One Magic Play - Overanalyzed

Picture this: It's the final game of the final match of the tournament. The board state is such that either you or your opponent will be dead within the next turn cycle. You will win the game if nothing happens, but just barely. You have the opportunity to win the game this turn, but going for it creates a risk that you might lose immediately. How do you decide what to do?

I was recently in this situation. Perhaps because it was the final play of the entire tournament, or the uniqueness of some of the cards involved, this one has stood out to me. I spent several hours over the next day thinking about it and wondering if I actually got the play right. Thinking through conditional probabilities has lead to some confusing moments, but I think I've found an approach that results in clarity. 

This post will talk about that situation, as well as some similar situations that arise as a thought experiment.

The Game State

With actual deck lists and board state photos, an exact answer should be obtainable.

Deck lists:

Noah Shanning - Counterburn

(SB for game three: -1 Wheel, -1 Chain, -1 Lat Nam, -1 Pyroclasm, +2 Crypt, +1 Maze, +1 Blood Moon) (This is his actual sideboarding which I will use for analysis. In game, I assumed he may have some Pyroblasts as well since it can race a Deep Spawn in some situations)

Ty Thomason - Reanimator

(SB for game three: -1 Mana Crypt, -1 Mox Emerald, -1 Mox Ruby, -2 Disenchant, -1 Ashen Ghoul, -1 Mind Twist, +4 Hymn +3 Contagion)

Board state:

8 life with one unknown card in hand

4 life with the 4 cards in hand

The Options

The two main decisions at this point in the game are whether or not I should attack with Deep Spawn, and whether or not I should try to remove the Gorilla Shaman if I do attack so that it represents lethal damage.

Not attacking will not let me win. I will be at one life on my next turn so even Demonic Tutor for Contagion won't work. If I draw Contagion, I could Demonic Tutor for Black Lotus (or vice versa), but would still be one mana short from paying the cost. Even Consultation after a top deck of Lotus or Contagion would require tapping City of Brass. Attacking also leaves the opponent at 1 life after his upkeep, which means the Serendib will kill him before he can attack on the following turn. So even if he draws a removal for Deep Spawn (REB or Chaos Orb), attacking will win the race. Therefore, I must attack.

There are two ways to attempt to remove the Gorilla Shaman. The first is to cast Demonic Consultation for the last Contagion in my deck. The other option is to cast Demonic Consultation for one of four Bazaar of Baghdad, play the Bazaar and activate, and draw Black Lotus and Chaos Orb. I'm not going to do the math, but I think the Consult for Contagion is a bit more likely...

Any time opponent has a burn spell in hand, I lose the game. I am already dead to Psionic Blast, and any other spell will finish me off after Serendib attacks on the opponent's following turn. I will also lose to burn spell when I tap City of Brass to attempt to Consultation. We can ignore those situations. Therefore, assume no burn spells in opponent's hand.

If I attempt to remove the Shaman and my opponent has a Counterspell (Counterspell, Mana Drain, or Force of Will in this case) I will lose on the swing back. If I do not attempt to remove the Shaman, I will lose only to a non-Psionic Blast burn spell off the top during my opponents following turn. Also, sometimes I lose to my own Demonic Consultation.

So which choice gives me the best chance to win?

Detailed Analysis

Any creature in hand would have been played by opponent. This would provide an option to block and survive while still having enough damage left to attack back for the win. It also removes my option of holding back Deep Spawn to block. Therefore, assume no creatures can be in hand.

Additionally other cards we can rule out from being in his hand: Maze of Ith and Mishra's Factory (he played a Volcanic Island last turn), Blood Moon, Chaos Orb, Lat-Nams Legacy, Merchant Scroll, Time Walk, Ancestral Recall, Braingeyser and Timetwister. I don't know if he would play Tormod's Crypt at this point, so we will assume he could still have that.

Possible cards in his hand:

4 Island

4 City of Brass

2 Volcanic Island

1 Library of Alexandria

2 Tormod's Crypt

1 Counterspell

1 Force of Will

1 Mana Drain

So 3/16 of the time he will have a Counterspell here. (~19%)

What are the outs he can top decks to win if we give him an additional turn to live?

4 Lightning Bolt

3 Incinerate

1 Chain Lightning

So 8/47 is lethal. (~17%)

5 Redraws with Ancestral Recall, Merchant Scroll, Timetwister, Lat-Nam's Legacy, and Braingeyser (Time Walk will not win as he will die to Serendib before his next draw)

Redraws represent an additional 2% or so.

3 Drawing the game with Psionic Blast (~6%  plus ~0.5% on redraw)

Missing with Demonic Consultation - 14%

How to Interpret the Numbers

Here is where I may not have this exactly correct. How can you combine these probabilities to get the correct picture? (Reminder, all of this math is conditional on not being dead to burn spell in hand already.)

Is it right to say you lose 33% of the time by casting Consultation (19% to Counterspell and 14% to Consult itself)? No you have to combine the times they both fail and subtract from 100%, so this happens ~30% of the time.

