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Last Saturday my buddy Ryan and I hit up the 2HG Challenge at Misty Mountain in Madison WI. We were a bit surprised by how small it was, but all in all we had loads of fun. I’m going to write up a report for you guys, but I though I’d post up the pool first so you could take a stab a building it. I’ll have our deck lists and a run down of all the games up in a day or two. For now just let me know what you guys think of the pool and how you would build it, keep in mind this is 2HG so you have to build two decks. Until next time. -Bob Artifacts/Lands Colfenor’s Urn Mutavault Shelldock Isle Obsidian Battle-Axe White Burrenton Bombardier x2 Daily Regimen Graceful Reprieve Indomitable Ancients Kithkin Greatheart Kithkin Healer Kithkin Skirmisher Kithkin Zephyrnaut Lairwatch Giant Mosquito Guard Oaken Brawler Pollen Lullaby Shinewend Stonehewer Giant Swell of Courage x2 Veteran of the Depths Weight of Conscience x2 Wispmare Blue Aquitect’s Will Benthicore Deeptread Merrow Dewdrop Spy Disperse Familiar’s Ruse Flood Chaser Ink Dissolver Inspired Sprite Merrow Witsniper Mouthdust Changeling x2 Mulldrifter Pestermite Protective Bubble Sower of Temptation Spellstutter Sprite Stonybrook Angler Stream of Unconsciousness x2 Thieves’ Fortune Tideshaper Mystic Black Final-Sting Faerie x2 Footbottom Feast Frogtosser Banneret Hunter of Eyeblights Marsh Flitter Moonglove Changeling Morsel Theft x2 Noggin Whack Oona’s Blackguard Peppersmoke Pulling Teeth Skeletal Changeling Spiderwig Boggart Squeaking Pie Grubfellows x2 Weed Strangle Weed-Pruner Poplar Red Blind-Spot Giant Boggart Shenanigans Brighthearth Banneret Consuming Bonfire Fire-Belly Changling Fire Juggler x3 Flamekin Brawler Giant’s Ire Hurly-Burly Lash Out Lowland Oaf Roar of the Crowd x2 Singmoggie Thundercloud Shaman War-Spike Changeling Green Bramblewood Paragon Battlewand Oak Changeling Titan Cream of the Crop Earthbrawn Elvish Warrior Fertilid Game-Trail Changeling x2 Heritage Druid Lignify Luminescent Rain x2 Lys Alana Huntmaster Orchard Warden x2 Rootgrapple Spring Cleaning Woodland Guidance
Tags: Magic 2HG Sealed
Today I want to talk about something that has been nagging at the back of my mind for some time. It something that takes place at a lot of PTQs, GPs, and probably even on the Pro Tour itself. Something you’ve probably taken part in and didn’t even realize it. In any event I think it will do us all some good to talk about it so here goes. As you may or may not know I played Heartbeat over this extended season and did pretty poorly, going something like 4-8 in 3 events. I would guess that out of all of the matches I played I won game 1 about 60% of the time. Normally by meeting some request of my opponent, “Show a Brain Freeze in you board/hand and I’ll scoop” for example, and of course I do so we can move on to the next game. This is where I run into what’s so troubling. Is refusing to meet this request cheating or more importantly what if I took the maximum time allotted me to win? Strictly speaking from the time I untap on the combo turn until the time I actually win can take a lot of time, depending on how the cards come down, and in between there is a lot of shuffling, searching, and decision making. A lot of players have good answers in their sideboard for combo decks, and sometimes the nature of playing a combo deck lets you steal games you are not otherwise entitled to. By eating up as much of the clock as I can game 1 I put myself in better position to earn points on my round. I’m not talking about stalling; I’m talking about playing at a reasonable pace until the game state has me as the victor or until my opponent concedes. Doing things like shuffling before each Mind’s Desire flip and making your opponent cut each time, all of which are perfectly legal, but the whole thing still feels like cheating to me. To help put things in perspective a little more let me give you a real life example. In Chicago, round one I find myself paired against Gerry Thompson, not exactly a scrub if you know what I mean, but to make matters worse Gerry was playing the Rock, by far one of Heartbeat’s worst match-ups. I make a few misplays here and there but still manage to set myself up to win. On the last turn I pause and ask Gerry for a library count and a few seconds to work out some math. At this point he says if you show me a Brain Freeze in the board I’ll scoop. Knowing that you are unlikely to win this round if it goes game 3 would you just show him the Freeze and go to game 2? The first thing I wanted to do was look at the issue from the other side. Let’s say it is game two and I’m down a game. Once I go off a lot of people would not only make me play it out, but make me shuffle on every Desire flip to eat up the clock, which I don’t get upset about and they have the right to ask. I’ve even had a judge called on me for not shuffling. If it is not cheating for them to ask me to play it out, and no one puts a special stigma on them for asking me. Shouldn’t it be ok for me to do the reverse and play the game out? My next step was to look up what a judge considers cheating. So I booted up the DCI Floor Rules and this is what I found. Cheating Cheating will not be tolerated. The Head Judge reviews all cheating allegations, and if he or she determines that a player has cheated, he or she will issue the appropriate penalty based on the DCI Penalty Guidelines. All disqualifications are subject to DCI review and further penalties may be assessed. Cheating includes, but is not limited to, the following intentional activities: § Receiving or giving outside assistance § Looking at opponents’ card faces while shuffling or cutting their decks § Collusion to alter the results of a game or match (see section 25) § Misrepresenting cards or rules § Using marked cards/sleeves (see section 44) § Drawing extra cards § Illegally manipulating which cards are drawn from a player’s deck or his or her opponent’s deck § Stalling the length of a turn to take advantage of a time limit § Misrepresenting public information (point totals, statistics of cards in play, number of cards in a deck, and so on). § Giving false or misleading information to a Judge or tournament official Now I said before that I wasn’t doing any actual stalling. Meaning I was making all my decisions in a reasonable amount of time, but once my opponent asks me to show him a card or cards and he’ll scoop aren’t I doing just that and isn’t the reverse also true? Where do you draw the line? Let’s take this outside the realm of Heartbeat and myself for a bit. A while back I remember a lot of teachings decks that would 6-0-2 a lot of swiss rounds that would only have 6-0-6 game records and 2 IDs. After seeing this some Madison area players constructed a deck with the goal of playing only one game each round in the swiss. They did this by using Gaea’s Blessing to drag out games that he could clearly win long enough to make sure the aggro decks couldn’t come back. Lucas Duchow took 3rd place at PTQ with the deck. Now just in case he reads this I’m not calling Lucas a cheater, but that doesn’t change the fact that what this deck did could be considered cheating. At this point I decided that maybe getting a few more voices into the fray might be the best thing to do. So I asked some pros what they thought about the matter and I found that I’m not the only one who has problem picking a side. Mike Turian had this to say about it, “A good rule of thumb is that if you think it might be cheating don't do it. I don't think it is cheating for you to piece together the combo in the situation you described, I do think that it would be both foolish and unsporting. A reputation takes years to build and moments to destroy.” Brian Kowal took a completely different approach to the issue, “That’s not cheating. I never show my opponent the card when they say show me and I’ll scoop. They don't actually have to scoop to you if you show it to them. The only time to show them would be the rare time where you aren't so sure the card in question actually wins you the game but they think it will. Making a game play out is never cheating. Stalling while playing it out is cheating. It’s not your fault if the game goes long as you are going off. They have the option to concede at any time.” As you can see Mike and Brian have two very different opinions on the matter, but I think the best response I got came from Zac Hill and Adrian Sullivan. After posing what I felt was going to be a pretty simple question the two had a lot to say about the issue and even debated back a forth a bit. I’ve copied their thoughts down below for everyone. -- Zac: I don't think players are ever obligated to concede. Intentionally taking any game actions for the sole purpose of spending time, though, is cheating. It's a slippery slope but I'd definitely leave it up to the judge. I know, for example, that when playing Turboland I can't just cycle through my deck infinitely for forty five minutes and then kill my opponent because it's game 1. Adrian: Wow. I completely disagree with that, Zac.
