Otherworldly Gaze

Instant

Look at the top three cards of your library. Put any number of them into your graveyard and the rest back on top of your library in any order.

Flashback {1}{U} (You may cast this from your graveyard for this card's flashback cost, then exile this.)

Legality

Format	Legality
1v1 Commander	Legal
Alchemy	Legal
Archenemy	Legal
Arena	Legal
Block Constructed	Legal
Brawl	Legal
Canadian Highlander	Legal
Casual	Legal
Commander / EDH	Legal
Commander: Rule 0	Legal
Custom	Legal
Duel Commander	Legal
Gladiator	Legal
Highlander	Legal
Historic	Legal
Legacy	Legal
Leviathan	Legal
Limited	Legal
Modern	Legal
Oathbreaker	Legal
Pauper	Legal
Pauper Duel Commander	Legal
Pauper EDH	Legal
Pioneer	Legal
Planechase	Legal
Pre-release	Legal
Quest Magic	Legal
Standard	Legal
Tiny Leaders	Legal
Vanguard	Legal
Vintage	Legal

Discussion (27)

NV_1980 on Riddle Me This, Riddle Me That

2 months ago

This looks like fun but it also looks a bit (too) slow as most cards in your deck have an average CMC of 5+ and it will take on average five turns to summon your commander in order to cheat your creatures into play. I think there are ways to keep your deck budget, while still increasing its speed. First off, I think adding the talismans (Talisman of Dominance, Talisman of Hierarchy, Talisman of Progress) would help.

Second, a few cheap scrying/draw resources like Portent, Esper Charm, Index, Telling Time, Otherworldly Gaze, Opt, Dream Cache, Serum Visions and Sphinx's Revelation can really help you find the cards you need a bit quicker.

Hope this helps.

Jett2112 on Grixis Spellbook cEDH Refined

2 months ago

For redundancy, complete the playset of Forks by adding Twincast. You could add a combo potential by running Burning Inquiry with your Underworld Breach and Storm-Kiln Artist. It looks like you need to fix your land base to work with Tainted Pact. In my experience Wheel of Misfortune and Primal Amulet  ^Flip are overrated, consider taking them out to lower the mana curve. Otherworldly Gaze is a cool pick, I might try that in my Kess deck Pox Diamond.

zapyourtumor on Murky Waters

2 months ago

Card Suggestions Show

I've listed all these below with explanations, I just have to put them at the top so I can check mark them as suggestions. Drown in the Loch, Fatal Push, Inquisition of Kozilek, Damnation, Unmoored Ego, Sunken Ruins, Ledger Shredder, Aether Gust, Mystical Dispute, Remand, Spreading Seas, Memory Deluge, Orvar, the All-Form

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I think the main decision you have to make with this deck is whether you want it to be a true control deck or a tempo deck. A true control deck would try to trade one for one and build card advantage before dropping a threat like Murktide or Jace or simply winning with Snappy beatdown. A tempo deck on the other hand would try to turbo out a quick Murktide and then protect that threat.

Mixing control and tempo is nothing new, and it sometimes works quite well. But because a lot of the cards from each type of deck don't necessarily go well together, you can sometimes end up in an awkward situation.

Here, you definitely have a mix of both types (which, I'd like to emphasize, is not necessarily bad). Archmage's Charm, Counterspell, Cryptic Command, Snapcaster Mage, Devastation Tide and Jace, the Mind Sculptor are all heavily control-flavored cards in your deck. They all either break even or generate card advantage, or massively stall out the game.

On the other hand, Force of Negation, Otherworldly Gaze, Thought Scour, Spell Pierce, and Subtlety are all tempo-flavored cards.

The problem with this combination in this deck is that half of your cards aim to turbo out a Murktide Regent as fast as possible with Otherworldly Gaze and Thought Scour and then protect it in the short term with cheap spells like Dismember, Force of Negation, Subtlety, and Spell Pierce. The main problems with these cards is that they are pretty terrible topdecks late game. Scour isn't too bad because it cantrips, but topdecking a Gaze when you really needed a counterspell or card advantage engine or a Murktide would probably feel terrible. And all the control-type cards aim to reach that stage of the game.

One example of a problem that arises when you try and combine these two archetypes is in the manabase. Tempo decks typically don't need many lands; depending on the deck's mana curve, we are generally looking at 19-20 lands, and occasionally even 18 or less. On the other hand, control decks almost always want at least 22-23 lands, sometimes up to 24-26 lands in order to reliably play their more expensive spells on curve like Archmage's Charm, Cryptic Command and Snapcaster Mage, and to also always have mana held up during their opponents turn for a reactive spell.

Of course, many cards fit very flexibly into both tempo and control decks, for example Counterspell is just so strong it works in both, while Consider being a cheap cantrip also fits into both types. So in my opinion one of the most important decisions you should make, if you want to make the deck more cohesive and just function smoother as a whole, is whether you want to lean more towards tempo or control.

Quick disclaimer: I think it is definitely possible to make the deck more competitive while keeping both tempo and control aspects; however you should probably then trim both the very slow control-leaning cards (Cryptic Command, Devastation Tide, Jace, the Mind Sculptor), and the cheap tempo-leaning cards (Otherworldly Gaze, Thought Scour, Force of Negation) and replace them with cards more towards the middle ground. The rest of the cards, like Archmage's Charm, Subtlety, Force of Negation, Spell Pierce, Dismember, and of course Murktide Regent are all flexible enough that they can slot into both types of decks.

