The PTQ exceeded 270 players, so a long nine rounds.
Round 1: Brad with Combo Elves
I was a little uncertain with my deck to start the day; I lost kind of a lot in Standard queues on Magic Online this week, but I kept losing to cards like Treetop Village and Boomerang, so I tried not to lose any confidence.
So of course Brad opened up with like Nettle Sentinel or a Heritage Druid, one of those jobbers, and I was like “oh man…”
Game One was not untenable, but I certainly wasn’t in a good position when he landed a turn five Primal Command, Time Walking me and gathering up a Ranger of Eos. I scanned the board and was pretty sure it was game, especially since I knew that I had a Savage Lands on top.
… But then a plan appeared in me olde noggin. I laid down the Ajani Vengeant in my hand — a singleton as you know — and kept his one Wooded Bastion tapped. Three or four turns went by, and it still hadn’t untapped! No Ranger, no more White sources, no combo. I was able to get in with Bloodbraid Elves and steal Game One.
I sided in Naya Charm, Lightning Bolt and Hallowed Burial (9) for Kitchen Finks, Cascading Sunlight, and 1 Bituminous Blast.
Game Two I had all the cards I needed to keep him off of combo killing me. Sadly, I somehow lost to creature beatdown 🙂
Game Three was capped off by Enlisted Wurm flipping Hallowed Burial.
1-0
Round 2: Ryan with Kithkin
This was the most frustrating match of the day because Kithkin — probably the most popular deck — is a virtual bye for my deck. Game One I kept a hand that I kept at least five other times over the course of the day — Borderland Ranger and two lands — and I got killed before taking my fifth turn. He literally went second turn Cenn; Mutavault, Cenn; Cenn; Cenn. The irony (beyond missing my third drop with the Ranger in my hand) was that I had not one but two Maelstrom Pulses 😐
Game Two I battled out of his tricks and stabilized the board ahead on life with a Kitchen Finks and a Borderland Ranger and four cards (but they were all lands) to his five lands and no cards, no board. Of course he ripped five straight head shots (including two copies of Ajani Goldmane, the most dangerous card out of Kithkin in this matchup) and I flipped five straight lands and inexplicably lost from 18.
To be fair, I sided kind of janky this matchup (but that matters less when you aren’t drawing any spells). I sided much better in the subsequent three Kithkin matches (see below).
1-1
Round 3: Joshua with Merfolk
Game One was kind of a whatever. He mulled to five, then played consecutive three mana Lords. I had a Maelstrom Pulse, so my first play put me up about four cards, which was essentially insurmountable for him.
Game Two he was ahead early with a Sage’s Dousing and Cryptic Command, but I caught up with my Cascades. Uneventful.
2-1
Round 4: Tim with Fae
I am trying to analyze my deck building right now. I don’t really get why I consistently build decks that are excellent against Reflecting Pool Control but consistently mediocre against Fae. His draws weren’t even that good (mine were actually pretty bad, but playably bad, and I saw a Cloudthresher and resolved two [unimpressive] Enlisted Wurms), but he won in two. The second one he needed a second Scion to kill me on the spot (though a Cryptic Command or Mistbind Clique might have kept me from winning on a counterstrike); he got the second Scion… I think I would have won otherwise.
I sided Cloudthresher for Maelstrom Pulse in this one.
2-2
Round 5: Chris with Kithkin
This round was mentally indistinguishable for me with the next one (I took no notes and it was a long tournament, sorry). 2-0 win over Kithkin; opponent was even named Chris! The Kithkin matchup is favorable but still competitive in Game One, a complete blowout in sideboarded games.
I used the same sideboarding strategy in this and the subsequent two Kithkin pairings: I sided out all the Bloodbraid Elves, three Bituminous Blasts (or two Blasts and one Captured Sunlight), and Ajani Vengeant for Lightning Bolt and Hallowed Burial. Bloodbraid Elf isn’t really a card against Kithkin because of all their first strike and Burrenton Forge-Tenders (plus they are just one more janky thing you lose to a Hallowed Burial). Sunlights help force them to commit to the board while you fix mana or blow up lots of tokens.
Incidentally you may have noticed I basically never side out Primal Commands (though I do side them in).
3-2
Round 5: Chris with Kithkin
As above.
4-2
Round 7: Bill with Jund Aggro Cascade
This was a weird match because of what cards he showed me in Game One… Hellspark Elementals, Bloodbraid Elf, Maelstrom Pulse, maybe a Bituminous Blast. I put him on some cross between Cascade and burn, so I sided in two Primal Commands for two Maelstrom Pulses. I am not sure if it’s right to leave in Maelstrom Pulse (or how many) against burn decks. On the one hand Maelstrom Pulse is horrendous in Game One but on the other hand, they might have Everlasting Torment.
Anyway I won both games north of 20. I spent most of Game Two Primal Commanding a Savage Lands and searching up (and sandbagging) Enlisted Wurms while beating down with one Borderland Ranger (I think I ran six Primal Commands with Naya Charms helping out). I just wanted to know what his last card was; turns out it was a Ball Lightning.
5-2
Round 8: James with Boat Brew
Strange matchup. Three complete blowouts, two for me and one for him. I drew terribly in three games; he drew terribly in two games (but apparently my terrible draws far out-lasted his terrible draws). Maybe my third game wasn’t that terrible… I had two Hallowed Burials in hand at the end of the game (but I didn’t really want them… I wanted some guys so I could cast a Hallowed Burial). He was quite flooded in both the games he lost, but I was even more flooded in Game One than he was (though James made the point that I was playing a Ramp deck and he was playing with Path to Exile). In the third game, James was somehow flooded and color screwed at the same time, which is really awkward if you think about it… But I guess the loss of Battlefield Forge really hurts decks like Boat Brew. All in all, a bit of a sloppy match all the way around.
6-2
Round 9: Oliver with Kithkin
Game One he mulled to five in what is already not a great matchup; he made it competitive with multiple Cenns and Figures, but I set up offensive Ajani and Naya Charms to attack him to death.
Game Two Josh says I played one of the worst blowouts he had ever seen. I won by a mile but apparently I played it quite badly. I had a superb draw with Kitchen Finks, multiple Lightning Bolts, Hallowed Burial, and lands. I decided to Bolt and Pulse all his guys (Ethersworn Canonist, Wizened Cenn, and Wilt-Leaf Liege) and go offensive. He had a trio of Cloudgoat Rangers but I had four Hallowed Burials, including one off of an Enlisted Wurm, to make it look easy.
