Deconstructing Constructed — A Time Spiral Block Constructed Tournament

This will be in the same format as the last mock tournament. Best of five games, 2 pre-board, 3 post-board… so let’s get started.

The Contenders

3 WW (WW and WW/u)
3 Teferi Control (Mono U and U/B/r)
3 Scryb & Force (G/R and G/R/U)
2 Library Control (W/B/U)
Balance
Almost MBC
Dragonstorm
Boros
B/U/r Control

As you can see, the field was reduced significantly from our last tourney. Me? I’d like to say streamlined. Wild Pair and Blink Riders were eliminated for their constant inability to beat WW. Blink Riders could only win slightly over half its games post-board, and pre-board wasn’t going well unless we compromised its ability to beat control decks. This left us with no good options left to try and tune the deck. Perhaps Yokohama will show a better build of this deck, but we simply weren’t getting the results versus the field that we wanted.

Wild Pair was eliminated for many of the same considerations. Even the popular Sliver Pair version lost too many games when it couldn’t find Wild Pair. I’m sure that a viable Wild Pair exists; I just don’t know how to construct it for the current metagame. Meanwhile Mono Red aggro was just worse than WW for all practical considerations. Maybe somebody is sitting on this mystical list that doesn’t suck, but none of the ones we’ve made or seen are The One.

Anyway, here are the lists.

White Weenie

Changes to the sideboard:
-4 Sunlance

+3 Dust Elemental
+1 Temporal Isolation

Changes to the sideboard:
-3 Honorable Passage

+3 Dust Elemental

I was quite happy with how my WW build had performed in the last tournament and made one simple change to the sideboard. However, Dust Elemental isn’t for the match most people associate it with. Dust Elemental is here as a trump in the mirror match, because when WW bogs down into a stalemate Dust Elemental comes down as a must-deal-with threat that’s nearly impossible for them to handle. It’s bigger than anything WW has, can’t be blocked by anything WW has and can’t be killed off by anything commonly see in WW sideboards. As long as Disenchant and Kestrel are in the deck, Temporal Isolation is just a desperate stall tactic.

I’ll go over more about what I think of WW sideboards at the end of the article.

Teferi Control

Changes to the board:
-2 Willbender
-1 Wipe Away
-1 Snapback
-1 Tendrils of Corruption

+1 Forest
+3 Krosan Grip

(Original board was accidentally 16 cards)

More testing basically showed that Bogardan Hellkite and Void were well worth the Red splash if we chose to go with the U/B route. The alternative for Teferi control, shown here, is a Mono Blue build Rich Shay and I worked on when we did some testing. I was giving him various lists to play around with and he hated them all with a passion. Rich basically told me that the decks lacked any sort of a curve or main game plan, and that diluted them to some extent. He found it annoying that much of the removal the decks played was one-for-one trades against WW that cost him more tempo than the opponent.

So after some brainstorming, he gave me a basic list. I tweaked a few cards and added a sideboard. Many of the choices were made to give the deck a more aggressive attack route against WW and attack other control decks via the ground instead of the slower attrition wars many of the decks get dragged into.

Scryb & Force

Maindeck changes:
-4 Magus of the Library
-2 Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
-1 Scryb Ranger

+4 Wall of Roots
+1 Boom / Bust
+1 Wurmcalling
+1 Stormbind

New Sideboard
4 Utopia Vow
4 Seal of Primordium
3 Word of Seizing
2 Deadwood Treefolk
2 Wurmcalling

We reworked Roel Solivere’s deck a bit from the last time we played it and are reasonably happy with the changes. The Wall of Roots frequently soaked up damage in the WW match while giving us at least as much mana as Magus of the Library did. Wurmcalling was added to give us another solid mid-game threat that excelled in the late game. The sideboard was completely reworked to do better against the general field as the original board had some questionable calls and cards that were only good against one archetype (Hivestone for example). We were really happy with how the new build was flowing and ended up playing three copies of it in the tourney.

The only differences between the three was one featured Bogardan Hellkite over the Wurmcallings, and the third one cut all the Scryb Rangers and the extra Stormbind for Avalanche Riders, focusing it more around LD.

