Magic Deck Vortex: Age Counts

Well, it's been almost a year since this contest guidelines were posted for this one and I'm sure most of you have forgotten all about it. However, I am bringing it back to life. I received over 40 submissions for this contest of which there were 12 solid decks and about 3 other unique decks worth posting. I hope to provide a few cool combos for your inner combo-drive. Then I hope to give you a little insight into some of the top decks as well as present the winner of the contest to you. Remember the winner of these contests gets to choose the next contest, design a card for the CELIXIA fictional card block, choose a future card or mechanic feature, or choose a future facet for Magic Deck Vortex. Since MDV is a totally free site and isn't a store of any king, I can't afford to send you free cards so this is my way of giving you a 'prize'.

Note: To the right are the original guidelines posted with the contest back several millennia ago...

I have completely eliminated the scoring process. I use to judge each deck on five different criteria. The scores were totaled including bonuses and penalties and then the visitor who had the highest score won. Why did I eliminate the scoring process? Well, I found this to be extremely time consuming which was also the major factor which kept me from reviewing and posting contest results for many of the past contests. With that said, know I now judge the decks based on my personal criteria: Do I like it and does it look like it works? I think these are better criteria although I do internally think about the five previous criteria when looking at decks. For your reference, those criteria were Balance, Cohesivity, Focus, Creativeness and Playability. You can imagine the amount of work involved with just reviewing decks to be scored. This is why I changed this.

Also, you'll notice the layout of the contest results have changed a bit (as are many other design qualities of the entire site) in order to provide a better, clearer contest overview with results. There is no longer a need for the scoring grid since I now review them and score them myself with a basic number 0-5. The decks look like the do in the Deck Database and there should be a few new graphics. How exciting. You'll also notice this layout resembles that of articles on www.magicthegathering.com, which I find to be a good layout... which I why I am moving future articles/contest reviews to this layout. (That and I now have Frontpage 2003 which helps me build better pages like this one!)

Nothing really.. although they both were used quite a bit in the decks submitted for this contest. In fact, there was a small group of eight to ten cards that were used all over the place. I was hoping to see some more of the various cumulative upkeep cards that are extremely unique like Balduvian Shaman, Corrosion, Flow of Maggots, Wave of Terror, Musician, Thought Lash, Mystic Vortex, Snowfall, Splintering Wind, Heart of Bogardan, Varchild's War Riders, or even Revered Unicorn. However, only one deck submitted used Balduvian Shaman but there were no white enchantments without cumulative upkeep in it. So it didn't do well. Then there was a deck that used Infinite Hour Glass as it's 'cumulative upkeep' card. However, it doesn't have cumulative upkeep so that deck was disqualified.

Luckily for me I have already found a few decks using a few of the aforementioned cards. Thoughlash has its uses with Donate as shown in a deck by myself called Thought Lashing. It's not the best deck but it's 'unique' and makes use of a trash rare. Then I have found a home for Varchild's War Riders in Varchild at the Beach by Anthony Alongi on www.magicthegathering.com. But that's about it. Why couldn't some of your awesome deck builders out there make a deck out a card that wasn't so good? Oh well.

As far as the cards I did see quite a bit, some I saw so much I thought to myself, 'can't you guys use a little variety? Don't you know if you make a deck with Musician that works well you will definitely get 1st place? And even if you don't get first place I would probably feature your deck in this review anyway? Geez!'. Below is the top five cumulative upkeep cards you guys and gals used in your decks:

5. Soldevi Simulacrum / Ritual of Subdual
Both of these cards equally had a wide presence in the submitted decks. What's not to like about a 2/4 firebreathing artifact creature with Cumulative Upkeep. It can attack and deal damage.. and lots of damage if you have lots of mana. It's the artifact's carrion ants. However, what's up with the bad art? I am so glad Wizards of the Coast has decided to coordinate their art with the cards. This thing doesn't even look like an artifact. What's up with that?

And then there's Ritual of Subdual -- an expensive enchantment that can totally screw any player not playing the current affinity deck... well maybe. Outside of this contest, Subdual Duel is a cool deck using the Ritual's ability. I would encourage you to check it out. I probably have a few other decks for you to check out using the Ritual but I don't want to detract from this contest result page.

Anyway, both of these cards were decent cards with Cumulative Upkeep and even without the Power Conduit, these two cards have been found in decks throughout time that really aren't so bad.

