I constantly get teased at CMU about how much I love morphs.
“It’s turn 6? Nick is obviously playing two morphs!”
And usually I do.
It’s no secret that I love Blue in pretty much every format, and certainly in TPF draft. This week I want to talk about the archetypes involving Blue, and how each one is very different and requires a different plan during the draft. Each color combo has key cards, and now that the block is complete we can really dive in and figure out how to maximize each archetype.
U/G
This color combination was essentially unplayable back in TTT and got significantly better with the release of Planar Chaos. It doesn’t take a genius to realize that this was mainly due to the addition of Shaper Parasite and Erratic Mutation in the common slot of that set. Future Sight has really made the archetype shine.
Leaden Fists
My initial thoughts on this card were that it was just another Melancholy type of effect, but I was very wrong. I’ve won many games on the back of this card, and I can’t think of a better place for it than U/G. The uses for this card are many, so let’s take a better look.
The first and most obvious use is to lock down a troublesome opposing creature. Second, you can use it as a one-shot pump spell to win a game. Third, you can put it on something like Dream Stalker to ambush a bigger opposing attacker and make it hard for your opponent to get through in the future. Fourth, you can find some way to untap the guy carrying the Lead, such as Scryb Ranger, Coral Trickster, or even Second Wind, to build your own Moldervine Cloak. Finally, you can fetch up the Fists with Mystical Teachings.
Man, that was a mouthful.
Hopefully, I made my point clear: this is not just another Melancholy, and it should be given much more credit.
Venser’s Diffusion
I’ve said this in the past, but I’m repeating it now. When you’re U/G, your plan is to out-tempo your opponent. This card is unique in that you can use your mana more effectively and bounce something that was on Suspend instead of waiting for it to come into play. Of course, it still pales in comparison to the true tempo card for the archetype from Future Sight…
Aven Augur
I love this guy. Not as much as I love the original Undo, but he’s pretty damned close. If you’re planning on using his ability your opponent will only have a one-turn window to kill him before it happens. I’ve had this guy in multiples in a couple of drafts, and he is just ridiculous when the board is close to even or you are winning, and even more so if you can gas back up with card drawing.
Infiltrator il-Kor
I guess I’ll just do this now because this guy is amazing in all of the archetypes featuring Blue. Despite that, I’d say he is at his best in U/G since Green doesn’t provide much support in the evasion department, save Uktabi Drake and Dustwasp. Another plus in this archetype is that you can use a pump spell on him to push through for the win, and not even need Trample to do so.
Giant Dustwasp
Please don’t take Citanul Woodreaders over this guy in these colors. I don’t care if you have Tolarian Sentinel, or whatever other reason you come up with, I promise you it’s likely wrong. Dustwasp, Durkwood Baloth, and other big Suspenders are the real reason U/G is one of my favorite archetypes in the format, since you can use your early mana on them and then start casting bounce spells to create an avalanche of tempo.
So you’ll be dead in a few turns? Sounds good to me.
When you can’t bounce everything, this guy should be able to do the job and he’s quite marginal in about half of the decks in the format that don’t plan on playing a ton of creatures.
Sample U/G Draft Decklist
Uktabi Drake
Dream Stalker
Scryb Ranger
Veiling Oddity
Fathom Seer
Nessian Courser
Shaper Parasite
Venser, Shaper Savant
Nantuko Shaman
Aven Augur
Mystic Snake
Giant Dustwasp
Infiltrator il-Kor
Sporoloth Ancient
Durkwood Baloth
Citanul Woodreaders
Strength in Numbers
Edge of Autumn
Logic Knot
Ovinize
Leaden Fists
Snapback
Temporal Eddy
9 Island
8 Forest
When you get into this archetype your goal is tempo, and possibly abusing bounce effects like Tolarian Sentinel or Dream Stalker with the many comes-into-play abilities or morphs. If you can get a fatty on board and then just clear the way with bounce like Temporal Eddy or Diffusion, it should be tough to lose.
