Start typing a card name and use the auto-complete feature to quickly select the card you're trying to add. Enter a quantity and add that card to your sideboard!
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.
Mill deck based on a comment I received on one of my earlier mill decks.(http://www.mtgvault.com/thevanished/decks/everything-mill/#601199 wickeddarkman's comment)Suggestions are welcome!----------------------------------I just realized that this can win on their turn 2, with a perfect opening hand.Hand: Island, Swamp, Hedron Crab, Glimpse the Unthinkable, 3x Archive Trap53 cards in deck, 7 in hand.T1: Play Island, Hedron Crab, Pass (53d, 7h)Their turn: Draw, Fetchland/Evolving Wilds (51d, 7h). Play 3x Archive Trap, mill for 39 (11d, 7h). Pass.T2: Swamp, Mill for 3 (8d, 7h), play Glimpse the Unthinkable, mill for 10 (-2d, 7h), pass.Their turn 2: instant loss.
The idea is to mill as much as possible in the space of 3 turns.Hedron Crab (up to 9), Minister of Inquiries (6), Mesmeric Orb (up to about 15 possibly), and Shriekhorn (6) all work to mill a decent amount of cards over the space of 3 turns.Thought Scour (2 and dig for more mill) and Dream twist (6) work to mill over the space of 2 turns.All of your other spells can be spaced out over a few turns to mill for maximum damage.
This deck has been viewed 7,352 times.
NOTE: Set by owner when deck was made.
First of all you have to kill at your own turn 4, which means that if they start, they also have 4 turns to kill you :DKilling with mill at turn three is possible, but demands that an opponent fetches and faces one or more traps, which is very unlikely.I am speed-testing my own mill at the moment with a focus on 1 cost cards, and results are generated slowly but gives me a solid view into how it all might fit together.At one time in all my milling I took a great measure of all the clasic cards in mill, and got some solid numbers out of it.For example I found out that my deck performed better with only two hedron crabs! Why? Because hedron crabs block each others mill.Here's an example. you have 3 hedron crabs and 2 lands in your opening hand. You play 1 land and 1 crab. turn 2 you play a secon hedron crab, then a land, which lets two of your hedrons mill for three. However the third hedron can't be played and get to mill at the same time, so it will mill thre cards less than it should. Compare this with a hand with 3 shriekhorns, and you will see that the horns simply produce a lot more mill than 3 hedrons, which shows that hedrons block each other's mill. After a lot more than 200 games I had finally learned the perfect number of hedrons which was 2.Archive trap went through similare testing, and I assumed that at a tournament the opponent will always play around their fetchlands, meaning that archive trap allways demands 5 mana. A lot of testing later I got the results that if I can stall the opponent for one more turn I would frequently enough get 5 lands so it would pay to play archive trap. The result turned out to be that my deck could only support playing 1 archive trap. (whenever I drew two, the second was just a dead card)using the same logic, I also got down to 1 mesmeric orb, and 1 shelldock isle.18 lands is too little.visions of beyond will never allow you to kill at turn 3.I can recommend that you try playing with exactly three chancellor of the spires, as it has a good chance of being more usefull than archive trap.
Permalink
Okay, first thing, the deck wasnt designed to win in 3 turns. It was designed to mill as many cards as possible in the space of 3 turns. That being said, are you saying to drop the cards to the values you suggested? Or to cut them so you only see the amount in your hand in any specific game? I agree on the lands, what would you cut?Visions is in here purely for draw to dig for more mill later in the game, i understand that it doesnt help you win, its ment to help the mill over three turns.
Wait, we could cut visions for 2 more lands and something else. What to add tho?
I would recommend taking out Mesmeric Orb. It will make you mil as well when your lands untap at your upkeep.
