The Combat Phase — The Power of Three

I miss smashing face.

I’ve come to this realization from the last couple weeks of testing. I tried to do a whole bunch of tricky things with Electrolyze, Remand, Repeal, Wildfire, and then, again with suggestions from the forums, moved on to make a Black/Green deck with discard and elimination, like the old days. That’s today’s focus.

The mid-range decks I make don’t smash face, but the decks that do smash face are just too simple. It reminds me of Dungeons and Dragons in college. Dungeon Masters have different styles. I used to be Monty Hall Dungeon Master. Smash this monster, level up, get cool loot. Hilary used to be a storyteller. He would have detailed maps of his land. Towns. Histories to those towns. An open plotline where if you went in the wrong direction you started to see things that were far too high level for you, and you knew you should turn back before you were roasted by a dragon. (We re-rolled a lot until we learned that.) His campaigns were intricate. The problem was his reward system and his story telling. He thought being rewarded with a banquet in our honor by the town we just saved was better than a Vorpal Sword. Or that a walk through the woods, describing trees and beautiful waterfalls, was better than a dungeon crawl.

I went in the opposite direction and handed out Potions and Swords for killing a turtle. What was a turtle doing with a Two Handed Sword +3? Who cares! You levelled!

I’m surprising no one with this, am I?

Rodney had the perfect balance. He mixed a nice storyline and a good plot with suitable rewards and action-oriented play.

How is Magic right now? Considering the vast diversity in the field, and seeing how well so many people found ways to utterly smash the long-thought dominant White Weenie at Pro Tour: Yokohama, I would guess that Magic is like a Rodney campaign right now. I’m not so sure, though. Yes, it takes skill to make Top 8 in a Pro Tour. It takes skill to even make the Pro Tour! But how much of it is skill right now, and how much is just choosing the right deck type?

Does it really take skill to play Dragonstorm? Does it really take skill to counter everything you play and Think Twice at the end of your turn? Does it really take skill to attach three Blanchwood Armors to a Silhana Ledgewalker? Is a mid-range deck even viable right now? Or is the environment so full of control, combo, and aggro that you have to play these or go home?

Notice the question marks. I’m not telling you, I’m asking you.

Green/Black, with inspiration from the forums.

I make up a monstrosity that is intent on three-mana brokenness. Hypnotic Specter, Stupor, Mind Rot. I facilitate this with Llanowar Elves, Elves of Deep Shadow, and the Birds of Paradise I have just bought. Man, I am spending far too much money on Magic these days. I round out the deck with Grave-Shell Scarab and Gleancrawler. Taking advice from the forums last week, I also add in Nightmare Void into the sideboard and Svogthos, the Restless Tomb to the main deck. In typical Wakefield “card advantage that’s not actually card advantage” theory, I add in Nekrataal.

Match 1: Boros

Lions and everything. Calciderm finishes me in the first when I’m a little land-light. I side in Keening Banshee and Darkblast.

Boom! He has no chance at all. Wow! Gleancrawler is bigger than Calciderm. Wow! You can kill anything creature based with Keening Banshee and Nekrataal.

“I will play a guy who kills your guy. See how I now have an attacker and you lost a guy? How broken is that?”

Despite the savage beating, I do what I usually do after a match. I look over the deck to see what I liked and what I didn’t. As much as I love the Gleancrawler, his special ability is crap. Sure, sometimes you can do the Grave-Shell to Gleancrawler to Draw Cards trick, but he costs six… there must be a way to beat down faster than that. (Looking over this, I wonder what I’m thinking. A 6/6 with Trample for six is amazing. The special ability is just gravy.)

I decide to add in Plague Sliver, and then decide I should look through the cards I have and see if maybe Black/Green has some form of Watchwolf that would be better. I’m stunned when I find something else broken at three.

Ohran Viper… Wow.

Going right along with the theory of “broken plays on turn 2,” I can’t imagine anything scarier than Stupor, Hypnotic, or Ohran Viper.

Heady with victory, I enter an eight-man queue. (Most of the testing from here on out is in the eight-man queues. I find they give the best representation of what you will see in a PE.)

Match 2: Dralnu

My opening hand contains far too much land, an Elf, and a Nekrataal. I keep, hoping to see some creatures on the other side of the board. He plays an Island and I groan.

