From The Lab – Big G or Bust

Hello.

This week I will be displaying family photos from my recent trip to Gran Canaria, and then talking about Game Theory as applied to toasters.

Heh heh, just kidding.

After San Diego, I thought it would be time to return to talk about the Time Spiral Block format, as everyone is currently trying to win themselves a free holiday in Spain. When Future Sight came out, I saw Gathan Raiders and Keldon Megaliths and immediately went all-in on the already successful Mono-Red deck. Unfortunately, until the herd of Green/White Tarmogoyf players figure out they can’t beat Blue/Black Teachings, Mono-Red is going to have to take a short break until the metagame spins round again (hopefully in time for Grand Prix: Firenze in a few months).

Until then, I thought I’d pick out a deck recommended to me by one of the English players at San Diego and try it out against some of the top decks in the format to see how it fares. This will also hopefully give me (and you!) some insights on the key cards of the format.

Unfortunately, regular Internet access at home left with the swarm of students heading back home for the summer. I’m trying to get this fixed, but for the meantime it’s no MTGO for me.

Sad Panda Prof.

Of course, this means that I haven’t had a chance to check out the weenie poison Sliver deck that’s allegedly tearing up the Premier Events online.

As an aside, I’m never quite sure what to make of the online metagame. Is it ahead, and the real life metagame a few weeks behind, or is it in some sort of alternate reality timeline that continually gets reset by big real life tournaments? I never quite know. It’s relevant because sometimes you can turn up to a real life tournament with the current cutting edge deck from online, only to get battered by two week old tech that all the cool online kids have stopped playing.

The first British PTQ was won by a Black/Red Madness deck, and the second (won by our editor) was infested with Adrian Sullivan’s Baron deck. There was barely a Tarmogoyf or Horizon Canopy around, and people’s eyes would have probably fallen out at the sight of a Virulent Sliver in Constructed play.

And what does all this mean?

I dunno. Beware of local optima, I guess.

Or rather, covering my ass from the expected “GP: Montreal decks, that’s so three weeks ago.”

Prof,
I need you to help me break through. Belief is flagging. The barrier between realities is strengthening. I must have more power.

Yes, Mr. Rhino.

Ah, Greater Gargadon. A few weeks back I was singing your praises as the be-all and end-all of aggro mirrors, and then the Block format went and done a full 360° on me. Mono-Red unfortunately has to go on hiatus for the time being, but are there any other ways we can use Timmy’s Revenge?

About a week before Montreal, Martin Dingler handed my Red deck a thrashing with this deck:

4 Call of the Herd
9 Forest
6 Mountain
2 Mystic Enforcer
1 Plains
2 Wall of Roots
4 Boom/Bust
4 Epochrasite
4 Greater Gargadon
2 Grove of the Burnwillows
1 Harmonize
4 Prismatic Lens
3 Riftsweeper
4 Spectral Force
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Terramorphic Expanse
2 Word of Seizing

Sideboard
1 Mystic Enforcer
3 Detritivore
3 Krosan Grip
3 Molten Disaster
4 Sulfur Elemental
1 Word of Seizing

I think Geoff Fletcher used it to win a trial for GP: Montreal but was unable to attend. He played an updated version at the PTQ on the Saturday of PT: San Diego.

The deck:

The PTQ didn’t go so well for Geoff as he finished up 5-3, but he said he felt he had been unlucky in the games he’d lost and that the deck was pretty strong in the current environment, especially against the Teachings decks most pundits are tipping as the best. The reason for this is mainly Boom / Bust. Korlash is a scary threat with seven lands and an Urborg in play. But put all their lands in the bin, and Korlash goes away as well. Bargain!

The Temporal Isolation were added to fight the Green/White Tarmogoyf decks, which had suddenly jumped in popularity after Montreal.

There are some aspects of the list I’m not totally convinced on. The number of lands seems risky to me, but I thought I’d play the deck as is to get a feel for it first. I’ve wanted to run Gargadon and Boom/Bust together as soon as Planar Chaos came out, but the closest was as a sideboard package to beat counter-less control decks in the Black/Red deck I should have played in Yokohama.

As for decks to play against, I picked the Top 3 from Montreal. I imagine these have been updated since, but I can only work with what I have (and I will hopefully have MTGO again soon, grr).

I played four games pre-sideboard and four post-sideboard with each deck. Tarmogeddon went first on the odd games.