Yes, it will, however, most of the time, it will actually benefit us more than hurt us, and this was discussed on my other mil deck, link in the bio
This is very silly. The odds you get 3 crabs in your opening is very rare. People still play 4 aether vials in decks like merfolk, not because they want to use more then one. running 4 copies gives you a good chance of drawing one in your opening hand. And Hedron crab is one of the best mill cards printed IMO. if you have 2 on turn 2 you can just play a fetch land to mill 12. If they sit on the board, you can get good mill value for 1 mana
Echoing Truth or Ghostly Flicker could be worth considering even if they normally don't mill directly. But they allow you to re-use the ETB effects of Hedron Crab and Minister of Inquiries as well as re-use Shriekhorn.
Interesting idea. I feel like that could be another deck, using panharmonica to double etb triggers for mill. I'm curious now.
when playing with Hedron Crab, i highly recommend the uses of Oboro, Palace in the Clouds! That way, each and every turn you are assured to have trigger of a landfall. It can easily replace one basic island.
Good idea, thanks! Added it.
also, if you want a really interesting card: Surgical Extraction, a perfect control card for this kind of deck
Yeah, it's in the sideboard already!! But thanks for the suggestion anyway!
One thing you will experience with this kind of deck is the difference between the "slow 6-millers" And the fast 1-time mill. Since 1-cost 1-time mill doesn't mill higher than 5 you will be wanting to play "slow 6-millers" during the opening of the game.During turn 1-2 you will gain most from the "slow 6-millers", but these cards will perform worse than 1-time mill during turn 3-4.During turn 1-2 you will be able to cast 3 slow-millers.During turn 3 you want to cast either a 2-cost and a 1-cost 1-time mill or just a mind funeral.During turn 4 you want to cast mind funeral and a 1-cost 1-time mill or two 2-cost mills.Let's try to break that down:3 slow-mills.1 mf or 2cc+1cc.1mf & 1cc or 2 X 2cc.During 4 turns you draw exactly 10 cards, which means that since you can possibly play 5 1-cost cards during the game, you will not be able to design a deck with MORE than half of the deck being 1-cost, without actually destroying the decks speed. (you haven't got this many, I checked :D ) Since we may optimally need three slows and two others, that means that you can actually calculate how many ordinary 1cc you will need. ( around 18 slow mills and around 12 ordinary 1-cost mills). (30 cards equal 3+2 3+2 3+2 3+2 3+2 3+2)Since decks often misbehave this is not exact numbers, but from this, I can tell you that you have about the right number of each type of card, though thoughtscour does mill a bit low.Since we need 2cc's often (when not drawing mind funeral) we need around 15 2-cost cards which you haven't got.
Holy crap dude, you go in depth on the analysis. I'm impressed.Everything you're saying makes sense, so how would you fix this deck to match what you're saying?(And also, lands, from your previous comment)
I use a lot of logic and a lot of paperstrips which can work as a statistical computer:http://www.mtgvault.com/wickeddarkman/decks/the-paperstrip-method/http://www.mtgvault.com/wickeddarkman/decks/simple-use-of-paperstrips/http://www.mtgvault.com/wickeddarkman/decks/the-paperstrip-method-v2/Since I'm in the middle of it all with my own version, I can only report how the cards behave in my own deck, which will perhaps be different from your deck.So far cards fight for a spot on paperstrips in my deck, which gives me a lot of data, some of it a bit distorted.Since I also let the process decide how many lands I have in the deck, hedron crab's measurement is a bit off. Whenever I get a lot of land hedron explodes, whenever I get to few lands I have some lands in competition with other things, which I might mark towards becomming a land. This means that whenever I get hedron crabs on the hand I think really hard on how much I can mill totally with some cards either being slowmill or a land, so at the beginning of the project hedron crabs will get more points than they should naturally do in a deck with a set amount of lands. Once I have a set amount of lands I can measure the hedron crabs for real.The best slowmill is without doubt shriekhorn because it mills either 6, 4 or 2. Compared with this, the ministers are very unflexible. I have two ministers measured with mills averaging about 5.4 cards each, and two other's averaging at only 4.5 In the past I have been knocking my head to understand why some cards rate higher while others rate lower, but the obvious answer is that since you can only cast 3 slowmills on an average, and if you draw 2 hedron crabs and two ministers, one of these cards will perform worse than the others. By using paperstrips ccards can be individualised and REALLY measured in performance, so since there is a lot of slowmill in the deck, some cards will automatically be marked as obsolete within the deck.All of this can be used with logic.I have been measuring dreamtwist and ghoulcallers bell on the same paperstrips to see which card is the fastest.While dreamtwist is the best card when drawn at turn 3-4, the bell is better or at least equal at turn 1-2.Add to this the fact that dreamtwist rarely gets any open mana to be cast a second time, and that if you draw several dreamtwists only one can get the activation mana, and suddenly ghoulcaller's bell becomes the better of these two cards. Also the bell will perform even more if you manage to live past turn 4, increasing it's mill each turn.I can't tell you how it will all end, so far I measure against goldfishes, and much later I will run it against a lot of testdecks which will probably root out the worst cards. (Playing against live decks was what trimmed my 4 mesmeric orbs down to 1. Most of the time it dies to abrupt decay, but if you play only one, you have a low chance of drawing it turn 1, so it is likely to turn up lategame, and if the opponent is tapped out it may mill more than 7 cards which makes it better than mind sculpt.)
