{From Right Field is a column for Magic players on a budget, or players who don’t want to play netdecks. The decks are designed to let the budget-conscious player be competitive in local, Saturday tournaments. They are not decks that will qualify a player for The Pro Tour. As such, the decks written about in this column are, almost by necessity, rogue decks. They contain, at most, eight to twelve rares. When they do contain rares, those cards will either be cheap rares or staples of which new players should be trying to collect a set of four, such as Wildfire, Llanowar Wastes, or Birds of Paradise. The decks are also tested by the author, who isn’t very good at playing Magic. His playtest partners, however, are excellent. He will never claim that a deck has an 85% winning percentage against the entire field. He will also let you know when the decks are just plain lousy. Readers should never consider these decks “set in stone” or “done.” If you think you can change some cards to make them better, well, you probably can, and the author encourages you to do so.}
This Week’s Campaign Promise: I Will Stop the Madness in Freedonia
Every hero has a nemesis. Mine is the country of Freedonia, once ruled by the Brothers Marx. They have made my life miserable for long enough. Their reign of freedom — free thought, free love, and free ice cream – ends on the day that I get elected to the 2006 Magic Invitational.
Vote for Romeo!
…
The Suckage, and How to Get It
I suck. You know it. I know it. People who know nothing about me know it. I pass people in the mall, and I can see them look at me and size me up instantly: “he sucks.”
I’m not just talking about Magic writing or Magic playing, though I suck at those, too. Seriously, gang, we all know that I’m not the best writer. I’m not even the best writer on this site. Heck, I’m not the best writer on the non-premium side. (I’d vote for NJX, Abe, Dave, Talen, or blisterguy.) My suckage at the actual playing of the game has nearly reached legendary proportions. It’s more than Magic, though. I just generally suck.
I suck at everything I do. For instance, my boss makes it a weekly occurrence to sit down and point out the things I do and don’t do that, as we work our way down the non-suckage chart, prove that I suck at my job. I suck so badly at my job that they’ve let me continue to do it for over seven years, probably for entertainment value.
The problem is that I don’t really feel like I suck. Most things that I try to do, I have a pretty good idea of how to do them well. There’s a difference between knowing and doing, though. (“Paging Dr. Yoda. Paging Dr. Yoda. You’re needed in O.R. six for an emergency cliché extraction.”) Perfect example: painting. Not the artistic, it-looks-like-I-puked-on-a-canvas-but-it-represents-man’s-inhumanity-to-man kind of painting. I mean the HGTV-inspired-my-wife-to-make-over-the-house kind of painting. Having lived only in my parents’ home, dorm rooms, and apartments my entire life before I married Luanne (Hi, honey!), I’d never painted a wall before. So, I went to the aforementioned HGTV web site and read about it. Seemed pretty easy.
When I was done, it looked like an epileptic baboon had painted the place while he was drunk. I have no idea what went wrong. Simply put, I suck.
That realization makes writing this column tough some weeks. There are people who actually tell me how much I don’t suck.
“I love your stuff. You make me laugh.”
“I loved that mono-Black deck. I actually came in second in a tourney and didn’t have to spend two hundred bucks on cards.”
“If you weren’t married, I’d let you slather me in sugar-free French vanilla Jell-o pudding and lick it off me.”
Sorry, that last quote wasn’t about Magic. It was from Naomi Watts. Again. Apparently, restraining orders mean nothing to that woman. I have no respect for people who don’t respect our court systems.
Anyway, these people count on me rising above my genetic predisposition for chunk-blowing. For them, I try. Unlike Avis, I don’t try harder; I just try. Sometimes, I do it hard. But never hard-er.
I bring this up because this week’s deck is Blue. If there’s one color that eludes my grasp in Magic it’s “the best color ever” and “the color of champions.” Jeez, imagine that. I bite like the fleas in Christina Aguilera‘s bed, and I’m no good at getting Blue to work. Go figure. Is there an Einstein in the house? An Edelstein, even?
Sure, with Matt Frazier’s help, I invented what became known as Blue-Green Madness. (We called it Flapjacks because that’s Matt’s favorite breakfast, and he always wanted to invent a breakfast-themed deck a la Trix.) Okay, the first tournament that I ever won was won with a Blue-Black deck that I called Avatar of Won’t. (I’m sure you can figure out how that one worked, being as smart as you are good lookin’.) I have trouble with ones that are mono-Blue, though. Why? Because I suck.
