Two updated Extended decks, plus about eight matches of additional Extended testing. Enjoy!
I started out playing the Mono-White Control deck from last night again. For those of you who got the wrong deck list looking at it (which is everyone… it wasn’t even sixty cards*), here is the proper deck list:
3 Chalice of the Void
4 Akroma’s Vengeance
2 Crovax, Ascendent Hero
2 Decree of Justice
4 Eternal Dragon
4 Mana Tithe
4 Martyr of Sands
3 Oblivion Ring
4 Proclamation of Rebirth
4 Wrath of GodÂ
20 Snow-Covered Plains
4 Temple of the False God
2 Urza’s Factory
sb:
1 Chalice of the Void
4 Unmake
1 Crovax, Ascendent Hero
4 Kataki, War’s Wage
4 Condemn
1 Boseiju, Who Shelters All
Urza’s Factory is new, obviously. I have to admit I didn’t actually produce any tokens with those tonight… But I’m sure something like those might come up someday… And the deck doesn’t need 22 Plains.
I also swapped in the fourth Kataki, War’s Wage over the solo Ethersworn Canonist; the deck is super good against Affinity already, but the Time Walk aspect against Lightning Bolt Red has just been so good. Plus, it gives you a body that they almost have to answer, which doubles up as life gain, kind of.
Mono-White testing was pretty unspectacular tonight. I broke even in four matches. Ironically the first three were against various Lightning Bolt Red… a nigh bye.
I lost the first match L-W-L… I randomly Condemned a Mogg Fanatic in Game three not realizing his Morph was, um, not a Gathan Raiders. I was planning to kind of ignore it and jump around with chumps and whatnot, but it was a Blistering Firecat! Then he paid retail for another one and I took a million… I really wish I had not blown that Condemn.
I played against the same player later, and played around his Morphs and easily won.
Next match was against another Lightning Bolt Red; Game One he ripped a second Sulfuric Vortex right before I found my first Martyr of Ashes and he got me for just enough, even though I actually had two Eternal Dragons and the Martyr on board. Only Flames of the Blood Hand or Shrapnel Blast would have been relevant in that spot (I had the Proclamation). Game Two I drew four spells, eleven lands. Shrug. I was able to fight off two Sulfurics with Oblivion Rings (obviously not profitable) but with almost no spells otherwise, I couldn’t race or gain life effectively.
The last match was against a kind of poor Black deck… So 2-2 almost doesn’t even count.
In the interim I worked on a Beasts deck. Michael Le (won with my Beasts two Extended PTQ seasons ago) told me to work on it, pointing out Mutavault + Contested Cliffs is a combo against a 1/1… But I realized the strategy is probably not good enough against the metagame. So I scrapped the Boreal Druids to work on a Mono-Blue deck (that turned into a U/R deck).
I started with the Spire Golem deck I made with Andre Coimbra and ended up with this, which is part way between my deck, Tezzerator, and Gabriel Nassif’s deck:
1 Aether Spellbomb
2 Chalice of the Void
3 Chrome Mox
2 Engineered Explosives
1 Pyrite Spellbomb
2 Umezawa’s Jitte
2 Vedalken Shackles
I beat regular Faeries, earning a quick concession in Game Two after showing a couple of Ancestral Visions (Osyp mentioned sideboarding these to me).
After that the Tournament Practice metagame switched from Red Decks to Rock decks. I beat The Rock / Death Cloud and Storm combo; got crushed by Slide. I actually shouldn’t have lost to the Slide deck. He gave me a wide open turn by not flipping his Exalted Angel that I had bounced three times, but then he played a second Angel and there was no way to get around both with my Trinket Mage, Riptide Laboratory, and choice of Spellbombs (I was at one). Game Two I mulled to four and saw a total of two lands in the four hands I looked at and bowed out.
The Rock deck was another super easy victory thanks to siding in Ancestral Visions. The Rock works so hard to get an advantage with Raven’s Crime and so on and I just managed time and drew a bunch, then started dancing around his Worm Harvests with Relic of Progenitus and Tormod’s Crypt. I actually forgot there is a free ability on Relic of Progenitus for about three turns. Embarassing. But I had so many cards it didn’t matter.
Glen Elendra Archmage was pretty good against The Rock.
Storm combo he had such enormous Storm in Game One! He showed his whole hand, made a giant Mind’s Desire, showed so many Goblins that they didn’t fit on the board… I was ready to spoil his fun with the Trinket Mage I had in hand… But he had also ye olde Tendrils. No fun! Games Two and Three I made Chalice of the Void for one about as quickly as I could (Ponder, Rite of Flame, etc.) and just got some light countering going. Ho hum.
