No Stick is one of the best control decks available to anyone trying to qualify this season. The listing I have has a number of changes from Arita’s PT: LA list, but it’s tested very well. In addition, this version has already qualified my friend Max McCall (T8 GP Seattle), who won his PTQ this past weekend. In other words, this deck is amazing.
So you want a list? Sure. Here’s Silvestri Scepter. Copying Flores deck names for the win!
Lands (26)
Spells (34)
- 4 Counterspell
- 3 Wrath of God
- 3 Force Spike
- 3 Cunning Wish
- 4 Thirst for Knowledge
- 4 Isochron Scepter
- 3 Orim's Chant
- 2 Fact or Fiction
- 4 Absorb
- 4 Lightning Helix
Sideboard
For a little bit of a history lesson, I shall now bore most of you by explaining how I got this build. I originally picked a base version of the deck up from Rich Shay (82nd at PT: LA). Finding that my precious Goblins deck was sufficiently hosed without Aether Vial, I settled on a deck with combo control properties so I could smash the vast fields of aggro while not rolling to the occasional Desire deck. Ravinca brought me Lightning Helix and Sacred Foundry and I quickly realized that a Lightning Bolt and Healing Salve at 2 mana every turn was a good deal. And after some more theory, actual testing and sideboard tips from Max (Exalted Angel and Muddle the Mixture in the board were big improvements) this was my final build.
Let me be frank, before I came upon Dredgeatog and similar Life from the Loam powered decks, I would’ve said No Stick* is the best deck in Extended, bar none. Now I think there may be a number of top decks (Stupid Dredge mechanic breaking Psychatog), but you still retain a high winning percentage against the most popular decks in Extended. To top it off, you trump or at least 50/50 six out of the eight decks that made top eight at LA. I’ll assume you know how the deck basically works, so let me go over some of the more interesting card choices.
*What was the problem with leaving it Scepter Chant exactly? Meh.
Notable Card Choices
Lightning Helix—This is probably the best card printed for Isochron Scepter since it’s been released. On a Scepter it effectively puts your opponent on a 7-turn clock, while giving you life boosts to stall against aggro. In addition, with everyone’s addiction to the new duals, people are constantly taking 4 or 5 points of damage from their lands alone, making Helix even more effective. It also destroys the majority of creature-based decks like Goblins, Jank, UG Madness, Boros Deck Wins and cripples many Affinity builds.
With all these advantages, plus Sacred Foundry making the WR cost easier to cover, it was an easy choice for me to play it over Fire / Ice. Helix is simply more effective as creature removal or as a clock and I believe that trumps the Ice cantrip ability you miss out on.
Absorb—This was my choice of counters after Force Spike and Counterspell. Simply put, I dislike Mana Leak for not being very good in the mirror, Tog and Desire matches. Having a hard counter was very valuable to me and the life-gain was an incidental bonus for the more burn-heavy aggro matches where Scepter is slow to come online. I believe Arita chose Prohibit, because hard counters (albeit limited ones) are very useful in the current Extended and a huge number of cards are 2cc or less. Plus that whole Chrome Mox thing he decided to use.
Though I don’t exactly like Prohibit, I’d prefer it to running Mana Leak in this slot. I just have a heavy dislike for ‘pay X mana’ counters in the current format for the number of good control decks that are floating around.
Thirst for Knowledge—This isn’t so much of a notable addition, as more of a justification to why it’s here with only 4 artifacts (Scepter, no less!) in the deck to pitch. Simply put, it was included because it had the words, ‘Draw 3 cards’ and ‘Instant’ written on it. This card puts the most cards into your hand, which gives you the maximum amount of options. I prefer seeing and choosing from 3 + my hand when making decision for what cards to keep. Thirst accomplishes that for only 2U and so that was my pick for the deck. That’s my reasoning and in testing and at the PTQ it paid off in spades.
Shivan Reef—This is notable since a number of people have seen this card in my list and said something along these lines, “Well more Red mana helps, but why not Forge[/author]“]Battlefield [author name="Forge"]Forge[/author] or more fetches?”. Simply put; this is done because the deck loves having 16 Blue sources and needed more than 4 lands that made Red mana. In addition, Reef, unlike City of Brass, can tap for colorless and not ping itself. Let’s face it, many of the aggro decks at LA were helped significantly by opponents losing 3-5 life from their own lands. You do not want to fall into this same trap, but you must still keep mana consistency. That’s why Reef is in the deck.
