Magic Deck Vortex: Planned Efforts

So… college. Yeah. It’s been cutting into my free time pretty hardcore, what with the toga parties and all (just kidding), so I’m going to never have a lot of it to spend writing, testing, and deck building, but I’m doing the best I can, so please bear with me. That being said, there’s a deck building competition this week, and I’ll try to get that graded post-haste, and sent to Streetz, so you won’t have to wait forever.

This article presented a few challenges for me along with the fact that I have no free time. I was testing for it an Eye of the Storm deck, and that turned out extremely badly, even for a Johnny like me. I still have nightmares at night… Let’s just say it went badly, and leave it at that.

[Let's just move along.. pay no attention to the evil card demon to the right... It's just a figment of our imagination...] ~Streetz~

Creature interaction has always been one of the hardest parts of the game of Magic, and probably always will be. Questions on how damage stacks and what abilities resolve when has been puzzling players since Alpha, and it’s so integral to the game that this won’t be the first or last time I ever present a Raiding the Dollar Bins deck based on it.

Creatures with abilities are nice. In Ravnica, we see how good abilities can be. If you don’t believe me, take a look at Grave-Shell Scarab, or perhaps Oathsworn Giant. These creatures are amazing in limited, a format defined be creature interaction. Cards like Veteran Armorer, Master Decoy, and Thought Courier are good because they add a new dimension to the game that wasn’t there before. I’m sure you all have lost games because of forgetting about a random creature like Veteran Armorer. To go with this idea, I’m making a deck, and a fun one at that. Along with this recurring theme of creatures and their abilities is something exciting from the Ravnica block that I think you’ll find it quite interesting. Go go Concerted Effort!

Concerted Effort is a card designed for creature abilities. Not only now do all your creatures fight on the same team, they also share all their abilities, which makes cards like Skyhunter Skirmisher all the more powerful. Not only is he a double striking flyer, but now all your creatures doublestrike and fly… it’s so not fair and so, so awesome! Let’s take a look at the deck. (And it only costs 2WW! ~Streetz~)

The game starts off pretty early with turns one and two either playing out Courier Hawk and Tundra Wolves, or perhaps a Bonesplitter and a Telling Time. Telling time is an interesting card in this situation because you get to peel the top 3 off your library to look at. Depending on what you’re looking at, and what you’re playing against, pick appropriate cards. If you’ve got a Banshee’s Blade on the board and you’re looking at Concerted Effort, Telling Time and Skyhunter Skirmisher, take the Effort and Skirmisher, and send Telling Time to the bottom.

That brings me to another point. Skyhunter Skirmisher with Banshee’s Blade is unfair. The first time an equipped Skirmisher swings, it’ll do 1 damage, and turn into a 2/2, then swing for another 2, and become a 3/3. If your opponent has no removal, it’s good game.

This deck has multiple options as to a game ender, be it Banshee’s Blade and the Skirmisher, Concerted Effort and a Traveler’s Cloak attached to something, or just an Iridescent Angel coming across for 4 each turn. Make sure you don’t over-commit to the board, as you don’t have anything to counter effects like Wrath of God. Compulsive Research and Telling Time are in the deck to help refuel your hand in time to lay down some more beats.

Concerted Effort becomes key if you want to win the game in style. It makes Tundra Wolves have landwalk (via Traveler’s Cloak) and lets a Riptide Crab double strike. When all your creatures share all their abilities, things can get pretty ugly pretty quickly.

This deck could go two ways in building strategies. You could try to go for more white weenie style by adding cards like Glorious Anthem or Savannah Lions, and this deck could easily take a control aspect, reaching for cards like Mana Leak and Absorb. The deck as is makes a fine build, but it isn’t afraid to play towards different styles.

1) Iridescent Angel has protection from all colors. This means you can’t enchant it with Traveler’s Cloak. However, you can equip it with cards like Bonesplitter because artifacts are colorless. Remember that protection gives a creature 4 things:

All this mumbojumbo from the comprehensive rules can help you win games, so pay attention to it!

