MONO BLUE DEVOTION
Standard forum
Posted on Dec. 2, 2013, 8:18 p.m. by Stein_
Why is MBD so powerful right now? I understand Thassa is brutal, Tidebinder hits sometimes against certain decks, it doesnt run much spells, and loses to supreme verdict....what am i missing??
Its powerful cause its fast to build up.
Also holding a bunch of creatures in hand while swinging with a Frostburn Weird for 4 each turn while waiting for the board wipe is sure to beat Supreme Verdict and Anger of the Gods .
December 2, 2013 8:39 p.m.
thats what im saying. i pull off riot control, then supreme verdict. it loses. makes no sense. maybe these peeps are cheating lol
December 2, 2013 8:39 p.m.
Riot control to supreme is how mazes end wins, so unless your running that or some kind of Azorius control then you probably aren't tuned to face every top 8 archetype with that strategy.
MUD, (mono-blue devotion) is very good against every match-up right now, including mono-black devotion, (MBD) which is arguably the strongest deck atm, aside from MUD.
December 2, 2013 8:48 p.m.
Thassa, Jace, aot, and bident don't die to supreme so it can come back pretty quick with mutavault swinging in post wipe and drawing off bident and scrying off thassa, it's consistent to say the least.
December 2, 2013 8:50 p.m.
haha, i didnt even realize i wrote mbd and not mud. derp. actualy, riot control is very very good. it takes out all aggro decks. i play a homebrew esper midrange control. I havent had a change to play any sort of standard this season, but I was curious as to why it has all the rage right now. even in its SB, it doesnt seem like it would get past my strategy. so i understand what youre saying, but i still just dont see it yet. i cant wait to jump back in and see what i have missed.
December 2, 2013 8:51 p.m.
it literally takes almost nothing to build devotion for thassa, once she is active your on a 4 turn clock.. It can easily gain advantage on board state and card advantage with the bident. According to a lot of articles I've read, including one from Brian Braun-Duin, the pros think Mono U devotion is the best deck out right now. That's not saying they guarantee it wins every tournament, but from game to game, matchup to matchup, it's by far the most consistent deck and regularly Top 8's the major tournaments. Don't put the deck down just because the people you played don't know how to pilot it.
December 2, 2013 8:55 p.m.
A lot of its power comes from both Cyclonic Rift and Bident of Thassa . If Master of Waves and at least a couple of its Elemental tokens connect, the Bident can easily refill your hand and keep the pressure on the opponent. With Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx , you can easily get to 7 mana to Overload Cyclonic Rift by turn-5, the turn after Master of Waves hits the board. This, obviously, removes all blockers, enchantments, and Planeswalkers, effectively clearly the way. If your deck relies on creatures blocking or things like Chained to the Rocks to deal with creatures, Rift is going to eff you up. If your opponent has 2 Rifts and you're out of removal, it's game over.
That, and Scrying each turn with Thassa is very underrated. It keeps lands off the top and helps keep the fuel in your hand.
December 2, 2013 8:55 p.m.
yeah the scrying is what i love about her, for 3 mana. okay, i love rift. that card is incredible now with devotion and extra mana. i run that as well. are there any exile artifact removal thats not green??
December 2, 2013 9:01 p.m.
I don't believe so. Erase was Standard, but it rotated. D=
December 2, 2013 9:06 p.m.
also, with the amount of net decking going on (because alot of players don't have imaginations..sadly), there is TONS of room for any deck to whoop on these top 8 decks. their strategies are all pretty thin in my opinion...
December 2, 2013 9:07 p.m.
if there was an exile effect in other colors that that, thassa would be no problem. after supreme verdict, she sits on the board, waiting for her friends again....hmm...i guess just keeping it offline is good enough, or even throwing ashiok in the board, to mill them out and take their stuff...seems worth a try.
December 2, 2013 9:12 p.m.
sigh
It's not that people who net-deck don't have imaginations. It's just that some people enjoy winning more than building decks. I can see and respect that.
And I wouldn't even go so far as to say net-decking is any more popular now than it ever was. This is how Standard always is.
December 2, 2013 9:12 p.m.