Versus Zampere Goyf

This is the deck that won Montreal. I love the synergies with cards like Flagstones and Edge of Autumn.

I fancy Zampere Goyf in this matchup. It’s faster and has better evasion, including the really scary Griffin Guide.

Game 1, and the ground quickly clogged up with Elephant tokens and Tarmogoyfs. Zampere Goyf gained the edge with a graft counter off a Llanowar Reborn to hold Tarmogeddon’s elephants at bay, and then took to the air with two Griffin Guides. Tarmogeddon died without ever drawing a White source of mana for the Temporal Isolation in hand.

That’s the hazards of a three-color deck.

Air superiority with Griffin Guides was key, with Llanowar Reborn playing a strong role by reversing Tarmogeddon’s early tempo Call of Herd advantage.

Epochrasite felt weak.

0-1

Game 2, and there was a lot of mulliganing. Zampere Goyf went down to four cards, while Tarmogeddon went to six. The four-card hand for Zampere Goyf was fairly amazing, as it again looked to win fast through the air with a Griffin Guided Riftsweeper followed by a Reborn-grafted Serra Avenger.

However, Word of Seizing was a complete wrecking ball, dealing with the two fliers and stealing the Griffin token.

One of the key decisions I had this game was to kill an early Epochrasite, either by attacking with Riftsweeper on turn 3 or blocking it on a suicide attack into the Avenger. I didn’t, choosing to keep it in play as a 1/1. This turned out to be important, as although Tarmogeddon turned the game around with the Word of Seizing, it couldn’t seal the game quickly enough and this gave Zampere Goyf time to cycle into successive Mystic Enforcers with threshold. Had the Epochrasite been able to come in as a 4/4 earlier, this wouldn’t have happened.

This makes me think Epochrasite isn’t right for this matchup. Zampere Goyf has so much evasion it can afford to keep the insect in play as a lowly 1/1 for most draws and win through the air.

0-2

Game 3 was a slugfest, with multiple Isolations deciding it in favour of Zampere Goyf. The Green/White deck drew multiple Call of the Herds and was able to force Tarmogeddon into a multiple block that left it wide open to being wrecked with a second Isolation (the first shut down a Spectral Force).

0-3

Tarmogeddon had a slow start in the fourth game but was able to summon a Spectral Force on turns 5, 6, and 7 to create a solid wall of fat. Neither could attack, as Zampere Goyf had got in a lot of early damage with Call of the Herd tokens and was threatening to overlap.

Turn 8 saw Mystic Enforcer and a Temporal Isolation on Zampere Goyf’s Serra Avenger. Then it was finally safe to cast Bust and bring the Gargadon in on the following turn. With no land, Zampere Goyf’s monsters were too small to turn that around.

I didn’t really feel comfortable with the Tarmogeddon deck this game. Had Zampere Goyf drawn a Temporal Isolation for the first Force or a flying monster earlier, the game would have been over quickly.

I’m not sure I like Spectral Force currently. Despite being enormous, he does feel a little slow and clumsy.

1-3

Onto sideboarding, and it’s clear that counteracting Zampere Goyf’s airforce is the plan for Tarmogeddon.

Dead/Gone comes in to answer both Griffin Guide and grafted Elephant tokens. We add another Word of Seizing and also look to Akroma, Angel of Fury as the primary win condition. Unmorphed she should rule the sky, and she’s immune to Temporal Isolation.

Out go the Epochrasites, and with them three Boom/Bust. We only want to blow up the world when we’re ahead, and that’s going to be difficult against a deck with as many monsters as Zampere Goyf. As it seems to be mainly about airpower, Molten Disaster stays in the board… although you could conceivably run one over the miser’s Boom/Bust left in the main.

-4 Epochrasite
-3 Boom / Bust

+3 Akroma, Angel of Fury
+1 Word of Seizing
+ 3 Dead/Gone

On Zampere Goyf’s side we’ve seen a bunch of fat men, so in come Bound in Silence. Cloudchaser Kestrels come in to counteract the opposing Temporal Isolations, and we also have to bring in two Serrated Arrows. This is because the opponent is showing Mountains, and we need an out in case they bring in Fortune Thief

The bears aren’t massively exciting with the amount of fatties walking around. Unfortunately I don’t want to get rid of all of them, as that would demolish the curve. Riftsweeper stays in by dint of being able to kick Big Gargs into touch. Thrill of the Hunt also goes, and with it two Call of the Herd. Ideally I’d rather keep them in over the Arrows, but even though I know the Tarmogeddon list isn’t running Fortune Thief I wouldn’t have that luxury against an unknown deck in a real tournament. While Call of the Herd is probably better than Riftsweeper, I’m concerned about making the deck too heavy on the three-drop. We want something to drop that turn 3 Griffin Guide on.

