I agree totally ... With my Jeskai Mill/Burn I lost only 1 match (vs Green / Ramp Gae's Revenge) so far (something 15W-1L) at rank 40 (ok on Xbox so the string is pretty irrelevant) and only because I got mana-screwed (I run 23 lands)

I understand your point, and have thought the same myself. However, through lots of testing, I feel that the option of a mill victory is worth the 3 card slots for Tutelage. As others have said, it is a distraction, and sometimes damage is not a viable path. It also has the advantage of being able to mill away vital cards from some decks that depend on a few mythics.

I checked on my record in the Showdown, and of my 8 wins so far, 5 were from mill and 3 from damage. Now, I am sure that if I replaced the Tutelage and a few other cards w/ something else, I could turn some of those mill victories into damage victories, but not all of them. I can not count the number of times that I have been pursuing one path, and my opponent does something to cut that path off (Massive Lifegain or removing Tutelage) and I had to switch paths mid game. I generally can switch to a new offense quicker then my opponent can switch to a new defense.

IMO, the reason that my mill deck works is because it is NOT focused on the mill aspect. Cards dedicated to mill are 3 Tutelage. Cards that compliment Mill are Collective Defiance, Take Inventory, Chandra, Nahiri and Jace. All of those complimentary cards except maybe Take Inventory have power on their own.

The deck is a Control deck that has 3 cards dedicated to a Wincon. The rest of the deck is control (except Gideon) that can contribute to a damage victory or a mill victory.

Just to be different:

I think Wintervoid's mill 3 slots is better, but this deck is more fun:

Nahiri no Mill.

3 x Lightning Axe

1 x Jace, Vryns Prodigy
2 x Oath of Chandra
2 x Unsubstantiate
2 x Declaration in Stone
4 x Take Inventory

1 x Oath of Jace
2 x Fevered Visions
2 x Geistblast
4 x Fiery Temper
2 x Exquisite Firecraft
2 x Collective Defiance
1 x Radiant Flames

1 x Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
1 x Nahiri, The Harbinger

1 x Jace, Unraveler of Secrets
1 x Archangel Avacyn

1 x Chandra, Flamecaller

2 x Bedlam Reveler

3 x Plains
3 x Island
5 x Mountain
2 x Wandering Fumarole
2 x Needle Spires
2 x Prairie Stream
2 x Sulfur Falls
2 x Glacial Fortress
4 x Evolving Wilds


Unfortunately Akoum Firebird is bugged when attacking walkers, or I would include 1 over 1 Reveler.

Deceptive curve is deceptive.
It's supposed to be 3/11/14/2/2/2, but the Fiery tempers are a 2 or 1 mana play about half the time, collective defiance is a 4 drop or 7 drop (with geistblast) most of the time, Exquisite Firecraft is a 6 drop 20% of the time (geistblast) etc etc etc. Nahiri tutors for Jace more often than for Avacyn or Reveler, but this depends on the opponent's deck ofc. -8 get a jace flashing back Defiance to geistblast taking out 2 threats + deal 6 + leave another walker behind is pretty deece.

This deck doesn't want to durdle all day. It wants to keep your board clear and burn you/attack with manlands to soften you up. It is able to do so without losing the card advantage war, meaning that a late walker or an endgame reveler is often enough to close the game very rapidly before the opponent is able to draw out of it.

Try it, it's fun piecing the legoblocks together It can really punish the PW decks that are a bit slower with its burn/haste theme, and the early removal is pretty good vs aggro.

This should also be a deck that would have fun with the red and blue hulks

Okay....looking at the new set, and I still am concerned that Artifact/Enchantment hate will make this deck's life miserable.....but I will see if I can still make it work.

Basically, with more enchantment hate, I feel I either need to get rid of the enchantments.....or add more to overload the hate. I am going to try the second option by adding Dynavolt Tower.

