I’ve got something of a grab bag of items to discuss this week, including the StarCityGames.com $10000 Open weekend in Boston, the changes to the Vintage restricted list, and the M10 rules changes. Let’s get right to it!
Boston $5K — Standard (6/20)
I’ll be honest: I played a grand total of three Standard games between Regionals and this $5K. After Regionals, Elves has gone from a niche deck to a significant player in the format. I played almost the exact same 75 from Regionals (-1 Thoughtseize, +1 Kitchen Finks main; -2 Mind Shatter, +2 Snakeform in the board). Although my expectations weren’t very high, I was able to win five of my first six rounds:
Round 1: Win 2-1 vs Black/White Tokens
Round 2: Lose 1-2 vs Jund Ramp
Round 3: Win 2-1 vs Faeries
Round 4: Win 2-1 vs Red Deck Wins
Round 5: Win 2-0 vs Faeries
Round 6: Win 2-1 vs Red Deck Wins
Against Jund Ramp, my opponent was mana screwed game one and scooped early rather than reveal what he was playing. I incorrectly put him on 5C Blood or Jund Aggro, and this cost me severely as I side-boarded incorrectly for game two. In game three, I had a chance to win if I top-decked a land, but missed. Also, did you know that Karrthus steals your Chameleon Colossus? Obviously I am not retaining enough information when I read “Five with Flores”.
In round 5, I had one of “those” plays – the ones that would live on in infamy if they happened during a game of serious significance. In game two, my opponent was down to three life, and on my upkeep played Mistbind Clique with a Bitterblossom token, a Spellstutter Sprite, and a Scion in play. He championed the Bitterblossom. I had just a land in hand, and Putrid Leech in play. His counter-attack would kill me, so the only play I had was to float mana through to my draw and pray. I floated two green, a black, and a colorless, with Cloudthresher meaning I won the game, and anything else meaning I lost (Eyeblight’s Ending being my other potential out and buying me at least another turn). Obviously I flipped over Cloudthresher off the top for the win. Thanks to my opponent for being a really good sport about it as well — and of course, note that with the coming rules changes, this play wouldn’t even be possible. From here, things fell apart:
Round 7: Lose 1-2 vs 5C Blood
Round 8: Lose 1-2 vs B/W Tokens
Round 7 was a great match. Games two and three were close, with me playing around a Cryptic Command and using Garruk to win the second game, while over-extending into a Wrath of God cost me in game three. Despite this, I had a chance to steal the game had my opponent not dropped a Putrid Leech into play to ruin my Profane Command plans. In round 8, my B/W opponent curved out perfectly game 2 and I couldn’t find an Infest or Cloudthresher, and in game 3 he had two Wraths and two Paths plus a Finks and was able to stabilize and take over the game.
I still believe in Elves, and I found the Garruks in the sideboard to be exceptionally good against RDW and 5C Blood. Not surprisingly, I lost two matches to decks that I haven’t play-tested against at all. Remember to play-test, kids! I expect to keep playing either Elves or 5C Blood / Jund Aggro this summer, although obviously this depends on what is (and is not) in M10 and how that changes the format.
Boston $5K — Legacy (6/21)
This was the event I was really psyched for, after having done well with my Legacy deck in Bethlehem last month. It’s also probably my last Legacy tournament until Champs at GenCon, as Legacy doesn’t see much play in the Philly area. My list didn’t change much from the one I posted here — I replaced the one main-deck Relic of Progenitus with a third Red Elemental Blast, and in the sideboard I cut 2 Pyroclasm, and 3 Chalice of the Void for 4 Propaganda and a second Echoing Truth. Walking the room, I was much more concerned about Merfolk and other miscellaneous aggro than I was about Storm. At GP: Chicago I found Pyroclasm to be inefficient against Merfolk. Propaganda is a better option, and one that served me well at the start of the day:
Round 1: Win 2-1 vs Merfolk
Round 2: Win 2-0 vs Affinity
Round 3: Win 2-0 vs Merfolk
Round 4: Win 2-1 vs Counter/Top
I boarded in all four Propaganda in the first three rounds, and against Merfolk it really is pretty devastating. The Affinity match-up seems like it might be bad, and I could’ve lost game two to a top-decked Shrapnel Blast, but my opponent didn’t get there. I won both of those games on the back of Dreadnaught, and being able to REB Master of Etherium was pretty clutch. The Counter/Top match was very close, as they always are. My hand was very good in game one, while in game two I was seriously out-classed by Dark Confidant and Tarmogoyf. In game three, we fought battles over Counterbalance (which we both tried to resolve) and eventually ended up both drawing off the top of our decks. I hit a Counterbalance, but had no top in play. Eventually I hit Painter, just needing Grindstone. My opponent played a Bob and Stifled the blind CB trigger. My top card was Grindstone, so I untapped and won.