Okay, your analysis makes sense... but I'm totally lost on your paperstrip method. I get that you're basically proxying a xeck, and then giving it positive or negative marks based on how it performs, but I'm lost on how you're deciding which card is on the strip, and your lands and whatnot.
When starting from scratch I always start with 60 blank strips, play a perfect game drawing what I want, then reshuffling and drawing a perfect hand again, noting the cards I choose down. later some cards reapear and I add to the concept until at some part the perfection starts to be only part of it, and during that phase I usually add secondary picks. Later again I will get hands where I disagree with some of the strips after some time, and that's when I split up the strip and let each part get points whenever it was the best pick at the time. After lots of games (usually a weeks time) the deck takes enough shape and has a certaincy over it that makes me start testing it against real decks while adjusting the strips constantly. Once I get past that point and know I've got something it gets advanced :D
Oh, okay. That makes a lot more sense.. still confusing, but I think I get the basic idea. I guess I just have to try it to really get it. Thanks!
Oh! This'll help a ton. Once you mark a card as a specific card, is is permanently that? Or if you draw it again, can it change what card it is?
Once a card has been marked as a specific card 5 times more than other cards on the strip the card becomes permanent. Once all of the deck is permanent I start testing against testdecks with new strips, but these strips have the permanent name on them. A number of games will be played against the testdecks (I use between 20-30) and each time a card was useless against the testdeck it gets a minus, otherwise it gets a +. After running against all the testdecks I count the totals on each card. Every card with more than +2 is kept, and any cards with less points revert to blank strips again and I brainstorm what could be put on these new blank strips.Once you got the practice of using these strips the deck builds itself, and you just feed it with card suggestions and the process accepts it or casts your ideas away. After a while you will start wondering why you ever started to build your own decks, since paperstrips can build them so much better :D
Okay, that makes a lot more sense, thank you!
Not relevant to the colors but, has any body used Hedron Crabs and Scapeshift. Just wondering if it could somehow work in a deck together.
Oooooh.... that could easily work... I'll have to remember that... Nice catch!
Yes, hedrons and scapeshift had a small era during the heydays of titanshift (before 1 cardban dimminished it a bit)This era was very shortlived though. Todays meta will be launching more hatecards at this concept a bit more than the meta did back then.
I've done the initial work on my own deck:http://www.mtgvault.com/wickeddarkman/decks/clockwork-mill-generation-1/I got 24 1-costs, 13 2-costs, 4 3-costs 19 lands and 4 blank cards.I will experiment with the last 4 cards as they can become either archive trap, chancellor of the spires or startled awake.I will also doubletest ghoulcaller's bell and dream twist as the bell can mill a twist and thus get a bonus out of it.I will also test noxious revival.
Here's the results:only three ministers, only two dream twists (they steal each others mana when you only have 4 turns to kill) a single noxious revival (having two in the hand is lethal to yourself) and I've ditched the bells.3 chancellors and a single archive trap still works very well.
