Thursday, December 4, 2008

Magic The Gathering Worlds 2008

The 2008 Magic: The Gathering World Championships is the culmination of the Magic year. Players from more than 50 countries will come together in Memphis, Tennessee for the pinnacle of international Magic competition. National Champions, Pro Tour winners, the highest-ranked DCI players, and more will square off to earn the coveted title of "World Champion."

Worlds also features the best public events of the season, topped by a series of gold-themed tournaments culminating in a top prize of $10,000 in 14k gold. There's also a slew of attractions inside the hall such as A Planeswalker's Journey through Worlds, artist signings, fan activities, game shows, trading, and much more for every type of Magic player.

The 2008 World Championships will be held December 11-14 at the Memphis Cook Convention Center.

Tournament Information

The 2008 World Championships is a four-day event featuring Standard, Shards of Alara Booster Draft, Extended, and National Team Three-Person Team Constructed.

The Player Party and Registration will take place at Graceland on Wednesday, December 10 (6 p.m. - 10 p.m.). For more information, click here.

  • Format and Schedule
  • Prize Payout
  • Invitation List
  • Graceland Player Party and Registration Information

  • Tournament Location

    Memphis Cook Convention Center
    255 North Main
    Memphis, TN 38103

    Hall Hours

    Thursday, December 11: 8:30 a.m. - 3:00 a.m
    Friday, December 12: 8:30 a.m. - 3:00 a.m
    Saturday, December 13: 8:30 a.m. - 3:00 a.m
    Sunday, December 14: 8:30 a.m. - 3:00 a.m

    Hotel Information

  • Memphis Marriott Downtown Hotel (connected to the Convention Center): 901-527-7300
  • Wyndham Garden Hotel (two blocks away): 300 N. Second Street, 901-525-1800 230
  • SpringHill Suites (three blocks away): 21 N. Main Street, 901-522-2100 102 Sleep Inn
  • Court Square (three blocks away): 40 N. Front Street, 901-522-9700 124
  • Comfort Inn Downtown (three blocks away): 100 N. Front Street, 901-526-0583

  • More hotel information is available on the Memphis Cook Convention Center website.

    Transportation

    Wizards of the Coast has made arrangements with a shuttle service to facilitate transportation between Memphis International Airport and the downtown area. Calling to book pick-up 24 hours in advance is advised for departure. All anyone has to do is let the driver know you are with the "Wizards of the Coast" group.

    Round trip = $20

    link: http://www.wizards.com/Magic/TCG/Events.aspx?x=events/magic/worlds

    Saturday, October 4, 2008

    California Regionals Standard Report

    by TheInferno

    This year regionals was held at a venue called Great Escape Games. My girlfriend and I arrive at the scene with neither of us having slept in the last thirty hours. ( No we aren't tweakers we just had a lot to do the night before.) My girl and I immediately get in an argument when we find that mapquest skipped a step when explaining where this place was. Great Escape is conveniently located BEHIND an Old Navy store. When I say behind, I literally mean we pulled into the shopping center drove around all of the stores a few times and then drove into the back of the shopping center where old navy's loading dock was before spotting it. I'm guessing it's called great escape because if your are running from a store that you have stolen something from, this is where you go.
    Anyways...

    I meet up with all of the other Reno players in the parking lot (Shyft, Jon Stocks, Nick, Brad, and St). I was hoping that one of them would have Mutavaults handy but it's then that a playset of Mutavaults is more expensive than a barrel of oil. The only man with mutavaults in the whole tournament let me borrow them for $40 and $100 in collateral!!!! I have to agree to this seeing as how my deck is garbage without them. I register this deck with one minute to spare and zero hours of testing under my belt...




















    UW Merfolk
    Main Deck Sideboard
    4 Lord of Atlantis
    4 Merrow Rejeerey
    4 Cursecatcher
    2 Tideshaper Mystic
    4 Silvergill Adept
    4 Sower of Temptation
    2 Sygg River Guide
    4 Stonybrook Banneret
    4 Mana Tithe
    4 Sages Dousing
    2 Cryptic Command
    2 Mystic Gate
    4 Wanderwine Hub
    4 Adarkar Wastes
    4 Mutavault
    7 Snow-Covered Island
    1 Snow-Covered Plains
    1 Venser, Shaper Savant
    4 Burrenton Forge-Tender
    3 Flashfreeze
    4 Sunlance
    3 Stone Cloaker



    Round 1: Josh ( Faeries) Josh is on the play game 1
    Game 1: Josh leads out with turn two Bitterblossom which I'm not very afraid of with two Lord of Atlantis in my hand staring back at me. I play turn one Cursecatcher, turn two lord, and turn three Rejerrey. On my fourth upkeep he attempted to Mistbind Clique which was immediately met by a Mana Tithe.
    "MANA TITHE," he yelped, "What kind of garbage are you playing?" Turn 4 Rejerrey, Lord, Lord was enough to take game one.
    1-0
    Game 2: On the draw I choose to play turn one untapped revealing Cursecatcher and pass. At this point Josh either didn't care or completely forgot about my Mana Tithe that won the last game, but he played Bitterblossom straight through my untapped white producing land. Of course I was bluffing....how obvious could it be? Anyhow, his blossom produced enough faeries for him to beat me down to twelve with and then came back to back scion of Oona's to put me away while stuck on three land.
    1-1
    Game3: NUTS!! First turn Cursecatcher. Second turn Cursecather, Mana Tithe his Bitterblossom. Third Turn Merrow Rejeerey. Fourth turn Lord, Lord, Mana Tithe his Cryptic Command on my fifth turn for the win! He was a little bit more than angry.
    1-0
    Games: 2-1

    Round 2: Another Josh ( More Faeries) I am on the play game 1
    This match was really boring.... Game 1: Josh mulls to five while I'm looking down at Island, Island, Mutavault, Lord, Rej, Catcher, Dousing.
    He only played two land this game. My notes for this game were: He M to 5. Oppo= No second land until turn he loses.
    1-0
    Game 2: This game was as exciting as the first. I played Curse catcher followed by Banneret. After that I doused his next three spells and then Cryptic commanded his first Bitterblossom of the match and beat him down with my two 1/1s and two Vaults.
    2-0
    Games: 3-1

    Round 3: Jeremy (5c Combo simalar to 420.5n) Jeremy is on the play game 1
    Game 1: All I can say about this game is with me at nine and him having six permanents on the board, Jeremy sacrificed his Horizon Canopy to draw a card and then proceeded to Firespout to kill my whole team and put counters on his Kitchen Finks and Murderous Redcap, and then sacrificed his whole board to put Greater Gargadon in play since I only had a plains open thinking this was the play that would end the game and then…MANA TITHE!!! He effectively Obliterated his half of the board! I drew Silvergill, which drew me a Mutavault, which both attacked four times to win me the game. Try to tell me that this isn't the best punt in magic history!
    1-0
    Game 2: Jerry drew multiple firespouts to ruin my aggro draw with no counters. He won the game with three kitchen finks and a Horde of Notions.
    1-1
    Game 3: I lead out with two Burrenton Forge-Tender and a Silvergill Adept with a Mana Tithe for his Kitchen Finks. From here on out I had a counter for every spell he attempted to play for the rest of the game. Thank God for punt of the century!!!
    Matches: 3-0
    Games: 6-2

