Flow of Ideas – A New Combo Deck for Standard: Brain Drain

I’m not one to regularly test a lot of Standard when I don’t need to. I generally don’t invest time into the format unless a major event is coming up… that is,
unless
an awesome, original deck catches my fancy.

Fortunately for you, it happens to be the latter.

What makes the deck even more awesome is that it’s something that came out of the genesis of one of my readers. I always read all of the e-mails people send me, and I always try to reply if I’m not buried under too much else. (If you’ve ever sent me an e-mail and haven’t received a response, I apologize — but you can guarantee I read it.) One of the favorite things readers like to send in are decklists. They’re always fun to read, too, because many of them provide unique ideas.

Last Tuesday, regular Flow of Ideas reader, Juan Carlos Navarro, sent me something pretty original. I looked at the decklist, and my eyes immediately widened. The concept behind this deck was just
awesome.
I played a few quick games and saw a lot of things I liked, as well as some things that could use improving.

For reference, this is the maindeck Juan sent me:

The Big Idea

The deck is built under a few premises. First of all, the combination of Molten Psyche plus Reverberate is almost always going to mean you win in a deck like this. The second Psyche counts the cards drawn from the first, meaning if your opponent has five cards in their hand, and you Reverberate a Psyche, you hit them for fifteen — and that’s before you factor in any Temple Bell cards you forced them to draw that turn! On top of all that, any Runeflare Traps you draw are almost certainly active, and your deck has plenty of efficient burn to back it up with.

However, the deck had a lot of things that could be improved and things I could try out. The mana base could easily support blue, so the very first thing I tried after messing around with the original list was a hybrid Pyromancer Ascension shell. When it worked, it was very exciting, but unfortunately the consistency wasn’t there with so many artifacts. If you drew the artifact half or the spell / Ascension half, it was fine, but if you drew Pyromancer Ascension and a bunch of artifacts, the deck didn’t work at all.

After that, I began to try several variations on the original. I tinkered with the amount of burn a lot, sometimes having burn-heavy versions with Galvanic Blast, Lightning Bolt, and Burst Lightning, and others that lacked Galvanic Blast entirely. I also began to try and figure out if reactionary cards like Pyroclasm or Mana Leak had a place maindeck. I tried incorporating Trinket Mage to see if it worked at all.

During those iterations, I tried several different artifacts and versions with and without Voltaic Key. The Runed Servitors were no good at all, and there were some slots there. I was worried Key was too cute, but it proved crucial. Eventually, in the four days I had to work on the deck, I came to a list that felt far better than the others.

As you can see, the deck has evolved quite a bit from the original incarnation. The plan is similar, but the way you get there is different.

Let me go through the deck card by card.

The Mana Base

I immediately knew there was a lot more you could do with the mana in a deck like this than twenty Mountains. The deck worked well whenever I drew Temple Bell and started to collapse when I didn’t, which told me one thing — I needed blue. Fortunately, a blue and red mana base can work in this format. The mana isn’t perfect, but it’s usually enough to cast my spells. (Mox Opal and especially Prophetic Prism help a lot; more on those later.)

I immediately knew Scalding Tarn would hop into the mix, and Halimar Depths rose from two copies, to four copies, then back down to three copies. You don’t want to draw too many, but you can use them pretty creatively in conjunction with cards like Temple Bell and for setting up your draws in general.

Finally, I knew twenty lands were too few when I was originally sent the decklist. Seven cantrips and three draw spells later, I feel like twenty hits just about right. I could even see going down to nineteen, but I always try to put an extra land in my decks.

Now, the numbers on spells might seem a little eccentric. Normally I despise so many three-ofs, but they’re that way for good reason. Before I get to those, let me clarify the cards that managed to snag four copies.

The Four-Ofs

Preordain is a natural fit in this deck. It finds you the card you’re looking for and is generally powerful for its cost. I don’t think there’s a lot of question there. Temple Bell is one of the crucial backbones to the deck as both an artifact and a way to cause both players to draw. Chalice is both an artifact and a mana source, and Molten Psyche is part of your combo core. The one card I think you can potentially toy with the numbers of is Galvanic Blast. However, often you need to finish out games or deal with a pesky creature or planeswalker, and Blast does that admirably.

The Three-Ofs

Now, onto the surprisingly high amount of three ofs.

In a deck like this you have to carefully balance your draws in deckbuilding to avoid too many dead draws. That’s what the three-ofs are attempting to minimize.

Runeflare Trap is great in some matchups and worse in others, but, regardless, whenever I’d open a hand with two I felt like I was sacrificing too much early game on their account.

Mox Opal is awesome in this kind of deck. However, with all of the filtering and draw, often I’d end up with dead copies. The only real way to filter through them is Molten Psyche, and even then that’s a little sketchy at best.

Voltaic Key is a card I really wanted to maindeck four of, but something had to burn in the path of the pair of Pyroclasms, and the fourth Key was the unfortunate casualty there.