Bitter Ordeal is a nice miller, plus you get to pick what to mill. By turn 3 you can make sure their deck is neutered.
That works very well for this deck. If I'm not mistaken, Gravestorm triggers from any permanent that was sent to the grave on the turn that it is played. So lets say that I make my opponent mill 12 cards and then I play Bitter Ordeal, not only do I get to exile a card from his deck, I get to do it again 12 more times for a grand total of 13 exiled cards.
HALT!A permanent is only a permanent if it is in play.While in the deck or in the graveyard it is considered a blank card.702.68. Gravestorm 702.68a Gravestorm is a triggered ability that functions on the stack. “Gravestorm” means “When you cast this spell, put a copy of it onto the stack for each permanent that was put into a graveyard from the battlefield this turn. If the spell has any targets, you may choose new targets for any of the copies.” 702.68b If a spell has multiple instances of gravestorm, each triggers separately.
Ah, so it doesn't quite work like that, sad day.
Otherwise it would have been very powerfull.But!I've been guided to "fraying sanity" by DEDWARDS, which is potentially more powerfull than bitter ordeal would have been if worded differently. I recommend using only two fraying sanity in the above deck alongside with 3-4 mind funeral.I've also discovered a flaw in my calculations of "the minister" so 4 might be better than 3.
I can't quite find the card you're talking about. Does it have a different name? or spelled differently?
Error denied!I am the namiest and the spelliest!!!(and the googliest)http://www.magicspoiler.com/mtg-spoiler/fraying-sanity/
For those who are too lazy to search for it:Fraying Sanity{2}{U}Enchantment - Aura CurseHour of Devastation Rare Enchant playerAt the beginning of each end step, enchanted player puts the top X cards of his or her library into his or her graveyard, where X is the total number of cards put into his or her graveyard from anywhere this turn.
Suggestion: Add Aether Hub to fuel Minister of Inquiries. At worst, it's a Waste, at best it fuels one more triggers of Minister of Inquiries. But most of the time it'll be Tendo Ice Bridge.
Not a bad idea :DPsyou are the copyiest and the suggestioniest :D
Ohhhhhhh, its an Hour of Devestation card, that's why I couldnt find it. And that is a beautiful card. I love it.Dedwards, good idea. Ill mess around with it.
DedWards, added the Aether Hub. Dropped 3x Visions of Beyond, added 2x Aether Hub and 1x Archive Trap
Even if it's in the sideboard, i'd advice you to play only one noxious revival, since most cards will turn it into a dead card if you want to win as many turn 4 games as posible.Fraying sanity doubles any mill played as well as the mill-effects used at the turn it is played (hedron/minister)My measurements tell me it's a card you'll want to play 4 of (My own guess was 2, but measurement's are better)
Got it. Updated.Also, what would you recommend dropping when it comes out?
My major "Thorn in the eye" is thought scour.but!If your gamestore knows you will be playing mill a lot, I would drop the archive traps.Fraying sanity will mill them everytime they play a spell or fetches.If you also play with archive traps you can be damned sure that everyone in the area learns never to fetch against you, and the pros will have this behaviour inbreed into their playstyle.Alternatively you can prey on the fear caused by archive trap. Play with a single one, and when you take out your deck make sure it's always at the bottom, and take it out in a way that flashes it to the opponent.That way they will cripple themselves unnecessary by not fetching for fear of the archive, and your deck won't be affected much by having that single.Your mana base is simply too low for archive traps if you meet the pro's. I'd say play at least 22 lands if you really want them.
Thats fair, and good reasoning. However, it doesn't sound fully legal... Anyway, alternatively you could always leave 4 of them in for game 1, then when they make the mistake in the first game you punish them, and then after game 1, sideboard them out for another thing to help.I think I will drop Thought Scour for the new card.Also, again with the lands. What would you recommend dropping for more lands? The more I look at the deck, the more I think that Dream Twist isn't particularly powerful...