    Round 4: Miles ( Mono Red Burn) Miles is on the play
    Game 1: Due to my lack of any sort of testing I had no clue this deck even existed. His draw was great game one but mine was about par with it. The game came down to him drawing only to a burn spell that did three or more damage and he ripped Rift Bolt for the win.
    0-1

    Games 2 and 3 my notes were almost identical. Turn one Forge-tender. Turn two Silvergill. Turn three Forge-tender, Flashfreeze his creature and proceed to smash with tender and two Mutavaults for the rest of the game. I find that this match is very easy to deal with if you draw multiple Forge-Tender and Flashfreeze.
    Matches: 4-0
    Games: 8-3
    Round 5: Yong (LARK!!!!!!!1 YAY) I am on the play
    Game 1: I didn't know much about the format but I know this matchup was great for me. At this point my lack of rest started to catching up to me. This game I had Sygg River Guide on the board the whole game with him controlling an Island, but I never attacked. Whenever I get close to top 8 I get pretty nervous and when it is mixed with sleep deprivation I am terrible. He plays land-go forever until I get ready to start attacking for the win. He Cryptic Commands three turns in a row tapping down my team; he didn't realize these attacks would have only taken him down to one, so I saved my own Cryptic Command for Wrath of God. He attempted to Wrath, I countered and drew a Rejeerey for the win.
    1-0

    Game 2: Yong goes into the tank for roughly five minutes while thinking about whether or not to keep his seven card hand and eventually decides to keep it. I play turn one Cursecatcher, turn two Mutavault and Silvergill Adept, and he scoops on his fourth turn becuase of a lack of land and my ability to draw great hands in this situation.
    Matches: 5-0
    Games: 10-3
    Round 6: Jon Stocks (Mono Red Burn) Jon is from Reno and a good friend of mine so we draw with both of us only needing 1 more win to top 8!!!

    Round 7: Jacob Mills ( Homebrewed U/G) I am on the play... I think
    I am basically asleep for this whole match. I didn't keep very good notes, and I punted three times in game two. Game three I won on turn five of time and burst into celebration. I'm sorry Jacob, I wish I remembered this match. TIME FOR TOP 8!!!!!
    I intentionally draw round 8.
    During round 8 I met up with the other three players that intentionally drew... We smoked and talked about our decks. Two of them were playing faeries and the other was playing merfolk. Suddenly I'm feeling very comfortable with my odds of going to nationals. I re-entered the room just in time to see another faeries deck take out G/R mana ramp and Jacob beat his opponent. So far I'm pretty sure I have a bye against most of T8.

    Top 8: Mark (Faeries) Mark Is on the play
    Game 1: My deck shines in this game. Turn one Cursecatcher. Turn two Jeremy resolves a Bitterblossom. Turn two I play Silvergill Adept. Turn three I play Lord of Atlantis, which Mark immediately attempts to smother. I sacrifice Cursecatcher he pays 1 of course, and I Mana Tithe. Turn four Mark attempts to Mistbind Clique which is met by another Mana Tithe. I draw Mutavault and the game is history from there.
    1-0
    Game 2: My opening hand is Mutavault, Adarkar Wastes, Lord of Atlantis, Lord of Atlantis, Cursecatcher, Cursecatcher, Sages Dousing. Eventually I decided to keep since I was on the draw and this hand had some serious potential. I didn't draw a second blue producing land as Mark's deck delivered and average hand and an average outcome against a land screwed deck. After some joking around and quoting The Office Mark and I get back to it.
    Game 3: (What a way to end it) After much contemplation Mark and I both decide to keep our hands.Mark suspends Ancestral Visions. I play Stonybrook Banneret. Turn two Mark Played Bitterblossom. Turn three I played Sygg. Sadly enough he was the best creature in my hand, but I did have three Sages dousing. Mark keeps the aggression on with Bitterblossom but doesn't play anything else. On my fourth turn I draw Silvergill Adept which Mark attempts to Spellshutter Sprite which is met by one of my three Sages Dousings. I draw Lord of Atlantis and Island and pass. On his fourth turn Mark finally plays an Island so I can get in there with my Banneret and Sygg, now that they can't block Mark attacks with his two bitterblossom tokens, putting me at 18. On my turn I draw Lord of Atlantis and go into the tank. Do I play a lord and attack putting him at seven and just cast one dousing on the visions which is coming out of suspend next turn? Do I play both lords since he only has two cards in hand and hope that neither of them is a counter or terror or cryptic command? I decide to attack for three putting him at thirteen. At the end of the turn Mark plays Scion of Oona. This makes things really interesting. Do I douse this or do I double douse the visions and go to nine. I decided to race. But wait! Mark lets the first Sages Dousing Resolve and doesn't pay. I draw Island from Sages Dousing. He attacks for six which puts me at twelve and attempts to play Vendilion Clique I have to counter this because it represents unblockable lethal damage. I draw Adarkar Wastes off of Sages dousing. Mark Terrors my Sygg while I am tapped out. Mark now has zero cards in had with two open land. My draw is another Adarkar Wastes of course. I play Lord, Lord attack with the team which puts Mark at seven and a certain end to his regionals. Mark draws and all of his buddies gasp as he flips over another Scion of Oona. I show him my two land hand and give him a well deserved hand shaking. What a match. Mark is a great kid and an even better opponent. I wish you the best of luck at nationals.
    On no sleep, no testing and no Mutavaults when I walked into the room, I top 8ed at regionals. It was an uphill battle, but it was a lot of fun.
    On no sleep, no testing I lost to a top deck.

    Saturday, February 16, 2008

    Extended Tournament 16 February Top 8 Decks

    DeathCloud 
    //Lands
    3 Overgrown Tomb
    4 Bloodstained Mire
    3 Wooded Foothills
    1 Polluted Delta
    2 Tainted Wood
    3 Golgari Rot Farm
    3 Snow-Covered Forest
    4 Snow-Covered Swamp

    //Creatures
    4 Ravenous Baloth
    4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
    4 Tarmogoyf

    //Spells
    4 Garruk Wildspeaker
    2 Liliana Vess
    4 Thoughtseize
    3 Smother
    3 Pernicious Deed
    4 Sensei's Divining Top
    3 Death Cloud
    2 Damnation

    //Sideboard
    1 Smother
    1 Damnation
    4 Leyline of the Void
    3 Extirpate
    2 Darkheart Sliver
    3 Duress
    1 Boseiju, Who Shelters All


    Hearbeat Combo
    //Lands
    8 Forest
    6 Island
    4 Snow-Covered Forest
    4 Snow-Covered Island

    //Creatures
    4 Sakura-Tribe Elder

    //Spells
    1 Brain Freeze
    4 Cunning Wish
    2 Deep Analysis
    3 Early Harvest
    2 Fact or Fiction
    4 Gifts Ungiven
    4 Heartbeat of Spring
    3 Mind's Desire
    3 Moment's Peace
    1 Nostalgic Dreams
    1 Recollect
    3 Remand
    1 Revive
    2 Search for Tomorrow

    //Sideboard
    2 Brain Freeze
    1 Chain of Vapor
    1 Early Harvest
    1 Echoing Truth
    2 Engineered Explosives
    1 Fact or Fiction
    2 Gigadrowse
    1 Hunting Pack
    1 Krosan Grip
    1 Moment's Peace
    1 Pact of Negation
    1 Stifle


