Worlds was a strange, unique event. Three formats, three days means testing is spread thin. No PTQs means a shift in the field from the normal grinders to a spread of Nationals winners and Pro Players Club members. The formats are in a strange place, with two being somewhat winding down, one in full PTQ swing, and the last on deck for next season. Unlike most Pro Tours, the formats are mostly fleshed out from previous events, letting the tuners have a huge edge…. until Day Three strikes. Eighteen rounds with no cut is also more forgiving and even someone who 2-4s Day One is still in Top 8 contention if they rattle off eleven or twelve straight wins. Finally, you have the team portion, which is something that will be hard to match moving forward in both what it was and what it meant.

So, given that, here is what you should expect from the last old school World Championships.

Standard:

1. This format is about proactively doing things, not setting up

Standard is currently a format high on individual card power and relatively low on synergy. Sure, you have things like “U/W Humans,” but be real. Most of the time you are just bashing their face in with a Mirran Crusader or some powerful four-drop. In a theme I expect to continue to see if set sizes don’t change, the early stages of post-rotation formats are going to be dominated by the “Titans” of the format. The most linear decks are hard to build without a couple hundred more cards of support. There are a couple close to the line, but for the most part you can’t just Red Deck people out just yet.

(Before I continue, let me establish I’m using Titans in the loose sense of the category of threats that are one- or two-hit kills without help. This directly includes Hero of Bladehold and loosely includes things like Geist of Saint Traft and Angelic Destiny. It almost directly translates to the Constructed equivalent of bombs in Limited.)

Someone is going to stick their bomb and just crush most of the time. This means the choking point of this format is going to be mana, not cards. You have X amount of time before they get their threat down; how do you use it? Often this time is going to sync up with when yours hits, so how do you break the parity? You can’t afford to just miss on doing something for a turn, as that means the threat they played last turn just destroys you.

You need efficient and effective answers and threats to break this. There isn’t really time in this format to durdle around and set up value plays like Think Twice. On the defensive, you need to match your opponent up the curve so that your Titan actually still has a game to swing around as well as have the best answers to break the heads-up fights. On the flip side, one of the ways to break a Titan fight is to have the faster Titans and things to back them up (see Humans). Either way, the key is to do things because the difference between a five-for-one and a four-for-one bomb is fairly marginal.

2. Expect a strong showing from U/B Control

As a continuation of above, U/B Control is currently the control deck with the best spread of answers. You don’t ever just brick a turn like Solar Flare does with all of its three-drop garbage like Liliana of the Veil. You have a real curve and most notably have a lot of middle turns where you actually do two things. I expect that the tuning brain trust for this event will smooth out the curving issues the deck has, as they are more superficial than fundamental.

Given that, I expect a short on Think Twices. Maybe not zero, but I’m definitely on two or three being better than four. The card qualifies as a do-nothing early and only really shines on turn four and five as a way to utilize your mana towards a sixth land while Doom Blading. Forbidden Alchemy is in a similar boat. Alexander Shearer recently suggested Ponder here, and I wouldn’t mind it here. For some reason, a split of 3 Think Twice, 2 Forbidden Alchemy, 2 Ponder seems a good intuitive spread to maximize your ability to play real spells while hitting land drops.

3. U/W Illusions is the real deal

So you want to play a true linear deck. G/W Tokens is too clunky, and U/R Delver is just a bit short on quality to really get there. G/W Humans is almost enough, but it has no real way to interact.

Enter U/W Illusions.

Todd Anderson was not joking around when he posted this deck. It kills fast like G/W Humans but can actually stop a Mana Leak. The critical mass of Lords and other oversized bodies really push you ahead against the other aggressive decks that have been surging as of late while still maintaining the same level of beats that makes them good against the rest of the field. Phantasmal Image is also a very good man in the world of Titans, most notably completely embarrassing opposing Hero of Bladeholds when you have a Lord of the Unreal in play.

If you stick to other decks, take note of this. I don’t know how big of a breakout it will be, but Gideon’s Lawkeeper and Mortarpod are solid incidental ways for other aggressive decks to trump an otherwise hard matchup.

This deck is no joke. You have been warned.

Limited

1. This format is much less about card power and much more about having an actual deck

Similar to Standard, it is very easy to just die if you miss a beat in this format. The main reason is because of the Werewolves immediately flipping on an off turn, but in general things just happen very fast. The green creatures just push the board so far ahead every turn that even if you play a spell on a turn, you can almost immediately lose if it doesn’t actually do something. The red spells are very good at killing you if you just fumble to a late “stable” board state, and Silent Departure just demolishes you. You need your deck to generate real board presence up the curve every game as opposed to hoping a couple powerful cards clumped on the curve will mop it up.