Dream Twist feels iffy to me too. There's a new Desert that may be worth one or two:Ipnu RivuletLand - Desert Hour of Devastation Uncommon {T}: Add {C} to your mana pool.{T}, Pay 1 life: Add {U} to your mana pool.{1}{U}, {T}, Sacrifice a Desert: Target player puts the top four cards of his or her library into his or her graveyard.Good points is it enters untapped and can sacrifice itself to itself to pay for the ability, so no real investment.
I've cut dream twist in my own version because ghoulcaller's bell proved to be too inefficient.Before that I cut them Down to having 2 in the deck. These milled an average of 5 Cards when the bells were given priority one in my castingorder. Since you play mesmeric orb you will still be able to get that average if you have mana left.try cutting a single dreamtwist and add a single land. That would have you at 21 lands, a number I've been playing with in lots of milldesigns. The major question is if 21 lands can support all fraying and mind funerals. (I'm working on that myself)
Alright, I switched dream twist for the fraying sanity.
spoiler1937 has deleted this comment.
DedWards has deleted this comment.
Here's a milldeck that currently won. Number of players unknown (minimum 10) 3rd place.http://tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=23884&iddeck=186552
Man, that has some interesting choices. Went a little more of the control route, which makes sense. Sideboard was full of unusual choices however.
Most UB with focus on manic scribe tends to look like that.(Sometimes they really want to activate the scribe, and by playing more different types this improves the scribe) I think manic scribe is overrated, but it is one of the best answers to leyline of sanctity.My own overall strategy is to not meet someone playing it, and if they do, I revive chancellor of the spires with breaking//entering or simply fold. Most of the time I can surgically extract the threats to the chancellor away and then simply walk over. (surgical is unaffected by leyline).
A friend of mine has designed a Standard mill deck and I'm asking for you and wickeddarkman to give some sage advice. I'll be commenting on it too, but the two of you seem more knowledgeable on the archetype than I am.http://www.mtgvault.com/keagan182/decks/fraying-your-sanity/
Here's my take on mill. I play in modern and constantly go top 8. http://www.mtgvault.com/everdev22/decks/millstraction/
It does look like a solid build, but so far I haven't seen it at any of the larger decksites.If you constantly go top8 you should have shown up recently :D
There's a difference between "constantly go top 8" at an LGS, and "constantly go top 8" at the bigger tournaments (like a PPTQ). Only the latter will go up on the larger decklist sites.
Yeah, I know, but I'm trying to encourage him to go for the big tourneys.
Hello hello, look who joined the discussion. I will start off by introducing myself, by saying I have been playing competitive modern mill for about 3 years. I've had many discussions on the archetype with wickeddarkman and I will give credit where credit is due. He knows his mill! I've done extensive testing of my own and I have come to the conclusion that Minister is not that good at all. as well as Aether Hub not being worth Sacrificing Basic land slots in your deck. Basics are very important due to ghost Quartering your own lands to trigger Crab. (happens more then you'd think) Not to mention the ever increasing dominance of Blood Moon. I played with Manic Scribe for a bit and at first I was really impressed but this high was short lived. However I'm going on record that Fraying Sanity is one of the most powerful mill cards ever printed. In it's young life so far it has already proven to be something that needs immediate removal or it wins games. I've actually added 1 copy of Traumatize to the deck because of the 2 card kill combo. (i very well may cut this)Visions of Beyond IMO is one of the most important non mill cards that you could play. The simplest way I can phrase this would be to compare mill to burn.(It's very much the same). If burn had access to a draw 3 for 1 mana card for an opponent having 13 or less life it would be broken. Viisons is that card for mill. Play it! Here is my current up to date build if you wanna have a look. http://www.mtgvault.com/maniacalmaniac/decks/mlgnnt-mllng/ I run an Esper build, mainly because of the side board options white has (Leyline of Sanctity, Stony Silence and 2 Disenchants because I refuse to scoop on turn 1 to an opponent having their own Leyline out). Also since Condemn is so good main deck. (Death Shadow) It's better then Path to Exile more often then not since opponents life total does not matter. It's only downfall to a mill player is not being able to kill a mana dork or Bob(Dark Confidant). The main problem your current build has is 0 removal. Without a god hand any tier 1 deck will beat you because you simply can't deal with their threats. Take this for what it is. A lot of opinion with a dash of experience
Nice to meet you Manical! I'm a mostly standard mill player and I'm looking to get into modern, but sadly, money is a problem...A few details about the deck:- It started from a deck that just threw together every good mill card in modern, and called that a day. That deck is referenced in the deck details if you'd like to check it out.- This deck is just an iteration that does what the deck detail says. It tries to hit as many cards as possible in the space of 3 turns. And I think it does its job incredibly well. Now I do agree with you, especially after playtesting it a little (proxied it, didn't buy it), it gets beat a lot. So I built another deck with a little more control. Although finding that balance between control and mill is.... difficult.Lots of people seem to have different opinions of Visions... I tend to agree with you, but if you look at the discussion, I actually dropped it for something else based on some data from wicked, I think... oh! More lands. I was running like 20, which is too little based on suggestions.