Josh’s contention is that I shouldn’t have even Bolted his Canonist; I could have just blocked his Liege and traded my Lightning Bolt and half a Kitchen Finks for it; at this point he would have still been forced to commit more cards, which would have made my first Burial very worthwhile (instead of just taking out a Ranger and his buddies, and maybe one more card). Essentially I won the Cascade lottery to make a badly played game appear deceptively smooth. Oh well.
7-2
I am not sure what to do at this point.
Kithkin took out Osyp playing G/W Combo Elves in the finals when Osyp shipped to five cards. Kithkin is probably going to stay a top tier deck, and the Rhox Meditant deck appears to be one of the finest anti-Kithkin decks in the field. The problem I’ve encountered is that it is very difficult (for me) to beat Fae and anything else simultaneously. I have built decks that are awesome against Fae and Reflecting Pool Control simultaneously, viz. Blightning Beatdown, but can’t beat Kithkin. Right now I think I have a deck that is very good against Kithkin but will not be able to beat Fae consistently. I have been shredding Fae online with Kithkin, but then I have the mirror… plus I am not going to be able to compete with a competent Reflecting Pool Control player basically ever.
Another option is aggro Cascade instead of control Cascade. I think I am going to come back to the Naya-based 4x Primal Command (sideboard) Cascade deck I was playing immediately prior to the Rhox Meditant deck, and just try out Lightning Bolt over Volcanic Fallout (main) to start. Could be an option… Then again, there are worse strategies than to run this deck again, one match (again!) out of Top 8.
Your thoughts and comments are always welcome.
LOVE
MIKE
PS With this 7-2, the Optimus Prime Tee Shirt is still batting one thousand in packs acquisition.
About moving Naya Charm to the main for more MTGO tournament testing, plus a little more G/W Steward of Valeron dot dec and a look at All-in Green! More or less lots of deck lists all featuring basic Forest and Wooded Bastion 🙂
The summer I was pretty good at Magic (solid individual performance at Pro Tour Charleston culminating in winning the New York State Championship that fall) yes, I was playing lots of Magic with Jon Finkel, but I was also playing lots of MTGO tournaments, specifically 8-man Constructed Queues.
Based on several readers’ suggestions, most notably Gerry Thompson, I decided to branch out of my Tournament Practice Room testing with just a bunch of one-on-one queues, which, while not Premiere Events or anything, are still raked tournaments and force me to play a bit better than the Tournament Practice Room. What is probably obvious to everyone — but I had somehow forgotten over the last couple of years — is how much more difficult the play in actual tournaments is! The Tournament Practice Room is very loose by comparison, even when opponents have all the cards.
Anyway, I have played five total matches with the Rhox Meditant deck (now with 100% less Rhox Meditant), going 4-1 overall. Last blog post I described getting one against G/W Combo Elves. That was good for +10 points. Here is how the next four matches have gone…
The Esper Beats loss was obviously hairy. No offense to my opponent meant, but this was a loose deck. All 2/1 shroud first strike, Paladin en-Vec, and 2/2 flying (Mulldrifter and a four mana Mulldrifter that only costs four).
The first game I was very distracted because Clark kept getting out of bed and running around and I got up no fewer than four times to put him back to bed. This caused me to play the wrong land on turn three so I couldn’t play Civic Wayfinder, so my first play ended up being turn FIVE. I figured that I could win by overwhelming his two power guys with Enlisted Wurms but he just kept playing more and more.
I put the read on that he didn’t have Cryptic Command, but I was still kind of in trouble to his 2/2 flying. Basically I flipped Maelstrom Pulse on every early Cascade for no targets, then never saw a Maelstrom Pulse or Bituminous Blast (and never a Bituminous Blast at all this game) once there was a target. Boo-urns.
Game Two I just smashed him with tempo and played several Primal Commands on his Arcane Sanctum. He only ever played one Paladin en-Vec before I won.
Game Three I shipped a weak two-lander into a moderate two-lander with a little gamble to it. I developed, teased him with a Primal Command (he bit with Cancel) and figured I had him set up; I was right on my read of one Cancel but he had a COUNTERSQUALL for my Hallowed Burial! Boo-urns! Boo-urns! I thought I could stabilize it but he had a last minute Terror for my Enlisted Wurm. I was gambling a bit on that one, looking for a Hallowed Burial, Bituminous Blast, or at least Maelstrom Pulse. I got like a nothing… Civic Wayfinder. I am not sure it was better to play the Enlisted Wurm rather than a Civic out of my hand and a Kitchen Finks (despite none of them being long for the world). Shrug.
The B/G deck I beat with Naya Charm. He played with a land destruction sub-theme, Rain of Tears, Fulminator Mage, and Primal Command, so I sided in Naya Charm just for lands. In Game Three he used his Primal Command to start racing me with Thornling. I expertly stayed alive with a combination of well measured chump blocks anticipating Trample, Primal Commands of my own to stay alive and Time Walk, and racing back. I got him the last turn when he activated Treetop Village, inviting Bituminous Blast, which flipped Naya Charm, that tapped his Thornling and left the doors wide open for my Enlisted Wurm.
Those two matches were last night.
For tonight I decided to move some Naya Charms to the main; basically I swapped three of them for three Planeswalkers but didn’t really change any of the 75 (just some positions); if I had Naya Charm main, I am pretty sure I would have beaten the Esper deck in Game One (and with it, the match). If you are REALLY lazy, here is the deck list:
The Cascade LD seemed like not a great matchup because he had Cruel Ultimatum to reset. I don’t really remember how I lost Game One. He never did anything that worthwhile. Like a Civic Wayfinder is better than all of his cards (Bloodbraid Elf, various Stone Rains, whatever). Boomerang makes the deck quick and Grixis Charm flexible; he actually got me with Deny Reality into Grixis Charm when I only had two lands and forced me to discard multiple in I think Game Two… but I won that one as well as Game Three.
I got Ultimatum’d in both of the first two but I pulled out two anyway. Basically I Ultimatum’d him back with the Enlisted Ultimatum I was sandbagging. Game Three my hand was kind of mana light to begin with, he boomed me down to no permanents, and I got back after he cast all his spells (just didn’t draw Cruel Ultimatum this game).
My Sanity Grinding opponent was super nice, and a comic book fan by his nickname 🙂
Sanity Grinding is just not a hard matchup if you can force through the main deck Primal Command… Game Two i think I played like four Primal Commands. This game I actually got off Ajani Ultimatum, which was cute (doesn’t happen every day).
If nothing dramatic happens, I am playing the above deck list, but with Borderland Rangers, next weekend.
So another deck I played a bunch of matches with — albeit Tournament Practice Room — is All-in Green. I wanted to try to re-embrace the All-in Green from the Steward of Valeron deck. That deck I have been winning most of them, though I did lose the G/W mirror tonight, to G/W Tokens. Anyway, I decided to make All-in Green per my discussions with BDM in real life and the Top 8 Magic Podcast:
sb:
1 Behemoth Sledge
1 Gutteral Response
4 Cloudthresher
4 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Ranger of Eos
4 Rhox Meditant
I played five matches with this deck.
