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The Magical MOCS
It's official. The MOCS (Magic Online Championships Series) Season One has officially started, running from January 4 to February 1. That means that everyone who wants to qualify for it is grinding out Qualifier Points (QPs). What's so special about QPs? Well at 15 you are automatically qualified for the MOCS. At 25 you earn one bye, and at 35 you get two byes. For a ten-round tournament, those two byes you earn can mean the difference between finishing in 9th place and 8th place. In order to stand the best chance at grabbing two byes, you better bring your A game to Magic Online and start playing in as many Daily Events as possible. For me, that means focusing on the three formats that regularly launch. Modern, Innistrad Block Constructed, and Standard. If you want to earn those byes for the MOCS, you have to bring the best you have.
The Best of You
So what do I have in store for Modern? Well, nothing too special. I really like the U/R Storm deck a lot (big surprise, right?). Although the lists I have seen online are not very good (in my opinion at least; they still 3-1 or 4-0 Daily Events). Given that I like the U/R Storm list, you'd think I'd be playing that deck, right? Wrong. I'd much rather deal infinite damage with 2/1s and 1/4s, thank you very much.
| U/R Twin Combo Featured by Larry Swasey on 2012-01-15 (Modern) | ||
Artifact Creatures 2 Spellskite Creatures 4 Deceiver Exarch 4 Pestermite 2 Snapcaster Mage Enchantments 4 Splinter Twin |
Instants 3 Dispel 4 Remand Legendary Creatures 3 Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker 1 Vendilion Clique Sorceries 4 Serum Visions 4 Sleight of Hand Basic Lands 6 Island 2 Mountain Lands 4 Cascade Bluffs 3 Misty Rainforest 4 Scalding Tarn 4 Steam Vents 2 Sulfur Falls | 4 Blood Moon 2 Gigadrowse 1 Mindbreak Trap 3 Spell Pierce 2 Vendilion Clique 3 Shattering Spree |
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I'm sure a lot of the card choices are being scrutinized by the savvy combo players out there. One Vendilion Clique? Two Snapcaster Mages? Only three Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breakers? Three Dis—OK, OK. I'm not going to list the whole thing out again. Instead, allow me to explain and ease the worried people out there in Modern land.
I like Snapcaster Mage. I also like Clique. There, that explains the numbers. If you want the competitive reason why, allow me to elaborate further. A problem that often comes up in combo decks is that sometimes you keep drawing the wrong cards. Arguably, Snapcaster and Clique are these wrong cards. On the plus side, these cards help dig for the right cards and also allow different styles of play to emerge from this otherwise very straightforward deck.
Have you ever been playing a combo deck and just had one of the pieces in your hand with nothing to do? Or maybe you have two copies of half the combo. Now imagine that instead of drawing blanks, you draw awesome cards that have flash and other abilities. Speaking of flash, that's another unique aspect of these cards. Every creature other than Kiki-Jiki has flash, and even that has haste (although if you resolve a Kiki-Jiki, you're much more likely to win the game than just attack for two).
Just being able to hold up your mana and represent counterspells or the combo from nowhere severely limits your opponent's options. And you even have the option of just bashing for two every turn with Snapcaster! It's like the best plan B ever. As for there only being three Kiki-Jiki, I find that I don't want to get stuck with multiples in hand, especially at five mana and with pretty strict color requirements (although drawing one Cascade Bluffs certainly helps).
For the sideboard, I find that Blood Moon really helps against the big mana Urza decks. Sure, they can have some colored mana, but it stops them from casting their game-breaking spells like Karn Liberated and Mindslaver. It also stops their utility lands (namely Academy Ruins). Gigadrowse allows the tapping of an opponent's creatures or lands to wildly swing the game in your favor. It can act as a Fog or a Mana Short.
Mindbreak Trap is a one-of just because I hate losing to Storm decks, and you can randomly mise it against them. It's also a hard counter for spells in the worst-case scenario. Shattering Spree stops troublesome artifacts like Spellskite, Torpor Orb, and those in Affinity decks. Spell Pierces are typical anti-combo cards and anti-control cards. It's a lot easier to combo off while holding one mana up than two or more (for Remand and Dispel potentially). Lastly, Vendilion Clique is just a solid guy that can help to expand upon plan B (play end-step guys and bash) or to help against combo and control decks. Hell, it's even a blocker against aggressive decks.
Block Rockin' Beats
| G/B Planeswalker Control Featured by Larry Swasey on 2012-01-15 (Innistrad Block Constructed) | ||
Creatures 4 Bloodgift Demon 4 Bloodline Keeper 4 Mayor of Avabruck 2 Reaper from the Abyss Enchantments 2 Curse of Death's Hold 4 Dead Weight Instants 3 Tribute to Hunger |
Planeswalkers 3 Garruk Relentless 3 Liliana of the Veil Sorceries 2 Bramblecrush 2 Caravan Vigil 2 Sever the Bloodline Basic Lands 9 Forest 12 Swamp Lands 4 Woodland Cemetery | 2 Witchbane Orb 1 Naturalize 4 Victim of Night 1 Garruk Relentless 1 Liliana of the Veil 1 Bramblecrush 4 Night Terrors 1 Sever the Bloodline |
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So what's the deal with this deck, and why am I not splashing red? Well, I wanted to play a deck with all of the powerful cards in the format. To me, that means playing the planeswalkers of the format. This strategy led to strong decks in the Scars of Mirrodin Block Constructed format. Koth Red was a very powerful strategy, beating most decks on the back of a turn-three Koth of the Hammer. So, if the strategy is generally pretty good, why not continue the trend?
