1.5 news flash. Extra! Extra! Read all about it. 1.5 players have stopped being bitter - and long before you realized it! We're not whining anymore. We're not crying anymore. We not complaining any more than any Magic player of any other format usually complains. Okay, so that's not saying much knowing the nature of Magic players (see New Card Look, Extended Rotation, Skullclamp, 6^th Edition Rules, and other note-worthy sky-is-falling episodes).

Well, we have stopped whining, but does everyone know this? Nearly two months after 9/1, Oscar Tan's mere mention of 1.5 motivates people to post in the SCG forums replies like this: "Until Type 1.5 players act maturely and respect themselves, they should expect to be treated like children." Wow. We have really been painted with a broad paintbrush. It's an old and stale paintbrush, too.

Also from the SCG forums "... I think the pessimism and the so-called 'negative energy' are generated by the fact..." BRRREEEEP! Your regularly scheduled program has been interrupted for this important news flash! There is no more negative energy! There is no more whining! Most 1.5 players are busy building new decks and trying to break the new format.

But yet we can't seem to shake the whiny reputation. Too many SCG forum members continue to whine about our supposed whining. And so many of those forum members have a severe misunderstanding of the old and new format. Here's one of my favorites: "The overwhelming majority of the decks have some critical flaw, from proclaiming Standstill as the new Ancestral to playing only Cognivore in Oath." Please. Cognivore in Oath?

Actually, let me start again. Please. Oath in 1.5? Now I'm going to come across as an arrogant jerk here, so you may want to skip the rest of this paragraph. Banning Oath in 1.5 was a favor to so many bad players. Now they no longer have to spend their precious time wondering why their super-duper Oath deck lost to Landstill, or Belcher, or Pox, or, well - just about anything. Oath was no good in 1.5 for probably the past two or three years. To even be close to viable, Oath had to play Funeral Pyre, Afterlife, or other such nonsense. Oath was bad. I told you that you should have skipped it; now I'm an arrogant jerk. [It's amusing that just when Aaron Forsythe finally (and somewhat accidentally) designs a card that makes Oath good in the old formats (Forbidden Orchard), Type 1.5 can no longer play it. Oh well. - Knut]

So since we know that 1.5 has stopped whining, can we all please stop whining about 1.5 whining? We have moved on, can you? Jeez, we either get to be completely obscure or a bunch of whiners. SCG forum posts like this from ESpark, "I ain't checked today, but whenever there's a 1.5 thread here, they tend to post a link to it, and then whine like... something that whines a whole lot" is obviously a cry for help. The boy needs some 1.5 edu-ma-cation, so for his benefit and anyone else's, here is my handy-dandy timeline of the new 1.5 (because you need it and I want to give it to you)! Notice how the whining has petered off.

• Late August, I submit an article detailing the best prizes for 1.5 tournaments. Frowny face at wasted time.
• 8/30, Rick Argiro posts an extensive primer for his 7/10 conversion. Double frowny face for more wasted time.
• 9/1, The new B&R. Shock, horror, dismay. Whining ensues. This general reaction from the most devoted 1.5 players lasts for approximately three days, but truly mars the 1.5 community's reputation. Please reread the three days part. We did get over it.
• 9/1, 9:43 AM, Rick posts a 1.5 Long deck that is capable of turn 1 wins. The deck never really pans out, but it really opens a lot of eyes as to how abusive the new mana can be.
• 9/1, 1:01 PM, Artowis posts a Belcher deck capable of winning on turn 1 and consistently winning on turn 2 or 3. Although likely not the best deck of the format, Belcher will remain a defining deck and force many others to pack 4 Null Rod in the board. Once again, we wonder how safe 16 free mana artifacts could be for any format.
• 9/1, early during the day, a few people realize that not only is ATS untouched by the bannings, it gets a whole lot better with Enlightened Tutor. See! Not everyone was whining; some were creating and modifying.
• 9/3, Forsythe posts his article explaining the changes. Many disagree with his reasoning.
• 9/3, Mods and Admins on The Source bow to popular opinion and change the site's URL to the much easier to find www.mtgthesource.com. It's been easy to find for almost two months, Oscar. Give it another chance.
• 9/3, TMD creates a 1.5 forum. Minor tech becomes fractured and some members stumble over redundant posts. See the Super-Gro threads on MTS and TMD. In my opinion, the forum has yet to live up to the quality expected from TMD. Not whining, just observing and stating.
• 9/4, a flurry of activity nearly overwhelms Mods and Admins with good, bad, and ugly posts on MTS. Most of those posts contain little to no whining. See, the whining is diminishing.
• 9/9, ridiculous Smith article on SCG. I hate myself for even acknowledging it, as it is simply the darkest blemish on the face of the little 1.5 community. Oh, and it is mostly and foolishly wrong about too many things. Flaming, not whining.
• 9/10, 40.8% of the people who answered Forsythe's poll about 1.5 "don't care" about the change. Ouch. Nothing hurts more than apathy.
• 9/12, SCG revisits the Smith blemish in its forums. JP Meyer proclaims "Type 1.5 is the new Type 1." I'm not sure what that means, but it sure is catchy. It sounds important too.
• 9/20, some of the first "new" 1.5 tourneys are played. The sky is in fact not falling. Very little whining reported.
• 9/24, I slop together a Survival Control deck (SuCo) for my Friday night tourney.
• 10/8, I retire SuCo as I realize that it would be a lot better if rounds were about one hour longer than usual. I do so with very little whining.
• 10/22, Forsythe still has no name for 1.5. Ok, ok, so I may be whining a little here.

