elendra Archmage
2 Negate
2 Threads of Disloyalty
1 Academy Ruins
Okay, back to Game Three:
It is your opponent’s turn seven. He only has six lands in play even though he has been a savage miser this game because one of his lands — a Ghost Quarter — is in the bin. He plugged your Academy Ruins (not realizing you are also a savage miser and are palming the other Ruins). He has just attacked your face with his Platinum Angel, so life totals are 20-16 in favor of the degenerate mana deck..
This is his board:
This is his graveyard:
(Simic Signet, Ghost Quarter, and Gifts Ungiven)
On turn two you sent Annul at his Simic Signet, his Ghost Quarter “traded” for your Academy Ruins, and his Gifts Ungiven was successfully stifled (not Stifled) by a Mana Leak last turn after he played his Platinum Angel.
Which means, yes. Savage. Miser. He has almost a double ‘Tron, a handy dandy Island, hasn’t missed a land drop, all-natural.
This is your board:
Not too shabby. You even have mana open for your Glen Elendra Archmage… twice if necessary.
Your graveyard is seven cards:
(Annul, Chrome Mox, Chrome Mox, Thirst for Knowledge, Thirst for Knowledge, Academy Ruins, and Mana Leak)
This is your hand:
Mana Leak
Spellstutter Sprite
Spellstutter Sprite
Riptide Laboratory
Riptide Laboratory
Academy Ruins
Tormod’s Crypt is on the stack.
I would do images to show your hand and to indicated Tormod’s Crypt being on the stack but I am tired of looking up hideous background images.
Anyway, the bad guy has two mystery cards in hand.
If I had to draw a picture of this game, in total, it would look, um, EXACTLY like this:
Okay You Make the Play-ers…
He is playing Tormod’s Crypt. Ye olde zero mana spell is on the stack.
… What do you do next?
LOVE
MIKE
11 comments ↓
I’d counter it with the Archmage.
I figure my options here are (1) counter with Archmage, (2) counter with Sprite, (3) throw up the random Mana Leak, and (4) do nothing.
Going in reverse order, I’m not fond of the “do nothing” plan because the Tormod’s Crypt does cramp my style, by turning my Archmage from an indefinite-use item (with the Lab) into a single-use item. Although I don’t care too much about any other graveyard antics, the Lab-Mage engine is just too useful in this game for me to want to give it up. After that, the Mana Leak plan is, well, a worse version of the Sprite plan, in that it counters nothing, and attempts to pick a fight. I was briefly excited about the Sprite plan, as the idea sprang into my head that I’d either counter the Crypt (yay) or pick a fight and burn the opponent’s turn. However, the Crypt is potentially a great feint, and I might pick a fight with Sprite only to find that the Tron player is happy to let the Crypt go, safe in the knowledge that I am tapped out and have no real on-board way to deal with a resolved Mindslaver. Ugh. So, with that in mind, I choose to pop the Archmage to counter the Crypt, because I’m going to be recycling the Archmage plenty soon enough with my Lab, the Tron player can’t really pick a fight about it (they’re not likely to have Stifle), and if worse comes to worse, I can also counter that Mindslaver attempt at the cost of losing the Archmage engine.*
*Which is worth is, since at a minimum, the opponent can waste the Archmage while they control my turn.
You activate Archmage targeting Tormod’s Crypt.
If you don’t then Archmage is one-shot anyway because he is going to Crypt you in response to persist. Why is this play better than simply letting it resolve, since after all, you get one more counter out of Archmage either way? Simple. Later the opportunity may arise for you to rebuy your Archmage with Riptide Laboratory. Furthermore, you also have Academy Ruins in your hand and those Chrome Moxes in your graveyard could prove important at some point if you draw a Thirst for Knowledge.
The problem with Spellstutter Spriting said Tormod’s Crypt, despite it being an incredibly juicy option since you are not going to have many other good targets, is it leaves you tapped out. If you tap out and either of his last two cards are business, you are going to lose this game.
i’m basically putting him on slaver and ruins in hand and if that’s the case i think there are two options: counter with archmage or not counter it at all. if you don’t counter it and he tries to resolve another spell this turn, and you counter with archmage, then the outcome will be the same as if you counter the crypt and they play another spell except you’ll be minus a graveyard or you could not counter and possibly counter the next spell with mana leak which leads down a whole different branch in the tree. if you counter with archmage and he doesn’t play another spell then that buys you a whole lot of time it seems plus you’ll still have a load of cards in hand. if you counter and he plays a second spell which you again counter with archmage then that leaves you with a mana leak and spellstutter sprites to fight with their other spells and angel. that being said i think i favor countering with archmage and waiting to see what comes next.