I recall MANY games where just such play has been done. I don't even think of that as shady.
Two that spring to mind immediately: Jim Hustad playing URw control at GP Phoenix a million years ago. He had complete control of the game, a million land out, a COP: Red, stabilized versus a player playing some kind of Red-based beatdown deck (I forget which). He didn't take a long time with any decision. He played at a reasonable pace. When the judge called time, he cast Urza's Rage with kicker, and then untapped and cast Urza's Rage with kicker.
The other is John Shuler, playing Rec/Sur at the US Open vs. White Weenie. He could pretty much just Recur his opponent into oblivion if he wanted, but he didn't. Instead, he only used Avalanche Rider enough to keep his opponent at 3 mana. He "forgot" to Recur a few times. He gained a few life off of Spike Feeder here and there. He Weaved a few times (and "forgot" to do so a few times). He just kept his opponent hoping that he could win. His opponent finally realized that he couldn't win the game when there were only a few minutes left. FINALLY, the opponent conceded, but couldn't finish game two in time.
I don't see anything different between these two things and a Turbo-land player playing solitaire like that. They DON'T have to take the kill.
Eating time via taking too long making decisions IS wrong. That's why there are rules against slow play. But nothing forces a player to MAKE the kill. If it isn't to a player's advantage, it's not required of them, and similarly, the (losing) opponent who refuses to concede is also not required to concede. It might very well be worth their time, though, and failure to concede at the right time has cost many people a match.
If someone is wasting the clock improperly (taking too long to resolve decisions), this can be a question of sportsmanship, and there are historical examples of when people are given even HARSH penalties because of their failure to play a sporting game.
An example of this is the player who mulligans 7 times, taking their fully allotted time mulliganing each time, eating up a million minutes, and thus, taking the match. This has happened, AND it has also been ruled as drastically unsporting (resulting in appropriate penalties). Zac: See, I don't really see the point of the shuffling/playing distinction. Sure, in practice, your opponent can concede if you're just infinitely cycling your deck, but what if you don't have a win condition left? What if it's game two and he *knows* you don't have a win condition left, but you keep playing cards because you won game 1? Clearly concession is no recourse, but the rules of Magic shouldn't provide players an outlet to victory (the clock) when winning a game given enough time would clearly be impossible. Me: I think Zac's example is more of what I was going for when I asked the question originally. But I don't know if it really changes what anyone has said up to this point. I personally think that most of the time I would pack it in because I'm lazy, but if winning meant the difference between a top 8 and going home I'd probably try to run out the clock. I still don't know if it's cheating though. Adrian: It's definitely NOT cheating.
The reason that the shuffling situation was ruled as poor sportsmanship is that it is using procedure to run out the clock.
Zach's example of continuing to play without a win condition left is an excellent example. Just because you can't win doesn't mean you have LOST. The other person still has to succeed in getting the victory.
Part of the decisions that one makes when SELECTING a deck is keeping in mind its costs and benefits. Zoo CAN win in very few minutes/turns. Tog can do the same. Scepter-Chant generally can not.
So, in the specific example you gave, where you have no win conditions left, but have won the first game, and your opponent knows it, you still haven't LOST. You aren't obliged to concede simply because your opponent is the only one left that CAN win. They still have to do it. At this point, the decision of when to concede is a strategic one, certainly not an issue of cheating.
If you are to start stalling via certain repetitive behaviors (repeatedly activating a Top), slow play or sportsmanship may be an issue. But that is all... Zac: ""So, in the specific example you gave, where you have no win conditions left, but have won the first game, and your opponent knows it, you still haven't LOST. You aren't obliged to concede simply because your opponent is the only one left that CAN win. They still have to do it. At this point, the decision of when to concede is a strategic one, certainly not an issue of cheating""
That is actually a great point. I hadn't thought of it that way before.
I don't really differentiate much between slow play, sportsmanship, and cheating, though, I don't think. -- As you can see there is no easy answer. What I can tell you is that the DCI will not call you for cheating so long as you keep playing at a reasonable pace, but like Mike said, “A reputation takes years to build and moments to destroy.” As of now I’m still not sure which side of the fence I’m standing on, but I think I’m inclined to side with Adrian on this one. Managing the clock is part of the game and learning how to manage it well is something we should all do. Let me know what you guys think. I’m curious to find out where the magic community as a whole stands on this issue. As always any feedback is greatly appreciated. Until next time. Bob
Tags: Magic
I’m going to be playing Heartbeat again this weekend in Chicago and I wanted to help myself mentally prepare. I like to write things down when preparing like this so I figured why not share with everyone. In this blog I’m going to go over the list, the match-ups, and some possible changes I might make to the list. Then if I have time I’m going to blog up a few sample games for you guys and go over the finer points of playing the deck. First up the list: Lands
6 Forest
6 Snow-Covered Forest
5 Snow-Covered Island
5 Island
Creatures
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
Spells
4 Remand
4 Heartbeat of Spring
3 Early Harvest
3 Gifts Ungiven
3 Fact or Fiction
3 Mind's Desire
1 Brain Freeze
4 Cunning Wish
1 Deep Analysis
1 Revive
2 Nostalgic Dreams
3 Moment's Peace
2 Search for Tomorrow
Sideboard
SB: 1 Early Harvest
SB: 1 Fact or Fiction
SB: 1 Brain Freeze
SB: 1 Moment's Peace SB: 1 Mana Short
SB: 1 Pact of Negation
SB: 1 Chain of Vapors
SB: 1 Hunting Pack
SB: 1 Nourish
SB: 3 Engineered Explosives
SB: 3 Spell Snare
This is a pretty standard list, at least I’d like to think so. This list has changed a lot over the season, but the most recent changes was changing to Fact or Fiction in favor of Deep Analysis and replacing Hurkyle’s Recall with Nourish in the side board.
Why these changes? Well Deep Analysis was for disruption or counter heavy match-ups and at the beginning of the season seemed really good, because of Doran and NLU, but I’ve come to realization that the meta-game is so wide-open that you have to be more flexible. Fact or Fiction is more powerful and better against combo and disruption light decks. So I went the card that’s just more powerful. This is good lesson for everyone in the current format. Don’t try to hose anyone out specifically just play the most powerful and flexible cards you can.
Nourish is a little easier to explain 20$ Burn or Burn Deck Wins has been every where as of late. Nourish is the only answer I have to this deck and it’s not terrible against RDW either. Strangely I think this should’ve always been in the sideboard as it is always good against aggro decks I just had never thought about it until that terrible pile or burn spells reared its ugly head.
Quick Aside: I think it’s interesting that Wizards is making life gain more and more relevant. I remember when Nourish was just a terrible card, but today it fills a very important role in a viable deck list. I think this is mostly a ploy to make white a stronger color, but I’m all for it.
