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Published by Books Electric Publishing
Contents copyrighted 1996 by Books Electric Publishing
Enough bureaucratic stuff, get to the contents already!
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Spotlight on ... Griffins
Card to Watch for ... Phyrexian Vault
Deck of the Fortnight ... Red/Blue Blur
Questions ... Classic Crusade Confusion
Tidbits of Wisdom ... Some Comments on Creatures
Trade/Combat Zone and Marketplace ... Look for expansion here.
Feedback ... What do you want?
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Spotlight on Griffins
Theme decks are usually of questionable strength, although sometimes a "theme card" (such as Elvish Archer, River Merfolk, and Mindstab Thrull) is strong enough to make tournament appearances in non-theme situations. Our newest creature that a theme deck can conceivably be centered around is Griffins, so let's take a look at what strengths these flappers have to offer:
Ekundu Griffin: Flying, First Strike, 2/2. Hmm, it takes four mana to cast. Erhnam Djinn also takes four mana, but if you can just get THREE Ekundus into play, your griffins can take Ernie on. Oh, brother--it doesn't take a genius to see how Erhnam can be so popular. Perhaps a comparison with Nettletooth Djinn would be more fair. Five turns after Nettie is cast, you'll have taken 20 (assuming no blockers), and dealt a total of 15 (five of that from Nettie). Not horrible, since you'll have an easier time finding a blocker for Nettie than OP will for your Ekundu. Still, not a great deal.
Mtenda Griffin: the most dangerous of the lot (with nice artwork, too), since you can use Mtenda to rescue a fallen Griffin. Sure, this only works in a griffin theme deck, in a long game, but once you get up to 9 mana, Mtenda really rocks if he doesn't get killed, since you can take him in and out of play every turn until you're out of griffins in your graveyard. Ok, those are some pretty huge maybes (9 mana? A creature living turn after turn?), but this might be more viable once Armageddon, Jokulhaups, and Balance (the mightiest land-hosers) leave the tourney scene, as a clever player will make sure Mtenda is the last creature he summons.
Teremko Griffin: Flying, Banding. Banding is, in theory, a better power than First Strike, since it makes blocking SO much easier. Unfortunately, you need multiple creatures in play for Banding to be useful, and this is just not something you can hope for reliably in a tournament game. Flying and Banding are not very compatible as powers--unless your deck is comprised of all Fliers, it is unlikely you'll be able to exploit both of these in any given game. I vote Ekundu better than Teremko, and Mtenda better than both (in theme decks) once land-hosing gets "trimmed" down.
Unyaro Griffin: Sacrifice it to counter a red spell. Note very critically how this sacrifice doesn't require tapping (a cost that generally means the sacrifice will never happen). This makes Unyaro a nice buddy for Mtenda, and gives protection against the oh-so-threatening-to-griffins Pyroclasm. Unyaro beats Teremko (banding is unreliable and essentially useless against a red deck, which Unyaro is effective against; against non-red, banding can still be risky on defense), but after that it really depends on what your deck is trying to accomplish.
Zuberi Golden Feather: Ok, obviously this card only works in a Griffin deck, and here we have a problem. Griffins are all white, so a Griffin deck is (most likely) going to be strong in white (if not mono), making the 1 white, 4 generic cost requirement of Zuberi no different than the 2 white, 3 generic, cost of Serra Angel. Much like Banding, Zuberi's power only works if you get multiple creatures in play, and griffins at that.
Those are the griffins. Their low toughness (2, except for Zuberi) makes them critically vulnerable to Pyroclasm, not to mention the new Mirage creatuers, Burning Palm Efreet and Femeref Archers (and the archers are TRULY horrifying!). If you're going with a Griffin theme deck, I recommend you go with either strong creature control to crush these new beasties, or many Crusades and other toughness-enhancing enchantments--sooner or later you'll need something big enough to stop whatever large menace OP provides. Other than themes, Griffins aren't likely to be seen much, since in any other color, 4 mana can get you much more creature (eg, Phanstmal Fiend, Azure Drake, Nettletooth Djinn, and Dragon Whelp). Use with care if at all.
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Card to Watch for ... Phyrexian Vault
Card control, the card war, card superiority. This seems to be what Magic is all about these days, and for good reason. A chimpanzee with a good deck can be the world champion if only the chimp can draw two extra cards a turn, or so many "experts" believe. And between the Internet (any hypocrisy here? Yeah, we're dealing with it.) and a half dozen or so magazines, Bonzo has no difficulty getting hold of the blueprints for a good deck.
