It's over.

The last IBC qualifier that I know of was Sunday. The short story is, I didn't make it to the Tour... But I've never been one for short stories, so I'll do a rundown ("postmortem") of the IBC season, a recap of my showing at the event (not too bad), and then a look forward at upcoming Standard for States and our odyssey into a new format.

IBC Postmortem
The post-season comments on IBC can be summed up, with some small exceptions, to a single question:

What colors should you have added to your blue?

Last weekend's answer? Pick one:

1. Red and White
2. All of them.

The season began in Tokyo, before IBC was a complete block, with R/G beats dominating - but with a U/W metagamed aggro-control deck winning out in the end, riding the protection of white and the pure, sickening card-and-tempo-advantage offered by IBC blue.

Once Apocalypse was released, a number of huge gold bombs hit the tourney scene: Prophetic Bolt, Pernicious Deed, Spiritmonger, Mystic Snake, et al. The Deed joined Void and Rout as the sweepers in the set, although now I have a strange feeling I'm forgetting one. No, it's not Obliterate… somebody refresh my memory!

What happened then? Tempo, and then three-color control, showed up and cleaned house for a month or so. U/B/R and B/U/G were the main control archetypes - the latter winning in Denver, triumphing in a vast sea of Fact or Fiction-driven CounterBurn decks.

As the season began to end, a new blue came to be, with the patriotic flag (R/W/U) decks who sported Lightning Angel to dominate opposing bears, along with the best of the U/R cards from Apocalypse.

Then, just before"lights out," Kai won with Domain again, ensuring that Collective Restraint would be in play at nearly all the top tables at subsequent events, and unintentional draws would play a huge part in the last weekend.

Whew. I can't say it wasn't eventful. Things get eventful when so many cards are drawn.

The Last Battle

…as I mentioned, was Sunday. I had been searching for quite some time for a nonblue strategy that could hold its own, as those of you who have read my articles probably know. I was having a lot of trouble doing so, but in the last three days before the event I revisited a forgotten IBC card: Phyrexian Arena. This, and only this, appeared in testing to be able to keep up with the card-drawing abilities of the other decks in this set. It also took advantage of the lack of enchantment removal (not counting Domain's sweepers) in the maindecks of the dominant netbuilds.

For the sake of discussion, here's my build:

4 Phyrexian Arena (worth the pain)
3 Dega Sanctuary (a painkiller, and gaining two or four life a turn will protect you from the local bear population)

4 Addle (MVP! MVP!)
4 Vindicate (I had trouble drawing these when I needed them)
3 Ghitu Fire

4 Nightscape Apprentice
3 Goblin Legionnaire
3 Pyre Zombie
3 Blazing Specter
2 Flametongue Kavu

3 Chromatic Sphere (should have been four)
4 Caves of Koilos
4 Battlefield Forge
4 Urborg Volcano
6 Swamp
5 Mountain (should have been 4)
1 Plains

Sideboard:
3 Slay (these should have been Terminates for domain's sideboard Spiritmongers)
3 Mask of Intolerance (nice domain, buddy)
3 Dodecapod (never used)
3 Aura Blast (often needed, but rarely drawn)
3 Shivan Zombie (because"whatever-Mar" is always a threat)

How did it do? Very well, with only two very bad games of mana flood. The one modification I would have made (besides playing eight Addles!) would be to add the fourth Sphere and pull out a mountain. One less land drawn in a row versus well-running netdecks could have made a huge difference.

The deck has a large number of excellent opening hands. Here's a sampling:

1. Addle, Arena, and the ability to make 1BB
2. Familiar, Spectre, and the ability to make 1BR.
3. 2X Vindicate and at least one Sphere for thinning.

These three instances usually resulted in a win. When they didn't happen, any hand with Addle in it had a fighting chance. Why? Because people playing IBC will sometimes keep bad hands, counting on one broken blue card to save their game. Enter Addle: Exit blue crap, end game.

The rounds:

Round 1 vs. Liquid Tempo.

This wasn't even funny—I smashed him in two games. In the first, Arena plus two Sanctuaries held off the bears until sheer card advantage did him in. I ended at 48 life. In the second, a third-turn Specter mugged his hand to the point where he couldn't recover. I noticed he was using the Bobcat version of Tempo, although I don't think he kept them in for game 2.

Round 2 vs. U/R rogue

This was much closer - in fact, he gets a Sligh draw in game 1 with Rogue Kavu, U/R removal, and two kicked Skizziks. The only reason I lived as long as I did was that I had three Vindicates and took out his red sources, delaying the Skizziks... But I couldn't find my Arenas or Zombies, so I'm done in.

Games two was closer. Multiple Addles resolved (I even picked red instead of blue for one of them and got an Flametongue), and I burned him out with Ghitu Fire in response to him burning me down to five life or so.

Game 3 I had multiple Sanctuaries and Familiars and ended at 46 life, after being beaten down into the single digits.

We talk a bit at the end, commenting that it's sad when Rogue builds kill Rogue builds. Where's netboy when you want him?

Round 3 vs. Kai's Domain (oh, here he is!)

Game 1 he keeps a questionable hand, counting on his blue search card to fix things for him. Addle takes away the blue search card, and then he draws a bunch of land while getting beaten up by Specters. I'm happy with the win, but I know I was lucky I stopped his blue stuff. Like I said, I'd play eight Addles in IBC if it was legal — it's the only way to go non-blue.

