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Finding the SolutionBy Stefan Preiml on January 3rd, 2006 · Filed in Extended (Type 1.x) · 3 CommentsIntro
Yay, a deck full of shenanigans, either stealing your opponent's creatures with Gilded Drake, then returning the drake to your hand with Waterfront Bouncer, or removing a load of opposing creatures or lands due to the interaction of Parallax Enchantments and Stifle. First Concept Dempsey's was a nice deck. Unfortunately for me, a passionate aggro-control player, I never really had the cards for that deck, and also wanted to keep playing The Rock at that time. But back in July, with a glimpse of a new format on the horizon, I was planning to play a U/W aggro-control deck. If you want to see how my first build was and take a good laugh, here it is:
Yup the deck was odd. Stormscape Apprentice? No Angels? Maindeck Stifles? Yup some strange things going down. As you may see, I was more or less emulating the deck from last season, but looking back, this was also somewhat prophetic with 3 maindeck Katakis, though they're a better fit in Boros Deck Wins than they are in here. I was experimenting with this deck a lot, trying to improve matchups by changing some cards. The worst of it, somehow, was Goblins, but anything that was slower than the little red men was manageable or, despite this odd nature of the deck, a decent matchup. Trinket Mage to the Rescue The Trinket Tutor  , with Pithing Needle being the most prominent. The deck also included Umezawa's Jitte, and for its heavy use of artifacts, the Katakis went to the bench and Thirst for Knowledge provided an excellent draw engine.After that, Pro Tour: Los Angeles was already rolling around, and when I made my research for Big Toothy Grins and Being Shot Down in Flames, I stumbled across the decks of Markus Petterson and Erik Gröndahl that would prove that my friend's friend and I were not the only players with that archetype in mind.
Looks like an Invitational Winner Convention Damn you, snow! So now I was preparing myself for the two Austrian PTQs I would drive to, taking a bunch of local kids with me, with the first one being on the weekend before Worlds. Unfortunately, just on this weekend one of the fiercest snowstorms in recent history scotched that. Travel by car was almost impossible and for me, a novice driver, too risky. Train tickets were also too expensive for my taste, so I had to let this chance pass and try my luck on the PTQ two weeks later. In between, Worlds went down. Wizards had a feature on their site for "Fun Extended Decks", that included, besides "The Phantom Menace," the following deck:
I hope you recognize the resemblance. The Solution But now, without further ado, the deck I played in the PTQ:
Unfortunately, I only went 2-2-2 at the PTQ, with a loss to the Rock, probably the worst matchup, and to CAL, which is normally a good matchup, but I got destroyed by the tech of Sterling Grove. The draws were against CAL and Affinity, both missing one extra turn for my win. I won against a CAL deck and a Rock deck. To play the Deck Easily the All-Star in the Team Don't confuse it with a normal metagame deck that relies on beating a certain matchup and playing all day against it. This deck has its strong sides against certain decks, but is capable of beating anything. Here are some matchup analyses for you: Dredgeatog: If you can sneak in a Pithing Needle or two and fend off its artifact destruction with counters or Pikulas, you can easily win. Just be careful with the Deeds and a possible Darkblast. Normally, you board in Purges and maybe Kira. Boros Deck Wins: This matchup can be very dependent on the draw of the Boros player. I would recommand aggressively mulliganing into a Silver Knight, but due to his pressence and Worship, this is a nice Matchup. Boarding in the third Worship as well as all Kiras is just further enhancing. Friggorid: Silver Knight is shutting them down if they can't come up with a Wonder fast enough. You also randomly auto-win against them by putting down a Meddling Mage on Ray of Revelation and a Worship. Friggorid doesn't play any kind of creature removal, and as long as you don't let your Mage run into a Stinkweed Imp, you're safe to wait for a Meloku for the win. CAL: Normally a decent matchup, as you can auto-win via Pithing Needle on Seismic Assault and Meddling Mage on Burning Wish. Your opponent will have to draw himself to death unless he is playing Genesis, which you can easily answer with Scrabbling Claws. Affinity: The Normal Affinity deck is unable to answer Worship, and as long as you are Meddling Maging for removal spells like Fire / Ice, Darkblast, and sometimes Shrapnel Blast and Pyrite Spellbomb, you should easily win with The Solution. Your boarding options are also supperb. Just board in Kataki, and Kira to defend it from Darkblast. The Rock: Easily your worst matchup due to their habit of playing four Putrefy maindeck. Normally you board in Kira, Great-Glass Spinner and Disenchants to counteract their equipment and removal spells. Don't be afraid to stuff Kira into a Hypnotic Specter; it's better to kill that guy than lose a random card in your hand and still have to deal with the Specter next turn. Goblins: Silver Knight + Worship = Win. The only thing that made me lose to Goblins once was Dralnu's Crusade. Tooth and Nail: Very odd, because I never thought of testing this matchup, and now I have to include it as it made Top 8 in Charlotte. Meddling Mage on Tooth and Nail and Pithing Needle on Oblivion Stone should buy you some time. Counter the fatties while you're attacking. Heartbeat Combo: Meddling Mage is just superb here. Scepter Chant: Pithing Needle? Sideboarding Options When I put the sideboard together to compete in PTQs I realized that U/W has a ton of sideboard options available. I just want to acknowledge some of these here. Making life way more difficult To Combat CAL and Dredgeatog, you also have some nice options beside the obligatory Disenchants and Purges. On one hand you have Hokori, Dust Drinker, which also works against controllish Rock Decks. Both Psychatog and CAL tend to tap out in the early game, and this is where Hokori jumps in. Another card I found interesting was Morningtide. You never really care about your graveyard anyway, since your cards are always dead and gone once they reached the bin, but Morningtide rips apart both decks mentioned above and can also kick Heartbeat in the groin. Another interesting card choice is Annul, which is capable of hitting the weak spots of NO Stick, CAL, and Affinity. After that you still have a relatively wide choice among removal spells, with Disenchant being the obvious flagship for its utility factor. Then you have Purge, with its Master's Degree in killing Psychatogs, and Devouring Light, a rising star in creature destruction, IMHO. There is also a pet card of mine that I found just impossible to include in the sideboard. Suppression Field is unfortunately hindering you in your game here as you are using Fetchlands, Umezawa's Jitte and Meloku, and a ton of artifacts with activated abilities. Other possibilities friends of mine suggested were Sword of Fire and Ice,wich is good against both Boros Deck Wins and The Rock, and True Believer, which stops the heavy Discard attacks The Rock and CAL, and sometimes Psychatog to a minor degree, can unleash upon you. End of Story? Yeah, maybe I'm stretching this part a bit, but this deck is really nice, and I hope some of you might pick it up for the next Extended season. Unfortunately it will be some time until this deck will be available for tournament play again as Limited, Standard, and Block Constructed Seasons are coming up next. With the Azorius Senate Guild coming in Dissension, using the very color combination this deck relies on, we might find a number of useful cards for it as well, enhancing this deck even further. Credits: Writing: chaosof99; Banner & Images: iloveatogs; Editing: Dr. Tom and Binary By Stefan Preiml on January 3rd, 2006 · Filed in Extended (Type 1.x) · 3 Comments |
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