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9-02-2001
 No Rares Decks #1, Artifacts, White, Blue
I remember reading in one of the early Magic magazines they had an interview with (I think it was) Richard Garfield, where the interviewer asked what the selection process for 'power rares' was. Richard replied that if someone came to him and said that a particular rare was too powerful, the response was to tell them to make a deck that abused the card, and then he would go to a bin of dog eared common decks, pull a couple out at random and then beat the 'super deck' round the head with it.
I also have a friend who used to play Magic who built a deck along the lines of 'evolutionary programming'. He treated his set of cards as a 'gene pool'. He threw together a random bunch of cards and then played lots of times. Every time he drew a card that was completely useless, he'd make a note of it, make a note of what would have been good in that situation, and then swapped those cards. I assume he swapped them after the game, but he played against some decks that were considered overpowered and those people probably weren't allowed to play anyone with those decks, so it might have been an in game swap. He got to the point where the deck was so highly tuned that he hardly ever lost, yet if you looked at it, it would have looked like a pile of random commons with a couple of uncommons and a rare or two. He was no Mr Suitcase.
My own experience with rares is that as soon as I want something the price of trading it goes through the roof. The only times I've ever been happy with trading are things like splitting the cost of a box and then dividing up the rares. Then there was winning prize support for an article on this site, that was a nice experience :-) The prize support at Brisbane tournaments was always a nice experience. I liked paying $7 (or whatever it was) to play and coming away with say three boosters + 1 booster for placing + 1 booster for random finish. Or in booster draft if you see a rare you need for constructed I'm usually confident that my 'limited skills' will carry the rest of the deck if I sneak off with that one extra off colour rare. Playing winner takes all booster draft is another experience that is good for the old adrenaline.
Inspired by the stories of the success of commons in decks and general frustration with trading, I built my own deck out of a pile of random red/black fourth and fifth commons. I played with it, trimmed it down and made it a very lean and mean deck. It was full of supposedly random cards, but there was still a lot of punch there, and even against 40-rare dojo decks it could usually pull out one win out of three games, which is good for casual play, but not for winning tournaments. Those wins were usually all the more satisfying because my deck would cost less than most of the cards in the opponents deck.
Applying these prnciples to Classic (6th Edition) what do we notice? Obviously the Erg Raiders, Unholy Strengths, Incinerates etc are all gone. Vampire Bats were reprinted as Phyrexian Battleflies: don't laugh, a first turn Dark Ritual, Bats, Strength Strength means six damage turns two and three and then they're within burn range for turn four. And if you don't get that kind of start they still let you smooth out kinks in your mana *supply*, which is different from your mana curve. They were powerhouse cards that would often take down an opponent just before they ran out of steam.
What is there to replace them? I've looked at the Sixth Edition list and cut out all the rares, and wanted to see what jumped out at me.
ARTIFACTS
There are a couple of interesting things that the artifacts let you do. First up, the Diamonds give you non-land mana acceleration. Mana acceleration is another way to boost your commons up to the level that can compete with rares. Second is the life gainers (Throne of Bone, Soul Net etc). Now they might not seem that big a deal, but playing against burn for instance, if you turn all their Shocks into one pointers, then that is going to really hurt them. You can halve the effectiveness of their deck with one card.
Dragon Mask has been noted for its effectiveness in decks where creatures have cute 'comes into play' or 'leaves play' effects. It's also pump that doesn't have the problem that enchantments have, ie kill the critter to get two for one card advantage. While it is not terribly cheap, it is situational, which is what makes Giant Growth good. Where it really shines is with cheap creatures that need to block instead of attacking, or in other words, walls. In fact, combining it with Lead Golem makes the Golem better because you get around the Golem's drawback. And you then have a creature that can kill Blastoderms. Of course, this takes a lot of mana (see mana acceleration). Obsianus Golem is another creature that can go toe to toe with Blasty, with or without the Mask.
And while the cheap artifact creatures might not be fantastic, Ornithopter certainly is cheap to recast. Surprisingly there are no cheap artifact walls in Sixth Edition. Primal Clay doesn't count because it is a Rare, and Wall of Spears is no longer in the basic set. Unfortunately the only other cheap creature is Patagia Golem, at 4 mana for a 2/3 with an expensive evasion ability.