    DeathCloud
    //Lands
    1 [GP] Godless Shrine
    2 [RAV] Overgrown Tomb
    2 [ON] Bloodstained Mire
    2 [ON] Windswept Heath
    2 [AP] Llanowar Wastes
    4 [7E] Swamp (1)
    1 [PLC] Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
    6 [10E] Forest (3)
    2 [FUT] Horizon Canopy
    2 [10E] Treetop Village

    // Creatures
    2 [LRW] Liliana Vess
    3 [FD] Eternal Witness
    4 [ON] Ravenous Baloth
    4 [LRW] Garruk Wildspeaker
    4 [CHK] Sakura-Tribe Elder

    // Spells
    3 [PLC] Harmonize
    2 [PLC] Damnation
    2 [MR] Chrome Mox
    3 [ON] Smother
    2 [AP] Pernicious Deed
    3 [DS] Death Cloud
    4 [7E] Duress

    // Sideboard
    SB: 1 [PLC] Damnation
    SB: 1 [AP] Pernicious Deed
    SB: 4 [GP] Leyline of the Void
    SB: 3 [SOK] Pithing Needle
    SB: 3 [TSP] Krosan Grip
    SB: 3 [PLC] Extirpate


    Doran Rock
    // Lands
    2 [ON] Bloodstained Mire
    2 [GP] Godless Shrine
    2 [MOR] Murmuring Bosk
    2 [RAV] Overgrown Tomb
    1 [CHK] Shizo, Death's Storehouse
    3 [10E] Treetop Village
    4 [ON] Windswept Heath
    1 [ON] Wooded Foothills
    3 [UNH] Forest
    1 [UNH] Swamp
    1 [UNH] Plains

    // Creatures
    4 [10E] Birds of Paradise
    4 [RAV] Dark Confidant
    3 [LRW] Doran, the Siege Tower
    4 [RAV] Loxodon Hierarch
    4 [FUT] Tarmogoyf

    // Spells
    4 [JU] Cabal Therapy
    3 [7E] Duress
    3 [RAV] Putrefy
    2 [ON] Smother
    3 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte
    4 [AP] Vindicate

    // Sideboard
    SB: 2 [TSP] Krosan Grip
    SB: 2 [MOR] Offalsnout
    SB: 3 [AP] Pernicious Deed
    SB: 4 [GP] Leyline of the Void
    SB: 2 [DIS] Indrik Stomphowler
    SB: 2 [LRW] Gaddock Teeg


    UB Moonlace Aggro Rock Midrange Combo
    // Lands
    4 [UL] Faerie Conclave
    4 [ON] Flooded Strand
    4 [ON] Polluted Delta
    4 [LRW] Secluded Glen
    3 [RAV] Watery Grave
    1 [DIS] Hallowed Fountain
    2 [TSB] Pendelhaven
    2 [UNH] Island

    // Creatures
    4 [LRW] Scion of Oona
    4 [LRW] Spellstutter Sprite
    4 [LRW] Oona's Prowler
    4 [LRW] Nightshade Stinger
    4 [MM] Cloud Sprite
    3 [LRW] Mistbind Clique

    // Spells
    3 [MOR] Bitterblossom
    4 [MM] Counterspell
    4 [SC] Stifle
    2 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte

    // Sideboard
    SB: 1 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte
    SB: 4 [BOK] Threads of Disloyalty
    SB: 3 [OD] Sphere of Law
    SB: 4 [UL] Engineered Plague
    SB: 3 [TSP] Moonlace


    Next Level Blue:
    // Lands
    1 [TSP] Academy Ruins
    4 [ON] Flooded Strand
    4 [ON] Polluted Delta
    1 [GP] Steam Vents
    2 [DIS] Breeding Pool
    1 [RAV] Watery Grave
    1 [MR] Tree of Tales
    6 [PT] Island (4)
    1 [DIS] Hallowed Fountain
    1 [SOK] Miren, the Moaning Well

    // Creatures
    4 [FUT] Tarmogoyf
    3 [FD] Trinket Mage

    // Spells
    4 [7E] Counterspell
    4 [CS] Counterbalance
    4 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
    2 [MR] Thirst for Knowledge
    1 [CH] Tormod's Crypt
    1 [FD] Engineered Explosives
    3 [MR] Chrome Mox
    3 [FD] Vedalken Shackles
    3 [JU] Living Wish
    3 [BOK] Threads of Disloyalty
    3 [7E] Force Spike

    // Sideboard
    SB: 1 [TSP] Academy Ruins
    SB: 2 [CH] Tormod's Crypt
    SB: 1 [10E] Pithing Needle
    SB: 1 [CHK] Meloku the Clouded Mirror
    SB: 3 [LRW] Sower of Temptation
    SB: 1 [DIS] Indrik Stomphowler
    SB: 1 [SOK] Kataki, War's Wage
    SB: 1 [LRW] Gaddock Teeg
    SB: 1 [FUT] Yixlid Jailer
    SB: 3 [TSP] Ancient Grudge


    Mono Red Burn
    // Lands
    4 [OD] Barbarian Ring
    4 [DS] Blinkmoth Nexus
    4 [MR] Great Furnace
    6 [LRW] Mountain (2)
    2 [MOR] Mutavault
    1 [DS] Darksteel Citadel

    // Creatures
    4 [PLC] Keldon Marauders
    4 [10E] Mogg Fanatic
    2 [ON] Blistering Firecat

    // Spells
    4 [MOR] Shard Volley
    4 [10E] Incinerate
    4 [TSP] Rift Bolt
    3 [TSB] Browbeat
    3 [JU] Lava Dart
    4 [CHK] Lava Spike
    4 [MR] Shrapnel Blast
    3 [BOK] Flames of the Blood Hand

    // Sideboard
    SB: 4 [SC] Sulfuric Vortex
    SB: 3 [JU] Flaring Pain
    SB: 4 [TSB] Tormod's Crypt
    SB: 4 [GP] Shattering Spree


    Ideal:

    // Lands
    1 [LRW] Plains (4)
    1 [8E] City of Brass
    1 [TSB] Gemstone Mine
    1 [DIS] Hallowed Fountain
    1 [RAV] Sacred Foundry
    2 [CHK] Boseiju, Who Shelters All
    2 [ON] Windswept Heath
    2 [ON] Flooded Strand
    4 [IN] Ancient Spring
    4 [IN] Tinder Farm
    4 [IN] Sulfur Vent

    // Spells
    1 [CHK] Honden of Seeing Winds
    1 [AP] Pernicious Deed
    2 [JU] Solitary Confinement
    2 [PS] Orim's Chant
    2 [DIS] Dovescape
    3 [SOK] Enduring Ideal
    3 [9E] Form of the Dragon
    3 [MR] Seething Song
    4 [TSP] Lotus Bloom
    4 [AP] Fire/Ice
    4 [JU] Burning Wish
    4 [FD] Pentad Prism
    4 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top

    // Sideboard
    SB: 1 [SOK] Enduring Ideal
    SB: 4 [8E] Boil
    SB: 1 [10E] Pyroclasm
    SB: 1 [LRW] Thoughtseize
    SB: 4 [TSB] Tormod's Crypt
    SB: 4 [GP] Leyline of the Void

    Tuesday, January 15, 2008

    TEPS for new Extended

    Yeah, I know, it sounds disgusting doesn’t it? Still, that’s the word that Craig the Editor used earlier this week to describe the act of playtesting Extended with Mind’s Desire, a.k.a. The Extended Perfect Storm, a.k.a. TEPS. This article is primarily intended for those of you who are fairly new to Extended, or Combo decks, or TEPS specifically. If you’re a 1950-ranked Pro, you might just find some new wrinkle here, but the chances are that you already know all the stuff I’m going to tell you, and more. Why not save yourself the bother and go back to thinking about Draft archetypes for Kuala Lumpur next month?