So...current list:


Instant(12)
4x Galvanic Bombardment
3x Blessed Alliance
3x Geistblast
2x Brutal Expulsion

Sorcery(14)
2x Declaration in Stone
4x Take Inventory
2x Collective Defiance
2x Radiant Flames
2x Exquisite Firecraft
2x Planar Outburst

Enchantment(5)
3x Sphinx's Tutelage
2x Fevered Visions

Planeswalker(4)
1x Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
1x Nahiri, the Harbinger
1x Jace, Unraveler of Secrets
1x Chandra, Flamecaller

Land(25)
2x Prairie Stream
3x Plains
2x Wandering Fumarole
2x Island
5x Mountain
2x Needle Spires
2x Clifftop Retreat
2x Glacial Fortress
2x Sulfur Falls
3x Evolving Wilds

First change is adding in the Towers. It was tough to decide what to cut. I decided to go with Brutal Expulsion. That card has save me many times, but it is a luxury more then an integral part of the deck. Tower should replace the instant damage side of Brutal, but the Unsubstantuate part will be missed. Also, I lose the ability to catch up when 2 creatures are on board. Planar was another option to cut, but I feel I will need the sweepers.

So:

-2 Brutal Expulsion
+2 Dynavolt Tower

One card that I always hated to have in the deck, but it served it's purpose very well, was Galvanic Bombardment. I need the quick defense, but it is useless vs creatureless decks. The first copy is also sometime worthless vs things like Advocate. I am going to replace with Harnessed Lightning. it does cost 1 more, but the first one can hit 3 toughness creatures. The main draw though, is that it works well with the Tower, and even vs a creatureless deck, adds 3 points of damage to the face if the tower is out.

That leave 1 spot open, which will be used by Combustible Gearhulk. This violates the idea of a creatureless deck, but my thoughts are as follows. First, I am mainly interested in the spell effect. Second, Nahiri can not actually pull something up, and it will trigger twice. Third, another Artifact to eat removal (although more likely to eat creature removal). Fourth, it's a cool new toy.

-4 Galvanic Bombardment
+3 Harnessed Lightning
+1 Combustible Gearhulk

I will consider adding Aether Hub's, but I think the advantage of 1 extra energy will often be used up for mana filtering.

This set probably hurts my deck more then helping it, but this may be a way to have the deck last for another season. The alternative is to drop the mill aspect, and make it more a control/burn deck.

True, how good would you say burn is by itself? If we were to keep the Tutelages then we could always take a more defensive route with the deck. Doing this would make the deck much slower because you will want to play a visions or Tutelage with protection. Unsubstantiate would be a fine card; it allows you to protect your enchantments, aswell as bounce a spell your opponent plays and taking it from them with Collective Defiance.

I have thought about switching to just burn. I think R/U would be better if you go counterburn, or even counter tutelage. Heck, I lose to counter tutelage w/ me deck all the time (All depends who gets out first tutelage usually, but still think they have an advantage vs my deck) The issue I have is I don't think those decks stand up to agro as well. My version really is more a of a control deck.

Now, I am not saying it can't work, but I had a heck of a time figuring out what to cut for the new cards, and I really am not that happy about it tbh. I may end up keeping the brutals, and make the Lightning switch and add the Tower or Hulk for 4th slot.

I think if I do switch to burn, something like Rabs list above is the right direction.

Well in my Jeskai mill is just a secondary wincon (despite the 3 Sphinx's Tutelage)

My most usual victories come either from PW (Chandra) or Burn (thanks also by the 2 Fevered Visions)

I am quite excited to mod it more by adding Kaladesh cards !!!

After having played about 25 games with it, I feel fairly confident in moving my deck out of the "Brewing" section and posting it here as a real thing. Some updates may still occur, but the core is solid.

Background:

Ever feel like your opponent got to play too much magic? Do you enjoy saying "...go" with 10 untapped lands and 7 cards in hand? Want to durdle so hard the Mill players quit out of frustration? Do you sate yourself on the tears of Superfriends pilots, crying into their pillows, clutching their foil Languish and wishing it could stop the pain? Do you want to get steamrolled by RG Aggro?

