"Oh no, not the bees! Not the bees! Aaaaahhhh! Oh, they're in my eyes! My eyes! Aaaahhhhh! Aaaaagghhh!"
- Edward Malus, The Wicker Man (2006)
- Edward Malus, The Wicker Man (2006)
I am a paradox. On the one hand, I love playing control decks, and on the other, I hate combo decks. Why is this a contradiction? Control decks realistically must use a combo finish to close games out in a reasonable time frame, or the deck turns into a sort of spellslinger stax that can be its own hell to both play with and against. So, I'm torn: do I swear off blue-based control forever, or do I compromise my ideals and get my hands dirty with combos?
Well, you read the tags.
Tasigur, the Golden Fang: Invincible Counter Fog is a control-combo deck that seeks to slow the game down and protect itself until the late game when it can combo off. Being based in blue, we run the best countermagic available to dictate the flow of the game, and black and green give us access to some of the premier removal spells in the format. Board wipes, from Cyclonic Rift to Damnation to Oblivion Stone, allow us to break parity with our thin board state. Tutors and recursion spells like Demonic Tutor and Regrowth allow us to find or replay our best spells and sculpt our hand to maintain a balance of control spells. Finally, as the deck name suggests, to protect ourselves, we run a number of fog cards to help extend our presence in the game.
When your opponents are rudderless, we close the game out with infinite mana generated in a couple of ways funneled into a few win conditions. The two key cards for generating this mana are Turnabout and Rude Awakening to untap our lands. Along with a ton of mana from lands and either Seasons Past with a tutor or Shigeki, Jukai Visionary's channel ability with a recursive spell enable us to repeat this loop an infinite amount of times. Winning from there is largely trivial, but I run a very specific and very fun way to close out games. What is it? Here's the decklist. See for yourself.
Invincible Counter Fog
Approximate Total Cost:
Here's how it works:
Combo One
Requirements: some combination of Seasons Past, Turnabout, and Demonic Tutor in your hand, graveyard, or library, and 13+ lands
Tap 13+ lands
Cast Seasons Past returning Turnabout and Demonic Tutor (7+ mana)
Cast Demonic Tutor for Seasons Past (5+ mana)
Cast Turnabout untapping your lands (1+ mana)
Tap 13+ lands (14+ mana)
Repeat for infinite mana and recursion
Combo Two
Requirements: some combination of Shigeki, Jukai Visionary, Turnabout, and Regrowth in your hand or graveyard, and 13+ lands
Tap 13+ lands
Channel Shigeki, Jukai Visionary returning Turnabout and Regrowth (7+ mana)
Cast Regrowth returning Shigeki, Jukai Visionary (5+ mana)
Cast Turnabout untapping your lands (1+ mana)
Tap 13+ lands (14+ mana)
Repeat for infinite mana and recursion
Throw in Tasigur for infinite self-mill as well to get everything into the graveyard as well as an infinite recursion outlet himself. This is redundant, of course.
Then it's TIME FOR BEES! It's the most absurd win condition I can think of with the ability do basically anything you want.
Lands
40 seems a bit high, but considering the mana-heavy nature of the win conditions and this is a control deck, hitting those land drops consistently is key. Beyond the obvious color fixers like Command Tower and 10 fetches, I tried to keep the basic count reasonably high to maximize fetchland targets since we're running Crucible of Worlds and Conduit of Worlds. In addition to control lands like Bojuka Bog or Boseiju, Who Endures the tech lands I run are Field of the Dead for random blockers and Academy Ruins or Volrath's Stronghold for recurring board wipes, Crucible effects, win conditions, and fogs. Finally, Nephalia Drownyard is one of our win conditions with infinite land untaps.
Ramp
I'm not completely sure this deck needs a plethora of ramp, but at the moment I think the deck should be developing its manabase instead of sculpting its hand in the early game, so here we are. Exploration plus Crucible of Worlds with a commander that self-mills is good. Who knew? The rest of the ramp package is so-so, but putting lands directly into play and upping our land count is important for comboing off later. Plus, they help fuel Tasigur delve costs. I've considered switching over to a more Lands-oriented package with Ramunap Excavator and Life from the Loam with Azusa, Lost but Seeking and Dryad of the Ilysian Grove but I think those are too threatening and lead the deck down a combo path for what is fundamentally a control deck.
Countermagic
The bread and butter of blue-based control decks. Not much to say here other than a) I really don't like Arcane Denial and b) I've been thinking that Cryptic Command isn't great for a while now. Holding open four mana typically isn't a problem, but it's a lot to ask for a counterspell even into the late game when I can counter and activate Tasigur. Compared with Mystic Confluence which has better mode selections overall, I think it's not worth playing.
Spot Removal
Pongify and Rapid Hybridization are conspicuously absent, but with Tasigur not being a constant presence in the game I think they pose too much of a threat to my life total. Notably, I have no real sources of life gain so protecting my life total is paramount for my longevity (more on this later). Also missing are Into the Roil and Blink of an Eye, two cards I've long played in control decks. In their place are Echoing Truth, a card that leads to more blowouts against relevant threats and doesn't have the unnecessary card draw kicker that is largely winmore. I feel that the kicker is a bit of a trap. They're much better in 1v1 but in multiplayer they're a very short temporary fix that costs four mana to cantrip. I'd rather have a board wipe rider than a cantrip. The rest of the removal package is pretty straightforward. Notably, Capsize and Beast Within with Reality Shift also double as win conditions.
Board Wipes
I'll just say it: there aren't a whole lot of great options here. White is king of board wipes, and while we gain a lot by not playing that color, this is where we pay the price. That said, it's not as bad as it seems. Pernicious Deed and Nevinyrral's Disk take a turn cycle to become active which sucks, and Oblivion Stone and Perilous Vault are quite expensive, but they're ways for me emulate Hour of Revelation and Farewell to a degree. Damnation and Toxic Deluge are classic black board wipes, and Evacuation and Cyclonic Rift round out the wrath package by being instant speed. Eight wipes seem high enough to see them with some consistency when accounting for tutors and recursion.
Recursion
When your commander self-mills you'd be foolish to not play a healthy amount of recursion. The crucible effects allow us to hit every land drop, and Conduit does extra work by recurring key permanents. Noxious Revival and Regrowth, despite being good on their own, are integral to the infinite mana combo with Shigeki, Jukai Visionary. Speaking of Shigeki and Seasons Past, similarly to Revival and Regrowth they're solid on their own without the infinite mana enablers. Being able to reload your hand time after time in the late game before you go off is incredibly powerful. Plus, they're cool cards.
Tutor
Good cards are good. No Muddle the Mixture to make room for everything else.
Sustain
This is a highly relevant section of the deck that in conjunction with the control package enables it to survive into the late game and protects against alpha strikes even then. Without lifegain like Gray Merchant of Asphodel or Pulse of the Fields to keep you healthy, it's entirely possible to be ground down by random aggression over time. Being able to burn these to save 6+ life from attackers not only helps us live longer by saving life, but also by deterring future attackers as well. Maze of Ith and Glacial Chasm need no introduction. Spore Frog with Conduit of Worlds or Constant Mists with either crucible will essentially lock aggressive decks from killing you in the late game, so repelling them early on is essential.
Infinite Mana
While these two cards aren't great on their own, they do have some minor utility. Turnabout can prevent an alpha strike or lock someone's mana down for a turn, and Rude Awakening can be used to snipe someone out of the game starting in the midgame. It ain't much, but they're there if you need them.
Bees
Zacama