After reworking our original R/G/U build, one of my friends pointed out that someone at MTG Salvation was having a lot of good fortune with his own build of the same type of archetype. I took a look and found his build to be a bit more streamlined than ours, so we decided to only make 1-2 changes to the maindeck and board to help with Griffin Guide. Other than the Radha spot, we were really happy with how this performed, so we replaced them with Stormbind, because we found that we were drawing a huge amount of cards per game. It also gave us more answers to flying creatures like Stonecloaker and co.

As stated before, this is Tussius’s listing from 4/6 with the following changes:

-2 Radha, Heir to Keld
-1 Aeon Chronicler

+2 Stormbind
+1 Call of the Herd

Although we kind of want Dead / Gone or Deadwood Treefolk in the deck somewhere, we were pretty pleased with how the deck functioned. Kudos to Tussius for the original build.

Library Control (W/B/U)

The only difference between the two lists is one replaces Sudden Death with Magus of the Tabernacle, but realistically it depends if you except more WW or more Teferi style control decks. Otherwise you can read the basis for the deck here. The reason we included two of this deck is because of strong testing results we got from it. We actually had a possibility of winning against WW (not favorable, but it’s a winnable match) and kept a great control match due to Sacred Mesa and being able to switch from pre-emptive attacks to beating whatever they threw at us.

Balance

Changes to the maindeck:
-2 Mountain
-3 Errant Ephemeron
-4 Temporal Isolation

+1 Island
+1 Plains
+3 Mana Tithe
+4 Vesuvan Shapeshifter

Changes to the Sideboard:
-4 Jaya
-4 Sulfur Elemental
-3 Heroes Remembered

+4 Cancel
+3 Dismal Failure
+3 Psionic Blast
+1 Island

The maindeck changes helped a great deal, because now we had Teferi removal that worked and there was a number of times it allowed us to speed up our overall kill either by copying Gargadon or by playing defense until Restore Balance got online. Mana Tithe is an effective tool, since you rarely tap out early on except to cast Paradox Haze or at end of turn for time counter altering.

Almost MBC

Changes to the Sideboard
-1 Shadowmage Infiltrator
-1 Enslave
-2 Spell Burst
-1 Wipe Away
-1 Dralnu, Lich Lord

+1 Haunting Hymn
+2 Forest
+3 Krosan Grip

Not much has changed from the last build, but the deck needed an answer to help with Sacred Mesa.

Dragonstorm

The Balance deck worked, so… why not the Dragonstorm deck? This is pretty much the same list you see on MTGO and Magic-League, just with Wall of Roots and more Disintegrate to help with the back-up kill of hard casting Hellkite.

Boros

The problem with the original Boros builds was when we weren’t curving out, the deck typically fizzled and lost. So for this tournament I decided to go with my friend’s build of Boros with LD to extend the window the creatures have to beat down while having a finisher in Disintegrate.

B/R/u Control

New Sideboard:
4 Curse of the Cabal
3 Pull from Eternity
1 Plains
2 Enslave
2 Sengir Nosferatu
1 Void
2 Funeral Charm

This list was featured in Zac Hill article and was different enough from the normal builds, including my own, that I wanted to try it out. It was holding off our WW builds most of the time while not automatically packing it in to Teferi. The discard also meant it could hold it’s own against decks like Dragonstorm or Wild Pair before they were fully set up.

The Results (Shorthand)

The Results (Longhand)

The Initial 16

Dragonstorm versus R/G Spec

Game 1: Dragonstorm is on the play and plays a Prismatic Lens and two turn 2 Lotus Blooms that he had from the opening hand. The reason for the delay is simple; the DS player knew he had time in the match and that he had better odds of building up the fourth lethal storm on turn 5 rather than 4. R/G is hard-pressed to race despite blowing up a land, and a turn 4 Spectral Force is much too late as DS goes for the kill on turn 5 via double Bloom and a fresh Prismatic Lens.

Game 2: R/G Spec mulls to six and first set of plays is a Wall of Roots followed by a Spectral Force on turn 4. Dragonstorm lays a turn 2 Ancestral Visions and spends the rest of its time building up charge counters on storage lands. Spectral Force comes in and another Spectral Force comes down on turn 5. After getting knocked down to four on turn 6, DS manages to throw down a Dragonstorm for three; knocking the Spec player down to four. A double-block later and the Hellkite’s come over the top for the win.

Game 3: Dragonstorm mulligans to five and gets run over, never getting over the six mana mark.

Game 4: Another double Lotus Bloom start sees three Hellkite comes down on turn 4 and the game ends soon after.

