Pop quiz time – what do the following 150+ cards have in common? “They all have capitalized letters?” Oh, you are so clever. Here’s a clever little thing you can do with your deckbox. Sideways. For everyone else, well, the title is a clue.
Here’s the list:
Ancient Grudge
Angel’s Grace
Arcane Laboratory
Armadillo Cloak
Artifact Mutation
Aura Mutation
Bind
Blinkmoth Well
Blood Moon
Boseiju, Who Shelters All
Bottle Gnomes
Braids, Cabal Minion
Cabal Therapy
Call of the Herd
Chainer’s Edict
Chalice of the Void
Circle of Protection
Clickslither
Coffin Purge
Commandeer
Condemn
Counterspell
Cranial Extraction
Cremate
Crimson Acolyte
Damping Matrix
Dark Confidant
Darkblast
Deathmark
Deep Analysis
Defense Grid
Descendant of Kiyomaro
Devastating Dreams
Disenchant
Dismantle
Disrupt
Divert
Dovescape
Duress
Dwarven Blastminer
Echoing Truth
Eight-and-a-Half-Tails
Empty the Warrens
Engineered Explosives
Engineered Plague
Ensnaring Bridge
Eternal Witness
Exalted Angel
Extract
Faith’s Fetters
Filth
Firemane Angel
Flames of the Blood Hand
Flametongue Kavu
Fledgling Dragon
Gainsay
Genesis
Ghastly Demise
Gigadrowse
Global Ruin
Goblin Pyromancer
Guided Light
Harmonic Sliver
Haunting Echoes
Hideous Laughter
Honorable Passage
Hull Breach
Hunting Pack
Hypnotic Specter
Indrik Stomphowler
Infest
Innocent Blood
Ivory Mask
Jester’s Cap
Jotun Grunt
Kami of the Ancient Law
Kataki, War’s Wage
Krosan Grip
Leyline of Lifeforce
Leyline of the Void
Life from the Loam
Loaming Shaman
Loxodon Hierarch
Loxodon Warhammer
Luminesce
Mana Short
Meddling Mage
Molten Rain
Moment’s Peace
Morningtide
Mystic Crusader
Naturalize
Nostalgic Dreams
Obliterate
Orim’s Chant
Orim’s Thunder
Overgrown Estate
Overload
Overmaster
Oxidize
Pacifism
Paladin En-Vec
Pernicious Deed
Phantom Centaur
Phyrexian Ironfoot
Pithing Needle
Plow Under
Psychotic Fury
Pull from Eternity
Pulse of the Fields
Purify
Putrefy
Pyrite Spellbomb
Pyroclasm
Pyrostatic Pillar
Ravenous Baloth
Ray of Revelation
Razormane Masticore
Recoup
Ronom Unicorn
Rule of Law
Scrabbling Claws
Seedtime
Shadow of Doubt
Shattering Spree
Silver Knight
Smother
Solitary Confinement
Soltari Priest
Sowing Salt
Sphere of Law
Squelch
Stifle
Sulfuric Vortex
Sun Droplet
Sword of Fire and Ice
Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir
Teferi’s Response
Thoughts of Ruin
Threads of Disloyalty
Tivadar of Thorn
Tormod’s Crypt
Trickbind
Tsabo’s Decree
Umezawa’s Jitte
Vindicate
Viridian Shaman
Viridian Zealot
Wall of Shards
Wing Shards
Withered Wretch
Worship
Wrath of God
The answer, of course, is that they all are sideboard cards. More importantly, most of this list came straight off the 2006 Worlds Top Extended Decks list. The rest made Top 8 at recent PTQs, or finished well in Online Premier Events.
Okay — almost all. Seal of Cleansing is no longer Extended legal. I just wanted to see if you were paying attention. Another is probably a typo, and while “unknown cards” did appear on a couple decklists…
As for the rest, do you know what each and every card does? They all were played at high profile Extended events. An opponent might pull out any one of them. That would be a good opponent playing a goof deck, not some random kid playing Craw Wurm.dec who suddenly realizes that Compost could be good against Ichorid.
