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Magic the Gathering’s Banned Card Update: Implications for EDH and Beyond

On June 18th, Wizards of the Coast posted their biannual announcement outlining the changes to the banned and restricted list. These announcements typically have a severe but limited impact on the formats for which certain powerful cards are either banned or restricted. Occasionally and most recently, we have watched as a number of potent cards have experienced their release from the prison of banned or restricted cards. Notable cards that have had their sentence in exile commuted include Dream Halls, Entomb, and the newly emancipated Grim Monolith.

As a fan of Magic’s older formats, I typically stay up like a kid on Christmas Eve awaiting the presents that might be revealed. The last couple of banning announcements have had significant metagame and thus financial implications. The legacy format shifted with each unbanning in 2009. At Grand Prix Tampa, I was chatting with Patrick “The Innovator” Chapin about the implications of the newly unbanned Entomb on the legacy format. He noted that there was a pretty sick reanimator deck in the works that abused the process of dumping large, game-winning creatures into the grave and bringing those creatures back in the very early turns of the game via the Entomb, Mystical Tutor, and Reanimate. The deck had served a tenure in the gaming days of past and was ripe for rebirth.

Following the sage advice of Patrick, I set out on a journey to secure as many copies of the newly unbanned Entomb as possible. Earlier in the year, I had dropped $12 dollars on a playset of unbanned Dream Halls. The cards made an eventual appearance in the top 16 of a Starcitygames Legacy 5K, and my investment grew 5 fold. When there are whispers on the wind of an exciting new deck in an environment, you should: 1. Consider the source of the rumor 2. Do some evaluative thinking for yourself, and 3. Research prices on your speculative investment. If these three factors align to your liking, jump on the chance to own the cards, pilot the deck, and to make a solid investment. I purchased my two copies of Entomb at $7, my next two copies at $14, and the next four copies at $20 dollars each. The cards currently have an estimated value between $30-45.

This trend inspired me to await each possible opportunity to scoop up unbanned cards early and often. On June 17th, I stayed up late. I had to be at work the next day by 7am, but still felt it would be an awesome opportunity to await the announcement and make some quick decisions based on the outcomes. I have both good and bad news. I purchased a couple of copies of Grim Monolith for a low number, but the other announcements would have a far, far greater effect on the playability and financial value of my Magic collection. The announcement outlined the following terms:

The following card sets are permitted in Extended tournaments:
• Time Spiral (until October 1, 2010)
• Planar Chaos (until October 1, 2010)
• Future Sight (until October 1, 2010)
• Tenth Edition (until October 1, 2010)
• Lorwyn
• Morningtide
• Shadowmoor
• Eventide
• Shards of Alara
• Conflux
• Alara Reborn
• Magic 2010
• Zendikar
• Worldwake
• Rise of the Eldrazi
• Magic 2011 (effective July 16, 2010)
• Scars of Mirrodin (effective October 1, 2010)

The following cards are banned in Extended tournaments:
• Hypergenesis
• Sword of the Meek

My wife and I had only recently made our venture into playing competitive Extended tournaments. Over the last 8 months we picked up an additional play set of Tarmogoyf, play sets of each of the shock lands, and any number of tournament viable staples including Dark Confidant, Umezawa’s Jitte, and the recently popular Dark Depths. By the conclusion of the 2009-2010 extended season, Tarmogoyf was slated to reach $90 while Dark Depths were selling for $160 a foursome. We had been a huge fan of Extended Zoo decks that packed Tarmogoyf, used fetch lands to grab shock lands to even out the complicated casting cost of the deck’s many creatures and spells, and our particular version which sported Tribal Flames. This card rewarded particularly complex mana bases. For 2-casting cost, you could burn your opponent for each land type you controlled.

On the back of the most recent bannings, this deck and those sorts of rewards will be nearly extinct. I feel that the biggest loss to the format will be felt in the interaction between fetch lands and the shock lands. Building decks with the shock lands allowed for a different kind of magic. There was a distinct deck style available in Legacy and Extended than could be found or created in the Standard format. You were able to play a number of cards that “cared” if your dual-color producing lands (duals) were stamped with a basic land type. Underground Sea is both a Swamp and an Island. Watery Grave is both a Swamp and an Island. Underground River, Secluded Glen, and Drowned Catacombs are neither. The importance and convenience of fetching the former cards with a Polluted Delta (or other relevant fetch land) made the cards vastly more playable and superior to the latter for a wide array of decks. Those days appear to be gone in Extended along with that deck building freedom and “color-screw” liberation. Splashing extra colors is not as viable, playing a vast mix of cards will be result in slower and possibly less efficient decks. Consider the difference between the speed of the aforementioned Tribal Zoo and 2008’s 5-color control. The sheer number of come-into-play-tapped lands can really slow down a deck that relies on a complicated mana base.

Additional implications beyond the general loss of the fluid, complicated mana bases are the pure execution of some other deck types. Zoo was the rush deck type that worked to keep combo decks in check. Decks like Thopter Foundry, Dark Depths Combo, and Hyper Genesis were generally offset by the possibility of a speedy death at the hands of a skilled or lucky zoo player. With Zoo decks being eradicated, it appears that Wizards simply axed or put a tight time limit on the viability of popular control decks. Play your Dark Depths one last time in October, and then ship them off to legacy land. Sword of the Meek will R.I.P. along with the explosive starts and finishes provided by Hypergenesis.

What will be left when the dust settles? I imagine that players will find themselves immediately drawn to Faeries or one of the Tier II combo decks like Pyromancer’s Ascension.dec looming in the background. Aside from the obvious, it is likely that the format will morph and shift into something satisfactory, but at the expense of some great cards and good times.

Bannings In EDH: The Good, the Bad, and the Low Cost of Newly Banned Cards

Following the trend set by Wizards of the Coast, the Elder Dragon Highlander Rules Committee drops banning updates parallel to the mother ship. There were several shocking and non-shocking editions to the updated banned list. After generating a great amount of forum buzz and internet publicity around the Channel-Eldrazi deck, it seems that our best efforts to employ awesome, powerful, Eldrazi spells using mana ramp will be thwarted by the RC.

At least we got a couple of thousand hits on the YouTube channel and finished a three part series on the deck before it was banned to the stone age. I cannot say that it was unexpected. The synergy between the Spawnshire of Ulamog and Channel prompted a near-instant rules update to clarify what “outside of the game” entailed in EDH. If you were every privy to blowing out an opponent using the very lucky draw (or fortunate ability to search up Channel using any of a dozen cards) using Channel and unnamed giant Eldrazi, then you surely realized that the days of the easy, early Eldrazi were numbered. I am just glad that they did not ban the Eldrazi. That would have been a hard ban to accept. In any case, these are the updated bannings for EDH as of today:

There is a lot about this list that sits well with the player base. However, I think we should consider revisiting the Tolarian Academy banning. Tolarian Academy was always very, very strong. It was a sort of win condition among blue purists. The Azami deck will still be able to win games, but they will not be able to combo off quite as easily without the academy. Some players are complaining that Arcum Dagsson is dead and players will not be able to finish so effectively with Zur. I guess I am comfortable with these changes. Sharuum decks have always been a sort of sore spot and now they will have a tougher road to hoe. In general, many, many blue decks have just had their power dimmed. However, it seems likely that the next level of mono-blue decks will rise to take their annoying place atop the local metagames. Niv-Mizzet and Vendillion Clique are largely unaffected by the Tolarian Academy banning and will be new, most-hated generals.

On the topic of most-hated and feared generals, we must play a swan song for the little elf that staged a year long triumphant comeback from his previous banning. Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary will be sorely missed. I felt like the banning of the abused, obscure artifact was simply enough. The deck should have survived without the Staff of Domination. It was a good compliment next to blue decks and offered green-lovers everywhere a pure option. Now I fear that mono-green decks might dwindle to the power level of other non-blue mono colored decks. In the long run, I feel like the fear of early Eldrazi hitting the board will scare the RC into banning too many cards.

Future Implications

The next line of relatively awesome cards is set to fill the void left by the latest bannings. The front line has been shot down, but the battle wages on as the cards march like revolutionary war soldiers into the metagame. If players still want to pursue the dream of having an untimely, annihilating Eldrazi god break dancing across the gym floor. There are plenty of cards that will having you shouting, “You just got served” at your weeping opponent. Gaea’s Cradle comes to mind. The interaction between the increasingly expensive Grim Monolith and Power Artifact also springs to mind. You are not going to be able to ban enough mana ramp and acceleration to keep people off of the Eldrazi forever. Hopefully, the RC will realize this and will take Tolarian Academy off of the list. My wish is for a return of Rofellos and the Academy, but until then I am sure players will find new and awesome ways of doing tricky and conniving plays.

Check out our upcoming videos on YouTube where we carry on more of the discussion around the EDH bannings, the “improved” values of the recently banned Extended cards the implication on your EDH decks, and more hated generals. We will also explore some decks using alternative ways to power out your Eldrazi spells! Keep checking us out right here on www.thegameacademyonline.com and on YouTube at Elderdragonhighlandr.

