Grand Prix: Detroit is coming home July 11th - 13th 2003 at the Renaissance Center in Downtown Detroit, and it's about time that the Grand Prix comes back to Southeastern Michigan.
Oh, wait; this is the Magic Grand Prix, not the car race. Either way, I'm glad I can take the city bus down Woodward Ave. to get there. I'll be the only loony on the bus with a briefcase full of Magic cards handcuffed to my wrist, but I'll get there.
That is, if my wife lets me go.
Regardless, I've never been to a tournament of any type; I seem to miss out on prereleases, and Friday Night Magic games end up with me showing up late. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to play, it's just that other things going on in my life right now prevent me from ever allowing myself to attend these solemn events.
That, and my wife won't let me go.
So when I heard from Professional Events that there was going to be an Onslaught Block Grand Prix at the Ren-Cen (us Detroiters abbreviate everything around here; it must be all of the car exhaust), I told my wife that this is one thing that I would really like to attend. Well, that and since I work for General Motors, it means I can get free parking now that the Ren-Cen is owned by GM. To all of the non-locals coming to the Murder Capital of the US, Park at the Greektown Casino and take the People Mower (mover) to the Ren-Cen. It's really cheap and you get to see some of the nicer parts of the ghetto. You can even see the new Ford Field where the Detroit Lions get beat every weekend - and once the Tournament is over, you can blow the rest of your money shooting craps at the casino.
So instead of spending money on real cards and feeling the wrath day after day from Satan's female counterpart, I downloaded Apprentice and Magic Workstation. I used Apprentice in the past, possibly two or three years ago when it was still in its infancy - but it didn't look like it was updated since I used it two or three years ago. Magic Workstation, on the other hand, is an amazing system that actually functions as if you really have four of every card ever made, and finding an opponent was so much easier than installing mIRC and crawling through the ghetto of the internet to find a game just to find out that since I'm behind a router and a firewall, that I couldn't play with this kid still on his parent's AOL account anyway.
So I cheated. I admit it, now that it's done with and I have the cards stored away in alphabetical order with the rest of my cards - I looked at the net and downloaded some deck lists for some Onslaught Block decks. Never before have I succumbed to the tendrils of knowledge that Magic has brought upon my very eyes. Now I know the evil - and to make the matter worse, I think I like it. One problem, though. I don't want to play card-for-card what my opponent plays. So I had to throw in my own flavor of cards if nothing else for just . . . um . . . flavor.
Quickly looking at the tiny amount of Onslaught Block tournament reports, I realized that as of yet, no one has unleashed the Scourge power in the Onslaught decks yet. This is something that may give me an edge over everyone else. Then I came back down from reality and realized that by the time the Grand Prix hits Detroit, there will already be Tier One decks online, and the losers who just download deck lists and make a deck before the tournament starts will be in abundance. To make matters worse, and my headache, I made a list of possible deck ideas and if they've even possible.
Here's my original list:
- MBC
- Elves
- Goblins
- Soldiers
- Beasts
- Wizards
- Dragons
- Zombies
- Control
- Clerics
- Birdies
- Aggro
- Astral-(slide, glide, lube, lux, whatever you want to call it)
- and White Weenie.
After looking at the possible cards that are available, and realizing that some of these could be combined given that most of the cards are dual-purpose now, I made a second list:
- MBC-Zombies
- Elves
- Aggro-Goblins
- White Weenie
- Clerics
- Astral-whatever
- Beasts
- Dragons
- and Control Wizards.
Birds just didn't have enough support from other spells aside from other birds, MBC and Zombies went hand-in-hand, Aggro and Goblins were literally made for each other, and the Control and Wizards seemed to be working out of the same book anyway. White Weenie looked to be a pretty stable deck, but I really don't feel like shelling out $200 to pick up the Exalted Angels, the Fetchlands, Akroma, Angel of Wrath, and then Jareth. I wanted to make at least four decks that I could playtest against my friends who were doing similar things, so that we could all come up with one deck each that felt would be a decent contender in the Grand Prix.
My choices ended up being Zombies, Elves, Goblins, and Clerics. Zombies have a good all-around feel, but my worry is that the Astral decks and the Aggro decks that they would just maul them over since black has little to no pro-red main decked. Elves have a really strong power base depending on the type of build that was used, but it's mainly creatures with few supporting spells that could prevent creature removal, which is the serious downfall of any creature-based deck. Elves just happen to be one that relies faithfully on its creatures. Goblins would be a decent choice, but the White Weenie and Astral decks with all the pro-red would prevent any real chance of a threat occurring, while Clerics were more along the lines of a"all in wonder" type deck, but with no serious threat other then a Scion of Darkness showing up once in a while.