However, think about that kid with Craw Wurm.dec. Sure, he may live at the bottom tables all day, but you could still meet him round 1, or round 2 if he gets lucky round 1. More importantly, maybe a person sitting next to him last event saw Compost, saw that a ton of people were playing Ichorid, and decided to stick Compost in the sideboard of Aggro Flow.
That would be a bad thing if you were planning on playing Ichorid, and were planning on dealing with problem enchantments by dredging out a singleton Ray of Revelation.
Note that Compost is legal in Extended, but isn’t on the above list. The list is huge, but not all-inclusive.
Wish Sideboards
I did not include engine cards that, while technically in the sideboard, are merely there to be Wish targets. For example, most TEPS decks put a Mind’s Desire and Tendrils of Agony in the sideboard to be found with Burning Wish. Scepter-Chant decks do the same thing with Lightning Helix and Orim’s Chant — hide them in the sideboard so Cunning Wish can find them. That’s part of those decks’ engines, not traditional sideboarding. Traditional sideboarding means including cards that you add to the main deck against certain opposing decks, to help that matchup.
Traditional sideboarding identifies the opposing deck’s plan for victory, then takes a couple whacks at it upside the head. So let’s look at some of the targets that various sideboard cards aim their whacks at.
Whacking the Storm Count
I will start with the cards that work against storm decks, like TEPS and Sunny Side Up. These decks try to get a high storm count, then cast something with a storm trigger that can just win the game — usually Tendrils or Brain Freeze, but occasionally something like Empty the Warrens. The “what” does not matter — it’s all about the storm count anyway.
Rule of Law and Arcane Laboratory both prevent the storm count from getting too high — or getting to two, for that matter. They both do the same thing, and do so quickly and efficiently. The downside, of course, is that they don’t do anything else, making them pretty much useless in any other matchup.
The other alternative for dealing with Storm counts is to let the count climb, then stop the opponent from playing the kill spell that turn. Gilded Light can be cast in response to the storm trigger going on the stack, and can make all copies of Tendrils or Mind’s Desire useless. Gilded Light does not help against Empty the Warrens, but it is somewhat useful against other targeted spells, like Lightning Helix and Duress.
A better solution to a high Storm count is Orim’s Chant, which stops everything if you time it right. Orim’s Chant is also a decent answer to speed and beatdown decks — casting it during upkeep buys, in effect, one extra turn. In that respect, Orim’s Chant has only one real downside — it costs $350 a playset online.
You can also avoid being killed by storming Tendrils and / or Brain Freezes with cards that prevent you from being targeted, like Ivory Mask or True Believer. These work, but they won’t stop a hoard of goblins from Empty the Warrens; Ivory Mask is a turn slower than Arcane Labs, and True Believer in not as instant-aneous as Gilded Light.
Whacking the Graveyard
Some decks — most notably Ichorid and Sunny Side Up, but also decks like CAL, Aggro Loam, Elemental Bidding and the G/x decks with Genesis and Eternal Witness — rely on their graveyards. In order to win, some decks need to take that resource away. (Other decks will just run them down or combo them out, so it does not matter.)
The means to deprive a deck of its graveyard can be divided into two main groups — the one-shot wonders and the slow-but-steady permanents.
The most splashable, and cheapest, one-shot wonder is Tormod’s Crypt. For no mana, Tormod’s Crypt completely nukes one graveyard. It does target a player — meaning that cards like Ivory Mask and Gilded Light can fizzle it, but the decks that rely on graveyards generally don’t run those cards. (Well, Flores’s Haterator did run Gilded Light, but who knows whether it will this week.) Other one-shot wonders include cards like Morningtide — which is slower, more expensive and more symmetrical than Tormod’s Crypt. About the only advantage to Monrningtide that I can see is that it kills Terravore dead, which Tormod’s Crypt cannot do, and that you can fetch Morningtide with Burning Wish. Cunning Wish can fetch Cremate, Coffin Purge and so forth, and Living Wish can fetch Loaming Shaman or even — channeling Rizzo here — Crypt Keeper.