3-1 in favor of Dragonstorm

Balance versus U/B/R Teferi

Game 1: God I hate Teferi.

Game 2: Greater Gargadon + Restore Balance + Paradox Haze ends the game before Teferi can do anything to stop me.

Game 3: I lay a turn 1 Restore Balance and sit on Cancel mana for the entire early game to hit Teferi on turn 5. The follow-up Teferi is met by a Psionic Blast and I play a Gargadon to combo with my turn seven Balance. Teferi can’t recover from the Teferi before Gargadon beats the heck out of the Teferi player.

Game 4: Balance mulligans to six and can’t trump a turn 4 Teferi backed by turn 5 Cancel. I’m shut down for all intents and purposes.

Game 5: I am so tired of Teferi, but this time my counter play of Vesuvan Shapeshifter takes care of him. Dismal Failure forces my Balance through and knocks out all but one card in his hand. Phyrexian Totem starts to beat me up, but my Ancestral Visions resolves the following turn, which gives me Gargadon and Shapeshifter. Within two turns I have two Gargadon in play and am sitting on Mana Tithe and Cancel to stop Damnation. Game over.

3-2 in favor of Balance

AMBC versus Library Control

Game 1: Library keeps a hand full of threats, but can’t draw a third land to get Totem or Mesa online. AMBC gets Aeon Chronicler online and soon has a huge mana advantage over me. Eventually Library drops Mesa w/ 4 land, but opponent sets up a double creature kill + Extirpate to force a sacrifice of the Mesa and then removing all of them from the game. Although Library is able to lay their own Chronicler and stay in the game for a bit, it can’t get anywhere and eventually falls to Twisted Abomination.

Game 2: Library lays a turn 3 and 4 Totem and then Mana Tithe the opponents Totem. Aeon Chronicler comes down and teams up with Totem to bash for twelve. Although the Totem meets a Tendrils for three, forcing a few land to hit the bin. I can’t draw land to save my life, despite running 26 and having a Flagstones repairing most of the sacrifice damage. Eventually Mesa gets online and I take a Hymn for my troubles. Despite that, I slowly wear him down via Pegasi and Aeon Chroniclers until I win.

Game 3: Library resolves get Mesa before a Hymn destroys my hand. Soon after an Aeon Chronicler + two Totems kill me before I can build up an army.

Game 4: Riptide Pilferer is a big pain early on, slowly chewing away my resources while I get Aeon Chronicler online. Despite the early setback I’m able to recover using Negator as a huge blocked. I also destroy his Chronicler via Pull from Eternity and then hit him with my own Haunting Hymn. Still he has Vesuvan Shapeshifter and a Totem, versus my Totem and a White mana deprived Sacred Mesa. I Mystical Teachings up the Isolation I left in the deck to deal with Shapeshifter.

All I did is store up tokens, and I eventually win when he’s forced to attack with the Totem and I Disenchant it. I then swing back with Pegasi and Totem for the win.

Game 5: AMBC mulligans to five. Although Library loses its first Sacred Mesa to Krosan Grip, it simply started too far down to survive Stupor and a follow-up Aeon Chronicler.

3-2 in favor of Library Control

R/G Spec versus B/R/u Control

Game 1: Spectral Force mulligans to six and gets off to a slow start. A turn 6 Spectral Force meets a Damnation, Sporesower Thallid hits a Tendrils, and the game was soon over thanks to Hellkite.

Game 2: Spec mulligans to four where it finally sees a hand with a number of lands above one. It’s a blow-out.

Game 3: Stupor + Double Void blows the R/G deck out.

These games were really boring, and games 2/3 were done in about five minutes respectively. Void and discard are just huge beatings against this type of deck… Dodecapod, anyone?

3-0 in favor of R/B/u Control

No Battlemage (R/G/U Spec) versus U/B/R Teferi

Game 1: Two early Acid-Moss knock Teferi down, and it’s unable to muster anything but a Cancel on a Spectral Force. A suspended Aeon Chronicler follow-up gives NB all the gas it needs to finish Teferi off.

Game 2: Teferi mulligans to five and can’t counter a turn 3 Harmonize from the NB player. Despite two Damnations to clear the board of Spectral Force and Hellkite, Teferi can’t do anything to Stormbind, which deals the final six points of damage.

