The ultimate STASIS deck!!!
JSilva2452
i will try to make a new one with ROOT MAZE instead of KISMET
ill send a new one every time i update my deck
here it is:
idea: run opponent out of cards
4 stasis
4 chronatog (skip turn)
4 howling mine (better chance of drawing a card)
4 vampiric tutor (get cards out quicker)
2 kismet (lands come in tapped)
2 gerrard's wisdom (gain lots of life when howling mine is in play)
4 boomerang
4 counterspell
4 dissipate
2 dismiss
2 jester's cap (gets rid of fire blast, serra's blessing, quirion ranger)
13 island
4 something for any color mana
4 something B/U
4 something W/U
sideboard:
4 hydroblast
3 cop red
2 cop black
2 karma
2 wrath of god
2 propaganda (makes opponent tap lands)
Colin Creitz
You've got some serious probelms here. Realistically, Stasis needs to
be able to come out safely on 4 if you want a chance against
WW/Stompy/Sligh/[insert fast deck here]. After that, mana will be tough
to come by, especially in blue. Therefore, DISMISS HAS NO PLACE IN THIS
DECK. In the counterspell department, Stasis is crippled by the loss of
Force of Will. In my own Stasis deck (which still does not reflect
Tempest), I was using four each of FoW and Arcane Denial, plus a couple
of Power Sinks mostly for after Stasis was down or for the turn right
before. In the configuration I'm testing now, I'm using Memory Lapses,
Power Sinks, Disrupts, and (grudgingly) Dissipates. Dismiss and
Dissipate might work OK if you're confident about getting a blue or two
Medallion out. Another definite possiblity for the sideboard is
Hydroblast - good call there.
Great idea: four Howling Mines. They're essential. A good way to
capitalize on these is to sideboard some Serra creatures (Bay Falcons)
and some Empyrial Armors, so as to completely change the theme of your
deck through the sideboard. Bad idea: 4 Boomerang. Captialize on your
Mines by using Disempower, which requires no blue (you have better
things to do with it anyway) and can also be used offensively. Good
idea: capitalize on your 4 Stasis by putting in some Disenchant, which
is more offensive then Disempower. My deck runs three each of
Disenchant and Disempower, plus two Boomerang. Howling Mines love
Island Sanctuaries, which as it turns out are awesome passive defense.
Put in a couple.
Those Jester's Caps are ridiculously expensive for this deck. While
around turn 10-12 you will have 8-10 mana and your opponent will have 0,
util then you can't count on having that much sitting around. As long
as you're using black, which I think is a bad idea, try Lapse/Lobotomy,
eh? That also gets one out of the opponent's hand. Boomerang and
counters get rid of the Ranger, which isn't as dangerous as one might at
first think (it's kind of zero-sum to use it), and Disenchant or
Disempower gets rid of Serra's Blessing. Boomerang will deal with any
of those threats. As for Fireblast - your Chronatog can take up to one,
or you can counter it. You should have at least a couple of mana
sitting around anyway when you decide to stop drawing. And if your Tog
goes away, just play traditional Kismet/Stasis until you find a new one.
It's bad to have black here. You'd be better off as U/W rather than
U/b/w. Replace the Vampirics with Enlighteneds and (if you're paranoid)
paranoid) Mystics. If you insist on black and like your chances at
getting mana early, Lobotomies and sideboard Perishes would be in order.
As for Root Maze, I like it a lot better than Kismet for this deck in so
many ways. Getting out Kismet is undoubtedly the hardest part of
playing this deck, due to its high cost (this is related to my prejudice
against Dismiss, since on turn N with Stasis in effect, you can never
have more than about N-2 mana available), so Root Maze is pretty
good-looking at G. While we're throwing in Green, we can add the Birds
of Paradise/Instill Energy combo, and maybe even remove some Chronatogs
since the lock is pretty strong this way too. Add two Gaea's Blessing
as well, and we're set. I'd probably leave in one Kismet, for dealing
with weenie decks equipped with some way to wiggle a mana or two out of
the lock. This makes us U/W/g.
