Wherein Michael J. Flores further discusses the one thing that matters most in the Reflecting Pool Control mirror match and displays a long back-and-forth battle between competing Stage Three strategies (possible spoiler: the one from Shards of Alara wins).
Last week in Top Decks I described a frustration with the Reflecting Pool Control mirror matches which was instrumental in my switching to Jund Mana Ramp for the New York State Championship.
That frustration was / is that the Reflecting Pool Control mirrors generally come down to State Three, where one player resolves Cruel Ultimatum and eventually wins… regardless of what either player did or how hard the other player fought during State Two.
After identifying this, I simply decided to switch from a paradigm of mana efficiency and card advantage in Stage Two (where most “Magic: The Gathering” is played) to a strategic game revolving around beating my opponent in Stage Three, that is, saving my Cryptic Commands for his Cruel Ultimatum even if if meant falling behind his Mulldrifters (or at least not scooping up some juicy Mulldrifter targets) during the second Stage.
This, I believe is still right.
The problem is that especially in sideboarded games, the crafty Reflecting Pool Control player can just play to force his Cruel Ultimatum regardless; for example he can wait until eight mana and play Cruel Ultimatum + Gutteral Response, or set up with a Vexing Shusher. It is basically impossible to outsmart this strategy. Like even if you sit back with double Cryptic Command on eight mana you will fail if they simply went first. Grok?
I know you grok.
Even in Game One situations, he can wait until nine mana to cover with a Negate.
So I just decided to avoid this dance entirely and play a more proactive Mind Shatter + Gutteral Response strategy at the New York State Championship.
So speaking of the New York State Championship, I made a video based on our reigning Champion Stephen Carpenter’s Reflecting Pool Control deck. Here is the aforementioned Reflecting Pool Control deck:
Reflecting Pool Control
1 Adarkar Wastes
4 Vivid Creek
3 Vivid Meadow
3 Vivid Grove
4 Reflecting Pool
3 Mystic Gate
2 Flooded Grove
2 Sunken Ruins
1 Fire-Lit Thicket
1 Cascade Bluffs
1 Yavimaya Coast
1 Oona, Queen of the Fae
4 Mulldrifter
4 Kitchen Finks
2 Cloudthresher
So interestingly, I immediately got into a Reflecting Pool Control mirror match where my opponent outdrew me on Cryptic Commands and got a slew of two-for-ones on me. Yet I was able to win it in State Three because he blew three Cryptic Commands on Cloudthreshers and Esper Charms and was out when it came down to the one card that really matters in the Reflecting Pool Control mirror: Cruel Ultimatum from Shards of Alara.
This was a really interesting back-and-forth battle. I hope you like it.
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PS I won Game Two very quickly with three Kitchen Finks on offense so it never came down to Stage Three shenanigans.
Brian David-Marshall wrote about a UK Champs winner he dubbed “The New Girl” (after my win with the Brian Kowal designed “This Girl” at New York States a couple of years back). I decided to make a video about The New Girl as part of a post-Champs Standard discussion for the mother ship.
This is it:
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The New Girl, Gravesend UK Champs Winner, by Ian Walters
Brian Kowal designed a new R/W homebrew creature deck that he used to win a recent Game in the Gulf “boat” Qualifier. His deck hybridizes Ranger of Eos selection with a Reveillark end game. It comes out fast and has a deceptive amount of power.
sb:
4 Gutteral Response
4 Vithian Stinger
3 Runed Halo
4 Wrath of God
Vithian Stinger seems a little loose to me, but I really like how the deck has played out so far.
If I were to change anything, I would add some spot removal — probably something along the lines of Lash Out or Condemn in the sideboard — because Brian told me not to play any spot removal in the main deck.
Irony of ironies, Brian won his Cruise Qualifier by swinging with a bunch of Siege-Gang Commander tokens, tripping Windbrisk Heights, and popping Wrath of God. For reals! Then he followed up with Ajani Vengeant to lock out the end game (opponent was Kithkin).
Anyway, give this one a whirl. It is interesting to play and quite different from basically everything else in Standard.
So this is the follow up to Thursday’s post about what to do on turn three. If you haven’t read it, check this out first: You Make the Play
I was actually quite proud of myself that I broke patterned thought and “slowed down” with the “turn two” play of Rampant Growth on turn three… I went for Swamp like most of you said you would.