On to the math-ups. I’m going to cover the big ones, but there is a lot of over lap and occasionally just make broad statements about groups of decks, like combo for example.
Doran
This is a tough match-up for both players. If the Doran player gets a really aggro start and you can’t get your hands on a Moment’s Peace things will be rough. If the Doran player can two-for-one you with a really disruptive start things will be rough, but you’ll have more time to assemble a decent hand with the help of all your draw spells. A few important things to keep in mind are to watch the life totals and remember you can Hunting Pack at instant speed and don’t be afraid to Cunning Wish for a Moment’s Peace. I’ve killed a lot of Doran players with an EOT Pack so just don’t forget it’s an option.
Sideboarding is a little tricky against Doran. You can to bring in wither Engineered Explosives or Spell Snare or possible both. If you think he is going to board in Gaddock Teeg I’d leave the Explosives in the board, but if you aren’t worried about Gaddock Teeg bring them both in, unless the Doran player is running some kind of odd variation with out Bob’s then you can just leave the explosives in the board The reasoning is that they just won’t have a lot of things you’ll want to blow up because you can only get Explosives up to 2 counters. If they don’t have either well you probably don’t have to side board at all. Tricky right, well don’t fret once you play the match-up a few times you’ll get the feel for when to board what.
No Teeg, with Bob
-4 Remand, -1 Nostalgic Dreams, -1 Search for Tomorrow
+3 Spell Snare, +3 Engineered Explosives Teeg, with Bob -3 Remands +3 Spell Snare
In game two the big cards to watch out for is Vindicate and graveyard hate. More and more Doran lists are playing the Vindicates main nowadays so you might run into it in game one, but as long as they don’t have something stupid like triple Vindicate or they aren’t smart enough to use it on your lands then you should be fine. If you opponent brings in Leylines, Tormod Crypts, or other graveyard hate. You’ll want to side out your Nostalgic Dreams and Revive as they can become very dead.
All in all I think this match up can go either way. It’s one of those match-ups where every little edge and mistake counts about a million times. So the best advice I can give you on it is don’t mess-up, or to put it another way, playtest a lot.
Dredge
The great thing about Dredge is that as long as you can get a hold of a Moment’s Peace you resign them to killing you with a Fatty, something that is not always plan A for a dredge player. Sakura-Tribe Elder is very strong against dredge so remember to keep one on the table to deal with Bridge from Below. All in all as long as they don’t kill you on turn 2 you might even be up by 5-10% which is something a lot of decks can’t say about the match-up. Keep in mind that the fact Dredge can kill you on turn two puts the overall game 1 percentage in their favor, but after their second turn if you are still alive things drastically change. Because you have about 7 cards that just ruin Dredge’s day, that you can play from that point on.
A few key things to note, Aquamebas don’t just come into play right away. Your opponent puts the trigger on the stack and then finishes Dredgeing. This means that if he dredges multiple Aquamebas and you have a Tormod’s Crypt in play you can RFG all of them before he gets to put any into play. Now that’s not that important with this particular list, but just incase you want to run Tormod’s Crypts, like Wafo-Tapa did, you’ll know now.
Another big thing to remember, and this one is relevant to this list, is that if he tries to Dread Return something with Bridges in the yard you can respond by using a Tribe Elder to keep him from getting any zombie tokens. The reason is because of the intervening if clause on Bridge from Below that makes the card check for itself twice. That means that Sakura-Tribe Elder effectively shuts off the Flamekin-Zealot kill because they won’t get any zombies swing with.
The last big interaction to remember is Remand and Flashback. If you counter a flashed back spell with Remand the card is RFGed not put into their hand. The reason is that, and I might not be explaining this 100% correctly, the Flashback ability is a replacement effect dictates where the card goes and does not care about whether or not the spell resolves only that you played it for it’s flashback cost.
As far as sideboarding goes well it’s a bit of a guessing game again. If you think they are going to bring in graveyard hate of their own, which if you win on the back of a Moment’s Peace is pretty likely, then you’ll want to out Nostalgic Dreams, and Revive for Engineered Explosives. If you don’t expect them to bring in graveyard hate then I wouldn’t sideboard anything for game 2, but bring in the Engineered Explosives for game 3. Why?, well Engineered Explosives is terrible against Chain of Vapors. Since your opponent is going to mulligan aggressively in to his sideboard cards your Explosives probably isn’t going to be on the table when he tries to go off, but if he doesn’t see any target for his Chain of Vapors 2 game in a row he’ll likely take them out, meaning your explosives will be able to put a serious kink in his plan.
Graveyard hate, games 2 and 3
-2 Nostalgic Dreams, -1 Revive
+3 Engineered Explosives
No Graveyard hate, game 2
No change
No Graveyard hate, Game 3
-1 Nostalgic Dreams, -1 Search for Tomorrow, -1 Brain Freeze
+3 Engineered Explosives
Keep in mind that if at any point you think he’ll be hating out the graveyard just take out Dreams and Revive.
I like my match-up with Dredge and think that you get better against them games 2 and 3 than most other decks, because you don’t always have to mess-up your plan to deal with them. As always the biggest key to winning is just making very few mistakes.
Red Decks Win
The RDW match-up is just a breeze. A buddy of mine, Nick Williams, played RDW to a top 8 finish in Madison and he will tell you he hates playing this match up. The reason for this is pretty simple, Moment’s Peace. This card is like a double Time Walk against all of these decks. The other reason is Hunting Pack. A Hunting Pack EOT or sometimes even in the Declare Attackers step can just ruin everything for an aggro player.
The card to watch out for in this match-up is Lava Dart, some decks play it and some decks don’t, but if they do you’ll have to remember to make sure you are out of range of them before going off. Sometimes this involves finding a way to cast Nourish more than once, but other than that you should be ok. Sideboarding for this match up is pretty easy too. Just swap out some Remands for Spell Snare as Spell Snare counters most of their relevant creatures. If you see any graveyard hate in game two bring in the Engineered Explosives for the Dreams/Revive package.
Game 2
-3 Remands
+3 Spell Snare
Game 3, if you see graveyard hate
-2 Nostalgic Dreams, -1 Revive
+3 Engineered Explosives
In my experience it’s pretty hard to lose this match-up as long as you play tight magic, easily 75-85% in your favor, but don’t let that fool you. The best match-up in the world won’t matter if you play sloppy and if your opponent knows what he’s doing you can easily hand him the match by getting to comfortable and making mistakes.
Zoo
The Zoo match-up is a lot like the RDW match-up, but different enough that to give it it’s own section. The big difference is that Zoo often times has disruption out of the board and sometimes in the main. That means that games 2 and 3 can be more difficult for you, but nothing you can’t fight through with a little card drawing. Sideboarding for the Zoo match-up is exactly the same as for RDW.
Game 2
-3 Remands
+3 Spell Snare
Game 3, if you see graveyard hate
-2 Nostalgic Dreams, -1 Revive
+3 Engineered Explosives
Keep in mind you probably don’t want to keep a hand that has multiple copies of an important spell because of Cabal Therapy, but you do want to keep a hand with a few different draw spells like any combination of Deep Analysis, Gifts Ungiven, or Fact or Fiction. Save your counters for dooders as Zoo players have trouble winning if they don’t have a dooder to attack with. Overall this match-up is a little tougher than RDW after you board up, but its far from un-winnable.
