Maindeck:

3 Obzedat, Ghost Council
2 Augur of Bolas
1 Snapcaster Mage
4 Azorious Charm
2 Dissipate
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Terminus
4 Lingering Souls
2 Think Twice
3 Victim of Night
4 Sphinx?s Revelation
1 Detention Sphere
1 Jace, Architect of Thought
1 Jace, Memory Adept
1 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
1 Liliana of the Veil
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Watery Grave
3 Godless Shrine
4 Glacial Fortress
4 Drowned Catacomb
4 Isolated Chapel
3 Nephalia Drownyard

Sideboard:
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Dead Weight
2 Dissipate
2 Negate
2 Dispel
2 Rest in Peace
1 Jace, Memory Adept
1 Nephalia Drownyard
1 Liliana of the Veil

This was a good starting point. Let?s take out what I know for sure we want to keep. 4 Sphinx?s Revelation
4 Azorious Charm
3 Obzedat. Ghost Council
4 Lingering Souls
1 Snapcaster Mage
2 Dissipate
1 Detention Sphere

These cards were all good for me. The numbers felt right. Snapcaster Mage isn?t particularly amazing in this deck in multiples since there aren?t very many early spells to re-use. I was very happy with one and will continue playing just one. Augur of Bolas was mostly terrible for me. The only match I wanted it in was against Boros Humans and Mono Red. Every other match they would have been better as other cards so I think it is best to cut them from the deck. Victim of Night was amazing for me, but I think three was too many. I wanted to play Dimir Charm here originally but the idea of not being able to kill rancor?d things, Loxodon Smiter, Thundermaw Hellkite, or Restoration Angel turned me off of it. After playing I think it should be a mixture of Dimir Charms and Victim of Nights for these slots. Liliana was always good for me and was being sideboarded in in almost every match. I think two is the correct number that should be in the maindeck. As far as the sweepers go I am still unsure on the correct numbers, either three Supreme Verdicts and one Terminus or two and two. I wasn?t disappointed with two and two so for now I think it?s fine. Every time I played Sorin I was happy with him. He works very well with Lingering Souls and I probably want a second copy. Jace, Architect of thought just wound up being a removal spell for Jace, Memory Adept or being a draw spells. I don?t think he is needed in the deck. Jace, Memory Adept did mill a few people out but with Lingering Souls and Obzedat in the deck it is really easy to kill people with damage so this may be unnecessary maindeck. This leaves us with a more filled out version of the deck.

3 Obzedat, Ghost Council
1 Snapcaster Mage
4 Lingering Souls
4 Sphinx?s Revelation
4 Azorious Charm
1 Detention Sphere
2 Dissipate
2 Victim of Night
1 Dimir Charm
3 Supreme Verdict
1 Terminus
3 Think Twice
2 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
2 Liliana of the Veil

This is 33 Cards. This leaves me with the number of lands I wish I had played, 27. I never wanted to miss a land drop until after turn 6 or 7. Playing 27 lands helps ensure this. Easy manabase.

4 Godless Shrine
4 Watery Grave
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Glacial Fortress
4 Isolated Chapel
4 Drowned Catacomb
3 Nephalia Drownyard

After seeing what decks showed up at this the sideboard would likely be something like this:

2 Rest in Peace
1 Graffdigger?s Cage
2 Jace, Memory Adept
2 Dissipate
2 Negate
2 Dispel
1 Supreme Verdict
1 Detention Sphere
2 Dead Weight

I think Esper Control could be a strong player in this new standard metagame but I think that a lot of fine tuning is in order. We?ll also have to wait for the results of Pro Tour Montreal to see what new decks surface. I am pretty satisfied with this list and will be using it as my baseline for testing.

Thanks for reading! Dthomas6@gatech.edu. Until next time!

4 Lotus Cobra
4 Overgrown Battlement
4 Phyrexian Metamorph
4 Acidic Slime
4 Frost Titan
4 Primeval Titan
4 Joraga Treespeaker
4 Genesis Wave
4 Halimar Depths
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Island
4 Tectonic Edge
4 Verdant Catacombs
10 Forest



The point of this deck is to cast Genesis Wave and crush your opponents with an overwhelming amount of power. The mana acceleration in this deck comes from the Lotus Cobras, the Overgrown Battlements, and the Joraga Treespeakers, with the Phyrexian Metamorphs helping you by copying Cobras or Battlements if you need to. If you do the math on it, you can be casting Genesis Wave for more than 20 on turn 4 with the right hand. There is plenty of disruption in the deck as well. Between Acidic Slime, Frost Titan, Tectonic Edge, and Phyrexian Metamorph there should be plenty of time in a game for me to draw a Genesis Wave. A lot of the decks in Standard right now are really mana tight. Making their land drops is very important. With the kind of mana denial this deck possesses, it could be easy to stumble a deck by attacking it?s mana base. There are 28 lands in this deck because making the land drops in the deck is VERY important.

The maindeck is definitely geared for the slower decks but the sideboard can be easily packed with helpful cards. The first thing that needs to be addressed is the inclusion of some anti-aggressive cards. I think that Obstinate Baloth is an amazing card and the fact that it is seeing only sideboard play makes me sad. Loxodon Hierarch is strictly worse and it saw plenty of maindeck play. This just goes to show you how the power creep has advanced in Magic over the past few years. But having 4 Obstinate Baloth in the sideboard helps against any aggressive deck, since it is better than Acidic Slime. I think another card that would be useful in the sideboard is Spellskite. It will help improve the Exarch Twin matchup while also being pretty decent against burn. The Spellskites could help protect your mana dorks until you get a critical spell off. So I think that having 4 Spellskite in the sideboard is a must. They can serve as walls against aggro as well if you need them to. Phyrexian Metamorph can also be used here to copy Obstinate Baloths or Spellskites in sideboarded games. In the control matches I expect there to be a lot of counterspells being used on the big mana stuff. One way to help mitigate this is by switching out the Genesis Waves for Summoning Traps. Since I would want to maximize the drawing of Summoning Traps, and to make sideboarding a little easier, I would have 4 Summoning Trap in the sideboard. The last 3 cards that I would put in the sideboard would probably be a single Pelakka Wurm and 2 Phyrexian Revoker.

This is a pretty fun deck. It reminds me of playing Warp World I standard. I can?t wait to play this deck in FNM without having to play against Stoneforge Mystic decks and Jace decks. It makes these kinds of decks a little more fun. I hope that you guys take advantage of this period of time to create more fun and inventive decks before M12 comes out instead of just playing Valakut or Exarch Twin. As always if you have any questions feel free to email them to me at Dthomas6@gatech.edu. Until next time!

1) Caw-Blade may be the best deck in standard now, but like I said in my last article, there is plenty of room for innovation. The mirror is boring anyways so I think someone needs to come up with a new deck.

2) RUG is still a deck. In fact it is a lot better than I was giving it credit. I thought RUG was completely dead due to the Splinter Twin combo decks. It turns out I was wrong. I lost to a RUG deck and the deck ran really well. Beast Within and Dismember are great ways the deck can fight both Caw-Blade and Exarch Twin.

3) Vedalkan Certarch is playable in Standard right now. The Tezzeret deck that was designed by Brian Kibler is pretty sweet. It has Phrexian Metamorph, Phyrexian Revoker, Etched Champion, Vedalken Certarch, and Flight Spellbomb. The deck can compete against the decks in Standard that are getting played right now, specifically Caw-Blade, and it looks like a lot of fun. I want to try it out sometime soon.

4) When you are choosing to draw in a format like Legacy, it is sometimes better to just lose the die roll. I kept winning the die rolls and having to tell my opponents that I wanted to draw instead of them winning the die rolls and choosing to play. This is only a big deal because most of my opponents were smart enough to figure out that something was up and that I was probably playing Dredge. I really wish I had been able to start some of the matches without my opponents knowing what I was playing.

5) If you are ever in the downtown area for just a few days in Indianapolis, there is this sweet noodle restaurant you have to go to. In fact if we had known about it before Sunday, we would have eaten most of our meals there over the course of the trip. The restaurant is called Noodles & Company. If you are ever in Indianapolis you have to go to this place at least once and try their Wisconsin Mac & Cheese. It is quite possibly the best Mac & Cheese I have ever eaten.

6) Cucumber water is pretty sweet. The hotel we were staying in had water for everyone and the flavor of the water changed each day we were there. They had two different tanks and one had Cucumbers in it and the other had Lemons in it. Now Lemon water is pretty refreshing and good but if you like Cucumbers, then Cucumber water is pretty sick. I will likely be trying to replicate this with not much success.

7) Don't every bet my friend Tony Chu X amount of money to do anything involving consuming Ranch Dressing. We made this mistake without realizing how much he actually liked the stuff. He was paid $50 to chug a bowl of ranch dressing and did so in about 3 seconds. One of the grossest things I have ever seen someone do. Just remember, if his name is Tony Chu and there is ranch that needs to be chugged for money that you should let someone else try since it will likely be more entertaining.

8) I am actually the worst person apparently when it comes to realizing that he is being trolled. In fact through the course of the entire weekend, Caleb Durward kept trolling me in different ways and it usually took me about 2 minutes to realize that I was being trolled.

9) Fogo de Chao is amazing. For those of you who have never been, you have to go there to find out yourself how amazing it is and for those of you who have been there you know exactly what I am talking about.

10) And to finish off this list of things I learned is that I will be going to Grand Prix Kansas City. Just somehow I ended up realizing that I would be able to go to the Grand Prix (yay!).

There it is, the 10 things I learned from Indianapolis. That?s all I have for you guys today so until next time, you can always reach me at Dthomas6@gatech.edu. Until next time!

