Bant Mass Polymorph: Scars of Mirrodin Standard

We all know how Valakut Ramp has turned into the new Jund deck. Valakut has posted very good results against a lot of the decks in the format and has such a strong ability to "go over the top" of other decks that it is the clear deck to beat. So, I was thinking if you could play a bigger threat at the same or similar speed as Valakut then you put pressure on them to finish you off as soon as possible. Essentially, if they don't get the perfect hand you will win. Aggro decks have tried to accomplish this by spamming creatures early game or using landfall effects to hit for massive damage. But Pyroclasm has been a real problem for these decks. Top players like Gerry T have started to run Pyroclasm main deck. Yes, you can play around Pyroclasm so that you constantly have threats. Doing so however, causes you to have play slower whereas Valakut's strategy is unchanged. They have kept the same inevitability while slowing you down. Any aggro player knows this is bad. This is not to say that aggro can't beat Valakut because it definitely can. Especially when B/R Vamps is packing Mark of Mutiny you can lose a game out of no where. But Valakut wins more consistently.

So, what do I have to contend against Valakut? Something you probably didn't see coming: Bant Mass Polymorph.

Here's the List:

Creatures: 3

1 Iona, Shield of Emeria

1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn

1 Ulamog, the Infinte Gyre

Spells: 31

3 Preordain

3 Oust

4 Explore

4 Mana Leak

4 Growth Spasm

3 Cultivate

4 See Beyond

3 Awakening Zone

4 Mass Polymorph

Lands: 26

4 Misty Rainforest

4 Khalni Garden

3 Terramorphic Expanse

2 Tectonic Edge

4 Plains

5 Islands

4 Forests

Sideboard:

3 Condem

2 Journey to Nowhere

2 Spell Pierce

2 Negate

3 Ratchet Bomb

3 Jace Beleren

My friend Ryan over at Casual MTG Creations also put up a Mass Polymorph deck (after I mentioned it to him) if you would like to check out his build. His mana base is more consistent, but his deck lacks removal and runs creatures that produce Eldrazi spawn like Nest Invader. I refained from doing this because I don't want to Polymorph into them. But, he also included Beastmaster Ascension to make up for this. I have not yet fully tested this deck and I am sure it will need changes. I just don't know what yet. It might be that the deck is still too slow to compete against Valakut and that mana base is too inconsistent. But I hope those things can be worked worked out.

Ryan: Mimic Vat in the House

Jund is back to be the deck to beat (at least I think) in this new Mimic Vat configuration. Ryan, here is my list which I adapted from yours:

4x Bloodbraid Elf

2x Kitchen Finks

4x Putrid Leech

3x Fulminator Mage

4x Shriekmaw

3x Skinrender

1x Grave Titan

2x Bituminous Blast

4x Maelstrom Pulse

2x Blightning

3x Terminate

3x Mimic Vat

25x Lands

First off, I decided to wait on which lands to include in the deck. I’m not sure what the main deck list will look like and for now while it is undergoing so many changes I thought it might be best to wait. Also, there is my lack of experience with the extended lands. Some notable changes I made were the inclusion of Kitchen Finks and Blightning. I included Kitchen Finks because (I’m not sure if this is how persist will work with Mimic Vat though) I think you can gain 4 life in some circumstances when you bring back a Kitchen Finks.

For example, Kitchen Finks is on board and chump blocks a creature and dies. It’s persist ability goes on the stack. In response you activate the Mimic Vat. The Vat ability resolves before the persist ability. Now, you bring back Kitchen Finks with no counters during your declare blockers step. Kitchen Finks enters the battle, you gain 2 life, blocks and dies, hits the graveyard and comes back so you gain another 2 life. At the end of turn the Finks, is exiled due to the Mimic Vat.

The possible 4 life, but guaranteed 2 life might not be enough to warrant the inclusion of the Finks. However, it does give Jund a way to prolong itself into the late game if need be (out last Faeries when they have Bitterblossom active and you don’t have a pulse for it), or counteract the Putrid Leech activations.

Blightning I thought was too powerful not to include. I cut the mournwelk because it felt too slow and couldn’t be cascaded into. Blightning accomplishes the discard and deals damage which if need be can be redirected to a Planeswalker. I decreased the upper end of the curve to ensure that the deck doesn’t lose any tempo by cutting 1 Grave Titan and Bituminous Blast. I would not mind going back up to 2 Grave Titan and maybe another Bituminous Blast but I would need to actually test to find out. I also cut 1 Mimic Vat because 4 seemed to many. You can still win without it and having an opening hand with more than 1 might make it unkeepable and you really don’t want to have to mulligan with Jund. If the Finks is not worth it, I could see those card slots being used to up the Grave Titan, Bituminous Blast, Blightning, or Lightning Bolt count (not that my list includes Lightning Bolt in the main, which might be a problem).

