[MCD] - Anti Control Tech

[RowanKeltizar]

The blue control archetype is becoming somewhat more relavent in my playgroup. I guess it was inevitable with all the broken cards getting released. Wanted to compile a list ofanti-control cards for non-blue decks to consider. Please chime in so I can continue to compile the list, thanks!

As far as discussion, I'm interested in hearing what you are actually running in your decks these days. Some of these cards might be outdated. I'm also interested in cards that have particular synergy with a certain commander or archetype you've built. In addition, I'm having trouble finding anti-control cards for black especially. Any hidden gems here?

I consider S-tier anti control cards to be things like Deflecting Swat and Rhythm of the Wild that serve more than one purpose. Boseiju, Who Shelters All is another one that probably could go in most decks since it also taps for mana.

I'm a little less interested in cards like Pyroblast or Vexing Shusher that only have one function and could be dead cards.

I don't think I want to include cards like Ruric Thar, the Unbowed that affect all non-creature spells since that list would be very long and not quite focused enough for what I have in mind.

So, cards that specifically counter or redirect outside of blue, or outright shut off or significantly hinger counterspells and interaction on your own turn.


WHITE

Silence
Grand Abolisher
Mana Tithe
Orim's Chant
Ranger-Captain of Eos


RED

Deflecting Swat
Wild Ricochet
Bolt Bend
Shunt
Reroute
Ricochet Trap
Tibalt's Trickery
Price of Glory
Pyroblast, Red Elemental Blast
Overmaster
War's Toll

Red has access to several chaos effects such as Possibility Storm which make it nearly impossible to cast interruption

BLACK
note: one of blacks greatest strengths especially against control is discard effects, hand hate, and draw hurts cards. I won't list them all here but this can be an important consideration especially if your commander supports it.

Inquisition of Kozilek
Duress
Grief

Imp's Mischief

GREEN

Destiny Spinner
Dosan the Falling Leaf
City of Solitude
Allosaurus Shepherd
Prowling Serpopard
Savage Summoning
Insist
Gaea's Herald
Leyline of Lifeforce
Root Sliver
Hall of Gemstone
Veil of Summer

COLORLESS
Defense Grid
Mana Web
Boseiju, Who Shelters All
Cavern of Souls

MULTICOLOR

Rhythm of the Wild
Vexing Shusher
Dragonlord Dromoka
Spellbreaker Behemoth
Guttural Response


FLASH ENABLERS (all colors) Casting your spells at instant speed can throw the control player off from their normal tempo. You can cast your important spells in response to them tapping out for that end-step Braingeyser or Fact or Fiction. Note that I'm including blue spells here because you may want flash enablers in a creature based blue deck where you aren't running a lot of other control cards.

Leyline of Anticipation
Vedalken Orrery
Quick Sliver
Yeva, Nature's Herald
Raff Capashen, Ship's Mage
Renari, Merchant of Marvels
Shimmer Myr
Sigarda's Aid
Tidal Barracuda
Alchemist's Refuge
Winding Canyons
Emergence Zone
Aluren
Arlinn, the Pack's Hope
Breath of the Sleepless

[TheAmericanSpirit]

I'd personally exclude anything like City of Solitude, war's toll, and defense grid. Those cards aren't anti-control as much as anti-interaction, and their presence on the battlefield helps the combo player more than hurts the control player. Ideally you want your things protected, but not anyone else's.

[Crazy Monkey]

Especially with the Random Card of today, I'll chime in that operating at instant speed is an orthogonal approach here. Shimmer Myr, Yeva, Nature's Herald, Vedalken Orrery, [insert more narrow flash source here], Winding Canyons, and Emergence Zone either forces the blue player to be honest and not End-of-Turn-Fact-or-Fiction to build their hand, or just opens the door while they're dealing with something else. This method obviously become much worse if there are 2+ players on blue control. However, the upside is that these are generically useful inclusions to decrease the surface area for interaction to stop you. To point to an overused example; use Yeva, Nature's Herald for an End-of-Turn Avenger of Zendikar into my turn Craterhoof Behemoth requires an instant to interact with it, and is not very telegraphed.