Mono-Black:
Won in I think two… I think that everyone who is looking to play Mono-Black should think about it for a minute; Chameleon Colossus is bad enough but Great Sable Stag is coming too.
Jund Elves:
I was able to trump with Chameleon Colossus + Behemoth Sledge.
Blightning (no Blightning?)
I lost the first of two matches due to a misclick. I had Chameleon Colossus on board and Primal Command underneath a Mosswort Bridge. I accidentally clicked to use the Bridge with four mana in my pool; for some reason the Colossus didn’t activate! (That reason was my misclick). Would have won otherwise so he game me a rematch.
In the rematch he got me fair and square.
Finally I beat a slow cascade deck by dropping second turn Ethersworn Canonist. He played four Cryptic Commands but refused to bounce the Canonist, so eventually I got there.
So would I play All-in Green in a real tournament?
Probably not. It lacks the ability to deal with utility creatures; case in point, my Blighting opponent played second turn Sygg, River Cutthroat every game but one. I basically had to wait until he was ready to block (which was non-zero, but also not up to YT).
At present I don’t really see a whole lot of time put into All-in Green versus actual tournament play for the Rhox Meditant deck.
For those of haven’t done it yet, go order Zvi’s book!
Short post tonight – just indicating some recent changes to my favorite Standard decks.
I got back from movie night at Jonny Magic’s and started playing in one-on-one queues for the first time tonight. Movie night was awesome, as usual. Super packed house for a viewing of The Triplets of Belleville. I found out that Tom Martell has a blog! The best part about Tom’s blog is that it has almost no content, but a link to my blog 🙂
Anyway, I played three matches, one one-on-one queue with Rhox Meditant deck and two Tournament Practice Room matches with Steward of Valeron deck. All successful.
Rhox Meditant Deck (now with 100% less Rhox Meditant)
I somehow got an Anathemancer in my main deck and played 61 cards (Jon Becker alert).
My opponent was G/W combo Elves, which should be a miserable pairing. Game one I might have been able to win — it’s possible — but I flipped Anathemancer on a Cascade spell when he had only Forests. Sub-comical.
His play was superb, by the way. He did all the little things that some players get sloppy and miss. For example I flipped Maelstrom Pulse with Bloodbraid Elf and targeted Devoted Druid when he had two on board; he correctly killed his own Druid with -1/-1 counters rather than lose them both; right play, obvious when you say it out loud, and still something many miss. I conceded when he had three Regal Forces in play, thirteen Green creatures, and had played his second or third Primal Command on me.
Game Two I got on tempo. Just Kitchen Finks into Bloodbraid Elf this time. His draw wasn’t bad, just slow and on the draw. I had more Bloodbraid Elf action and Maelstrom Pulse and other removal to handle any little Elves. I had Hallowed Burial from my opener but never had to play it.
I sided again for Game Three to be faster.
+3 Naya Charm
-3 Ajani Vengeant
This game took forever and he had superb action but he was never really in it. It was a little scary when he got me with a third turn Primal Command but I recovered for Maelstrom Pulse on half his Elves engine, which slowed him enough to bite it to my first Hallowed Burial. I played three or four total in Game Three, off of Naya Charms and Enlisted Wurms.
I trished him out long, Long, LONG until it was Enlisted Wurm against [lonely] Regal Force. At this point he had like one card left and I had six, including Naya Charms and Hallowed Burials hand and graveyard. Hallowed Burial is great in this matchup.
Naya Charm might just be better than Ajani, but Ajani is a key source of headaches for control decks. It’s all balancing.
Main changes are minus one main deck Ranger of Eos, swapping for a Path to Exile.
Sideboard includes Ethersworn Canonist now, which is a concession to the Bloodbraid decks and also can help slow down combo decks. I haven’t sided it in yet.
Matches were straightforward; nothing fancy. The best was when I used Celestial Purge against his first turn Borderpost 🙂
I have a PTQ coming up. I am probably going to play my two-for-one Cascade deck as detailed in Rhox Meditant Again (ironically with no Rhox Meditants… replaced them with Ajani Vengeant), but I wanted to work on a fallback deck that would require less processing power and allow me to play more quickly through a long tournament. Inspired by the standout G/W decks of Pro Tour Honolulu, I decided to explore, um, a different Rhox Mediatant deck.
I am not sure that this deck isn’t just worse than G/W Tokens. However there are certain synergies that are just irresistable, for example Chameleon Colossus + Elspeth, Knight-Errant. You get these crazy mana acceleration draws sometimes that go like Noble Hierarch, Steward of Valeron, multiple Hierarchs, in… then you have Exalted for tons of damage the next turn, plus Cloudthresher mana. It’s really quite strange.
Ranger of Eos is a really high quality card in this deck despite there being only four total targets main. You don’t usually play a long enough game to “run out” of one mana creatures, even if you are stuck drawing some. There is usually something else you can play on four or five mana.
For those of you who haven’t played Thornling yet… Start. I can’t believe I am saying this, but Thornling is better than Chameleon Colossus most of the time. Indestructable is a powerful ability, as is trample. When combined with Indestructable and multiple Noble Hierarchs, +1/-1 is really quite dizzying.
All that said, this deck might not be as strong as the now Rhox Meditant-free Rhox Meditant Again deck, or some of the others. It is, however, straightforward to run and fun to play, which are compelling features when approaching a long day that promises to be an arduous struggle of rounds.
I really like a Thornling 🙂
So for those of you who didn’t know yet, we just started taking preorders on My Files by my good friend Zvi Mowshowitz. This volume of My Files is like Zvi’s Deckade, only Zvi is a Pro Tour Champion instead of just a master of, you know, life like YT.
I know you guys are all going crazy to sign up to pick up your copy of My Files, so I’ll just run out the link to Top 8 Magic now, and let you go about your business: My Files at Top 8 Magic
The future of beloved Jund Mana Ramp is uncertain due to M10 coming soon (sadly I probably won’t even get to play it in its current form in a PTQ). However some friends have asked for a sideboarding guide. Here goes!
For easy reference, here is the Jund Mana Ramp deck list I would play:
B/W Tokens is a deck where Jund Mana Ramp is a slight but not overwhelming favorite. The main problem is that you can get stuck with Shriekmaw hands that are worthless against B/W Tokens. Volcanic Fallout is okay but nothing special, usually trading one for one with Spectral Procession but not doing a whole lot else.