He taps out for Signet; I rip a Stupor and strip Rewind and Spell Snare. Grave-Shell Scarab shows up and I just keep casting him. He finally gets through, and by now I’ve drawn Ohran Viper and Hypnotic Specter. I try to play the Hypnotic, but he Remands it… so I play the Ohran. Oh(no)ran!

He plays a morph, I play a Nekrataal, and he flips over a Shapeshifter and copies the Nekrataal. We both learn that this does not allow him to kill one of my creatures. Then I start recursing Nightmare Void.

So funny.

I side out some elimination and side in more discard.

My opening hand is land, Elf of Deep Shadow, Stupor, Mind Rot, Sudden Death.

He’s sided in more elimination and Remove Soul. Soon his hand is empty and I have a Svogthos that will continue to get bigger and bigger or I’ll flood the board with creatures. Forums + Me = goddamn genius.

Match 3: Lightning Angel

This is round 2 of the eight-man queue.

Game 1 – Second turn Stupor, third turn Nightmare void, fourth turn Grave-Shell Scarab. He casts Compulsive Research. I dredge Nightmare Void and take his Wrath. See, it’s really smart to dredge discard after they’ve just searched for cards. There’s your tip of the day. Don’t tell me I never give you useful tech. Yes, that was sarcasm.

Game 2 – Mulligan to five. Lightning Angels do a lot of damage really quickly. I can’t seem to find enough elimination.

Game 3 – I side out all the discard and add in all the creature kill. There is no way this deck should beat me. I draw a bunch of little weenies and no elimination. Two Lightning Angels beat me up. So impossible.

Actually, via replays, as usual, I see my mistakes. On turn 2 he plays a Signet with only White land on the board, so I try to screw him and use a Putrefy on his Signet. If I had saved that Putrefy I might have been able to win. It would have been closer, at least.

Wendy asks if I’m ready for dinner. Sure, I’m ready to burn stuff down after losing to a deck I should beat ninety nine times out of a hundred. I say “burn stuff down” because I’m making steaks.

Here’s how much I know how to cook. Wendy and I are at the grocery store today, and again they do not have my hard-boiled eggs. We have looked the last four times, and they are no longer stocked. This annoys me. I like to get up in the morning and have one packet of oatmeal and one hard-boiled egg. Good carbs. Good protein. Low calorie.

“That’s it! I’m just going to boil some eggs when we get home. I’ll make them myself.”
“Good idea. We have a dozen eggs, and then you can call your mom and tell her you learned how to cook.”

So funny, that girl.

She’s turning into my new Joshie. Who replaced my old Alan.

Wendy and I are watching Grey’s Anatomy. Burke and Christina are refusing to speak to each other. They still live together. Still in love. Whoever speaks first is wrong, and is giving up power to the other. I pause the show.

“We can’t have power struggles like that. You need to understand that I’m the man.”

“Right. Which means you apologize first? I’m glad we’re clear on that.”

Wendy is lying in bed reading. I have just stepped out of the shower, combed my hair, and I’m drying myself off. In the process of doing so, I find a rogue chest hair. Located on the top left hand corner of my chest, almost to the shoulder, it is silver, and six inches long. I’ll have to have Wendy pluck that for me. I come out of the bathroom and ask Wendy

“Hey, want to see something gross?”
“Not if you ever want to have sex with me again.”

Beautiful and witty. Gotta love that.

Oh yeah, dinner time. One of the things I can do is cook steak on a grill. I have mastered that, being the voracious carnivore I am. Of course, at home, I have a gas grill, and Wendy has a charcoal grill that she doesn’t know how to run. She usually has one of the men at her parties run it. Today it’s my turn. (Hmm, I guess now it’s always my turn.)

She has these little white “Charcoal Starter” briquettes that were used at her last barbeque in October. I was there for that, and they don’t work very well. Stephan was working on getting those coals going for hours.

I’m not gonna let that happen. As a Leo, and a Man, my ego is fragile. I’m not going to be in charge of the grill, cooking for my woman for the first time, and have a fire that only “sort of” gets going.