Building a New EDH Archetype with Eldrazi and Annihilation (Part 3)

The e-mails have piled up.  The IM requests, facebook comments, and private messages on YouTube all converged on a single request:  WE WANT THE LIST!  In this article we are picking up with the final bits of commentary on card inclusions, the awesome new synergies, and tech that make the Eldrazi Tribal deck so powerful.  Players have watched the YouTube video and have begun making their own lists.  Today, we will satisfy the requests and will publish the entire deck list.  If you have just joined us, make sure to check Parts 1 and 2 which lay the foundation for the genesis of the deck, the engines and card that make it run, and some of the debates we have started while searching to be the among the first to map out the newest EDH archetype:  Eldrazi Tribal.

Haste/Eldrazi

There are several great options in red that allow us to give our fatties haste.  The ability to hit the board running and kick on the early Annihilator cannot be underestimated.  We include haste promoting cards including Anger, In the Web of War, Sarkhan Vol and Madrush Cyclops.  We are looking at various ways to keep our guys attacking on the turn that they hit the board.  The best way to stop Eldrazi spells  will be counters and nontargeted removal.  Ulamog is indestructible.  Therefore cards like Hallowed Burial will be better than cards like Wrath of God.  However, players are going to need to pack as much as possible to deal with this deck.

If your opponents are coming up with solid removal, then you can punish their efforts with annihilator on the next recruit to your board.  There are not too many instant speed removal cards that put a hasty attacker on the bottom of the deck or remove them from play.  Path to Exile and Swords have always been popular, but they will not stand up to the continual threat of your Eldrazi if you keep them coming.  If you like to pimp out your haste, try the inclusion of the FNM Lightning Greaves.

Mana Ramp/Expensive Spells

Most of our deck is Green.  Green provides some traditional advantages of some of the other colors in the fact that it gives us mana acceleration.  With new mana ramp spells like Growth Spasm to match with classics like Explosive Vegetation, Yavimaya Elder, Sakura Tribe Elder, and Seedguide Ashe, you have a really solid way to both fix and juggernaut your mana row.  We have selected lots of cards that search for basic land along with cards that throw forests directly into play.  I like cards like the lesser know Seedguide Ashe because he gives you a substantial body along with 3 forests when he “leafs” play.  The cool thing about cards that throw forests into play (versus a basic land) is that you can shop for and place dual lands right out of your deck.  Bayou, Overgrown Tomb, Taiga, and Stomping Ground all allow you access to forests while fixing your mana.  These cards are awesome and give you a great advantage as well as pairing with the fetch lands in the deck.  If you do not have the original duals, we found that the deck play tested well with the tap lands, vivid lands, and new man land duals as well.  You might just want to adjust what type of ramp sources that you choose.

It is also possible to take the deck build in a slightly different direction.  We are packing Sol Ring, but there are certainly more artifact based mana accelerants.  Further, we already mentioned Cabal Coffers and could also pack Gaea’s Cradle.  I have not noticed if these cards would be amazing, but you have search for lands in uncharted Territories making them an option.  I have become a little shy with my more expensive artifact mana ramping due to the high number of artifact sweepers that are played locally.  I traditionally have shown love to Coalition Relic and Gilded Lotus.  Those cards might still be acceptable.  However, I have not been such a fan of little dudes like Llanowar Elves or Birds of Paradise.  They are small-timing it in a big environment with lots of card value and too much board sweeping.

Cheating the Fatties into Play!

We have the mana ramped up, we have ways to give the Eldrazi haste, but we also want to see these guys early and often.  After receiving some feedback on the forums, we have made some adjustments to our strategies.  We are now packing a few ways to get the big guys on the board.  These strategies trade off the benefits of casting the Eldrazi (which in some cases you simply want to do i.e., Kozilek) for early beatings and early game annihilation.  Annihilator is a really tough mechanic in EDH.  However, its potency diminishes as the game progresses.  Players are flopping lands, making tokens, and building their board.  A turn 16 annihilation for 4 is likely to be met with a shrug from an opponent that simply sacs off a couple of tokens and some lackluster lands.  However, if you can toss a couple of annihilators into play on turn 6, 7, or 8, then you have a different story.  Some opponents will sacrifice half of their lands, their entire army, or the engines that attempt to make their own decks work.  That is where cheating guys into play can really pay off.

The Eldrazi drones and spawn naturally work to make the tribe hit the board early.  However, Magic offers some other options.  You might not have thought of some of these cards but you will quickly see how strong and synergistic they can be.

We are going to include Sneak Attack.  Sneak attack is an enchantment.  I have stated before that few EDH players pack enough enchantment hate.  This makes good enchantments better, and great enchantments backbreaking.  Sneak attack cost 1 red and 3 colorless.  Once you make that investment, a single red mana can toss an Eldrazi into play with Haste.  Sure you have to sacrifice it at the end of turn, but throwing down a copy of It that Betrays can sure pay off.  You might snatch some lands from an opponent or capture some of their other sacrificed goodies.  The biggest threats from your deck will just shuffle them back in allowing you to redraw them or search them out later.  However, the annihilation damage will be done.

Other super options for this type of early game Eldrazi satisfaction include Cryptic Gateway and Belbe’s Portal.  Cryptic Gateway works well with your Eldrazi spawn.  The spawn share a creature type with their gods and you can play a Dread Drone, tap the two spawn tokens and summon a fattie.  This seems pretty silly and wildly fun.  Belbe’s Portal (2/3 of the great EDH cards specific to Belbe) also lets you put Eldrazi into play for the low cost of 8 mana.  Emrakul offers you a Time Walk for 7 more mana, but you might want to simply have access to a sort of Progenitus with annihilator 6 on turn 8.  Maybe I am just greedy, but these cards fit the theme and capitalize on the Eldrazi size and strength in the early game.  Late game they become less impressive, but I imagine you can appreciate the inclusion.  I love packing unused and “junk” rares that fit with the themes of my decks.

Searching for Eldrazi

There are tons of great search effects that we can use in our deck.  We, after all, are playing black.  More search effects make a deck strong.  There is no doubt.  However, there is a balance that I seek in deck construction in this format.  The reason that we are playing EDH, in many cases, is the love of the highlander nature.  One hundred varied cards often implicate a high degree of variance.  If I want super consistency and a deck that does the same thing each game, then I would stick to my 4-ofs in standard constructed.  However, in EDH I like to have a deck that offers a different play experience each time that I sit down.  Therefore, I am going to play a little light on Tutors.

You make the shell work for your style of play.  We have access to Demonic Tutur, Vampiric Tutor, Grim Tutor, Diabolic Tutor, Liliana Vess, Worldly Tutor, and others.  Beseech the Queen and other cards can work well in these spots as well.  I have chosen to make tutors 4-6% of my deck.  You can go less or more, but this will help you hit the right card for the right situation when you get into a tight spot.

The Deck List

General:  Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund

Colorless Eldrazi  (11)

All Is Dust

Artisan of Kozilek

Emrakul, the Aeons Torn

Hand of Emrakul

It That Betrays

Kozilek, Butcher of Truth

Pathrazer of Ulamog

Skittering Invasion

Spawnsire of Ulamog

Ulamog the Infinite Gyre

Ulamog’s Crusher

Other Eldrazi Spells (8)

Awakening Zone

Brood Birthing

Corpse Hatch

Dread Drone

Emrakul’s Hatcher

Growth Spasm

Kozilek’s Predator

Rapacious One

Mana Ramp (10)

Sol Ring

Yavimaya Elder

Sakura Tribe Elder

Life from the Loam

Hunting Wilds

Wooded Elves

Seedguide Ashe

Explosive Vegetation

Solemn Simulacrum

Garruk Wildspeaker

Haste-makers (5)

Sarkhan Vol

Anger

In the Web of War

Madrush Cyclops

Lightning Greaves

Search Cards (6)

Buried Alive

Demonic Tutor

Liliana Vess

Realms Uncharted

Vampiric Tutor

Worldly Tutor

Card that Cheat Fatties into Play (4)

Sneak Attack

Cryptic Gateway

Belbe’s Portal

Channel

Creature-Based Engines (Search, Fog, Recursion) (8)

Survival of the Fittest

Squee, Goblin Nabob

Genesis

Eternal Witness

Spike Weaver

Acidic Slime

Restock

Yawgmoth’s Will

Removal/Board Wipe (6)

Decree of Pain

Damnation

Pernicious Deed

Terminate

Duplicant

Woodfall Primus

Other Card Advantage/Utility Spells (7)

Bloodbraid Elf

Harmonize

Sylvan Library

Baneful Omen

Sensei’s Divining Top

Skullclamp

Overrun

Mana Base (50% Green, 20% Red, 20% Black, 10% Colorless) (34)

Eye of Ugin

Temple of Eldrazi

Temple of the False God

Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth

Phyrexian Tower

Strip Mine

Taiga

Badlands

Bayou

Stomping Ground

Blood Crypt

Overgrown Tomb

Fire-lit Thicket

Graven Cairns

Twilight Mire

Auntie’s Hovel

Gilt-Leaf Palace

Karplusan Forest

Sulfurous Springs

Llanowar Wastes

Rootbound Crag

Dragonskull Summit

Raging Ravine

Lavaclaw Reaches

Wooded Foothills

Bloodstained Mire

Verdant Catacombs

Evolving Wilds

Savage Land

Reflecting Pool

2 Forests

1 Mountain

1 Swamp

The archetype is bran new and we have only been testing this build for a couple of weeks.  I am sure that this is a really outstanding shell for the deck.  We built the deck with multiplayer in mind, but 1 vs. 1 testing had proven that it is about a 50/50 match-up against Rofellos!  If it can hang with that kind of ramp and huge dudes, then it should hold its own against other archetypes.  I had originally wondered if we should just play the Eldrazi out of the Rofellos shell, but I am convinced for both fun and the diversity in tricks you get with the additional colors that the Jund style build is just fine.