Karma is silly. At 2WW in a deck with 4 known white sources, it's
approximately as useful to this deck as a Force of Nature. Colorscrew
is just not as useful as it should be, and since the deck looks to win
by decking, concentrate on that. With the maroskin sideboard I
suggested, the theme is massive damage under control situations; there,
we concentrate on that. Counterspells are the best kind of screwage.
Against Burn/PB: The COPs feel good at first, and then you realize that
they're not too useful either. Go to two COP-Reds and an extra
Enlightened Tutor. Burn is the antithesis of this deck and you should
be prepared. I haven't seen any ProsBloom action here, but my guess is
that you just have to get control before they run the combo. They can
and will counter your COP:Black. Root Maze or Kismet ruins their day,
doesn't it? I'm not sure.
Some off the wall ideas: Spirit Link or Pacifism for creature control.
Wrath of God for last-ditching.
Artifact mana (diamonds/Petal) for possible speed increases.
Prosperity for late-game, finishing the lock, or finishing off an
opponent after turtling him down to 15 cards with Island Sanctuary.
A couple of Feldon's Canes.
SB Anvil of Bogardan to screw Necropotence up and capitalize on your
Mines (no discard phase, remember?).
Mana Web (!).
Splash red for minor burn, Pyroblast.
An infinite engine in the background (you have PLENTY of time with this
deck).
Bosium Strip.
Hurricane for flyer control in the green version.
Worldly Tutor - acts, for drawing purposes, like an extra Bird.
Finally, land. Basic lands are underrated, especially given that new LD
land. Try either 65% islands/35% plains or 50% islands/30% plains/20%
forests. Maybe a little bit of nonbasic overlap is OK here, but not
necessarily desirable. Pain lands are especially stupid, given this
deck's propensity to win at 1-4 life, and the new depletion lands suck
because there aren't enough untap phases to go around, so maybe
Undiscovered Paradise or even (GASP!) pay lands would work better,
although I don't know about the latter. How about Quirion Elves in the
green version? They can give you up to 8 multicolored mana sources with
the Birds.
---------------
"You'd /like/ to Tsunami..."
-- Alternate flavor text for Arcane Denial
Colin Creitz (remove the obvious part from my email address to respond)
JSilva2452
THERE WILL BE NO STRAIN WITH root maze IN IT BECAUSE OF THE USE OF aluren
this deck has only lost under 10 matches since this summer and i play a game
every day
the deck has changed drastically eversince the removal of the ICE AGE block of
t2
IDEA: run opponent out of cards
TIPS: try to get a cap out before the lock incase of fireblast, etc.
not as much counter cards as there used to be...choose wisly
4 stasis
4 chronatog {(skip turn)might want to take one outand throw in a meditate}
4 howling mine (better chance of drawing a card)
4 vampiric tutor (get cards out quicker)
2 kismet {(lands come in tapped) might want more than 2}
2 gerrard's wisdom (gain lots of life when howling mine is in play)
4 boomerang
4 counterspell
4 dissipate
2 dismiss
2 jester's cap (gets rid of fire blast, serra's blessing, quirion ranger)
13 island
4 something for any color mana
4 something B/U mana
4 something W/U mana
sideboard:
4 hydroblast
3 cop red
2 cop black
2 karma
2 wrath of god
2 propaganda (makes opponent tap lands)
JSilva2452
Subject: The ultimate STASIS deck!!!
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From: jsilv...@aol.com (JSilva2452)
Newsgroups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.strategy
Date: 27 Oct 1997 00:04:23 GMT
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robin
JSilva2452's Stasis deck which started this thread was blue/white/black
with too many expensive spells as Colin Creitz pointed out. How exactly you
run Stasis depends on whether the deck will be Type II or not.
First, I'll comment on some of Colin's useful points.
>You've got some serious probelms here. Realistically, Stasis needs to
>be able to come out safely on 4 if you want a chance against
>WW/Stompy/Sligh/[insert fast deck here].