That said, Jund tends to win the games where B/W has a “regular” draw on basis of card quality. They play something, you play something better. Most of the time you will want to kill Ajani Goldmane in any way you can as quickly as you can.
The games Jund loses are usually games where the opponent has a very disruptive Tidehollow Sculler draw or locks you out with infinite Ajani + Persist creatures.
Sideboarding we just swap Shriekmaw (very bad) for Caldera Hellion (very good). One thing you might consider doing is to NOT Devour with Caldera Hellion, allowing it to die. This can give you a future option of Makeshift Mannequin, especially on the opponent’s turn. Terror is pretty good because it can kill like a 10/10 Mutavault.
I’ve never played agaisnt ElfBall with Jund but this is how I would side.
Elves
+3 Caldera Hellion
+1 Shriekmaw
+1 Terror
+1 Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund
-3 Cloudthresher
-3 Volcanic Fallout
Elves is a much more competitive matchup than most of the other creature decks because they [also] have Chameleon Colossus. I have personally never lost a game where I drew so much as one Shriekmaw; I am willing to use Shriekmaw for defensive speed. Basically you want to stretch most of Phase II with a better board and keep damage off (remember they can kill you with Profane Command).
Sideboarding is a bit tricky; you are taking out creature kill and swapping in different creature kill. You need all your Banefires to kill Chameleon Colossus and in some cases first turn mana accelerators depending on the tenor of the game. I would be fine playing versus Elves any round but it is not a super easy matchup like G/W Tokens or Five-color Blood.
Fae
+1 Anathemancer
+1 Terror
+1 Volcanic Fallout
-3 Shriekmaw
Fae is a favorable matchup for Jund Mana Ramp… and you still lose some of the time. Terror is in for Mistbind Clique (their main threat against you).
Five-color Blood is a blissfully easy matchup main deck and it just gets better sideboarded. Remember the original tension our group described RE: Civic Wayfinder v. Bloodbraid Elf. Five-color Blood might be able to sting you with Sygg, River Cutthroat, but if you are going to lose, it will usually involve being on the wrong end of a Putrid Leech (I never have though). You want to tax the Leech as much as possible with Kitchen Finks and Civic Wayfinder. If you can stick a Chameleon Colossus at any point (and presumably defend it from Cruel Ultimatum) you can’t really lose. I have withstood Cruel Ultimatum out of Five-color Blood several times. Just not a dangerous matchup for Jund Mana Ramp.
Fog is a deceptively super easy matchup. In Game One you basically need to do six damage fair and square. If you can do six damage you can usually win with Volcanic Fallout, Cloudthresher, Banefire, and Makeshift Mannequin. Always evoke Cloudthresher — that sets you up for Makeshift Mannequin (you can’t really ever get creature damage in once you are at six mana). If you have to discard, discard stuff like Broodmate Dragon; you are just never going to get damage in that way.
Primal Command is good many different ways. Drawing extra and then braining their Howling Mines is fine. Shuffling your deck up in the middle of Stage Two (successfully) is basically game right then and there (they will deck).
Anathemancer is better than most of the other creatures even if they don’t have a lot of nonbasics. You really just need to sneak in a small amount of damage to dominate them, and they will be less apt to blow a Fog on a two damage packet than, say, a doubled-up Chameleon Colossus.
G/W Tokens is an extremely easy matchup. I am not sure which is easier, G/W Tokens or Five-color Blood but they are both extremely easy and you almost can’t lose. So if this is the case, play so they can’t kill you out of nowhere with an Overrun, because it’s one of the only ways they can ever win. Unlike B/W Tokens they don’t have a persistent source of creatures or any way to keep you from demolishing them turn after turn with superior spells.
Sideboarded you just max out on creature kill and kill all their guys (i.e. the only way they can win).
Jund Mana Ramp
+1 Shriekmaw
+1 Terror
+1 Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund
+4 Primal Command
-4 Kitchen Finks
-3 Volcanic Fallout
This sideboarding strategy assumes they are running some terrible Fertile Ground deck with no Chameleon Colossus; if they have Chameleon Colossus you have to leave in all your Kitchen Finks, so instead pull Black removal.
Red Decks
+1 Shriekmaw
+1 Terror
+4 Primal Command
-4 Cloudthresher
-2 Volcanic Fallout
You are about a 20-25% dog game one; you are that much of a favorite sideboarded. You want to gain seven and grab Broodmate Dragons to race.
Reflecting Pool Control
+4 Anathemancer
+1 Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund
+4 Primal Command
-3 Shriekmaw
-3 Kitchen Finks
-3 Volcanic Fallout
Reflecting Pool Control is one of the easier matchups for Jund Mana Ramp. Philosophically you need to utilize your Trish cards (Civic Wayfinder et al) to keep pace with Reflecting Pool Control’s card advantage while establishing what pressure you can. You can usually jockey for a fair amount of damage with Treetop Villages. The most annoying thing is if they can hurt you with a Plumeveil; that will usually take a lot of wind out of your sails. That said, you are heavily favored main if you can get them anywhere near where you need to get them and then point Banefire. Their deck is quite slow so you can often hit multiple Banefires to win. Shriekmaw is not nearly as bad as it seems because you need to suppress Walls, plus Shriekmaw has fear; nevertheless we side him out.
Sideboarded you can really only lose if they have a large number of varied sideboard cards, viz. Pithing Needle and Runed Halo AND THEY DRAW THEM. Your offense is irresistable otherwise, with Anathemancers and Banefires as near-auto-wins. If they tap for Broodmate Dragon you kill them with Karrthus (if you are a miser like WillPop anyway), and you basically win any game you can stick a Primal Command (usually Time Walk + Anathemancer).
White Weenie
+3 Caldera Hellion
+1 Volcanic Fallout
+1 Shriekmaw
+1 Terror
-2 Broodmate Dragon
-4 Banefire
Sideboarding White Weenie is slightly different from sideboarding G/W Tokens. White Weenie is a harder matchup than G/W because Burrenton Forge-Tender can kold your sweep, plus White Weenie can get really wicked fast draws like Isamaru, Wizened Cenn, Procession, Ajani, and so on. Therefore we side out Broodmate Dragon and leave in Chameleon Colossus on basis of speed. You just want a faster body on the board.
And then there was that whole thing about the fight scene on 8th Avenue 🙂
Long story short, I actually made a Rhox Meditant-based deck the same night that I started working on the Cascade deck from “Primal Command I Guess?” … It was weird. I won the first ten-ish matches and got bored already; plus there were all those Bloodbraid Elf mirrors. So I decided to borrow a feather from Saito’s cap and go with Rhox Meditant for additional card advantages / Bloodbraid Elf trumping.