Game 2. Down a game, he predictably goes into beatdown mode, and in come the Spiritmongers and the Bobcats. The Cats are useless early against my Familiars, and I get Mask of Intolerance out after correctly picking black with Addle and taking the Void I found there. Arena/Sanctuary is active, and his only option is to search through twenty cards of his deck and come up with the other Void. Sadly, that's just what he does, tapping my regenerators so he can come through with a huge attack of enlarged Spiritmongers.

Game 3. How many of you have been able to finish three games versus Domain? Me neither. This ends with a 1-1 draw.

I'm a bit sad about the draw, as I did well versus Domain in my somewhat limited testing. Things were going to change, though, and not for the better.

Round 4 vs. Kai's Domain (is there an echo in here?)

This guy is also 2-0-1, so I figure he's either playing Domain also or has faced it before. His name is Romain - so of course answer #1 is the correct one. This guy is exactly like my last opponent, except he's much luckier.

Game 1. I'm beating the living snot out of him with Goblins and Spectres, and he topdecks his one copy of Overgrown Estate the turn before I can burn him out, after not having cast a single search spell.

Whatever.

The extra eighteen life allows him to stabilize, draw ten or more extra cards with multiple Strategies, and lock me out with Collective Restraint.

Me:"During my upkeep, I fall asleep."
Him:"Okay, that resolves."

Game 2, really a repeat of game 1, except now he has two Estates in his deck. I can get no Addles or Aura Blasts. I'm also hoping for Vindicates to use on the only plains in his deck, thus turning off the weapon (until Agenda arrives, anyway), but it's not to be — I'm getting a lot of lands in a row. The Weapon removes my Arena, then goes to work on my white-generating lands. He's curious why I don't concede. I guess the reason is"spite." No, not the split card.

Egads. Lucky Domain is unbeatable in IBC.

2-1-1. My chances of qualifying are in serious jeopardy. I need to win out and hope for good tiebreaks.

Round 5 vs. B/U/G bears—at first I thought it was Kowal, but it was more aggro and had other stuff like the green 'Volver.

This is over in ten minutes, as I completely destroy him. Did I mention my deck does well against bears?

Time for the last fight of my IBC life.

Round 6 Vs R/W/U flag.

Game 1, I totally crush him with a third-turn Spectre and an Addle for"broken blue cards." I take the Prophetic Bolt off of him, and his maindeck Gainsays, tossed to the Specter, are a source of some amusement for us both.

Game 2. He gets a quick draw of bears and U/R bounce/burn, while my Arena gives me no answers. He has moved his Meddling Mages to the sideboard because he has no idea what to pick. Flametongue and Prophetic Bolt finish me off after I try to stabilize.

Game 3. For all the marbles.

He mulligans, so I like my chances. Unfortunately my deck has saved a big fatal mana flood for me, while I take hits from Legionnaires and Galina's Knights. I stabilize a little with Arena, and with a grand flourish he drops Lightning Angel and keeps serving. I comment that I have twelve answers for the Angel in my deck (which is incorrect; I only have nine), but am unlikely to draw them before it's over, even with an Arena in play. I'm mostly right — after five consecutive lands off my deck, and some burn from him, my deck offers up a Vindicate, but by now his lands are untapped and ready to perform the"blue job." Game.

I feel ill.

So close.

Sigh.

Well, not really. I guess the winner of our match was fated to end up in tenth. He got half a box. I got a sour stomach.

But I rocked with that deck. And it had no blue. It was possible! Maybe with another week of tuning….

…excuses, I know — there's always the what-ifs.

I'm proud of how my deck did. And the future awaits….

Onward Into Odyssey
States is a month away. With the larger card sets than IBC available and the departure of Fires, CounterRebel, and free-counter Skies, the field is wide open.

What am I going to try? Well, I'll seriously look into G/B at the start. I can play eight Addles in Standard - or at least four Addles plus four Duress. (Of course, eight might be too much and it's likely to drop to seven.) That, and the green flashback cards plus the Pernicious Deed or 'Monger should be a fairy straightforward disruptive, aggressive deck.

U/G has strong possibilities. Can you imagine a tempo package with multiple Standstills? That's absolutely sick. That, along with all the squirrels and control boys' favorite card, Opposition. Egads, will this madness ever end?

Black has some good spells in Odyssey, but the creatures kinda suck. Still, Last Rites with flashback cards or a reanimator strategy should be quite strong, and could find it's way into my G/B build. Life/death, anyone? Third turn monger, discarded to the Mongrel and Raised again?

Wait —"Monger, Mongrel." Coincidence?

What can white do? I don't know. Maybe combine with red and go nuts with burn and Balancing Act. Again, I don't know.

And blue's card drawing is still really scary. There's another flavor of draw-go and Magpile on its way with the inclusion of Finkel's dream card, Shadowmage Infiltrator. That alone could cause me to branch into red for Volcanic Hammers. I Suppose the Mongrels will help here, though, but only if I can keep them in play.

And Epicenter, ah, yes — give me back my ‘Geddon, please. Threshold might be hard to get, but it will be worth it to destroy all the lands again. A question on this — if you have Threshold, do you still need to target a player? I suppose the answer is yes, because they could always remove cards from your graveyard in response. Do Threshold-dependent cards check on announcement, resolution, or both? I bet that answer's in a FAQ somewhere.

Well, that's my thoughts at the moment. Have fun building original decks, folks! Now that IBC qualifiers are done, It's time to see what the other four colors can do.

joel