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Going to play it tonight in a small FNM.

Second version

//Artifact Creature
4 Baleful Strix

//Creature
2 Deathrite Shaman
1 Eternal Witness
1 Grave Titan
1 Phantasmal Image
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Shriekmaw
2 Tarmogoyf
1 Thragtusk
4 Veteran Explorer

//Enchantment
2 Pernicious Deed
1 Recurring Nightmare

//Instant
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm

//Planeswalker
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

//Sorcery
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Green Sun's Zenith
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Ponder

//Artifact
2 Sensei's Divining Top

//Land
2 Bayou
2 Forest
2 Island
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Polluted Delta
2 Swamp
2 Tropical Island
1 Underground Sea
4 Verdant Catacombs

//Sideboard
SB: 2 Engineered Plague
SB: 3 Counterbalance
SB: 1 Golgari Charm
SB: 3 Surgical Extraction
SB: 2 Pithing Needle
SB: 3 Thoughtseize
SB: 1 Tormod's Crypt

First little tournament:

Round 1 vs BUG Delver: 2-0 win
Round 2 vs some mono blue phyrexian dreadnought delver brew: 2-0 win
Round 3 vs RUG Delver: 2-0 win
Finals vs Miracles: 1-2 loss

I won game 1 vs miracles and then got slaughtered by a turn 4 jace two times in a row. Real beating.

This deck looks really interesting to play, I don't even know what to say about it because I haven't seen one like this before. I kind of want to try to play something like this. Great job on the build, it looks fairly solid. And miracle decks are seen in legacy? I've never seen one made that looked like it could have a leg to stand on in that format, but then again legacy isn't my strong suit.

[QUOTE=Chewrida]This deck looks really interesting to play, I don't even know what to say about it because I haven't seen one like this before. I kind of want to try to play something like this. Great job on the build, it looks fairly solid. And miracle decks are seen in legacy? I've never seen one made that looked like it could have a leg to stand on in that format, but then again legacy isn't my strong suit.[/QUOTE]

UW Miracle Control has been a Tier 1 deck in legacy since 2012 and has seen very little change since then. It's really solid and has a good machup against many decks. I think it fell out of favor somewhat in 2013 (for unknown reason, it's not like it got worse) but now it's back and strong in 2014 with among many Top8's a second place in Grand Prix Paris a few months back. The guy went undefeated day 1 without buys (9 rounds) and lost the finals day 2. It's given the deck new appeal to many players.

That said it's not easy to play, it's one of those really slow decks that has to win Game 1 because there never is a game 3 to win within the 50 minutes timeframe. I've played it for a while and liked it but like I said it's a very demanding deck and going 9 rounds with it is not really for me. The fact that you get the occasional draw due to slowness of the deck doesn't increase your odds of going Top8.


This is the GP Paris list

http://www.mtgdecks.net/decks/view/65725

It's basically UW Counterbalance with a number of possible wins, most play Entreat the Angels and Jace but there are versions with Helm of Obedience kill and there are Sword of the Meek combo versions as well. All are very good.

This is a Helm of Obedience version

http://www.mtgdecks.net/decks/view/67070

Sword of the Meek version

http://www.mtgdecks.net/decks/view/66372


The deck is alround very good against the entire field. It's excellent against creature based strategies and Counterbalance is fantastic against Storm Combo, Elves and Tempo. The only way you loose is when tempo decks can race you and counter your first terminus. Goblins was a problem for me in the past as terminus puts ringleader back in the deck and they basically beat you in cardadvantage in the long run chaining Matron and goblin ringleader. But it's not like it's unbeatable and Goblin decks fell somewhat out of favor due to the many Deathrite Shaman decks.
Show and Tell isn't the best matchup either but it's fair. Playing a Humility based version of Miracles can dramatically increase your odds here.
This is the deck where I learned to side out my force of wills in grind matchups which made a huge difference for me.

With all the insane crap wizards printed in recent years UW seems to have it all. It's just creazy how packed those two colors are with raw power in legacy. My friend used to run 4c Landstill for years before Planeswalkers came along. 4 colors were needed to give the deck enough answers, now 2 colors are enough for the perfect control deck.

Thanks for linking some of the miracle decks, I completely forgot about terminus. I figured entreat the angels would be in there. But you are right with the raw power that u/w has, and it makes me wish I was a control player. I love control decks but I'm all around better at playing and building aggro.

Great explanation on all that by the way, I appreciate the time you put into the answer and showing me things about legacy miracle and other aspects of the format.

happy to do so man :)

An interesting card for legacy control that I overlooked until yesterday and that was printed in the Commander 2013 series (Derevi pack) is Unexpectedly Absent. It's still pretty cheap (5-6$, I just ordered a few) and comparable to Submerge but obviously much better. With all the fetchland in the format you can easily get rid of any targetable non-land permanent (thinking Jace, or any problem creature like lets say Marit Lage) in response to something that will make them shuffle. Even if they don't shuffle it can still be very good. It functions like extra Swords to plowshares on permanents.

That's an interesting card, I haven't seen it before either. With all this indestructible creatures like the new God creatures it would be a good fit to solve that other than sacrificing or Neg countering them. And it doesn't give the opponent anything unlike path to exile or sword of plowshares

[QUOTE=Chewrida]That's an interesting card, I haven't seen it before either. With all this indestructible creatures like the new God creatures it would be a good fit to solve that other than sacrificing or Neg countering them. And it doesn't give the opponent anything unlike path to exile or sword of plowshares[/QUOTE]

My only proplem with it in commander is that it is yet another card poeple will use to shuffle away a general. I really dislike that tactic, whats the point of playing commander if you're intentionally going to do everything you can to force your opponent to play Highlander.

Yea, I see what you mean, it's why when I play commander I try to make sure my commander isnt the main reason or way my deck works. Maybe work with the deck, like compliment it, but if you can't win without your commander you didnt build a very good deck in the first place. Granted losing your commander will definitely put you at a disadvantage.

[QUOTE=Chewrida]Yea, I see what you mean, it's why when I play commander I try to make sure my commander isnt the main reason or way my deck works. Maybe work with the deck, like compliment it, but if you can't win without your commander you didnt build a very good deck in the first place. Granted losing your commander will definitely put you at a disadvantage.[/QUOTE]

All my decks work without their commander but like you stated its a serious disadvantage still. Its a good thing they allow you to exile instead of shuffle your commander under duel commander rules. Its the way to go in my opinion. Not that I play deul commander, I always play multiplayer but I like their ban list and custom rulings.

To tell you the truth I was unaware that there were different rules for multiplayer and one on one duals in commander.

Duel commander is a tournament format, they have a website here

http://duelcommander.com

If you play against serious duel commander players you'll realize how different it is from casual multiplayer commander, you'll also be dead within a few turns :)

Wow commander gets that fast huh? I've had some pretty good games where like I reanimated Iona turn 4, but against decks that can win that fast consistently would be rough. Although I'm always up for a challenge so I'd gladly face one until I made one myself that could compete with it. It's what I did against my friends vintage dragonstorm deck. He built it and I would hardly get to turn 3 before he won and it'd be like that 3 out of 4 games so I built a deck to compete against it and now my deck hardly lets him see turn 3. So it'd be interesting.

I'm not sure where you can find competitive commander decks online to get an idea of what poeple play but I'm sure the info is out there.