Future deck blueprints will commonly include Phyrexian Vault for several reasons. #1 on the list is it makes your creatures count almost as cantrips; there are many spells that do what cantrips do, for 2 less mana or so (eg, compare Flare to Death Spark). For two extra mana, the cantrip equivalent gets you an extra card. For two mana, the Vault will get you an extra card, as naturally you'll sacrifice the creature when its about to be nuked anyway--i.e., both players put a card in the graveyard, and you get an extra card in hand. "But almost nobody uses cantrips!" you say, and its a valid point. Most cantrips can't hardly ever win you a game, and take up alot of mana for their effect, but creatures sure as heck can win a game, the mana to doesn't have to come at the same time you cast a creature, AND thanks to a change in the rules for 5th edition, the Vault becomes even more dangerous. Let's look at this rules change:
The Vault is the first card since Ashnod's Altar that conveniently lets you sacrifice as a fast effect (ok, there's Carrion now, also) and the benefit from the Vault is way above the Altar; fast effect sacrifices are generally superior, since it gives you more freedom, and, importantly, prevents your creature from being controlled or removed from the game (an important effect for cards like Ivory Gargoyle). Get it, use it, and (very quickly) learn to love it.
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Deck of the Fortnight... Red/Blue Blur
Mana Sources: 4 Cities of Brass, 8 Islands, 8 Mountains, 1 Strip Mine
Non-Permanents:
1 Boomerang
4 Brainstorm
4 Counterspell
1 Detonate
2 Dissipate
2 Disintegrate
2 Lat-Nam's Legacy
1 Earthquake
2 Force of Will
1 Force Void
4 Incinerate
1 Inferno
1 Jokulhaups
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Memory Lapse
4 Power Sink
1 Ray of Erasure
2 Volcanic Geyser
(no sideboard, this deck is for amusement purposes only. Anybody really want to hear about sideboards?)
The idea here is to bash OP senseless with direct damage, using Counterspells and the like to slow him down to a crawl. Note how "reverse degeneracy" gives this deck a hefy advantage against a typical white deck (which typically have 4 Disenchants and 4 Swords to Plowshares--rumor has it this card won't make 5th edition-YAY!), since this little beastie has NO artifacts, NO enchantments, and NO creatures. With 8 useless cards in his white deck, OP is likely to get one "useless card" in the draw, and another one every 7 turns or so after that. This is a backhanded way of winning the card war, but it can work, even in a speed deck. The other rule for this deck is to do almost everything (besides counterspells) in OP's discard phase--there's only FIVE non-fast effect cards in the whole deck. Let's talk about some of the individual cards:
Your counterspells are all-purpose, and make sure you save one for OP's Zuran Orb; if this card gets out, your chances of dealing enough damage to OP to kill him drop to nil. Other than that, counter everything you're even slightly worried about. Try to use Memory Lapse to counter creatures--this slows down a creature-based deck to an absolute crawl (better yet, Memory Lapse OP's attempt to Plowshare his own creature!)--you've got Ray of Erasure if you're forced to Lapse something dangerous, but you'll find its much more fun to Erase something that just got Tutored to the top of OP's deck. Force Void is another hilarious cantrip, just cast it once, and OP will be so discombobulated over losing a card to a cantrip/counterspell that he'll consider keeping a mana in reserve forever afterward. Hence, one Force Void is plenty. When OP is low on life, just burn through the cantrips to get the spell that finishes him.
Jokulhaups is the obligatory reset button--never play more than 6 land if you can help it. Once you get 'Haups, try to save 7 or 8 cards in hand before initiating Ragnarok and clearing the board. No Hammer of Bogardan is in this deck, although no doubt you'll be tempted to experiment with it. Yeah, its a fun card, but is has no business here. The Hammer is a sorcery, and really sucks up the mana for it to have full effect (hey, look, Dissipate nukes OP's Hammer if he's playing it!) This deck needs to keep that mana free until OP's discard phase. Maybe we'll see the Hammer in the next deck of the fortnight. Inferno, a common finishing touch, costs 7, and clears the board of creatures in a painful way; only lay your 7th land if you intend to cast Inferno (the most expensive Instant?) during OP's very next turn. Don't forget, sometimes you can use Inferno and/or Earhquake to deal out enough damage to both of you that the game ends in a draw. Since the average game with this deck takes about 5 minutes, this is no great loss. :)
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Question ...