Throughout Magic history, many broken cards that needed to be banned or showcased such a power level have existed. Whether or not they were actually banned has differed per situation. One reason for this lies in the power level of the cards in general at the time of the card in question. This of course varies by format, but the proof is there. Skullclamp is one of the most well-known overpowered cards in Magic history. Yes the card is actually broken, but if you take a look at Vintage today Skullclamp is not restricted and is not in any of the top performing decks. I wouldn?t quote me on this, but I believe this is an indication that many of the cards used in said format are of equal or greater power. To be honest though, Skullclamp may not be the best example. One way to look at the situation is to examine the really good cards that have stood out over the past few years. Umezawa?s Jitte, Sensei?s Divining Top, Tarmogoyf, Sword of Fire and Ice are examples of cards that are really good, but probably not broken. In many situations, with the exception of Tarmogoyf, the deck that the card was included in had to be molded a certain way to better take advantage of these card?s abilities. One big reason these cards were so dominant in standard is that not a lot of the other cards available were similar in power level. Tarmogoyf is an example of a really good creature. It is just very efficient for the mana cost. You aren?t getting some game breaking ability, you are getting a creature with a lot of value for the mana. Umezawa?s Jitte is really only good in decks that can either produce lots of creatures or have lots of creatures, which requires you to design your deck to do that. Sensei?s Divining Top is good on its own, but when combined with shuffle effects it can provide you with an amazing amount of card quality control. When combined with fetchlands specifically, the power of the card is absurd because it gives you a considerable amount of control over your draws. Sword of Fire and Ice has the same restrictions as Umezawa?s Jitte for the most part. Modern Magic has a card that would fall in this category of really good cards, Jace, the Mind Sculptor. The fact that one card can do so many different things, and very efficiently at that, is great. Jace is like Tarmogoyf, it shows up in decks merely as a concession to the power level of the card. Is the card broken? No, but it sure is good. Stoneforge Mystic is an interesting case since it requires you to build a deck around it, but the card slots that you are using with it aren?t making up a significant portion of your deck.

Caw-Blade is a great example of how the card has to be built around to work. One of the reasons why Caw-Blade is such a great deck is how efficient it is at doing what it is designed to do, beat with little guys and equipment. Squadron Hawk fit perfectly in the role of having an efficient creature to carry equipment on. They are in the deck because they carry equipment a lot of the time like Troll Ascetic did back in Mirrodin. Yes, Stoneforge Mystic is a very good card because of some of the equipment they have recently printed, but in my eyes the card is just very efficient at doing what it says, find and put equipment into play. There are decks out there that have the ability to beat Caw-Blade, but they may not do well against the rest of the meta. Since the deck is well positioned in the Standard meta, it makes some of the cards seem a bit more powerful, maybe even broken, than they actually are. Consider this, if Caw-Blade had the same cards in a different meta and wasn?t the top deck in the format a lot of people wouldn?t even think about the deck, let alone whether or not a card from it was broken. The deck would still be the same efficient deck, just not the deck to beat. When you put the deck in this scenario, some of the cards begin to look more like good efficient cards rather than broken cards.

I'm going to bring this to a conclusion though before I begin to talk about every card in detail from Magic history that falls into this area of power, because that would take far too long. If you learn only one thing from this article, I want it to be that truly broken cards are rare and that really good, efficient cards could easily seem broken. As always if you have any questions for me or want me to write about a particular topic, just send me an email at Dthomas6@gatech.edu. Until next time!

4 Golgari Grave Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Narcomoeba
4 Putrid Imp
2 Golgari Thug
2 Ichorid
1 Angel of Despair
1 Sphinx of Lost Truths
1 Flame-Kin Zealot
4 Bridge from Below
4 Careful Study
4 Breakthrough
4 Lion?s Eye Diamond
3 Dread Return
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Deep Analysis
4 Darkslick Shores
4 Cephalid Coliseum
4 Underground Sea

Sideboard
4 Chain of Vapor
4 Leyline of Sanctity
4 Pithing Needle
1 Blazing Archon
1 Ancestor?s Chosen
1 Cabal Therapy



This is pretty much a stock LED dredge list. I am a fan of the raw power the LEDs give the deck which is why I chose it over the Tireless Tribe variants. Darkslick Shores is actually pretty sweet in it. It is basically like having 8 Underground Seas only a little better. A huge plus to Darkslick Shores is that they are not islands. This means that Merfolk cannot islandwalk me through a wall of zombies. Actually, if I could play 8 Darkslick Shores I would. One big reason for playing this deck is that it is pretty much favored against every deck in the field game 1. And since not a lot of people, at least from the results of the latest legacy tournaments, were playing graveyard hate it would be pretty good at winning the match.

The tournament started off like any other tournament. I played some games of magic. Round 1 I played against Adam Petrie playing UG Natural Order/Show and Tell. Game 1 I mulliganed to 5 and never really got going. He had a turn 3 Progenitus and I died to it. Game 2 I had a pretty standard dredge hand and combed off. Game 3 I mulliganed to 4 and was able to start dredging pretty early on. I caught a break when he cast a Natural Order to get a Fauna Shaman, which meant he was holding the Progenitus (which turned out to be both of them when I therapied him the next turn). I was able to combo off before he could get any sort of offensive force assembled. 1-0

Round 2 I played against Matt Zona playing Team America. Game 1 we both mulliganed to 4 and I get him to 8 life with a Putrid Imp and then get stopped by two Tombstalkers and a Tarmogoyf. Game 2 he uses his Tormod?s Crypt immediately when I get a dredger in my graveyard and I combo off a few turns later. Game 3 I mulligan to 5 and he plays an engineered plague on zombies on turn 3. He struggles to find his green mana and when he finally does I had already stripped him of his Pernicous Deeds. I kill him with some zombies and an Ichorid. 2-0

Round 3 I played against Kristopher Hackelman playing Dredge. Game 1 I mill half of my library and see no dread returns and die since his dredges were a little better to him. Game 2 I mulligan to 5 and he has a normal start with better dredges. This mirror match is pretty annoying since it really comes down to the better dredges/opening hands. 2-1

Round 4 I played against Evan Erwin playing Merfolk. Game 1 I mulligan to 5, as usual. He plays 2 Cursecatchers and I realize that I can?t win the game before he does so I try to end the game having him thinking I am playing a different deck by just playing my Underground Seas and saying go. I succeeded in this and he apparently thought I was playing ANT. Game 2 I mulligan to 6 and play through a Tormod?s Crypt. At one point he has an 8/8 Coralhelm Commander and friends to my Blazing Archon, 3 Narcomoebas, Golgari Thug, and Zombies. I kill him by attacking with my Narcomoebas and Golgari Thug. He blocks a Narcomoeba and the Thug, I put the Narcomoeba back on top with the ability, dredge the Thug the next turn, and repeat the attack the turn after that. Most interesting way I was able to win the entire day. Game 3 was pretty close. It was ultimately decided when he declined to Cursecatcher a draw spell to remove two Bridges from my yard. I then played a Pithing Needle naming Cursecatcher and proceed to win after stripping his hand. 3-1

Round 5 I played against Lukas Parson playing Affinity. Game 1 he keeps a 1 mana source hand with a Ravager. I take the Ravager from his hand before he finds his second mana source and easily win the game. Game 2 he mulligans to 4 keeping a hand with a Ravager and no lands. His only play for the first two turns was a Memnite. I am able to combo off and take any relevant cards from his hand before he finds his mana. 4-1

Round 6 was against Jody Keith playing ANT. I win the die roll and we both keep our hands. I had a potential turn 1 kill, but instead I went for the guaranteed turn 2 kill. He decided to do the same thing. Since I won the die roll I went off first. Lion?s Eye Diamond is so good in Dredge. Game 2 he keeps a slow hand and I am able to strip him of his important cantrips and his tutor. On turn 3 or 4 I gain about 70 life with an Ancestor?s Chosen and put a large number of zombies into play. Seems pretty good for one of my most difficult matchups. 5-1

Round 7 was against my roommate Shawn French playing Junk and Taxes. I won game 1 without any opposition. We knew that it was going to be pretty much impossible for him to win game 1. Unfortunately, since Dredge had done decently well at the last open, he was packing the correct amount and type of graveyard hate to have against me. He was packing 4 Leyline of the Void in his sideboard along with Gaddock Teeg and a Bojuka Bog. I keep a hand with LED, Chain of Vapors, Deep Analysis, Careful Study, and lands (one being a coliseum). He opens with just one leyline. When he tried to Thoughtseize me on his second turn I bounced his leyline in response with my chain and showed him a hand of nothing. I untapped and drew a dredger and comboed off. 6-1

Round 8 was the on camera feature match against Marsh Usary playing GW Aggro. Game 1 I mulligan to 5 and basically kill him on turn 2. I put an Angel of Despair into play killing his only land. He draws a Maze of Ith but is way behind and can?t race the zombies, angel, Ichorid, and Narcomoeba. Game 2 I mulligan to 6 and keep. I decide that waiting to discard a dredger and then comboing off is the best line of play. It turns out he kept a generic hand with path as his only disruption. 7-1

Round 9 against David Vo playing Combo Elves. We intentionally draw since it locks us for top 8. 7-1-1 First round of top 8 I get paired against the only person in top 8 I didn?t want to play, Kristopher Hackelman playing Dredge. Game 1 he misplays and attacks with his zombies, not enough damage to kill me, and forgets to leave back enough blockers. I untap and kill him. Game 2 I mulligan myself out of the game. Game 3 we both mulligan to 4. I had the enabler first in the form of a Putrid Imp. I am able to start dredging before him so I am able to find the kill faster. In the second round of top 8 I get paired against Alix Hatfield playing Time Spiral. Game 1 I mulligan to 5 and keep a hand with the enablers but no dredgers. I end up winning off the back of double breakthrough as he was only able to counter one of them. I drew them off a cephalid coliseum, which was pretty lucky. Game 2 I pretty much snap keep my opening hand. I have dredgers, and LED, a coliseum, and careful studies. He was just unable to counter everything and I comboed off on turn 3.

In the finals I get paired against the Jesse Hatfield playing the exact same 75 cards as his brother. Game 1 I keep a hand with a Cabal Therapy as my enabler and a LED to power any Deep Analysis I dredge into. Unfortunately he had the Force of Will for my LED and I was stuck slow dredging the rest of the game. It was not fast enough to allow me to combo off before he did. Game 2 I keep a hand with no dredgers but a bunch of enablers. I found my dredger before he could set up his combo and was able to combo off and strip his hand with therapies. Game 3 was the most interesting game. I mulligan to five and start off with a Careful Study that puts a dredger in my graveyard. I do some dredging and therapying. On my turn 3 I activate my coliseum and therapy Jesse. He Meditates in response and I name Force of Will. This is unfortunately where I make a mistake. I was so used to playing against hate the entire day my mind auto defaulted to naming the Echoing Truth in Jesse?s hand on my next therapy. I was supposed to take his Turnabout since I could Dread Return a Golgari Grave Troll and have him on dead guaranteed the next turn. Taking Brainstorm was correct since it left him only the top of his library to draw what he needed, a High Tide. Not taking the Echoing Truth could have still worked out for me had he just blanked for two turns in a row. Unfortunately for me, a High Tide was waiting for him on top of his deck and he comboed off. Just as unfortunate was the fact that both the Sphinx of Lost Truths and Flame-Kin Zealot were in the last seven cards of my library.

