About Andreas Ganz
Andreas Ganz
I
am a Swiss Magic player, have been playing Magic since 1998 and began
playing tournaments in 2002. I am intrigued by the competition that
comes with high level tournament play. Some of my “magical
accomplishments” include:
- 10 lifetime pro points
- Vice National Champion
- Playing Pro
Tour London
- Team National Champion
- Playing Worlds 2005 in
Yokohama
- Several GP day 2
appearances (with the highest finish being 23 in Stuttgart)
But the achievement that meant the
most to me, at least in retrospective, was winning against Kai Budde (the then Roger Federer of Magic) in the decisive round of my first GP playing for day two. You
might also recognize me because I designed large parts of the
5CB deck promoted by Patrick Chapin and played by several pro players
at this year's Grand Prix Seattle including my Sygg, River Cutthroat
technology. I
don’t provide this information to brag about any results, but merely to
give you an idea of my magical background and experience. This allows
you to judge more accurately how you want to handle my writing and how
useful it might be for you.
The article consists of three different sections. Part one will give you an introduction to the deck and its history. In part two I will talk about different decklists and analyze them card by card and the last part contains the matchup analysis, an interview with pro player Manuel Bucher the “inventor” of the deck, some general playing tips as well as possible additions from Alara Reborn.
Before reading part two of the series, I suggest you take a look at part 1, and part 2, if you haven’t done so already.
The first feature article will take an in-depth look at the Cruel Control deck of the current standard format. The article consists of three different sections which will be published over the next few days. Part one will give you an introduction to the deck and its history. In part two I will talk about different decklists and analyze them card by card and the last part contains the matchup analysis, an interview with pro player Manuel Bucher the “inventor” of the deck, some general playing tips as well as possible additions from Alara Reborn.
In the second part of the feature article I talk about different Cruel Control decklists and analyze them card by card. The last part, which will be published soon, contains the matchup analysis, an interview with pro player Manuel Bucher the “inventor” of the deck, some general playing tips as well as possible additions from Alara Reborn. Stay tuned!
Matchup Analysis
I will describe how the different matchups play out and what the important points are. I will then provide the sideboarding plans for the two different decklists I recommended. I will only discuss the most common matchups in detail and give you a general idea about how you want to sideboard.
I think you can separate the decks in the current standard environment into Cryptic Command decks (Cruel Control, Faeries, Reveillark) and Spectral Procession / Windbrisk Heights decks (Red White and Black White) with Faeries and Black White also playing Bitterblossom as another key card and with Faeries overall making the best use of these key cards due to the insane synergies with the rest of the deck. Other viable decks which usually don’t play any of these key cards are Blightning decks and Doran decks.
Mirror Match
As the deck needs all the lands it can get to operate smoothly you have to try to deny them their card draw. This means you should play Cryptic Command on their Esper Charm and try to counter Mulldrifter. This is another reason why I like Remove Soul that much because it allows you to counter their Mulldrifter even if you are on the draw. The game will eventually come down to a fight over Cruel Ultimatum and if one player manages to resolve the powerful sorcery the game is usually over barring some lucky topdecks.
According to Paulo Vitor Damo da Rosa this version has quite a good matchup versus Gabriel Nassifs list. The main reason for that is Ajani Vengeant. While I agree that the Planeswalker is a good card in the mirror it still seems a bit exaggerated to say that this version has a good matchup in the mirror, because apart from Ajani the decks are almost identical and I would therefore say it is a 50-50 matchup.
If you are playing with the Ajani version of the deck and they have Pithing Needle, you want to bring in Oblivion Ring to deal with the Needle, Scepter of Fugue or their own Ajani Vengeant. With the other version you want to bring in Kitchen Finks as well as Wydwen, the Biting Gale against discard and Planeswalker strategies and try to become the aggressor.