Affinity
Affinity is an interesting match-up in that I used to have dedicated hate in the form of Hurkyle’s Recall, but cut it for Nourish. I don’t think this match up is very hard, but some of the difficulty is determining what kind of Affinity you are playing against. If you are playing against the Atog/Fatal Frenzy version you want to make sure you have the ability to play Moment’s Peace whenever they decide to go all in on you. You can’t always do that, but if you draw a Moment’s Peace make sure you wait until the last possible moment to play it. As far as sideboarding goes I don’t think you need to do any against the Atog/Frenzy version, but if you opponent is playing Shrapnel Blasts you want to bring in Spell Snare for Remand. The reasoning is pretty simple, countering Ravager, Shrapnel Blast, and Cranial Plating is important, but Spell Snare cannot counter Fatal Frenzy, and since your opponent will have to go all in before casting it you can Remand it and leave them with terrible board position.
Frenzy
None
No Frenzy
-3 Remand
+3 Spell Snare
NLU
Next Level Blue is good for you game one because they have a bunch of dead cards against you and can’t counter any of your business spells with Counter Balance, well except Brain Storm but it won’t get the storm copies so it’s ok. Just draw cards and develop your mana until you can play enough draw spells on their end step to either tap them out or drown them in card advantage. Sideboarding is a pretty easy affair as well take out the sort of dead Moment’s Peace and put in Engineered Explosives, this card will deal with any of their business spells and gets around Counter Balance. You can also bring in Spell Snares to help with this. I can never really make up my mind on what to take for the Spell Snares because I like to keep Remands as well, but normally I just cave and take out the Remands
Games 2 and 3
-3 Remand, -3 Moment’s Peace
+3 Spell Snare, +3 Engineered Explosives.
The next two games are pretty much the same as the first one except you are better at countering things and can blow up their lock card. Watch out for Gaddock Teeg as that card can pose a real problem to you at times, especially if they already have the Counter Balance lock on you.
Death Cloud
Death Cloud is a pretty rough match-up for you. They pack a lot of disruption and can put you on a clock, but if they fail to draw a dooder or get a little Thoughtsieze happy they can open themselves up to loosing to Hunting Pack. I did a write up about PTQ Chicago about a week ago and I covered most of this match-up there, or at least what not to do in it. To be honest I haven’t played against it enough to offer much more advice than this: take your time and think about your plays and remember you can bounce Garruk in response to a Death Cloud and depending on the situation it might just put both of you into top decking mode. As far as sideboarding goes you don’t really have anything in the board that deals with Death Cloud and this is something that has lead me to maybe finding a card to replace Engineered Explosives with something to help this match-up. NLU will be on the decline and isn’t so terrible that you really need Explosives to win anyways, but I’ll talk more about this later. So as long you don’t see any graveyard had leave your deck as is, but if you do side out your Dreams/Revive package for Spell Snares because at least it counters Tarmogoyf.
Game 2
None
Game 3, if you see graveyard hate
-2 Nostalgic Dreams, -1 Revive
+3 Spell Snare
Various Combo Decks
These match-ups are not very fun or interactive and I’m not going to say much other than draw faster hands and keep Remands to mess them up. Against Enduring Ideal you’ll want to Remand Enduring Ideal and against TEPS you want to Remand Plunge into Darkness and hope that they don’t have another one or that you draw a new Remand off of the old one. I realize that this isn’t very helpful, but truthfully there isn’t a lot you can do about other combo decks. You have Mana Short in the board to wish for on upkeep and you can bring in Engineered Explosives to blow up Lotus Blooms on upkeep as well. Other than that these matches are pretty much a coin flip and you really just want to avoid them. I’m not going to go over specifics as there isn’t much you can do in these to get an edge, but I’ve been working on find some kind of edge in the board.
Which brings us to our last little bit, possible changes.
The main deck is pretty solid as is, but the heavy amount of graveyard hate have me leaning towards removing my second Nostalgic Dreams for the 4th Gifts or maybe a 3rd Search for Tomorrow. All in all the difference is noticeable, but probably not big enough to matter in such a wide open meta-game. Plus if Vancouver is any kind of a test hating out the yard might be on the decline. So the Dreams will still be very good. My advice is to bring all the cards with you and make the choice based on what you see around. If you see a lot of combo you’ll want to play the Search because it makes you faster, for a control heavy meta-game you’ll want to play the Gifts Ungiven to maximize your card advantage, but if you don’t really see a lot of Tormod’s Crypts or Leylines Dreams is probably the best card.
The sideboard on the other hand is pretty wide open. The only cards you have to have in you board are:
1 Early Harvest
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Brain Freeze
1 Moment's Peace
1 Hunting Pack
That leaves a full 10 cards to play with. Now the cards I really like in the board that I wouldn’t change are
1 Mana Short
1 Pact of Negation
1 Chain of Vapors
3 Spell Snare
These cards have served me well and take care of a lot of problems from, Gaddock Teeg, Tarmogoyf, and random spell that keep you from going off. That still leaves up with 4 cards to find. I still like Nourish a lot in this environment and think I’m going to leave it in, but I just don’t think Engineered Explosives is worth it anymore. The problem is I don’t have a clue what to replace it with. I want a card that improves my match-ups against Death Cloud and other combo decks, but isn’t too narrow. Negate is an example of a card that does what I want, but is too narrow otherwise. Rootgrapple looked promising for a while, but just cost too much. So for now I’m going to just stick with Explosives and keep on the look out for a good replacement. I mean knowing that 72/75 of your cards are solid is better than most people can say.
Overall I still think this is a great deck to play and in my opinion is probably one of the better combo decks in the format. If you guys have any suggestions on what those last 3 cards might be let me know. As always your comments are welcome and thanks for reading. Until next time.