If you want to watch any of the three matches that were recorded, then you can go to http://www.ggslive.com/2011-event-vods/ and select the matches from the Atlanta Open playlist at the top. Second isn?t that bad. We split the money in the top 4 so we were playing for the trophy and open points basically. Lion?s Eye Diamond was pretty invaluable for me throughout the entire day and I wouldn?t want to play this deck without it. In fact if I were to play in another Legacy tournament with dredge I would play 74 of the 75 cards I played here. Instead of an Ancestor?s Chosen in the sideboard I would have an Iona, Shield of Emeria. There are only a few matches where Ancestor?s Chosen is actually better, and those matches aren?t that bad in the first place. Iona is very helpful against the combo decks.

As for those of you who are waiting for my second pauper teachings article, it will have to wait till after I graduate this May. After graduation I plan on writing articles consistently so that you will have something new to read each week. As always, if you have any questions you can contact me by email at Dthomas6@gatech.edu . Thanks for reading!

5 Color Control
Maindeck:
4 Cryptic Command
4 Esper Charm
4 Mana Leak
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Preordain
3 Plumeveil
3 Wurmcoil Engine
2 Cruel Ultimatum
2 Volcanic Fallout
2 Jace the Mind Sculptor
1 Path to Exile
1 Day of Judgement
4 Vivid Creek
4 Reflecting Pool
3 Vivid Meadow
3 Island
2 Vivid Marsh
2 Sunken Ruins
2 Mystic Gate
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Creeping Tar Pits
1 Mountain
1 Cascade Bluffs


Sideboard:
3 Thoughtseize
2 Leyline of Sanctity
2 Gaea?s Revenge
2 Vendilion Clique
2 Shriekmaw
1 Celestial Purge
1 Volcanic Fallout
1 Hallowed Burial
1 Condemn


There was a lot of bad publicity going around about this deck. Most people thought this deck was ?dead?. During its time in standard, it had the same rival. Faeries were always there. But I played it then and I wanted to play it now. The testing I had done didn?t hint that it was the best deck in the format, but it had reinforced the fact that the deck definitely wasn?t dead.

Luckily, I started off the tournament the good way. I had 3 lovely byes thanks to my rating. For those 3 rounds I just played casual games with my friends as they waited thanks to their byes as well. Then it was time for the 4th round. I apologize to those who I played if I am omitting any important details from our matches, but I will try to accurately describe what happened.

Round 4 ? Steve Sadin with R/G Valakut
I think this was a great way to start off the day. I personally enjoy playing against the people whose names are very well known throughout the Magic community and Steve is certainly no exception. As we were getting ready for the round to start we made small talk. This match didn?t start off very well for Steve as he had to mulligan to 5, I think for game 1. Since I had kept my initial 7, game 1 didn?t take long for me to win. I had the counterpells when I needed them and the Wurmcoil Engine to end the game. It didn?t help that my esper charms were being used to take advantage of my situation and make him discard his cards during his draw steps. For game 2 we both kept healthy hands but he was on the play. I led with a turn 2 Thoughtseize to him showing an incredible hand with Harrow, 2 Scapeshifts, Primal Command, Obstinate Baloth, and lands. He had played a turn 2 Khalni Heart Expedition so the harrow was the most threatening card. I couldn?t let him ramp that fast since it would render my Mana Leaks very useless very quickly. Unfortunately I didn?t draw any counterspells and ended up essentially losing when he cast his Primal Command. Once he cast the Primeval Titan he had fetched with the Primal Command I conceded the game. Game 3 I led off once again with a turn 2 Thoughtseize. To my amazement he had kept a hand with no green mana but full of green spells. He had ramp spells, primal commands, and primeval titans. I took a Harrow and was hoping that he wouldn?t draw a forest. He didn?t. In fact he didn?t draw a 3rd land until I had played a Jace, the Mind Sculptor. After that, with the help of some Cryptic Commands and Mana Leaks, I was able to resolve Jace, the Mind Sculptor?s ultimate while threatening lethal damage with some Wurmcoil Engines at the same time. Fortunately for me and unfortunately for Steve his draw didn?t pan out. Good start, 4-0.

Round 5 ? Tyler Wilson with URW Pestermite Combo
Game 1 he opened up like a blue white control deck with his lands, but once he got a mountain with a fetch I was pretty sure he was playing Pestermite Combo. I had not actually done very much testing against this deck since our testing group didn?t feel that it was going to show up in large numbers so I knew, loosely, how to play against it. We play a slow game of draw go for a while with him playing Volcanic Fallout and Lightning Bolt at the end of some of my turns since they were clearly not very useful. My problem came when He was able to sneak some attacks in with a Celestial Colonnade I had found myself at a very low life total. In fact, it was just low enough for him to finish me off with some Volcanic Fallouts. Game 2 started off pretty roughly for me. I had kept 2 of my Plumeveils in since they could block attacking Pestermites and Celestial Colonnades. The problem was that I had drawn both of them within the first few turns. As I was filtering through my hands with my pair of Vendilion Cliques, he killed them each time, he snuck an Ajani Vengeant into play. It killed the 2nd Vendilion Clique and then quickly began locking down a land. The land he was choosing to lock down was my only answer at the time, a Creeping Tar Pit. I desperately played my draw spells trying to find some way to rid myself of the Ajani or at least keep him from blowing all of my lands up. Luckily I found my 2nd Creeping Tar Pit just in time. With the tar pits I was able to take down Ajani Vengeant. After that we stalemated for a while with me sneaking in damage when I could with my tar pit. After a long drawn out game, in which we both went through a Wurmcoil Engine, I finally drew a way to finish the game. I played a Gaea?s Revenge to which he just looked at and then when he realized what it was he scooped up his cards. This left us only 15 or so minutes for game 3. Due to some early discard, I was able to take control of the game. My Thoughtseize on turn 2 revealed a hand full of Pestermites with a lack of the companion enchantment, Splinter Twin. Once I had desposed of those 3 Pestermites I began my offensive. His lack of counterspells proved troublesome since I was able to land a Wurmcoil Engine. The turn after I played the Wurmcoil Engine I played Gaea?s Revenge again and he conceded. 5-0.

Round 6 ? Dakota Rogers with Ooze Jund
Dakota is someone who plays at a local Atlanta store so we knew each other. He actually pointed out that the first, and only, time we had played was several years ago at a Magic Scholarship Series event that I won. Game 1 started off rough since he had won the die roll. I was displeased to see his turn 2 Putrid Leech. Thankfully he didn?t put me on having a Lightning Bolt so when he tried to pump it I was able to answer with the Lightning Bolt. His next series of plays were pretty characteristic of a normal Jund deck but were on the unimpressive side of the plays a Jund deck makes. I played a turn 6 Wurmcoil Engine and that pretty much was all that I had to play to win game 1. There was one creature that stuck out game 1 that was very unusual. He had cascaded into a Devoted Druid with his Bloodbraid Elf before losing to my Wurmcoil Engine. This was very intriguing. Game 2 he started off in a similar manner but his turn 2 play was a Fauna Shaman. I had the lightning bolt but he had the replacement Fauna Shaman. Soon his team was joined by a Kitchen Finks but I quickly halted his attacks with a Plumeveil. This was when his deck clearly gave itself away. His next play was a Bloodbraid Elf that cascaded into? a Quillspike? There was only a small place in the back of my head that thought he would be playing a Necrotic Ooze Jund deck but I didn?t really think he would be playing a deck like that. Once again on turn 6 I had a Wurmcoil Engine. This time, he was able to actually use a Fauna Shaman to find a partial solution to my Wurmcoil Engine. In response to an Esper Charm I played forcing him to discard in his draw step he tutored and played a Cloudthresher. A Day of Judgement and 2nd Wurmcoil Engine later, he was dead. After the match he told me he was indeed playing a Necrotic Ooze Jund deck, very interesting. 6-0, pretty good so far.

Round 7 ? Matt Sperling with RG Aggro
Game 1 was pretty interesting. I won the die roll and led off with my normal assortment of vivids. His first play was a turn 2 Noble Hierarch. I was surprised on his 3rd turn that he chose to attack with his Noble Hierarch when I had 3 mana open. I gladly played a Plumeveil and blocked his Noble Hierarch. He sighed, clearly displeased with himself for attacking into that, and played a land and said go. Game 1 really didn?t go well for him. He drew not very many action spells, but a lot of land. I, however, drew plenty of action and won the games as usual through Wurmcoil Engines. I was pretty sure that he was playing RG something but I wasn?t sure what so I sidedboard like I would have for a Fauna Shaman Vengevine deck. Game 2 wasn?t exactly how I envisioned it would be. He had the mana dorks and then cleared a land with a turn 3 Goblin Ruinblaster. This turned out to be a crucial play. In fact, had I had the counterspell for the Goblin Ruinblaster I would have likely won the game. He was able to put an Inferno Titan and some Vengevines into play before I could play my Wurmcoil Engine. With me at 3 life and no out in hand I conceded. Game 3 started off great for me. Matt ran into a problem. He had kept a hand full of mana dorks with little land. Lightning Bolts took care of the first two mana dorks and then a Shriekmaw. That Shriekmaw and a Creeping Tar Pit attacked several times to seal the game in my favor. 7-0, locked in day 2 now needed to make sure I finished strong.