Suppose I have White Knights and a Crusade is in play, so they're 3/3. On his turn, OP casts Pyroclasm, and the follows it up with a Disenchant on the Crusade. Do the knights live, since "destroying a source of an effect doesn't eliminate the effect"?
Destroying the source of an effect doesn't eliminate the effect, alright, but Crusade is a continuous effect--i.e., its effect is generated continuously, so as long as it is in play, the knights get +1/+1. But, if the Crusade leaves play, the effect ends there (some cards specifically state their continuous effect lasts until end of turn--this is most relevant when +*/+* type effects are being used). Anyway, when the Crusade goes, so does its effect. Still don't believe so? Consider what would happen if Crusade got Sleighted (or Bent) to Green. Would now both White and Green creatures get a bonus? That's obviously wrong. The continuous effect would now only affect Green creatures, and White guys would be left out (or, as Jimmy the Greek would say, left on the sidelines).
Got Questions? Reply to this e-mail address, and we'll see what we can do.
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Tidbits of Wisdom ... Some Comments on Creatures (excerpted from Advanced Magic, by Rick Moscatello), Part 1
The most important thing a player needs to know about creatures is that they are the most fragile cards in the game. Nothing is easier to remove, nothing is easier to make useless, and, nothing in your deck is more likely to beat you than your own choice of creatures. This is just a fact. When you cast a creature, OP gets your discard phase, an untap phase, an upkeep phase, a draw phase (the big one), a main phase, an optional attack phase, another discard phase, then YOUR upkeep phase, and then YOUR main phase before you declare an attack to find a way to eliminate your creature. Then, after all this time, if it is still alive and not decrepit, your creature will get to attack him; much like the birth of a human being, its a miracle anybody ever dies from creatures, even though it happens all the time. If you are going to build a deck based on creatures (i.e., one with 20 or more creatures in it) the following should be of interest:
The only question that really must be answered in a creature deck is "How are they going to keep alive?" The most common tournament method is small, low casting cost, creatures (aka, "weenies"), since it is easy to bring them out quickly enough that some might survive. Maybe. Unfortunately, that low casting cost means, generally, weenies are easy to kill if the other deck is even halfway close to expecting them. Thus, a weenie deck must have some way of dealing with anti-creature decks. As the hardest colors to successfully bring out creatures against are Red and White (with Black a close third), Protection from Red creatures (eg, Sea Sprites, Repentant Blacksmith) are often worthwhile. White, unfortunately, has Wrath of God and Balance, both reasonably low cost spells capable of annihilating any number of creatures with Protection from White, making the latter power something of a joke. Protection from Black creatures generally work well, as Black's ability to slaughter creatures indiscriminately is often nullified by Protection. Protection from Green is a little silly--Regeneration is nearly the same power, as Green has so little ability to hurt another creature directly. Protection from Blue is pointless--it won't stop a counterspell (since the protection effect won't come into play until after the spell is cast), and this is the real worry from Blue. Naturally, this shouldn't be the only defense for your creatures, as protection is useless against artifacts, such as the Serrated Arrows from the Homelands expansion, which also put the coffin nails in many Regenerating creatures--their consistently low toughness makes them easily obliterated by one or two -1/-1 arrow counters. Some weenie decks prevent the anti-creature cards from coming into play by cutting down an opponent's mana in one way or another, like with Armageddon (destroying all land) or Winter Orb (seriously cutting down the mana available during a turn). Another way to protect your creatures might well be with Blue counterspells, although trying to have the mana to summon a creature, and keeping enough mana available to protect it with a counterspell, presents problems as well--Force of Will helps, but having spare cards to throw away isn't common. Black has some creature-protection power, as its several spells that force another player to discard certainly makes it difficult to keep cards to use against creatures. Through the use of Dark Ritual, Black can sometimes get a creature into play before an opponent has enough mana (or drawn the right card) to kill it. Sometimes.
Even if you do keep your weenies alive, you might well run into problems when your opponent has bigger creatures in play. For this eventuality you need to have a way to deal with these big guys. Banding is an important power, as a few banders can easily give you the edge in any creature war. Since most large (past 4/4) creatures don't fly, a few fliers in your deck, combined with enough banders on the ground, may allow you to attack him while his gigantic minions sit around bored. Alternatively, you can try to shut them down with cards like Meekstone and/or Icy Manipulator, and nothing says you can't use creature removal cards, even indiscriminate ones, yourself. Finally, many weenie decks use some "universal pumper" like Crusade (+1/+1 to all white creatures) to give the weenies more power than their casting cost merits.