Cruel Control with walls:
In: 4 Kitchen Finks, 1 Banefire, 3 Wydwen, the Biting Gale, 2 Pithing Needle, 2 Negate
Out: 4 Volcanic Fallout, 3 Plumeveil, 2 Wall of Reverence, 1 Cruel Ultimatum, 1 Terror
Cruel Control with Wrath of God:
In: 3 Scepter of Fugue, 2 Negate, 2 Oblivion Ring, 2 Wydwen, the Biting Gale
Out: 2 Cloudthresher, 3 Volcanic Fallout, 3 Terror, 1 Wrath of God
(Click on the title for a sample decklist)
Your strategy versus Faeries is to outland them by drawing more cards. This implies that you don’t expose your card draw to counterspells, respectively making it as hard as you can for them to counter your card draw. An example would be if they have a Mutavault and two Islands in play. You should then play Esper Charm on their upkeep, because they might play another Mutavault and can then counter your Esper Charm with Spellstutter Sprite.
If you manage to counter or kill Mistbind Clique and afterwards reset the game with a Volcanic Fallout you are in good shape. Sideboard cards you should consider against Faeries are Cloudthresher, Scepter of Fugue, Pithing Needle and Wydwen, the Biting Gale as well as Negate. The wall version will bring in Kitchen Finks and Wydwen, the Biting Gale in order to buy time and to attack Jace Beleren.
Cruel Control with walls:
In: 4 Kitchen Finks, 1 Banefire, 3 Wydwen, the Biting Gale
Out: 2 Wall of Reverence, 2 Cruel Ultimatum, 2 Broken Ambitions, 1 Pithing Needle, 1 Plumeveil
Cruel Control with Wrath of God:
In: 2 Wydwen, the Biting Gale, 2 Negate, 1 Cloudthresher, 1 Volcanic Fallout
Out: 3 Wrath of God, 3 Ajani Vengeant
(Click on the title for a sample decklist)
Volcanic Fallout is extremely important in this matchup as well as Wrath of God if you are playing with it. The game versus Black White is usually straight forward and you should simply counter everything you can and wreck them with Volcanic Fallout.
After sideboarding you need to be aware of their best weapon against you which is Head games. In the Wrath version you can bring in Scourglass to clear their side of the table.
Cruel Control with walls:
In: 4 Kitchen Finks, 1 Wall of Reverence
Out: 1 Pithing Needle, 1 Terror, 1 Broken Ambitions, 1 Cruel Ultimatum, 1 Remove Soul
Cruel Control with Wrath of God:
In: 1 Cloudthresher, 1 Volcanic Fallout, 2 Scourglass, 2 Negate
Out: 3 Terror, 3 Ajani Vengeant
(Click on the title for a sample decklist)
Red White is one of your easier matchups. Nonetheless you should be cautious because you can lose to Figure of Destiny, Ajani Vengeant or Reveillark. This is one of the matchups where you should consider using the discard mode of Esper Charm. Try to counter Reveillark or lock them their fifth land with Ajani so that they have to play an Ajani of their own. If they can’t get you below 10 life with an early Figure of Destiny you should be in good shape and eventually win with Cruel Ultimatum.
Cruel Control with walls:
In: 2 Pithing Needle, 2 Celestial Purge, 2 Negate
Out: 2 Wall of Reverence, 3 Plumeveil, 1 Mulldrifter
Cruel Control with Wrath of God:
In: 2 Celestial Purge, 1 Cloudthresher, 2 Negate, 1 Volcanic Fallout
Out: 3 Terror, 3 Ajani Vengeant
There are even more decks in the current Standard environment as for example a mono blue mill strategy based around Sanity Grinding, but you can’t really expect to play against such a deck, while it is not necessarily a bad strategy and even almost unbeatable with Cruel Control it is nonetheless a tier 2 or even tier 3 deck.
I would say the decks you should expect to play against the most at any particular tournament are the big three consisting of Cruel Control, Faeries and Black White decks.