Round 8 ? Alex Hon with Faeries
I was very surprised that this was the first time I was going to play against Faeries, especially since it was the deck I expected to show up in the largest numbers. The only reason I knew what Alex was playing was because we had been playing games during our byes. I was pretty unhappy about having to play Alex because playing friends isn?t fun, especially when we are both doing well. After some talk about intentionally drawing, we decided to just play the match out. It was decided that we would rather have one of us be in great shape for top 8 than both of us coming out potentially screwed at the end of the day. Game 1 was quite the game. He didn?t have the turn 2 Bitterblossom so I was able to play the game at my pace, really really slow. There was a lot of draw go. Eventually he stuck a Bitterblossom and a Scion of Oona. At this point I was still at a reasonable life total and had just a few cards left. He knew the cards in my hand due to a Thoughtseize from earlier that game. I had 5 lands in play though, his Tectonic Edge taking out a Creeping Tar Pit, and needed my 6th land badly. I used my Esper Charm during his draw step to make him discard two cards and he discarded two lands leaving him with nothing in hand. He made his attacks and passed the turn. This was it, if I drew an untapped land I could play my Wurmcoil Engine and that would likely be enough to win me the game since we would both have no cards in hand. To my disappointment, I drew a Creeping Tar Pit. I wasn?t out of the game yet, it was still a 6th land. I passed the turn and Alex drew, made his attacks and passed back. He had exactly 4 mana up after this. There were only a few cards he could have drawn that would stop my Wurmcoil Engine. He didn?t draw Jace since he didn?t play it. It was likely not a discard spell since he didn?t play it knowing what was left in my hand. When he didn?t do anything during my draw step or upkeep I eliminated the possibility of it being a Vendilion Clique or Mistbind Clique. He was holding a land, a removal spell, or a counterspell likely. He had already been through several Mana Leaks and several Cryptic Commands at this point so I was hoping it was a land. I drew my card and went to play my Wurmcoil Engine hoping he had drawn dead last turn and he showed me the Cryptic Command. How unfortunate for me. The good news was that I was not out of the game yet. I could still survive two attacks so a Volcanic Fallout into some gas could put me back into the game. He untapped and played a Scion of Oona he had drawn. He attacked me for exact. I was pretty displeased since he had topdecked so well. Game 2 was interesting. With me on the play I led off with a turn 2 Thoughtseize. I don?t remember what I took but I do remember seeing that he was in an awkward situation with mana. He only had black mand and colorless mana from Mutavaults and Tectonic Edges. He made some attacks with his Mutavault which eventually ended up being ambushed by a Plumeveil. We then drew and passed the turn for several turns. I finally began to build up my mana again. I had been holding both of my Gaea?s Revenges since the beginning of the game. I thought I was done but it looked like I had a shot since he wasn?t drawing anything. Once I got to 7 mana I cast a Gaea?s Revenge and attacked. He went hard into the think tank eventually shipping the turn back to me. All he had was a Mistbind Clique and some manlands at this point. I untapped and played a 2nd Gaea?s Revenge and he conceded. Gaea?s Revenge was doing pretty good so far and I was pretty pleased. Game 3 I started off with a mulligan to 6 and kept. He was on the play and led with a discard turn 1. I untapped played me land and said go. He untapped and played Bitterblossom on turn 2. Then the Faerie deck did exactly what it was known to do, just stop the other person from being able to do pretty much anything while killing them at the same time. At the end of the match Alex confessed to have been topdecking throughout most of the match. I found this pretty amusing. In fact I didn?t find out until much later in the day that his turn 2 Bitterblossom game 3 was not in his opening hand. I was pretty angry that Alex had won by topdecking the entire time, but it wasn?t with him. I was just angry that I did everything correctly and lost to the topdecks. But that is a part of Magic. No matter how good you are, you can just get lucky or sometimes unlucky. 7-1 now, but that still isn?t a bad record and there was one more round for me to win so I could finish on a strong note.

Round 9 ? Matt Ferrando with UW Control
There is no heavy amount of detail associated with this match. I drew perfectly and he didn?t. Everything he played I answered and some of the things I played he couldn?t answer. Game 2 was basically the same thing. He did have hope in game 2, but it was only if I played a normal finisher like Wurmcoil Engine. When I played the Gaea?s Revenge he conceded. We were talking about this specific matchup afterwards and he was surprised by a few things, specifically my choice of playing the deck. Matt turned out to be a cool guy and I was glad I played him. One of the best parts about playing Magic is meeting new people.

I was greatly pleased with my day 1 finish. 8-1 is a pretty good record to start day 2 with. Top 8 was definitely reasonable. If I was lucky I could 4-0-2 into top 8, but likely I would need a record of 5-1 or 5-0-1 to make top 8. To finish in the money all I had to do was 3- 3. So far, this was the best record I would enter day 2 of a GP with so I was pretty excited about day 2. I found out something pretty interesting during day 2. I was one of four 5 Color Control decks that made day 2. Two of the other three players playing it were Patrick Chapin and Guillaume Wafo-Tapa. I thought this was pretty cool.

At the beginning of day 2 I had a good feeling about the day ahead. I was pretty excited about the matches I had ahead of me. I don?t think I have ever wanted to top 8 a tournament so badly.

Round 10 ? Patrick Cox with RG Valakut
Game 1 went well for me. I drew a large number of Cryptic Commands. Once I saw him fumble on a land drop I started using the bounce mode on Cryptic Command. I would counter his spell and return a land to his hand. This kept him off critical mana. The turn I tapped out to play Wurmcoil Engine I was afraid he would play the 6th land and cast Scapeshift and Prismatic Omen in the same turn but he didn?t have it. I played a second Wurmcoil Engine shortly after and game 1 ended when I played Cruel Ultimatum. Game 2 was rather short. I declined to counter his first 3 ramp spells of the game since I only had one Mana Leak. If he had any important spell afterwards, like a Primal Command or Primeval Titan, and I had wasted my Mana Leak on a Cultivate I would have probably lost the game. It was a good thing that I saved the Mana Leak because he did indeed have the Primeval Titan. In fact, he had two more Primeval Titans. If I had not saved the Mana Leak I would have surely lost the game. With a hand full of cards to his hand of just one or two I was able to win the game. 9-1 now. At this point I was pretty excited, I was one win closer to top 8.

Round 11 ? Colby Gerrish with UW CawBoom
Unfortunately this round I was paired against my friend Colby. His deck of choice was very interesting. He was playing a UW Polymorph deck that used token generators and Squadron Hawk to Polymorph into either Iona or Emrakul. He had dubbed the deck CawBoom which was pretty amusing. Neither of us was sure who had the upper hand in the match. Game 1 was pretty rough for me. It was clear that he had the Polymorph but I couldn?t let him resolve it. So he just started attacking with some Squadron Hawks. While trying to deal with these annoying little 1/1s I was trying to make sure he couldn?t Polymorph but I wasn?t putting a lot of pressure on him. I was missing several of my land drops as the game continued on and he wasn?t. This was pretty crucial for him. After a couple turns of draw go he pointed a Cryptic Command at one of my lands. Over the next few turns he bounced a few more of my lands with some more Cryptic Commands. This ultimately led to him casting a Polymorph I couldn?t counter since I was trying to keep up and keep my lands in play. He hit Iona and named white. I had a small window here to get back in the game. If I could make my 7th land drop on the next turn I could cast a Cruel Ultimatum and start gaining control of the game. I played a Jace and bounced the Iona back to his hand. He had two options, to tap out and hardcast Iona or to send one of his Celestial Colonnades and make sure my Jace doesn?t get a chance to do anything else. He chose to do the latter, which was the right play of course. Unfortunately I didn?t draw a 7th land and the game quickly ended in his favor. Sideboarding was interesting because we both knew how the other was going to sideboard. He knew I had Gaea?s Revenge in my sideboard which meant he was likely to leave a few Day of Judgements in even though normally he would sideboard them out against my deck. It was his only way of dealing with Gaea?s Revenge. Game 2 he went agro on me. His board plan of dorks worked. He played some kitchen finks then an Elspeth and I was unable to keep up. I fumbled on land and since I could only cast one spell a turn with my lands I was unable to stop him from countering my spells. 9-2 now. A loss now meant that I had to win out to make top 8. Not unreasonable, but I had to have a bit of luck on my side and be at the top of my game to do it. I was hoping that Colby would make top 8 though. His deck was pretty amusing and it would be cool to see him top 8.

Round 12 ? Joshua Howe with Faeries
When I first sat down at the table to play Joshua I knew I recognized him but I couldn?t remember from where. It wasn?t until he had played his first land of the game that I remembered where I knew him from. Joshua was one of the players who went undefeated on day 1. In fact he beat my friend Alex Hon in a Faeries mirror match in the last round of day 1. Game 1 was a very long game. It took 29 minutes. My deck did exactly what it is designed to do when games go that long, win. Game 2 started off reasonably well for me. I Thoughtseized him and he his turn 2 Bitterblossom was met with my Celestial Purge. I landed a Plumeveil and he landed a Mistbind Clique. Then he killed the Plumeveil. He added a Scion to his team and quickly I began to lose the game. I needed to find a Volcanic Fallout quickly or else I was going to lose to the Mistbind Clique. Unfortunately I was unable to find a Volcanic Fallout and he had the second Grasp of Darkness for my second Plumeveil. The problem with having one of the games take so long is that usually if you go to game 3 you don?t have much time left. This was one of those situations. We were just beginning to shuffle up when the timer had about 7 minutes on it. I was fully expecting a draw when there was a glimmer of hope. My opponent mulliganed to four. I kept my opening hand which had plenty of gas. With a Thoughtseize and an Esper Charm I was able to empty his hand. When I went to play Jace on turn 4 he revealed the Spell Pierce he had drawn off the top. This is where things went bad. I had nothing but lands, a Mana Leak, and a Lightning Bolt in hand at this point. And for the next few turns all I drew was land. He drew a Scion and began attacking me with it. Then time was called in the round. I had only a few outs at this point to actually be able to win the game in turns. They all involved me drawing specific cards on certain turns. All I drew was lands. So we went to time. After the match I looked at the top of my library and I would have drawn plenty of spells to ensure that I won the game. It would have started with a Cruel Ultimatum into an Esper Charm into a Gaea?s Revenge. If I had five more minutes I would have won the match. Unfortunately I didn?t so the match was a draw. This was not something I wanted this early in the day. Until the last round it was basically a loss. 9-2-1 now.