4. Naked Singularity
You know, I never noticed until writing this little list that Naked Singularity and Reality Twist are almost the same card. They both do the same thing and alter what type of mana are produced by basic lands. However, not a single submission used Reality Twist. Naked Singularity popped up everywhere. I think some of the decks really lacked from it while others found a good use for it. Combining it with non-basic lands is always to your advantage as a good 80% of all decks out there (tourney and casual) use a majority of basic lands in their build. But, with that aside I think most magic players out there just like the fact that the card says naked. A few decks included "NUDE" in their deck titles.

3. Tornado
This, hands down (in my opinion), is the best cumulative upkeep card ever... with the right components. For 2G and a power conduit, you can destroy any permanent on the table. Mind you to make this work REALLY well you need two power conduits on the table.. but still. 2G to destroy any permanent is a force not to be reckoned with. The art is cool too. And a velocity counter? What a neat name for a counter. I wouldn't mind seeing some gravity counters... maybe some Pavlov counters? Wouldn't you?

2. Aboroth
When you get a 9/9 for only six mana, it attracts a lot of attention.. which explains why this guy was found all over the place. True, he's really an 8/8 when you can finally attack with him (haste granting abilities to the side) and then next turn a 7/7.. and so on. But with the Power Conduit, the meat of this contest, you can turn those -1/-1 counters into +1/+1 counters and the age counters from the cumulative upkeep ability into +1/+1 counters too. Aboroth is a really big beatstick for a cheap cost and I believe this is why this card was so popular. Kind of cool too that back around the time when this site was originally established on the web I built a deck using the Aboroth as a win condition before Power Conduit ever existed. This was while I still had a deck clinic. That's back in the days when I only had one job and a lot of free time on my hands. Anyway, that deck was called Wrath of Aboroth and it can be found here.

1. Mystic Remora
A blue enchantment for one blue mana that isn't that good.. but that provides a card for each noncreature spell your opponent plays. Not so bad. And by the way, that's only if they don't pay the 4 mana to prevent you from drawing a card. But, it's a one casting cost enchantment with Cumulative Upkeep which fuels your Power Conduit - Magistrate's Scepter combo nicely.. or whatever Power Conduit combo you deck submission had. Mystic Remora has a mediocre ability and is a counter generating permanent which makes good fuel for many conduit decks. This is why I think this card was seen so commonly thought this contest. However, using the Remora didn't make for a very good deck most of the time.

One deck that didn't score in the top 10 but still makes a decent use of the card is the following by Vincent Hsu. Note: This deck was actually submitted much later than the due date but it still worth posting. It's playable and fulfills all of the requirements of the contest.


	4 Lord of Atlantis 4 Merfolk Looter 4 Vodalian Merchant 4 Tidal Warrior 2 Ambassador of Laquatus 3 Rootwater Thief 4 Power Conduit 3 Aether Vial 4 Mystic Remora 3 Quicksilver Fountain 4 Propaganda 16 Island 4 Lonely Sandbar 1 Teferi's Isle	Power Merfolk. Description of deck by it's author (quoted): Basically this a Merfolk deck utilizing massive draws and Power Conduits to gain favor against your opponents. All the spells are prone to Power Conduits' target. Majority of the creatures are 2cc, thus making the Aether Vial extremely useful. As well as Mystic Remora for the purpose of more draw as well as the cumulative upkeep with Power Conduits. Quicksilver fountains can have a potent synergy with Power conduits against non-blue decks. You can essentially lock a player with all islands except for 1 thus putting them in a mana screwed situation. As well as synergy to Lord of the Atlantis, giving all my merfolk +1/+1 and islandwalk means death to you the enemy. Propaganda is a utility card to slow the player down as I take control with merfolk, it also has synergy with Mystic Remora, forcing the opponent to either allow us for draws or attack with few creatures.
	by Vincent Hsu, deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	TRIBAL: Merfolk - Mystic Remora / Power Conduit

This deck uses two cards as it's main source of counters: Mystic Remora and Quicksilver Fountain. The Fountain has an excellent synergy with all of the merfolk (in combination with Lord of Atlantis). Then there's the AEther Vail... quite a potent cards that allows you to cast most of your merfolk for free.

