It Didn't Turn Out

I'm hitting a wall with The Wretched. I've got the wall built, but how do I win? Drawing into Stormtide Leviathan isn't a bad idea but other threats would be nice.

I'm currently trying Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger as another finishing option. That's definitely a creature that can put a hurt on someone but it also comes out on turn 8 so it really isn't better at jumpstarting my win mode. I thought about Helix Pinnacle but that is a card that wants me to incorporate an infinite mana combo so I can just win outright. It's a neat idea but it belongs in another deck. Amusingly, days after I wrote my first draft of this post, Noah suggested Helix Pinnacle, so maybe I'm being too pessimistic about this. 

I may need to set this deck aside for now. It's got some neat things happening but the closure part isn't wanting to clasp together.

Of course, as I say this I rediscover Verdant Touch which may provide the threats I'm looking for, or Sprout Swarm, which has the potential to do the same.

The lighting struck though and I certainly have a better deck than I had before. I'm not dodging the work that comes after, however. This deck is going to stay in rotation for awhile and I'm definitely going to prioritize playing it for another week to see if I can get that keystone that will help make The Wretched more formidable.

Which is where the next thought comes in: What if I'm done?  Take a look at this picture.This is against the RWB tokens deck that Lauriel pummeled me with a couple weeks ago.

Now, I'm sitting behind an energy field and attacking for 8 a turn. She can (and did) cast enough creatures that Impact Tremors alone was trying to do 9 points of damage to me. Which I just shrugged off.

Fuz had similar problems, except I had out an Vorinclex that was borking his mana, until I was able to clean up. Seriously: Vorinclex is a dick. Although Elesh Norn and Jin-Gitaxias are mammoth dicks. Nobody talks about Jin-Gitaxias but someone is going to figure out how to use that monster...

Hmmm...

Anyway what I'm getting at is that maybe I don't need to do anything. Maybe this deck is a weird successor to the lock decks of old and I don't have to come up with a genius masterstroke. All I need to do is set things up, swing with the big guns and call it a day.

It's good exercise, playing a control deck like this, having to think a little differently so I can maximize my resources along a different flight plan. I've had a lot of fun doing it, too.

So for now, let's move on.

The Sky Cracks Open

With my new Energy Field'd deck, I brought it to the table against Noah, playing a WB aggroish token thing. Not dissimilar to the RWB deck Lauriel was playing that smashed me, only this time Planeswalkers and angels were taking up the red slots.

I had to hustle out my Recycle/Spellbook combo and then I had to play the combo again to keep the cards coming.

"That's two cards," Noah says when I play the second Spellbook.

Huh. Why, so it is!

And that's how we began one of the silliest games we've played in a long while. Noah put out three different planeswalkers, generating tokens and buffing them while I drew an insane amount of cards per turn while hiding behind Energy Field.

Then the whole game swung of if I could finish the game before he could destroy Energy Field, somehow. I kept drawing cards-too many, it seemed-and although I was able to play and protect a Stormtide Leviathan, Noah had enough removal coming to him that he could force me to use Capsize on my creature instead of attacking with it.

One turn had me using eighteen mana in order to protect my creatures from his removal, drawing six cards, then replaying those creatures, drawing six more.

Eventually, I just ran out of cards and milled myself to death.

Hell of a way to lose. Wish you'd seen it.

Matt started watching the game about halfway through, suggesting Reliquary Tower while it was going on. While I'm balking at something that doesn't provide me colored mana, the extra ability is probably worth it.

By the end of the game, though, he suggested Wheel of Sun and Moon.

"How does that help?"

Noah explained: "It's a replacement effect so your cards never go to your graveyard."

The light went on. They saw a way for me to not sacrifice my Energy Field or deck myself. But with that combo, the drawback to playing Counterspell or Anticipate goes away which means I can look for ways to close the game and protect that without having to subject myself to pure grinding. And I own a couple Wheel of Sun and Moon, which means it's a great time to try that out.

We Still Pretend

When in doubt, go for overpowered.

It's not a bad way to go, when looking for ways to improve a deck. Which is why when I saw a Garruk on my desk, I thought 'Well, maybe we just overpower them.'

But not with Garruk: that card doesn't exactly help me if I've got a Recycle out but no Spellbook. And Jace generally doesn't provide a win condition unto itself.

Enter Kiora, the Crashing Wave.

So with a deck tweaked to add KtCW, I went to play Jason online. I told him: I'm testing this but it's just not working out and I need some help.

He started throwing some decks at it, specifically looking at aggro decks because we know that's where things are bad.

They were still bad. But better bad!

Capsize-buyback is pretty good with Prophet of Kruphix. Elvish Fury however, isn't. In game after game, that card just didn't matter, even when I was in a position to use it.

So after a multiple games I finally put it to Jason: what do I do?

His first thought was a Fog effect. Lull was the first thing that came to mind, with Respite being a close second.

I can't say I'm entirely surprised about this: Saga block is one Jason frequently references because it's power level is just so off the charts. I thought that Respite might might be a better effect-Fog + lifegain = more time.

Our test of Respite didn't really impress us.

Kiora, however, showed some potential. Getting her ultimate off was something Jason was constantly trying to stop and that took pressure off of me and gave me more time to get things set up. An ultimate on her would, we agreed, be incredibly good for The Wretched.

"What about Energy Field?" Jason asked.

That's a pretty damn good idea. I mean, I had some small reservations but I know better than to dismiss Jason's out of the box ideas. So we tested it.

That test went incredibly well. I had to be careful about putting creatures into play, along with making some very deliberate decisions about when to use Counterspell but the pressure was immediately transferred to Jason to find an answer, once Energy Field came down.

Now we're getting somewhere.

Another Day, Some Other Way

As is becoming my habit, I ran The Wretched without changes so I could really get a feel for the glaring holes.

And boy, did I get that.

Aggro decks. Lauriel was playing a very nice BRW tokens deck and just killing it. While I had...well, you can see the picture. Nothing.

Granted, I had scooped my board at that point but the fact remains! I had nothing and did very, very little.

So I took out Brainstorm and Ancestral Vision for Anticipate and Gitaxian Probe (as suggested by Matt), removed a Stormtide Leviathan for Kruphix, God of Horizons, along with adding three Prophet of Kruphix while removing Fable of Wolf and Owl.

Games against Matt the next evening merely enforced the weakness, though: I can't stabilize the board fast enough. I don't have enough action to start forcing opponents to play the game on my terms. I need to try and brainstorm something for this deck that can't quite be a combo deck and isn't exactly a control deck.

So, what next?

Jason.