Bob
Tags: Extended
Yesterday I played Heartbeat at the PTQ in Chicago and I made two huge mistakes. Both of these mistakes were completely avoidable and both of them cost me the match. Mistake number one came in the first round. I was playing against Enduring Ideal and things went probably how you’d expect them too. Game one he comboed off very quickly and I didn’t have a remand. Game two he tried to combo off and I Cunning Wished for a Pact of Negation, leaving him with no cards in hand, no lands, and only a spent Pentad Prism in play. I untapped, paid for the Pact, and shipped the turn. He drew played a land and shipped it back. I untapped and went off. We shuffled up for game three. He was on the play and I watched him take not one but two mulligans. After I took one myself into a six card hand that included two Remands I was pretty sure I was going to win. A few turns later he hasn’t done anything all game except play a few land and burning wish for a Cranial Extraction that he can’t even play and I’ve got everything I need to go off. Literally any card in my deck is good enough to win me the game. I untap and draw . . . Pact of Negation. I forgot to put it pack into my sideboard after game two. I was utterly sick with myself. I just stared at if for a while before calling a judge over. A quick check of my sideboard revealed I only had 14 cards and I was officially 0-1. Afterwards I talked with the people sitting around us who saw it happen. Some of them wondered why I had called the judge since I could’ve won without showing the Pact and walked away with the win. I just didn’t think I deserved to win after making such a bone head play and I don’t like the idea of being a cheater. Some of the others had some really good advice though. When I played the Cunning Wish I placed it clearly RFG so that my opponent would be able to see it. But I could have placed it on top of my sideboard. There is no rule about placing your RFGed cards on top of your sideboard as a reminder. The best part of this is even if you forget to swap the wish and the spell back at the end of the game you’ll still have 15 cards in you board and you won’t get a game loss for an illegal sideboard. I was pretty upset with myself, but thanks to the most horribly run tournament I have ever been to I had nearly two hours to come off tilt for my next round. Mistake number two came in round number two. My opponent Mike Pinnegar top 8ed just a week before playing the same Death Cloud list he was playing against me. Game one was taking forever. He was having a lot of trouble splitting gifts and facts and was eating my hand with a lot of disruption. Using a Liliana Vess he cast Thoughtsieze on me 3 turns in a row and then made me discard a few times with Vess as well. Unfortunately he didn’t have a lot of pressure on my early to make the disruption any good, and I was able to go off a few turns before he could win. When I started going off there was about 23 minutes left in the round and I felt like I needed to play faster than I did. So I had UUGG floating in my pool and I wanted to play Mind’s Desire. Instinctively I tapped two Island to cast it with my floating mana, I didn’t have a Hearbeat in play just a bunch of lands, even though I clearly had way more Forests in play. I flipped a Cunning Wish on the Desire and I had a Remand and a Brain Freeze in my hand so another Brain Freeze would’ve been enough to kill him. This is where I made my biggest mistake, instead of taking the time to look at what resources where available to me I just wished for the Brain Freeze. Then I found myself stuck wanting to cast three blue spells and only having two blue sources in play. If I would’ve slowed down and been more careful I could’ve won that game and probably the match considering how long the first game went, but instead I was down a game and there wasn’t nearly enough time left in the round for me to possibly do any better than a draw. Luckily it didn’t matter as Mike’s next draw as blazing fast and included two Leyline of the Void in play before the game even started which went a long way to keeping out of the game. Both of these mistakes were completely avoidable and kept me from being possibly 2-0. I was pretty upset for a while, too upset to even draft which is basically my favorite thing to do ever. Hopefully this can be of use to some of you out there that might be fairly new to the PTQ scene like me. Don’t let the fact that you know how to play your deck well get in the way of you doing that. I have played probably 100+ games with Heartbeat and can normally tell if I’m going to win by turn 3 or 4 even if the game ends up being a dozen or more turns. So I got myself on auto-pilot and it cost me. Don’t do this to yourself. Learn you deck backwards and forwards so you can make your decisions quickly, but don’t make them so quickly you mess them up. Magic is infinitely complex and you will always find yourself in new situations. Maybe if I had taken my time the way Mike did I would have been sitting at Table 1 come round 6 and not the other way around. Until next time. Bob
Tags: Extended PTQ
A few things before I get stared. I’m pretty excited about Finkle winning, but not only winning just absolutely destroying all weekend. 16-1-1 at a Pro Tour! Insane. Anyways, last night me and some friends decided to sit down for a 6 man team draft. I didn’t keep notes or anything, but I still have the deck so I can go over it you guys. 3 Goldmeadow Stalwart 1 Cenn’s Tactician 1 Coordinated Barrage 1 Tarfire 1 Kindled Fury 2 Kithkin Greatheart 2 Order of the Golden Cricket 1 Knight of the Meadowgrain 1 Cenns Heir 1 Kinsbaile Skirmisher 1 Lash Out 1 Redeem the Lost 1 Kinsbaile Borderguard 1 Burrenton Bombardier 1 Countryside Crusher 2 Lowland Oaf 1 Roar of the Crowd 1 Chandra Naalar 11 Plains 6 Mountains I also had a Hostility which I didn’t play. I really didn’t need red mana until turn 4 and I didn’t want to run any more mountains than I had to. Some of the others disagreed with me, and by some I mean all. I still think it’s better to leave it out, but I could be wrong let me know what you guys think. Round 1 VS Seth Seth was playing G/R treefolk/elementals. Game one was very long, but mostly because we both stalled and drew nothing but lands for a bit. The board was pretty clogged up, and then I drew a Chandra and he was forced to make bad attacks to get rid of it. I won a few turns later. Game two I came out really fast and with the help of Chandra got Seth all the way down to 1. I knew I was in trouble though because I had 6 lands in play and 4 in my hand and nothing else. I drew the Crusher and thought he might get me out of this predicament, but I still couldn’t draw a relevant spell. I had like 2.5 cards in my deck that just won me the game .5 being Lash Out, but I didn’t win the clash or draw the other cards so I lost. Game three I kept a pretty decent hand and Seth mulled to 5. Then we both drew all lands. Except Seth had Unstoppable Ash in his hand and I had nothing good. I was pretty upset after this because I felt like I should’ve won both of those last to games. Round 2 VS Andrew I like playing against Andrew because I get to write down our life totals as BA. This cheered me up some and I remember making a comment about needing to calm down so I didn’t play on tilt. Game one I had a pretty nuts draw and Andrew’s was a little slow. It looked like he was going to stabilize when he Lashed Out one of my dudes to pretty much even up the board, but the Clash revealed a Chandra on top of my library and he scooped them up. Game two was more of the same. After these two quick games I felt even worse about losing because of poor draws, but I still had another match to play so I shook it off and got ready. Round 3 VS Nick Nick will tell you that he’s not much of a limited player, but don’t let that fool you, he plays very tight magic and always does well when we draft. He was playing U/B controlish type deck it was very slow, but had lots of removal. Game one he didn’t play anything until turn 4 when he ran out a Latch Key Faerie and I had a Tarfire to run in for the win. Game two I made a huge bone head play that probably cost me the game. He had a Oona’s Blackgaurd and a Nightshade Stinger with a 1/1 counter on it in play. He attacked with both and I played Coordinated Barrage targeting the Stinger. About 30 seconds later after he’d played a Pepersmoke to kill one of my dudes and fizzle my spell I realized how much a donk I was. It took a while to finish, but I feel like I lost the game on that play. Game three I mulled to 5, but kept a hand of Goldmeadow Stalwart, Kinsbaile Skirmisher, Knight of the Meadowgrain, Cenn’s Tactician, and a Plains. It was probably better than any four cards ever could hope to be so I kept it. I drew Mountain and then Plains and by the time Nick Stabilized I was sitting at 20 and he was at 4. The game broke down to me swinging with dudes that he had to chump block while I dug for a direct damage spell. Just as he thought he was going to pull out of it I drew Roar of the Crowd for 4 and that was game. 2-1 on the day isn’t terrible unfortunately for me the rest of my team didn’t fair so well and we lost. I still feel like I could’ve 3-0ed if I had drawn better in the first round, but it happens. I also think this deck show cases just how strong aggressive strategies can be in LLM. I’ll try to show case some other colors next time I draft and I’ll remember to write down all my picks to give you guys more stuff to criticize/analyze. Either way let me know what you think the deck. Until next time. Bob