I alluded to this a bit in my Over-Under article with the low ratings on the high-drop blue and black guys that don’t really fight. This isn’t Ravnica or M10 where Snapping Drake just won the game every time. You need early cards, and if you want to go late, they need to be able to do something later. You need late cards so that when they have theirs you can keep up. This isn’t to discourage you from drafting a control deck, as they do exist. You just need to have things that matter. Fortress Crabs, Sensory Deprivations, ways to actually establish yourself. Walking Corpses is the future/present.

Draft a curve, build a deck. Come into each draft having a general shell that you are trying to aim for depending on what colors you end up in. This draft format is very close to Constructed despite not having many linear mechanics.

2. Allied colors trump enemy pairings, but three-color decks are fine

In general, the enemy color pairings aren’t very synergistic. G/U is half curve out on monsters, half blockers and undersized fliers. G/B is half curve out, half creature light. U/R is similar to G/R; only instead of monsters, red is about all out aggression. W/B and W/R aren’t as unfortunate, but blue and green are the two best colors, and red and black are the two worst. White also is heavy on removal, which means black and red are almost overly redundant.

Compare to the allies. G/W is obviously insane, as it has heavy removal and amazing bodies. U/W is U/W and will always be U/W (good tempo, good beats, good fliers). U/B has a ton of strong two-for-ones to build up to a control deck. The efficient black guys and removal help R/B reach a critical Zendikar-style mass of aggression. R/G is probably the worst allied color combination, but you still have fine synergy between the aggression of red and the oversized creatures of green forcing through damage.

That said, three-color decks are awesome. It just happens the two best colors are the two best at splashing (blue and green), and there are a ton of great effects to splash. G/R really loves a couple white and black removal spells, and U/B loves to stretch for Brimstone Volleys and Geistflames. Finally, there is Dredge. Almost all of the successful Dredge decks I have seen stretch for incentives across blue, green, and black. Spider Spawning is especially potent, and on the rare end Splinterfright comes around surprisingly late for no reason along with Boneyard Wurm. In general, cards just aren’t super color intensive in this set, and between Shimmering Grotto and Traveler’s Amulet, you can get the fixing you need to support three colors.

You can still draft enemy color decks, but be warned that more often than not it’s just a trap.

3. Follow signals.

Getting cut when you are trying to have a functional deck is the worst. Instead of being able to pick and choose your way to a deck, you are stuck with whatever you get in a world where just having 23 playables isn’t enough. I would much rather abandon a few picks early or have a slightly scattered first pack and then know where to go than just be stuck. The overall power level is fairly flat in this format, and the packs are deep, so a card 7th pick in an open color isn’t much worse than a 3rd pick in a cut one.

In red or green, these should just be face up/down on the table in the form of Werewolves. In other colors, just watch for packs that look a little too deep around fifth pick or something like a Silent Departure or Bonds of Faith making it around a little too late.

Modern

My thoughts here will be fairly sparse, as I expect most people’s to be. Either they don’t know enough and don’t care about it or know something and have no incentive to share.

1. The field is going to be flooded with Stomping Grounds and Punishing Fire

I’ll let you in on a well-known “secret”: Almost no one tests for Day Three of Worlds for a ton of reasons. The format is only a third of the Swiss rounds and is even less if you are going to draw into Top 8. Standard is easier to test for and “more relevant” because of Top 8, and once you crush it and draft, you can coast through to Top 8 with an average deck. You can mise Modern lists from people who don’t do well. Your efforts are split, and the amount of energy necessary to actually level an unknown format is a massive time sink and will likely make you do significantly worse in the other formats. I can keep going, but in general people just play whatever sounds good here.

The default choices for this format are the obvious Zoo and Jund, as they are the easiest to not build miserably. I expect a lot of people to still be on level one for this event, so if you really want to break it, start by attacking the format there.

Beyond that, expect a lot of Punishing Fire from those who actually try to level things but not break them. Zoo can play it; Jund can play it; and I’m sure tons of people are dying to default to blue-based control where this combo is a solid engine.

2. Combo is far from dead.

I’ve already talked about this a bit, but there still exists a wide spread of combo decks in this format. All the real combo decks from the PT are only moderately hurt (Storm more than the others), and there was a whole slew of fringe decks that can step forward like Melira and Eggs.

Don’t show up expecting all your opponents to play fair. Have a plan, and importantly make it broad. Thoughtseize, Vendilion Clique, and counters are all good against most of the combo decks. Rule of Law, Tormod’s Crypt, and Gaddock Teeg each only hit a fraction of the archetype as a whole and will be dead slots most of the time.

