I’m sure there were several people in San Francisco that were Nationals Champs, but only three of them, the most recent U.S. Nationals Champions, are going to be the topic of this article. For those of you not in the know, that would be current U.S. champ Luis Scott-Vargas, last year’s champ Paul Cheon, and 2006 Brazilian Champion Paulo Vitor Damo da Rosa.
This isn’t the first time that some of them have shared a Top 8, and I’m sure it won’t be the last. Back in 2006, when Cheon won the U.S. Nationals tournament, Luis Scott-Vargas was there too, way up at 3rd place. Their decklists were nearly card-for-card the same in that event too, Solar Flare decks with only one spell different, Vargas’s 2nd Kokusho versus Cheon’s 3rd Zombify. I’m not sure how many people also chose to play the same deck as this pair at that event, but a great deck paired with great play vaulted them to the top.
The same story is true in San Francisco at the Grand Prix. Whether they call the deck “Duders” or “Cheontourage” or nothing at all, the fact remains that their Black/Blue/(X) Teachings list performed incredibly well. It’s certainly possible that they had two hundred of their friends playing the same deck at the event, but I’m willing to bet that that isn’t the case. Whenever you are able to get two copies of the same deck into the Top 8 of an event, that is an accomplishment worth being proud of. I’ve managed it a few times over the course of many, many years. But, as I’ve talked about in many recent articles, in a format that is so incredibly difficult to crack, getting three copies into the Top 8 is amazing.
How was the format so particularly hard? In my conversations with numerous minds in the game, from Richard Feldman to Brian Kowal to Patrick Chapin, and many others, there seemed to be a large consensus about what defined the format in its latter days. While many people had opinions on what the “first tier” of decks actually was, it was held, largely between Black/Blue/(X) Teachings decks, various Pickles builds, and Blue/Green Tarmogoyf decks. This is not to say that certain decks, such as the Kavu Justice deck recently piloted by Josh Ravitz to a PTQ victory, were not to be expected and respected. Rather, it is that these three decks were the ones most responsible for eliminating a competitor from the ranks of players “in contention” for a win in any tournament.
Talking with Chapin was particularly frustrating, if only because we were trying to “solve” what could indeed be a completely unsolvable format. It didn’t appear that there existed any deck that had the ability to simply brush these other decks all aside. The wrong matchup would just end your day. Take Ravitz’s victory. While I’m sure that he would have just fine matchups against certain builds of Black/Blue/(X) Teachings decks, I’m also willing to bet that other builds would tear him apart. Ravitz, to his great fortune, never saw a Teachings deck over the course of his PTQ win.
My own attempt at such a deck ended up being an incredibly fun Mono-Green beatdown deck that I think might have actually been just such a deck, but I never had enough hard and fast numbers to be able to hand it to anyone and say, “This is definitely the one.” To most people, I would hand them either my Baron deck or Shell-Game Red, each with their slight modifications to update them to the new format. Block seems to be dead, or I’d share the Green deck I was working on (designed initially by Chicago judge extraordinaire, and fellow Cabal Rogue compatriot, Rashad Miller), but I suppose if enough people clamor in the forums, I could make my next article about that deck…
Cheon, da Rosa, and Scott-Vargas’s approach to the format with their deck (which, for simplicity’s sake I’m going to refer to from now on as “California Teachings”) is definitely one that I can get behind. One of the things that I like most about it is the main deck, running none of the cards I consider complete crap. I say this only slightly tongue-in-cheek. While I could be wrong, I’ve always felt very judgmental about many cards that I see in peoples’ Teachings list. I’m going to go out and flatly state that if your Teachings list has Aeon Chronicler, Extirpate, or Cancel main deck, it is probably wrong. The worst thing that I can see in the list that these three are running is that they choose to run an Extirpate in the board, such a tiny sin that I can easily forgive it in light of their accomplishment. (For the record, I don’t think that those cards are garbage in other decks or format, just in Block Teachings…)
So, here it is, California Teachings, as played by Luis Scott-Vargas, Paulo Vitor Damo da Rosa, and Paul Cheon, to 1st, 3rd, and 8th place, respectively:
3 Shadowmage Infiltrator
1 Bogardan Hellkite
1 Detritivore
1 Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir
1 Triskelavus
1 Haunting Hymn
4 Prismatic Lens
3 Coalition Relic
4 Damnation
2 Void
3 Careful Consideration
2 Foresee
1 Pact of Negation
1 Slaughter Pact
2 Tendrils of Corruption
3 Mystical Teachings
1 Strangling Soot
2 Molten Slagheap
4 Terramorphic Expanse
4 Tolaria West
3 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
2 Urza’s Factory
1 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Mountain
3 Island
1 Academy Ruins
4 River of Tears
Sideboard
2 Detritivore
2 Pull from Eternity
2 Spell Burst
2 Slaughter Pact
1 Imp’s Mischief
1 Ancient Grudge
1 Return to Dust
1 Extirpate
1 Pact of Negation
1 Void
1 Strangling Soot
(da Rosa’s list ran one less Foresee, preferring a 4th Shadowmage Infiltrator, but otherwise, the lists were all perfect matches.)