There are some card inclusions and tweaks in this list that vary slightly from the video that we posted.  User comments and some play testing led us to cut some cards and add others.  Most folks might not initially like some of the lesser, colored Eldrazi themed cards like Kozilek’s Predator, Dread Drone, and Corpse Hatch, etc.  However, we are keeping them for two reasons:  we like the Eldrazi theme over an Eldrazi splash, and the cards actually play into our ramp/cheat big dudes into play strategy.

This is one of my favorite projects in a long, long while and I am sure that you can use this shell as a basis for your Eldrazi deck.  I imagine these decks are going to be popular, so you might also find ways to preserve your permanents and fight of the Eldrazi hordes.  If you are not going to join them and plan to beat them consider the inclusion of Gilded Drake, Hallowed Burial, and even the likes of Jester’s Cap.  See you next week and thanks for leaving your comments and suggestions.

Building a New EDH Archetype with Eldrazi and Annihilation (Part 2)

Last week we started a really exciting project.  The new set released and we wanted to jump on the opportunity to build and play with the Eldrazi Tribe.  We have continually been play testing the build and tweaking the card inclusions.  We have an outstanding shell and ended up making a casual deck that grew in competitiveness.  It turned out that the Annihilator mechanic was very, very powerful and the engines that we used in the deck made it very effective.  After some play sessions, we wanted to highlight some of the sick synergies that we planted in the build and how we came to label the deck….Channel Eldrazi Tribal.

Check out our video on You Tube for a complete visual spoiler of the list, commentary, and game play right here at the Game Academy.  We have a channel featuring other EDH videos and interviews with some of the game’s most interesting and entertaining personalities.  Our YouTube channel is Elderdragonhighlandr.  Oh yeah!  Also check the conclusion of this article next week for the complete published deck list in part 3.

Synergies that Allow the Deck to Compete

Spawnsire & Channel (Colorless Spells/Channel)

This is where the debate begins!  The EDH rules that apply to cards that grab other cards from “outside of the game” are, at the time of this article, ambiguous.  Some folks believe that cards cannot be brought in from outside the game.  When EDH was first developed in Alaska, the original play group banned the “wishes” cycle of cards.  Subsequently, those cards have been removed from the banned list that most folks follow.

This is where the confusion might start.  Last October, the EDH rules were placed, by Wizards of the Coast, into the official comprehensive rules for Magic.  This is an amazing recognition of the alternative format, but introduced some interesting concerns.  When a card in traditional constructed Magic refers to “outside the game” it is generally limited to the sideboard.  Legacy players use Burning Wish and fetch Empty the Warrens from their sideboard while playing Charbelcher, for example.  However, most players don’t play a sideboard in EHD.  The rules allow for play groups to make a 10-card sideboard (which I support), but many playgroups either don’t know this or just don’t use it.

It would seem like you could retrieve exiled cards, but the exiled zone is now part of the game.  Therefore, it does not really exist “outside of the game.”  However, EDH is a casual environment and the developers of Magic keep making cards that grab tools from outside the game.  The intent or “spirit of design” of these cards might just be to whip out your binder, search the collection, and drop in anything that you want!  I think that is pretty awesome.

However, there are several concerns.  While searching the collection is amazing and would allow ridiculously fun game states, highlander formats are confronted with a violation of the core rule of the highlander game:  More than one copy of a card might enter the game.  The single card rule applies to deck building, but is not specific enough to apply, at this time, to cards that might enter the game post construction (during gameplay).

If cards can come into play from the binder and if you can play multiple copies, the Channel-Spawnsire is pretty wackey.  You could have a scenario in which you might draw Spawnsire and Channel (or cascade into channel, or tutor for channel, or tutor for Spawnsire, etc.).  If you have at least 31 life, then you would be able to pay 30 life for 30 colorless mana via Channel.  Ten mana could pay for Spawnsire and 20 for his effect.  Once you trigger the effect, you could go grab a pile of Eldrazi (including shapeshifters) from your binder.  I could imagine a more Spike player sitting with a pile of Emrakul promos outside of the game.  If you cast any odd number of Emrakul copies (accounting for the Legendary destruction if you play out even numbers), then you could take a ton of extra turns and would have some giant bodies that could not be stopped.  Just think of the madness.  Because you “cast” the Eldrazi with Spawnsire’s effect, you are able to capitalize on all of the powerful effects!  This is mindboggling.  Some will think it is cool while others will hate it.  I think it is not that broken and just seems like a solid win condition.  It can be interrupted and puts the Channel player at risk by paying 75% of the starting life total.

In a rules scenario where this interaction is illegal. I think you still play both cards in your deck.  Channeling out an Emrakul seems pretty sweet.  You pay 15 life, take an extra turn and drop in a huge creature who untargetable and mostly unblockable with that nasty dose of annihilator ready to cripple the player playing white.  It is strong.  I like it.  I think players will need to adjust their deck builds to account for it.  There have not been too many cards that actually forced a shift in the EDH metagame.  The Eldrazi might be a good exception to this rule.  These guys are so big and scary that they might cause a disturbance in a mostly unalterable metagame!

Awakening Zone & Token Generators/Skull Clamp

This will offer your deck the option to either draw a lot of extra cards or simply ramp up the mana.  Drawing a couple of cards a turn is sure to keep your deck fighting and will give players a chance to keep the big Eldrazi coming in the face of counters.  Not much to say here.  Skull Clamp is great with faerie, goblin, solider, and now spawn tokens.  If you can generate them, you might as well play it.

Buried Alive Tool Box

Recursion can be a very powerful trick.  I think most decks should run graveyard disruption.  In fact, many of the Eldrazi have some anti-synergy with setting up a graveyard toolbox or recursion engine, but they are so effective that you can just play it anyways!  If you get an early Buried Alive, then you can sink the Genesis/Squee/Eternal Witness/other dude into your graveyard.  This can help both recursion engines that we mentioned before and can also help you ditch cards to think your deck if needed.

Baneful Omen/Sensei’s Divining Top

The Eldrazi cards just keep making an impact in this deck.  We are going to pack some cards that have great synergy with the high converted mana cost cards in the deck.  The average Eldrazi spell runs at about 9.  Big Eldrazi creatures make up about 10% of our deck.  We are also playing Decree of Pain and quite a few more cards that cost 5 or 6.  The interaction might be obvious, but I will explain for players that are not as familiar with Baneful Omen.  The Omen is an enchantment. I think enchantments are one of the least hated on cards in the EDH format  (next to planeswalkers).  Therefore, you are likely going to get this interaction to stick.

Baneful Omen allows you to reveal a card from the top of your deck.  We will use the Divining Top to keep our most expensive cards on top while drawing the cards beneath those cards and resetting the fatty for the painful reveal.  If you have Divining Top placing an Emrakul in the hurt position, then you can deal your opponents 15 a turn until someone can make you shuffle or otherwise disrupt our combo.  Again, it deals 15 to every opponent at the end of each turn.  Not too shabby.  Triple black mana is a little stretch for our deck, so we made sure to include Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth.  This deck might also be able to play Cabal Coffers with a few tweaks.  More testing might be needed.

Life from the Loam/Uncharted Territories

So you want to fix your mana, you want to play cards for value, you want to reuse fetch lands, or just search up a tool box land, then you are in luck.  Uncharted Territories marks another great card from the Rise of the Eldrazi expansion.  The synergy with Life from the Loam is pretty slick.  It seemed like the perfect compliment to the ramp that we are trying to accomplish to power out our huge Eldrazi spells.

I think that there are a group of players that might abuse this with land destruction.  I don’t mind land destruction (per se), but think that abusive land destruction engines are pretty annoying.  Crucible of Worlds should not really be pulling back strip mine and the ilk.  However, I think there are times when it is appropriate to use a strip mine or tectonic edge to deal with a man land or Maze of Ith.  The best use for our Uncharted Loam combo will be to grab Urborg, Phyrexian Tower, Eye of Ugin, and Eldrazi Temple.  These cards push your deck’s priorities and have pretty solid synergy with ramping and the utility engines that aid your deck function.

Prelude to the Final Deck List

Next week we will conclude our deck construction.  We have crammed several cool new cards into the list.  We are finding synergy and balance and have a few final tweaks before we finish.  We want to find lots of ways of cheating our big guys into play and have some really interesting tech including Sneak Attack.  Further, we are going to lean on our green spells in a big way to provide us with tons of mana ramp.  About 15% of our deck will consist of mana ramping dudes, sorceries, and enchantments so we can “get there.”

The deck is about 2 weeks into play testing and I am sure that this will become a new staple archetype in the environment.  It has applications in 1 vs. 1 play and multiplayer.  A couple of months ago, Magic designer (a big fan of fatties) posed a question on Twitter.  He mused what Sheldon Menery might think about the way that the Eldrazi would change the way that EDH is played.  At first I thought this simply referred to colorless spells, All is Dust working for every color, and throwing down big dudes.  Now I am beginning to understand the full implications of this new tribe.  We are looking at giant dudes, that are “easily” cast in EDH packing come-into-play effects, giant bodies with the brutal annihilator mechanic.  The are metagame warping!

