When I was asking various friends what I should play for the Star City $5K, Adrian Sullivan and Ben Bleiweiss both told me I should play Green/Black Elves. Green/Black Elves?! How boring!! That archetype has been out there kicking around since Lorwyn was released, and I’m always drawn to the shiny and new. Playing a well-established archetype with little wiggle room for brand new cards just didn’t sound like much fun, so I ended up vacillating between several new deck ideas, to a disastrous result in the main event, and a redeeming and fun result in the side tournament (go-go Assassins!).
As much as I liked Assassins, I couldn’t help but feel that the deck was a bit underpowered, so as I pivoted towards Regionals I kept hearing Adrian and Ben’s advice in the back of my mind. Okay, G/B Elves was obviously good, and yet after the Mega-Magic Weekend, it was certainly not on the radar as a deck to beat. Maybe I could go ahead and play it without feeling like a total sell-out.
Then Gindy comes along and wins Hollywood with the damn deck. Sh**. I definitely can’t say the deck is off the radar now. There’s nothing rogue or cutting edge in playing the deck that just won the Pro Tour. Yet, I cannot deny the fact that the deck suits me; I have no doubt I can play the hell out of the deck. And I cannot deny that the deck is chock-full of power and is fully capable of beating any of the top decks in the format.
But it’s not rogue!
But it’s good…
Guilt on one side versus Gilt on the other.
A few other variables to consider: I don’t have much time for actual playtesting in the time leading up to Regionals, so the odds of pulling together a viable, off-the-radar “Bennie deck” is pretty slim. G/B Elves is pretty well and soundly built; the differences between the two Top 8 versions are very slim. Here’s a baseline build merging the two:
Baseline G/B Elves
4 Thoughtseize
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Wren’s Run Vanquisher
4 Imperious Perfect
1-2 Boreal Druid
0-3 Chameleon Colossus
3-4 Civic Wayfinder
2-4 Garruk Wildspeaker
0-3 Nameless Inversion
3-4 Profane Command
0-4 Terror
3 Forest
4 Gilt-leaf Palace
4 Llanowar Wastes
4 Mutavault
1-2 Pendelhaven
2 Swamp
4 Treetop Village
1 Urborg, Tomb Of Yawgmoth
Sideboard:
0-4 Bitterblossom
0-3 Cloudthresher
0-2 Incremental Blight
0-4 Kitchen Finks
2-3 Primal Command
2-4 Shriekmaw
0-2 Slaughter Pact
0-2 Squall Line
0-2 Terror
It’s easy to see the non-negotiables: 4 each Thoughtseize, Llanowar Elves, Tarmogoyf, Wren’s Run Vanquisher, Imperious Perfect, 4 Mutavault, 4 Treetop Village, with 3-4 copies of Civic Wayfinder and Profane Command.
That leaves about 10 cards wiggle room as nonland maindeck material to flesh it out. Gindy and Nakamura made room for 3-4 additional pinpoint removal, with Gindy going for 4 Terrors and Nakamura going with 3 Nameless Inversion (particularly tasty as Tarmogoyf food). Both went for Garruk Wildspeaker, Gindy playing just two copies and Nakamura running a full four copies. It’s interesting that Nakamura apparently relied on the Garruks for his entire four-mana allocation, choosing against running any copies of Chameleon Colossus; Gindy ran 3 copies of the potent changeling. When it comes to the 10 slot differences, there’s too much variation to arrive at a consensus just eyeballing it. And the sideboard! My goodness, there’s some serious, very interesting differences outside of Primal Command and Shriekmaw.
It would be easy to just run with Gindy’s build; he won the Pro Tour after all! However, I personally think the deck isn’t perfect, and I do think he caught some lucky breaks along the way to win the event; in particular, he got ridiculously lucky against Reveillark. I don’t want to rely on luck if I can help it, because luck tends to bite me in the ass.
I thought it would be handy to buckle down and really go over the information available on Gindy and Nakamura’s successful march through Hollywood, to weigh and consider which cards seemed to play a vital role in their success before making a decision on what build to bring to Regionals this Saturday.