This list can be broken down into many sections, and there is numerous overlap between them, but I’m going to repeat those numbers anyway…
The Mana
If Sligh decks and all of their descendents like Red Deck Wins and Boros have taught us anything, it is this: consistent mana is important. For the aggressive decks, a huge part of their success was always in their mana — regular, stable, and dependable. Another big part of their success was the stumbling in the mana of their opponents.
2 Molten Slagheap
4 Terramorphic Expanse
4 Tolaria West
3 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
2 Urza’s Factory
1 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Mountain
3 Island
1 Academy Ruins
4 River of Tears
3 Coalition Relic
4 Prismatic Lens
California Teachings is not an aggressive deck, but it is a deck that is packing a hefty four colors. While it eschews the rewards of Green in the form of Gaea’s Blessing (*sniffle*), it touches on each of the rest of the colors (though it can flashback a Grudge). The deck runs 33 mana. It only pushes into White for access to its sideboard (though potently). The Red, on the other hand, is quite meaty. Bogardan Hellkite, Detritivore, Void, flashbacked Strangling Soot, and more in the board to boot, mark this deck’s Red.
One of the important things about this deck’s mana, though, is its preparation for the long game. While running enough basic lands to support any of its off color spells easily (ostensibly a minimum of 16 color producers of its off colors, if you count the tutoring), it also runs a full set of 4 Tolaria West. Tolaria West can be an important Pact tutor in many games, as well as grabbing an Urborg to power up its Tendrils and Black in general. It also allows for three other huge plans.
First, the easy access to Academy Ruins means that any incredibly long game can eventually end in a repetition of Triskelavus with the Ruins. For many of the aggressive decks, especially those that don’t include any burn for reach, a recurring Triskelavus is often the game. This advantage is much less clear in Teachings near-mirror matches, but it still can very often be incredibly hard to answer.
Second, early access to Molten Slagheap. In any of the slowest matchups, one of the most consistent ways to actually win the game is to have a huge mana advantage. If you haven’t won the game off card advantage (generally involving the tricky interplay of many, many complicated factors that can be quite draw dependent), mana advantage can give you the game as well. If you have access to 14 mana against your opponents 9 on turn 9, it is very likely that you can transform this mana advantage into a game win a lot of the time.
Finally, access to two Urza’s Factory. Again, in the longest controlling long games, these cards can easily determine the victor. Being behind in the Factory race can be incredibly difficult to recover from, and this deck’s double Factory, plus full set of tutors for it, take the cake.
With 33 mana, it is entirely possible that this deck will overwhelm itself with land, but thankfully the deck can do something about that…
Card Selection and Drawing
3(4) Shadowmage Infiltrator
3 Careful Consideration
2(1) Foresee
3 Mystical Teachings
4 Tolaria West
We’ve already talked lightly about the Tolaria West, but it stands mentioning them again here. 33 mana doesn’t feel like so much if you can turn that extra mana into a Pact instead. This dual-use gives the deck a certain kind of extra mana stability, much like a Mind Stone or Horizon Canopy can give reliable early mana when needed, but be discarded for another purpose if you have more than sufficient mana.
The Careful Considerations are probably one of the most valuable weapons in this deck when it comes to getting rid of the extraneous cards. While Foresee gives the same card advantage and can also be used to dig deeper if that is necessary, the Considerations provide a dumping ground for all of that extra mana if you’re flooded (or extra spells, for that matter, if you’re mana hungry).