-3 Saffi Eriksdotter
-2 Call of the Herd
-2 Thrill of the Hunt

+3 Cloudchaser Kestrel
+2 Bound in Silence
+2 Serrated Arrows

The first game is much better for Tarmogeddon. Elephant tokens, followed by Spectral Force and backed up with Dead/Gone and Temporal Isolation, is too powerful for Zampere Goyf when it doesn’t find Temporal Isolation.

1-0

Zampere Goyf comes straight back with a blistering start. A Griffin Guided Riftsweeper on turn 3 puts Tarmogeddon on a fast clock. Zampere Goyf follows with a Griffin Guide on Mystic Enforcer to really turn the screw.

Tarmogeddon puts up a fight. Temporal Isolation deals with the Mystic Enforcer, and although Word of Seizing is used purely as a Fog, it does buy enough time to unmorph Akroma, Angel of Fury.

I assume the Goyf deck player wouldn’t be a chump and don’t run Guided Riftsweeper into a face down morph with 3RRR open, although this might happen at a PTQ if you’re really lucky, and would probably change the result of this game.

Tarmogeddon unmorphs the angel, but can’t muster any offence, and is overlapped a few turns later when Cloudchaser Kestrel brings the Enforcer back from Isolation.

1-1

Dead/Gone really shines this game, as Tarmogeddon goes first and gets Tempo advantage from an early Call of the Herd token. Two Dead/Gone and a Temporal Isolation prevent a slightly mana-screwed Zampere Goyf from ever getting in the game.

2-1

An early grafted Tarmogoyf runs rampant on the ground and is followed by a Mystic Enforcer and Serra Avenger.

Zampere Goyf gains threshold very quickly, thanks to Flagstones numbers two and three and Edge of Autumn number two. Tarmogeddon unmorphs an Akroma but after getting wrecked with Isolation in order to double block the Tarmogoyf, cannot hold off three huge monsters while on two life.

2-2

After boarding helps, but this doesn’t feel a favorable matchup for Tarmogeddon. Spectral Force can rule the ground, but there are a lot of flying monsters that bypass him completely. The Fortune Thief-or-no aspect can muck around with Zampere Goyf’s sideboard though, as they have to bring in slightly sub-optimal cards or lose to a silly 0/1.

Versus Wafo Slivers

I have a sense of foreboding for this matchup.

It’s like being Ripley and hearing someone radioing base to say they’ve found a bunch of strange eggs. You just know it’s going to end badly.

Game 1, and there is some interaction as Tarmogeddon steals and eats a Gemhide Sliver. This delays Wild Pair for a couple of turns, but Call of the Herd beatdown isn’t fast enough and Whitemane Lion goes nuts to find all the aliens.

0-1.

Game 2, and Tarmogeddon used Boom early as a straight Stone Rain thanks to Terramorphic Expanse. Unfortunately it was on the draw, and this didn’t stop Wafo slivers from making Coalition Relic first. I’ve been playing for so long I’ve been conditioned to assume most three-mana diamonds are a little on the mediocre side, which is probably why I didn’t really notice Coalition Relic. It’s really rather good though, with the charging ability giving a lot of versatility.

Despite the Stone Rain, Wafo Slivers is still able to make Dormant Sliver, and from there goes nuts while Tarmogeddon sticks on land.

Take Possession on the only Green source isn’t really necessary, but why miss the opportunity to kick someone in the nuts if they present them?

0-2

Tarmogeddon had a good draw this game: laying Goyf, Mystic Enforcer, and then gaining Threshold thanks to Busting the world.

Unfortunately, blowing up the world isn’t very effective when the other side makes three Wall of Roots and a Gemhide Sliver.

Telekinetic Sliver showed up, and things got really miserable.

0-3

Turn 2 Gemhide.

Turn 3 Dormant, draw a card.

Turn 4 Gemhide, draw a card; Gemhide, draw a card, Wall of Roots.

Tarmogeddon turn 4? Mystic Enforcer. Not exactly the same degree of power.

Tarmogeddon managed to steal and eat the Whitemane Lion tutor with Word of Seizing, and even get in an attack, but then Might Sliver and twenty-odd powers worth of slivers charged over through the red zone.

