Look, I don't know anything about the "heart of the cards," but I am fully aware of the need to pick up your deck, squeeze it in a throbbing, clutched fist and slam it against the wall and watch it spread like confetti.

This only seems to happen, personally, when I play against White/Green and my deck bails on me. If Elton John played Magic, he would choose the colors White and Green, filled to the brim with Faith's Fetters, Wood Elves, and Loxodon Hierarch. They would flit around in their Temple Garden and drink green tea and smoke clove cigarettes and gossip and titter and dress the little Saprolings in glitter wigs and purple skirts while "gaining life" and playing "Scatter the Seeds."

It drives me nothing less than crazy when my deck, even while fully equipped to deal with such an abomination as White/Green, farts out or just hands me lands. "No!" I hiss. "You're only supposed to do this when I'm facing Wildfire decks, you idiot! Cough up the goods!" But it doesn't. The more disgusted and disappointed you get, the worse your deck treats you, and the more your opponent will draw into multiple Faith's Fetters and bejeweled Loxodon cross-dressers and little Elves that give them Wood.

This is where the next six or so games will not only go downhill, but they will go straight to hell. Believe me or don't - your deck knows your mood and responds in kind. Once you are furious and sick to your stomach and in dire need of dealing out a massive beating to compensate your pain, your deck will mock you. It will make you mulligan to five every game. Every die roll will show up as a 1. You will be one land short of gaining control and you will draw junk until you scoop. Your forehead will bead with sweat and your starfish will pucker in rage. Every deck you face will be your worst matchup. This is 100% true and there's only one way to remedy this catastrophe.

Stop playing.

Relax. Smoke 'em if you got 'em. Breathe, dammit. There's no way to just "keep going until you win" because you aren't going to. You're like a cat when it gets all weird and pissed off and that sliver of hair on their back stands up like a mohawk. You're unable to make rational decisions, and your deck hates you too much to actually give you the opportunity to make those decisions. It's over. You need to take an emotional poop. I know. Bad luck is one thing, but an infinite loop of bad luck is something else, and it happens to the best of us.

*deep breath*

You feel that? In no time you'll be back in the saddle, lopping the head off of that godforsaken Hierarch and dealing too much damage for lifegain to make any real sense. It's a fact, as it just happened to me after writing these paragraphs. My W/G opponent even rolled a one and mulliganed to five. I felt no sympathy. It happens to the best of us.

It's been over a week but hey, check out my Prerelease Deck:

1 Elves of Deep Shadow
1 Birds of Paradise
1 Order of the Stars
1 Selesnya Evangel
1 Mourning Thrull
1 Shrieking Grotesque
1 Silhana Starfletcher
1 Civic Wayfinder
1 Centaur Safeguard
1 Shambling Shell
1 Souls of the Faultless
1 Ostiary Thrull
1 Droning Bureaucrats
1 Blind Hunter
1 Conclave Phalanx
1 Exhumer Thrull
1 Graven Dominator

1 Douse in Gloom
1 Withstand
1 Gaze of the Gorgon
1 Ribbons of Night
1 Scatter the Seeds

1 Glare of Subdual

1 Orzhov Basilica
1 Selesnya Sanctuary
1 Golgari Rot Farm
3 Swamp
4 Plains
7 Forest

Heavy W/G. Scatter the Seeds. Lifegain. Ironic, right?

You don't have to remind me that this deck lacks good beaters. My U, U/R and R pool was absolute junk (excluding Wee Dragonauts). My Red contained zero(!) removal. The only thing worth a damn in R/G was Streetbreaker Wurm. U/B included only Moroii. I won't bore you with my cardpool, but I honestly believe that what I listed was the best I could do. The cards I ended up with screamed out "Here's some half-playable stuff that is just O.K., but enjoy the Glare of Subdual, Ostiary Thrull and Droning Bureaucrats." I was absolutely forced to go W/B/G. Needless to say, when one or two of those cards hit the table, coupled with the lifegain cards, it was a slow death for the opponent. Most of my matches went into extra turns.

I made an easy run into first place in my flight, got dispatched by the State Champ and ended up with sixth place after drawing with my last opponent, though I won when we played "just for fun." (3-1-1). I quickly sold my prize to make back the money I spent.

Did you ever notice that Sparkmage Apprentice looks like A.C. Slater at first glance?

On a related note, one of the judges at the Prerelease told us he once met an Amish Magic player. He swore it was the truth. His wife waited outside with the horse and buggy the entire tournament. Predictably, we spent the next five minutes making bad Kingpin Irish-voice imitations and "I'll raise you a barn for a concession" jokes. Pro Tour Lancaster County got a chuckle or two though once someone started rapping "Amish Paradise" it ceased to be funny.

