Not all that Glitters is Gold

Hello everybody! I'm going to talk about my favorite part of magic today... Trading! As has been mentioned occasionally in various posts, I am a card pimp. I won't spend money on cards just because they are foil or foreign, but if I am trading and I could trade for one or the other, then I will always go for the pimp one.

Trading for pimp cards is always interesting, starting with what do you value the cards at? For example let's use the foil incinerate from the 2001 Deckmasters box set I traded for recently:

What would you value this card at in NM condition?

.

..

...

....

.....

I had no idea, and would have guessed 5 as it is a safe number that you can't lose too much value from, but can potentially gain value with too. After doing some research, I found a site selling them at 8, so I offered 7 for it, which was obliged. But what if I didn't have a computer? We would have probably gone for 5, and never thought of it again.

But now I have to stop and think of all the other times I have traded for pimp cards and wonder if I gained value, lost value, or was right on target? In my Storm deck I have 4 Dark Rituals in the form of 2 Black Bordered 4th Edition Japanese ones, a Black Bordered 4th Edition French one, and a German Urza's Saga one. I decided to look up the price of the Japanese ones because I can't remember what I got the others at (or even when!). I got them at 5, and it turns out SCG has them at 7 a piece, and ebay has 2 listings at 7 and 8.86. I also got a pair of counterspells from him (Japanese BB) but I couldn't find any listings anywhere online, but I got them at 5 as well.

Now those are old cards, what about new cards? Usually the rule of thumb is that a foil is worth twice a non-foil. But is that always true?

No

This is especially the case with cards that normally don't hold any value, but they are very played. Here's some examples from Innistrad:

Dissipate                        0.76         5.00
Forbidden Alchemy       0.38        10.00
Stoney Silence               1.37         8.00
Brimstone Volley          0.18          2.50
Delver of Secrets           0.15         5.50
Snapcaster Mage          27.20        70.00
Past in Flames               5.51         18.00
Unburial Rites               0.81          6.50

All of these cards have foils that are disproportionate to their non-foil cost. The closest is Snapcaster Mage, which I posted up simply for data reasons. But all the other cards are 4-30x more valuable in foil! Recently I have traded for a couple foil Stoney Silences for my Enchantress Deck at 2, without any knowledge it's actually worth far more than that! Now that I know, I now have another card I can pull out tons of from everyone's binder as trade filler.

Card pimpin' aint easy, but always be ready because you never know when a sweet value deal may be headed your way! That's all I have for today! Until next time, Stay Classy!

Ryan Lackie
Ryan.Lackie@gmail.com
@ThingsILack

Standard Natural Order

Hello everybody! Normally I would post an FNM report today, but there's not much to talk about... fine, you want the report? Here it is:

Round 1: beat mana skrew 2-0

Round 2: lost because I am really dumb (had 1 red source in play turn 4 facing down a lethal board from Red Deck. 4 lands also included a Ghost Quarter. I could have Ghost Quartered my own land, fetch mountain, and then Slagstorm his board to survive)

Round 3: I had to drive my girlfriend home, so I missed the round

Round 4: played Mau instead of MTG

Round 5: played Legacy instead

So I didn't really get to test my deck much, though it was evident I didn't do much testing against Red Deck or other aggro decks. But I feel if I didn't misplay in both games then I would have been fine. In game 1 he was on the draw and went T1 Stromkirk into T2 Shrine. He played the Shrine pre-combat and I had to choose between Geistflame and Mana Leak (I topdecked Geistflame). I wound up using going with Geistflame, but I think I should have Mana Leaked... Shrine is much harder to deal with than a dude... But that is why I need to test more. I think the  Tribute to Hunger could be cut as it is very beatable. Bu that's not what I am here to talk about today!

As you should know If you have been following the blog (although if you haven't I still love you anyways) is that I LOVE playing combo decks. There's something sweet about breaking the rules as to what magic is supposed to be. Breaking the restrictions of mana and other sweet things is how I roll. I was very sad to learn Pyretic Ritual wasn't reprinted in M12, because I was hoping to make a deck using Pyretic Ritual, Infernal Ritual, Snapcaster, Past In Flames to do... something... probably make a huge Devil's Play.

