Firstly, I’d like to say a big thanks for all the feedback on last week’s Goblin Charbelcher article. I’m going to try out a couple of your suggestions over the next week and see how they work, but my gut feeling is that the deck is too slow and too easy to disrupt… Especially in a world filled with Terror, Smother, and Shock. When I did get it to go off, people were impressed but they soon learned how to stop it and really had me on the ropes.
This week I’d like to look at another excellent Artifact bought to us by Mirrodin: Isochron Scepter. There’s been a lot of talk on the net about Isochron Scepter. If you haven’t heard already, it’s part of a lock that can leave your opponent stuck on one or two land for the rest of the game.
The idea is that you drop a land and a Chrome Mox, cast the Scepter and Imprint Boomerang on it. Next turn, you untap and can Boomerang their land. At the very least, you need an Isochron Scepter, a land, a Chrome Mox, a spell and Boomerang in your opening hand.
I did a quick check on the stats and, assuming we have at least twenty land and sixteen other spells, we get our dream hand in just over 5% of opening hands. If your matches are going to three games each match, we should see one or two lock hands in an eight round day. Of course, if you’re going second it might not even matter as your opponent will be free to cast Shatter, Naturalize, or a Boomerang of their own.
Even so, you might be able to do it – and it doesn’t matter if you can do it on turn 1, 2, or 3 if you can disrupt your opponent for long enough. Capping their mana at four might just be enough to beat U/W Control or MBC – after all, they need five mana to blow their Oblivion Stone to kill the Scepter! What I’d like to do is find a way to include the lock in a deck that doesn’t die horribly without it. To start I took a look at all of the spells that we could Imprint on the Scepter when Mirrodin becomes Standard legal.
Chill Haunting
Fade From Memory
False Cure
Misery Charm
Shade’s Breath
Smother
Spoils of the Vault
Terror
Black doesn’t have a lot of spells we could use, but Smother and Terror stand out as the really quality ones – the rest are probably not worth considering. On the other hand, Blue has more spells than we could fit into a deck:
Annul
Artificial Evolution
Backslide
Boomerang
Brain Freeze
Chain of Vapor
Disarm
Dispersal Shield
Dream’s Grip
Flash Counter
Mage’s Guile
Mana Leak
Meddle
Metamorphose
Mind Bend
Remove Soul
Spy Network
Standardize
Stifle
Trickery Charm
Twiddle
Unsummon
Boomerang, Chain of Vapor, and Unsummon in various quantities allow us to bounce any permanent and slow down a creature-based assault. Annul, Mana Leak, and Remove Soul can help slow down players or give us a guaranteed counter for creatures, artifacts and enchantments each turn – not a bad idea at all. Stifle also shouldn’t be overlooked.
Battlegrowth
Divergent Growth
Giant Growth
Naturalize
Predator’s Strike
Run Wild
Turn to Dust
Vitality Charm
Wirewood Pride
When you see a list like this it really makes you think that Wizards are stuck for spell names if they have to call so many things”Growth.” That aside, we have some good creature-boosting spells and Naturalize.
Red, as you’d expect, gives us quite a few direct damage spells:
Break Open
Brightstone Ritual
Chain of Plasma
Electrostatic Bolt
Fever Charm
Fists of the Anvil
Guerrilla Tactics
Shatter
Shock
Spark Spray
Shrapnel Blast
Shock, Shrapnel Blast, and Guerrilla Tactics are already starring in a new deck by Brian Kibler called”Collateral Damage.” The only other spell I’d consider might be Shatter or Fists of the Anvil. Giving a creature +4/+0 each turn can’t be that bad a deal, can it?
Lastly, a quick look at White:
Aura Extraction
Awe Strike
Blessed Reversal
Chain of Silence
Demystify
Gilded Light
Healing Salve
Holy Day
Piety Charm
Rain of Blades
Raise the Alarm
Razor Barrier
Redeem
Reward the Faithful
Roar of the Kha
Unified Strike
Wipe Clean
White has nearly as many spells as Blue to consider – but most of them aren’t Standard-viable. Holy Day would be a nice spell to use every turn, as would Raise the Alarm. Wipe Clean and Gilded Light have both seen service in sideboards, but I’m not sure we want them main deck.
So, where do we go from here? I’d like to make sure we leave the abusive lock in the deck, so we’re going to have to play Blue. I’m fairly sure that Blue won’t be good enough on it’s own as it has no mass removal, and can’t really deal with threats apart from bouncing them. Given the spells above, I’m going to outline three decks: U/W, U/R, and U/B. In each deck, I want to include at least twelve spells we can copy – and each deck must keep Goblins and Mono Black Control (MBC) in mind.
