FEATURE FRIDAY: LORD OF TRESSERHORN CONTEST RESULTS

Thanks to everyone for the outstanding response to the Lord of Tresserhorn Elder Dragon Highlander contest. Sorting through the decklists was a great deal of fun, and I picked up many interesting ideas. The winning entry will be piloted in the Elder Dragon Highlander Challenge next Sunday night after the World Champsionship final rounds by Gabor Hegyi, a Level 2 Judge from Hungary. Gabor volunteered to run the winning deck so that I can play my own Arcades Sabboth monstrosity.

What I realized while reading the decklists is that there are way too many good cards to play to just pile good cards into the deck and hope it works. Synergy of the elements is the strongest element on which I judged the decks. There were similarities to several of the decks: using blue for card drawing, black for disruption and recursion, and red for destruction and damage. Interestingly enough, there were several folks who mentioned that another player drawing two cards from Lord of Tresserhorn as not a significant disadvantage. Kudos to Matt McCormick's entry for taking the opposite stance and punishing opponents for drawing and discarding cards with Chains of Mephistopheles (Chris Richter will be happy), Underworld Dreams, Megrim, and Urza's Guilt. Additional kudos to Thomas Reeve for keeping even his basic land count at one each, making it the only true Highlander submission.

Several single cards struck my fancy. Props to Sebastian Smith including Lord of Tresserhorn's buddy Keeper of Tresserhorn in his deck. I liked Sebastian Sadja's choice of Shambling Swarm for something to sacrifice to our general. Don Oldbaugh had the foresight to use one of my favorite multiplayer cards, Radiate, which always creates fun when it's played. Don was also sharp enough to pick up on the utility of Karakas, although it's not a card I would generally allow in a UBR deck. I found Robert Hutchins' and Jason Bartholomew's respective use of Distorting Lens and Ghostly Flame to get around a main weakness of this color combination--Protection from both Red and Black--to be very clever. Whim of Volrath would have been serious tech as well. Anthony Taulbee picked up on the format-brokenness of Temporal Aperture and included it in his deck, along with another of my favorites, Goblin Bombardment. Surprisingly enough, Fact or Fiction was nearly a forgotten card--it was the first card that came to mind when I was thinking about my own version of the deck--appearing in only 22% of the submissions.

Choosing just one winner was most difficult, so in addition to the top pick, I'm going to award Honorable Mention (and $10 in Star City credit) to three other decks. Here we go:

HONORABLE MENTION #1: TAD WHITMIRE

What I liked about Tad's deck is the tremendous synergy of all the cards and the courage to use Ovinomancer (guess who owns the original art?).

GENERAL (1)

Lord of Tresserhorn

RED (9)

Anger
Fervor
Flametongue Kavu
Obliterate
Pulse of the Forge
Siege-Gang Commander
Squee, Goblin Nabob
Starstorm
Thunderscape Familiar

BLACK (24)

Animate Dead
Avatar of Woe
Beacon of Unrest
Bringer of the Black Dawn
Buried Alive
Dance of the Dead
Dark Banishing
Dark Ritual
Dark Suspicions
Demonic Tutor
Disciple of the Vault
Entomb
Guiltfeeder
Krovikan Horror
Mortal Combat
Mortivore
Nekrataal
Nightscape Familiar
Reiver Demon
Terror
Underworld Dreams
Vampiric Tutor
Zombie Infestation
Zombify

BLUE (22)

Bringer of the Blue Dawn
Capsize
Counterspell
Evacuation
Gilded Drake
Intuition
Mental Note
Merfolk Looter
Morphling
Opportunity
Ovinomancer
Pulse of the Grid
Raven Familiar
Read the Runes
Stormscape Familiar
Sunken Hope
Thirst for Knowledge
Thought Courier
Traumatize
Treachery
Upheaval
Whispers of the Muse

GOLD (4)

Psychatog
Recoil
Shadowmage Infiltrator
Terminate

ARTIFACT (10)