    Right, now that the game’s geniuses have gone, we can get cosy. Let’s kick off by looking at the deck, and then we’ll talk a bit about what all the cards do, what they should do, and most importantly what they can do when you’re up against a brick wall. Then we’ll move on to some test games on Magic Online, and we’ll end by concluding you should all be dull and go and play Doran decks anyway. The decklist:

    Maindeck:
    Artifacts
    4 Chromatic Sphere
    4 Chromatic Star
    4 Chrome Mox
    4 Lotus Bloom

    Instants
    4 Cabal Ritual
    4 Seething Song

    Sorceries
    4 Burning Wish
    3 Channel The Suns
    4 Infernal Tutor
    3 Mind's Desire
    4 Rite Of Flame
    2 Sins Of The Past
    1 Tendrils Of Agony

    Lands
    3 Gemstone Mine
    3 Geothermal Crevice
    2 Irrigation Ditch
    4 Sulfur Vent
    3 Tinder Farm

    Sideboard:
    3 Krosan Grip
    3 Orim's Chant
    1 Channel The Suns
    1 Duress
    2 Empty The Warrens
    1 Eye Of Nowhere
    1 Mind's Desire
    1 Pyroclasm
    1 Sins Of The Past
    1 Tendrils Of Agony

    This, boys and girls, is most definitely not a 60 card deck. No, it’s a 69 card deck, it’s just that 9 of those start out in the Sideboard. Tutoring effects are amongst the game’s most powerful historically, and if you haven’t been playing long you might not have experienced the straight-to-hand power punch of a decent tutor. Mind you, even the Harbingers in Lorwyn Limited give you a glimpse of that. Here we have Burning Wish, a card that allows us to get any of our 9 sorceries out of the sideboard and into our hand at the price of just two mana. It’s no coincidence that many Black players name Burning Wish as their first stab-in-the-dark with Cabal Therapy.

    But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. What does the deck aim to do? First, put a lot of mana into play. Second, convert this boatload of mana into one killer turn, building up a Storm count ready to be exploited by Mind’s Desire. This six-mana beauty allows you to remove cards from the game and then play them for free. This, all being well, allows you to wade your way through as much of your deck as you need before using the Storm mechanic again with Tendrils Of Agony aimed at your opponent. In that one turn, they can lose far more life than they have. So now let’s see how the components of our deck shape our gameplan.

    Geothermal Crevice, Irrigation Ditch, Sulfur Vent, and Tinder Farm.

    Mana acceleration generally comes at a price, most often in terms of disposability. Cards like Birds Of Paradise that let you ‘cheat’ on mana turn after turn are in demand for a reason. As for land, most of the time there’s a penalty to pay for generating more than one mana. In the case of these Invasion lands, the penalty is that you have to sacrifice the land to get the second mana out of them. Fortunately for us, having cards in our graveyard is no bad thing, as we’ll see.

    Gemstone Mine.

    One of the challenges about putting this deck together so that it functions is the problem of running many many colors. Joseph and his Amazing Technicolor Deckcoat wouldn’t have as many colors as this bad boy. While the Invasion lands are something of a blunt instrument, Gemstone Mine is our go-to-guy in a mana crisis when the quantity is less important than the quality. Like Aladdin’s genie, the Mine can grant you three wishes, and frankly, anyone who can’t win a game of Magic after that kind of help doesn’t deserve it. Still, we really don’t want to have color issues, so...

    Chromatic Star, Chromatic Sphere.

    Eight one-mana artifacts join the team, and they serve four functions in our deck. First, they get to generate the color of mana we need when we want it, and at essentially no cost (although we have to have one mana available to activate them, we get one mana back.) Second, when we sacrifice them, we get to draw a card deeper into our deck. This is good times, when we’re busy searching for killer cards from our library. Third, they fill the graveyard, pushing us towards Threshold, which is key for one of our cards. And fourth, because they’re so cheap at one mana each, we can cast them on the turn we propose to win sometimes, generating an extra tick in the Storm count, increasing our chances of success. One little aside, although they mostly do exactly the same thing as each other, the Chromatic Star allows you to draw a card even if it has been destroyed by your opponent. Worth bearing in mind if you have both in hand and expect some countermeasures.

    Chrome Mox, Lotus Bloom.

    The zero cost Mox helps boost our mana supply, and can get us out of tight spots regarding mana color if we Imprint wisely. Because it costs precisely nothing, we’ll be casting these like they’re going out of fashion on the turn that we ‘go off,’ i.e. win. Remember, the higher the Storm count, the more likely we are to win, so this is just gravy. The Bloom gets suspended, generally on turn 1 if we can make it so, and will appear as scheduled on turn 4. Especially on the draw (going second), turn 4 is when we expect to drop our load and do our thing (that’s another way of saying ‘win’). The Bloom not only gives us a three mana shot in the arm, it also contributes to the Storm count.

    Cabal Ritual, Rite Of Flame, Seething Song.

    These are our dedicated bonus mana producers. On our winning turn, we want to cast as many spells as possible, and that means mana. Seething Song is the most dependable of the three, since it always always always gives you two more than you started with. On the downside, if you started with UBR mana in your pool, out the other side of a Song you’re looking at RRRRR. Perhaps you’re starting to see why those one-mana artifacts are a bit good? Rite Of Flame is never bad, but gets incrementally better as you see more of them. The first Rite gets you plus one mana (single R becomes RR), the second gives you plus two net (R becomes RRR) and so on. It’s pretty unlikely that you’ll actually cast three or four before you get to the initial Mind’s Desire, and from there on they’re free to cast anyway. Cabal Ritual is the most interesting and often the most important of the bunch. Unlike Song, which is a static +2 mana, or Rite which could be 1,2,3, or 4+, but is always a known factor (‘there have been none so far, therefore this Rite will generate plus 1,’ for example), Cabal Ritual is an either/or card. Either you don’t have Threshold, in which case you get +1 mana, or you’re in the happy position of having 7 cards in your graveyard already, at which point it’s +3 mana. I have to tell you, most of the time you need that +3, so you want to be planning on obtaining Threshold, which isn’t always as easy as it looks. One of the quickest ways to improve when you first start playing with TEPS is to pay attention to your Cabal Rituals and make sure they give you that +3 bonus. When we get to Sins Of The Past, I’ll explain a bit more about this.

    Channel The Suns.