I’ll start with the U/W deck. Mana Leak is an obvious choice to join Boomerang, and I’d like to have one or two main deck spells we could tutor for with Merchant Scroll like Annul, Remove Soul, and Stifle. White gives us Raise the Alarm and Holy Day: Casting Fog each turn really annoys players hoping to win with creatures.
Playing White also gives us access to Eternal Dragon, Wrath of God, and Akroma’s Vengeance. Even though the Vengeance will kill the Scepter I think we have to play at least one. Finally, I want to play Exalted Angel; it’s just too good against certain decks too leave out.
Counter Stick
Creatures (6):
3 Eternal Dragon
3 Exalted Angel
Other Spells (33):
4 Chrome Mox
4 Mana Leak
4 Boomerang
4 Isochron Scepter
3 Holy Day
3 Raise the Alarm
2 Merchant Scroll
1 Annul
1 Remove Soul
2 Stifle
4 Wrath of God
1 Akroma’s Vengeance
Land (21):
4 Flooded Strand
4 Coastal Tower
6 Island
7 Plains
Well, the deck contains our lock and has seventeen spells we can imprint on the Scepter. Wrath of God and Akroma’s Vengeance clear the board, and Holy Day and Boomerang slow down creature-based assaults. Raise the Alarm can give us a couple of creatures if we really need them, but we’re going to be relying on Eternal Dragon and Exalted Angel for the win. I’ve added Merchant Scroll to see if we can play a”toolbox” of Blue Instants that we can get before casting the Scepter.
I started testing with five games against Goblins. Game one started well; a first-turn Scepter imprinting Holy Day gave me time to sit back, wait until I hit six mana-sources, and hard cast an Exalted Angel. Without a way to kill it on the table, I soon won the game. I only really had to stop one Siege-Gang Commander. That is exactly what I wanted the deck to do.
In game two, I imprinted a Mana Leak but there were already creatures in play; I didn’t see a board sweeper until far too late, and when I did clear the board a Clickslither finished me off. In game three, a Chrome Mox accelerated me to a turn three Wrath of God, with a second in hand. I stayed quite high on life for a few turns but had to Wrath again. Fortunately, my opponent was mana screwed and couldn’t make use of his two Clickslithers before I cast an Exalted Angel and started gaining life. I bought a Dragon back to my hand and dropped a sizeable blocker and finisher. Game four went exactly the same as game one, except that I had to mulligan to five and was going second. A Scepter imprinting Holy day kept me alive long enough to play out a Wrath of God, followed by a hard cast Angel. Game five, I lost to Hammer of Bogardan; I just couldn’t stop the damage.
The deck obviously needs much more testing, but it’s a good start. Some more creature removal would be good because you really need to imprint Holy Day or see Wrath of God or Akroma’s Vengeance. Hammer of Bogardan is never easy to deal with (oh for a Dissipate!) but the deck either needs to find a way to gain time (Renewed Faith) or kill faster (Akroma, Angel of Wrath maybe?). Circle of Protection: Red would be my first sideboard choice as it gives me a way to cope with Hammer of Bogardan and helps soaks up some damage in the early game, too.
The first game against MBC didn’t go well. I didn’t see an early Isochron Scepter and couldn’t slow down their development. My hand was full of Holy Day, Stifle, and Wrath of Gods. Not for long, of course, as the MBC player got to eight mana, played around Mana Leak and cast Mind Sludge to empty my hand. Even so, they couldn’t kill me because they had no threat! That was solved in short order by an Undead Gladiator, and although I killed it a few times it just kept coming back.
We really need a way to deal with the graveyard.
Game two, I got the lock. Going first, I dropped the Scepter and imprinted Boomerang. That really was game over. I drew into land until I could cast a threat and won as soon as I could. I never let them get to two lands. Game three, I went first again and got the lock on turn 2. They never had more than two lands in play. I was mana-screwed and had to throw cards away, but eventually I cast the Dragon more times than they had removal and won. Even if I had gone second, there would have been little they could do.
Game four, I didn’t see Boomerang but managed to imprint Stifle. I stopped my opponent from drawing extra cards with a Phyrexian Arena but when he got to eight mana he dropped and blew his Stone to get rid of everything – I’d used the Scepter to stop the Arena – and my hand was empty thanks to Mind Sludge. I never recovered.