The problem with one-shot wonders is that they work once — and that’s it. That can be very good against an Ichorid deck that has dumped 40 cards, including all four Ichorids, into it’s graveyard by turn 2, but it is less useful when all a graveyard contains is a single Cabal Therapy or Life from the Loam. In those cases, it is often better to be able to remove certain cards turn after turn. Examples of these slow-but-steady cards are Scrabbling Claws, Withered Wretch, and even Nezumi Graverobber. Scrabbling Claws is cheap and, in effect, cycles, but you generally have to sacrifice it to get rid of a particular card immediately. Withered Wretch is near perfect, but only works in the very few decks that can reliably have BB on turn 2. Graverobber is too expensive, both in what it costs and in what you have to pay to get rid of a card.
There are tons of other options. Some are more useful, some less — and some are just funny. For example, imagine getting a Mirror Golem into play against an Ichorid deck. Mirror Golem will remove one Ichorid and become a creature with protection from the others. Of course, at six mana, it is pretty much unplayable in anything but a Tron deck, but I find it amusing. It would also be a house against those decks that rely on Harmonic Sliver or Indrik Stomphowler or Viridian Shaman to kill artifacts — although if those decks forget to stick Krosan Grip in their sideboard (for NO Stick at least) they are already in trouble.
Mirror Golem. Some parts of my articles are tech, some are just me amusing myself.
Moving on.
Whacking the Hand
Zvi used to divide decks into those that play fair and those that don’t. Combo decks that cheat on mana costs (e.g. 1U for 19 copies of Brain Freeze) don’t play fair — and Extended has a good supply of combo decks. Me — I’m more of a lawful good player. I’m running a Paladin in one RPG right now, and I play classic “fair” decks like aggro Rock on MTGO. I have spent a lot of time pitting fair decks against unfair decks, and the best weapon I have found against the “cheaters” is to nuke their hand early and often.
Remember, though, that Extended is fast. Games are won and lost by turn 3 or 4. Cards like Persecute, which can be fine in Standard, are woefully slow in Extended. Extended discard needs to cost one or two mana. Duress is great, with Cabal Therapy either slightly better or slightly worse depending on the deck. (Cabal Therapy would be better if the metagame were less diverse, but if you see an opponent play a turn 1 Flooded Strand, you could be facing anything from U/W Control to Boros. That makes a turn 1 blind Therapy a lot more of a crap shoot than it used to be.)
Gerrard’s Verdict is bringing up the rear, and most other discard is not playable. Mind Rot anyone?
Whacking Creatures
Extra creature removal was once a huge part of sideboards, but it is not so common nowadays. A few Boros decks had Jittes, which is removal combined with lots of other good stuff. Some U/W Control decks pack extra Condemns, and some experiment with trickiness like Wing Shards. Every so often a deck will have a random Putrefy in the toolbox, or Darkblasts. Decks fearing Silver Knight and / or Paladin En-Vec may bring in Pyrite Spellbombs, but old classic creature removal, like Flametongue Kavu, is pretty rare.
Instead, most decks bring in 4/4 lifegain creatures to stop aggro decks. Loxodon Hierarch and Ravenous Baloth are more common, at least in decks that can support the colors, than removal spells and / or creatures. That said, decks with Burning and or Cunning Wish will generally have an answer — anything from Wrath to Pyroclasm to Infest. (Yes, Infest. Look it up — and then think about Flores and his Troll Ascetic / Worship lock.)
Whacking the Board
Wrath of God is the most widely played board sweeper, but it is almost always a maindeck card. Beyond that, though, the number of sweepers drops rapidly. Pernicious Deed is still amazing against Affinity and the like, but Affinity now tends to run Pithing Needle and Stifle in its sideboard, specifically to stop Deed. Devastating Dreams makes an occasional appearance, but only in specialized decks, like Aggro-Loam. The rest of the sweepers, like Akroma’s Vengeance, are just too expensive and too slow.
