Most of the variants I talk about are games for two to six people. This is all well and good, considering it is tough to play games involving more than six people. I mean, the game's not too much fun when you get one turn every half-hour, right? But what happens when your group gets larger than six?

Tournaments, my friend, tournaments.

Friday Night Magic (FNM) is a great way to hang out and play in tournaments with the locals. But this isn't always an option. See, I have one problem with FNM, it’s on Friday nights. Now, I work standard eight hour days, and sprinkle in some umpiring of youth baseball on the side (by some I mean 10+ hours a week). At least, I do that Monday-Thursday. But on Fridays, I put in an additional 5 ½ hours at a local restaurant. For those of you that aren’t from Wisconsin, Friday night = Fish Fry. If you go to just about any restaurant in Wisconsin, barring fast food, on a Friday night, they’ll have a fish fry going on. So, that being their biggest night, I get hired on.

But working those extra hours on Fridays means one thing. No FNM for me. OK, so aside from the cool textless spells and other FNM foil rewards, nothing lost, right? Well, not really. See, just about all the of the competitive players only show up on Friday nights. The card shop holds “for fun” unsanctioned tournaments during the week or on Saturdays, but because the top prize for one of those is only like 4 boosters, most of the tourney guys don’t think its worth their time. So that leaves the 20 or so of us who are tired of coming with the same deck every week and having me win all the time (that last part’s a joke). So what did we do? We came up with different ways to format our tournaments.

Today’s formats, variants, whatever you want to call them, go beyond the simple two player game. These are ways to spend an entire day of “tournament” Magic.

Now, I know this is a casual site. But I know that I enjoy playing in a tournament every once in a while. Sometime playing with something on the line is more fun that just “playing for fun.”

Spy Network

If you aren’t a tournament player, one of the oddest things about playing in your first tournament is your deck registration sheet. You'll probably have your deck all spread out on the table because you can't remember exactly how many copies of what you have. Well, if you want to play in a spy tournament, start spreading that deck. Note that this is the only format I’ll talk about where you are required to turn in a decklist. In fact, the whole strategy of the spy format is what you put on your decklist.

At a normal tournament, the only person who sees your decklist is the tournament organizer, and maybe a random judge if you get deck-checked. In a spy tournament, however, everyone gets to see your decklist, or a part of it at least.

You come to a spy tournament with a sixty-card minimum deck from whatever format you are playing (Type 2, Extended, etc.). Don’t have a sideboard pre-built. At the beginning of the tournament, each player gets a decklist sheet with a line about half-way down. Each player fills in 45 of the cards in their deck above the line, and whatever is left below the line (normally 15, but you could be playing Battle of Wits). The TO will then make a copy of the decklist for himself, and cut off the top half of the original. Everyone then gets to see 45 cards of everyone else’s deck. With this knowledge, players build their 15 card sideboards.

So obviously there is strategy involved in A: deck choice, and B: what you chose to hide. Playing well know archetypes isn’t the best idea in this format. Even though you are hiding 15 cards, most people will probably know what they are anyway. Instead, coming up combo decks and then hiding pieces of the combo is a fun way to mess around with your opponents. Hiding lands is also a good way to go. Does your white deck splash blue for Meloku? Hide both Meloku and the Islands/Adakar Wastes. Maybe you could hide all the creatures in your deck, then watch their face when Simic Sky Swallower comes crashing down. The possibilities are endless.

But how do you look at it from the other perspective. I know what they’ve shown, but I also know that they are hiding something, probably something good. How do I sideboard for it? When building your sideboard in this format, you have to walk a fine line against building against specific cards and building against specific archetypes. Most of the time, you will be building against archetypes that look like they could be of trouble to you. For instance, combo decks usually die to disruption. Even if you don’t know exactly what the pieces to the combo are, if you see a good amount of fetch cards, hand disruption should probably be put into your sideboard. Do you see a lot of big creatures on a decklist? Well, add Wrath of God. No matter what they have hidden, Wrath probably kills it.

Another little nuance of this format is that cards that ask you to name something specific are often really good. Cabal Therapy, for example, becomes relevant even before its flashback ability comes into play. Cranial Extraction and Isperia are more recent examples.

The final thing I want to talk about with this format is bluffing. This sort of ties in with the hiding combo pieces above, but it takes it a step further. I don’t condone having dead cards in a deck, so make sure everything has a place, but it doesn’t hurt to have a card that draws a lot of attention but doesn’t do a whole lot. For example, take a look at this decklist, courtesty of MaGo and the MDV database.