Fulminator Mage is really powerful in this deck, but only if you have Mimic Vat. Its power level drops considerably if you don’t have the Mimic Vat so I reduced his count to 3. Skinrender, while not full out removal offers a great Mimic Vat target, is a good tempo card, hits black creatures, and is a decent body. For these reasons I upped its count by one. So, that’s all I have really for changes. I agree with your assessment on the Lands that reflecting pool, raging ravine, the eventide lands, maybe the scars lands in some number, and fetches, all will probably be included in some number and configuration but testing will also play a big role for that.

I really am looking forward to getting the pieces together for this deck as I think it will be an Extender contender even if it is not the top deck. I also think the sideboard Volcanic Fallouts, Great Stable Stag, and maybe a Bituminous Blast and a Blightning or two for the faerie and control match ups respectively, will give the deck at least a 50% win percentage against most decks. Scapeshift I think will be the hardest opponent and may warrant the inclusion of a 4th Fulminator Mage from the board. Lightning Bolt or smother may also be other creature removal and direct damage options to look at.

What do you think of the changes? Did I miss anything? Let me know.

-Mark

Blink and it's Gone

This deck is a post Scars deck that Ryan and myself came up with. The deck tries to abuse Venser's "Bink" ability to trigger enter the battlefield effects. It also synergizes really well with baby Jace, aka Jace Beleren. It allows you to continuously use his -1 ability to draw cards. Then exile him with Venser to restore his counters. Other targets for Venser include Wall of Omens, Seagate Oracle, even Sun Titan. This deck really gets ridiculous when Sun Titan hits the field. If you can't blink any of these targets lands work just as well. This allows you to potentially leave counterspell mana up after casting spells. Noticeable cuts from the deck include Jace, the Mind Sculptor, and Baneslayer Angel.

Creatures:

4 Wall of Omens

4 Seagate Oracle

2 Transendant Master

4 Sun Titan

Spells:

1 Ratchet Bomb

3 Preordain

3 Mana Leak

3 Deprive

4 Jace Beleren

3 Day of Judement

3 Venser, the Sojourner

Land:

4 Celestial Colonnade

4 Glacial Fortress

3 Seachrome Coast

3 Tectonic Edge

4 Islands

4 Plains

As always I would like to hear your thoughts and opinions on the decklist

Back to Basics

I have been receiving numerous emails desperately pleading for me to restart my blog, well not really. I mean I think only one and half people actually read it. Paul counts as a half because we aren't sure if he is entirely human yet. (Sorry Paul) The real reason why I wanted to get back to writing this blog is that my Magic: The Gathering skills have improved immensely since my last post on June 2nd.

Over the summer I spent a lot of my time drafting and playing constructed at a new card shop that my friend Ryan introduced me to. (Yes, we are still best friends/rivals, more on this later). The store is called Toys 'N Things. The shop owner Evan is a great guy who really caters to the players. The store is open as long as people are there playing. He even provides free pizza at FNMs! So, even if you don't place at FNM the pizza and the competition make it worth while.

That brings me to the players. The level of competition at the store is difficult with the majority of players having competed in PTQs and a few players making the Top-8. These guys thought me a lot about higher level competitive play. When I first started playing Magic I was concerned with only the cards I was attempting to resolve and what my plan of action was. But, to be truly competitive you can't be a reactive player like I was. Proactive is the way the go, and no I don't mean the acne medication. What I mean by proactive is anticipating what your opponent is planning to do or might do in the future and then playing or, in some occasions, not playing your spells to set up a favorable board position.

With the influx of good players comes good cards. I was able to buy and trade cards and put together a strong White-Blue Control deck. So, here is the list that I have been playing at FNMs in the recent weeks:

Creatures:

4x Wall of Omens

4x Baneslayer Angel

2x Sun Titan

Total: 10

Spells:

3x Path to Exile

2x Condem

4x Mana Leak

2x Deprive

2x Jace Beleren

3x Jace, The Mind Sculptor

2x Elspeth, Knight-Errant

3x Day of Judgment

2x Jace's Ingenuity

Total: 23

Lands:

1x Mystifying Maze

4x Celestial Colonnade

4x Glacial Fortress

3x Seriji Refuge

3x Tectonic Edge

1x Scalding Tarn

1x Arid Mesa

5x Pains

5x Islands

Total: 27

Sideboard (Subject to change on a weekly basis due to the meta-game):

2x Negate

2x Flashfreeze

2x Luminarch Ascension

3x War Priest of Thune

2x Oblivion Ring

2x Leyline of Sanctity

2x Sphinx of Jwar Isle

I am not ashamed to admit that I am still not as good at sideboarding as I would like to be. In theory sideboarding is a very easy concept, but in practice it can be very difficult.