Check us out next week for the most up-to-date list for the deck.  Also, note the fact that you can buy all the singles that you need from The Game Academy.  As of today, there are still some copies of Survival of the Fittest, Sneak Attack, and Ulamog.  Grab yours before the prices go up or the supplies run out!  Check out the game academy’s online store on this site and their listings on eBay for some really juicy EDH foils and rarities.

*Editor’s Note* – The Game Academy hosts an EDH league every Sunday; tournament signups begin @ 2 PM and tournament entry is $7. All entry will be given back to top finishers in store credit to use towards anything in the store. Jeremy is always in attendance to play EDH in our league, offer deck advice, and record matches for his popular YouTube channel. If you don’t have an EDH deck, don’t worry, we normally have a few extras if you want to play. See you here!

Building a New EDH Archetype with Eldrazi and Annihilation (Part 1)

Release weekend marked a couple of Magic milestones.  The Rise of the Eldrazi set released and was immediately ready for some constructed play.  There were several players that were hanging out on Thursday evening waiting for that proverbial stroke of midnight to land their first boxes of the new product.  I know the release events were very successful and The Game Academy had players crawling out of the woodwork to snatch up product at the lowest prices in town.  You can check the main site, but The Game Academy is doling out boxes of Rise of the Eldrazi for $89.99.

I like hanging out at the shop on release weekends.  You get a chance to meet up with all your Magic-playing pals.  Everyone loves a new set release.  As you know, there are all kinds of players out there. You have your casual crowd.  These players might show up for some of the prerelease events or occasional two-headed giant tournament, but can most often be found gaming at the kitchen table.  You can see players that frequent FNM and there are always tons of drafters.  I know a lot of folks stop in to pick up boxes of the new sets and scurry off to draft away the nights.

Other players sit and crack packs, chasing the big money payouts and then trade in the goods to open more packs.

I had several goals on release weekend.  I landed some of the foil cards that I hoped to obtain.  We racked up a foil Vengevine and foil version of Gideon Jura.  My wife is a champ when it comes to opening packs and landed one of every mythic in the set!  Needless to say, it was a great weekend.  After playing in some release events and digging through a giant stack of newly printed foils, I turned my attention to the development of a brand-spanking new archetype in Elder Dragon Highlander.

Eldrazi:  The Tribe Better than Expected, Annihilator is Sick!

I will caution the readership with a disclaimer:  This deck-type is way more powerful than you would expect and you probably should not build this list. It is bonkers!  I am sure that it could easily fit into one of our “Most Hated…” films on YouTube.  Our Elderdragonhighlandr YouTube channel is currently featuring this list and you can check out both the deck and some game play on our site.  I think that building an Eldrazi themed deck is pretty sweet.  After play testing and fidgeting around with a couple of builds, the Eldrazi spawn tokens and actual Eldrazi tyrants offer very powerful cards.

Initially, I felt the Eldrazi might be a sort of bust.  They look a little like Darksteel Colossus or Progenitus.  My misread was that the Eldrazi would play like these fatties.  Traditionally, EDH folks have built decks that have packed a couple of giant, fat dudes as finishers.  I have a 5-color build that finishes with Progenitus.  He is complicated to cast, hard to stop, and basically bats clean-up.  Darksteel Colossus has served the same role.  I like a big indestructible dude with trample.  You can push through damage and keep him around in the face of many forms of removal.

However, you only need one or two of these big guys in your deck.  You do not need an entire tribe of Progenitus-esque creatures populating your deck.  I imagined that the Eldrazi would fill a similar roll and therefore be relegated to the “token fatty” spot in many EDH decks.  This alone is pretty cool, but not as interesting as what I discovered.  I had imagined that folks would only want a single copy of Emrakul or might only want to splash Kozilek.  After building and testing, I am now sure that I was wrong.

It turns out that the Eldrazi are not exactly like token fatties.  They are much, much more.  Many of the tribe members have effects that trigger as you cast the Eldrazi.  This goes a long way in shifting the way the cards are played.  It adds further value to the card beyond the amazing payoff of dropping a giant dude and swinging or blocking.  Further, they have a little keyword:  Annihilator! This effect is so sick.  It is nearly broken.  When you drop an Eldrazi early in the game and get off an attack, you end up crippling your opponent with an undeniable and devastating threat.  These guys are simply busted!

I thought playing the deck with ramp and haste would capitalize on the strengths of the Eldrazi.  There were multiple games when a giant dude hit the table on turn 6 and marched into the battle forcing mass sacrifice.  If you are swinging with multiple guys each sporting large annihilator stats, then you will cripple opposing defenses and limit the opponent’s ability to recover from the onslaught.  Let’s walk through a scenario presented during the game play on Sunday.

Player 1 is Eldrazi Tribe (RGB).  Player 2 is Slivers (5-color) and Player 3 is packing an Enchantress/Enchantment Lockdown deck (5-color).  The Eldrazi player drops Awakening Zone and plays out some quick ramp cards resulting in the premature appearance of Ulamog.  Player 2 has a small brood of slivers and Sliver Overlord while Player 3 has ramped mana and Luminarch Ascension with 3 counters awaiting its final counter to enable an army of white angels.  The Eldrazi player gets off a single attack on the Sliver player forcing the sacrifice of 4 permanents.  Player 2 drops down 2 lands and 2 creatures.  A final sliver blocks leaving only the Overlord and 5 lands.  The Eldrazi player builds the board with one of the less impressive Eldrazi only sporting annihilator 2.  Player 2 cracks back for some general damage and adds a land, but is clearly at a disadvantage after the attack.  Player 3 digs for some sort of removal.  Wrath and Damnation won’t kill this particular indestructible Eldrazi.  He survives for another turn along with his tribesman.

At this point, the Eldrazi player swings into Player 3 resulting in the loss of 6 permanents and epic life loss.  Now that player is significantly behind in board position and joins in the efforts to usurp the Eldrazi player.  Both Players 2 and 3 team up to survive.  Player 3 comes up with a Hallowed Burial and provides a collective sigh of relief.  However, Kozilek, Butcher of Truth hits the board with the aid of haste provided by a binned Anger.  The Eldrazi player draws 4 cards and punishes Player 3 with another round of annihilator 4.  The game state favors the Eldrazi player in available mana, total permanents, capacity to deal damage, draw cards, and overall tempo.  No amount of combined defensive efforts is enough to contain the slaughter.  Annihilator achieves its namesake.

I imagine that soon players will find out just how incredible the destruction and impairment can be to opposing players.  I was shocked, excited, and ended up feeling a little dirty.  These guys are big.  They can be stopped.  However, when they pile up and “get in there,” it is hard to hang.  For better or worse, I think that playing them all (even the lesser ones) just might be a great call.

Building the Deck:  Channel/Eldrazi

I will begin this section with some credits.  The idea to make the deck came from my wife and I.  We had been planning to build a tribal deck and became more excited with each preview and unveiling of the Eldrazi cards and themes.  I game sometimes with some new buddies in Spring Hill, Florida and noticed that most of them were very excited to build standard, multiplayer versions of the Eldrazi deck.  They were ramping and rolling out huge creatures.  One of my friends, Alex, spawned a ton of tokens and went for the Overrun kill condition, while another, Chris, just aimed to pump out giant guys using the Awakening Zone.  Both strategies were a bit slow and interesting and seemed perfectly fitted to EDH play.  You can’t drop two copies of your Awakening Zone (which is pretty awesome) but you can sport all the goodies!

The next steps were clutch.  “Faddy” Josh Harrison and I sat down with the aid of the Gatherer and mapped out many of our Eldrazi-themed options.  It can be noted that aside from the colorless Eldrazi spells and creatures, that the Eldrazi spells tended to align with the Jund colors (red, black, and green).  We searched for the best generals.  It would be cool if there were an Eldrazi specific or related general that fit with the Jund colors, but this does not exist for both thematic and practical reasons.  However, you can play Karthas, Tyrant of Jund.  This guy is both a house in EDH and does some nasty things with dragons.  He is also a 7/7 which is very large compared to most EDH generals.  I like him as a narrow and interesting sort of back-up plan.

Once we settled on a general, we moved through all of the various Eldrazi spells and thematic inclusions that we could find.  When possible, we gave an card from Rise of the Eldrazi the benefit-of-the-doubt and included the card for play testing.  We played each creature that made spawn tokens and most spells that generated spawn tokens.  Some of these guys may get cut, but we initially set out to develop a build that followed theme rather than aiming for the most honed and cut-throat list.  It ended up a little busted anyway, but we will get to that later.

The thematic spells were organized into Red, Black, and Green.  Green provided the best ramp options, red allowed our creatures to have haste, and black provided tutors and great removal spells.  To make your EDH decks function, it can often be beneficial to include some “engines” that make the deck competitive.