Round 5: Lose 0-2 vs Zoo
Round 6: Lose 1-2 vs Ultimate Planeswalker (Feature Match)
Round 7: Lose 1-2 vs Canadian Thresh
Obviously this was not how I wanted to end up after a promising start. Against Zoo, the first game I got hit with three consecutive Wastelands, and ended up needing to use Ancient Tomb four times and dying to burn. Game two I didn’t have much of a chance against his Bolts, Chain Lightnings, Fireblasts, and Krosan Grips — it felt impossible to keep Painter in play. The list I’ve been running was not built with Zoo in mind, and something will probably need to change as this deck is growing in popularity. Firespout, Hydroblast, and Chill are all cards I’ll consider for the sideboard. Perhaps more importantly, this match-up showed the importance of having a win condition that doesn’t involve artifacts. While I’ve been on the fence before, now I am pretty certain that I want to rework the mana (probably -1 Volcanic, -1 Seat of the Synod, +1 Polluted Delta, +1 Tropical Island) to include some number of Tarmogoyfs main for Zoo and Canadian Thresh.
The Ultimate Planeswalker deck, which is really modified 4C Landstill, was also a good match. I made a misplay that may have cost me the first game, when my opponent top-decked a Mishra’s Factory with me at 8, with him having Ajania Vengeant and Elspeth in play. I didn’t realize I was facing lethal until halfway through my turn, and wasted some mana playing an irrelevant Trinket Mage before playing the Top I had in hand. I did have a chance to Top into a Wasteland, but it wasn’t there and I lost. I could have played Top, checked for a Wasteland, and then played the Trinket Mage to check again; instead I was blinded by my potential to win the following turn by playing Trinket Mage for Grindstone (with Painter in hand). I won game two very quickly. In game three, I took a mulligan to six and kept a hand with one land, 3 REBs, a Grindstone, and a Brainstorm. My Brainstorm revealed a second land and a Top, but it would be many turns before I found a third land. I had to save one Volcanic from a Wasteland by pointing a Pyroblast at a land and then Dazing it. Eventually I just got too far behind and lost to the Planewalkers. It’s entirely possible that another mulligan would have been correct, but the REBs were very crucial to my success as I had to resolve my combo through Meddling Mage and Spell Snare out of the sideboard.
The Canadian Thresh match was very close, with me pulling out a game one win, and then losing games two and three to top-decked Lightning Bolts. Game three I also made a misplay in running out a Trinket Mage to get a Relic of Progenitus. I had meant to sideboard out one of the two I had brought in, but apparently brought out both; this basically wasted an entire turn and gave my opponent another turn to draw into his burn spell.
All in all, I’m not sure how I feel about the tournament. I definitely didn’t play well in rounds five or seven, making misplays that may or may not have cost me a game in each match. The deck as I played it is very vulnerable to Zoo, and my Canadian Thresh match-up doesn’t seem all that good either. I’m pretty sure adding Tarmogoyf to the main and sideboard will help balance this out. On the plus side, the Merfolk match-up felt fine on the back of Propaganda. I think the right call is to address the Zoo match-up at the expense of the Ichorid match-up. There were people at the $5K who ran Ichorid, but it failed to perform and still seems like a worse choice in Legacy than it does in Vintage. I’ve only played the deck once in my last 38 Legacy matches, and carrying 4 cards for that match is basically the worst of both worlds: not enough to be effective, but enough to negatively impact me in other match-ups.
June 20th Banned & Restricted Changes: Vintage
I’m not in a position to speak intelligently on this card, as I’ve never played in a Vintage environment where it was legal as a 4-of. It enables Dragon Combo as a potentially viable Vintage deck, although it is likely that such a deck would remain a tier-two strategy (or worse). Time will tell. It would have been interesting to see what happened to 5C Stax if this card was unrestricted but Crop Rotation was left on the restricted list. Given the fact that 5C Stax plays Crucible of Worlds and Goblin Welder, Entomb would be a powerful tutor there; given the limited slots available and the fact that Crop Rotation is a better choice, I doubt it’ll see play in that style of deck.
I do feel confident stating that this card is simply not good enough for Ichorid. There is no reason you would want to play this card and rely on a mana strategy. The effect just isn’t powerful enough to be worth opening yourself up to Force of Will and mana denial strategies — no individual card in Ichorid is worth putting into your graveyard for all of those concessions.