Okay, maybe you don't want the last one. Still, all of the above describe the deck I'm about to post... Jeskai Draw-Go Control.


Boulevard of Broken Dreams ()
(Control)

Threats

2x Dynavolt Tower
1x Nahiri, the Harbinger
1x Jace, Unraveler of Secrets
1x Chandra, Flamecaller
1x Torrential Gearhulk

Removal

2x Fiery Impulse
3x Fragmentize
3x Harnessed Lightning
1x Kozilek's Return
2x Radiant Flames

Counterspells

1x Dispel
2x Scatter to the Winds
3x Broken Concentration
1x Calculated Dismissal
2x Insidious Will
2x Confirm Suspicions

Card Draw

3x Telling Time
3x Glimmer of Genius

Lands (26)

8x Island
3x Mountain
1x Plains
2x Prairie Stream
2x Wandering Fumarole
1x Needle Spires
2x Glacial Fortress
2x Sulfur Falls
2x Clifftop Retreat
3x Aether Hub


Card Choices

I built this deck after struggling to get any of my own energy decks to work out - everybody I battled was playing with full sets of Grasp of Darkness, Blessed Alliance, and Fiery Impulse.

Let's make those people feel silly.

You might think the fastest deck in Duels can end the game on turn four... but this deck ends it on turn three. If they don't have 3+ power on the board when you untap with , the game is over. They just don't know it until 20 turns later. We often have more counterspells than the opponent has meaningful cards in their deck. Your goal in the game is to make progressively fewer and fewer of their draws meaningful as you choke the hope out of their shattered body.

Let's start with the cards that can actually kill your opponent.

2x Dynavolt Tower
1x Nahiri, the Harbinger**
1x Jace, Unraveler of Secrets**
1x Chandra, Flamecaller
1x Torrential Gearhulk
2x Scatter to the Winds
2x Wandering Fumarole
1x Needle Spires

No other cards in this deck can deal damage, and we have no alternate win conditions (aside from concession). Luckily, if we lock out enough of their deck, we only need one source of damage.

**You'll notice I've included Nahiri and Jace in here - they can't actually kill anybody. But they do provide so much card filtering that your opponent can't keep up, and either ultimate will usually stop any fun that was still happening. Note that Nahiri can get Artifacts as well as Creatures, so you can grab a Dynavolt Tower if you've already drawn the Gearhulk.

The walkers all share the same features - they can remove something the turn they come down, then fix our draws for the rest of the game, as well as offering a path to victory on their own. Ideally we never want to cast them without at least one counter up, but sometimes your hand is weak enough that you need to cast and pray the response isn't too bad. Importantly, the usual enchantments for shutting down walkers are actually terrible against us, because of 3x Fragmentize.

Torrential Gearhulk is a lot of value in one card - it's typically a Confirm Suspicions with Kicker : Get a 5/6 Creature. Being a Nahiri target (and thus getting to flash back two spells) is even better. Unfortunately, he is a creature, so expect your opponent to have saved up three to four kill spells for it due to a lack of other targets. Usually it's best to just let it go, but you can fight over it if you're that desperate for a 5/6 body.

Dynavolt Tower is the new equivalent of Sphinx's Tutelage - it's a three mana threat that will - eventually - end the game, and dodges a lot of removal. The advantage to the Tower is that it also stabilizes the board along the way, and converts your bad spells into damage. Suddenly that Harnessed Lightning looks a lot more like a Lightning Strike - and you can even point it at Planeswalkers, a traditional weakness of a deck like this.

And lastly, the creature lands. We rarely ever want to activate them - five mana is a lot. Their main job is to keep us from decking after we've got four counterspells in hand, 15 lands, and our opponent is on empty. They're also relatively low opportunity cost; we're in the market for dual lands already.

This brings us to the mana base - it's pretty close to what you might expect. 26 lands is a control deck standard.

