Z
Zadok001
Guest
Everyone remembers Hunted Wumpus, right?
Now, tell me, isn't that thing _some_ good against Fires? Think about it. First of all, it costs the same amount as a 'Derm, sans one green mana for colorless. It's a 6/6. So it doesn't just BLOCK 'Derm, it KILLS 'Derm. Yes, it has a drawback - But that's not as big a deal as it looks againts Fires right now. They can drop a 'Derm, which the Wumpus pounds into the dirt. Or... Uh... They can drop a Birds of Paradise?
Dragons, you say? Well, with a Spidersilk Armor, the Wumpus blocks and kills both major Fires Dragons, and doesn't even die to Rith!
What else turns Fires black and blue? Fog is pretty strong, I hear. How about 20 Fogs? Dawnstrider.
Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to present the preliminary build of 4-Color-Green, a deck designed to hand Rebels and Fires their heads on a platter, while putting up a fair fight against Counter-Rebels and U/W control.
(I'll back up these card choices in a minute...)
4-Color-Green, Version Beta 1.0
David Zadok Stroud
Secondary Mana Sources (12)
4x Birds of Paradise
4x Llanowar Else
3x Vine Trellis
1x Utopia Tree
Setting Up The Board (17)
4x Hunted Wumpus
4x Spidersilk Armor
4x River Boa
4x Dawnstrider
1x Kavu Chameleon
Enhancement And Tricks (12)
3x Armadillo Cloak
3x Wax/Wane
3x Urza's Rage
3x Tsabo's Decree
Land (19)
3x Forest
1x Swamp
1x Mountain
1x Plains
3x Brushland
4x City of Brass
4x Rishadan Port
2x Karplusan Forest
Obviously, this is a very basic build of the deck. I've only playtested the Rebels and Fires matchups, both of which were completely dominated by this deck. (5-1 against Fires, 6-0 against Rebels, Dojo DTBs. One man testing, so not very reliable results.)
Card choices:
Utopia Tree vs. Vine Trellis: I concluded that four Birds, four Cities, and the multi-lands weren't going to help me as much as I'd like for casting all of my off-color spells, so I took the risk of tossing in a Utopia Tree in the place of a Trellis. It hasn't had a signifigant impact in any way as of now, neither helping nor hurting.
River Boa: It's almost always a good idea to block Blastoderm. Boa does a great job of that. It helps defend the fort should a Burst go off without protection, too, though it's not too effective in that case. It's also one of the three major Cloak targets in the deck. An all-round solid creature with a low mana cost. With 31 mana sources, I shouldn't often be pushed for mana, but it's good to have low casting cost creatures for defense anyways.
Dawnstrider: Absolutely amazing, the Striders can do some REALLY nice stuff against almost any deck. Modern Fires rarely run more than four removal spells, almost always Shocks/Assaults, so these are really pretty survivable. The mere threat of having one in play can keep someone from attacking you, and they only cost two mana. They also have an interesting effect against Parallax Wave, forcing more counters to be removed if someone actually wants to ATTACK with his creatures. The Spidersilk aggravate this same problem, and put an enormous stress on Rebel decks to draw into multiple Waves and dodge the Wanes.
Kavu Chameleon: I really like having one of these maindeck, to get around such major troubles as Story Circle without the need for a Wane. He's a costly beast, but very, very good, and he tops out the deck's mana curve.
Armadillo Cloak: More maindeck anti-Fires tech. Dropping a Cloak on a Boa is deadly against many, many decks. Fires just can't deal with a Cloaked creature with more than 2 toughness. As a result, a Cloaked Wumpus is a scoop almost every time. There's just no way to stop the thing. The Cloak commonly goes on the Wumpus, the Boa, or the Birds. The Birds are a last resort to dodge blockers, but they work fairly well.
Urza's Rage: I chose this particular burn spell for several reasons. First, Shock doesn't cut it in a quasi-control deck with this much mana. The cost of the Rage is rarely a problem, and it kills Sivvi and almost any other Rebel that sees play. The Kicker is irrelevant, but I suppose it could come up after enough time has passed. Don't count on it, though.
Tsabo's Decree: Anti-Rebels tech of the day. This is also an excellent removal spell for the ever-frustrating Blinding Angel, even at 6 mana. Most control decks, when faced with Wumpuses and Boas, must play down an Angel ASAP, around 5th turn. That taps them out, leaving an opening for the Decree. It also absolutely WRECKS Rebels. It puts them almost totally into Topdeck mode, and that's not good for them at all.
Conclusion:
This deck BEATS Fires. It also BEATS Rebels. I can see it having serious difficulties against U/W Control, but a morph into a more Fires-like deck after sideboarding would give it a solid chance, and it does have enough threats to drop pressure and just win off that, in theory. Again, Beta 1 build. Anyone tried this type of deck before? What were your results?