Do you win 75% of the time you just attack without casting Consultation (100-17-2-6)? I think this approach works. 

But where I'm not sure I'm confident is the comparison of these values: 70% to win by casting Consultation vs 75% to win by not casting it. This would say that not casting it is better by about 5%.

Another way to look at it:

Assume instead of Consultation you have Contagion in hand. Sometimes, you cast Contagion and win the game, but you also would have won that game by not casting it (opponent's hand is blank and they don't draw the burn to kill you). Therefore, you only should cast it if the odds they have burn spell on top is greater than the odds they have a Counterspell in hand. Our math places both of those probabilities right around 19%. So with Contagion in hand, you probably can go either way. However, the added 14% fail rate of Consultation means you should not cast it and instead hope to fade the top deck.

What if you have a read?

Sometimes you may have a read that the opponent has a Counterspell in hand. If you increase the chances they hold a counter, you can see the math will favor not casting a spell even more. This applies even if you have Contagion instead of Consultation.

Maybe you have the opposite read and know with high certainty the opponent is holding a land? You still would need to do the math on missing with Consultation vs them top decking a burn spell. This would favor casting Consultation by about 5%, but you can imagine situations where you should not cast it because it would add risk of losing compared to not.

What did I do?

I did not have time during the match to do such thorough analysis. My thought process was something like this: I lose 15% of the time to Consultation, I think it is likely his last card is a Counterspell given the way the past two turns had played out, so I should not play any spell and just attack. This is what I did and I won the game because of it. My opponent showed me the Mana Drain that was in his hand, along with the Chaos Orb he top decked that was a turn too late.

 At the time, I wasn't sure I made the right play, but I feel a bit better about it after doing this analysis. And so I won the NEOS Season 12 December Monthly.

If you think there is something else to consider or a cleaner way to present this math, please let me know.

My Romancing the Stones End of Year Report

(Editors Note: This was mostly written in December, but not published until March of 2025).

I've really been slacking on the blog posts this year. I played in a lot of events, and only wrote three reports. I even skipped writing a report on an event I won!

I've decided to summarize all my events of last year into a few posts. This is the first one on the Romancing the Stones run events. I hope to do another one for other Old School or Premodern events, and a final one that is just my Lobstercon report (it's over half done already!).

Romancing the Stones Middle School Leagues

I played in the three online MS leagues. I was unable to attend either Festival of Friendship or Houston Hurricane this year, so no OS or Vintage.

Dance Party - 9th Place

For the first league of the year, I played Worldgorger Dragon combo. I ran back the same list I used at the MS World Championships a month prior. I went 4-2 and finished 9th on tiebreakers. I defeated Nether Spirit Control and three others I cannot remember. I lost to TerraGeddon and MonoWhite Wayfarer. TerraGeddon had Sphere of Resistance and Wasteland to slow me down. MonoWhite used Wayfarer for Wastelands and had all angles of disruption. I guess I'll always be losing to Wayfarer Wasteland in these events.

I still think Dragon is a good deck (more on that in the future?). It's a lot harder to play than I ever would have expected, but the list is getting closer every time I play it.

School's Out Forever

I threw UR Stasis together right before the event and forgot to include Pyroblast in the SB which is one of the main reasons to even splash. I really liked the idea of switching to Sea Drake after SB. There might even be a UR Aggro deck out there. I went 5-1 in the Swiss before losing to Landstill in the top 8. I think I won a lot of my matches with Sea Drake as a surprise. A few opponents were not that familiar with the Stasis plan and I took advantage. I don't think this list is that strong, every game felt close. Arcane Denial is bad.

Fall Semester

I originally planned on playing a different list (no spoilers for future leagues here) but never found the time to brew on it. Instead, I made modifications to Michael Arnold's Lobstercon Elves list. I cut Elvish Champions from main for extra land and maximum of the good cards. Didn't play Champion in the SB either, but it may be an option. Absolute Law is suspect, but Armageddon was great. Thornscape Battlemage was MVP. I'd probably want another Battlemage and a Pyroblast in the SB.

This is recent enough I can do round by round:

R1 - Jeff on Sligh

I got to untap with a Priest of Titania somehow and won G1. G2 I think I had turn 2 Absolute Law but it wasn't enough. G3 he mulligan to 5 and I had Masticore I think.

1-0

R2 - Patrick on Landstill

I win G1 with just enough damage attacking and then Battlemage to kill him after combat. G2 he had an Exalted Angel and just raced me. G3 I win by lots of value with Acolyte and Symbiote.

2-0

R3 - Daisuke on UR Control

G1 I win with turn two Survival easily. G2 he has to counter my Absolute Law which lets me get him with Armageddon.

