Introduction

Why, hello there! I've been out of commission for the last couple of weeks, and one of the things that was happening over that period of time was my preparation for States. I'm generally not the type of person to play Standard but after the release of Scars of Mirrodin, I felt that Jace was the best card in Standard, as I had predicted, and so building a deck around him wasn't going to be too difficult or expensive considering that I had access to all the Jaces I would need. My first impression was to play U/W control, which is what I ultimately played. I really wanted to work some innovation and have an amazing left-field deck of my own, but when I got into testing it, the U/W control deck ended up being a really good fit for my play style (go figure, right?) and I was coming out with pretty impressive win percentages.

Initially, I started with a list that was not playing Wall of Omens. I understood that regardless of if I played Wall of Omens or not, the metagame was going to be warped by Wall of Omens and there were just not going to be too many creatures to block with it. However, I still wanted the strength of Wall of Omens in the main and not just to depend on the threat of Wall of Omens. These went in the slot of Preordain and all of my testing was done with 0 Preordain and 4 Wall of Omens and everything was going very well.

I had settled on playing six Jaces, three of each. As I expected a lot of other people to be playing Jace as well, I wanted to win Jace battles. I also wanted to play a mix of two Condemn and two Journey to Nowhere, neither card is ideal but both are just about good enough. A full set of Mana Leak was fairly obvious and I followed it up with three Stoic Rebuttal. With Stoic Rebuttal, you're never giving your opponent the message that you can't get to Metalcraft, unlike with Cancel and it doesn't incur the tempo loss that something like Deprive does. I was playing a singleton Giddeon Jura for a while but was ultimately unimpressed with what he did in anything but the aggro matches, so I cut him for Elspeth who seemed like she would give me a lot more utility and would be a brick house in the control mirror.

I was initially playing a list without Day of Judgment, but was losing to the aggro decks too often without it, so I moved a pair of the three I had in the board to the main and started winning about the amount I expected to against these decks. One of the final conclusions I made about my list was that Seachrome Coast actually wasn't very desirable, coming into play untapped on one, two or three was far less important to me than coming into play untapped on four and later and giving me added resilience to Tectonic Edge. I had previously cut from a full set Seachrome Coast down to two and as I was making the final modifications before assembling the deck I cut the two that I had for a pair of Islands.

For my win conditions I had settled on playing a pair of Sun Titan and four Baneslayer Angels. I got a lot of questions from people about all of this but I feel that Baneslayer is the best win condition available because she races the ramp decks and destroys anything that isn't the control mirror. Even in the control mirror, she applies a lot of pressure and flies over opposing Titans. Sun Titan on the other hand is actually the most common source of wins for the deck, which was the relative soft lock of Tectonic Edge + Sun Titan, which would rapidly dwindle the resources my opponent's had to answer Sun Titan, who was also presenting them with six damage a turn. However Sun Titan returning Jace, a fetchland or even Wall of Omens were all welcomed sources of card advantage that on their own were difficult for opponents to break through. I was even playing a pair of Ratchet Bombs which when paired with Sun Titan were incredibly difficult for many decks to win through.

The last couple of nights, when I had my physical list of the deck together, I was testing and was not getting the hands that I was accustomed to at all. Everything was seemingly falling apart as the draws were all quite sub-optimal and I did some consulting and determined that I really needed to add in the set of Preordain to smooth out the draws. I eliminated a Jace Beleren for Preordain and cut down a Baneslayer for another, the Elspeth that I was playing seemed like the next logical choice as she stuck out and I cut a Jace's Ingenuity for the final Preordain, although it truly saddened me to see it go.

I wake up bright and early in the morning and head out to the event site. I start scribbling down my deck list and look at Elspeth Tirel who was left in the deck box, just in case. I get the sudden urge to play her, but resist it and set her aside and finish my list. As I'm pacing things up I get a compulsion to write Elspeth Tirel on the list and sleeve her up. I rationalize to myself that I was probably getting bad draws because I was playing 60 cards and a 61st should fix all of that.