0-4

Ow. I felt a bit like those convict dudes in Alien 3. Trying to fight off a nigh-unstoppable killing machine with a few picks and shovels really doesn’t feel like a fair fight.

Too. Slow. And. Cumbersome.

Sideboarding…

Right, time to bring in pest control. Molten Disaster should go some way to keeping the alien menace down. Dead/Gone should also be useful at picking off early Slivers before they attain critical mass.

Epochrasites and Temporal Isolation don’t feel too useful. The tricky choice for me was to keep the Word of Seizing or call in the A-bomb. I brought in Akroma, as I felt Word of Seizing needed other things around like Gargadon or them to have a sac’able sliver to be truly effective. Of course I may be wrong, but that’s what testing’s for.

I was unsure on Boom/Bust, as the Sliver deck has so much non-land mana production. But it feels like the plan of the deck is to blow up the world so I’ll stick with that for the moment.

-4 Epochrasite
-4 Temporal Isolation
-2 Word of Seizing

+4 Molten Disaster
+3 Akroma, Angel of Fury
+3 Dead/Gone

I left the Sliver deck as is. It had just dished out such a pasting I couldn’t really figure out what I could bring in that was better than what was already there.

The first game after boarding Tarmogeddon mulled to four, laid a Forest and then said go a lot until it got locked by the appearance of Telekinetic Sliver.

0-1

The second game was actually quite close, mainly through the Sliver deck missing a couple of land drops. Tarmogeddon managed to unmorph an Akroma and drop the Slivers to two life… before the non-Blue slivers appeared with Telekinetic out to lock the angel down.

Tarmogeddon had a lot of creatures out, which all needed to be tapped down. This gave it a couple of turns to draw Molten Disaster to finish the game. It didn’t, and Might Sliver sent a lethal swarm through the red zone.

0-2

You remember me saying those times when Tarmogoyf is a 0/1 don’t actually exist? Well…

Awkward.

This was a miserable mulligan draw from Tarmogeddon. It looked okay, with a first turn Gargadon and then Tarmogoyf. But no cards went to the graveyard, and two more Gargadons came off the top of the library.

Slivers put it out of its misery with a Whitemane Lion / Wild Pair fuelled Telekinetic lock a few turns later.

0-3

The fourth game looked like the Tarmogeddon deck might put up a fight. It opened with an Elephant token on turn 3.

Then I had a very tough call on when to Molten Disaster. I should have used it on turn 4 to take out a Dormant Sliver. Instead I made Mystic Enforcer, thinking I could develop a stronger board position and maybe net more slivers.

Unfortunately, a Frenetic Sliver appeared, and Tarmogeddon didn’t draw a third Red source for the kicker on Molten Disaster.

I played out both options. Playing the Molten Disaster without kicker killed one of five slivers thanks to good coin flips.

Waiting for the third Red source meant the Molten Disaster would never be cast, thanks to a Telekinetic Sliver that appeared to turn all the slivers into Icy Manipulators on the following turn.

0-4

I think we’ll just call this one a bye to the slivers, although Dead/Gone would have been really useful had it appeared.

I was impressed with the Sliver deck. There was definitely a lot of coolness going on, and Coalition Relic is actually really good.

For the Boom/Bust deck, this is a horrible but possibly acceptably bad matchup. At the time of testing I was going to make a comment about how certain decks might be prepared to lose to Wild Pair Slivers, as it’s not as popular as other archetypes. However, the Slivers have evolved and mutated into an aggro deck, with poison and a backup milling strategy in the mirror. We’ll have to give it a few weeks to see if this is a long term trend, or whether the sliver archetype drops back to Wafo-Tapa’s more generalised model.

Versus Neon Teachings

I really liked this deck after watching Paul Cheon pull a bunch of tricks with Triskelavus and Momentary Blink when I thought a late game Mystic Enforcer would have spelt doom.

This type of deck is Tarmogeddon’s favorable matchup, according to Fletcher. He built it to bash Teachings and Mono-Red after all.

Game 1. Tarmogeddon made Epochrasite and then some elephants. Neon Teachings Damnation’ed them away. The Epochrasite came back.

As an aside, it’s sort of odd how the Epochrasite is kind of dual purpose. I always saw him in the main role of fighting the Red mirror, but he’s also kind of annoying to the Wrath-reliant decks.

