Not that it affected Classic players, where Illusionary Mask was always playable and unrestricted, but as of June 18th, Illusionary Mask became unrestricted in Vintage. This has Vintage players worldwide eagerly pulling out their Phyrexian Dreadnoughts, but meanwhile, casual players like myself are putting Illusionary Mask to other uses. Today's column is all about how you can maximize it in your own casual decks.
Without using Phyrexian Dreadnought.
1. Skipping harmful EtB costs
Like the Phyrexian Dreadnought example illustrates, Illusionary Mask lets you skip unwanted EtB penalties. (If you don't understand the rules behind this: when your creature does enter the battlefield, it has no rules text and so nothing bad happens. And when your Mask eventually flips the creature over, it has rules text, but it's not "entering the battlefield," so nothing bad happens.)
Here are some of the especially powerful creatures with especially harmful EtB costs. They're sorted by CC, with my favorites in bold.
1CC
2CC
3CC
4CC
5CC
6CC
7CC
Among the above, there are more than enough respectable choices from each color. You can make the mono color deck of your choice, or whatever combination of colors suits you.
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* Based on the way a Masked creatures unflips, haste will rarely matter unless you jump through some hoops.
2. Morph!
Yeah, as of a few oracle updates ago, face-down Mask creatures function as 2/2 morphed guys, not 0/1 mystery guys. That means... they have synergy with morph cards! Consider the following:
Deals on unmorphing
- Fathom Seer - Unflipping it to Illusionary Mask gives you the same stuff as unmorphing him, but for one less mana and without returning any lands.
- Skinthinner - Same concept here. For only two mana you're killing a creature, instead of the 6BB it normally costs. Finally, he can see some non-draft play! (And for all of you saying "why not just cast Terror for two mana" — then you don't get a free 2/1 with the deal.)
- Voidmage Apprentice - It can be hard to unmask him exactly when you need to, but if you can, you're saving a lot of mana (1U instead of 5UU).
- Thelonite Hermit - Unflipping him is risky, since it usually involves attacking, and he has a fragile body, but the payoff can be worth the risk. We're talking about 9 points each of power and toughness if he survives. For only 3G instead of 6GG.
Morph lords
- Aphetto Runecaster - You might be drawing a lot, if your deck is concentrated enough.
- Aven Farseer - Underwhelming, I guess, but funny. For the first time, he can give himself a counter!
- Ixidron - He may not become huge, but he'll at least be the biggest creature on the battlefield. In addition to shutting down your opponents' guys. And getting you some duplicate Fathom Seer triggers.
3. Getting the Mask
You can craft your deck to function well without the Mask. Or you can go the easier, less stable, but probably more fun route of making your deck rely completely on having a Mask! Here are some tips if you do:
- Fabricate - I wish Mask was cheap enough to work with Trinket Mage. But since it isn't, Fabricate is still a perfectly viable option.
- Enlightened Tutor - High-tix, but powerful.
- Diabolic Tutor - We're getting a little expensive now, since the whole point of MOST Mask decks is to get guys on the cheap, but it's certainly worth considering in some decks.
- Maralen avatar - Yessssssss.
- Muddle the Mixture - There's also Dimir Infiltrator and Shred Memory, but I'm guessing Muddle the Mixture is more relevant for the average Mask deck.
- Lots of library manipulation - Cantrips, scry, Sensei's Divining Top, shuffle effects....
- Red's bizarre tutors - Gamble and Orcish Librarian aren't as reliable as many of the above, but if you're running mono-red, they might be necessary!
4. Decklist Time
To decide what colors to run, let's examine carefully what each color is offering from across the above lists.
Black:
- many of the most efficient cards (most notably Hunted Horror)
- utility, with Skinthinner
Red:
- big trample creatures
- big fliers
Green:
- a bunch of big doofy creatures with no evasion
- the only 1cc creatures (although who cares, when the Mask itself isn't out on the first turn?)
- regeneration, with Hunted Troll
White:
Blue:
Based on that, I'm liking blue by far the most. I also like the way white complements it, with its mana curve and skillset, so let's make those our colors. (As said above, though, this is far from the only combination afforded by the Mask.)
The list I ended up with tops out its curve at only 4 mana, yet still supplies some tremendous beats. It fills out the rest of the deck with search, removal, and stall. Here's the list, which I encourage you to tinker with as you see fit:
5. Bonus Deck (Vanguard)
Of the two, this deck is a lot more brutal.
I already mentioned how helpful the Maralen avatar can be towards tutoring up specific cards. Since Illusionary Mask-centered decks really want to get a Mask out on Turn Two every time, this is the perfect avatar for us.
Here's our plan:
- Turn 0: Pay 7 or 8 life to the avatar. (We really, really, need to guarantee getting our stuff early and in the right order.)
- Turn 1: Cast either Death's Shadow*, Duress, or Dark Ritual.
- Turn 2: Tap out for Illusionary Mask. (Some games, you can even get a Turn 2 Ritual into both a Mask and Hunted Horror!)
- Turns 3+: Drop gigantic creatures with no penalty, backed up by various cheap disruption.
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*Death's Shadow isn't synergistic with our Illusionary Mask, obviously, but he's strong enough with this avatar to run anyway (a fact I pointed out in an earlier article of mine). Remember, we're starting the game at 10 life. At the most.
Most of the decklist is described above. The rest includes a few toolbox-style situational 1-ofs, supported by our avatar's tutoring ability. In some games, Planar Void will be invaluable. In the games that it's not, we'll just choose not to draw it. Here's the list:
If I haven't convinced you to use Illusionary Mask yet... come on, they're only one ticket each! That's less than a single percent of what the IRL version costs!
3 Comments
Very nice. Keep writing these. There are a ton of cards out there that people have forgotten about. I miss those old articles.
Also worth mention that the mask works incredibly well with other "enters the battlefield" effects, such as Fading, and Vanishing. This opens up Blastoderm, as well as Keldon Marauders, Calciderm, Ravaging Riftwurm, and Waning Wurm, as great, cost effective smashies as well.
Oh, and Deadly Grub is fun too. I have that in one of my mask decks.
I also like Kjeldoran Dead too. 3/1 regenerate for one black is a good start.