3. If you are looking for PTQ season decks, only use these as very rough bases

See point one, but even those who are testing for this are testing loosely and against an unknown field. This results in a bunch of very jumbled results. Even if you 5-1, you didn’t 5-1 against a real metagame. Your deck is probably somewhat legitimate, but when you 7-3 a Pro Tour, those last five are against a refined field. Here it’s less rounds against people who could easily be 0-2 in a format you are 2-0 in, as pairings are all on overall records. I know my last time at Worlds, I accidentally led Matt Marr astray by suggesting he play Tron in the draw bracket, which simply led him to being crushed by people who played Zoo after drawing in Standard.

If you want to win a PTQ early on in the season (one of the easiest times to do so), these results make it easy to make a move. People will blindly follow them, leaving you a strong opportunity to refine the gems and capitalize. Watch MODO, keep up with the hive mind, and test well, as Extended/Modern has/will be a format that rewards that heartily.

And with that, I conclude what is likely my last Worlds summary ever. Out with the old and in with the new. I’ll miss the team competition the most, but I’m excited to see how the new Invitational/Worlds hybrid turns out.

This article has also gotten me reminiscing about events past. I’ve started compiling lists of old stories, and rather than just jam a single article with all of them, I’m going to roll them out in related lists. This week, I’m going to close on the Top 5 Punts I’ve Ever Witnessed. Names of the punters have been retracted to avoid publicly embarrassing anyone, except for myself because I know I deserve it.

Honorable Mention: You Know How This Works, Right?

This was disqualified from the running, as the story is secondhand and may be embellished, but it deserves mention due to the context.

The Scene: Worlds 2009. Day One, the Canadian National team headlined by Quentin Martin is playing team Constructed.

The Play: Quentin turns over to the Legacy match and sees a Standstill in play and a Stifle in his teammate’s hand. He asks, “You know how this works, right?”, to which his teammate answers, “Yes.”

Quentin turns back and a minute later looks back for a judge call. The stack is the following:

A: Spell

A: Stifle Standstill Trigger

B: Counterspell

A: Counterspell your Counterspell

B: Force your Counterspell

A: Force your Force

I guess the actual answer to the question was in fact “No.”

5. And That’s Why You Don’t Keep Going

The Scene: Grand Prix Columbus 2010. I am X-1 with Storm mid Day Two and am playing game one against the Shelldock Isle–Doomsday-Emrakul deck that ended up Top 8ing.

The Play: Game one stalls out approximately forever. I get my combo countered once when I go for Ill-Gotten Gains, but he has nothing to follow up, and we eventually build up huge hands. I end up going for it once he plays a Show and Tell or some other similarly threatening card and resolve Ad Nauseam at about a million life.

Flip, flip, flip, cool, easy lethal Lion’s Eye Diamond and Thoughtseize. Keep going to hit discard. Flip, flip, flip, Thoughtseize. Cool, may as well keep going. Grim Tutor, go to three, stop. I have about a million blue and black mana floating from all the Rituals and Lotus Petals in my deck.

Thoughtseize, go to one, seeing…. two Stifles. I take one, then realize the issue.

All four of my Duresses are in my graveyard. I have no way to gain life for my only other discard of Thoughtseize, bar my one Tendrils of Agony that will be Stifled, resulting in my deck having no way to actually win the game left. That’s game, boys. I end up losing the match in an unnecessary game 3 when he blind Tops into a Force of Will.

The lesson? Don’t just keep going; know what you are actually trying to do. Especially with combo.

4. Good Games?

The Scene: Shards of Alara Sealed PTQ the release weekend for the set. Stu Parnes, local green-white master, manages to discover the exalted mechanic is insane before anyone really understands it, and I end up forcing it in top eight while casually opening Elspeth, Knight-Errant. My end deck is something like a couple spells, two Rhox War Monks, Elspeth, and 12 exalted creatures. After punting game one of the quarterfinals to a trick I knew existed and could have easily played around, I manage to ride my absurd deck to the semifinals.

The Play(s): It is game two, and I am under pressure from an early Ajani Vengeant. I match with Elspeth, but my opponent gets an Esper Battlemage down and starts pressuring my planeswalker while threatening an ultimate on his.

I should have had no place winning this game, but the following events occur:

1. He blows Ajani immediately once it hits seven instead of waiting to let it live and get more value, despite knowing from a Tidehollow Sculler that I am slow rolling three lands.
2. Two consecutive Grixis Charms are used to bounce tokens instead of pumping his creatures to kill my Elspeth that is making the tokens.
3. This is the big one. My opponent attacks with a Tidehollow Sculler hiding an Aven Waveskimmer, then after attacks, Battlemages my token that can block to kill my Elspeth. I slam a Sigil Blessing, eat the attacker, and win the game with my flier and planeswalker.

Apparently he was one green source away from an Empyrial Archangel that would have made things interesting or sealed the deal the whole time. Who knew?

In the end, I defeated Adam Yurchick in the finals with a lucky Cancel for his Battlegrace Angel and won the ticket and invite to Pro Tour Kyoto, and that was and still is.