This seems like it could be a good deck for a few weeks into the PTQ season, as it seems to have the advantage versus some combo, The Rock, and other Blue decks. Then again the advantage-getting strategies can probably be spliced onto other Blue decks successfully.
I just realize there are 61 cards in the second deck. I’ll fix this if we decide to move forward with the deck list (which, again, seems reasonable for a few weeks into the season).
Osyp suggested a similar idea (but no deck list) on our mailing list. You know that I am like a feather and anyone suggesting I play this… I probaly will float in that direction if it is mentioned.
The deck list:
3 Chalice of the Void
4 Akroma’s Vengeance
2 Crovax, Ascendent Hero
4 Decree of Justice
4 Eternal Dragon
4 Mana Tithe
4 Martyr of Sands
4 Proclamation of Rebirth
4 Wrath of God
22 Snow-covered Plains
4 Temple of the False God
sideboard:
1 Chalice of the Void
4 Unmake
4 Condemn
1 Crovax, Ascendent Hero
3 Kataki, War’s Wage
1 Boseiju, Who Shelters All
I played about five matches with this deck last night but my computer crashed so I lost the notes. So I am going completely on memory for the first night.
For the first night I played on Boseiju, Who Shelters All in the main. It was kind of awful. In fact I played it as my first land against Zoo and Red decks and I think it cost me the Zoo Game One. So I moved it to nowhere (I always had the second Boseiju in the sideboard). Anyway, I crushed Swans with two awful draws and I don’t see how you can reasonably lose to Faeries or Wizards on MTGO; I don’t see how those decks can beat you in a tournament unless you don’t draw anything the whole match.
Swans
I get the worst mana flood ever. Crush him.
I get a medium horrible mana screw. Crush him.
The Swans matchup was pretty simple. I drew sixteen straight lands in Game One, and somehow won. Basically I took a couple of hits from his Swans and then played Chalice of the Void for two, to counter his Chain of Plasma. I blew up his guy.
Wait, wait wait… He goes for it, Repeals my Chalice and plays the combo with all his mana… I have the Mana Tithe. Of course I re-play the Chalice and finally draw Eternal Dragon. Blood Moon of course did nothing.
Game Two was the opposite… I wasn’t completely screwed but I was discarding for a while. Just so happened to have a key Mana Tithe, etc.
Affinity
I actually got run over by the super fast draw in Game One. Game Two I got Akroma’s Vengeance, and Game Three I got Kataki. Affinity is a non-issue for this deck.
Zoo
As above, I was quite punished by the main deck Boseiju. I replaced it with a Plains… The deck actually needs 26 lands, and skimpint to 25 hurt.
Game Two I kept a hand with three Eternal Dragons and Condemnm but only one Plains. It took six turns to find the second one. Some nice stalling with the Martyr helped a lot. This was actually pretty close… He didn’t play Teeg (at least against me).
Going down 0-2 to Zoo is annoying if he doesn’t present Teeg… Just a case of my hiccuping against Zoo and the fact that you don’t want to do that. The sideboard is chock full of cards that are actually cheap enough to point at Teeg.
Gifts Rock
Nope, this deck can’t beat Gifts Rock. Death Cloud and Life From the Loam destroyed me. I had a Chalice on two in play in I think Game Two but he just killed me with Kitchen Finks.
Today…
All-in Red
A surprisingly easy matchhp. Especially in sideboarded games, I had every Unmake a girl could ever want.
Lightning Bolt Deck
This one was also super easy.
My hot play was to Martyr for four, not five, not revealing my tricky card. The opponent tapped out to point Flames of the Blood Hand… My last card was Mana Tithe 🙂
Weird Elf Deck
I conceded match after he showed me a fourth Thoughts of Ruin. I actually screwed up on the first Thoughts of Ruin.
Fae
He timed out. I was the beatdown eerly, then got him eventually to three life. I suggested he concede but he kept playing.
There seems to be very little Fae / Wizards can do against this deck, at least in Game One. White has more card advantage, which is inexorable as it is inexhaustable.
The main advantages of this deck are that it is solid against Red and Fae. It cannot however beat The Rock, ever.
Just some thoghts. Happy New Year!
LOVE
MIKE
PS Is it worthwhile to splash Red? Lightning Helix is already White for the Martyr… Firespout might be good against Zoo and playable against Elves. Thoughts?
