November 1st. What does that date mean to many Magic players? First off, it is the final day for Urza, Mishra, and the rest of the artifact cycle. Secondly, it is three days away from many State Championships. (Kentucky and Minnesota, to name at least two.) With Worlds over and the tourney scene shifting to limited formats, now is the time to work on decks for States and Pro Tour Chicago.
When blocks rotate out, a feeling of freshness is aired. It is very hard to predict the metagame for such a new format. However, if one studies the Mercadian Masques block qualifiers, you can see some decks that can be fit into the stiff competition at States. Over the coming weeks, I will highlight these Masques Block decks and change them to look good in the Sixth edition/MBC format. (I won’t be able to do anything for Invasion until I have a spoiler in hand.)
These week’s deck is Nether Go! Built by Peatross, this deck had many strong showings in the past round of PTQs. I played this deck in two different PTQs and did fairly well with it both times. Here is the decklist that I used:
2x Snuff Out
3x Vendetta
4x Counterspell
4x Thwart
2x Rethink
2x Foil
1x Trade Routes
1x Soothsaying
3x Dominate
3x Brainstorm
1x Rath’s Edge
1x Dust Bowl
10x Swamps
13x Islands
The deck looks like a pile the first time I saw it, but it played very well. Let’s look at the lands first and see what changes we could make.
MBC New Type 2
1x Rath’s Edge 4x Underground River
1x Dust Bowl 4x Salt Marsh (Invasion uncommon)
10x Swamp 4x Rishadan Port
6x Island
3x Swamp
I believe 25 lands in this deck is too many. I would like to cut the number down to 21-23. The amount of nonbasic lands that I want to run is surprisingly high, and this will affect my card choices later on in the deck (No Vendetta.) Hopefully, the amount of nonbasic hosers in Invasion will be limited in use. I like to use the nonbasic lands because of the amount of versatility they bring to the table. Any land that can produce two different colors of mana should be seen as a threat (except for the Homelands "tri-lands").
The counterspell base is going to be radically changed, as was the land base. Gone are Thwarts and Foils. Most people want to use the ACC on these cards, and with the limited number of Islands, doing so will put you at risk.
MBC New Type 2
4x Counterspell 4x Counterspell
4x Thwart 4x Power Sink
Power Sink made the cut because of its lack of a double-blue mana requirement. Where most counterspells cost two blue, the Sink is a spell with X for one blue. Desertion made it because it gives good creature defense. If you counter a Blastoderm, you get that Blastoderm on your side. The Thwarts were added as extra insurance. It is possible to get the ACC of the card without hurting yourself, but it would be better to hard-cast it.
Besides counterspells and lands, this deck had other cards in it. During the PTQs, I found it quite hard to cast the Nether Spirit. I also found out that if you have a Spirit and a Wumpus in your graveyard during your upkeep, the scene can get pretty ugly. The creature base had to be changed. We do lose the Spirit, but we keep one of the strongest cards from the Mercadian Block in the deck:
MBC New Type Two
2x Nether Spirit 2x Derelor
3x Thrashing Wumpus 3x Thrashing Wumpus
I chose the Derelor because of many reasons. One, it is a 4/4 for four mana. The high toughness of this beast moves it safely out of Shock, Flameshot, and in some cases Rhystic Lightning range. The drawback of having to pay one extra black for your black spells should not matter much, but it also overextends some of our mana capabilities.
The other spells in the deck should be a mix of card drawing, creature elimination, and board control. The MBC deck was superior to many because of its use of Vendetta, Snuff Out, and Dominate. However, again because of prior choices, the deck gets new cards.
MBC New Type 2
4x AK 4x Accumulated Knowledge
3x Brainstorm 3x Brainstorm
1x Predator, Flagship 1x Predator, Flagship
1x Trade Routes 2x Boomerang
1x Soothsaying 3x Bribery
3x Dominate
I like Terror. True, it does not remove activated Chimeric Idols or other artifact creatures, but it is good because you do not lose life. Life is very important to the deck, and if you spend it all in the early to mid-game then you will have no defense left for the late game. Bribery over Dominate was a hard choice. I looked at it this way: If my opponent is playing Blastoderms and I am playing Dominates, then I have a couple of dead cards in my deck. However, I can easily Bribe a Blasty to my side.
Let’s take a look at the Decks side-by-side:
MBC New Type Two
1x Rath’s Edge 4x Underground River
1x Dust Bowl 4x Salt Marsh
10x Swamp 4x Rishadan Port
6x Island
3x Swamp
4x Counterspell 4x Counterspell
4x Thwart 4x Power Sink
2x Nether Spirit 2x Derelor
3x Thrashing Wumpus 3x Thrashing Wumpus
4x AK 4x Accumulated Knowledge
3x Brainstorm 3x Brainstorm
1x Predator, Flagship 1x Predator, Flagship
1x Trade Routes 2x Boomerang
1x Soothsaying 3x Bribery
3x Dominate
My new Type 2 deck seems to be missing two cards. This, loyal reader, is where you can help me. Submit to me at [email protected] your ideas for the two missing slots in the new version of Nether Go! (Err… maybe it should be Derelor Go!) If I choose your entry, you will win something really cool. (Most likely a foil of some sort from my collection, but NOT my foil Hermit.) Entries will close two weeks after the posting of this article, and the cards must be legal for the new Type Two.
Join me in my next article for some new deck ideas. I plan to cover Fish, Rebels, Mercs, and Stompy in the coming weeks. Thank you for reading, and remember – have fun with the game!
Joshua C.H. Claytor
www.geocities.com/teampikapuff
IRC D-lo