If you could get out a defense early enough at a last resort you could hide behind that defense and ping the enemy with a Rod of Ruin. The Rod is a good option in an environment with lots of 1/1 creatures, but of course it is no Masticore. But then, what is? In a creature heavy deck, for instance one with Grizzly Bears, if you are going up against another deck with Grizzly Bears then Skull Catapult lets you trade your Grizzlies for their Grizzlies at 2 for 1 card advantage. And it turns your chump blockers for Blasty into Shocks. That's more of an issue for a deck with more cheap creatures though.
So an artifacts uncommon deck would focus on mana acceleration (and lots of it), Ornithopters, Golems and Masks or Catapults. With enough mana acceleration 'overpriced' uncommons become 'underpriced' and underpriced is good.
WHITE
One of the common threads through these articles is 'what does this colour do against Blastoderm'? White cannot remove it without the Wrath, Red cannot burn it out, Black's targeted removal is utterly useless etc.
White probably has the best answer for a Blasty, in Circle of Protection. Being an enchantment it can be tutored for with Enlightened Tutor, which is not a rare, but that is another article. :-)
The Circles are incredible and they are so cheap. Given enough mana and the right Circle at the right time, there are so many decks that just get shut down by this that it is not funny. Even the vast majority of dojo decks are going to break out into a sweat if your deck is cheating by using the circle.
Disenchant is another wonderful answer to a lot of the rare heavy decks, which tend to rely on at least one or two enchantments to do their dirty deeds.
Wall of Swords is a great way to buy some time.
Okay, so White has some great defense and some cheap creatures (Armoured Pegasus, Archers, Ballistae and Veterans), most of which can do something 'cute'. What about the big punch?
Well, that's why this article is the logical one to follow the Artifacts one. They are beautiful complements of each other (that is White and Artifacts, not the articles ;-). White buys you the time with the excellent defense, and Artifacts gives you direct damage in the form of Rod of Ruin and Skull Catapult. Artifacts also let you perform 'stupid stack tricks' in the form of Dragon Mask and Skull Catapult.
A lot of White's creatures are cheap, small and with unusual powers. The Griffins never seemed to have much of an impact on the environment they were part of before being added to the set, so lets ignore them. Mesa Falcon is pumpable for toughness. Infantry Veteran pumps other (attacking) creatures. Heavy Ballista has a double strength ping ability. I was at a large sealed deck tournament (it might have been NZ Nationals) and one guy there got three Ballistae which crushed everyone that got in his way, so they certainly work in Sealed. Longbow Archer is almost in the White Knight category of abilities and power/toughness and it has first strike. D'Avenant Archer also has the ping ability. Tundra Wolves has first strike, Resistance Fighter has a mini fog, Standing Troops do not tap to attack, Staunch Defenders has life gain when it comes into play (see Dragon Mask) and with a bit of pump can go toe to toe with Blasty and win (see Dragon Mask), Venerable Monk is a half pint Staunch Defender, but still good value with the Mask. Hero's Resolve turns anything into a Blasty Blocker. It's obviously better than Holy Strength was, but I don't think that it really compares to what Unholy Strength did in my red/black deck.
Of the creatures, I think the first strike, pinging and comes into play effects are the best of breed. They are a good mix of defense and stupid stack tricks (which is good offense).
That gives a shortlist of:
Some others, eg Samite Healers or a flyer or two such as Mesa Falcon or Armoured Pegasus, which both fit in the two casting cost slot, would round it out nicely. Either of these is clearly superior to Bog Imp, which I will recommend when I get to black.
In other words, White has an embarrasment of riches with very cost effective small creatures.
Ornithopter and Hero's Resolve is a *very* cheap huge toughness flying blocker that can even attack for one. And it's pumpable with Infantry Veterans, and Archers and Ballistae can deal with anything that gets in its way.
Divine Transformation can certainly lay the smack down. But, again the caution about creature enchantments offering two for one card advantage. Put it on something flying though and unless they have the answer in hand or in the next couple of cards and it will be all over. The ultimate card advantage is just winning.
The path to victory though is to use the psychology of card advantage to psych your way to victory. Eg, with pumpers and pingers or a Dragon Mask you can attack with something small, but then they know that if they block it then at least one of their 'better' creatures will die. First strike is golden here. So they let it through. Fine, now on their turn they face the problem that anything they send over to you is going to get stomped, so they have to send everything and will lose most of it because you still have the option of the Dragon Mask and or pumpers. So they can't attack. This is a beautiful situation, because a couple of 'bad commons' have just put the opponent into a situation where they are letting you nibble away at their life total and doing nothing back to you OR they are letting you trade two for one card advantage. Either way, they lose.