An updated deck list followed by a couple of matches with All-in Red, including two mini-You Make the Plays!
I have been playing mono The Rock lately but some discussion on my mailing list has put me off The Rock for the moment. I decided to play the other Extended deck I like tonight, All-in Red.
This is my deck list:
4 Chrome Mox
4 Demigod of Revenge
4 Deus of Calamity
2 Manamorphose
4 Blood Moon
4 Desperate Ritual
4 Empty the Warrens
4 Magus of the Moon
4 Rite of Flame
4 Seething Song
4 Simian Spirit Guide
Basically I reversed the numbers on Manamorphose and Empty the Warrens from the pre-Pro Tour Berlin version. Manamorphose really just improves Warrens; and Warrens was the best threat. I don’t know if Manamorphose will ultimately make the prime time version of the deck list, but I like it quite a bit because I have some gamble to me and have been known to play it just to see what happens. What usually happens is that I reveal a Demigod of Revenge or some such.
In this deck, versus Standard, I actually prefer Deus of Calamity more than Demigod of Revenge. In All-in Red in Extended, you don’t actually get to play multiple Demigods in a single game very often because you simply don’t have the mana (you usually use a lot of the Red Dark Ritual cards and don’t tend to have a lot of staying power); if you can play Deus of Calamity on the first turn on the play, there are really very few ways for you to lose. At the least you usually get to play The Abyss for a while until they can deal with the Deus, at which point you can often clean up with a medium Empty the Warrens or some other threat, exploiting the, you know, calamity that the Deus wrecked.
I originally only wanted to play about three matches but they went relatively quickly and ended up playing about five. Everyone I played tonight was very nice. Thanks for the games all.
ONE
Game One:
My opponent led off on Darksteel Citadel, pass.
Now no Affinity deck will ever do that so I put him on the Lightning Bolt deck. I kept this hand.
YOU MAKE THE PLAY ALERT. What do you run (answer in the forums)?
Chrome Mox
Chrome Mox
Seething Song
Empty the Warrens
Magus of the Moon
Demigod of Revenge
Mountain
Mountain
We can discuss this in future, but what I actually did was to play both the Moxes, imprinting Demigod of Revenge and Magus of the Moon to play turn one Empty the Warrens, burning to 19.
The other option is to play Demigod of Revenge; however as I put my opponent on Lightning Bolt deck, I assumed that he would have a hard time dealing with eight Empty the Warrens tokens whereas he might be able to just Shrapnel Blast the Demigod out of the sky if need be.
He played Keldon Marauders, putting your hero to 18.
I sent all my Goblin tokens and put him to 13.
He counterattacked and put me to 15, then played Sulfuric Vortex.
I looked at his board… Darksteel Citadel and Great Furnace, eh?
I will be on 12 on upkeep. If he hits a land, that Sulfuric Vortex is gonna… well you gotta play the cards that they give you!
He had the double Shrapnel Blast, but sadly (for him), no fourth land. Huzzah!
Sideboarding:
I decided to side in 3 Umezawa’s Jittes and 1 Shattering Spree for 4 Blood Moon. Magus of the Moon is no great shakes but at least he has a body for the Jittes I sided in.
Game Two:
He opened on Spark Elemental.
I responded with turn one Deus of Calamity.
Pause.
Yep. That’s a concession.
1-0
TWO
I played a very nice player with medium Red whom I have played a couple of times before with my version of The Rock.
Game One
He shipped to five and kept a one lander. It wasn’t a competitive hand against my second turn Demigod of Revenge.
Sideboarding:
I sided four Firespout and 3 Jitte for seven Blood Moons and Magus of the Moons (leaving a Magus, obviously).
I had to use the first Firespout on his turn one Slith Firewalker. There were no Seething Song for Arc-Slogger heroics in this one and All-in Red beat medium Red in unspectacular fashion.
2-0
THREE
Game One
I kept two Moon cards versus Lightning Bolt deck. Luckily I drew eight Mountains off the top. So at the end of the game, my spell count was a Mox, Blood Moon, and Magus of the Moon. No, I didn’t get there.
Sideboarding
I sided identically to the first match, above. I probably should have sided in more Shattering Sprees.