3. Sac, Fetch, ummmmmmm…

The Scene: Nearing the end of Pro Tour Philadelphia. A friend of mine is playing Splinter Twin against a known European Pro playing Melira Pod, with the winner being a lock for Top 50 with a round left to play for a potential top 16. I am intently watching one side, while another European Pro is intently watching the other.

The Play: My friend is up a game, but things are looking dire. The Pod player leads off on multiple Fulminator Mages, ensuring he boarded the second in before Podding it up. A tense game follows involving numerous Pod activations, leaving the Twin player hanging on in a tough spot as time is winding down. The Twin player is at four life with just a Pestermite and Simian Spirit Guide in play facing down a Linvala, Acidic Slime, and Birthing Pod. The Pod player main phase pays two life (to eight) to Birthing Pod away his Slime and starts flipping through his deck. He tanks, flips through again, and goes back into the tank.

Something snaps. His friend stone-cold bursts out laughing… at him. He turns beet red, as he realizes his Sun Titan is right in his sideboard, where he just checked for the Fulminator Mage. He jams in with Linvala only to have a second Pestermite ambush and block it down.

The Twin player untaps, draws, attacks for two.

Pod untaps, frowns, and ships the turn.

Twin untaps, attacks, and passes.

Pod untaps, draws, and passes again at four life.

Twin untaps, attacks, and passes.

Pod untaps, slams down a creature, and ships at a precarious two life.

Twin player draws, shrugs, and Exarchs down the blocker before attacking for lethal.

Guess you should always look before you leap, then look again.

2. I Don’t Think That Works How You Want It To…

The Scene: Extended PTQ in 2002 just after Tinker was banned alongside a million other cards. Mirrodin is the latest set to be released, and the format is mostly fair decks like the Rock and Psychatog while people try to figure out what is going on. A 12-year-old me decides to show up with a deck then known as Sexy Rector mostly based around how Pattern of Rebirth and Academy Rector are stupid good.

The Play: After some early long grinds against Psychatog, I end up winning out in the X-1-1 bracket to play for top eight. I get paired up against U/G Madness, and my opponent is visibly tilted that A) he can’t draw, and B) he lost game one to a small child. He takes game two on the back of Rushing River, and we are off to game three.

My turn one Cabal Therapy hits a Wild Mongrel, but he Careful Studies into an Aquamoeba on two and has three mana up to my Birds of Paradise on my turn four.

I untap and cast Pattern of Rebirth targeting Birds of Paradise. It resolves, and I flashback Cabal Therapy. My opponent tries to stop me and Naturalize it, and I explain to him how priority works. Opting not to trust the rules knowledge of someone in middle school, a judge is called, who explains the situation. My opponent tries to argue he should be able to go back, flashing the two Circular Logics he has drawn since turn one, saying he would have countered the spell. The judge obviously no sirs him, and I fetch up Akroma, Angel of Wrath with trigger.

The rest of the stack resolves, and I name Circular Logic with Cabal Therapy.

I end up losing in the semifinals of the event to Rock, but I’m running high after top eighting my first two PTQs ever. I subsequently do not have another top eight until I am in college despite playing the whole time.

1. This Still Makes Me Cackle

The Scene: Grand Prix Washington DC 2010. I am playing Jund and am X-2 in the middle of Day Two. This match is my third or fourth Jund mirror of the approximately 100-round event.

The Play: I’m up a game, but things aren’t looking great. My opponent had a fast start, and I’m almost dead. I manage to string some Sprouting Thrinaxes together to start to pull ahead at one life. He has three Saprolings to my three, live Thrinax, and a Raging Ravine. The past three turns I’ve been calling out the Lightning Bolt or Blightning, and much to his dismay he has bricked over and over. “You draw it, or should we keep playing?”, “Not a Bolt, or time for game three?”, etc. Anyone who has watched me play should know the standard pattern of me calling out their best possible play, them frowning, and me mising my way to victory. I end up tapping down to a single open Savage Lands to push through some Ravine damage, and it happens. “Guess I need the Shadowfeed, right?”

He untaps, draws, and everyone watching behind him starts to walk away. He taps a Mountain, pulls a card forward, and I move my hand towards my land pile to pack it in.

“Lightning Bolt your Sprouting Thrinax.” Umm…. well, okay. “Pulse the tokens.” Wait, what?

My Ravine starts eating his life total with a Thrinax back to block, and I force exact lethal through his Thrinax that Moated me for a while.

He sighs, signs the slip, then starts flipping cards. The top one? Lightning Bolt, and his reply is one for the ages.

“Damnit, if I had drawn that one I could have killed you.”

Epilogue: I stand up, go to drop off the slip, and run into someone who left when he ripped the first Bolt. Their response: “Wow, you won game three really fast.”

See you at Worlds, or next week when I follow up with my Top Five Must Be Nices.