The Mad Genius… The… The… Well… They weren’t a team long on nicknames, I guess. I’ve called Randy everything from Grand Poobah of Magic: The Gathering to Grand Wazir of some similar, but Team CMU (now known largely as Wizards of the Coast R&D) relied on inventive genius, unparalleled networking, and superb technical play rather than intimidating superhero titles like The Man, The Machine, The Great One, Hat, Kai Budde , etc., to dominate in their day. We know most of the legends of that great team by their real names… Lauer, Turian, Buehler, Schneider, Forsythe… I could go on all day. However, today’s article and deck list is dedicated to two of the team’s less visible ivory columns, legendary deck designers Innovator Patrick Chapin and, um, awesome human being Andrew Cuneo.
Time Warp: Last Thursday
Dear Blog,
This isn’t going very well. I was beating on Gruul all week, and even beat Tin Street (a.k.a. Mother Superior &c.) in the mock tournament, but afterwards, Sadin just kept killing me. I think I lost eight straight games! I would have won two of them but in the first Maher flipped over Hit / Run, and in the other one, they kicked out Neutral Ground, so Sadin said it wouldn’t count and picked up all of his cards humming "neener neener neener." We tested sideboards, too, and he brought in Threatens for my Tombstalkers! What a hater! My "Hit / Run the Gargadon" plan never worked… Get this… he plays Mogg War Marshal! How do you Hit / Run a deck like that?
On top of that, DougP* kept beating me with Boros. Boros! Does anyone even game with that?
Whatever should I do?
Your pal writer,
michaelj
…
Dear michaelj,
Make a new deck.
–Blog
…
Okay!
Pat and I had been working on his awesome Korlash strategy for some weeks. The core of the deck and its engines were his (obviously), but I contributed the format-hating sideboard strategy. One thing I noticed was that his color combination was the same as that of Mishra, Artificer Prodigy at B/U/R. Mishra is a card that Heezy (Mark Herberholz) and I had been trying to break since Time Spiral mock tournament #1, to no avail. Separately, a few months ago (before the release of Planar Chaos even), Andrew Cuneo, one of the great grandfathers of superb deck design, shipped me a Mishra list he had been working on; I noticed that there was a fair amount of overlap between the two strategies and brought the idea to Pat, who was too caught up in his Korlash deck to help out.
Andrew’s deck had numerous cards that were powerful top-down but that I ended up discarding (Icy Manipulator, Phyrexian Totem, Triskelavus, etc.) but I kept his Signet engine (obviously) and his powerful four drops Serrated Arrows and Bottled Cloister. Bottled Cloister is just fantastic in the Mishra deck. The great failing of Heezy Avenue, the first Mishra deck that I tried, was that it just ended up being infinitely worse than Solar Flare; Bottled Cloister does so many things well, and in a Mishra deck, it actually protects itself. Even when they have the Indrik Stomphowler–Mind Twist, you have a personal Howling Mine and can draw into incremental gas. This was an idea that I wanted to preserve as I crossed Andrew’s deck with the commonalities from Pat’s. Even before I finally decided that I wasn’t going to play straight Rakdos (deep into Friday, actually), I was puttering around with a human-alien Mishra-Korlash hybrid. By Friday, this was the deck that I presented to the allegedly retired Josh Ravitz, and the man you should be voting for as Resident Genius, Mark Herberholz:
4 Bottled Cloister
3 Dimir House Guard
2 Dimir Signet
4 Serrated Arrows
3 Chromatic Star
1 Damnation
4 Epochrasite
4 Korlash, Heir to Blackblade
4 Mishra, Artificer Prodigy
4 Rakdos Signet
3 Rise/Fall
2 Tendrils of Corruption
2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Urza’s Factory
6 Swamp
4 Watery Grave
1 Academy Ruins
Josh wanted to cut all the Bottled Cloisters, but I explained to him how the deck worked. Eventually he relented and suggested that we could cut one, and one Serrated Arrows, for bullet Detritivore and Persecute. Heezy agreed on the Arrows cut as the deck was "too good" versus Gruul. If you’ve never seen this deck in action, it’s basically the strongest anti-aggro deck in the field due to its blistering defensive speed. The reason is that it cuts off the early game with Epochrasite, and thanks to mana acceleration, it can play two-for-one Legends of CMU to control board tempo as quickly as turn 3. Both Mishra and Korlash are naturally two-for-ones in context (unless the opponent has Char). You block; they spend another card. If you untap, or if you have a redundant Korlash, their card advantage abilities become part of the mix, and two-for-one is left in the dust. On top of that, you have all kinds of Tendrils and Damnations, tempo Rise / Falls, not to mention the Arrows engine. I know the deck looks a bit slow, but its ability to create a dominating "don’t attack me" board position in the first three turns is essentially peerless in Standard.