Engines that Make a Deck Competitive

Some of the best engines for EDH decks were born out of standard deck lists.  The card interactions and win conditions provided by these engines can give your build an edge.  These are some of the engines that we selected:

Survival of the Fittest/Squee, Goblin Nabob

The Survial of the Fittest engine is really solid in a 100 card deck.  Once you have it online, you can search out some sweet cards and build card advantage in decks playing green and red.  I like to make my first target for the Survival engine, Squee.  He comes back from the graveyard every turn and allows you to always have a creature to pitch for your searches.  Second up is Genesis.  When you pitch Genesis, a little green mana keeps your best creatures coming back to your hand.  Additional Survival targets include Eternal Witness and tool box cards like Acidic Slime, Duplicant, or Solemn Simulacrum.  If you can play this sort of engine, you can also fish out your Eldrazi creatures as you need them or might be able to retrieve your general if it gets shuffled into your deck.

Genesis/Eternal Witness Engine

We already talked about fishing this engine out with the aforementioned engine, but there are other ways to set up this interaction.  Buried Alive allows a player to search the deck for 4 creature cards and put them into the graveyard.  In this deck you are able to drop in Genesis, Squee, Eternal Witness, and any other creature that will meet your needs.  This is pretty sick and something that Josh Harrison turned me onto.  This allows your deck to be very interactive and also provides a player choosing not to play blue with some resilience to lots of counters.

To Be Continued…

The decklist is already available to view on YouTube.  There is some play test footage where you can get a chance to see Josh Martinez and Molly Blair defend against the annihilating deck.  Check out our channel: Elderdragonhighlandr on www.youtube.com.  You can find more of our videos on EDH if you search EDH or Elder Dragon Highlander.  Further, you can find the game footage and interesting videos for other games on The Game Academy’s You Tube channel.  Check out thegameacademyonlie and keep checking back on www.thegameacademyonline.com for singles and the second part of this article.  We will publish the refined decklist next week!!! See you guys around the shop, in Atlanta, and right here every week.

Bonus Engine

Thursday evening I had the great pleasure to play cards with some buddies that I had not seen in a while.  My pals Omar, David, CV-Dubs, and I worked on Omar’s new blue deck for a while.  These guys were picking up classic blue-related staples and debating card slots in a solid Teferi list, and Omar turned me onto something pretty cool.  As one of the win conditions for the deck, Omar would put Mystical Tutor on a stick.  He would imprint the tutor on Isochron Scepter.  After casting Beacon of Tomorrows, he could shuffle the sorcery card into his library, take another turn, set the Beacon on top of the deck and draw the card.  This little win-condition in the Tutor/Beacon engine seemed pretty ingenious.

*Editor’s Note* – The Game Academy will host Legacy tournaments every Thursday; signups begin @ 6 PM and tournament entry is $7. All entry will be given back to top finishers in store credit to use towards anything in the store. Keith will always be in attendance, so if you have any questions or need deck advice don’t hesitate to ask! =)

I attended the SCG Open in Atlanta primarily with the intent of playing Legacy. Because I needed to enter four more events (and make at least one top 16), to qualify for the 50K, I decided that I’d play in standard even if I hated my deck.

Under some influence from John Cuvelier, I was fixed on running Open the Vaults. Since I don’t play a great deal of standard, I didn’t actually get to play test any games until the day before the event. About ten games later, I was done with the deck. Perhaps I just had no idea what I was doing, but I was getting crushed by outdated Mono-Red and Naya Allies, and I wasn’t doing so well against Jund either.

I tried weighing my other options, including chilling in the hotel all day and cube drafting, but decided that I should definitely play the event. I recalled Sam Riley talking about an insane Polymorph deck on our online discussion group. Moreover, Sam Riley had been trying to pawn off a few decks on our group in exchange for a cut of winnings. I decided to give him a call, and about ten hours later (less than twelve hours before the tournament), I had a 75-card copy of Riley’s UGW Polymorph ready to go. I played some practice games against Naya Allies, and it felt a bit over 50-50, though Mono-Red was still terrible. Whatever the case, the deck seemed pretty cool, so I figured I’d give it a shot.

4 Awakening Zone
2 Oblivion Ring
4 Deprive
2 Negate
3 Path To Exile
2 Iona, Shield Of Emeria
3 Elspeth, Knight-errant
3 Jace, The Mind Sculptor
2 Day Of Judgment
4 Polymorph
4 See Beyond

1 Forest
4 Island
4 Plains
1 Arid Mesa
2 Celestial Colonnade
4 Glacial Fortress
4 Khalni Garden
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Scalding Tarn
2 Seaside Citadel

Sideboard:
1 Realm Razer
4 Flashfreeze
2 Negate
1 Path To Exile
2 Silence
1 Emrakul, The Aeons Torn
1 Progenitus
2 Day Of Judgment
1 Mountain

The Mountain and Realm Razer were supposed to be for control decks, but I never actually boarded them in as I’d rather just get Iona in nearly every situation.

—

Round 1 – Michael Chen – UW Control

I started with a double mull, but hit all my land drops, while Chen was stuck on two after keeping his six. I was able to apply pressure with Elspeth and eventually resolved a Polymorph with Deprive backup.

+2 Negate, +2 Silence, -1 Elspeth, -2 Day of Judgment, -1 Path to Exile

In game two, I kept six, and ran out a turn three Awakening Zone. Michael fired back with Jace, the Mindsculptor, but I called with Elspeth. After my Soldiers took down Jace, I played one of my own, and had a Deprive for Michael’s Baneslayer Angel. Several turns later, I dug into a Polymorph, and Michael scooped it up.

1-0

Round 2 – Kennen Haas – Bant Aggro

Kennen, a local player, brought a rogue Bant aggro deck featuring the very annoying River Boa. In game one, Kennen brought some heat with multiple Rhox War Monks, but I had Awakening Zone to soak up much of the damage. Eventually, Iona came down on white, and we were off to the races. An Elspeth eventually came down to throw off some of the math, and I was able to pick up game one.

+2 Silence, +1 Path to Exile, -1 Elspeth, -1 Negate, -1 Awakening Zone

In game two, I was able to hold off Kennen’s offensive, including some River Boa beats, by holding all my Islands. On one of Kennen’s turns we had a counter war over a Garruk or something, then I untapped and played an upkeep Silence in response to my Awakening Zone trigger. With only two or three mana up, Kennen was helpless to my mainphase Polymorph into Iona on white. Kennen had a few turns to draw into an Into the Roil with counter backup, but despite several Explores and Ponders, was unable to get there.

2-0

Round 3 – Steve Smith – Mono White Control

Steve literally did nothing besides play a few Knight of the White Orchids and Everflowing Chalices. He was able to ramp into a lot of mana both games, which made me fear Into the Dust — so much so, that I boarded into Emrakul, figuring he’d have to be an idiot to not board out Day of Judgment, and Oblivion Ring would likely be played on my Planewalkers.

-2 Iona, -2 Day of Judgment, +1 Emrakul, +1 Negate, +1 Path to Exile, +1 Silence

3-0

Round 4 – Derek Davis – ?????

I have no recollection of this round, but my score sheet shows him gaining eight life at some point, so he must’ve been hitting me with Rhox War Monk and Baneslayer or an Elspeth’d Baneslayer.

4-0

Round 5 – August Benard Caras – WW/g

August was playing a pretty cool white weenie variant with Student of Warfare, Ranger of Eos and Stoneforger Mystic, with green for Knight of the Reliquary and Stirring Wildwood. He came out the gates quickly in game one, but I had Day od Judgment along with the typical ground clogging Elspeths and Awakening Zones for games two and three.

-2 Deprive, -2 Negate, +2 Day of Judgment, +1 Silence, +1 Path to Exile

5-0

Round 6 – Jeffrey Loveday – Naya Allies

I was able to steal a very close game one from Jeffrey with Iona on red, when he left only Ancient Ziggurat untapped on the end of turn five. I mulled to five in game two, and wound up land flooded, while in game three, Jeff had a very fast draw, and had time walked myself too many times with “comes into play tapped” lands.

-4 Deprive, -2 Negate, +2 Silence, +1 Path to Exile, +2 Day of Judgment, +1 Flashfreeze

5-1

(At this point Riley had been knocked out of top 8 contention at 4-2.)

Round 7 – Isaiah Ley – UG Polymorph

Game one was very epic, taking nearly the entire fifty minutes. I kept a four lander, but didn’t draw another spell until around turn seven. By then, the board was something like my Elspeth, Colonnade and Awakening Zone versus Jace, the Mindsculptor, Garruk (with three dudes, and four loyalty) and a polymorphed Iona (on White). I was able to attack Isaiah to to three with the Elspeth’d Colonnade, while he raced back with Iona. At three, Isaiah finally was able to deal with Elspeth, bouncing it with an Into the Roil. He attacked with Iona (dropping me to six), then Polymorphed the tapped Iona into an untapped one. On my turn, holding four lands and two Elspeth, I drew See Beyond. See Beyond hit another See Beyond, which hit a third See Beyond. By now, I had Deprive and Polymorph in hand. I went for Polymorph on Isaiah’s Iona, killing it and revealing his library. Based on this information, it appeared he had a Negate in hand. Since I was dead if I passed turn, I had no option but to tap out for Elspeth. To my surprise, it resolved, and some random token got in for the last three damage. Phew…

-2 Elspeth, -1 Iona, -2 Day of Judgment, +2 Negate, +2 Silence, +1 Path to Exile

Because there wasn’t much time left in the round, I boarded with the intention of locking Isaiah out of Polymorph, with no real intention of outright winning the game. Ironically, Isaiah, in desperation, tapped out for Garruk or something, and I was able to resolve Polymorph into Iona on blue.