Until they find Teferi anyway. But we all know how much I hate that know-it-all smug wizardly piece of cardboard.

Anyway, Epochrasite returned and was joined by a couple more elephants, forcing a second Damnation.

Teachings then made a hefty 8/8 Korlash…

… which became 0/0 when Tarmogeddon finally hit the sixth land for Bust.

1-0

Teachings mulliganed but hit the perfect hand of Lens into Korlash, use grandeur into fourth turn Haunting Hymn.

Good. Game!

Who says the control decks are all slow…

1-1

Game 3 was also quick, but for the wrong reasons. Teachings mulliganed to five. It couldn’t find a land to switch River of Tears into a Black source and it was definitely all tears as Tarmogeddon ran it over with a herd of elephants.

2-1

Mana problems afflicted both decks in the fourth game as well, as Teachings couldn’t find a second Blue for Careful Consideration or second Black for Damnation.

The sixth land was Tolaria West, which mocked the Haunting Hymn in hand.

Tarmogeddon hit six mana in its turn and Bust’ed the world away, before kicking Teaching’s teeth in with a Gargadon and Epochrasite when they come out of suspension.

3-1

Surprise surprise, Boom/Bust quite good versus Korlash decks.

While the ‘Geddon is an obvious slam-dunk, the card I don’t quite know how to evaluate in this matchup is Epochrasite. There are times when his “cockroach ability” is quite an annoyance to the removal decks. But looking quite good and actually conforming to the game plan are not always the same thing as I found out to my cost against Gerry Thompson.

Sideboarding gets tricky, as Neon Teachings can bring in countermagic in the form of Draining Whelk. The rest of the decisions were actually quite tricky, as my feeble aggro player mind threw a cog at what I should bring in and out.

I think I eventually decided on this, although I’m by no means sure it’s correct:

+2 Draining Whelk
+1 Venser
+1 Momentary Blink
+1 Snapback

-1 Careful Consideration
-1 Teferi
-1 Tendrils of Corruption
-1 Mystical Teachings
-1 Slaughter Pact

Onto Tarmogeddon. We have to assume countermagic for games 2 and 3, but thankfully we’ve got a plan B in an uncounterable X spell. I felt they were probably stronger than Isolation. The tough call was Akroma over Epochrasite. Akroma hits harder and although she doesn’t come back if she dies, neither does Epochrasite with Teferi out (assuming I don’t know it gets boarded out, if in fact this is correct in any case).

+4 Molten Disaster
+3 Akroma
+1 Word of Seizing

-4 Epochrasite
-4 Temporal Isolation

Tarmogeddon opened with a suspended Greater Gargadon and then Tarmogoyf, but overall it was better for the Teachings deck. Psychotic Episode hit Boom/Bust, and Korlash allowed the control deck to become the aggressor. Mystical Teachings fetched Haunting Hymn, which cleaned out Tarmogeddon’s hand.

This gave Tarmogeddon a one-card window of opportunity.

Personally, I hate these one-card windows of opportunity. Even though by odds they should draw something irrelevant so often it’s the one card that breaks you in half and puts both pieces in the woodchipper.

People do like to complain when it does go wrong, but the simple fact is there are wreckers they can draw in their deck and the odds are considerably higher than never. It does happen.

Although I’m building this up to the Boom/Bust it was actually a Mystic Enforcer. This wasn’t too bad, as Teachings already had the Temporal Isolation, but elected to hold both it and Korlash back to keep mana open for Draining Whelk.

It then got a little tricky as the Enforcer still got in for six thanks to the Gargadon (sacrifice with damage on stack to get round Isolation) and was then followed by another Enforcer. This was met with a Whelk, but allowed the Gargadon in.

I think Teachings was probably still favorite, but a topdecked Venser made absolutely sure.

0-1

Game 2, and the Tarmogeddon deck was well and truly buried under the card advantage from a turn 3 Finkel.

Tarmogoyf and unmorphed Akroma forced a Damnation, but Neon Teachings had a second Finkel to follow.

Tarmogeddon tried for an Enforcer followed by Bust, only to destroy itself when Snapback returned the Enforcer to hand. Neon Teachings obviously recovered faster with an Infiltrator in play, and ended the game quickly with Korlash.

So the Snapback feels like one correct choice.

Not sure on the Akromas on the other side. I’m wondering if I’d be better off with Epochrasites.

