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Mattedesa's Deck Garage
Dimir Discard/Counter
June 7, 2007

Today's deck came in like this:

DIMIR DISCARD/COUNTER DECK

Hi.. I need help with this deck.. It wins some but also loses some..
What it does is to use the power of black discard, at the same time countering to control the pace of the game using blue. It also uses Gold cards that uses both features at the time I want such as Consult the Necrosages. It is a standard deck. Can you suggest any improvements? Here's the Deck List:

Creatures (6)
1 Teferi Mage of Zhelfir
3 Augur of Skulls
1 Draining Whelk
1 Skeletal Vampire

Spells/ Artifacts (32)
3 Delay
4 Mana Leak
3 Perplex
2 Sudden Death
3 Stupor
3 Foresee
3 Consult the Necrosages
3 Wistful Thinking
3 The Rack
3 Megrim
2 Dimir Signet

Lands (22)
2 Dreadship Reef
9 Island
9 Swamp
2 Dimir Aqueduct

Any suggestion is welcome. Thanks!

After looking over the deck, it seemed pretty solid to me, so I decided to ask the writer to tell me a little more about his deck and the issues it has. This was his reply:

Thanks for the reply Matt! Here's some of the problems:

1. I tried this deck with Augur of Skulls but i cant seem to really use it. It usually gets killed, countered, or watever before it reaches upkeep so I can sacrifice it. I'm trying to finding a substitute creature. I'm thinking about adding another whelk or teferi. Or should i keep the augur? or substitute another non-creature spell. What can you suggest?
2. I'm also thinking of adding 2 more sudden deaths, or a damnation or two. If I do, what would I probably remove? Or do you think they are enough? I try to control my opponents hand through discard and counter, but if he gets a good creature in the game whenever I fail to have him discard or counter it, Problems start.
3. I'm thinking of adding one urza's factory, would it be effective?
4. Do you think this deck needs more counter spells? (I can add snags) or more cheap discards? (cry, funeral ,piracy) I thought about cheap discards because as you noticed I didnt put cheap discards but 3 to cast discards which come mid game. I read an article that says discard is most effective at the start of the game. Do you think my deck should follow that advice or should I keep my discard cards?

Thanx for your help!


Thank YOU for the reply! This helps me a lot as I think through ways this deck could be tweaked. As I mentioned earlier, this deck is pretty solid, but I do have a few thoughts on what you asked, as well as a few things I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest.

1. I'm surprised that Augur of Skulls isn't getting to use his ability. With his regeneration and your counterspells, I would think he would live long enough more often than not. But since, in your metagame, he isn't working, let's go ahead and drop him. With those 3 spots, I think you could afford to add one more each of Draining Whelk and Teferi. In the third spot, I had an interesting thought: Magus of the Jar. He would obviously be a late game card, but if you can activate his ability with Megrim in play (best to play during your turn when you have Teferi out so he can't take advantage of the draw), your opponent takes 14 damage when they discard their seven cards!

Also, you can use his ability in response to a spell you need to counter to give you seven more chances to draw a counter! Of course, play him only when you have a counter in hand to stop their attempt to kill your Magus before you can use him! And since we just added another win condition or three, I don't really think we need to muck up the high end of the mana curve with the Skeletal Vampire. He's good, but just doesn't seem to fit everything else that's going on here.

2. I like the idea of adding a couple Damnations. You are not often going to have many creatures on the board that you're going to be too concerned about destroying, and this would help in case they have something untargetable. We made room for one by dropping the Vampire, and I think we can make some more room by dropping the Signets. I know they provide good mana acceleration, but I think you're better off without those so you can keep your mana open and bluff the threat of a counterspell. In the other open spot, let's go with one more Island (or some sort of dual land if you can get it).

3. I don't think Urza's Factory would help anything in this deck.

4. Discard when used by itself as a method of disruption is best in the early game (as the article said), because the opponent is more likely to have good cards in their hand to get rid of. In your case, discard is part of the win condition, so discard is good anytime - unless they have no cards in hand, in which case The Rack should take care of them pretty quickly. As for having more discard or counterspells, I don't think you need more, but I think we can do a little better on your choice of cards. IMHO, Delay doesn't quite fit your deck. Your deck is, by nature, going to play long games, giving the spell a chance to resolve later, causing you to use another counterspell - a 2 for 1 in your opponent's favor. I would opt for a hard counter like Cancel. Sure it's one more mana, but with those Damnations we added, you should be able to take care of anything that sneaks through in that one extra turn. And with Perplex, while I see the synergy, I am afraid it's not a dependable enough card. It leaves the choice up to your opponent as to which option (having a spell countered or discarding their hand) is better for them. What if they've got no cards in hand? It's dead in your hand. I like cards that are always useful. I would suggest taking out Perplex and adding one more Cancel, one more Consult the Necrosages, and one more Foresee.

One other concern I have is that you may have too many sorcery speed spells. A control deck like yours wants to keep it's mana open as often as possible for at least the pretense of an impending counterspell. If this proves to be a problem, you could try Mindstab and/or Piracy or Funeral Charm to help keep your mana open. For drawing, Careful Consideration could be used as an early game instant drawer, or a late game sorcery speed drawer when you still have mana open. One other direction you might consider is putting in Underworld Dreams to pick away at your opponent. It would work very well with Wistful Thinking, and would be a 21 point damage combo with Magus of the Jar and Megrim, but that might be pulling your deck too far off focus.

So, ignoring the last paragraph of random thoughts, your revised deck might look like this:

Creatures (5)
2 Teferi Mage of Zhelfir
2 Draining Whelk
1 Magus of the Jar

Spells/ Artifacts (32)
4 Cancel
4 Mana Leak
2 Sudden Death
3 Stupor
4 Foresee
4 Consult the Necrosages
3 Wistful Thinking
3 The Rack
3 Megrim
2 Damnation

Lands (23)
2 Dreadship Reef
10 Island
9 Swamp
2 Dimir Aqueduct

I hope this helps, but the truly best way to get it just right is to keep playing your deck. Don't be afraid to try different cards. If it doesn't work, put it back the way it was.

-mattedesa