Combo and Synergy - January

Like many of you, I can't wait to see what all World Wake has in store...and like many of you...I look for new spoilers every day, hoping to find how the new set can be broken. Here are a few spoiled cards from World Wake that have some cool interactions with some cards we already know. (Thanks to MTGSalvation for the spoiled lists).




As if Red wasn't strong enough. In the new set, Red can carry a playset of this in its sideboard to cripple Blue. Ricochet Trap reads:

"Instant - Trap. If an opponent cast a Blue spell this turn, you may pay R rather than pay Ricochet Trap’s mana cost. Change the target of target spell with a single target."

For one Red, you can change the target of any counterspell a Blue player has to target Ricochet Trap instead of its original target.




Knight of the Reliquary is such a cool card and Celestial Colonade is amazing. In a Bant deck, he can sacrifice a Forest or Plains to find a 4/4 Blue and White vigiliant, flyer that produces mana. I cant wait to see what other manlands come out in the new set.




This is one my favorite combos from the new set. Enchant a fetch land such as Misty Rain Forest. Block with your Misty Rainforest / Wind Zendikon creature. Sacrifice the fetch land. When sacrificed you are able to search for a Island or Forest and return the Misty Rainforest to your due to Wind Zendikon's triggered ability. This could really break landfall decks.




Kalastria Highborn could be a really broken card in the new set. Paired with Vampire Aristocrat you can sacrifice any creature at any time to Syphon Soul your opponent. Pair these cards with Bloodghast and you could have a truly broken combo.

My Top 4 finish with Barely Boros

The last blog I wrote detailed my decision to go with my Bloodchief Beats deck at the Star City Games Standard 5K this past Saturday. Well, obviously I had a change of heart shortly before the tournament. I had been going back and forth between the Bloodchief deck and a Barely Boros deck I had for a couple of weeks. When I wrote the blog I felt as if I had made up my mind for sure. My thinking was that Blightning was better than Zektar Shrine Expedition, Terminate was better than Mark of Mutiny, and Bloodchief Ascension could be better than Ajani Vengeant in certain matchups. Other than that the two main decks were identical. Both featured heavy RDW spells like Goblin Guide and Hellspark Elemental.

Thursday night before the tourney an idea hit me like a ton of bricks. What about Day of Judgment main decked? It solves my problems with Shroud creatures like Wall of Denial and Sphinx of Jwar Isle as well as flyers like Emeria Angel and Broodmate Dragon. In other words, Day of Judgment takes out what Earthquake doesn't. With this revelation I decided to go with Barely Boros instead of Bloodchief Beats. I changed my mana base a bit to allow for more Plains and tweaked my sideboard and added more fun surprises for my opponents. Here is the final deck list I decided on...

Maindeck:

Creatures
4 Goblin Guide
4 Hell's Thunder
4 Hellspark Elemental
4 Plated Geopede

Enchantments
4 Zektar Shrine Expedition

Instants
4 Burst Lightning
4 Lightning Bolt

Planeswalkers
3 Ajani Vengeant

Sorceries
2 Day Of Judgment
3 Earthquake

Basic Lands
8 Mountain
4 Plains

Lands
4 Arid Mesa
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Terramorphic Expanse

Sideboard:
3 Baneslayer Angel
2 Goblin Ruinblaster
2 Manabarbs
2 Celestial Purge
2 Path To Exile
2 Volcanic Fallout
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
1 Day Of Judgment

As you can see the main deck is very similar to some other Barely Boros decks you'll see out there except for one major distinction, Day of Judgment. I won plenty of games by blowing up the board with DOJ and unleashing a couple of loaded Zektar Shrine Expeditions on turn four. This never failed to catch my opponent by surprise. Game 2 I always brought in Baneslayer Angel which was another nasty surprise for my opponents. This gave me a significant advantage over RDW which I ended up playing in three different match-ups. Here's the breakdown of each match I played in the tournament.

Round 1 vs. Red Deck Wins (W 2-0)

This is a very good match-up for me because of my ability to race and gain life at the same time. Ajani Vengeant is really good in games 1 of this match-up. Here's what I side in for games 2 and 3.

-3 Earthquake, -2 Day of Judgment, -2 Ajani Vengeant
+3 Baneslayer Angel, +2 Celestial Purge, +2 Path to Exile

As good as Ajani Vengeant is Baneslayer Angel is even better against RDW. That combined with Path to Exile and Celestial Purge make it almost impossible for RDW to beat me. My Unearth creatures keep coming back while I remove theirs from the game. Seems so unfair but I'm not complaining.