In addition to the Detritivore / Persecute bullets, I identified that the deck had Graven Cairns on B/R and should probably have a greater number of Dimir Signets, as Rakdos mana was already spoken for. This was the final deck list:
Creatures (16)
- 3 Dimir House Guard
- 4 Mishra, Artificer Prodigy
- 1 Detritivore
- 4 Epochrasite
- 4 Korlash, Heir to Blackblade
Lands (22)
Spells (22)
It was 74/75 perfect for the tournament; I should have played only two Bottled Cloisters and run the fourth Rise / Fall. That actual mistake actually bit me in my qualifying round. Rise / Fall is perhaps the best card in this deck. You want it early against Dragonstorm, and in the middle turns, it is usually an out that will reverse almost any winnable game. However, I finalized my deck literally less than 24 hours before game day, and I had nowhere near the correct amount of testing behind it to figure out so subtle a change. Also note that by its very nature, this is probably the most difficult deck in Standard to play… every card is basically a tutor. As we know, more tutoring equals more stacks equals more opportunities to err. I erred my pants off in the quarterfinals. You know those games you can’t win unless your opponent makes, say, fifty consecutive errors? That was me… More on that later.
Card Rundown
3 Bottled Cloister
This card is one of the reasons that Andrew’s initial build was so inviting. He figured out how to bend Mishra to persistent card advantage without spending cards or mana. In context, this card is absolutely bonkers. One of the three ways Pat’s straight Korlash deck can lose is by Persecute. Bottled Cloister laughs that off. U/R Hatching Plans has to go all in on Goblins… One round of Goblins-storm is absolute cake to beat with this deck. Sometimes you just slaughter them with Mishra-into-Arrows, and any other time, you are fine with spending the one Damnation to Hymn their last 10 or so topdecks.
I will play a naked Cloister only in a few situations (unless I have nothing better to do): versus U/R Hatching Plans, versus Korlash, and Game 1 versus a deck that I don’t think has any elimination for it. The beauty of this card in a Mishra deck (again) is that the second Cloister will protect the first. Even if you get one busted – the one, presumably, with cards from hand – you still have a personal Howling Mine on the other side.
1 Detritivore
This card is awesome in the slow control matchups. The cool thing in this deck is that few if any reactive decks can stop Transmute-into-Suspend, at least main. Credit (main deck) to Ravitz.
3 Dimir House Guard
These are the Demonic Tutors of the deck. You probably already figured out that The Legends of Team CMU has a fair number of four mana spells.
4 Dimir Signet
As above.
3 Serrated Arrows
These are 3/4 of my copies of Wrath of God. Back in the late 1990s, they were considered comparable in U/W, with U/W generally needing to Wrath a single pump Order, but able to take out three with one Arrows. In this deck, Arrows – especially "infinite Arrows" with Mishra and / or Academy Ruins – is much better than even four Wraths or Damnations. Per usual, you just have to be patient (queue eerie music).
3 Chromatic Star
The fourth was one of the last cuts. Andrew’s deck was something like 22 lands, 6 Signets, 2 Phyrexian Totems, and 4 of these bad boys running 30 primary mana sources for a virtual 32. Chromatic Star, being a kind of cantrip, allows you to reduce the number of lands you play; thus I was very comfortable with 22 lands and 6 Signets. In this deck, Star-Star off the Ruins was a typical card drawing engine I used in the mid-game to crush dreams with Mishra.
1 Damnation
I polled numerous players, from any random barn to PT Champ Jeroen Remie, about how many Damnations they thought I was playing, and all of them came in at the 3-4 range; that is awesome! People won’t over-commit due to fear of Wrath, but you can actually Wrath if you need to. One is perfect for this deck, but requires a great deal of patience; I was very careful about protecting my Wrath, never going for quick card advantage in the early game if I predicted the duel would go long and would come down to a big turn. The only downside is sometimes you draw Damnation instead of Transmuting to it, and it can be Castigated if you haven’t set up Cloister.
4 Epochrasite
In the deck Andrew sent me, these were Bottle Gnomes (pre-Planar Chaos, remember). I kept the Gnomes for a while, including them in the alpha and beta sideboards for both beatdown and Dredge, but found them wanting. Epochrasite is just a million times better than Bottle Gnomes with Mishra. I literally had games versus Gruul that were turn 3 Mishra, untap, Signet-Signet, Epochrasite-4/4 Epochrasite, Epochrasite-4/4 Epochrasite. "Yeah, that’s fair." I think I might have been convinced on the deck when I saw on MTGO that when my Suspended Epochrasite warped in, I actually got an extra 4/4 via Mishra.