Game Two
Turn two Deus of Calamity was deployed, but he blocked to stall and played Ensnaring Bridge! Good gravy. I wasn’t sure what to do and played a naked Demigod of Revenge, which did nothing. Then I topdecked a Jitte. He ran out a Pyrostatic Pillar. I decided I didn’t want to mess with that with my no-acceleration hand and just made two Warrens tokens with the outlook of hopefully getting something online. However he had a Mogg Fantatic to keep the tokens off.
I played some dorks, took Pillar damage; he had to burn every one and take Pillar damage to keep Jitte off him. Eventually it was 5-7 my lead but he had this card Shrapnel Blast and saved it for when I foolishly summoned a Simian Spirit Guide.
I am not sure how I should have played it differently. Possibly I should have waited for another Warrens, but I think waiting too long I would have just died to multiple burn spells.
2-1
FOUR
Game One
He opened on a tapped Steam Vents.
I was on the play and answered with turn two Deus.
Concession!
Steam Vents? What is that? I assumed Fae but didn’t do anything on account of possibly being wrong.
Game Two
I got Spell Snared as a two-for one (I had already committed Rite of Flame)… so that prevented a turn two or three Empty the Warrens for six.
Then I resolved some Moon-ish spells, and the race was his Vendilion Clique versus my Magus of the Moon.
Following I got in Empty the Warrens for eight; this survived the aforementioned Vendilion Clique, which took my other Empty the Warrens.
He kept sending the Clique and used Threads of Disloyalty to mise one of my tokens.
Then he showed me Venser, which executed two tokens, and Vedalken Shackles.
I thought I had enough gas because of holding a Deus of Calamity back, but he had Flashfreeze as well.
Luckily I had gotten him to two life at this point.
So basically I could win on a storm Warrens or a Demigod of Revenge, but probably be frozen out by anything else. Unfortunately I knew there was one of my remaining three Warrens on the bottom of my deck, meaning I only really had two Warrens left…
But luckily one was on top.
So Mox for nil got me four tokens… possibly enough to win.
But no! Engineered Explosives ate all my guys and suddenly the fae was off to the races. He even made a Spellstutter Sprite for no value.
On his main phase he Shackled my remaining 2/2 dork to get in with Venser and the Clique. Okay… Shackles tapped. Sprite tapped. YT on two.
I could smell the demigod on top.
Yep, topdeck city!
That’s match. Thank you top of my deck!
3-1
FIVE
Game One
I was on the draw.
He ran out turn one Overgrown Tomb.
I answered with turn one Deus of Calamity.
He was honored to be able to eat a Tarmogoyf.
Oblivion Ring! No fun.
Main deck Jitte? Even less fun; then Dark Confidant.
I basically had to play a Warrens for two just to keep the Confidant / Jitte from running me over.
Check and check plus… but he still had a Jitte with a counter.
I sprang into action with a hasty 5/4.
But he had another Oblivion Ring!
I was waiting for that and played another Deus. Whew.
But he answered with Mogg Fanatic, now wearing the Jitte.
He trades, but greviously, including a Seal of Fire.
Now it’s Spirit Guide beatdown.
But no! Kird Ape.
I play Magus of the Moon.
A terrible battle ensues, killing everyone and soaking up all the Jitte counters.
Nothing from him…
And I Mox for nothing, and play four tokens from Warrens.
And finally I get by a Jitte!
Sideboarding:
I sided out 1 Magus of the Moon and two Manamorphose for three Umezawa’s Jitte. Magus is okay-plus, but I figured he had Red removal and Jittes (which are colorless) as well as Plains for Oblivion Ring… So not that good.
Game Two
This is the hand I kept:
Simian Spirit Guide
Simian Spirit Guide
Mountain
Deus of Calamity
Blood Moon
Seething Song
Magus of the Moon
He opened with Windswept Heath for Wooded Foothills.
I ripped a Mountain.
YOU MAKE THE PLAY ALERT: What do you do?
I elected to play first turn Blood Moon using both Guides.
He answered with a turn two 1/2 Tarmogoyf, which made me think maybe I should have played the Magus instead.
My next two draws were Deus and Seething Song, so little direct improvement, especially as he mised Plains.
Next turn I made Deus with Rite of Flame and Seething Song.
He swung…
I blocked and he finished off the Deus with a Tribal Flames.
He ripped and played Oblivion Ring on my poor Blood Moon.
I ripped and played Deus.
He played Confidant into Confidant…
But your hero picked up Jitte.
Uncontested Jitte did what uncontested Jitte does.
4-1
So 4-1… Not conclusive but certainly a fine record for the night.
Please address how you would have dealt with those opening hands in the comments below.