Let’s start with the Champ:
Creatures (24)
- 4 Llanowar Elves
- 4 Civic Wayfinder
- 1 Boreal Druid
- 4 Tarmogoyf
- 4 Imperious Perfect
- 4 Wren's Run Vanquisher
- 3 Chameleon Colossus
Planeswalkers (2)
Lands (20)
Spells (14)
Sideboard
Round 9 – Won 2-1 vs. Bernabe, Julio – B/G Elves
Round 10 – Won 2-1 vs. Maaten, Rogier – Faeries
Round 11 – Lost 1-2 vs. Kopec, Mateusz – Faeries
Round 12 – Won 2-1 vs. Mowshowitz, Zvi – R/G Midrange
Round 13 – Won 2-1 vs. Thibeault, Vincent – Doran
Round 14 – Won 2-0 vs. Felske, David – G/W Big Mana
Round 15 – Won 2-0 vs. Ruess, Jan – Merfolk
Round 16 – Drew 0-0-0 vs. Choo, Yong Han
Unfortunately, Gindy didn’t get tapped for any feature match coverage during his march to Top 8, so we can’t examine any matches blow-by-blow. Can we deduce anything here? His deck wasn’t particularly dominating, with five of seven matches going the full three games. He split matches 1-1 with the metagame boogeyman Faeries deck. In light of Gindy winning Hollywood, I’m particularly interested in the mirror match so let’s look at Bernabe’s deck.
Julio Bernabe
4 Forest
4 Gilt-Leaf Palace
4 Llanowar Wastes
2 Mutavault
1 Pendelhaven
4 Swamp
4 Treetop Village
2 Boreal Druid
2 Chameleon Colossus
4 Imperious Perfect
4 Llanowar Elves
3 Riftsweeper
1 Shriekmaw
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Wren’s Run Vanquisher
4 Nameless Inversion
2 Primal Command
4 Profane Command
3 Thoughtseize
Sideboard
2 Cloudthresher
2 Garruk Wildspeaker
3 Kitchen Finks
1 Primal Command
3 Shriekmaw
1 Slaughter Pact
2 Squall Line
1 Thoughtseize
Gindy’s deck had more manlands, more copies of Chameleon Colossus, more Thoughtseize, and ran Terror over Inversion (Terror being a more reliable Tarmogoyf killer), and Civic Wayfinders. Bernabe ran maindeck Riftsweepers (not impressive in this matchup) and two Primal Commands along with a full boat of Profane Commands.
Hmm.
Okay, let’s look at the Faerie deck Gindy beat.
2 Faerie Conclave
5 Island
4 Mutavault
1 Pendelhaven
4 River of Tears
4 Secluded Glen
1 Snow-Covered Island
4 Underground River
4 Mistbind Clique
4 Scion of Oona
4 Spellstutter Sprite
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Bitterblossom
4 Cryptic Command
3 Nameless Inversion
4 Rune Snag
4 Terror
Sideboard
4 Bottle Gnomes
3 Damnation
4 Fledgling Mawcor
4 Thoughtseize
Looks like a pretty stock build, heavy on the pinpoint removal in the maindeck. Running 4 Terrors helps deal with Mistbind Clique much better than Nameless Inversion. Let’s look at the deck Gindy lost to.
Matuesz Kopec
2 Faerie Conclave
5 Island
4 Mutavault
1 Pendelhaven
4 River of Tears
4 Secluded Glen
1 Swamp
4 Underground River
4 Mistbind Clique
2 Pestermite
4 Scion of Oona
2 Sower of Temptation
4 Spellstutter Sprite
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Bitterblossom
4 Cryptic Command
4 Terror
3 Thoughtseize
Sideboard
3 Deathmark
4 Flashfreeze
3 Fledgling Mawcor
2 Loxodon Warhammer
2 Slaughter Pact
1 Thoughtseize
Okay, instead of Rune Snag he ran two each Pestermite and Sower of Temptation, tempo cards that can set the stage for turning things around and going for the kill. He also ran Thoughtseize in the maindeck over the Inversions (and so would not inadvertently make Gindy’s Tarmogoyfs marginally bigger). Kopec also seems top loaded in the sideboard to rumble against Green – Flashfreeze, Deathmark, Slaughter Pact. Even Warhammer, giving him the ability to race. Kopec wanted to beat Green, and he made sure he would. Even so, Gindy took at least one sideboarded game, so that’s encouraging. The takeaway here I suppose is that Gindy’s build has a good shot at beating a stock Faeries build, and can even rumble against one loaded with hate.
