Note: Please mark decks as "Premium" if you use Premium cards in your deck builds. Thank you.

If I left anything out or you see any errors please let me know.

Source: Atharva's Decklists & Strategies Thread

Unlocked and ready for discussion!

Rough draft of mono-blue control.

Draw-Go (I need to start thinking up some better names)

Creatures - 7
3 Gargoyle Sentinel
2 Chasm Skulker
2 Talrand, Sky Summoner

Other Spells - 29
4 Vapor Snag
4 Negate
4 Nullify
4 Think Twice
4 Voyage's End
4 Inspiration
3 Dissolve
1 Time Warp
1 Counterlash

Lands - 24
20 Island
4 Radiant Fountain

Figured I'd throw together some sort of mill deck because why not? There's an achievement for it or something right? Good enough for me!

Passive Resistance (Premium)
x24 Island

x3 Hedron Crab
x4 Vapor Snag
x4 Doorkeeper
x4 Nullify
x4 Think Twice
x4 Voyage's End
x4 Coral Barrier
x3 Guard Gomazoa
x3 Niblis of the Breath
x2 Mercurial Pretender
x1 Time Warp

Yeah you better hope your mill engines stay online 'cause if they fall your toast. It's passive resistance for a reason. Bounce dudes, counter 'em and stall for time while picking away at the enemies mind. Mercurial Pretender is there just to act as another copy of Doorkeeper or Hedron Crab. I'd have preferred Clone but you work with what ya got.

No Millstone in the mill deck? ;P Although I admit, it doesn't quite look like you need one. I'd try to fit a couple in somewhere though...I think. I like this build.

Your only other win condition is flying beats with Niblis or islandwalking beats with a 1/1 squid token; so basically you have no other win condition.

The biggest problem with the Doorkeeper deck is just how mana-hungry it is; you only have 11 defenders, so you're looking at paying three mana every turn to mill 2-3 cards and if you need to counter/bounce/whatever, you sometimes won't be able to afford the Doorkeeper.

If you want to mill somebody with Doorkeeper then you need to make the mana you spend on it more efficient; load up on more defenders from black, or go into green and play ramp (Cultivate synergizes well with the Crabs).

I think black is probably the better option because you get to run Flesh to Dust, but I'm admittedly not too familiar with the entire pool.

Flesh to Dust is quite expensive on it's own. This deck isn't really looking for other win-cons, just milling (at least that's my thinking). There may be a better version of mill (it will be hard to tell before the majority of us can test things out) but this seems like a good starting point to me.

If Doorkeeper was just a tap ability it could be fringe-viable; as is, it's just too expensive. You essentially have to just ride Hedron Crab to victory behind your walls, which I don't think will get there without any way to abuse landfall.

Isn't there a 3/3 colorless defender in this pool that you can also attack with if you pay for it? That would be a solid inclusion in any Doorkeeper deck.

It's a premium card.

@hakeem,

gargoyle sentinel. @garren, I agree the sentinel might be a good idea.

Gargoyle Sentinel. You're right, that might not be half bad either. Still, you have to take something out...

Once I get a better sense of the whole pool I will brew a Doorkeeper deck, but until then I can't say what I'd do with it.

I don't see doorkeeper or vent sentinel being reliable win conditions. I can see them being like enablers, like milling yourself or doing just a little bit of damage when needed in the right decks, but I don't see the actual deck becoming competiitve viable unless defender gets get really really really good at stall.

Doorkeeper is just a piece of the entire mill strategy, albeit a large one. If you remember from 2013 the Hedron Crabs can do a lot of milling on their own as well. Again, it will be hard to figure out the best strategy until we get to test it...but this seems a good starting point.

That's for the feedback guys! Like I said I didn't really expect this thing to be viable (or at least not very good) but hey figured I'd try it out anyway. If we were to build a mill deck (assuming such a thing could be done) which would you say is the better focus; Doorkeeper or Hedron Crab?

I'm kinda leaning towards the crab myself since he requires less mana and less set-up but I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts.

I would say the Crab under most circumstances. The crab is good no matter what really (in a pure mill deck), the doorkeeper has to be built around defenders to be worth anything. Like Hakeem was saying, if you do a with crabs, land fetches, and tutors it might work out pretty well. As pure blue I think you are off to a good start. I'm sure in practice some things will not work as well, as always, changes will be made.

The Big Blue... 2015 deck (The Big Blue...)
60 Cards. 38 nonlands (10 creatures, 38 spells). 22 Lands (22 ).

Creatures 10
-- 3x Pestermite
-- 3x Archaeomancer
-- 2x Talrand, Sky Summoner
-- 2x Roil Elemental

Spells 28
-- 4x Vapor Snag
-- 2x Void Snare
-- 2x Quicken
-- 4x Courier's Capsule
-- 3x Nullify
-- 2x Negate
-- 2x Voyage's End
-- 4x Think Twice
-- 3x Dissolve
-- 1x Time Warp

I suppose everyone had just about the same idea. This particular decklist could use some tweeking though...

Anyone care to test?

EDIT: If you see something that is premium or DLC just replace it with something else or add more of something already there!

Deck has to be edited...

Stall, mill and win? (premium)
60 cards : 12 creatures, 24 other spells and 24 lands (islands)

Creatures :

3 X Hedron Crab
4 X Doorkeeper
2 X Chasm Skulker
3 X Guard Gomazoa
2 X Talrand, Sky Summoner

Other spells :

4 X vapor snag
4 X voyage's end
4 X Think twice
3 X nullify
2 X Millstone
3 X dissolve
3 X inspiration
1 X time warp

The goal's pretty simple, your main win-con is to slowly mill your opponent with the doorkeeper and the Hedron crab, and the Millstone, the rest of the cards just there to slow the game as much as possible help you filtering your deck.
Talrand's there because he simply fits the deck very well, you'll get to just kill someone with drakes out of nowhere from time to time.
The draw power of this decks makes for very linear games aswell, you play a "miller" turn one or two and wait to counterspell/draw at instant speed/use one of your mana sinks at the end of your opponent turn.
Also, the deck has a pretty low curve but the 24 lands are erally necessary, the crabs, your ability to scry often, and your mana sinks make good use of them.

As for the cards I considered including :

Tome scour doesn't fit, the goal's not to mill asap but to set up a softlock, the same goes for Chill of Foreboding.
void snare is a worse version of voyage's end, being able to bounce at instant speed is just way too important, and the scry is a huge plus.
negate doesn't get a lot of very important nullify doesn't get.
Speaking of nullify, I just couldn't find the room for another one, no more millstone or inspiration.
corral barrier is worse than the walls I play and I don't need more.
chasm skulker is pertty awkward, he's sorery speed and bad at blocking when you play it, the same goes for archeomancer, ... if only the deck had more time warp.

Any opinion?

Void snare is a worse version of vapor snag/voyage's end, it's true.

Except it targets a permanent. It's a great answer to the quite-present beastmaster ascension decks online,

I have faced only one beastmaster's ascencion in my +/-30 games with the deck but it wrecked me when I did since I'm petty good at blocking but not at killing the attacker, the ascencion got all of it's counter from a 2/1 wolf and a 1/2 spider.
I'll try playing the snare over the vapor snag, I just hope the lost of instant speed castability won't hurt that much.

On a side note, i've played multiple times against a gaveyard based G/B deck and won only once out of a crazy Talrand.
This archtype seems to be pretty common and I don't seen how I could better my match-up while staying mono-colored.