If you aren't going for the weenie route, your next best bet is the medium size/casting cost creatures (3/3 or bigger, 5 mana or less). If you can keep one of these guys alive for a half dozen turns, chances are you can hit your opponent for the 20 life you need to win the average game. Where the weenie deck uses sheer numbers in order to get a creature in play, mediums let you be a bit less concerned about keeping your creatures around. Offsetting their greater durability is Control Magic-type cards that take your creature from you, and hit you with it as well--many a Serra Angel has "turned" on its summoner and brought about his demise. The problem with Control Magic and Binding Grasp is that they are enchantments, the hardest type of card in the game to get rid of. This is exacerbated by the fact that most people that play Control Magic also play Counterspells, so, not only are few cards capable of dealing with Control Magic, those few cards are likely to be countered when you attempt to cast them. Of course, creatures with upkeep costs or mana requirements (Junun Efreet or Order of Leitbur) are inconvenient to be taken from you (and people think upkeep is a penalty...), and there are a nice variety of creatures that are inherently difficult to be Controlled (eg, Blinking Spirit, Autumn Willow), and somewhat self-destructive cards (Despotic Scepter, the more popular Nevinyrral's Disk, and, of course, Pyrexian Vault) can certainly offset the power of Control Magic. When you find a solution to the Control Magic problem, you next have to realize that creature removers are often cheaper to cast than creatures; your deck must have a higher mana percentage in it to support the mediums and still must have multiples of mediums so that they can survive an onrush of cheap removal spells. But even with a higher mana percentage in your deck, it is a little bit harder to stock many medium creatures, as their somewhat higher casting cost makes you more vulnerable to the dreaded "mana stall", where you don't draw enough mana to play anything. Hence, it is a good idea to have a few little "support" creatures; these support creatures give you defense in the early game, maybe even drain away a few of your opponent's anti-creature spells, and, if chosen well, will allow you to break up the occasional deadlock when up against creatures comparable to your own (Banding, as before, works well, although other powers, such as the ability to do one damage to any target, or augment another creature, can sometimes work also). In addition, support creatures will prevent you from being overwhelmed by OP weenies (as an example, a deck with 40 Savannah Lions and 20 plains will crush a deck with 40 Plains and 20 Serras before even one Angel is cast!).
The Big Guns (casting cost 8 or more) aren't seen much in tournaments, and for good reason. Their high casting cost means they won't come into play until late in the game unless you have either many sources of fast mana, or your deck can bring one in via a roundabout way, by discarding it and getting it back into play through the various, lower cost, reanimation spells. The worst problem with Big Guns is the most common creature removal spells (Swords to Plowshares, Balance, Dark Banishing) can remove creatures of arbitrary size, and it isn't efficient to blow 8 mana on something your opponent can remove for 2. Of course, Control Magic again rears its ugly head whenever something huge draws near. Deep Spawn is one of the few large creatures that is worthwhile, maybe, as its trample ability means it won't be stopped by a lone regenerator--the foil of many large creatures, and the ability to not be the target of spells or effects means it at least has a chance surviving the 3 or 4 turns it takes to crush someone with it. In any event, if you are going to play with large creatures, you need to have some reason to believe you can get one out quickly, or that you will live long enough to summon it later, and you must have some way of protecting it, and, finally, have some reason to believe that land destruction won't be played on you (with the restriction of Strip Mine this becomes minutely more possible). This combination of difficulties (the last weighing most heavily) will always make 8+ mana casting cost creatures a rarity in tournament play.
While it is generally a mistake to play with many of the larger creatures in your deck, having even one does provide a nuisance factor to your opponent--he will always be on the lookout for your one large creature that, if you manage to summon it, will do crippling or fatal damage to him in a short period of time; sometimes this factor alone is worth the risk of getting a Big Gun in the opening draw (where you are unlikely to use it for many turns), although it rarely is worth the risk of getting two such creatures--25% of your opening hand will be unused for 8 or more turns, a disadvantage that can easily allow an opponent to soundly thrash you.
Next issue, more thoughts on this topic (like, how to tell if a creature is worth putting in the deck).
Got a Tidbit of Wisdom or Counter-Argument? Let us know!