There's a second axis to the above, those being Marisi, Breaker of the Coil and Basandra, Battle Seraph to limit what can be done when. It's somewhat similar to Dosan the Falling Leaf, but being only during combat makes them draw less attention than Grand Abolisher and also generally cannot cover someone else comboing out.

If we're talking purely about counterspells, there is also something to be said for the [put X onto the battlefield] of Sneak Attack, Elvish Piper, Stoneforge Mystic, etc. These will be deck dependent, but avoid the object of interest from ever being on the stack.

I'll also agree with the concept that full turn anti-interaction cards are extremely broad in application, and may be too broad for the intentions put forward for this list. They're intended to keep players 'honest', but generally enable the more combo aligned decks to avoid disruption.

[TheGildedGoose]

Thoughtseize
Duress

Pinpoint discard is underrated for pushing through important spells.

[Legend]

Orim's Chant

[pokken]

The best way to interact with control is to 1) be able to deal with their combo finish and 2) pressure them to spend 1 for 1s as bad stream of life effects.

The on board static control effects are usually much weaker than simply playing your own removal and killing their rhystic studies.

The play patterns that enable control in commander are mostly idiots not paying rhystic tax or pressuring the combo control deck.

S tier stuff in green imho is heroic intervention and veil of summer. Those effects are rarely dead and always blow out control. But just having a beast within for their rhystic study or being willing to take a turn off to play around remora is far more important

Playing an asceticism just turns you into public enemy.

[Dragonlover]

It's not for every deck, but may I recommend Possibility Storm? Makes it impossible to sculpt a hand, and makes every attempted counterspell a roll of the dice.

Dragonlover

[RowanKeltizar]

What sparked this topic was a game I played last night. I was playing Henzie. There was Meren, Elminster and Tasha, the Witch Queen as well as Xyris, the Writhing Storm.

Tasha and Elminster were pretty heavy on counterspells and control effects. Everytime I was about to win, my board would either get wiped or my key cards countered. Elminster wrathed the board every turn for 6 turns in a row. Or Tasha or Xyris would wheel. The tasha player had the guts to proxy a Timetwister. But Molten Psyche and Echo of Eons were played by Xyris.

Anyhow, about 2.5hrs into the game (>.<) I had a game winning Living Death in hand, but it was countered. This was after my Massacre Wurm was removed in response to it's own life loss ability. This is a game where If I had a way to counteract the control players, I would have been able to push through a win.

Thoughtseize
Duress

Pinpoint discard is underrated for pushing through important spells.

Thanks, I needed this reminder. Targeted discard isn't used much in my playgroup, but I think it's time to give it a try. I'm going to slot in Grief in my Henzie deck. Seems like a perfect fit that I can get multiple triggers from.

I will also be getting a few copies of Boseiju, Who Shelters All once the secret lair copies finally hit the market.

Especially with the Random Card of today, I'll chime in that operating at instant speed is an orthogonal approach here. Shimmer Myr, Yeva, Nature's Herald, Vedalken Orrery, [insert more narrow flash source here], Winding Canyons, and Emergence Zone either forces the blue player to be honest and not End-of-Turn-Fact-or-Fiction to build their hand, or just opens the door while they're dealing with something else. This method obviously become much worse if there are 2+ players on blue control. However, the upside is that these are generically useful inclusions to decrease the surface area for interaction to stop you. To point to an overused example; use Yeva, Nature's Herald for an End-of-Turn Avenger of Zendikar into my turn Craterhoof Behemoth requires an instant to interact with it, and is not very telegraphed.

This is another avenue I hadn't considered but makes a lot of sense. I will try some flash effects. I can finally get my hands on a Vedalken Orrery now that they are going to be at a reasonable price point. Playing creatures at instant speed is phenomenal.

If we're talking purely about counterspells, there is also something to be said for the [put X onto the battlefield] of Sneak Attack, Elvish Piper, Stoneforge Mystic, etc. These will be deck dependent, but avoid the object of interest from ever being on the stack.

Yeah, i have definitely had success with this.