For those of you in the dark about how this cumulative upkeep - power conduit thing works, let's do a rules refreshment (which was posted on the original deck contest guideline page).

Rules Refreshment
Why does Power Conduit work well with Cumulative Upkeep?

Let's quote www.crystalkeep.com where the rules are found easily for this:

502.13 - Cumulative Upkeep

502.13a - Cumulative upkeep is a triggered ability that imposes an increasing cost on a permanent. The phrase "Cumulative upkeep [cost]" means "At the beginning of your upkeep, put an age counter on this permanent, then sacrifice this permanent unless you pay [cost] for each age counter on it." [CompRules 2003/07/01]
502.13b - If a permanent has multiple instances of cumulative upkeep, each triggers separately. However, the age counters are not linked to any particular ability; each cumulative upkeep ability will count the total number of age counters on the permanent at the time that ability resolves.
Example: A creature has two instances of "Cumulative upkeep - Pay 1 life." The creature currently has no counters but both cumulative upkeep abilities trigger. When the first ability resolves, the controller adds a counter and then chooses to pay 1 life. When the second ability resolves, the controller adds another counter and then chooses to pay an additional 2 life. [CompRules 2003/07/01]
502.13.Ruling.1 - The result of adding counters is that the cost to be paid is one times the cost the first time it is paid, two times the cost the second time, three times the cost the third time, and so on.
Example: If a card has "Cumulative Upkeep: {B} and 2 life", you pay {B} and 2 life on the first upkeep, {B}{B} and 4 life on the next upkeep, {B}{B}{B} and 6 life on the next upkeep, and so on. [D'Angelo 1998/02/03]
502.13.Ruling.2 - If cumulative upkeep is not paid for some period of time because the permanent is not in play or was temporarily changed so that it no longer had a cumulative upkeep, the cumulative upkeep tracking is not reset because the cumulative upkeep counters are not removed. Payment resumes as soon as it applies. [D'Angelo 1999/05/01]
502.13.Ruling.3 - Cumulative upkeep is not reset if the permanent changes controllers, because the counters are not removed. [D'Angelo 1999/05/01]
502.13.Ruling.4 - Permanents which count their last paid cumulative upkeep count the number of cumulative upkeep counters on the card and multiply by the cost per counter. [D'Angelo 1999/05/01]
502.13.Ruling.5 - This ability is put on the stack (see Rule T.2) at the beginning of upkeep. If the permanent leaves play before this ability resolves, you still have to resolve it. Of course, you can just decide not to pay and there will be nothing to sacrifice. But you can also choose to pay if you really want to. [D'Angelo 1999/05/01]
502.13.Ruling.6 - If the cumulative upkeep cost somehow changes between the time the ability is placed on the stack and when it resolves, use the cost at the time it was put on the stack. [DeLaney 2000/01/13]
Note - Also see Rule G3.32, "Cumulative Upkeep".

Power Conduit works well because the cards with Cumulative upkeep make "Age Counters", thus the name of the contest, and furthermore can be used by the Conduit to make +1/+1 counters on other creatures you control.

The contest was full of crazy decks some of which made it into the top fifteen just for being wacky. One such deck as submitted by Jake87 used over 80% lands to build a deck of 60 cards. He chose to run Naked Singularity and Juju Bubble for his cumulative upkeep cards and what better to synergize with the Naked artifact than a bunch of non-basic lands.. a lot of them. While I can't see this deck being very competitive, it's still worth a look. He uses JuJu bubble to gain a lot of life and the Naked Singularity to disrupt his opponent. What's even cooler is that fact that you can take the age counters from either artifact and turn them into +1/+1 counters on your lands (as long as they are animated at that time). The +1/+1 counters remains even when the land creature becomes a land. Paying 1 mana for a Assembly-Worker with three +1/+1 counters is quite a deal.