8x Island
3x Mountain
1x Plains
2x Prairie Stream
2x Wandering Fumarole
1x Needle Spires
2x Glacial Fortress
2x Sulfur Falls
2x Clifftop Retreat
3x Aether Hub

Notably, no Evolving Wilds in the deck. The goal is to have untapped mana as often as possible - the more untapped mana we have, the more counters we can hold up. In fact, we've only got three lands that always enter tapped (the creature lands) and two that might (Clifftop Retreat). Colored sources are 19 , 13 , 11 . No, we will not be able to cast Fragmentize on curve - but that's fine. We only really want to be able to cast it by turn four anyways, while holding up a counter spell. We're one dual land short of the max - that is indeed a missing Needle Spires. We don't need red or white as much on curve, so we don't need it for those purposes, and I honestly wanted fewer tapped lands more than I wanted another threat. If you're trying to activate a creature land without having at least three mana up for a counterspell, you are unlikely to be winning that game. And by the time you might be doing that (on 8-10 lands), you can find one of the three in the deck. Normally you don't bother activating till you can hold up two or even three counters.

Next, the removal suite:

2x Fiery Impulse
3x Fragmentize
3x Harnessed Lightning
2x Radiant Flames
1x Kozilek's Return
2x Dynavolt Tower
1x Chandra, Flamecaller

This deck is trying to 1-for-1 everything your opponent does. As a result, sweepers aren't actually very good - the opponent rarely gets two permanents on the board at once. The only exception is if they're playing multiple 1 and 2 mana creatures - in which case, Radiant Flames is the most relevant card in the deck. Our matchup against those decks is still pretty bad, but at least if we draw Radiant Flames, the game ends. Kozilek's Return is a bit more of a hedge - being instant speed means we can cash it in as a Fiery Impulse most of the time, but it can also sometimes be randomly good as a sweeper. Even if it just cleans up a single Pia and Kiran Nalaar, it did it's job. Chandra is such a good all around card that she makes the cut (and functions as another sweeper if we live to six mana).

The main thing to notice about these cards is mana cost. Every card here needs to be so cheap that we don't need to take down counterspells to play it, or needs to win the game on its own after we tap out for it once. Fragmentize is the MVP of multiple matchups for exactly this reason. For example, we can just let Sphinx's Tutelage resolve, counter their card draw spell, then untap and blow up the Tutelage for a single mana.

Fiery Impulse is a necessary evil, though it's often the worst card in the deck. When it's not, though, it will save your life. Crucially, at 3 damage, it can kill every targetable creature land. Helpful tip: if your opponent attacks with a Wandering Fumarole, wait until they activate the P/T switch ability, then Impulse it with the ability on the stack - this prevents them from being able to save it, no matter how many times they try to switch P/T again in response. Harnessed Lightning is a two-mana Murder in a deck with Glimmer of Genius, and Dynavolt Tower lets you stop countering creatures after it gets into play (and provides a 10-ish turn clock).

Speaking of 1-for-1ing, let's talk Counterspells. We're playing a lot.

1x Dispel
2x Scatter to the Winds
3x Broken Concentration
1x Calculated Dismissal
2x Insidious Will
2x Confirm Suspicions

First, we have all five Cancels, because that's the best counterspell you get these days. Scatter to the Winds has slightly more upside, though you rarely want to make a 3/3 creature and expose it to removal until the game is locked up.

Insidious Will is a new KLD addition, and it's... fine. Usually it's just an overpriced counterspell, but the flexibility can come up. You never copy your own spells - but you can redirect their kill spells or targeted draw spells, and you can copy things like Necromantic Summons while selecting the same target to fizzle their spell and get the payoff for yourself.

Confirm Suspicions fits better in the "draw" section than the "counter" section. This spell is a lot of where the deck gets its inevitability, and it's usually the best Gearhulk target.