Another thing worth mentioning is that countermagic as a whole goes up in value a lot in these types of builds, since you can bounce and then counter a problematic bomb creature in the late game if you happened to be tapped out. Logic Knot has been really strong for me, and Cancel is obviously fine as well. The big picture in a vacuum is to suspend guys, play guys, and keep your opponent on the back-foot, hopefully long enough to finish him off.
A final tidbit on this color combination is that Primal Forcemage is at an absolute premium with all of the Blue Suspenders, and also the fact that Veiling Oddity has been a monster for me every time in these colors. You have to pick the Forcemage high if you want to get it, and the same is also true for cards like Thallid Germinator now that Sprout Swarm is around.
U/W
Before Future Sight, it was basically a known fact that I hated White and would essentially avoid it at all costs. As is the case with most completed block draft formats though, U/W tends to become a powerhouse after the addition of the last set, if it wasn’t already. This block is no exception, and I’ve been spotted shuffling up Plains again.
Whip-Spine Drake
This guy pretty much does it all. He morphs, he hardcasts, he ambushes 2/2 fliers or flips up after damage on the stack. I’m not sure what more you could possibly ask for in a common creature that the Drake doesn’t have.
The one real problem here is similar to the Gathan Raiders conundrum. Blue drafters will take this guy to cast it face up, and White drafters will take it just to unmorph him, so it’s not like you get a bonus for being the U/W player with late pick Drakes. They are still going to be far better when you have all of the options available to you, and it just means that you have to pick them high.
Merfolk Thaumaturgist
This guy has been talked about before, but I still rarely see him in play and I don’t know why you wouldn’t run him in U/W. I suppose if you have absolutely zero interactions then okay, but that’s a pretty rare thing. Saltfield Recluse is freakin’ amazing, and still underrated in most draft circles. The Merfolk combos well with all of the good defensive creatures that U/W has, and most people tend to forget how it works and at least get blown out by it once in a match. I gave an example of this in a past article where you can kill a 1/4 with a 2/2 by switching after damage has resolved.
Shade of Trokair / Knight of Sursi
Both of these men are strong, and I’m not sure what more I can say about that. Shade is better in the heavier White versions, but I’ve never been a fan of things like Ivory Giant so I really can’t say how White you’d have to be to make that guy good. After playing some more with the Knight, I like it best overall.
Slivers
I wrote about the U/W Sliver deck back in TTP, and I suppose it’s still somewhat valid today. The real problem is that Future Sight only gives us Lymph Sliver, and losing a pack of Watchers or potential key slivers like Quilled or a bomb like Psionic or Pulmonic probably hurts the deck too much to make the strategy consistent. The better plan now is to draft this if you can get the good cards for it, but not to enter a draft seeking to do it on the blind.
Foresee
This card is probably best in either these colors or U/R, since you plan on casting a lot of early drops… and then it doesn’t matter so much if you tap out to reload. I see people playing multiples of this in U/B, and while it’s not the worst thing ever, I believe that you want to build U/B such that it keeps its mana open to Cradle to Grave, counter, Mystical Teachings, or whatever else you need to do.
Lumithread Field / Marshaling Cry
While I wouldn’t be heartbroken to have either of these in my U/W deck, I believe they actually belong in G/W. The Field is still going to be fine and can help protect your Amrou Scouts or Infiltrator il-Kors from pingers, but it’s not nearly as spectacular as when you have a ton of Saprolings out. Marshaling Cry doesn’t seem to matter so much, since you’re either the aggro version of U/W and you don’t care about defending, or you’re the control version and your Jedit’s Dragoons or Synchronous Slivers already have Vigilance and you don’t care if your fliers tap anyway.