Bluer Than Blue
Which leads me right to this week’s deck. (You knew I’d have to get there at some point, dincha?) I fell in love with Halcyon Glaze from the moment I laid eyes on her. I know what yer thinking. “Why would a good, upstanding, married Magic writer like Chris Romeo fall for Halcyon Glaze?” For starters, she’s simply enchanting. More precisely, she’s an enchantment. She only turns into a creature when you cast another creature spell. This means that she’s immune to most sorcery-timed creature removal a la Wrath of God, Wildfire, and Cruel Edict.
My, oh, my, what a creature! She’s a 4/4 flier. The transformation is glorious, akin to watching Lindsay Lohan go from gawky kid to hot babe. Okay, yeah, Naturalize and Terashi’s Grasp can kill her, something most creatures don’t have to worry about. You take the good with the bad, right? All the married guys holler “Yo!”
The biggest problem, of course, is that the card screams mono-Blue beatdown. There’s double-Blue in the casting cost. Then, there’s the fact that it makes a 4/4 flier. Can you hear it? That’s Halcyon Glaze: “Mono-Blue beatdown!”
Good mono-Blue beatdown decks, though, are as common as valedictorians at a Ujena swimsuit models convention. I was going to try it anyway. Why? Oh, come on. You know why. Because I suck.
Come Fly with Me
The first thing I did was take a little engine that we’ve all loved since Betrayers of Kamigawa was released: Ninja of the Deep Hours and Ornithopter. This little-piece of synergy allowed the deck to do two things. First, there’s the obvious play of swinging with an Ornithopter on turn 2 and dropping an N.D.H. into play, thus, drawing an extra card for the turn. Second, and more important for the Glaze, it would allow the deck to have extra creatures to cast.
I worked hard on this. I mean, sweat-dripping-from-my-brow hard. I was making tweaks here and there, and it still wasn’t working as well as I knew it could. It wasn’t bad. It didn’t suck, at least not as much as you’d expect it to given that I was the designer and pilot. (George is my co-pilot. He’s a six-month-old Siamese kitten, which could explain something.) It wasn’t, however, consistently winning against more tuned decks.
The biggest problems were the more dedicated weenie beatdown decks. Ornithopter can stop Boros Recruit or Suntail Hawk. It’s not so good at stopping Watchwolf. I was missing something, and I couldn’t figure out what it was. Why? Because I suck.
Send in the Cowells
Fortunately, there are people who don’t suck. One such non-sucker is Mike Cowell. I was working on version number eleven (I told you, I’d been working very hard on the deck) when Mike sat down at my table with… a Halcyon Glaze deck. We both had third-turn Glazes. Mike, however, being one who doesn’t suck as much as I do, had a secret weapon: Imaginary Pet.
The Pet fits this deck like a glove. It comes down on the second turn and stops all sorts of beatdown shenanigans. (Frenzied Goblin need not apply.) It is almost constantly coming back to your hand. If it’s not, it’s because you don’t have any cards in your hand. So, you’ve probably already lost. “gg”
When Mike dropped the Pet, I had an idea.
“I can steal this from him, and he’d never know.”
Then, guilt set in.
Do you see what I mean? I even suck at stealing other people’s ideas. He didn’t need to know that I didn’t have the Pet in my deck. He’d never have known if I didn’t tell him. I did, though. I asked him if he’d mind if I mentioned him in an article. He said no, he didn’t mind.
So, Mike, if you’re reading this, unlike me, you don’t suck.
Since this version of the deck would be my twelfth and to honor my idol Homer Simpson, I decided to call it:
One Dozen Glazed
19 Creatures
4 Ornithopter
4 Imaginary Pet
4 Ninja of the Deep Hours
4 Shimmering Glasskite
3 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
18 Other Spells
4 Halcyon Glaze
4 Remand
3 Telling Time
4 Boomerang
3 Icy Manipulator
Guildpact still isn’t available online. (As I write this, anyway. Stop looking at the calendar. I know what day this piece hits the site. I don’t have my time machine hooked back up yet, Doc Brown. Besides, I can’t get my hands on one-point-two jigawatts of power. So, go away.) Looking up and down that spoiler (or at least the Blue and artifact cards), I see only one card to add or change. As soon as I get them, Repeals replace the Boomerangs. Immediately. A couple of other cards that I’ll be testing heavily in this deck are Thunderheads in place of the Manipulators and Drowned Rusalkas instead of the Pets.
Again, you can see why my suckage factor is so high. I spend a bunch of ink talking up the Imaginary Pet, and then I talk about dropping it. Jeez, I suck. Follow my twisted thinking, though. The Pet has many advantages. One that I forgot to mention was that it still only costs a buck, and you can still get original Urza’s Saga version for that. Boo-yah! One thing it will never do in this deck, unless you hand is empty, is attack.