Last night's FNM is a good place to start talking about this deck and the odd circumstances that always surround Ryan and myself whenever we compete in the same FNM. Yesterday, was the second FNM in a row where we were paired in the opening round. In the first FNM I won the matchup. But this time around Ryan got is well deserved revenge and beat me 2-0 with ease. I was discouraged at first because the last time I lost in the opening round I missed placing by one win, loosing to the mirror match.

Ryan was playing the Soul Sisters deck. It was a deck I had been aware of but did not consider it as truly competitive. I was dead wrong. Its ability to gain life and pump out large creatures is amazing. With an easy to achieve 30 life Serra's Ascendant becomes a 6/6 flying lifelink for W. Ajani's Pridemate can get insanely big off the essential 8 copies of Soul Warden in the deck. He gets a +1/+1 counter for each instance of life gain. So with two soul wardens in play, you drop down a creature, make a token with Elspeth, and give all your creatures a +1/+1 counter and vigilance until end of turn. So that means your Pridemate gets +5/+5 total. Total mana cost: one white for a Serra Ascendant that is probably now a 6/6. My Blue White deck just could not handle the power, aggressiveness, and lifegain that the Soul Sister deck powered out.

But overall both Ryan and I managed to go 4-1 on the night. My last match was against a Naya Ramp deck. He was running the same list that placed 5th at Nationals. Here it is:

Lands:

4 Arid Mesa

5 Forest

3 Mountain

4 Plains

4 Raging Ravine

2 Stirring Wildwood

3 Tectonic Edge

1 Verdant Catacombs

Creatures:

4 Knight of the Reliquary

4 Primeval Titan

Spells:

2 Ajani Vengeant

4 Destructive Force

2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

3 Garruk Wildspeaker

2 Gideon Jura

2 Oblivion Ring

3 Path to Exile

4 Rampant Growth

4 Trace of Abundance

Sideboard:

3 Celestial Purge

3 Day of Judgment

4 Obstinate Baloth

2 Realm Razer

3 Ricochet Trap

Our first game lasted 40 minutes. My opponent Jim had a turn 5 Destructive Force with him having 7 lands and only 5 lands for me. This pretty much reset the board and giving him a slight advantage. It took a while but I manage to maintain board control with my planeswalkers and then build up my mana to a point where I could cast spells again. After trading some powerful cards I got a slight edge in board control. At this point we had 8minutes remaining in the round. I showed my opponent my hand loaded with powerful cards. I told it would take a me a while but I have the board position and card advantage to beat you. He considered it and resigned hoping to take the next two games quickly.

Things did not go well for him. I had a turn 2 luminarch ascension, turn 3 wall of omens, and 4 jace the mind scluptor. he was locked out of green mana only have a plains and two arid mesa on his turn 4 and didn't have a land for turn. After he passed back to me I got the final counter on my ascension. Fatesealed with Jace, like I had been doing since I played him, and passed the turn. At the end of my opponent's turn I made 3 4/4 angels. then I played elspeth pumped an angel attacked for 15 and put my opponent down to 3 life after fetchland damage. He then promptly conceded. The time left on the clock was under one minute.

So overall, it was an exciting FNM and easily one of my favorites. All my friends did well and I can't wait for the next event.

Time To Get Aggressive!!

Standard right now is being dominated by 5 main deck variants. We have the obvious Jund, Blue-White Control, Red-White-Blue Planeswalker Control (Superfriends), Naya Vengevine, and Mythic Conscription. Naya and Mythic are the fastest of the deck types here. It can be debated which of the two decks is the fastest (I would give it to Mythic b/c of the lotus cobra knight of the relquinary combo). The drawback for Mythic is that the combo can be easily broken. Jund is Jund and is all about card advantage. Blue-White plays more counterspells than Superfriends and varies in the number of creatures. It also usually has more X spells and so can have longer matchups. Superfriends splashes red for Ajani Vengeant and runs a few less than impressive draw spells like Divination. I'm not a fan RWU Planeswalkers because I don't really like Ajani. But he can control the board a little with his plus ability and can deal damage to a creature or player (damage to a player can be redirected to a planeswalker) with his minus 2. I suppose if you really have the board locked down Ajani's Ultimate becomes instant win.

What have here in Standard are two slow decks, 2 fast decks, and Jund somewhere in between. Note that because of Cascade's card advantage Jund can be just as fast as the fast decks but since it is unreliable it can lean towards the slower side as well. My solution to try to win against all these decks in Standard is to play fast and play hard. Here's the Black-Red Aggro deck that I came up with to meet these needs.