Since we have solved the whining issue, we next get to look at the new format itself. I've devised a theory that has helped me accept the new format. Looking at these changes, one should realize that it is Wizards's job to make the formats as playable as possible. And boy, is it a big job! A big, hard job. All right, maybe it is not as big and as hard of job as I'm making it out to be, but I'm sure it wasn't easy. Examine what they had to remove - three of the more expensive cards of the format. By doing so, they knew that they would kill two of the top decks and at least weaken one. They also had to realize that so much fast mana would make Belcher a viable deck type. Now this big, hard job is motivated by money and there is nothing wrong with that. The more accessible and playable a format is, the more players will play it. The more players in a format, the more money Wizards makes. Unfortunately when Wizards tried to carefully do their big, hard job, they eviscerated the old format to create a more playable, user-friendly format. I like the new format so far, but hated having to say goodbye to the old. See, whining done; new format accepted.

Instead of whining, I'll reserve judgment on most of the bannings, as most were reasonable. But I do have a few comments for three of the more questionable cards. First, Oath of Druids. The only reason that I can see for maybe banning Oath was a preemptive strike. Would Forbidden Orchard make Oath into too much of a monster? Not likely, but at least this is a reasonable theory. Land Tax? A card that I can play around by simply having as many lands as my opponent? Plus, now my opponent must play White and mostly basic lands. Ah, true brokenness. Good thing that it is gone. Hermit Druid? I'm sorry, what does that card do again? Oh yeah, it dies in a format with Lightning Bolt, Swords to Plowshares, Force of Will, Tormod's Crypt, and Mogg Fanatic. In many ways, Hermit Druid was already banned - banned for sucking! Don't mistake sarcasm for whining.

On a more serious note, the B&R change may have an odd peripheral effect on 1.5. Over the summer, 1.5 tourney organizers were structuring large successful tournaments. What was the incentive for those tournaments? The 1.5 power cards and more specifically Mana Drains. Expensive cards motivate players to attend tourneys. Well, now what does 1.5 have to offer as major prize incentive? Dual lands? I think that there exists a major discrepancy between the motivational power of dual lands and Mana Drains. Would you not agree? In an effort to support 1.5 and promote the format, Wizards may have inadvertently taken away the best tournament motivators. (Notice how I am analyzing and theorizing - not to be confused with whining). Of course all of this may not matter if Wizards decides to somehow formally support the new format. I have high hopes for that.

And now the part that you have been waiting for. What should you be playing or testing? The short answer: something with Psychatog, Survival of the Fittest, Fact or Fiction, Goblin Welder, or Goblin Lackey. The long answer: Abuse the most broken cards.

Survival has received the most attention lately, especially since you can now find it with Enlightened Tutor. Remove three utility creatures and two Forest and then add three Tutors and two Savannah. Boom, got it. Here's Caulyn our resident ATS expert's current list:

ATS
//Mana

4 Windswept Heath
2 Wooded Foothills
4 Tropical Island
1 Taiga
2 Savannah
5 Forest
4 Birds of Paradise
3 Wall of Roots
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary

//Search
4 Survival of the Fittest
3 Enlightened Tutor
4 Brainstorm

//Protection
4 Force of Will
2 Stifle
1 Mystic Snake

2 Eternal Witness

//Utility
1 Anger
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Genesis

//Control
4 Tradewind Rider
2 Quirion Ranger
1 Seedborn Muse
1 Gilded Drake
1 Masticore
1 Spore Frog
1 Kami of Ancient Law
1 Uktabi Orangutan