The Pro’s Opinion
I had the opportunity to talk to the original designer of cruel control respectively its predecessor Quick’ n Toast, Manuel Bucher who is a friend of mine. ManuB as he is known on magic online is responsible for a lot of successful deck designs, he is currently a level 7 pro player with four Grand Prix Top 8s to his name and I am curious about what he has to say concerning his pet deck.
Hi Manu, how are you doing?
Excellent, what about you? :-)
As far as I know you invented the Quick’ n Toast deck back in the days, which is today known as Five Color Control or Cruel Control. Could you tell us about the development and evolution of the deck and your ideas behind the concept of Quick’n Toast?
The deck was based on the synergy between Vivid Lands and Reflecting Pool. With that combination you could play the most powerful cards in every color. The list in Hollywood was built to beat Fae and standing good against Elves and Aggressive Red Decks – its biggest leak was Reveillark, which is still a pretty bad match up nowadays. Sadly the deck lost a lot of powerful cards with the rotation of Time Spiral, and the deck moved towards a sorcery speed big mana likeish deck but it is still playing the best cards of all the colors.
The latest Standard premier event you played in was Pro Tour Kyoto. What were you playing and why?
I played the Five Color Deck that eventually won the tournament. We tested a lot and it was the deck you had the most options so you could build it to beat most of the field. In the end we were not that happy with our final list, but it was as good as it could get – and it eventually won the tournament, so we succeeded.
What were your main insights during or after the tournament concerning the version of the deck you chose to play, your sideboard and how the matchups worked out?
I sadly played only four rounds of standard in that tournament. I lost one to Faeries which is not a great matchup for the version, and I am fine with that loss. I lost to a Five Color Control and a Boat Brew deck which I got pretty bad draws twice. Overall I still like my choice as it was good against the field of the tournament – if there is more faeries around I would change it a bit. The sideboard is pretty complex as you have an insane amount of possibilities, and I don’t think you are ever happy with your 15 cards at the end of the tournament.
Would you change anything in your version of cruel control?
A lot of time passed, and I didn’t play Standard at all (focusing more on Limited and Block Constructed). As the format shifted like it does after every Pro Tour I don’t have any changes afterwards. I will be playing in the upcoming standard GPs, and if it’s still a good choice I will play it – and we will see what Alara Reborn will bring for the deck.
What do you think about versions with Wrath of God instead of the wall package as advocated by Paulo Vitor Damo da Rosa? What are the advantages / disadvantages?
I am a huge fan of Plumeveil in general, as I think it makes Faeries a way easier matchup, and it is a great card against any Figure of Destiny deck as well. Wrath of God is pretty bad against Red and Faeries where the wall package is pretty good. On the other side Wrath is better against Spectral Procession and Ziggurat.dec. In my opinion Spectral Procession is a good matchup most of the time and Ziggurat is pretty bad without Wrath – so unless you have an insane amount of Ziggurat in your metagame, I prefer the wall package.
What do you think about Cruel Control in the current Standard format? Is it well positioned? And would you recommend playing it?
You can build the deck to beat everything, so if you have a good read on the metagame it is very well positioned and you should play it. On the other hand, if you are facing an unknown metagame, you have the possibility to be very bad positioned and you shouldn’t play the deck. So as a conclusion I would say that I would recommend playing the deck, the better you know the metagame.
What would you advise somebody who picked up the deck and is trying to learn how to play it? Do you have any useful tips on how to play the deck?
You should always build a plan on how to win the game, and plan the next turns in advance, which is crucial so you know you play the right lands. You have to test the complex matchups a lot (like Faeries) while ten games might be enough in the easy ones (like RW).
Can you give some advice on mulligan decisions with Cruel Control, are there any hands that the average player might be inclined to keep but should be mulliganed and vice versa?