Rhox Meditant falls kind-of in the Civic Wayfinder camp. One of the reasons that Civic Wayfinger decks like Jund Mana Ramp are so effective against Five-color Blood et al is that Civic Wayfinder pre-empts and profitably matches a Bloodbraid Elf. The Civic Wayfinder has superior speed to the Bloodbraid Elf and trades with it heads-up. The Civic Wayfinder goes and gets a card; the Bloodbraid Elf goes and gets a card. Which card is superior? It’s hard to say. Sometimes a Boggart Ram-Gang is better than a basic Swamp. Usually the basic whatever the Civic Wayfinder gets is 100x better than whatever the Bloodbraid Elf gets (this is in-matchup we are talking about). A Boggart Ram-Gang is a real threat, but a Putrid Leech might or might not be. A Maelstrom Pulse might be relevant, then again might not be.
Rhox Meditant is very similar to a Civic Wayfinder. It is not of superior speed to a Bloodbraid Elf; it is of equal speed (which is kind of superior speed when you go first). It is, however, of superior size. Yes, six is bigger than five. But more importantly, it has exactly enough power to down a Bloodbraid Elf and exactly enough toughness to weather a Bloodbraid Elf. Therefore it counteracts the Bloodbraid Elf’s body, and more; as for the bonus cards? Usually the Bloodbraid Elf will have the upper hand; a Rhox Meditant is not a Civic Wayfinder: There is absolutely no “aim” to it. But then again, when you topdeck a Rhox Meditant under pressure, you are probably happier to see it late in a game than a Civic Wayfinder.
That said, as an anti-Bloodbraid Elf deck, this one plays both 🙂
Why is it version 1.2? The original version had main deck Behemoth Sledge over Primal Command. I was seeing the efficacy of Primal Command in the other deck, and was playing it in the sideboard of this one. However Behemoth Sledge seemed like a good addition to the strategy based on wanting to ramp up bodies of Civic Wayfinder or Rhox Meditant (not huge), or giving Enlisted Wurm trample (double huge).
This was changed from version 1.0 for the following reason…
You know how we guru masterminds always say to make the tightest play, you know, while rubbing our fictitious beards? Well in at least one case I didn’t do so and it cost me.
I won about ten matches with this version, against a variety of decks, and only lost one. This is how I lost it:
I am playing against a Five-color Bloodbraid Elf variant. His fifth color comes out the very last turn of the first game, where he Counterspells my game-winning Enlisted Wurm, taps my team, and kills me. “Game winning” is kind of in quotes because it could have been Naya Charm and it would have done the same thing. Anyway his super cool innovation was Blightning. Blightning is really impressive with Sygg, River Cutthroat (turn two Sygg, turn three Blightning is a kick in the jones), and Blightning is superb off of the Bloodbraid Elf.
So it is the deciding game. My mana has come out really strange. It’s like turn four and I am planning to play a Kitchen Finks to stabilize. My plan is Bituminous Blast into Enlisted Wurm based on the Finks stabilization. He has a lot of cards due to playing Sygg into Blightning, then Bloodbraid Elf into Boggart Ram-Gang. But I think that I can stabilize with a Finks, get some nice value on the Bituminous Blast, and then put the nail in his coffin with the Wurm.
But then I draw Captured Sunlight.
Why couldn’t it have been Bloodbraid Elf?
So I am thinking to myself… Kitchen Finks is an irrelevant blocker that gets me two-to-four, soaks up a little, buffers my life total, really just bridges me to turn five.
But Captured Sunlight? I get four life up-front and I am just going to flip a three anyway (probably). I have 13 cards I can flip (there is a Kitchen Finks in my hand). If I flip one of the three Kitchen Finks, I am way ahead on the Captured Sunlight. If I flip a Civic Wayfinder I am about even, at least if he doesn’t have a Bituminous Blast. If I flip a Maelstrom Pulse that would be pretty cool… Probably a little better than if I flipped a Civic Wayfinder, but not tremendously better. Because I was 11/13 likely to flip a non-Behemoth Sledge.
How likely am I to win if I play the Kitchen Finks?
It’s hard to say.
I have a plan.
I think I am going to win.
I have lands. I have multiple Cascade spells. He only has maybe four Counterspells in his deck. That said, he has really powerful cards. He has already gotten me for a three-for-one and an additional plus-one due to Sygg, Blightning, and his board. But I have a plan and I think that I can win this one… But it’s not certain. For sake of argument let’s say that I am dead even (I am probably a dog, to be honest). But for sake of argument say if I make the Kitchen Finks play I am in a position to dig in my heels and win half the time.
Let’s say if that’s true that Captured Sunlight into Kitchen Finks — which is a clearly superior play — puts me way more likely to win due to a bigger cushion in life total… 65% over 50%.
We agreed that a Civic Wayfinder (slightly worse on the board, but with an arguably more significant life delta, plus the obvious card advantage) is about even. So 50% again.
Captured Sunlight into Maelstrom Pulse is very similar to playing a Kitchen Finks. We gain life (twice as much initially) but we also get to point at the guy we want to kill, and kill him (I probably would have picked Boggart Ram-Gang). This removes the possibility of his getting short term Bituminous Blast advantage that also prevents us from making the block we want (he can attack with just Boggart Ram-Gang and Sygg the following turn and leave us with no blocks if we go Finks and he goes Blast). So it is 55% over 50%.
But what about Behemoth Sledge?
We never win if we flip Behemoth Sledge.
You know how this story ended up. Otherwise why would I have removed Behemoth Sledge, and with it, any chances of ever flipping a Behemoth Sledge?
Did I get unlucky?
Yeah, 2/13 is not particularly likely.
But how unlucky did I get?
People bet their mortgages on 15-16% every day… and sometimes it’s right (with the right amount of value on the line). How about in this case?
I laid out a table with the estimated percentages we discussed, the likelihood of play X or Y occurring, and then a point value based on the chance to win times the likelihood of occurring (so for example with Kitchen Finks I have a 50% chance of winning 100% of the time, so it gets a value of .5). Are you surprised to see this?
Ka-pow!
Even though 23% of the time I increase my chances of winning from 50% to 65%, my overall chances to win suffer when I go Captured Sunlight rather than Kitchen Finks. In fact, they suffer to the tune of 3%.
Just something to think about the next time you go for that “cool” play instead of the consistent, tight, one you were thinking about until it actualy came time to execute.
LOVE
MIKE
Currently Reading (actually an early Father’s Day Gift):Fables Covers: The Art of James Jean Vol. 1 <-- exactly what I wanted 🙂
P.S. Imagine we didn't have Behemoth Sledge in our deck at all. This is what our table would look like instead:
About 1/3 of the time we end up about as good (Civic Wayfinder) and about 2/3 of the time we end up in better position than when we play Kitchen Finks. So if there is no Behemoth Sledge dramatically dragging us down with its 0% likelihood of winning, the right play changes quite clearly.
