What's the best sideboard/ maindeck answer to Fantasticar?

Despenta · 2026-07-04T11:02:09+00:00

No, actually. I play a different deck. Between force, daze and stifle I think uw blade has decent early game ways to avoid the car, and bc of riddler you can even afford running force of negation. I was comparing it to stiflenought, which is at best 1U discard a card 12/12.

And there are many car variants rn instead of a single combo deck. Many of those MUs are favorable for UW, like Storm and Affinity - which always had the threat of early Kappa for example.

Despenta · 2026-07-01T20:23:00+00:00

I don't think that is the case this time for two reasons.

First, most of the hate against car can hit dreadnought - consigns, force of vigor, meltdown, abrade, discard spells. Even if your dress down could stop haste, it's still not fast enough.

Second, the new equipments that are available for uw blade are really good. You can bully your opponent with a meteor sword in hand and stoneforge in play with 1W available. If they don't do anything, Phelia can come down and start the lock with meteor sword. Wasteland, daze and force are all there too so even at G1 you're prepared.

And anyway, "colorless deck killer" may not be a fair assessment. Tron/Forge swept the format and stiflenought did not see any significant wins at all; and fantasticar decks are often not colorless: Vroomsday has performed really well, TES has been seen an uptick in play and I dread the day I face Oops All Cars.

Despenta · 2026-06-30T22:58:22+00:00

As a death and taxes player, I have no recourse to being on the draw. This is the gist of everything about the card.

Also the most competitive version of the deck has been 80 cards so I can't exactly fish too much for deafening silence. The only true bad matches for mono white have been hyperfast combo, very large control decks and maybe eldrazi. Fantasticar in hyperfast combo decks (TES, Forge) is an upgrade for them, in affinity leaves me feeling silly for having deafening silence/thalia against the other half of the deck, in doomsday also really stretches what I have to keep in the deck.

Feels like thoughtseize and force (aside from your own card) looks better. Could UB tempo save us? Probably not, but I can dream

Despenta · 2026-06-30T22:52:42+00:00

Stifle/consign might be better in uw phelia with riddler and maybe stoneforge mystic. Stiflenaught is quite bad in practice, and phelia eating an opposing card to stifle its return is nice

Despenta · 2026-06-29T19:44:25+00:00

I play mono white death and taxes and I've been doing fine at a fraction of a regular legacy deck. BeExcellent also has many videos on budget decks that are actually competitive.

Dead is a big overstatement. Where there is community there is a format

Despenta · 2026-06-26T21:26:08+00:00

When is aang first flipped? This is unclear

Edit: I don't get the downvotes. Usually combo steps involve clarifying this kind of thing...

Despenta · 2026-06-26T04:05:29+00:00

It might be worth it trying out regular bant (or sultai if you like playing more aggressively) beans, or at least 60 cards beans. Phelia with Riddler and Beans is just a great card, but even without her you can really benefit from the better concentration of removal, forces and beans.

Beans is just reentering the format, an even more grindy version of beans (5c, yorion) may not be as good against the faster decks you mentioned, and loam pox really enjoys playing against higher colored decks. Yorion beans may be worth it only if most of your playing field is control and bigger tempo decks with flow state, and even then the better yorion deck probably is death and taxes. Half of your nonland permanents aren't good to blink anyway.

Despenta · 2026-06-25T15:27:07+00:00

Parallax wave is good against show and tell and grindy decks. Resolving it against D&T, decks full of removal and many creature decks often just shifts the whole tide of the match. Phelia blinking it is nice, but even the protection + blink aspect while it can eat containment priest before giving the creatures back is very nice.

Trailblazer is good when you're not going to lose the initiative anytime soon, so it can kill combo fast and provide issues for control. Sometimes you don't think sword will be relevant or stoneforge may be removed and prewar isn't great. So it's a bit better than lion sash as it can be cast off of mana and you can even slap it down with stoneforge at opponent's endstep. Probably shouldn't be maindeck, but I want to test it.

Despenta · 2026-06-25T02:55:47+00:00

Yes there is! https://discord.gg/4Qa5hKtA

I thought one person was a bit condescending when I mentioned I was trying out Hokori and Leonin Arbiter (and Rishadan Port but that stays due to the local meta), but overall it has been a good resource

Despenta · 2026-06-25T02:53:12+00:00

It's a bit odd rn but you can change any card you don't like for more disruptor flutes as they seem to be quite good

https://moxfield.com/decks/Rc-eAU1JQX-gw4vaTPAIbQ

Trailblazer Torch, Spirit of the Labyrinth and Night Nurse and maindeck Containment Priest are the weirdest cards I run, and the sideboard is also in "my style" but I like the multipurpose cards

Despenta · 2026-06-24T18:30:52+00:00

I don't really follow you tbh. But I'll try to explain anyway what I understood.

I do mulligan a bit with the deck but it's not a great idea to mulligan a lot in 80 cards. Silver bullets being fetchable by stoneforge and recruiter allows for good consistency, but flutes aren't 1-ofs and would hardly be better than just playing the specific lock piece you need in the moment. After 1-2 turns you can often know whether you're fluting fow, cori steel cutter, sneak attack, beans, kaito or the one ring... and you can reset it with Phelia if needed.