So out of those four choices, I took the card lists that I downloaded and threw them into Magic Workstation and started to play against other people. I wanted to change some of the cards around before I did any real-life testing, since there were some cards that I really had no idea on why they were in the type of deck they were in. I ended up choosing Elves as my main deck and Clerics as the secondary deck in case I came across too many metagame problems. The main idea I want in a deck - especially one that I plan on playing in a serious tournament - is that the deck has to be able to prove itself against any strange rogue deck that would pop up. This way, since I have two decks to test out, if one fails miserably where the other one succeeds, I can adjust each one to make it more proficient where it once lacked.
So without further ado, here's the Elf deck that is currently being tested:
"Elves of Deep Trouble"
1x Fierce Empath
3x Caller of the Claw
3x Gempalm Strider
1x Silvos, Rogue Elemental
2x Wirewood Channeler
3x Wirewood Hivemaster
3x Wirewood Herald
2x Wirewood Pride
3x Wirewood Symbiote
4x Elvish Warrior
3x Taunting Elf
3x Timberwatch Elf
2x Birchlore Rangers
3x Elvish Guidance
2x Alpha Status
3x Wirewood Lodge
19x Forest
Sideboard:
1x Caller of the Claw
3x Wellwisher
3x Stabilizer
3x Pacifism
3x Slate of Ancestry
2x Naturalize
(Note: I don't think this is nearly an optimum build - that many 2s and 3s worry me - but on the other hand, as rough as it may look he is at least testing it, and it's the first post-Scourge attempt I've seen at elfage - The Ferrett)
It's pretty obvious what this deck is meant to do: Completely overpower with small creatures that get boosted by the enchantments from the other creatures and the Wirewood Prides. I also threw two of the Alpha Status' in, but one hasn't actually come up in a game yet, but it's just more of a good thing. Here's how the deck faces against what I consider the top five Tier One decks that you'll be seeing at any Onslaught Block Constructed tournament.
In case you don't know, the top five decks which I consider the top tier are White Weenie, Astro-Glide, Goblins, Veggies and Beasts. I main reason I don't consider elves, clerics, wizards, soldiers and birds top decks are because there aren't many that I've seen that have played and performed consistently, and there just aren't enough good ones out there to come up with a standardized build. Anyway, here's how the Elf deck fared:
Elves vs. Goblins
This is a surprisingly tough matchup, depending on the build of the Goblin deck you're playing against, also, depending on your initial draw. With this elf build, if you don't draw three lands and three or four elves the first turn, mulligan. No matter what else you get, it's easier to take one less card and end up with an even number in your hand than it is to fight to topdeck the land you desperately need, or elves that would win you the game - or more importantly, prevent you from losing.
Playing against goblins has proven to be tricky, especially if the goblin build has Starstorm. I've played against a few different builds that sideboard Starstorm, but the ones where they've got it maindecked are going to be hell on any elf deck. The easiest way out of this is to use the Caller of the Claw; since many of his creatures will be leaving play too, you'll be getting oodles of little nasty tokens with big pointy teeth long before your untap phase even begins. Once this happens, the game is yours.
The only other real threat against this deck is the abundant amount of flying creatures. You come to realize real quickly that Dragons don't like Elves. Form of the Dragon is pretty much game over unless you put Naturalize from the sideboard in. Let him get down to five life, then lose the Form of the Dragon, and come through with the whole forest.
The trick behind this deck is obviously speed: The quicker you can get small elves out and use either other elves with the +x/+x abilities where each X is the number of elves in play, or you use the enchantments with the same provisions, you can win. Once large nasty creatures start hitting the table and you're playing a"Draw-Go" game, just scoop and sideboard what you know you need in. It's easier that way.
Sideboarding vs. Goblins:
+2 Naturalize
+3 Wellwishers (in case that hurt starts to...)