But there is a combo deck out there that reminds me most of Legacy Natural Order decks. In Legacy, you can just go to the Red Zone every turn with Tarmogoyf and Vendillion Clique until your opponent finds an answer. In the same way, this deck can attack with 4/4 tramplers on turn 3 (Goyf anybody??) and 5/1s on turn 4, and then use it's combo pieces as if the combo didn't even exist until all of a sudden your opponent blows everything up. So you happily untap and immediately combo-kill them. Sounds sweet right? Well... such a deck does exist! This isn't exactly an unknown quantity either, but regardless, I present Grim-Grin Combo:

2x Hex Parasite
3x Reassembling Skeleton
4x Skinshifter
3x Spellskite
3x Civilized Scholar
3x Bloodline Seeker
4x Necrotic Ooze
3x Grimgrin, Corpse Born
1x Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon

3x Distress
1x Doom Blade
1x Go for the Throat
2xNaturalize
3x Forbidden Alchemy

4x Drowned Catacombs
3x Forest
3x Hinterland Harbor
4x Island
7x Swamp
3x Woodland Cemetry

If you don't see the combo, here's how it goes: With Necrotic Ooze in play and Bloodline Seeker + Grimgrin in your graveyard, you tap Necrotic Ooze to make a 2/2, then sacrifice it to untap the Ooze and put a +1/+1 counter on it. You can repeat this until Ooze in infinitely large. If Skinshifter is in play, you can also give Necrotic Ooze flying or Trample. I will almost always pick trample, however they might have a Glissa in play (want to beat Wolf Run Green? play Glissa!), at which point flying is appreciated.

The one thing I don't like about this deck is how there's very few 4-ofs which makes the deck far more inconsistent. That, and it looks like a not too straightforward deck to play, more or less a pile of cards that can surprise work well together. That being said, it does simply look fun to play. One cool thing about having Civilized Scholar is that if you have a Necrotic Ooze in play with Dr. Jeckyl in the bin and the other 2 combo pieces in hand, you can still combo off. Because part of Civilized Scholar's ability includes untapping when you pitch a creature you can:

Tap Ooze to draw a card, discard Grimgrin and untap
repeat, but discard Bloodline Keeper and untap
combo kill

When I first started writing this post, that was the only deck I wanted to talk about. However, I had an epiphany at 1:30am when I was still awake about 45 minutes after I wanted to be asleep and I realized Blightsteel Colossus is REALLY good right now. Wolf Run has no way to interact, so they just lose, and it helps you completely dominate any rogue decks you might face. I build it in a UW shell that should theoretically be just as good with or without the combo. Here's what I came up with:

3x Azure Mage
2x Snapcaster Mage
4x Blade Splicer
1x Geist of Saint Traft
4x Mirran Crusader
1x Blightsteel Colossus

4x Ponder
1x Disperse
4x Mana Leak
4x Master's Call
3x Oblivion Ring
4x Shape Anew

2x Ghost Quarter
4x Glacial Fortress
4x Inkmoth Nexus
4x Island
2x Moorland Haunt
5x Plains
4x Seachrome Coast

Sideboard:
2x Flashfreeze
1x Snapcaster Mage
1x Divination
2x Geist of Saint Traft
2x Sword of War and Peace
4x Timely Reinforcements
3x Day of Judgement

Basically, this deck can bring the beats with all of its guys which deal more damage per hit than the mana you invested (which is a key theory of red decks). Then when you finally get slowed down (or midway through the beat face action) you drop a Blightsteel and give the opponent a "you just lose fool" look.

The sideboard is obviously theoretical, but I don't think I have enough against UB. Clearly I can uptake the control role with DoJ, Timely, Divination, and Snapcaster. I am not too familiar with UB Control overall, so I don't know what beats it. I feel like Geist of Saint Traft is where I want to be though.

One thing that is really nice about this deck is that you can board out the combo whenever you want. Even if it helps you beat red deck game 1, it really isn't too powerful, but something like Timely Reinforcements is VERY wanted, especially because we can just race them and let them get just 1 more creature than us before blowing them out.

I have done minimal testing with the deck so far, but it has been VERY good. I am very pleased with how everything has been going. I have almost nothing for the deck though, so I might not be able to FNM with it this week, unless people love me and throw all their cards at me. One development that I am considering is cutting Ponder for Champion of the Parish to make you have a better beatdown curve. If I do that, I would probably cut the Moorland Haunts for basic Plains to increase the odds of a turn 1 untapped white source.

That's all I have today! Basically, despite the seemingly defined meta that we have right now, there are still plenty of potential decks out there that can capitalize on a stationary target. Until next time, Stay Classy!

Ryan Lackie
Ryan.Lackie92@gmail.com

All the Answers

Hello Everybody! Almost a year ago, PV posted an article on Channel Fireball that cemented itself as a piece of eternal Magic theory. If you haven't read it, I highly suggest you do: Playing to Win verses Playing Not to Lose. Standard seems to have a major separation in decks that win and decks that don't lose. Here's some major decks that are players in the meta:

GW Tokens
Red Deck
Tempered Steel
UB Control
Solar Flare
UW Blade
Wu Tokens (Wu Tang as GerryT calls it)
Wolf Run Ramp
Wolf Run Green
MB Infect