Dispel sees some play in standard, but almost none in duels. Still, in a deck where all we care about is instant speed interaction, a single copy of this comes up a lot. Most importantly, it wins counter wars - which you'll get into against any other blue deck. It lets you feel comfortable cracking all those clues and casting those draw spells on the endstep, because you didn't really tap out. It's also notable that the main answers to walkers are enchantments that cost four mana or less and Anguished Unmaking. The former get removed by Fragmentize, and this stops the latter. You never want more than one, though, because it is pretty narrow.

Calculated Dismissal is the last man in. We want one or two more counterspells... and there actually aren't any more worth playing. We've literally run out of good counterspells. So this slot can be filled with one of whatever the next best option is. Spell Shrivel, Calculated Dismissal, and Countermand are all reasonable, and Horribly Awry could help a little with the aggro matchup. I've chosen Calculated Dismissal since I think having a turn three counterspell is crucial, and this one has the most upside. This card still has some lategame value, because opponents will try to overwhelm you all in one turn, and this can catch their last threat. Scrying is also worth more than normal in this deck because of how polarized our draws are.

Lastly, card drawing:

3x Telling Time
3x Glimmer of Genius
2x Confirm Suspicions

That's not a lot of card draw - but we don't need a ton, either. When we can literally counter every spell the opponent casts, just getting one or two cards up is enough to close it out. Telling Time continues to look terrible on paper and overperform in every deck I put it in. "Blue cantrips still good - Magic community shocked," I'm sure the headline will read. Anyway, its main role is allowing you to mulligan less by smoothing our draws - our deck mulligans poorly, so that's handy. Also having anything proactive to do on an empty board when your opponent doesn't cast anything into your counter is nice.

Glimmer of Genius is insane. "Scry Two" doesn't look like a big upgrade, but it makes all the difference in the world. When you need a very specific kind of card - be it "Counter", "Land", "Threat", "Removal", or "Sweeper" - this lets you dig four deep for it. It might even be better than a discounted Scour the Laboratory for that alone - it certainly is when you include the energy, which our deck makes decent use of.

Confirm Suspicions is only 1 mana more expensive that we'd usually be willing to pay (after all, I did consider Countermand) and it draws us three cards in the process. Yes, we will have time to crack those clues. Also, having them be clues is often even better - it means we still get value with a full hand. Also, as mentioned above, this is usually the best Gearhulk target (in our deck, and probably in duels as a whole).


Strategy

Draw
...Go
Draw
...Go

Thus how Draw-Go got its name. For real, though, the only cards you could be casting on your turn before six mana are Fragmentize and Radiant Flames. The first is so cheap you can still hold up counter magic, and the latter ends the game against aggro. You only have four other sorcery speed cards in the deck, and all of them should be cast with one (or two) counterspells still up.

Counter the cards you have to. Let the ones you don't resolve. Nothing is more disheartening than playing against somebody you know has a counterspell, casting your threat... and having it resolve, because they just don't care enough.

There is no rush to win the game. You have the best long game of any (reasonable) deck in the format. Even Ulamog isn't a big deal - sure, he eats two lands, whatever - counter it, let's get on with life. The real worries are Lumbering Falls and Gaea's Revenge. Luckily, nobody plays them! Perfect. (Westvale Abbey making a token every turn is also a hassle, but we can usually find a creature land or a Dynavolt Tower fast enough to beat that).


Matchups

This deck is very good in a lot of matchups, and very bad in some others. So far I've found:

Very Good:
Superfriends
Midrange/Control

Good:
Midrange
Control
Mill
Burn
Aggro/Burn
Vehicles

Neutral
Midrange
Ramp
Vampires
Humans/Aggro

Horrible
Energy Aggro
Werewolves


The summary of this is that if your opponent plays a Swamp, you start cheering. If your opponent plays a turn two Werewolf or Voltaic Brawler, you're gonna have a bad day. And if they play an Island and start passing as well, you're probably favored, but you need to be on your toes.


And that's a wrap...

Comments / Criticisms / Superfriends' Tears welcome!

