Pro Tour: Geneva is coming up in less than 10 days. Planar Chaos is not yet in the shops, but we have already started drafting, in order to figure what the new set has to offer. Quentin Martin, Geoffrey Siron, Julien Nuijten, Jelger Wiegersma, Florent Jeudon, and I rented two apartments in Avoriaz, a ski resort in the French Alps, to both ski and draft.
A regular day for us sees us wake up at 9:30am, eat breakfast, then get ready to slide on the slopes at 11am. We’re back home around 4pm, when we draft once or twice in a booster “team draft.” As we’ve only six players in our “colony,” we decided that the most entertaining way to practise was to split into two teams that we determine after the draft. The difference with an 8-man draft is that the pool of cards is smaller, so in general the decks are a little weaker, and you can generally predict with great accuracy which card is going to wheel. Overall, the whole point of this training is to figure out how good the cards are, and which combinations of colors are viable. Basically, we’re looking to define what the format “is.”
For the coming weeks, I’m going to review each color: the strengths of the cards, which combinations of colors are viable, and which card is best in a given archetype. Reviewing cards out of their “context” is, in my opinion, quite useless, as it doesn’t give useable information. I’ll be reviewing the commons of that color and each combination of colors, and I’ll also supply my common pick orders.
For the first week, I’ll be reviewing… Blue.
List of Blue Commons
Aquamorph Entity
Dreamscape Artist
Erratic Mutation
Gossamer Phantasm
Merfolk Thaumaturgist
Piracy Charm
Primal Plasma
Reality Acid
Shaper Parasite
Synchronous Sliver
Veiling Oddity
Wistful Thinking
Blue is, by far, the color that has the most common depth. Eleven out of twelve cards have a use in a Blue deck. Only Wistful Thinking as the only unplayable – more on this further on.
The good thing with Blue is that it offers mostly reliable color combinations:
Blue/White
It’s said, by folks around me, that Blue/White is the best archetype. The U/W mage doesn’t have to splash for removal anymore, as he gets his own in the shape of Sunlance, Shaper Parasite, Erratic Mutation, and Piracy Charm. It has sure lost some flying power with one less Time Spiral booster to get Ephemerons and Castle Raptors, but it has gained in board control with Saltfield Recluse, Merfolk Thaumaturgist, Poultice Sliver, and the removal spells mentioned above. It’s a staple archetype with a lot of playable cards in all three packs, so don’t be afraid to give up some quality cards for synergy.
Blue/Red
Blue/Red was many people’s favorite in triple Time Spiral booster draft. The suspend-storm strategy is less reliable with one less Time Spiral pack. Fewer Halberdiers, fewer Ephemerons, fewer Grapeshots and Empty the Warrens. You can either stick to a board-sweeping strategy with Planar Chaos, using bounce spells and Reality Acids, or you can go for a very aggressive strategy with high powered creatures and either Veiling Oddities to deliver a serious beating once, or Merfolk Thaumaturgist to keep your guys alive.
Blue/Black
Blue/Black has lost a lot of its power commons. Black isn’t offering much in Planar Chaos, so if you decide to go U/B, you have to pick up your card advantage, and playables, in Time Spiral. You will have to rely on the Blue coming in the last pack.
Blue/Green
This has been my favorite combination for some time, and it also seems that U/G with Planar Chaos will see much success. It doesn’t even need the popular splash of Red anymore, as it used to rely on in triple Time Spiral. This is a tempo-oriented archetype; while you hold the fort with Green creatures, tricks and bounce spells, you deliver aerial assaults with both Blue and Green beaters: Ephemerons, Giant Dustwasps, and Uktabi Drakes. Dreamscape Artist can get you the Mountain you might need for your Red splash, should you so desire.
Blue Common Review
The only unplayable Blue common. The only time you would want it in your deck would be to fight Null Profusion, the Black Recycle.
The Reality Acid has a lot of potential, though it is very dependent on your previous picks. With one or two Tolarian Sentinels and two Dream Stalkers, it becomes a great pick. Otherwise, it’s not worth it.
A 3/3 for five is rarely exciting. This one is usually no exception. It’s fine in a White/Blue sliver control deck. All the defensive slivers pair quite well with it: Quilled Sliver, Watcher Sliver, and Poultice Sliver. It is very likely to wheel if you’re interested in it for your W/U deck, so don’t be too excited to open one. Just wait for it to come back.
I’m quite sure the Oddity is widely underrated. In a Blue/Red deck, it allows you to attack for ten damage or so. It depends, of course, on the creatures you rely on to win the game. As you’ll see below, I’m a huge fan of Aquamorph Entity… As a 5/1, it usually hits once for five when you unmorph it, and with the Oddity hits again for five before trading for a creature the next turn it attacks. The Oddity is good with Halberdiers. It looks to me that it’s the Red/Blue Ivory Giant. Its suspend enables storm, as the Ephemerons did, even if it’s not quite as good as the 4/4 flyer.
A Blue instant-speed removal spell. The only problem with this card is that you won’t want to play your Chromatic Stars in the same deck. This is comparable to Erratic Explosion in many ways. The only difference is that you cannot hit your opponent with it directly. Instead, you can play it as instant speed. There’s not much to dislike about it.