When you look at this, the thing that should jump out at you is Mortal Combat and Revenant. You’ll probably be thinking that I’ve hidden ways to get mass amounts of creatures in the graveyard. In reality, the Mortal Combat alt-win is actually win strategy #2 in this deck. Here’s the 15 I hid:

3 Swamp
4 Kokusho, the Evening Star
4 Partiarch’s Bidding
4 Iname, Death Aspect

The important cards are the three four-ofs. This deck wants to win by Iname-ing 4 Kokushos into the graveyard, then playing a Bidding, naming spirit, returning them all to play. When they see the table, each one of them dies due to legend rule, causing each opponent to lost twenty life. Pretty cool, huh? Even if, for some reason, your dragons have been removed from the game, then Mortal Combat becomes your win condition with Iname.

Yes, I know, 4 Kokusho = not casual, but this deck showed off this strategy really well.

When you want to get your sneaky side out, spy magic may be the way to go for you.

Pros: Rewards non-archetype building-Strategy extends to deck registration, which you won’t find anywhere else-lets you sideboard into a known metagame.

Cons: Because you build your sideboard on sight, you may want to drag your collection along with you-deck registration takes a while.

The Gauntlet

Playing with one deck is for wusses. Playing best 2 of 3 matches is for wusses. This tournament has you bring three decks to the table and play best 3 of 5 matches. When you are building your decks for this type of game, you have to follow the “unified deck construction rules.” This is just a fancy way of saying that your three decks combined cannot contain more than four copies of any one card, aside from basic lands.

But what am I building decks for?

You’ll be running the gauntlet with your three decks. You’ve successfully run the gauntlet when you beat all three of your opponent’s decks. There are a few key rules, however.

After game one, the losing player pulls out deck number two. The winning player shuffles up his same deck to play with. The losing player restarts at twenty life. The winning player keeps his/her life total from the previous game.

So if I lost to Streetz, but managed to get his Energy Vortex deck down to 1 life, game two starts 20 to 1. One more important rule: any cards that are removed from the game don’t come back when then next game starts. So your flashback cards and Judgment Wishes aren’t too good in this format.

That’s it. After that, all normal Magic rules apply.

Now for those of you freaking out about not being able to use more than 4 of each card, don’t worry…its’ doable. Wizards just ran a Pro Tour using unified deck rules, and it was block constructed. Even with only three sets, the rule is feasible. Basically, the rule is there so you can’t play three of the same deck.

Strategy

Alright, so we need three decks. What is the best deck to use where? One of the ways to win at alternate formats is to use the changed rules to your advantage. The rule that seems extremely abusable to me is the remove from play rule. Remember, if a card gets removed from the game, it doesn’t return for the next game. With that in mind, I came up with this for seat A: (extended legal)

So basically, burn the heck out of them. Y-Flame, Y-Storm, Scorching Lava, Demonfire, Carbonize, Frostwielder, and Kumano all can remove stuff directly from the game. If that plan goes awry, Samurai of the Pale Curtain picks up the slack. Now anything you kill gets removed from the game. This deck doesn’t have much in the way of lifegain, so you probably won’t go 3-0 with this deck. But even if you lose game one, you’ll have taken a good chunk of your opponent’s deck with you.

I debated adding LD in the form of Stone Rain, because Pale Curtain-ing away their lands is always fun. In the end, though, you need ways to get rid of their guys more than their lands.

The Middle Deck

The middle deck is kind of a challenge to build. I like to think of it as the long reliever in baseball. You first deck, your starter, takes you as deep as possible. But if your starter falters, your long reliever has to come in and hold down the fort for a while, and set the stage for your closer, deck #3. Because of that, this deck has to fill a number of roles. If you lose game one, it has to be able to take out a weakened deck quickly, so you can get to your opponent’s second deck on as equal of a footing as possible. It should also have some staying power, because you want to stay away from your third deck for as long as possible.

So what do you play? I’m not going to give a decklist for deck #2, after all part of Magic is your creativity, right? But keep in mind that your deck should be good in both the early and the “long game.” If your second deck manages to make it to their third deck, odds are you’ll be starting with a very low life total, thrusting you into a “long game” scenario early.