This was where I made a mistake. I should have conceded the match if my opponent was not willing to concede. The draw bracket is not likely to have aggressive decks in it. Based on the way control decks play it was very likely that I would have to play control decks the rest of the tournament. This was something that I should have thought about at that time. Taking a loss at this stage would have increased the chances that I would play a deck that I would have wanted to play. Another option I should have considered at this point is just taking the draw and dropping. In fact that would have been the correct decision. One of the most important things that could come out of a good finish at a GP is a pro tour invite. Taking my rating into consideration here I would have most definitely been qualified for the pro tour on rating at this point since I had played good people. Instead of doing either of these things though I decided to play on because I could still make top 16 and get some pro points, some money, and a pro tour invite.

Round 13 ? Dan Lanthier with Faeries
Game 1 was pretty unexciting. He mulliganed to five and conceded when I cast a Wurmcoil Engine. Game 2 was decided by an early Bitterblossom. I couldn?t get rid of it or find a Volcanic Fallout in time. Game 3 I kept what most would consider a questionable hand. I think my keep was fair. I kept a hand with 2 lands, Esper Charm, Mana Leak, Plumeveil, Leyline of Sanctity, and some other card. On the play that hand could be amazing. Unfortunately it took a few turns to draw the 4th land. Even after casting an Esper Charm and drawing two cards I was having trouble finding land. This ultimately led to me losing the game. Without land I couldn?t cast spells I wanted to and counter his spells at the same time. 9-3-1 now. Once again I should have made a different decision here than the one I did. I should have dropped to protect my rating since I could top 32 at best, which does give me a few pro points and some more money but doesn?t give me the pro tour invite which is ultimately what I wanted. I insisted on continuing since I could still finish in the money.

Round 14 ? Caleb Durward with URW Pestermite Combo
Caleb is another person I met during this event who is a cool person. Unfortunately my matches with him were pretty lackluster. Game 1 he ended up having just enough counterspells and Pestermites to force through the combo. With his 3 mana up he was able to cast a second Pestermite in response to my Esper Charm targeting his Splinter Twin to win him the game. Game 2 was interesting. He won the game on what we deemed after the match the incorrect play. I had four mana up and he had a Pestermite in play. He had five mana total. He played a Splinter Twin with one mana up to play his Spell Pierce. The reason we deemed this the wrong play was because there was so many different cards or combinations of cards that I could have and play with four mana that would thwart his attempt to combo off on me. Unfortunately for me he made the play and I only had one of the cards. It seemed that this day would just be a bad day of Magic for me. 9-4-1 now.

Round 15 ? Samuel Karls with Wargate
At this point I was just trying to recover some of the points I had lost for the day. This was quite possibly the most unexciting match of the entire weekend. To continue the streak of bad luck, my deck just didn?t give me the draws I needed. I drew poorly and was unable to answer his deck. This was definately not my day. 9-5-1. At the end of the day I finished 113th. That was such a long way from the 7th place I was in after round 10. Sometimes you can just have a bad day of Magic and that is what happened to me. I did make a few bad decisions as far as continuing to play is concerned but I was still unlucky and luck is a part of the game. I do not regret my deck choice, but I do wish I had a couple of different cards in the sideboard and maybe maindeck. I do know that my mistake of not conceding will never happen again. Fortunately my rating didn?t take too big of a hit. At 2020 I will have to do some work to get my pro tour invite. I need a good 80 points to get a pro tour invite again. I have done it before and I can certainly do it again. One of these days I hope to write one of these reports for you all where I am talking about making a top 8 in an event or even winning one.

Every standard deck is made with the card in mind or the card in it. It doesn't happen very often where the card in question isn't breaking the format in half. Jace the Mind Sculptor is just an amazingly good card, just not broken. If you look at the standard decks right now you can see that Scars of Mirrodin played a minor role in deckbuilding as compared to other first sets in new blocks. This isn't to say that Scars of Mirrodin is a terrible set because I think Scars of Mirrodin is a fun and complex draft format. I just don't like the constructed playability of a lot of the cards in the set. The only deck listed above that doesn't work right when you take Scars of Mirrodin out of the pool of cards for standard is the Genesis Wave deck. The new lands do help plenty of the decks have better mana bases but they would survive without them.

I think that the R&D team did a great job in designing a set with Scars but I think that the actual mechanics of the set don't give us a lot to work with. Metalcraft could become a serious constructed competitor, as well as infect, if they printed the right cards. The problem with metalcraft for constructed is that to really get the metalcraft benefits from the cards you would have to devote a large portion of your deck to artifacts. I'm not sure I am comfortable trying a metalcraft deck out in standard because I don't think I could fill out a large portion of my deck with artifacts I would truly want to play with. When R&D made the cards with metalcraft they had to make sure that they weren't overpowered. Imagine if metalcraft required only two artifacts instead of three. There are plenty of cards that become really good or even absurd. Mox Opal and Etched Champion would both be amazing cards for constructed because getting to two artfacts isn't that hard, especially if the card requiring you to have metalcraft is an artifact itself. Three artifacts certainly isn't a ridiculous amount though. I think they chose a safe number that isn't too much for metalcraft.

The problem I have with infect is the size of some of the creatures. I think that having a two mana 1/1 infect regardless of the evasion is a little underwhelming. However, a two mana 2/2 infect creature with no evasion is just a little too good. It would be similar to printing a two mana 4/2 creature without infect. Not exactly the same but very similar. Since there is no way to remove poison counters from someone in standard it makes being attacked by creatures with infect a while already poisoned a little more threatening than being attacked by normal creatures when you've already been dealt some damge. Infect decks aren't that bad as decks in constructed. The problem lies against other creature decks. When your largest creature is a 1/1 and they have several 2/ 2s it makes it a lot harder to attack through. It is possible though for infect to become a serious deck if Mirrodin Besieged brings the right cards. I honestly would have preferred a Jund standard over the current standard. Even with just Shards of Alara. There is still a little room right now for new decks, but it is going to take a longer amount of time than usual for a new deck to appear. I am pretty sure that no new rogue deck will take standard by storm between now and when Mirrodin Besieged is released. It is entirely possible Mirrodin Besieged could have the same impact on standard that Scars of Mirrodin did, very little. But it is also possible that Mirrodin Besieged brings a whole set of complex and great constructed playable cards. I am hoping that it at least brings enough good artifacts to make metalcraft a theme in which a constructed deck could be built around. I will say that even though I am uninterested in standard for the most part right now I have come up with a rogue-ish deck that is fun and surprisingly effective. But that will have to be discussed in another article. As always if you have any questions or want me to write about a specific topic feel free to email me at Dthomas6@gatech.edu.

Recently my interest in pauper magic has been re-sparked for some reason and I have been messing around on Magic Online with various pauper classic decks. The current meta consists of quite a few decks but there are only 4 or 5 that consistently post results. The decks I have been testing against are goblins, storm combo, cloudpost control, and affinity. Here are a few examples of what the decks look like:

Goblins:
17x Mountain
4x Goblin Bushwhacker
4x Goblin Cohort
4x Goblin Sledder
2x Intimidator Initiate
4x Jackal Familiar
4x Mogg Conscripts
4x Mogg Flunkies
4x Mogg Raider
4x Mogg War Marshal
4x Sparksmith
2x Dragon Fodder
3x Lightning Bolt

Storm Combo:
4x Azorious Chancery
3x Dimir Aqueduct
2x Evolving Wilds
6x Island
1x Plains
1x Swamp
4x Terraporphic Expanse
4x Cloud of Faeries
1x Mnemonic Wall
4x Mulldrifter
3x Nightscape Familiar
4x Sunscape Familiar
4x Compulsive Research
4x Deep Analysis
3x Foresee
4x Frantic Search
2x Scarsdale Ritual
4x Snap
2x Temporal Fissure

Cloudpost Control:
1x Bojuka Bog
4x Cloudpost
4x Glimmerpost
6x Island
3x Izzet Boilerworks
5x Mountain
1x Mnemonic Wall
2x Ulamog?s Crusher
1x Arc Lightning
1x Capsize
4x Compulsive Research
4x Condescend
3x Expedition Map
3x Firebolt
3x Flame Slash
1x Lightning Bolt
1x Mysteries of the Deep
2x Mystical Teachings
4x Prohibit
4x Prophetic Prism
2x Rolling Thunder
1x Staggershock

Affinity:
4x Great Furnace
4x Seat of the Synod
4x Tree of Tales
4x Vault of Whispers
4x Atog
4x Carapace Forger
4x Disciple of the Vault
4x Frogmite
4x Myr Enforcer
4x Chromatic Star
4x Galvanic Blast
4x Lotus Petal
4x Pyrite Spellbomb
2x Springleaf Drum
2x Terrarion
4x Thoughtcast

These are the decks I am mainly focusing on when I am making a pauper deck. There are plenty of other decks that are viable but these are the decks that usually show up in the largest numbers.

Ever since I picked up and played Dralnu for the first time I have enjoyed the combo of Rewind and Mystical Teachings. I have been working on a blue black teachings deck for a while. Here is where I am at:

UB Teachings:
3x Dimir Aqueduct
4x Evolving Wilds
9x Island
5x Swamp
4x Terramorphic Expanse
3x Twisted Abomination
4x Agony Warp
4x Brainstorm
1x Capsize
4x Counterspell
1x Diabolic Edict
1x Dispel
1x Echoing Decay
1x Echoing Truth
3x Evincar?s Justice
2x Ghastly Demise
1x Mysteries of the Deep
4x Mystical Teachings
1x Negate
4x Rewind
1x Wail of the Nim

I am currently trying to work out the kinks in the deck. A big problem with this current list is that the affinity and storm matchups are very rough. The sideboard can help a lot but I want to be able to win game 1. There are several things I need to figure out though. The first thing I want to do is make sure that I have good ways of ending the game. So

far Twisted Abomination has been doing a great job of ending games but I am unsure whether or not there are better choices. There are several cards I have been considering for this spot; Ulamog?s Crusher, Trapjaw Kelpie (as a 1 of since I can teachings for it), Sentinels of Glen Elendra (another potential 1 of as a teachings target), Drudge Reavers (as a 1 of as a teachings target or as a 4 of to just be the finishers), Calcite Snapper, and Gravebane Zombie. I am looking for a creature that can end games quickly, is very hard to kill, or ideally both. Meeting these criteria is a lot harder to do with commons. Another issue is how much spot removal or how many sweepers I should be playing. Agony Warp has been pretty amazing so they are likely to stay as a 4 of. The Evincar?s Justice is the card I am really questioning. I haven?t had enough experience with the card against the aggro decks to determine whether it is necessary. If I were to replace it with other cards I would probably replace it with more spot removal. The only way to figure out what cards are going to make it are through testing the deck. The next article will be on the testing of the pauper deck and what changes I will be making as a result. I hope these next few articles will spark an interest in pauper in some of you. Even though I am developing a Magic Online deck pauper can be played as a paper format and is pretty fun.

