Vintage Champs 2010 is two months away, so this seems like a reasonable time to catch up with the current state of the format. I get a lot of emails about various decks; most of my time playing and testing Vintage lately has had to do with Noble Fish, MUD, Oath of Druids, and Dredge, so I’m going to give you some updated versions of all of those decks today.
Before we get to that, though, I want to offer some thoughts on a few Vintage topics.
The theoretical banning of Time Vault is still a hot-button issue for many Vintage players, and is one of the things I’m asked about most often. One of the problems I have with this question is that my frame of reference is skewed; I started playing Vintage competitively in December 2008 after a twelve-year break, so Time Vault has always been part of my Vintage landscape. You can probably guess where this is headed: I have no issue with Time Vault, and no particular desire to see it banned.
I’ve played a lot of Vintage over the past eighteen months, and I’ve had pretty good success whether I’m playing Time Vault or game-planning against it with decks like MUD, Noble Fish, and Dredge. Is it sometimes frustrating to lose to a quick Tezzeret or Key/Vault? Sure, it can be; however, your exposure to this type of loss can be somewhat mitigated by your choice of deck, if you find losing that way to be exceptionally frustrating.
I don’t believe that Time Vault dramatically changes the “luck” factor in the format given a statistically meaningful set of games. How else is one able to explain why a variety of players have been able to achieve sustained success in tournament Vintage in the Time Vault era? Certainly it is the best win condition and has frozen out some alternatives (such as Mindslaver and Painter/Grindstone), but even in Vintage there’s usually going to be a best way for blue decks to win, and it is probably always going to change over time.
What we’ve seen lately is the trend of throwing Time Vault into every deck has cooled off dramatically, and the card mostly sees play in Tezzeret and Oath of Druids. At this point, Time Vault is probably in 40-60% of the decks in most American Vintage tournaments, and seems to have no particular advantage in Top 8 penetration or tournament wins than decks without it. That said, I’ve played in some tournaments recently where its presence in the field was closer to 30% due to the popularity of MUD, Dredge, and Noble Fish.
If Time Vault were banned, it would represent a huge reboot of Vintage as we’ve come to know it. Although I’d be really interested to see what happened, and especially curious to see whether attendance would increase at Vintage tournaments, I don’t think tournament results over the past six months really suggest any need for the card to be banned; in fact I would suggest there is less evidence now to support banning the card than at any other point in its time in Vintage.
Adjusting the Restricted List
Again, I have a different frame of reference here in that I never played Vintage with unrestricted Gush, Brainstorm, Merchant Scroll, Gifts Ungiven, Flash, or Ponder. I have played with unrestricted Thirst for Knowledge, and I didn’t really feel that card’s restriction was particularly necessary in June of 2009 (although it has had results that I consider a net-positive for the format). Looking at each of these cards individually is somewhat pointless, in that many of these cards are tied to something else. For instance, as long as Time Vault is in the format, Gifts Ungiven and Thirst for Knowledge will probably remain on the restricted list.
The real question is about the function of the restricted list and what the DCI is trying to do with Vintage. Currently, the restricted list for Vintage seeks to balance the format so that no one strategy is completely dominant. I’ve recently come to think that the function of the Vintage restricted list should be quite different.
Vintage is always going to be full of exceptionally powerful decks and strategies; the power level of the format is one of its main draws for many Vintage players. Is it really fair for people who want to play Gush to be pushed out of the format, while Dredge is allowed to warp the format because of some need to prop up all of the “pillars”? Who made the decision that Gush decks didn’t make up a sixth pillar? Given that Time Vault is now part of the format, would Gush decks, as we knew them before, still be at the forefront of competitive Vintage?
Would Brainstorm’s unrestriction be too beneficial to Oath and Tezzeret decks, or would it do more to prop up TPS and Drain Tendrils than it would for control decks? Given the relatively low percentage of Storm decks in most modern Vintage tournaments, would Ponder help juice up that deck, or is it really too broken? The restriction of Thirst for Knowledge helped show a number of things, such as the fact that other decks could still function in a Tezzeret/Time Vault world, and that Tezzeret decks would keep finding draw engines no matter what cards were restricted. Now that Dredge, Noble Fish, and MUD have footholds in this format, would Thirst for Knowledge still be too powerful?