Magma Jet—I actually used to have these maindeck to go along with Lightning Helix. I think these are better than Fire/Ice simply because Jet deals 2 damage like Fire and then has Scrying for 2, which is comparable to Ice. So you’re getting both sides for the price of one, not to mention on a Scepter it’s 2 damage a turn and a mini Brainstorm when done at upkeep. It’s not quite as good as Helix and I ran out of room to run them in the maindeck, but it’s good Wish-able removal.
Muddle the Mixture—Too limited in a counter role to be worth playing in the maindeck usually, but as a [[Cunning Wish[[ target, it has value as a transmutate tutor for Scepter or Helix.
Starstorm—This is the only card in the sideboard I’m iffy about. I can’t say you’ll always have RR around when you want to be casting this card, since it’s heavily dependent on how many fetches and duals you draw. However, it is a decent Wrath spell against Goblins and Jank.
Overload—It kills Pithing Needle, Isochron Scepter and Cranial Plating for R all the time, with no exceptions. This makes it a wonderful Wish target and worth boarding in multiples to take care of the complement of Pithing Needle almost every aggro deck brings in post-board. In addition it’s another spell to eliminate Scepter in the mirror, which could give you a slight edge.
Notable Cards Missing In Action
Why I’m not using Sensei’s Divining Top or Telling Time—The Top simply doesn’t work without running more Fetchlands then I’m comfortable with and it won’t make up its card loss until a bit later in the game.
Telling Time, on the other hand, I had high hopes for and was just disappointed by. TT is an awesome rendition of Brainstorm, but there’s one major difference that turned me off compared to TFK. The card looks at the top three, but ultimately only one goes to your hand and the other possibly valuable card you waste your draw step to pick up.
If you get three good cards on top of the library, you only get one right to hand and see the second card at your next draw step, meanwhile your third card disappears to the bottom of the deck. TFK draws the three cards and says discard the worst two cards in your hand. The same applies if you see three bad cards on the top of your library, Telling Time only gets two out of the way (one to hand and one to the bottom) and leaves one lousy card to draw, while TFK clears off all three cards.
No Sphere of Law or Circle of Protection: Red— The reasons for not running these anti-Red cards are quite simple. The two cards are ok temporary solutions, but Red decks have evolved to the point where they can easily bypass them with a few board cards. For example, Flaring Pain can dodge both cards on two separate attacks or, if it gets countered once, simply play it again. Pithing Needle, which was the tenth most played card in the maindeck at LA and the fifth most played out of sideboards, really show how ineffective COP: Red can be. This doesn’t even take into account the number of Jank and Goblin decks that can easily run or splash for enchantment removal.
I simply believe Exalted Angel does the job of defending your life more effectively then either enchantment, and is harder to nullify than COP: Red or Sphere of Law. It forces an odd decision for Goblin decks: they either bring in Pithing Needle and artifact removal and remove creature removal, or they remove threats. If they take out any of their removal, it increases the strength of turn 3 Morph, turn 4 flip Angel or even a hardcast Angel on turn 6. Meanwhile, if threats come out, their goldfish slows down a number of turns.
No Kataki, War’s Wage—I simply overlooked it, whoops! It’s a very effective option if you expect loads of Affinity at your PTQs.
No Fire/Ice—Ok, this is a biggie, but I have a very simple answer for you. I think Lightning Helix is more effective (see my entry on Helix earlier) on it’s own or combined with Scepter. I would much rather gain the 3 life than occasionally split a 1:1 damage ratio. The downside of being unable to draw cards is notable, but ultimately moot. Helix is certainly better than Fire/Ice in the aggro matches. Meanwhile in the control matches you either can draw cards off Ice and try and stall until you get a second Scepter down or an actual clock (8-10 turns is way too long). Personally, I prefer to just win the game with Helix instead of using a slow draw engine, especially considering that the slow draw engines in other decks tend to trump yours.
No Chrome Mox—Another big deal and again I have a simple answer. In no match did I feel rushed enough to believe Chrome Mox would be worth the loss of a card from my hand. No Stick is simply fast enough already with its counters, highly efficient removal and the cheap cost of Isochron Scepter. The only thing it truly lacks is a real card advantage engine outside of Fact or Fiction. So why bother losing resources for a minimal speed boost? Probably the biggest loss I’ve felt from not running Chrome Mox is being unable to pitch extras to TFK.
Aggro Matches
Affinity— Let’s start with the most played deck at PT: LA. Other than the occasional broken Affinity hand that just wins, you’ll have the advantage pre and post-board. In game 1, Force Spike, Lightning Helix and Cunning Wish are your best friends. The key to this match is just stopping Cranial Plating and countering Thoughtcast. The only scary creatures Affinity still runs are the colored creatures of Bob (Dark Confidant) and Erayo, Soratami Ascendant. Both die to Helix or Wrath of God.