Deck #3

Ah yes, the closer. This is the deck that has to potentially win three games all by itself. With this in mind, I’ll be throwing some life gain into this one. Maybe some is a bad word--a whole friggin’ lot of life gain into this one. What’s my favorite insane life gain combo? Nourish on the Panoptic Mirror. I’ve been on the wrong side of this one, and it isn’t pretty. The game ended with my opponent at 3000+ life (I decked him). He had a pair of mirrors, each showing Nourish, so he was gaining 12 a turn. Luckily his win condition was infinite creatures, and I had Horobi + Goblin Sharpshooter set up, but the life combo still was pretty insane. With that in mind, I have this:

Mana Leak, Counterspell, and Boomerang help stabilize the early game, until you set up Panoptic Mirror with Nourish. Fabricate and Reshape help you go find your mirrors. Remember that mirror isn’t legendary, so don’t be afraid to play more than one. Deep Analysis on a mirror lets you find your kill guys quicker.

Note that I kept this to extended legal cards. Type 1 his the most rediculous "remove stuff from game" combo ever-Phyrexian Processor on 19 + Crumbling Sanctuary. This little combo was a huge key to the Tinker decks back in the day, and becomes even more degenerate in this format.

So that’s it for the Gauntlet. The strategy runs deeper than the game here. Carefully decide what decks you want where before throwing down.

Pros: Deep Strategy-Bad deck matchups only last one game.

Cons: Best three of five matches take longer-Larger collection required

The Masters

Good golf tournament, fun magic format.

You guys are getting a deal from me here. Note the title: Masters. There are two of them. That’s right; you get a 2 for 1 (always a good thing in Magic). Each of these formats, the mini master and the grand master, are limited formats. That’s right, no deck construction required (well, before the tourney at least).

Mini Master

This version is the preferred game if you have a number of players higher than eight. You’ll see why in a minute. Unfortunately, the masters tournaments only work when your number of players fits a bracket (4, 8, 16, 32 etc…). At the beginning of the tournament, each player is given one booster pack. They take that pack, add exactly fifteen basic lands, and play their first round opponent.

Standard two of three matches are played. After the match, the winner takes the losers cards and adds them to his card pool. From here on out, you can add as many or as few basic lands as you wish, but your deck must always be a minimum of forty cards. Because you generally want to run 17-18 lands in sealed, only 7-8 cards won’t make the cut. In a sixteen man tournament, the finalists will each have earned six packs, which is just one pack more than a normal sealed deck.

Grand Master

It’s a mini master, but with two big changes. Instead of a booster, each player gets a tournament pack (or 3 boosters, its equivalent) to build their decks with. You must build a 40 card minimum deck, and can add any amount of basic lands. This is better with 4 or 8 people, as your cardpool tends to get very large in the later rounds with more than 8.

Yes, this is a limited format, so the strategy will change depending on the cards you open. There are a few general tips, though. Get used to playing the unplayables, especially in the mini-master. But even in the Grand Master, your first round will probably see you running cards that have no right to be run in limited.

General sealed deck strategy will apply. You’ll almost always want to run 17-18 lands (after the first round of the mini-master). Also, this format is even slower than normal sealed, so drawing first is almost never the wrong play. Sideboarding, which normally will have an effect on sealed play, isn’t as big of a deal here, as you’ll be scrapping for playbles in the main deck anyway.

Prize support for this one can vary. Because technically the winner of the last match would get his opponent’s cards (I.E. the rest of the cards he didn’t already have), some people play that winner keeps all. Others will redraft rares and uncommons. Basically, you can figure out how to split prizes for yourself.

And that’s the Masters. Just keep Tiger Woods away, and you may have a chance at winning it.

Pros: Limited game, so it mixes things up a bit-Decks are remade after each round, so your deck will get better as the day goes on.

Cons: Luck a big part of the mini-master (opening Light of Sanction sucks)-Redoing deck after every round gets time consuming.

I hope you enjoyed me going a little different direction with my column this week. Next time, we take a look at how we can make avatars fun.

~Nate Lisko (lionden_56)~

You can discuss this article in the MDV forums here.

Articles Spotlights from 2006
The Games People Play - Tactical Magic.
If I worked at R&D
The Beginner’s Guide to Rogue
Druid Week Primer
Opting In: Ravnica
MDV Idol: Finale!
Avatar Week Primer
Delusions of Mediocrity: Getting Stuffy in Here.
Raiding Ravnica: Guildmages and You!
Lands-More than Mana: Part One