0+2=1

This deck's name is taken from the fantastic NoMeansNo song, mostly 'cause I can.

4x Counterspell
4x Deprive
4x Sunder

12x Forest
11x Island
1x Oboro, Palace in the Clouds

4x Serum Visions
3x Summer Bloom
4x Explore

2x Meloku the Clouded Mirror
4x Skyshroud Ranger
3x Dirtcowl Wurm
4x Vinelasher Kudzu

So what does this do? Pump out a bunch of land, drop Dirtcowl Wurm or Vinelasher Kudzu and then cast Sunder. Meloku is there as a backup device, generating 1/1 flyers and providing the air attack should the big dumb monsters on the ground prove to be less than adequate.

For the longest time, this deck was all about getting to the mid-late game; the addition of Vinelasher Kudzu helped give this deck some early gas but this is one of those decks that, despite its synergies, wants to cast one big spell and win. If it doesn't get it's big spell, it is possible to win on the back of a large Vinelasher backed up by countermagic, but it's more difficult. Still, better to have a plan than no plan.

In madness you dwell

OK, it's been a little while so a link back to the Thing That Should Not Be, as a refresher for readers.

I'm playing against B/W humans again. It's not going well. Thingy is getting overrun by Champion of the Parish. Aggro decks; is there a plan here?

There is; Play Mimeoplasm, remove two Dearly Departed and have a 10/10. That should make things interesting. And then the program crashes. OK, that happens.

Do over: I have Chancellor and Tome Scour, with an Island in my opening hand and yeah, I mill for 12. But no love comes my way afterward and I die to large humans swinging.

Sigh. This deck needs some more disruption, specifically creaturekill.

So new changes:

-4 Jace Archivist: removing because of the UU in the casting cost, truthfully. In a three color deck, especially ones with out a 'bridge' color and lands that support it (such as the Lairs of Planeshift) or very expensive lands, double color requirements can be backbreaking. Chancellor is UUU and that tweaks the entire manabase but I feel it's worth it as a Mimeoplasm target or, if hardcast, a swinging effect using the opponent's deck against them.

-2 Gravedigger; I just don't have as many targets as I'd like for this.

+3 Tolarian Winds for the draw, +3 Doom Blade for creaturekill. Let's move on!

My next matchup is against a U/R Equilbriium deck with Kobolds and Storm Entity/Grapeshot to try and win. I get out three Looters and despite going through over a third of my deck, get a whole lot of nothing in terms of action. The milling effects are working though: if I can survive 10 more turns I can pull this out.

Stonewood Invocation arrives though and I don't have to. Still, an ugly, drag out way to win.

Game two has the glory of a revealed Chancellor of the Spires in my opener and a difficult choice on turn two: Do I cast Tolarian Winds and draw a fresh set of 6, or do I keep the hand and go with the glory that is a Mind Funeral and Mimeoplasm in hand? I decide to stick it out with the Mind Funeral and hold back. The deck I'm facing hasn't shown to be speedy or disruptive enough so ditching a good hand doesn't seem wise.

I end up eating 3 on turn 4 from a Storm Entity and I still have a full hand and my opponent's graveyard is full of terrible things to copy so I cast Winds, draw 5 and on my next turn, cast Tome Scour to mill another five cards (getting a Kobold!) and casting Gravedigger to get back The Mimeoplasm.

After taking another 3, I play the Mimeoplasm to get myself a 8/10 flying Chancellor, cast Ponder from my opponent's graveyard and draw a Doom Blade. At this point I feel like I've got the game wrapped up...and then he throws down 4 Kobolds, Grapeshot, Grapeshot, I eat 11 and die.

Eh, it happens. But fuck, if Storm isn't the worst card mechanic they've ever done. (Transform taking a close second.)

The second matchup highlights one of the problems I've been having with Thingy: It's very reliant on my opponent's stuff: if I mill Kolbolds or Disenchants, these are not spells or creatures that are worth removing/recasting. They don't make for scary Mimeoplasms or solid Chancellor effects. My own efforts to ensure that my Mimeoplasms are badass may not be enough.

So it's on to the final match! I take the play and lead with a Looter and start drawing, discarding and seeing what I can get. A second Looter comes while my opponent has T1 Ponder, T2 Ponder, Ponder. So I may need to hurry this up.