Round 2 vs. Jacerator (W 2-1)

This match-up was extremely difficult. I knew what the deck had in it but I had never actually tested against it with my deck. The one thing I had on my side was plenty of burn. This allowed me to swing in on my turn and if he used a fog spell I would wait till the end of his turn and burn his face with Lightning Bolt or Burst Lightning. This damage added up over time and ended up doing him in. What made it even more difficult for me is that he ran Wall of Denial main deck instead of Day of Judgment. That made it hard for me to deal damage with Hellspark Elemental and Hell's Thunder. He won game 1 but I had answers in my sideboard for games 2 and 3.

-4 Hell's Thunder, -1 Hellspark Elemental
+2 Goblin Ruinblaster, +2 Manabarbs, +1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

Hell's Thunder was virtually useless against him but I kept in 3 Hellspark Elemental's because they are easy to Unearth and if he makes a mistake and taps out late in a game I can swing in with lethal force. Goblin Ruinblaster helped me slow him down with a little land destruction and Manabarbs would have beat him by itself if I was able to get it resolved. Unfortunately I never did so I had to beat him the old fashioned way by swinging away. I won game 2 by a steady stream of burn. Game 3 was much more tense as I had one card left in my library when I finally landed the killer blow with 2 Hellspark Elementals, two 5/5 Plated Geopedes, and one Goblin Guide all rushing in. I got lucky when he didn't show a fog spell and won the game right there.

Round 3 vs. Red Deck Wins (W 2-1)

This match was very similar to Round 1 except he had an amazing hand in game 1 and I had a so-so hand. Even with that he only had 6 life left when he beat me. Games 2 and 3 went according to plan. See Round 1 for sideboard strategy.

Round 4 vs. Emeria's Pledge (W 2-0)

This was a very strange match. My opponent was given a game 1 loss because a judge caught him illegally shuffling. It's a good thing because I wasn't paying attention at all. This set him on tilt in game 2 and after being stuck on two lands through turn five he scooped up his cards and walked away. Once again I wasn't complaining and was glad for the win. The judge informed us that we would have to play with our main decks in game 2 so there was never a side-boarding opportunity.

Round 5 vs. Mono White Aggro (W 2-1)

All I remember about this guys deck was a bunch of First Strike creatures including Baneslayer Angel. I was able to take game 1 by burning every First Striker he threw out there and swinging in with my team. He never recovered and we were on to game 2.

-4 Hellspark Elemental, -3 Zektar Shrine Expedition
+3 Baneslayer Angel, +2 Volcanic Fallout, +1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant, +1 Day of Judgment

Hellspark Elemental wasn't going to do anything for me against his deck and Zektar Shrine Expedition wasn't much better. Game 2 he went first and was able to gain control of the board with numerous First Strikers. He played Baneslayer Angel on turn 5 and there wasn't much I could do about it. After a few swings he had the win and we went on to game 3. Game 3 I went first and that's always a good thing with my deck. Turn 1 Goblin Guide followed by turn 2 Plated Geopede followed by turn 3 Hell's Thunder followed by turn 4 Ajani Vengeant followed by turn 5 Baneslayer Angel. Well, that's about as good as it gets for my deck post sideboard. Needless to say I won the game.

Round 6 vs. Red Deck Wins (Draw 1-1)

You might be wondering how the hell do two super fast aggro decks go to a draw. Well, let's just say that my opponent tended to take quite a bit of time pondering each and every move he made. He made very good decisions but he took an incredible amount of time making them. To make matters worse he was able to play 3 Dragon's Claws in game 2 but not much else. This made almost every spell I played an automatic 3 life gain for him. I ended up pulling out a win in that game by playing a kicked Burst Lightning for 1 damage. Ridiculous! Game 3 I had control again and probably would have won but once again he slow played every single turn. It was frustrating and embarrassing that two Red decks end up drawing but that's what happened.

Round 7 vs. UW Shroud Control (W 2-0)

Game 1 I saw three Deft Duelists hit the battlefield by turn 4. I had Earthquake though and he quickly ran out of steam after that. It was obvious that he was playing my worst matchup in the meta-game so even though I won game 1 I had my work cut out for me in game 2.