On the surface, Key looks way too situational for this deck. It really only combos with one other card and is useless otherwise. However, in the games you win, you will almost always find a Bell. When you do, the combination of the two is often crucial to winning. If the game goes long, you need to fill their hand back up, and you also need to dig further ahead. It helps trigger Runeflare Trap on their turn. Some games you’ll just draw two or three Keys and start forcing each player to draw three or four cards.

In addition, Key is also a cheap artifact to power metalcraft that easily fits into your curve whenever you have a spare mana. While that sounds like a lame reason, it’s certainly better than Sylvok Lifestaff. You can’t afford to not be metalcrafted.

Temple Bell is great in this deck. What’s better than four Temple Bells? Seven of them! Granted, Jace can’t be untapped with Voltaic Key and also dies to creatures, but it’s still great regardless. Often the single greatest obstacle with this deck isn’t assembling your combo, but making sure your opponent has enough cards in their hand to deal significant damage. Like Key, something had to burn for the second copy of Pyroclasm, and Jace isn’t great against creatures so the fourth Jace took the hit.  

Reverberate is great in combination with your kill cards, but you don’t want to draw too many of them early. By the time you want one you can usually find one, and you don’t need four to accomplish that.

Prophetic Prism is one of my favorite additions to the deck. First, it cantrips and helps push you toward assembling your combo. Second, it’s an artifact that helps you turn on metalcraft. Third, it fixes your mana. In a deck that tries to hit 1UU early on yet wants to have 1RRRR available later, Prism and Mox Opal are unbelievably crucial. Prism has mana-fixed me to victory on multiple occasions.

The Two-Ofs

Finally, you have the pair of Pyroclasms. These are a concession to creature-based matchups since those are where you’re weakest. Having two is wildly different from having zero because in a deck like this you can often find one at a pivotal time. While I was reluctant to add these maindeck, as most reactionary cards proved poor in this deck, I think they’re important overall.

The Sideboard

Moving onto the realm of sideboarding, some of the numbers there might look strange as well. Let me explain.

The four Lightning Bolts and rounding out the set of Pyroclasms are pretty reasonable. Against the beatdown decks you want more burn and need to kill their creatures. The last Jace Beleren also makes sense so you can have an extra one against control. Fair enough. But what’s up with the rest of it?

Well, the truth is, your core strategy isn’t always good against everything. In matchups where your main plan is going to have problems in games 2 and 3, you can instead opt to deploy Lux Cannon and Destructive Force to keep them off of any permanents. Ever. The Cannon works superbly alongside the three Voltaic Keys, and allows you to crush your opponent in a whole new fashion.

As for Force, I know it might seem ambitious to play that card in a deck with twenty lands, but when your engines get going, you reach all new heights of mana thanks to all of the cantripping and card draw. See the strategy section for more details in the matchups I bring it in.

Brittle Effigy is necessary to beat Molten-Tail Masticore. As for the single Trinket Mage, the one creature in the entire 75, I wanted to sideboard the fourth Voltaic Key but knew I needed access to a third Effigy against Masticore decks. Why not a card which provides access to both?

Sideboarding Guide

With the explanations out of the way, here is how I have been sideboarding.

Ramp Decks

-2 Pyroclasm

+1 Jace Beleren, +1 Trinket Mage

If they have small creatures in their list, keep the Pyroclasms in.

I found the Ramp matchup to be mostly favorable. It’s certainly not unlosable, and I’ve lost a fair share of games, but you’re definitely the advantaged one. You’re both goldfishing each other, and generally you can kill them the turn after they play their big threat. (Avenger or Primeval Titan.)

U/X control

-3 Galvanic Blast, -2 Pyroclasm

+3 Lux Cannon, +1 Jace Beleren, +1 Trinket Mage

This is one of your best matchups. It’s very hard for them to deal with the constant source of cards from Temple Bell. If you can stick a Bell, you often win. Don’t walk into countermagic, and you should be fine. Game 1 you often need Blasts to deal with Celestial Colonnade, but the game changes after you fire up Lux Cannon post sideboarding. They really have no good way to deal with Cannon plus Key aside from one or two Volition Reins. They theoretically have Ratchet Bomb, but if you play your Cannon carefully you can make sure to never lose your Key to it.  

Also, don’t forget you can Runeflare Trap them after a Jace, the Mind Sculptor Brainstorm! It’s a neat little trick that has come up numerous times.

Mono-Red

-4 Temple Bell, -4 Everflowing Chalice, -4 Galvanic Blast, -4 Molten Psyche, -4 Preordain, -3 Reverberate, -3 Runeflare Trap, -3 Mox Opal, -3 Voltaic Key, -3 Jace Beleren, -3 Prophetic Prism, -2 Pyroclasm, -10 Mountain, -3 Island, -3 Halimar Depths, -4 Scalding Tarn

+4 Baneslayer Angel, +4 Kor Firewalker, +4 Condemn, +4 Celestial Purge, +4 Dragon’s Claw, +4 Everflowing Chalice, +3 Leyline of Sanctity, +2 Iona, Shield of Emeria, +2 Day of Judgment, +2 Kor Cartographer, +19 Plains, +3 Emeria, the Sky Ruin, +4 Marsh Flats, +1 Swamp

…No, but seriously, the matchup is really bad. I don’t think you could win game 1 if they mulliganed down to zero.