I can't hurry it up fast enough and the Storm combo takes me. The details escape me, though I do remembering thinking: I need a Doom Blade, because a 20/20 Storm Entity is coming soon.

Sometimes, I hate being right.

Briefly out

I'm moving and don't know when my internet/life will return. I figure about a week, then I'll be able to resume Tues-Thurs posting again!

Crystalized Thought

Sometimes reading through articles on Magic is good brainfood. The competitive edges that players try and work through don't exactly apply to my metagame but they do help solve mental problems. For example, this article at Channel Fireball contains this gold nugget:

Now, when I come to Jon with a list, the first thing he asks me is, “What do you want to beat?”

Dead on. No deck or strategy can beat everything and I don't use sideboards, so the question is: What strategy is this deck meant to beat. 

It is why I have created a mental subcategory of decks called "Jason decks"; ones that are meant to defeat his strategies (frequently milling or thievery ones.) When I don't play a Jason deck against him and I lose, I take what I can and learn from that. When I win and I do so because of a well executed strategy, not because of bad/good luck, then maybe I'm onto something.


However, I need to view all my decks this way: What is this meant to beat? The answer to that question takes a bit of the sting out of a loss when I'm playing a strategy that is just flat out unworkable given my opponent's strategy. That doesn't excuse bad play or poor decisions but it might allow me to remove a bit of ego from the equation and see situations for what they are, instead of just feeling bad because I lost.

Forgiveness

Game situation: Sensei's Top telling me Plains, Plains, Swamp is in my future, while I'm facing double Ankh of Mishra. So things are bad.

I have a Seal of Cleansing on the board to take care of something, only question is what, of course.

Then the worst happens; I shuffle my deck when I meant to draw. This fucks the whole game really. There's no way for me to properly reset things-you can't un-shuffle a deck (although it wouldn't be a problem if the Shuffle and the Draw commands weren't right next to each other...design fail!)

I'm given a forgiveness token and we just keep going.

It's good to play with friends.

The Thing That Should Not Be

Brought to you by HP Lovecraft and Metallica. A new deck, even, born from the insanity of the Commander runs.

4x Chancellor of the Spires
2x Dimir Aqueduct
4x Forest
4x Gravedigger
10x Island
4x Jace's Archivist
2x Krosan Cloudscraper
4x Looter il-Kor
4x Mind Funeral
2x Simic Growth Chamber
4x Stonewood Invocation
6x Swamp
4x The Mimeoplasm
4x Tome Scour
2x Trickbind

Whenever I build a new deck-especially one as weird as this, where the goal is to mill the opponent out as much as possible but NOT to win, instead to steal their best creatures via Mimeoplasm and combine to make a flying or shadow creature of my own, if necessary, or just a huge body if not, to win.

But yeah, it can mill out too, though that's harder to accomplish. I don't know why I tend to shy away from milling strategies but I do. Frequently these strategies don't feel proactive enough for me and that may be part of the reason; another is that good control cards frequently cost a bit of money and thus are more difficult to get to work.

Anyway; this is the new trick! We'll see how it goes.

I'll see you in Hell

I started off vs a Cloudpost variant, wishing to cast Eldrazi in a hurry and rapidly found myself facing a Ulamog's Crusher, with an It That Betrays coming soon. I cast Faith's Fetters on the Crusher to stall for time and begin dredging Nightmare Void in order to keep the opponent's hand empty.

Artisan of Kozilek swings at me and I sacrifice Academy Rector and a Swamp. Using the Rector's ability, I get Confiscate to attach to the Artisan and then....

We don't know what. Do I take 10 or do I just get the giant creature?

Eventually we decide that I don't have to take damage, I get the Artizan and swing until my opponent's dead. Turns out, that's the right play both from a gameplay and a rules standpoint. So go us.

Game 2: I cast Cabal Therapy blind, with a board of Urza's Mine and Power Plant, naming Ulamog's Crusher. I get lucky (sorta) and hit on that, but I fuck up the use of my Sensei's Top through inappropriate mouseclicks and die to Spawnsire and Ulamog. The drawback to playing online is that it can be easier to fuck things up electronically than it is when physically handling the cards. I could've had it, but it was not meant to be.