Game 1: R/G Valakut
My friend was playing just a stock R/G Valakut List. As I anticipated, this match is one of the deck?s worst. He started off with an early explore into turn 3 Oracle of Mul-Daya which I immediately lightning bolted. I had an Awakening Zone on turn 4 but no Furnace Celebration. The turn after he played Primeval Titan I drew Furnace Celebration and killed the titan with the tokens I had from Awakening Zone. Unfortunately he had a second titan and a land for turn killing me since I had fetched twice. If I had seen any countermagic I might have been able to stabilize, but the game was unexciting and extremely in his favor.

Game 2: Mono Green Eldrazi Ramp
I didn?t think this matchup was in my favor either. I had the turn 3 Awakening Zone with turn 4 Furnace Celebration. He had ramped to 6 mana on turn 4 but did not have a titan or summoning trap. Luckily he only had 8 mana, with 2 Eldrazi Temples, so he couldn?t cast anything fat. I untapped and passed the turn back with all my mana open and all the tokens I had made thus far, just 2 sadly. He untapped and passed the turn. When I went to Jace?s Ingenuity, tapping me out of blue mana, he played a Summoning Trap which he had obviously drawn that turn. He found Ulamog and I promptly lost to it. Had it been Kozilek or Primeval Titan I would have been able to kill them with burn, but Ulamog is indestructible so I just died to him.

Game 3: Mono White Quest Aggro
I have yet to see this deck win against a deck with adequate spot removal so I was sure that this match was going to be a clean sweep so long he doesn?t have the turn 1 quest. I was very fortunate, he wasn?t able to pop the quest on turns 1, 2, or 3. I was able to kill all of his creatures leaving him with just a single Memnite. By the time he was able to pop the quest it was too late, he couldn?t stick a piece of equipment on anything without it dying before the equipping resolved. I did realize though that if he had popped the quest on turn 1 or 2 I would have just lost to the deck because I can?t kill the equipped dork that early.

Game 4: Mono Red Aggro
Quite honestly, this matchup was a landslide victory for me. None of his creatures lived and Koth died immediately. His only real way to win was through drawing enough burn. If for game 2 I had any sort of life gain, this match would be pretty much unwinnable for the red deck.

Game 5: UW Control
This was a very long game. We played the waiting game for the first 6 or so turns of the game. It came down to how much I was willing to flinch early in the game, which was none. After a long game I finally landed a single Awakening Zone and a Single Furnace Celebration. Once my board position was established he couldn?t win. It was much easier than I thought since he was only playing 5 counterspells in his deck. I came the realization though that this match relies more on their draw than mine, since my deck is just a bunch of burn.

So all in all I finished 3-2, which isn?t that bad. I got pretty lucky in retrospect though. I would call this deck a moderate success. I probably won?t ever play this deck again for a while. I think it could be successful but it would have to be in a metagame where ramp isn?t so prevalent. Furnace Celebration is an amazingly fun card and I hope that the card finds a home in some deck. It is insane when it works. So until next time!

As it turns out, I should have done something slightly different for my maindeck. We determined, during the 3 rounds of byes I had, that I should have been playing instead of 8 plains and 8 mountains, 7 plains 7 mountains 1 razorvenge thicket and 1 horizon spellbomb. I ended up sideboarding into this configuration of mana after every game 1. I?m not sure whether or not it would have mattered because I never drew the spellbomb all tournament. Overall I was satisfied and figured that I would be able to at least 7-2.

Round 4: Patrick Chapin

Yay! Someone who I?ve read about! I really enjoy playing people that are this good. It makes me feel like I am doing something right. We get deckchecked before the round ends so we sit there and talk about random things. Once we get our decks back, Patrick turned his game face on.
Game 1: He wins the die roll and choses to draw first, something I figured would be uncommon throughout the day. I kept a slow hand and his draw is fast. He had an active Auriok Sunchaser to my nothing in play. I wound up getting low on life and before I could stabilize he was able to finish me off with Necrogen Censor, clasp and stag.
Game 2: I choose to draw this game. It starts off well for me since he mulligans to 6. He clasps my myr on turn 2 and plays his sunchaser. Again he metalcrafts with it in play and begins the early aggro. By the time I end up killing his sunchaser he is able to Necrogen Censor me out again with the help of a Glint Hawk Idol. Sorcery speed removal doesn?t kill the idol.
Unexciting start to a GP at 3-1.

Round 5: Logan Mize
Game 1: He chooses to draw first and starts off slow while I start out aggressively. Not a very exciting game.
Game 2: He chooses to draw again. This time I get a much slower start but still manage to get some early beats on. Then he plays Skithyrix. I felt like if I made the right chump blocks and drew a few gas cards then I could still win the game. Two turns later he played Geth. So chump blocking doesn?t work when he can just steal them and kill me with whatever I chump blocked with. I lose this game.
Game 3: I chose to draw and his deck decides to turn on aggro mode with a turn 3 Necrogen Scudder and a an early metalcrafted Bleak-Cloven Vampires. I get rolled. Not good, 3-2 now. I need to win out at this point to day 2. It?s not impossible but I need to not make any mistakes and be at the top of my game for the rest of the day.

Round 6: Isabelle Russell
This person was one of the nicest people I played all day long. She?s only been playing for a few years and this was her first GP. Not bad since she had no byes and is fighting for day 2. I certainly had no plans of letting that happen though.
Game 1: She gets an aggressive myr start. I stabilize on the board to the point she can?t attack any more. During this board stall I am holding an Arc Trail in hand. The problem is that she has an Abuna Acolyte in play. Eventually the board becomes her acolyte, Ferrovore, myr, and scrapmelter to my Rust Tick and stag. She attacks with just the scrapmelter and I double block with my two creatures. She shatters the Rust Tick and I am afraid I am about to get blown out by the shatter (since she has the acolyte in play). Somehow she forgets to use the acolyte?s ability and my stag trades for her scrapmelter. I realize that the only way I win this game now is if my Arc Trail resolves without her using the acolyte. Since she didn?t use the acolyte to save her scrapmelter I figured there was a decent chance of her not using it when I Arc Trail. It turns out I was right. I untap and Arc Trail targeting her Ferrovore and acolyte. She uses the Seize the Initiative in her hand to save her Ferrovore and forgets to use the acolyte?s ability. Had she remembered the acolyte at any stage in this game I would have lost. Due to this though, I am able to survive just long enough to draw and play my Myr Battlesphere. I Glimmerpoint Stag it and the game ends shortly after. I was pretty lucky to have won this game.
Game 2: Much less exciting or tense as she just draws a bunch of lands and I play darksteel sentinel. She can?t kill it before it kills her. 4-2 now, just 3 more rounds.

Round 7: Joe Baka
This match was pretty unexciting, his deck (to his own admittance) was not very good and he was unsure of how he was still x-2. I play battlesphere both games 1 and 2 and he couldn?t handle it. He didn?t really put on any pressure in either of the games. 5-2, just 2 more rounds and I?m in.

Round 8: Blaine Hatab
This is a bit awkward. My opponent doesn?t show. He was x-2-1 so he didn?t have a shot of making day 2. I?m pretty sure he just forgot to drop. Free win here. 6-2 with 1 round to go.

Round 9: Brian Edgar
Game 1: He started off very strong this game with a Sylvok Replica and Mimic Vat. Not good at all. I have a very aggressive draw which forces him to sac the replica to kill my Glink Hawk Idol. I am able to reset his Mimic Vat with a Glimmerpoint Stag so he can?t start blowing up my things. I was able to punch through enough damage a few turns later so that his Mimic Vat couldn?t save him.
Game 2: This was the interesting game. He opted to draw first. We both had very slow starts. The game is slow until he plays Myr Battlesphere. At this point it is my Golem Artisan, Gold Myr, and Necropede equipped with Sylvok Lifestaff (with Darksteel Sentinel and lands in hand) to his battlesphere, Carapace Forger, and myr army. He attacks with just his battlesphere. I play and block with my Darksteel Sentinel, Necropede, and Gold Myr. He opts not to kill the Necropede, equipped with a Sylvok Lifestaff, since it would kill his battlesphere. On his next attack he does the same thing, attacks with just the battlesphere. I block with my Necropede and pump it to enough to take down the battlesphere by itself. When it dies I kill one of his mana myr. On my turn I play my Myr Battlesphere. He makes short work of it with a Revoke Existence before I can do anything with it. He is at almost full life now with mine hovering pretty low. I begin to go on the attacks with just my sentinel. After a few turns he draws his Sylvok Replica. Before he can take out the artisan I get one last attack in with it and my sentinel and take him to one. When he kills the artisan during his turn I go to six because of the lifestaff. Now we are in a board stall. I have 4 myr and a Darksteel Sentinel to his 3 myr, Carapace Forge, and Glint-Hawk Idol. He draws and attacks me to 4 with his idol and I untap, kill a blocker and swing for lethal. WHEW! 7-2, I?m in day 2.

He should have taken the match to game 3. When he attacked with his battlesphere for the first time he should have also attacked with his carapace forger. The reason being, If I wanted to kill the battlesphere I would have to take 4 damage from the forger since I didn?t want my artisan to die. This one attack probably would have changed the game in his favor. I would have almost never been able to attack with anything other than the sentinel. Lucky for me he didn?t see the attack.

Round 10: Forrest Mead

Technically this is a part of day 2 play. It is an added round of sealed to help with final standings since so many people make day 2 at these large GPs. Game 1: I get a mediocre start and he plays a Golem Artisan turn 5 with all artifact dudes in play. I have no answers in hand and die to it. Very unexciting.
Game 2: I choose to draw and he curves out pretty perfectly with 2, 3, 4, and 5 drops. I have no removal and his Golem Artisan again makes short work of me. I get destroyed. 7-3, not the record I wanted at the end of sealed but I still made it to the draft portion. With a bit of luck I could still top 16.

