Don’t play fair if you can help it.
Pretty much every article Zvi Mowshowitz ever wrote
Don’t take this article’s title the wrong way: I’m not advocating actual cheating at Regionals. You should not draw extra cards, misrepresent the game state, perform the Ruel Maneuver, or decide to switch decks between rounds 1 and 2 of the event.
(Don’t laugh; I’ve heard stories about that the last one happening at a Regionals.)
What I mean is, this year’s Regionals format allows you to play an unusually high number of decks and cards so powerful that they are like cheating. Part of this is due to the Storm mechanic, which is inherently quite strong. However, another part comes simply from the ways in which the Wizards of the Coast are toying with costs, drawbacks, and power levels: is it okay to have a Black Lotus if you have to wait three turns for it? Can we make a counterspell superior to Force of Will, if you were to lose the game by playing the card on turn 1? Can the format withstand the Kobold blitz?
(Don’t laugh; five decks in the Top 50 of Pro Tour: Yokohama ran Kher Keep in the main deck, and Pierre Canali had a copy in his sideboard. The Day of the Kobold may yet come.)
We should be clear on our definition of what “unfair” means. The other day in an eight-man queue on Magic Online I had someone play Yavimaya Dryad on turn 3, then he spent the following turn enchanting it with Blanchwood Armor and playing a main-phase Might of Old Krosa to attack me for ten. It might seem unfair to take ten damage in one attack from one guy, but in fact it was quite fair: my opponent had to spend three cards, two turns, and seven mana to get there. He’s hoping his beefy Dryad can go the distance, because if I have an answer for it, it would be only fair for him to lose the game after being on the wrong side of a three-for-one. In fact I did have [CENSORED SECRET TECH], and once the Dryad was dealt with I won the game with ease.
(Sorry to keep that from you. I know there are a lot of people who take the position that it’s my job to reveal things that you might not know, tech for Regionals among them. However, I also want to qualify for Nationals, and I have enlisted the help of certain people on the condition that the decks stay quiet. The funny part is that this wouldn’t matter if people didn’t read me. So, in order to get the tech in my articles, you have to not read my articles.)
The idea of playing unfair is not that you get ridiculous effects, it’s that you get an unexpected level of ridiculousness given what you had to invest. Jayemdae Tome was powerful in its day, but even at its height of popularity it was still a fair card. Necropotence, though… I think we all know where it sits on the fairness scale.
In that vein, you won’t be seeing any control decks on this list. Teferi’s effect is pretty unfair, but you do have to pay five mana including UUU, and Sudden Death is in the format. Rewind + Karoos might be ridiculous, but come on, this is a four-mana counterspell we’re talking about here, it’s eminently fair. In general, sitting back and doing nothing but playing counterspells and card-drawing has been a fair strategy for along time, because you have to be a pretty good player to do it correctly. It’s only when you are able to put your brain on autopilot and still have multiple Dragons into play on turn 4 that things get unfair.
And in that vein…
Creatures (5)
Lands (22)
Spells (33)
- 4 Sleight of Hand
- 4 Seething Song
- 4 Dragonstorm
- 4 Remand
- 4 Telling Time
- 3 Gigadrowse
- 4 Rite of Flame
- 4 Lotus Bloom
- 2 Pact of Negation
Sideboard
One of the most popular decks on Magic Online – mainly because it can be assembled on the cheap (i.e., without dual lands) without losing too much. No lies: I’ve lost to at least one person who was playing Terramorphic Expanse in those Steam Vents slots and basic lands in those Shivan Reef slots.
You’ll hear more than a few people say that this is the “best” deck in Standard, although I’m leery of saying that any deck in a format this wide open is definitely the best. However, the numbers speak for themselves: This list is modified from Makahito Mihara’s World Champion list only in that Pact of Negation has been shoehorned in; otherwise, I like to say that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
With an eye to last week’s topics, I’ll be asking my three questions about each of the decks in this article, to wit:
What is the goal? If you don’t mind having to mulligan for Lotus Bloom and spend a few turns waiting out its suspension, you can crush a fairly slow Standard format by developing an unfair amount of Dragons on turn 4. Against some decks, you don’t even need that much: simply hard-casting a Bogardan Hellkite on turn 4 or 5 will be more than enough. Some of these decks also run Empty the Warrens to beat you with Storm copies in a slightly different way.
What features of the format does it take advantage of? The format is ill-prepared for a Storm deck. By definition there are only a few ways to be prepared for the Storm mechanic, but this format is ill-prepared for the entire deck because there are not as many good ways to disrupt it. This is not Extended, with its Duresses, Cabal Therapies, and Meddling Mages; if the combo player enters their main phase with a Lotus Bloom on the table, odds are the opponent has already lost.
What cards is it afraid of? The prevailing wisdom is that Dragonstorm is afraid of Rewind. I’m not sure that’s even true anymore. Pact of Negation is so powerful as an offensive weapon, and a typical hate card like Shadow of Doubt will accomplish next to nothing if you are Gigadrowsed out in your end step. So, I think the best way to make Dragonstorm fear you is to run active disruption – Persecute, for instance, or the Delirium Skeins in a Dredge deck.
