Everyone,

I'm new to storm, I've tried DPS before and didn't give it much of a chance after I made a serious of punts (or "Mental Missteps" if you will... terrible joke, I know). However, Paradoxical Storm really grabbed my interest

I feel a great way to learn how to play the deck is to go through some hands.

Here's your opening seven:

Preordain
Grim Monolith
Lotus Petal
Mox Sapphire
Polluted Delta
Defense Grid
Mana Vault

Against:
Game 1 Matches

1. An unknown opponent (game 1)
   A) On the play
   B) On the draw

Game 2 Matches

2. Mentor
   A) On the play
   B) On the draw

3. Oath
   A) On the play
   B) On the draw

4. Dredge
   A) On the play
   B) On the draw

5. Aggro Shops
   A) On the play
   B) On the draw

6. Stax
   A) On the play
   B) On the draw

7. Mirror
   A) On the play
   B) On the draw

8. Landstill
   A) On the play
   B) On the draw

9. White Eldrazi
   A) On the play
   B) On the draw

10. JacoDrazi
    A) On the play
    B) On the draw

11. Hatebears
    A) On the play
    B) On the draw

12. Grixis (Painter)
    A) On the play
    B) On the draw

13. Grixis (Tezzeret)
    A) On the play
    B) On the draw

If Im versus ANY blue deck I turn 1 fetch for a basic island, Mox Saph, Defense Grid, pass turn. If against MUD, (On the play) I Mox> Preordain, Obv find PO, (magic xmas land) Petal>Vault>Grim>Fetch, cast PO, draw 3, and win. On the draw vs MUD I lose (MUD xmas land).

Why would you fetch a basic island against a blue deck? Most of them do not play wasteland and only so many even play strip mine.

You drew too much of one half of the deck, fortunately that's the half of the deck you really need multiples of. In my experience playtesting Outcome, against most opponents with Islands that Defense Grid with this much mana buys you 2, maybe 3 turns. So you've got 5 topdecks realistically... you might not do much better with a mulligan, PO mulligans atrociously.

Will contemplate the decision against the taxing strategies.

@mdkubiak An increasing number of Gush decks are in fact running Wastelands. I'm not sure that fetching basic there is actually right... but it well could be since nothing in your hand needs another color and you are holding preordain. The question is, are you more likely to color screw yourself than get wasted and get hosed that way... plus how bad is each scenario. It does feel like one of the ways you lose is Wasteland for a Duel and Misstep the Vault and then not be able to get to a good Outcome play.

@Topical_Island The general rule of thumb for Paradoxical Outcome decks is that any non-recurring enemy Wasteland not targeting your potential Academy draw is not bad.

@BazaarOfBaghdad Huh... didn't know that. In any case, you can just calc it out if you know the opposing decklist, or the average number of Wastelands per blue deck in your metagame. The rule of thumb makes sense though.

Personally my favorite way to learn to play a deck is by physically playing with it. Holding the cards in my hand or seeing them on screen works pretty well for me. You might also consider using pics of opening hands instead of just card names...

@Islandswamp I actually drew the hand (minus switching out for a preordain). I wanted to try a different type of topic in the mana drain. We can talk about individual cards all day, but I feel that gets us only so far.

I think talking actual situations and how you should play it out could be beneficial for everybody. Like, what happens if you take line X over Y? What benefits do you get? What risks are you playing into? Do you play more of your mana rocks or do you hold onto them to not give too much information. If you play a lot of your mana rocks, maybe you're giving people too much information. If you play land and go, that doesn't tell anybody anything, but may be too slow and could get destroy by Shops doing that.

Or is the hand so bad it's a mulligan against anything?

Not to mention to people who've never played it themselves, talking about these things could help. I can goldfish all day, but that only tells me my hand will go off if I have no opponent. I can look at individual cards and deck lists and make assumptions.

Of course, nothing beats playing. But learning from others, and I'm not talking just me, can go along way for everybody. Even experts at vintage can always learn.

Now take that exact 7, and replace Preordain with Git Probe, and now you have perfect information. How does that change "the game" completely? And is it a good or bad thing?

@Serracollector Yeah but if you swap preodain for probe, the hand goes from decent to mediocre, as preordain is the only action card in that hand (it has a decent chance of finding a threat that is immediately castable and protectable)where probe has 1/3 probability (in contrast to preordain)of finding what you need this turn, and if all three cards from the top are undesirable, you just double timewalked yourself with the probe vs preordain .