Okay, okay. Fine.

-4 Molten Psyche, -4 Temple Bell, -3 Runeflare Trap, -3 Reverberate, -1 Prophetic Prism

+4 Lightning Bolt, +3 Lux Cannon, +2 Destructive Force, +2 Pyroclasm, +2 Brittle Effigy, +1 Trinket Mage, +1 Jace Beleren

Yes, that is all fifteen cards.

The inherent problem with the matchup is that Temple Bell and Jace don’t really force them to keep cards in their hand since they can just cast all of them. Unlike other decks where you can make them drew a bunch on their end step and then more on your turn, red can just unload a bunch of instants at you.

I tried a bunch of different tactics for games two and three, and the best I could come up with was killing their creatures as they came up and then trying to win a long game with Destructive Force and Lux Cannon, eventually resulting in no permanents. They can still try and burn you out with one mana burn spells, but I think you can try and go ultimate with Jace and eventually deck them.

I actually had some Leyline of Sanctity in the sideboard for a while. You can produce WW a lot more often than you may think. It’s so ridiculously narrow, though, that I couldn’t justify keeping them in.

U/G/x Vengevine

You can board for this matchup in one of two ways, depending on which you think will work better against the opposing build.

-2 Runeflare Trap, -1 Voltaic Key, -1 Reverberate, -1 Jace Beleren, -1 Prophetic Prism

+4 Lightning Bolt, +2 Pyroclasm

Or:

-4 Molten Psyche, -4 Temple Bell, -3 Runeflare Trap, -3 Reverberate, -1 Prophetic Prism

+4 Lightning Bolt, +3 Lux Cannon, +2 Destructive Force, +2 Pyroclasm, +2 Brittle Effigy, +1 Trinket Mage, +1 Jace Beleren

Basically, you have two choices. You can either stick to the combo plan or go for the grind plan. If you expect them to have multiple pieces if disruption for your artifacts, I’d stick to the combo plan. Otherwise, it might be better to try and charge up the Lux Cannon.  

Elves

The same exact sideboarding plans and line of thinking for the U/G/X Vengevine decks apply here. I would lean toward the Lux Cannon strategy though just because their deck is faster than Vengevine is and you might not have the time to set up even your best draws.

Conclusion

While this deck departs from my usual faire because I don’t think this deck is perfect or necessarily “Tier 1,” it is a lot of fun to play and something I would be happy playing at FNM or similar. Would I play it at StarCityGames.com Open: Charlotte? Depends what I thought the metagame was going to look like — and if I wanted to have a guaranteed good time every round.

More importantly to me, I can tell there is a lot of potential in this deck that might just need some tuning. I’m leaving it up to you guys to see what you can make this deck do! There are a lot of great tools out there, and the person who figures out the best iteration of the deck could easily have a format-changer on their hands. Let me know how it goes and what you think!

Finally, I have a closing note for those who enjoy my articles and would like to read more of what I have to say each week: I started a blog! It’s called Design Space and can be found at
Designspaceblog.com.
I don’t plug projects I’m up to often, but I figured this is pretty relevant to you guys.

Why? Well, there’s a lengthier explanation on the blog about it, but the short version is that over the past few months I’ve noticed a lot of game design based ideas slowly seeping into my work. (My article two weeks ago is a good example.) Some people seem to really enjoy these articles while others don’t find them interesting at all, and so I’ve been torn trying to carefully balance both circles.

As a result, I decided to open a blog where I can solely focus about game design. That way, I have different channels for the different kind of content I produce. While design and I are so intertwined that it will continue to pop up in my articles here and there, you can expect less of it in these articles.

The good news is that this is all-upside for you, the reader! It just means you’ll have more of my work to read each week if you choose. If design doesn’t interest you then feel free to pass it up and continue to read about strategy, decks, and theory on here. If design does interest you, then you’ll have some extra articles to read.

I’ve already written a few thousand words on my blog in the past few days, so go check it out if you like my writing and/or reading my thoughts on game design.

With all of that said, I hope you enjoyed the article. May you deal a lot of damage with Molten Psyche. If you’re going to the StarCityGames.com Open in Charlotte, regardless of what deck you’re playing, have fun!

If you have any comments, feel free to post them in the forums, send them via e-mail at Gavintriesagain at gmail dot com, or tweet them to me @GavinVerhey. Otherwise, I’ll see you next week.

Talk to you soon!
Gavin Verhey  

Rabon on Magic Online,
GavinVerhey
on Twitter, Lesurgo everywhere else