This is not strictly true and is impossible to achieve in any case. I've
yet to see a Stasis deck that can establish itself in four turns. But for
every turn you counter your opponent's actions you are giving yourself
another turn in which to build the combo. A deck with 12 counters can count
on getting 3 or 4 of them and thus gaining this many turns in which to put
down the lock. So realistically I figure a Stasis deck has about 8 or 9
turns in which to deliver the goods.
>In the counterspell department, Stasis is crippled by the loss of
>Force of Will. In my own Stasis deck (which still does not reflect
>Tempest), I was using four each of FoW and Arcane Denial, plus a couple
Dead on. Arcane Denial is essential for drawing power and Force of Will for
being able to counter while under Stasis. Dismiss is too expensive to
replace Arcane Denial and Medallions don't really help since they do
nothing for most of the spells we need to cast. On this basis alone I'm not
sure if Stasis makes it in Type II.
>Great idea: four Howling Mines. They're essential. A good way to
>capitalize on these is to sideboard some Serra creatures (Bay Falcons)
>and some Empyrial Armors, so as to completely change the theme of your
>deck through the sideboard.
I'm not sure if a transformative sideboard works with this deck. Your
opponent is going to keep creature kill for your Chronatogs and so will be
able to neutralise your very few threats. The chance of getting a
Falcon/Armor combo is pretty slim and makes the deck rely upon two sets of
combos instead of just one. This sideboard idea is farfetched.
>My deck runs three each of
>Disenchant and Disempower, plus two Boomerang.
Wacky. I'm not sure where you can afford the six slots for artifact removal
in an already tight deck. You might want to look at the new spell that is
to enchantments what Disempower is to artifacts -- it's called Serene
Offering.
>Howling Mines love
>Island Sanctuaries, which as it turns out are awesome passive defense.
>Put in a couple.
For sure. In Type II this is your best method of holding off the creature
onslaught. Against mono-colour decks a stronger combo is Light of Day
("Black creatures cannot attack or block") with Whim of Volrath (a buyback
version of Sleight). Together these cards make you invulnerable to
creatures. However, I believe we'll be seeing a lot fewer mono-colour decks
once people absorb Tempest. First, there are way too many mono-colour
hosers available now. Second, there are plenty of multi-colour mana sources
and neat cross-colour combos for people to use.
The other problem is that neither of these methods protects us from direct
damage. A Sligh deck will eat us alive because we won't be able to counter
all the creatures, won't get the Light/Whim combo out in time, and even if
we did we'll die to Bolts.
My Type 1.5 Stasis deck uses Glacial Chasm as a perfect defence against all
forms of attack.
>counters get rid of the Ranger, which isn't as dangerous as one might at
>first think (it's kind of zero-sum to use it), and Disenchant or
The Quirion Ranger is *very* dangerous because it not only gives our
opponent an extra land to use each turn, but also an extra use of a mana
elf. If Kismet or Root Maze is in play the land won't help them much, but
the elf sure will. That's why it's nice to have some removal, though it's
hard to know where to find it in this setting.
>It's bad to have black here. You'd be better off as U/W rather than
>U/b/w. Replace the Vampirics with Enlighteneds and (if you're paranoid)
>paranoid) Mystics. If you insist on black and like your chances at
>getting mana early, Lobotomies and sideboard Perishes would be in order.
I agree completely. Go with U/W or U/G but not three colour in Type II.
>good-looking at G. While we're throwing in Green, we can add the Birds
>of Paradise/Instill Energy combo, and maybe even remove some Chronatogs
>since the lock is pretty strong this way too. Add two Gaea's Blessing
>as well, and we're set. I'd probably leave in one Kismet, for dealing
>with weenie decks equipped with some way to wiggle a mana or two out of
>the lock. This makes us U/W/g.
The problem here is that really there are two types of Stasis: with
Chronatogs or without. If you drop the Chronatogs and use Root Maze instead
of Kismet then the Birds/Instill combo makes sense (though you'll have to
come up with four more card slots). For global enchantment removal you can
use the Emerald Charm, which also allows you to untap a permanent (giving
you an extra turn under Stasis) or remove flying from a creature (locking
them under Island Sanctuary).
