How does a knowledge pool deck work?

Asked by NihantJace 9 years ago

So I heres what I think I know about knowledge pool decks: they work by shutting your opponent out of the game by exiling whatever he casts. Here's where I'm confused. I thought they won by making your opponent unable to cast any spells. However, since they cast a spell and it is replaced by another spell and the original spell is exiled by knowledge pool, can't you cast that original exiled spell when you cast another spell? If so, how is that a win condition? They can just recast anything that is exiled. Sorry for my ignorance.

nobu_the_bard says... Accepted answer #1

Not sure about other formats, but in Commander, typically Knowledge Pool forms a lockout with something like Curse of Exhaustion. You can't cast spells anymore (from your hand), because your first spell is exiled, and you automatically fail to cast the spell knowledge pool lets you use (as it is a second cast action). Most of the lockouts are based on something like this.

With Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir, it works because Teferi doesn't let you cast spells except when you could cast a sorcery. Since the trigger from the pool is on the stack when making the choice to cast the spell, you instead can't cast the spell, since sorceries require an empty stack. Normally Knowledge ignores timing restrictions, but Teferi overrides this.

April 4, 2016 10:45 p.m. Edited.