Whacking Artifacts and Enchantments
Isochron Scepter decks are still around, which makes Krosan Grip pretty much a given in any deck that can cast it, and it’s Split Second ability puts it above Naturalize. Disenchant is also staple for White decks. Beyond that, a few other removal spells do see play. I have always been a fan of Dismantling Blow, so I liked seeing that make an appearance in U/W Tron decks.
Artifact and enchantment killing creatures are also making an appearance, especially in decks with Living Wish. Harmonic Sliver and even Indrik Stomphowler (Jamie Wakefield tech!) are not much good against an Isochron Scepter with Orim’s Chant, but work just fine against Solitary Confinement (which is making a comeback) and Static Orb / Opposition (Top 8 in Oklahoma City — make of that what you will). Those critters also do a great job of smashing equipment, Armadillo Cloaks and so forth.
Whacking Your Expectations
One of the more interesting effects of having both the Ravnica dual lands and the Onslaught fetchlands in the format is that color restrictions are a thing of the past. Nearly every deck can splash nearly any color, and can do so without having to play City of Brass. This means that people are often surprised by sideboard cards from outside a deck’s usual color pallet. Boros decks running Orim’s Chant are old news — but how about Orim’s Chant in Rock decks? I saw a Zoo decklist with Divert in the sideboard — and that Divert really swung some close games. One writer advocated Cabal Therapy in Boros, and Boros splashes Green as well.
Last article I reminisced about a Rock deck that splashed Armageddon — in that day, it only worked because of Green’s mana fixing. Today, all decks have incredible mana fixing. So, imagine your deck’s worst nightmare: the card that you just don’t want to see cast against you. Unless it’s color requirements are ridiculous (e.g. Teferi’s 2UUU), any deck may be splashing for it.
Any deck.
/whine mode on
‘cept mine. frikken 100 TIX Chants…. grrrr…. blasted hoarders …. mumble….
/end whine
Things that Make You Go Hmmmm
A lot of sideboard tech (and sideboard dreck) struck me as strange. Some of it was interesting, some of it was inspired, and some made me wonder if any drugs could mess up someone’s thinking that badly.
Blinkmoth Well stops a NO Stick cold, and it is uncounterable. You can even fetch it with Living Wish — but first you have to get Living Wish to resolve. It’s interesting.
How about Goblin Pyromancer? Was the guy running Goblin Pryomancer just channeling Extended from years past, or are goblins still somehow viable? And what was up with the Tsabo’s Decree?
Those cards fall into the drugs category.
Jotun Grunt is fascinating. It should work. It sux for me. Maybe I’m just unlucky, but for me it wasn’t even useful against Ichorid. It’s either a wins-more card, or useless. I don’t know why — and definitely YMMV.
Some Boros decks ran Molten Rain, and sideboarded additional Stone Rains. One ran Sowing Salt. Sowing Salt could be crushing against U/W Tron and U/W Control decks — but is getting a four mana sorcery to resolve against those decks ever going to be feasible?
How good is Blood Moon? It may not be better than Destructive Flow, but it certainly is more splashable.
Hideous Laughter made a showing. Another attempt to beat the Mike Flores netdeck du jour, or a playable card?
Hmmmm.
Sun Droplet is great in slower formats. Can U/W decks really slow down the format enough to make it work? People are still trying it — we’ll see whether it remains in sideboards as the season progresses.
Sudden Death was nowhere to be seen (aside from one Oklahoma list, which had five copies), but the fact that it cannot kill Exalted Angel or Eternal Dragon may explain it. Sudden Shock has also only made one Top 8 list so far — and that maindeck. Affinity is not dead, and Psychatog still exists, at least in potential, so why is it missing?
Spell Snare has made an appearance or two. What deck would you bring that in against? Boros, yes, but Boros hasn’t made many Top 8 lists recently. Aggro-Loam has a fair number of two mana cards, but even Zoo decks have a raft of one- and three-cost cards.
Hmmmm.
Squelch over Stifle or even Voidslime. Is that drugs talking?
Hmmmm.
That’s enough. I’ve listed almost 200 sideboard cards. Time for you to stop reading and start testing.
Don’tcha think?
PRJ