Some six months ago in a casual discussion between Team GWS and rival team (yet dinner mates) ICBM, Mike Solymossy - also known as 13Nova and TheSalad - suggested using Intuition in TPS combo (The Perfect Storm) as a singleton. Eric Becker - Kobefan on The Mana Drain and StarCityGames forums - started toying around with the idea almost immediately. It wasn't long before he alerted the team that he had created a monster.
It was something of an advantage playing with such a stack of powerful cards in a comparatively redundant deck. Eric noticed that, while he had created the deck for its superior consistency comparative to most Grim Long builds, it also was significantly more explosive than any TPS build he had seen. So here was the moderate between the slower, consistent builds with eight disruption spells and the hugely explosive, stand-on-your-chair-and-yell-“turn one kill” builds we knew to fold to Stax.
Here was his first list:
Land 14
4 Polluted Delta
3 Flooded Strand
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Swamp
2 Island
2 Underground Sea
1 Tolarian Academy
Artifacts 10
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mana Crypt
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Vault
1 Sol Ring
Instants 23
4 Dark Ritual
2 Cabal Ritual
4 Force of Will
1 Chain of Vapor
2 Rebuild
3 Intuition
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Ancestral Recall
4 Brainstorm
Sorceries 11
4 Duress
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Mind's Desire
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Timetwister
2 Grim Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
Enchantments 2
1 Yawgmoth's Bargain
1 Necropotence
In retrospect it's surprising how little changed from his first list. The process of evolving the deck into what it later became was less of a tuning of what was already there and more of trial and error of intricacies that may have worked. Among them were:
Remand – This is an excellent card against Mana Drain decks exclusively, and therein lies the problem. Control is handily a good match for IT, particularly after sideboarding, and more help is not needed from such a narrow card.
Perplex – Eric's infatuation with new Standard countermagic extends here. It has a few unseen advantages. The mana cost is extremely convenient as it can be cast off of a Swamp, Island, and a Mox on turn 2. Against Mana Drain decks, it's a huge tempo gain when spent on a draw spell. Most importantly, it is never dead as it can transmute for Yawgmoth's Will or any other nutty spell.
Muddle the Mixture – It's transmute is largely useless, to the point where we joked that Mana Drain would be better. I'm not sure how untrue that is.
Merchant Scroll – We're still largely undecided on this card. It's been in and out several times but never was in more than one or two copies. Against Stax, the idea was that it could fetch out a bounce spell, but in reality the sorcery-speed is hindered significantly by Tangle Wire.
Fact or Fiction – It ended up being too randomly good or randomly bad for a four-mana slot.
Gifts Ungiven – I'm not wholly sold on this card. Four mana is often too intense for its timing. Eric has tried it with some success, but said he wouldn't run more than one or two.
Deep Analysis – To quote Eric from our forums, “I learned that you find Deep Analysis in just about every Intuition pile, then you draw cards and then might have the win. I guess I thought it belonged in the deck since you find it all the time; however, I was wrong.” It seemed to set up the win superfluously when Intuition could just get good cards that do win.
Hymn to Tourach – As a sideboard option over Cabal Therapy, we found Hymn to Tourach to be really strong against Gifts and Slaver albeit a bit worse than Cabal Therapy. It really shined as an option against the combo mirror that was comparable to Cabal Therapy.
Lion's Eye Diamond – I like it as an extra accelerant piece definitely over a third Cabal Ritual. It's better with three Grim Tutor and an extra draw-seven.
Tinker, Memory Jar – I've had some pretty good success with Memory Jar and Tinker. The biggest problem is this deck's inability to go off the same turn that Tinker is played, barring some insane mana draw. Almost every time I've untapped with it in play I've won, though.
After testing more, we changed a Rebuild for diversification purposes specifically to combat Chalice of the Void set at three. Mind's Desire was deemed too mana intensive for its effect. We required a larger number of business spells, or the ability to generate a larger Storm count faster, to make Mind's Desire playable.
So the new list looks something like this:
There are about 55 cards that are pretty solid set in the maindeck. One Force of Will, Timetwister, one Grim Tutor, a third bounce spell, and Mystical Tutor have all been rotating around for the cards we mentioned above as testing. The list I presented is a composite of what we've been working on for a varied metagame.
The deck wins like Grimlong via a loaded graveyard and a huge Yawgmoth's Will. With so many Grim Tutors, there are a considerable number of games that play out like Grimlong. The major difference is quite obviously Intuition.