Genesis Chamber
Iron Myr
Leaden Myr
Masticore
Platinum Angel
Silver Myr
Sol Ring
Talisman of Dominance
Talisman of Indulgence
Whipersilk Cloak

LAND (30)

Badlands
Barren Moor
Bloodstained Mire
Flooded Strand
Forgotten Cave
Great Furnace
Maze of Ith
Polluted Delta
Seat of the Synod
Underground Sea
Vault of Whispers
Volcanic Island
Wasteland
4 Mountain
7 Swamp
6 Island

The Deck in Tad's own words:

The cards that turn Tresserhorn's drawbacks into your advantage would be: Mortal Combat (getting to 20), Disciple of the Vault (if you are sacing Myr or Chamber tokens), Dark Suspicions, Pulse of the Forge, Pulse of the Grid, and Underworld Dreams. I think the rest of the deck is loaded with synergy where you have plenty of options for victory.

Traumatize/Mortal Combat, Reanimation, or even Upheavel/Zombie Infestation or Tog (though the Tog will most likely only kill one player. I'll take that.). I also find the Ovinomancer and haste giving effects to be entertaining, and with a familiar out thats some cheap reusable kill, or transformigation if you prefer. The Whipersilk Cloak was for fun with Tresserhorn, giving a 3 turn clock at the worst against any opponent. Two bad it's 21 and not 20 ;).

HONORABLE MENTION #2: ABE SARGENT

I liked Abe's use of sub-themes in his deck, along with the single card choices of Illusionary Mask and Scroll Rack. Our group doesn't allow Portal: Three Kingdoms cards, but I'm willing to work with Abe a little on his use of only one.

Lord and Cards that Work Well With It:

Fling
Illusionary Mask (No Lord payments with Mask)
Lord of Tresserhorn
Surestrike Trident
Zombify

Creatures to sacrifice, and Goblin engine:

Arms Dealer
Goblin Assassin (Imagine with, say, Siege-Gang or Goblin Marshall)
Goblin Marshall
Goblin Matron
Goblin Warchief
Moggcatcher
Siege-Gang Commander
Squee, Goblin Nabob

Other Big'uns:

Avatar of Fury
Avatar of Woe
Clone
Crosis, the Purger
Mortivore
Vesuvian Doppelganger

Little'uns:

Anger
Filth
Nightscape Familiar
Sedge Troll
Shard Phoenix
Subterranean Spirit
Wildfire Emissary
Wonder

(Anger, Wonder and Filth being Intuition targets)

Drawin' and Siftin':

Brainstorm
Buried Alive
Fact or Fiction
Impulse
Intuition
Opt
Portent
Probe
Scroll Rack
Sleight of Hand

Miscellaneous:

Agonizing Demise
Counterspell
Demonic Tutor
Exclude
Forbid
Jilt
Mana Leak
Mystical Tutor
Nevinyrral's Disk
Recoil
Repulse
Talisman of Dominance
Talisman of Indulgence

Earthquake Effects (Lord has Regen, and can therefore survive):

Earthquake
Fault Line
Rupture
Starstorm
Torrent of Lava

"If you take 21 points of damage from a single General, you lose." This includes their OWN general, right?

Backlash
Delirium
Dong Zhou, the Tyrant
Grab the Reins
Ray of Command
Threaten
Treachery

Land:

Maze of Ith
Volrath's Stronghold
Other Lands (Dual, Pain, Crosis's Catacombs, Basics, etc)

HONORABLE MENTION #3: JAGGO

Jaggo's entry earns honorable mention for best deck name and tightest theme.