    Although Channel does give us a minor mana boost of +1, that’s not the reason we’re playing it. Rather, it’s the ultimate mana fixer. G and WWW? Cast Channel, it’s one of everything. GRUB? Cast Channel, it’s one of everything. BBBG? Cast Channel....you get the idea. You know the Spice Girls song ‘Two Become One’...? Channel The Suns is ‘Four Become Five,’ and you might feel like singing about it too.

    Sins Of The Past, Infernal Tutor.

    In a way, these are our Get Out Of Jail Free cards. Infernal Tutor isn’t that great a lot of the time. For it to really shine we need Hellbent, so it has to be the last card in our hand. When we’re busy going off that’s not a major problem, and at that point it functions like a super-Burning Wish, that can get any card at all from our entire library, most often Mind’s Desire. When we have plenty of cards still in hand, it can only find something that’s already in our hand. This can be fine if all we want is more mana - a second Cabal Ritual or Rite or Song or Channel - but it does nothing to find the missing pieces from our setup. As for Sins Of The Past, it’s an unwieldy bugger of a card at 6 mana, but has the advantage of costing nothing but Black mana. This is another reason why Cabal Ritual is so important as a +3 spell, because Sins is the ultimate backup spell, where you get to play Mind’s Desire from out of the graveyard if you haven’t managed to sew up the game on your first Stormed-up Desire. It’s very very hard to lose if you have Sins plus mana as backup when you go off.

    Burning Wish.

    You know how you’re only allowed four of any one card in a deck? Not in this deck. Here you have 7 Channel the Suns, 7 Mind’s Desire, 6 Sins Of The Past and so on... well, not literally, but that’s the effect of playing Burning Wish. When you draw it, what it’s really saying is, ‘Hi. I’m your friendly Burning Wish, and I want to be your low-maintenance girlfriend. What would you like me to be today? For just R1 I can be almost anything you like. Want to smooth your mana? I’ll be your dream Channel The Suns. Fancy some Combo power? I’ll be your next Mind’s Desire. You have a pesky monster problem you want clearing up? I’ll be your Pyroclasm. Want a permanent to be not-so-permanent? Eye Of Nowhere is what I’ll become. I can expose an opponent’s plans if you make me Duress. I could turn into a bunch of monsters with Empty The Warrens. Let’s go round again as I become Sins Of The Past. Or if you want to end it all, I’m your Tendrils Of Agony.’ Talkative little thing. One thing you’ll find as you start playing with TEPS is that peoples’ fear of Burning Wish is basically justified, but that also means that they can make some horrible miscalculations. As I’ve said to several opponents lately, as they named Burning Wish with Cabal Therapy deep into the game, ‘Are you kidding? If I had Burning Wish anytime since last Tuesday, you’d be dead by now.’ And, despite the hyperbole, it’s essentially true. You struggle to lose once you successfully resolve Burning Wish, God bless it.

    Mind’s Desire.

    They named the deck after this one, because it’s next to impossible to execute a decent winning strategy without casting it (Empty The Warrens notwithstanding, more later.) We’ll have plenty of opportunity to see this guy in all its glory later.

    Tendrils Of Agony.

    Not to be confused with the workmen outside my house who woke me at 6.15 this morning - this was of course the Ten Drills Of Agony - Tendrils is the kill mechanism, the coup de grace, the cherry on the cake, and the shuffle-up-your-permanents. Your life goes way way up, and theirs goes way way down.

    Orim’s Chant, Krosan Grip.

    The only cards in our Sideboard that can’t be searched for by Burning Wish, hence our need for a goodly number of them. Orim’s Chant can buy us a crucial turn against an opponent who is about to wreck our plan if left unmolested, and also guarantees that we’ll be left in peace when our moment comes. Krosan Grip is there for all the assorted naughty things people will throw at us of an Artifact and Enchantment disposition, which might include vile things like Chalice Of The Void, or Engineered Explosives, or Trinisphere, or Counterbalance or....

    And that’s our deck. Like most Combo decks it’s extremely tightly focused. Get mana, play a bucketload for Storm, Mind’s Desire, go off.

    Of course, it’s not always as simple as that. Let’s get to the Tournament Practice room on Magic Online and get some games going.

    Match 1 versus Dredge

    Generally I expect to lose to Dredge. It’s simply quicker than we are. Not this time though. In Game 1 I take an opening hand featuring no land, but with a Lotus Bloom and assorted acceleration I can expect to go off turn 4. Although he has a poor start, I’m still surprised to find myself getting to turn 4 without being, er, dead. Still, there I am, putting my Bloom into play, and from there double Seething Song, Channel the Suns, 2 Chromatic Spheres and assorted other goodness lead to my opening Mind’s Desire being for 10 copies. (If you’re still not sure what happens, I get to remove 10 cards from the game - technically the top card of my library on 10 separate occasions, but now just the top 10 as a sanctioned shortcut - and play any of them I like for free. Mana producers? Free. Artifacts? Free. Tutors? Free. And most importantly, more Mind’s Desires or Sins Of The Past, Free.) Since many opponents will concede at this point, it might be worth running some solitaire games to actually see the whole Combo in action. In Game 2, I keep two land, a Rite, a Ritual, a Wish, a Desire, and a Chant. Good news. He’s set to go off, so I Chant him, meaning he can’t play spells that turn. That leaves me vulnerable to him having a Stifle for my Storm trigger when I go off, but it may surprise you to learn that it’s generally better to have some chance than no chance, provided that you’re trying to win of course. He doesn’t have a Stifle - are people running Stifle in boards right now? - and I Combo out. Somewhat to my surprise, I win the match.

    Match 2 versus BG

    On the play, I keep Gemstone Mine, Lotus Bloom, 2 Cabal Rituals, Seething Song, Infernal Tutor, Chromatic Sphere, and Mind’s Desire. Turn 1, I don’t have the Desire any more, thanks to his Duress. In this environment, it’s a good idea to calculate mulligans on the basis of what your hand looks like without its best card. As we’ll see, sometimes they don’t take the best card, but you can’t expect that, especially if you’re at the back end of a PTQ. He follows up his Duress with Dark Confidant and then a Tarmogoyf. By now I’ve drawn into Sins Of The Past, and that means it’s time to switch to plan B. Assuming that he doesn’t have Extirpate maindeck, I can aim to generate a bunch of Black mana, cast Sins, then play the Desire out of my graveyard. In order to do this I really want my Rituals to be for 5 Black mana, so I deliberately burn for one at the end of his turn. Why? Because that way I get to sacrifice the Gemstone Mine when I remove the last counter, contributing to Threshold. My Bloom resolves, followed up my Chrome Mox, Seething Song, Ritual, Ritual, Sins, Tutor, Sphere and then Desire from the graveyard for 9 copies. End of game.

    Game 2 gets complicated. I have a genuine (i.e. unplayable hand) mulligan to 6, keeping 2 land, Bloom, Star, Tutor and Burning Wish. What does a hand of five look like? It’s the same without the Bloom, when he Duresses me turn 1. Turn 2 he makes Ghost Quarter. Now that’s a proper irritant, since I have zero basic lands to go and fetch when he blows it up. I make a Chromatic Star to help smooth mana, but he Molders it, and then makes Dark Confidant a.k.a. Bob. When I get up to 8 cards in hand, I have to discard. Since I’ve drawn Sins, it’s time to try the same plan as Game 1, so I discard Mind’s Desire. Now that we’ve boarded it’s more likely that he’ll be able to Extirpate me into near-oblivion, but there’s no way with his Ghost Quarter and minimal fixing for me that I’m going to be able to operate normally. This way, I have a chance of brute-forcing my way up to six Black mana and get a speculative Desire off for 4 or maybe 5 from the graveyard. Tediously, he Duresses again, taking a Ritual. Needing a Gemstone Mine or Channel The Suns to get the engine started, I don’t find them, and die.