Let’s move on to the Top 8 coverage where we can look at the blow-by-blow.
Top 8 Results
Won 3-0 vs. Bohny, Nico — Quarterfinals – Doran
Won 3-2 vs. Choo, Yong Han — Semifinals – Reveillark
Won 3-0 vs. Ruess, Jan — Finals – Merfolk
I thought it would be handy to make a note of which cards Gindy played during his matches to see which cards showed up, and which cards didn’t. I’m going to italicize the sideboard cards.
Quarterfinals vs Bohny (Doran)
Game 1, opened Llanowar Elves, then Wren’s Run Vanquisher + Thoughtseize (got rid of Profane Command). Next, Civic Wayfinder and Boreal Druid. Then Chameleon Colossus, Thoughtseize. Then Thoughtseize, Profane Command.
Game 2, led with Vanquisher, Llanowar Elf, Tarmogoyf. Then Chameleon Colossus. Thoughtseize. Primal Command, Colossus.
Game 3, led with Wren’s Run Vanquisher, then Thoughtseize, Vanquisher. Then Civic Wayfinder. Imperious Perfect. Terror,
Primal Command, Tarmogoyf, Imperious Perfect. Profane Command. Played Terror. Played Tarmogoyf. Primal Command, Colossus.
Semifinals vs Choo (Reveillark)
Game 1, led with Thoughtseize, Imperious Perfect, Imperious Perfect, “removal for the Sower” (Terror?). (Note: Choo double-mulligan)
Game 2, Llanowar Elves, Civic Wayfinder for swamp, played Thoughtseize. Shriekmaw, Boreal Druid. Thoughtseize. Chameleon Colossus. Imperious Perfect. Squall Line.
Game 3, Shriekmaw, Squall Line.
Game 4, Wren’s Run Vanquisher, Llanowar Elves, Garruk Wildspeaker, Cloudthresher, Shriekmaw, Terror, Primal Command.
Game 5, Llanowar Elf, Chameleon Colossus, Garruk Wildspeaker, Boreal Druid.
Finals vs Ruess (Merfolk)
Game 1, Terror, Boreal Druid, Civic Wayfinder, Garruk Wildspeaker. Profane Command, Thoughtseize, Profane Command.
Game 2, Wren’s Run Vanquisher, Imperious Perfect, Imperious Perfect, Terror, Tarmogoyf, Shriekmaw, Garruk, Tarmogoyf, Chameleon Colossus.
Game 3, Llanowar Elves, Chameleon Colossus, Shriekmaw, Slaughter Pact, Imperious Perfect, Imperious Perfect, Wren’s Run Vanquisher, Chameleon Colossus. Terror.
The sideboard cards that made appearances: Shriekmaw, Primal Command, Slaughter Pact, Squall Line.
Hmm. To add to the mix, we’ve got a few other sources of information regarding Gindy’s deck.
From BDM’s interview with the PT winner – “I really like Colossus – I don’t see why not to play it,” said Gindy when asked about the differences between his and Shuhei Nakamura lists. “It’s pretty insane, and four Civic Wayfinders make sure Profane Command and Colossus are always online.” He packed five cards for the faerie match… “I think Mono-Red is the best matchup but the worst was Quick ‘n Toast.” Versus Reveillark, Zvi Mowshowitz explained that part of getting lucky in the matchup would mean winning quickly… and that meant he would not have time for his Tarmogoyfs to supersize. “Zvi’s advice was good,” acknowledged Gindy. “I took out four ‘Goyf , two Terror, one Profane Command, and one Perfect and put in the Primal Commands, the Shriekmaws, two Squall Lines, and two Threshers.” Gindy urges saving Terror for Sower of Temptation, and NOT Lord of Atlantis (since the lord pumps your Colossus and Mutavault and gives them Islandwalk). “I think Marijn Lybaert list is good for the field – just add more Faerie Macabre in the sideboard and you can beat Reveillark.”