The final list I play is this:

"U/W Control"

• Creatures (9)
• 4 Wall of Omens
• 3 Baneslayer Angel
• 2 Sun Titan

• Spells (27)
• 4 Mana Leak
• 4 Preordain
• 3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
• 3 Stoic Rebuttal
• 2 Ratchet Bomb
• 2 Day of Judgment
• 2 Jace Beleren
• 2 Condemn
• 2 Journey to Nowhere
• 1 Into the Roil
• 1 Jace's Ingenuity
• 1 Elspeth Tirel

• Lands (25)
• 8 Island
• 4 Plains
• 4 Celestial Colonnade
• 4 Glacial Fortress
• 3 Tectonic Edge
• 1 Arid Mesa
• 1 Scalding Tarn

• Sideboard (15)
• 4 Leonin Arbiter
• 3 Negate
• 3 Flashfreeze
• 2 Volition Reins
• 1 Into the Roil
• 1 Day of Judgment
• 1 Condemn

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The only comment on the sideboard was that in testing I was noticing that Leonin Arbiter was only effective in multiples, but was the best option available. I played 4 to optimize my chances of getting two against ramp decks.

Round 1 against U/r Destructive Force

I lose the first of many die rolls on the day and mulligan my Island + Preordain hand into something marginally more stable. In Legacy you can't count on Land + Brainstorm or Land + Top to get you to your second land, it seems even more obvious that you can't do it in Standard either. Apparently my opponent had a very similar hand and leads with turn one Scalding Tarn into turn two Preordain, Discard a Pyroclasm after I lead with Celestial Colonnade. I'm delighted by this turn of events but apparently he manages to topdeck a few lands in a row, so we have a real game on our hands. At some point we both start stumbling and discarding cards around four lands. He aggressively attacks one of my two Colonnades with Tectonic Edge and seemingly takes himself off vital mana. II bait a few counters with both Jace Belerens. I land a Jace the Mindsculptor but he topdecks another land to get up to six and Volition Reins my Jace. He Brainstorms and passes. My Celestial Colonnade kills Jace and he plays another on his turn, this time +2ing it. I swing in at it and spend another turn killing it, as he apparently is lacking the resources to do something about it. After this Jace dies we enter a period of Draw-Go again, with him slightly ahead on cards in hand and slightly behind on lands. I land a Baneslayer and he answers with a Frost Titan, I Mana Leak, He Mana Leaks. Frost Titan turns off my Baneslayer and all I can really do is play my Sun Titan, which returns a previously discarded Journey to Nowhere, which I pay for and after a couple of swings he packs it in. He kindly shows me an Everflowing Chalice as he attempted to get back into the game after I had creatures down, so I know to keep in my Ratchet Bombs.

Sideboarding

-4 Wall of Omens, -2 Condemn

+2 Volition Reins, +3 Negate, +1 Into the Roil

I'd rather have a card that does something than Wall of Omens, none of his creatures are even phased by this, assuming he is even using anything other than Frost Titan. Condemn is only going to be active when it is too late so I get that out of there as well. Volition Reins is to take his Jace if possible, Negates counter everything he can really do, Into the Roil is a catchall.

Game two starts with him on the play and I keep a hand with Colonnade, Tectonic Edge, Scalding Tarn, Preordain, Ratchet Bomb and some counter magic, this should go well. He leads with Scalding Tan into Preordain and I start playing my lands. He plays an Everflowing Chalice on turn two and I Ratchet Bomb it out of there on my turn two. We play draw go for a few turns until he plays his fifth land which is Tectonic Edge. At this point in time the board looks like this:

Him: Island, Island, Mountain, Mountain, Scalding Tarn, Tectonic Edge

Myself: Celestial Colonnade, Plains, Scalding Tarn, Arid Mesa, Glacial Fortress, Tectonic Edge.

When he goes to his end step, alarms go off in my brain and I know that this Celestial Colonnade is vitally important to the success of this match. So when I get priority I have six lands in play and I do the following.

1. Activate Arid Mesa. Sacrificing is part of the cost so I have five lands on the battlefield. In response
2. Activate Scalding Tarn. Sacrificing again is part of the cost, so I have four lands on the battlefield In response
3. Activate Tectonic Edge targeting your Tectonic Edge Once again, Sacrificing is part of the cost to activate this land, so I have three lands in play with all of those triggers on the stack.

He claims that I cannot do things without passing priority, that he will get a chance to respond. He doesn't try to explain his point to me, and I explain that when I activate an ability or play a spell on his turn, I get priority afterward and without passing priority is how this is happening. He still seems confused or something and we call the judge. After a few moments, my opponent realizes what is going on and he says, "You're right, it works."