-4 Hellspark Elemental, -3 Hell's Thunder, -4 Goblin Guide
+3 Baneslayer Angel, +2 Goblin Ruinblaster, +2 Manabarbs, +2 Volcanic Fallout, +1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant, +1 Day of Judgment

I decided to ditch most of the aggro elements of my deck and added as much anti-control spells as I could from my sideboard. It worked perfectly. I was able to successfully cast 2 Baneslayer Angels, 1 Goblin Ruinblaster, and 1 Manabarbs which ended up sealing the deal. There's not much a Control Deck can do about a Manabarbs on the board especially if they're staring down two Baneslayer Angels.

Round 8 vs. Jund (W 2-0)

The guy I was playing this round ended up placing 2nd overall in the tournament. He was undefeated at this point and was already going to make the Top 8 even with a loss in this round. He wanted to go grab a bite to eat so he offered to concede to me in order to make that happen. Even though I wanted the chance to play Jund because I felt good about my chances against it I gladly accepted and went on to prepare for Round 9.

Round 9 vs. UWR Control (Draw 0-0)

This was the last round before the Top 8 was determined and both of us were undefeated. We were informed that we could draw in to the Top 8 without playing and that we did. So, I went to go watch some of my prospective opponents as they battled to get into the Top 8.

Round 1 of Top 8 vs. UWR Control (W 2-1)

I ended up getting seeded against the same guy I drew with in Round 9. This is generally not a very good match-up for the deck I was running but the 2 main deck Day of Judgments and the anti-control sideboard ended up tipping the match in my favor. Game 1 he pretty much dominated me. I never drew Day of Judgment in order to get his Walls off the board and it cost me the game.

-4 Hellspark Elemental, -4 Hell's Thunder, -1 Burst Lightning
+3 Baneslayer Angel, +2 Goblin Ruinblaster, +2 Manabarbs, +1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant, +1 Day of Judgment

Game 2 started off with Goblin Guide followed by Plated Geopede. He played a Wall of Denial on his turn 3 and another on turn 4 to slow me down a bit. I was able to slip by and do minimal damage over the next few turns and then I drew a Day of Judgment. Hoping not to get countered I played it and smoked the board. This cleared the path for the Baneslayer Angel sitting in my hand and he never recovered. Game 3 I was able to get a Plated Geopede, Ajani Vengeant, and Elspeth, Knight-Errant all on the board at the same time. He had a Baneslayer Angel and a Wall of Denial on the board. For two turns I was able to draw a fetch land and with Elspeth's help swung in with Plated Geopede as an 8/8 first striker. The first turn he took the 8 damage and the second turn he blocked with the Wall. At this point I decided to blow up the board again with Day of Judgment and finished him off the next turn with Ajani Vengeant's helix ability and a resolved Earthquake.

Round 2 of Top 8 vs. Vampires (L 1-2)

This match ultimately was decided by the person that ended up winning the die roll in order to go first. As you can imagine he won the roll and ultimately the match. Game 1 I was completed dominated by 2 Vampire Nighthawks, a Bloodghast, and of course Tendrils of Agony. I was able to get him down to 11 life but because of the Nighthawks he finished the game with 21 life. This actually might be the worst matchup for me because of the life gain ability of the deck.

-4 Hellspark Elemental, -2 Zektar Shrine Expedition, -4 Burst Lightning
+ 3 Baneslayer Angel, +2 Celestial Purge, +2 Path to Exile, +2 Volcanic Fallout, +1 Day of Judgment

Game 2 was about as well as my deck had played all night. I had an answer for everything he put on the board and was able to finish the game without losing a single point of life. After finishing him off with a Burst Lightning and Lightning Bolt on turn 5 it was off to Game 3 where he would be going first again. Game 3 was actually very close until the very end. We were both at 7 life when he swung in for the win. The turning point of the game was on his turn 6 after I had played Baneslayer Angel on turn 5. He dropped a Vampire Nighthawk and a kicked Gatekeeper of Malakir which took out Baneslayer Angel. This changed the board dramatically and after playing Malakir Bloodwitch the next turn I was needing Day of Judgment or it would be the end of me. I didn't top deck it and ended up on the losing end of this one.

All in all it was an incredible experience and if it's any consolation the guy playing Vampires ended up winning the whole thing against Jund the following round. This was supposed to be his biggest mismatch but he ended up winning 2-0. His deck was very consistent and seemed to be very well built. You can check out all of the Top 8 decks and profiles here.