0-2

Early Infiltrator followed by Korlash was again Tarmogeddon’s undoing. Color problems meant Tarmogeddon couldn’t unmorph Akroma or kick up Molten Disaster, and I’m starting to think these may not be the correct sideboard options for this matchup.

0-3

Neon Teachings got a flier in the second game with double Prismatic Lens. Third turn Psychotic Episode presented an interesting choice. I took Call of the Herd over Boom/Bust to remove any early aggro. This meant the Haunting Hymn that followed would still leave Boom/Bust in hand. The play was kind of moot though as Tarmogeddon had drawn a second Boom/Bust the turn before.

Neon Teachings again presented a one-card window of opportunity by laying Korlash. A second land in a row would take Tarmogeddon up to six land and a back-breaking Bust.

It wasn’t a land, and Neon Teachings got to untap and was then waiting with Draining Whelk when the sixth land appeared a turn later.

0-4

Oh dear.

Well, that’s definitely an example of one sideboard plan working and another… well… not.

For a small sample size, I was fairly lucky that both decks actually drew their sideboard cards and the difference was marked. In game 1 Tarmogeddon could cast Bust with near impunity, but after boarding was wrecked repeatedly by Draining Whelk. I was uncertain whether Korlash should stay in, but he finished games very quickly and never gave Tarmogeddon the slightest chance of going to plan B of Molten Disaster. Akroma and Molten Disaster never really had an impact and that’s not good for a sideboard card.

The one thing that did worry me about the Teachings decks was that it did give windows of opportunity to the opponent. On both occasions the chances were very slim, but present enough of them during the course of a tournament and sooner or later someone’s going to come through and wreck you.

This might just be me, though. Better control players could probably leave fewer windows open, but playing more cautiously does also give more draw steps for an opponent to find an answer.

Of course, this is mainly why I’m happier throwing burn at people’s faces. A dead opponent can’t topdeck cards to kill you, and the quicker you make them dead, the fewer cards they draw.

Hmm, this is a lot of words on a deck list that did not perform well against our gauntlet.

While I would have liked to say the deck was fantastic and you should all go play it now, that would be a lie… and we all know lies are bad.

It’s a sad but inevitable fact that most newly created decks always struggle at first when thrown into a gauntlet of established decks. Tarmogeddon struggled against Green/White Tarmogoyf, got soundly whopped by Wild Pair Slivers, and while initially looking promising against Blue/Black Teachings, it got beaten heavily once the counterspells came in.

It probably beats Mono-Red though, but I suspect that won’t be around until the poison Sliver deck gets popular enough for Magus of the Scroll and friends to feed upon.

So where do we go from here. Do we junk the deck or start to make modifications?

My impression of the deck is that it eschews card drawing in favor of packing in more threats. However, Time Spiral Block Constructed appears to be a format when you can indeed ask the wrong questions, and these threats are only good under certain circumstances. In the games, the Tarmogeddon deck just felt slow and cumbersome, and struggled sometimes with color issues.

After playing with it in the Wild Pair Sliver deck, the card that I really want for the Bust deck is Coalition Relic. This is fantastic for fixing mana and getting to that sixth mana for Bust. It also survives the Bust itself, which is never a bad thing.

Of course, if we add Coalition Relic and already have Prismatic Lens and Terramorphic Expanse, then we can afford to get greedy. The interesting question is exactly how greedy?

I think it wants another color, and I think that color wants to be Black. If we want to blow up the world, then I want to make sure the Blue/Black decks have no cards in hand to stop, us and that the creature decks have no creatures in play to beat us up after we nuke the land.

Black gives us Damnation to mow down the critters, and discard spells to pick apart Teaching’s hands.

We can either return to a pre-sideboarded version of Black/Red, or still maintain the Green base and maybe take something like Olivier Ruel’s five-color deck from Montreal and load up on monsters. The important guys to me seem to be Tarmogoyf and Mystic Enforcer. Call of the Herd may also play a role.

This of course could be insanity, but I’m a desperate man. The PTQ Craig won had a Top 8 that lasted over five hours. I don’t care how good the Blue/Black Teachings decks are, I’d rather go and do something more fun – like pick parasites out of a lion’s gums – than subject myself to that.

Currently I’m out of time and space, which is annoying as I don’t like to write about a bombed-out test session without at least having an improved list at the end. Come back here next week, when I take a sledgehammer to the manabase and try to improve the chassis for my favorite Time Spiral combo that never was: Gargadon and Bust.

Thanks for reading,

Prof