The Golden Age
I still think fondly of U.S. Nationals, where I grinded in and then made Top 64. Since then, though, Magic tournaments have been a disaster for me. What do you do when you’re in a slump and you can’t break out of it?
Weathering the Slump
The simplest answer is that you need to keep playing. So I played a bunch of Mirrodin block PTQs and always went X-2 drop without achieving a winning record.
Then I showed up at VA States with B/G Control, teched out to beat Affinity, and got paired up against Mono-Blue Proteus Staff, Kiki-Jiki Alarm combo, and G/u Blasting Station. At least the final loss was at the hands of StarCity’s own Bennie Smith. We had a great match.
I welcomed the Extended season as a chance to break my Magic slump. At GPT Boston in Rockville, MD, I played Rebirth. Round one I lose to a bizarre Scepter Control variant, followed by an easy win against Goblins, and a loss to Affinity. The Affinity player won through Energy Flux in games two and three on the strength of Moriok Rigger and Shrapnel Blast. What can I say? I wasn’t expecting a Standard version of Affinity.
Nevertheless, I remained adamant (read: foolishly confident in my pet deck) that Rebirth was the best deck for me, so I took a slightly modified version to GP Boston. After scrubbing out in the Grand Prix Trial the night before, I made some modifications to my deck, adding a Cranial Extraction and Eternal Witness to maindeck so I had more game against combo decks. The next day, I chilled through round one thanks to a bye. Then in round two I encountered another StarCityGames.com celebrity…
Michael J. Flores.
And he was playing Red Deck Wins. I should have known was he was playing, but nonetheless I foolishly kept a land-light hand and lead with Llanowar Wastes. Flores hit it with Wasteland and passed the turn. After that, I struggled to get a second and third land into play while Flores followed up with another Wasteland and two Rishadan Ports. My deck failed to function at all and he leisurely burned my done and eventually finished me off with a Fledgling Dragon that grew up very quickly.
Flores got off to a slow start in game two and dropped a Sulfuric Vortex pretty early. I responded with Vampiric Tutor and put Sphere of Law on top of my library. At around 8 or 9 life points it looked like I had stabilized. I proceeded to find no love from the top of my deck. Meanwhile, Flores hit me with two or three Volcanic Hammers and used Rishadan Port on my City of Brass to ping me for the remaining points.
Round three I got back on track and won two easy games against some kid playing the Rock. His draws were poor and his play was worse. In game one he got stuck on two Swamps. I watched, dumbfounded as he Vampiric Tutored twice and didn’t make a land drop either of the following turns!
Then I lost to Mind’s Desire and drew against U/G Madness. The Desire deck won game two after I hit both Mind’s Desire and Brain Freeze (should have been Cunning Wish) with Cranial Extraction. The Madness deck had at least two Stifle in the maindeck. Two Stifle! That’s pretty good against Rebirth. Getting the draw was a big accomplishment.
And I was really bummed out. What started as an amusing slump had become a catastrophic downward spike on the graph of my Constructed rating.
With great difficulty, I abandoned Rebirth. Even if it was really was a good deck, it just didn’t like me. Every matchup was such an effort, providing too many chances for game-breaking mistakes.
Return of the Rock
In the last two weeks I’ve attended a PTQ (Philadelphia) and a GPT (Seattle). I ended up 21st at the PTQ after a narrow loss to Aluren in round seven. How narrow? In game three, I Extracted Aluren. Then my opponent played as many fliers as possible and beat me down. On the last turn of the five-turn clock I took exactly six points of damage. I really needed to rip Pernicious Deed. Still, 21st was a hell of an improvement and I had broken my losing streak at last.
The next weekend, I Top-8’d at a GPT for Philadelphia. Top 8 was like a rerun of losing to Flores. My opponent’s RDW build had Tangle Wire and mana denial screwed me in both games. Sulfuric Vortex got the best of me in game two.
Here’s my current build:
8 Forest
3 Treetop Village
6 Swamp
4 Llanowar Wastes
1 Volrath’s Stronghold
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
3 Wall of Blossoms
4 Eternal Witness
4 Ravenous Baloth
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Duress
2 Vampiric Tutor
2 Smother
1 Diabolic Edict
1 Recurring Nightmare
1 Cranial Extraction
1 Kokusho, the Evening Star
4 Pernicious Deed
Sideboard:
4 Engineered Plague
2 Coffin Purge
2 Smother
2 Cranial Extraction
2 Naturalize
1 Oxidize
1 Duress
1 Bone Shredder
What is the Rock?
