Hello happy readers! I hope that your day is just going incredibly well! I hope your break is doing well too! Today is New Year's Eve in many places in the world, and this is the final article I have for you in 2021! Let's celebrate one of my favorite formats by looking at its best Non-Free counters!

Here are the rules for Type Four, as a reminder:

Type Four is a Cube or Stack that you create ahead of time. It has three rules:

1. Every player has an infinite amount of mana of every color and type, like snow mana or 15 B mana for effects.

2. Each player may only cast one spell per turn.

3. If you have a card with an alternate casting cost, if you pay that cost, that spell doesn't count as your spell for the turn, and you can cast something else.

This format is heavy in Blue for counters as people cannot play more spells than the counter player has counters in a single turn. Counters are amazing here. Beef is amazing here as well as you can easily drop a 10/10 creature on the first turn that will kill in two hits. It's a very Green and Blue heavy format, but Black and White's mass removal are the third button on the lever, as they are key ways to answer problems in the format. Also good are the tempo of bounce and the ability to exile as many of the best cards in the format feature indestructible.

Consider the powerhouse first pitch counter Force of Will. In this format, there are two ways to cast it. The first is to cast it normally, without pitching a card or losing a life, and this will count as your spell for the turn. Need an emergency counter when you've already cast something? Lose a life and exile a Blue card and then cast this for free!

Now, if I were to have a list of the top counters of all time, that include cards with pitch-ery, this Decree would be my top option. It cycles, so it doesn't count as your spell for the turn, and it replaces itself with that cycle. And then you can net the counter spell trigger. It's harder to answer a triggered ability than an instant spell, so this is much harder to answer back, it's free, and it replaces itself. But a list of this and Force of Will and Crimson Vow's Wash Away would be a boring list and very obvious.

Let's do something else! Let's look at the top ten counters which do not have the ability to be cast for free in this Type Four format. Ready?

Honorable Mention - Time Stop

Let's kick things off with an Honorable Mention, Time Stop. What this will do is move to the end step, exile everything on the stack, and discard down to 7 for the current turn's player. Why is this in my counter suite conversation? It doesn't actually counter a spell, right? But in response to when an ability or spell you want to answer is on the stack, cast this, and it is exiled. That means it's essentially been answered. But, because it was not countered, Time Stop will answer spells on the stack that cannot be countered, like Hullbreaker Horror that proper counters are neutered against. It's a nice push and pull.

Also, a shoutout to Ertai's Meddling, which will also exile a spell on the stack for 100 turns without countering it as another "counter" to something you cannot otherwise answer, although it won't work on abilities like Time Stop, nor is it as flexible a card from other places. Time Stop is just an honorable mention here for counters but it would rank much higher on an "instant answer" list since it can answer so many things.

#10. Disallow

I mentioned before that countering an ability is harder to do in Type Four as most cards that just counter abilities aren't often worth running. This, on the other hand, is a pure Counterspell 8.5 times out of 10 when you want it, and a counter for abilities either triggered or activated ability the remaining 1.5 times you need to answer the ultimate loyalty ability of a planeswalker or a morph trigger like someone morphed up Chromeshell Crab and wants to swap with your big flying beater you just attacked them with. Good stuff!

#9. Fervent Denial

This card is pretty nifty. On the front end you get a free Counterspell. Nice! And then on the back end you get Counterspell! Two counters on one card. It's also good card advantage as it's basically a two for one. And in this case, two counters for one, which is even better. It's also rocking value with discard effects which aren't that many, but we have a few here and there with discarding.

#8. Forbid

Forbid is the highest scoring three-mana counter on today's list. It's a Cancel, without anything fancy. But, if you want to cast another Cancel on a future turn, you can just discard two cards to buy it back. It's very strong when one spell of the counter persuasion stops their entire turn barring a free spell, so the discard regularly gets used here. It's a very powerful source of countering fun times in Type Four.

#7. Insidious Will

Flexibility is very important in a counter. Consider the flexibility of this free instant. You have three options! Counter target spell (75-80% of the time), redirect the spell (about 15% of the time for things like card draw spells), and Twincast the spell (5-10% of the time, since if it's something worth copying, you'd often rather just counter it, like Fact or Fiction). That's an incredible amount of flexibility for this hard counter! This flexibility is so big on this spell, that this is the highest scoring counter that is not card advantage of some sort.