But what is our strategy here? By what tactics will we accomplish our goals?
In this matchup we want to minimize creature damage. We want to keep him contained so that even if he rips the combo, it won’t immediately kill us. Our resources are limited… but so are his, so the short term objective is to get a two-for-one on your Firespout or Jund Charm. How do we ensure a two-for-one? How do we preserve card advantage?
I feel there is no point in playing the Civic Wayfinder at all at this stage.
However, there might be an even better play hiding in our options… an no one suggested it.
Josh Ravitz says to say “Go.”
That’s right, do nothing. But sulk.
Play possum. I’m stuck on two Forests. Do your worst. Give him a bad beat story for later.
The plan is to play Firespout next turn regardless. We are likely to pull off the two-for-one. But what if we play dead? Will he over-commit? We have the maximum chance of a three-for-one if we sit. Think about it.
What do we get from a Rampant Growth? Very little. In this game we are not on a harsh time limit. We are not going to play Chameleon Colossus next turn (probably). We are going to play Firespout. We can play Firespout with the resources at hand, in hand, and already on the board. The difference is that we can put the ball in the opponent’s court for additional card advantage extraction.
Why commit Civic Wayfinder if we are just going to blow everyone up?
Don’t we want more opposition coming to the party?
I think Josh makes a very compelling suggestion, and not obvious at all.
I don’t know if there is a right answer, but if I had the same situation again, I think I would pretend to be manascrewed. This one is not a resource race. If you kill their guys, you are likely to succeed.
I’m sure most of you find that “solution” thought-provoking, at least.
A fine hand against a non-Red-hating beatdown deck, I think you will agree; if not the speediest (but you don’t necessarily have to be the speediest to win this matchup in Game One).
I made Forest, Forest my first two turns; he played Knight of Meadowgrain on the draw.
So on turn three, I had an interesting pull: Rampant Growth (turn two pluck being Kitchen Finks).
My “scripted” play from my opening hand was obviously to start getting ahead with Civic Wayfinder.
So here are the questions:
What play would you make?
What play do you think I made?
What is the right play?
Brett Blackman just won the 2008 Pennsylvania State Championship with Faeries, battling through three Faeries mirrors in the Top 8. In this video, Brett outlines his strategy for winning the Faeries mirror as well as changes he would make to his State Championship-winning deck list.
Here is Brett’s Pennsylvania State Championship-winning deck list:
The key cards are Bitterblossom and Thoughtseize. Bitterblossom is the true threat, and Thoughtseize is there to steal the opponent’s Bitterblossom. Brett advocates aggressive mulligans to obtain these strategic cards or proxies for therm.
On the play only, you can keep a hand with Broken Ambitions so as to counter the opponent’s turn two Bitterblossom.
Ponder allows you to keep otherwise weak hands, and even hide a Bitterblossom one deep, so that the opponent’ can’t Thoughtseize yours.
Should you find yourself up against a Bitterblossom with none of your own, the 2008 Pennsylvania State Champion suggests using Agony Warp to set up a two-for-one in the hopes of putting the opponent behind on the board.
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I know this video is a little different, but I hope you liked it. Thanks and congratulations to the newly-minted 2008 Pennsylvania State Champion!
Just a quick update about my performance at the 2008 New York State Championships.
I’ll probably write something more substantial about this tournament — and outlining my deck of choice, maybe with a video — in the near future, but I figured I’d update you as to how I did.
I went 6-2, tied for the eighth position, but based on a second round loss I finished middle-of-the-pack in the Top 16.
The deck was great and performed as i thought it would. The only change I made from the previous post was to swap two Lash Outs in the sideboard for two Shriekmaws (which I foolishly bought on-site for $3 each). The reason was that I didn’t want to be too far behind against multiple Burrenton Forge-Tenders. In the sparse testing I did against the Weenie White decks, I crush unless they have multiple Burrenton Forge-Tenders; if they have multiple Burrenton Forge-Tenders, it’s really a question of how many of those little buggers “multiple” is… I don’t think I can easily beat three if they have anything else, and even two Forge-Tenders is rough.