I crack open these little briquettes, and the white saran wraps around them are crumbling in my hand. They are very old. And dried out. Well, these aren’t going to last. And they’re probably not very good, since they’re dry. Might as well use them up.

I dump the half package of one into the bottom, open up the other package and dump that in too. Then I cover them with charcoal, and light it.

In minutes, a five-foot column of flame is roaring over my head. I’m six feet tall. The grill is about two feet tall. The flames from the grill are over my head. Wow. Now that’s a fire! I pull the grill away from the side of the building. Sure, the building is stone, but it is hot.

The column continues to burn at that height for fifteen minutes. When it finally dies down even a little bit, the charcoal is a nice perfect grey color. Just the way it’s supposed to be after about an hour and a half of smoldering. I have broken the land speed record for getting charcoal grey and ready for cooking.

“Wendy, I need the steaks!”
“What, already?

Ten minutes later, the steaks come out perfectly. Wendy is walking around near me with the portable phone talking with her boss, when the door buzzes (We’re on the fourth floor in a locked building.)

Wendy answers it since I don’t speak Spanish well enough yet.

“Yes?”
“Firemen, open up.”
“What? Why?”
“FIREMEN! OPEN UP!”

Wendy buzzes them in and I start to chuckle. I lift the lid off the grill. The steaks are perfect and there’s no flame. Let’s hope this goes well.

Soon, three men are at our door, puffing. Full gear. Oxygen masks on. One of them undoes his mask.

“Where’s the fire?”
Wendy tells him. “There is no fire.”
“Two of your neighbors in different buildings called in a fire here… Oh, there it is.”

He smiles and walks over to the grill. I open the lid for him and he peers down at my perfect steaks.

“Smells good,” he says.

“Wendy, tell him we’re sorry to make him come all the way up here, but we have extra for him and his men.”

She does and he says, “that’s very kind, but there isn’t enough for us. There’s more of us than you think.” He goes over to the edge of the terrace and points down.

Below us, are five fire trucks and an ambulance. And an army of men.

The three that came up chuckle, tell us it’s no problem, and leave. Lucky lucky.

My steaks were delicious.

Match 4: MGA

If you’re playing Green and your opponent plays a Swamp, you lose.

Green has to swing with guys to win.

Swamps eat Green guys like Pez.

The exception to this rule is Silhana Ledgewalker. I played a guy yesterday where the only creatures in his deck were Silhana Ledgewalker. He would throw a bunch of enchantments on them and swing. Notably, Verdant Embrace. I lost because he drew a Silhana Ledgewalker and made it huge.

The exception to this rule is if your opponent is playing Cruel Edict. [Though it doesn’t help much against Verdant Embrace. – Craig.]

I prefer 187 creatures to Cruel Edict. That whole two-for-one thing.

I’m going first. I start out with a one-land hand and play a third turn Grave-Shell Scarab. He plays a Scryb Ranger in response. He plays Call of the Herd, I Nekrataal it, swing for five. He flashes back the Call; I Putrefy it, swing for seven. He plays a Moldervine Cloak on his Scryb Ranger, attacks, and then plays a Ledgewalker. I rip another Nekrataal; kill the Scryb, swing for the win. See, 187 creatures that swing for two, four, and six are better than just “use a card to kill your guy.”

I take out all my discard, and add in creature kill.

Game 2…

MLGreen plays triggered ability from Keening Banshee targeting Dryad Sophisticate.
Farfenstarfer plays Might of Old Krosa (Enhanced) targeting Spectral Force.
MLGreen plays Putrefy targeting Spectral Force.
MLGreen plays triggered ability from Ohran Viper.

Drawing another Viper…

MLGreen plays Hypnotic Specter.
MLGreen plays Ohran Viper.
Farfenstarfer has conceded from the game.

I swarm him with multiple Nekrataal, Elves, Keening Banshee, Vipers and Scarabs.

Busted at three.

I look over the deck some more, and decide to add Darkblast to the sideboard.

Match 5: Calciderm White/Red

Game 1 – I mulligan to five on the play. Nuff said.

I side in some Darkblast and Keening Banshee.

Game 2 – He just draws perfectly. Stonecloaker removes my Darkblast. He always has burn for Ohran or Hypnotic. I never have enough elimination, and keep drawing elves and birds.

