Saturday, January 29, 2011

Vs. Non-Aggro -> Play Control?

I have been trying to take the control role against control decks, and ramp decks, in games 2-3.

In game 1, control's creature removal is dead, and their draw (Wall of Omens, Spreading Seas) are often sorcery-speed cyclers.  Their removal for my win condition is near-zero.  This often means a win game 1 against control, because in many ways I'm a better control deck game 1.

Ramp doesn't play pure creature-removal, or bad card-draw, and is fairly non-interactive on it's way to killing me with a Titan or Trap.  (problems I don't have good main-deck answers to)  This often leads to a G1 loss, since I don't have good answers, and they don't worry about having answers.  I am not a very good control deck game 1 (Titan->Trap ->Loss, Titan -> no counter -> loss, so many times 2x threats = loss).  The only way I win game 1 is to "aggro" them out with a turn 4-5 kill off an early PA + charge with staggershock, etc.

The control matchup feels like more of a coin-flip, once they bring in Purge/Memoricide for dead removal, and I bring in counters.  It is pretty easy to lose to discard -> Grave Titan, or "activate collonade on 12 land".

The ramp matchup feels nigh unwinnable with the current strat.  I can counter all I want, and they can still just play valakuts and kill me.  (especially when my clock goes infinite at 4x staggershock as my offense)

So if I am going to go control against these control + ramp decks, I need a answer to their non-counterable threats (MBT + Tectonic Edge), a way to deal with their removal for my threat post-side (Nature's Claim, Celestial Purge, Discard -> Memoricide, Ratchet Bomb)

Sideboard consequences:
I typically take out Burst, Bolt, and bring in 8x counter.
ITR is not awesome against most ramp.  ITR is probably manditory in some quantity against control, because it is defensive against removal for the PA, and offensive against answers like Leyline.

Having a planeswalker (Jace B.) to grant recurring card advantage and/or kill opposing Jaces could be necessary, in place of something?

I have a ton of sideboard slots I can dedicate to these match-ups, but I'm not sure what to take out after the initial 8.

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