I think the optimal hand includes a removal like Plumeveil or Terror, a Cryptic Command, a card draw (Mulldrifter / Esper Charm) and four lands. While you don’t need a removal or a Cryptic Command it is very hard to keep hands with fewer than three lands and no card draw spell. So I would ship most hands with two lands and no card draw spells, but I keep a very large sample size of my opening hands.
Can you give some sideboarding advice and point out common mistakes you see other players making when sideboarding with Five Color Control?
It is the same sideboarding advice as I give for every aggro control or control deck – don’t make sideboard plans and stick to them – if your opponent is playing around Plumeveil 100% of the time, just sideboard it out even though it was the best card in testing. Watch out how your opponent plays and configure your deck to be the best against your opponent and his deck choice.
I suppose you are already familiar with most of the spoiled cards from Alara Reborn? If so, what do you think about the set in general? And did you already spot cards you want to try out in Cruel Control?
The set is very interesting. Terminate will be a huge addition for the deck, as unlike Terror it can deal with Doran and Tidehollow Sculler. Bituminous Blast is a card I am very excited testing with. Overall I think the set is very interesting and adds a lot to the format.
Anything you would like to add?
I want to thank the readers for reading and you for hosting the interview. It was a pleasure!
Thank you for your time, I hope you successfully break the block format and good luck for the upcoming Pro Tour. I would be happy to get your opinion on the latest Magic the Gathering topics again soon.
Tips and Tricks
In this section I want to provide you with some nifty tricks you should be aware of when playing the deck. Some of them might come in handy while you might already know others.
Managing Your Lands And the Vivid Land Bluffs
Try to always plan ahead, play the correct lands, and tap the right lands, in order to keep the counters on your Vivid Lands and avoid removing them unnecessarily. Do not rush when tapping lands, think twice about which lands you tap and assess which spells you want to play on your opponents turn. You can also try to bluff by tapping your lands in a certain way or removing counters from Vivid Lands you don’t necessarily have to, in order to mislead your opponent. An example would be to tap a Cascade Bluffs and leave two Vivid Creek and an Island untapped. This might make your opponent believe you don’t have Volcanic Fallout but you could as well have it and lure them into overextending. If the game state allows you to use some of the counters on your Vivid Lands you can try to mislead your adversary, but that is an advanced strategy and won’t work against every opponent.
It’s almost always correct to play Esper Charm targeting yourself and not your opponent unless you can get the last two cards out of their hand. The reason for this is that in the Cruel Control deck your drawspells do not play the same role as draw spells in other decks, where the goal is to turn one draw spell into several other spells. In Cruel Control you will usually draw another spell and a land. This is crucial in order not to get mana screwed. And I am not referring to mana screw on four lands but on five and six lands, which can be your demise when piloting such a deck. An exception to the mentioned Esper Charm rule has to be made versus Red decks. If your opponent missed a land drop and you are holding an Esper Charm it is often correct to make your adversary discard two cards (hopefully two burn spells) in order to save some of your precious life points and even if they might still be holding a land you should consider targeting them with Esper Charm.
If you are on the play versus Faeries and your opponent has the turn two Bitterblossom you have to decide if you want to destroy it with Esper Charm or rather draw two cards. The decision depends on the rest of your hand. If you are already holding two Volcanic Fallouts you can try to race them and make them lose to their own Bitterblossom and opt to draw two cards instead. On the other hand if you won’t be able to make good use of the Bitterblossom lifeloss you should destroy the pesky enchantment immediately which is the correct play most of the time.
Mulligan Decisions
Seeing as landdrops are crucial for a deck like cruel control you should mulligan almost every two land hand on the play without a Mulldrifter or an Esper Charm and two lands that will let you cast the charm. I like to keep hands with as many as five lands as long as you have a carddraw spell in hand, especially if you know what you are playing against. Such hands are acceptable in the mirror match where you don’t want to miss landdrops. And on the draw you can even consider keeping a six land hand as longs as the spell is something along the lines of Cryptic Command, Mulldrifter or Esper charm.
