This week I bring you another reader submitted request: Mono White Hate. This request came from Anthony Stebel, a reader who appears to have made a Twitter account to get a hold of me, and I am sorry for missing your message. I found this recently dated from June 2nd of this year. To anyone who may have tried to reach me and had this happen, I apologize and will be sure to check my message requests more actively.
Anthony writes:
“Hi Aaron. Wondering if you can brew – mono white Hate. Including Aven Mindcensor, Leonin Arbiter and possibly Suppression Field? I hate Fetchlands and Jitte. Haha”
I have been playing around with some similar ideas in Modern for a while as I previously wrote about here before becoming an official Hipsters writer. Without wasting any more time, here’s the brew!
Mono White Hate
| Lands (19) 4 Ancient Tomb 4 Cavern of Souls 1 Gemstone Caverns 10 Plains Creatures (25) 2 Angel of Condemnation 4 Aven Mindcensor 4 Glory-Bound Initiate 4 Leonin Arbiter 4 Phyrexian Revoker 4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben 3 Thalia, Heretic Cathar Spells (16) 4 Chalice of the Void 4 Chrome Mox 4 Suppression Field 4 Trinisphere |
A few things that I prefer for Legacy prison decks is the ability to run Sol lands such as Ancient Tomb or City of Traitors for that easy turn one Chalice of the Void on one, or combined with Chrome Mox/Mox Diamond we can play a turn one Trinisphere or Thalia, Heretic Cathar. There’s not a whole lot that’s more backbreaking to a greedy mana base than a turn one Thalia.
Creatures
As requested by this reader, we have Leonin Arbiter as well as Aven Mindcensor as potential early game mana denial. Greedy mana based run heavily off of fetch lands to ensure they have the proper mana. Forcing our opponent to pay two mana to search their library can keep them locked off mana for multiple turns until they legitimately draw into actual lands. Aven Mindcensor can take that a step further in ensuring that even if they can pay mana for the Arbiter tax, they may still fail to find a land or the correct land in the top four cards.
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben is combo hate as well as a way to ensure that our opponent cannot use their cheap spells to churn through their decks efficiently. Turns out when Brainstorm and Ponder cost two, they just aren’t that great.
Thalia, Heretic Cathar is a great way to really slow an opponent from developing their mana as well as their defense. Their creatures entering tapped means we have additional turns to get aggressive and close a game out before they can stabilize.
Phyrexian Revoker is our main way to shut down opposing planeswalkers as well as mana rocks out of decks like Storm that can help our opponents gain access to the mana they need to fight our land-focused mana denial.
Glory-Bound Initiate is something that I have been wanting to try in Legacy for its ability to get aggressive as a two mana 4/4 with lifelink. It really tempted me to try fitting Always Watching into the deck and go more on the exert route, but there weren’t enough creatures with exert that made it worthwhile. Maybe next time? 😉
Angel of Condemnation is another interesting addition that I wanted to try out. While it doesn’t really synergize with Suppression Field, it does give us a decent out to Show and Tell-style decks. While the rest of the deck isn’t great there, Angel gives us the opportunity to answer an Emrakul or Griselbrand every other turn of ours. That isn’t too bad and gave this Angel the right to two slots in here. I would normally have tried out Palace Jailer, but the increase in True-Name Nemesis in the meta has led me from allowing my opponent to get the Monarchy which I can’t ever hold efficiently due to a True-Name being “unblockable.”
Lock Pieces
Chalice of the Void is the backbone to any respectable prison strategy. Shutting down upwards of twenty four cards in any given deck in Legacy, this card should surprise no one in any proper prison deck.
Trinisphere is the ultimate and final tax check for any spell being cast. We don’t want to allow just a two mana Brainstorm, when we can potentially force a three mana Brainstorm. When our opponent had to pay two mana to get the land in the first place it is very unlikely that they will be able to pay two mana let alone three for that Brainstorm in the same turn.
Suppression Field is a card that I have thoroughly enjoyed throughout my years of Prison strategy. Similar to Leonin Arbiter it forces two mana to actually use a fetchland. Unlike Arbiter, this will happen with every single fetchland as well as every single activated ability while Arbiter will ignore any further searches once the initial cost is paid each turn. While this does not syngergize with Angel of Condemnation it does a lot to shut down cards like Deathrite Shaman, Jace, the Mind Sculptor, Aether Vial, etc. The point is that Legacy is full of activated abilities which is why Phyrexian Revoker is so good and why Pithing Needle is a great sideboard option.
Initial Thoughts
My initial thoughts are that this deck will experience very similar problems in variance like many other Prison style decks such as Stax, Mogg Stompy, Mono W Soldiers and the like. There is very little in the way of card advantage or selection. When you run hot you are unstoppable, but when you run cold it’s freezing outside without a coat.
Regardless of this, I love Prison strategies and Mono White Hate Bears is a fine deck. This one has just a bit more hate which gets two thumbs up real high in my book.
Happy brewing to each and every one of you. If anyone has an idea for a brew that they would like to see, I will gladly take requests and challenges on twitter or in email at [email protected].
Aaron Gazzaniga works part time at a game store and in his off time has been an avid magic player/brewer since 2003. Having begun in Odyssey Standard Block and always favoring control and prison style decks, we come to this moment in time where Aaron finally gets to talk about and share his ideas. If you want to contact Aaron tweet @aarongazzaniga