Game 3: Lots of Top for me...but now what? He's got Cloudpost and Urza's Tower, I get a Phyrexian Ghoul on board...now all I have to do is somehow win without seeing a Rector (yoink!) and hope he doesn't accelerate into death.

I use Nightmare Void to keep the worst things off my back for a couple turns but in the meantime, the Urzatron gets assembled and I just have a 2/2 in play. It see-saws for a bit while I hold off then control It That Betrays with Confiscate but once Eye of Ugin comes out, the searching for Eldrazi spells comes and though I'm able to force the discard of an Ulamog, the search happens and I can't prevent the second.

The deck didn't fail me so much as my play did. Still, maybe there's some tightening up to do. There's always work to do on playskill...

Next up, I was in a three player game, against a G/W beast deck that I'd built and loaned to someone, and a mono-B nasty that runs Phyrexian Obliterator.

My hand had a Confiscate in it but it also had a Sensei's Divining Top, so I kept. Unfortunately, I think I blew the plays again. I managed to use/sacrifice three (three!) Academy Rectors to put a Faith's Fetters on a couple nasties and Confiscate another. But I didn't dredge correctly to get rid of the cards I didn't need, so while I managed to hold out for a bit, eventually the G/W player landed a Rampaging Baloth and that was it.

This deck needs me to practice with it more. Also, I don't like having cards I cannot ever cast in my hand, mocking me like a high school girl. I may like Mythic Proportions but I like having castable spells more.

Next game:
Vs. B/W humans-with the Entomb, Dearly Departed start. Knowing this, I cast Cabal Therapy mostly blind. Next turn, I'm able to cast Academy Rector and take Mother of Runes.

The problem comes when I use Top and find 'land, Confiscate, Mythic Proportions'. This happened in nearly every recent game I've played online. I've been having to dredge or attempt to shuffle away these cards and it's making this deck do things it doesn't want to. I may have to sub out the Caves of Kolios for Marsh Flats.

It's the little things but they add up and being able to use the tools I put in a deck is one of those helpful things that I need to keep in mind when I build/re-build them.

I end up being unable to remove enough creatures and I can't get the combo going, so I find myself overrun by humans eventually. The end comes when the 2nd Dark Confidant comes down.

Next match: BW Humans via Fuz
At this point, I've subbed the Mythic Proportions out for Eldrazi Conscription.

Slow start again, with Swamp, Basilica as my opening plays, vs Champion of the Parish and Tireless Tribe. A Dearly Departed gets discarded to the Tribe and the game ends soon.

Game two, despite having a brilliant turn 1 of Ritual, Buried, and a turn 2 of two humans at 4/4, I'm able to hold out until a Phyrexian Ghoul arrives on turn 3, I suck up 8 damage then cast Rector turn 4, wait, and at the ends step search for Conscription, giving me turn 5 swing for 12 with 2 Annihilator. I pull it out afterward.

Game three: Champion leads, I have nothing again, except a Persecute and a Nightmare Void--but these cards are excellent later in the game; they aren't helping me set stuff up. After a Tireless Tribe and a Blood Celebrant comes in, I've got nothing, still and my draw is a Confiscate after taking 3. So things are looking rough.

When Mom shows up turn 3 I know I'm in trouble, especially since my response is to play a Nantuko Husk. I'm facing an absurd army and nothing to do. It's...troublesome. Putting out a Phyrexian Ghoul next does nothing for me, and when the next human drops has protection from black (Death Speakers!), that's game.

Lesson #1: enable your enablers. Sac-lands and Top have been a combo for years; I should've been on that bandwagon long ago. Change made.

Lesson #2: when something clearly better comes along to help you, take it. I don't run strict enough decks to use cards that don't help me. Conscription is the better choice and I should just take it. Mythic Proportions will find its way into something else.

Lesson #3: Bad matchups are bad. Die, Die was built to handle the slower combo decks/control ones, with the discard and activated abilities. Games that want to beat me by turn 4 will frequently have the upper edge. That's OK; there's always another deck.

Lesson #4: Casting Cabal Therapy blind is...suboptimal. However, no choice remains when the decks that I end up playing are so diverse. I generally think this adds to the fun but I'll acknowledge that for someone taking the game seriously, this play is absurd.