When I originally wrote Who’s the Beatdown?, the prevailing strategy in sideboarded games was to try to go more control. Here is a pretty basic example of how a deck might want to do that, Dave Price’s Top 8 deck from Grand Prix Seattle:
SIDEBOARD
3 Cursed Scroll
4 Masticore
2 Null Rod
3 Perish
3 Sphere of Resistance
In sideboarded games against other beatdown decks, specifically the Red Decks that were so hard to beat, Dave would remove cards like Sarcomancy (almost always awful) for cards like Masticore (more expensive, but worth lots of cards). This deck could set up a second turn Masticore with Demonic Consultation and Dark Ritual; cross the old fingers. With three lands — provided one was a City of Traitors — the Black deck could play the control, with the Masticore drawing fire (but possibly surviving still due to high toughness and regeneration), generating much card advantage by being able to pick off Ball Lightning. You can call this a kind of “Tinker” scenario, but for our argument it’s jockeying into the “control” role due to the non-tenability of the “beatdown” role against Fireblast and Ball Lightning when you have all these suicidal Zombies in your deck.
Arguably 2/3 of Dave’s sideboard could be categorized as “creature suppression” … Compare with the main deck’s 1/60 (unfettered beatdown).
The same was not untrue for “control” defaulting decks. Dave’s deck was from about a year after I wrote Who’s the Beatdown?. Look at Randy Buehler’s influential World Championship deck from about a year before I wrote that fairly well received article:
Randy Buehler – CMU Blue
4 Nevinyrral’s Disk
4 Counterspell
4 Dismiss
2 Dissipate
3 Forbid
4 Force Spike
4 Impulse
3 Mana Leak
1 Memory Lapse
1 Rainbow Efreet
4 Whispers of the Muse
Even with 26 lands main deck Randy was willing to side in four more lands for the mirror to prolong the time until he would actually have to start tapping lands by just playing more and more of them (and in this case having something to say about how the opponent spent his mana in the case of Wasteland applied to cards like Stalking Stones)… Jockeying for more and more and more control.
Randy’s Forbidian from more-or-less the exact moment of the original Who’s the Beatdown? sided three lands as well as some glacial Whispers of the Muse that were certainly not there for the ultra-fast beatdown and combo decks of the era; played quickly, these Whispers would increase Randy’s chances of drawing early Thawing Glaciers, played late, they were even more effective in the card advantage department, especially very very long games.
Of course there are no hard-and-fast rules that are completely unbreakable… We’re talking about prevailing trends here. At the time I talked to Zvi about why this might be — players (at least sometimes correctly) positioning themselves as beatdown or control in game one, but both usually going for control sideboarded — and he remarked that it was obvious: Control has more card advantage, and it’s simply easier to win with more card advantage.
The reason this is interesting is because as time has gone on the best deck designers and players have tried more and more to go more beatdown than control sideboarded. Maybe not beatdown in the sense of “siding in Jackal Pups” (though that happens all the time when the format gives you the tools you need), but beatdown in the sense that you want to seize the initiative and force through your threats.
Think about Jund Mana Ramp v. Fae. I think Jund Mana Ramp is the control in this matchup (consider Asher ManningBot’s comment from You Make the Play, You Make the Play), which is as dodgy as it is unexpected (Game One is not exactly the most stable pillar of percentage)… But consider the specifics. Fae is the threat deck. They win not with permission but resolving Bitterblossom on turn two, and overwhelming with Mistbind Clique. Spellstutter Sprite is a pure tempo move one-for-one and Cryptic Command is usually there to get spit out of the way so that the infinite 1/1s and big old 4/4 can get in. Jund Mana Ramp is the Spartan 300 in this matchup. Jund is trying to hold the hot gates. The legions of little Fae are buzzing in… Jund wins by killing lots of them with Jund Charms and Cloudthreshers, usually wins with one big old Cloudthresher that didn’t get countered or killed… You know, how Weissman did back in the day with his one Serra Angel. That’s why getting in with a Kitchen Finks, Chameleon Colossus, or in Asher’s comment a Civic Wayfinder can change the tenor of a game: It’s like a special treat where you aren’t just taking it every turn and trying to survive until you can do something awesome.
But sideboarded, Jund can tear fingernails getting into the beatdown spot with Mind Shatter, or specifically Mind Shatter + Gutteral Response. So much more active. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. When it’s working, you either work them and they have no chance to be either beatdown or control because they now have nothing and you are about to untap and smash whatever they have left with the soon-to-be-full value Cloudthresher in the grip; when it doesn’t, you are still making active plays that are wearing on a limited screen of counterspells that will eventually buckle if they don’t, you know, execute on their plan and beatdown you to death.