I’m skipping ahead, though. You want to know how this deck was working, right? Just say “yes” so that I can move on. Thanks.
The Cards & Playing the Deck
I don’t normally include the ubiquitous “here’s why I picked each card” and “here’s how to use the cards” section, but I’ve found some interesting stuff with this deck. Besides, I just wanted to make some obvious comments.
Kira: Drop her as soon as possible. She protects all of your creatures, except for the Glaze when it’s still just an Enchantment.
Telling Time: This card is one of the best spells of any type that I’ve ever used in any color. Looking at the card, it should be obvious that it’s great. Moreover, it’s very elegantly designed. Okay, I’m gushing. It’s not obvious exactly how completely fantastic this card is, though, until you play it. You’re not just seeing three cards deeper into your deck. You’re maximizing those next three cards, losing the least useful or important one and making sure your draw the right one on your next draw. This one’s saved me more than any other card in the deck.
Boomerang and Remand: You only have four of each. Save them for when you really and truly need them. For example, you probably don’t need to Remand a Char (unless the Char ends the game), but you’ll probably Remand a Wildfire. (However, I did win one game in which a Wildfire resolved, leaving me with no lands, because I had two Glazes on board and an Ornithopter in hand. Heh.)
Icy Manipulator: Don’t forget that you can actually save your stuff sometimes, even with Kira on board. Target it with Icy, then bounce it. I’ve only done it a couple of times, but it was worth it.
Don’t be skittish when playing this. It’s Blue, but it really is about the beats. Don’t try to use Jedi Mind Tricks on your opponent because you can’t back them up. There are, of course, times when you will be the control deck, times when you get nothing but Remands, Boomerangs, and Icy Manipulators. Play what you’re dealt, and do it thoughtfully.
The Games
One thing that I want to warn you about “from the git-go,” as my bubbas down here say. A lot of people conceded to me quickly when I was playing this deck. It’s not that I was beating down so quickly that they were overwhelmed. It was Remand. Some people see that first counterspell and just quit. I understand. Countermagic sucks worse than I do. There’s no way for me to tell them, “Don’t worry. This is the only countermagic in the deck.” I guess I could just tell them that from the outset, but that’s not very smart testing, now, is it?
Digression: Countermagic
During one night of online testing, a heated discussion occurred in the Casual Games room on the pros and cons of countermagic. I didn’t get into it for two reasons. For one, the good answers take too much space. Second, the Adept told everyone to stop. So, I’m putting my two cents in right here.
The person who started this particular night’s loss of bandwidth wrote, essentially, “I don’t know why people get so upset by countermagic. It’s just a one-for-one trade. There’s no advantage like with Wrath of God.”
That’s absolutely wrong. There is advantage; it’s just not card advantage.
Here’s why a lot of people don’t like countermagic. It’s like your girlfriend or wife saying yes, you can, and then changing her mind once you’re all hot and bothered. Looking at it one way, you haven’t really lost anything because you can’t lose what you didn’t have. The thing is that you really have lost something: the anticipation of doing something that you really wanted to do. Anticipation is sweet. Anticipation is a promise of sorts. That anticipation drives our lives, not just Magic. “I’m gonna get a new car! … No, I’m not …” “I’m gonna get a Serra Angel! … No, I’m not …”
More important, though, countermagic is advantage. I’ll let Mike Flores tell everyone the technical term for it. It might be tempo. I dunno, because I suck. What matters, though, is that countermagic’s not just a one-for-one trade. It’s usually a one-for-one trade in terms of cards (my one spell for your one spell), but it’s also typically a loss of a turn for the person whose spell is countered. That’s what hurts. Countermagic is very often (usually?) cast on the other guy’s turn. I have to cast my creatures and sorceries on my turn. That’s when you play your countermagic. I tap out to cast Serra Angel on my turn, and you counter it on not your turn. The player with the countermagic hasn’t lost a turn. S/he’s set up exactly the way s/he wants to be. That countermagic, though, that Mana Leak or Hinder or Rewind, often costs the player whose spell is being countered an entire turn.
That, folks, is why countermagic is so annoying. It’s not just that you’re being told “No, you can’t do that” as if you were a four-year-old kid trying to get into the cookie jar, or a horny teenage boy trying to get into a cheerleader‘s sweater. It’s that you’re also often (usually?) losing a turn. No one likes that. No one.
End of digression.