6-1

Round 8 – David Sharfman – Jund

The match was featured on ggslive.com. See it here:
Video 1
Video 2

-1 Negate, -1 Jace, the Mindsculptor, -2 Deprive, -2 Iona, +1 Path to Exile, +1 Emrakul, +4 Flashfreeze

Game two is missing, but was fairly anticlimatic. Sharfman fired off a few Duresses early, but had very little pressure. Somewhat later, Sharfman tapped down for some threat, and got Emrakul’d.

Round 9 – David Yancey – Chapin Mono Red

The matchup was depressing. It was even close to close. David started game one, on the play, with double Goblin Guide. I tried to make some blockers with Elspeth, but they all met Searing Blaze. Game two was more of the same, with David leading out with Goblin Guide and a Dragonlord, with multiple Searing Blazes for Awakening Zone tokens and such.

-1 Jace, the Mindsculptor, -2 Negate, -4 Deprive, +4 Flashfreeze, +2 Silence, +1 Path to Exile

Round 10 – Jason Byram – Naya Allies

Jason started with a mulligan, and was very quickly facing down an Iona on white. He was able to get in with a few allies, but his Bloodbraids kept hitting white spells, and I had plenty of tokens with which to chump. With the life totals 10-13, I attacked with Iona, then played Jace to bounce Bloodbraid. Bloodbraid came back down, and hit another white spell, at which point Jason scooped it up.

-4 Deprive, -2 Negate, +2 Silence, +1 Path to Exile, +2 Day of Judgment, +1 Flashfreeze

Jason started game two with a turn two Harabaz Druid, but with Day of Judgment in hand, I mentally took a victory lap. On his second turn, Jason ran out three other allies. None had haste, and I wound up clearing the board still at 20 life. Jason played a few more guys on the following turn, but I had a Path and Oblivion Ring. An Elspeth came down on the following turn, and had no problem racing with the few creatures Jason had left.

—–

I finished in 12th place, which is good enough to get the points I need to qualify for the $50K provided I play in at least one other Open.

After the event, Riley and I discussed possible changes to the deck. I think the deck is pretty close to perfect, though I had some mana hiccups along the way. I think I’d try tweaking the mana base some, and probably try out Terramorphic Expanse, since it gives some more fixing without making Glacial Fortress terrible. Additionally, with Stark’s Planeswalker deck shaping up to be the ‘deck to beat,’ it’d probably serve well to add an addition Oblivion Ring in the main.
What’s particularly nice about the deck, is you have access to way more counterspells than any other deck in the format. I think that gives Polymorph a huge advantage in control matchups. The only real problematic matchup is mono-red aggro, but you’re likely not going to beat them with the Planeswalker deck either.

Also, I have no idea what the Progentius in the sideboard is for. Maybe someone reading this can tell me. Whatever the case, it’s getting the axe for now.

4 Awakening Zone
3 Oblivion Ring
3 Deprive
2 Negate
3 Path To Exile
2 Iona, Shield Of Emeria
3 Elspeth, Knight-errant
3 Jace, The Mind Sculptor
2 Day Of Judgment
4 Polymorph
4 See Beyond

1 Forest
4 Island
4 Plains
1 Arid Mesa
2 Celestial Colonnade
4 Glacial Fortress
4 Khalni Garden
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Scalding Tarn
2 Seaside Citadel

Sideboard:
1 Deprive
3 Celestial Purge
1 Oblivion Ring
3 Flashfreeze
2 Negate
1 Path To Exile
2 Silence
1 Emrakul, The Aeons Torn
2 Day Of Judgment

Speaking of Mono-Red, that deck seems utterly busted in this metagame. If I were to start testing for Grand Prix DC, or Regionals, I’d start with Taylor Raflowitz’s build with some minor updates. Taylor seems to be an actual master of the game, so I’m much more comfortable running something he’s been tweaking and testing with than some random net list.

Maindeck:
4 Ball Lightning
4 Goblin Bushwhacker
4 Goblin Guide
4 Hell’s Thunder
4 Plated Geopede
4 Burst Lightning
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Searing Blaze
3 Staggershock
3 Devastating Summons

13 Mountain
4 Arid Mesa
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Teetering Peaks

Sideboard:
4 Goblin Ruinblaster
3 Manabarbs
2 Unstable Footing
3 Earthquake
3 Quenchable Fire

It should have a pretty easy time taking down Polymorph and Planeswalkers, with a 50-50′ish Jund and Naya Allies matchups. I imagine Bant might be hard, and if the UW Control decks care enough, those matchups could be hard also, but UW Control has bigger fish to fry, since they pretty much get curb stomped by Polymorph and Planeswalkers.

For those curious, I scrubbed out of the Legacy with Life & Taxes. You can read more about that deck on my blog. I still feel it’s a pretty strong deck in the current metagame, but sometimes you just lose to Pernicious Deed.dec.

–

Keith McLaughlin

*Editor’s Note* – The Game Academy hosts an EDH league every Sunday; tournament signups begin @ 2 PM and tournament entry is $7. All entry will be given back to top finishers in store credit to use towards anything in the store. Jeremy is always in attendance to play EDH in our league, offer deck advice, and record matches for his popular YouTube channel. If you don’t have an EDH deck, don’t worry, we normally have a few extras if you want to play. See you here!

Rise of the Eldrazi:  EDH Diamonds in the Rough (Part 2)

In our last article, we surveyed the Rise of the Eldrazi expansion for hidden gems for our Elder Dragon Highlander decks.  When I first began reading the spoilers for the set, I initially felt that the set might not impact the current environment beyond adding the Eldrazi tribal cards.  The mythic Eldrazi creatures will certainly splash into all types of EDH decks for fun and glorious beatings.  However, after playing with the set during the prerelease weekend, I found even more cards that tout the “fun-factor” and possible power levels to earn a place among the select 100 cards players pack in their EDH decks.

I speculated in the prior article about possible interesting cards in the colors white and blue.  This article will, for better or worse, attempt to speculate on the possible finds in red, black, and green.  Let’s jump back into the speculation and debate.

Red Hot EDH Prospects

The prerelease taught me a couple of important lessons.  I was initially sour on the “level-up” mechanic.  In many cases, the cards do not appear to have the goods to make it in a constructed metagame.  However, they are nearly limited bombs and, if played well, impact games in a huge way.  These guys are like a new, slanted Figure of Destiny.  But they are the “lay-away” version in many cases.  Have you ever tried to save enough money to buy a car in cash?  Saving up a little over time and putting it into a bank can be a more manageable way to pay then dropping a lump sum all at once.  I think the metaphor might just hold water as we see these cards gain steam in the standard metagame.

Players should note that “reading your opponent” becomes somewhat easier due to the sorcery speed leveling.  If you have a creature that could be leveled for 3 colorless mana and you leave that mana open, your opponent might put you on the instant card that you intend to play.  I suggest jumping into this mind game by taking liberal levels when needed and occasionally using the leveling inconsistently to bluff if possible.  If you always play the level-up mechanic in a straight forward manner, you are giving away a ton of information.

This brings us to the red mythic that should find a place in both dragon-based (Does a dragon rider count?) and mono red decks.  Kargan Dragonlord’s level-up only costs one red; therefore, you are able to pump him up fairly fast in the mid and later game.  Low cost spot removal that deals 1-3 damage is not as popular in the slower, epic EDH metagame.  In standard, a quick lightning bolt can dispatch this guy, but you will be beckoning larger forms of removal as you move this dragon into his 8/8 ass-kicking range.

World at War provides two additional attack phases for 5 mana.  If you have a hasty or ready-to-swing general with a clear path to your opponent’s face, then you can really pile on some general damage with each additional combat step.  Generals like Thraximundar will capitalize on these multiple attacks making them impressive.  Godo, Bandit Warlord will land a total of 6 attack phases with this card.  This could be the basis of a Samurai deck or some sort, or might just be splashable fun.  That kind of action aided by the right equipment, evasion, or other interesting effects can really change the pacing of the game.  While this card is powerful, its rebound may result in the double-attacking player earning a large target from the rest of the table.  Play this fun and powerful card at your own risk!

Conquering Manticore provides the savvy EDH player with a way to steal away impressive opposing creatures, while the Lord of Shatterskull Pass will wreck havoc on decks that plan on generating a great deal of smaller tokens.  He would be able to wipe out a token army in one fell swoop.  I could see this guy fitting into an EDH deck as anti-token and rush tech.

The Treasure Hunter’s Guide to Rise of the Eldrazi

1. Foil Kargan Dragonlord
2. Foil World at War
3. Foil Lord of Shatterskull Pass

Black Cards from RoE for EDH

The Best Black Card in the Set!  (I guess it is also red)

Early speculation hints that black received a huge boost from the Rise of the Eldrazi.  The standard environment Black decks will land some impressive removal in the form of Consume the Meek and add to the hand disruption provided by duress and extended’s Thoughsieze in Kozelik’s Inquisition.  Some writers have also hyped Consuming Vapors.  I could see this card as a great way to get around shroud or indestructibility.  Keep it in mind for certain titan creatures with protection form a given color or a certain undying nature.  These cards seem perfectly fit for 60-card constructed decks but might not have that big of an impact on 6/6 Dragons, epic Angels and the card drawing machines that are blue EDH decks.  However, there are certainly some black toys available for the avid EDH player.