Sample U/W Draft Decklist
Blade of the Sixth Pride
Amrou Scout
Whitemane Lion
Saltfield Recluse
Coral Trickster
Aven Riftwatcher
Amrou Seekers
Riftmarked Knight
Spiketail Drakeling
2 Knight of Sursi
Ramosian Revivalist
Viscerid Deepwalker
Stormfront Riders
Castle Raptors
Brine Elemental
Crovax, Ascendant Hero
Temporal Isolation
Dawn Charm
Judge Unworthy
Second Wind
Erratic Mutation
9 Plains
8 Island
After I drafted this deck I wasn’t very optimistic about my chances, but the cards were very fluid together and I somehow 3-0ed. Granted, the deck is fine, just not anywhere near the top echelon of decks I’ve had.
As I was saying before the decklist example, U/W can take on either aggro or control forms, whereas U/G is almost always going to be a tempo deck. U/G can almost be control, but the whole time it is doing so it’ll be wishing it was tempo. U/W is fine in either form, and the trick is knowing the cards that gain value in the different builds. Some of the more controlling versions will run a Sliver sub-theme, since those creatures are good on defense anyway. This deck probably gets my vote for most improved archetype with the addition of Future Sight, even if I still prefer U/G or G/R.
U/B
I’ve drafted U/B a few times lately, and found it to be somewhat unexciting. Since then I’ve done a lot of thinking about the color combination, and I’m now left wondering if I was just drafting the deck wrong and not focusing on being totally control and leaving mana up almost every turn. I think the problem was that I played cards like Foresee, which don’t interact well with Cradle to Grave and counters. Even in its best form, you are often still trading one-for-one removal for creatures, and then you have this problem where you have trouble actually killing your opponent… or maybe you get manaflooded and just lose. This is certainly one of the more complicated archetypes to draft in the format, and picks that seem intuitive may well just be incorrect in these colors.
Gathan Raiders
Kinda sad that the best common in this archetype isn’t even Blue or Black. If you don’t take an Instant speed approach to this archetype, I think you should definitely be looking to abuse Grave Scrabbler. It’s not hard to go nuts with Tolarian Sentinel, or even just multiple Scrabblers and Dream Stalker plus a Madness outlet. Raiders powers up sick things like Gorgon Recluse, Dark Withering, Ichor Slick, yada yada yada. Oh, and they actually kill people, which is something U/B is sorely lacking.
Grave Scrabbler
I mentioned in an article a few weeks back that I felt like this guy was going to be the absolute nuts in B/R. Since then, I’ve thought about it more and realized that he is even better in U/B. He’s something you should definitely be building around in the first two packs, as these guys tend to go late due to being so situational.
Blind Phantasm
This guy is the Horned Turtle of the block, with 2/2 being about the par for the course. He’s not an absolute necessity like Horned Turtle was, and I’d probably rather just have more morphs, but as I mentioned earlier, I’m biased in the face-down department.
Looter il-Kor
His value went down slightly in value in TTP, but I think he’s back at the top of the charts now with the Madness options in the third set. An interesting question I’ve been wondering about is if you first pick a good Black card and are faced with Looter or Fathom Seer as your second pick, which one do you actually go for now? I had to make this decision once, and wussed out and went with the Fathom Seer who is better overall. I think Looter is somewhat of a gamble, but probably not enough to matter, and could easily be the best choice in these colors just like it was back in TTT.
Corpulent Corpse
Since Black as a color basically sucks in this block, this guy has gotten better again. He also goes along well with the leaving your mana up every turn plan that I’ve been describing. Mindstab is obviously very good at putting you way ahead in this type of deck but I didn’t really think I needed to devote much space to mentioning that.
Death Rattle
This card has been really good for me in the last few drafts I’ve done, and the main reason is because it can be so cheap with all of the ways Blue gets cards in the graveyard. Just make sure you kill the Green guys with your other removal so that you don’t get stuck in a spot with a dead Rattle.
