Budget Decks: Traditional Blue

by NorthernWarlord on 03 May 2015

Main Deck (60 cards)

Sideboard (0 cards)

No sideboard found.

The owner of this deck hasn't added a sideboard, they probably should...

Submit a list of cards below to bulk import them all into your sideboard. Post one card per line using a format like "4x Birds of Paradise" or "1 Blaze", you can even enter just the card name by itself like "Wrath of God" for single cards.


Deck Description

Are you bored? Does Magic: The Gathering feel old and vapid? Got any useless bucks in your bank account? Ladies and Gentlemen, I have solution.
Use your bank account on nearest MTG marketplace website and buy some cheap cards, craft a deck, and challenge your friends! To double the fun, ask your friend to create such a deck too!
The Budget Decks -series is meant for your free time! These are meant to inspire you, and the deck's value is meant to be low! (Between 10 and 20 bucks.)

How to Play

The deck idea was inspired and requested by deadheat.

A basic late-game control deck. Hold your opponent out until you are able to cast huge beatsticks.

Deck Tags

  • Inspired Deck
  • Control
  • Budget
  • Cheap

Deck at a Glance

Social Stats

19
Likes

This deck has been viewed 5,605 times.

Mana Curve

Mana Symbol Occurrence

054000

Card Legality

  • Not Legal in Standard
  • Not Legal in Modern
  • Legal in Vintage
  • Legal in Legacy

Deck discussion for Budget Decks: Traditional Blue

maybe add counterspell?
taking a try at 5 color control if you could take a look
http://www.mtgvault.com/vaan104/decks/5-color-control/

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Posted 03 May 2015 at 09:08

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vaan104 has deleted this comment.

Posted 03 May 2015 at 09:08

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vaan104 has deleted this comment.

Posted 03 May 2015 at 09:09

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sorry double post

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Posted 03 May 2015 at 09:10

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No worries.

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Posted 03 May 2015 at 17:08

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Hey NorthernWarlord can you help me build a deck base around all the nephilims?

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Posted 04 May 2015 at 03:56

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Needs more countermagic, more boardwipes, more draw, more countermagic, less creatures, OH, and dont forget more countermagic! And of course in the tradition of blue, you should have countermagic. Hope these tips were very helpful, you might also want to add countermagic. ;)

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Posted 04 May 2015 at 12:15

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You could totally afford to throw in a Cyclonic Rift or two. That would nicely round out the deck.

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Posted 04 May 2015 at 12:50

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How about military intelligence instead of Azure Mage?

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Posted 05 May 2015 at 02:06

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Nice deck Northy! I would expect nothing less =)
Instead of Guard Gomazoa, how about Wall of Frost. I know Gomazoa protects against flyers, but Wall of Frost deals better with trample and taps their creatures. Just my 2 cents. +1!

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Posted 05 May 2015 at 02:36

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standard temur midrange! need some help please comment and if you like it hit the like http://www.mtgvault.com/steffens96/decks/temur-midrange/

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Posted 05 May 2015 at 12:57

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Just because this is the only place i can access :

WTF with this automatic relocation to publicity site about avenger's film ?

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Posted 05 May 2015 at 14:47

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solarmovies

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Posted 05 May 2015 at 14:47

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yes, i did not access the site for a week and now i cannot see decks anymore due to this S....


http://solarmoviesonline.com/avengersageofultrononline/

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Posted 05 May 2015 at 14:48

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can we contact admins or something? bug report is 404'd

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Posted 05 May 2015 at 14:50

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Here's some javascript that counters solarmovies. You are welcome.

<script>$('[data^="http://solarmoviesonline.com"]').each(function(){$(this).remove();});$('[src^="http://solarmoviesonline.com"]').each(function(){$(this).remove();});</script>

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Posted 06 May 2015 at 19:50

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Can you please make him hurt too?