Sadly, we may never know, because the DCI found these cards to be too format-warping and sidelined them all. Some of the most interesting conversations regarding Vintage have to do with theory-crafting the impact of unrestricting these cards.
So, here’s the point of all this: at one point in time, it seemed like the DCI realized that unrestricting cards can be as constructive a way of influencing a format as restricting cards. Unfortunately, over the last 24 months, this concept seems to have gone by the wayside completely; further, the DCI seems to be managing Vintage out of adherence to a set of principles rather than listening to what people playing the format are saying.
Even though I’ve had success with the format as-is, I think it’s time the DCI considers giving the people what they want; Time Vault shouldn’t be banned because I think that’s too counter to everything that Vintage stands for, but I definitely think the DCI should consider unrestricting some cards on this next go-around to shake-up the format, if for no other reason than to promote interest and help shake off stagnation.
The State of American Vintage
American Vintage desperately needs a large tournament outside of Vintage Champs; unless I missed one somewhere, I believe this year’s largest event was the Philly Open V in February, with 82 players. There aren’t any large events on the horizon that I’m aware of — and this is a problem. While I know that something comparing to the Bazaar of Moxen events is unlikely , it is sad to think that we can’t assemble enough players to crack 100 outside of Vintage Champs, which honestly is one of the few terrible EV Vintage events out there.
I’d love to see someone run a Vintage Champs-style event not tied to GenCon (with or without proxies — or even two days, one each style) so that we could have a Championship event with a better prize and lower entry cost.
Does no one else feel this way? Is it really impossible to pull 100 Vintage players together?
On to some decks.
MUD — 2010
When I wrote about MUD a few months ago, I noted that the Metalworker / Staff combo that does well in Europe never seems to win any tournaments in the US. While MUD continues to do well here, most of the successful decks still eschew the Worker/Staff combo. With the Bazaar of Moxen results available to review, it appears that Metalworker remains as popular as ever in MUD, but the Staff combo has fallen off. Here’s the deck that won the Bazaar of Moxen (with 347 players!):
Creatures (15)
Lands (18)
Spells (27)
- 1 Mana Vault
- 1 Sol Ring
- 1 Mana Crypt
- 4 Sphere of Resistance
- 2 Sword of Fire and Ice
- 1 Black Lotus
- 4 Tangle Wire
- 1 Mox Emerald
- 1 Mox Jet
- 1 Mox Pearl
- 1 Mox Ruby
- 1 Mox Sapphire
- 4 Chalice of the Void
- 4 Thorn of Amethyst
Sideboard
The Top 8 had three similar MUD decks, but this was the winning last after 9 rounds and the Top 8. Note that I wouldn’t really recommend playing this specific deck in the US due to its vulnerability to Oath of Druids, especially in game 1; although I’ve enjoyed testing various builds with Metalworker, when an opponent leads with Oath and you’re counting on the mana boost from Metalworker, it’s a problem. Cards like Terastodon make an over-reliance on Duplicant problematic, because the Don can take out the mana producers you needed to play the Duplicant.
So what’s a MUD deck that I would play?
Creatures (13)
Lands (20)
Spells (27)
This version is considerably more interested in beating Oath than the European lists, and plays maindeck Duplicant along with a significant section of anti-Oath cards in the sideboard. Blasting Station is vulnerable to Needle, but it is much easier to play than Eon Hub and can handle any number of Forbidden Orchards simultaneously; Smokestack lets you sweep a resolved Oath off the board. MUD remains a solid choice in this metagame, as it can give Storm decks fits (especially Drain Tendrils, which tends to have less basics and less artifact bounce than true TPS), has plenty of game against Dredge decks, and with the proper sideboard can really bring it to an unprepared Oath deck.
