Greetings everyone!
I’m currently travelling in Seattle, doing a little house-sitting and enjoying a “workcation” up in the Pacific Northwest. Nothing says “summer” like 45-degree nights bundled up in sweaters and blankets! I’m not sure how long it will be before I end up moving here, but I will say this – it definitely has an upside. I grew up on the east side of Cleveland, and the low temperatures and relative humidity don’t bother me at all – plus, the fish is safe to eat. (Seriously, though, this place is a haven for my inner fat kid. And my outer one, too.) And I’m beginning to believe that this whole “250 days of rain” thing is a reverse marketing ploy to keep people out of Seattle; I’ve been here a week and it hasn’t rained once.
Since I’ve been here and not surrounded by my cards, I haven’t really kept up with the goings-on in the Magical world this past week. I did, however, bring a few decks with me (mostly random stuff I had built, but also my EDH box) so when I found a place to play Friday Night Magic last weekend, I wasn’t stranded without anything to play. Here’s what I’m playing these days:
Creatures (25)
- 4 Llanowar Elves
- 2 Elvish Visionary
- 2 Master of the Wild Hunt
- 4 Leatherback Baloth
- 2 Wolfbriar Elemental
- 4 Joraga Treespeaker
- 3 Nest Invader
- 4 Vengevine
Planeswalkers (3)
Lands (7)
Spells (25)
Rare Cost Summary:
Vengevine ($39.99 x 4 = $159.96)
Wolfbriar Elemental ($0.99 x 2 = $1.98)
Master of the Wild hunt ($5.99 x 2 = $11.98)
Garruk Wildspeaker ($5.99 x 2 = $11.98)
Oran-Rief, the Vastwood ($0.99 x 1 = $0.99)
The purpose of the deck? To maximize your return from a resolved Overrun (or from Garruk’s ultimate ability) without spreading yourself so thin that you can’t recover from mass removal. The deck can easily run out multiple tokens early in the game, survive a Day of Judgment, and reclaim the battlefield, either by recurring a Vengevine or by hitting one of the Wolf-token generators. A second-turn Leatherback Baloth is trouble for a good number of decks as well – he’s a great answer to Putrid Leech, he’s well out of single-card burn range, and he smashes down Wall of Omens.
But you say, Dave, I don’t have Vengevines, and I can’t borrow them from friends. I understand that. I will say that, if you like playing Green-based aggro decks, you should be investing the time and tradestock into trading for these guys, as they are the real deal (as evidenced by the number of decks that sprung up around them at their initial release) – but, if acquiring them immediately is just not possible, then one of the other 4-power-for-4-mana guys (either Obstinate Baloth or even Cudgel Troll) will fit the bill. I actually don’t hate Cudgel Troll; he fits a lot of what is great about Vengevine (four power, survives Day of Judgment) and all he’s missing is the haste. Well, and the forty dollar price tag.
I apologize in advance for those of you who also read Jamie Wakefield column, as I’m sure you’re getting to this point and saying, “Really, Dave? We get enough Mono-Green decks for a week each Monday.” And I get you. But it’s probably important to remember that I was one of the original students in the Wakefield School of Magic, that I traded my very soul away to get Verdant Forces to play Secret Force, and that some small part of me will always be drawn back to the Green beats. I mean, it’s all I can do not to add a Forest and an Elvish Visionary to that deck just to keep the numbers right.
I went 2-2 on the night, continuing what I am calling the “English National Team Curse,” beating Blue-White Control and Blue-White Mill in the first two rounds before losing to Goblins (with sketchy mulligan decisions) and Mass Polymorph (no removal is bad against them) in the final two rounds. Had a great time!