Creatures:
4x Goblin Guide
4x Vampire Lacerator
4x Goblin Bushwhacker
4x Plated Geopede
4x Hellspark Elemental
Total: 20

Spells:
4x Lighnting Bolt
2x Sign in Blood
4x Terminate
4x Blightning
3x Sarkhan the Mad
Total: 17

Land:
3x Lavaclaw Reaches
4x Dragonskull Summit
3x Arid Mesa
3x Verdant Catacombs
6x Mountain
4x Swamp

Sideboard:
4x Duress
3x Goblin Outlander
3x Goblin Ruinblaster
3x Thought Hermorrhage
2x Consuming Vapors
Total: 15

This deck doesn't run a creature with converted mana cost higher than 2, even with kicker, in the main deck. It gets a little higher with Goblin Ruinblaster in the Sideboard. The Ruinblaster and the Outlander make good additions for Superfriends and White-Blue Control. Thought Hemorrhage is also brought in against these matchups to relieve the pressure that Planeswalkers can place in these decks. Duress is crucial for taking out hard to deal with cards before they ever see play. Consuming Vapors can be brought in against Naya, Jund, and Mythic where you might take some early damage that you need to recover from while removing threats at the same time. The creatures also great at taken out planeswalkers because of their haste and the ability Bushwhacker which can give them a power boost as well as haste. Blightning is simply a great card. Sarkhan the Mad is there for late game insurance. Being able to put 5/5 fliers into play as well as draw cards and deal large amounts of damage is pretty nice. Playing one Sarkhan and using him to put dargons into play under your control and then when he dies using a second to deal damage straight to an opponent can be too much for them to handle. Terminate is there for the big creatures and Lightning Bolt for small important creatures like Lotus Cobra, Noble Hierarch, Birds of Paradise, as well as the all important Planeswalkers. The fetch lands help to fix mana and the extra Landfall for the Geopedes is also a blessing. I think this could be a competitive deck in the Standard format.

Who Am I?

I know it has been a while since my last post...sorry. Life happens. Anywho, Ryan and myself were talking the other day how am very competitive and many of my decks fall into the metagame. Ryan's decks on the other hand often don't represent a portion of the metagame but are nontheless still good. I would say his one exception to this is Polymorph. Then we noted how a player evolves as they progress through Magic. As a player moves from begginner to seasoned veteran often the decks a player makes change in quality and play style. So that is today's topic of discussion.

In magic players are often categorized based on three stereotypical personality traits. They are: Timmy, Johnny, and Spike. Timmy is the person who loves to the craziest, biggest, most awesome thing happen (I think we all have a little Timmy inside us, *smile*). A great example would be when you hard cast Emrakul, the Aeons Torn, take an extra turn from his ability and the annihilate ur opponent. Trust me its sweet.

Johnny loves the combos. He can't wait to find new card interactions and then build a deck around it and finding new ways to support the combo. In my opinion Louis Scott-Vargass, one of the best Magic players, is a Johnny at heart even though he plays competitively. I mean the guy piloted Grape Shot Elves, which is a deck that can combo out for a turn 2 win. Its legit. Another cool combo deck is the Open the Vaults deck. RDW (Red Deck Wins) used use cards like Rite of Flame and other mana accelerators to play Deus of Calamity on turn 1 or 2. Its pretty scary to facedown a 6/6 trample that forces you to sack a land whenever he does 6 or more damage to you, especially that early.

Spike is the tournament player. He is the type of person who wants to win and win big. Spike players are all about creating that deck that is like a work of art or a muscle car that you build in your home garage. They are constantly making changes to adapt to the counter strategies of other players. They learn how their opponents play and try to anticipate their moves. In an almost chess-like fashion they play around cards that their opponent might have in their hand, waiting for that moment when they tap-out to play a card, then dropping that hopefully game winning bomb of a card.

For me I am a Spike. But I wasn't always this type of player. Now that you are aquainted with the types of players I will recount my own progression as a Magic player to try and shed some light on the subject. I started out as a Timmy, as I believe most players do. The first deck I ever played was a monogreen Big Creature deck that my friend at school Howie had. I remember playing Krosan Cloudscraper for the first time. I thought it was so AMAZING!! I mean Krosan just stomped all over every other creature. I was sad when he got kill spelled a few turns later.

But as I played more I started to see card-card interactions. The way I learned this was from my starter deck which was a Simic deck with a small Landfall subtheme. Casting Harrow during the combat phase with Roil Elemental in play was a great combo to get my interests peaked. But this wasn't enough for me. All my combos seemed to be disjointed. Card A and B worked well together and so didn't B and C. But card A and C just failed miserably together. So I started to try a make my deck flow. And by flow I mean refine. At the end of the day I scrapped the Simic deck altogether for pieces of another deck. I went monogreen (hmm I wonder why, maybe the memories of playing Krosan Cloudscraper were in the back of my head) with a greater focus on Landfall. Now I just didn't have a few creatures that did something when I played a land but all my creatures seemed to have some triggered ability activate. I was gaining life, my creatures were getting buffed, and Rampaging Baloths were making tokens. It was great and the deck won.