Technically, it’s a mid-range control deck that builds up overwhelming card advantage in the long-game. I don’t think that’s a very helpful description, though. What else is the Rock?
It’s a deck that attacks your opponent from all directions. Duress, Cabal Therapy, and Cranial Extraction strip your opponent’s hand while Pernicious Deed, Smother, and Diabolic Edict control the board. Opponents who have to commit to the board to win face the damned if they do damned if they don’t dilemma.
But the Rock is also a toolbox deck. It does everything: accelerate your mana, beatdown, destroy all creatures in play, pick off troublesome creatures one at a time, blow up artifacts, wipe out enchantments, gain life, strip your opponent’s hand, and even deal direct damage. And Vampiric Tutor fetches the right tool for the job.
As long as the Rock finds the right cards it can win any match-up. Duh, this is true for any deck, right? Not exactly. Unlike other decks, the Rock has the ability to reuse and recur the best cards for any given matchup. With Eternal Witness, Volrath’s Stronghold, and Recurring Nightmare you hit your opponent again and again with your best weapons. Against combo, this involves repeated Cabal Therapy and Cranial Extraction. Versus aggro, playing Wall of Blossoms and Ravenous Baloth over and over again while sweeping the board with the occasional Pernicious Deed works nicely.
To look at it another way, Rock has three types of cards: anti-combo stuff (Cabal Therapy, Duress, and Cranial Extraction), anti-beatdown cards (Sakura-Tribe Elder, Wall of Blossoms, Ravenous Baloth, Smother, and Diabolic Edict), and cards that do practically anything (Pernicious Deed, Vampiric Tutor, Volrath’s Stronghold, and Recurring Nightmare).
Alright, so the Rock has a lot of flexibility but what about actually winning? Usually, winning is almost accidental. As you’re playing lands (Treetop Village), recurring your best spells (Eternal Witness), and keeping your life total at a comfortable level (Ravenous Baloth), threats are coming online, so beating down while taking control of the game is almost accidental.
The Rock can also steal a page from Red Deck Wins’ book. Open up Duress. Follow up with Cabal Therapy. Then drop Wall of Blossoms and flashback Cabal Therapy. Play Ravenous Baloth on turn 4. Your opponent won’t have any removal after all that hand destruction and you should be able to handle any blockers with Pernicious Deed and black removal spells. This aggressive approach isn’t what Rock is designed to do, but the capability is there, and when you can play aggro control like that, why not?
Are we really any closer to understanding what makes this deck work? The Rock is more than just a deck with flexible cards that can help you win any match-up. It’s a deck that gains control while playing threats at the same time. And unlike other toolbox decks, it cheats with its silver bullets, because thanks to recursive spell casting can fire the same bullet over and over again.
Breaking it Down
8 Forest
3 Treetop Village
6 Swamp
4 Llanowar Wastes
1 Volrath’s Stronghold
Nothing too fancy here. The mana is skewed towards Green because you need Green to fix your mana and there are eight spells with GG in the mana cost. Given that there’s still quite a bit of combo floating around, three Treetop Villages feels right. And Volrath’s Stronghold is ridiculous with Eternal Witness. Twenty-two lands is a little slim. If you can squeeze the 23rd one in there, it seems like a good idea, since recursion is so mana intensive.
The Birds stand alone. They may not help accelerate out any impressive three-drops, but they are the fastest mana fixer available and make excellent food for Cabal Therapy and Recurring Nightmare. Against RDW, they die immediately to burn, but that’s okay. Better to have singed Birds than a singed dome. And against combo decks the Birds help ensure that you can crank out discard spells and Eternal Witness faster.
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
3 Wall of Blossoms
4 Ravenous Baloth
This is your anti-beatdown creature set. Sakura-Tribe Elder is so much better than Llanowar Elves in this sort of build. Against RDW the Elder is even more important than Wall of Blossoms, since it helps your mana development outrace Wasteland and Rishadan Port. Wall of Blossoms stalls creatures but-Cabal Therapy aside-it’s pretty lame against flying armies and combo, so three feels about right. Ravenous Baloth show up in full force. After all, it’s the Rock’s most efficient threat and as a bonus it really annoys aggressive decks. The Baloth is also a great finisher because it’s immune to nonsense like Gilded Drake, which can be a factor against Cephalid Brunch and Aluren.