There are a lot of decks that are working to win quickly like Tempered Steel, Red Deck, GW Tokens, UW Blade, and Wu Tang. Other decks are playing to win, though are slower and offer more resiliancy like MB Infect and Wolf Run decks. Solar Flare is just bad.... With these decks identified as the ones to answer, effective control decks can uprise like Jeremy Neeman's UB Control deck. I have seen other decks uprising recently where the only win condition in the deck is Inkmoth Nexus, Nephalia Drownyard, or Snapcaster Beats. There's no actual legitimate threat in the deck, it just capitilizes on your opponent trying to trying to be cool and play magic. I have been working a deck recently that can out-control the control decks while providing proactive threats that can end the game in short order. It's similar to the deck I played at States, I present Grixis Vengeance:

3x Snapcaster Mage

4x Burning Vengeance

4x Think Twice
4x Desperate Ravings
4x Forbidden Alchemy
4x Mana Leak
2x Dissipate
2x Geistflame
3x Slagstorm
1x Go for the Throat
1x Tribute to Hunger
1x Sever the Bloodline
2x Devil's Play

2x Ghost Quarter
5x Island
3x Mountain
1x Swamp
4x Sulfur Falls
3x Dragonskull Summit
2x Blackcleave Cliffs
3x Drowned Catacombs
2x Darkslick Shores

Sideboard:
2x Wurmcoil Engine
2x Dissipate
1x Flashfreeze
1x Olivia Voldaren
3x Memoricide
1x Sever the Bloodline
2x Jace, Memory Adept
1x Tribute to Hunger
1x Doom Blade
1x Geistflame

Burning Vengeance is a very cool card because it gives you huge card advantage. In addition to doing whatever you were planning on doing you get to kill opposing creatures or even win the game! To use Burning Vengeance, you have to play with a lot of Flashback cards, which are inherently card advantage. Thanks to all these sources of card advantage, it is very for us to play the "play to not lose" game while actually having a reasonable way to win. Having one Burning Vengeance is a threat, having 2 is incredibly good, 3 is a complete blowout, and 4 is just an automatic victory. If for some reason this all fails, you can always Devils play your opponent for 10 or 11 and then flash it back and win that way with just 1 card.

I was testing this deck against GW Township and UB control and I felt completely dominant in both matchups. Wolf Run was tricky, which isn't a good position, but that was solely due to Thrun. I imagine Dungrove Elder will also be a problem because of Hexproof, but he can be countered, which takes out his teeth after turn 3. They are pretty much the main reason I have Memoricide in the Sideboard. I feel like this might be completely wrong though and I would rather just have a card like Black Sun's Zenith because it gains bonus points against aggro like Township. I do also use Wurmcoil against them which has Deathtouch and make racing impossible for them, while obviously providing a little card advantage when he dies.

One card choice I want to point out for a moment is the maindeck Go for the Throat. I feel that right now artifacts aren't in a good place. That is why I cut Ancient Grudge from the deck, and as a part of that: green. What Artifact cards to I care about? Wurmcoil? I can Mana Leak or Sever the Bloodline. Inkmoth Nexus? Burning Vengeance! ....and that's it! Black creatures are relevant though -- Phyrexian Crusader (another reason for Black Sun Zenith) and Grave Titan are 2 major targets worth killing with Go For the Throat. Grave Titan can be answered in the same manner as Wurmcoil, but Crusader is a bastard! MB Infect is legitimate deck, and it took down a couple state tournaments, so you must prepare accordingly.

This is a deck that reminds me of 5-color control. Well it doesn't REMIND me of it, as I started playing at ZEN release, but based on what people like Chapin have said about the deck, it is similar in that it must be constantly tweaked to beat the threats of the day. I can absolutely see this deck going through various stages of life depending on what the meta brings. I can't see artifacts ever getting too big again thanks to Ancient Grudge and how much it destroys those decks.

Quick Aside
{
Dismember is so oppressive to the format that it isnt even played anymore! Just something to think about if you're always looking for that edge. I have my super special secret awesome card, do you?
}
End Aside

Anyways, that's all I have for today! Tomorrow I should be rocking this deck at FNM, so I will have more data to crunch and present. I feel like this deck has a ton of potential because it has an answer to EVERYTHING. With 12 draw spells that all have flashback, you see 1/2 your deck every game, so every card counts! Until next time, Stay Classy!

Ryan Lackie
Ryan.Lackie@gmail.com
@ThingsILack

MA States

Hello everybody! This past weekend, I played in MA States aaaaand....... went 1-4 before dropping. However, I though my deck was awesome! The games I lost was mainly due to mana, which would have been fixed had I actually put more than 1 match into testing. The deck? 4 Color Burning Vengeance. It was a grixis-based list splashing green for Ancient Grudge. My mana problems came from having only 24 lands, 2 of which were absorbed from being effective by being Copperline Gorges.

