Flores and Price of Progress - Part 2

Flores and Price of Progress - Part 5

Flores and Price of Progress - Part 4

Flores and Price of Progress - Part 3

Flores and Price of Progress - Part 1

Enjoy! Let me know if there are any issues.

Top8Magic Fans,

BDM, Flores, Sadin, Will, Gabe, myself and the rest of the Top8Magic crew wish you and yours a Happy Holiday!

We have tons of posts that will slowly be uploaded over the holidays. Expect two to three every 24 to 48 hours.

Happy Holidays,

Top8Magic Crew

Post Berlin and Readers Comments Part 5

BDM, MichaelJ, and Wilson Price of Progress discuss the 9th through 16th place decks from Pro Tour Berlin. While the Top 8 was dominated by Elves the next 8 decks were dominated by diversity with cards as diverse as Fecundity and Azami, Lady of Scrolls populating the lists.

With Worlds on the horizon and a PTQ season not far behind will any of these decks dethrone Elves as the king of the Extended hill?

BDM, Michaelj, and Wilson PoP answer the Top8Magic comments section with a discussion of everything from smattering of basketball talk (ranging from LeBron and company in Cleveland to why BDM thinks the Knicks will make the playoffs), the impact of Rewind on the creation on Cryptic Command, the new season of Top Chef, why Tom hates Chinatown, and Elves, Elves, Elves!

In the comments to my previous post More On Greedy Grixis, enzoreal asked me to try to improve upon Will Price of Progress’s deck focusing on Ajani Vengeant, Bitterblossom, Cryptic Command, and Mulldrifter (cards I identified as being some of the strongest in Will’s deck).

This post is an attempt to modify Will’s deck to fulfill this request.

These were my goals…

1. Preserving [some of] the unique elements of Will’s Greedy Grixis deck
2. Staying competitive in the metagame, specifically against the Fae, Reflecting Pool Control, the Red Deck, and Kithkin
3. Minimizing weak draws in early Stage Two
4. Preserving game in Stage Three in the face of decks with Cruel Ultimatum
5. Increasing the deck’s ability to control the board (Will’s version has minimal board control capabilities)
6. Of course focusing on the unique combination of both Ajani Vengeant and Bitterblossom in a single deck

One of the issues I had with Will’s deck is that it obviously boasts some very powerful cards – especially Reveillark – but that a lot of the elements in the deck are at odds with one another. For instance it is a “Mannequin” deck with no Shriekmaw (I know Will mentioned this in Kithkin Testing, but I don’t know his most recent list, if there has been a change).

I have heard from various sources that Fulminator Mage should to be great in this format because of the mana bases but it was actually pretty mediocre. Even at its best, this card is pretty middling unless you are on the play, plus it presses your mana base, requiring (b/r)(br) untapped on the third turn, which is difficult.

I really like the 2/2 synergies in this deck with Reveillark, but they create some strange incentives… In particular there is the RR mana cost on Siege-Gang Commander… Like I said in my previous post you have to play twelve Red mana sources (which of course can be accomplished simply by increasing the number of Vivid lands)… But I have a different RR I’d rather play end game in this strategy.

4 Mind Stone

4 Bitterblossom

4 Cryptic Command
4 Mulldrifter

2 Agony Warp
4 Ajani Vengeant
2 Cruel Ultimatum
4 Esper Charm
2 Nucklavee

4 Pyroclasm

1 Austere Command

4 Arcane Sanctum
3 Cascade Bluffs
3 Crumbling Necropolis
3 Mystic Gate
4 Reflecting Pool
4 Sunken Ruins
4 Vivid Creek

Sideboard:
2 Mind Shatter
1 Cruel Ultimatum
4 Gutteral Response
4 Condemn
2 Wispmare
2 Wrath of God

We know from the Brian Kowal Boat-Brew that Mind Stone into Ajani Vengeant is some kind of two-three sequence. Playing Mind Stone gives us something to do on turn two in the games where we don’t draw a Bitterblossom. In addition, this gives the deck a faster potential Stage Three in the mirror with those Mind Shatters (though obviously Mind Stone is worthless [directly] in conjunction with the main deck’s Stage Three sorcery).

I know that Cruel Ultimatum is old hat for similar decks in this format but I decided that it is the Stage Three this deck wants for a non-intuitive reason: With Bitterblossom as the main threat, life total actually matters! The five life increase is nothing to sneeze at.

You will notice I switched the reanimation from Fulminator Mages into Reveillarks to Pyroclasms into Nucklavees. This is pretty important… The deck is set up to take heavy advantage of Nucklavee; it seems like the change in the metagame towards Elves (possibly) will demand more quick defense than Will’s deck had previously. Pyroclasm is fast, and it has relatively low downside versus Firespout in this environment.

I know the Austere Command looks strange but… Okay, it will probably become a Wrath of God. Fine.

Condemn is a no-brainer for this deck; my friend Antonino De Rosa says you have to play four copies of this card between main and side in Reflecting Pool Control, and there are four in this board; the reason for Agony Warp in the main over Condemn is simply to increase the synergies with Nucklavee. Agony Warp is generally superior to Condemn unless you are actually facing a Demigod of Revenge or Hell’s Thunder. Though Condemn might take over Agony Warp’s spot in the main in order to free up sideboard space.