Sample U/B Draft Decklist
Corpulent Corpse
Looter il-Kor
Augur of Skulls
Aquamorph Entity
Crookclaw Transmuter
Brain Gorgers
Primal Plasma
Mass of Ghouls
Street Wraith
Body Double
Tombstalker
Piracy Charm
Snapback
2 Cradle to Grave
Cancel
Ichor Slick
Dismal Failure
Foresee
Mystical Teachings
Death Rattle
Haunting Hymn
Dark Withering
9 Swamp
8 Island
This was the one U/B deck I’ve done well with so far, and it was largely due to the fact that I opened Tombstalker and Body Double which are both ridiculous in these colors. This is a good enough example of the “instant” strategy though it has too many random creatures for my tastes and not enough spells.
I honestly believe a Mystical Teachings based strategy is the best way to go, even if you don’t get Teachings. Suspend a guy early, and then counter / kill / bounce whatever your opponent plays. This makes cards like Crookclaw Transmuter even more valuable than before, since you can keep mana up and still play a guy if they don’t play anything relevant. I was tinkering around with Drudge Reavers for a while as well, but have decided that I hate them due to all of the pinging effects, Piracy Charm, Midnight Charm, and Erratic Mutation. I also like to have a Bog Serpent maindeck to handle a few ground creatures with one card if you’ve effectively played attrition during the early turns of the game. Think Twice is good to gas up with, and probably one Foresee in the late game (though casting it on turn 4 with multiple Cradle to Grave in a deck makes me cringe). Mass of Ghouls is strong as well, since you should have cleared the way for it by the time you’re ready to cast it.
Another tidbit about Black is that it’s pretty good in the first and third sets, so while you shouldn’t go into a draft ever trying to force it, if you’re being shipped it in pack 1 you should probably get hooked up in pack 3. Try to make sure your second color is good in Planar Chaos though, so you don’t completely miss out on a pack. I have a feeling that a properly drafted B/W Rebels deck is one of the best things you can have in this format, if enough of the cards are present in the draft and you’re the only one with this idea.
U/R
Oh, how the mighty have fallen.
This deck was unbelievable in TTT, and still pretty strong in TTP if you got the right mix of stuff. Now that the block is complete, I’ve been having trouble winning with this color combination, because Future Sight doesn’t help much at all.
Let me clarify.
Yes, there are lots of good Red and Blue cards in the third set, but the problem is that they don’t mesh well together. You often end up with this deck full of Flowstone Blades, Riddle of Lightning, and all of these other bounce and removal spells and no way to actually win the game. The real problem is that the creatures in these colors are pretty bad at attacking, unless you open a bomb or get some Halberdiers or Fomori Nomads. The nice thing about TPF is that theoretically any color combination is perfectly playable, but U/R has taken a huge hit in the past two sets as it can no longer have these busted Storm turns with Coal Stoker, Empty the Warrens, and Grapeshot only being available in one pack.
Shivan Sand-Mage
Yeah, this guy is uncommon, but he’s also truly amazing in these colors. U/R has tons of suspend options, and you can get some truly ridiculous starts with this guy and another suspend creature involved. I can’t even imagine what would happen if you had Warrens too.
Fatal Attraction / Flowstone Blade
These are both fine, however unexciting, yet they are not what U/R was looking for. Remember that they both combo with Tolarian Sentinel for reusable Shock effects.
Grinning Ignus
Should you manage to assemble some Storm cards, this guy is what you’re looking for. He’s also awesome if you opened a bomb like Hellkite and need help getting it out, but you probably know all of this already.
I looked through my bag of recent decks and apparently have thrown away the few U/R decks I’d actually drafted. The problem is that the rest of the guys that I play with seem to have come to the same conclusions and had similar negative results. So yeah, I apologize for not having a decklist, and while I could make up a list of what a usual U/R build would look like, I’m hoping I got the point across that this color combination got the shaft.
Again, the story here is that we basically got a bunch of removal spells and not much else. If Planar Chaos had some creatures that this deck could use to attack then maybe we’d be in business, but honestly I haven’t had good results yet and it doesn’t look good on paper either. Let me know in the forums if anyone has experienced anything different here, but it’s going to take a lot to convince me otherwise.