Stubborn Denial

Instant

Counter target noncreature spell unless its controller pays {1}.

Ferocious — If you control a creature with power 4 or greater, counter that spell instead.

Discussion (51)

Joker4242 on Island Secrets

5 days ago

My sideboard continues to change frequently. I have a 4th Archmage's Charm, Cyclonic Rift, and Day's Undoing at the ready. Surgical Extraction seems likely to stay in. But the rest are merely placeholders. I’m not exactly sure what I should replace them with. Pongify is still a valid option. Having early removal may prove highly beneficial. Mystical Dispute and Stubborn Denial are also useful counters against other blue/counter decks.

Now Relic of Progenitus is a very useful card, although is does have its drawbacks.

It can consistently remove cards from your opponents graveyard. But it’s second ability works against you because it will exile your graveyard as well. It does not work well with Day's Undoing. It is also not blue, nor is it an instant or sorcery, therefore you cannot combo it with Thing in the Ice  ^Flip or exile it with Force of Negation.

Surgical Extraction Is nice, it can be cast for free, it can be cast at any time, it can also be recycled with Mystic Sanctuary. The downside is that you must always pay 2 life to cast it (this deck has no lifegain whatsoever). Both cards have their downsides and neither one fits exactly, although Surgical Extraction works slightly better for this kind of deck.

Vendilion Clique is a useful card on its own, yet it doesn’t fit exactly into the deck. I don’t have enough bounce in the deck to consistently utilize Clique’s ability several times over. Now the 3/1 flying is nice, but I already have that with Brazen Borrower. The upside to the Clique is that you get to look at your opponents Hand and get rid of a problematic card. However, Borrower can act as an Instant spell (Which can trigger Thing in the Ice  ^Flip. Borrower can also remain in exile, this way it won’t be Bounced by Thing in the Ice nor will it be shuffled back into the deck by a Day's Undoing.

Venser, Shaper Savant is certainly a placeholder, it does pretty much what Cryptic Command will be doing (but with less options).

Kefnet the Mindful used to be in the deck. It was paired with Day’s Undoing to immediately become a 5/5 flyer. The problem is that he takes to long to setup. His 4 mana draw/land bounce ability won’t be useful until the late game. In the end, he ends up taking space in the hand or field, but doesn’t actually do anything (with a hand of 7 cards Kefnet is formidable, as soon as you start to play spells, Kefnet is useless again, essentially, Kefnet discourages spellcasting).

Aether Spellbomb was a card I enjoyed playing in the main deck. However, I found that it couldn’t combat every situation. Eventually it made its way into the sideboard as I needed to make space for Brazen Borrower (a mich more useful and potent card). Even though it has saved me in the past, I am thinking that it just can’t keep up with the rest of the deck. For one, it cannot be exiled with Force of Negation, for another, it is not an instant or sorcery, therefore it cannot trigger Thing in the Ice  ^Flip. I think it has served it’s purpose in the past, but I don’t see it coming back into the deck.

This is what I would end up with when considering what I want to keep in my sideboard:

1x Archmage’s Charm 1x Cyclonic Rift 1x Day’s Undoing 3x Surgical Extraction 4x Mystical Dispute

I still have 5 slots left to fill.

I’m thinking about perhaps adding some sort of protection against burn decks, maybe some more countermeasures against other counter/control decks, and I also feel like my defenses against Aggro may need to be tightened up.

AndrewS05 on A question on interactions with ...

1 week ago

The following sequence occurred in a game where I had Silverfur Partisan and 2 2/2 wolf tokens on the battlefield.

Opponent: Casts Bonecrusher Giant Stomp adventure mode targeting one of the tokens.

Me: Respond with Gods Willing targeting the token to give it protection from red.

Opponent: Casts Stubborn Denial in response to Gods Willing (With Ferocious also)

Me: Respond by casting another Gods Willing targeting the token to give it protection from Red.

At the end of all this, how many 2/2 wolf tokens would be created from Silverfur Partisan's Trigger? We both were unsure of the answer. Thanks!!

(For those who may be wondering, he did not target Silverfur because it had a +1/+1 counter on it at the time)

GeminiSpartanX on Best Counterspells in Commander?

2 weeks ago

Hello all!

I'm simply asking which are the best counterspells available in EDH. I have a UW somewhat-controlling deck, and I want to make sure the last few counterspell slots I have (roughly 12 or so in total) are better than other possible options. I know that Force of Will, Force of Negation, and Mana Drain are the best, followed closely by Pact of Negation, the OG- Counterspell, Cryptic Command, and then possibly Negate or Dovin's Veto. My question is which ones do you choose after those? Here are some that I've run before:

Swan Song

Dispel

Spell Pierce

Arcane Denial

Archmage's Charm

Muddle the Mixture

Delay

Deprive -(when you also run Mystic Sanctuary)

Disdainful Stroke

Stubborn Denial

Render Silent

Disallow

Which of these would make the cut in a deck that cared both about the overall quality of the counter as well as the efficiency (cmc) of the counter? Are there any more that I've missed that are worth mentioning? Please let me know which ones (4-5) you would use after the initial 8 that I mentioned! (P.S.- I know we're talking about blue counterspells here, so please be kind even if it's the type of magic that you don't like).

newrise on Golden Control

3 weeks ago

Ohh boy do I love me some Oko in this deck! Had a cEDH game the other night. It was me on Banana man, 2x Urza and Emry.

