Evaluations

What to do, right? 

After last week's debacle of games, I sat down to take another look at Blot.

How does this deck actually win?

Fortunately, my one win last week told me: I generate infinite creatures with Intruder Alarm plus Sprout Swarm and attack with a bunch of saprolings. 

So what does this deck actually need?

It needs time. 

I found some Thrummingbirds to help accelerate the saproling growth process, and was messing around with Lull as a way to give me extra turns. Creature combat has become the primary path to victory, so my thinking was: hey, it's a free turn every time  I cast it.

With that came copies of Expel from Orazca, a card that I'm sure can be solid in the early game and a big tempo shift in the mid to late game. Denying someone a draw step is a heck of a trick and if used at the right time, you can mess with people's Brainstorms or fetch lands. 

Then serendipity stepped in, which is always nice. I was putting some cards away-specifically a Rolling Thunder-and I came across two copies of Propaganda in my binder. 

Well, let's not look a gift horse in the mouth, right? Because what's better than Lull giving me one turn? A perpetual cost that slows my opponent down for the entire game. 

Let's roll with that, and see where it takes me. 

Little Dabs

Oooooboy. 

This deck was terrible. It just never came even close to what I was hoping it would do: I played two matches with Fuz and lost 4 of 5 games. Not a very good showing. 

More than the record, though, is the feeling of how it was going-that is, did I have opportunities to turn things around?

I never felt that I had a chance-even when I got Opposition out, I didn't have the resources to follow through or worse, I was already so far behind that it didn't matter. 

I need to think about this deck as a tempo one, and look for cards that leverage tempo for me. Sadly, on that front cards like Thelon of Havenwood and Kasmina, Enigmatic Mentor just didn't quite do what I hoped.

Basically, nothing is meeting the Hexdrinker rule, and given the power curve here, that's a problem. I found that when Steady Progress was played, that helped advance my board state-the proliferate is also why Sporesower Thallid and Sporoloth Ancient are in the game. 

Which makes me wonder: are there fungus I haven't considered? The creature base is solidly from Time Spiral block and I have, admittedly, failed to do further research into better creatures. 

A few clicks later; yeah, that's a bust. 

So, what next? How can I give myself a boost? 

On Endings

Well...crap. 

While I cannot say I am surprised by the news that support for the Transformers TCG is ending, it is still a bummer. I got to meet some new, cool people and the game is a lot of fun. 

However, the pandemic and the United States' collective failure to properly manage that pandemic, almost certainly killed this game. It's very hard to get people excited about playing when there is no way to play in person. 

There's a lot to unpack about the failure to manage the pandemic. One of the people I met through this game, Adam, has said to me "I am glad we live in interesting times, but I wish people didn't have to suffer for it."

And the thing is: we're always living in interesting times. The difference between the pandemic the Obama administration had to deal with-and there were two-and the one the Trump administration is dealing with comes down to how each views governance. 

We hired people (via elections, in this instance) to manage things so we could do other stuff, like play card games. In one instance, those managers did a pretty good job with the pandemic. 

It's a small, silly thing, to want to continue to play games under the circumstances. But that small, silly thing would probably have continued, if we had people who cared about the citizens of this country in charge right now, instead of enhancing their own pockets. 

Still, I'm sorry to see this game go: it really was a fantastic to play and I hope that the people I've met will still play games from time to time.

The online experiences aren't terrible but they also aren't amazing-OCTGN has a real issue with card art being far too small, and almost no one has a proper camera and lighting setup to make paper games visually adequate via an online meeting service. I don't blame Wizards for not having an online platform to play: the game was too new to invest that kind of resources.  

Still, this was a good thing to be a part of. Plus, I still have my "Six Heads" aggro deck to talk about! So that'll happen-I think I've got a pretty good beatstick there.

Cleanup

So, with the black out of the deck, that leaves me with this:

3 Thallid
4 Sporesower Thallid
3 Sporoloth Ancient
2 Thelon of Havenwood
3 Thelonite Hermit
4 Utopia Mycon

 

3 Intruder Alarm
3 Opposition
4 Paradox Haze

 

4 Sprout Swarm
2 Steady Progress

 

10 Forest
10 Island
2 Vivid Creek

Is it bad? No, but it is short a couple cards. 

I am going with Kasmina, Enigmatic Mentor to fill in those slots for two reasons: first, it helps protect my other creatures and second, it will produce creatures that can be tapped with Opposition. The card draw is a bonus, since this deck seems to be a little short on card draw. 

So, time to give this a little rollout and see how it does. 

Blot

Let's revise this thing. Because; I mean...look at it.

3 Thallid
3 Deathspore Thallid
4 Sporesower Thallid
3 Sporoloth Ancient
2 Thelon of Havenwood
3 Thelonite Hermit
4 Utopia Mycon

 

3 Intruder Alarm
3 Opposition
4 Paradox Haze

 

4 Sprout Swarm
2 Steady Progress

 

2 Golgari Rot Farm
9 Forest
9 Island
2 Vivid Creek

The inclusion of Black in this deck is unnecessary: it's a combo-ish deck: make tokens, use Opposition to lock everyone down, and win. The inclusion of Deathspore Thallid is absolutely The Glory Of Cool Things, and it messes with the mana base on top of all that.

So let's quit messing around. I can tweak the mana base, improve my card selection and make this something a bit more reliable. 

Let's have at it.

This deck, named after the Transformer, wants to generate a lot of creatures over time, and use Opposition to stall the game while more creatures than my opponent can  handle appear. 

The goal, then, is to stall the game out. The good news; I have a guiding idea! The bad news; I don't know how to execute it. Yet. 