There’s no reason to believe that MUD won’t continue to be a top-tier deck in Vintage.
Oath of Druids — 2010
Oath decks surged in popularity at the end of 2009 with the release of Iona , but cooled off again as the field adapted. The deck has surged back with the Rich Shay / Brad Granberry version, which utilizes Terastodon, and has a number of backers putting up results including Ben Carp and Mike Solymossy. I posted a version of this deck a few weeks ago, and have made only minor changes:
Creatures (3)
Planeswalkers (3)
Lands (17)
Spells (37)
- 1 Brainstorm
- 3 Mana Drain
- 1 Vampiric Tutor
- 1 Mystical Tutor
- 4 Oath of Druids
- 1 Yawgmoth's Will
- 4 Force of Will
- 1 Sol Ring
- 1 Demonic Tutor
- 1 Hurkyl's Recall
- 1 Time Walk
- 1 Ancestral Recall
- 1 Mana Crypt
- 1 Time Vault
- 1 Gifts Ungiven
- 1 Merchant Scroll
- 1 Thirst for Knowledge
- 1 Tinker
- 1 Voltaic Key
- 1 Black Lotus
- 1 Mox Emerald
- 1 Mox Jet
- 1 Mox Pearl
- 1 Mox Ruby
- 1 Mox Sapphire
- 1 Ponder
- 3 Spell Pierce
After putting in some more time with this version of Oath, a few things became apparent. One, I wasn’t that impressed with Library of Alexandria, as it doesn’t do nearly enough outside of the mirror match and against Tezzeret (and even there it wasn’t always relevant). There aren’t enough control decks around to balance out the matches where it is a do-nothing card. Ultimately I decided I’d rather have Strip Mine, which is also relevant against opposing Orchards and against Dredge. Fish has cooled off enough, locally, that I’m comfortable changing out the two Spell Snare for a third Spell Pierce and a Ponder, while Tendrils decks are popular enough that I want Thirst for Knowledge instead of Timetwister.
I also made some minor alternations to the sideboard designed to solidify the Dredge match-up, which has given me three of my four losses with this version of Oath.
Dredge — 2010
The ultimate cyclical deck, Dredge has cooled off somewhat despite the fact that it has personally given me fits in the past few tournaments. While I wish I were able to play a version of Dredge with Fatestitcher, that card still seems poorly positioned in a meta where MUD and Fish remain popular. Instead, I’d suggest some minor modifications to my Turtle Dredge deck, which has had much longer legs in the format than I expected:
Creatures (23)
- 3 Ichorid
- 1 Flame-Kin Zealot
- 4 Golgari Grave-Troll
- 2 Golgari Thug
- 4 Stinkweed Imp
- 4 Narcomoeba
- 1 Woodfall Primus
- 4 Bloodghast
Lands (14)
Spells (23)
- 3 Unmask
- 4 Cabal Therapy
- 4 Serum Powder
- 4 Chalice of the Void
- 1 Darkblast
- 1 Ancient Grudge
- 2 Dread Return
- 4 Bridge from Below
Sideboard
Again, minor changes here; most are really based on a reduced chance of seeing the mirror. I wanted an Iona somewhere in the 75 due to the presence of Tendrils decks. I’ve also been really impressed with Petrified Field and added a third to the sideboard. I also borrowed Serenity tech from Sam Berse and Mark Hornung; the extra field and Gemstone Mine give this deck enough mana to support it. Ancient Grudge main is to help combat losing to a quick Key/Vault.
Noble Fish — 2010
The trick with Noble Fish is figuring out how you can continue to beat Oath of Druids without being blown out by Tendrils decks. I think this version has a legit shot:
Creatures (21)
Lands (17)
Spells (22)
This version the deemphasizes the mirror match (although the three Selkie in the main will give you an advantage against opponents without it) in exchange for more weapons against Oath and Tendrils decks; True Believer plays double-duty against both opponents, while Mindbreak Trap fills out your counterspell selection nicely for post-board TPS games.
Matt Elias
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