Max Tietze
8/10/2012 10:54:00 AM
Last weekend I attended the SCG open in Washington DC. My goal going into the tournament was to figure out something to play that wasn't Delver. Don't get me wrong, I think Delver is a very strong deck, and it has treated me well over the past few months. There is just one card that has given me fits and ultimately caused me to retire my checklist cards for the time being (curse you see-through sleeves!). Ever since the printing of
Thragtusk delving just hasn't felt the same for me. No longer is it so easy to
Gut Shot away all of Naya Pod's mana creatures and
Vapor Snag my way through the more expensive ones. Five life tagged onto a body that needs to be killed twice is the most effective creature in standard right now for fighting delver decks. Let's not even mention what happens when
Restoration Angel joins the party. It looks like the solution for Delver is to play something like Charles Gindy's list, with 4
Gut Shots and
Mental Missteps to make sure a mana creature never lives and
Hero of Bladehold to put on huge amounts of pressure. Nonetheless, I did not have access to such a list going into the tournament and had to search elsewhere for ideas.
I spent the week leading up to the tournament scouring decklists from Magic Online Daily Events and throwing together various lists to no avail. I predicted a lot of Naya and Delver and wanted to play something that would be strong against both while still having a plan against more controlling decks. I also wanted it to be something that would fit my play style. I am a control or agro-control mage at heart, and despite picking up other various decks from time to time, I like to stick to my comfort zone. Several days before the tournament I stumbled upon a UWR list by MTGO player Butakov that had gone 4-0 in a daily event. He was basically playing UW midrange splashing red for
Bonfire of the Damned. I made a bunch of changes to it, but kept the initial shell of Blade Splicer/Phantasmal Image/Restoration Angel defense with a
Sun Titan or Gideon end game. I registered the following list:
In a format dominated by creature strategies, I really liked the idea of gumming up the ground with a slew of golems, while casting essentially one-sided sweepers. The
Whipflares were very useful, and filled the role of
Gut Shot with many added bonuses. I kept a
Gut Shot in the deck mainly to have some options, and to be able to disrupt
Blade Splicer into
Restoration Angel at instant speed.
Whipflare plus 3
Phantasmal Images means the deck has no shortage of ways to deal with Geist of St. Traft. You can whip a flipped Delver. You can whip a Huntmaster, send his wolf friend packing, and take out two mana dorks in the process. Do you know why a play like that is not only possible but very likely? Because if you play your cards right, you are just some sort of UW midrange or Delver deck… that is until your
Sulfur Falls comes down and all of the sudden your opponent has no board.
This brings me to the mana of this deck, which is a little more skill testing to maneuver than you might think. Ideally, in game one you would like to hide your red mana from your opponent for as long as possible, hoping that they overextend into a sweeper. The only thing that makes this a bad idea is the chance of drawing a miracled Bonfire. Your first 2-3 land drops should generally be UW if you can afford to. If you have a
Whipflare in hand and are trying to set up a blow out, this can go on for longer. If you think the chance your opponent will continue to overextend in the early game is greater than the benefit of miracling a Bonfire, sometimes it is ok to miss an extra point or two or damage off of miracle. Just be aware of your plan when your draw step comes around so you don't give anything away if you do happen to draw one. This game of pretending you are a UW deck is really only relevant in matchups with the potential for overextending such as Naya, Zombies, or Elves. Be careful that you don't get so caught up in it that you don't have red mana when you need it! A lot of your mana sources come into play tapped unless various conditions are met, so don't search out an Island with that
Evolving Wilds only to untap and realize that your
Clifftop Retreat won't be ready until next turn.
Let me explain a few card choices that you might be wondering about:
3
Snapcaster Mage
While
Snapcaster Mage has been one of the staples of standard for some time, and no self-respecting Delver player would shuffle up less than 4, he is not nearly as good in this deck as in Delver. Half of your targetable spells are sweepers, which certainly get flashed back in the right matchups, but are hardly the most efficient use of a Snapcaster. You are playing the control role in most matchups, so the body is not often relevant, whereas
Gitaxian Probe, Snapcaster, beat down, is a pretty common start for Delver. This being said, Snappy is great as a flexible Ponder with legs and is definitely worth playing.