The list I played:

2x Snapcaster Mage

4x Burning Vengeance

1x Ancient Grudge
1x Doom Blade
2x Dissipate
4x Forbidden Alchemy
3x Geistflame
4x Mana Leak
4x Desperate Ravings
4x Think Twice
1x Tribute to Hunger

2x Devil's Play
1x Sever the Bloodline
3x Slagstorm

6x Island
3x Mountain
4x Blackcleave Cliffs
2x Copperline Gorge
4x Drowned Catacombs
4x Sulfur Falls
1x Ghost Quarter

Sideboard:
1x Nihil Spellbomb
2x Jace, Memory Adept
1x Geistflame
1x Slagstorm
2x Wurmcoil Engine
1x Consecrated Sphinx
1x Ancient Grudge
2x Dissipate
1x Tribute to Hunger
1x Flashfreeze
1x Doom Blade
1x Sever the Bloodline

My deck was good, but not quite tuned yet. All of my losses were really close, and like I said, it all started with the mana. Ancient Grudge was pretty terrible all day, just killing a Contagion Clasp once and an Inkmoth Nexus once across my 14 games. On the other hand, Sever the Bloodline is incredible! One match, I exiled a pair of Solemn Simulcrum in the early game, and then flashed it back later to neuter his Wurmcoil Engine. In testing since the event, I have been able to get many 4-for-1s, especially against Solar Flare. Oh how do I love it when they Sun Titan chain into just about anything, and then I just kill all of then for the low low cost of 4 mana with Mana Leak backup. Then when they try to get you again with Wurmcoil, you just flash it back and pass turn, laughing maniacally. (Is it a surprise my plan against Solar Flare and control decks is to Jace mill them?)

So after I acknowledged that the only thing Ancient Grudge is good against is Inkmoth, which Burning Vengeance already laughs at, so that was an easy cut. I replaced it with a Ghost Quarter, and then cut the green lands with a Dragonskull Summit and a Darkslick Shores. The maindeck has otherwise remained the same,  except the Doom Blade is now Go for the Throat to kill Phyrexian Crusader.

The sideboard has been basically completely changed though. Here's what it is currently, and why:

2x Jace, Memory Adept

I bring in Jace in lieu of Geistflames for control decks and Solar Flare. He provides an additional win condition, while also helping you stay ahead in card advantage, depending on the need of the moment.

2x Wurmcoil Engine

I bring this in against Aggro decks, usually cutting Dissipate. The most important part of this card is Lifelink and its resiliancy against removal. Depending on the matchup, he can also be used against control decks as the obligitory Titan

1x Doom Blade, 1x Tribute to Hunger, 1x Sever the Bloodline

Having a variety of removal options is simply important because they help you tune your deck for whatever you need to beat. The majority of this deck's SB is 1 or 2-ofs for that reason.

1x Flashfreeze, 2x Dissipate

Having a variety of counterspells is very important against the control decks and especially Wolf Run. Being able to untap with mana up against Wolf Run with them having no threats in play is usually game over post board, and the extra counterspells is a major reason why

1x Disperse

I actually want this card for the Red Deck matchup to reset their Shrine in the late game or force them to pop it pre-emptively before its lethal, but after you have stabilized.

1x Olivia Voldaren

This card simply seems unreal to me! It can be incredible against Aggro or Control as you can mow down all of Aggro's creatures, or steal all the control ones. I don't know if it is actually worthwhile, but in theory, untapping with Olivia should be GG.

3x Memoricide

This deck's biggest problem is Hexproof cards like Geist of Saint Traft, Thrun, and Dungrove Elder. Memoricide lets you attack those before they become a problem. Obviously this can be good against a threat-light control deck like UB by destroying all the threats out of their deck. Memoricide provides options, and good ones at that

The deck is undefeated after my first 2 days of testing, which doesn't really say much beyond there's potential. I will probably be rocking this deck at FNM this week, so I will have plenty more data to work with then. I feel this deck has favorable matchups because of it's flexibility. Against Aggro more removal comes in, and against control, we can out-control them while shocking them as we out-draw them until they lose. As of right now, I can't see any situation where we are the beatdown, so that's important to keep in mind if you're interested in trying out Grixis Vengeance.

That's all I have for today! Until next time, stay classy!

Ryan Lackie
Ryan.Lackie@gmail.com
@ThingsILack

Trader's Challenge

Hello Everybody! I haven't posted anything in 2 weeks, but that's not because I haven't been trying. I wrote my monthly financial article, and then the whole thing got auto-deleted instead of being posted. Then I had a cool idea for an article on trading, but I didn't know how to frame it and make it sound remotely interesting. That being said, the basis for the article was good, so I'm going to run with it anyways:

I frequently talk about how much I like trading and how it is a fantastic way to make any deck you want at a fraction of the cost, or even sometimes to profit by trading for cards before they go up in value or simply getting good value on a trade. I decided to establish a challenge for myself: build any deck I want without spending any money on it. I have many legacy decks that I have been interested in building, so now I can flex my trading muscles and demonstrate how I can build all these "expensive" legacy decks without actually clearing out my bank account.