If you didn't catch it, what happened here is I made it so that I was going to be able to destroy his Tectonic Edge without him being able to kill my Celestial Colonnade or any other land in response. This works because Arid Mesa and Scalding Tarn are both on the stack when I go to activate the Edge. Meaning that those lands are not in play, but I'll soon be getting lands from them, When I activate Tectonic Edge, I have three lands in play, which is one fewer than he needs me to have to be able to activate his Tectonic Edge. When my ability resolves, his Edge will be destroyed and then my other two activated abilities will resolve, putting me back up to five lands. This play ends up being quite a big swing as he never sees another Tectonic Edge, but it isn't the end of the game.

I dead-end on my draws and decide to go for a Jace, he has an answer for it and an answer for my Mana Leak as well. He follows up with his own Jace, but this time its a Mindsculptor and gets an Everflowing Chalice on the table for what is almost certainly a tell that he intends to Destructive Force next turn. I untap, and since he is pretty slim on mana I decide to go for Elspeth Tirel, who resolves and immediately +2s. Now, if he wants to Destructive Force, I will have a win condition on the table, not him. He Brainstorms with Jace and passes the turn. I am really in a position where I need to use Elspeth to kill Jace and curb some of this card advantage that he is generating, so I do exactly that and she falls to one counter. He plays a Frost Titan on his turn, clearly with the intention of killing Elspeth, but I have a Day of Judgment for it and Elspeth gets up to three counters. He goes for a Volition Reins on Elspeth and that gets countered, Elspeth gets up to five counters and he attempts another Volition Reins, which also is countered. Elspeth gets up to seven counters and the Frost Titan he plays next turn is destroyed when she drops back to two counters. I follow up with a pair of Baneslayers over the next two turns and he offers me his hand.

1-0 (2-0)

Even if she is bad for the rest of the day, I don't think I could have won that game without Elspeth, she really pulled her weight there.

Round 2 against U/W control

He wins the roll and plays a turn one Preordain, keeping both cards on top and drawing. On his second turn, however, he discards which is most peculiar. I stall out on lands but he manages to draw them for several turns in a row. I attempt a Jace and he wins the counter war over it, then I am able to bounce his Jace at end of turn and Land my own Jace. We get into the game where I'm drawing two cards every turn and he has to play a Jace every turn to kill my Jace. I end this with a Jace the Mindsculptor on the table and he has a Giddeon Jura. The first one gets Condemned after it takes out a Wall of Omens and the second one is attacked for eight by two Celestial Colonnades. I try to keep him in game one for as long as possible, but at some point he gets discouraged, looks at the clock and packs it in. Elspeth is in my hand ready to seal the game.

Sideboarding

-4 Wall of Omens -2 Journey to Nowhere

+3 Negate +2 Volition Reins +1 Into the Roil

I am forced to Mulligan in game two and I end up getting stuck on lands, as does he. But this is mitigated by the fact that he has Calcite Snapper. This is a real sting to me as I took these out of my board late in the deck's development and know how good it is in the mirror. He crashes through my Jaces and I'm never able to find land five for Baneslayer.

Game three I open up with double Baneslayer and Into the Roil which I sit on literally all game. It's draw-go for a long time until he stumbles on land and I decide to pull the trigger for an end of turn Jace's Ingenuity, which is countered but denies him the vital mana to counter my Jace Berelen on the main phase. I'm able to gain a few cards on him before he kills it and I risk a Baneslayer. He comes in with a Giddeon and puts it up to eight, I topdeck the land that I'll need to activate Colonnade and Stoic Rebuttal a Condemn, but he just doesn't have it. On his turn He does manage to kill the Baneslayer through Stoic Rebuttal and edge my Colonnade and I sit back and wait; counter a Sun Titan; counter a Jace. Finally, my lands get to a place where I can safely cast another Baneslayer. We fight over it and it starts ticking away at his life total, which is over 30. He goes for Sun Titan number two, which is countered and when I try a Sun Titan, I foolishly walk it into Mana Leak. When he drops to five life from constant Baneslayer swings, he taps all but three lands and Volition Reins my Baneslayer Angel. I have four mana untapped from activating Colonade last turn and attacking for nine on the last turn and my hand is Mana Leak and Into the Roil. I let the Reins resolve and bounce the Reins at end of turn with Mana Leak backup. He motions to hand me the Baneslayer back and to put his Reins into the graveyard, but I explain to him that we're just going to end this now.