I lost the dice roll, but got to go after the Emry player. My opening hand was as follows:

Yavimaya Coast - Oko, Thief of Crowns - Sol Ring - Mox Diamond - Mana Drain - Stubborn Denial - Carpet of Flowers

Emry player went first with an Island go. Then my turn. I lucked out and drew a land to play out Mox. Dropped Yavimaya Coast , Sol Ring , Mox Diamond and Carpet of Flowers into 0 counters in that order and passed. Next up was the 2 Urza players. First one dropped island into Sol Ring and passed. Next one played island go.

Back to the top of the turn the Emry player played another island and dropped a mana rock (I forget which one) and passed to me. On my turn I named the Emry player for my Carpet of Flowers trigger. Now I had 2 blue mana to hold up for a fight to put out Oko, Thief of Crowns . No one fought over it, but did moan a lot. I then elk'd the first Urza player's Sol Ring and passed.

They played island into Mana Crypt into urza. I wasnt sure about Urza hitting the field this early so I started a counter war. To act like I has come big play I cast Mana Drain which they responded to wit ha Force of Will then I hit em with a Stubborn Denial and the counter war was over. They pass to the next Urza player and another island go.

This goes on for numerous rounds until Emry gets cast and I elk it. I cast Tasigur, the Golden Fang on turn 3 to fend off the elks I've been making. Eventually I get to a point where I active Tasigur and they gave me a mana drain which I later used to counter their Urza lol.

About turn 4 Emry player drops a Mesmeric Orb which was amazing for me as I get cards from the yard and I had Carpet of Flowers up for mana I needed. The Urza players kept milling good cards and counters.

On about turn 8 or so after I've used Damnation to wipe out the elks and things I don't like I cast a Mystic Remora and pass with about 4 lands and a few rocks open. Next turn the first Urza player tried to go off, but I stop urza from hitting the field again and in the process draw about 5 cards. Next turn next urza tried to go off again and I keep countering key things and draw about 10 cards from that exchange. Emry player cast their general again and a few other spells drawing me even more cards.

Having a huge grip by the time my turn hit I let Mystic Remora die and tried to go off. One of the Urza players had a Rhystic Study and luckly I had draw a Narset, Parter of Veils with enough mana from carpet to cast it and go off. We fought over Narset as he saw what I planed to do, but she eventully resolved. I knew they has a Pact of Negation in hand, but had my own for backup. I then dropped Jace and made my library disappear winning the game.

Sorry for long story, but it was a great game that I controlled from the start and it showed just how useful(broken) Oko can be when you get him out early and no one can deal with him. Its these kind of games that make me really appreciate the deck and everyone who has put some much work into making it. I never would have thought with so much blue and counters at the table I could have won much less controlled it like I did. Also My deck list is always up to date with the primer with the exception of running Timetwister . I own one, but find it hard to carry it around so I've got Echo of Eons in its place as for me it works just as well when I need it.

TL;DR Oko is a must vs creature strats and will win you the game.

griffstick on Tasigur Control

1 month ago

• Abjure
• Flusterstorm
• Spell Snare
• Stubborn Denial
• Swan Song

I think having these counterspells will certainly help you do what it is you are trying to do and protect that plan.

Rabid_Wombat on Smashy temur with a splash of “no you don’t”

1 month ago

Hey man , First off I'd ditch three basic lands for the following:

Sarkhan Unbroken - Great for card draw + mana-fixing and pumping out Dragon Tokens.

Dragonlord Atarka - because he is a total Boss, great for blowing up Walker's and acts as an extra Wincon.

Cyclonic Rift Get a good board state happening and Cyclonic wins games.

A few more Counterspells would be sweet too - Stubborn Denial , Counterspells and Temur Charm are ideal.

You will probably need some more Enchantment/Artifact hate too so you don't get shut down by Stax effects:

Krosan Grip , Hull Breach and Force of Vigor are great.

Surrak be all about the Creatures winning you the game..I'd add around there more mana dorks cause you gotta ramp for the big guys to hit the table early, drop six Instants and Sorceries. Talking about dudes like Elvish Mystic , Somberwald Sage , Birds of Paradise .

And finally, get rid of the Frostfang, Feldon, Scaretiller & Niv-Mizzet for a couple more big stompy dudes like Inferno Titan , Genesis Hydra , Terastodon and Soul of the Harvest .

Hope that helped, look forward to playing against the deck bro :D

Anti-sticky_keys on On your end step, I'll...

1 month ago

Hmmm... Ok deck I guess I think it could use a few more counterspells. You may want to add: Abjure , Admiral's Order , Aethersnatch , Annul , Arcane Denial , Commandeer , Commit , Confirm Suspicions , Counterlash , Counterspell , Cryptic Command , Daze , Delay , Deprive , Desertion , Disallow , Dismiss , Disrupt , Dream Fracture , Ertai's Meddling , Evasive Action , Exclude , Faerie Trickery , Familiar's Ruse , Flusterstorm , Foil , Force of Will , Force Spike , Hinder , Insidious Will , Last Word , Logic Knot , Mana Drain , Mana Leak , Memory Lapse , Mindbreak Trap , Muddle the Mixture , Mystic Confluence , Negate , Out of Bounds , Overwhelming Denial , Overwhelming Intellect , Pact of Negation , Remand , Sinister Sabotage , Spell Crumple , Spell Pierce , Spell Shrivel , Spell Swindle , Spelljack , Stubborn Denial , Summary Dismissal , Swan Song , Thwart , Unsubstantiate , Venser, Shaper Savant , Void Shatter , Illumination , Lapse of Certainty , Mana Tithe , Failure , Dovin's Veto Just to name a few.

Lanzo493 on

1 month ago

I'm a great fan of Worn Powerstone for ramp. It's very efficient. Also, Stubborn Denial seems to be well suited to your deck.