Wherein MichaelJ plays a few rounds with Greedy Grixis by Will Price of Progress. Also a discussion on mana bases and a holiday greeting!

I played Will Price of Progress’s Greedy Grixis deck as described in Price of Progress: Kithkin Testing.

I was intending to play eight matches per the process I decided on for Eight Matches with Blightning Beatdown, which would have in fact given me the opportunity to call it something cool like “The Top 8 Magic Matches with Greedy Grixis” or some such…

But I got bored after three matches (and I will explain why soon).

On balance I went 3-0 with Will Price of Progress’s deck before being overwhelmed by the desire to make a Shamans linear deck.

The first match I played was versus Shamans.

His deck had Red for the Elementals Harbinger and Rage Forger, but was firmly Shamans with Chameleon Colossus, Doran, &c. I found this to be supremely exciting.

The games were quite close because he had too many lands coming into play tapped, and so I got them 2-0. Plus my cards were Blue whereas his were !Blue.

The coolest play of this session was realizing I had the kill in a sort of non-intuitive way. I got in, used Ajani Vengeant, then Cryptic Commanded my own Ajani, and re-played the Planeswalker for a sick little Lightning Helix to deal the final three. Would I have won anyway? Probably. But very Jon Finkel nonetheless.

Hmmm…

The second match I played was against the Fae with White. He opened up on Arcane Sanctum and played a second turn Awesome Blossom and I was for a moment struck that I might be in some kind of a “preposterous mana base mashup” mirror.

However he ended up the Fae; I am sure you have seen these First Among Equals decks with Esper Charm for Biterblossom in the mirror, and to replace long lost playset of Ancestral Visions.

It was win-loss-win, with him shipping to Paris in the third.

I was pretty surprised with this win, but I think it was a mite confusing for him. Should he be attacking Ajani? Is it possible this deck is actually good?

I am not sure if Sower of Temptation is any good against the First Among Equals or not.

The last match on this session was against the Guile deck — more or less — from last year.

This was as lopsided a match as they come, with the Guile deck ill equipped to deal with Bitterblossom (and I drew multiples), plus <strike>my</strike> Will Price of Progress’s deck was quite spectacular in sideboarded games thanks to Gutteral Response (counters Cryptic Command and another twenty cards for one mana).

Typically I sided out Fulminator Mages and Siege-Gang Commanders and / or Makeshift Mannequin, that is, the cards that don’t do anything ever for cards that are quite good. I brought all the Thoughtseizes and all the Gutteral Responses in against Fae and Guile, and the incremental Sower, Reveillark, and Ajani against Elemental Shamans.

I actually got “the Fulminator Mage draw” against Fae and it was decidedly lukewarm. I mean basically this is Stone Rain… Only if you draw it against basic lands, viz. Guile you feel especially worthless (which als happened… but the Guile matchup is quite lopsided due to Awesome Blossom).

The best cards in this deck were: Ajani Vengeant, Bitterblossom, and of course Mulldrifter and Cryptic Command. The worthless cards were Makeshift Mannequin and Fulminator Mage (which is why I sided most or all of them out even when they were supposed to be good).

The mana base is quite horrendous. I kept having to take damage. Personally, I abhor pain land duals in this format, especially when playing suicidal cards such as Awesome Blossom. For instance the Shamans deck actually tried to race me in Game Two; it was only my topdecking Ajani Vengeant (and then setting up that awesome Cryptic Command two-step) that savedd me from the stupid Caves of Koilos, &c.

Presuming you play Will Price of Progress’s spells precisely, your mana costs look something like this:

BBBBBBBBBBBBBBBB

UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

RRRRRRRRRRRRR

WWWWWWWWW

You can get away with 12 sources of Red mana (Will’s mana base actually only has 10) but need more than 14 sources of Blue mana. It is imperative to have at least 14 lands that come into play untapped, meaning for a deck with only 25 lands, you can only play 11 that come into play tapped.

Note that you can theoretically bias the Red mana like so:

BBBBBBBBBBBBBB

UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

RRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

WWWWWWWWW

… which is much better than biasing Black mana due to the double cost on Siege-Gang Commander.

That doesn’t really get us anywhere, though. We still need more than eight sources of Black mana and probably White mana.

This is what Will Price of Progress’s mana base can produce:

BBBBBBBBBBBBBBB

UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

RRRRRRRRRR

WWWWWWW

This isn’t too bad in terms of distribution, but for the fact that there are too many pain lands and that Rugged Prairie is actually horrendous in this strategy.

I propose:

3 Arcane Sanctum

4 Cascade Bluffs

4 Crumbling Necropolis

2 Mystic Gate

4 Reflecting Pool

4 Sunken Ruins

4 Vivid Creek

You theoretically have 15 sources that can play Bitterblossom on the second turn and all 25 of your lands produce Blue mana. Also, no pain at all.

It’s a question of testing at this point, though I wonder what Paul Jordan would say (hint hint).

Happy Thanksgiving everybody.

LOVE
MIKE