I have quite a few terrible casual decks that were dreadfully misguided attempts at breaking underused cards. For example, I worked for days on a dreadful Vintage Zur's Weirding deck, I built a fully powered Eon Hub deck (with which I smack down casual players, mind you), and I built a non-combo Second Sunrise deck (which actually isn't too bad), and a downright stupid Varchild's War-Riders deck.

But the deck that I am at least somewhat proud of is a Gurzigost deck. Some of you may know this card - and it really shouldn't be that bad a card. Come on, it's a 6/8 for five mana! Basically, it is a big fattie that I believe is somewhat underused, even in casual play... But I guess that there's a good reason for that. In order to break the beast, I decided to play on the extraordinary synergy between Gurzigost and Dreamborn Muse.

Here is the first decklist. It was not very good.

Gurzigost V.1
4 Birds of Paradise
2 Brainstorm
4 Counterspell
4 Dreamborn Muse
4 Eternal Witness
4 Gurzigost
4 Mana Leak
1 Ravenous Baloth
3 Wall of Blossoms
3 Wirewood Savage
2 Viridian Zealot
4 Wasteland
7 Forest
6 Island
2 Polluted Delta
2 Windswept Heath

I made this deck a while ago, and well, I am wiser and older now. Card choices like Wall of Blossoms kind of perplex me today. I made the deck Extended-legal, as I make all of my casual decks fall into the parameters of some format.

Basically, the deck was meant to protect itself with the Wall of Blossoms and Counterspells, until it could drop beastly fat like Molder Slug, Ravenous Baloth, and Gurzigost. I lost a few games to terrible decks, but not once did I get decked.

But the Counterspells did not really fit into this deck. They killed tempo and forced me to keep my lands and my birds untapped when I really needed them the most. So, in the next version of this deck, wanted to cut the Counterspells and replacing them with cards that better fit this deck. Also, the reason for a green draw engine in this deck befuddles me today. I was playing with blue, but still found it necessary to draw cards with Wirewood Savage and Wall of Blossoms.

Another problem that I found with the old version of this deck was that the mana base was rubbish. There are only twenty-one lands and four Birds of Paradise - but more importantly, there are too few cards that can produce both colors of mana and that can fetch both Islands and Forests.

These problems were fixed in the next version. Here I use blue spells for draw and milling and use green spells for beats, just like they are supposed to.

Gurzigost V.2
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Brainstorm
4 Dreamborn Muse
4 Eternal Witness
4 Fact or Fiction
2 Gifts Ungiven
4 Gurzigost
4 Mesmeric Orb
3 Ravenous Baloth
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
2 Uktabi Orangutan
3 Viridian Zealot
4 Yavimaya Coast
7 Forest
7 Island

I know, this version has even fewer lands than the first one, but somehow I am not getting mana screwed at all. Perhaps it is just my dumb luck or Divine Intervention. (Or perhaps the four Birds and four Elders can count as quasi-lands.)

I also added Fact or Fiction and Gifts Ungiven in order to drop more cards into the graveyard, but ultimately to build up card advantage. These six cards, added to the Mesmeric Orb and Dreamborn Muse, give the deck a total of fourteen cards that dump cards into the grave on your side.

This deck can win in two ways: It can either use the Gurzigosts to beat the opponents silly or just use the Dreamborn Muse and the Mesmeric Orb to deck the opponent into submission. Fortunately, you can never be decked (unless a Wrath of God hits or if you neglected to cast the beast) with this deck. You can always arrange the stack so that the Gurzigost will always Replenish your deck.

This final ability makes this deck very handy in long multiplayer games. When everybody else's deck begins to run dry you keep adding to the bottom (I know it is tedious, but so if every upkeep ability). Also, when your opponent is trying to bore you into submission with a casual Fog deck (is there any other kind of Fog deck?) then just casually win and find interesting people to hang out with. (I really did play with this deck against somebody's Fog/ Angus Mackenzie deck, and it was one of the most boring experiences of my life.)

If you want to play with this deck then be very wary (try saying that five times really fast) of the nefarious Planar Void decks. They are bad news in a bag for a mindless bad rare deck such as this.

My deck is not the most original deck out there. I am sure that if you scour every spoiler there are green cards that fit the theme and strategy better, but alas, I have work to do and rather limited time. However, few decks have as of yet harnessed the wacky power of the 6/8 beast. The only decks that I found on the net with him are stupid or dreadfully ineffective.

Another idea for the card would be to pump use spells that take out two or more cards in one shot like Harrow or Careful Study to develop card advantage and copious amounts of mana. Or perhaps you could use cards that have flashback to take advantage of some of the cards in the graveyard.

Have fun... play Magic... eat food... leave the house on a bimonthly schedule.

Roman Pazuniak
The_Eat on OCTGN
The Eat on the boards
Email- boris@punks.org