3-0

R4 - Gregg on Aluren

I don't remember G1 or G3, but G2 was an epic where I had to answer Plague Spitter, Engineered Plague, and Goblin Sharpshooter (thanks to Thornscape Battlemage). I had sided out my Masticore so couldn't close the door and his Walls stopping my attacks. I go for Armageddon but he draws just enough lands to cast Aluren and his last card is Recruiter. I still have a shot by flashing in a Acolyte and I need to draw Symbiote to untap an Elf, pick up a creature, and search for Lyrist and have the mana to activate it. I did not draw the Symbiote though. (Note: thinking back, this line doesn't really make sense to me but this is how I remember it)

4-0

R5 - Shun on Worldgorger Dragon

G1 he bricked and never found a dragon. He did Animate Dead Ambassador Laquatas to block but was quickly overwhelmed. G2 I had a good start with both Crypt and Lyrist. I was able to keep Lyrist up and eventually Armageddon set him too far back to recover.

5-0

R6 - Tak on UGw Madness

G1 I have Survival and he did not have Force of Will. I win easily from there. G2 he has Meddling Mage for Survival, but I naturally draw Masticore, Genesis, and Hermit to grind him out.

6-0

I'm first seed after Swiss. My R1 through R6 opponents all made top 8 as well. 

QF - Keith on The Rock

Probably my worst matchup in the top 8. He has four Plague in the sideboard, but fortunately for me he only has two Deed main. I don't really remember G1 or G2. G3 I feel like I'm going to lose but eventually chain enough Acolyte and Symbiote activations to pull it out.

7-0

SF - David on MonoU Flyers

Third time we've met in the top 8. He's out for revenge. This was probably the best match of the tournament. I actually have some detailed notes:

G1 mull to 6 I lead Llanowar into Survival, but he has Foil. His start of Sprite plus Curiosity means I can't really wait to draw better. My turn 3 Acolyte is countered, and I draw a bunch of lands and lose.

G2 I play turn one Llanowar Elves and turn two play 3 more elves with the help of a Cradle. He has turn 2 Sprite but he's holding up Annul. I play two more elves and start attacking. He goes to 9 before finding Hibernation, but Cradle lets me replay enough that I win the race easily.

G3 I mulligan to 5, keep hand of Survival, Acolyte, Granger, two lands, putting a 3rd land and Battlemage on the bottom. He has turn 1 Sprite. I play land and pass. He plays two more Sprites. I play Survival, but it resolves! He plays turn 3 Sea Drake. I search for Wellwisher and play it, but he has Foil. He attacks me down to 8. On my turn I search for another Wellwisher and play it, this one resolves. He attacks me to 1. I play Quirion Ranger, Fyndhorn, gain 3 life, then return forest to untap Wellwisher play acolyte and gain 4. I gain 4 more on his turn. Now I'm at 12 and he attacks me to 5. I attack for 4 on my turn and gain 8 more life, but don't have a creature to use with Survival. He attacks with just the 1/1s for now leaving back Drake to block. So now I can just use Wellwisher once a turn and not have to bounce all my forests. Eventually I find a creature for Survival then find Squee and win easily from there, grinding through two more Force of Wills along the way.

8-0

Now I've beat everyone in the top 8 at one point in this league.

Finals - Tak on UGw Madness

I'm on the play G1 and my Survival resolves. I win easily from there. G2 he has Meddling Mage and I die with two Survivals in hand. G3 he has Mage on Survival and Mage on Hermit. Eventaully I find red mana for my MVP Thornscape Battlemage which I use with Symbiote to stabilize the board. Symbiote plus Battlemage / Acolyte means he can't really do anything and I win without drawing Survival.

9-0

So I finally win one of these leagues after four other top eights and two finals losses, plus three ninth places. winning qualified me for the Invitational. I wasn't sure at first if I would go, but I didn't have any big Magic events for the rest of the year. I was skipping Eternal Weekend and wanted one more thing to play. I committed to flying to Austin to play.

 

RTS Invitational

(Editors Note: I never wrote this part, so this just from memory months later)

I played Landstill in MS because I think its the best deck, even though I've never played it before. I was also expecting a field of mostly Burn/Sligh and Dreadnoughts, which was accurate.

I don't remember why I chose Oath, but I think I expected mostly Lurrus decks. I was wrong here, but wasn't unhappy with my choice.

Vintage I went 2-1. I lost to Rob Connely, beat Ben in the mirror, and then beat Stu after an awkward situation in game 2 where he tapped his opal for mana multiple turns without metalcraft. I was in a winning spot anyway and would have been further ahead had we caught it, so he conceded. I won game three by hard casting Atraxa on turn four.

Middle School I went 2-1. I lost to Tweedy in a terrible match, but managed to beat Lizzy on RG Oath and Paul on Dreadnought easily enough. I almost decked myself against Lizzy in game one though.

Top four I beat Rob Wilson with early Shown and Tell after seeing the coast was clear with a Probe. I lost the finals to Chase which should be on video somewhere. I may have over mulligan and was probably too aggressive with the trap in the third game.

Invitational was great and I'm really glad I finally got to play in one. 

Conclusion

Now that I'm finally publishing this, I've already completed the first league of 2025. I suppose I should start on that report. It looks to be a fun one.