How do I play Intuition, guyz?
Any amount of skill required beyond simple math and understanding of the matchups comes from Intuition piles. There are some pretty common similarities to playing the card that I can give as mere guidelines rather than stonework rules. Versatility, rather than power, makes Intuition the right card for this deck.
1) Intuition sets up Yawgmoth's Will. Almost never does Intuition, particularly in game one, do anything except get the gamestate into the one where Yawgmoth's Will resolves. Common stacks are three mana sources - if the setup hand does not have enough mana post-Yawgmoth's Will - or three tutors - if the mana is present, but the tutor isn't. Occasionally it's useful to get three Duress or Force of Will, to assure resolution of the Yawgmoth's Will, but very rarely does that actually matter. The amount of must-counter threats is so high that Intuition usually finds cards that do something on their own.
2) Intuition deals with hate cards. A large number of viable hate cards for combo involve slowing down the combo player through mana denial. Intuition allows for dodging Chalice at zero and Null Rods by fetching out Dark Rituals, and Chalice at one by fetching out Cabal Ritual, Cabal Ritual, Black Lotus.
3) If there isn't any business in the hand, get some. Often a trash hand can be transformed into the absolute nutz with an Intuition topdeck for bombs.
The Sideboard and Matchup Analysis
4 Dark Confidant
3 Cabal Therapy
1 Coffin Purge
2 Massacre
3 Tendrils of Agony
1 Mind's Desire
1 Hurkyl's Recall
Before I even start a matchup analysis, Eric Becker and I have some relatively small, yet fairly important disagreements. He plays this maindeck list -1 Swamp, +1 Flooded Strand. He then runs the Swamp in the board instead of a Tendrils of Agony. That disagreement comes from the Stax matchup exclusively. I'll address this in the Stax section.
Versus Control Slaver – Slightly Favorable
First game they only really have a couple threats: Mindslaver and Tormod's Crypt. Since casting a Yawgmoth's Will is the only real way to win on the first game, anything that slows down or stops it is a problem. The abovementioned cards are the biggest game losers, as they generally cannot be Duressed out - the primary way IT gets rid of Yawgmoth's Will stoppers.
Sideboard:
-3 Grim Tutor, -1 Rebuild -1 Hurkyl’s Recall, -4 Force of Will, -1 Mystical Tutor, -1 Timetwister, -1 Intuition.
+3 Tendrils of Agony, +1 Mind’s Desire, +4 Dark Confidant, +3 Cabal Therapy, +1 Coffin Purge.
The goal post-sideboarding is to minimize the effect of their increased counterspell base. Generally the wins involve an early Dark Confidant with a small storm spell as the finisher. They will probably bring in both Tormod's Crypt and Red Elemental Blast, both of which are largely ineffective against the plan. Jester's Cap is also largely useless.
Versus Gifts – Unfavorable
Anything with Mana Drain and a clock is a problem. Duress destroys them first game, but it still require a pretty solid hand afterwards to pull it off.
Sideboard:
-4 Force of Will, -1 Rebuild, -1 Hurkyl's Recall, -3 Grim Tutor, -1 Mystical Tutor, -1 Timetwister, -1 Intuition.
+3 Cabal Therapy, +4 Dark Confidant, +3 Tendrils of Agony, +1 Mind's Desire, +1 Coffin Purge
As disappointing as the Tendrils plan is against Gifts, they play too many counters after sideboarding to attempt to combo out normally. Because they have a quick clock and counters, often Cabal Therapy names Gifts Ungiven and Duress takes their gas. Removal of their clock allows for IT to set up a Dark Confidant or a combo situation.
Versus Stax, Uba and Five Color – Highly Favorable
The three bounce spells make the first game fairly elementary. They revolve stuff that is largely irrelevant, with the exception of Sphere of Resistance. The most important aspect of the match is playing the lands correctly. An Underground Sea should rarely, if ever, stay in play at the end of turn. Mana stability will win every first game.
Sideboard:
-4 Duress, -2 Force of Will, -1 Yawgmoth's Bargain, -1 Timetwister.
+4 Dark Confidant, +3 Tendrils of Agony, +1 Hurkyl's Recall.
The mulligan is very important. An early Dark Confidant wins every game. Without it, mana stability is an absolute must. There is no hand worth keeping that does not have either of those, barring ridiculous broken stuff on the play. Pretty frequently, Confidant deals six to ten damage, and a small Tendrils finishes them off. The only sideboard card they might have that matters is Duress.