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The second important decision to make is what secondary color, if any, you want for your deck in order to complement the primary color (blue). The main issue with mono blue control is that you have very few ways to deal with resolved permanents, which is why most players typically splash white or black (or occasionally red). Blue only has access to bounce spells, which are decent in tempo decks but generally bad in control decks because they are card disadvantage (and also terrible late).

Here, I see you kind of "splashed" black, but your only maindeck spell with black pips uses phyrexian mana anyways, while the only black spell in your sideboard can be casted with only blue mana. In my opinion, since you already have black lands, I would commit fully to a UB manabase by including a few more fetches (U fetches since that's your main color) because it gives you access to a lot of strong options:

Drown in the Loch is a really good spell doubling as both removal and countermagic at only 2 cmc, and only gets stronger as the game goes on. Fatal Push is another great removal spell which is generally stronger than Dismember, although it needs at least around 7 fetches to show its full potential. You can also run discard like Inquisition of Kozilek, although that is more tempo/midrange-esque so it may not be a great fit for this deck. Black also gives you an actual boardwipe in the form of Damnation, which is definitely a lot stronger than something like Devastation Tide since it gets rid of the creatures permanently and indirectly generates CA by trading with multiple enemy creature cards. It also doesn't hit Jace. If you don't think you need it in the mainboard, it can be a great sideboard inclusion. Lastly you have access to some sideboard options like Unmoored Ego.

If all of the blue pip spells like Counterspell and Archmage's Charm have you worried about mana fixing issues, you can run the filter land Sunken Ruins which is great in these types of decks to ensure you can cast both BB and UUU spells.

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Those two main points aside, I have a few other card suggestions I think could work well here, some of which lean more control and some which lean more tempo.

Ledger Shredder is a great card which leans a bit more towards tempo but unlike Gaze/Thought Scour it helps turbo out a Murktide while also growing into a significant threat itself.

Aether Gust and Mystical Dispute are decent color-specific sideboard cards.

Remand is a tempo-leaning card that is generally not great in pure control lists, but could be good here if you decide to stick to the turbo murktide strategy.

Spreading Seas is probably the best sideboard option mono-blue has against Urza's Saga.

Memory Deluge has a bit of antisynergy with Murktide, but a very good digging spell if you decide to go towards control.

Orvar, the All-Form is another great sideboard card which instantly turns the tables on any Creativity player thinking they auto won the game after cheating out an early Archon of Cruelty.

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If you made it this far, thanks for reading all of my comments. I like the deck and I'm excited to see where you can take it in the future. Happy brewing!

Jopling on Extract the Demon ($30 Dredge Primer)

3 months ago

GrimlockVIII The lack of interaction is actually this deck's biggest weakness. I've really struggled to find any that work as being able to be cast from the graveyard is an absolute necessity.

I always mulligan until I can play Tome Scour or Otherworldly Gaze in my opening hand, so the vast majority of cards go into my graveyard.

Any suggestions for interaction that could work would be greatly appreciated!

Dead_Blue_ on Chandra or Blood Moon?

4 months ago

I invite you to try Otherworldly Gaze, it’s sooooo good. I’ve ran Visions, Consider, Opt, Gaze is better than all of them. Being able to dig 6 cards deep at instant speed is nuts. Gaze is also what adds so much value to Devastation Tide

Thought Scour is great for Murktide but I actually included it for the interactions with Subtlety

I went 5-0 with the deck 2 days ago so I’m happy with it, just like I said could use some better SB options

wallisface on Chandra or Blood Moon?

4 months ago

Control decks have access to much more practical/better finishers than Chandra. Teferi, Hero of Dominaria often serves as something that can close out a game pretty, as can the Hall of Storm Giants you're already running.

Blood Moon may be very strong in your local meta, its not something I think this community will be able to comment on as we don't know what you regularly play against. Based on the MTGO meta, I wouldn't think it's worth running in this shell.

Personally I think there are some cards in the mainboard that are quite questionable at the moment that may be worth more thought, rather that trying to squeeze red into this deck. Namely, Otherworldly Gaze feels very impractical for a control deck, as its giving you card-disadvantage (and card advantage is generally the only way control can survive). Devastation Tide fits in that same bucket. Thought Scour seems like a really weak way to cantrip in control, and I can only assume you have it because you're trying to force Murktide Regent into this shell. My big concern is that 19 lands is criminally-low for a control deck, and means you're very unlikely to get your 3rd land drop reliably at all.

It feels like your low land-count and questionable mainboard choices are going to make it hard for you to currently control the game, and I'm not sure either of these red cards address those issues at all

Chasmolinker on Death's Awakening (Help me Update!)

4 months ago

Nice deck list +1
I've built a similar deck BUG Scavenger using Birds of Paradise both as a ramp card to get Varolz in play earlier and also as an evasive threat thanks to flying.

I also like Lotleth Troll as my primary win-con since it already has trample and can be used to chump block/regenerate early on. It also gives you a discard outlet for Death's Shadow in hand.

I used to run Thought Scour to fill the yard, but I've really liked the addition of Life from the Loam and Otherworldly Gaze.

TheOfficialCreator on Consider vs Gaze

4 months ago

I would say that for the specific deck in question, with the amount of topdeck manipulation you want, Otherworldly Gaze is better, since the card draw may not even be worth it most of the time due to the value a card might rather have on top of your deck or in your graveyard.