During the span that made me Resident Genius a couple of years ago, many of the successful decks I put together — Josh Ravitz on Kuroda-style Red, my PTQ win with Critical Mass, and Osyp Lebedowicz with URzaTron — featured controllish decks with sideboards set up to beat controllish decks by forcing through table-shattering threats… All three of those sideboards were masterworks.
So why am I on this topic?
Here is a video I just uploaded to ye olde YouTube:
If you watched B/W Tokens Part I you can see that I had overwhelming offense in the sky with multiple Marsh Flitters and Cloudgoat Rangers while he couldn’t get through on the ground due to my little White men. However he was playing with the powerful Chameleon Colossus, which is usually medium scary for Bitterblossom players.
I mentioned in the video I sided out Glorious Anthem which just makes me even more beatdown in favor of Wrath of God and Elspeth, Knight-Errant (block one Chameleon Colossus forever and / or guarantee Wrath of God card advantage) in order to cover that side of the spectrum. In this case I am going kind of old school, siding control / card advantage cards, but you see how I cut off both beatdown [which I already had] AND control [in the case that he could get his bit threats through] roles.
You see a lot of successful decks implementing exactly this strategy, even if no commentator indicated that was what they were going for.
LOVE
MIKE
PS:
Michael Jacob’s B/W Tokens
4 Bitterblossom
3 Marsh Flitter
4 Terror
2 Thoughtseize
4 Tidehollow Sculler
3 Ajani Goldmane
4 Cloudgoat Ranger
4 Glorious Anthem
2 Knight of Meadowgrain
1 Knight of the White Orchid
4 Spectral Procession
For anyone who hasn’t seen the new B/W Tokens decks in Standard, Michael Jacob used a version to help knock down the 2008 Worlds team title in favor of the good old USA.
Michael Jacob’s B/W Tokens
4 Bitterblossom
3 Marsh Flitter
4 Terror
2 Thoughtseize
4 Tidehollow Sculler
3 Ajani Goldmane
4 Cloudgoat Ranger
4 Glorious Anthem
2 Knight of Meadowgrain
1 Knight of the White Orchid
4 Spectral Procession
sb:
2 Head Games
2 Thoughtseize
3 Stillmoon Cavalier
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
3 Wispmare
3 Wrath of God
This deck has some unusual choices…
[Only?] Two copies of Thoughtseize on one… but these compliment the full set of Tidehollow Scullers on two.
Black two mana spells include tons of Terrors, but also possibly the most powerful spell in the deck, a quartet of Bitterblossoms. This is the kind of deck — along with Blightning Beatdown — where I can really appreciate Bitterblossom. It’s obviously a strong card… I just hate the fact that it is Faerie-stamped.
The only “true” three mana spell in Michael’s deck is Glorious Anthem. I saw a similar innovation in a deck that Andre Coimbra showed me before Worlds. Andre was testing my Blightning Beatdown pretty heavily and was losing badly to B/W tokens. So he decided to brew up some mirror innovations for the B/W deck, and Glorious Anthem “to win the tokens fights” was one of the things he came up with. It looks like Jacob had the same idea.
Regardless, Glorious Anthem has killer synergy with token creatures in general… It can help to make 1/1 throwaways into [more] legitimate threats.
One thing that struck me as a little odd in this deck was the White Planeswalker in the main, that is, the “other” Ajani [Goldmane]. Yes, you can increase all tokens with Ajani, simiar to Glorious Anthem, but Elspeth Knight-Errant actually makes tokens. Her “to the air” attack is about as devastating as you can get with a Knight of Meadowgrain early. Do you realize that a ten-point life swing on a stick actually increases Elspeth’s loyalty?
Offense is rounded out by multiple “make three or more guys” guys… Marsh Flitter, Cloudgoat Ranger, and Spectral Procession. In the following video, I get my Spectral Procession stolen on turn two, but the other two token generators make quick work of Game One.
This one is kind of like a Who’s the Beatdown? redux.
It wasn’t really intended that way… The first part especially is about the Reflecting Pool Control deck Mike McGee used to make Top 8 of the Star City Games $5,000 event. But game play gave us a rare opportunity to observe the control deck switching roles.