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Duress
1 Cranial Extraction
The first two cards don’t need any explaining, but Cranial Extraction does. While this variant of Lobotomy may not have lived up to its initial hype, don’t be fooled. It remains excellent even if it’s not broken. Having one copy changes certain match-ups entirely. After destroying an opponent’s hand, the battle of topdecks begins. Cranial Extraction ensures that your opponent won’t ever be able to draw his or her most game-breaking card.
Think of some of the juicy targets: Isochron Scepter, Aluren, and Mind’s Desire. Granted, these decks can still win once their trademark card is gone, but it sure does become a hell of a lot harder. One Eternal Witness later and these decks may not have any solid path to victory left. Even in match-ups where Cranial Extraction is supposed to be slow and bad it can be surprisingly good. Think of Affinity without Disciple of the Vault, U/G Madness lacking Wonder or Circular Logic, and Goblins devoid of Goblin Warchief. Cranial Extraction is also very helpful in the mirror match, which has the potential to go on forever unless you can permanently remove troublesome things like Eternal Witness and Recurring Nightmare.
4 Pernicious Deed
2 Smother
1 Diabolic Edict
Here is the board control element. Pernicious Deed almost never gets sideboarded out, especially in this era of Aether Vial and creature combo decks. In this metagame, Smother is better than Diabolic Edict. I’m tempted to swap the Edict for the third Smother. Smother is better than Edict against Affinity, Life, U/G Madness, Goblins, Red Deck Wins (the lone Blistering Firecat being a notable exception), and Desire. You’d think that Diabolic Edict would shine against Reanimator but that’s not even the case when there’s a dumb Putrid Imp or Hapless Researcher to get in the way.
But I still play that one Edict. Sometimes Reanimator doesn’t have a dork in play to match the monster that comes back from the grave. And often there’s a creature like Arrogant Wurm, Myr Enforcer, or Troll Ascetic that hands around after you blow up Pernicious Deed. And Edict as a one-of is deceptive. As I mentioned earlier, Rock has the ability to recur whatever spells it needs. Once you find that first Edict you can easily reuse it over and over again.
4 Eternal Witness
2 Vampiric Tutor
1 Recurring Nightmare
1 Volrath’s Stronghold
This is where the utility and overwhelming card advantage comes in. These spells fetch whatever you need, be it in the graveyard or still lurking in your library. They are the glue that holds the deck together, giving the deck lots of options and late-game punch. Or, if you want to view it another way, they are copies one through eight of whatever spell you need most to win a given match-up. They find or recycle your best weapons.
1 Kokusho the Evening Star
The big Black dragon may be clunky, but it has its uses. It’s your most unstoppable win condition in the mirror match. When you’ve reached the point where six mana is no problem, Koko shows the Baloth what a real finisher looks like. The Dragon also provides a way to win games outside of the red zone or through damage prevention effects. It’s also worth noting that Koko has insane synergy with Recurring Nightmare.
A lot of players have been cutting down on this card in the sideboard or dropping it entirely. That seems like a really bad idea to be. Mono Red Goblins have gotten much better now that people are coming to grips with the brokenness of Aether Vial. Without Engineered Plague the Rock doesn’t stand a chance against the explosiveness of Goblins and card advantage machine known as Goblin Ringleader.
As if that’s not reason enough, the Plague (naming Beasts) is also a tremendous help against Aluren. Sure, Aluren does have answers to the troublesome enchantment, but the Plague buys you time to set up the crippling Cranial Extraction.
It’s also a good idea to bring in a few copies of the Plague against RDW if Blistering Firecat is at large.
2 Smother
1 Bone Shredder
This is the anti-beatdown and anti-U/G Madness suite. Not much needs to be said. Terror might be better than Bone Shredder, but I like the interaction the Shredder has with Volrath’s Stronghold and Recurring Nightmare. Having a flying chump blocker can also be relevant against U/G Madness.
Here’s some extra ammo against control and combo. Their uses are pretty obvious.
2 Naturalize
1 Oxidize
The main intent here is to make sure that you have instant speed artifact removal when Isochron Scepter hits the table. Oxidize makes for a more efficient Vampiric Tutor target and gets around the occasional Welding Jar or Meddling Mage chanting against Naturalize. As a bonus, these cards
If you have to depend on one card to turn around the Reanimator match-up, this is it. And it’s immune to discard to boot.