Tags: Limited
I’ve been looking around for some new standard tech and over some conversations with my buddies we decided we should try to abuse Idyllic Tutor. Enchantments are abstractly very powerful cards so we figured at the very least we should take a look at what kind of targets we had in standard. So I booted up the gatherer and this is what I found:
Teferi’s Moat Oblivion Ring Sacred Mesa Story Circle Porphyry Nodes Pacifism Hoofprints of the Stag Bitterblossom Imerpial Mask Cream of the Crop Aura of Silence Opal Guardian Abundance Verdant Embrace Nettlevine Blight Take Possession That’s quite the. Some of the became obviously terrible like Nettlevine Blight, but for the most part we came up with a situation in which we could see ourselves wanting to play most of these. Most exciting was the way Porphyry Nodes interacted with opposing Bitterblossoms, effective shutting them off. After a little more discussing we came to this list as a jumping off point. 4 Martyr of Sands 4 Wrath of God 4 Ancestral Vision 4 Ponder 4 Idyllic Tutor 4 Oblivion Ring 1 Take Possession 1 Sacred Mesa 1 Teferi’s Moat 1 Story Circle 4 Cold Steal Heart 2 Mind Stone 2 Gaea’s Blessing 5 Plains 3 Islands 2 Forest 4 Horizon Canopy 2 Nimbus Maze 2 Adakar Wastes 4 Treetop Village 2 Mutavault Sideboard 4 Riftsweeper 1 Take Possession 1 Sacred Mesa 1 Teferi’s Moat 1 Story Circle 2 Imperial Mask 2 Aura of Scilence 3 ? The mana base will need some work, and the sideboard is obviously not ideal, excuse the pun. I’ve done some testing with this list and can say that it pretty strong against linear aggro strategies. In fact the first bit of testing I did was against extended goblin decks and I won just about any game I drew a Martyr of Sands. Story Circle and Imperial Mask will just win you the game against D-Storm, and against control you just need to get a mana advantage and then use Take Possession, Sacred Mesa, or your man lands to win. The sideboard is just a second copy of all of your hosers plus some others. Riftsweeper is in there to get back cards that an Earwig Squad might jester cap away. This list is very rough, and already exposed some major flaws behind the list. First off the deck is very slow and any game you cannot draw a Martyr or Wrath of God you will probably lose. Krosan Grip is going to be a problem, but right now not a lot of decks are running it and Gaea’s Blessing goes a long way to fighting it. You can shuffle the enchantment back into your deck and then tutor it right back to your hand. With all these thoughts in mind I’ve been looking to change the list to mostly G/W splashing the blue only for Moat and Take Possesstion. To replace the lack of card draw I was thinking to carry the snow theme a little heavier so I can support Scrying Sheets. So that lead me to this list: 4 Martyr of Sands 4 Phyrexian Ironfoot 4 Wrath of God 4 Into the North 4 Idyllic Tutor 4 Oblivion Ring 1 Take Possession 1 Sacred Mesa 1 Teferi’s Moat 1 Story Circle 4 Cold Steal Heart 2 Mind Stone 2 Gaea’s Blessing 3 Snow-Covered Plains 1 Snow-Covered Forest 3 Horizon Canopy 4 Artic Flats 2 Boreal Shelf 4 Scrying Sheets 4 Treetop Village 3 Mouth of Ronom This list is a little better at fending off ground pounders with Ironfoot, but loses a lot of cards advantage relying almost exclusively on Scrying Sheets. Maybe the right answer is somewhere in the middle. I’ve been tinkering around with the idea of getting rid of green entirely and using a heavier blue theme to protect my enchantments with heavy permission, but haven’t decided on list as of yet. Let me know what you guys think about using Idyllic Tutor or any ideas you might have as to best way to abuse it. Finally I just wanted to say thanks again to all of you guys for taking the time to read and respond. Apparently someone thinks I’m doing a good enough job to give me some dollars, and that can only be because you guys are leaving me so much feedback. Thanks again and until next time. Bob.
Tags: Standard
I played in PTQ Hollywood in Madison this weekend and things did not go as planned Lands
6 Forest
6 Snow-Covered Forest
5 Snow-Covered Island
5 Island
Creatures
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
Spells
4 Remand
4 Heartbeat of Spring
3 Early Harvest
3 Gifts Ungiven
1 Fact or Fiction
3 Mind's Desire
1 Brain Freeze
4 Cunning Wish
3 Deep Analysis
1 Revive
2 Nostalgic Dreams
3 Moment's Peace
2 Search for Tomorrow
Sideboard
SB: 1 Early Harvest
SB: 1 Fact or Fiction
SB: 1 Brain Freeze
SB: 1 Moment's Peace SB: 1 Gifts Ungiven
SB: 1 Pact of Negation
SB: 1 Chain of Vapors
SB: 1 Hunting Pack
SB: 1 Hurkyl's Recall
SB: 3 Engineered Explosives
SB: 3 Spell Snare This list was tuned to play against aggro decks as I expected to see lots of Zoo, RDW, Affinity, and Doran. I did not, but if you do I’d suggest giving the list a try. If nothing else it’s funny to watch people guess at what you’re playing until you go off. Round 1 VS Eric playing NLU Eric was a nice guy and we had the same play mat so I expected good things. Unfortunately I mulled to 5 in game one and he had a counter for every draw spell, frown town. Boarding -3 Moment’s Peace -3 Remands +3 Spell Snare +3 Engineered Explosives Game 2 I kept a reasonable hand made what might have been a questionable play. I had a turn 2 Tribe-Elder and no third land in my hand, but a second Tribe-Elder. Thinking a blocker is basically a time walk against the goyf I elected not to fetch with him. I went to play the next Elder and it was countered. So I was forced to fetch up a land with the one in play. I never saw a fourth land. Round 2 VS Grumpy kid playing Aggro Loam I can’t remember this kid’s name, but he was super salty about not being very good at magic any more. Apparently he used to play magic, quit for a while, and just got back into the game recently and wasn’t very good anymore, or so he said. Game 1 was over in quickly as I accelerated into a turn 3 Heartbeat with mana up for remand. He tried to play a spell I remanded it and he scooped. He had Cabal Therapied me so he knew I was going to go off once I untapped. I don’t remember how I sideboarded this so chances are good I didn’t. Game 2 took a bit longer because he used my Heartbeat to go crazy and burning wish for Devastating Dreams and play a Terravore. Unfortunately he used up his mana wrong and was forced to ship the turn. He was at 2 with a Bob in play, but I didn’t want to risk just shipping it back and hoping. So I did the best I could and played Mind’s Desire for a Paltry 3, Mind’s Desire, Early Harvest, Early Harvest. After about 5-10 minutes of me gold fishing through my deck I won. Round 3 VS Jamison playing RDW Jamison was a very good player. I also found out recently that he won a vintage power 9 tourney recently as well, so congrats to him. Game 1 he played out some dooders I cast Moment’s peace a few times and then went off. Had he been playing Lava Dart’s he would’ve one the game, but he wasn’t so I did. Game 2 was more interesting. Normally I would bring in Spell Snare against Teeg, but he didn’t show me any white mana in game one so I figured he wasn’t playing it. I was wrong. So he plays some dooders, and then on turn 3-4ish fetches up a Sacred Foundry and I knew exactly what was going. It’s very hard for me to go off with a Teeg in play as a good chunk of my deck costs four mana. Losing out on Mind’s Desire isn’t too terrible, but I can’t up the storm count very effectively if I can’t play every other card in my pile. So I was sitting at practically no life and no Moment’s Peace. I had a Brain Freeze and a Remand in my hand so I decided to go for it. I added a bunch of mana to my mana pool, 7 I think, used it to play Cunning Wish for Early Harvest and untap and play Freeze. I let two copies resolve and remand the original to my hand. Off the Remand I draw Nostalgic Dreams. I’m able to Dreams a Remand. Freeze for 5 more and Remand again and draw . . . ANOTHER REMAND! I was so stoked. It was probably the second most exciting moment of my day. Round 4 VS Brad