A Type II deck might look like this:
4 Stasis <- key card
4 Root Maze <- the combo
4 Howling Mine <- get the combo quicker
2 Island Sanctuary <- avoid damage + draw fewer cards
2 Propaganda <- lock them down quicker
4 Ancestral Knowledge <- set up the lock
4 Birds of Paradise <- mana for us
4 Instill Energy <- with Birds = infinite upkeep
4 Memory Lapse
4 Power Sink
4 Counterspell <- 12 counters necessary
7 Island
7 Forest
2 Skyshroud Forest <- kind of slow, but who likes mana screw?
4 Gemstone Mine
Sideboard:
4 Hydroblasts <- essential against Red
2 Emerald Charm <- multi-purpose
2 Wall of Roots <- delaying tactic + draws Bolts
2 Downdraft <- against heavy fliers
2 Anvil of Bogardan <- kills Necro + more drawing
3 Mana Web <- against mono colour
I see several problems with this deck, not least of which is the complete
absence of creature removal. Basically, we're hoping to lock up our
opponent quickly enough that we just don't care about getting pummeled for
a while. But I worry about fast red, even with the sideboard, and fast
green because of Quirion Rangers and Scragnoth, not to mention River Boa.
If we include Chronatog then the Birds/Instill combo is useless since we
hope to skip our turns and hence not pay upkeep. In the four slots we gain
I would put Mystic Veil, making it quite difficult for the Chronatog to be
removed. Another idea is Bubble Matrix but I think the Veil is stronger.
Maybe someone can playtest these two decks and see if they have a hope in
hell.
A Type 1.5 version might look like:
4 Stasis
4 Root Maze
4 Ancestral Knowledge
4 Howling Mine <- same as above
4 Memory Lapse
4 Arcane Denial
4 Force of Will
2 Counterspell <- upgrade to 14 counters
4 Chronatog <- skip our turns
2 Mystic Veil <- protect our atog friend
4 Glacial Chasm <- we'll skip this upkeep too
8 Island
4 Tropical Island
4 Tundra
4 Gemstone Mine
All of the land produces blue mana -- just as well since the entire deck is
blue with the exception of the Root Maze. We have 8 sources of green mana
for this one card. Hopefully there's very little chance of mana screw. We
also have 8 sources of white mana, which is for our sideboard, like so:
4 Hydroblasts
2 Anvil of Bogardan
3 Mana Web <- as before
2 Disenchant <- better than the Charm
4 Swords to Plowshares <- maximum removal
Comments are of course welcome, especially from those who have tried this
out.
+----------------------------+------------------------------------+
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Magibuff
In article <34571690...@news.execulink.com>, robin.es...@ACM.org
(robin) writes:
>JSilva2452's Stasis deck which started this thread was blue/white/black
>with too many expensive spells as Colin Creitz pointed out. How exactly you
>run Stasis depends on whether the deck will be Type II or not.
>
>First, I'll comment on some of Colin's useful points.
>
>>You've got some serious probelms here. Realistically, Stasis needs to
>>be able to come out safely on 4 if you want a chance against
>>WW/Stompy/Sligh/[insert fast deck here].
>
>This is not strictly true and is impossible to achieve in any case. I've
>yet to see a Stasis deck that can establish itself in four turns. But for
>every turn you counter your opponent's actions you are giving yourself
>another turn in which to build the combo. A deck with 12 counters can count
>on getting 3 or 4 of them and thus gaining this many turns in which to put
>down the lock. So realistically I figure a Stasis deck has about 8 or 9
>turns in which to deliver the goods.
As a point of reference both, Squandered Stasis and turbo-stasis generally
have stasis down on turn 4, they are not hard locks, but Turbo keeps it in
place with the howling mines and escapes via despotic scepter. Squandered
uses the mines also but gets 2 mana out of it's lands for the most part.
These decks are built on the idea of quick locks and taking some damage
until the hard lock is in place. Take a look at the dojo for classic examples.
Mike Stephens
Everything is under Control.