Matchups
Doing this section of the article seemed like a good idea at first, but my goodness is it a chore. I tried to only mention the decks that are seeing a significant amount of play. But that’s nine decks. Nine! What an amazingly healthy format. This is the most fun and exciting format I’ve ever played in. Let’s start with…a red deck.
Red Deck Wins – Very Close (probably leaning toward unfavorable)
RDW has three paths to victory: efficient creatures, mana disruption, and burn. Dealing with the creatures is the first task. Any opening hand without Sakura-Tribe Elder, Wall of Blossoms, Smother, or Edict probably needs to get sent back. Blistering Firecat is the hardest creature to deal with. Some red decks don’t bother with the Firecat anymore, but don’t count on getting so lucky. Just to be safe, try to have Pernicious Deed ready for Firecat removal.
If you handle the creatures, the burn shouldn’t be too big a problem, because it takes RDW a long time to deal 20 damage without any the help of its efficient creatures. Look for the opportunity to set up Ravenous Baloth recursion with Vampiric Tutor.
Dealing with RDW’s mana denial is the biggest challenge. Think carefully with those land-light lands. Sakura-Tribe Elder is your best friend and is a popular target for Eternal Witness. Don’t be shy about using Vampiric Tutor to grab a basic land either.
-3 Duress
-1 Cranial Extraction
-1 Kokusho the Evening Star
-1 Eternal Witness
+4 Engineered Plague
+2 Smother
After dropping some situational and slow spells for more removal, the match-up gets a little bit better for the Rock. Aside from Tangle Wire, RDW doesn’t have anything too threatening to bring in.
Goblins – Slightly Favorable
Goblins have come a long way since PT Columbus and it’s a much stronger deck now that people have recognized the power of Aether Vial. Game one is very difficult and Goblin Ringleader, the card advantage machine, is the bane of your existence. Duress is almost totally useless, unless you’re on the play and hit Aether Vial. And the one-ofs like Diabolic Edict, Cranial Extraction, and Kokusho are all pretty bad.
Focus on just clogging the board in the early game, and make as many one-for-one trades as necessary to stay at a healthy life total. Then you make it to the Ringleader stage of the game. Goblins will refuel its hand and attempt to storm the gates with hordes of red men. Cabal Therapy is a great follow-up to the Ringleader, since you know what to name, but ultimately you need to establish some card advantage of your own with Eternal Witness or Recurring Nightmare. Of course, this is a very expensive way to go, and chances are that you won’t be able to keep up with the Ringleaders.
-3 Duress
-1 Diabolic Edict
-1 Pernicious Deed
-1 Cranial Extraction
-1 Kokusho, the Evening Star
+4 Engineered Plague
+2 Smother
+1 Bone Shredder
What a difference sideboarding makes. All the expensive and situational spells turn into fast removal and a two-card combo that shuts down the entire Goblin deck. Technically, Goblins does have some outs against Engineered Plague, such as Goblin King, Goblin Goon, Dralnu’s Crusade, and Thran Lens, but all of these answers are pretty fragile when you have black removal spells and Pernicious Deed. Goblin Goon is the most resilient, but with two Engineered Plagues on the board, a lowly Birds of Paradise neutralizes the big dumb Goblin.
Watch out for Sulfuric Vortex coming out of the Goblin deck’s sideboard. If you think it’s coming in, consider leaving the fourth Deed in and possibly bringing in Naturalize.
Affinity (with Fling) – Very Favorable
It’s very fortunate for the Rock that the current popular versions of Affinity eschew Myr Enforcer and Somber Hoverguard in favor of Atog and Fling to enable a fast combo-kill.
With hand destruction, inexpensive chump blockers, and Pernicious Deed it’s pretty easy to survive the first game, even when Affinity gets a spicy draw. Just remember to leave a blocker out when Aether Vial has two counters on it. You don’t want to be on the receiving end of an Atog blitzkrieg. Of course, baiting your opponent into going all-in with the Atog is a good idea if you’re holding Smother in hand.
Once you survive the early onslaught and reset the board, play it safe with Ravenous Baloth recursion, so that your life total is well out of range of garbage like Shrapnel Blast. The Blast isn’t common, but I’ve had scrubby players kill me with it before. Play it safe with your life total and finish off Affinity at your leisure.