It's not about having imagination or not.... The pros are using the best cards available in standard in their decks, if your going to make a deck of the same color your options are use the best cards available (making your deck resemble the pros decks) or use cards that are less effective (whether it's because of cost or because it doesn't fill the same role as the card your using it in place of). Trust me, your not more creative than the TEAMS of pros that put these decks together. The reason they don't seem as good in the hands of someone that's not a pro is because you have to fully know the deck your using and how it interacts with everything you have and your opponent has.
December 2, 2013 9:15 p.m.
haha, im not trying to argue here, it is simply an observation. from playing fnm, grand prixs, open trials, and IQ's, i just love seeing the creative decks aka homebrews win. its always awesome. those who net deck, are just boring. when you make a strong homebrew, and win with it, the opponent has no idea what to do with you. its quite wonderful.
December 2, 2013 9:35 p.m.
reddead405 says... #17
one thing that bugs me is that people see Master of Waves as a super power house. until i Turn him and kill him and all his tokens that is. and as long as you can keep the board suppressed Thassa, God of the Sea isn't to much of an issue and pack the right removal and Bident of Thassa is as good as gone. I don't know, MUD just doesn't seem as good me as it's cracked up to be.
December 2, 2013 9:39 p.m.
gheridarigaaz says... #18
Thinking about how a deck like mono blue is... wouldn't the deck build itself? It relies on wracking up as much devotion as possible as quickly as possible, frostburns were borderline playable until the mechanic came around...
You could go about it a different route like Vaporkin and Water Servant and other elementals alongside Young Pyromancer to get boosts off of the master, or go master-master with the Master Biomancer to make sure your tokens stay once the master of waves have gone, though ultimately looking at the drawing board there's an optimum build then there's a gimmicky build. Not saying anything's wrong with either, it's just that most people tend to prefer builds that win consistently... personally havent had the chance to build a MUD deck just yet, but i know i'm mainboarding some form of Clone as it seems to be the thing a lot of these decks don't consider especially with the meta being pretty strongly dominated by blue and black devotion decks... that Nightveil Specter swings both ways, so why not take advantage of it ;)
As for why it's so strong? It's got an array of tools to retain board presence, which a lot of other colours won't have a lot of efficient answers to, jund decks run Abrupt Decay which hits a lot of things... just not masters or bidents, destroy effects in general are pretty niche in what they can hit with all this protection floating around on all kinds of things. Tidebinder's a bear at worst, but she also serves as a niche answer to decks that mono-blue has trouble dealing with, it buys time so you can answer the opponent's threat with one of your own, probably bigger too
December 2, 2013 9:50 p.m.
The funny thing about Nightveil Specter is that it let's both MUD and MBD players play their opponents cards when matched up together, with Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx I've had 3 nightveil's out, swung in, flopped a Gray Merchant of Asphodel off the opponents deck, and activate nykthos for black devotion, cast the gray merchant for 11 devotion to black, even though I'm mono-blue.
And vice-versa, MBD hits with their nightveil specter, scrying with Temple of Deceit so they can cast the Thassa, God of the Sea they flopped off the opposing blue deck and then next turn hit a Master of Waves and cast it, activating thassa's blue devotion, 3 from nightveil, 1 from thassa, 1 from master.
Knowing it's a good chance you will face one or the other at any given event makes this interaction even more profitable assuming you are the one with the nightveil in play.
*on a side note, it just dawned on me that if one were to not be impressed with MUD or MBD despite understanding them, they could just plain not be interested in them, however I feel that's not fair, given last years standard what with Snapcaster Mage and resto thrag shenanigens, I'd say this standard is much more skill intensive and just plain more fun as a result. Not to mention these mono-devotion decks are some-what cheap compared to decks of last season, I defs had decks hitting upwards of $750 on the medium because my Bant land base was made up of 24 rare dual lands..
December 2, 2013 10:14 p.m.
I don't understand all the comments about "I don't think mono blue is as good as everyone makes it out to be", as if people are making up stories about it to convince you it's good. There is a reason you see it in basically every top 8 of all the big tournaments, and trust me it has nothing to do with the deck not being as good as people say it is. If the deck didn't perform then the pro's wouldn't continue to use and people wouldn't be copying it.
December 2, 2013 10:22 p.m.
"I don't understand all the comments about "I don't think mono blue is as good as everyone makes it out to be""
Simple. People play against it and they do exceedingly well against it, so they form an opinion around their previous experiences and post it online.