It turns out that Liliana and Garruk are very powerful, especially together. Combined, they can pick apart armies and control both the board and the size of the opponent's hand. Caravan Vigil seems suspect, but the mana requirements in this deck don't mess around. If you're not hitting BB on turn three, the game might already be over. Okay, so it won't be over, since you have a lot of other cards that are castable, but I wanted to make a point! Harumph!
Against the creature-heavy decks (Token variants, Red decks, and R/W Humans of note), the deck has a ton of removal to deal with threats. Dead Weight is incredible, as is Tribute and Liliana. Don't forget Garruk can fight a creature and then make 1/1 deathtouch Wolves. Against the more controlling decks, once again Liliana and Garruk shine, as does Bramblecrush. Bramblecrush is the card that I secretly love in the deck, blowing up all troublesome permanents that the removal won't deal with. Burning Vengeance? Gone! Liliana? Say no more! Garruk? Poof!
As far as the board goes, Night Terrors are there for the slower decks that you actively want to try to get rid of a particular card (Burning Vengeance, Spider Spawning, Garruk, other potential big mana threats). Victim is there for the aggressive decks, acting as more removal. More removal means the planeswalkers become very capable of taking over a game, even more so than usual. The reason I have the fourth Garruk and fourth Liliana in the board is because, believe it or not, you don't ALWAYS want to be drawing them. I'd also rather have the two Bramblecrush maindeck over them so I can have outs to various cards that might otherwise be troublesome.
With Modern and Block down, it's time for Standard. And boy do I have a spicy brew for Standard. What's that? You want me to give you the list and then elaborate on it? Alright!
Stop, Elaborate, and Listen
| R/B Planeswalker Control Featured by Larry Swasey on 2012-01-15 (Standard) | ||
Artifacts 2 Batterskull Artifact Creatures 1 Wurmcoil Engine Creatures 1 Grave Titan Instants 1 Dismember 2 Doom Blade 2 Galvanic Blast 2 Go for the Throat 3 Gut Shot |
Planeswalkers 2 Chandra, the Firebrand 3 Liliana of the Veil 1 Sorin Markov Sorceries 4 Arc Trail 4 Despise 3 Distress 4 Tezzeret's Gambit Basic Lands 4 Mountain 11 Swamp Lands 4 Blackcleave Cliffs 4 Dragonskull Summit 2 Stensia Bloodhall | 2 Nihil Spellbomb 2 Ratchet Bomb 1 Wurmcoil Engine 2 Bloodline Keeper 4 Phyrexian Crusader 2 Olivia Voldaren 2 Deathmark |
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Here's a hint with this deck. You actively want to play against creature decks. Luckily, almost all of Standard is based around creature decks. All of the removal is to allow the planeswalkers to take over the game (a running theme it seems). Here's a fun fact: Did you know that Stensia Bloodhall deals damage? This is relevant because dealing damage allows the land to start pinging planeswalkers if it ever gets to that stage of the game.
All right, so now that we have all this removal, how do we win? Well, there's actually quite a few ways to win. The first and most obvious is controlling the game through planeswalkers. Two of these act as win-conditions: Sorin and Chandra (best friends forever!). As a team, these two make short work of an opponent. Even better, opponents often start at less than 20 life due to Phyrexian cards. Gut Shot and Gitaxian Probe are everywhere nowadays, and that doesn't seem likely to change. Don't forget we're packing some burn in here too. Alternatively this deck can slowly ping someone out with Bloodhall or just slam a big guy down and go to town.
So what's that weird blue card doing in this deck? Well, Tezzeret's Gambit is because there is no Sign in Blood in the format. You really need the draw spell to hit the lands on time. Proliferating is also pretty good with walkers, and using Chandra's -2 ability on a Gambit is a very good feeling.
As for the sideboard, it's what you would expect for the usual red and black cards. Bloodline Keeper is for creature decks so you have slightly more threats and so you can have one card take over the game, much like Emeria Angel used to do. Deathmark is good against W/u Humans and G/W Aggro decks. It kills Hero of Bladehold and Birds of Paradise with no bias as to who is on the receiving end. Nihil Spellbomb is for those decks that just love the graveyard. Whether the deck be a Moorland Haunt deck or just a deck with some flashback spells (Forbidden Alchemy, Think Twice, Snapcaster Mage + a spell), it removes the graveyard all the same.
Olivia is for the creature decks. It's not maindeck because you don't really want a four-mana blank in some matchups, especially against control decks, which are already tough enough as it is. Crusader is very good against Mono Red, requiring a Shrine of Burning Rage to answer effectively. It's also fairly safe to assume they won't be boarding in Dismember, since the only creatures involved in game one should be Germ tokens or lumbering 6/6s. Wurmcoil Engine in the board functions as another big dude to bring in as well as having the crucial ability of “lifelink.” Finally, Ratchet Bomb serves as a catch-all. It's very good against Illusions, clearing tokens, Insectile Aberrations, or even cards higher up on the curve like Phantasmal Bears (yes, a whopping one mana is higher up on the curve). It can also be brought in against control decks to deal with planeswalkers and Oblivion Rings.
How it Ends
So there you have it, my deck choices for trying to squeeze out QPs in every event. The MOCS is a very big deal to players like myself who choose to almost exclusively play on Magic Online. Granted, I have yet to top eight a MOCS, but just competing and recognizing the various names in the same tournament such as Reid Duke and Bing Luke is just incredible. If you play Magic Online, I'd highly recommend taking the MOCS seriously and treating it as you would a very large tournament. It's always a blast to play in, and I'm really looking forward to this year of MOCS.
krazykirby4 on MODO
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krazykirby AT gmail DOT com