2) Double Strike does first strike damage and normal damage. No lie, I seriously tested this deck against people who thought normal damage was better than double strike. Double strike puts first strike damage on the stack, then after it’s resolved, puts regular damage on the stack, so keep that in mind when you’re doing your combat math. There’s a reason why Skirmisher costs 1W more than normal.

3) Attack, Attack, Attack! Make sure that your creatures are going through for all the damage they can, especially if they have vigilance. The only way you’re going to win this game is if you do it the old fashioned way by smacking your opponent for 20.

If you’re looking to add some money to this deck, a good place to start would be fetch and painlands. Flooded Strand and Adarkar Wastes make this deck run easier and better than it can with normal lands. Prepare to cough up the dough for them, especially now with the Standard (T2) and Extended (T1.x) metagames being all haywire with the addition of Ravnica.

Another addition to consider would be Legion’s own Akroma, Angel of Wrath. She’s got more abilities that can be copied than any other creature to date, and is really good just by herself. For this deck, she a nice investment, and I don’t think you could go wrong with replacing the Iridescent Angels with her.

Creature control could be prime for this deck. Cards like the convoking Devouring Light or the white Fireball Hail of Arrows could definitely find their place in this deck. Cards like Counterspell and Mana Leak could also be a big part of this deck.

You could try to revamp this deck for a White Weenie strategy, going for cards like Paladin en-Vec and Isamaru, Hound of Konda, and Glorious Anthem. To go that route, you have to completely take out the blue.

And now… what you’ve all been waiting for! Deck building competition time!

The Ravnica: City of Guilds
Deck Building Competition

Criteria:
The deck you create must be turned in by (1 week after initial posting) All decks must be sent to deathbybeebles@yahoo.com . A deck that is late will be disqualified from the competition. All decks must have an original name that describes in short the deck, or is memorable in some way. Please do this, as it is easier for me to judge since I will know which deck belongs to who.

The deck you will be creating is an Extended deck. That means you are only allowed to use cards from Invasion onward. Decks must be built around a certain card, which will be specified lower in the competition rules. Decks not following these requirements will be disqualified.

Please send with your deck a paragraph or two describing the deck and what it does. Tell me how it works, tell my why it works, tell me combos and synergies. Explaining how your deck works is a surer way to score better in the competition as it helps me play it better during testing.

Decks must be built in one of two fashions. Choose which way you would like to work during this deck building competition and TELL ME IN THE EMAIL YOU SEND ME. This will alleviate confusion for me, and help me get through the grading process quicker.

There are two lists of cards to choose from. From List #1 choose any card, and build a deck around it. This deck will be graded on a scale of 30.

If you so choose, you can decide to not pick a card from List #1, and go to List #2. If you pick any card from list #2, you must build a deck around another card with the same color from List #2 (if you pick a gold card, pick the other gold card). These decks will be graded on a scale of 15, combined together to give you a score on a scale of 30.

The Lists are as follows:

List #1
Blood Funnel
Eye of the Storm
Flickerform
Warp World
Searing Meditation
Bloodletter Quill
Cloudstone Curio

List #2
Necroplasm
Woebringer Demon
Light of Sanction
Twighlight Drover
Cerulian Pheonix
Followed Footsteps
Mindmoil
Molten Sentry
Scion of the Wild
Ursapine
Bloodbond March
Phytohydra
Nullstone Gragoyle
Crown of Convergence

To clarify this once more, you can either build a deck from a card from List #1 graded out of 30, or build two decks with cards from List #2. If you build two decks, your final scores out of 15 on each deck will go together to make your final score.

There will be no modifiers for this competition. Instead, each deck will be judged only on its ability to do well in the 5 categories of scoring, listed below.

Focus: 6/6
Cohesivity: 6/6
Balance: 6/6
Creativity: 6/6
Overall-Playability: 6/6

There you have it! Two decks or one? And can you pull it off?

Death_By_Beebles

If you have a supposed junk or dollar rare that you would like Death_By_Beebles to cover in Raiding the Dollar Bins, contact him at : deathbybeebles@yahoo.com