If you really want to be mean with Ertai, the Corrupted then use him with Arcane Laboratory and Rule of Law. Bitterblossom, Nuisance Engine, Sacred Mesa and Puppet Conjurer will suplly him with sacrificial fodder and nobody can play a spell at all. Don't forget to add cards to untap him as well; Pemmin's Aura is a great card for that purpose for example (which also gives Ertai shroud and which can be fetched easily with transmute cards or Enlightened Tutor).
Not sure how casual a such deck would be though...
I've got a Lovisa deck in the folder waiting to be played (when I'm finished with Mass Effect 2, and maybe the Witcher 2 as well).
I've run into some pretty nasty Ertai the Corrupted decks.
Good first part of the article. The descriptions of the caw lists was nice. I would of liked to seen some test data regarding your Valakut list. It's one thing to say this will be good, it's another to go and prove it.
Thanks Rachel,
Yes, you were missed at the last event. My next article should be covering the tournament you played in. I though Dumb Blund was definitely a nice deck choice. Sure, it's capable of going further in the tournament.
Those are two interesting combos, the combination of Vedalken Mastermind with Reality Acid is definitely a nice one if you can get it going. However, it is a little vulnerable to being disrupted. Still might be worth a try though.
Gotta say, after watching you play the deck, it seems even less casual.
Turn 1: Sol Ring
2: Sculpting Steel --> Sol Ring
3: Future Sight
4: Tezz AND Jace, the Mindsculptor
Or something like that. Of course, the obvious rebuttal is that was, as you called it, a "god hand", but I still think with starts like that, you're not going to sway many people that you're rolling with a "casual" mono-blue build. If anything, starts like that only serve to substantiate people's fears and loathing. ;P~
No idea, but I'd expect pretty soon. Someone just has to find the time to pound out the code. In the past, sometimes that happens really early, sometimes not. Depends on how busy everyone is.
You can always put in the links manually - but that takes time and effort. I did a few, but not all. I've been busy, too.
Thank you Olaw for this wonderful article. I wish I wasn't always sleeping in on Sundays for the event. The one I've played so far I tried my Dumb Blund (Blue Jund) deck with Sedraxis Spectre splashed in with all the other strong Jund cards that are legal now (Putrid Leech, Blightning, Murderous Redcap). I only managed 7th-8th with that one where control decks beat me up a little. I'd still like to try my hatching plans/abjure/vedalken mastermind/reality acid combo deck but it seems a little clunky for the speed of the format.
Great article and commentry on the vids, ive got the decklist ready to go. But my local shop allows "peasant" which includes four uncommons. I would love to know what four you guys and Copperfield would exchange for uncommons.
i was thinking of Condemn, Pestermite, Arc Trail, Glimmerpoint Stag or the likes of Cunning Sparkmage could all be amazing threats...
Thanks for the comments. Hinder and Mana drain could come out for a Desertion (or Spelljack) and Draining Whelk, I always forget the Whelk until someone's beating my face in with it. Cryptic most often does duty as an instant Sleep. Does de-power the deck somewhat but if I just wanted to win I wouldn't be piloting anything remotely like this.
With the counters I really wanted to pare them down to just a handful and my approach was to make that handful best of breed (in my opinion). I'm not giving up my FoW and Pact of Negation, though. There are too many players in the format that do nothing but wait until they can launch their "I win" combo.
Nice article. The deck seems a little Spikey with some of the hard counter choices. I mean, they are basically good-stuff counters that you would play in a tier one Classic deck. For more "fun" and casual counters I would suggest Draining Whelk and Overwhelming Intellect. Maybe even Desertion. I like those, and Commander in general, because they're big, splashy and wholly unplayable in competitive formats. =D
too bad, really enjoy triple anyset, so mmm has been fun , lots of powerful rares and some money. it will be interesting to see the cream rise after people open only one pack at a time
I enjoyed the 3MBS drafts, I only did a handful but got some packs back through forcing UB. As you noted, Vedalken Anatomist is the mutt's nuts; took as many Serum Rakers and Phrexian Ragers as I could find; Dross Rippers, Geyser and Oculus going late. Vivsection very good with those cards and Myr Sires were good for clogging up the ground. Piston Sledge puts your opponent on a very short clock.
I couldn't agree more with RoninX. He is spot on regarding tempo and advantage.
Fast aggro decks are very hard to build in this format because of lack of aggressive 2 drops. Which is why infect isn't as strong as SSS drafts because of no ichorclaw and plague stinger.
You want to rake in advantage generating commons in your 2 to 3 drops (oculus, emissary, rager, sire, wellspring), get to 6 mana quickly, play dinosours and bombs and then push them through with either bounce or heavy equipment.