I’m actually surprised this came off the list, because it is very powerful. This is exactly the type of card that 5C Stax wanted to see come off the restricted list and has more of an impact on the deck than Burning Wish would have had. In fact, this is actually a pretty wily choice in that it pushes Stax close to tier 1 without compromising the viability of Vintage aggro or Fish strategies (to whatever extent you believe those strategies are valid to begin with). In Stax, not only does it tutor for Mishra’s Workshop, Barbarian Ring, Wasteland, and Bazaar of Baghdad, but it dramatically increases the likelihood that the deck can execute a full Strip Mine lock instead of a Wasteland lock. While it remains to be seen if this is enough to make 5C Stax competitive with Tezzeret, it certainly goes a long way to improving that match-up for 5C Stax and probably pushes that deck from tier 2 to tier 1.5. It will be interesting to see what shifts occur in the meta-game if there is a resurgence of Workshop decks in the format, as well as how much of an issue the ease of creating a Strip Mine lock creates complaints due to the “un-fun” factor.
Again, Crop Rotation is not going to see play in Ichorid. There is no reason why a deck already set up to find Bazaar would want to open up slots in the deck to run enough mana-producing lands to play this card. It also opens up the deck to vulnerability to Force of Will. The fact that Ichorid is so powerful against Force of Will / Mana Drain strategies is the main appeal of that deck.
Grim Monolith, Enlightened Tutor
The decks that would run these cards are solidly tier 3, at least based on current Vintage tech. While it is certainly possible that someone could break one of these cards, or that cards printed in the future might push a strategy that uses them into tier 1 or 2, for now I think these will only see play in less competitive decks. Enlightened Tutor requires an investment in white, which isn’t worthwhile for a deck like Oath of Druids (which can already run Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, and Imperial Seal in black), and 5C Stax already didn’t play this card and has no reason to with superior tutors like Crop Rotation and Entomb now at its disposal.
I appreciate what the DCI was attempting to do with this restriction, but I have concerns as far as where the Tezzeret shell goes from here. My main worry is that the use of Remora as a draw engine will become more popular, and I don’t think this is a good thing for Vintage. It creates boring, stalemated games where both players wait for the Remora to drop, and then fight a counter war over the next one. An environment loaded with Smokestack and Mystic Remora is not my idea of a fun time. Further use of the Remora engine will also make Ritual decks considerably weaker — this “pillar” of Vintage is in danger of toppling over completely.
Despite what some people believe, I do think that Thirst for Knowledge, as the most-played draw engine in Tezzeret, was a valid target for restriction. Most Tezzeret builds will be negatively impacted by this change, and has potential to be good for the format. Intuition plus Accumulated Knowledge isn’t as efficient, Night’s Whisper isn’t blue and is a sorcery that costs life, and Dark Confidant can be killed and is also dangerous with an end-game plan that involves taking repeated turns. The loss of Thirst for Knowledge is obviously bad for Control Slaver and Painter decks, but these decks have been mostly driven to extinction by Tezzeret.
M10: Combat
I think the most important distinction that needs to be made is over the idea that there is “strategy” involved with damage on the stack. There is no question that this change takes away an option that we’re all used to, and that it makes certain cards fundamentally worse. However, I disagree that this change takes away “strategic” options from us as Magic players. This idea seems totally false to me, because putting damage on the stack is almost always the correct play. Stack damage, then play Momentary Blink. Stack damage, then sacrifice Mogg Fanatic. Stack damage, then play Giant Growth. Stack damage, then activate Guildmage ability. These aren’t really tricks, they’re simply the optimal play provided by the rules. Sure, it’s an option, just as you always have an option to make the optimal play, or a play that is strategically worse. Can you occasionally win games by making these plays because your opponent worded combat incorrectly, or wasn’t aware that these plays were available? Yes — just as you can win many Magic games due to poor strategy on the part of your opponent. I have no problem with the fact that some people will no longer steal games at FNM by asking, “Damage on the stack?”
I’m also perfectly all right with the fact that there are new optimal plays related to ordering blockers. It will take some getting used to, but it is clear that some spells are better now than they were before, and some are worse. Some creatures printed before aren’t as good, but design space has opened up to print creatures with better sacrifice options than before. As far as strategy goes, ordering blockers correctly will require significantly more skill than putting damage on the stack, because there IS a choice involved, whereas damage on the stack was basically always the correct choice. There is also more strategy involved when weighing the value of a creature against its ability, whereas before it was almost always correct to stack damage and get the best of both worlds. However, this one is a trade-off, because you lose the ability to assign damage in a way that is beneficial post-combat (such as if you have a sweeper or the chance to remove a Lord or other pump effect). I haven’t played any games with the new rules yet, but they do seem to favor the defensive player.