Game 3 – I Darkblast his Soltari Priest and he plays Stonecloaker. Then Calciderm. Calciderm + Stonecloaker = Unsolvable for this configuration.

I add Edict to my sideboard.

Match 6: Red/White

Again.

I lose in two quick ones. Which is redonkulous. Seriously, are you kidding me? I’m losing to 1/1, 2/1, and 2/2s when I have 4 Keening Banshee, 4 Nekrataal, 4 Putrefy, 2 Sudden Death, and 3 Cruel Edict?

I’m losing to Calciderm when I have Ohran Viper and infinite blocker Grave-Shell Scarab?

Are you kidding me?

Match 7: Smallpox

Game 1 is a nice opening draw. I start off with a Bird and he Funeral Charms it. But I have another Elf, and a Hypnotic and an Ohran.

Game 2 – Cry of Contrition, Smallpox, Basal Sliver, Stupor, Rack, Rack, etc. No chance.

Game 3 – I start off strong with a Tomb and a Bird. He Cry of Contritions me. I play a second and a third turn Ohran, and that’s game right there. My hand is at seven most of the game despite his discard.

Match 8: Gruul

Game 1 – I get beaten up by my lands and his men. He has enough burn to kill all my acceleration, and he keeps swinging with two Kird apes. I have two Llanowar Wastes as my sole source of Black mana, and they beat the crap out of me the whole game.

Game 2 – I kill everything he puts on the board, with guys that get to swing the turn after they assassinate someone.

Game 3…

MLGreen has won 1 game. Eclipse_Team has won 1 game.

MLGreen mulligans down to 6 cards.

My first hand was one Forest, two Svogthos, Bird, and two Elves. Would you have kept that against burn? I keep a two-Swamp hand and hope for land.

Eclipse_Team plays Mountain.
Eclipse_Team plays Kird Ape.
Turn 1: MLGreen.
MLGreen plays Swamp.
Eclipse_Team plays Llanowar Elves.
Eclipse_Team plays Kird Ape.
Eclipse_Team removes Rift Bolt from the game with 1 time counter.
Eclipse_Team plays Rift Bolt targeting MLGreen.
Eclipse_Team plays Char targeting MLGreen.

And that’s game.

Time to look over the deck again.

I am still getting my ass beat by my lands and Elves. And a way to get back some life when Gruul turns on the sun to blast me out might be good. Remove the Elves of Deep Shadow and add back in Loxodon Hierarch? That gives me access to Wrath and Putrefy and I can remove the discard and the Hypnotics. Wait a minute, now I’m going backwards… I like the Black/Green version of this deck much better than the tri-color version because I love Stupor and Hypnotic. I can make a version with Loxodon and Mortify, but I have to remove the Ohran and the Nekrataal. And since the land is already sketchy, that means removing the Svogthos too. Can’t have that.

I remove the Llanowar Wastes and replace them with Gemstone Mines. The beatings are just too much.

Match 9: Dragonstorm

Game 1 – I get a second-turn Hypnotic, third turn Ohran. I hit him once with the Hypnotic. The next turn he uses Gigadrowse to keep me from drawing and him from discarding, and then goes off.

Game 2 – He casts Empty the Warrens for six, but a Nekrataal, Hippie and an Ohran keep that from helping him too much. He does another Empty for two, and then concedes.

Game 3 – Second-turn Hypnotic is stopped by a Remand. I can’t complain. It’s his first Remand and my third second-turn hypnotic. Next turn I play a Stupor and hit Dragonstorm, Rite of Flame. His Lotus Bloom comes into play, he passes the turn. I play an Elf and the Hypnotic again. He Pyroclasms, and then Warrens for six. I Nekrataal one. He attacks, and first strike kills another. I play an Ohran. He plays a Bogardan Hellkite, clearing my board. Goblins finish me.

Where was the discard I sided in? I look over the deck and make no changes. I had the tools to beat him, but just didn’t draw them. I consider adding in Krosan Grip to the sideboard, but decide against it. Seriously, I need more disruption than Hypnotic and twelve discard spells?

Match 10: Lightning Angel

Game 1 is second turn Hypnotic, third turn Stupor, forth turn Hypnotic, and he can’t find a Wrath.