I still wasn't satisfied with the deck because if I couldn't play a lot of lands I wouldn't get my fatties on the board. This lead me to the internet with hours of research following. I would stare at a deck list and think I don't get it, how do they win? Some the decks I was looking at didn't have big creatures and didn't have an obvious sorcery or instant that was gamebreaking. I knew the decks were good cause pro players had been using them and winning successfully. I had seen my first real control deck. From here on out I was all about streamlining my decks. Fine-tuning them until they could crush my opponents. I looked over the rule book to get a better understanding of the game, looking for new strategies and things you could do in certain situations to get a slight edge on my opponent. The Spike in me was born.

So I would say that on average, players go through a Timmy to Johnny to Spike evolution. Now some people don't make the jump to Spike. Ryan is one of those people. Its why he makes decks constantly on MTG Fanatic and then leaves them behind to make another. He is constantly searching for that new combo that would be so cool if he could pull it off. I have friends who are still in the early stages of their Magic career who I would say are still mainly Timmies with a hint of Johnny. DJ would fall right into this category. I still think that everyone will always have some Timmy in them. I can't explain how satisfying it is to use Nissa Revane's ultimate in my Eldrazi Elves deck (which I've done twice now) only to return her to my hand cast her and use her life gain ability. I had 5 D-20 lifecounters at this point and my opponent conceded.

People say that being a Spike player is no fun, that I loose out on a part of the game. I think it is just the opposite. People who don't play competitively don't understand how much fun it is to tinker ( catch that pun?) with a deck until it is just right. Matching wits against a formidable player, someone who you just simply don't know if you can beat, is just so much fun. I may not always come out the victor, but I'll take on any player with any deck any day.

New Deck: Eldrazi Elves

Okay so today started out pretty boring, but turned into one of the most epic days of magic that I've had in long time. After some trading I was able to procure 3 copies of Eldrazi Monument for my mono green Elf Deck. The deck was not something that I played often because it had no removal and was vulnerable to burn and other forms of creature destruction of which their is plenty in this format. After a few small changes I transformed it into an Eldrazi Elves deck.

I playtested the deck against my best friend/archenemy Ryan. I played against Enchanting Angels, Niv-mizzet Pyromancer, and Bant-Allies. They were all close games, well except for the Bant Allies matchup. Here's how it went down:

Turn 1:
Ryan won the roll and mulliganned to 5 cards. He played a Seaside Citadel and passed the turn. I atarted with a forest and followed up with a Llanowar Elves.

Turn 2:
Ryan dropped down a Island and played an Oran-Ried Survivalist and ended his turn.
I responded with my second Forest and and Elvish Archdruid.

Turn 3:
Ryan sadly missed his land drop and instead played a Jwari Shapeshifter as a copy of Oran-Rief Survivalist. This pumped up his first Oran-Rief to a 3/3. The Jwari entered as a 2/2. Ryan then passed the turn.
I played a Forest and then I threw down an Arbor Elf. I tapped the first Archdruid to play a second Elvish Archdruid. Using my remaining mana I cast a Nissa's Chosen and pasted the turn.

Turn 4:
Ryan missed his second land drop and played a second Oran-Rief Survivalist. This pumped up the 1st one to a 4/4 and the Jwari Shapeshifter (which is a copy of Oran-Rief) to a 3/3. Ryan chose not to attack and passed the turn.
I played a Forest, tapped one of the Archduids to play a Joraga Warcaller kicked twice. I played Eldrazi Monument and attacked for lethal damage.

There you have it turn 4 win with Eldrazi Elves. I was pleasantly surprised because I didn't even know that a turn 4 win was possible with the deck. Needless to say I was pretty happy. I ended up winning 2 games straight to take the series.

In the game agaist Niv-Mizzet I had control of the board for most of the game. Ryan continued to draw more draw spells and at the end had only played 1 Burst Lightning and 1 Lightning Bolt. So for me it was spam elves and attack, pretty simple. I didn't even play Eldrazi Monument.

The game against Enchanting Angels was by far the most exciting. Enchanting Angels uses Sigil of the Empty Throne to put 4/4 flying Angels into play. Mesa Enchantress is used to draw cards and Wall of Omens and Wall of Denial help to slow down the game. Wall of Denial was key in this matchup for Ryan because it really slowed down my attack. Another key card was Ghostly Prism which requires that your opponent (me) pay 2 colorless mana to declare a creature as an attacker. The game went on long enough that I was able to have an Eldrazi Monument in play and use Nissa Revane's ultimate. You would think that all that would be enough to take down Ryan even with creatures being take out with cards like Journey to Nowhere, Pacifism, and Oblivion Ring (this is also generating a 4/4 angel with Sigil of the Empty Throne plus card drawing). I was sure that 17 attackers all with a base power of 2-3 which were all recieving +5/+5 flying and indestructiblity (after several Warcaller's and Archdruid's were taken out) would be enough to kill him (and remember I am paying 2 mana per attacker, thank you Archduids). But no, a timely Angel's Song prevented all the damage. Ryan by that time had 7 4/4 Angel tokens on the battlefield. So he attacked for what I thought at the time was lethal and so I concede, absolutely furious at myself that I did not see the Angel Song coming. However, now that I am writing this blog I realized that on a piece a paper I had next to me I written down 32 life from using Nissa Revane's ability to gain 2 life per elf becuase I already had 4 Nissa's Chosen on the battlefield. So had I not made two mistakes that game I should have won. Ryan played well though and definitely deserves the win on that one though.