"Zombies of Tresserhorn"

BLUE

Ancestral Recall
Aura Thief
Beacon of Tomorrows
Discombobulate
Dismiss
Jilt
Shoreline Ranger
Spelljack
Thwart
Time Stretch
Time Walk
Whirlpool Drake
Whispers of the Muse

BLACK

Abyssal Gatekeeper
Aphetto Vulture
Balduvian Dead
Blood Pet
Boneknitter
Carrion Wurm
Corpse Harvester
Entrails Feaster
Gempalm Polluter
Grave Defiler
Grave Pact
Gravebane Zombie
Graveborn Muse
Gravedigger
Gravespawn Sovereign
Grotesque Hybrid
Havoc Demon
Infernal Spawn of Evil
Lord of the Undead
Nefashu
Nightscape Familiar
Nim Replica
Noxious Ghoul
Organ Grinder
Oversold Cemetery
Phyrexian Bloodstock
Phyrexian Reaper
Plaguebearer
Skinthinner
Soulless One
Twisted Abomination
Undead Gladiator
Undead Warchief
Vengeful Dead
Withered Wretch
Zombie Scavengers
Zombie Trailblazer

RED

Chartooth Cougar
Deadapult
Rukh Egg
Shivan Phoenix

GOLD

Lord of Tresserhorn
Prophetic Bolt
Pyre Zombie
Suffocating Blast
Undermine

ARTIFACT

Anodet Lurker
Clockwork Dragon
Darksteel Colossus
Junk Diver
Mindslaver
Platinum Angel
Solemn Simulacrum
Sundering Titan

LAND

Badlands
Faerie Conclave
Ghitu Encampment
Library of Alexandria
Spawning Pool
Underground River
Underground Sea
Unholy Grotto
Basic lands

THE WINNER: NATHAN LONG

Along with the card quality and combo elements--I love Lifeline and coming-into-play abilities --Nathan's super-tech of Hivis of the Scale pushed his entry over the top.

GOLD

Lim-Duls' Vault
Lord of Tresserhorn
Prophetic Bolt
Spinal Embrace
Terminate

RED

Anger
Crater Hellion
Earthquake
Gamble
Gorilla Shaman
Flametongue Kavu
Hivis of the Scale
Mogg Fanatic
Mogg Maniac
Pandemonium
Rukh Egg
Shard Phoenix

BLUE

Capsize
Clone
Crypt Angel
Desertion
Equilibrium
Fact or Fiction
Fog Bank
Hapless Researcher
Intuition
Man-o-War
Merfolk Looter
Stormscape Familiar
Whispers of the Muse
Wonder

BLACK

Abyssal Gatekeeper
Animate Dead
Avatar of Woe
Beacon of Unrest
Blood Pet
Buried Alive
Decree of Pain
Demonic Tutor
Diabolic Edict
Diabolic Tutor
Entomb
Grave Pact
Living Death
Nightscape Familiar
Reanimate
Recurring Nightmare
Wall of Souls
Vampiric Tutor
Zombify

ARTIFACT

Citanul Flute
Fellwar Stone
Iron Myr
Leaden Myr
Lifeline
Mind Stone
Platinum Angel
Silver Myr
Sol Ring

LAND

Maze of Ith
Volrath's Stronghold
Other lands to taste

The Deck in Nathan's Own Words:

This deck mostly revolves around the graveyard. You want to get a big creature into the graveyard and reanimate it. This deck also likes to steal or bounce stuff. Some of the 'tech' cards include Citanul Flute (lets you tutor for a key creature), Hivis of the Scale (I noticed that a general has a high probability of being a Dragon, so the Hivis lets you steal their general), Pandemonium (since the creature deals the damage, it works well with Generals. The Lord is a 10 point bolt, even if you can't do everything listed), Lifeline (also helps with the Lord and combos nicely with Pandemonium and the Lord).

 

This was a great contest. Thanks again to all the entrants. Hopefully, Elder Dragon Highlander will catch on in your neighborhood. Again, stayed tuned for the EDH Challenge the Sunday evening of Worlds. It's not too late to enter. Currently-reserved Generals are Arcades Sabboth, Lord of Tresserhorn, Darigaaz, Sliver Overlord, Crosis, Nicol Bolas, and Sol'Kanar. Drop me an email if you'd like to participate. A full report on the event an the performance of Nathan's deck will follow. This time next week, I'll be in San Francisco, but I'll be sure to weigh in on how the event is going so far.