4
Rust Elemental
3 Siege-Gang Commander
4 Viashino Sandstalker
2 Warbreak Trumpeter
4 Confusion in the Ranks
3 Lightning Greaves
3 Nuisance Engine
4 Pyroclasm
3 Slice and Dice
2 Tel-Jilad Stylus
13 Mountain
3 Forgotten Cave
4 Great Furnace
4 Temple of the False God
4 Blinkmoth Nexus |
 Confusion
in the Desert.
Description of deck by its author (quoted):
Lots of people shared their Confusion in the Ranks ideas with me.
Aaron Wells noticed that Confusion lets you trade an artifact land for
any artifact or land you want! Andy from New York suggested pairing
Confusion with Tel-Jilad Stylus to make the permanents you traded away
disappear. (That's not nice!) Francisco Rendon decided Okk made a lovely
playmate for your opponent. Lyle Waldman had a Confusion-Day of the
Dragons-Boomerang combo that acted like a permanent Reins of Power… plus
you got all the Dragons! (But he hasn't learned about sharing yet, so he
included Brand.) Cy Braddy was generous enough to give away Grid
Monitor. Scott from Washougal, Washington, mentioned that with a
Mycosynth Lattice out, all permanents are artifacts, so anything could
be swapped with anything else. Alex Maron, who likes sharing more than
anybody else, suggested Shared Fate!
Mike MacHenry tried a Confusion in the Ranks combo-kill (can you say
“combo-kill,” boys and girls?) that used a Phage the Untouchable in your
graveyard and an Animate Dead. Confusion makes Animate Dead slide over
to your opponent before Phage rises from the dead, so Phage will pop up
on your opponent's side, causing instant game loss… right? This brought
all of R&D to a halt—and even inspired applause—before that big meanie
Paul Barclay said it didn't work that way. Since you put Animate Dead's
triggered ability on the stack, Phage enters play on your side, not your
opponent's. You would lose. Frown. Still, Mike cleverly stuck 2-for-1
enchantments into his Confusion deck. Use Animate Dead on something
else, or play Sarcomancy, and your opponent must share both a creature
and an enchantment with you!
Rick Hindman had the ideas I liked the best. Way back when Scourge came
out, I asked you folks in Internet Land for decks that used the two
goofy rares I couldn't break: Dimensional Breach and Grip of Chaos. The
Breach decks came in quickly, but the few Grip decks that trickled in
weren't impressive. That's because Grip was waiting for its bestest
friend Confusion in the Ranks. Rick was the first to write to me about
putting them together to rip a hole in the space-time continuum. (Can
you say “space-time contin-aw, the hell with it. Can you say "lame
gimmick," boys and girls?) The game morphs at that point into something
that uses Magic cards but is not, in any recognizable sense, Magic. His
deck also featured Nuisance Engine for repeated theft, Warbreak
Trumpeter for bulk theft, Lightning Greaves for immunity, and Rust
Elemental for donation purposes only.
I split Rick's deck into two decks pretty quickly. My “serious”
Confusion in the Ranks deck, if such a thing exists, doesn't use Grip of
Chaos. But it does use the Trumpeter, Greaves, and Rust Elemental. I
quickly found two new Confusion-based combos. Siege-Gang Commander was a
better Trumpeter; you snag three creatures in exchange for 3 Goblin
tokens. (You'll momentarily give up the Commander, but when the tokens
charge in afterwards, you can trade one of them for the Commander back.)
Even better was Viashino Sandstalker, which many of you have also
discovered by now. It jumps in, trades for your opponent's best
creature, then jumps back to your hand to go again the next turn.
Stealing every creature your opponent plays for the rest of the game, or
smashing in for 4 if there are no creatures to steal, will end the game
quickly.
Though I put the deck together in December, I never got a chance to post
it before the holidays and the Darksteel previews. The new set
contributes the very-hard-to-steal Blinkmoth Nexus. Finally, since this
deck tends to roll over to weenie decks, Pyroclasm and Slice and Dice
help contain the early beats.
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