4 Korlash, Heir to Blackblade
Most of the deck is tuned around Mishra (Andrew’s Legend), but Pat’s Legend provides the manabase, and the second linear of Swamps matters. I generally lead with Korlash, especially if I have another Korlash. He is among the best finishers in Standard.
4 Mishra, Artificer Prodigy
I play him early in one of two situations: 1) my opponent is Gruul and I need to stall, or 2) I don’t think my opponent can kill him immediately. I usually hold Mishra so that I can at least pull off Star-Star on five mana, or double Signets or some such. Usually if you untap with this card, you don’t just win… it’s a blowout.
1 Persecute
Bullet; Josh’s argument was that I was so far ahead against Gruul I had an extra 20% in the tank every match, but adding one Persecute to my Rise / Fall deck could give me dozens of points against Dragonstorm.
2 Rakdos Signet
As above; downgraded from 4 copies due to Graven Cairns.
3 Rise/Fall
This might be the best card in the deck. I stole the Rise / Fall engine from Pat; basically, you can Rise the opponent’s guy (tempo) and your House Guard to win in a blowout in almost any game you are capable of winning. I used Rise to reset Korlash under Faith’s Fetters more than once, and pointing this at your own dude (as well as Dimir House Guard) is actually pretty good when your plan is to Transmute into Damnation.
2 Tendrils of Corruption
It isn’t a perfect Lightning Helix, but you need some life gain. It’s good against Gruul, U/R ‘Tron, any deck that has a little (or a lot of) direct. Obviously you get blowout games on this. Obviously you get blown out by Gargadon sometimes.
Sideboard
1 Academy Ruins
I side this in against decks where my main plan is recursion (Arrows recursion, Crypt recursion), or decks where I want an extra land because they are fast and I can’t afford to stumble (this or Urborg, below, that is). I also side it in against other B/U/R decks where it is going to come down to Detritivores, or where we might get into a Strip Mine fight.
1 Leyline of the Void
Another bullet singleton stolen from Pat; sometimes you mise. Sometimes you transmute to it.
2 Persecute
Staple for Dragonstorm, Hatching Plans, ‘Tron, &c.
1 Serrated Arrows
Rounding ’em out. Comes in against decks like Project X that can’t really beat Arrows recursion.
4 Tormod’s Crypt
One thing I liked about Rakdos was that I had about a 0% chance of losing to Dredge. One of the things I was very frightened about was facing Dredge and losing to it, which would make me look like a donkey. My deck is obviously a dog to Dredge Game 1, where my plan is like "play House Guard and hope they don’t have main deck Leyline." I never actually had the time to test Dredge exhaustively given how late I finished The Legends of Team CMU, so I had no idea how the matchup would play out, but I assume that they can’t beat double Crypt on turn 3 in a deck that can slaughter or dominate every drop.
3 Detritivore
The plan against permission decks is to go to four ‘Vores and beat them on mana. As you know, permission decks can’t really fight House Guard into Detritivore… With four copies and three of Rise / Fall, dominating on ‘Vore isn’t hard. You know that I love to tap out in control, and in this format I love it more than normal. Permission is so bad right now. Brian Kowal and I were joking about our mid-range tap-out decks this weekend and he recounted the most gigantic beating ever against control. He let his opponent set up an unbreakable hand with Mystical Teachings, and then just played an Extirpate that turned into the better part of a Mind Twist. Permission can’t do anything about that. They can’t do much about the fast Gruul attack. They are madly draw-dependent in other matchups… Tapping out is just better than sitting back on mana right now in my opinion.
2 Tendrils of Corruption
Square these out against Gruul and other attack decks, whether or not they have Gargadons. Sometimes you just shotgun the Gargadon with 7+ Swamps, and it’s very frustrating for the bad guys.
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
This comes in whenever the other Tendrils come in for Swamp support, against any deck with Detritivore, and against other B/U/R decks for the Strip Mine fight.
My sideboard ended up pretty terrible because I didn’t play against any Dredge, and Tormod’s Crypt was sub-par (I drew it when I sided it in, with Mishra in play, and it was terrible). That said, I think this deck is 74/75 right, again with the fourth Rise / Fall in over the third Cloister.
