Peasant Magic: a format filled with no rares, five uncommons, and many commons in every single deck. This format has its share of fast aggro decks that fill up most of the field, a few combo decks, and a distinct lack of viable control decks.

I really, really, really wanted to build a control deck - but my guts told me that there was no way I could win against an aggro deck with a superior card drawing engine. (Yes, Skullclamp. Were you expecting something different?)

The first thing I knew that I wanted to do when building a deck then was that I wanted it to be a combo deck, and I wanted it to be able to beat the snot out of aggro decks.

The second thing I knew was that I needed a way to deal with the early rush of creatures.

My next conclusion was that the deck would probably not work if it was a Counterspell-based control deck, but it might work as something more aggressive - like a hybrid of Fish or Pirates.

The last thing I considered when building the deck was that I wanted it to be a net deck that I could port to Peasant Magic because it would annoy the crap out of players trying to get away from a particular format.

I decided to port Life from Extended. (I know. I'm evil.)

For those of you who know how Life works, skip this paragraph; for those of you who don't then continue reading it. Life involves three components.

• A creature whose toughness gets larger when you target it;
• A way to target it a bunch of times for free;
• A way to sacrifice it and gain life equal to its toughness.

Then you just target the toughness pumping creature a billion or so times and sacrifice it for a lot of life.

When you're playing against this deck, if you're trying to deal twenty points of damage then you've got a large curve ball thrown at you with almost a Counterspell-like no! You usually win when the opponent concedes, or through a very slow process of beating them down with two near-unkillable creatures.

When I started to build the deck, I looked to see what creatures toughness got larger when targeted by a spell or ability in the color white (if I missed one in another color, please excuse me). I came up with Angelic Protector, Task Force, and Daru Spiritualist. With not much to look at there - and Angelic Protector was uncommon. I then decided to see what cards gave you life when you sacrificed it - and while there were many, this is what I deemed playable: Animal Boneyard, Starlit Sanctum, and Worthy Cause. I knew I could rely on the En-Kor creatures for targeting so I didn't even bother looking hard for something to target the creature.

Now the dilemma I had was that all the life gain effects were uncommon, and that only one of the creatures worked with the land. The reason this was a problem was because even though I didn't mind losing to other combos, decks running counter spells could just counter the Worthy Cause or Animal Boneyard and I was sunk - or heck, they could remove any of the creatures I needed to go off with. So for some reassurance, I decided to try Aether Vial in the deck first and then go with a more "I lose to Counterspells" feeling later.

This is the first list I came up with.

Lands
17 Plains
2 Starlit Sanctum
5 Forest

Creatures
4 Nomads En-Kor
3 Teroh's Faithful
4 Daru Spiritualist
4 Order of Leitbur
3 Spirit En-Kor
4 Temple Acolyte
4 Crimson Acolyte
2 Obsidian Acolyte

Others
3 Aether Vial
3 Crop Rotation
2 Disenchant

When I started playing with the deck, I came to the realization that this deck has nowhere near the consistency of the Extended version - and as such, this was not suitable for readers. The main reason this deck is so abysmal compared to the Extended version is because it lacks the tutoring power of Extended life.

The flaws with this deck ended up being even more than just the tutors, though; the only reason Aether Vial was in the deck was to fight against Counterspell, but the situation rarely occurred because there weren't as many Counterspells in my area as I thought. Realizing these flaws, I set out to build a second deck, and came up with this:

24 Lands
19 Plains
1 Starlit Sanctum
4 Forest

28 Creatures
4 Nomads En-Kor
4 Spirit En-Kor
4 Task Force
4 Daru Spiritualist
3 Crimson Acolyte
2 Obsidian Acolyte
4 Temple Acolyte
3 Order of Leitbur

8 Other
1 Animal Boneyard
2 Crop Rotation
2 Disenchant
3 Worthy Cause

Now I was cooking with gas. Now granted, this deck still isn't as consistent as the Extended version because it lacks the tutor power - but because the amount of En-Kors and the amount of toughness-pumping creatures went up to eight of each, the combo went off more.

For some of the card choices, I decided that the Acolytes were pretty helpful for saving your creatures - or in the case of Temple Acolytes, you - from disaster. Order of Leitbur was a good was to beat through if the opponent didn't concede immediately, and Disenchant was just a main deck way to deal with Skullclamps or enchantments that could be annoying you.

Here are some quick notes on the deck:

• In the event your opponent does not concede when you set off the combo, you can use your almost-invincible creatures to handle most attacks, and possibly mount an offensive.
• The Crop Rotations are in the deck to get the Starlit Sanctum.
• If you are looking for a more resilient build, try adding some Auramancers and more Animal Boneyards.
• The Invasion Acolytes can be used to pump creatures with Daru Spiritualist if you need to.
• Since there are plenty of other clerics in the deck, don't feel like you have to sacrifice the Daru Spiritualist if you use it in the combo.
• Against control decks, avoid playing the buyback on Worthy Cause, and only play it at their end-of-turn step.
• Above all, have fun.

Now, I wouldn't be a responsible deckbuilder if I didn't at least play with it for a bit - and my results support the hypothesis that you will lose to combo decks that rely on decking, and win against anything that tries to deal twenty damage unless they have Counterspells, a God hand (with the occasional Skullclamp), or they cheat by putting magically getting a Flames of the Blood Hand.

For tips on building a sideboard, Disenchant, Monk Realist, and Teroh's Faithful are good places to start. Additional copies of the Invasion Acolytes are also welcome (I ended up facing a lot of red and black decks). From there, season with a dash of your favorite common cards.

For an alternate build you can try a red/white version that uses Strange Inversion or About Face for the attacking with a huge (if fragile) attacker, a black version featuring Sever Soul and Transmutation for both ways to go off, or even a blue version featuring Cephalids that reanimates a huge creature for attacking and winning via Dragon Breath.*

Until next time, have fun writing "Yeah!" in your life column,
Andrew Lubich.

* - As a quick note on those who want to try and duplicate the Cephalid Breakfast/Life decks that you see in Extended, I've tried it - and it's destined for horrible failure because there is no good common or uncommon replacement for Sutured Ghoul. Then add in the fact that the mana base is hard to duplicate with only common lands and green land search, and that you have no real way to discard the reanimation target if you draw it, and... well, you can pretty much see the idea flop from the start.