I'd personally exclude anything like City of Solitude, war's toll, and defense grid. Those cards aren't anti-control as much as anti-interaction, and their presence on the battlefield helps the combo player more than hurts the control player. Ideally you want your things protected, but not anyone else's.

yeah, that's a legitimate consideration for sure and probably not the direction I would want to go since I tend to run a lot of interaction in my own decks barring my artifacts only list where Defense Grid is actually pretty helpful since I don't have any interaction to speak of outside of my stax stuff.

[pokken]

If it's specifically counter magic my suggestion is to just play blue or red. The only good answer to a cedh or near cedh countermagic count (multiple players running 8+) is your own countermagic or stax. Defense grid type crap is usually worse than sphere of resistance or static orb type stuff. Abolisher and archon of valors reach on instants can be reasonable

But personally I try to avoid playing my nonblue decks in a 3 blue tryhards game. It's just not fun.

[RowanKeltizar]

But personally I try to avoid playing my nonblue decks in a 3 blue tryhards game. It's just not fun.

probably this was my mistake. I have kind of a loose schedule rotation to the decks I play at our regular weekend gatherings so I'm not playing the same decks all the time. I wanted to play my jund deck, and after I was done shuffling, I looked around I saw I was facing off against 3 blue decks and a combo Meren player. I take enough pride in the fact I was able to keep in the game and even get several shots at winning or at least get some decent damage through.

At any rate, our playgroup definitely isn't cEDH level and I would like to think I can try to compete against a blue deck using my non-blue stuff if I play smart and play the right cards for that deck.

I really like the utility lands Winding Canyons and Boseiju, Who Shelters All as being some nice anti-control tech. They are tutorable with Crop Rotation and Kura, the Boundless Sky which is really nice. They are much harder to intereact with and remove than other types of permanents and my jund deck can handle a denser number of colorless utility lands with Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth and Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth both being in the deck too as well as Dryad of the Ilysian Grove.

I could always try Boil lol

[pokken]

Veil of summer, deflecting swat, pyroblast probably where I would start in jund.

[toctheyounger]

Ranger-Captain of Eos is pretty strong. I guess it doubles as utility and a way to go off if you can, too. Being an activated ability makes it harder to interact with too.

I also find things like Archon of Emeria while not directly related slow down control players enough that they often need to pick abd choose whats allowed a little more. By the same token Collector Ouphe effects hurt too.

Hall of Gemstone is particularly nasty for control, although it is a weird effect that probably affects your lines too. Likewise with Mana Maze, although they do both have their uses.

Archon of Valor's Reach and Serra's Emissary have the potential to hose entirely, Chalice of the Void and Sanctum Prelate got you too if you know your meta well enough.

Jin-Gitaxias, Progress Tyrant at least gets your first spell through each turn. And Veil of Summer/Overmaster either bait removal or get you some breathing space.

Hope this helps!

[RowanKeltizar]

Is there a creature with a Deflecting Swat effect? Basically looking for a red Willbender.

Ranger-Captain of Eos is pretty strong. I guess it doubles as utility and a way to go off if you can, too. Being an activated ability makes it harder to interact with too.

I forgot about this guy. Definitely a strong include.

[toctheyounger]

Best I can think of is Spellskite, which doesn't help at all.

[EonAon]

honestly red is more Fork. White and black have counterspells but are very conditional. Red has anti blue conterspells which make it narrow in the application and they also arent many of them.

You may want to try a stax or death and taxes variant with Thalia, Guardian of Thraben Vryn Wingmare and other added cost effects.

[ISBPathfinder]

So, I guess I have a few thoughts on things that tend to work really good against counter magic / sweepers / spot removal in general.