The fifth game came down, once again to Scepter and Boomerang. I dropped the Scepter on turn 4, and bounced a land straight away. I kept my opponent on at most four lands, all the while his Arena eating away at his life. A few Consume Spirits kept his total from dipping too low, but I drew enough land to recur my Eternal Dragon and cast it. It died a few times but eventually it stayed on the table long enough to deal the fatal damage. The last game I imprinted Raise the Alarm early on, but a Riptide Replicator making 2/2 tokens ended the party after an Infest took my creature advantage away.
3-3 against MBC is no bad score, especially with our narrow margin against Goblins. Even so, I’d like to see a lot more work on these matches before I moved on to testing against other decks. Against Goblins, you feel that you need more creature control but much of it will kill your Scepter. Against MBC, you have far too many dead cards that you’ve put in to help you beat Goblins. You can take them out – but what for?
Other than to get Boomerang to cement our lock, Merchant Scroll wasn’t as useful as I’d have liked. Having one Annul or a Stifle or two didn’t seem to help much either – nowhere near as much as Remove Soul helped. I also wanted to see Eternal Dragon all the time – so much so that I’d recommend going up to four. Whenever I saw Akroma’s Vengeance, I cycled it, but having it there was very comforting. I wouldn’t take it out.
Counter Stick II
Creatures (7):
4 Eternal Dragon
3 Exalted Angel
Other Spells (32):
4 Chrome Mox
4 Mana Leak
4 Boomerang
4 Isochron Scepter
3 Holy Day
3 Raise the Alarm
2 Merchant Scroll
2 Remove Soul
4 Wrath of God
1 Decree of Justice
1 Akroma’s Vengeance
Land (21):
4 Flooded Strand
4 Coastal Tower
6 Island
7 Plains
The deck retains our lock and has six spells we can imprint. Raise the Alarm isn’t as good as I’d have liked, but it can stall Goblins before a Wrath. The extra Dragon is in, as is an extra Remove Soul – it’s cheap and it works. We have one Decree of Justice, as it’s just so good. Against MBC and other control decks, you want to imprint Boomerang as early as possible. Against Goblins I find that imprinting Remove Soul or Holy Day is the best bet unless you can lock them on one land.
One important thing to keep in mind is that I saw the lock more often than you’d expect. I’ve played ten games and seeing once would have been about normal. These results are probably skewed in the new deck’s favor.
Next up, I’ll take a quick look at a Blue and Black Scepter deck. Terror and Smother are obvious choices to add, but we lose Wrath of God. Oblivion Stone would be a great addition – if it didn’t kill our Chrome Moxes and Scepters.
Undead Stick
Creatures (4):
2 Grid Monitor
2 Undead Gladiator
Other Spells (34):
4 Chrome Mox
2 Infest
4 Terror
3 Smother
4 Isochron Scepter
4 Boomerang
4 Mana Leak
3 Coercion
2 Rewind
2 Concentrate
2 Stifle
Land (22):
4 Polluted Delta
4 Salt Marsh
7 Island
7 Swamp
In my first game against Goblins, I cast an early Terror, dropped a Scepter imprinting Terror on turn 3 and a Grid Monitor turn 4. My opponent, stuck on three lands, had a hand of two Siege-Gang Commanders and Goblin Sharpshooters. I killed a creature a turn until the board was clear, filled back up with Concentrate, and trundled over for the win with the Grid Monitor.
Game two came down to a first-turn Scepter Imprinting Terror and a turn 3 Grid Monitor. Game three, the Goblin player came out fast but a Mox helped me drop a Grid Monitor on turn 3, giving me a little breathing room, and a Terror killed an annoying Goblin Warchief. A few turns later I dropped the Scepter, Imprinting Mana Leak – not as good as a Chill used to be, but it certainly slowed down the game. And yet it wasn’t enough to save me, as a handful of Goblins and not enough removal sent me to my death.
In game four, I gained control but had no way to win. With no Tutors to fetch a big monster and no Consume Spirits to take my life total back into the safe range, I died to Hammer of Bogardan after a Scepter Imprinting Terror and Concentrate had given me a hand full of useless creature removal. In the last game, I ran out of removal before my opponent ran out of Goblins. I didn’t see the Scepter.
So the deck seems a little light on removal, needs a better finisher, and doesn’t have enough card drawing. That’s quite a few problems!
