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BMoor's Magic The Gathering Deck Garage
Mono Blue deck
July 5, 2007

Dear B'Moor,

            Thanks a lot for looking at my email, here's my mono blue deck I run in friendly competition.

 

Spells

Counterspell  x4

Cancel x4

Snapback x2

Wistful Thinking x4

Accumulated Knowledge x4

Piracy Charm x2

Reality Acid x2

 

Creatures

Drifter Il-Dal x2

Shaper Parasite x2

Aeon Chronicler x2

Brine Elemental x2

Vesuvan Shapeshifter x2

Riftwing Cloudskate x4

Primal Plasma x2

 

Land

Island x20

Dreadship Reef x2

 

            The idea behind this deck is to control the game through a combination of counterspells and card advantage, which I achieve through wistful thinking (used on the opponent), accumulated knowledge, and aeon chronicler.  I just wonder if I'm trying to do too much with the deck by having the pickles combo in there, since my deck isn't really built around it. One thing I had considered was taking the brine elementals out and replacing them with Serra Sphinx to power up the decks offense. Another flaw with the deck besides having a strong focus is its speed, because it takes me a while to get set up well with enough mana to hold for counterspells and still play creatures.  The reality acids are in there because I have trouble dealing with big threats that actually make it to the table.

            I don't play in any tournaments, and the only standing rule we really have in our group is no isochron scepters.  However, I am on something of a budget and would prefer I didn't spend to much just to modify a deck.  Cards I would like to keep are accumulated knowledge and wistful thinking, unless there are far better options available for drawing and opponent discard.  Thanks for the help,  Jon

This deck looks like a nice change from my usual work with tribal decks, combo decks, and deck based off of whatever the correspondent has in their shoebox of cards.  A good counter/control strategy is always pretty effective and fairly straightforward.  Let's see if I can get this one running on a higher frequency.

As usual, I'll start with your creatures.  You're right in guessing that the Pickles combo is too unwieldy here: Brine Elemental especially is just too expensive.  The Shapeshifter, though, is quite powerful and worth keeping.  Replace Brine Elemental with Shaper Parasite, who has a much more useful morph trigger.  This also lets you use a variant on the Pickles combo to repeatedly Shapeshift into a Parasite for multiple +2/-2 or -2/+2 effects.

Now, you site speed as your primary problem, so let's try to fix that by bringing your curve down.  Riftwing Cloudskate is a good card, but it comes down so slowly.  And even though the Drifter is a one-drop, it ties up an island that you could be using for counterspells.  You are not the aggro deck, my friend, so you don't need Drifter il-Dal.  And Primal Plasma is nice, but usually you'll want the 1/6 as a blocker or the 2/2 flier and you can get those for cheaper.  Out go the Cloudskates, Drifters, and Plasmas.  In their place go Dream Stalker.  A 1/5 for 1U is a good deal, despite the drawback.  And the drawback actually works quite nicely with Reality Acid: the Acid destorys its host when it leaves play, but it doesn't care how it leaves play.  Those should help you hold the ground and bring your opponent down to your speed.

That leaves four extra slots for your noncreature spells.  You currently have 8 countermagic cards, but I'd like to bring that number up.   Add in four of either Mana Leak, Rune Snag, or Dismal Failure (since you want card advantage).  And some more bounce would aid the counter suite very handily, so exchange Piracy Charm for either more Snapback, or Boomerang, or possibly Wipe Away.  Boomerang is likely the best because it hits all permanents, and still costs only two.  It's in the Core Set for a reason!

Finally, your lands.  Dreadship Reef?  Not bad, but I think Faerie Conclave (coming back in 10th) would be better.  You don't need to stockpile large quantities of mana, and you don't need Black mana.  A 2/1uncounterable flier would be of more help to you, sneaking in for 2 here and 2 there when you need it.  Urza;s Factory has a similar effect; since you want to leave your mana untapped to counter things, once you get to 8 lands you can start making 2/2's to overwhelm your opponent.

That turned out to be a shorter article than I expected, but I did say it was a simple deck philosophy.  Good luck, Jon!

~BMoor