Game 1: His first two lands were Forest and Mountain. I was worried about the fast beats and burn of a R/G deck. Fortunately, I came out just as fast with Ornithopter and Imaginary Pet. While he was casting 2/2’s and 3/3’s, I got out two Halcyon Glazes. On my fifth turn, I dropped Kira. She triggered the Glazes while also protecting them. In two more turns, thanks to the Pet being recast each turn, it was over. (1-0)
Game 2: He was playing U/B. His removal was essentially useless because he couldn’t deal with the Glazes. He had some nice creatures which would normally have been fairly good beaters, but he wasn’t about to beat them into my two Imaginary Pets. Then, for the first time in all of my testing, I got to attack with Imaginary Pets. I was down to one card, and he hit me with discard. Thank you so very much. (2-0)
Game 3: Yet another U/B deck. This one was a milling deck. He was at two life while I had two Glazes on board with a Pet and two Remands in hand. As long as I could get to my turn, I’d be able to cast the Pet (regardless of whether it hit) and then protect the Glazes. The only problem turned out to be getting to my next turn. I was tapped out from casting creatures, tapping down blockers with the Manipulator, and drawing cards with Telling Time. That gave him free rein to cast the perfect Tunnel Vision. He called Telling Time, and it turned out that Telling Time was the very last card in my deck. He followed that with Psychic Drain for one, tapping out. I lost when I couldn’t draw during my turn. Had he picked any other card, I would have won. That’s what I call close. (2-1)
Game 4: And now, my second G/R deck. I kept an iffy hand (everything cost three or more), but I had three lands. He got a fairly fast start with a second-turn Kami of the Hunt thanks to the first-turn Llanowar Elves. I got Glazes in play on turns 3 and 4 (probably a mistake since I could have cast extra blockers instead) and then began swinging for eight a turn while chumping with Kira and Ninjas of the Deep Hours. While I was at six, he had four fairly large creatures. I had a Kira and Shimmering Glasskite in hand, but I only had six mana. I needed one more creature, and it had to be cheap. (A land also would have helped, but then I’d have to top deck a creature on my next turn to make the Glazes go.) Enter Telling Time. I cast the Time and kept an Ornithopter, putting a Ninja on top for next turn. Kira came down, activating my ‘Thopters, so I could swing for eight and drop him to four. Then, I cast the ‘Thopter. He couldn’t kill me without burn, though he got me to two. On my turn, I cast the Ninja and swung for eight with the Glazes. (3-1)
Game 5: I was infatuated with his deck. It was a G/U Enchantress deck. He also ran Halcyon Glaze. Unfortunately, it also ran Drake Familiar. The game went very, very long. So long, in fact, that we had to adjourn because I had to go to work. I was ahead eight to four when we adjourned. I’m positive I would have won since I had Glazes on board and control in my hand while he was tapped out. I guess he could have countered something with Disrupting Shoal, but I’d seen two-thirds of his deck and nary a counterspell in sight. Still, we didn’t finish. (3-1-1)
Game 6: This guy figured out who I was, and even told me it was “an honor” to play me. Wow. I was sure that my inflated ego was going to do me in. Fortunately, it didn’t. He was playing a R/G/W deck with Loxodon Hierarchs and mana acceleration as well as Cloudstone Curio. Uh-oh. I started with early creatures and didn’t let up. Ornithopter was followed by Imaginary Pet was followed by Halcyon Glaze. When Shimmering Glasskite came down, I didn’t think he’d have a chance. However, he dropped a Flame-Kin Zealot. Uh-oh again. I blocked with my ‘Thopter and Imaginary Pet. That kept me alive for the last turn that I’d need. I dropped him to two after recasting the Pet and then bounced his Curio. He didn’t have enough mana to drop the Curio back into play, cast a creature (bringing back the Hierarch), and recast the Hierarch to gain life. Close and fun. (4-1-1)
Game 7: Mono-Green can be good, but it needs a fast start. He didn’t get one. More precisely, he got lots of mana and mana fixers but not much to use it on. Meanwhile, I was flying over for four and six damage at a time and drawing the random card here and there with the Ninja. When he finally got a beast with a Blanchwood Armor on it, Icy Manipulator was online to neutralize it. (5-1-1)
Game 8: Holy inappropriate decks, Batman! A Glare of Subdual deck in the Casual Decks room! Do you know what Glare decks hate? Kira, Great Glass-Spinner. Sadly, I went through over half of my deck (thirty one cards) and didn’t see one. (5-2-1)
Game 9: This may be the worst match-up for One Dozen Glazed: Boros. Creatures come down quickly and they move fast. Luckily, Kira prevents a lot of the problems cause by Thundersong Trumpeter and all of those targeted removal spells. It was extremely close, but, thanks to the blocking power of the Pet and the attacking 4/4 Glazes, I won. Just barely. I was at two when the game ended. (6-2-1)
Game 10: Another Boros deck. This time, I didn’t fare so well. S/he came out of the gates smoking and never let up. I was on defense the whole time. When I lost, s/he was at eighteen. (6-3-1)
I hate to disappoint you, but I just didn’t have time to get this deck into the Tournament Practice room. Remember, a lot of folks conceded to me the instant they saw any bounce or countermagic. So, while these are the results for ten games, it took about sixteen to get them. That doesn’t count the first thirty or so games that it took to get the deck to this version, number twelve. If there is enough clamoring for it, I will take this to the T.P. room.