• Low Curve - Lower your curve run a lot closer to the ground and stop running expensive cards. By this I sort of mean lowering your curve way the hell to the ground with more draw engines in it. The point of lowering your curve is making it so that they pay as much mana as you to counter spells and focus less on big flashy spells that counter magic can throw you off as much and more on cheap things with heavy spamings of draw.
• Ramp - There are a lot of commanders that just having mana on hand plus the commander can provide a very strong boardstate. By this I mean commanders like Kenrith, the Returned King and Tasigur, the Golden Fang where your commander shows up and every time by itself is a large concern. The point of this is that even if they counter magic your commander you can just keep throwing it at the board and ramping also makes it easier to replay them. Ramp strategies involving green can also use some of the non basic land tutors to get things like Cavern of Souls.
• Eminance - Commanders like Prossh, Skyraider of Kher, Bruna, the Fading Light, and Edgar Markov have effects on cast / from command zone that can be harder to control interact with. I have played with and against several of these and they are really hard to deal with via control.
• Commander Wincons - There are a number of commanders who are low cost that represent a threat via combat that can put a lot of pressure on opponents without a lot of extra cards committed to the strategy. I think the trick for voltron vs control is actually to aim for strategies that are light on buffs and support cards that can operate well on their own. Jenara, Asura of War is an example of a commander where they come in cheaply and need very little additional assistance to represent a very good threat.
• Control Countering Commanders - By this I mean that if you really want to throw issues at control strategies you can play some specific commanders like Chromium, the Mutable or Nezahal, Primal Tide. There a few other counterspell immune commanders but I think hexproof ones are also very reasonable vs control.

I realize I just identified a bunch of things which is sort of like, change your entire deck design / commander choices which might not be super reasonable so I guess lets look at some more cards / packages / strategies that in the 99 might help.

• Lands - I am not saying that they don't run land answers but lands generally don't die to counterspells / sweepers. What I am getting at here is that big mana generation lands and must answer effects like Emeria, the Sky Ruin can be a real beating in your lands. Cavern of Souls is also really good if your commander is a large focus of your deck especially queing into counter magic. I run Cavern quite often and I don't have a particularly heavy counterspell meta I play against.
• Gods - Lots of the gods are cheap and hard to sweep with wraths. Its actually surprising how much work Klothys, God of Destiny can do given time. I get that they can eat counter magic but they tend to be very sticky against a lot of control often taking more premium removal to remove them.
• Toolbox - If you have a tutor heavy strategy you can run some silver bullets that work a lot against your meta and go get the ones you need. Lots of people don't like going tutor heavy because it breaks the spirit of the format a little but it lets you pack one or two strong effects against archetypes you have issues with and some recursion and the combination of all that can really let you fight back against meta issues.
  Walker Hate - I hate to say it but that specific game seems like you saw as many sweepers as you did due to the walker commanders. Packing things like The Immortal Sun / Pithing Needle can help shut them down. I think expecting a walker commander to be heavy on sweepers is also sort of to be expected and I just lean hard into killing those players even when they have literally no boardstate because walker commanders are lame in that you need to attack their commanders down and deal with more sweepers.

I think its important to not shift too much to adjust to your local meta unless its absolutely out of control but it can also be a big deal to lower your curve and rely less on weird combo / haymaker kind of plays to carry you to wins. Shifting to simpler strategies with less cards reliant can help a lot against sweepers and counter magic. Try to focus on setups that are leaner to the ground and require less setup to perform. When your entire boardstate is just your commander a sweeper isn't nothing but its going to be easier to set back up than it will be for some of your opponents. I also feel like some amount of the issue you had comes down to the fact that you were playing against two walker commanders. My own opinion of walker commanders is that they tend to extend opponents life total by forcing you to attack their walker commander while they try to defend them via blockers and sweepers. These sort of commanders can create stall heavy games unfortunately.

I don't really have an answer but maybe..... see if your meta can agree to not play more than one walker commander at a time. I do think there are commanders who can counter them and other commanders who just play better against those strategies but I don't know how much you want to try to counter them so much as add some strategies that work better against them.

[3drinks]

I'm more in favour of Scald and Citadel of Pain. Scald especially as a one-sided manabarbs pressures them exceedingly hard as they can't target that when everyone else is doing stuff that demands their interaction.

[EonAon]

I always kinda like the Spellshock Mindcrank combo. If you're going red/black also has excellent hand control options. Price of Glory is always fun as well. Boil and Boiling Seas is also possible if they are decently island heavy. As well red has creatures that can cast things out of the yard like blue does. Admittedly they are not as efficient as blues.