Blue’s best common. In the best case, you can trade three-for-one —you’re attacked with a 2/2; you block, and unmorph to kill another 2/2; and still have a 2/3 on the board. The fact that you can use it again if you bounce it makes it a reusable Nekrataal. Not only does it kill creatures, it can also save your other creatures with its -2/+2 ability that you can use after damage have been dealt.
This is best in U/R and U/B, where you usually have a hard time to find creatures to finish the game. I wouldn’t mind packing as many as four or five of these in a deck. With Black and Red taking care of opposing creatures, it can finish the game quite quickly. I won’t mention its synergy with Veiling Oddity again, but I just want to add the combo with Merfolk Thaumaturgist (which fits in U/R better). With the fish in play, it basically becomes a 5/5. In U/B, I like it in addition to Ridge Kusite. While the spellshaper isn’t by itself very impressive, it does a great job with Morphs around it. And a 5/1 that can become a 6/1 first strike is quite hard to block.
I probably overrated this card in the beginning. While I thought thinning your deck was very valuable, it’s still very slow, and hard to manipulate towards a big advantage. You usually want to avoid giving up a card in your hand to pull a land into play. It gains in value if you’re splashing a third color for a couple of cards, especially as there are no fixers in Planar Chaos (with Evolution Charm being the obvious exception). In a U/B deck, it will depend on how many Madness cards you’ve collected. But in any other two-color deck, it’s probably the 23rd card of your deck.
The underrated Merfolk does a great job in both U/W and U/R. In Blue/White, it gives a great board advantage as you can turn your defensive creatures into big attackers (such as Watcher Sliver). With a Saltfield Recluse tagging along, you can take care of most creatures in the format. It also makes Bewilder slightly more playable. Try to pick one or two Bewilders in your final picks if you’re Blue… they may come in handy. While it’s not very exciting on its own (but it’s still playable), it can become a cantrip removal spell with the Thaumaturgist. In U/R, it’ll give most of your creatures at least +0/+2.
A cheap removal spell that can be useful in some situations. Not a very high pick, but a pretty good card, just as Funeral Charm is in Black.
Hill Giant has never been a bad card in Limited. When you can decide to turn it into a 2/2 flyer or a 1/6 defender, it becomes a very reliable pick. You should never be disappointed to pick one.
This is best in U/R and U/B, where you can take care of those pesky critters that will kill it by randomly targeting it, such as Thallid Germinator, Saltfield Recluse, D’Avenant Healer… You don’t really want to have them against White, which has a lot of ways to deal with it without spending a card. Against other colors, it’s a two-power flying creature that arrives on turn 2. It’s probably not as good in U/W or U/G.
Pick Orders
The following pick orders are archetype-specific, meaning that you evaluate the strength of the cards depending on the colors you’re playing. Some cards might be inherently more powerful than others placed higher in these pick orders; this is because each archetype has certain strengths and deficiencies that need to be remedied, and I have taken this into account. The cards that are not listed are cards that you should not be overly concerned about — they are fairly unimportant, and they will come late and often should only be played if you severely lack playables.
Blue/White
Shaper Parasite
Sunlance
Erratic Mutation
Saltfield Recluse
Primal Plasma
Whitemane Lion
Shade of Trokair
Piracy Charm
Aquamorph Entity
Avec Riftwatcher
Merfolk Thaumaturgist
Special Notes
- You might want to pick Sinew Sliver and Poultice Sliver if you have drafted Watcher Slivers in the first two packs.
- Merfolk Thaumaturgist: Even if this guy can have a big impact on the game, don’t pick it too high as no one else is going to want it.
Blue/Red
Shaper Parasite
Dead / Gone
Prodigal Pyromancer
Erratic Mutation
Stingscouger
Aquamorph Entity
Brute Force
Primal Plasma
Veiling Entity
Gossamer Phantasm
Battering Sliver
Merfolk Thaumaturgist
Special Notes
- It’s still hard to determine which card is better: Dead / Gone or Prodigal Pyromancer.
- Remember the above note for the Thaumaturgist. This also depends also on your creatures.
- Blue-Red is often a combination where you want Tolarian Sentinels and Dream Stalkers. So if you’re already packing those, make sure you get one or two Reality Acids at some point.
Blue/Black
Shaper Parasite
Erratic Mutation
Rathi Trapper
Primal Plasma
Aquamorph Entity
(Most of the other cards aren’t that exciting.)
Melancholy
Ridged Kusite
Gossamer Phantasm
Blightspeaker
Special Notes
- You’d better be getting a good Blue signal before pack 3 if you’re Blue/Black, as there are really no exciting Black picks in Planar Chaos.
- Tendrils of Corruption lost a lot of its power now that you have to rely more on Blue in U/B.
Blue/Green
Shaper Parasite
Erratic Mutation
Giant Dustwasp
Utopia Vow
Mire Boa
Citanul Woodreaders
Primal Plasma
Uktabi Drake
Evolution Charm
Piracy Charm
Special Notes
- You might want to pick a couple of Dreamscape Artists if you’re splashing Black or Red.
All the archetypes mentioned above are reliable. I’m not sure which one, out of all the potential archetypes, is the best one, but unless I’m cut on Blue by my right neighbour, it’s very unlikely I will be disappointed with my deck.
See you next week for more on Planar Chaos Limited.
Until then,
Raph