I was trying to figure out something compelling to say about the two Cascade decks that I have been working on this week, and I guess the answer is Primal Command. It’s funny… I was telling BDM how much I liked playing these decks and he reminded me that we spent a long time (originally) bagging on Primal Command. It has turned out quite the Command… But this isn’t really about Primal Command but some Cascade stuff.
My initial motivations were somewhere between wanting to play with Steward of Valeron and playing with a Red Deck (I think I might have specifically been thinking of playing with Ball Lightning alongside Bloodbraid Elf at the time)… Which explains my Flame Javelins.
From a separate angle BDM has been telling me that he thinks that you might as well play Naya Charm in a deck like Pat Chapin’s five-color Bloodbraid Elf deck… None of us like the UUU requirements in that deck, though everyone of course respects the Blue cards Cryptic Command and Cruel Ultimatum. My theory was that I could just cheat and play all the Bituminous Blasts and that would be kind of like having Blue cards.
I understand people like a Sygg but Steward of Valeron makes for more explosive potential draws. You know, turn three Bloodbraid Elf into Boggart Ram-Gang and all that. It doesn’t come up that often, but Steward of Valeron is a very high quality card… Easily the equal of Putrid Leech in terms of quality if not offensive capability.
Volcanic Fallout is kind of super stainsy… at times. Half the time I don’t want to play it when it comes up on a Cascade. I was thinking about playing with Jund Charm (which is worse against Faeries) but my mana right now is only a very slight touch for Black, and then relatively high on the curve, which is much different than having to play exactly Jund Charm, especially under pressure. For now it’s Fallout, but that is my least favorite spell in this deck.
As for the sideboard I keep wanting Aura of Silence, thinking to myself how much easier a lot of these matches would be with Aura of Silence… and then winning anyway, without it or Maelstrom Pulse. “See next deck,” I suppose.
Here is a rundown of the matches I’ve had with Base-Naya Four-color Aggro so far:
1. Kithkin Apparently Kithkin matters. Tonight I am working on Top Decks for the week, which of course includes Kithkin in the Top 8 of the most recent Grand Prix but also a win by my old teammate Matt Boccio (easily the most dangerous Vs. player ever in terms of batting average) with Mono-White Kithkin in Philadelphia. Like I said, apparently Kithkin matters.
Well in this case it was a super easy win for Base-Naya Four-color Aggro. Woolly Thoctar was very big and useful and I got money with Volcanic Fallout.
1-0
2. Esper Something This deck was lots of Borderposts and a variety of artifacts, Tezzeret, etc.
Game One I won on tremendous tempo. It was just like bam, Bam, BAM… Bam again, kick, wham, stunner… Hello! His like only meaningful play (and I use the term “meaningful” loosely given the configuration of this deck) was to play Pithing Needle naming Anathemancer.
Game Two was the reverse. First of all he juked my brains out with Esper Panorama. I had like Reflecting Pool, Steward of Valeron, Exotic Orchard… it slowed me down a bit. Then Esper Panorama was like his only nonbasic the whole game. This one he used Tezzeret to gather many and more copies of Vedalken Outlander and Scepter of Dominance. Basically he just kept tapping down my Stewards and laughing at my Red men. Eventually he got enough counters on Tezzeret to go Ultimate on quads Outlanders (and whatever else) for a blowout.
Game Three I was like desperately trying to figure out how to win. Because my Game Two strategy was atrocious. That is I flipped Anathemancer (Red spell) on a Cascade and he had no nonbasics on board. And I had like two more in grip that I ran out there (you know, ran onto the Battlefield) and they were nothing. Less than nothing.
So I thought very hard about how and what I should sideboard. I put all the Cloudthreshers in. I just wanted something that could damage my opponent through his mighty Outlanders. But I decided to keep one Anathemancer in with my four Primal Commands. This game he ran out quite a few nonbasics (probably thinking I had sided out my Anathemancers, which I had… but one). Last turn was Primal Command for the Anathemancer + scoop. Great match for Tournament Practice.
2-0
3. Four-color Bloodbraid Beatdown He had the Madrush Cyclops version, which is a lot more common than I would have thought. This was a L-W-W for the good guys. He had the early Cascade advantage but I mised into Naya Charm and realized I could Naya Charm race him through… Which only didn’t work because he had Naya Charm too 🙂
Primal Commands demolished him in the sideboarded games. The combination of gaining seven life to race the opponent’s Anathemancer and setting up your own (sometimes bonus) Anathemancers makes Primal Command a compelling addition to the Cascade strategy.
Typically in these matchups (quite common) I have been siding…
Siding out Steward… I dunno about that but it is the weakest card in the deck when it comes to both players sending overhand rights at each other (Anathemancers and Primal Commands in my case, along with the nonstop Cascade blowout cards from both sides); Flame Javelin is just weaker -4 than Primal command +7.
3-0
4. G/W Elves I played against a super nice opponent who was a former WotC designer, which explains this tight quote when she mis-played and ran out post-combat Noble Hierarch to miss a point of Exalted:
“I’m roleplaying as a blond, apparently.”
LOL. Gamer humor.
It went all three games. Game one she blew me out; game two she got blown out by Cloudthresher and Fallout to erase her mana accelerators. Game Three I had a commanding lead but elected not to attack Garruk Wildspeaker… I just blanked for a second because I didn’t realize that I was going to be ninety percent kold to her on-board (on-Battlefield) Behemoth Sledge. This almost got her out, but not quite.
4-0
5. Esper Artifacts Game One he opened with a super fast Salvage Titan on Chromatic Stars and thereabouts, but I had Flame Javelin and Woolly Thoctar (he stalled).
Game Two I got smoked by four copies of Master of Etherium in the first 14 cards. I beat the first two but the next couple of 8/8s got me.
In the third I had the sick tempo starting with Boggart Ram-Gang. Then I had this awesome play with Glaze Fiend on the Battlefield, with him playing Master of Etherium. I timed it to kill the Fiend with Fallout and got the then-little Master two-for-one. Bloodbraid ran into 5/4 which ran into a concession.
5-0
6. R/W Brew His Jungle Shrine saved me! I had a slow draw but Exotic Orchard hooked a brother up. No idea how I beat his Redcap + Ajani but I did.
6-0
7. Jund Aggro My Thoctar ate his Ram-Gang, etc. However one too many F2s cost me six points on a Bloodbraid Elf + Boggart Ram-Gang of my own though 🙁
His Anathemancer pounced but I had lots of Naya Charms to keep him out of the Red Zone. Same sideboarding as before:
8. Some Domain Brew This was a pretty weak Brew that had lots of good cards and also synergy but maybe wasn’t fast enough. I just sided in Primal Commands for his Fertile Grounds.