http://www.mtgvault.com/thevanished/decks/destructive-mill/Heres that more control-y one, although, I think I'm going to rebuild it, doesn't seem good looking at it now...
MANIACALMANIAC:It's fun that you come to the conclusion that ministers and hub isn't worth it as bloodmoon is on the rise, at the same time that I tell the poor guy that ministers and hub are worth it with emphasis on blood moon being usefull :DThe difference is in our colors of choice, you with Esper, me with grixis.http://www.mtgvault.com/wickeddarkman/decks/fraying-mill-generation-3/At least we both agree that manic isn't that good, and that fraying is the coolest :DTHEVANISHED:Once you go Down the path of mill with removal you will end up in a huge web of decissions. In the end you will learn that the more removal you use, the less you can mill, which Means you need more removal to deal with what comes into play while you are waiting for the mill-Card. I did this once and ended up with only 5 millcards in the deck. (2 mindshrieker and 3 surgical extraction) you can never get enough removal...
Yeah, I fully agree with that. It seems like the only options are full out speed-mill with little to no control, or all out control with a hint of mill.
This point is what makes Fraying Sanity so great. It essentially doubles all mill cards allowing for the needed removal cards.
And Mills from the removal as killing / countering a creature counts as "...put into that graveyard from anywhere..."
Okay, I threw together another list, this time a little more control-y, and I took Maniacal's esper idea, and threw in white for the better sideboard options. Check it out, lemme know what you think:http://www.mtgvault.com/thevanished/decks/modern-esper-competitive-mill/
MANIACALMANIAC:I can see the logic in that, but then wouldn't you lose by default when NOT drawing fraying? Because your decks mill capacity would then be dependant on it :D
That's why its so hard. You can't be completely dependant on control, because you still need the mill in case you dont get Fraying, but you also want as much control as possible so you can live to use the fraying.
It's almost a Paradox :D
You can still hit removal with your mill. Unsummon is a silly card when all you need to is buy a turn or two. Plus, if your like me and run startled awake, it also hits persistent nightmare. Giving you a cheap return to 13 mill. Also why I play surgical extraction. Hits anything graved, even the first turn if possible. Usually blood moon. I'll be the first to admit however, mill isn't tier 1. Even with fraying sanity in the mix just simply because 60 is a bigger number then 20. But with being said, I often find it takes most off their guard with its speed and recursion. I find ignoring 90% of my opponents game plan gets me the most my wins. you gotta move quickly to win with mill. Every turn hits 5 plus cards if you can get it. ( except turn 1) Like someone have mentioned before, you can't mix very much without losing the mill speed. It's essential to the build. Going midrange or 3 colors is harder I find. Allows any deck with resiliency or a solid control package to just take over. Fatal push is your friend in game 2 if you need to hit a mana dork or deaths shadow to buy a turn to land a glimpse or set up fraying sanity. I rarely use my counter magic but it's there if needed against infect aggro and the likeAlso, I don't hit many real tournaments, other then FNM at times, because my area is small and completely off the radar of big events. Mostly I play this deck like a burn deck because going slow will just get me killed to a cranial plating or Tarmogoyf. And nothing feels worse in mill then feeding into your opponents big bad without response. Except blood moon. We hates the blood moon.