R1 – Won 2-1 v. Faeries
R2 – Lost 0-2 v. the Red Deck
R3 – Won 2-0 v. Reflecting Pool Control
R4 – Won 2-1 v. Reflecting Pool Control
R5 – Won 2-1 v. Kithkin Backlash
R6 – Won 2-0 v. the Red Deck
R7 – Lost 0-2 v. Faeries
R8 – Won 2-1 v. Faeries
Versus the Red Deck in Round Two in Game One all my mana came into play tapped and I was just a turn off; it’s pretty frustrating to be on the play with a Rampant Growth and two Kitchen Finks and getting hit with a Stigma Lasher!
Game Two I had Lash Out to allegedly fix my draw and hit a Rampant Growth but sat on four mana for turn after turn with multiple Primal Commands and Broodmate Dragons in my hand, withstanding four (!!!) hits from a Demigod of Revenge and never playing anything.
I don’t have any real excuse for Round Seven; sometimes you just lose. Game One he got the monkey Faeries draw and successfully played his cards in the order they came. Game Two I had a Gutteral Response to cover a Cloudthresher but his answer was a Spellstutter Sprite. If the Cloudthresher resolves it’s a blowout for me; it didn’t so I went from twenty-ish to zero in two attacks thanks to multiple Scions. He showed a great deal of strategic ddiscipline in not blocking my Chameleon Colossus with his second Scion of Oona — I think most players would have crumbled and blocked — and that non-block was highly instrumental in his winning. Just the right play under pressure; the sad part was I was playing for Top 8 and he wasn’t! Random pair-down; he got me, then he didn’t even make it.
That said, I think the Jund Mana Ramp deck is superb against Faeries, though. Two other wins on the day, all the tools… You win most of the time, but not all the time of course. And on the draw, sometimes you just get Clique-Clique locked and never make any meaningful plays.
All in all, not my best New York State Championships. The sad thing is, the deck is probably done. In case you have occasion to play a deck that is generally very good against the Red Deck, very good against Faeries, and smashes Five-color Control (this is the ultimate reason I played the Ramp deck), I suggest Jund Mana Ramp (I make no claims about Reveillark or the mirror, friends).
As promised I am going to share my suggested deck for the 2008 State Championships.
I have been pretty good at this tournament in the past (won in 2006, finished 2d in 2005 losing the mirror to Julian Levin), usually playing an unusual deck for the metagame.
This year I am going to play Jund Mana Ramp. Because you probably care more about the deck list than the analysis, here it is:
4 Civic Wayfinder
4 Chameleon Colossus
4 Cloudthresher
2 Farhaven Elf
4 Gift of the Gargantuan
2 Primal Command
4 Rampant Growth
4 Fire-lit Thicket
8 Forest
1 Mountain
4 Savage Lands
2 Swamp
4 Treetop Village
sb:
3 Mind Shatter
2 Broodmate Dragon
4 Gutteral Response
2 Primal Command
4 Lash Out
My decision to play this style of a deck is based on two things, 1) the lack of good two mana acceleration in Standard (save Rampant Growth) and 2) the fact that I think that Gift of the Gargantuan is the strongest card for Standard Constructed in Shards of Alara. This card is exceptional. Until you have flipped up a Cloudthresher and a Treetop Village against a Five-color Control deck you don’t know how good it is.
I played the pair for a long while in my Reveillark deck (which I was going to play until about mid-way through this week) but I came to the conclusion that it was not strong enough against Five-color Control (which I estimate will be the most populous deck of the 2008 State Championships). The problem with Reveillark, Four-color Control, and similar decks was that I was worrying about stopping a Five-color Control’s Stage Three game plan of Cruel Ultimatum / Nucklavee by sandbagging cards like Cryptic Command and Hindering Light but the clever Five-color Control player (in sideboarded games at least) can just wait until he has eight mana and beat me with Vexing Shusher or Gutteral Response.
Ultimately I decided to tune towards a more proactive strategy.
The secret of this deck is that it plays very much like an Onslaught Standard era Beasts (“Bests”) deck. That is, it plays very deceptively towards card advantage. Jund Ramp is almost Blue in its implementation.
Gift of the Gargantuan – two for one.
Civic Wayfinder – two for one.
Farhaven Elf – two for one with acceleration.
… Right on down the line.
It’s like I have my own little squad of Mulldrifters.
The acceleration lets you get ahead of the opponent on mana even while you are proactively dealing with other aspects of the game.