Game 3: Stormbind slips into play. Guess what Teferi can’t deal with? Teferi comes out blazing with a quick Aeon Chronicler that ends up trading with multiple elephant tokens and a Void takes care of Spectral Force. Hellkite comes down into play and knocks Battlemage down to eight life. The race comes down to drawing a Disintegrate, Hellkite, or Harmonize (to fuel Stormbind) in the next two draws versus Hellkite beatdown. NB rips a Disintegrate off the top and finishes off the Teferi player.

3-0 in favor of No Battlemage

WW versus WW/u

Game 1: WW gets Griffin Guide and WW/u can’t find Psionic Blast to take out the Guided Priest, until it’s too little too late as WW sneaks a few more points in via Javelineers.

Game 2: WW/u gets Griffin Guide.

Game 3: Both decks bring in practically their entire boards for the match. Opal Guardian is better than nearly any WW creature, Disenchant / Kestrel take care of Temporal Isolation / Serrated Arrows / Sacred Mesa. Dust Elemental is insane when dropped EOT, since it’s unblockable and invulnerable in this match. It also gives you the chance to replay your army before the opponent has a chance to attack again.

Long story short, the WW decks stalemate, Snapback takes care of a Guided Priest and then WW/u drops a Dust Elemental, which WW can’t stop.

Game 4: WW mulligans to five and gets run over by an opposing aggressive WW draw.

That’s the thing about WW mirror matches; they could go either way depending on draws. The one major plus WW/u has going for it, is the answers to Guide that also double as creature removal / disabling.

3-1 in favor of WW/u

Library versus WW

Game 1: Lost the logs for this one, sorry. All I know is Library wins.

Game 2: Library can’t get anything going early on past Mana Tithe on a Griffin Guide. Every time it finds an answer, WW lays another threat to keep the pressure on, and Library eventually folds to the beats.

Game 3: WW takes a mulligan to six and can only muster an Icatian Javelineers for its first three turns for damage. Unfortunately for Library, this meant both of its Phyrexian Totem got hit by Disenchant, severely disrupting the mana. For some reason Library could not draw White-producing lands past its initial Plains and was stuck with two charge lands, a Swamp, and a Plains in play until turn 8. Utilizing Temporal Isolation and Damnation, the deck held off WW for some time.

Eventually, multiple Sacred Mesas and Temporal Isolations died to Cloudchaser Kestrel and Disenchant. Aeon Chronicler comes back to strike a bloody revenge, along with a few remaining Pegasus tokens. WW can’t stop to 5/5 Avatar and pets, and dies.

Game 4: Library has to take mulligan to six and WW mulligans to five. A Shade and Javs kick things off offensively for WW, and then it Disenchants a Phyrexian Totem, while Library Mana Tithes a Priest and starts building up the storage lands. After building them up, Library drops a Stupor to deplete WW’s hand and drops down a Magus of the Tabernacle. The game is practically over at that point.

Shade and Javs manage to deal about 12 damage due to my inaction, but Stupor and Magus of the Tabernacle end the game. Eventually Mesa comes online, and physically ends the game.

3-1 in favor of Library Control

Boros versus Mono Blue Pickles

Game 1: Boros is on the play and starts off with a mulligan. It keeps a six-card hand that has flurry of LD, along with Soltari Priest and Griffin Guide. Two early Prismatic Lens alleviate the pressure, and a Piracy Charm on the Priest in response to Guide ends the offense early. Once Mono Blue can draw into more lands, Shaper Parasite and Teferi take over the board against Avalanche Riders and Serra Avenger. After knocking Boros down to eight, two Psionic Blast finish the job.

Game 2: Boros again mulligans to six, but Mono Blue ends up with a very slow start. Calciderm hits on turn 4 and eats half of Teferi’s life, before managing a flipped Brine Elemental to cut off its final attack. Unfortunately, Mono Blue had to use most of its resources keeping Serra Avenger off the table and eating even more life away. This opening allows for a Serra Avenger + Griffin Guide to hit the table. It’s soon joined by a second Calciderm.

Teferi’s only answer is to take down the Avenger via Psionic Blast and Piracy Charm, but a fresh Cautery Sliver, along with the Calciderm and Griffin token. Mono Blue is at three life, which prevents it from killing anything with Psionic Blast, and Boros simply overwhelms the blockers in play.