playing Gifts Rock This is probably one of my worst match-ups. I have like no sideboard cards against it and it’s full of disruption. Brad was packing a full 8 disruption spells, and just blew me out in both games. In game one he casts Cabal Therapy on me 4 times in one turn, and in Game 2 he casts Duress on my like a billion times. I was still in it for packs, and the other guys I was with were still doing well, except mike who was like 1-X or something else terrible so I played on. Round 5 VS Brenden (spelling) playing Mirari’s Wake Combo/Control This was by far the best 3 games of magic I have ever played. Brenden was the nicest person I’ve ever played magic against at a PTQ type tournament, and by the end of the match I felt like I was playing a casual game with my buddies rather than at a PTQ. Games 1 and 2 were sort of boring as we each took turns comboing off, but game 3 was just amazing. We started off pretty slow just accelerating our mana and playing draw spells. I knew Brenden had a Mana Leak in his hand so I to play around it I just floated a bunch of mana and played Early Harvest first. He plays the Leak and I pay for it having leaving myself GG in my pool. He plays a second mana leak. Had I floated blue mana I could’ve played remand and continued to go off, but I didn’t. Then Brenden Extripated my Early Harvests and I was sad. Brenden plays and activates Mindslaver on me. My hand was pretty gassy and I figured Brenden would just burn my Mind’s Desire for one and take back the turn were I expected him to have a way to recur the Mindslaver. Instead he proceeds to go off with my deck. Hoping to kill me with my own combo! It was the coolest thing I had ever seen. Sadly the Mind’s Desire flip came up pretty poopy and he was unable to do it. He did however put 2 Heartbeats into play and then a Mirari’s Wake on his own turn so he had something like 32 mana available and on my end step he played Fact or Fiction, but he got to choose how to split the cards! Obviously he 0-5 spilt the cards and took the 5. That was pretty much the end of the game. After this I dropped from the main event and joined a draft for a Box with some of my teammates. I had to play one of them in the first round and his deck was better overall so I just scooped it up to him and he went on to win the box. We used the box to draft again and good times were had by all. Until next time. -Bob
Tags: Extended PTQ
A few days ago I wrote about LLM and talked up Giants as a good archetype. I had some people disagree with me so I thought I’d put some work into going over the archetype in more detail to better explain my opinion. I wanted to do a draft walkthrough, but LLM isn’t on MTGO yet and I had to move back into the dorms over this weekend so I didn’t get a chance to do a paper draft. So I will just go over what cards I think make the archetype so good, why they are so good in this particular format, and a general sort of pick order for the cards, along with a general idea of how the deck will normally play out. As a disclaimer I will say that some of this is speculation as Morningtide is still very new and this may end losing value as time goes on. Bombs These are the cards that make you want to play this archetype and there are quite a few of them. A good number of them are in Lorwyn and mostly uncommon so you are likely going to be able to get one of them. A good number of these are also good in other decks based on sure power level. So taking them early won’t commit you if the other cards don’t show up. Thundercloud Shaman, well this one is a bit of a no brainer. He wraths away creatures that aren’t yours, pick him accordingly. Cloudgoat Ranger is often referred to as a mini-dragon and I think that’s a good way to put it. It’s 6 power for 5 mana and normally wins the game in short order if your opponent doesn’t have an answer for it. Brion Stoutarm can steal games with all kinds of fatties to throw around. Not to mention he is also just very solid on his own. Borderland Behemoth gets overlooked by some but if even if you only have one other giant in play he will be worth the 7 mana he costs you. Keep in mind that if things go well you probably will not be playing retail for this guy, or any guy for that matter, so he will often be an 8/8 trampler for 6. Feudkiller’s Verdict can be very strong in this archetype. It is generally pretty lacking in the early game so gaining 10 life is nothing to scoff at and a 5/5 body to go with it is pretty good too. Don’t forget that Stinkdrinker Daredevil makes this cheaper as well. These cards along with other non-tribal R/W bombs, R/W commands or Planeswalkers for example, are going to be cards that really make you want to play with giants. Obviously the ones in Morningtide aren’t going to put you into R/W, but it’s important to know that they should be taken over just about any other card you open. What to look for in Lorwyn. These cards are going to be the bulk of your deck and some of them might surprise you. For the most part I’ll list them in the order I think you should pick them. I’m also not going to list cards like Lash-Out, Tarfire, and Oblivion Ring as you should already know to pick these cards very high. Stinkdrinker Daredevil/Brighthearth Banneret are very important to making your deck a powerhouse. Not getting them won’t be the end of the world because the threats you play will be powerful enough to make up for falling behind most of them time, but these guys will keep you in the game and can make for some just stupid starts. You should take Stinkdrinkers before you start taking other giant cards, like Axegrinder and Hearthcage Giant, but not over things like bombs or removal. The reason is that most of the solid fatties will table, but these guys will not. If you have 2 of them in your pile already it’s probably ok to let them pass, but you really will at least 3-4 of these 2 cards total. The more you have the more often you will get your fast starts. The Banneret has the added bonus of not being dead when you draw it later in the game. Avian Changeling does a lot of things for you. It turns on Kithkin Greatheart, can slow down an aerial assault, or just lay down some beats. It’s also just a very flexible card so it doesn’t lock you in should the other cards not show up. Goldmeadow Harrier is a great card for keeping you in the game when you have slower draws. This probably isn’t much of a surprise. Giant Harbinger isn’t a great threat in and of itself, but it will tutor up a lot of game winning cards. Again not much of a surprise, but something you’ll want a copy of. Axe-Grinder Giant is what this deck is all about, big threats that you can get out quickly and put on lots of pressure. If you can get this guy out on turn 4 or 5 he will really be a beating. He may not be the most exciting card around, but he will demand an answer from your opponent. Hearthcage Giant does the same job as Axe-Grinder, but gets picked lower because he cost more and tends to wheel more often in my experience. He does bring 11 power to the table, though, so don’t think he won’t be game changing. Kithkin Greatheart gives you some early game while getting better later on, nothing surprising just a very solid pick. Fire Belly Chaneling does all the same things that Avian Changeling does, but for obvious reasons isn’t as good. Crush Underfoot will often be able to get the best creature your opponent has on the board for at the low, low price of 2 mana. Even less if you have a Daredevil in play. Neck Snap is a pretty poor removal spell compared to some of the others, but having one copy of it can make games 2 and 3 easier for you as people tend to play around it if they know you have it. As it’s normally pretty obvious when you do have and I will often side them out if I have any kind of playable card to replace them once my opponent knows I have them. Maybe that’s wrong, but it’s won me a few drafts so I thought I’d share it with you. Kinsbaile Balloonist can throw your fatties into the air. Not the ideal card to be playing on turn 4, but he can make your threats even more, well, threatening, and does a good job of making your deck competitive when you miss out on “familiars” Giant’s Ire might be belong either one spot up or one down I’m not sure, but Daredevil makes it cheaper and it will likely draw you a card so if nothing else it will be a good sideboard option against some decks. Hillcomber Giant cost double white and you’ll want to be heavy into Red so trying to get WW for just a 3/3 isn’t that great. That said he is a Giant and still turns on your Greathearts and things. Cards to look for in Morningtide Swell of Courage is an absolute bomb. In fact I probably should’ve listed it with the other bombs, but I didn’t so I’ll list it here. Don’t let that mana cost in the upper right