While Paulo seems to have disagreed, it does look as though Luis and Paul clearly felt like the deck wanted to have five of these pure card advantage spells, with the three Shadowmage Infiltrators making a potentially breakable permanent version. Perhaps Paulo felt less afraid of his Infiltrator’s death whether from his opponent or from his own Damnations, but either way this sets up eight pure draw spells. (It is worth noting that Paulo considered Finkel to be one of the two best cards in his deck.) My own gut says that Luis and Paul are probably correct, and the deck probably only wants 3 Finkel, based on my expectation that the deck is probably going to be too busy on turn 3 to usually feel safe dropping the card, but much of that question is a factor of metagame consideration.
With so much space already allotted to card draw, the expensive tutoring power of Mystical Teachings comes in as only a three-of. My own Baron deck ran four copies of the card to accommodate a very different strategic goal: creating a honing process in which the deck tailored itself to beat a particular opponent. This deck only runs three copies as a means of increasing redundancy on the particular cards that it is going to natural run into as a result of drawing so many cards. At some point, this deck is going to want to find a card advantage spell, or a control spell, or extra removal. While the deck does include some silver bullets, it isn’t built to make that its sole focus.
Control Elements (board)
4 Damnation
2 Void
1 Slaughter Pact
2 Tendrils of Corruption
1 Strangling Soot
1 Bogardan Hellkite
1 Triskelavus
A clear four-of, the Damnations are a required element for the Teachings archetype, and California Teachings is no different. What is perhaps more surprising is that California Teachings chooses to not run more Tendrils of Corruption. Typically, many Teachings decks choose to max out both of these cards at 4/4, but in this case, the trio of Champions has another plan in mind.
First of all, this deck runs a lot more other point-and-click elimination. Slaughter Pact, the repeatable use of Strangling Soot (or even Triskelavus and Ruins), and two Void provide a lot of strong answers to expected cards. Tendrils can be an incredible card, but it can also be a little dead in the wrong matchup. Four mana is a lot, and so many of the decks out there are expecting to dodge Tendrils with a card like Mystic Enforcer.
Void is the ultimate K.O. of this strategy. Any aggressive opponent sandbagging creatures is likely to see them all eaten up by a Void. Calciderm? Void for 4 snuffs it out, and takes care of any of his little bros up in the hand. Dealing with a nasty Tarmogoyf is easy with a Void for 2, slaughtering a whole ton of potential friends like Looter or Avenger that might be waiting in the wings. Excitingly, against the non-aggressive decks, Void plays an entirely different role, where that Tendrils is only usually sitting around to be discarded to a Careful Consideration.
Control Elements (spells)
1 Haunting Hymn
2 Void
1 Pact of Negation
1 Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir
1 Detritivore
There it is, that nasty little Void again. While not as complete a beat as Haunting Hymn versus a control deck, a lucky or smart Void on a control player can sometimes wreak just as much havoc. Void isn’t just for four in these cases (to smash the card drawing spells), but can also be for two or three to knock out a number of the opponent’s mana, or for zero to reclaim the ground in a losing Factory war.
Regardless, though, it is the Hymn that really gets people. Haunting Hymn is one of those ridiculous cards in the control matchup when it hits, and it can be incredibly hard to recover from. One of the reasons that I’ve generally hated Aeon Chronicler in the Teachings decks is Haunting Hymn. To make a Chronicler at all worthwhile, it generally has to be instantly powered out by a Teferi, or it ends up tapping you out completely, leaving you wide open to a Hymn. From there, they can get their own competing card advantage going, whether via Consideration/Blessing, Infiltrator, Detritivore, or simply knocking out the Chronicler.
Pact of Negation is one of those incredible little success stories from Block. While initially seen as largely a tool for combo decks, it’s utility as a counterspell tutor target that is free is fantastic. Sure, sure, sure, it says on the card “free” and “counter,” but a lot of people were definitely put off by that five mana follow up. The biggest boon for Pact, though, is the ability to spread out the costs of an important turn.
Teferi belongs in this section primarily because it can be used to shut down Suspend cards of all kinds, as well as nullifying the utility of a ton of instants. Counterspells aren’t the only instant that gets virtually wrecked by Teferi. So do any combat tricks. Even if you can just put it out there, knowing that a combat phase is going to be trick free makes it much easier for a control player. Chaining Mystical Teachings through Teferi into some of the other finishers or disruption in the deck is also a very important element, of course, but this fits a little less in that category.
