Topic: U/B/W - First Deck

First deck I made myself. Can I get some thoughts on how to make this better, or how a UBW deck would even work?

4 Darksteel Citadel
4 Dismal Backwater
4 Island
3 Plains
1 Radiant Fountain
4 Scoured Barrens
3 Swamp
4 Tranquil Cove
4 Ornithopter
2 Erase
4 Mardu Hateblade
2 Curse of the Swine
4 Ensoul Artifact
1 Singing Bell Strike
2 Cancel
2 Divination
1 Ephara's Enlightenment
4 Jorubai Murk Lurker
1 Master of the Feast
2 Monastery Flock
2 Solemn Offering
2 Wall of Frost
2 Congregate
2 Divine Verdict
2 Indulgent Tormentor
1 Mahamoti Djinn
1 Ob Nixilis, Unshackled
2 Scuttling Doom Engine

Last edited by M3OWMLX (2014-11-10 21:26:19)

Re: U/B/W - First Deck

What is the goal of your deck? That is to say, are you focusing on cancels and shutdown (an Azorius or mono-blue style like Azorius Arrester or Arrest), destruction (mono-black, like Murder), controlling your opponent's deck (Dimir, like Mind Funeral), or life-gain and extortion (Orzhov, like Syndic of Tithes's Extort ability)? Or something completely different, like an artifact focus (Esper)? Once we determine what you are looking for in a deck, we can tweak this.

Also, if I used any term you don't know, I suggest you look it up. Even if it doesn't really help you become a better player, it will make you sound like you know more. Always a plus.

Re: U/B/W - First Deck

I have a friend who owns an artifact deck, maybe you should look it up: https://deckbox.org/sets/823424
Basically, turn 2 you have a 5/5 indestructible or a 5/5 attacking with Ornithopter, and then complement with Chief Engineer which makes it easy to play your Scuttling Doom Engine.

Last edited by Jay4prez (2014-11-11 13:44:53)

Re: U/B/W - First Deck

Okay, so it's an artifact deck. That helps me figure out how you want the deck to play out. The thing about your deck as it stands is that it relies on one card (Ensoul Artifact) to work properly. And you have a good chance in a 60-card deck of not drawing that until later in the game, when your opponent could have something like Centaur Battlemaster with a lot of +1/+1 counters on it, or been churning out stuff with an Arbiter of the Ideal. Or you could be going up against a red-white swarm deck that runs Archetype of Courage, Archetype of Aggression and Akroan Hoplite. And these decks would win faster than you could be sure you would get your combo on the field. Or they would just swing more creatures than you could block. This deck would cause problems, especially because it is tribal, letting every creature benefit from tribal effects.

So coming from that observation, we have a couple options:

First, we can find ways to slow the game down, maybe some small artifacts (Pillar of War or Bronze Sable or Opaline Unicorn, which also taps for mana) or tiny non-artifact blockers (Embodiment of Spring or Disowned Ancestor). That way, we can afford to wait until our combo comes together.

Or, alternatively, we can look into deck control (our deck, not theirs), making sure we get to our killer combo more quickly. Say, throw a few Oracle's Insight in there, maybe a Jace's Ingenuity. Now, with this strategy, we need to stall out the early rush that we might see from a Rakdos or mono-red deck. For that, we can throw in some Blinding Sprays (which also lets us draw), some Crippling Chills (again, we get card draw with it), and maybe a Thassa's Bounty in there as well.

Now, there are 3 things you should probably realize about my advice:
1) I am assuming you absolutely want to stick with an UBW (Esper) color scheme.
2) I am assuming you are playing standard. (If not, look into the Alara block for great artifacts.)
3) This is only a suggestion. Feel free to take my advice or ask someone else what they think of what I said. In fact, that would probably be a good bet.

Re: U/B/W - First Deck

I also would like to point out you have lots of solos in the current set you posted.
If you plan on playing a specific combo, you'll want to increase the chances of it occurring by repeating cards. For example, your Ob Nixilis, Mohamoti Djinn, your Radiant Fountain are solos that I would personally remove to add other cards that are part of the strategy.

Re: U/B/W - First Deck

Jay4prez wrote:

I also would like to point out you have lots of solos in the current set you posted.
If you plan on playing a specific combo, you'll want to increase the chances of it occurring by repeating cards. For example, your Ob Nixilis, Mohamoti Djinn, your Radiant Fountain are solos that I would personally remove to add other cards that are part of the strategy.

This is great advice! 

I would also suggest that Master of the Feast is a violation of this as well.  I would suggest replacing these with cards that synergize with your overall strategy better.  Perhaps 2-3 Heliod's Pilgrim?  It would almost add extra Ensoul Artifacts, and would add tons of value to the 1-ofs Singing Bell Strike and Ephara's Enlightenment. 

I would also consider moving Erase and Solemn Offering to the sideboard, since they can be completely dead cards in your hand for some games. 

Congregate is a card that's easy to fall prey to.  It looks like a great card to have, until you start to play with it and notice that one of three things usually happens: either a) You cast it for a ton of life because you have a ton of creatures on the field, so you win with a ton of life (you would have won anyway); b) You cast it and gain a ton of life because your opponent has a ton of creatures on the field, then you lose because your opponent keeps attacking you (you would have lost anyway); c) There aren't many creatures on the field and nothing really changes.  There's very few cases where a card that costs 4 mana and doesn't do anything to change the board state is better than another 4-drop that does impact the board.  Consider replacing these with something that saves you life (like Murderous Cut) by impacting the board.

My last piece of advice would be to tweak your lands a bit.  At least the 1-of Radiant Fountain should probably be replaced with fetchlands (Evolving Wilds is a good budget choice here).  Whenever you're running 3 colors on a budget, it's important to pick ONE to be your most important color (appears to be blue here) and splash into the other colors lightly.  This will allow you to run more basic Islands (for early 'comes into play untapped' sources), and raises the chances that you'll have your other colors by the time you need them (hopefully not until turn 4+).  Stay away from any double/triple symbol costs that are in your splash colors (like Master of the Feast) unless they have a good chance of just winning the game themselves (like Elspeth, Sun's Champion).

I hope something in here helps!