	1 Rayne, Academy Chancellor 1 Juju Bubble 4 Power Conduit 3 Naked Singularity 1 Mind's Eye 1 Crucible of Worlds 4 Darigaaz's Caldera 4 Crosis's Catacombs 4 City of Brass 4 Ghitu Encampment 4 Mishra's Factory 4 Spawning Pool 4 Stalking Stones 4 Treetop Village 4 Faerie Conclave 1 Strip Mine 1 Yavimaya Hollow 3 Deserted Temple 3 Petrified Field 4 Library of Alexandria	Lands, Lands .. lands. Description of deck by it's author (quoted): Aside from being an anti-counter deck, this deck mostly relies on speed. With all its creatures costing nothing, the deck can attack very early on, and even though lands must be tapped to attack, not playing spells frees up a lot of mana. The only spells are meant as backup for sticky situations. Juju Bubble allows for a lot of cheap life, and Naked Singularity will annoy everyone but you- rarely does anyone, even someone with a 5 color deck, like his basic lands to produce different color mana. Other cards are there to accelerate you (Library of Alexandria) or slow opponents (Strip Mine) or keep your lands going (Petrified Field, Deserted Temple).
	by jake87, deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	UNIQUE: Lands - Power Conduit / Naked Singularity

A lot of stuff going on with this deck. Many, if not almost all, the creature lands. This builds a nice base for attacking and blocking. Juju Bubble as a way to regain life control. Mind's Eye and Crucible of Worlds to better your chances of survival with card draws and finally Rayne, Academy Chancellor to keep your hand filled whenever an opponent targets a permanent you control. The major drawback to this deck is the fact of only being able to play one card a turn most of the time. Azusa, from Champions of Kamigawa could help this deck out quite a bit.

Malignant Growth. What a cool name and a cool card. The following deck was submitted to the contest in an attempt to abuse the card with a whole lot of fog affects. The only problem is that this deck has too many cumulative upkeep cards to stay focused on the goal -- making your opponent deck themselves.


	4 Power Conduit 4 Malignant Growth 4 Ritual of Subdual 4 Dawnstrider 4 Nuisance Engine 4 Energy Field 4 Fog Bank 4 Moment's Peace 4 Wash Out 2 Ertai, Wizard Adept 2 Illusionary Wall 2 Forest 2 Island 2 Yavimaya Hollow 2 Halls of Mist 4 Tropical Island 4 Skyshroud Forest 4 Yavimaya Coast	Stay alive - starve the enemy. Description of deck by it's author (quoted):
	by Pekko, deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	MILL: Malignant Growth - Fog Effects / Power Conduit

Personally, I would have 86'd the Ritual of Subdual, Energy Field and Illusionary Wall in exchange for some basic counters and enchantment protectors and maybe even Propaganda. Nuisance Engine could go too. But hey.. I like the Malignant Growth / Power Conduit part of this deck a lot!

One popular combo found in several decks was the Lightning Coils - Power Conduit combo. Teamed up with some cards with Cumulative Upkeep and you have the potential to bring many 3/1 'hasty tasties' into play (as one person named them). One deck that used this card interaction is:


	1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary 4 Priest of Titania 4 Llanowar Sentinel 4 Elvish Vanguard 4 Titania's Chosen 4 Phantom Nantuko 4 Yavimaya Ants 4 Power Conduit 4 Lightning Coils 4 Tornado 3 Ritual of Subdual 15 Forest 4 Mishra's Factory 1 Gaea's Cradle	Power Elves! Description of deck by it's author (quoted): Get lots elves into play with lots of counters on them. Like Elvish Vanguard (/Chosen), Priest of Titania, and then Llanowar Sentinel. :) After that bring on that Power Conduit with a random gamewinner: Power Conduit - Lightning Coils Power Conduit - Tornado Power Conduit - Ritual of Subdual Power Conduit - Random elf in play Backup with random huge Elves, Phantom Nantuko and Yavimaya Ants.
	by Jasper Smeulders, deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	BEATDOWN: Elves - Power Conduit / Lightning Coils

Again, this deck uses just a few too many cards with Cumulative Upkeep. If it were my deck submission, I would replace the Ants and the Ritual card with some battle tricks and/or more creatures.

Speaking of beatdown decks, there was a deck submitted that actually seemed pretty good. It used one of the popular cards seen throughout the decks -- Aboroth. It looked quick to play and fun too using famous old cards like Kaysa and Killer Bees and also the amazing Elvish Spirit Guide. Check this out:


	4 Aboroth 4 Power Conduit 4 Serrated Biskelion 4 Nature's Lore 4 Wild Growth 4 Elvish Spirit Guide 2 Yavimaya Hollow 4 Rancor 2 Kaysa 4 Killer Bees 2 Might of Oaks 4 Basking Rootwalla 18 Forest	Green likes counters. Description of deck by it's author (quoted): This is a deck I conceived a while ago with some various changes to suit the challenge. The crazy fast mana acceleration in this deck allows for an Aboroth to come into play very quickly with a Power Conduit in play already. The Biskelion is fun because you can tap it and then used the Power conduit to reverse the effect on itself while hurting the opponents creatures. But generally speaking its just a massive beatdown deck. It works best when on turn 1 you play a forest, Spirit Guide a Wild Growth onto it, then tap it to play Nature's Lore and tap the fetched Forest to play another Wild Growth. I Love This Deck.
	by Carl Bahr, deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	BEATDOWN: Aboroth - Power Conduit / Rancor

Looks pretty solid. Quick with the acceleration cards like Wild Growth, Nature's Lore and Elvish Spirit Guide. You could have the Aboroth out by turn three or four with the right opening hand. Then once you get the Aboroth out you have Rancor to make him really deadly. Serrated Biskelion is one of those cool cards from the Mirage Block that deserves to be in every deck... but really benefits from any deck running a power conduit or two. And come on, the deck has Killer Bees. I have to feature it in this column somewhere. (See what I mean.. if you run a crazy deck and a crazy card in your deck that works ... you'll see your name and deck in print here at MDV... I like this kind of stuff).

I was going to post the top ten but ten through eight were a bit redundant. I'll start commenting on decks once you get to third place. Let me say this first... thank you to everyone who entered this contest and thank you for your time spent in building these decks. Not all of you got your decks posted.. but I as well as everyone else appreciate your effort and work to make this contest a success.


	4 Blood Pet 2 Braids, Cabal Minion 4 Festering Goblin 2 Purraj of Uborg 4 Withered Wretch 4 Thrull Surgeon 2 Phyrexian Arena 4 Power Conduit 4 Culling the Weak 4 Dark Ritual 4 Tombstone Stairwell 20 Swamps 2 Phyrexian Tower	Tombspawns for me, None for you. Description of deck by it's author (quoted): Pretty simple deck: Play Tombstone Stairwells with Power Conduits to get a 2/2 each turn for each creature in your graveyard. To get creatures in your graveyard, play Thrulls you can sacrifice, Braids, Phyrexian Towers, and Culling the Weak. Withered Wretches will get creatures out of enemies' graveyards, so they get no tokens. Phyrexian Arenas will help you get the cards you need, and Purraj of Urborg is good after playing all those spells, either in conjunction with Power Conduits or just as a strong creature with first strike.
	by jake87, deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	S.C.S: Tombstone Stairwell - Power Conduit / Withering Wretch

The following is an interesting twist on Domain including the needed cards for the contest and Spellweaver Helix... quite a nice addition to the deck.


	4 Power Conduit 4 Naked Singularity 4 Sylvan Scrying 4 Tribal Flames 4 Exotic Disease 4 Allied Strategies 4 Ordered Migration 2 Mirari's Wake 2 Mirari 2 Kangee, Aerie Keeper 2 Spellweaver Helix 2 Hammerheim 2 Terminal Moraine 2 Bayou 2 Volcanic Island 2 Scrubland 2 Plateau 2 Tropical Island 2 Tundra 2 Savannah 2 Underground Sea 2 Taiga 2 Badlands	Dominaria in the Nude. Description of deck by it's author (quoted): A rather mutated version of Domain. The theory is that taking the age counters from the Naked Singularity and turning them into +1/+1 for birds, or storing them as charge counters on other artifacts, will lock down most other decks, which are mono or allied duel colored. Having nothing but duel lands in the deck gives me a mana base of 8 of each color in the deck (10 for red because of Hammerheim), and they all contribute towards domain spells. Since the deck is mostly sorcery, Spellweaver Helix and Mirari find a home, and the two artifacts combo well (Spellweaver Helix says on the card "whenever a card is played, if it has the same name as one of the imprinted Sorcery Cards, you may copy the other and play the copy without paying its mana cost"). Mirari's Wake is good for casting multiple spells, helping me keep up with upkeep is the Conduit is disenchanted, and makes my Ordered Migration birds bigger. Sylvan Scrying is a handy land fetch. ... Dual lands anyone?
	by Emerald Night, deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	UNIQUE: Domain - Naked Singularity / Power Conduit