    I keep Bloom, 2 Chrome Mox, 2 Chromatic Star, Rite of Flame and Orim’s Chant to start game 3. On the play, I can at least suspend the Bloom before his inevitable turn 1 Duress hits. And there it is, taking my Rite Of Flame. 3 games, 3 Duresses. Like I said, visualise your hand without something. I Imprint the first Chrome Mox with Orim’s Chant and make a Chromatic Star. I mock his Ghost Quarter, since I have no land for it to destroy, and watch as he makes 2 Dark Confidants. Only more hand disruption worries me, and he doesn’t see any. I get off a Desire for 6, and with another Desire in hand the mana acceleration I get for free sees me home.

    Match 3 versus Mono-Green Beats.

    Whilst not a rich man, I am prepared to lay a modest wager that you are unlikely to face this deck at the top tables of a PTQ. Barring miracles, this is essentially a goldfishing operation, where I lay a land, then a second sac land plus a Chromatic Star. Turn 3 I draw Channel The Suns. I go off with Channel, Rite, Song, Burning Wish, a sacrificed Star into another Ritual, Chrome Mox and then Desire for 7. The Storm count reveals Burning Wish and plenty of free mana. Game 2 is even simpler, with a Desire for 9, a number at which it’s next to impossible to misfire. Incidentally, now seems a good time to issue the standard government health warning about any results you see here. Never was a room so misnamend than the Tournament Practice room, since many of the decks you’ll play against (and indeed with) should never be allowed near a PTQ unless you have a death wish. In other words, testing lies. Thanks Zvi.

    Match 4 versus Domain Zoo.

    I’m generally pretty hopeful about this matchup, since I hope to simply be a turn quicker than my opponent. Game 1 really doesn’t work out like that, and turns out to be quite the workout for the deck, which is exactly what we want, so that we can learn what the deck can do under pressure. I mulligan to 6, and keep land, Bloom, Star, Sphere, Mox and Song. This is what’s known in the trade as a drawing hand. Right now I have absolutely nothing in terms of going off, but I do have mana of multiple colors, at least 6 mana by the time Bloom resolves, and two extra draws via Sphere and Star. I should be fine. Things start getting complicated when he makes Turn 1 Birds Of Paradise and follows up with Turn 2 Magus Of The Moon. I like Mountains, but not that much. I suspend a second Lotus Bloom, but when the first one resolves he Putrefies it. He makes Tarmogoyf and then casts Living Wish for Gaddock Teeg, casting the Lorwyn Legend. Now there’s another hoop we have to get through, since Gaddock comprehensively shuts down the bit of our deck where we actually win. Fortunately, my hand has been building up nicely, and the goodness is complete when I draw Burning Wish just after my second Bloom resolves unmolested. Song, Song, then Burning Wish for Pyroclasm. Cast it, goodbye Gaddock. Sacrifice a Star, draw Chrome Mox, which I cast without Imprint. Sacrifice another Star, draw Channel The Suns, nice. Sacrifice a third artifact mana-washer, draw land, never mind. Lay another Chrome Mox, cast Desire for 9. Overcoming both Magus and Gaddock, nice.

    He pulls things round Game 2, as he puts quick pressure on me, and my Desire for 5 (which is on the border of likely failure) doesn’t come through for me, as I see 2 Rituals and three land. I fizzle and die.

    In the decider I make the first use out of Plan C, which involves Empty The Warrens. I have to be honest, I hate Plan C. Whether you’re going about your lawful business with regular Desire action, or cheating a bit with Sins Of The Past, you’re the one making the running. Most of the time, only the vagaries of your own deck can stop you doing your thing. With the Empty plan, it’s very well named, as empty is exactly what your hand and options are going to be once you’ve tried it. You use up every resource in the known universe, and at the end of it, you don’t kill your opponent. Instead you pass the turn, and pray. Not that I have any objection to the power of prayer, but when it comes to Magic I like to leave the divine out of it. Whether you have 20 tokens or 200, they all have 1 toughness, they’re all monsters, and they all die to mass removal. ‘Please don’t kill them, please don’t kill them’ you chant over and over, and that’s without the decks toting burn spells who calmly thank you for their bonus turn and set you alight. No, I’m really not a fan. However, as plan C goes, it does pose a fairly considerable question. I was forced into Plan C here thanks largely to Magus Of The Moon and a clumsy initial Desire for 5. Thankfully, my 20 goblins were sufficient to pull off a 2-1 victory.

    Match 5 versus Opposition

    When he made a turn 2 Wirewood Hivemaster I was smirking. I mean, who plays with junk like that? When he made another one turn 3, plus a token, I was still smiling, though it was a bit of a puzzled smile. When he made Opposition turn 4, I wasn’t smiling at all, as he proceeded to tap everything I owned forever and ever Amen. In the second game he made Sensei’s Divining Top turn 1, and Counterbalance turn 2. These get followed up by a pair of Wren’s Run Vanquishers. I manage to Krosan Grip the Counterbalance, which improves my odds somewhat. Then he makes a third Vanquisher and Imperious Perfect. Since I’m on 11, I have to go off the following turn. This is problematic. Double Seething Song, double Chrome Mox, last card Infernal Tutor for Burning Wish, Wish for Empty The Warrens, and we’re off to the races with your friend and mine, Plan C. I make 14 1/1s. Now, bizarrely for Extended, we’re playing combat math. He attacks, I chump two of them and fall to 7. Now I have 12 guys left. 10 of them attack into Imperious Perfect and Wirewood Symbiote. He drops to 4, and as things stand I can beat him. Not if he plays Opposition however, and that’s what he does. Frowny face.

    Match 6 versus Mirror, kind of.

    At least, that’s what I think as he starts off with a suspended Lotus Bloom and an Invasion sac land. Interestingly, it turns out that he’s actually running a version of the Aussie Storm deck from last Summer’s Standard. That means Pyromancer’s Swath and Grapeshot, plus card draw and search like Ponder and Compulsive Research. He also has Sensei’s Divining Top, and when he draws a second one things get a little funky. He gets in a position to go off, and then uses most of his mana to lay a Top, tap it, draw a Top, putting Top to the, er, top, play a Top, tap the Top, draw a Top, putting Top to the, er, top... He does this nine times then casts Grapeshot for 30. If I’m going to get beaten, this is the kind of thing I love to watch. Game 2 I get to go off first, but he’s on the play in the decider and goes off with Swath plus Grapeshot. This is the kind of Magic that make Pros want to not play a deck, knowing that so much depends on the opening coinflip. Admittedly, Orim’s Chant would have given me the decider, as I was ready to go off the following turn, but them’s the breaks.

    Match 7 versus Mirror, actually.