7 decks I am interested in are:

Enchantress
Team America
Faeries
Aluren
Burning Tide
Belcher
Reanimator

I guess you can really say that I am only trading for 6 decks, as i already have almost all of the cards for Reanimator, but I did trade off cards like Reanimate and Animate Dead, in addition to some targets. So there are a couple cards to trade for there. With these decks, I grabbed decklists from SCG Opens withing the past 3 weeks and used those as a basis for what cards I need to trade for. I priced out all of the decks, eliminated the cards I don't need because I already have them (ex: Underground Sea, Tarmogoyf). I don't really see the merit in posting this up as it is just a pile of numbers that goes on for pages and isn't all too interesting to read. That being said, I think this is a challenge that I want to put up for the public to see and maybe get ideas from.

In the same way that "pack to power" is the new hot thing in town (I have received many requests to do one of those, so maybe I will after this project), I feel having target decks is something people should aspire for. Trading with a goal is very fun, and actually makes going to big events worthwhile as you gain access to cards that no one in  the local area has.

Since I started this project last week, I have attended a couple events:

Innistrad Sealed PTQ
MA States
Legacy 1K

I will have reports on States up soon, I didn't do well, but the deck was different and I feel I have an awesome tuned-up version. The PTQ can be described as this: it sucked. I don't enjoy sealed anyhow, and my pool had maybe 5 cards in the 1-3 mana range that were remotely playable, and they were all different colors. The Legacy 1K was a little better, but I was playing Dredge for the first time in a long time and I misplayed my way out of the top 8.

Each of these events attacted people who I have never met before and may never see again. Trading was hot all day, and I picked up some sexy cards. Like what? How about a foil chinese Mutavault!

I was also to actually pick up cards I wanted too, like a set of Burning Wish for TES (I decided to add red for Past In Flames). The next weekend included States and the 1K, where I was trading so much I can't even point out exactly when I got the cards I did. Notable cards included Savannah, Taiga, Korean Firestorm, 4x Aluren, Wastelands, and much much more!

Standard has a ton of financial things happening right now. Last week, Sun Titan blossomed in price up to 9 over States weekend because of how you can chain them with Phantasmal Image and the popularity of Solar Flare. Liliana wasn't played in the winning UB control list from last weekend's GP, and so her price has already dropped to $56 from the 70 she was at recently. Also of note there were 0 dismembers in the Top 8 of said GP. To say the least, it has become so format defining that it's no longer any good. My pick for card best profiting from this: Bloodgift Demon. Thanks to Wolf Run, Garruk 2.0 is above 30, and thanks to tokens Elspeth is above 15. Finances are always changing, and capitalizing on them is how you can fast-track to profits.

Quick Aside
{
My binder was almost completely emptied out recently by someone who took every card worth $2 or less, and in return I got 2 Lilianas, Arcbound Ravager, foil Sulfur Falls, and other assorted goodies. I learned the value of holding bulk in your binder first hand, and you never know when what you have been sitting on for the past year all of a sudden turns into goodness. It's all about capitalizing on the moment
}
End Aside

So I just wanted to put my challenge out there, and I will put in periodic updates as this project evolves. The 2 really challenging ones are Enchantress and Aluren as Enchantress features 2 Moats, worth 300 a piece, and Aluren has 4 Imperial Recruiter at 215 a pop. It is possible to make Aluren without the Recruiter, while less powerful it does work.

That's all I have for today, hopefully with my new laptop I will no longer get my posts deleted right before they go up, and i will have content again. Until next time, Stay Classy!

Ryan Lackie
Ryan.Lackie92@gmail.com
@ThingsILack

I swear this is actually an aggro deck!

Here's your task: build me an aggro deck. There's no rhyme or reason to it, just build be an aggro deck using all the best cards that we have available to us. The only requirement is that you cannot have any creatures at CMCs over 5. Maybe here are some of the cards you come up with:

Werewolves - all of them
Stromkirk Noble, and all other Vampires
Skaab Ruinator
Hero of Bladehold/Oxid Ridge
Urabrask, the Hidden
Glissa, the Traitor
Anything with Battle Cry
Goblin Chieftan + any goblins left
Geist of Saint Traft
Invisible Stalker + Swords
Delver of Secrets
Diregraf Ghoul
Mirran Crusader, and other assorted Humans
Everything Infect
Porcelin Legionare
etc

Now, what If I told you to add Bithing Pod to the list, and then just call it a day? Now we may consider a couple cards that interact favorably with Pod:

Birds of Paradise
Phyrexian Metamorph
Perilous Myr
Veridian Emissary

Now, we have to ask the question, why would we want Birhting Pod in an aggro deck? One of the great things about Birthing Pod is how it really helps you cheat on mana costs. I can very easily use Birthing Pod to turn my Glissa into a Hero of Oxid Ridge, and still only have 3 basic forest in play! So I decided to look at some of the best aggressive creatures in the format, pile them up together, throw in 4 Birthing Pod and call it a day! My colors of choice for this deck is Naya, because you get access to both of the heroes, the Werewolves, and the cards are naturally aggressive anyways so we're not losing any points. I did a gatherer search of creatures that could be good for the deck, and my list consts of:

Avacyn's Pilgrim
Birds of Paradise
Stromkirk Noble

Accorder Paladin
Cloistered Youth
Leonin-Relic Warder
Perilous Myr
Stormblood Berserker
Viridian Emissary

Blade Splicer
Daybreak Ranger
Fiend Hunter
Mirran Crusader
Porcelain Legionaire
Phyrexian Metamorph

Hero of Bladehold
Hero of Oxid Ridge
Instigator Gang

Acidic Slime
Falkenrath Marauders
Urabrask, the Hidden

Obviously this is way too many cards for an aggro deck to utilize, so we need to make some cuts. I think we're not going to need Falkenrath Marauders, because Urabrask is just better for the team, but I think one Acidic Slime is right up top with 2 Urabrasks to help everyone else out (have you ever considered the implications of giving Hero of Bladehold haste??). Going down from there, I like the 3 4-drops we have and I could consider 3 of each hero, and 2 of the Werewolf. The rest of the deck cascades down very quickly from there with various cards that may or may not be any good. One card that I can confidently say to cut is Viridian Emissary. Normally, this card is used to ramp into faster Praetors, but for us it's quite useless. Going down to the 1-drop slot, I don't particularly like Stromkirk simply because he is only good on turn 1, which we can't reliably expect in a triple colored deck. Here's a deck decklist mashup:

4x Birds of Paradise

4x Perilous Myr
2x Accorder Paladin
3x Porcelin Legionaire

3x Blade Splicer
2x Daybreak Ranger
1x Fiend Hunter
3x Mirran Crusader
1x Phyrexian Metamorph

2x Inistiator Gang
2x Hero of Bladehold
2x Hero of Oxid Ridge

2x Urabrask, the Hidden
1x Acidic Slime

4x Birthing Pod

4x Razorverge Thicket
4x Sunpetal Grove
4x Rootbound Crag
4x Clifftop Retreat
1x Mountain
4x Plains
3x Forest

It's clear that red is a soft splash color here, but look at the cards red offers! Hero of Bladehold, Initiator Gang, and Urabrask help make your entire team go completely over the top! They all also provide bonus advantages, with Hero shutting down their 0 and 1 power creatures (read: chump blockers), Initiator Gang helps you get VERY far ahead without having to overextend to Day of Judgement, and Urabrask prevents your opponent from settign up last-second blockers in a pinch! The rest of the deck is mainly full of 2 and 3 mana creatures designed to enter the red zone. We have 8 Battle Cry effects in the deck, and the 2 Daybreak Rangers + Fiend Hunter act as your active removal suite that let's us take complete control of the board while also never missing a turn of turning dudes sideways.

If you're looking for a deck that can very effectively attack for nothing but value, then I highly suggest trying out Naya Pod! I have been talking about how great the creature suite is without even mentioning the Birthing Pod itself! Birthing Pod just helps us gain tons of value everday! Maybe you turn a random Perilious Myr into a Mirran Crusader, killing their Grim Lavamancer in the process, or turn your blade splicer into a Hero of Oxid Ridge and attack for 8? Or turn a Instigator Gang into an Urabrask, then cast Hero of Bladehold? Attack for 12! Perilious Myr into Fiend Hunter? Nice blockers? There's just nothing but options!

This list is obviously raw, as I'm sitting here compelled ot write it at 1:15am, but I feel it has a ton of potential! If you want a unique and potentially busted deck to start working on, maybe Naya Pod is right for you! But until next time, Stay Classy!

Ryan Lackie
Ryan.Lackie92@gmail.com
@ThingsILack

Liliana goes Aggro

Hello everybody! When I was at FNM last night, I had several people come to me looking for advice on their deck, and then asking to trade for the cards they needed. I always enjoy helping other people out, but it was extra funny when I had 4 or 5 people come to me with very similar decks: BR Vampires. I had already traded out all my Vampires to the first guy, then the entire manabase to the second guy (got a Snapcaster DING!), so I had to turn the next 2 or 3 away unfortunately. That aside, the deck did seem very interesting and powerful. I don't have an initial decklist, but the key cards are:

Bloodcrazed Neonate
Stormkirk Noble
Rakish Heir
Vampire Outcasts
Stormblood Berserker
Volt Charge
Tezzeret's Gambit
Grim Affliction
Falkenrath Marauders

This is a very red-heavy build, although the random black cards do add good value. One of the guys I was working with was making incremental changes to the deck further improving proving by cutting cards like Bloodlord of Vaasgoth for faster cards like Stormblood Berserker that weren't initialy on his radar because of the lack of tribal. He had opened a box to acquire all the cards he needed, and in that box was a Liliana which he put in the deck because "It's black, valuable, and if I put it anywhere else I will lose it." While our games against eachother weren't very telling as he is a very new player and wasn't playing ass efficiently as he could have, there were still learning moments in that game. The most notable of these is how good Liliana was in the deck!