Game 3: Boros takes yet another mulligan, although this time it is for power issues instead of being unable to draw more than one land of twenty four like the previous two games. Mono Blue casts Cancel on Boom, Psi Blasts a Serra Avenger, and soon gets the Shapeshifter + Brine Elemental lock into play.

Game 4: Boros casts a turn 2 Boom / Bust with a Flagstones in play, taking out Mono Blue’s first Island. A turn 4 Calciderm drives the point home and takes ten life off the Mono Blue player, and then trades with a Vesuvan Shapeshifter. Two Disintegrates for five are aimed at Mono Blue’s head, but only one resolves. Psionic Blast takes out the follow up Serra Avenger, and soon a flipped Brine Elemental and Willbender lock the game up before Boros can draw any more gas.

3-1 in favor of Mono Blue Pickles

The Elite 8

Dragonstorm versus Balance

Game 1: Balance is on the play and drops an early Greater Gargadon and Restore Balance. This is followed up by two Paradox Haze. Dragonstorm loses a Wall of Roots and all its land, and soon dies.

Game 2: Balance mulligans to six and both decks get off to slow starts, the first play of each being Ancestral Visions. DS lays down mana, and Balance eventually plays a Gargadon and morphed Vesuvan Shapeshifter. The Ancestral Visions gives Balance its namesake to put into play. The critical turn comes when Balance uses a Timecrafting at end of turn to take off a counter, the upkeep takes off a counter, and a second Timecrafting for four removes the rest of the time counters.

Balance comes down and ‘Geddons, as well as making DS discard two cards. Thanks to Wall of Roots holding off the morph beats, both the VS and Gargadon live. Gargadon comes into play the following turn and VS copies it, bash for eighteen. With no land, DS has no answer and dies.

Game 3: Dragonstorm throws down a turn 4 Hellkite, which I use a Restore Balance to get rid of. I follow this up with a Gargadon + Shapeshifter, and end the game in short fashion.

3-0 in favor of Balance

Library Control versus B/R/U control

Game 1: Sacred Mesa resolved and B/R/U couldn’t burn the Library player out.

Game 2: Both decks got Aeon Chronicler online, but one deck has Pull from Eternity maindeck and the other does not. After gaining card advantage, a Haunting Hymn wrecks the B/R/U deck and it’s unable to recover.

Game 3: B/R/U never gets past four lands, while Mesa eats it alive.

Game 4: Library mulligans to five. Even though Mesa comes online around turn 7, it’s too late as B/R/U has set-up a substantial Aeon Chronicler which leads to a pair of Hellkite coming down and ending the game in short fashion.

Game 5: The game goes R/B/U threat — Library plays an answer.
Foriysian Totem — Disenchant
Curse of the Cabal — Pull from Eternity
Haunting Hymn — Imp’s Mischief
Stupor — Stupor
Etc

Eventually R/B/U runs out of cards in hand and on the board and a Phyrexian Totem and Aeon Chronicler go all the way. Game 5 is interesting in the sense that if Library had missed even one answer it would’ve been set back significantly enough to be much closer than it ended up.

3-2 in favor of Library Control

WW/u versus No Battlemage (R/G/U Spec)

Game 1: Helllloooo Griffin Guide and Soltari Priest! NB has no answer, and dies in five short turns.

Game 2: NB mulligans to six and can’t curve out fast enough to stop the creatures. Calciderm has a field day when no Spectral Force appears on turn 5, and NB gets run over.

Game 3: WW/u mulligans to 5 and loses to a turn 4 suspended Aeon Chronicler into turn 5 Spectral Force.

Game 4: WW gets a turn 2 and 3 Soltari Priest, followed up by two Psionic Blast. The game is over before it begins.

I didn’t play these games, so unfortunately the notes are only as comprehensive as my friends made them. Though the match isn’t exactly the most interesting of sorts, especially before sideboard where WW blows out R/G/U on a consistent basis.

3-1 in favor of WW/u

Library Control versus Mono Blue Pickles

Game 1: Library gets beaten down to around eight life before it really can get itself established. From there it lays Sacred Mesa and takes control of the game, but all Pickles has to do is stall until it gets a Brine Elemental online. The sudden lack of an untap phase throws everything out of whack and opens the deck up to losing Mesa and a couple of tokens stopping the Elemental and Parasite in play.

Eventually Library clears the board with Damnation and gets another Mesa online, but it’s too late. Mono U has had all the time it’s needed to find two Psionic Blast, and they end the game.