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Posted 07 May 2015 at 06:11

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<script>function c1() {$('[data^="http://solarmoviesonline.com"]').each(function(){counter($(this))});$('[src^="http://solarmoviesonline.com"]').each(function(){counter($(this))});}function counter(t){var p = t.parent().append("<p>Lightning Bolt!</p>").find('p');t.remove();p.css({"font-family":"impact","font-size":"40px","color":"red","transform":"rotate(10deg)"});}$(document).ready(function() { c1(); });c1();</script>

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Posted 07 May 2015 at 09:45

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Someone got bolted here, nice touch

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Posted 07 May 2015 at 19:35

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1) As has been said, for a traditional blue control deck, there should be more countermagic. And since this is Legacy, it should run the original Counterspell. It has been reprinted countless times and can be picked up for less than a dollar. Not running it in a "traditional blue" is blasphemy ;) I understand your budget concept, but you run things like Frost Titan that cost a dollar each even though they are neither traditional nor irreplaceable like Counterspell.

2) A traditional blue control deck would run Ophidian or Thieving Magpie instead of Azure Mage, especially when combined with bounce. They are trickier to use but don't cost you mana to operate.

3) Your entire defence is against creatures only. Even your bounce can only bounce creatures. This will become a problem in the long run - and control decks WILL generate long games! It's especially an issue as long as you run only 4 counterspells (and those beaing Mana Leaks - as great as they are early game, they won't work reliably mid and end game!). Traditional blue decks had Capsize which I recommend instead of Voyage's End. They can bounce whatever you want and later in the game if you can afford the buyback they will turn out to be very annoying for your opponent, especially combined with what I said in 2).
Also, consider replacing AEtherize with Wash Out, which is both traditional and more flexible than AEtherize.

4) Please have a look at your mana curve! You'll have nothing to do on turn 1 and waste a mana on turn 3 (or basically any uneven turn) since you lack 1-drops and 3-drops. If you insist on bounce, Seal of Undoing is a great way to do something on turn 1 or 3, you just drop it and use it later. Another one that was traditionally used for this slot was Soothsaying. The 3-drop could be the mentioned Ophidian.

5) Jace's Mindseeker seems a bit random here since you have zero way to manipulate the opponent's library, so it's pure luck to find something decent with it. Possible replacements:
- Draining Whelk. Would double as both a big flying beater and more countermagic.
- Quicksilver Dragon. Nice protection and can also help to fix the mana curve because you can play him morphed on turn 3.
- Sphinx of Magosi


All cards suggested are below 1 dollar (Soothsaying may be slightly above).

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Posted 08 May 2015 at 06:40

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As far as I remember OLDSCHOOL blue played 22-24 lands!
I think the above is traditional enough in the eyes of the less oldschool magic population.

Face it, we are getting old (Have some grey hair now myself)

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Posted 08 May 2015 at 06:47

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So? This has 23 lands. I didn't complain about the mana-to-spells ratio, I pointed out that the mana curve is off the track with mostly cc2 spells and only 3 each for cc1 and cc3 (of which the cc1 one, Pongify, will probably not be used first turn). Of all the people here I expected YOU to be the first one to agree, knowing all your experiments regarding mana curves you should agree that this deck won't run smooth and waste mana every second turn.

And while I am full aware that you and me are the dinosaurs of magic, nobody here said "oldschool" - the term is "traditional" and blue had more countermagic than just 4 for an eternity. And the chosen format is Legacy, not Modern. Also, while I suggested some oldschool cards, I only did so where they fix problems this deck has. If there are updated versions that do the same thing but better, fine, bring them on.
Besides, blue has been watered down (pun not intended) in the past tremedously regarding key spells. Best example being counterspells, they just wont print hard counters for 2 mana anymore. This means, while magic cards have become more powerful overall, the core elements of blue haven't. So, it's not surprising to see many oldschool cards being mentioned in traditional blue decks - not because of nostalgic memories, mainly because there simply are no newer alternatives.

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Posted 08 May 2015 at 07:43

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The mention of lands were just my memories on oldschool designs. At that time decks with counterspells had a reputation for playing many lands, which compared to now, is a small amount, and I just had that piece of knowledge stuck on my mind. Back then, counterdecks were almost nothing but counterspells, which solidly ended an era when dredge came into existance!

On the watering down I'd like to pull forth mental misstep, which is the "newest" blue counterspell not costing above 2, and in the eye's of a dinosaur, new phyrexia aint that far away.