The advantage is most pronounced in sideboarded games against Five-color Control. You ramp out your mana, test spell them with a Cloudthresher; usually they will counter this. Now you untap and go at it with Mind Shatter, ideally with Gutteral Response waiting. The game will usually be yours!
So anyway, that’s my deck, at least as of right now. This deck is pretty powerful and has some really good board presence and defense in an eight -pack of sweepers; it has a superb matchup against Five-color control, and has the tools to be competitive with Faeries. Broodmate Dragon came from Evan Erwin as a solution to Red Decks in State Three with Demigods crashing into me every turn. “Double Dragon” produces multipe relevant defenders.
Post any questions in the comments below and I will try to get to them asap.
Thanks for reading, and good luck tomorrow!
LOVE
MIKE
P.S. Were I not playing Jund Mana Ramp for States, I would likely be on Blightning Beatdown. After tonight’s Mock Tournament — where Brian David-Marshall went 3-0 — BDM said that he would be on Blightning Beatdown as well (Blightning itself being very powerful). Brian did a short writeup on the deck at Top8Magic.com.
Just in time for the State Championships! This is the third of three videos featuring the qualifying decks from the Pro Tour Berlin Last Chance Qualifier (LCQ). This Top 2 Faeries deck was played by Jorge Pinazo.
Like the previous two videos, this one was also built for this week’s Top Decks at magicthegathering.com.
Jorge actually hybridized a Wizards sub-theme onto his deck with Stonybrook Banneret and Sage’s Dousing. Sage’s Dousing is actually better than it might look at first blush as Mistbind Clique, Vendilion Clique, and the beautiful Spellstutter Sprite are all Wizards in addition to being Faeries.
There is literally no reason to believe Faeries won’t be a top deck this weekend.
Did you see how they snuck up on Extended even, putting someone in the Top 8 with a “Block” deck (more or less)? You had best be prepared for the little Blue men!
Just a reminder I will be updating here on FiveWithFlores before Saturday whereas I’m not sure if I will have time to post a pre-States video about my deck choice on YouTube. So make sure to check back. I hope you loved the videos!
Just in time for the State Championships! This is the second of three videos featuring the qualifying decks from the Pro Tour Berlin Last Chance Qualifier (LCQ). This Top 4 Blightning Beatdown deck was played by Oscar Almgren.
Like the previous Demigod Deck Wins video, this one was also built for this week’s Top Decks at magicthegathering.com.
Another preview for you!
Enjoy!
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Oscar’s Blightning Deck:
4 Bitterblossom
4 Ashenmoor Gouger
4 Blightning
4 Demigod of Revenge
4 Figure of Destiny
4 Goblin Deathraiders
I didn’t use Oscar’s sideboard hardly at all… When I tried this out I was mainly getting a feel for the starting sixty; Thoughtseize, though, is very good as everyone on MTGO plays Cruel Control. I think I would like more copies of Everlasting Torment, that is, the fourth. I like Infest the least but perhaps Oscar had a transformational mindset that I have not yet grasped with my limited play of his deck.
Not surprisingly, Bitterblossom is excellent in this deck, as it is in many decks. Having a steady stream of attackers freed up my mana for pumping Figure of Destiny, distributing burn spells, &c.
Goblin Deathraiders is yet another two, which I suppose is available only in this specific color combination (that is, it is actually Gold rather than hybrid like Vexing Shusher). This card was okay for me. It hits much harder than the other options, especially if you have the fire in your hand. I can only assume Magma Spray in hand is a beating for Kithen Finks (because this never came up for me… probably because I never sided in Magma Spray).
I didn’t play any “mirror” with this at all but I can only assume the B/R version is weaker in the mirror due to Springs and Bitterblossom (ouch, collateral damage, what have you). However the deck seemed much kinder to me than straight Red Demigod elsewhere. The added pressure of Bitterblossom really affects how opponents play (which you probably already know having been on the wrong end of one at some point in the last year… I can only assume). In a Red Deck it is much more gratifying than in a Blue deck.
🙂
Just a reminder I will be updating HERE for certain before Saturday and I’m not sure if I will have time to post a pre-States video about my deck choice. So check back Friday or so if you want to know what I am bringing. My favorite cards in Standard that no one plays with are Rampant Growth and Gift of the Gargantuan, so I have been playing them in a variety of decks (mostly Reveillark versions) but I think I have one, finally, that I am going to go with.