	1 Karn, Silver Golem 2 Masticore 4 Sky Diamond 4 Power Conduit 1 Magistrate's Scepter 2 Naked Singularity 2 Nevinyrral's Disk 3 Cowardice 4 Mystic Remora 4 Arcane Denial 3 Mana Leak 3 Force Spike 3 Fabricate 1 Tinker 3 Saprazzan Skerry 4 Faerie Conclave 4 Seat of the Synod 1 Tolarian Academy 7 Island 4 Rishadan Port	Naked Cowards. Description of deck by it's author (quoted): You can play this deck in multiple ways. A cool start would be first turn sker! second turn remora + power conduit. Or you just sit there countering stuff until you can drop a game-winner. That would be an ordinary thing like Masticore OR something really cool - like Naked Singularity. Actually, dropping a singularity in a multiplayer game at 1 am in the morning is really sweet. And thanks to Power Conduit, the mana screw it brings won't go away. And no, you're not quite as suffering from the naked thing as your opponent is. You run 12 nonbasic lands producing blue mana + 4 diamonds. How to win? There are many ways. Fabricate Karn and swing with Singularities. Pile +1/+1 counters on your Faerie Conclave (Yup, they stay there all day) and fly over each turn. The Faeries will survive a Disk detonation, too. Concerning the Disk: It may not seem to fit in the deck, but is NEEDED sometimes. And if you don't want to break it, swing with it. Karn'll help you. Another really cool thing you should try to pull off is to drop a Cowardice, then start! to target your opponent's creatures with the Conduit. Look if they can play them again with a Singularity on the table. Or a Denial in your hand. Take an extra turn sometimes with the Scepter. If not anything else, this deck is VERY annoying, you see. All in all, a Power Conduit/Cumulative Upkeep build is hard to make consistent, that's the main reason for all the countermagic. If nothing fits together, you can at least try to maintain a little control and hope for the missing combo piece. And at the end of the day, nothing beats the feeling when you screw your worst enemy with a Naked Singularity!
	by Johannes Bauer (Berlin), deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	CONTROL: Cowardice - Power Conduit / Naked Singularity

A little note about the 4th place deck, Hurting Chasm. I really liked the concept behind this deck although the Glacial Chasm upkeep still has to be paid each turn (2 life) in order to keep it in play. With the Power Conduit you can remove age counters from it meaning you only have to pay 2 life each turn.. not 4 nor 6 nor 8. There is no way to gain life back in this deck so it would have scored much higher had it contained something like JuJu Bubble or Well of Life... But as I was saying, the Spikeshot Goblin - Power Conduit concept is REAL nice.


	4 Spikeshot Goblin 4 Grim Lavamancer 2 Barrin, Master Wizard 4 Power Conduit 4 Counterspell 4 Force of Will 4 Impulse 3 Thirst for Knowledge 1 Fact or Fiction 1 Chrome Mox 1 Mox Diamond 4 Arcane Denial 4 Glacial Chasm 1 Teferi's Isle 13 Islands 4 Shivan Reef 2 City of Brass	Hurting Chasm. Description of deck by it's author (quoted): The function of the deck is to get a power conduit in play with of course a glacial chasm. This will prevent you from getting damage. You can attack to kill the opponent, that is why I choose for Spikeshot Goblin and Grim Lavamancer. I tested this deck only in multiplayer and it worked very good. The counterspells are in it to keep the combo on the table. Early creature don't have to be countered because when chasm is in play you get no damage.
	by Marijin Pinxteren, deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	COMBO: Spikeshot Goblin - Power Conduit / Glacial Chasm

There were a few variations of Spike decks but the best was the third place deck, Forgotten Powers. Combining the best cumulative upkeep card cards that almost all generate or use +1/+1 counters to their advantage, this deck looks like it could pack quite a punch. All of the spikes in the deck can turn those +1/+1 counters either from your Power Conduit or from Forgotten Ancient into needed utility effects... like fog and gaining life. And gaining life is important especially since every time you destroy a permanent with Tornado you have to pay 3 life if you have any velocity counters. Since you will only have one Power Conduit out during an average game... you will have to pay the life once in a while so the Spike Feeder comes in real handy. I'm not too sure about the Snow-Covered forests... and why they are there.. but hey. It's still a cool deck.