BLUE
Blue is classically perceived as *THE* colour of abusive rares, so what is left once they are all removed from the card pool? The answer of course is plenty.
Counterspell is another excellent answer to anything, including a Blastoderm. The trick is getting it first. Spell Blast is good against cheap spells--and fantastic against the Power Nine--though against the sort of decks you will probably throw your pile of commons against you are probably better off with Power Sink and/or Relearn to recurse the crunchy goodness. Memory Lapse is okay if you can do something about the top of their deck or if you just want to buy a turn (see Time Walk) in the early game. Remove Soul is another good cheap defense against a creature deck and if you can get a Time Walk out of it, then all the better.
Dream Cache gives some good library manipulation, letting you turn bad cards into good, new pots for old! It works well with Browse, if you *really* don't want to see those cards ever again. Inspiration is not cheap but it is card drawing, good in a deck with a heavy base of mana production.
Soldevi Sage is a very cheap solution to a mana glut, in the form of really cheap card drawing. Sure, you have to sacrifice two land, but the ability doesn't cost you mana to use, and you get to draw three cards. If you have more land than you know what to do with, or a way of playing more than one basic land per turn, then you can quickly dig into some more powerful cards.
Sage Owl is another good library manipulation card combined with a 1/1 flying creature. There is some good synergy with Dragon Mask and the comes into play effect.
If you play first, and they only play a land in their first turn, then Boomerang stuffs up their mana development by giving you a free turn, and forces them to discard. Uh, is Time Walk any good? Does anybody know? ;-) Of course Boomerang has a lot of other stupid stack tricks and so forth, and is a counterspell for anything that would destroy your favourite permanent, including combat damage.
You can continue the mana denial theme with Pyschic Venom, and Phantasmal Terrain which works wonders in combination with the Sea Monster, who, by the way, eats Blastoderms for breakfast, though you are going to need some form of delaying tactic or card drawing or other mana acceleration to get out in time to make a difference. Segovian Leviathan is half a Sea Monster, unfortunately it is hardly half the price. Though, if you are running Phantasmal Terrains it does become unblockable when you get one down.
The uses of Glacial Walls for blocking Blasty have already been noted far and wide. But most people seem to have forgotten that Phantom Warrior has the ultimate form of evasion: cannot be blocked. Wind Drake is another cheap high power evasion creature. Gaseous Form turns any creature into a perpetual Blasty blocker. Harmattan Efreet can give other creatures flying. Abduction lets you steal your opponent's best creature, so long as it ain't the Blastoderm. Bit of a shame that. Air Elemental is pretty good for the beatdown. It's no Morphling (but then, what is?).
Prodigal Sorceror brings the power of Tim. You are almost certain to have a whole bunch of other Tims lying around from other expansions and so you could certainly throw together a deck of Tims. This seems to work particularly well with a sprinkling of countermagic and a dash of defense. At least, no-one seems to want to play against that kind of deck more than twice. The synergy between Gaseous Form and Prodigal Sorceror is obvious. Block and ping all day long.
Blue is probably the best colour to try the 'evolutionary' approach to deck building. Because there are so many options it is very hard to draw hard and fast rules. There is denial, card drawing, library manipulation, evasive creatures, good creature defense, mana glut solutions, too little mana solutions.
Blue really is the colour of qualitative advantage. Pick your opponents best spell, and prevent it. Pick your opponent's best creature, it's yours. Protect your best permanent. Reuse your best spell from your graveyard. Etc etc, repeat ad nauseum.
The only glaring gap between Fifth and Sixth Editions is the absence of Unstable Mutation, which lets you take a cheap flyer and really go 'laying the smack down all over the town'. Which sounds funny, but the only thing that seems to be missing is that stupid creature enchantment. A Sage Owl, a Phantom Warrior and two Unstable Mutations would be really bad news for just about anybody to be on the receiving end thereof. Unstable Mutation should have some flavour text along the lines of: "and then the little drake bellowed 'I AM THE BLASTODERM! HEAR ME ROAR!'"
Rick Carson.
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