I’ll start by dropping the Stifles. They’re nice but certainly shouldn’t be main deck. We can add a third, much-needed Infest and a third Grid Monitor. Coercion was better than I had hoped, allowing me to grab a Siege-Gang Commander in the early game. The mana seemed fine, but later on I seemed to be drawing too much land. I’m going to drop one and swap out a pair of Islands for Lonely Sandbars before moving on to try the deck against MBC.
Game one against MBC echoed the U/W deck. Going first, I dropped a Scepter Imprinting Boomerang on turn 3 – I’m learning to love Chrome Mox in these decks. My opponent never got more than two lands in play. I took my time and killed them with a Grid Monitor. Both decks have a lot of dead cards, but MBC needs to get to five land before you get a lock otherwise they just can’t kill the Scepter.
In game two, I locked up the early game but once again couldn’t kill my opponent. Even with the extra deck thinning and Grid Monitor, I sat there until my imprinted Mana Leak had no real effect on the game and I just didn’t have the counter spells I needed to gain control. Eventually, they could just cast creatures I couldn’t kill and beat me to death. Imprinting anything other than Boomerang seems a waste in this match.
In game three, I saw an early Undead Gladiator, which gave me a way to get rid of useless Terrors and Infests. I saw no Scepter and no win condition. We both played out land after land until three Consume Spirits stole my soul for the win.
In game four, I saw an early Grid Monitor after casting Coercion and nabbing Mind Sludge. I managed to counter one Oblivion Stone and Boomerang my Monitor to save it from a second but it died to a Consume Spirit. Luckily, a second Monitor hit the table with Rewind backup. The last game was won with a turn 2 imprinted Boomerang. Again.
These games led me to two conclusions:
This deck can’t finish well. It can gain control just fine, but needs more ways to win.
MBC needs to find a way to deal with Isochron Scepter. If someone plays one before turn 4 and imprints Boomerang, you’ve probably lost the game. Perhaps dropping seven Swamps for four Bloodstained Mire, two Urborg Volcanoes, and a Mountain would allow us to play Shatter and get out of it?
With these thoughts in mind, here’s a better version of the deck:
Undead Stick
Creatures (6):
3 Grid Monitor
3 Undead Gladiator
Other Spells (32):
4 Chrome Mox
2 Infest
4 Terror
3 Shock
4 Isochron Scepter
4 Boomerang
4 Mana Leak
3 Coercion
2 Rewind
2 Concentrate
Land (22):
2 Grand Coliseum
3 Polluted Delta
2 Bloodstained Mire
3 Salt Marsh
6 Island
5 Swamp
1 Mountain
As you can see, I’ve added a touch of red to the deck. A Mountain, two Coliseums and a pair of Bloodstained Mires support the three Shocks. This means that we can hard cast them if we want to but we really want to imprint them on the Scepter. This makes our removal more useful because if there are no critters we can throw it at our opponent instead. The third Undead Gladiator gives us a little more game against control decks, allowing us to throw away cards we don’t want.
I think the biggest problem this deck has is the lack of real mass removal. Wrath of God was amazing in the U/W version, but we’re stuck using Infest because Oblivion Stone hurts us too much.
Lastly I’d like to take a look at one of my favourite color combinations: Red and Blue. Red has lots of removal that we can either Cycle away or throw at out opponent. I’d also like to give Shrapnel Blast a test run.
Shrapnel Stick
Creatures (5):
3 Grid Monitor
2 Rorix Bladewing
Other Spells (34):
4 Chrome Mox
4 Isochron Scepter
4 Boomerang
4 Mana Leak
4 Shock
4 Shrapnel Blast
3 Starstorm
2 Hammer of Bogardan
3 Rewind
2 Serum Tank
Land (21):
4 Grand Coliseum
4 Great Furnace
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Island
4 Mountain
1 Stalking Stones
I could add Ensnaring Bridge into the mix but, I want to be sitting with cards in hand against most decks. I’m also trying Serum Tank. We’re playing a lot of artifacts if you include the eight artifact lands, and so I’m hoping I’ll get to draw some cards! After the Blue and Black deck, I don’t want to gain control and not be able to finish so we have three Grid Monitors – great as an early blocker anyway – and two Rorixes, along with two Hammer of Bogardan just in case we don’t get to Imprint the Scepter with Shrapnel Blast…
Goblins kicked me all over the park in game one. Game two, I imprinted Shock on the Scepter on turn two and killed a creature a turn, dropped Grid Monitor, and was firmly in control on seventeen life. I let the Monitor finish my opponent off with a few free Shocks to help out. Game three I didn’t see enough red mana and died. I did take care of Rorix with a Shrapnel Blast, but couldn’t cope with the 1/1 guys attacking every turn!
