61

Megatron's first test run was against a mono-B deck Jason was playing using Abyssal Demon and Hellcarver Demon! Oof. It did not go well; even when I was able to Darksteel Forge to keep a blocker up, taking 5 a turn just isn't going to save me. That said: I was very interested in the Hellcarver/Abyssal interaction. Sometimes I think that all the time I spend revising blinds me to exploring new interactions.

The demon deck was a new build for Jason, so we talked shop for a bit: turns out his plan A for the deck was Hellcarver Demon into Barren Glory, not 'Destroy you with Abyssal Demon and win' which is what I thought his plan A should be. As for me, I had a rough game 2 where I had to mulligan down to five cards. It wasn't a good test, but I still like where he's going with it.

So he moved on to his Aether Rift deck, which is always a little batty. But what happened next is what gives me hope for this deck. Check out this image from game two.

After hammered by Flametongues with Lifeline out (which, HOLY CRAP, creates a painful situation) I get a Darksteel Forge into play. Now it's a waiting game. I'm sacrificing creatures to make a larger Ravager and Crushers while trying to avoid taking 16 damage, 8 of it trample. I can't kill his creatures and the Eldrazi are starting to arrive, forcing me to sacrifice the creatures I've been using to build up my alpha-strike team. If I have to let go of my Arcbound Crushers or Ravager, then they come back as tiny 1/1s instead of Eldrazi-withstanding behemoths. I also have to not kill the Eldrazi because they will come back untapped which means I have to trample through more damage and I can tell, I'm running out of time.

Eventually, I've built up gigantic robots and I do a quick bit of math because I have to attack for the win when I do. An 18/18 trampler can be handled by 3 creatures but that still leaves a 17/17 trampler and a 15/15 Ravager.

All in all, I swung for 60 in that picture and I still only barely made it happen. But I made it happen!

Jason's advice: run more Fabricate to make sure you get Lifeline because that card is insane. I'm inclined to agree but I'm not sure what to cut. Also, I have a nagging suspicion that Lifeline and Darksteel Foundry together is overkill.

I'm just not sure that I should care. So I'm going to do something that people just don't do in this game.

I'm going to 61 cards.