Speaking of Wrath of God, resolving one against Affinity is far more crippling now than ever before. No longer do you worry about getting blasted for four or five life for wrecking them! This of course will buy even more time to Wish for Overload or find Scepter, but also they have low threat counts. Isochron Scepter with Helix or Chant is still a win on turn 2/3, but sadly, in some of those games you’ll have to destroy a resolved Pithing Needle first.
Post-board play is better for them if they have 3-4 Pyrostatic Pillar in the board to bring in. Turn 2 Pillar with any sort of a clock effectively nullifies your own turn 2 Scepter. On your side of the table though, you gain 4 cheap Vindicates and potentially the monster of Exalted Angel. Considering most Affinity decks only run Shrapnel Blast or Darkblast for removal, I’ve won a decent number of games off turn 2 Helix, turn 3 Morph, turn 4 flip. This isn’t my normal boarding plan, but a few of my testing partners reported success with it.
3 Overload and a Disenchant come in (Sometimes Exalted Angel depending on build);
Force Spike and a TFK come out.
Goblins—You destroy them game 1, barring mana screw or double Cabal Therapy randomness. Resolve a Scepter with Orim’s Chant, Lightning Helix, Magma Jet or even Counterspell, and you’ll gain overwhelming card advantage in a few turns. In addition, Goblins still folds to Wrath of God and Absorb can easily buy you a few turns. Goblins simply can’t keep up with you without Aether Vial to nullify counters. Cabal Therapy builds can steal a few more games, but considering almost every game you see Scepter in your opening hand you win and any game you can stall past turn 7-8 you win, you can see why Goblins has little chance.
Goblins odds improve in games 2 and 3 with Pithing Needle and any artifact removal coming in, but Exalted Angel keeps their winning percentage about the same. The more threats they take out for board cards, the longer you have to find your own threats and answers.
4 TFK and a Force Spike leave; 3 Exalted Angel and 2 Overload come in
Jank and Boros Deck Wins—I group these together because of how many cards they share and how similar they are in playstyle. These matches are slightly harder than Goblins or Affinity game 1 due to maindeck artifact removal and burn. It’s about 50/50 against a Fujita-esque build while your winning percentage rises against Tormos builds. Same basic rules apply though; turn 2 Scepter with Helix or Chant is going to win the game in short order. Absorb anything you can when running low on life in the match. If you can hit a Lightning Helix, that’s great, but otherwise just make sure you get the 3 extra life in the bank. Sometimes people wait to counter the ‘final’ burn spell thrown at their head and then get blind-sided by another one in response. Don’t let it happen to you.
Details about the match are dependent on how each version is designed though. For example, Fujita’s build is more difficult to deal with than the Tormos version due to extra mana denial and Kataki, War’s Wage in the maindeck. For these versions, keeping tabs on open mana and how many sources you represent is a must. Losing a crucial dual can be a game-breaking play, but preventable if you keep track of what lands you fetch for and keep off TFK usage. In general though keep track of how many burn spells they’ve played and when you’re comfortable, flatten the board with Wrath or Starstorm out of the board.
Board play is heavily dependent on what they bring in. Sadly I can only give a general boarding strategy and a little advice. After boarding you really only want to counter threatening spells like Genju of the Spires, Dwarven Blastminer and spells that will kill your Scepter.
What leaves is dependent on the build, usually just Force Spike. The same applies to what comes in. Usually just Disenchant will come in to take care of Umezawa’s Jitte, Suppression Field or Genju.
UG Madness—You wreck them. Badly. Resolved Scepter or Wrath of God will make them cry. Besides the deck isn’t worth playing in the current Extended metagame anyway.
Golgari Madness—This on the other hand can be a bit more obnoxious with its ability to win on turn 4. On the upside, this deck has very little actual disruption to bother you with. Most of the builds run a set of Circular Logic and sometimes a Cabal Therapy or two maindeck. As a result they have very limited means to stop an early Scepter play or early draw to find Wrath of God or Scepter. Oh and Cunning Wish into a Boomerang on an alpha strike Wild Mongrel or Psychatog is typically a game breaking play. Just always remember what answers you have in the board; you have a lot of options for this match.
I don’t have a whole lot of testing against these new builds, so I can’t tell you conclusively who wins the match. Sorry about that. On the plus side, Max beat this deck in the finals of his PTQ, so winning 2 games is certainly possible.
No board plan has yet been developed.