-3 Duress
-1 Cranial Extraction
-1 Kokusho the Evening Star
+2 Naturalize
+2 Smother
+1 Oxidize
Sideboarding makes a good matchup fantastic. Smother, in particular is amazing, since it kills everything except Frogmite. And with Naturalize and Oxidize you gain fast answers to the dreaded Aether Vial.
U/G Madness – Unfavorable
You need to use Cabal Therapy very aggressively and attack U/G’s creatures to win game one. Only go after Circular Logic after you’ve ripped apart the madness engine as much as possible or when you’re forcing through a game-breaking spell. I like to name Wild Mongrel with the first Therapy if Smother isn’t in hand. If you don’t have any removal in hand and Wild Mongrel or Aquamoeba hit the board before the first Cabal Therapy, name Arrogant Wurm. An Arrogant Wurm on turn three is almost a guarantee that Rock loses game one.
Usually, you want to Vampiric Tutor for Smother or Pernicious Deed. Once you survive the early game, you can dominate the late game by recurring removal with Eternal Witness + Volrath’s Stronghold or Recurring Nightmare. Though Extraction is really slow, Wonder is a great target for it, allowing Sakura-Tribe Elder and Wall of Blossoms to perform their chump-blocking duty.
-3 Duress
-1 Cranial Extraction
+2 Smother
+1 Bone Shredder
+1 Coffin Purge
With all the additional removal, it’s much easier to focus on removing all madness outlets in the early game. Terror provides an answer to the dreaded Arrogant Wurm, and Bone Shredder provides another way to abuse Volrath’s Stronghold. Nevertheless, this match-up remains an uphill battle against U/G’s formidable tempo, which only gets better with Submerge coming in from the sideboard.
Scepter-Chant – Slightly Favorable
If Scepter goes active with Orim’s Chant imprinted and you don’t have Deed in play, you can move directly to the scoop phase. Therapy for Isochron Scepter every time (unless your opponent casts Brainstorm in response to hide it). Play Pernicious Deed as a threat, forcing your opponent to deal with it before dropping a Scepter. And if you get the opening, Extracting Isochron Scepter is practically as good as dealing 20 damage.
-2 Ravenous Baloth
-2 Smother
-2 Wall of Blossoms
-1 Kokusho
+2 Naturalize
+2 Cranial Extraction
+1 Duress
+1 Oxidize
+1 Bone Shredder
Post-board games improve tremendously, because you can destroy Scepters at instant speed. The same plan applies as in game one, only this time you can run down Isochron Scepter with an Extraction much more easily. Though limited, Bone Shredder comes in as an emergency answer to Exalted Angel.
Life – Very Favorable
Get comfortable for a long game one. Sometimes you can win quickly with removal followed up by an Eternal Witness or two, but it’s risky because their combo is so redundant and Rock can’t set a fast clock. Settling in for the long game is usually a better plan. Let Life set up its combo, which necessitates committing to the board. Then wipe it all away with Pernicious Deed. Make Test of Endurance the first Cranial Extraction target, then get Extraction back with a Witness and go after Living Wish. Eventually, you set up Extraction recursion and every spell Life has.
-3 Duress
-1 Kokusho, the Evening Star
-1 Wall of Blossoms
+2 Cranial Extraction
+2 Smother
+1 Bone Shredder
There probably won’t be much time left for game two, which is fine. You follow the exact same plan except killing creatures and Extracting things is even easier. Bone Shredder, adds another nasty little combo, so you even have a good plan for winning the old-fashioned way with combat damage.
Machine Reanimator – Unfavorable
Start praying, because game one is almost impossible. You have to hit hard with hand destruction on turns one and two and follow up with some quick pressure. If you have the luxury of time and a Vampiric Tutor handy, fetching Cranial Extraction and ripping away Sundering Titan is a great play. Unlike against traditional Reanimator decks, Smother and Pernicious Deed can be huge, because Goblin Welder must die.
-3 Wall of Blossoms
-3 Pernicious Deed
-1 Recurring Nightmare
-1 Kokusho the Evening Star
+2 Coffin Purge
+2 Smother
+2 Engineered Plague
+1 Duress
+1 Oxidize
The matchup is much better after sideboarding, but the match-up is still very difficult overall, since game one is so terrible. Mulligan aggressively, looking for Coffin Purge. Always set Engineered Plague to Goblin, and remember that Oxidize is a nice emergency solution to George W. Bosh. It seems strange sideboarding out all those Deeds, but they are slow and this deck can run off of very little mana, so blowing up artifact lands is nothing special. Engineered Plague and Smother are better because they offer quicker answers to Goblin Welder.