Personaly I almost exclusively draft blue with lots of artifacts(wellspring, slasher, hexplate). You can usualy pick up anatomist or mind control if you do which are better than most rare bombs. Quicksilver Geyser wins game the most though, bouncing opponents 6 drops and attack with my 6 drops is usualy good enough for lethal. My game count was 50-5 so it seemed to work well, god I'll miss MMM.
The culling dias would be good to get some more mileage out of my utility creatures. There are sufficient lands that I don't really need Ponder or Brainstorm as "mulligan stoppers" so I'll swing in the Dias and see how it plays.
Have enjoyed our games, also :)
I find the play-by-play in other articles difficult to follow without a plethora of screen-shots. I'll do a commented highlights video (three-four mins of key plays a game) for my next article and, if it's well received, do one for this deck aswell.
I've been playing this deck for a few days and can attest to its fun/competitiveness. I like the “reach” that the Galvanic Blasts and Necrogen Censors give it in the endgame. I like how it’s relatively easy to figure out what the optimum play is – I think it’s been good practice for me in that special mana-maximizing that aggro players excel at. I need all the help I can get.
And my experience with the deck leads me to second the advice given in one of the videos: trade your Squadron Hawks for theirs. Anything else and you find yourself behind in card advantage/board power races.
The Necrogen Censors are a touch expensive for Classic Pauper, but I wonder if there couldn’t be a fun casual deck that exploits them?
Triple MBS is the first format that I was actually able to "go infinite" in and via 4322 queues at that. I started with 6 packs, paid all my entry fees and packs with winnings or sales of pulls/won packs, ended with 10 packs after ~20 drafts. I locked in pretty early on that the format revolved around two drop and 6 drops with the two drops really bridging the way to the 6 drops (Viridian Emissary is nuts in triple MBS). Other than than I really just focused on having a solid curve - in this case meant almost an inverse of a normal format (which tend to have lots of 4s) I tried to have something like 5 4 3 4 5 for ccs 2-6, though this obviously was just a skeleton. Card advantage and tempo advantage were at a premium in this format and morbid plunders and geysers were always going too late.
Now admittedly I ran pretty well - but I only got two mythics in ~20 drafts (Glissa and Sphinx) so its not like I was ripping like LSV. In addition to overvaluing two drops and six drops I only drafted white once (the only time I didn't win packs). Yes, you can get a great white aggro deck but they crumble to green decks.
You can find that Balance deck in Part I. It was one of the best decks I played against during the whole season. It was a deck that costs even less than $5,00 to build but it managed to reach to Top-4 that week winning against a lot of very expensive decks (including mine). So yes, it was very nice.
I will surely play in Season Four but maybe not as often as I did in the previous season. I already have three decks ready so far for the next season and many more are being brewed (as always).
Awsome articles Mr. Erman! I read all the parts from 1-3 and they were all a great read. I'd like to congragulate you on your season 3 finale win!
I have since added a jitte to the meloku deck as wel. It was pulling most of my wins out for me. I think the reason I only had one was because when I orginally made the deck I thought time of need could find it too.
I'd like to revisit the Garmageddon deck as well, but it needs to be diversified. It is to linear as it is now. I want to add green to it but I just haven't gotten around to it. I also saw another gargadon, balance deck in one of your aticles, so I'll try to take some tricks from it as well.
Season 4 is on and we will be trying out a new host as school has killed my time. Be sure to come and check it out, 12:30 pm EST in "/join BYOS". It's daylight savings time this week so we will be 1 hour earlier.
Precisely so. My first three events were 3-1, 4-0, 3-1. Even at the terrible 3 tix buy price that MBS packs were going for during the release (they've rebounded to about 3.2 now), a 3-1 gets enough tix for another event. It helped significantly that my 4-0 also included a Tezzeret, which was another 30 tix or so.
Release event sealed swiss have quite strong payouts, so it's pretty easy to chain events together, and it helps that even some of the more mediocre rares are still worth selling. It's worth noting that aside from a Blue Sun's Zenith which I kept for a commander deck, I sold every rare and mythic (and most of the uncommons) that I got from the events I played. If you prefer to hold onto your cards for deckbuilding, it becomes a bit more challenging to stay on the sealed gravy train.
If you really want to be mean with Ertai, the Corrupted then use him with Arcane Laboratory and Rule of Law. Bitterblossom, Nuisance Engine, Sacred Mesa and Puppet Conjurer will suplly him with sacrificial fodder and nobody can play a spell at all. Don't forget to add cards to untap him as well; Pemmin's Aura is a great card for that purpose for example (which also gives Ertai shroud and which can be fetched easily with transmute cards or Enlightened Tutor).