Thanks for reading and good luck on your next coin flip!

Lad takes 4th place at Star City 10k

Our own Lad (Justin Petri) took home 4th place at the Star City $5000 Standard Tournament this past weekend. Check back later for his comments on the deck and the tournament itself.

Go here for his deck list

Congrats Man!!!

Bloodchief Beats

The StarCityGames.com Standard 5K will be in Ft. Worth this Saturday and my partner and I will be there ready to grind it out. Nicky will be playing his beloved Grixis Control deck featuring Chandra Ablaze and Cruel Ultimatum. I happen to think his deck is the best Control deck going right now. I have been testing out quite a few different builds looking for a way to beat Jund. My Shroud Control deck is very strong against Jund but has struggled against speedy token decks. I toyed with the idea of adding Red to the Blue and White I was already running and I got much better results because of Earthquake. In fact, Luis-Scott Vargas just won the StarCity tournament in LA with a similar strategy. Here is the deck list he ran...

UWR Shroud Control

3 Ajani Vengeant
2 Jace Beleren
3 Sphinx of Jwar Isle
4 Wall of Denial
2 Divination
2 Double Negative
2 Earthquake
4 Flashfreeze
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Mind Spring
2 Path to Exile
4 Spreading Seas

4 Arid Mesa
4 Glacial Fortress
4 Island
2 Mountain
4 Plains
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Sejiri Refuge

SIDEBOARD
4 Baneslayer Angel
1 Cancel
2 Essence Scatter
3 Luminarch Ascension
2 Mind Control
2 Negate
1 Oblivion Ring

I am very tempted to go to battle with this deck as I have a lot of experience playing it in various forms. The only problem is that I expect to see quite a few players show up with this deck as their answer to Jund as well considering it won the whole thing in LA. I always like to go Rogue whenever possible because I feel it gives you an advantage over the rest of the field. Sometimes it works and sometimes it fails miserably. With this in mind I've decided to make a 180 degree turn and focus on speed as my ticket to victory. I love the color Red in magic and I'm very impressed with the sheer speed and finishing power of RDW. However, I don't think Red is enough to do the job especially with a Wall of Denial on the board staring down at you. I decided to take the strengths of RDW and splash in some Black to the mix. The deck list I came up with is...

Bloodchief Beats

4 Goblin Guide
4 Hellspark Elemental
3 Hell's Thunder
4 Plated Geopede
3 Bloodchief Ascension
4 Burst Lightning
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Terminate
4 Earthquake
4 Blightning

4 Arid Mesa
4 Marsh Flats
4 Dragonskull Summit
4 Teetering Peeks
4 Mountain
4 Swamp

SIDEBOARD
1 Bloodchief Ascension
3 Duress
2 Fleshbag Marauder
2 Malakir Bloodwitch
3 Manabarbs
2 Terminate
2 Volcanic Fallout



The key to this deck is Bloodchief Ascension. It gives you a significant advantage in both the mirror match as well as the other speedy deck in the format, Boros. Grixis control has very few answers for it and LSV's UWR deck only runs one Oblivion Ring in the sideboard to answer it. This spell could be a nasty surprise for anybody out there not prepared for it. Because of the addition of Black I've also added Blightning and Terminate to the main deck mix. Blightning is one of the scariest spells going right now and works really well in combination with Bloodchief Ascension. Terminate is our main deck answer to Baneslayer Angel, Rhox War Monk, and other powerful creatures that prove to be annoying. The rest of the main deck is basically the best spells that RDW had to offer. Plated Geopede can be an absolute beast in this deck with 8 fetch lands and 4 Teetering Peeks to power it up and Goblin Guide might be the best one drop creature Red has ever had.



The sideboard is where we really make a difference in dealing with the tougher decks out there. Duress and Manabarbs are obvious inclusions when up against any Control deck. Fleshbag Marauder is mainly in the sideboard to help against the Shroud creatures. Wall of Denial and Sphinx of Jwar Isle can be really tough to deal with. Malakir Bloodwitch is also good against Wall of Denial but is really good against anything running Baneslayer Angel. Volcanic Fallout is sided in against Boros and White Tokens.

I feel this deck has all of the strengths of RDW and adding the Black helps neutralize some of the weaknesses. I highly recommend the deck to anyone looking to play something a little less expensive while at the same time competitive. I hope you guys are doing well and good luck on your next coin flip!