Game 2: Morphs beat the crap out Library when it struggles to hit BB for Damnation. When it finally drops the bomb, it gets Cancelled and that’s the ballgame.

Game 3: Pickles mulligans to five and Library established Mesa. By the time it gets Disenchanted, there are already half a dozen angry Pegasi in play.

Game 4: Library mulligans to six and has a slow start. Phyrexian Totem eats Disenchant, and Aeon Chronicler gets hit by a Cancel when it’s about to resolve. Meanwhile Teferi takes the lull in the action to lay two morphs, and Damnation merely slows the bleeding. Once Teferi and another morph hits the table, Library knows the jig is up. After a desperate search for Temporal Isolation, it’s finally about to stop Teferi beats… but Isolation gets re-directed to Willbender, and the game ends a turn later thanks to Psionic Blast.

3-1 in favor of Pickles

The Final 4

Balance versus Library Control

Game 1: Library is on the play and mulligans to six, this doesn’t stop it from using Stupor + Pull from Eternity knock out the major threats from the Balance player’s hand and board. By the time he can recover via Ancestral Visions, Imp’s Mischief and Aeon Chronicler are afoot and wreck the Balance deck.

Game 2: This is one of the only matches where I’m saddened by not having Teferi in the deck. The problem is none of Library’s disruption permanently shuts off the deck. This game illustrated it well. Stupor, Pull from Eternity, and Temporal Isolation shuts off all the weapons from the Balance deck for the first eight turns or so. Eventually I resolve Haze and then lay another Restore Balance. Library tries to race with Sacred Mesa, but a timely topdeck of Fury Charm means Library gets hit with a Wrath + Mind Twist + loses three lands, essentially shutting off Mesa for the time being.

It comes down to a matter of who rips the best, and Balance manages an Ancestral Visions while Library is stuck drawing dead spells. The Visions eventually resolves, and gives Balance a Greater Gargadon and Balance to ruin the opponent. Within two turns the opponent gets hit by an Armageddon and soon dies to the 9/7.

Game 3: Library gets stuck on three lands while Balance sets-up the Gargadon — Balance combo. A last second Pull from Eternity is thwarted with Dismal Failure and Library promptly loses the game.

Game 4: Balance and Library both mulligan to five, Balance due to mana issues and Library due to so many cards sucking in this match. Long story short, the only two spells Balance played was Greater Gargadon and Cancel. The unexpected side of this is that was enough to win. Without being able to resolve a Temporal Isolation or draw out of the lack of lands, Library got killed without much of a struggle.

The last two games sucked. I hated seeing my control deck go down with such a lack of effort. We did test the match more afterwards, and it’s not as one-sided as the games indicate, although the lack of Teferi hurts this build a lot.

3-1 in favor of Balance

WW/u versus Mono Blue Pickles

Game 1: A quick start by WW on the play peters out when it runs into Shaper Parasite and Snapback from Pickles. Calciderm ends up trading with Vesuvan Shapeshifter, and suddenly WW is really looking for some gas. A ripped second Calciderm is met by a Cancel, and soon two dorky morphs are beating down. Fathom Seer gives Mono Blue a Teferi for its troubles, and ends the game soon after.

Game 2: WW mulligans, but ends up with a hand of 2x Soltari Priest, Griffin Guide, Calciderm, and 2x Plains. Turn 2 Soltari Priest, turn 3 Griffin Guide… whoops, meet Piracy Charm! The turn 4 Calciderm eats a Cancel and that’s it for WW as far as creatures go. Teferi takes control of the game and ends it.

Game 3: Mono Blue mulligans to five and gets run over.

Game 4: Mono Blue loses a turn 2 Lens to Mana Tithe, and then a turn 3 Shaper Parasite to another Mana Tithe. After that it gets stuck on 3 lands, only able to drop Gray Ogres into play of no real value. WW lays real creatures and Shade of Trokair dominates the board. By the time Snapback makes an appearance, Stonecloaker is there to fly over the few dorks on the ground for the win.

Game 5: Mono Blue takes control of the ground via Shaper Parasite, 2x Desert, and Piracy Charm. WW can’t get any men past this arsenal of creature killers, so they stare at each other for a bit…

At least until Vesuvan Shapeshifter makes an appearance. Once the Parasite effect starts recurring, the game is over.