December 2, 2013 10:27 p.m.
Playtesting with Riot Control . Amazing. Absolutely amazing.
December 2, 2013 10:30 p.m.
notamardybum says... #23
MUD ,aka Mono-Blue Devotion, is a paint in the ass. They can drop a Master of Waves without any creatures on board and wreak havoc. With permanents like Claustrophobia , its a bit harder to get rid of, and me running rakdos, there are no destroy enchantment cards.
MUD is also relentless at having an onslaught of creatures coming at you from turn 1. Turn 4 they have 4-8 creatures in play. Supreme Verdict doesn't destroy Thassa, God of the Sea , Jace, Architect of Thought , Bident of Thassa , and neither does Anger of the Gods .
I've played against variations of the deck where they run 0/5 blue walls with Claustrophobia and I have to decide If i want to cut the devotion down and kill the wall.... or wait til something comes along like Master of Waves and then im over run. Frostburn Weird is also fairly resiliant by being able to avoid dying by Anger of the Gods , Ultimate Price . It's also big devotion and great defense in the early game, but also can attack you for 4.
Thassa, God of the Sea once on board is automatically an uphill battle. With her on board, you need immediate responses to everything they play in short of a land. Unblockable 4 dmg a couple turns hurts quite a bit. pair it up with a slew of elementals, an 8/1 unblockable AEtherling , them drawing a shit ton of cards and yeah... you've now lost the game.
Stop trying to figure out why it's so good, or saying it sucks. Theres a reason its won tournaments. Its got great tempo while at the same time disrupts yours.
December 2, 2013 10:49 p.m.
Playtest Riot Control against every deck in the meta, not just MUD, and post results on a deck page.
December 2, 2013 10:50 p.m.
If anything, why aren't you making a deck specifically to beat mono-Black devotion, which seems much less 'fair' than MUD, seeing as how they can win w/o having to deal combat damage, they just Gray Merchant of Asphodel a few times and your dead.
Build a deck to beat that.
December 2, 2013 10:54 p.m.
yeah but that would just be their lone experience with it, and could very easily have everything to do with the person they played and not the deck. Plus, if it wasn't as good as people made it out to be then it wouldn't be getting top 8 so frequently because the pros wouldn't be playing it at all.
December 2, 2013 11:20 p.m.
Both MUD and MBD are extremely strong right now. Not to be blunt, but questioning that is just wrong. However, they're just strong right now. Someone will find a way to trump it, even if it's just the next set. But until then, don't waste time debating whether or not it's good- instead, try to be the one finding the new solution.
PS- I doubt it's Riot Control . 3 mana for fog + life? Eh. But hey, prove me wrong.
December 2, 2013 11:32 p.m.
Lol that is true good sir! Well, I tested with riot control, its iight(yes I said that). However, I think with more removing I do, Crypt Incursion gets a spot as a 1 of. My style of esper is extremely different. Not typical esper control at all. I actually like creatures, but I don't mind killing them either, as long as I can play with them later, which I do =) I have it available for feedback on my front page. Lemme know whatcha think . I am not a big fan of shpinxs rev either, I don't like the draw a card gain a life for 1 mana. Late game, its bonkers, but I prefer to rock the read the bones. Its a sweet, sweet card. The deck is titled Esper Midrange for now. This thread has been fun. =)
December 3, 2013 2:34 a.m.
MUD is so strong because it is very resilient and very synergistical. Thassa, God of the Sea can't be touched by a Supreme Verdict , and a Cloudfin Raptor and Nightveil Specter later, you're dead.
December 3, 2013 7:30 a.m.
Pyrokineticrage says... #30
I am currently running a Dimir Devotion deck allowing me to play a lot of my opponent's deck against them. While maintaining a hefty amount of control and a few creatures capable of finishing the job, all while staying under 4 mana.it counters MUD and MBD very well and does surprisingly well against Other Mono Decks. Cant wait for Friday i have only been testing against pro level decks. I cant wait to see how it does against the more creative FNM decks.
Slayne says... #2
I don't see why it's so good either. I've never lost a game to it. 2-0 ever time. It's almost like a free win for me. The deck dies pretty easy to Anger of the Gods and simple removal like Hero's Downfall and Ultimate Price
December 2, 2013 8:23 p.m.