Aluren – Slightly Favorable
First you want to hit Aluren with Cabal Therapy, but this is only a defensive posture, since Aluren has plenty of ways to dig up extra copies of its namesake. What you really want is to line up the crippling Extraction. Try to ramp up to four mana on turn three and get Cranial Extraction in hand with Vampiric Tutor. Don’t get overconfident, after removing Aluren from the game, though. Aluren can race you in the air with Cavern Harpy and Raven Familiar. Or it can wish up Meloku the Clouded Mirror or Genesis from the sideboard. If neither of these plans works out, play Pernicious Deed and always leave four mana open to activate it. This is pretty pathetic, but it forces the Aluren player to either hold off until hitting six mana (Aluren plus Living Wish for Maggot Carrier) or find the necessary Cloud of Faeries very quickly so that the necessary two land become free for Living Wish.
-2 Wall of Blossoms
-2 Smother
-1 Diabolic Edict
-1 Kokusho the Evening Star
-1 Recurring Nightmare
+4 Engineered Plague
+2 Cranial Extraction
+1 Duress
Mulligan until you have some disruption in hand. With the additional Extractions, the dream plan of removing Aluren on turn three is much easier. But in the meantime, dropping Engineered Plague (Beast) is a good stall tactic. And play additional Plagues is you have them because Aluren can find enchantment removal for the Deed pretty easily. After you Extract Aluren, go for Living Wish, followed by Cavern Harpy. After the first Extraction hits, Aluren will try to race, but having Engineered Plague to shut down Cavern Harpy makes this race much more manageable.
Desire – Slightly Favorable
Unless the Accumulated Knowledge engine is already online, always name Intuition with the first Cabal Therapy. It is the card that most important card in Desire’s arsenal and getting it on the natural draw is crucial for enabling its unfair turn 3 kills.
Then look for Witness recursion with Therapy. Keep Medallions and Familiars off the board with Pernicious Deed, Smother, and Edict. Use Cranial Extraction on Minds Desire, Cunning Wish, and Brain Freeze-in that order. And try to make Snap fizzile with removal. With only eight disruption spells and no efficient answer to Sapphire Medallion, game one is quite difficult.
-2 Pernicious Deed
-2 Wall of Blossoms
-1 Diabolic Edict
-1 Ravenous Baloth
-1 Kokusho, the Evening Star
+2 Cranial Extraction
+2 Naturalize
+1 Smother
+1 Duress
+1 Oxidize
With the addition of Naturalize, Smother, and Oxidize, controlling the Medallions and Familiars is easier. The extra Duress and Cranial Extractions make the discard plan much more realistic. Unlike game one, this time your best long-term plan is to Extract Mind’s Desire repeatedly, until there aren’t any win conditions left.
Smart opponents might try something tricky, like sideboarding out Mind’s Desire entirely and bulking up on Brain Freeze. Thus, knowing what to Extract first can be difficult. Try to use what you see with Duress and Cabal Therapy as a guide. For example, if your opponent kept an opening hand with Brain Freeze, that suggests that he might have switched to the cold shower plan, because if there is only one Freeze in the deck that’s like accepting a mulligan. One the other hand, if you’ve torn apart your opponent’s hand and you haven’t seen Mind’s Desire or Brain Freeze yet, naming Cunning Wish with Cranial Extraction probably the right play, since you know it will hit and then after looking through your opponent’s deck you’ll know what to Extract next.
The Rock May Be Old But It’s Still Good
I hope a few myths have been shot down. Rumors of the Rock’s demise were greatly exaggerated. It’s still a very good deck. The Rock isn’t merely a 50% deck without any favorable match-ups. It crushes Affinity and Life. It’s also a very solid choice against combo decks such as Aluren and Desire. Though you don’t want to run into the Reanimator and U/G Madness match-ups, even those are winnable, you’re just under more pressure to have great draws or to inflict bad draws on your opponent.
In this amazingly diverse metagame, the Rock has the tools to put up a good fight against everything, even the craziest of rogue decks. It’s also worth noting that Rock is a very forgiving deck. Playing it perfectly may be difficult, but usually making the occasional play error isn’t that big of a deal.
Take it easy,
–Rick
rick at rickrust dot com