TagStandard

It won the thirty-player Kings Games Tournament. It won the NEC tournament at the Dragon’s Lair in West Hartford, Connecticut. Alex and Zvi both made the top 8 at the MagicSingles.com Invitational with Elvish Succession; Alex defeated Zvi in the quarterfinals and went on to take 2nd place. Rob’s played it in eleven Magic Online eight-man tournaments, splitting in the finals of seven of them for a total match record of 16-4. Is this the dark horse for Regionals?

I became somewhat enchanted with the Green/Blue deck I played at the M’s Collectibles Invitational. It performed so well for me and gave me a nice feeling that I hadn’t felt in a while in Constructed: The feeling that in some games, there was nothing my opponent could do to stop me from winning. Let me show you my unconventional sideboard (no Composts?) and the sideboarding strategies for each matchup.

Last time, I explained the deck’s infinite combos in great detail. While the sheer ridiculous power of going infinite is fun – including a sideboarded-in infinite damage loop that can wipe out combo decks – you can often defeat your opponent with the deck’s humbler”finite” combos. Learn why it’s wise to chump block at twenty life on turn 4 against this deck!

I had just finished writing about the Elfball deck for the Magic Online site, and liked some of the interactions of the other cards in it, so I decided to make a more Standard-worthy version of the deck and try it out on Magic Online. At 9 a.m., I had lost only one game and decided to split in the finals. Somehow, my Elf deck had gone undefeated…

The Rogue in me is battling with the Johnny in me. I’m down to B/R Land Destruction and CounterRift, and I’ve decided I’m gonna test them both to see how they do – or if they do well at all.

I wrote last week’s Back to Basics column because I thought I had to clarify a concept discussed in the previous week’s column. Now, it turns out that I have to clarify the clarification, and people ribbed me that the beginner’s article still went over the beginner’s heads.

Ted’s contest has been screwed by random circumstance twice – once by getting it in just a little too late for a Friday posting, and once by the technical problems we were having yesterday morning. So let’s try this again: HELP TED SELECT THE DECK HE’LL PLAY AT REGIONALS AND WIN A FOIL!

Going through the deck database, I also ran across some distinctly”rogue” builds that qualified some enterprising players who dared to turn their back on netdecking and go their own way. I thought I’d present the decks that I found particularly fun.

In addition to being incredibly fun to play, Elvish Succession is a very powerful deck. I’ve had better results with this deck than any other deck I’ve tested in the current Standard. If I were playing in Regionals, this would be the deck I would play. And what do I mean by fun and powerful? I mean drawing your deck as early at turn 4, having infinite mana, gaining infinite life, having infinitely-large Husks, Elves, and Fallen Angels, creating infinite bear and insect tokens, and rebuilding your library into all creatures whenever you like.

I could spice up the story by saying that I prayed to the almighty and dropped a flying elbow on my deck, but I just calmly flipped the top card of my deck onto the table… And it was Upheaval. So I played my land, and ended with a hand of five lands and Wild Mongrel. Her board didn’t have any early drops – just Arrogant Wurm, Wonder and Equilibrium, and her next two draws didn’t reveal a chump blocker. I realized that I no longer had the right to complain about any topdeck ever.

Since I am supposing that Legions is not a major influence over the Standard metagame, I can look at results from large Standard tournaments from before its release and include them in my tracking. I have a boatload of data to look through to find the strongest deck; the deck most likely to land me a qualifying finish in the Regional tournament. What have I discovered with looks at the Top 8s from States and the National Qualifiers?

I read Jim Ferraiolo’s article about his B/G Oversold Cemetery deck with great interest, because it’s a style of deck I love. I decided to take it to a tournament as a pre-Regionals run; how did his deck do in a real-world test?

What the hell are you supposed to do with a metagame that runs at least six decks deep? The smart answer is, of course,”Find the best deck and play it.” But you have to ask: What is the best deck? Is it the deck that has made the most Top 8s so far? Is it the deck that features the best matchups against the field? Is it something else entirely? How about we look at our testing gauntlet and see if we can find the answers, shall we?

Will last weekend’s results scare me away from playing Phantom Living at Regionals? Of course not! I’m not smart enough for that. I really do chalk last weekend up to a string of bad luck. Besides, it’s been doing very well in testing and got me to the Top 4 against the same field the last time I played it.