Thanks for reading, Peace.

New Decks Review

Today I was reading an article over on Daily MTG about some new decks that are gaining some respect in the standard format. Jund has been the standard staple for a while now. If you haven't played against a Jund deck consider yourself lucky because it can be a very annoying matchup for a lot decks. Jund wins for one reason, card advantage. Take a look at the card every Jund deck has four of Blightning. It sends three damage at your opponent's face and forces them to discard two cards. That is some serious card advantage but, it doesn't stop there. Bloodbraid Elf is the amazing 4 drop 3/2 haste with cascade (more free spells for more card advantage). Maelstrom Pulse can take out several permanents with the same name for 3 mana. But most of us have seen this all before. So why was Jund being mentioned as a new deck at all? Take a look at this deck list:

Land:
4 Evolving Wilds
3 Forest
3 Mountain
4 Raging Ravine
4 Savage Lands
1 Scalding Tarn
3 Swamp
4 Verdant Catacombs

Creatures:
4 Bloodbraid Elf
2 Borderland Ranger
4 Plated Geopede
4 Putrid Leech
4 Siege-Gang Commander
4 Sprouting Thrinax

Spells
2 Bituminous Blast
4 Blightning
2 Lightning Bolt
4 Maelstrom Pulse

Sideboard
1 Bituminous Blast
1 Burst Lightning
1 Chandra Nalaar
3 Consumping Vapors
2 Doom Blade
1 Island
4 Sedraxis Specter

When have you seen a Jund deck with a Sedraxis Specter in the sideboard? Well, just now. Because Blue-White Control and Blue-White Tapout have become serious threats this Jund version was designed to be a Jund deck that can masquerade as a Red-Deck-Wins or Grixis Burn. Spreading Seas has been Blue-White's main way of messing up the Jund mana base while providing a replacement card. This deck takes advantage of that to force the opponent to discard cards. This a great concept because everyone knows Jund and expects to see certain cards from all Jund decks. But playing cards not seen in Jund like, Sedraxis Specter, puts your opponent on their heels. They don't know what is coming next so they can't respond as well when you play that turn 4-5 Blightning when they thought you were mono red because you played Plated Geopede on turn 2 and 3. In my opinion, John Pham, creator of the deck, took Blue-White's strategy and turned it against them. That is a head's up play. John Pham is this week's sneaky beaver.

Also on this list are Polymorph and a deck called Spread 'Em. The Spread 'Em deck is really interesting. It plays mainly Bant colors but has a splash of red for Bloodbraid. The other creatures are Baneslayer, Rhox War Monk, and Wall of Omens. All of which are powerful cards that get the job done. This deck's sideboard has a card that we don't see too often at the pro level, Trace of Abundance. For R/W and G you can enchant a land, give it shroud, and lets it produce 1 mana of any color whenever you tap it for mana that it produces normally. When you enchant a card like Celestial Colonnade you can get a lot of mana options but also a 4/4 flying, shroud, vigilance for 3WU. The deck also runs Ardent plea which in the main deck configuration cascades into either Wall of Omens or Spreading Seas, both of which draw you a card. In this sense a Blue-White deck has gone slightly Jund-like to get card advantage and creature advantage.

On a more personal note, my close friend Ryan put together a Polymorph deck. If you want to learn how to build this deck at a fraction of the cost I would suggest checking out his blog Casual MTG Creations, the link is the top right of this page. Now, onto the deck. Polymorph tries to do one and one thing only, get the biggest, baddest, most dangerous creature onto the field and use that creature to make your opponent cry like a baby. Polymorph does this very well. All the cards in Polymorph either prevent damage, produce a token, mana accelerate, counter a spell, or draw cards. Polymorph wants to get to 6 mana by turn 5 so that it can cast polymorph, targeting one of their tokens, and then reveal the only creature in the deck: Emrakul, the Aeons Torn. The extra mana is necessary in order to cast a counter-spell. Other creatures that have seen use are Iona, Shield of Emeria and Progenitus. If Polymorph gets one of these creatures on to the battlefield, shake their hand, resign, and move on to game 2 because it is over, I know from experience.