But the prerelease was fun times. Huge turnout, despite the rampant screams for boycott because of the Rancored_Elf disaster.

For the record, I could care less about spoilers. Prereleases are, for the most part, "fun" tournaments, and anyone staying up all night memorizing the new expansion to have an edge over players that they're going to slaughter anyway needs to re-think life. I might skim through the spoilers once or twice before the Prerelease, but there have been enough mistakes (Moonlight Bargain and Wreak Havoc for example) that I don't take them completely seriously. The first couple weeks after the new expansion hits stores, most of the new cards are over/underestimated, misread and bungled up anyway. I don't think it makes much of a difference, to be honest, though Wizards firing nuclear missiles at Rancored_Elf does seem pretty extreme.

If spoilers and leaks were nuked forever (yeah right), I wouldn't care at all. Lots and lots of folks on the messageboards went stark raving naked crazy over the whole thing, but that's Magic players for you. I've watched so many "mistakes," card bannings and other moves by Wizards that cause players scream and go nuts, yet in a month or two it's all blown over and there's still the same people on the same boards anxiously waiting for another pile of crap to hit their fan. It's the cycle, and it's always gonna be there.

Enough of that. Let's talk shop.

I'm still heavily playing the same White Weenie deck I posted last week. I completely removed Terashi's Grasp from the sideboard to add four Samurai of the Pale Curtain. This only pisses me off when I'm facing down Icy Manipulator, but screw it. I can get around that. Pale Curtain might be fragile 2/2 with no protection, but if the opponent finds no immediate answer, it can make them gun-shy from dropping Kamigawa Dragons or Dredge cards until they find their Putrefy or whatever. Usually those one or two stall turns are all you need to secure the inevitable. The two-cost warm body with Bushido is always a good sideboarding option in matches where Devouring Light or Paladin En-Vec is unnecessary.

Kami of Ancient Law has been showing up in many maindecks lately. I don't find anything horribly wrong with this idea, as there is no shortage of top-notch enchantments being ran in plenty of awesome decks: Annex, Confiscate, Faith's Fetters, Form of the Dragon (though I rarely come across Ideal decks anymore), various Genju, Glare of Subdual, Glorious Anthem, Greater Good, Heartbeat of Spring, Night of Soul's Betrayal, Phyrexian Arena, Threads of Disloyalty, etc. Very few of these enchantments are "I can worry about this later" cards. It would be optimal to get them the hell off the table as soon as they appear, or risk losing.

I find nothing wrong with a maindeck Ancient Law given these statistics.

That is, if I were still planning on running Mono-White Weenie.

Snoot and Pepper Featured by Caldwell Van Der Snoot on 2006-02-05 (Standard) As written about in http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/11252.html Print this deck!
Maindeck: Creatures 4 Dark Confidant 4 Lantern Kami 4 Leonin Skyhunter 4 Paladin en-Vec 4 Suntail Hawk Enchantments 4 Glorious Anthem Instants 4 Mortify 4 Shining Shoal	Legendary Artifacts 4 Umezawa's Jitte Legendary Creatures 3 Hokori, Dust Drinker Basic Lands 7 Plains 2 Swamp Lands 4 Caves of Koilos 4 Godless Shrine 2 Orzhov Basilica Legendary Lands 1 Eiganjo Castle 1 Shizo, Death's Storehouse	Sideboard: 4 Hand of Honor 4 Kami of Ancient Law 4 Samurai of the Pale Curtain 3 Ivory Mask
Download this deck in Apprentice format!		Download this deck in Magic Online Text format!

Like most Reality TV shows, my deck contains one black person in a houseful of whites.

I'm only throwing a splash of Black into my snoot. I don't like the Orzhov Guildmage, and the other weenie creatures in Guildpact have no room in this deck. Hyppie is good times, but third turn Hypnotic Specter is not excellent in this format. Last Gasp is also an option, but if extra removal is what I need, it would be Devouring Light, which I swapped out for Mortify.

Mortify: Finally, Meloku. Your ass is mine.

Tap out in desperation to play Meloku, still lose. I like it.

And it's because of Mortify I've decided to go from Mono-White to White/Black.

"Caldwell! Haven't you heard of Char? That kills Meloku, why didn't you go Boros?"

Because Boros doesn't have Dark Confidant on its side, and Char can't kill fat people.

Thanks to Mortify, having the Ancient Law in the sideboard is no longer a debate. Not only do we have precious pin-point removal, but we have the option of nailing any annoying enchanment as well.