Minor Tweaks

It's been difficult, what with the pandemic and all, to get games going. So I've gone back and revamped a few older decks. 

First up: Push the Fader, a Wildfire deck using Parallax Tide to keep my lands in play.

The problem: Zuberas (Burning-Eye and Rushing-Tide, respectively).

The solution: Rekindling Phoenix and God-Eternal Kefnet.

The Phoenix comes back post Wildfire, the God doesn't die to Wildfire. They both meet the Hexdrinker rule, which is critical here.

3 Izzet Signet

2 Mind Stone

2 Covetous Dragon

3 Surveilling Sprite

3 Rekindling Phoenix

3 God-Eternal Kefnet

2 Wurmcoil Engine

4 Parallax Tide

3 Shock

3 Prophetic Bolt

1 Incinerate

2 Opt

1 Magma Jet

5 Island

2 Izzet Boilerworks

4 Cascade Bluffs

4 Seat of the Synod

5 Mountain

3 Great Furnace

4 Wildfire

1 Ponder

Really polishing it up would mean cutting Ponder and Magma Jet for a third Opt and second Incinerate, just for consistency. That might be wise, just to see if I can take advantage of God-Eternal Kefnet's ability more. But I do like where this deck is at now, far more than I did. 

Next up, Disposable Heroes. 

The problem: High CMC creatures (specifically Dawn Elemental) and no removal. 

The solution: Copies of Swallow Whole. 

2 Samurai of the Pale Curtain

3 Devoted Retainer

2 Elite Vanguard

2 Soltari Foot Soldier

1 Soltari Priest

4 Celestial Crusader

1 Paladin en-Vec

3 Order of the White Shield

2 White Knight

2 Mystic Crusader

2 Skyhunter Skirmisher

3 Benalish Marshal

4 Light from Within

4 Sheltering Light

3 Swallow Whole

4 New Benalia

18 Plains

I think Swallow Whole is an underrated removal spell: it's a better Devouring Light as far as I'm concerned. With the high volume of creatures in Disposable Heroes, the additional cost isn't a problem.

Noah suggested Benalish Hero and with the cards I have with protection from red or black, this could be remarkably beneficial. Heck, once I drop a Light from Within, distributing damage how I choose could be a huge trick.

Sheathe The Blackblade

(This meant to go up last Thursday. Whoops!)

The cards from Commander 2020 definitely have a place in this Dakkon deck. What I'm still not sure about is the mana base. 34 lands isn't much, yet I still seem to find myself mana flooded. 

That might just be bad luck, but it doesn't seem like it, since I have more cards than ever with cycling. 

I've also realized that I've overlooked some cards out of Onslaught block, which I can't believe I'd forgotten had cycling, until I saw Eternal Dragon as part of the current Commander deck with cycling as its theme. 

But there are much better cards to use now, even while I do not forget the spice of the previous cards. Decree of Silence seems SO good and yet...I just can't justify it.

Another task that I cannot believe I forgot until recently was that I had failed to recalibrate the color requirements for this deck after making changes. Turns out I need a lot more Swamps than I thought. 

So there's been more tweaks but play still was difficult. The deck just kept floundering, until I realized that I couldn't have a 'one turn I win' moment. I needed to pace my play out slower and play defense-meaning play out my creatures, and just wait it out. I have reanimation strategies so it really is in my interest to stall until I'm ready.  

So here's were I'm going to leave it, for now. There's some tutors, some resets and a nice combo finish if I can get there. 

Commander: Dakkon Blackblade

Instant 1 Batwing Brume 1 Ensnare 1 Gleam of Resistance 1 Forsake the Worldly 1 Hieroglyphic Illumination 1 Hampering Snare	Artifacts 1 Armillary Sphere 1 Obelisk of Esper 1 Fluctuator 1 Alhammarret's Archive 1 Commander's Sphere
Enchantment 1 Moonlit Wake 1 Cast Out 1 Faith of the Devoted 1 Lay Claim 1 Drake Haven 1 Dragon Wings	Sorcery 1 Incremental Blight 1 Living End 1 Forced March 1 Living Death 1 Absorb Vis 1 Call to Mind 1 Akroma's Vengeance 1 Razaketh's Rite 1 Wander in Death 1 Stir the Sands 1 Finale of Eternity 1 Dismantling Wave 1 Decree of Justice 1 Cleansing Nova
Lands 1 Barren Moor 1 Drifting Meadow 1 Remote Isle 1 Coastal Tower 12 Swamp 8 Island 7 Plains 1 Desert of the Glorified 1 Desert of the Mindful 1 Desert of the True Planeswalker Liliana Vess	Creatures 1 Jhessian Zombies 1 Esper Sojourners 1 Dromar, the Banisher 1 Sanctum Plowbeast 1 Glassdust Hulk 1 Twisted Abomination 1 Disciple of Malice 1 Scion of Darkness 1 Undead Gladiator 1 Viscera Dragger 1 Shoreline Ranger 1 Primoc Escapee 1 Pendrell Drake 1 Keeneye Aven 1 Yoked Plowbeast 1 Noble Templar 1 Disciple of Grace 1 Tribute Mage 1 Winged Shepherd 1 Oketra's Attendant 1 Angel of the God-Pharaoh 1 Vile Manifestation 1 Lurching Rotbeast 1 Striped Riverwinder 1 Wasteland Scorpion 1 Horror of the Broken Lands 1 Shimmerscale Drake 1 Curator of Mysteries 1 Herald of the Forgotten 1 Drannith Healer 1 Void Beckoner 1 Avian Oddity 1 Archfiend of Ifnir