Eric likes the additional land in the sideboard to help smooth out the draws against Smokestack. I have preferred the extra Tendrils, both to sideboard in against other decks and to save us against Jester's Cap, which is so prevalent as of now. The difference is fairly minor and a bit of a metagame call, but stems from our varied tournament results versus Stax.
Versus U/W Fish – Favorable
They have a ton of annoying cards but nothing that really wins. Extract is a threat first game, but often it is just played in the sideboard of those decks. Chalice of the Void and Null Rod can stop IT dead, but one Intuition often solves the problems.
Sideboard:
-4 Duress, -1 Necropotence, -1 Hurkyl's Recall.
+2 Massacre, +3 Dark Confidant, +1 Tendrils of Agony.
After boarding, Massacre reduces the number of problematic cards down to just Chalice of the Void and Null Rod. Confidant blocks like a champion and draws a few cards along the way. It's pretty easy after board, with the exception of Orim's Chant.
Versus GWS Oath – Close to even
The builds that have both Duress and Chalice of the Void are quite obviously more difficult than the build with more counters. Game 1 is all about playing Duress correctly. There are a few times when it is necessary to Duress their Oath of Druids out of hand because, unlike Slaver or Gifts, Oath doesn't benefit from the late game all that much.
Sideboard:
-1 Rebuild, -1 Mystical Tutor, -2 Force of Will.
+3 Cabal Therapy, +1 Tendrils of Agony
Intuition for Cabal Therapies is one of the hottest plays ever post-sideboard. I've found that with an Intuition in hand, it is remarkably easy to completely ignore their Oath of Druids unless they have a couple of Forbidden Orchards in play. Without threat of a clock, the match is a breeze. I love getting rid of their Oaths with Duress or Therapy.
Why play that pile of cards?
First and foremost, combo is always the best deck choice because of its high amount of broken plays. IT is no exception to that rule; it runs more amazing “I win now” cards that any other deck in the format. Somewhere in the neighborhood of one in five games is won simply because IT draws “the absolute balls.” Those games aside, it has some of the most powerful topdecks in the format and a reasonable amount of consistency to boot. Where usually the dismissal of combo comes from its inconsistency, the entire team was wholly impressed with the deck's ability to set up the win turn 2-4 every single game, while remaining resilient to most of the hate that sees play as of now. This is the most successful combo list we've ever worked with.
TPS, as it was known in its heyday, is inferior to this new build. IT is more consistent and more resilient to hate than any draw-seven based deck ever was. Yawgmoth's Will is a ton more effective in IT than in TPS.
The deck is superior to Gifts primarily because the Stax matchup is infinitely easier with IT, and because it goldfishes almost a turn faster while not losing much of its matchup against ManaDrain.dec. While the play-style would seem vastly different, they are very closely related. Both decks stop the problematic cards and ignoring everything else to just win. That sentiment defines IT.
IT is better than Grimlong and Belcher because, at the cost of one or two turn goldfish, it gains infinite resilience and stability. There really isn't such thing as the fizzle with IT. Every time it tries to go, the only thing that can stop it is the opponent. Often, IT does an excellent job of disabling even that threat. Think of the deck as TPS without the need to play a draw seven spell to win, but also with stronger setup going into the late game. While the topdeck is less amazing that most other combo decks, the amount of times the deck is forced into topdeck mode is halved or less.
GWS has played the deck in ten different tournaments, both locally and at StarCityGames, and won at eight of them. This number includes Rhyno Spindler's Black Lotus winning last weekend at the most skill intensive Midwest tournament I've ever attended. Even some of the older, less developed lists showed a lot of promise in the beginning. It seems a bit too bold to say that IT is the best deck in the format, but I don't at all feel overzealous in my claim that it will affect the metagame.
Tournament Report
I won't bore you guys with some huge, detailed report. For that, you can catch Eric's report on The Mana Drain. The pre-tournament antics were limited to a ton of beautiful landscape on the way to Richmond. Fourteen hours, twenty-seven “Your mom” jokes, forty ounces of coffee just for me, and a bonus stop in the scariest hick town I've ever seen to take a piss in broad daylight beside a tree as thick as my thigh, got us to the Marriott in enough time to listen to Boston and talk about that Mike Sheen idiot (just kidding, Mike… we still love you). It turned out that Meandeck was in the same hotel as us, but Steve had too many insane plays for anyone except JD to visit. I immediately switch from pretentious literature vernacular to hip Magic the Gathering player dialect.