Creatures (25)
- 1 Akroma, Angel of Wrath
- 4 Golgari Grave-Troll
- 4 Stinkweed Imp
- 1 Angel of Despair
- 3 Bogardan Hellkite
- 4 Greenseeker
- 4 Fa'adiyah Seer
- 4 Llanowar Mentor
Lands (21)
Spells (14)
Sideboard
This is basically Benjamin Peebles-Mundy list from last week with a couple of small changes. I wanted to try the full set of Dryad Arbor, because it seems to me you can get off some pretty broken Dread Return plays with that card. I also wanted Nightmare Void in the maindeck.
This deck is the sleeper of the format. As mentioned in Frank Karsten’s most recent column on The Mothership, it made just 4% of Premiere Event Top 8 slots compared to 18% by Dragonstorm, but it may well be the most busted deck possible after Future Sight makes its entrance; the potential power of Bridge From Below is that great.
What is the goal? To turn your deck face-up and let you Demonic Tutor from it every turn. Sounds unfair when you put it that way, right?
What features of the format does it take advantage of? There are not a lot of good ways to attack a strategy like this in the current format. Hand destruction doesn’t do much; most of the time this deck is begging to be Persecuted. However, the Rack doesn’t do much, because you can just dredge Life From the Loam a couple of lands to fill your hand. Your Dread Return targets are excellent on both offense and defense. Counterspells buy time, but in most cases are just delaying the inevitable.
What cards is it afraid of? Extirpate is the strongest and most-played graveyard hate spell, so it’s clearly a factor. The so-called Dralnu* deck can Mystical Teachings for Extirpate get your Life From the Loams, and they have plenty of counterspells for your Dread Returns, so you are reduced to trying to win with the Svogthoseseseses that you are lucky enough not to dredge into your library. Other graveyard hate is rare, but it’s bad news if it resolves; I recently played Dredge against an Angelfire deck that brought in Moratorium Stone, and I wanted to pick up his deck and throw it in the toilet. Of course, we were playing Magic Online, so I couldn’t do that. Instead, I just picked up my laptop and threw it in the toilet. That’ll show ‘em!
Also, some decks can just clog the ground and make it hard for you to get through. In an eight-man queue I was decked by Glare of Subdual in a post-sideboard game – I got down Blazing Archon, but could never attack. I actually dredged enough to get my lone Angel of Despair into play twice, but my opponent just played another Glare that he had been sitting on each time. Also, I recently played a Dralnu deck that ran Grim Harvest and Shadowmage Infiltrator, which was a disaster: the same Jonny Magic just blocked my Restless Tomb over and over until my opponent got Skeletal Vampire, and he always seemed to have a counterspell for my Dread Returns targeting Akroma.
Lands (20)
Spells (40)
How’s that for secret tech, huh? Unless you read Fearless Leader’s article yesterday, you might not have even known that Hatching Plans was playable, but it seems that there are certain players on Magic Online who are determined to change your mind. This list was sketched together after watching some games by one of those players in a recent Premiere Event. I’m not sure on the numbers; twenty land seems too few, as does three copies each of Claws of Gix and Chromatic Star. Another list recently appeared on another website, but that one does not have Remand and Ignite Memories in the maindeck, which I saw in the online version.
I was not able to discern the sideboard for this deck from the matches I saw, other than Blood Moon. If I were running the deck, I would start my board with four copies each of Ignorant Bliss (versus discard, obv) and Repeal (for Kird Ape, plus it combos very well with Claws of Gix) and go from there. It has been suggested that Storm Entity goes straight into this deck once Future Sight becomes legal, but I don’t know; what do you cut? As I said, I already want the fourth copies of Claws of Gix and Chromatic Star.
What is the goal? Same as Dragonstorm, except you are abusing cheaper cards, so you can build up ridiculous storm counts. In the PE I saw this deck force through seven copies of Ignite Memories on turn 4. Yes, that game ended right on the spot. Game 1 in that match saw six goblins generated on turn 2 by Empty the Warrens, and once all of them were blocked or removed, an Ignite Memories for five finished the job.
What features of the format does it take advantage of? Again, same as Dragonstorm, except that it also has the combos via Hatching Plans. It’s notable that while Hatching Plans turns out to be dead by itself, the cards that combo with it are not; Perilous Research will often sacrifice Chromatic Stars for card-drawing, for instance. All those extra cards improve your matchup against Dralnu, as well as decks that try to attack you with discard spells.
What cards is it afraid of? Turn 1 Kird Ape. The problem with Gruul decks is that they turn off half of your win conditions – Ignite Memories will almost never be lethal by itself, even if they have cards in hand when you play it. You basically have to win with Goblins, which is surprisingly hard to do sometimes. For example, if the opponent has two creatures down when you Empty the Warrens for 8 tokens, then you get to attack for 6, then 4, then 2, and then you both have two guys, your opponent’s guys are bigger and he’s still at eight life. Time for plan B … except this deck doesn’t do plan B too well.
That Plan B problem is indicative of another thing about this deck. How do I say it? … You can build up ridiculous storm counts, but you can also fall on your face and break your anus. Now, you may be wondering what kind of catastrophic event could lead to that disturbing physical result. I don’t know, but I imagine it would be just as ugly as this deck is when it loses. It’s the sort of deck where watching it win just once makes you want to play it, and losing with it just once makes you want to give it up forever.
Of course, maybe the first version of ID19 also looked that way…
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* I actually haven’t seen any “Dralnu” decks running Dralnu, Lich Lord anymore, but I think you know the sort of deck I am talking about.