2
Vapor Snag
I actually started with just one, but decided to add another as a way to kill
Golem Tokens and Rancors, and I'm glad I did. Again, this card is not as good as it is in Delver, and usually plays a different role. A very common start to the game is for a Naya player to play Birds or Elf followed by a
Blade Splicer. You are forced to
Whipflare or Bonfire in case they have a
Restoration Angel, and
Vapor Snag is the easiest way to clean up the board and regain parity.
Vapor Snag is more of a defensive card for you, and you generally want to be getting some value out of it rather than casting it aggressively.
1
Oblivion Ring
The old catch-all answer. Mainly in the deck as a way to kill a
Birthing Pod. Though clunky, it is never a dead card. Good luck finding a way to get it back with
Sun Titan, but don't forget that it is technically a target.
1
Day of Judgment
I initially didn't want to play any Days, just because I liked the idea of all of my sweepers being one-sided. Fearlessly making golem after golem after geodude can be a lot of fun, but I was glad to have the Day as a way to kill Restoration Angels,
Dungrove Elders and Titans. It won me a seemingly unwinnable game where my opponent started out on the play with Llanowar Elf,
Birthing Pod, Thrun+Rancor, then tapped out thinking I was playing Delver. I would not cut it from the deck.
1
Ghost Quarter
You might think that playing 2
Cavern of Souls plus another colorless land is a little greedy in a 3 color deck. It has a lot of utility though, and remember it can be used as inefficient mana fixing in a pinch. Having access to one can give you a fighting chance when your opponent resolves a
Primeval Titan, and you copy it with
Phantasmal Image to get
Ghost Quarter. Then Sunny T can come down to bring back the Image that just got targeted with Wolf Run for 0. Also, being able to deal with
Gavony Township and
Moorland Haunt are far from corner cases.
I won't go into too much detail about the actual rounds I played in DC, but I will say that I was happy with the deck, and didn't feel like I had a bad matchup in any of my rounds. I lost round 10 playing for top 8 against Mono Green, when I was forced to mulligan to 3 in the third game. An anticlimactic way to end my tournament after 10 rounds of battling, but sometimes it's just not meant to be. My rounds went as follows:
WBR
Trading Post (2-0)
RG Elves (2-0)
Zombie Pod (2-1)
Delver (1-1-1)
Monoblack
Trading Post (2-0)
Delver (2-1)
GW Pod (2-0)
Delver, Matt Costa (0-2)
Naya Pod, Brian Braun-Duin (2-1)
Monogreen (1-2)
I made the sideboard mainly against control and ramp because those matchups are where you have the most dead cards maindeck. Those are also traditionally the worst matchups for a midrange deck, since they are doing more powerful things than you in the long run. I had the Cavern in the board as a 25
th land to bring in against control where all your big spells are coming in. I no longer think it's warranted and I would be happy cutting it for an extra
Combust. I would also cut a
Negate for a 3
rd Combust. I found
Combust to be the best card to draw against Delver, and with people playing
Hero of Bladehold now, I do not think it would be excessive to board in 3. With those changes in mind, I'll run through some sideboarding strategies.
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Delver
+3
Combust
+1
Divine Offering
-3
Bonfire of the Damned
-1
Blade Splicer
The
Divine Offering should come unless you are somehow certain they don't have equipment.
Sword of War and Peace is particularly devastating, but I would bring in the Offering for
Runechanter's Pike as well. Bonfire is pretty weak here, since they are usually just beating you down with one threat. You don't want to be tapping five mana to kill their Geist, when they can just
Vapor Snag it, or
Mana Leak and get in a free attack. I was actually keeping them in during the tournament, but Matt Costa was surprised that I did, and he made me realize that no good delver player is going to get caught in a Bonfire. You already have a bunch of ways to kill their creatures, and Bonfire is the least efficient one.
Oblivion Ring seems weak in this matchup, but it can be a nice out to an equipment or a surprise
Consecrated Sphinx out of the board. I don't think this is a bad matchup, but it requires a lot of play skill on both sides and can go either way.