I guess it all came down to turn one, where the opposing beatdown deck played Ghitu Encampment. Because I was on the play, this let me Remove Soul his first play and buy a ferocious amount of time.
Then it was Kitchen Finks, Kitchen Finks against an opponent with no creature set up to block.
Normally a deck like Red Deck Wins or Blightning Beatdown is a challenge for Reflecting Pool Control. However instead of playing a sit-there attack-acceptance strategy where we would win (hopefully) after a lifetime of draw-go Magic, I saw multiple Finks as an opportunity to attack.
A lot of the readership (viewership?) has been asking for full matches. So we will probably be following this one up with Game Two… and why we didn’t side in something that would seem obvious to most of you.
Until then… Don’t get played.
LOVE
MIKE
P.S. Oy! Mike’s deck list:
2 Island
3 Remove Soul
4 Wrath of God
3 Condemn
2 Cascade Bluffs
2 Flooded Grove
2 Cloudthresher
4 Cryptic Command
3 Jace Beleren
2 Mulldrifter
4 Vivid Creek
3 Vivid Grove
1 Vivid Marsh
4 Vivid Meadow
1 Negate
2 Ajani Vengeant
2 Cruel Ultimatum
4 Esper Charm
4 Kitchen Finks
2 Mystic Gate
2 Sunken Ruins
4 Reflecting Pool
It’s a redux of Vengeant Reveillark aka the Brian Kowal Boat-Brew.
Our good friend Osyp Lebedowicz just scored Top 8 at the Star City Games $5,000 tournament in Philadelphia with Brian’s deck, which he considers one of the top two decks in Standard (alongside the Fae).
For those of you who haven’t seen the most recent list, here it is cut down to a manageable 60 cards:
Sideboard:
4 Guttural Response
4 Stillmoon Cavalier
4 Voice Of All
3 Wrath Of God
The Boat-Brew is just chock full of great cards; Osyp was close to saying that Bantoine Ruel (Ranger of Eos) is his favorite card in Standard, but his final vote goes to powerhouse Planeswalker, Ajani Vengeant.
The deck is very robust against the majority of the Standard field, though there is a potential soft spot against Faeries. Faeries with four Sower of Temptation is very difficult to overcome, particularly because Sower of Temptation is just the scariest possible prospect when you are laying out 4/3 Reveillarks.
Osyp took the time to talk to me about some potential changes for the deck, along with justifications.
1) The deck already cut the first Murderous Redcap; Osyp wants to do away with the other three, plus one Kitchen Finks, and replace that quartet with Spectral Procession. Spectral Procession is a known quantity in Windbrisk Heights decks. It is also probably better against Red Decks than Kitchen Finks because the tokens can block a Demigod of Revenge while still getting damage in.
2) Swap the main deck Burrenton Forge-Tender for a Flamekin Harbinger. Flamekin Harbinger might seem like a strange choice for a deck with… What? Three elementals? But think about it like this: With Flamekin Harbinger, you can get Reveillark with Antoine Ruel, meaning Ranger of Eos gets better and better. If you can get your 1/1 killed (not hard) look to be able to set up more than one Reveillark. Osyp feels the Red Deck matchup is strong enough to justify this change, and the following video does nothing to change this opinion:
This list is 72/75 what I have been featuring every related blog post and video. Josh Ravitz supplied the physical cardboard and told me that I had too many cards for Reflecting Pool Control (my best matchup) and elected not to supply me with Thoughtseize, instead gave me some Lash Outs. The Lash Outs were great!
ROUND ONE – Merfolk
I played against Curtis, an old friend of WillPop aka Will Price of Progress aka Will Price (boring) from Top8Magic.
Game One I rolled the ‘folk, no probs, won at 19 drawing two Blightnings.
I hadn’t really thought about sideboarding against Merfolk and sided out Blightning for Infest, Hell’s Thunder for Gutteral Response.
Basically got runner, runner-runner’d out of Games two and three. In Game Three, it was literally 14-19 my lead and I ka-powed through two Reveillarks and all his little guys with Infest and a Mogg Fanatic. My grip was double Demigod of Revenge versus nil. He ripped Reveillark #3. Okay, well, I guess I’m sending Demigod #1 to his doom. Back come Merrow Reejeery and Sower of Temptation (no targets). However he has a Windbrisk Heights and some man land action. He comes in for six or so and forces me to pick up a Ghitu Encampment. No probs I have Sulfurous Springs to get back in there with Demigod and have to take two points to play my Demigods. The prob is… He ripped Loxodon Warhammer off of the Cryptic Command off of the Windbrisk Heights. So now I have two Demigods, am north of 10 life… and can’t attack.