Game four I once again got kicked around, and game five – finally – I imprinted Shrapnel Blast, for all the good it did me. Sacrificing an artifact every time you want to kill a creature isn’t as easy as it sounds. I also found that there were a few too many artifacts to make the Chrome Moxes work well. I also never really got to use the Serum Tanks, so I have no idea how good they are.
After a 1-4 beating, I figured it was probably good to change a few things before we move onto another deck:
Shrapnel Stick II
Creatures (4):
3 Grid Monitor
1 Rorix Bladewing
Other Spells (35):
4 Chrome Mox
4 Isochron Scepter
4 Boomerang
4 Mana Leak
4 Shock
3 Shrapnel Blast
3 Starstorm
3 Pyroclasm
2 Hammer of Bogardan
2 Rewind
2 Serum Tank
Land (21):
4 Grand Coliseum
4 Great Furnace
4 Seat of the Synod
3 Island
6 Mountain
I’ve upped the Red mana producers and added three Pyroclasms, as they proved so useful in my land destruction deck, Red Rain. I’ve cut back on the Shrapnel Blasts, as you just don’t want to see them when you’re playing against Goblins, and against Control decks you have umpteen ways of winning already!
With the extra Red mana and three more cheap spells that can kill more than one goblin at once, the deck immediately improved. The first few games I lost, but lost narrowly (I needed one more attack to win). Game three I won easily and games four and five were close – but I pulled it out.
I still don’t want to see Shrapnel Blast against Goblins; a Shock or Volcanic Hammer would be much better. Serum Tank drew me a few cards, but seemed a”win more” spell; if I had time to draw cards, I was pretty safe already. I hope they’ll be better against Control decks – so enter MBC!
In game one, I got the unbeatable turn 2 imprinted Boomerang. In game two my opponent was mana screwed, so it didn’t really count. Game three came down to me drawing a few counters to stop a Persecute and Mind Sludge, dropping Grid Monitor and watching him go nearly all the way. Hammer of Bogardan and Shrapnel Blast finished my opponent off just in time.
MBC worked well in game four. A turn 3 Coercion took my counter and I had nothing to stop the turn 5 Mind Sludge. Oblivion Stone took away my Serum Tank and a Chrome Mox to leave me empty handed, low on mana producers and with no way to get back in the game. Visara finished me off. Game five came down to countering an Oblivion Stone. I had a Mox and an Isochron Scepter Imprinting Shock in play, pinging away each turn. I managed to play Rorix and swung twice before a Terror took his life. A Consume Spirit or two helped a little, but eventually a Grid Monitor joined the fray and my opponent could only watch as his own Arena killed him.
2-2 if you leave out the mana screwed game. That’s not bad, but a win seemed to go all my way, whilst a loss went all his way. I never felt that I could pull back a game I was losing, but also never felt I could lose when I was in the driving seat. MBC is too reliant on Oblivion Stone to destroy troublesome artifacts – and, if you can deal with it, you have the upper hand.
Now each of these decks has one, big problem: Instant-speed artifact removal. If your opponent has a Naturalize or a Shatter in hand when you play the Scepter, you’ve just lost two cards. Akroma’s Vengeance and Oblivion Stone are your next worse fears. In all cases, Annul will probably come in to help against the Stone but you don’t really have anything to use against Shatter and Naturalize… Not unless you really want to play Flash Counter.
Of the three decks, I’d say that the U/W version is strongest, thanks mainly to Wrath of God. Then the U/R one and lastly the U/B deck. All of them have a”just win” hand against MBC and most control decks unless their opening hand has an Annul in it.
Each of the decks has a few problems of their own, too. The U/W deck really needs a way to kill opposing artifacts, and Oblivion Stone hurts a little too much. U/B desperately needs the Stone to help against enchantments – but again, it may just be too painful. Lastly, U/R needs a way to clear out Circle of Protection: Red and Story Circle
All three decks are fun to play and infuriating to play against when they work. I’d expect some players to play something like these at States and County Championships around the world – but like everything, they’ll have their own tweaks that may surprise. Even so, I’d certainly add one of these to your test gauntlet.
Thanks again for the feedback from last month, if you have any feedback for this article, Scepter-based decks of your own, or results from your own testing feel free to post in the forums or email me.
Cheers,
Jim Grimmett
Team PhatBeats.