@mdkubiak said in Paradoxical Storm (Keep or Mulligan):

@Islandswamp I actually drew the hand (minus switching out for a preordain). I wanted to try a different type of topic in the mana drain. We can talk about individual cards all day, but I feel that gets us only so far.

I think talking actual situations and how you should play it out could be beneficial for everybody. Like, what happens if you take line X over Y? What benefits do you get? What risks are you playing into? Do you play more of your mana rocks or do you hold onto them to not give too much information. If you play a lot of your mana rocks, maybe you're giving people too much information. If you play land and go, that doesn't tell anybody anything, but may be too slow and could get destroy by Shops doing that.

Or is the hand so bad it's a mulligan against anything?

Not to mention to people who've never played it themselves, talking about these things could help. I can goldfish all day, but that only tells me my hand will go off if I have no opponent. I can look at individual cards and deck lists and make assumptions.

Of course, nothing beats playing. But learning from others, and I'm not talking just me, can go along way for everybody. Even experts at vintage can always learn.

Just see if you can either snap a pic or make one and post it. The idea is good, but for some reason I work better with visual cues when it comes to Magic. I'm more likely to gloss over something important with a wall of text. I wasn't intending to knock you.

@Islandswamp Oh, I didn't think you were trying to knock me at all, Joe. I was just explaining my reasoning behind the post.

Sorry that I came off like I was thinking you were knocking me.

I mulligan that hand all day. You're banking on your Preordain getting you gasoline, but that doesn't quite work that way.

Here are three new hands (per request of Joe to have actual photos). What I would like to discuss, because I think it could be interesting, is depending on the match up (see above) or unknown opponent, if you are on the play/draw, how would you start off or would you mulligan?

Hand 1:
Underground Sea
Volcanic Island
Demonic Tutor
Ancestral Recall
Preordain
Timetwister
Tinker

Hand 2:
Mox Opal
Chrome Mox
Gitaxian Probe
Paradoxical Outcome
Mox Opal
Senseei's Divining Top
Grim Monolith

Hand 3:
Tinker
Sensei's Divining Top
Gitaxian Probe
Mox Ruby
Force of Will
Mox Opal
Defense Grid (I realize you wouldn't have this in game 2 against a Shops Deck).

@mdkubiak Hands 1 and 3 look like easy keeps no matter the situation, and I could be talked to keeping Hand 2 in a Game 1 situation vs. a non-blue deck (where I wouldn't likely see Null Rod effects), but otherwise I would probably ship it back. Hand 3 has plans vs. Rod or Force, and the deck has a high number of low-casting bombs. It's not a high percentage among the ideal hands, but it seems better than a random six draw.

'Regardless the situation' seems a little agressive. I've only looked at hand 1 in some detail (Silly work keeping me busy) but Hand 1 is a mulligan against known Dredge, known Workshops on the draw, and maybe even known Workshops on the play.

my favorite hand by a MILE at first glance is Hand 3. You have Gitaxian Probe to either hit another 0cc Artifact or a land, and also to know if they have misstep (becuase they misstep the top but don't ever force it), and you have turn 2 Defense Grid with Force of Will backup. The Tinker is actually the least interesting card in that entire hand, too.

@Soly said in Paradoxical Storm (Keep or Mulligan):

'Regardless the situation' seems a little agressive. I've only looked at hand 1 in some detail (Silly work keeping me busy) but Hand 1 is a mulligan against known Dredge, known Workshops on the draw, and maybe even known Workshops on the play.

I question the call against Dredge... suppose it depends if you know what variation they are on. It has been my experience that Paradoxical Storm just out-speeds dredge most games. I think that on the play vs Dredge, I am keeping hand 1 all day.

Turn 1:
Underground->Recall
(if resolves)
should hit 1 or 2 artifact mana, either Twister that turn, or turn 2
(if countered)
pass turn

They play bazaar, pass

Turn 2:
(Draw 0 drop mana)
Land->rock->Tutor for Lotus->Twister
(Draw non-0 drop mana)
Land-Tutor for Lotus->Twister

Hello guys, I hope it's okay that I borrow this thread as it seems like almost a good fit for my question. So I am thinking about playing Paradoxical Storm, and I noticed that a couple of the deck-lists have an Ancient Tomb in the SB. So my question is, why and against which decks is this land used?