Liliana is this deck's Armageddon

Quick Aside
{
Armageddon was last printed in 6th edition, so it hasn't been around for a while. However, when it was around it was a very potent card for aggro decks, namely White Weenie. Basically the WW deck would build up a threatening board poition by turn 3 and then on turn 4 they would Armageddon and set both players back on mana. However, this is far from a fair trade. Just like how a control player with no creatures breaks the "symmetrical" effect of Wrath of God, the aggro player with Armageddon would gain HUGE advantages. Because now that the opponent has no lands, they can't cast any spells (read: put up any resistance) and they just have to take it like a man. If the aggro player had 4 power on board, then cast Armageddon on turn 4, by the time the defending player got back up to 4 lands, they would have 0 life.
}
End Aside

In an aggro deck, you typically drop your hand on the table and just get there before the defending player has time to stabelize. Liliana is this deck's Armageddon because while her +1 ability is "symetrical" it really isn't if you don't have nay cards in hand! Her -2 ability is huge if your opponent plays a defender like Spellskite so that you can keep on pushing through damage without a blink of an eye. And then there's that -6 ability.... I don't think that one needs any explanation. Having a planeswalker is always a great way to gain advantages, and aggro decks have been dying for a great planeswalker since they were first incepted. Usually a Koth would be the top of the curve, but having a planeswalker at 3!?!?! That's just delicious! Oh, and if you wanted to make things sweeter, we already have a proliferation subtheme!

Now that I think about it, how balin' would it be to also have a Koth or Chandra as another source of recurring card advantage? Ok, maybe not Chandra because she's pretty terrible, but Koth wouldn't be bad considering were R/b anyways! Maybe our new tricked out Vampire deck looks something like this:

4x Stormkirk Noble
1x Vampire Interloper
4x Bloodcrazed Neonate
4x Stormblood Berserker
4x Rakish Heir
2x Falkenrath Marauder

4x Volt Charge
4x Tezzeret's Gambit
2x Grim Affliction
2x Go for the Throat

4x Liliana of the Veil
3x Koth of the Hammer

4x Dragonskull Summit
4x Blackcleave Cliffs
2x Swamp
12x Mountain

The one thing that worries me about this deck is that it is possible that we cast Koth and have no mountains to work with, but with 12/22 lands being mountains, I highly doubt that happening. This is a "vampires" deck with just 15 vampires, but these are going to be very high quality vampires after just one attack due to our 10 proliferation effects, and then once we add our planeswalkers to the mix, things just start getting REALLY dangerous!

I know the people who initially presented me their BR vampire lists wanted them to be budget lists, and adding 7 planeswalkers doesn't adhere to that, but if were looking for the next big deck, this could be it!

Until next time, Stay Classy!

Ryan Lackie
Ryan.Lackie92@gmail.com
@ThingsILack

TNT FNM 9/30/11 *3-1*

Hello everybody! When I posted the UR Burn deck last Wednesday, I was thinking it was going to be a very fast deck that could burn players out very quickly and efficiently. So when I opened a Snapcaster in a pack, bought a Snapcaster at $22, and then traded 8 B/R Dual Lands (M12/SoM) for a third, I knew I should give the deck a try at FNM. Here's the deck I registered:

4x Delver of Secrets // Insectile Aberration
4x Snapcaster Mage
4x Grim Lavamancer

4x Gitaxian Probe
3x Galvanic Blast
3x Shock
1x Devil's Play
4x Incinerate
4x Brimstone Volley
4x Arc Trail
4x Ponder

4x Sulfur Falls
10x Mountain
7x Island

Sideboard:
4x Mana Leak
4x Twisted Image
2x Falkenrath Marauders
2x Inferno Titan
3x Ancient Grudge

So as it turns out, this deck does win with a flurry of burn spells, but I wouldn't exactly call it fast.... This deck basically played as a ton of 2-for-1s grinding out incremental advantage then slowly getting there with the creatures. I played against GW Humans round 1, UW Puresteel round 2, UB Control round 3, and UW Venser round 4. The games were generally slow and not so memorable, but I will never forget round 3 game 3...