I think there are two decisions to make here –
Q1. Do I want to counter the crypt?
Q2. If I do want to counter it, what with?
Downside of the crypt resolving – I lose my tasty graveyard targets for the academy ruins I have in-hand.
Upside of the crypt resolving – I have mana up prevent one of the next two cards landing.
So what am I more worried about – him getting down the crypt, or his other two cards?
Worst case scenario – he has a mindslaver and a counterspell in hand. How can you stop the mindslaver from landing?
Say I let the crypt resolve – this then leaves me with several option open for counter-spelling the next spell that comes into play. However, the crypt will activate and I will certainly lose my graveyard and possibly the archmage.
However, I then have mana open to counter various different kinds of threats by keeping the sprite option open.
If I pop the archmage, my counter-spelling options come down to just popping the archmage a second time. However, I keep my graveyard.
My instinct is that if the opponent has a mindslaver and counterspell in hand – the worst case scenario – you may as well pop the archmage, keep the graveyard, and leave just enough mana open to prevent a mindslaver from landing and wear whatever else might come down the line.
So, yeah, I agree with those above.
How is this even close? “The Play” is clearly to back up to before the tournament started and play a red deck instead. You would be eating lunch right now with a 2-0 record instead of spending minutes agonizing over every spell the opponent can or could play.
If your time machine is broken, I don’t see any arguments other that the ones above – counter the Crypt with the Archmage.
Why not spellstutter sprite it?
I guess you could save the sprites to flash in and kill angel. Also, countering with archmage would let you counter 2 spells this turn instead of just one. Putting out sprite doesnt seem bad to me though… Unless he has a counterspell, in which case you lose the counterwar over whatever else he has in his hand, which could ultimately lose you the game. Its a tough decision.
Sprite is terrible because he can just let you Sprite the Crypt, then you’re completely tapped out and he resolves Mindslaver, which you can do nothing about once it’s in play (unless you topdeck that Nassif miser’s Stifle, which I wouldn’t count on).
The way I see it:
You counter with Archmage, you can counter one more spell (persist).
You don’t counter it, you can still only counter one more spell (timing with the Crypt).
But if you spend a mana to counter the Crypt right now, that leaves you only able to counter non-creature spells for the rest of the turn. Given that the opponent has 5000 mana available, this seems like a terrible idea. Just because they don’t have an opening for Mindslaver doesn’t mean they don’t have an opening for Sundering Titan, Darksteel Colossus, etc, threats that you can’t counter if you go down to one open mana countering a basically-irrelevant card.
If it is his turn 7 and has six lands in play (with ghost quarter in the bin) it means he has played land for the turn. You definately don’t Sprite as you have no Mana available for the play after (i.e. Mindslaver without activating).
If you Mage it, then you can still Mage there next play, unless it is an instant (gifts). If you let it resolve, then you get one activation from the Archmage before they remove it from the game with the Crypt.
If you let it resolve and they go for Mindslaver, you still have the play of Mana Leak for the Mindslaver or even Gifts.
Did we board in Stifle’s? If so we can let the Crypt sit and Stifle it at a future time.
My opinion is to let it hit and do nothing. Holding up the Archmage for a bigger threat and countering a more important spell, even if you only get one use out of the Archmage.
He has access to ‘Tron. He can pay for Mana Leak on Sundering Titan (and anything else that deck plays), and so Mana Leak is basically useless this turn. If you use one mana on Archmage, you can still bluff Annul. I don’t see why you would let Crypt resolve, especially since you have an Active Riptide Lab. If he plays another spell this turn you have to Archmage then you are down the Archmage anyway because of Crypt, plus you lose your graveyard containing Chrome Moxes.
There is no reason to play around a card that deck won’t have like Darksteel Colossus. I am utterly certain that you should Archmage the Crypt in this situation.
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