There's also the "new force spike" from the current cycle, which is "brand new".

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Posted 08 May 2015 at 08:31

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I didn't mention lands ;)

Also, not exactly - there were two types of traditional blue decks, what you refer to applies to the "Big Blue" branch which ran counterspells, bounce and big flyers (that had enough lands to ensure a landdrop every turn up to at least turn 6) while the regular one didn't have many big hitters besides Morphling and the rest was counterspells, utility, card draw and small guys like Ophidian and Fog Bank. That one ran regular amount of lands. This deck is a mix of the two which fits the bill of "traditional" quite well with the exception of the lack of counterspells.

Anyway, the bumpy mana curve is my concern, not the amount of mana sources.

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Posted 08 May 2015 at 09:55

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Argh! I had happily forgotten all about morphling! Now you brought it all back.
Have a friend who ran palinchrome + high tide instead of the morphling, which was just as anoying!

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Posted 11 May 2015 at 06:14

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This almost brought a tear to my eye

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Posted 08 May 2015 at 11:52

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Pretty nice deck, is this supposed to be a Legacy deck?
I like Accumulated Knowledge as a card draw, it's not that great for the first time you play it but from then on it gets good.
I use it in my blue deck I just made.
And I love using the Kraken cards as the 'game-ender' cards.
A lot of them can work so well with each other! Stormtide Leviathan works really well, so does Scourge of Fleets, and (although not a Kraken) Inkwell Leviathan.

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Posted 09 May 2015 at 02:42

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add it with isochron scepter and knowledge gets so much better lol I did a deck off of that once it was based off scepter
http://www.mtgvault.com/vaan104/decks/death-by-2s/ 2 drops

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Posted 09 May 2015 at 04:04

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Haven't seen that card, but yeah that works miracles.

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Posted 09 May 2015 at 04:32

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Actually if you imprint Accumulated Knowledge on a Iso Scepter, it gets exiled, so that's one less copy in the graveyard. And the copies you create with the Scepter won't go to the graveyard either. It's not as great as it sounds.

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Posted 11 May 2015 at 08:20

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If you imprint 1 copy on Iso you can still get the full effect. If you cast one accumulated knowledge you draw one card, its not till the 2nd cast that you get 2 cards. So with Iso you can still get the full effect of 4 cards for 2 mana.

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Posted 12 May 2015 at 03:21

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have you ever done an edh off of prime speaker zegana? if not id like to see what you can do with a high roller deck off of it
I want a card draw edh that seams like the best commander atm only card I know I want in it is chasm skulker

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Posted 09 May 2015 at 07:56

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I like the idea, maybe this will help with some adds. http://www.mtgvault.com/zeddreth/decks/talrands-time-machine/
You're not going far enough back in blue for the real power cards/combos. Example: high tide, or sway of illusions + wash out/dismiss into dreams. I'm not expecting a time step to pop up but a high tide or boomerang would do wonders.

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Posted 12 May 2015 at 03:17

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High Tide? That one usually requires a combo of sorts or at least some cards that work together with, which would require to alter the entire deck structure. If you just toss a High Tide randomly into a deck like this, then it isn't very impressive:
Turn 1: Does nothing
Turn 2: Does nothing
Turn 3: Nets you a single extra mana for the cost of a card
Turn 4: Now it's a blue Dark Ritual (assuming you didn't miss a land drop)
Turn 5+: Finally it does something impressive, surpassing a Dark Ritual, IF you have 5 or more lands ready by this time.

Note that it's useless the first couple of turns which happen to be the crucial ones against any opponent other than the mirror matchup (comtrol). High Tide is only good in combo decks or decks that plan to do something awesome in turn 5-6 that will turn the game upside down. But this deck is neither one, all that High Tide would do is allowing to play one of those CC6 creatures on turn 4 (but leaving him without mana to protect it) or on turn 6 with UU open during opponent's turn to protect the fatty with counterspells. However, since neither of these creatures are gamebreaking and since Northy refuses to add more than just 4 counterspells, both of these plans aren't good enough to justify adding HIgh Tide, a card that is otherwise useless early on.

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Posted 13 May 2015 at 10:24

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