"I could loan you a couple," Jeremy said, "but I can't really afford to trade any. What're they for? You figure out some good use for them with Merfolk?'

I didn't answer. Everyone knows that playing Forests makes me nauseous. How could I admit to Jeremy I was thinking of playing Secret Force?

Well, okay. Not with that name. I've always hated the name 'Secret Force'. Jamie originally came up with it due to his 'secret' Lure of Prey tech, and naturally, because of Verdant Force. The Lure of Prey has long since left the deck and the Verdants are down to two, so I'm definitely not calling my version 'Secret Force'. Cory inadvertently suggested the name for my version of the deck when he told one of his many sick jokes. Due to the success of my deck versus Necro-based decks, the name seemed appropriate.

Skullf***er v1.3

During the last Extended season, the combo deck to beat was High Tide. I played in a lot of qualifiers that season with a Lackey Sligh deck that beat the crap out of Tide, and my success that season has shaped the way I choose my deck for each set of qualifiers.

Step 1. Identify the best combo deck.

Easier said than done. PT Chicago was the acid test for this Extended season, and it was chock full of combo. Pebbles variants were everywhere, Tinker was pretty damn good, and oh, a variant of one of my favorite deck types actually won the tournament. Oath of Druids was definitely in vogue.

On Day 2, Jamie and I were walking around engaging in one of our favorite spectator sports, watching Magic. I usually like to watch the game from behind one player, while Jamie seems to prefer the tennis spectator PoV. So we start watching a match between this Japanese man and some random person, and I see the Japanese guy pull the Illusions-Donate trick which I'd heard of but thought of basically as an Alongi sort of play. We walked away shaking our heads and laughing at the ridiculousness of the deck. I mean, these guys were supposed to be PRO players!

Then it hit me. My old Bargain at Bloomingdales deck. The Extended monster that swept through a couple tournaments and with which I'd won on the first turn countless times, once after mulliganing to 6 and without ever playing a land. I had 2 Illusions of Grandeur in THAT deck for the insane card drawing boost they gave to Bargain.

So I hurried back to watch another game in that match, and sure enough, the Japanese guy had out Necro.

"People are splashing Necro into everything," I commented.

"It's Dark Ritual," Jamie replied. "Much as I love it, it shouldn't have been reprinted. People aren't using it to get out fatties or huge Drains, they use it get out out Necro which is like super Ancestral Recall. And then they use Necro for some stupid combo. God I hate--"

"Hey look!" I hurriedly interjected before he could say anything that might damage his credibility as a nice guy, "six dollar Pizza!"

After gorging ourselves on convention food we continued on. I bemoaned the fact that Sligh had a hard time beating Necro, and an even harder time beating Oath with Tormods Crypt out of rotation.

"You know," Jamie said while licking his greasy fingers, "Secret Force beats Necro. And we tuned it to beat Oath for this tournament."

"I'm not playing a deck called 'Secret Force'," I said disgustedly. "It sounds like a ten year old came up with the deck name."

Jamie laughed. "You're the only one I know that wishes the four of a card rule didn't apply to Kaervek's Spite."

It's true, by the way.

So on the way back Rod, Jamie and I discussed decks a little and talked a lot about non-Magic stuff. Jamie was kind of burnt out and was planning to take some time off, and I couldn't blame him. But that meant when the Extended season rolled around I'd need to find someone else to ride with and discuss the newest combos, and I wished mightily that I was on some internet mailing list where I could debate the relative merits of Consult over Vampiric and agonize over the number of basic land I should play in my Rec-Sur deck. But alas, it was not to be.

So I was left with the problem of discerning the best combo deck on my own, and devising it's foil.

Hey, hey. Night fights day.

I quickly settled on Fish as my deck of choice. It has flexible victory conditions due to the fact it can play both permission and beatdown, it's monocolored so can play Wastelands, and it was unexpected and unconventional. I carefully constructed it and brought it to a Q in Boston where in the first 3 rounds I played against a W/G Auratog… thing that ended up in the final 8, and Merfolk's worst nightmare - White Weenie.

That sucked.

But I watched a lot of Magic that day, and I saw that in New England at least, Necro-Donate was the top combo deck.

Step 2. Make the Anti-deck.

I usually start designing my Anti-decks with the basic Magic strategy of opposing colors. While this is hardly a rule (some of the best anti-Necro strategies are black and white weenie gets stomped by green, one of it's allied colors), it's a good place to start.

Necropotence is black, Donate and Illusions are blue. The natural enemies of Black are Green and White, the enemies of Blue are Green and Red. Immediately, I thought to myself Ernham and Burn 'Em, an old deck style using undercosted green fatties with white removal and red burn. I loved it.

So I made up a deck with Incinerates, Shocks, StP, Disenchant, and of course, Hunted Wumpus. It was pretty good at screwing with Donate, but there were a few things I didn't like about it. Number 1, it was vulnerable to Wasteland, so it could be screwed by people who weren't even planning for it. Number 2, due to the three color requirements of the deck, it was that much harder to play Wastelands myself. And there sure as hell didn't seem room for the Dust Bowls that I wanted to run in addition to Wastes. And Number 3, it really wasn't quite good enough versus Donate. I hated leaving mana untapped on my turn for Disenchant or Lyrist, and those either got Duressed or Firestormed away anyway. And since I'd reduced my offense by not casting spells so I could keep defensive spells ready I wasn't exerting pressure.

I needed a way to use my mana on both my and my opponent's turn. It took me 2 or 3 milliseconds to come up with Wall of Roots. Hmm, if I also play main deck Spike Feeders, it forces the Donate guy to go off twice or do four points of damage to me, and my experience was quickly showing that Demonic Consultation often eliminated the potential to do either of those things. And if I play a Huge Fatty (tm) on turn three it puts combo boy on a very short clock.

So I built the thing.

Next week-

Step 3. Losing to improbable circumstances
Step 4. Return to Canada. Meet the Mounties!

alan webster
wondering if he can get arrested for necrophilia based on how much his deck rapes Necro