Has anyone else been thinking about the theoretic name of Dissension's "Putrefy/Mortify"? Will it be called Stupify? Fortify? Solidify? Nothing?

Rectify
1BR
Instant
Destroy target creature or player.

I replaced Hand of Honor with Confidant. Even though Hand dodges most Black removal and holds back Ink-Eyes, Bob gives this deck a dimension it hasn't had since Mask of Memory. And he holds a Jitte blah blah blah...

Hand went to the sideboard, replacing Circle Of Protection: Black. Unless I repeatedly side in Ancient Law in the upcoming weeks, I'll probably move the COP back into the sideboard. It's just that good in certain matchups.

This is merely a rough draft. While I'm certain it will be excellent in current form, I'm also certain I'll be tweaking it, and I'll keep you updated.

Enjoy.

What Guildpact means for WW and WW/B and other cards of note:

Angel of Despair would be nuts as a Vindicate-ing 3/3 flyer for 3WB, would it not? Seven mana to blow up one single lonely permanent and have a 5/5 flyer seems sort of... Szadeck-ish to me. Maybe some Isochron Scepter - Otherworldly Journey thing or somesuch crap... Followed Footsteps... Astral Slide... Some Ghostway nonsense... who knows. Probably nothing.

"Bioplasm — Sensei's Divining Top!" bleh.

Burning Tree Shaman is nuts and all, but it means little to this deck. It's probably mostly going to irritate people running Top and to a point, Meloku. I think this can stink up Extended a lot better than Standard. Obviously this 3/4 for three is gonna get played. Just another great reason for Paladin En-Vec to be maindecked.

Castigate: A mostly Black deck with a splash of White might make a pretty decent discard deck, with Shrieking Grotesque and that Abyssal Nocturnus. Add Nezumi Shortfang, Ravenous Rats, Umezawa's Jitte, Moratorium Stone and maybe Blackmail or a couple Persecute, Bob, and Mortify and/or Last Gasp, and there's a decent rough draft. A whole new dimension to W/B Aggro, though I bet B/G with second-turn Hyppie and Putrefy is slightly better due to the sheer gallop of that deck.

Culling Sun: Ouch. This token deck-tech will bleed over to drop anchor in my bowl of Kool-Aid.

Dryad Sophisticate and Silhana Ledgewalker: Niiiiice. Wakefield would like these, right? Blanchwood Armor would look good on either. Looks like the final pieces of a Mono-Green Aggro deck. Maybe a splash of Red or Black...

Earth Surge plus Siege of Towers: *fart noise*

Electrolyze - There went Hawk and Bob. And they get a card. Right after you played the Bob.

Feral Animist: A Magic Card on crystal meth.

Goblin Flectomancer: The thinking man's Privileged Position.

Graven Dominator plus Night of Soul's Betrayal would work. If you like poop. Seriously, though, there's probably all sorts of tricks you could kick off this guy in casual, like some Orzhov Pontiff/Haunt thing. My Prerelease deck packed this guy, but I never did anything that cool with it other than swing.

Hatching Plans is feces. Does no one realize that you're essentially going to end up chucking two cards and some amount of mana for a net gain of one card and probably one turn wasted?

Ink-Treader Nephilim is pretty trippy if you think about it.

"Killer Instinct and Top”" Yep... "Killer Instinct and Congregation at Dawn”!" Yep... Killer Instinct and Crown of Convergence”

Orzhov Pontiff might be tested for this deck... it could at least wipe a bunch of tokens out of the way. We've been needing more cards like this to kick Elton John and friends square in the snikkel.

Parallectric Feedback: "...and in response to your Shoal-removing-Hokori response to my Char..."

Savage Twister: Pretty good, pretty good. Let Paladin En-Vec be your Bill Paxton.

Shattering Spree: Jesus. Seems like every year we get a new "IHATEAFFINITY" card. What's the next Block going to get?

And Your Little Dog, Too
W
Enchantment
Players can't play artifacts.

*dodges lawsuit*

Looks like Wizards is still apologizing for Affinity.

Sky Swallower: How do we break this thing? How do we keep from getting it destroyed with ease? How do we get it to come into play under their control? How do we chuck steaming turds at them? Is it even possible in Type 2? Is this some retarded cousin of Eater of Days and Leveler? Damnit! It is!

All Guildpact does is give U/R decks a pretty land.

Just kidding.

Did any of you notice there's no nine-cost for Grozoth to find? That sucks.

Until next time,

Caldwell S. Van Der Snoot

VanDerSnoot on MTGO

csvandersnoot@hotmail.com