-2 Wirewood Channeler
-2 Birchlore Rangers
-1 Elvish Warrior
Elves vs. Beasts:
Another tricky matchup, but the weak point of Beasts is the only way you can get an advantage. The idea behind a Beasts deck is to bring out huge creatures and stomp the snot out of your opponent. Ravenous Baloth is always good for quick"you can't kill me yet" life gain while Avarax is a game winner it and of itself. A pumpable creature that lets you go get more of them? Sweet Jesus, with the amount of mana this deck is capable of obtaining, these two creatures alone are nasty.
But all of the Beasts deck have one downfall: Speed. Some beast deck builds (try saying that nine times) have elves cocked and loaded to kill them as they attempt to get mana out, since you need oodles of mana to shoot off damn near anything in Beasts; use that to your advantage. The only consistent non-creature spell I've run into is Shock, which can be deadly depending on what it's aimed at, but it shouldn't be much of an issue. Once those creatures come out, you're going to need close to a miracle to get a win in edgewise.
The only trick that I've used against beasts and succeeded is to attack with a Taunting Elf and some others, but leave a Wirewood Prided elf ready to strike as well. That way, all the untapped creatures have to block the Taunting Elf while your multi-pumpupable elf walks right through the playground unscathed.
Sideboarding vs. Beasts:
+3 Pacifism
-3 Elvish Warrior
Elves vs. White Weenie
Yet another tough fight, the main idea behind this is to overpower the Angels and the freely use any of the Caller of the Claw instants once beatdown starts happening. The only way to overpower this deck is by the sheer speed and using pumpups on your elves to get through. Akroma, Angel of Wrath has to block a Taunting Elf, while any of the others can walk freely through. (Unless they have Wing Shards, of course - The Ferrett)
Difficult, but not nearly as impossibly as Goblins.
Sideboarding vs. White Weenie
+3 Pacifism
+1 Caller of the Claw
+3 Wellwisher
+2 Naturalize
-2 Birchlore Rangers
-1 Wirewood Hivemaster
-1 Wirewood Herald
-1 Wirewood Symbiote
-1 Taunting Elf
-2 Elvish Warrior
Elves vs. Astral Slide
Two words: Naturalize and Stabilizer. As soon as you get overpowered in the first match and you find out this is an AstroGlide deck, just scoop, side in Naturalize and Stabilizer. Once you side these in, it's like playing against a thallid deck; by the time anything interesting happens, you're attacking for eighteen. Starstorm is the only real threat once you stabilize the board, but with Caller of the Claw in hand, the game is over, plain and simple.
Also remember that Gempalm Strider does pretty much jack once Stabilizer is out. I've been burned with it; I might as well pass the knowledge.
Sideboarding vs. Astro-<Insert innuendo here>
+2 Naturalize
+2 Stabilizer
+2 Pacifism
+1 Caller of the Claw
-2 Birchlore Rangers
-2 Taunting Elf
-3 Gempalm Strider
Elves vs. Veggies
In the nine games I played against an Explosive Vegetation deck, the only things I needed to side in were Naturalize and Slate of Ancestry just to get some card advantage. It's honestly a really good matchup; by the time it starts to work, even if you get a bad draw, you've completely overpowered anything they might even begin to fight with. This is another deck where you can use their"fast mana" elves to boost your elves up and come through with some sick numbers for damage.
The only worry is Akroma. She can't be stopped, so just let her hit you. She's hitting for six, you're hitting for sixteen. And if an Exalted Angel is part of this build (it's pretty much 50/50 with the decks I've seen), just side in some Pacifisms and you're in like Flynn!
Sideboarding vs. Veggies
+2 Naturalize
+3 Slate of Ancestry
+2 Pacifism (if needed)
-2 Elvish Warrior (if needed)
-3 Gempalm Strider
-2 Birchlore Rangers
Also, just as a side note, If you happen to come up against a mirror match against an elf deck, drop in those Slate of Ancestries and remember - he with the most elves wins.
So here's the ideas behind the elf deck and why it seems to work so well: This deck is quick on the offensive, and hits hard when it comes through. The only reason the Taunting Elves are even in here is to force all the creatures to block it while two or three huge, over-pumped elves come over the wall, aiming their bows straight for the jugular vein. This deck has actually held up against some pretty strong Type 1 decks as well.
So, testing of both my cleric and my elves will continue as planned and if you're going to be playing at the Detroit Grand Prix, hopefully I'll get to see some of you and possibly play some of you. And if we all lose, we'll go play craps at Greektown.
That is, if my wife lets me go.
Hic
hic@softhome.net
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