Last time, I talked about two fun multiplayer formats, Two-Headed Giant and Emperor. Both of those formats are team games. Do you like to be your own team, and depend solely on yourself? There are a number of fun multiplayer formats for you as well.

Five Color Armies?

One such format is 5-color Army. Many of you will recognize this as a Star Format, but I’ve added a little twist to it. 5-color Army is a format where five people each play one mono-colored deck, one deck for each color. You sit in a pentagonal shape, in color pie order (White, Blue, Black, Red, Green). If this isn’t possible, three players on one side of a table with two on the other also works. The idea of the game is to eliminate the two opponents opposite you. These would be the opposing colors on the color pie. If you where the white player, you would be trying to kill the black and red players. You cannot attack the players to your left or right. You can, however, target them with your spells; they still count as opponents.

This format is interesting for a number of reasons; First, the interactions of colors. Using the previous example, the white player is taking hostile actions from the black and red players. Red and Black’s strengths are their removal abilities: Red’s direct damage and Black’s spot removal. White, however, has a lot of protection and prevention abilities (Blessed Breath jumps to mind), and can often times pseudo-counter an incoming spell by giving the target protection from whatever color is necessary. On the flip side, White is generally the weakest color in Magic power-wise after the first few turns. The bulk of the damage white is able to inflict is done early, with weenie creatures. They usually swing unblocked while the opponent is developing his or her board. However, dropping a bunch of early creatures means you will usually tap out on the early turns. A well-timed shock can kill off your creatures while you are unable to defend them. The longer the game goes, the less it favors white, because the red and black players will have a better chance of drawing into the spells they need. From personal experience, mono-white is usually very defensive in this format, and relies heavily on its allies. I’ve seen a good offensive weenie deck, and played one, but for the most part defensive is good in this format.

On the other hand, black rarely has to rely on its allies. Black has to defeat green and white. This match up greatly favors the black player. Unless the white player gets an early weenie swarm out, black usually doesn’t have to worry about white creatures, short of anything with Pro-black. Board sweepers like Hideous Laughter can take care of most white threats that come out, and spot removal takes care of the rest. Green presents a little more of a challenge. Green’s creatures are usually bigger than anything black can throw out, so spot removal is a lot more useful. Luckily, your ally against green is blue, which can help by countering and bouncing stuff that you have a problem with. Also, anything with Fear is simply GOD in this format, as rarely will it be blocked (I’ve seen instances where groups have special rules that disregard Fear. This is always an alternative). I could go through strategies for all five colors, but I have other formats I want to get to in this article, so I’ll move on.

A second reason this format is interesting is the dynamics between alliances. You are not technically teammates, yet you must work together to be effective. White’s allies are blue and green, but blue and green are enemy colors. Likewise, one of your opponents is red, while red is green’s ally. I’ve run into multiple instances where killing an opponent isn’t always the best route. This is especially true when playing a more defensive deck such as white or blue. For example, lets say you are white again, and your green ally is in trouble; the red player is basically the only reason he is still in the game. Even if you have the means, killing the red player is not in your best interest. If you do kill the red player, you’ll be taking on the black player alone. As you can probably tell, I talk about white in this format a lot. I usually get stuck playing white, so it is the color I’m most familiar with. Here’s the basic archetype of what I run. One side note; the group I play with has a few newer players who don’t have large collections. For this reason, we play 40-card decks, max 3 copies of any non-basic. We also use the extended format. Although this is different than what most of you will play, this can still serve as a basic skeleton.

The first thing you may notice is only 15 lands. Remember, however, that this a weenie rush type deck, with the curve maxing out at 4 (not to mention its only 40 cards). This deck takes advantage of what white does best: protection. Every creature in the deck has protection from either black or red. You also have a few COP’s and Blessed Breaths to make sure the opponent can’t throw in some surprises. Looking over the list on paper, I see that Privileged Position would be a great addition to this deck.

So that is five-color, or star magic.

Upsides: It adds a strategic element to the game with allies, it is great for new players because they learn the strengths and weaknesses of each color, and games often go down to the wire.

Dowsides: It requires exactly five people, a quick start by one player can end the game quickly, and not everyone has the ability to build a good mono-colored deck.

Chaos Magic:

The game of Magic is all about order and a sense of understanding. So how do we get rid of that? We play a game called Chaos Magic. This is an amazingly fun game that can be played with any number of players, from 2 to infinity. It does get a little confusing with more than six, though. Anyway, Chaos uses your standard sixty-carder, with no special building rules or anything like that. What makes this game fun is what happens during the game. There are multiple versions of Chaos Magic. The one me and my friends play involve an actual Chaos List, with effects numbered 1 to 100. You need two ten-sided dice or a 100-sided die (if you use the double tens, it is better to use two different color dice. That way, you know which die is supposed to be the first number).

The following example list has been quoted from Deck Builders 4T:

To begin the game, the first player rolls in the “world” list. Treat this as an enchant world effect. This effect stays active until a different chaos roll changes it.