8-0
9. G/W Little Kid In the opener he had Troll + Shield of the Oversoul. Which was not very impressive against multiple Ram-Gangs. Is Troll Ascetic more-of-less unplayable now?
He had Wall of Reverence which I somehow beat.
Through Game Two he just kept regenerating his Troll as I attacked a bunch with my 5/4s; I kept his mana busy and then went Primal Command, Bloodbraid Elf, go off.
9-0
10. Mirror I lost a close one when I thought I had the Naya Charm kill but he in fact had the Naya Charm to stall and then topdecked Anathemancer for eight!
Game Two I got with turn two Knight of Valeron, Elf, Elf for Kitchen Finks and Woolly Thoctar; he conceded and I had Bituminous Blast backup.
Game Three he gave me just a little too much information. I sent my Bloodbraid Elf into the Red Zone and he traded for everything. We had no board nowhere. He played Naya Charm for Bituminous Blast (which is what I probably would have done). So I just didn’t play any guys. I played Primal Commands for life and Anathemancers to go over 23 and then just killed him with Anathemancers from a distance.
10-0
I made another version at this point, which will be detailed in probably the next blog post. It was based on a large proportion of Bloodbraid Elf based decks showing up in the Tournament Practice Room.
That said I returned to this version and played another two or so matches (both against the Madrush Cyclops version) and won those as well. My analysis is that if you draw more Cascade spells you are at the advantage in the mirror. Naya Charm being quite good.
At about a 12-0 at this point I can say that the weakest card in the deck is Volcanic Fallout purely based on the composition of the metagame (it would be invaluable if there were all Faeries again) and the sideboard is full of great cards. What to cut for Aura of Silence? Celestial Purge is the obvious weakling at this stage but I love most of the other cards. Kitchen Finks and Anathemancer have to come in for the mirror and Primal Command is too outstanding to cut. It’s hard to say what I would want to change given the fact that I haven’t lost yet 🙂
Features two new decks (kind of), an update to G/W Mana Ramp, and my recommendation for this week’s PTQs… which includes, unsurprisingly, 100% more Chameleon Colossus!
In playing the Elves strategies from Standard Elves and then working on the subsequent Top Decks (premiering tomorrow on the mother ship) I realized that I really wanted Chameleon Colossus in… decks. Not just the G/W Mana Ramp deck, but other, say, mana ramping decks you may have seen here or say in the Pittsburg Regionals Top 8 🙂
For the G/W Mana Ramp deck I decided to move away from the original sort of G/W Tokens-ish model, re-contextualizing my threats. Out went Twilight Shepherd in order to help make room for Chameleon Colossus. I also changed the mana acceleration package, moving away from Rampant Growth and adding Wildfield Borderpost and Knight of the White Orchid, replacing Cloudgoat Ranger.
This made for a deck that was much less capable of exploiting Ajani Goldmane… So I also reconfigured the Planeswalker situation. This is what I ended up playing:
I played about five matches, but they felt much less relevant and conclusive than the previous night’s work with the first version of G/W Mana Ramp.
Five Color “Bounce”?
His mana base was very expensive (as many of them these days are)… But he didn’t do anything outstanding with that mana. Sure he played a Cryptic Command, but like sending Boomerang at my Wildfield Borderpost several consecutive turns was not beating anyone. Then I got Knight of the White Orchid card advantage and it was a mess for him, more-or-less.
1-0
Dominus Deck Wins
This was like a deck I suggested for Block Constructed PTQs last summer… U/R Mimic, Clout of the Dominus, and even the big Dominus itself!
His guys on the board were very good but I just stalled out of getting killed, got a little life back with the Behemoth Sledge, and won with Martial Coup and ‘walker card advantage. Dominus is pretty cool… I didn’t realize he could steal things like my equipment and a Planeswalker.
2-0
U/W Fog
Obviously this is a horrendous matchup but I felt like I could win either game, especially Game Two.
Game One I made a college try of it but eventually conceded when it looked like he wouldn’t make any truly catastrophic mistakes. Game Two was the annoying one. He played a Howling Mine on turn two and I missed four consecutive land drops anyway. I had to run Knight of the White Orchid for no value, stuff like that.
Anyway he drew all four Cryptic Commands in the first 34 cards which is why I lost, ultimately. I was very close to burning him out with Cloudthreshers and I was able to completely suppress his Howling Mines. On the last turn he played a Broken Ambitions that didn’t even resolve but he showed a four, trumping my Borderpost, and I got milled for my library (he had no Fog and no remaining Mine at that point).
2-1
Shorecrasher Mimic / Finest Hour Deck
We traded the first two; third game I just made a gigantic error that seemed like a cool play at the time. He had Elspeth and was launching Rhox War Monk at me. I blocked with a Spectral Procession token and sent my token to Exile to mise a card. I was going to Martial Coup with a ton of gas left — Spectral Procession, Chameleon Colossus, etc. — but then I realized that he would just kill me with Treetop Village + Elspeth!
I had no recourse but to string out blockers until I could find another Path to Exile or my own Elspeth; I found neither. He won by a mile but if I had played correctly, I would have won by a mile.
Funny… while I was making the play it seemed like a brilliant one!
2-2
Some Kind of ‘brew
It was a homebrew of some sort.
3-2
I quit at that point… This version of the G/W was not / is not ready for prime time yet.
Some people have been asking Will Price on Twitter if G/W is for real (I guess they didn’t want to ask me directly) … I think G/W can be good but neither of the decks I presented is likely to be the best deck. If I were playing this weekend, I would 100% play this:
Yes, this is our Jund Mana Ramp deck, minus one Makeshift Mannequin, all the Gifts, and replacing those with one Swamp and four copies of Chameleon Colossus.
Will is also down with this swap.
He says that the great thing about this is that all the people who didn’t like Gift of the Gargantuan will now feel vindicated, even though this isn’t a change based on what they have been saying at all. We just analyzed the metagame and saw a gap for a very good threat.
B/W Tokens – Already a good matchup… Chameleon Colossus makes it even better.
G/W Tokens – Awesome matchup… The change yeilds very little difference (but arguably makes things worse as it reduces our ability to set up devastating Shriekmaw plays); should still be a great matchup.
Cascade Swans – Our worst matchup… that no one plays. Change is arguably better because speed matters here.
Faeries – Good matchup where Chameleon Colossus is just our best threat 🙂
Elves – Good matchup where Chameleon Colossus is a nearly unbeatable threat for them.
So for most of the matchups in the format, Chameleon Colossus is a net positive. Ergo, welcome back, buddy!