Another contender for the best Survival deck is Quicksilver's R/G Survival Advantage. This deck has a long history and is a revision of Rian Litchard's revision of John Lacasse's R/G Lacasse Stompy deck that placed second in the first massive 1.5 tournament nearly a year ago. The newest version hardly notices the loss of Skullclamp. It continually drops fat threats like Ravenous Baloths or Shivan Wurms while gaining significant card advantage through either Yavimaya Elders, Genesis, Eternal Witness, or Survival or, better yet, all of the above! It also loves to two-for-one the opponent with Flametongue Kavu and remove multiple weenies with Goblin Sharpshooter. Unfortunately it has a weak game against Belcher and hopes to win games two and three by dropping the Rod. Here's one version, although the one that I was testing includes 4 Elvish Spirit Guides to speed things up.

Survival Advantage
//Mana
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Llanowar Elves
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
11 Forest
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Taiga
2 Mountain

//Search with the Usual Suspects
4 Survival of the Fittest
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Anger
1 Genesis

//Beats and Two-for-One-"ers"
3 Sword of Fire and Ice
4 Yavimaya Elder
2 Goblin Sharpshooter
3 Eternal Witness
4 Flametounge Kavu
4 Ravenous Baloth
1 Deranged Hermit
1 Shivan Wurm
1 Viridian Zealot

Last in the Survival pool is Welder Survival. Out of the Survival decks, it is currently receiving the least amount of attention. I believe that that is because of the inherent flaw in the deck that it relies on two cards instead of just one. The first two Survival decks only need to successfully resolve Survival to pretty much take over a game. Neither one needs to resolve the Green search engine to win though. ATS can cast a turn 3 Tradewind Rider and Advantage can simply cast fat threat after fat threat. Welder Survival has to resolve a Survival, resolve an angry Welder, have an artifact in play, and have a Weld-worthy target in the yard. With all that said and done, a turn 2 or 3 Sundering Titan or Phyrexian Colossus is nothing to scoff at.

Next - Belcher! Let's face it. The deck can simply steal games. It's stupid, it's broken, but it's inconsistent and easy to hate. Still, that turn 1 win is so tempting and the deck can goldfish so many opponents on turn 2 or 3. No generally accepted optimal version exists yet, but the deck is easy to make. Add some sort of mixture of twelve free mana artifacts (please don't ask why Mox Diamond is no good in this deck); Land Grants; one or two lands; Elvish Spirit Guides; some combination of Dark Rituals, Cabal Rituals, Red Rituals; and suicidal tutors like Plunge into Darkness, Spoils of the Vault, or Gamble. Choose your counter disruption from the options of Goblin Welder, Duress, Cabal Therapy, or Xantid Swarm. By the way, don't forget to add the deck's namesake.

Also, a Burning Wish variant of Tog has been performing well for Alex Artese and myself, but, as is expected for a new format with such a large card pool, an optimal list has yet to be found. Many 1.5ers bash the deck, but I can't argue when Nightscape Familiar makes great cards like Fire / Ice, FTK, and Fact or Fiction even more broken! Plus, Wishing for a cheap Upheaval hurts so good. Come on baby, make it feel like it should... Sorry. A little John Cougar Mellencamp for all you fans. Singing, not whining.

Last, a few decks actually didn't lose much at all with the B&R change. Goblin Sligh is pretty powerful now, and may be the only true aggro deck in the format right now. If you don't shut it down by turn 4, good luck living. Syracuse is still playing Landstill and claiming to have good results. Personally, I would miss Draining into Disk and sexy Angel tokens much too much to play a neutered Landstill. And finally, Neil Jenkins and Pat (GodzillA) are separately working on Stax variants. I've tested against both decks and have to say that I loathe playing against either one. They invoke memories of playing losing games against wMUD in the old format. Ugh, the slow and painful lockout is now aided by free mana instead of Mishra's Workshop. Thanks Wizards! Okay, so that was a little whining.

So in conclusion, 1.5 has stopped whining, Wizards does a big hard job, Oath, Land Tax, and Hermit Druid are probably not broken, I don't know what to offer for big tournament prizes, and you should be playing something with Survival, Fact or Fiction, or lots of free mana. Any questions?

Matt Pietarinen
Administrator on www.mtgthesource.com
Pietarinen@hotmail.com