Protection

I only had two Outmaneuvers in my binder, so I began to look for other tricks. When in doubt, go for removal. Rend Flesh was taking up a couple slots in the binder so in they went but I was still hoping to find something to play in against the 'I generate bunches of tokens' matchup. Enter Chandra's Fury. It's expensive but it's also does a lot of work, whittling down my opponent's life total in addition to dinking all their creatures and as an instant, I can use it at any stage of the game. There may be a better choice for that slot but I wanted to get some games in, so I decided to test Chandra's Fury out.

There was only one match this weekend, as Portland was brought to a standstill by the weather. I tweaked a whole lot of decks but getting out to play them was highly discouraged by ice falling from wires and branches. Cockatrice once again came to the rescue.

Fuz was playing a G/W enchantments deck which was unfortunate for him, as Spectral Lynx and Wildfire Emissary hit his deck where it hurts.

It did lead to a very clever play on Fuz's part in game two, where he sacrificed his Lignify (enchanting my Imposing Sovereign) to pump his Auratog, cast Auramancer to bring the Lignify back and then cast it on Wildfire Emissary. Smart stuff!

Along a similar lines, I had to use two Rend Flesh to destroy the Fledgling Djinns I had in game one, because they were slowly killing me due to being Pacified. It's not the kind of play I wanted to make but it was certainly the right one. In the end, I had a strong enough combination of creatures with Protection and Meekstone/Fervent Charge to win both games. Chandra's Fury even came in handy, taking a huge bite out of Fuz's life total (as you can see in the screencap from game 2.)

Now, that's good news but it's good news against a deck that had a significant disadvantage to begin with. Certainly, it's encouraging to have success but there's no way I have enough data yet.