We see the introduction of two new demonic fatties in Pestilence Demon and Hellcarver Demon.  These guys might join the ranks of Myojin of Night’s Reach, Avatar of Woe, and other black fatties.  I can not think of any great uses for Hellcarver Demon unless you are about to end the game and have fixed the top of your deck.  Maybe Pestilence Demon will fit a narrow metagame?

I have received e-mail from more than a few players that have embarked on building Vampire themed EDH decks.  There are over 60 vampires available for EDH players including great Legendary general options in mono Black (Anowan or Shauku), Black/Red (Vampiric Dragon), Blue/Black (Szandek, Lord of Secrets) and Black/Blue/Red (Garza Zol, Plague Queen).  I like our newest option in Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief.  She seems like you could give her some huge pumps later in the game both taking down formidable opposing creatures and piling on the general damage potential.

Guul Draz Assassin is also an interesting Vampire addition.  He can work as spot removal for some small bodies and will eventually grow up to diminish the size of even the biggest bodies.  This guy is good as a combat trick when he is fully leveled and can make dealing 21 general-damage with 5/5 bodies a real pain.  He is a sort of antithesis to pesky generals like Rofellos and Vendillion Clique.

Some of the most playable options in the current EDH metagame might be Mortician Beetle.  If you play cards with the Abyss clause or explore generals that make opposing players sacrifice creatures then this guy could be a nice compliment.  He is narrow but could get out of hand.  I n turn, you might find yourself wanting to sacrifice some of your own tokens or creatures.  Nirkana is both a vampire and a shade.  Therefore you can splash into your tribal decks while also having combat tricks with chump creatures.

The Treasure Hunter’s Guide to Rise of the Eldrazi

1. Foil Sarkhan the Mad
2. Foil Guul Draz Assassin
3. Foil Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief

Going Green:  EDH Prospects in Nature’s Most Beloved Color

There are a lot of cards that an EDH player could grow to love out of the new expansion.  Vengevine seems pretty awesome in terms of card advantage and represents one of the few pure green creatures with haste.  His 4/3 body is not huge for EDH but seems to offer some impressive possibilities.  I really like this type of card as it adds some diversity to your creature options.  I imagine this is going to end up being the money mythic for the set, so buy soon and foil it out early!  Pelakka Wurm packs a solid stat package, provides some life gain, and even draws a card when it dies.  You just about can’t beat that.  He is bigger than the average general and comes with all sorts of fringe benefits.  This guy definitely deserves a glance.

Tajuru Preserver will protect green players from having to sacrifice creatures.  This is a very narrow mechanic, but may come in handy as the mythic Eldrazi start sporting Annihilator in the newly shifting EDH metagame.  If you are the opponent with a ban on sacrificing permanents, it might make you less likely to be the target of attacks when a Kozilek is looking to swing on the field.  The stat package is lacking, but it might help if forced sacrifices are a concern.

The Boar Umbra and other green totem armor cards might see some play.  They work as both a boost and a shield for valuable creatures.  If you play a deck that likes to spawn fatties, then these cards serve both functions well.  Aside from the auras, I think everyone should grab a copy of Uncharted Territories.  Foils of this card are already approaching 10 bucks.  I think it is another winner as noted in prior articles.  Just consider interactions with Life of the Loam, exploration effects, and Crucible of Worlds.  You can search out copies of your judge promo Maze of Ith, Temple of the False God, or any other specific cards that you might like to play.    If nothing else, you grab two lands for 4 mana.  I like those numbers.

Other notable green cards include Ancient Stirrings and Momentous Fall.  Green card draw can be at a premium and these cards might let you search around.  The jury is still out on these cards though.  Mul Daya Channelers are getting some hype and might be a cool, diverse option for folks looking to spice up elves.  You may also want to use some deck manipulation to make these chicks obey your every command.  Kazandu Tuskcaller, when left unchecked, might prove to be a “small threat” that can quickly get out of control.  If she is fully pumped up, she will be bringing a circus to the battlefield every turn.  Finally, we have Awakening Zone.  This card might just be the next Bitter Blossom, or it might just be a knock off.  I know cards that traditionally throw a creature onto the field ala hasty goblins or black faeries tend to be pretty sweet in EDH.  You have Skull Clamp shenanigans along with a general way to ramp up some mana.  I t hink it might be a little more silver than true gold.  However, silver is still valuable.

The Treasure Hunter’s Guide to Rise of the Eldrazi

1. Foil Realms Uncharted (favorite card in the set)
2. Foil Vengevine (best card in the set)
3. Foil Momentous Fall

And the Winner is…..

I think that time will actually prove the levelers to be playable in most formats.  Ours will be one of the toughest sells, but often times games run a little defensive in the beginning while multiple players are ramping and holding of attacks for political reasons.  Why not play a level-up creature in the early game?  I don’t think these will initially be perceived as a crazy threat, but can offer some subtle advantage.  Eventually, they are able to compete with the big dogs.  You might want to foil out your favorite level-up creatures before the concepts takes off!

Green is a clear champion when it comes to EDH benefit!  I like Vengevine tricks and imagine that most folks are now able to appreciate the additional card draw and advantage offered in cards like Realms Uncharted, Momentous Fall, and even Ancient Stirrings or “Eldrazi Blossom.”  You even get a 7/7 wurm that does a ton of fancy tricks.

I hope you guys enjoy the impact of the colorless spells including the Eldrazi and an Akroma’s Vengence (All is Dust) for everyone.  They are some serious EDH gifts!  Foil out the goodies and leave comments about cards that you think I missed or that might be overrated.  At this point, we are mostly talking philosophy and speculation.  However, some of the speculation seems strong.

*Editor’s Note* – The Game Academy hosts an EDH league every Sunday; tournament signups begin @ 2 PM and tournament entry is $7. All entry will be given back to top finishers in store credit to use towards anything in the store. Jeremy is always in attendance to play EDH in our league, offer deck advice, and record matches for his popular YouTube channel. If you don’t have an EDH deck, don’t worry, we normally have a few extras if you want to play. See you here!
Elder Dragon Highlander:  Collector’s Edition Part II

This week we will pick up where last week left us.  We embarked on the journey into Magic the Gathering.  Some follow the path for competitive purposes, others will to amass a giant collection.  Many players seek fun and most of us are in for a little of each.  We perused a list of the top EDH cards for each color.  If you did not get a chance to catch the list, I have decided to copy it here one more time.

When I first started playing EDH, I found deck lists mind boggling.  Hundred card singleton lists are very difficult to comprehend without some framing or explanation about card choices and synergies.  Some folks try to assemble a good stuff type list that just plays a bunch of powerful cards, but this is nearly almost always a sure-fire way to end up with a suboptimal list.  Synergies and card interactions put EDH decks over-the-proverbial-top.  Therefore, you need to identify the most amazing cards that fit together to accomplish your given game plan.

With that disclaimer, it still seems relevant to create lists that collect the most powerful cards.  I love these lists and having discussions about the best cards in a color.  These discussions can help players consider cards they might have missed or may allow a deck builder to double up on effects that fit a deck’s theme or enhance the function.

Back in the day (you know the one), when I started playing EDH.  If followed deck construction advice from community forum members like Zerg (may he rest in peace) and others on various EDH forums.  I would follow Sheldon Menery’s columns and updates on the banned list, and would scour the internets for a reasonable explanation of popular deck lists.  Here are some interesting words of advice from Zerg in his forum post concerning some of the most important card to include in your EDH decks.  His descriptions are brief, but you get the general idea.

“Colorless

• Sensei’s Divining Top – anywhere. Period. Unless your playgroup is excessively annoyed by it.
• Lightning Greaves – for any deck that plans on attacking or has creatures that need to stay alive.
• Journeyer’s Kite – supplies you with lands forever, or until blown up. Mandatory in any nongreen deck.
• Gauntlet of Power and Extraplanar Lens – any monocolored deck. These cards are stupidgood.
• Nevinyrral’s Disk and Oblivion Stone – essential effect in any EDH deck and only available on two cards outside of white.
• Mind’s Eye – one of the best card draw engines in multiplayer, and available to any color.
• Solemn Simulacrum – Just really, really good.
• Sol Ring – Best artifact mana accel in the game.
• Thawing Glaciers – fills the same role as kite, every other turn.
• Maze of Ith – Surprisingly few creatures can get around it, it’s hard to remove (being a land) and fits in every deck.
• Strip Mine – utility nonbasics come with a lot of drawbacks, such as not being not fetchable by most land search cards, not benefitting from gauntlet/lens/etc, and usually not producing colored mana. However, some utility is just too strong to ignore. Same applies to every other land that made a cut to be on this list.

Black

• Yawgmoth’s Will – best card in Magic.
• Necropotence – best card draw spell in EDH.
• Cabal Coffers – Gauntlet of Power #3 in monoblack.
• Volrath’s Stronghold – Many decks would spend an actual card slot on this effect. Stronghold doesn’t even cost you a slot.
• Demonic Tutor &Co. – obvious card is obvious.
• Myojin of Night’s Reach – everyone’s hand goes “bye”. 9000 style points if whoever played it doesn’t activate the ability immediately, passes priority, and you sudden death it.
• Transmute cards – Yes, any card that merely searches for Yawgwin is good enough to make the “best of the best” list.
• Reanimation – one of the key strengths of black. Reanimation is often cheaper, more flexible, and more powerful than that creature you were thinking of adding to your deck.

