P>I’ve developed a fascination for Greater Good combo decks in the last couple of days, even going as far as to shell out beaucoup tickets on Magic Online to get the sucker built. I hope the mad cash I’ll rake in from this week’s stint on the Daily will more than compensate for that outlay…
Hahahahahahhaahhaahaha! Oh, no, really, you’re too kind. Thank you, I’ll be here all day. Try the lamb. [drum hits]
Folks, I’m here to talk about Constructed Magical cards in the Type Two format. Hey, if Pugg Fuggly can serve up a week of draft walkthroughs, I can hit some pitches in my wheelhouse for a couple of days. And I don’t care if you want ze Extended technologies now! I can’t be giving those out now can I? OK, OK, just one little nuggetron:
Good against every deck in the format? Just about. Now build something with it, noobs!
[Wedge] stay on target…
Sorry. Okay.
It seems that there are two “shells” out there that comprise this strategy; one of them is W/G and packs a ton of creature control, and the other is no less than a four-color beastoid with a mana base more painful than the Laguna Beach season finale. No, I don’t watch that show – my wife does. It’s awful. I think KRS-ONE said it best: the girls look sooo good but their brain is not ready… I don’t knowwwwww… Seriously, absurdly vapid high-school beach princesses and the stoned surfer dudes who pursue them. What a concept.
[Wedge] stay on target…
SORRY.
I promise I won’t digress any more. Not even one time to pad my word count. Nope, not even one more single time. Never again. I promise. Look, I’m honest. I’m keeping my promise on the real. I’m gonna talk about the deck now. Really. I’m not doing a Paul Maguire impersonation. I’m not.
The W/G framework which utterly annihilated the field in South Carolina (draw your own conclusions there) is heavily focused on board control, serving up a zesty creature kill cocktail of Wrath of God, Faith’s Fetters, and Devouring Light. I haven’t seen that many man haters since the NOW Parade aired on Lifetime television. The second place deck, for reference:
Creatures (14)
Lands (9)
Spells (37)
- 3 Sensei's Divining Top
- 8 Forest
- 4 Wrath of God
- 6 Plains
- 3 Kodama's Reach
- 2 Naturalize
- 4 Greater Good
- 4 Devouring Light
- 3 Faith's Fetters
Sideboard
Look, I didn’t even type the list out to pad my word count. I’m no cheat.
That deck was a great call for a field presumed to be heavy creature and creature control based, but as Bobby Dylan told ya, things have changed. Mono Blue Control is now all up in the mix, and this deck, as currently constituted, struggles mightily to defeat it. Even modifying the main and sideboard to fit Boseiju won’t save it – there are just too many dead cards. Who needs that much creature kill, anyway? The Yosei / Gleancrawler lock seems to be a lot slower, too. Without any dedicated reanimation spells, it’s difficult to pull wins out of your… I mean pull wins out of the atmosphere the way that the four-color version frequently does. Scope the following list:
Creatures (14)
Lands (22)
Spells (24)
- 4 Goryo's Vengeance
- 4 Forest
- 3 Gifts Ungiven
- 4 Zombify
- 3 Greater Good
- 4 Compulsive Research
- 2 Vigor Mortis
Sideboard
This is Nick Cogley’s first place build from Connecticut States. That mana base is a thing of beauty, isn’t it? Man, nothing but nonstop painlands to the face. Make it hurt, baby… A few things I like about Nick’s deck:
- Kuro, Pitlord is completely uncastable, yet hot and spicy in a you take nine / I’ll draw nine sort of way.
- Miren, The Moaning Well provides uncounterable saccage for the Legendary crew.
- Zombify grants some Cranial Extraction insurance and is another unique target for Gifts Ungiven
- Mana Leak and Boseiju in the sideboard = goooood
Overall, I think this list is flawed. There are only three copies of the Cash Card [Greater Good], no Footsteps of the Goryo, no Sensei’s Divining Top, and a few too many copies of Kokusho, the Evening Star. Twenty-six lands also seem a bit paranoid.
I prefer Shaheen Soorani second place build from Virginia States as the jump off:
Creatures (10)
Lands (17)
Spells (33)
The defensive combo of Sakura-Tribe Elder and Putrefy is fairly adept at slowing down an aggressive deck. R/W Weenie is still a little rough, but merely having these beats having to stuff the deck full of White control cards, in my opinion. R/W can be addressed in the sideboard if needed. All a Greater Good deck needs is a little mana and a little time. Borrowing tech from each of these two lists and fusing them together seemed like a good idea. Of course, I’ve added a little of that Italian flavor straight out of the Old Country, too.
3 Sensei Divining Top
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
4 Kodama’s Reach
3 Putrefy
4 Goryo’s Vengeance
3 Footsteps of the Goryo
1 Zombify
4 Greater Good
3 Compulsive Research
1 Gifts Ungiven
1 Life From the Loam (flavor)
4 Yosei, The Morning Star
2 Kokusho, The Evening Star
1 Kuro, Pitlord
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Temple Garden
4 Yavimaya Coast
2 Forest
2 Plains
2 Swamp
1 Island
1 Okina, Temple to the Grandfathers
1 Miren, The Moaning Well
1 Shizo, Death’s Storehouse
Sideboard:
4 Mana Leak
3 Cranial Extraction
2 Boseiju, Who Shelters All
2 Naturalize
2 Meloku, The Clouded Mirror
2 Kagemaro, First to Suffer
I haven’t done an awful lot of testing yet; I’m sure this list is far from perfect. I don’t know if the mana base can really support Mana Leak and Meloku both out of the board, and I’m evaluating Farseek as an option given the number of Ravnica lands present. I’m sure that when Guildpact comes out, Farseek will be the better call. It’s also possible that this iteration of Greater Good might want one more Boseiju to handle Mono-Blue. I will say that this list certainly gives better game against Islands than the White-based one.
I wish I had something witty to close with, but I don’t. After all that comedic gold earlier, I’m flat out of gas. LATOR.