2-0 (4-1)

Baneslayers have really been amazing so far and I'm glad I played them. I can see why people shy away from them, but I think they are phenomenal as a win condition.

Round 3 against U/B Control

He leads with Creeping Tar Pit and I have a turn 2 Ratchet Bomb which comfortably sits at 4 the entire game. He doesn't have the counter magic that I would assume he does and has Abyssal Persecutor, which is met with Journey to Nowhere. Later in the game he Into the Roils it and I oblige and take six before sending it on another Journey. Every time I play a Jace of any sort, he has a Hexmage. He has a lot of removal for my Baneslayers and even Hexmages an Elspeth. But all it took was a well-timed Sun Titan after his Frost Titan, and I was able to bring back a Journey to Nowhere and then proceed to Tectonic Edge him out of the game.

Sideboarding:

I'm a little unsure of how aggressive his deck is, but I decide that he probably needs to attack me to win and he doesn't seem to be playing Jace.

-1 Into the Roil +1 Condemn

In game 2 he leads off with a Duress taking Jace's Ingenuity and then he fumbles on lands early and discards Consuming Vapors, as I have a Wall of Omens and he isn't doing anything with creatures. He lands the first Jace after countering my Berelen and I topdeck into the Glacial Fortress that will let me swing with me Colonnade to kill Jace. Every subsequent time I play a Jace he again has a Hexmage and I'm afraid to lead out with creatures because of the Consuming Vapors that he has in his graveyard. How much of his hand is removal? I draw Elspeth and +2 her for a point of life. He Volition Reins her and -2s her which is a problem for me. He has double Tectonic Edge and has been waiting patiently for me to try to use Colonnade again, which I've refused to activate. I draw what is land number ten and play it and a pair of Baneslayer Angels. He has a Doom Blade for one but the other is able to take Elspeth down in two swings and then the third joins to kill him in no time at all.

3-0 (6-1)

Round 4 against Ugr Destructive Force

Game one sees me opening with a Stoic Rebuttal and him on the play. He goes for turn three Oracle of Mul Daya and before I know it he has something like twenty lands on the table and plays Frost Titan and then Destructive Force.

Sideboarding -4 Wall of Omens -1 Into the Roil -2 Condemn

+4 Leonin Arbiter +3 Flashfreeze

I keep a really shaky hand in game two that has Triple Leonin Arbiter but only a single Glacial Fortress as land and a Preordain. If I draw a land on two this hand will probably win. I don't, and he plays a ton of fetchlands before I am able to play Arbiter and then eventually end the game at two lands, each locked down by a Frost Titan.

3-1 (6-3)

Round 5 against B/u Vampires

When my opponent opens up with Pulse Tracker, I'm pretty sure that this is going to be a bye. His next play is Pawn of Ulamog followed by Captivating Vampire. I'm finding myself dwindling on life while these creatures beat against my two Wall of Omens. Soon another Pawn of Ulamog joins the fray and I decide to pull the trigger on Day of Judgment which gives him 16 Eldrazi Spawn. I grimace at the thought of what he can do with that mana, but it had to be done. I have a Ratchet Bomb that I've been bouncing around with Jace while he was in play. He plays Bloodthone Vampire and I look at the die representing the tokes and think to myself, "Oh no!" I place another Jace the Mindsculptor and bounce the Bloodthrone Vampire to his hand and Ratchet Bomb away all of his Eldrazi Spawn. After that threat was handled, a pair Baneslayer Angels came to sweep me away to victory.

Sideboarding -1 Into the Roil -1 Stoic Rebuttal

+1 Condemn +1 Day of Judgment

My opponent gets a much better draw in game two and it seems early appearances from cards like Kalastria Highborn, Bloodghast and Viscera Seer. This combination of cards proved to be a problem and my Wall of Omens really wasn't getting there. I played my pair of Journey to Nowhere for a Captivating Vampire and Bloodghast, only for him to find another one of each. I made a gamble one turn where I played Elspeth and he spent the rest of the game fighting against her. Captivating Vampire proved to be a huge problem as it prevented me from ever really being able to stick a Baneslayer and I was really struggling for resources to keep up my life total and the counters on both Jace and Elspeth. The details are blurry, but at one point I was quite low on life and he miscalculated and thought he had Lethal, missing my Celestial Colonnade, which allowed me to block and then ultimate Elspeth Tirel and land a Baneslayer and the game ended shortly thereafter. While the description was short this was probably the most intense match of the day for me.