Not sure how casual a such deck would be though...
LE
I've got a Lovisa deck in the folder waiting to be played (when I'm finished with Mass Effect 2, and maybe the Witcher 2 as well).
I've run into some pretty nasty Ertai the Corrupted decks.
SilverBlack is a great name for the format. It defines and clarifies what the format is about in one simple word. Kudos to whoever came up with it!
I want to play this format
Good first part of the article. The descriptions of the caw lists was nice. I would of liked to seen some test data regarding your Valakut list. It's one thing to say this will be good, it's another to go and prove it.
Overall a decent read, thanks for writing!
Brainstorm is not in fact the best blue card ever printed. It is the best blue card ever printed that is legal in Legacy.
Looking forward to more articles. Nicely done! Any chance we can get your Halfdane list? Cheers!
Thanks Rachel,
Yes, you were missed at the last event. My next article should be covering the tournament you played in. I though Dumb Blund was definitely a nice deck choice. Sure, it's capable of going further in the tournament.
Those are two interesting combos, the combination of Vedalken Mastermind with Reality Acid is definitely a nice one if you can get it going. However, it is a little vulnerable to being disrupted. Still might be worth a try though.
Gotta say, after watching you play the deck, it seems even less casual.
Turn 1: Sol Ring
2: Sculpting Steel --> Sol Ring
3: Future Sight
4: Tezz AND Jace, the Mindsculptor
Or something like that. Of course, the obvious rebuttal is that was, as you called it, a "god hand", but I still think with starts like that, you're not going to sway many people that you're rolling with a "casual" mono-blue build. If anything, starts like that only serve to substantiate people's fears and loathing. ;P~
No idea, but I'd expect pretty soon. Someone just has to find the time to pound out the code. In the past, sometimes that happens really early, sometimes not. Depends on how busy everyone is.
You can always put in the links manually - but that takes time and effort. I did a few, but not all. I've been busy, too.
Thank you Olaw for this wonderful article. I wish I wasn't always sleeping in on Sundays for the event. The one I've played so far I tried my Dumb Blund (Blue Jund) deck with Sedraxis Spectre splashed in with all the other strong Jund cards that are legal now (Putrid Leech, Blightning, Murderous Redcap). I only managed 7th-8th with that one where control decks beat me up a little. I'd still like to try my hatching plans/abjure/vedalken mastermind/reality acid combo deck but it seems a little clunky for the speed of the format.
So how long is it before PureMTGO are going to get MBS card-links?
Great article and commentry on the vids, ive got the decklist ready to go. But my local shop allows "peasant" which includes four uncommons. I would love to know what four you guys and Copperfield would exchange for uncommons.
i was thinking of Condemn, Pestermite, Arc Trail, Glimmerpoint Stag or the likes of Cunning Sparkmage could all be amazing threats...
Thanks for the comments. Hinder and Mana drain could come out for a Desertion (or Spelljack) and Draining Whelk, I always forget the Whelk until someone's beating my face in with it. Cryptic most often does duty as an instant Sleep. Does de-power the deck somewhat but if I just wanted to win I wouldn't be piloting anything remotely like this.
With the counters I really wanted to pare them down to just a handful and my approach was to make that handful best of breed (in my opinion). I'm not giving up my FoW and Pact of Negation, though. There are too many players in the format that do nothing but wait until they can launch their "I win" combo.
Nice article. The deck seems a little Spikey with some of the hard counter choices. I mean, they are basically good-stuff counters that you would play in a tier one Classic deck. For more "fun" and casual counters I would suggest Draining Whelk and Overwhelming Intellect. Maybe even Desertion. I like those, and Commander in general, because they're big, splashy and wholly unplayable in competitive formats. =D
too bad, really enjoy triple anyset, so mmm has been fun , lots of powerful rares and some money. it will be interesting to see the cream rise after people open only one pack at a time
I enjoyed the 3MBS drafts, I only did a handful but got some packs back through forcing UB. As you noted, Vedalken Anatomist is the mutt's nuts; took as many Serum Rakers and Phrexian Ragers as I could find; Dross Rippers, Geyser and Oculus going late. Vivsection very good with those cards and Myr Sires were good for clogging up the ground. Piston Sledge puts your opponent on a very short clock.
I couldn't agree more with RoninX. He is spot on regarding tempo and advantage.
Fast aggro decks are very hard to build in this format because of lack of aggressive 2 drops. Which is why infect isn't as strong as SSS drafts because of no ichorclaw and plague stinger.