I mean...it looks really good, but don't you straight up scoop to Scrapheap Scrounger trying to 1/1 it to death?

Dynavolt, Nahiri, and Gearhulk can all keep it under wraps - most likely, it just forces us to hold up a creature land on defense every turn until we can get one of those online. It's certainly not good to see, but that's true of every 2-mana 3-power creature. Honestly, the worst card to play against is a T2 Lambholt Pacifist.

Yeah, I found that out. T2 Lambolt, T3 Lieutenant is pretty much GG, especially if you're on the draw.

Yea the deck went in a direction I didn't like in the end, and I ended up scrapping Dynavolt entirely and including Blessed Alliance/Declaration in Stone.

-2 Tower, -3 Lightning, +2 Dec, +3 Alliance?

Lightning is too important vs aggro, I'd ditch the 3 x Broken Concentrations. Don't want 3+ counters in hand facing down a bad board. Rest of the changes would be fine.

Ended up going -1 Dispel, -1 Insiduous, -1 Calculated for the Alliances.

Imprisoned in the Moon?

hey, wanna show you my thopter deck. its not done yet, but it has some nice synergies... not sure if its competitive though.

4xgalvanic bombardment
3xAlchemist's Vial
3xera of innovation
2xMaster Trinketeer
2xEsperzoa
2xPia Nalaar
3xThopter Engineer
3xWhirler Virtuoso
3xChief of the Foundry
1xSaheeli Rai
3xWhirler Rogue
2xPia and Kiran Nalaar
2xValor in Akros
2xThopter Spy Network
3xGlimmer of Genius
22 Lands, especially
1xWestvale Abbey

The deck starts a bit slow but has following synergies
Carddraw-Engine with procs for era of innovation
Alchemist's Vial
Esperzoa

Thoptercrapping with buffing
era of innovation
Whirler Virtuoso
i imagined that whirler with era will do well in this deck, but was surprised how good it is.

Proccing Enchantments
Master Trinketeer
Pia Nalaar
Thopter Engineer
Whirler Virtuoso
Whirler Rogue
Pia and Kiran Nalaar
all proc several times for
Valor in Akros
era of innovation

let me know what you think

I've been playing with this deck for about a week, and I really like it. The only time I have gotten into trouble is if they get out too fast before I can get counters online (especially if I am on the draw) and I don't have enough removal. I tried going -dispel +planar but it's too slow to help you, and I don't like that at sorcery speed it works against everything else the deck is trying to be. So I went back to this version just started to mulligan more aggressively if I don't have early answers in my hand.

If you can get to turn 5 with the board still more or less in control, I don't think this deck can be beat.

Long time, first time.

Zerris, I really enjoy your builds and love the right ups. This one brought back memories of my favorite build of yours, 'Fun is a Zero Sum Game'. # 1 win condition, rage quitting!

After spending some time with this one I found an addition that really works here.

1x Disciple of the Ring

It's perfect for a deck being mostly instants and sorceries and looking to counter everything in sight. It is another win condition, but more importantly, it adds to that #1 win condition. When Disciple hits the battlefield, a rage quit follows shortly after.

I found that more often than not I had plenty of lands and was always looking to draw anything else so I just dropped down to 25 lands. It has been working great for me, but I'm no mana expert.

Thanks again for the great build.

I was just building something like this and thought to check out the Jeskai thread to see if something similar was posted. My deck is like your but...well...see for yourself!

1 x Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
1 x Disciple of the Ring

4 x Galvanic Bombardment
3 x Telling Time
3 x Unsubstantiate
3 x Harnessed Lightning
2 x Declaration in Stone
2 x Imprisoned in the Moon
2 x Scatter to the Winds
4 x Spell Shrivel
2 x Insidious Will
3 x Glimmer of Genius
2 x Confirm Suspicions

1 x Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
1 x Chandra, Torch of Defiance
1 x Nahiri, the Harbinger
1 x Jace, Unraveler of Secrets