Blue

• Control Magic &Co. – just like reanimation, it saves you mana, but also serves as removal, albeit usually less flexible than reanimation
• Countermagic –  often underrated in multiplayer because you “can’t counter everything”. The key is to use it to protect your other cards, not try to remove every threat.
• Magus of the Future / Future Sight – absurdity is directly proportional to the amount of mana you have, multiplied by the number of shuffle effects and tripled with Divining Top in play. The only two cards that have the potential to be dumber than Yawgwin.
• Hinder –  the easiest way in the game to say “bye, general!”
• [s]Gifts Ungiven[/s] – combo deck wins (for best results combine with Yawgwin or Eternal Witness in hand).
• Academy Ruins – See Volrath’s Stronghold.

White

• Land Tax and Weathered Wayfarer – these can be as good as green’s land search, but it’s only two cards.
• Sweepers – being able to remove anything and everything at once is white’s main strength. Be sure to include some, this is the only color that has plenty of options. Final Judgment, Hallowed Burial, Austere Command, and Rout, are usually the best.
• Condemn – Right below Hinder.
• Return to Dust – It might be silly to include a random artifact removal spell in this list, but I’ve been owned by this card so many times.
• Mistveil Plains – Probably one of the most underrated cards in the game. Combined with a tutor, you have the ability to fetch anything back from your graveyard. Also searcheable with fetchlands and hoses reanimation targeting your graveyard.

Green

• Eternal Witness – green is the only color with “return any card” effects, which are incredibly strong. Witness is by far the most abuseable of these.
• Far Wanderings – I have no idea why this isn’t in every green deck. Fetching 3 lands for 3 mana is nuts. (Keep in mind that you have threshold for about 80% of the duration of the game).
• Mana Reflection – see Gauntlet of Power.
• Tooth and Nail and Chord of Calling – chances are you have some fat creatures in your deck that you’d like in play. These are the best ways to do that.

Red

• Wheel of Fortune – the only card in red that’s on par with blue and black card draw. It’s damn good, but sadly, it’s the only thing red has.
• Reiterate – redirection/copy effects are great in general, but reiterate is head and shoulders above the rest. Nothing like copying an opponent’s cruel ultimatum. Twice. And still keeping the reiterate. In fact, this card is pretty much the only reason I want to play red.
• Gauntlet of Might – monored red gets an extra gauntlet of power, if you can afford one.
• Insurrection – usually enough to kill one opponent in multiplayer.

Multicolored

• Mirari’s Wake – Mana reflection, but better.
• Cruel Ultimatum – Just reminding you this card exists. If you don’t know what it does, click the link and read it.
• Vindicate – Tie fighters.
• Maelstrom Pulse – Not quite tie fighters.
• Terminate / Mortify / Putrefy – no reason not to have these.
• Debtor’s Knell – You’ll find something ridiculous to do with this every time you play it.

Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion – double strike is potentially very powerful and having it on a land means it’s reusable, doesn’t cost you a card, and wastes no slots in the deck.”

These thoughts do not totally match up with my thinking about EDH deck construction.  Some of the cards I find to be underpowered, too specific, or generally outclassed (e.g. Cruel Ultimatum, Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion, and Journeyer’s Kite).  However, the advice runs fairly consistent and helped shape my early thinking.  Eventually, I made it a goal to form a collection of EDH staples and core cards that would serve as the foundation for my deck construction.  I made this decision some time ago along with the idea that I would snatch up foils of my favorite staples and copies of the dual lands and older cards.  Subsequently, the Legacy format has jumped off and my collection of staples has turned into a nice investment rewarding not only in terms of the playability and fantastic aid in deck construction but also financially.

I would like to share some of the hottest movers on the EDH scene and would emplore those wishing to build a similar style collection to act fast.  Every couple of months the cards seem to take a dramatic leap in cost/value.

Buy Now:  For Fun and Profit

Let’s start with some of the cards that are both going to bowl you over and that might be a little obvious.  They might be apparent, but some folks are still out there with holes in their collections.  These are among the first cards that I would obtain and should always be on the “needed” or “wanted” lists.  At times these cards trade like a second currency, but time has proven them to be a stable investment that offers little risk.  If you are ever done with these cards you can ship them for about what you paid or more.

Dual Lands

You don’t have to play with dual lands to be successful in EDH.  However, they are simply the best lands that you can play with if you are looking to fix colors and diversify your mana-base.  If you need to be in both Blue and Black, then you have some options.  The pimped out choice is Underground Sea.  The runner up is Watery Grave, and somewhere following are cards like Underground River, Sunken Ruins, and tap lands that generate the needed colors. Here is the hitch:  as of March 24, 2010 the most inexpensive Underground Sea on popular retail sites (in near mint condition) will cost about $85.  Twelve months ago, you could have landed them for around $60.  Some of the dual lands have nearly doubled in price.  The lands with “less popular” (read as non-blue) colors have shot up from around $25 to over $40.  In early March, Wizards of the Coast announced that they will never reprint the revised (original) dual lands.  Therefore, they are likely going to continue their rise in price.  Pick these up now.

3^rd Edition/Revised

Badlands                    $40

Bayou                         $50

Plateau                       $40

Savannah                   $40+

Scrubland                   $40

Taiga                           $50

Tropical Island          $60+

Tundra                       $70

Underground Sea      $90

Judge Foils/Promo Foils

The DCI and folks at Wizards of the Coast have had their eye on EDH for a long time.  The format expanded its popularity in the judge community and Aaron Forsythe, head of Magic’s research and development, explained in an interview conducted on Youtube (Elderdragonhighlandr Interview Series) that EDH has been on the mind of developers for some time now.  Evidence pops up when you see a hefty multi-colored legendary general or giant octopus like Lorthos.  Further evidence can be found in the printing of the Judge promo cards released as payment and thanks for judges working at sanctioned events.

If you look over some of the staples listed in the format, you can nearly cross reference some of the most popular cards with the Judge promo list.  Let’s browse a couple of selections:

Promo Versions

Sol Ring                      $50+

Maze of Ith                 $40

Yawgmoth’s Will       $20

Demonic Tutor          $40

Wheel of Fortune      Unreleased (coming soon)

Foil Fetch Lands        $30-60

Aside from these judge foils, there are any number of FNM foils and promotional foils that cover the staple cards in EDH.  Eternal Witness and Necropotence can each be found reasonably.  Basically, any of these foil, promotional staples are desirable for EDH collectors.

From the Vault:  EDH Staples

Another area that Wizards has shown love to the EDH community involves the limited release, From the Vault series.  The first set was dragons and offered foil versions of some of the game’s most desirable foil dragon generals.  My favorite is Nicol Bolas.  However, the second From the Vault release secured foil versions of cards that were either impossible or improbable to find in foil.  Examples include the now banned Gifts Ungiven and the oft used staples of Mystical Tutor and Sensi’s Divining Top.  If you can find these products they are surefire EDH winners.  I keep a set and open a set for play in my decks.  Make sure to check out the upcoming From the Vault: Artifacts.  There are going to be even more EDH staples in that set.

Foreign Black Border and Rare Foils

Some cards cannot be found in foil.  For those cards, many players chase the foreign black border versions or original Alpha/Beta cards.  My dream is to own a complete collection of foreign black border dual lands.  If you are chasing the dream, you will have to be vigilant.  Stores might take a wants list and could notify you if the chase cards come through the doors.  You might happen upon them on eBay, but they are hard to find.  Occasionally, there are EDH staples or great cards that were in very short print like Moat and Mana Drain from Legends and the ever-popular Force of Will.  Those cards are likely going to increase in price and should be eventual additions to your collections.

Finally, folks should take the time to note that some cards are barely found in foil.  Merchant Scroll is a great edition for an EDH deck, but the 8^th edition foil is the only foil printing.  The uncommon is worth about $1 but its foil version is worth $25.  This situation happens occasionally.  Some promo cards are rare (like Swords to Plowshares) or the foil just drives the price.  You might watch for deals on these cards or find them in a foil bin for a great price.

I hope this series has been helpful and informative.  Thanks to the forum posters and folks who chase all of these amazing cards.  The hunt is half of the fun.

Every Saturday and Sunday we host our weekly Pokemon Tournament!

Saturday: Signups begin at noon, and the tournament starts @ 1 PM.

$5 Entry.

Each person that enters will get a FREE pack of the newest set.

Top finishers will be awarded store credit! Store credit can be used to buy Pokemon singles, sleeves, packs and more!

Sunday: Signups begin at noon, and the tournament starts @ 1 PM.

$7 Entry.

Each person that enters will get a FREE booster pack and slice of pizza for lunch. We will also be giving away random door prizes to players registered in the tournament!

Top finishers will be awarded store credit! Store credit can be used to buy Pokemon singles, sleeves, packs and more!

If you play Pokemon and live in the Tampa area, The Game Academy is the place to be on Saturday and Sundays!

Pokemon Tournaments every Saturday & Sunday at the Game Academy in Tampa!

Pokemon Tournaments every Saturday & Sunday at the Game Academy in Tampa!

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