Draft 1: My intentions going into this draft were to draft whatever was sent to me. To pay close attention to the signals sent. I had no intentions of forcing Infect from the start.
Pack 1 Pick 1: Skithyrix. This is a good pick 1, because you don?t have to play infect with him in your deck. He just wins games like a normal bomb, working better in infect decks obviously. But I think he leaves the options open to non-infect black if it shows up. At the end of pack 1 I have only 2 creatures with infect and saw very few. I figured that the archetype was not open so I was going towards a GB metalcraft deck, most likely.
Pack 2 Pick 1: Skinrender. A solid card, removal and a body. The real treasures I got in pack 2 came much later than expected.
Pack 2 Pick 3: Hand of the Praetors. I felt that this was a late enough pick hand that I could take it and go into infect this pack.
Pack 2 Pick 4: Putrefax. Exactly what I wanted to see after the hand. I was sure no one to my left was in infect. I finish up pack 2 with a few more infect creatures. Pack 3 wasn?t amazing with bombs or anything but it finished up the draft with the solid bodies I needed for early game. I got all of my 2 drops in this pack with some good utility cards. My first draft deck was the following:
1 Skithyrix, the Blight Dragon
1 Hand of the Praetors
1 Putrefax
1 Ichorclaw Myr
2 Blight Mamba
1 Gold Myr
1 Vector Asp
1 Corpse Cur
1 Skinrender
1 Cystbearer
1 Ichor Rats
1 Copper Myr
1 Moriok Replica
1 Blackcleave Goblin
2 Untamed Might
1 Throne of Geth
1 Instill Infection
1 Withstand Death
1 Trigon of Infestation
1 Horizon Spellbomb
1 Tel-Jillad Defiance
1 Slice in Twain
8 Swamp
8 Forest

Needless to say I was very pleased with the results of this draft. My deck was very good and I was confident that I could 3-0 this draft pod with this deck. The packs seemed very weak for any of the other archetypes comparatively.

Round 11: Christopher Kuehl
Game 1: He has a slow start and I don?t. I play turn 4 Putrefax and turn 5 Corpse Cur getting Putrefax back. He stalls a little bit but I find the Hand of the Praetors and the game ends shortly afterwards.
Game 2: Not very exciting, he doesn?t provide much opposition and I poison him out easily.
8-3, let?s go top 16!

Round 12: George Blankenship
Game 1: Best start I could possibly have with this deck. He scoops on my turn 4. I play turn 3 Hand of the Praetors and turn 4 Skithyrix and him with no creatures in play and dead next turn.
Game 2: I get a slower than usual start but that is made up by the Putrefax I play that gives him a chunk of poison. Once again I just amass poison dudes and win. 9-3, I got this.

Round 13: Chris Bott
Game 1: He stalls on two lands forever and I don?t. I poison him without much opposition.
Game 2: Same thing as game 1, he just has more creatures with toughness in play making it take a little longer.
10-3, one more draft to go.

Draft 2:
I forget most of the specifics as far as what picks in what packs and I apologize for this. But here is the deck that I got from the 2nd pod.
3 Ichorclaw Myr
4 Contagious Nim
3 Painsmith
1 Vector Asp
1 Corpse Cur
1 Iron Myr
1 Moriok Replica
1 Turn to Slag
1 Cerebral Erruption
2 Tainted Strike
2 Grasp of Darkness
1 Galvanic Blast
1 Heavy Arbalest
1 Panic Spellbomb
1 Throne of Geth
7 Mountain
9 Swamp

I was very unsure about the final build of this deck. I had never drafted RB poison before so I built the deck in the safest way I could, without any really ?cute? tricks.

Round 14: Bob Havlovic
Game 1: Not even close, my deck is really fast and I crush him.
Game 2: A little piece of advice, don?t tilt. I put myself on tilt in this game and cost myself the game. I made a small mistap in my mana that really angered me because it was the first mistake I had made all tournament. Basically I frustratingly passed my turn 4 without attacking. It would have been an attack for 11 (potentially 7 poison from a vector asp). This attack though would have straight up won me the game. Instead I end up losing this game because I flood out.
Game 3: I win this game without much opposition. It turns out his deck wasn?t very good. I am glad that my slip-up game 2 didn?t cause me to lose the match. 11-3 now. Unfortunately I am unable to top 16 due to tiebreaks. So if I win one more round I draw into top 32. Seems solid.

Round 15: Ben Hayes
Game 1: He gets a pretty aggressive start and my deck gets quite possibly its slowest start. His game.
Game 2: My deck is an infect deck. I drop him to 5 with the only non-infect creatures in the deck. Then he stabilizes and kills me while I flood.
11-4 now. Good news, I can draw next round into top 64 so I am guaranteed money.

Round 16: Kyle Boggemes
We ID into top 64.

As it turns out I misbuilt my 2nd draft deck. We did some playtesting with it afterwards and the deck I should have played was insane. Here it is:
3 Ichorclaw Myr
4 Contagious Nim
3 Painsmith
1 Vector Asp
1 Corpse Cur
1 Vulshock Heartstoker
1 Iron Myr
1 Moriok Replica
1 Galvanic Blast
2 Assault Strobe
1 Cerebral Erruption
2 Grasp of Darkness
1 Panic Spellbomb
3 Tainted Strike
1 Throne of Geth
6 Mountain
8 Swamp
That?s right. 14 land and 2 assault strobes. This deck was ridiculously fast. It needed only 3 mana to function and was capable of a turn 3 limited kill off painsmith, tainted strike, and assault strobe. Yes the cards had to show up but I had the numbers in this deck. I?m fairly confident that I could have 2-0-1d with this deck. But it is my own fault for not building it correctly. I don?t suggest trying new deck types in day 2 of a GP.

So all in all, I got 59th. Not terrible, especially since I started off 3-2. I will try to keep writing articles at a decent pace, but I can?t promise anything because of school. Just email me anything you might want me to write an article on at DThomas6@gatech.edu. Also, feel free to talk to me on MTGO if you want to. My MTGO username is Mageazn22. So, until next time?

Jace, the Mind Sculptor - 4 copies
-It's pretty self explanatory here. Jace is what every blue player wants in a deck. He is card advantage and an alternate win condition in the same package. Since this deck will include as many fetchlands as I can fit in Jace's brainstorm will be very strong in the deck.

Preordain - 4 copies
-Over the past few months I have grown very fond of this card. At first glance when it came out, I had just passed it off as a Ponder-like card that is great for digging for "combo" pieces. It turns out I was pretty wrong. The card is great. It makes all of your draws smoother, and topdecking it late game isn't that bad of a thing. Unlike ponder you can just put the two lands you see to the bottom of your library. The card also works incredibly well with Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Now I am including this card, usually a full playset, in almost every deck I am designing that is playing blue. It is a great card.

Jace's Ingenuity ? 4 copies
-The deck needs actual card draw and Ingenuity should fill that role well. As an instant it allows you to keep the options available to you maximized. I'm not sure if a full playset is too many, but this deck will want to draw cards. I'm not anticipating the curve of this deck to be very large.

Next I looked around for what countermagic I wanted to include in the deck. The Furnace Celebration + Awakening Zone combination is really good at killing creatures so I just needed to select a suitable set of countermagic to stop spells that could ruin the deck. Here is what I ultimately decided on for the countermagic:

Mana Leak ? 4 copies
-Mana Leak is a very good card. It is cheap, and allows us to protect ourselves early to mid game fairly well from most anything.

Cancel ? 2 Copies
-I wanted another hard counterspell that could counter anything. Cancel is perfectly fine for this role. As a two of it is mostly for the later parts of the game when Mana Leak becomes less useful.

Negate ? 2 Copies
-I like my two mana counterspells. Since the deck should be able to handle most creatures fairly well I wanted another cheap counterspell that handled the rest. Negate serves that role really well.

With eight counterspells in the deck I think it should be able to defend against the critical spells of the other decks that cannot be dealt with via the Furnace Celebration + Awakening Zone combo. The next thing to address was what cheap spot removal I should include to help survive the early game before the combo gets online. Here's what I decided on:

Lightning Bolt ? 4 copies
-Very efficient one mana removal spell. It kills most of the early game threats and quite a few of the mid game threats. It can also be used to get those last points of damage in to a player for the win.

Burst Lightning ? 1 copy
-I wanted at least one more cheap removal spell and this card is very good. It came down to this vs. arc-trail. I ultimately decided on Burst Lightning because it is an instant. The kicker probably isn't that relevant but it is there.

The next thing to address was the manabase. The cards mentioned above only add up to 33. I wanted a lot of lands in this deck, specifically fetchlands, so that there would never really be any problem using the furnace celebration combo and casting other spells at the same time. Here are the lands I decided on:

Misty Rainforest ? 4 copies
-A fetchland that gives me access to two of my three colors, obviously a playing a full set.

Scalding Tarn ? 4 copies
-See above.

Terramorphic Expanse ? 4 copies
-I wanted at least four more lands that fixed me and triggered the Furnace. I decided on Terramorphic Expanse because it seems perfect for the role.

Basics- 2 Forest, 7 Island, 6 Mountain
-The deck is by far majority blue so I wanted more blue sources. I wanted the two forests instead of just one because there may be a time when you want to play two Awakening Zones in one turn. One forest may ultimately be the right call though; I'll let testing decide that.

The final maindeck is:



The main goal of this deck is to try and use Furnace Celebration in the best way I possibly could. The next thing to do is test the deck against the decks I think that will be played in the format. The deck looks solid, I'm not sure how well it will do against the mana ramp decks. I will be doing that during this next week and sharing my results in the next article. I will also determine a sideboard as I test the matchups and figure out where the deck needs the most help. As always, if you have any questions just e-mail me at dthomas6@gatech.edu .

6. Maelstrom Pulse
One of the most efficient pieces of removal I have ever played with. The flexibility of the card is amazing. I wish it could have hit lands, but then it would have been broken. Just a great card.

5. Path to Exile
I?m not the biggest fan of giving my opponents extra lands, especially when I have to do it early in the game. But, one mana for removal for anything is still just one mana. The overall efficiency of this card is great. Condemn is a solid replacement, but Path is still better overall.