The day you aim for a bigger tournament you will need to remember to Exchange your snapcasters with augur of bolas. Augur of bolas wins more than snappy on the 100+ tourneys, probably because aggro is seen much more at these because they drain your mental energies less than playing something advanced.
Was that a slam against aggro players or do you just prefer filter over recursion?
It's a conclussion :DI've been tracking mill for quite some time and analysed plenty of numbers, which is why I see manic scribe as a turn in the wrong direction for mill. Mill hasn't won so much after that "innovation". (I think it will Work as sb)There's enough mill-data out there to support my claim :DSnapcaster mage is best at local tournaments, while augur of bolas wins the game for those in larger tournaments.My best guess is that augur provides better defence against aggro, which Means it must face more aggro than usually to outshine snapcaster mage. Snapcaster is more flexible, but wins mostly at the small local tourneys. My guess as to why, is that players knowing their local meta knows what to re-cast with snappy, but when facing unknown factors augurs random picks seems to be better than knowing the locals.All of that is sort of theory, but facts show that augur of bolas has participated most in the larger tournaments, while snapcaster features in smaller tournaments... Got any better theories ? :Dhttps://www.mtgstocks.com/decks/72516
I can see what you mean. However, the breakdown between augur and snapcaster works like this for me. Augur survives shock type damage and blocks 2/2's all day. Great vs aggro. Digging for a instant/sorcery 3 deep is also handy if your searching for your combo piece or kill card. My problem with it is if they can run shock, they can run lightning bolt. Which in modern is a no brainer. Fatal push, paths, pulse, decay etc. Doesn't care about toughness anyway. Also, can't kill ?/2's. Advantage augur for being able to block but loses points on dealing it back. Snapcaster Mage dies to anything. Literally 1 point will kill it. Thus Augur will kill snaps in a trade. But I'm not looking for it to stick to the board when my main goal is mill. if I get into a situation were I'm having to swing in with wienies I'm going to want 2 vs 1 point getting in. Which, if that's the case, I'm already losing at being a mill deck. Dig for 3, keep one lose 2 or recur 1. Guess for me getting a 5th copy of trap or glimpse is better then choosing 1 out of 3 to keep. My method is play it like its a red deck. Draw hit go. Draw hit go. Re-fueling my hand with visions and slagging mill as fast as possible. Mill will never be a tier 1 deck, so taking loses is only par for course. Snaps just gets me down the road faster then augur does and that's why despite the grand tourney stats, I feel like he's the better choice. What I'm curious about is ensnaring bridge. Is it worth it?
Ah, bridge...I've been playing with 2 different bridgedecks the last two years, and bridge is actually weak against practically everything out there. After all, lantern control has been present a lot the last 3 years, so not being adapted against bridge is just dumb.Like lantern control, mill may be able to remove any threats to the bridge, which just leaves aggro as a problem.Aggro can usually kill you while you are having stuf like another bridge and an archive trap in the hand, so your deck needs to either have low costs overall (Falling prey to chalice) or some reliable alternate costs (dismember, shriekmaw) or some way to discard your own stuff...
Hmm... Yea. after some play testing, bridge just can't get there. Who knew "destroy target artifact" was a thing ... Also, Abrade. Brutal.
The time I have had the best results with ensnaring bridge was when I played only 1 in mainboard.If I got it into play and they had no solutions I would win, and if they were capeable of bypassing it somehow it would only be 1 dead Card in the deck.Plus whenever the opponent saw it (with discard or it was selfmilled) they'd side more Cards into their deck than they actually needed so they would be stuck with lot's of dead Cards. I would usually sideboard it away.