[Dunharrow]

I like playing uncounterable spells that make sense. I have played Sudden Death and Sudden Spoiling to disrupt LabMan finishes.
Then there are the Counterfluxes of the world. Abrupt Decay. I find many of the blue control decks have combo finishes and it just takes one of these to disrupt them.
Though now there are more ways to disrupt uncounterable spells than 10 years ago.

I second Possibility Storm. Blue players cannot play with it effectively. It also messes with combo decks pretty well.

[Ruiner]

For red I'd recommend maybe trying out:

Stoneshaker Shaman
Tectonic Instability
Price of Glory
Citadel of Pain

These all either force lands to be tapped or at least encourage lands to be tapped on a player's own turn.

Depending on your attitudes towards land destruction, I also like Natural Balance as a way to slow down control decks that ramp a lot, while not crippling everyone.

Cards like Sulfuric Vortex, Spellshock, Pyrostatic Pillar, etc., can help apply pressure when you are a more aggressive deck also.

There are a number of uncounterable/split second red burn spells that also might suit your needs.

[NZB2323]

Carpet of Flowers can be really good for ramping against blue control players.

Kambal, Consul of Allocation does well against counterspells and other non-creature spells. Same with Esper Sentinel.

Eldrazi are good because of the cast trigger, so you could add Kozilek, Butcher of Truth, Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger, Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre, and Emrakul, the Promised End to the list.

Like ISBpathfinder said, Edgar Markov is pretty great against control. Even if they counter a vampire spell you still get a 1/1 off the cast trigger. And if they cast a board wipe you can sacrifice vampires to Goblin Bombardment and drain them off of Blood Artist. And if you play three 1 drop vampires in a turn, which one are they going to counter?

Any commander with an ETB effect is good against counterspells, because you get the ETB effect when you recast after being countered.

Ghen, Arcanum Weaver can be really good against control, since you're not casting your powerful enchantments, but cheating them in from the graveyard. If you have a way to do discard at instant speed you can put any of these enchantments in play in response:

• Stranglehold
• Fate Unraveler
• Painful Quandary
• Captive Audience

Neheb, the Worthy is also good against control with his discard, especially when combined with Necrogoyf, Syphon Mind, Angrath, the Flame-Chained, and Painful Quandary.

Ravos, Soultender can be good against control because a lot of times you can get back whatever they countered.

Winota, Joiner of Forces can go off against control.

Another great flash enabler you can add to the list is Vivien, Champion of the Wilds. Or you can just play flash tribal with Nymris, Oona's Trickster and have counterspells that can counter their counterspells.

[Treamayne]

Is there a creature with a Deflecting Swat effect? Basically looking for a red Willbender.

Not quite the same, but Wandering Archaic can really mess up the counterspell player. Also, Dualcaster Mage will let you flash a copy of their counter to counter the counter (which, of course, applies to all of the Fork variants, as previously mentioned)

[illakunsaa]

I think Rishadan Port is potentially a good card. You can tap a blue land during endstep and another one during your turn. I've also had good success with thoughtseize effects.

[PrimevalCommander]

I think Rishadan Port is potentially a good card. You can tap a blue land during endstep and another one during your turn. I've also had good success with thoughtseize effects.

Finally, another person mentions using Port the way I do. Doing this exact thing has helped me push through big plays on several occasions. Even against non-blue decks it can be a pain for opponents that like to play instant speed interaction. This land can be great anti-control tech with just a little planning. This means control players will typically have to leave open to counter your thing, barring all the free counters, which is a big ask for all but mono-blue decks.

Also if you see a pesky open bluffing swords or path you can call their bluff before you burn your combat phase, or play your hasty threat / combat trick.

[hyalopterouslemur]

Trinisphere is interesting. You know how everyone agrees Cancel sux? Well, Cancel's the best you have now, bro!

Reassembling Skeleton's ability can't be countered by counterspells.

If a spellshaper gets through, you now have a way to turn other cards into instants.

Maralen of the Mornsong is interesting. She can stop counterspells, but I should warn you, she also lets your opponents tutor combo pieces. Alms Collector and Spirit of the Labyrinth can slow down card draw as well.

Esper Sentinel is pretty cool. "Oh, you want to counter my spell? That's cool bro. But you have to pay for it, unless you just want to turn this into an exercise in looting."