Round 1: Miracles

Round 2: Death and Taxes

Round 3: Oops, All Spells!

Round 4: Burn

Reanimator

Drew Levin

Test deck on 11-30--0001

Legacy

Creatures (7)

• 1 Inkwell Leviathan
• 1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
• 1 Terastodon
• 1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
• 3 Griselbrand

Lands (14)

• 1 Swamp
• 1 Island
• 4 Underground Sea
• 4 Polluted Delta
• 2 Misty Rainforest
• 2 Verdant Catacombs

Spells (39)

• 4 Brainstorm
• 1 Show and Tell
• 4 Force of Will
• 4 Reanimate
• 4 Exhume
• 4 Daze
• 4 Entomb
• 4 Careful Study
• 4 Lotus Petal
• 4 Ponder
• 2 Thoughtseize

Sideboard

• 3 Show and Tell
• 2 Tropical Island
• 2 Massacre
• 2 Thoughtseize
• 1 Griselbrand
• 4 Abrupt Decay
• 1 Swan Song

As you saw, there’s a lot of variance involved in playing this deck. There is also—unfortunately for me—a lot of skill involved in casting the card Exhume. Some important takeaways for you:

• When people say “don’t be results oriented,” what they mean almost exactly is “don’t assume that just because your Death and Taxes opponent bounced your turn 1 Griselbrand that your matchup against Death and Taxes is bad or that you shouldn’t move in on turn 1 Griselbrand.” That kind of thinking is actively destructive, feeds off of anecdotal evidence, and will consistently make you worse. The point of being statistically driven is understanding that you are a favorite to win a game in which you put Griselbrand into play on turn 1 with ten life remaining even if they have four copies of Karakas in their deck.
• I’m still tilted about the Inkwell Leviathan thing. Magic Online needs an “attack with everything” button—they have it in Duels of the Planeswalkers!
• Terastodon is a difficult Magic card to play correctly—randomly blowing up their lands isn’t a winning strategy, as you noticed that I basically never did it. Blowing up your own lands to produce a shorter clock is often desirable. Having a 12/12 or 15/15 or 18/18 is nice.
• Iona, Shield of Emeria is probably just worthless and should be replaced with Ashen Rider.
• Massacre isn’t worthless, but it’s definitely the worst sideboard card.
• I continue to love Swan Song.
• I almost certainly underboarded Abrupt Decay.
• When in doubt, move in and accept the outcome. When you have options, figure out how to beat their most likely holdings and maneuver the game state into the most favorable possible position for you.

Good luck at SCG Open Series: Charlotte featuring the Invitational!