Aside about the English National Team Curse: For the most recent PTQ in Denver, I wore an English National Team soccer shirt, since my family is ostensibly British and I have an affinity for English soccer from my time watching Sky satellite while living in Germany. To that point, they had drawn twice in the World Cup – and I proceeded to go 4-4 at the PTQ. Since that time, I have been going exactly 50-50 in every Magic tournament I’ve played (or close enough that I think it’s a curse now) – 8-8 over three days at the Compleat Challenge, 3-3 at the M11 Pre-Release, 3-3 at the M11 Launch Party, and now 2-2 at this FNM. I’m trying to figure out how to break the curse, but it needs to happen PDQ, I have a StarCityGames.com Open Series weekend coming up! [As an actual Englishman, I declare this curse lifted. — Craig, amused]
I took my EDH deck box with me in the off chance that EDH had taken hold here like it has in Colorado Springs, but to no avail. I definitely would have gotten funny looks for all those foreign cards, too.
After a couple of asides and a giant bannerhead, I’ve lost all my flow to segue into talking about the Mass Polymorph deck. Well, I’m diving right in anyways.
Someone (actually, probably a hundred someones) noted that, with Mass Polymorph, we essentially have Dragonstorm back in Standard for the next the months (when Bogardan Hellkite rotates out with M10). Obviously it’s not exactly Dragonstorm, since you need to have some number of donks in play to turn into Dragons, but you also don’t necessarily have to cast three spells prior to Mass Polymorph to pull out your winning combo. It’s like Dragonstorm, but you can do all your set-up in the rounds prior to casting your game-ending sorcery.
I started building the deck just like Dragonstorm. Take four Mass Polymorph, add the standard Dragonstorm creature suite of 4 Bogardan Hellkites and a Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund, and then fill in with donk-generators. Someone has since shown me that, since you aren’t limited to actual dragons by Mass Polymorph, you can opt for the much more concise (and just as kill-you-dead) set of two Hellkites and one Magister Sphinx, which gets around any amount of lifegain as well. That is also the combo that my opponent pulled on me in round 4 of FNM last week.
What I kept thinking when I was playing against him, though, was that a fast aggro plan would either kill him before he got to six mana, or force him into using his donks to chump-block, which kind of circumvents the whole Mass Polymorph plan. And I was able to do cobble that together in one of those games, coupling a fast aggro hand with a Tectonic Edge to keep him off of six mana long enough for me to kill him.
His version of the deck was Blue-Green, using mostly Eldrazi Spawn-generating cards like Awakening Zone and Growth Spasm to get his tokens. I did wonder if there was a better way to do it, but I haven’t had a chance to really get in and poke at it. Red seems like it offers some good options in terms of making tokens (Dragon Fodder comes to mind, as does Brood Birthing) but you definitely don’t want to lose either the Blue or the Green, I don’t think. Green gives you mana acceleration and token makers and Garruk (which can be critical to casting and protecting Mass Polymorph), but you could probably shave the Blue back away from being the main color of the deck and just being around for that single Blue mana to cast Mass Polymorph:
Creatures (3)
Lands (14)
Spells (43)
Rare Cost Summary:
Mass Polymorph ($1.49 x 4 = $5.96)
Bogardan Hellkite ($1.99 x 2 = $3.98)
Magister Sphinx ($0.49 x 1 = $0.49)
Rares You Could Add, if You Had ‘Em: Either of the on-color fetchlands would work in the manabase, with Misty Rainforest probably more important than Scalding Tarn.
My opponent “watered down” his Mass Polymorph post-sideboard, adding in various things like Eldrazi or Iona, Shield of Emeria or Terastodon, and I’m not sure I agree with that philosophy. I can’t imagine a scenario in today’s Standard where Magister Sphinx plus two Hellkites doesn’t kill the opponent. I guess the White Leyline might play some factor in that, but that’s hardly popular at the time. I guess if your opponent somehow sides in Sadistic Sacrament, you need to be prepared for that possibility. Gotta love FNM!
I’ll be in Seattle up through the middle of August. I’ll try and keep up with what’s going on!
Until next week…
Dave
dave dot massive at gmail and davemassive on twitter and facebook