4-1 (8-3)

Round 6 against Valakut Ramp

As most games seemingly go in this format, nothing happens for the first four turns and then he plays Oracle of Mul Daya, which is Mana Leaked. He plays a Summoning Trap off it which hits an Avenger of Zendikar. I Day of Judgement this and his next play is countered as well. We stalemate while he looks for another threat, he gets it in the form of another Avenger of Zendikar and all of the tokens succumb to Ratchet Bomb. I play a Sun Titan who quickly takes him out of the game.

Sideboarding: -4 Wall of Omens -1 Into the Roil -1 Elspeth Tirel -2 Jace Berelen -2 Condemn -1 Jace's Ingenuity

+3 Negate +3 Flashfreeze +4 Leonin Arbiter +1 Day of Judgment

This is the board plan I used against ramp the entire day, I'm not sure if it's close to right but for the approach I was taking, I feel that it is fine.

Game two starts off slow again and my opponent gets to see all the answers I have for his threats. I end the game at a fairly low life total but Day of Judgment his board when there are multiple creatures, Counter or Journey any Titans and Sun Titan combos with one of my Tectonic Edges to destroy every one of his Valakuts. My opponent gets quite upset about losing this match, but sometimes you play a deck with 12 threats and your opponent has 12 answers.

5-1 (10-3)

Round 7 against Big Red

As I sit down at the table my opponent comments about how he has been on a lucky streak, dodging Valakut Ramp, but he has a feeling that I'm going to be the person to end his streak. I get the feeling that he's playing U/W control from that comment but he doesn't see the type. He wins the roll and shrugs and says "I guess I'll keep it." I cringe as I see a Mountain land on the table and turn 90 degrees dreading the incoming Goblin Guide. Thankfully, that is just my imagination and my opponent casts Basilisk Collar. I figure that he is running Cunning Sparkmage, but don't intend to get hit by it too badly even though my hand does have a Baneslayer as the only feasible way to win. I play a Wall of Omens on two and a Jace Berelen on three, which he Lightning Bolts. His next real play isn't until turn four which is Lord of Shatterskull Pass. I look at the Condemn and Journey to Nowhere in my hand and decide not to Mana Leak it. He suits it up and levels it and bashes into my Wall of Omens. I play another Wall of Omens on my next turn and he Flame Slashes it, at which point I decide that I should Condemn the minotaur. I play a Baneslayer with Mana Leak Mana open, which catches an Inferno Titan. I play my own Titan on my turn and that gets double burned before it can swing. However the Baneslayer is just enough and kills him.

Sideboarding:

-3 Wall of Omens +3 Flashfreeze

I'm not sure if my opponent is playing Koth, but the Inferno Titan and Everflowing Chalice makes me think he's playing a mono-red control deck like the list that Chapin dumped. I can be conservative in my sideboarding however seeing as how I'm up a game.

My opponent seems much happier with his next hand and starts with a Leyline of Punishment on the battlefield... huh? Well, that makes my double Baneslayer hand a lot less attractive, but, que sera, sera. We start off slow as expected. He casts Koth on four, which I Mana Leak. He plays Koth on five which I Flashfreeze. He attempts an Inferno Titan on Six after bolting my Jace Berelen, that too is countered. He proceeds to draw a multitude of lands and gets upset as I pair up some Baneslayers to attack him. They can't gain me life but at least they can still kill him.

6-1 (12-3)

Round 8 against Valakut Ramp

I'm paired against a friend-of-a-friend, a guy from the local gaming shop who is apparently doing pretty well. He was hanging around a lot of my matches as I finished up I thought he had dropped, but apparently he was X-1. Because this event had 257 people there were nine rounds. Had there been one fewer person, we would have been able to ID this round and both make top eight. As it stood, it was basically win-and-in. While we shuffle up he flashes me about half his deck, which I say something about. I explain that I'm not trying to look at his cards but they become difficult to miss when he riffle shuffles. I try very hard not to sound condescending about it because if he is doing this in every match he is really giving himself unnecessary handicaps. I learn that he's playing a ramp deck from this, but it really doesn't do much to influence the hand that I keep.