	4 Slith Predator 4 Chlorophant 3 Spike Rogue 4 Spike Feeder 4 Spike Breeder 4 Spike Weaver 4 Forgotten Ancient 1 Kaysa 4 Power Conduit 4 Lightning Coils 4 Tornado 1 Gaea's Cradle 4 Hollow Trees 11 Forest 4 Snow-Covered Forest	Forgotten Powers. Description of deck by it's author (quoted): All creatures in this deck are considered counter-batteries. Winning by smartly shifting powers to each other or even stalling the game 'till game breakers such as Lightning Coils or Tornado hits play. Power Conduit works fine with all cards in the deck.
	by Jasper Smeulders, deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	BEATDOWN: Spikes - Power Conduit / Tornado / Lightning Coils

There's nothing too amazing about this deck except that it's solid. I like solid, playable decks to make the top 5 slots of the contest and there's nothing unstable about elves, Alpha Status or Magistrate's Scepter with Elven powerhouses like Priest of Titania, Llanowar Elves, Rofellos, Wellwisher and the Elven tutor known as Skyshroud Poachers. This deck deserves second place and the rest to know about the deck is described by Johnathan Cain below. Congrads on second place, Jonathan.


	4 Elvish Vanguard 2 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary 4 Llanowar Elves 4 Priest of Titania 4 Skyshroud Poachers 4 Wellwisher 2 Heedless One 2 Wurmskin Forger 4 Alpha Status 4 Power Conduit 4 Magistrate's Scepter 4 Ritual of Subdual 4 Gaea's Cradle 14 Forest	Elvish Ritual. Description of deck by it's author (quoted): This deck is a normal elf deck. However it has a control aspect to it with Ritual of Subdual. The deck Utilizes the Power Conduit into a Magistrate's Scepter gives you a lot of time too attack. The Power Conduit takes its counters from the Elvish Vanguard and a Wurmskin Forger and moves them over too the Scepter. The deck has no problem paying the Upkeep On the Ritual. Most people tell me that the deck is torn down by a wrath of god ... umm its kind of hard to do pay for that when you can produce white. Skyshroud Poacher gets you what you need when you need it. ( normally a headless one or a Wellwisher ) And a well timed alpha status on a heedless one is a game winner Key Cards: Power Conduit , Ritual of Subdual, Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary, Gaea's Cradle
	by Johnathan Cain, deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	TRIBAL: Elves - Ritual of Subdual / Power Conduit / Magistrate's Scepter

I struggled with this one being first place for a few different reasons... but after comparing it to the others it was more efficient. Mind you I would have chosen a different card than 4 Chalice of the Voids and 3 Serum Tanks.. but the rest of the deck is great. The inclusion of Seedborn Muse and Sculpting Steel is what put this deck over the top. It obvious this guy spent some time playtesting the evolving this deck before he submitted it. Here's the deck:


	4 Chalice of the Void 2 Magistrate's Scepter 1 Mox Diamond 4 Power Conduit 2 Riptide Replicator 2 Sculpting Steel 3 Serum Tank 1 Sol Ring 1 Voltaic Key 1 Crop Rotation 2 Elvish Aberration 4 Llanowar Elves 4 Priest of Titania 1 Regrowth 2 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary 2 Seedborn Muse 4 Tornado 17 Forest 1 Gaea's Cradle 2 Wirewood Lodge	Green Conduit-Tornado Deck. Description of deck by it's author (quoted): Tornado is one of the best enchantments to benefit from this sucker, I think...I doubt if anyone even remembers it; it was so difficult to use! Chalice is of course absolutely insane with it, but that's already well known. It's got the legendary land and critter (Rofellos and Gaea's cradle) and is pure green/artifact, although at first I was going to add blue. I figured it wasn't that important after thinking about it for a while. Webmaster note: [This deck was submitted with a side board.. but it wasn't necessary since it would only ever be played casually.]
	by Ahren Paulson, deck submission to the Age Counts contest from 12/2003.
	S.C.S.: Tornado - Power Conduit / Elves

Congratulations Ahren on winning first place in a contest started a year ago!!! I look forward to see what feature you will choose next.

For the rest of you, make sure to email your deck submissions for this month's contest, The Making of a Legend. It is all about building a deck around one of the new legendary creatures from Champions of Kamigawa. If you have any questions or comments about that contest or the results from this one please email me (here).

I hope everyone enjoyed this contest. Thanks for visiting Magic Deck Vortex!