Now, tell me, isn't that thing _some_ good against Fires? Think about it. First of all, it costs the same amount as a 'Derm, sans one green mana for colorless. It's a 6/6. So it doesn't just BLOCK 'Derm, it KILLS 'Derm. Yes, it has a drawback - But that's not as big a deal as it looks againts Fires right now. They can drop a 'Derm, which the Wumpus pounds into the dirt. Or... Uh... They can drop a Birds of Paradise?
Dragons, you say? Well, with a Spidersilk Armor, the Wumpus blocks and kills both major Fires Dragons, and doesn't even die to Rith!
What else turns Fires black and blue? Fog is pretty strong, I hear. How about 20 Fogs? Dawnstrider.
Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to present the preliminary build of 4-Color-Green, a deck designed to hand Rebels and Fires their heads on a platter, while putting up a fair fight against Counter-Rebels and U/W control.
(I'll back up these card choices in a minute...)
4-Color-Green, Version Beta 1.0
David Zadok Stroud
Secondary Mana Sources (12)
4x Birds of Paradise
4x Llanowar Else
3x Vine Trellis
1x Utopia Tree
Setting Up The Board (17)
4x Hunted Wumpus
4x Spidersilk Armor
4x River Boa
4x Dawnstrider
1x Kavu Chameleon
Enhancement And Tricks (12)
3x Armadillo Cloak
3x Wax/Wane
3x Urza's Rage
3x Tsabo's Decree
Land (19)
3x Forest
1x Swamp
1x Mountain
1x Plains
3x Brushland
4x City of Brass
4x Rishadan Port
2x Karplusan Forest
Obviously, this is a very basic build of the deck. I've only playtested the Rebels and Fires matchups, both of which were completely dominated by this deck. (5-1 against Fires, 6-0 against Rebels, Dojo DTBs. One man testing, so not very reliable results.)
Card choices:
Utopia Tree vs. Vine Trellis: I concluded that four Birds, four Cities, and the multi-lands weren't going to help me as much as I'd like for casting all of my off-color spells, so I took the risk of tossing in a Utopia Tree in the place of a Trellis. It hasn't had a signifigant impact in any way as of now, neither helping nor hurting.
River Boa: It's almost always a good idea to block Blastoderm. Boa does a great job of that. It helps defend the fort should a Burst go off without protection, too, though it's not too effective in that case. It's also one of the three major Cloak targets in the deck. An all-round solid creature with a low mana cost. With 31 mana sources, I shouldn't often be pushed for mana, but it's good to have low casting cost creatures for defense anyways.
Dawnstrider: Absolutely amazing, the Striders can do some REALLY nice stuff against almost any deck. Modern Fires rarely run more than four removal spells, almost always Shocks/Assaults, so these are really pretty survivable. The mere threat of having one in play can keep someone from attacking you, and they only cost two mana. They also have an interesting effect against Parallax Wave, forcing more counters to be removed if someone actually wants to ATTACK with his creatures. The Spidersilk aggravate this same problem, and put an enormous stress on Rebel decks to draw into multiple Waves and dodge the Wanes.
Kavu Chameleon: I really like having one of these maindeck, to get around such major troubles as Story Circle without the need for a Wane. He's a costly beast, but very, very good, and he tops out the deck's mana curve.
Armadillo Cloak: More maindeck anti-Fires tech. Dropping a Cloak on a Boa is deadly against many, many decks. Fires just can't deal with a Cloaked creature with more than 2 toughness. As a result, a Cloaked Wumpus is a scoop almost every time. There's just no way to stop the thing. The Cloak commonly goes on the Wumpus, the Boa, or the Birds. The Birds are a last resort to dodge blockers, but they work fairly well.
Urza's Rage: I chose this particular burn spell for several reasons. First, Shock doesn't cut it in a quasi-control deck with this much mana. The cost of the Rage is rarely a problem, and it kills Sivvi and almost any other Rebel that sees play. The Kicker is irrelevant, but I suppose it could come up after enough time has passed. Don't count on it, though.
Tsabo's Decree: Anti-Rebels tech of the day. This is also an excellent removal spell for the ever-frustrating Blinding Angel, even at 6 mana. Most control decks, when faced with Wumpuses and Boas, must play down an Angel ASAP, around 5th turn. That taps them out, leaving an opening for the Decree. It also absolutely WRECKS Rebels. It puts them almost totally into Topdeck mode, and that's not good for them at all.
Conclusion:
This deck BEATS Fires. It also BEATS Rebels. I can see it having serious difficulties against U/W Control, but a morph into a more Fires-like deck after sideboarding would give it a solid chance, and it does have enough threats to drop pressure and just win off that, in theory. Again, Beta 1 build. Anyone tried this type of deck before? What were your results?