He is playing with Overgrown Battlement over some ramp piece that they normally play and when I counter Oracle of Mul Daya on 4 he Summoning Traps into one. I'm able to keep him pressed by countering a pair of Primeval Titans and dealing with an Avenger of Zendikar but he also apparently Maindecks Terrastadon which kills my Elspeth Tirel and both of my white sources. The second Day of Judgment in my hand is never realized as I can't get the white to make it happen and I die to something or other.

Sideobarding -4 Wall of Omens -1 Into the Roil -1 Elspeth Tirel -2 Jace Berelen -2 Condemn -1 Jace's Ingenuity

+3 Negate +3 Flashfreeze +4 Leonin Arbiter +1 Day of Judgment

In game two I aggressively counter his ramp spells and risk a mid-game Baneslayer once my hand runs out of action. He gets some action happening on a Avenger of Zendikar and I have to decide if I want to take 13 off his creatures next turn in exchange for hitting him for an extra five off Baneslayer or if I Day of Judgment immediately and avoid any nonsense with Oracle or a fetchland. He gamble pays off and the extra five damage puts him to eight life, where I'm able to hit him twice with Celestial Colonnade to end the game.

In game three I'm able keep him off all of his threats at get into a really favorable position where I have Jace active and he has Oracle of Mul Daya to show me whats coming. I need him to not be able to topdeck double threat, but it happens even under Jace's watch. I play a Baneslayer while he is stalled on lands and I try to dig for Journey to Nowhere, Ratchet Bomb or Day of Judgment, but I'm not able to find anything by the time he finally makes land drops and I succumb to an army of 5/6 plants

6-2 (13-5)

Round 9 against Valakut Ramp

In this game I'm able to control my opponent's threats and end things swiftly with a Baneslayer once he's out of gas.

Sideobarding -4 Wall of Omens -1 Into the Roil -1 Elspeth Tirel -2 Jace Berelen -2 Condemn -1 Jace's Ingenuity

+3 Negate +3 Flashfreeze +4 Leonin Arbiter +1 Day of Judgment

My opponent tells me that his hand is risky but it has too much of his board to put it back. He plays Explore on two and misses his second land drop. From there I land Leonin Arbiter which turns off any Cultivates he has for a while. I'm able to counter whatever threats he has and actually keep him at a single green mana while Arbiter + Baneslayer finish the job. He flashes his hand to me and it is lush with double green cost cards that I didn't want him to have in play.

Conclusions

I was happy with my performance especially considering how I was really an outsider in here. I didn't have any contacts or people that would scoop me in if I needed it, and I also did most all of the footwork on this deck on my own. I had expected at a certain point to make top eight and missing out was a bit disappointing but considering that this is the first time I've played standard at all in quite some time, I'm really pleased with the result.

I think in the future I'd like to swap out some of the white pin-point removal for black cards such as Doom Blade and see what I can work with a three color mana base to support Memoricide somewhere. I'm a huge fan of Sun Titan and am really glad that I stuck with him even after all the questioning. I never really missed Giddeon Jura and was very happy with Baneslayers all day. Coming into the tournament I had expected to see a fair amount of aggro and near the top tables there was almost none, which was a bit of a disappointment. I think that the U/W/b build will do quite nicely in the control mirrors,

But one of the questions you may have is, why did I decide to play Standard? Well, that was the note I wanted to close on. A few months ago, Bill Stark posted something on his web site that really made me start thinking. I'll link to it in a moment, but if you haven't seen it I don't want to set any expectations for it:

http://www.thestarkingtonpost.com/articles/-/Why_Legacy_Players_Suck

While it isn't exactly a timely reaction, next week I'd like to discuss what the ideas presented in that video have meant to me. And talk a bit about what I learned during States.

However, as of the time of writing I'm preparing to pack my bags for Nashville and will be looking at going to time for nine rounds in another tournament, but this time a Legacy event.

Christopher Walton

im00pi at gmail for Electronic Mail

Master Shake on The Source