Here's another example list quoted from deckbuilders.4t:

Gameplay is exactly the same as regular Magic, except for the added chaos rules. Each turn, after untap but before upkeep, there is a chaos phase. At the beginning of this phase, the active player rolls the dice, and finds the corresponding event on the chaos list. That effect then happens immediately. It doesn’t use the stack, and no one can respond to it. If there are no legal targets, the effect simply fizzles. Also, creatures phase in and out during the chaos phase.

The basics sound simple enough, but the complexity of the list is what makes this game fun. For instance, number 70 on the list is Jester’s Mask. It says, “Target opponent puts his hand on top of his library. Search that player's library for as many cards as they put on top of it. That player puts those cards in their hand and shuffles their library.” From first hand experience, this effect can be extremely annoying. My nice hand of five spells suddenly turned into a five-land hand. Other effects range from everything from land destruction like Stone Rain and Armageddon to life gain like Congregate (target player gains X life, where X is the number of creatures in play.) There are also really abstract effects such as, “count the number of permanents in play. If it is an odd number, put a 3/3 Djinn token with flying into play. If it is an even number, you take 3 damage.” My personal favorite is Mystical Prism, which says that you ignore colorless mana costs for spell you control. You only have to pay the colored mana cost.

There is one thing I don’t like about the format, is that sometimes you will run into different lists. I’ve played with lists that use 200 numbers, and includes extremely wacky effects. Some of these events include players and all their permanents phasing out until the next upkeep. Making players “disappear” for a turn is just one crazy effects. There are also artifact nuking effects, land swaps, and many more. While this list isn’t quite as extreme, the effects can change the game at a moments notice. The game works for two people, but the more people you have, the more possibilities for craziness.

This format also allows players to be flexible. If you don’t like some of the numbers on the list, make up new ones. The limits of the games are only the limits of your imagination. You can see cards “reprinted” on the list. Is there a card you think would have a cool effect in a chaos game? Don’t be afraid to add it to the list.

As far as deckbuilding for this format goes, you can’t really build a deck specifically for the game, as the randomness of the rolls prevents any sound strategy.

What's 15CH?

While multiplayer games are great when you have a night or weekend to spend playing long, drawn-out games, what happens when you’ve got 10 minutes to kill? You don’t have time to play a full game of Magic, yet you don’t want to just sit there and talk for ten minutes. That’s where the little format that could comes in. The format is called 15 card highlander (15CH), and it’s probably the best Magical way to spend ten minutes. Deckbuilding takes mere minutes, all the way from initial concept to sleeving and games rarely last longer than 5-10 minutes. The format is simple: each person has a deck of 15 cards, with no duplicates except for basic lands. Players don’t lose if they can’t draw. Sideboards of 3 cards are allowed.

Because each player will almost always draw all the cards in his or her deck, some of the ridiculously broken constructed cards aren’t as good in 15CH. Psychatog, Fact or Fiction, Ancestral Recall, Gifts Ungiven, basically anything that usually nets you card advantage suddenly losses its value. On the flip side, things like Breath of Life are excellent in this format, because you need to get the most out of your creatures. Being able to fish them out of your graveyard is key. Also, cards that allow you to break through stalemates are also important. Thundersong Trumpeter and Waxmane Baku (in the right deck) are very good in this format. In some respects, 15CH plays like a limited format. Stalemates will often occur, and being able to punch through them on a consistent basis is the key to victory. Trample is another way to overcome stalemates, and I value it highly. Milling is also a viable strategy in 15CH. While players don’t lose if they can’t draw, dropping their best cards into their yard can prevent them from being able to deal with what you play. I haven’t played with any Ravnica cards yet, but I can almost see Glimpse the Unthinkable being banned in causal circles already.

The great thing about this format is how drastically it can change by swapping just one or two cards. While the three card sideboard may seem trivial, the addition of those three cards can drastically change the strategy of the game, because you are almost guaranteed to draw them. For this reason, you also have to choose your sideboard cards wisely. Here’s a sample red/white deck that tries to avoid stalemates:

The prowess is simple; Thundersong shuts down opposing threats, while your creatures soar over for beats. The curve on the creatures is a little high, so early shocks and firebolts hold down the fort until your board develops. If any of your men die, never fear! You can recur them with Breath of Life. Isamaru is great on turn one in this format, as he will usually draw chumps for the first turn or two.

One of the funniest things I’ve ever seen in this format is someone who quickly threw a deck together, then realized that he had a spell that cost more than the number of lands he was playing. He was running five lands, and to his dismay drew Rhox. This may seem obvious, but remember that your land count will be low. The highest costing spells are not your friend in this format.

That’s all for this article. I hope that the next time you and your friends have a night where you get bored playing normal Magic, you remember one of these formats, and spend the night feasting on some of the craziness that can come with them. Next time, if there is a next time, I hope to discuss a format that I just recently found out about, and have had a great time playing, called Magic: The Wars. Until then, may all your topdecks be favorable.

Peace,

~lionden_56~

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