The Guildpact Inclusions
As I mentioned above, when testing this with Guildpact, I dropped the Icy Manipulators for Thunderheads, the Boomerangs for Repeals, and the Pets for Drowned Rusalkas.
“Why take out Icy Manipulators for Thunderheads?”
Icy is a temporary solution for a permanent problem: creatures. Get it? Creatures are permanents? So, they’re a “permanent problem”? Yeah, anyway, often you don’t want to just tap a creature down; you want it to go away. Besides, Icy often gets hit by Splash Damage because of other artifacts. So, you’re tapping down something for a couple of turns, but then the Icy gets “blowed up good” (Bubba again). That still leaves your problem creature.
Getting a couple of 3/3 fliers from Thunderheads can solve a lot of problems. Like two Watchwolfs (Watchwolves?). Sure, there are times when you’d rather have the opposing creature on the board and tame rather than dying and causing you problems. Kokusho comes to mind. Normally, though, instant-timed creatures are A Good Thing.
“So, what good are the Drowned Rusalkas? The Imaginary Pets and 4/4’s. The Rusalkas are 1/1’s.”
Imaginary Pet is almost never going to attack. In fact, in all of my testing, only once did I get to swing with it. That’s okay because the Pet’s power is on defense. The Rusalkas, though, are so versatile. They can swing for a point of damage. They can enable the Ninja of the Deep Hours. (As it stands, the only way to get a turn-two Ninja into play is with the Ornithopter. Switching the Rusalkas in for the Pets doubles your chances at getting a Ninja into combat on the second turn.) Best of all, though, they can turn dying creatures into cards. That works very, very well with Thunderheads.
Take the example above where your opponent swings with two Watchwolfen. You have eight mana but only a Rusalka on board, so your opponent feels pretty good about swinging with his two 3/3’s. Heck, you only have one card in hand. What could go wrong?
What could go wrong is that you cast Thunderheads and Replicate it. That gives you two 3/3 blockers. You block each Watchwolf. Then, with damage on the stack, you use your two mana and pitch the two tokens to draw cards. (Do it one at a time, though, in case the first one you draw is the one you want to keep.) Sure, in the end you only end up with one card in hand, but that’s what you started combat with, anyway. That means that your opponent lost two cards and you lost none. Let’s see, two divided by zero is either null or infinity, depending on what discipline you’re from. I have no discipline, so I say you’re ahead by infinity on that play. Woo-hoo!
There were indeed times that I wished the Thunderheads were still Icies and that the Rusalkas were still Pets. On the flip side, I know that there were times before I made those changes that I had wished I could just block and kill something rather than keeping it tapped down, or swing for one to drop a Ninja into play. You can’t have every card in your deck. What you do is test what you think might be good, and see what happens.
In the end, because of the Pet’s dominance on defense, I’d keep the Pet. It’s just too good in this deck. It doesn’t help draw cards when creatures are dying like the Rusalka does, but it activates the Halcyon Glaze over and over and over.
There was never a doubt about the Repeals, though. While they can’t bounce a land, they can bounce anything else, and they draw a card when they do it. It’s not as efficient as Boomerang with its two-mana cost, but this deck has yet to have mana problems. Card drawing will do that for you.
That means my current decklist is:
Creatures (19)
- 4 Shimmering Glasskite
- 4 Ninja of the Deep Hours
- 3 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
- 4 Ornithopter
- 4 Imaginary Pet
Lands (23)
Spells (18)
It seems so long ago that we started this long, glazed trip. Sadly, it’s over for this week. Make sure to tune back in next week when I make be taking a detour back a fortnight or so.
Chris Romeo
CBRomeo-at-Travelers-dot-com