1. Brian – Gruul W 2-1
2. Shane – U/R ‘Tron L 1-2
3. Harry – U/G/W Blink W 2-1
4. Paul – G/W Auras W 2-1
5. Chris – U/R Hatching Plans W 2-1
6. Michael – U/R/W Angelfire W 2-0
7. Christopher – B/G/W The Rock W 2-0
8. Steve – g/R Gargadon ID
9. Paul – Chapin Korlash Control W 2-1
QF – Seneca – Project X L 1-2
Round 1
While I didn’t make any large mistakes, I did play fairly tentatively in Game One. I set up quad Epoc on my second or third Mishra (he drew Char), then double Arrows. However he had Burning-Tree Shaman and I didn’t want to take any damage, so I just sat there with my army and he made more and more Elephants and Tarmagoyfs. Eventually I drew House Guard, dealt myself one on Burning-Tree, found the Tendrils, and flipped on the slaughter spigot. Game 2 he blew me out on Kird, Scab-Clan, double Rift Bolt… I had third turn Mishra, and saw the writing on the wall when he didn’t kill it.
Sideboarding:
+2 Tendrils of Corruption
+1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
-1 Bottled Cloister
-1 Persecute
-1 Detritivore
Round 2
Miserable. Game 1 I had triple Bottled Cloister into double Epoc off the Mishra. He had Wildfire and I still had seven mana thanks to Mishra and the Cloisters; out-drawn and burn out. Game 2 I stuck the third turn Persecute. Game 3 he went straight to ‘Tron with Signets, Wildfired on 3-4, doubled up Sigs, Wildfired again, and I still– had mana for Mishra into Persecute. He got me with Demonfire.
Sideboarding:
+2 Persecute
+3 Detritivore
+1 Academy Ruins
+1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
-4 Epochrasite
-3 Serrated Arrows
Round 3
I forgot to attack with lethal Korlash.
Sideboarding:
+1 Serrated Arrows
+2 Detritivore
+1 Academy Ruins
-4 Epochrasite
Round 4
This was New York State Champion versus New Jersey State Champion. I put him on G/W on account of his winning NJ States with it. I was right. Game 1 I kept lands and fours. He went Selesnya Guildmage, Moldervine Cloak, Serra Avenger. I played Korlash. He asked what I was on; I said 10. He played Griffin Guide on the Cloaked Guildmage and 20’d me on turn 5. Game 2 he opened on Lions, I showed him Epoc. Game 3 I was manascrewed and transmuted to Korlash. Still manascrewed; transmuted again. Eventually I had the land and made 4/4. He came in and didn’t kill me. I had Rise / Fall for his blocker. Unbeknownst to him I had drawn two Korlashes in addition to the two I transmuted for. Did I mention I had Rise / Fall?
Sideboarding:
+2 Tendrils of Corruption
-1 Persecute
-1 Detritivore
Round 5
I lost Game 1 to his three Remands. He drew three every game. One of the next I hit Seething Song and Empty the Warrens on Rise / Fall; the other he went Ignite for seven and I had three fours, Epoc, and Urborg in my hand; he flipped Urborg thrice and Epoc once. Whew.
Sideboarding:
-1 Serrated Arrows
-1 Tendrils of Corruption
+2 Persecute
Round 6
He mulled to four Game 1 and almost won. He came inches from winning Game 2 on Bust even though I hit three Persecutes on each of his three colors.
Sideboarding:
+3 Detritivore
+2 Persecute
+1 Academy Ruins
+1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
-3 Serrated Arrows
-4 Epochrasite
I actually blew Michael out with the fast Mishra-into-Epochrasite draw when he mulled to four in Game 1, but with four ‘Vores in, I thought I had enough threats.
Round 7
I almost lost Game 2 to his Ink-Eyes Dragon. Luckily I was drawing like three a turn and found an out.
Sideboarding:
I don’t remember. I never sideboard right against mid-range.
Round 8
Paul, Steve, and I all at 7-1. Of course I get paired against the GP Champion Steve Sadin. We draw so as to dodge Paul…
Round 9
Paul unintentionally draws. I am overjoyed in that in the last two rounds I have been paired against my teammates. Using my hypno-NLP superpowers I get Paul to agree that the best man should win… Only to remind him that one short month earlier, I was the Best Man at his wedding! My deck up against Pat’s deck is a potential blowout either way, but over many games, I have Cloister defense, and over sideboarded games, I just have more ‘Vores. Got it in three after making something like four mistakes at the end of Game 2 on forgetting to make a Factory Worker, attacking with too many guys, and pulling Urborg, Urborg, Academy Ruins on my card draw one turn… When I already had Urborg and Ruins in play.