As Manuel already mentioned an optimal hand against an unknown deck would include a removal spell, a Cryptic Command, card draw (Mulldrifter / Esper Charm) and four lands.
Playing Speed
Because Cruel Control is quite a slow control deck that takes some time winning even after it established complete control over the game, you should make sure that you can play the deck at a reasonable pace in order to avoid draws. Especially against other control decks you might run out of time in tournaments with 50 minute rounds if you take too long for your decisions. In addition you should know by heart how you want to sideboard for the different matchups in order not to lose too much time for sideboarding. It is acceptable to change your sideboarding plans slightly in order to adjust to the deck your opponent is playing or his playstyle and you might have to deviate from your original sideboardplan if your opponent plays a special version of a tier 1 deck, a tier 2 deck you did not practice against or is constantly playing around some of your cards like for example Plumeveil. However even then it is an advantage to already know approximately how you want to sideboard versus a control deck or versus an aggro deck and thereby avoiding sideboarding mistakes and losing too much time.
Should you decide to add Jace Beleren to your Cruel Control and are playing against another deck with Volcanic Fallout for example the mirror match you will want to use Jace’s first ability the turn you play him in order to get him to five loyalty counters so that your opponent can’t kill him with a Volcanic Fallout. This is important, because Jace will usually win the control mirror all by himself.
On the other hand if you are playing against Jace Beleren and your opponent makes this misplay, always remember to kill the Planeswalker with a timely Volcanic Fallout.
Bear in mind that these tips are merely guidelines and I advise you not to play on autopilot and to always strictly follow these rules, because in Magic there are situations where you have to adapt to something new and play differently than you did during playtesting. Have an open mind and always look for the correct play even if it differs from your experiences.
The Future Of Cruel Control And The Impact Of Alara Reborn
There are a lot of possible inclusions from the already available sets. You could for example play more Planeswalkers like Jace Beleren. In addition you could play more Negates and Remove Soul. Feel free to experiment with the deck and try out new cards.
When examining Alara Reborn you not only have to look for cards to add to Cruel Control but you also have to pay attention to cards that might be good against Cruel Control and how you plan to deal with them if other decks implement them. Some cards that caught my eye are:
Anathemancer
This might play the same role as Magus of the Moon did against Five Color Control. But instead of just slowing you down like the Magus did, Anathemancer can outright win the game or has at least the potential to inflict massive amounts of damage similar to a lava axe with a 2/2 body attached to it and should your opponent still be in the game when he plays his seventh land to unearth this guy you can usually pack it in.
Terminate
A powerful reprint that will certainly replace Terror in Cruel Control and probably some copies of Remove Soul, although I think I still prefer the counterspell.
Bituminous Blast
Bituminous Blast features the new Cascade mechanic and testing will have to show if it is a possible addition to Cruel Control. If you consider playing with Bituminous Blast in Cruel Control keep in mind that you have to adapt the rest of the deck to maximize the power of Cascade. This means that spells like Broken Ambitions, Negate and Remove Soul probably won’t have a home in the deck anymore and it seems quite difficult to replace these cards.
Soul Manipulation
Soul Manipulation might be playable as a one of and replacing a Remove Soul. For an additional mana you have the possibility to return a Mulldrifter from your graveyard to your hand. However I think that this card has more potential as a one of in Faeries.
Bloodbraid Elf
Everybody is talking about this being one of the best cards to come out of Alara Reborn and I have to agree. Bloodbraid Elf is extremely powerful and undercosted for the effect it provides. I am not sure in what kind of deck he is at his best but I imagine that you could play him in an aggressive Red Green deck as well as in Cruel Control itself which would then again make it necessary to adapt the deck. I am certain that it is very annoying to play against this card with Cruel Control although Faeries will have the most problems dealing with it.
Spellbreaker Behemoth
This card might pose a problem for Cruel Control as well as Faeries and could be a reason to abandon Remove Soul in favor of Teminate as well as playing the version with Wrath of God.