Mike Flores also wrote about Gindy, playing out his finals matchup and offered some observations – Profane Command FTW! Do not sideboard them out! Chameleon Colossus and Mutavault are Merfolk. Run 2 Pendelhavens.
Adrian Sullivan even weighed in on the deck: Primal Command comes in versus Doran, Reveillark, but you possibly need additional anti-Reveillark answers.
Hmm… hmm… hmm…
Okay, let’s see what we can learn from Nakamura.
Creatures (21)
- 4 Llanowar Elves
- 3 Civic Wayfinder
- 2 Boreal Druid
- 4 Tarmogoyf
- 4 Imperious Perfect
- 4 Wren's Run Vanquisher
Planeswalkers (4)
Lands (24)
Spells (11)
Sideboard
Round 9 – Won 2-0 vs. Fujita, Osamu — Mono-Green Elves
Round 10 – Won 2-0 vs. Wafo-tapa, Guillaume – Quick ‘N’ Toast
Round 11 – Won 2-0 vs. Ruess, Jan – Merfolk
Round 12 – Won 2-1 vs. Enevoldsen, Thomas – Faeries
Round 13 – Won 2-1 vs. van Medevoort, R. – Faeries
Round 14 – Won 2-1 vs. Kopec, Mateusz – Faeries
Round 15 – Lost 0-2 vs. Mihara, Makihito – Reveillark
Round 16 – Drew 0-0-0 vs. Lybaert, Marijn
Hmm, Nakamura chewed through three Faeries opponents, each match going to three games. We luckily have feature match coverage from Round 13 to look at.
Round 13 vs van Medevoort (Faeries)
Game 1, Wren’s Run Vanquisher, Tarmogoyf, Thoughtseize, Civic Wayfinder, Tarmogoyf, Garruk Wildspeaker, Profane Command.
Game 2, Llanowar Elves, Tarmogoyf, Bitterblossom, Wren’s Run Vanquisher.
Game 3, Llanowar Elves, Wren’s Run Vanquisher, Terror, manland beatdown.
Hmm, the game his sideboarded Bitterblossom came online he lost. On the other hand, boarded in Terror certainly helped in game 3.
Quarterfinals vs da Rosa
Game 1, Thoughtseize, Tarmogoyf, Civic Wayfinder, Garruk Wildspeaker.
Game 2, Tarmogoyf, Imperious Perfect, Thoughtseize, Terror.
Game 3, Llanowar Elves, Thoughtseize, Tarmogoyf, Wren’s Run Vanquisher.
Game 4, Wren’s Run Vanquisher, Nameless Inversion, Terror.
Game 5, Llanowar Elves, Llanowar Elves, Wren’s Run Vanquisher, Garruk Wildspeaker, Bitterblossom. Imperious Perfect.
Semifinals vs Ruess
Game 1, Llanowar Elves, Imperious Perfect, Civic Wayfinder, Wren’s Run Vanquisher, Tarmogoyf.
Game 2, Llanowar Elves, Imperious Perfect, Nameless Inversion, Terror.
Game 3, Wren’s Run Vanquisher, Shriekmaw, Terror, Imperious Perfect, Profane Command.
Game 4, Wren’s Run Vanquisher, Civic Wayfinder, Boreal Druid, Garruk, Llanowar Elves.
Just for kicks, I took at peek at Adam Yurchik’s 9th place deck.