    Turn 4, I win on the play. Turn 4, he wins on the play. Turn 4, I make a crucial error on the play. It turns out that Sins Of The Past gets removed from the game when it’s done its thing. If you’ve bothered to read the whole of the text on the card, you already know this. I either hadn’t, or had forgotten that I had, and dismally failed to reach Threshold, thus stranding myself on insufficient mana. Urghh.

    Match 8 versus Domain Zoo

    This is the reason I wouldn’t play Zoo in Extended. His Game 1 involved Isamaru, Hound Of Konda turn 1, Watchwolf turn 2, Watchwolf and Mogg Fanatic turn 3, and die on my turn 4. He hit me for 2,5, and 9. He could do no more. And I ignored him totally from first to last, and won. His pressure was slightly more troublesome in Game 2, and when I was forced to go off I could only Desire for 5. Thankfully a second Desire and a Burning Wish took care of things, but 5 is definitely a number where things can go wrong.

    Match 9 versus WBR Aggro

    Another goldfish type of opponent. He got me to 5 life, but then I Desired for 9. Game 2, despite him coming out with a Molten Rain, I was on 14 when I went off for 9 again. I really question why you would play these kind of decks at the moment. Isn’t Doran really hard work? Isn’t Dredge really hard work? Isn’t TEPS really hard work?

    Match 10 versus Dredge

    I’m on the draw, but let’s not worry about me, let’s look at what he does. Turn 1, he makes City Of Brass and casts Tireless Tribe. He discards Golgari Grave-Troll. He untaps, dredges the Grave-Troll. He lays Cephalid Coliseum. Thanks to the dredge, he has Threshold. He activates the Coliseum, and proceeds to dredge all kinds of naughtiness into his graveyard. He casts Cabal Therapy with Flashback, and makes 4 Zombie tokens thanks to all four copies of Bridge From Below. He Dread Returns a Golgari Grave-Troll, which is a 12/12. I have laid a tapped Invasion land. Ouch.

    Game 2 was much more interesting. I manage to Desire for 6, where I should be safe to not fizzle, and see 3 Chromatic Stars, 2 mana accelerants, and a land. I lay all three artifacts, and sacrifice them, netting me another 3 cards. None of the cards I saw that final turn were Burning Wish, Infernal Tutor, Tendrils Of Agony, or Mind’s Desire. I wondered what the chances were of that happening. Now these calculations are extremely rough, but when I started the turn I was looking for 8 cards out of 50. That’s not far off 1 in 6. So each additional card I see will have a roughly 83% chance of not being what I want. In reality, as I continue to see more ‘bad’ cards, my chances of seeing those ‘good’ eight ones increases slightly, but we’re only looking for approximate information. In total I saw 10 cards unsuccessfully. The chances of that are approximately:

    .83 x .83 x .83 x .83 x .83 x .83 x .83 x .83 x .83 x .83

    Which, as you’re doubtless bursting to know, is 0.15516041187205853449. That’s 15% to you and me. That probably means the actual figure, factoring in the slight increase in our chances each turn, is roundabout 12-13 %. In other words, what felt like an extremely unlikely loss actually has a failure rate of around 1 in 7 to 1 in 8. You are of course quite at liberty to say that you don’t care about this, but people have a nasty habit of talking in generalities: ‘It can’t fail. It never loses to Dredge. It’s a guaranteed bye against Aggro.’ That kind of thing. Knowing your deck’s failure rate is essential, especially with a deck like this.

    Ten matches, and a 6-4 record. Not especially impressive. Does that mean you shouldn’t play TEPS at your next PTQ? Not necessarily. Consider this:

    England has had one PTQ this season. It was won by TEPS, piloted by a man called Matt Light who started the day with a Constructed ranking roundabout 1630. He went 4-1-1 in the Swiss. In the quarterfinal he faced Goblins, and simply was one turn too quick for them. In the semis he faced Dredge, but the Dredge deck malfunctioned at critical moments, and Matt was able to go off turn 4 both games. In the final he faced perennial PT Qualifier veteran Stefano Gattolin, playing Domain Zoo. Stefano did everything he possibly could to eke out the win. He Vindicated land, he hit with Boros Swiftblade plus Tribal Flames for 17 damage on turn 3. In game 2 Matt avoided death by effectively giving himself an extra turn thanks to Orim’s Chant, and Matt went off without a hitch twice to win his first slot at a Pro Tour.

    Saturday, January 12, 2008

    Doran Rock Extended

    I can't remember when the last time I was allowed to play in a non-team format PTQ. I believe it has been 3 years since I had hit the gravy train and never had the chance to join the party. Today, Level 3 is no longer Level 3. It is virtually “Level 3”, but without the appearance fee, it often meant less than $2500 per annum for a Level 3 player. But in exchange, Wizards allows us to participate in PTQs, which I have been waiting to do for so long. Playing in PTQs is very different from a PT. You don't fly across the globe to play Magic, you get to hang out with all your local buddies, and most importantly, the level of tension is much less. Every time I went to a PT and if I made subtle decision mistakes, the tension never goes away and I would be angry at myself. In a PTQ I don't felt as bad even if I made the largest mistake on earth. I mean, I'll be good once I get home.

    Okay, enough on the introduction. Let's move on to the real stuff that you are looking for. Basically me and my mates gathered for a couple of times and formed about 6-7 metagame decks. I started on Gift Rock with the addition of Doran and I instantly fell in love with it. It's a three mana 5/5 without drawback, makes Cranial Plating and Goblin Piledriver look like a nerd while giving extra love to your Birds of Paradise and Tarmogoyf. What more can you ask for? I was switching constantly between the Gift Rock and the Doran Rock, and both featured 4 copies of Doran, the Siege Tower.

    After various testing, I decided to try my hand with the aggro version at the PTQ since it is easier to play, uses less Stamina and time to win compared to the ever complicated Gifts Ungiven... but no doubt they are both powerful decks. Here's my Doran Rock List:


    Doran Rock Terry Soh
    Main Deck:

    4 Birds of Paradise
    4 Dark Confidant
    4 Doran, the Siege Tower
    3 Eternal Witness
    3 Loxodon Hierarch
    4 Tarmogoyf

    3 Cabal Therapy
    3 Living Wish
    1 Profane Command
    3 Thoughtseize
    1 Umezawa's Jitte
    4 Vindicate

    2 Forest
    1 Godless Shrine
    1 Okina, Temple to the Grandfathers
    3 Overgrown Tomb
    1 Plains
    2 Polluted Delta
    1 Shizo, Death's Storehouse
    1 Swamp
    1 Temple Garden
    4 Treetop Village
    4 Windswept Heath
    2 Wooded Foothills
    Sideboard:
    2 Duress
    1 Eternal Witness
    3 Gaddock Teeg
    1 Harmonic Sliver
    1 Kataki, War's Wage
    1 Loxodon Hierarch
    3 Pernicious Deed
    1 Shriekmaw
    1 Umezawa's Jitte
    1 Yixlid Jailer

    Before I start to talk about the deck, let me explain why Rock is my deck of choice. Obviously, Doran is a great addition to the deck, but one hidden gem had given me enough assurance to play Rock. He is Mr. Gaddock Teeg. Let's see here. In the past, Living Wish for Kataki meant good game for Affinity, and wishing for Jixlid Jailer has the same effect on Dredge. Now, an unanswered Gaddock Teeg meant good game for UrzaTron decks, Minds Desire, Enduring Ideal and to a certain extent Dredge as well. This is just insane. This is the main reason I had been avoiding playing these decks, because I don't want to lose to Gaddock Teeg.