LOVE
MIKE
P.S. I started testing yet another new deck and it has actually been really awesome! I will blog about it tomorrow-ish 🙂 See ya then and all that.
By the way Rucka is one of my favorite writers (Checkmate, Queen & Country and all that) and Lark is one of everyone’s favorite artists… I think I read somewhere that they both consider Half a Life the best story they’ve ever worked on. Just sayin’.
So I was working on this week’s Top Decks and my good friend Paul Jordan insisted that I write about the G/W decks that did so well in Honolulu (sorry – you will have to wait until Thursday to read about those if you haven’t seen them yet).
However as you know I am a crazy lunatic when it comes to building decks, and the thought of summoning Thornling was pretty insane to me… I mean imagine Thornling wearing a Behemoth Sledge! I couldn’t get that image out of my brain. So of course I procrastinated tonight and have not as of yet completed my Top Decks article… But I did produce a new deck!
As you can see Thornling did not actually make the cut, unfortunately 🙁
The mana might need a little bit of work… I’ve had some issues getting my Green when I need it, but nothing serious so far.
The sideboard probably needs lots of work. Rhox Meditant and Captured Sunlight as a combo are probably better than the insane number of overcosted Wrath of God sweepers I have been consistently trying to side in. Hallowed Burial, now that I think of it, is probably kind of dumb relative to good old Wrath of God… I mean I am the one going for the persist combo, right?
Another thought is to reduce the curve a little bit to play Knight of the White Orchid and a set of Borderposts… But I haven’t thought that far into the future yet.
The deck is like halfway between a Jund Mana Ramp deck (note the Garruk Wildspeaker + Fertile Ground goodbadness and G/W Tokens. The Jund side allows me to play Jund-expensive super pricey cards like Martial Coup and Twilight Shepherd; from Tokens side I trade in the Overruns for some more expensive board controlling cards, while completing the Garruk package.
And what about Twilight Shepherd? She hasn’t been seen since G/W Little Kid!
Basically I wanted to integrate the Murderous Redcap-style B/W Persist engine into my deck, and Twilight Shepherd has persist. Meanwhile it is also a nice spell in general! This card has elicited numerous on-the-spot concessions.
Okay, quick testing…
Only five matches tonight (I do have to finish Top Decks, after all).
1. Some Kind of Beatdown
He was playing some kind of beatdown cards. I don’t really know the difference between these decks sometimes. Was it Jund Aggro? It didn’t look like Five-color Blood, anyway. Regardless, super easy.
1-0
2. G/W Tokens
This was a W-L-L.
Game Two I got stuck on three comes-into-play tapped lands (Treetop Village and double Heights) and a Fertile Ground and he was able to play two Spectral Processions and two Cloudgoat Rangers while I was diddling around trying to make my first Planeswalker.
Game Three I think I just screwed up. I had active Garruk and he had some Cloudgoat action (maybe two). I could have played my second Ajani (he had previously attacked one down) and instead I played a Cloudgoat Ranger. He of course had an Ajani and super-sized his squad and squashed me. I blocked to be able to have lots of mana the subsequent turn in case I drew Martial Coup but instead I just lost. Pretty sure I had that one if I understood the deck / matchup a little more.
Interestingly he played two Paths Game One and I played two Game Three and you can see how that went. Those of you with more experience… Is Path to Exile terrible heads up? I figured I needed it in case of Gaddock Teeg.
1-1
3. Jund Cascade
Some kind of a not memorable win. He had cards like Bituminous Blast rather than Broodmate Dragon. I just played the tempo game against his Putrid Leech and eventually he was going to be kold to me Windbrisk Heights and Behemoth Sledge… he just was.
Now that I think of it, I should probably just play four Chameleon Colossus in this deck, especially if Elves is the popular deck right now. Chameleon Colossus is great v. Jund, Faeries, Elves, Five-color Blood, and Mono-Black Rogues all.
2-1
4. Bant
This was the Noble Hierarch / Rhox War Monk kind of deck.
Game One I milked his board and set him up for Martial Coup into Kitchen Finks + Ajani Goldmane lock.
Game Two he shocked me with a Negate for my turn three Garruk Wildspeaker… but I was still able to dominate his little guys. A little tense because he can sometimes play a little close to the life total, but a win in two.
3-1
5. B/R Aggro
I could have lost either game. In fact one of them I pumped all my guys instead of realizing I was one eight and could have died to double Flame Javelin… But I was lucky and just didn’t. In general if you stick Ajani and some guys they are in miserable shape. I even shipped to six in Game Two, with no Green Mana for about eight turns, and pulled it out without a ton of difficulty.
4-1
So there you have it – Super scientific 4-1 including wins over every deck (Faeries, Cascade, etc.). So look no further!
🙂
I think the deck is worth a little more time, though. With some Chameleons I think it could be a good time.
It seemed like it was time! All four qualifying players from last week’s LCQ * were playing B/G Elves variants, so it seems like the deck is the real deal [again].
At first I didn’t believe that Gabe Carlton-Barnes played Elves (if you know Gabe he is much more likely to play Faeries, Fog, or even Wizards)… I haven’t talked to Gabe yet but his blood runs Blue. So if he qualified with Elves, it is probably worth the look-see.
This is the deck Gabe used to qualify (and the deck we featured in this video):
I played five or six matches with Gabe’s Elves deck and was relatively impressed.
I taped a great matchup against B/R where I got Fulminated down to two lands, then exposed my Mutavault with him having only one card in hand. Obviously it was a Shock and I was in the Stone Age.
I topdecked out of it and pulled it out!
The deck is relatively fast and was superb at beating random garbage decks.
However it seems atrocious against any kind of Reflecing Pool Control-type deck. I got devastated by a variety of Cruel Ultimatum and Broodmate Dragon combinations.
Anyway, the vid:
LOVE
MIKE
* I will talk about these Blue Envelope-grabbers in greater detail in this week’s Top Decks but I just wanted to congratulate Brett Blackman as well. Brett is a friend, reigning Pennsylvania State Champion, and a Top 8 Magic intern! Good job Brett 🙂
. I found out that Tom Martell has a blog! The best part about Tom’s blog is that it has almost no content, but a link to my blog 🙂
Steward of Valeron dot dec
<-- exactly what I wanted 🙂
P.S. Imagine we didn't have Behemoth Sledge in our deck at all. This is what our table would look like instead:
I was trying to figure out something compelling to say about the two Cascade decks that I have been working on this week, and I guess the answer is Primal Command. It’s funny… I was telling BDM how much I liked playing these decks and he reminded me that we spent a long time (originally) bagging on Primal Command. It has turned out quite the Command… But this isn’t really about Primal Command but some Cascade stuff.
    