Still he has no card in hand. I have to leave my guys home in case he draws a Merfolk for Reejeery tap but once I have active mana I can defend with Ghitu Encampments on the ground.
What is the single worst card he can pull?
Sower of Temptation!
Nil into ‘Lark into Cryptic into Loxodon into Sower?
Magnanimus!
Actually not magnanimus at all.
He takes my 5/4 and… You know how it went.
0-1
ROUND SEVEN – Reflecting Pool Control
I won five or six straight to go 6-1 at this point. Details at Top8Magic. Brian did a bonzer job by the way, updating on-the-go all day from his iPhone (have I mentioned we live in the future)?
6-1
ROUND EIGHT – Disaster!
So you are on a six round run.
You have beaten Story Circle on Red (on turn three, with no Blossom on board) and Story Circle on Black in the same game — without siding in Everlasting Torment; you’ve won the 56/60 mirror against probably a superior player (upcoming You Make the Play); you’ve pulled out a close one against the Fae by ripping Gutteral Response exactly when you needed a Gutteral Response.
Now you are two games from Top 8.
First.
Turn.
Windbrisk Heights.
Man!
Game One I only pulled five spells… and one was a Hell’s Thunder — it doesn’t even count!
Yet I have gotten him to two with a really brave Mogg Fanatic.
He’s on two.
If he’s not lethal next turn, it’s close.
You pull Incinerate!
The problem? Previous turn he picked up Burrenton Forge-Tender and played it.
Yeah.
No!
Game Two I was maybe tilting. I kept five lands (no Ghitu Encampment), Tarfire, Everlasting Torment. The only other spell I pulled the entire game was a second Everlasting Torment.
6-2
And that was the tournament.
I played the last round to see if I could get away with a $100 Top 16 prize.
Opponent was Fae.
I shipped to Paris four times in the two games. The real pisser was I had to ship a “perfect” two-land hand… but both lands were my two Reflecting Pools! No! Even against the Fae this was a pretty bad disadvantage. I could have won either game if I hit a break, but in Game Two he played three Cryptic Commands when any other response spell meant that I was going to get there.
And that was the tournament.
Josh says I was on tilt the last 1.5-2 rounds, but I think I played pretty well overall. I do not regret my deck selection by even one card, though I think three Everlasting Torments might have been better than four (final Lash Out).
MichaelJ is sick! No voice! Please forgive me, but I wanted to do a video on the deck I am playing at the Star City Games $5K before, you know, the Star City Games $5K.
I wanted to pretend-play eight matches on MTGO, pretending I was in a PTQ or whatever, but I went 6-1in the first seven, and I got a “draw” … However I wasn’t playing real Magic so the draw was irrelevant. So I just played the eighth (basically the nightmare matchup of Kitchen Finks, guys with large toughness, and Wilt-Leaf Liege for my Blightnings) … and got there easily. This solidified my choice of Blightning Beatdown for the $5K.
This is how I described the match on November 24:
8. G/W Little Kid
Game One – You probably know I made a deck with all G/W cards and Wilt-Leaf Liege for Block that won one PTQ (that I know about). I actually started thinking about this strategy again for Standard just because Wilt-Leaf Liege is so good against Blightning and Cruel Ultimatum. So basically, alongside Kitchen Finks and better guys than are in my colors — let alone my deck — this is the nightmare match.
Luckily he had a slow opening, which was my only saving grace. One too many lands came into play tapped so he couldn’t overrun me with superior forces. I stuck a Blightning that was pretty ironic. A turn or two later and I would have been eating 4/4.
Anyway he got out a ton of 4/x and 5/x creatures (with Liege boosts) but I had a late Bitterblossom to get in for a tiny amount of damage… eventually burned him to death.
Game Two – I side out Blightnings (obviously) for Everlasting Torments.
I luck out that his third land is a Mosswort Bridge, meaning my Figure of Destiny is 4/4 before he has a Wilt-Leaf Cavaliers in play. This is just what I need to get in -one too many times-. Then it’s all Hell’s Thunder and burn to the face. No sweat, thanks to his stumble.
And this here is the corresponding video:
Â
DON’T FORGET!
Â
I said way up top (and if you read the previous post) I am sick as hell. Meaning my voice is like cigarettes ground into gravel. Forgive me this one time, I really wanted to get the content out to you.