Naya Pod
+1
Consecrated Sphinx
+1
Combust
+1
Day of Judgment
+1
Divine Offering
-2
Mana Leak
-1
Phantasmal Image
-1
Snapcaster Mage
Mana Leak is weak here with all of their Caverns of Souls and excessive mana creatures. It's still nice to leave in at least one though. Countering an early
Birthing Pod or a late Bonfire can be key, and if you happen to draw it, Leaking anything will make them play around it for the rest of the game. If you are on the play, I might leave in an extra Leak and cut an Image. Use your sweepers wisely, but make sure not to let an unexpected
Gavony Township put an end to your plans. If you ever have the chance to kill a pair of mana creatures early, you probably should.
GRx Ramp
+2
Hero of Bladehold
+1
Consecrated Sphinx
+2
Dissipate
+2
Tamiyo, the Moon Sage
+1
Day of Judgment
-3
Bonfire of the Damned
-1
Vapor Snag
-1
Blade Splicer
-1
Gut Shot
-2
Whipflare
Hero of Bladehold is your all-star creature in this matchup. If you can land one without the fear of a Titan coming down the following turn, you are in pretty good shape. This guy is an army in a can, and they can only stop him with sideboard cards like
Beast Within or
Combust.
Dismember stays in so your Hero can attack into a Titan and live to tell about it. People tend to give too much credit to
Cavern of Souls when evaluating counters in this matchup. Yes, sometimes they will just ramp into an early Titan with Cavern on Giant and there is nothing you can do. However, counters let you interact with their mana acceleration and stop their sweepers. Sometimes they just don't draw a Cavern, and a
Counterspell plus a Snapcaster will be enough to put them away. Ramp might be this deck's toughest matchup, but after board you trade all your dead cards for powerful spells that Ramp has trouble dealing with.
Zombies
+2
Celestial Purge
+1
Timely Reinforcements
+1
Day of Judgment
-2
Phantasmal Image
-1
Sun Titan
-1
Dismember
If they are playing a version with a lot of clones, you want to take out both Sun Titans. Whatever they get back will be scarier than your
Blade Splicer or
Evolving Wilds.
Phantasmal Image is pretty bad in this matchup, since they have few good targets for him. Copying
Geralf's Messenger may seem like good value because of undying, but if they have a Messenger in play, an enters the battlefield tapped creature is not exactly what you're looking for. Even though they're an aggressive deck with Caverns, I have boarded in
Dissipate before when it seems like they are loading up on big non-Zombie cards like
Falkenrath Aristocrat or
Phyrexian Obliterator.
Control Decks (Trading Post, Solar Flare, Superfriends, etc.)
+2
Hero of Bladehold
+1
Consecrated Sphinx
+2
Dissipate
+2
Tamiyo, the Moon Sage
+1
Divine Offering
-1
Vapor Snag
-3
Bonfire of the Damned
-1
Dismember
-1
Gut Shot
-2
Whipflare
This is obviously going to change depending on what list you're facing exactly. The main difference is going to be in what you're siding out. Against a
Lingering Souls deck, I would want some Bonfires. The
Divine Offering is probably worth bringing in even if you're not sure, since you have some semi-dead cards to cut anyway. Chances are it will find a target, be it a
Batterskull,
Ratchet Bomb,
Nihil Spellbomb or even
Torpor Orb (no, you do not want to see this card on turn 2.) Despite the maindeck being tailored to beat creature decks,
Blade Splicer plus
Restoration Angel presents a quick clock that can steal game ones surprisingly easily.
I would recommend this deck to anyone who likes controlling the game, but enjoys the thrill that is miracling
Bonfire of the Damned. One minute you can feel like you've stabilized the board mid to late game with a few Golems, and with one lucky draw step the game is over. Free wins are fun! Not only can late game Bonfires provide you with this joy, but you might be paired against Elves. When their game plan involves 1/1s backed up by 2/2s I would say the matchup is favorable to put it lightly. As long as the metagame remains creature-centric I think this type of strategy is a great choice, and I am interested to hear anyone's input who has been working on this type of deck.
Keep those bonfires a blazing,
-Max Tietze
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