If I’m not lynched for this one, it’ll be a miracle. And not the nice, Frank Capra kind of miracle, either.
No, if I do manage to escape untorn, it will only serve to secure a more terrifying fate later. I hope you can all live with yourselves knowing that you’ve driven me to this.
My life lately has been much less like living and much more like travel, sleep, and music. There’s been some incidental search for employment (founded on the flawed assumption that I should keep eating), but on the whole it’s been go go go.
Fortunately for me, I know enough kind people with permanent addresses, spare rooms and live online ports to keep in touch, or at least a sham thereof.
This week’s offering will mirror my traipsing though Canada’s lush Golden Horseshoe. Soundtrack courtesy of The Smiths (The Queen Is Dead), Dream Theater (Awake; Falling Into Infinity), Mogwai (Ten Rapid), KMFDM (Naive – Hell To Go), Pet Shop Boys (please) and Molasses (You’ll Never Be Well No More).
If you want to recreate the experience in near exactitude, make those your playlist, but begin and end every day with Pet Shop Boys. After so much stylised romanticism, you’ll develop this attitude.
But I digress like unorganised speech index cards.
I take the time now to renew my rallying cry against the pervasive analysis of the new set, Prophecy. Looking over the expanse already written, one gets the idea that every appropriate subset of keystrokes is posted somewhere out in the all-too-forgiving internet.
I don’t say it lightly. People really are ready not only to commit pages and pages of text to go over (in tragic detail) every mark of ink, but also to say absolutely anything whatsoever. I fear it stems from the desire to be the first to claim the truth, and the desire for that from the belief that the uncovering of it has some worth.
I dispell that with a wave of my hand.
Suffice it to say that the number of comparisons drawn between Chimeric Idol and Masticore are enough to send me screaming around the room like Mike St. Louis after hearing stories about the local anime convention. I advise anyone interested in researching the differences between these two cards to hold one in each hand and look. Please leave it at that.
Now, turning a blind eye to all that I’ve just said, I’d like to talk about the potential resurgence of one of my favorite deck types in the wake of this set Prophecy: Green/Red Beat-dot-Down.
Please bear in mind that I’m a man of the road right now, so all this is not only theoretical, but also not necessarily non-false.
I’ve had a bit of a sickness over this type of deck. A fever, if you will, that makes it the only ultra-aggressive deck that I like to play. It goes all the way back to Kird Ape, which Taiga made into a steal of a deal. Then a bit of a hiatus (partially brought on by Orcish Lumberjack) into more controlling flavours of Green/Red and Red/Green.
Stronghold, however, put me right back where I started. Not only was the obviously good Muscle Sliver ready and willing, but now there was a second Grizzly Bear hoping to join his good buddies: Spined Sliver.
River Boa and Muscle Sliver were The Line. They dictated the quality of your two-drops, and now they had a companion to round it out.
And that card, Cursed Scroll? Oh my!
Unfortunately, that was the same time as the TeStEx qualifiers, and this whole operation got back-benched in favour of an ill-conceived experiment called German Hatred. We’ll not discuss that now.
It wasn’t until I finally cleaned out the basement that I found the old deck, proxies and all, and rekindled my waning passion for fast creatures whose way is clear thanks to spot red removal.
That, and this card called Spur Grappler. Four power worth of creature at turn three seems like too good a deal to pass up. But then I stopped to remember how I don’t like red creatures, and the whole epiphany shambled apart in my hands.
Out of the dregs I trawled this:
Meat Fire (Lost, Tired and Hungry mix)
4 Wild Dogs
4 Pouncing Jaguar
4 Llanowar Elves
4 River Boa
4 Albino Troll
4 Shock
4 Seal of Fire
4 Flame Rift
4 Rhystic Lightning
Never mind about the sideboard, this deck has more interesting near-theological consequences.
First of all, remember that I have this mania hampering my ability to play a deck that’s aggressive AND good. With that proviso, this all makes sense.
That said, this still isn’t a bad deck. A set of fast creatures with high power-to-cost ratios goes well with a similarly themed set of enhancers. what this deck lacks in metagame appropriateness, it more than makes up for with its ability to punish the unlucky.
It’s consistent enough, and mulligans well. And its fun like gangbusters.
And now, if you’ll excuse the shortness, I really must dash. It seems the three bear-shaped inhabitants of this house have returned unexpectedly. They’re unlikely to be happy, I’ve not only sampled their porridge and snoozed in their beds, but also mussed their fridge magnets, eaten all the tarragon and drunken all the soy sauce.
Adieu, and a quick window-based egress.
Josh Bennett
OMC
(With sincere apologies to the original author)
New Phone : Sixty-Five Percent
Old Phone : Thirty Percent
Roustabout : Four Percent