Where I do have an issue is with the way the message was delivered to us. If Wizards has tested these mechanics and found them useful in the acquisition of new players, I am fine with that. I want this game to continue to grow and to be successful for as long as possible. If that means changes to the way combat works, then so be it. I have no problem there — just come out and say, “We focus-tested and are concerned that damage on the stack during combat is hindering acquisition. This system has tested better with brand-new players, and we have been tasked with showing that we are taking concrete steps to increase acquisition.” My concern is this idea that we need things to be “intuitive” for new players, because it’s a slippery slope. There are many parts of Magic that aren’t intuitive. Under the new rules, it isn’t intuitive that a Prodigal Pyromancer can tap, put its ability to deal one damage on the stack, and then be removed from play, but still deal that damage — and yet, can’t do that during combat. Layers aren’t intuitive in the least. Look at this quote from Gatherer about Lion’s Eye Diamond: “The ability is a mana ability, so it is played and resolves as a mana ability, but it can only be played at times when you can play an Instant. Yes, this is a bit weird.”
Magic is a complex game and not all parts of it are going to be intuitive, and using that is a poor reason for making a change – you have to start asking, what else is going to be removed from the rules in the future? The benefit of the stack was that it was a universal rules system that anchored the entire game. Once you understood that underpinning, the majority of the rules actually were intuitive. Removing that foundation is dangerous. The idea that everything is just being made more intuitive isn’t true, because suggesting that it is intuitive to use two separate rules systems in one game to resolve damage seems like a stretch to me.
M10: Mana Burn
I’m also not a big fan of mana burn disappearing. I think that the existence of mana burn required new players to learn the distinct phases and steps of the game, and removing mana burn is actually detrimental to players learning this important concept. I am fine with the idea of players being punished for not learning this correctly, as it enforces tighter play, even at casual levels. Removing mana burn will foster loose play, which I think is a negative. Mana burn also adds some amount of flavor to the game. Most concerning to me, its removal also changes the power level of certain cards, some significantly, in older formats. For instance, it is now always the correct play to float mana when you play Daze. You never have to worry about taking mana burn from sources like Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, Grim Monolith, or Mishra’s Workshop, and Mana Drain becomes that much better than it already was.
M10: Nostalgia
Probably the most common reaction I’ve heard when people talk about the new rules is something like, “Now [Mogg Fanatic / Ravenous Baloth / Sakura Tribe Elder / Siege Gang Commander] sucks!” I haven’t been immune to this line of thought. To me, stating that Mogg Fanatic was printed, and considered very good, under the pre-6E rules is somewhat misleading in that ten years worth of creatures printed subsequently to this change were obviously made with stacking damage in mind.
After leaving the game in 1997, I played briefly in late 2002 into early 2003. Right when I started again, and just for fun, I showed up at an Extended PTQ with a Sligh deck I’d found in a box at my parents house. It had Lightning Bolt, Ball Lightning, Wasteland, Fireslinger, Mogg Fanatic, Orcish Artillery, Fireblast, and so on. I ran my record out to 4-1 before losing a second time to Super Gro. After the first round, my opponent asked me why I hadn’t stacked damage with my Mogg Fanatic. Obviously I had no idea you could actually do that — I had stopped playing before the release of 6E – and that’s how I learned about the stack. Humorously, my Orcish Artilleries were Korean 4th Edition, and my Canyon Wildcats and Fireslingers were Japanese Tempest, so although I had no idea what most of my opponent’s cards did, they were also confused with mine. I never expected Orcish Artillery to generate so many judge calls.
When I came back to the game again in 2007, the first PTQ I played in was Time Spiral Block Constructed, and I ended up 5-1-2. The deck I played was based on the Blue/Green Aggro deck from that Pro Tour, but modified to run Mystic Enforcer, Mystic Snake and Momentary Blink to further improve the Teachings match-up. As it included Venser, Momentary Blink, and Pongify, damage on the stack was a very important part of playing this deck correctly.
It is normal to have a gut-shot reaction to rules changes that “ruin” some of our favorite cards. I’ve always hoped that there would be a format where I could competitively use Momentary Blink again, because I think it is a highly skill-intensive card that I really enjoyed playing. What we need to do is look past this nostalgia for specific cards and focus on the new design space these changes create. The onus is really on Wizards to make creatures with better sacrifice abilities going forward, ones that are worth playing and create strategic tension between using them in combat and using their ability.
This weekend I’ll be playing Vintage for a Black Lotus at Alternate Universe: Blue Bell, before a break for July 4th and the M10 Prerelease. I’m trying my best to make sure someone plays Vintage Elves so that I have a report featuring that deck. Time willing, I’m hoping to do a review of Duel of the Planeswalkers for Xbox: 360 as well.
Until next time…
Matt Elias
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