You want to rake in advantage generating commons in your 2 to 3 drops (oculus, emissary, rager, sire, wellspring), get to 6 mana quickly, play dinosours and bombs and then push them through with either bounce or heavy equipment.
Personaly I almost exclusively draft blue with lots of artifacts(wellspring, slasher, hexplate). You can usualy pick up anatomist or mind control if you do which are better than most rare bombs. Quicksilver Geyser wins game the most though, bouncing opponents 6 drops and attack with my 6 drops is usualy good enough for lethal. My game count was 50-5 so it seemed to work well, god I'll miss MMM.
The culling dias would be good to get some more mileage out of my utility creatures. There are sufficient lands that I don't really need Ponder or Brainstorm as "mulligan stoppers" so I'll swing in the Dias and see how it plays.
Have enjoyed our games, also :)
I find the play-by-play in other articles difficult to follow without a plethora of screen-shots. I'll do a commented highlights video (three-four mins of key plays a game) for my next article and, if it's well received, do one for this deck aswell.
I'm with you on the class war thing. Good on your dog :)
I've been playing this deck for a few days and can attest to its fun/competitiveness. I like the “reach” that the Galvanic Blasts and Necrogen Censors give it in the endgame. I like how it’s relatively easy to figure out what the optimum play is – I think it’s been good practice for me in that special mana-maximizing that aggro players excel at. I need all the help I can get.
And my experience with the deck leads me to second the advice given in one of the videos: trade your Squadron Hawks for theirs. Anything else and you find yourself behind in card advantage/board power races.
The Necrogen Censors are a touch expensive for Classic Pauper, but I wonder if there couldn’t be a fun casual deck that exploits them?
Triple MBS is the first format that I was actually able to "go infinite" in and via 4322 queues at that. I started with 6 packs, paid all my entry fees and packs with winnings or sales of pulls/won packs, ended with 10 packs after ~20 drafts. I locked in pretty early on that the format revolved around two drop and 6 drops with the two drops really bridging the way to the 6 drops (Viridian Emissary is nuts in triple MBS). Other than than I really just focused on having a solid curve - in this case meant almost an inverse of a normal format (which tend to have lots of 4s) I tried to have something like 5 4 3 4 5 for ccs 2-6, though this obviously was just a skeleton. Card advantage and tempo advantage were at a premium in this format and morbid plunders and geysers were always going too late.
Now admittedly I ran pretty well - but I only got two mythics in ~20 drafts (Glissa and Sphinx) so its not like I was ripping like LSV. In addition to overvaluing two drops and six drops I only drafted white once (the only time I didn't win packs). Yes, you can get a great white aggro deck but they crumble to green decks.
I could go on, but, alas, the format is dead now.
RIP Triple Besieged, I will miss you.
Sshh, do not spoil next week's article :).
You can find that Balance deck in Part I. It was one of the best decks I played against during the whole season. It was a deck that costs even less than $5,00 to build but it managed to reach to Top-4 that week winning against a lot of very expensive decks (including mine). So yes, it was very nice.
I will surely play in Season Four but maybe not as often as I did in the previous season. I already have three decks ready so far for the next season and many more are being brewed (as always).
Thanks for stopping by!
LE
Awsome articles Mr. Erman! I read all the parts from 1-3 and they were all a great read. I'd like to congragulate you on your season 3 finale win!
I have since added a jitte to the meloku deck as wel. It was pulling most of my wins out for me. I think the reason I only had one was because when I orginally made the deck I thought time of need could find it too.
I'd like to revisit the Garmageddon deck as well, but it needs to be diversified. It is to linear as it is now. I want to add green to it but I just haven't gotten around to it. I also saw another gargadon, balance deck in one of your aticles, so I'll try to take some tricks from it as well.
Season 4 is on and we will be trying out a new host as school has killed my time. Be sure to come and check it out, 12:30 pm EST in "/join BYOS". It's daylight savings time this week so we will be 1 hour earlier.
Precisely so. My first three events were 3-1, 4-0, 3-1. Even at the terrible 3 tix buy price that MBS packs were going for during the release (they've rebounded to about 3.2 now), a 3-1 gets enough tix for another event. It helped significantly that my 4-0 also included a Tezzeret, which was another 30 tix or so.
Release event sealed swiss have quite strong payouts, so it's pretty easy to chain events together, and it helps that even some of the more mediocre rares are still worth selling. It's worth noting that aside from a Blue Sun's Zenith which I kept for a commander deck, I sold every rare and mythic (and most of the uncommons) that I got from the events I played. If you prefer to hold onto your cards for deckbuilding, it becomes a bit more challenging to stay on the sealed gravy train.