Control Matches
Old Tog—Contrary to popular belief, the Tog match is not a walk in the park for builds like Ruel’s. It’s far closer to 50/50 depending on player skill and how many copies of Deep Analysis the Tog player runs. They have limited ways to deal with a resolved Scepter (Boomerang… a 1 for 1 trade since I keep the Scepter. Scary) and your draw will match theirs. The downside is that they run an even larger counter-base so you can’t just force your way through them in a fight, unlike Kenji’s build.
Wrath of God, despite costing 4, is still very effective at killing Psychatog and a great way to slow them down or draw out a counter. In addition Lightning Helix and Absorb can actually give you enough extra life to stall the Tog player even longer. In addition, usually when they alpha strike you, they go through quite a few spells to get it that big. Feel free to pull the same Boomerang trick as the Golgari Madness if you run out of other options.
Post-board you dump Force Spike since it’s not all that useful and bring in Exalted Angel. You now have a large creature threat that they’ll have very limited answers too. Though the match tends to go down the toilet post-board, since now the Tog player has 4 Duress and potentially even more ‘must kill’ creatures.
Out goes Force Spike; in comes Exalted Angel
Dredgeatog—Read what I said about Ruel’s build and now let me explain the two upsides and downsides about playing against this build of Tog.
Upside: The deck runs a worse counter base and no real draw.
Downside: If they get off Gifts Ungiven for Life from the Loam and three cycling lands and you don’t have active Scepter… consider conceding. You can’t actually stop the Loam engine once it starts going. Oh, and they have multiple Putrefy and Pernicious Deeds to kill your Scepter.
You need to counter any Gifts Ungiven they cast and try to resolve Scepter with protection on turn 4/5. That’s all.
Out nothing. In nothing.
No Stick—The mirror is much like all other mirrors, a lot of emphasis is placed on hands and protecting a few key cards. The focus you have will be entirely on Scepter and Cunning Wish. Scepter is obvious, but Wish is important because it allows you to fetch Brain Freeze to go for the win in the late game. Also be wary of the builds running Eternal Dragon, Decree of Justice or maindeck Brain Freeze. They have the advantage in the match by default the longer the game goes on.
For post-board play, the best plan I can think of is dumping the Force Spike and Wrath of God so you can bring in Overload and Exalted Angel. Overload gives you some cheap spot removal and some wiggle room to let Scepter resolve. Meanwhile the Angel gives you another way to win the game that can’t be easily stopped if it’s not countered.
Also your board plan should include whether you have won game 1 or not. If you won, boarding in Angel is worse than just playing to survive and win 1-0. If you lost, then it’s in your best interest to have varied win conditions and to go for the throat.
Force Spike and Wrath of God leave. Overload and Exalted Angel come in.
Combo Matches
UG Desire—You run Counterspell, Absorb, Orim’s Chant, Isochron Scepter and Cunning Wish. All you really have to do is stop Cunning Wish and counter Early Harvest and Nostalgic Dreams on occasion. Orim’s Chant is some good after a Harvest or Mind’s Desire. To quote from Max, “Basically your entire deck jumps up and kicks them in the nads.”
Balancing Tings—If they resolve Obliterate and drop a large Terravore (And you have no mana to float for counters) you lose. Otherwise you win. Overly simplistic way to look at the match I’m sure, but that’s what it boiled down too most of the time.
Possible Additions
Now that PT: LA is done with, I’ve had a chance to look at some options that could improve the above list in certain metagames.
Artifact Lands—1-3 Seat of the Synod or Ancient Den could be added to the maindeck to potentially help out with TFK discard. I thought there would be more Blood Moon and artifact removal played, so I deliberately left them out of the original list. It may be worthwhile to add a few though, if you don’t expect much land hate. Just remember you take the risk of getting hit by a random Naturalize [or Oxidize, or Overload, or Putrefy, or… -Seamus] for a Stone Rain at an inopportune time.
Hinder—I’d like to thank Jim Gaffney (Godot to you Mana Drainers) for this suggestion. Hinder is still effectively a hard counter in many matches and has the added bonus of shutting down Life from the Loam recursion. If you expect a ton of Dredgeatog, this could be a very valuable counter.
Kataki, War’s Wage—See above. Obviously brought in to help the Affinity match, but I don’t think it’ll be necessary unless they upgrade again.
Conclusions
This deck is awesome. Play it. Win. Send me some cards / money when you do.
I would also like to take this moment to thank the DCI for showing all of us that you can completely screw up in the Top 8 of major tournaments and get a redo. Multiple redoes. Assuming it’s all on camera though; sorry, you PTQ-playing sucker. Also I give props to SWK for not stabbing Moreno or the table judge in the eye after those series of rulings.
Joshua Silvestri
Proud member of Team Reflection and Team Death Squid
Email me at: joshDOTsilvestriATgmailDOTcom