4 Forest
4 Gilt-Leaf Palace
4 Llanowar Wastes
2 Mutavault
1 Pendelhaven
4 Swamp
4 Treetop Village
2 Boreal Druid
2 Chameleon Colossus
3 Civic Wayfinder
4 Llanowar Elvesv
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Troll Ascetic
4 Wren’s Run Vanquisher
2 Loxodon Warhammer
4 Nameless Inversion
4 Profane Command
4 Thoughtseize
Sideboard
3 Kitchen Finks
3 Mind Shatter
2 Primal Command
3 Shriekmaw
4 Squall Line
Round 9 – Won 2-1 vs. Ootsuka, Koutarou – (deck not listed)
Round 10 – Won 2-0 vs. Cardin, Guillaume – Red Deck Wins
Round 11 – Won 2-1 vs. Dougherty, Robert – Red Deck Wins (with green)
Round 12 – Lost 0-2 vs. Ruess, Jan – Merfolk
Round 13 – Won 2-0 vs. Potovin, Nicolay – Faeries
Round 14 – Lost 1-2 vs. Bohny, Nico – Doran
Round 15 – Won 2-0 vs. Felske, David – Green/White Mana Ramp
Round 16 – Won 2-0 vs. Juza, Martin – Doran
It seems odd that Yurchick decided to replace Imperious Perfect with Troll Ascetics; I love the Trolls, don’t get me wrong, but the Perfects just seem to be a better overall creature for the deck. On the other hand, the Troll does a nice job at laughing at Sower of Temptation and Cryptic Command’s bounce.
Yurchick did face down two Red decks successfully, giving a decent argument that three Finks may be sufficient to go with two Primal Commands.
It’s interesting that Ruess’s Merfolk deck gave Yurchick a thumpin’.
Okay, so what have I learned from poring through all this information?
Chameleon Colossus and Profane Commands are the game-breaking spells in the deck. Gindy only ran three of each and squeezed in two copies of Garruk. In the coverage I’ve read, each time Colossus and Command resolved they often broke the games wide open, whereas the few times Garruk made an appearance it was rarely game-breaking (except once with a nuts draw, Overrun on something like the fourth turn). Sure, Garruk is good, but these other two spells seem to be better, and for consistency sake I think I want to run four of each. While it’s true that Sower of Temptation can’t steal a Garruk, Profane Command X>=2 handles that problem nicely, along with a full boat of Terrors.
The most effective way to play the deck is very aggressively, and victory is all about stealing as many hits on your opponent as possible. I would tend to build a G/B deck from scratch to be more mid-range, but both Nakamura and Gindy’s B/G elves played the beatdown, using Thoughtseize and removal to keep their opponent on the back foot while smashing in with Vanquisher, Tarmogoyf, manlands, and Colossus. So rather than “Bennie-fy” the deck and make it slower, I’ve decided to tighten it up, and make sure I remember to play it aggressive. So here’s what I’m going to sleeve up for Saturday.
Creatures (25)
- 4 Llanowar Elves
- 4 Civic Wayfinder
- 1 Boreal Druid
- 4 Tarmogoyf
- 4 Imperious Perfect
- 4 Wren's Run Vanquisher
- 4 Chameleon Colossus
Lands (20)
Spells (15)
Sideboard
The sideboard is still in flux, but this is pretty close. Shriekmaw, Primal Command, and Squall Line all seemed to play roles in winning games in the match coverage. Sudden Spoiling feels like a good call. Reveillark seems to be a tough matchup, and Gindy got extremely lucky to beat it in the semis. Faerie Macabre, Sudden Spoiling, and some number of Primal Commands seems like it would give the deck plenty of ammo to fight Reveillark, while still giving plenty of options against other decks. The Spoiling in particular ought to be good against the mirror, Merfolk with Sygg, etc. Primal Command and Finks is a good way to fight burn and other aggressive decks, though in all the coverage reporting I didn’t see either player bring in Finks (I imagine they must have helped get past some burn decks in Day 1 perhaps), so I’ve cut the Finks down to 3. Squall Line and Cloudthresher are good against Faerie decks, though it seems to me the aggressive elves do the job fine on their own – always apply constant pressure, never let faerie tokens accumulate, force the chump, force through damage at every opportunity, let Bitterblossom whittle away their life and finish things with Colossus or Profane Command.
It still feels odd to decide on a conventional deck, but intellectually I think it’s the right call, especially given that I would like to do well and have a shot at qualifying. Hopefully next week I’ll have good news to report from the Mid-Atlantic Regionals.
By the way, I have not yet secured a ride there, so if you’re in Richmond (or driving through) and have an extra seat available, drop me a line – I’d be happy to kick in gas money and lunch for your troubles!
Take care & have fun!
Bennie
starcitygeezer AT gmail DOT com