3-2 in favor of Pickles

The Top 2

Balance versus Mono Blue Pickles

Game 1: Balance takes a mulligan and kicks things off with a turn 1 Restore Balance and turn 2 Ancestral Visions. Teferi just plays lands, Lens and dorky Morphs, as I won’t be doing anything broken with just a Plains and Gemstone Mine. Said dorky morphs beat me up, and then I get hit by double Psionic Blast, ending the game.

Game 2: Despite using three consecutive Balance to clean the board and keep him at two land for most of the game, I can’t gain any CA or draw more mana to abuse my advantage. Eventually he recovers via Fathom Seer and drops Teferi, Kicker of Puppies.

Game 3: Stuff happens, cards trade. Eventually I set up Gargadon + Balance, but Balance gets hit by Cancel, and my last-ditch effort of using Gargadon to finish the game only gets me halfway there. Rich lays a Shapeshifter, which trades with Gargadon and then a Teferi to seal the game up against my now-ruined board.

3-0 in favor of Pickles

What it all means

Rich was thrilled when his baby won the whole tourney, even though he was only around to play the finals, as the deck performed very well in other pilot’s hands. I asked him what he thought about the deck and why it smashed Balance so badly in our match.

“The basic observation to be made is that the Balance deck is strong, but it relies on a few spells to remove threats and accumulate card advantage. Balance itself – and the time-manipulation cards that go into making it resolve – are similar to Dark Rituals going into a single powerful spell. They accelerate the turn on which the spell resolves, but they mean that the spells being countered results in a large loss of card advantage. When you factor in cards that destroy themselves, like Gemstone Mine, the effect is made worse, and this is why a small amount of countermagic is so potent against the Balance deck, but also why the deck is powerful against decks without access to stack control: it uses acceleration to make devastating threats resolve before they should.”

For the most part, I find this analysis to be on target and pretty much dead-on. The deck is basically a combo deck that abuses the suspend mechanic, getting huge flashy effects in exchange for the extra effort put into it. The key difference between our deck and the other control deck – which the Balance deck defeated – was the amount of pressure each deck applied. The Pickles deck presented is much closer to aggro-control than a pure control deck like U/B/r Teferi (or Zac’s version of B/R control). Yes, the creatures are mostly limited in combat, but the key is they can all come down on turn 3 and just beat for two while having their various abilities still.

Now the deck isn’t perfect – it can still lose to WW depending on draws and how the tactical strategy is applied, and it can get beaten by the pure power of some cards like Sacred Mesa. But it’s very effective at what it does do, and I think it showed that when it kept going and doing well against a collection of archetypes.

White Weenie still performed admirably in the tournament, and with a little luck it might’ve been WW in the finals again. I still have no doubt it’s the best aggro deck currently available. The modifications to the board for the mirror were done because Pentarch Paladin is too slow and Sacred Mesa hasn’t lived up to expectations. Mesa is simply too slow for my taste, and it’s easily destroyed by many WW builds utilizing Disenchant and Kestrels. In fact, I’ll let many WW decks keep Mesa around for a turn or two to suck up most of their mana for the turn. Beating 2-3 1/1 flyers is easier than stopping actual creatures they run.

Library Control performed mostly within expectations. Zac Hill control deck proved to be a superior version of my MBC deck in nearly every match. Void and Hellkite are just that good. Tussius’ deck did quite well, and only lost to a match where you and the deck really have to work hard and catch a break or two to win.

Predictions for Yokohama

WW will be the most popular deck played and will take at least two of the Top 8 slots.
Non-Teferi or Teferi marginalized control will put up significant numbers on the backs of Aeon Chronicler, Bogardan Hellkite, and Sacred Mesa. Or the Pickles deck from Shay and myself. Hehe.
Balance will make a significant appearance. People love Balancing Tings, and the cards are just amazingly strong for such a weak format.
There’s still going to be at least a four decks containing Teferi in various numbers in the Top 8. And that’s being generous.
Slivers will fail.
Some stupid Momentary Blink deck will make everyone’s life miserable because it lucked into Day 2 by only playing one WW deck on Day 1.

That’s all for now, and good luck to those going to the PT! Nest week we’ll have some (hopefully) fun new stuff to talk about from the Yokohama results. See you then!

Josh Silvestri
Team Reflection
Email me at: JoshDOTsilvestriATgmailDOTcom