Subject: Zur's Tower control (Type 2) Paul Oxford
     I really wanted to make a deck around Mesmeric Orb. I had an old Millstone deck that worked pretty good and I figured this card would go great in it. But it didn't. Paying three mana to mill two of your opponents cards and causing you to have two mill 3 of your own just didn't sit well. So I started over and made a new deck. In the process I discovered a lock down that pretty much makes it so your opponent never gets another card in his hand. for the rest of the game. It goes something like this:
 
LAND
4 X Urza's Mine
4 X Urza's Power Plant
4 X Urza's Tower
4 X Island
6 X Plains
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22 Land
 
3 X Serra Angel (The great and powerful Serra isn't as cool as she used to be... 4/4 doesn't tap to attack)
2 X Standing troops (Doesn't tap to attack)
2 X Yotian soldier (doesn't tap to attack)
2 X Diving Griffin (Doesn't Tap to Attack)
2 X Phyrexian Colossus (8/8 Pay 8 life to untap)
1 X Liege of the Axe (Doesn't tap to attack)
1 X Leonin Abunas (Artifacts you control Can't be the target of spells or abilities your opponent controls)
3 X Fatespinner
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16 Creatures
 
2 X Zur's Weirding (Play with your hands revealed. Pay 2 life to make player discard their draw card)
3 X Mesmeric Orb (Whenever a permanent becomes untapped that permanents controller mills the top card of library)
2 X Timesifter (Each upkeep players reveal the top card of their libraries- who ever has the highest converted mana cost takes another turn after this one)
2 X Millstone (2 tap- target player puts the top two cards of library in graveyard)
2 X Tower of Eons (8 tap- you gain 10 life)
2 X Tower of Murmurs (8 tap- target player puts the top 8 cards of library in graveyard)
2 X Howling Mine (Draw an extra card each turn)
2 X Bonesplitter (Equipment- equipped creature gets +2/+0)
2 X Banshee's Blade (Equipment-Equipped Creature gets +1/+1 for each charge counter on it- Any time equipped creature deals damage put a charge counter on banshee's blade)
1 X Planar Portal (6 tap- search your library for a card and put it into your hand)
1 X Tower of Champions (Target creature gets +6/+6 until end of turn)
1 X Ivory Mask (you can't be the target of spells or abilities)
2 X Welding Jar (regenerate target artifact)
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24 other cards
62 cards total
     This is how it works. The original idea was to mill your opponent. If you can get out one or two creatures (that's all you will need) drop the Mesmeric orb. And do nothing but attack each turn since all of your creatures don't tap to attack the orb won't affect you. (I know it sounds weird but if an opponent plays anything after a couple of turns they won't have any cards left) You can make it more interesting by dropping a Time Sifter before it... And probably take a bunch of turns since many of your cards cost 4 or more. Here is where I came into the Combo lock.....
     Around turn 4 you should have out one of each of the urza land... If you can get out a tower of Eon's and a Zur's Weirding you pretty much will win the game. Just use the tower to gain ten life and don't let your opponent draw again. After activating it once you will get five turns without giving them a card. They can do the same to you but they will run out of life really quick and since you can just gain more life to do it to them again you should eventually win. I'm thinking of re-tooling this deck so that it just takes advantage of this combo but for now I'll play with the orb just to see how well it works. I tested it a couple of times against the Elvish rage deck and didn't win the first time cause those elves are so damn quick. The second time I did win though and it was very one sided. Elves couldn't do a thing about it. Tower of murmurs is just nasty. 4 turns using it and I decked them. Ouch.
 
          Any feedback would be great- grendelprime1@email.msn.com Paul