The Detritivore is almost out of place in this category, but he deserves inclusion here because of his ability to knock out enough of the mana of an opponent so that their cards are virtually useless. As a generally untutorable singleton, the Detritivore can only really be arrived at by eventually running into him, or by chaining a Teachings into a Teferi into him. In some matchups, that chain is just the thing, but in most cases, its better to simply draw into him in the late game where he can’t gum up the game versus a beatdown deck, and where he’ll be of great effect against an opposing control deck. The extra ‘Vores in the board are there specifically in those matchups where it can be incredibly important to attain a mana advantage, such as the mirror.
The Kill
1 Bogardan Hellkite
1 Triskelavus
2 Urza’s Factory
While it is absolutely true that sometimes you’ll kill someone with Finkel or Teferi or a Detritivore, usually what these cards are doing is setting up a situation where the game is unwinnable by the opponent, and you could literally kill them with a Scryb Sprite. The real killers are these four cards.
Urza’s Factory quickly starts dominating any game that starts to turn stale. An unanswered Factory will kill someone in four turns (two plus four plus six plus eight equals twenty). Generally this pure a kill won’t happen, and your opponent will interfere, but it can turn sour real quick if they don’t get something going.
The Hellkite is probably one of the fastest pure finishers in the game, when you’re low on time. Unanswered, a Hellkite will kill someone in three turns (three attacks, plus the comes-into-play). Again, this isn’t the common way a Hellkite is used. Typically, the Hellkite will nuke one or several problems and then hop in the way of another one, smashing it as well. Many, many games are completely turned around by a Hellkite used like this.
The Triskelavus is one of those cards that is primarily going to be included in a deck because of its inevitability in combination with an Academy Ruins. Turn after turn of Triskelavus can be nearly impossible to stop, and just a single one can often stop an army cold.
One thing that is exciting about each of these finishers is that they can help buy you the time to survive before you’re ready to start kill the opponent. This is an incredibly big deal. Having non-extraneous kill conditions is a huge advantage for a control deck.
The Board
One of the interesting things about California Teaching’s board is how much it is tuned towards accentuating its basic strategy: draw more cards, and break the right stuff.
Breaking Men
2 Slaughter Pact, 1 Strangling Soot, and 1 Void help make this deck back a very formidable 14 creature kill spells. Void number 3 is especially exciting, giving the deck access to seven sweep spells, and really putting a damper on the sandbagging strategy that a lot of aggressive decks have relied upon to beat Black/Blue Teachings in the past. Sandbagging, in this case, just means that you aren’t going to have dealt them enough damage. Copious point-and-click from California Teachings make the initial rush a very hard endeavor for an opponent.
Breaking Mana
2 Detritivore, 1 Ancient Grudge, and 1 Return to Dust can all be used against the slowest matchups to tear the land and artifact mana of the opponent to pieces. Most of the slowest decks are particularly prone to reacting badly to this strategy. A positive side effect of the Return to Dust is protection against the otherwise devastating Take Possession (or two of them!).
Breaking Spells
2 Spell Burst, 2 Pull from Eternity, 1 Pact of Negation, 1 Imp’s Mischief, and 1 Void. These cards all answer a number of different things, but answer them they do. Spell Burst is a clear answer to any of the morph-based decks (nearly always Pickles). Pull from Eternity is a great answer for any suspend cards (in order of scariness, Detritivore, Aeon Chronicler, and Greater Gargadon). Pact of Negation and Imp’s Mischief are each able to negate an important spell, albeit in very different ways.
I’m actually not sure how often the Void is boarded in against an opponent in expectation of its use as a discard spell. My gut says that it is rare, but might exist, but I’m unsure. I haven’t played any boarded games with this deck yet, so it’s a tough call, there.
Breaking Nothing
Okay, okay. So Extirpate might have some use, some time or other. I would just contend that it is so narrow a use as to be meaningless. In my own experience, Extirpate in the mirror or near-mirror seems to only become effective in any really measurable way when you cast the third one, unless you get a “Cabal Therapy” hit out of it by actually knocking out a card from the hand. If I were to do anything to the deck, I’d replace this card with something that actually does something. It is fantastic against Bridge from Below, and if that’s why it is actually here, or if you expect Bridge decks, leave it in…
Congratulations
Honestly, I’m incredibly impressed with the results that the three champs put out there. So, here’s to Paul Cheon, Paulo Vitor Damo da Rosa, and especially Scott Luis-Vargas. Great work this last weekend. You guys put out a result that most of us can only dream of.
See you in Valencia!
(And, P.S., where did the deck originate? Hehe!)