My current best Standard deck is Vampires. I don't know why but the only time it has performed badly was at an FNM when I kept a 1 land hand (all the cards in my hand costed either 1 or two mana) and didn't get a second land until turn 4 or 5. By which point I had lost all hopes of winning against a red-green eldrazi ramp deck that wasn't even very good. (This meant I came in second place for the night and he in first) My point is that I want redemption for my deck and knowing that polymorph will probably be played at the next FNM, cause Ryan told me he was playing it, I needed a solid way to beat it. Here is the card I came up with: Sadistic Sacrament. This card has not seen any pro level play because there are very few decks that this card has even a remote impact on. But against Polymorph it is absolutely amazing. For BBB you can search your opponent's library and exile any 3 cards. In this case you choose their Polymorph targets, Emrakul, Iona, or Progenitus. Rarely will you see a total of more than 3 targets so if you can successfully cast Sadistic Sacrament you pretty much win. But their deck is full of counter-spells so timing is everything. Another card I would add in is: Consuming Vapors.

My deck runs 3 Kalastria Highborn main deck so if you can get the Polymorph down to a small amount of life, leave mana open after they play Emrakul. When his Annihilator 6 ability activates, be sure to sac all your vampire creatures then pay B for each vampire and watch their life total tick down to 0. So to do this effectively you need 6 vamps on the field and your opponent at 12 or less life. (Or any number of vampires and land equal to half of their life total So 10 life, 5 vamps, 5 land works too) But watch out for cards like into the roil which foil that plan by returning Kalastria to your hand. Thats all on these few new decks. Peace.

Some Fishy Fun Facts

Well I didn't get a chance to play when Merfolk (also known as Fish) were in standard. One of my friends from the college I attend, Adam, showed me how powerful they are by consistently beating me with his Merfolk deck. I love combos, control and just the epic-ness that Merfolk bring. So, I built myself a Fish deck and it is today's topic of discussion.

Here is my Deck List:

4x Cursecatcher
3x Enclave Cryptologist
4x Stonybrook Banneret
3x Coralhelm Commander
3x Inkfathom Infiltrator
4x Merfolk Sovereign
4x Merrow Reejerey

4x Aquitect's Will
4x Counter Spell
3x Merrow Commerce
4x Savor the Moment

4x Halimar Depths
16x Island

Okay, first I should start off with two major points. One is that this deck is missing one major component. The missing card is Lord of Atlantis. For those of you who don't know Lord of Atlantis give +1/+1 and islandwalk to all merfolk in play (including your opponent's). The essential part is the islandwalk. Islandwalk, because of Aquitect's Will makes all your merfolk unblockable. Also, Lord of Atlantis is the lowest casting cost lord in the deck at UU. The highest and most mana intensive is the Sovereign at 1UU.

The second point is that Counterspell makes this deck legal only in the Legacy format. However, I have played this build against several different types of decks and I found even without the Counterspell it plays quite well. So to make it legal in Extended only Counterspell would have to be changed. The most versatile replacement card being Deprive from Rise of the Eldrazi. But the drawback is that you have to return a land to your hand. This is not a huge drawback as long you have a Reejerey in play.

But what it does do, is put more pressure on you to get to 3 mana. This deck almost requires you to get to 3 mana to be effective. Now there are special circumstances when this isn't a problem. For example, one game I had two mana an Infathom Infiltrator, a Stonybrook Banneret, Merrow Reejerey, and Counterspell in hand. Now I chose the easy play (the Stonybrook) so next turn I could play the Reejerey and if I happened to draw an Island, the Infiltrator as well. But my opponent was no push-over and as soon as Stonybrook hit the field he ate a lightning Bolt. (I did indeed draw an Island) I went for the Reejerey to desperately try and get back in the game. He stuck because my opponent had already burned 5+ creatures. He also didn't draw any burn for 2 turns which let me get the board position I needed to win the game. But if he had a burn spell the turn the Reejerey came out, it would certainly have been game over. If I had to use a Deprive to counter a spell it may also have been game over. Returning a land to my hand at that point in the game would have slowed me down significantly. This should be no surprise because Counterspell is the best counter target spell card in the game and well Deprive is not (sniffel).

The Merrow Reejerey is the best card in this deck in my opinion. It buffs all your other merfolk, can be reduced to a CMC of U by having two Stonybrooks in play, and the best part is that whenever you play a merfolk spell you may tap or untap target permanent. This is HUGE. It allows you to untap land after playing a merfolk spell. With one Reejerey in play you can reduce the cost of any merfolk spell by Blue. For merfolk that cost Blue if you have two Reejerey in play then you actually net one mana. It situations where mana isn't a problem there is always the option of tapping down creatures or opponents land (be careful when you do this though because they cast a spell in response to you trying to tap their lands). Merrow Commerce is crazy because you can untap all your merfolk at the end of your end step. This means you can attack and block (almost like vigilence but better). Enclave Cryptologist lets you draw large amounts of cards when fully levelled due the Commerce's effect.