Game 2 – First turn Elf, second turn Ohran. He Wraths. I Nightmare Void him, he Mana Leaks it. He plays a Lightning Angel, I Putrefy it. I Void him again, so he flashes a Sulfur Elemental into play and Lightning Helixes me. He has no cards in hand. He attacks for three. I attempt a Nekrataal on his Elemental; he Remands it, swings again with the Sulfur Elemental, and plays Compulsive Research. I’m holding two more Nekrataal. But I’m at eight and he’s at twenty. I Nightmare Void him, he Remands it again, untaps, and Demonfires me.

I need Loxodon.

I sideboard poorly and forget the lesson I learned last time. I should have sideboarded in all my creature elimination.

From The Professional, a.k.a. Leon.

“Get everyone down here.”
“Sorry sir, what do you mean ‘everyone?’”
“EVVVERRRYOOOONE!!!!!”

Game 3 – First turn Elf, second turn Hypnotic. Of course he has a Helix for it. I play an Ohran, he plays a Signet. I play another Ohran, he Wraths. Another Ohran perhaps? No, he has another Lightning Helix. He plays a Lightning Angel; I play a Stupor and a Putrefy. He’s at 21 I’m at 16; I play a Svogthos and swing for five. He flashes in a Sulfur Elemental end of turn, and then plays a Lightning Angel and swings for six. Svogthos again comes in for five. I draw a Grave-Shell Scarab when I desperately need a Nekrataal. I can’t play him; his Angel is beating me down. I have to attack with the Svogthos, reducing him to five. He swings with Sulfur and Angel, reducing me to five. I draw Nightmare Void, swing with the Svogthos… he has to block with the Lightning Angel. He still has the Sulfur Elemental. So, basically, he’s going to attack, reduce me to two, and then Lightning Helix or Demonfire me for the final points.

Or maybe something else.

tyj26bk plays Plains
tyj26bk plays Bogardan Hellkite
MLGreen: gg

I gotta go back to the Loxodons.

The search for an original deck continues. Hopefully the forums will continue to offer good advice, and cards to try that I am missing. Right now the deck is going to go in a couple of different directions. Wendy asks if I want to go for a run after that last match, and I do. I need to think.

As Wendy and I were running, I thought of a number of directions to go. I think the base of the deck is a thing of beauty.

4 Llanowar Elves
4 Elves of Deep Shadow
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Hypnotic Specter
4 Ohran Viper
4 Stupor

From there, there are a number of options. There are very few more powerful third turn plays than “Attack with the Hypnotic Specter, Stupor you.” Okay, actually, “Rite of Flame, Rite of Flame, Seething Song, and Dragonstorm” comes to mind, but other than that… not so much. So, removing the Stupors and Nightmare Voids changes the focus of the deck entirely, moving back into a mid-range deck that does better against aggro, but has no chance against Dralnu or Dragonstorm.

Moving back into White as a third color allows for the addition of Mortify and Loxodon Hierarch as well as Wrath in the sideboard. Considering that right now I’m losing a lot to creature decks in the latest rounds of testing, that might be the logical direction to return to. I could do that, making sure to keep the Ohran Viper and the Hypnotic Specter (which we have found to be amazing). Adding in Mortify and Loxodon make Pillar of the Paruns a much better land. That card is awful in the Black/Green version. In poring over my collection, another B/W/G card that might be very powerful is Crime / Punishment. But of course, then you lose so much disruption because there is no room for Stupor and Nightmare Void. You also lose Svogthos, which at times is very good. I’m happy with him being 5/5 and 6/6… I don’t need him 20/20.

One direction that seems appealing to me (and is probably crap) is returning to a deck that no one has been able to get to work… the all-creature deck.

Remove the Stupors for Ravenous Rats.
Remove the Nightmare Void for Abyssal Specter.
Remove the Putrefy for what? Either Keening Banshee or Viridian Shaman or Indrik Stomphowler? The problem here is that Black doesn’t have anything nearly as good as Nekrataal to add in as creature elimination in the form of a creature.

Of course, 37 creatures and Svogthos seems pretty pimp. Or even 33 creatures and 4 Putrefy, since the Nekrataal stands alone.

Let me know your sage counsel in the forums.

Until next week!

Jamie