Double Negative
Double Negative could turn out to be a necessary evil in Cruel Control in order to combat the Cascade mechanic. Even if your opponent does not play any Cascade spells it is still a hard counter.
Maelstrom Pulse
The new Vindicate will certainly see play in a variety of decks and formats and it could prove to be a valuable addition to Cruel Control.
Please keep in mind that I did not test any of these cards in the deck and evaluate them solely based on my theoretical assumptions.
Information Sources About Cruel Control
I assembled a collection of articles, videos and decklists on the subject of Cruel Control for those of you who want to deepen their knowledge about the deck.
Articles
Star City Games
Five Color Control by Paulo Vitor Damo da Rosa (Premium)
Pro Tour Kyoto Tournament Report by Gabriel Nassif (Premium)
Kyoto Revisited by Manuel Bucher (Premium)
There Is Always A Greater Power: Nassif In Kyoto by Patrick Chapin (Premium)
Wizards.com
Coverage Of The Pro Tour Kyoto Finals: Gabriel Nassif vs. Luis Scott-Vargas
Coverage Of The Pro Tour Kyoto Semifinals: Gabriel Nassif vs.Akimasa Yamamoto
Videos
Cruel Control In Standard by Luis Scott-Vargas (Part 1)
Cruel Control In Standard by Luis Scott-Vargas (Part 2)
Cruel Control In Standard by Luis Scott-Vargas (Part 3)
Cruel Control In Standard by Luis Scott-Vargas (Part 4)
Cruel Control In Standard by Luis Scott-Vargas (Part 5)
Cruel Control In Standard by Luis Scott-Vargas (Part 6)
Video Deck Tech: Five-Color Control with Gabriel Nassif
Coverage Of The Pro Tour Kyoto Finals: Gabriel Nassif vs. Luis Scott-Vargas (.zip file)
Interview With Manuel Bucher
Podcasts
Pro Tour Kyoto In Review And An Interview With Gabriel Nassif by Richard Hagon
Decklists
Cruel Control Decklists On Deckcheck.net
Standard Decklists On Magicleague.com
Forum Threads
Decks To Beat: Cruel Control (Star City Games Forums)
Cruel Control In Standard (TCGplayer.com Forums)
Summary
In conclusion I want you to remember that there is no such thing as the “best version” of Cruel Control, there is only the “best version” of Cruel Control for your metagame or tournament of choice. I hope you liked this article and you were able to profit a lot from it. Please leave your feedback in the comments section, where I would also be happy to answer all your questions. Have fun playing with the deck because as we all know by now:
Sometimes it’s good to be cruel…
Keep your browser tuned to Blackborder.com, visit daily in order not to miss any of the upcoming articles and invite your friends to join the rapdily growing interactive Magic the Gathering portal that Blackborder.com is.
Have fun!
Andy
Email this page
I like the final installment also. I actually could have skimmed the interview. the tips and tricks section was cool and pretty informative.
Thank you for your feedback! It's good to see that the tips and tricks were informative!
I agree that the interview contains some things already mentioned in parts 1 and 2. Which means, if you read those parts attentively, you could skip or skim the interview. Nonetheless I think it might be interesting for some readers to see what the pro player and designer of the deck has to say about it.
If you have any questions regarding the article, feel free to post them in the comments section or send me any questions, suggestions or ideas using the contact form (use the "Editor" setting to reach me).
Keep your browser tuned to Blackborder.com, visit daily in order not to miss any of the upcoming articles, videos, podcasts and so on, and invite your friends to join the rapidly growing interactive Magic the Gathering portal that Blackborder.com is!
Have fun!
Andy
Another great article! I found this very informative. The tips and tricks are nice. My local meta is loaded with this deck, so all the information that can be gleaned is very helpful. Thanks!
If your local meta is full of 5cc control I would recommend the Sanity Grinding deck. Surprise!!!!
awesome article
Post new comment