4. Bloodbraid Elf
On many people?s list this is probably the number 1 or number 2 card they will miss most. I know that this is an amazing card, which is why it is still in top 5 on my list, but most of the time I was on the other side of the table. I didn?t spend a whole lot of time cascading into this card. The times I did though, it was an all-star. A 3/2 with haste and an extra effect for 4 mana is never bad.

3. Esper Charm
There is just something about instant speed card draw that can do other things as well that I like. This card has always been useful when I played with it. It had destroyed Oblivion Rings for me, destroyed Bitterblossoms for me, made my opponents discard the last two cards in their hand, made my opponents discard the card the just drew, and obviously drawn me plenty of cards. It is just such a great card.

2. Ajani Vengeant
Over time I grew fond of this planeswalker. He does so much. All three of his abilities are great. Not a whole lot of stories behind this card, he?s just a great planeswalker.

1. Cruel Ultimatum
Those of you who know me should have been able to guess this one. I have always enjoyed playing with this card. It is such a blowout spell. I have very rarely lost a game where I cast this spell on turn 7. It is a perfect example of card advantage. I have tried to play this card as much as possible, so long the deck worked. I?m also sure many people are happy that they won?t have to worry about this card being cast against them again in standard.

There it is, the 10 cards I will miss most from Shards. I am pretty excited though for the new standard format. I am curious to see what Scars of Mirrodin will bring us. A few decks die with the loss of Shards, but that leaves room for plenty of new things to come.

Until next time.

This is just a white weenie deck. Let?s say that for this example, you have been having problems at your local FNM with the mono red decks, they are just fast enough for you to always be behind, so you decide to board like this:

• 4x Kor Firewalker
• 4x Dragon?s Claw
• 4x Celestial Purge
• 3x Leyline of Sanctity

Now you will always be prepared for the red matchups, but you have nothing for any other type of deck. So if the red players end up losing early on and leaving, you are stuck with a board that isn?t very impressive against the rest of the field. I?d rather have help with multiple matchups rather than just one. Unless everyone except for you plays mono red at your store, this board isn?t to saucy.

One of the things you need to make sure of is that when you put cards specifically in your sideboard for certain matches, you have enough cards you want to switch out in your main. You never want to have cards sit in your sideboard unused because you didn?t have anything you could take out for it. It is usually a good idea to test a certain match before deciding what you need to put in your sideboard to help improve the match. You want to know exactly what cards would help your match instead of the cards in your main that were not very useful. Something to keep in mind though is that if a match is already heavily in your favor, you don?t necessarily need to sideboard anything against them. If sideboarding for a particular match increases your win percentage against the deck from 80% to 85%, then it is probably better for you to use the sideboard slots for a different match up.

Here is a decklist for a planeswalker deck:

• 3x Jace, the Mind Sculptor
• 3x Jace Beleren
• 3x Ajani Vengeant
• 3x Gideon Jura
• 3x Elspeth, Knight Errant
• 3x Day of Judgement
• 2x Condemn
• 2x Path to Exile
• 4x Mana Leak
• 4x Wall of Omensv
• 4x Oblivion Ring
• 4x Celestial Colonnade
• 4x Glacial Fortressv
• 3x Scalding Tarn
• 3x Arid Mesa
• 2x Mountain
• 2x Mystifying Maze
• 1x Sejiri Refuge
• 4x Plains
• 3x Island

1x Day of Judgement
4x Negate
4x Baneslayer Angel
2x Wall of Denial
1x Ajani Vengeant
3x Celestial Purge


When I sideboarded I had a plan, I knew exactly what was going out for what. These are some different sideboard plans for certain matchups:

General Control Match:
-3 Day of Judgement -2 Condemn -4 Wall of Omens
+4 Negate +4 Baneslayer Angel +1 Ajani Vengeant

Jund:
-3 Elspeth, Knight Errant -4 Oblivion Ring -1 Gideon Jura -1 Day of Judgement
+4 Baneslayer Angel +3 Celestial Purge +2 Wall of Denial


Naya and Bant:
-4 Mana Leak -3 Jace Beleren
+4 Baneslayer Angel +2 Wall of Denial +1 Day of Judgement

Mono Red:

-4 Oblivion Ring -3 Day of Judgement -3 Elspeth, Knight Errant
+4 Baneslayer Angel +2 Wall of Denial +1 Ajani Vengeant +3 Celestial Purge

Although I did board in Baneslayer Angel in all of these different matchups, I would not want the card in the main deck. At that current time, most of the decks that were being played had plenty of spot removal in their maindecks. Baneslayer Angel would be a lightning rod for removal if it were in the maindeck. The idea is to convince the person you are playing that you have no creatures worth spending removal on in your deck so they sideboard it out for cards to help deal with your planeswalkers. When you bring them in from the sideboard for game two there is a higher chance of them not having removal for the Baneslayer Angel when you play it since they likely boarded out some if not all of their removal. My sideboard in this particular list is pretty simple. I have extra removal, extra counterspells, and a card that gets better after sideboard.

The goal with sideboarding is to have cards for the matchups you feel are the weakest ones so that you have a better chance of winning games two and hopefully three. If you have any questions or want me to write about a specific topic, feel free to e-mail me at dthomas6@gatech.edu. I?ll see you next week.

Overall, this is a solid deck. It has a few removal spells and some tricks with a few bombs. I would expect at least a 2-1 finish with this deck in an 8 person draft. I find this drafting much more exciting than M10 so I will probably draft this set quite often until Scars comes out.

Primeval Titan immediately ramps you to Warp World mana. If you can spare it you can get 2 Khalni Gardens so the Warp World gets more permanents. This is the perfect type of deck to play at FNM. It is fun and just competitive enough to win. Another new card that is included in the deck is Obstinate Baloth. There may not be four in the maindeck of this deck, but it is a great card. It is a better Loxodon Hierarch. I have many a fond memories of playing Loxodon Hierarch in Standard. Card was so good, and Obstinate Baloth is even better.

As always, new lands are extremely interesting. Mystifying Maze is no different. It pays homage to Maze of Ith in staving off attackers, but is a little more balanced. It doesn't mean it isn't good, by no means at all. I think over time we will see quite a bit of play from this card. It is a great control card since it can still tap for mana.

Most of you have figured out how great a card Fauna Shaman is. The card is absolutely amazing. It is a fixed Survival of the Fittest. Sure you only get to use it once per turn, but it can also attack. Fauna Shaman will allow for toolbox creature decks to be made, like Ranger of Eos did, but in a less specific way. You can run a bunch of silver bullets maindeck to get with your Fauna Shamans. I could probably write an article on Fauna Shaman itself but I will leave it as is, the card is simply amazing.

M11 is one of the most interesting core sets of all time in my opinion. I cannot wait to play with the cards and see them in action. I will be head judging the pre-release this weekend up here at 3rd Coast Cards so I hope to see you guys this weekend. As always if you have any questions you can email me at Dthomas6@gatech.edu.

I enjoy playing midrange and control decks so this deck suites my style of play. It has great matchups across the board. Plus, the deck is incredibly fun to play. Planeswalkers and Vengevine!

As a reminder, I am willing to write about any reasonable topic that you guys want me to write about. If you have any ideas or questions, feel free to email me at Dthomas6@gatech.edu.

Originally, I had a single Kor Sanctifiers in the sideboard instead of the Vapor Snare, but I decided on the Vapor Snare last minute at the site due to some intel I had received. I could have realistically done more testing and probably would have come up with a better sideboard.

Surprisingly, I wasn't nervous before the first round of play. I was actually anxious. I realized that I was at a Pro Tour and had the chance at putting my name in the spotlight. In the 5 rounds of constructed I played 3 koros decks, 1 rdw, and 1 mono green eldrazi ramp. Just typical magic matches with nothing interesting happening. I finished it at 3-2, not bad but not great. I was hoping to clean it up in draft.

The draft started of awkwardly. I ended up with 2 echo mages after pack 1 as my only creatures. In packs 2 and 3 I grabbed cards for the UR distortion strike deck. I ended up with only 1 distortion strike though. I had 2 kiln fiends, 2 surrakur spellblades, sphinx of the magosi, and a few pieces of removal. The deck was good but not great. I went 2-1 in the draft pod with the deck and was content with that finish. In round 2 of the draft game 3, I was able to kill my opponent without ever attacking. I played an echo mage on turn 3 and my opponent immediately vendettad it. On turn 6 I played a sphinx of the magosi which was answerd by another vendetta. At this point he was at 11. I played my second echo mage and was able to fully level it up. During my 10th or 11th turn I drew a staggershock and was able to play it copying it with the echo mage for 6 damage and copying it during my upkeep on the rebound for another 6 damage which was lethal. Winning this way was pretty cool.

I finished day 1 with a record of 5-3, just good enough to move on to day 2. I'll save it for another article to talk about the non magic related shenanigans from Puerto Rico.

Day 2 began with a draft. I felt confidant going into the draft that I could at least 2-1 the pod. I got lucky with a pack containing a Drana for pack 1. Then pick 2 of pack 1 I was passed a coralhelm commander, which I consider almost a bomb. It pretty much locked me up in UB. Pack 2 I had some mediocre picks for the deck but at the end of it I was light on removal. Pack 3 I got passed a sphinx of the magosi for the 2nd pick. I was pleased with it. At the end of the draft I had a UB deck that was solid with 3 bombs but light on removal. I finished the draft 2-1 losing to a deck with more bombs. I was content with the finish.

The constructed portion did not start off well. I started off 0-2 losing to 2 UW control variants. The first UW player I lost in game 3 because he stuck Giddeon and I couldn't find an answer in time. The second UW player had eldrazi temples and the big eldrazis to cast with them. Not a good match. To even have a chance at finishing in the money I would have to win out from this point. I won the next two rounds, vs RDW and mono green eldrazi ramp. The last round of the tournament I get paired with Saito. We agree on an intentional draw to guarantee each of us top 100 since both of us had incredibly bad tiebreakers and were unlikely to make the top 65 if either of us won the match.

My final standing in the tournament was 70th, not bad for my first pro tour. I lost 6 points overall on my total rating. This kept me qualified for Nationals and likely the next pro tour.

Thanks for reading my first article and I hope you keep reading. If you want me to write about any particular topic, e-mail me at Dthomas6@gatech.edu and I will try to cover a topic if it is reasonable.