Rick (IQRick) runs the InQuest Magic Trivia Game in the InQuest special events chat room, Thursday Nights, 10 EST. (Keyword InQuest) Tune in there and win to get a starter deck in a random CCG.
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Trade/Combat Zone and Marketplace
Here's another trading tip: How do you know when you get a good deal? When you think you've screwed your trading partner, and he says "thank you" with that "I know I screwed you" look in his eye. I was trading my Wisps away for Tutors and Mirage Rares, and I swear neither myself nor the guy I traded with slept well that night with our conscience bothering us, even though we both thanked the other extravagantly. With all the Flanking around, I don't think Wisps are worth their weight in cardboard, and my trading partner evidently feels the card cost of tutor too great to make them useful.
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Any submissions or replies become the sole property of Books Electric Publishing.
Feedback
Our apologies for sending multiple copies out last time. Got a bit more feedback because of it. Many were understanding. A few were hostile. All are appreciated. LDDragon had something to add:
...I do disagree with one thing however. Your magazine stated that "When these
game-bending cards are no longer legal (referring to Zuran Orb and Land Tax -- Rick), Enlightened Tutor is unlikely to remain the best." If you are comparing enlightened tutor to the other tutors, it will remain the most powerful until there is some great change in the way the game works. Worldly tutor will remain mostly useless, because creatures will always be more vulnerable than enchantments
and artifacts. Mystical tutor has potential, but there aren't that many game winning sorceries and instants to pull out. A counterspell won't change the course of the game, and the best thing to pull out, balance, will be gone as well. You could pull out an armageddon (if its still around, and if you can survive the loss of land playing blue) or a stupor,or a fireball, or something, but these will not be as useful as the powerful enchantments out there. Enchantments are hard to kill (green really didn't get that much better at destroying them), and artifacts can be used at any time in any deck as long as you have the mana. With mystical tutor you won't have to take in special precautionary measures like you will with decks that use
enlightened tutors to protect your artifacts and enchantments. It is likely you will be playing with such precautions anyway, or else you are using more enchantments and artifacts than your opponent will be able to destroy. True, enlightened tutor will be weakened as the tournament scene changes, if
it changes like we expect it to change, but the other tutors will be weakened as well. I think they will all be around equal usefullness then, but enlightened tutor will still be the best.
(Good thoughts, although I still feel that enchantments and artifacts, while powerful, will not end the game as quickly as some sorceries, eg, Fireball, and there are even fewer cards that target sorceries than enchantments--this is because every counterspell, about the only thing that hits sorceries, can also be used to counter enchantments.)
One last criticism, your magazine mentioned that it is generally not a good idea to play with only a few artifacts unless they are ones with great affects that generally start to work as soon as you get them out. I must say that there is some merit for playing with just 4 of something like winter orb or icy manipulator as the only artifacts in your deck. These artifacts serve as major threats to your opponents theme
development. Therefore your opponent can absolutely not sideout his artifact destruction after the first game, and may also side in more artifact destruction if his deck is weak to your winter orbs or icy manipulators. He may have only seen one winter orb the first game, but he might assume that since you are playing with winter orbs you are also playing with common artifacts such as fellwar stones, icy manipulators, ivory tower, black vise, ankh of mishra, zuran orb (standard), diamonds, etc. However, your deck may need not the winter orbs at all, and you can side them out, giving your opponent alot of useless cards. Even if you don't side them out, your opponent might have some 6-8 artifact destruction in his deck
after sideing, while you are only using 4 artifacts. Thus you still have an advantage. Even if you have less than this number of artifacts, you might be able to psyche your opponent into sideboarding wrong if your lucky enough to pull a black vise on the first turn, or maybe you can trick him by playing with enlightened tutors and always pulling your two artifacts with them. This might make your opponent think your playing with more. These may not be the most practical way to net a sideboard advantage, but it can work.
LDDragon
(Most certainly, playing with 4 of an artifact will exploit degeneracy better than just playing with one. But, even four artifacts just makes the game a race to see who can draw their disenchants/artifacts first, and this sort of thing, i.e., luck, just isn't part of tournament level strategy. Reverse sideboarding? That's almost reverse degeneracy, and we will have something to say about sideboarding soon.)
Until next time!
Our sincere thanks to AOL, Compuserve, InQuest Magazine, Tulane University, and the New Orleans Magic club for their help in preparing this.