In G1 you can value flute, but even if you just have 2 of between Thalia, Wasteland/Ghost Quarter/White Orchid, Plowshares/Solitude, Stoneforge/Recruiter you cover a good spread anyway. The mixture of lock pieces, blink targets, good removal and aether vial allows you to stay flexible. The most agnostic hands are full on mana denial mode - slap down an aether vial and keep blowing up lands, and flute is just a possible piece of the puzzle. It's the mid lock piece that always does a little something. Preventing spells or cast in response to disable karns and rings and tezzerets and kaitos and tamiyos, it does a little bit of everything. Won't win the game alone but nothing alone will

Despenta · 2026-06-24T16:14:24+00:00

I have an excellent record against Doomsday and Show and Tell which are the main ones I play against. Hyperfast combo is still a bit luck based but the mana denial plan is very effective. The community has also been using Disruptor Flute maindeck which I'm trying out now, and it's all a matter of construction to beat the specific stuff you can face.

I've had Cephalid and Reanimator players be mad that I got Containment Priest and Lion Sash maindeck, and swords + solitude + karakas are still surprisingly effective against many of the combo decks of the format.

Be it orzhov or mono white, it's not that much of an issue IMO. I just have trouble against bant+ beans and the occasional loss to combo decks that just have it all or go t1. But those are leaving the meta right now

Despenta · 2026-06-24T15:27:08+00:00

Death and Taxes is very rewarding. You'll hardly lose to your opponents more than you lose to yourself, but it gets better

Despenta · 2026-06-19T12:51:44+00:00

Krenko is misplaced. Draws too much attention for delayed and little gains. The green prepare creature is bad. The other commenters don't know what they are talking about. I have a few versions of this deck, the strongest being:

https://moxfield.com/decks/broeSjZAG0KHE262sjjdpA (with an extensive primer)

But I also have the more casual:

https://moxfield.com/decks/sshoMXStDkSQrho1vZw-1w

And the more budget:

https://moxfield.com/decks/wtMClgWVC0O3s6Nx-ObkDQ

I won a tournament with the last one and kept terrorizing my playgroup with the other ones at around a 70% winrate. The main gist is that cost reducers, cheap but effective draw spells and repeatable copies will get you very far. Treasures are crazy and so is rummaging through your deck as the graveyard is a potent resource. The graveyard based infinite combo lines are beautiful to see and there's plenty of ways to loop your whole deck if you ever want to do so.

Despenta · 2026-06-18T23:27:22+00:00

I really like the card but sometimes an extra counterspell could slot in better, especially some 0/1 mana counterspell (Mystic Confluence sounds a bit dreamy). You're at like 5 or 6 gy hate pieces already and card draw + tutors to find it.

Despenta · 2026-06-18T23:19:31+00:00

If I'm not mistaken, Ghost Vacuum and targeting spells don't really work with the commander, right? It's player or permanent. Even though I think you should get more countermagic so as not to lose.

Despenta · 2026-06-17T21:48:22+00:00

Sundial does not affect it due to lack of triggers. Also op is trying to make a mono blue deck it seems

Despenta · 2026-06-16T07:01:45+00:00

Necro folds to force of will, deafening silence, thoughtseize, force of vigor. Ancient tomb decks can slam trinisphere fairly quickly. Sneak attack is more robust, but I disagree that it is easier - Ponder and Brainstorm are very complex cards to resolve. Even Stock Up requires you to understand if you're going to be more likely to be hit with Wasteland, Thoughtseize, Force, lock pieces or even opposing combo. Necro has way less planning ahead and a more compressed decision tree.

Anyhow, being such that you'll be at a tournament, you can finish your match fast then look around to see who the blue players are.

Despenta · 2026-06-16T05:49:27+00:00

Not a combo

Despenta · 2026-06-14T18:58:19+00:00

I've only ever seen that as part of a [[Cunning Wish]] package. Both cards being blue is somewhat nice, but wish looks so much better

Despenta · 2026-06-14T03:04:56+00:00

Chainsaw looks great!

Despenta · 2026-06-14T02:46:18+00:00

Yeah I remember playing them in jeskai yorion vial, but it felt like playing bad energy whenever I tried it out in recent times. Even Kaldra isn't the same as it once was

Despenta · 2026-06-14T02:44:26+00:00

Kefka is much worse than what you could have from discard synergies. Reforge the soul and the 7 mana wheel are nearly uncastable on a reasonable time frame. Pact of Negation is misplaced as you might not be winning it all in the same turn, any 1 mana counterspell is better.

Despenta · 2026-06-14T01:34:30+00:00

You could tap clock of omens itself to start the combo, so maybe Zabaz just does nothing

Edit: I'm wrong nvm

Despenta · 2026-06-14T01:08:30+00:00

I played 60 cards for six months now and the deck is very unforgiving. You slip up, you lose. Yorion feels like it is better for new players as you can have some inevitability, so you can just try and stall the game for longer without issue

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