Sideboarding:
+3 Detritivore
+2 Persecute
+1 Academy Ruins
+1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
-3 Serrated Arrows
-4 Epochrasite
Epochrasite is bad in this matchup even though it’s a Wrath matchup… Paul sided in Leyline of the Void agaisnt me and it was awesome in Game Two, cutting off Rise / Fall and blanking the Star engine.
Quarterfinals
I voted for Raph Levy for Road Warrior over beloved Kenji Tsumura… and this is how he repays me? I lost to Project X. I actually don’t think it’s possible to lose if I play right. Game 1 I had two Arrows up in the late game, which is hard to break for his fragile combo. I elected to kill Wall of Roots and Birds of Paradise. He went off. I didn’t think I was going to care. My plan was to let him go off and deck him on Arrows. Apparently he can make 1,000,000 1/1 guys with Teysa, not just gain some life. Uh oh. I held Cloister because I was going to deck him. Obviously my last rip, when my outs were House Guard, Rise / Fall, and Damnation itself, was Cloister #2. This is ironic for so many reasons. I was very far ahead with extra copies of both my Legends, and I tossed it. I had so much tempo I probably could have just played the Cloisters… But I tapped those Arrows so I didn’t deserve it. Game 2 I won easily with all four Arrows in play at one point… More than enough edge to withstand Crime / Punishment for four. Game 3 I mulled and he had an aggressive Loxodon draw. Yet again strategy failed me. I sided out Epocs for a third Crypt (I had double Crypt Game 2 but he showed Mystic Enforcer) and the ‘Vore package when I noticed that he was all non-basics. They were too slow. The last two turns I got greedy on the ‘Vore instead of leaving up Ruins mana to set up Star package with Mishra in grip and eight lands down. He played two guys with me on three and I had to rip. I didn’t. If I just used five to Suspend, I would have been able to use Ruins on his turn and almost certainly have the cards to win on Star-draw because ‘Vore could have chumped Loxodon (not to mention I could have just drawn Tendrils or something). I screw up on slips, tactics, and even on tables constantly, but it’s rare for me to be on a bad plan. This time I almost couldn’t make the right plays because I was aiming so far off of target. In my mind’s eye the football is hurtling from my foot towards the opposite end zone still.
Sideboarding:
You don’t want to know. Really.
As bad as I was, Seneca was awesome. Congratulations to him and good luck at Nationals!
…
Heezy is the uncrowned 2007 Resident Genius
Resident Genius Ballot is up today, and this year they elected not to honor the, shall we say, incumbent with a nom. Even if I were on the ballot, I’d tell you to do the right thing and vote for the Pro Tour Honolulu Champion, who has been consistently the best deck designer on the planet earth for going on one year. Here is his take on my Mishra deck (which he consulted on, much like Nassif’s Top 8 effort from Worlds):
I like how this deck is more proactive than Pat’s deck… I always get scared of having my deck be too reactive without any counterspells when a card like Persecute is legal (yes Bottled Cloister is an answer to that as well but Pats deck relies on Aeon Chronicler). You also retain the tutor engine and all of your silver bullets to make sure the deck has a good
amount of game vs. every deck in the format. Mishra is just so amazing in this deck. He ramps your mana (Signets), he draws you cards (Stars, Cloisters), he makes you men (Epochs), and he kills their men (Arrows). This deck just seems like the natural evolution of Pats deck to take over as the new dominant deck of Standard.
I would also like to add that if Mike weren’t such a gigantic idiot he would be testing with me for Nationals right now… Well, he’s still going to test with me but for once he’d actually be competing as well. Too bad!
Herberheezy
Lastly I’d like to thank BDM, Luis Neiman, and Asher-ManningBot for spotting me cards. Drafts are on me this week, guys! Also thanks to Paul for driving all of us miscreants to the tournament. Finally, thanks to the cute waitress at the diner for calling Asher monkey-boy, and Mishra for being awesome.
I know it is going to inevitably be called Flores Mishra or something, but in my heart this deck belongs to my friends Andrew Cuneo and Patrick Chapin. I hope you enjoy trying it out and do better with it on MTGO than I did at Regionals.
LOVE
MIKE
Vote Heezy!
* Doug qualified for Canadian Nationals with Zoo; he didn’t have all the rares for Zoo online, which is why I took my beatings with Boros. "DougP Goblins" as we called it, which Doug initially shared in the now-defunct Top8Magic.com forums, was the first deck in the chain reaction that eventually led to Dirty Kitty.