#6. Cryptic Command

With a shoutout to Very Cryptic Command and Lost in the Mist! Dismiss is a pretty good naked counter since it can replace itself and counter. Cryptic Command can be a Dismiss if you are looking for a card, but 75-80% of the time you use it to bounce something to the foe's hand as the tempo in a one spell per turn is very strong. You probably draw a card 20% of the time and tap something 5% of the time. It can be cast for bounce and tapping or drawing and bounce which increases its flexibility as well. The version of Very Cryptic Command that I have shown you counters any black bordered spell, which is nice since that's everything expect the rest of the Very Cryptic Command cycle and Uktabi Kong, as well as bouncing a card, and Lost in the Mist just counters and bounces without other options. They are all essential additions to a Type Four stack!

Welcome to the Top Five!

#5. Sublime Epiphany

Welcome to the better Cryptic Command! This thing won't just choose one thing, but all of the things! You can counter a spell, ability, bounce a key thing, make a token that's a copy of a dork you control, and draw a card! All in one card! It can counter both a key dork as well as a cast trigger you got from casting it, like an Eldrazi Titan's cast trigger. This card is the most flexible counter available for Type Four makers of stuff, the rest are pure power. Love it loads!

#4. Aethersnatch and Spelljack and Desertion

And a shoutout to free-able pitch spell Commandeer. There are three spells in this list that will steal a spell. The best is Aethersnatch, which will steal the spell and let you reselect its targets. This also does not counter the spell for purposes of "cannot be countered" things, like Terra Stomper. You can steal a creature, artifact, planeswalker like Karn Liberated, loads of goods. The best of the best!

And then the Spelljack will counter any spell and put it in exile, and then you can cast it from exile. Note that it doesn't take up your spell for the turn, since it's free, but you do have to wait to cast it normally, so if you counter a sorcery, you'll have to wait until your turn. The 'snatch just steals it and uses it immediately without waiting to do so. Desertion will counter any spell as well, and if you countered a dork it arrives to the battlefield under your control without needing to be cast. Good triad of terror!

#3. Confirm Suspicions and Overwhelming Intellect

Forget the card advantage of Dismiss which makes a 1 for 1 counter a 2 for 1 or the similar card advantage of Cryptic Command. Enter Confirm Suspicions! You'll draw three cards from casting this, since you have the mana to sacrifice them immediately. It's also nice for artifact caring things like the overload of Rise and Shine that can turn those Clues into 4/4 dorks, and also plays nicely with some cards here that also just, randomly, make a ton of artifacts like Old Gnawbone's Treasure making, and its overload is free since it's an alternate cost. But generally, you'll just pop the Clues for cards and move on. And then the Intellect will counter only a dork (around 50% of the cards in my Stack) but will draw you a ton of cards. Imagine the card drawing with cards like Draco or even a cheaper 7-drop like Platinum Angel. Great card for the card flow.

Just two slots, and two cards, left!

#2. Spell Burst

You saw how amazing a buyback counterspell is with Forbid, and that card makes you discard two cards per turn to buy it back. Imagine how good Forbid is when you don't have to discard to keep it up! Spell Burst is a buyback-able Spell Blast that can counter any spell with cost X, and then you spend three more mana and get it back to your hand. Awesome possum! This is also cheap on the secondary market, and might I suggest the re-art from Time Spiral Remastered? The new version is just a quarter here at CoolStuffInc.com, worth the cost for your Type Four Stack considering its power!

#1. Draining Whelk

Ah yes, the counter that can, reliably, kill quickly. Flash out this flyer. Counter a spell. Then it's pumped by the mana value of the spell, and you could easily have an 8/8 or 10/10. Untap. Swing with the flyer. Smash away. Other counters can draw cards or be used more than once or bounce something keen, but the Whelk? It wins games. It is way in front of the other non-free counters since it is very likely to be a very powerful flyer cast with flash. Compare it to other flash dorks that can do counters as well like Mystic Snake, Frilled Mystic, or sometimes Voracious Greatshark. All small stuff. No evasion. This flies and scales to the cost of the card countered. This thing wins games. It's also just a bulk rare.

And there we are! I hope that you enjoyed my look at the top non-free counters in Type Four!!! Ready for building your own stack or adding in these cards? Anything in here that I missed? Just let me know!