When I woke up, JD was still telling a story about the last time he played Belcher at some tournament, so I managed to get him to fetch me a coffee. Insane keep. We didn't get to the location until about fifteen minutes before and I forgot my list back the room. Sacktappa!
Round 1: Josh with Gro
Game 1: I won on turn 2 after a turn 1 Duress. I had infi gas.
Game 2: He plays infi doods (two Quirion Dryads) on turn 1 and follows it up with a Psychatog. I beat aggro.
Round 2: Ryan with Gifts
Game 1: He mulliganed to five.
Game 2: His hand was amazing but couldn't stop my Necropotence. He got totally served.
Round 3: Brian Demars with Control Slaver
Game 1: I play turn 1 Necropotence after he goes first. Quoth the master, “That's the only card that beats me.”
Game 2: I had to do a mini Tendrils early on and took him down to four life. I had three Tendrils left in my deck and a ton of accelerants in hand. We played draw-go while he beat me down with two Gorilla Shamans from thirty life to fourteen. Needless to say, I acquired more flaccidity than date with Roseanne.
Game 3: I drew infinite cards and they all sucked. He won with a huge dude before I could get my hand to pan out.
Round 4: Jeff with Stax with Metalworker
Game 1: He plays a turn 1 Chalice at one, but fails to play any other lock components that matter. I cast Rebuild or something, and he dies.
Game 2: He plays a turn 1 Metalworker and gets ten mana on turn two, with which he Jester's Caps me. I don't really care. I have a Tendrils in hand and he sees three in my deck and takes them - then I combo him out.
Round 5: Scott with B/U Fish
Game 1: He mulligans to six and I Duress turn 1 to take an Extract. His hand doesn't really do anything except Duress me. I win.
Game 2: He Duresses me turn 1 and sees a Tendrils and an Ancestral. He picks the Tendrils and Extracts to see that I have four in my deck. I Ancestral into fairly trashy stuff, but manage to mini Tendrils him twice for the kill.
Round 6: E J with Uba Stax
Game 1: My notes suck, but I won on turn 2 without him doing much of anything.
Game 2: He does something that makes me lose that I'm pretty sure involved Sphere of Resistance and Crucible of Worlds with Strip Mine. That was the only way I lost to Stax all day.
Game 3: I win before he does anything important.
Round 7: Eric Becker with IT
We check the standings, and he scoops to me so I can draw in. He has to win next round to make it. Being on Team GWS is the absolute balls.
Round 8: Jeff with Control Slaver
We ID fast enough to get lunch from Subway.
Top 8: Eric Becker with IT
I have to play against Eric and totally go on tilt. Eric's report with have a more detailed account of what happened but:
Game 1: I play three draw sevens over two turns and still can't kill him, for reasons none of us can figure out.
Game 2: I Duressed him and had Force of Will backup for a turn three kill.
Game 3: I mulligan to six and Eric plays turn one Hymn to Tourach. He goes off turn 2. It was a good game.
The highlight of our match was when the judge told us not to talk so much. I also caused them to mandate no use of electronics during gameplay on Day 2 because of my insane Mogwai plays.
I get sixth place and score a Mox Ruby.
On the ride home I spent infinite time typing on Eric's laptop. I just typed this sentence as we passed “Moorehead.” Fisher thought it was the funniest thing ever and made twenty more “your mom” jokes. Then he disputed the mom joke comment after reading it on the screen. I told him to “just eff off.” We presumably made it home safely if you're reading this article.
Props:
Eric Becker for the both the deck and helping me write the primer.
StarCityGames for hosting an infinitely awesome event.
Team GWS for totally ruling both in the Magic world and out.
JD for hanging out with us on Sunday longer than he did with his team.
Steve for saying, “See Mat, now you know how crazy playing combo can be!”
Ryan Spindler for owning the Vintage draft scene.
Ryan Spindler for owning my brain cells.
The chicken pot pie for glistening in the sun.
Slops:
The neighborhood around the convention center for making me worried about walking to get a gyro.
Soly for saying that I said “so many insane plays” more than Steve on Day 1.
The founders of GWS for picking a completely stupid team name.
Kentucky for being scary as hell to take a broad daylight outdoor piss.
Aaron Jarvis for…
Mat Endress
Team GWS
Lost.in.admiration on the forums
Still loving the nickname “Mandress” from Doug Linn
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