I'm playing against UB Control that has approx 2 Grave Titans and 2 Consecrated Sphinx for threats, and then everything else was control magic. For game 3, we had a long series of draw-go magic as any threat I played would get killed. He plays a Consecrated Sphinx into a Mana Leak that he hasn't seen in the previous 2 games, and I feel like I'm far ahead. However, he has 3 Lilianas! To make a long story short, I had 10 lands in play (note: 20 in the whole deck) with a couple in the yard from Liliana +1 activations and then he sacrificed his Liliana to -6 and destroy 5 lands. He then followed up with another Liliana in the same turn (though forgot to do anything with the new Liliana). I have 0 cards in hand, and so does he. Every card I play revolves around Liliana. I can't play creatures, because they just die to the -2. If I don't play my land, then he may trade a real card for it when Liliana +1, and if it's a burn spell I can just burn in response. The game slowly drags on, and he ultimates Liliana AGAIN splitting it so I have to choose between 4 Islands or a Mountain + Sulfur Falls pile. I have to take the red lands in case of any topdeck. The game slowly drags on and I eventually have 5 lands in play, which is important because I had 2 Falkenrath Marauders in my deck (they singlehandedly won me game 2). The game goes very slowly on and on until I win by drawing out his counterspell with a Grim Lavamancer while he's at 1 and then Arc Trailing him.

There were 18 cards left in my deck at the end of that game.

That exemplified perfectly what this deck seems to do. Grim Lavamancer is all about extra value, and so is Snapcaster Mage. Arc Trail is an inherent 2-for-1, and Brimstone Volley rewards you for stalling your opponent's attacks. Devil's Play has flashback by itself.

Sidenote
{
Insane play that happens alot: Opponent attacks with an X/2 creature. I flash in Snapcaster Mage and give Brimstone Volley flashback. Trade creatures with the opponent and burn face for 5!
}
End Sidenote

However, there's a different side to this deck. Turn 1 Delver of Secrets is THE fastest start available in all of standard. If you flip over an instant or sorcery (28/60 cards) you're swinging with a flying Wild Nacatl. An insane opening may be:

Turn 1: Delver of Secrets
Turn 2: (no transform) Ponder (put instant/sorcery 2nd to top), Grim Lavamancer
Turn 3: play draw-go for the rest of the game without your opponent on a 6-turn clock just from the Delver of Secrets, while you gain control of the board with Grim Lavamancer and you throw burn at your opponent's face to win by turn 5 or 6.

They say the best decks can attack from multiple angles, and I think this deck can provide that. If one Delver of Secrets is good, then 2 is insane right? I have had a few games in testing that you just play 2 Delver of Secrets and win in elementary fashion. Those games are free when you attack for 3 on turn 2 and 6 on turn 3, your opponent typically isn't ready for those.

A big thing with this deck is that it's not that impressive without any creatures. The best creature to have in the opening hand is obviously Delver of Secrets because it puts so much pressure on your opponent, and then that is followed by Grim Lavamancer and last Snapcaster Mage. Snapcaster is good, but not until the lategame which is why a hand with a 1-drop creature is just amazing!

After playing the FNM (and winning a $20 prize) I decided to change the deck to look more like this:

4x Delver of Secrets // Insectile Aberration
4x Snapcaster Mage
4x Grim Lavamancer

4x Gitaxian Probe
2x Devil's Play
4x Incinerate
4x Brimstone Volley
4x Arc Trail
4x Ponder
4x Mana Leak
1x Shock

4x Sulfur Falls
2x Rootbound Crag
8x Mountain
7x Island

Sideboard:
2x Nihil Spellbomb
4x Twisted Image
3x Falkenrath Marauders
3x Inferno Titan
3x Ancient Grudge

I added 2 Rootbound Crag in the manabase so that you can get random value out of the board with Ancient Grudge. I also moved Mana Leak from the board to the Main and replaced it with another Marauder, Titan, and 2 Nihil Spellbombs. The Spellbombs are for Solar Flare and and sort of random mill-me decks that I may face. Ancient Grudge is good against Tempered Steel, Puresteel Paladin, and Birthing Pod decks. Twisted Image is in mainly for Tree of Redemption, so depending on that card's popularity, it may or may not remain. Falkenrath Marauders is for control decks where you can unload some burn on them on their end step to try and tap them out, and then Falkenrath wins the game for you! After just 1 hit, he's too big to die to anything short of a Consecrate Sphinx or Doom Blade. As Flores pointed out, he's a 4-turn clock when the opponent is at 20 life! Inferno Titan is for against weenie decks like the Humans deck where he is just an unbeliavable card advantage machine! With just 21 lands and a little luck you can reasonably expect to cast him on turn 7 or 8 (which you should be able to last to warrenting effective use of burn) and simply win from there.

This deck is really exciting and really skill testing! I have joined with a few guys at toys to do a lot of testing with for states, and this is probably going to be the deck I champion and get tons of practice with over the next couple weeks!

Until next time, Stay Classy!

Ryan Lackie
Ryan.Lackie92@gmail.com
@ThingsILack