hand corner fool you this card cost XWW and just great at stealing games. Brighthearth Banneret I listed this above with the Daredevil, but I thought I’d list it again here so you know where I think it stands in the pick order. This guy is really what makes this deck so good. It allows you to consistently get a hold of enough familiars to be able to see at least one of them each game. This guy is also a combat trick, and if you have one in play a really cheap combat trick to boot. Taurean Mauler is just a good creature for a red deck or any deck for that matter. I don’t think it’s better than Swell or the Banneret, for this archetype, but it is very good and could very well be game winning from time to time. Countryside Crusher is probably better than the Mauler, but you’ll probably never have to make that pick so I wouldn’t worry about it. That aside this card will win you games if played at the right time. If you manage to get this down along side another threat you can reasonably expect the game to be yours. Obsidian Battle-Axe has been called the new Fires of Yavamaya and that’s a pretty good descriptions. This just makes a lot of your threats insane and can will probably be one of the best cards in your deck. Spitebellows should be treated mostly as a removal spell and not as a creature. It’s a very efficiently costed 6 damage. Also don’t forget that if you have Hearthcage Giant in play and you evoke this you can sack it to the Giant to pump with the triggers on the stack. Rivals Duel is a card I think could be good in this deck. At worst it will be a more expensive copy of Crush Underfoot at best it will eat two of your opponent’s dooders. War-Spike and Changeling Sentential cost the same have the same power and there is really very little difference between them. They aren’t great creatures over all but the can do a lot of work because of being Changelings so look to them to fill in holes and pick up the creature count if you are a little low. Interesting sideboard options Release the Ants seems like it could be pretty strong because of the tendency for this deck to have a higher curve. It might not be game breaking, but might be able to get in 2-3 damage near the end of the game when you have a lot of extra mana open. It also seems good with the Crusher, but this might just be unrealistic optimism spurred by my fondness of the art on this card. Boldwyr Heavyweights are in general kind of poopers, but then I got to thinking about them in limited and thought of Hunted Wumpus. With the Wumpus it was ok to play it because it was unlikely that anything it brought with it would be better or even as good as the Wumpus. While the Heavyweights should never make your main deck, ask yourself if your opponent can get anything that is so good it can deal with an 8/8 trampler. Chances are good that some decks won’t have anything that is going to be as good the Heavyweights. Just something to think about while you’re shuffling up after game one. Pyroclast Consul might be good if you can get enough Changelings to make it trigger a few times. It’s not likely to kill any of your threats and will clear the way for them to finish things up. Final Thoughts This deck has a lot going for it. A lot of the cards it wants most other decks don’t. The top picks are flexible enough to let you move into other archetypes if the giants don’t show, and frankly the power this deck can be considerably high. It is often packed with threat after threat. I don’t know who said it but I’m sure I’m not the only one who has heard the adage “There are no bad threats, only bad answers” and that’s what this deck does throw down threat after threat that demand answers. I’ll try to get a draft walkthrough and some match reports up to show case this deck in action. As always if you have anything to add or questions for me feel free to ask. Until next time - Bob
Tags: Limited
Vague Rantings #3: The New Lorwyn Limited I had a chance to hit up a prerelease a few weekends ago and cut up a few draft pods, some 2HG pods, and a few sealed pods. After all that and reading some other’s thoughts on the matter I figured I’d chime in a bit. How much does the M in LLM changes things? If I had to take a wild guess I’d put it somewhere around 33%, but in all honesty I don’t think it’s even that much. You’re probably going to be playing 3-6 Morningtide cards tops, and it’s hard to make a plan around a Morningtide card when you only get one packs worth. Morningtide does have a lot of neat interactions, but I think they will all feel sort of tacked on when you play them. You’ll probably just shrug and say “that was nifty,” but I’m guessing that will be the end of it. What about Kinship? Kinship is a mechanic I really like a lot. There are several Kinship cards that can be game breaking if you trigger them even once, and a few that can get out of hand if you trigger them several times. If I had to pick the five best cards with Kinship my list would look like this: Wolf-Skull Shaman, Kithkin Zephyrnaut, Winnower Patrol, Waterspout Weavers, and Squeaking Pie Grubfellows. This list might look a little odd at first but the one thing these all have in common is that they fit into already well established draft archetypes. Wolf-Skull Shaman is absolutely nuts in your standard elf deck. I had this guy in one of my Draft decks and played him on turn 2 both games in the second round. He made over 15 tokens that round. That might be a little extreme, but you get the idea. With Kithkin being under drafted a lot these days you should be able to get together a pile capable of activating him at least every other turn. While playing 2HG this card was responsible for dealing 16 damage to our first round opponents. Even with two decks worth of answers to find they could never find a way to deal with in anything that they would call favorable. A common that can single handed win games is good. Even better in a color you know nobody else wants to be drafting. Winnower Patrol is just very solid. 3/2 for 2G that will often swing for 4 it’s first trip into the Red Zone. Not much else to say really. Waterspout Weavers is another card that can be absolutely nuts in the right deck. Imagine this in a deck with Stoneybrook Schoolmaster and/or Summon the School. Activating this guy will be GG just about every time it happens. If only it was easier to draft merfolk . . . Squeaking Pie Grubfellows make the list because out of all the remaining Kinship effects out there his will trigger more often and comes with the most reasonable body. A 3/2 for 3B is passable and randomly eating cards out of your opponents hand is pretty good too. The reason I picked this card over Leaf-Crown Elder is that Treefolk just aren’t that strong of an archetype and I don’t think you want to commit to them in hopes of grabbing one of powerhouse Treefolk rares in Morningtide, but I could be wrong on this one. What about Prowl? Prowl is sweet. In fact I don’t think there is a single card with Prowl that isn’t good. Faeries where already pretty insane, but Prowl adds a whole other level to them. Aside from the obviously good Prowl cards here are two that I think might get overlooked by most people. Morsel Theft is just retarded, 1B for a six life point swing? Ok, thanks. In one of the drafts I did I ran 2 or 3 of these and they were always good. In fact using 2 of these a Frogtosser Banneret and an Auntie’s Snitch I killed a guy on turn 4 while sitting at 26 life, oh and I almost forgot it cantrips. RE-DONK-U-LUS! Thieves’ Fortune is very solid. It’s basically Impulse in the right deck. It might not be as good as Morsel Theft, but it’s nothing to be scoffing at. What about Reinforce? Reinforce is my least favorite new mechanic. I forget who said this, but I remember reading/hearing someone say that it was like cycling except you got 1/1 counters instead of new cards, and that pretty much sums it up. That said it’s pretty good in limited. It makes a lot of cards just so good, and gives White a huge boost because it gives them so many more tricks. In fact what might be the best uncommon in Morningtide is both White, weird I know, and has Reinforce. Swell of Courage looks like garbage at first, but once you play with it you’ll understand. It’s basically a white Titan’s Revenge, except at instant speed and if you don’t kill them with it you still have a huge dooder left. White is just keeps looking better and better. What cards do I want to be on the lookout for? Aside from all the fancy new mechanics Morningtide has some solid spells without anything fancy to them. Most of them are removal, but some of them might be surprising. So in no particular order here they are. Elvish Warrior is a card that I think is really strong. It can handle every 1 drop in the block and most of the other 2 drops. Add tha | 