The clincher in the deck is Savor the Moment. Or as Adam likes to call it, Savor the Flavor. This can be a game changing / game winning card. Why? Well you can take an extra turn for a measley 1UU, thats right folks (No seriously stop drooling. its disgusting, haha just kidding). The draw back about skipping the untap step doesn't matter because of the Merrow Commerce. So you get to draw a card and have two combat phasing. This is amazing because so much damage is usually unblockable. The Lord of Atlantis would make this so crazy awesome I almost might not want to play the deck cause it would so good. Nahh, I'd still play it.

The drawback with the deck as it right now is that it relies on getting cards like Merrow Reejerey and Inkfathom Infiltrator as well as other Merfolk on the battlefield to go off. Which means that it is vulnerable to to burn decks as well as decks with heavy removal. To get around this cards like Negate and Lullmage Mentor can get sideboarded in. This will help to get you more creatures on the field and into a position where you can counter your opponent's spells by tapping 7 Merfolk. Remember that Negate, Essence Scatter, Deprive all put 1/1 Merfolk into play using the Mentor's ability.


I will be posting an Ideal deck list as well as some Game records so you can see turn by turn how the deck was played.

A New Begining

I have a lot of friends that play Magic the Gathering but most play on a purely casual level. Some are more experienced than others. Often (usually by the less experienced players) I get asked the question how do I go about building a deck. New comers and first-timers listen up (read closely is more like it) because I'm going to discuss just that.

Okay, the first the thing you should ask yourself when building a deck is, "What is my win condition?". This can be a multitude of different things and you should have more than one in a deck. (Note that beatdown and mill are by my terms a strategy not a win condition) A win condition should be the game changer. For example, if you are playing mono-green, then beastmaster ascension, wolfbriar elemental, and overrun are all viable win conditions. There is one simple but important point to make about each of these win conditions, they all work together. A deck that wins consistently has to multiple ways of winning that synergize with the other cards in the deck. Wolfbriar can be multi-kicked to make tokens. Next turn, with Beastmaster Ascension on the field, you cast Overrun, hopefully attacking with enough creatures to put 7 counters on the ascension to activate its ability and giving all your creatures in play +8/+8 and trample (+5/+5 from the ascension and +3/+3 and trample from Overrun). If you pull this off unless they have a prevent damage spell like angel song or fog this is a game winning play.

Now that you have the win condition the next step is to compile a list of cards that will aid you in achieving this win condition. Cards like harrow, khalni heart expedition, momentus fall, all help you to produce mana faster, gain life, and draw cards which all will help you get to your win condition.

Unfortunately the third thing you should ask yourself when making a deck is, "How much am I willing to spend on this deck and how likely am I to get the cards I need?". It is a good idea to grasp how much a deck costs before building it and also how many of the required cards you already own. I have made countless deck lists in Word but few of them ever get made bescause I know that I am never going to get 4x Elspeth the Knigh Errant as an example. So what I usually do is keep two lists if there are cards I would like to put in the deck but don't have. I usually save them as a word file and store them on my iPod touch. (You never know when you are going to have an opportunity to buy/trade for cards and its helpful to know which ones your need) Now that I have two lists I try to take the "What I have Now List" and convert it into "What I Want to Have". This can take time and lists can go under many revisions or they can be made once and never touched again. It all depends on what cards become availble, get printed, or new combos that I find.

Decks also have to have another crucial concept. The Mana Curve. This is probably the most important part of every deck. You can have all the bombs and win conditions you want but if the Curve is too high you will never play them. If the deck you are making has to play fast to win then you better have some sort of backup plan if the game drags on. If not in the main deck then the sideboard definitely.

This brings us to the all important sideboard. ALWAYS HAVE A SIDEBOARD WHEN PLAYING IN ANY SORT OF COMPETITIVE EVENT. I went to an FNM one time where a player didn't have a sideboard. He would have done significantly better if had a sideboard. Sideboards are limited to 15 cards and have to be exchanged on a 1 for 1 basis with the cards in your deck. Considering that games 2 and 3 of a match are going to be sideboarded games it is essential to have a good sideboard becuase you play more games with your sideboard than without. I could write a whole post on the sideboard itself (which I probably will) so I won't go into detail about it here. But essentially you want to have easy to play cards that address certain weaknesses within your deck that your opponent has capitolized on to try and beat you.

The final part of the deck but certainly in no way unimportant is the mana base. Without a solid mana base your deck will not function properly. An easy to use quick rule of thumb is to have 1 land basic land per 2 nonland cards of the same color. So if you had 12 blue cards you should 6 islands or 6 lands that produce blue mana. This is a very basic description and a more detailed post will follow.