    For Tron decks, you will need to have a Counterspell ready, or else don't even think about casting Mindslaver, Repeal, Gifts Ungiven, Engineered Explosives and so on. For Desire and Ideal, you MUST draw a Burning Wish and a win condition in order to go off. Adding to the fact that Doran Rock hits hard with its creatures, your opponent wouldn't have that much time to assemble the appropriate pieces to deal with Teeg before dying.

    Naturally, Rock has always been a black green based deck that has discard, removal and a bunch of good creatures. Rock has also always been a slayer of beatdown decks because of the barrage of removal and fat creatures that stall the board. Rock usually doesn't do well against other greedier midrange decks like Tron or fast combo decks like Desire or Ideal, due to the lack of pressure. Now, Doran fixes the pressure part and Gaddock says “you better do something about me or die”.

    Explanation on card selection:

    4 Birds of Paradise - best all time accelerator and now he even attacks for one with Doran.

    4 Tarmogoyf
    4 Dark Confidant
    4 Doran, the Siege Tower – The aggressive guys in the deck. There is no reason to run less than 4 of each in an aggressive Rock.

    3 Loxodon Hierarch – He fuels Dark Confidant and gives you game against aggro. 3 seem like the right number, as he is fairly expensive.

    3 Eternal Witness - Once my all time favorite card, he is never bad, but he's not very aggressive unlike its comrades. Make sure you notice the interaction of Eternal Witness and Profane Command or Witness getting back Witness in a long battle of Attrition.

    3 Living Wish – This is similar to the 5th to 7th Vindicate, or finding game winning creatures like Kataki, Jixlid and Gaddock Teeg.

    3 Thoughtseize
    3 Cabal Therapy – 3 of each seems right. Also, never run Duress over Thoughtseize. Despite the life loss, Thoughtseize is always better in most scenarios. Either you play against a deck where life is irrelevant anyway, or otherwise you would want to discard cards like Tarmogoyf, Dark Confidant or Goblin Warchief instead of the non-creature spells. Cabal Therapy is just awesome, but ideally, you would prefer to draw 1 of each to balance it out.

    4 Vindicate – Versatile, flexible, etc. Just throw it on anything that stops your path to victory. I never board these out once.

    1 Umezawa's Jitte
    1 Profane Command – I play 1 of each to have a chance to draw them. They are not the key to the deck, but drawing one in the midgame is simply awesome. You never really want to draw 2 either; therefore 1 of each seems like the right amount.

    Lands - I added Okina and Shizo to the land base, taking out a couple of basic lands as a direct replacement. I mean, it's a free bonus to Doran, so why not? The only downside is increased vulnerability to Blood Moon, but people never really board it in against Rock and very few decks actually run Blood Moon. I know I wanted to play 4 Treetop Village and 8 fetchlands so that was simple. The current configuration of duals (3 Overgrown Tomb, 1 Godless Shrine, 1 Temple Garden) seems like the correct way to go. You always want to draw a Tomb as black and green is your main color. Having 1 of each of the other duals gives you flexibility to optimize your mana in different situations.

    Matchup Analysis

    Before going in depth on each sideboarding strategy for a specific matchup, you may ask, “There are at least a dozen viable decks in Extended, how do I prepare for so many matchups when Living Wish has taken up half of the sideboard?” The answer is by playing flexible sideboard cards in a wide metagame. For example, Tormod's Crypt is focused to fight Dredge, but that's all it does. On the other hand, Gaddock Teeg stops Dread Return, which is a key spell that Dredge would need to resolve to win instantly, but overall, it has less impact compared to a Crypt. But the thing is, Gaddock Teeg could be boarded in against four different decks, while Tormod's Crypt is only good against one deck and your sideboard has only so much space. Therefore, my boarding plan was simple:

    -- 2 Gaddock Teeg and 2 Duress against control/combo decks
    -- 3 Pernicious Deed and 1 Umezawa's Jitte against creature strategies

    This is the basic theory, but in the actual game you might board differently against a specific deck, or depending what sideboard cards your opponent brings in etc. Nevertheless, it is always good to have a basic plan in mind to make sure you are on the right track. As 7 slots had been devoted to Wish targets, I decided to equally split up (4 each) the rest of the slots for both control/combo and creatures.

    Goblins, Zoo
    + 3 Pernicious Deed,+1 Jitte, +1 Eternal Wtiness, +1 Hierarch, +1 Shriekmaw

    -3 Thoughtseize, -3 Living Wish, -1 Cabal Therapy

    The Living Wish is swapped for the one-ofs in the sideboard, as Wish is too slow in this matchup. Discards are near useless, so take out all Thoughtseize and 1 Cabal Therapy to swap for the Deeds and additional Jitte. Leaving 2 Therapy maindeck after boarding is fine, as you get a chance and know your opponent's game plan. If you don't like it, you can board in random creatures like Gaddock Teeg or Kataki as chump blockers instead of the remaining Therapies.

    Affinity
    +3 Pernicious Deed +1 Jitte

    -3 Thoughtseize, 1 Cabal Therapy

    The only difference between Goblins/Zoo matchup and this is that you keep the Wishes to fetch Kataki, that's all.

    Desire, Ideal, Tron
    +2 Gaddock Teeg, + 2 Duress

    - 1 Jitte, - 1 Profane Command, -1 Loxodon Hierach, -1 Doran

    You bring in 2 Gaddock Teeg into the deck and leave 1 in the sideboard. In this way, you have 5 Gaddock Teeg. Duress is additional ammunition in addition to Thoughtseize and Therapy. The whole game is about discarding their key spells, resolving Teeg and protect him. I used to board out all the Hierarch in this matchup, until I found that his Regeneration ability is actually relevant against decks with Burning Wish as they usually fetch Pyroclasm to deal with Gaddock. Once you could untap with both Hierarch and Gaddock in play, it is near impossible for them to deal with him.

    Counterbalance
    + 2 Pernicious Deed, + 2 Duress

    -1 Jitte, - 1 Birds, -2 Doran

    Counterbalance decks are neither aggro nor control and this often dragged to a long game. Their weakness is the board, as they often commits a lot on the table, like Mox, Counterbalance, Explosive, their own Goyf and Confidant etc. Deed is useful against them, but I believe 2 is enough, since you would need to keep your board fairly equal. Once you have Hierarch + Deed combo, that is often game. It is very hard to determine the slots to bring in and out against Counterbalance, because they are neither aggro or control. You want to have discards to deal with their engine and card advamtage, at the same time, you want to have answers to Dark Confidant and Tarmogoyf . Practice this matchup post-sideboard, it is very crucial to know the true value and effectiveness of each card since you are trying to fight them in all aspects.

    This morning I went to my local PTQ and I made Top 8 with this deck, but losing to a Monoblue Aggro Control deck in quarters. The deck seems to be working well in the current metagame. I don't think I would many any change to the deck, as I felt happy with maindeck and the amount of sideboards I can bring in against each deck. I recommend you to give it a try. Apparently lately I had been switching from a control player to a beatdown player. The joy of beating down while you had seen your opponent hand has nothing is invaluable.

    By Terry Soh