[JT] CGC: Now I Know My ABCD's - Pick Your Own Adventure

*deep breathe in*  Ahhhhh...  Welcome back to The Card Game Corner everyone.  Sorry I've been so silent with this lately.  Don't really have an excuse; just sort went M.I.A.  Anywho!  I'm back, and it feels good.

Subliminal hinting, but to what?!

Today's CGC is introducing a revamp to my deck discussions.  You see, I've recently rediscovered my love of budget decks for standard (more on how I rediscovered it in a bit), so we will be talking about our (my) ABC...D's; as in A Budget Constructed Deck.  Want to know what's great?  If I'm showing the progress of the decks, we can have the ABCDE's (Evolution).  Then for the last segment on that particular deck: ABCDEF's (Finale).  Yes, I like word play.  Deal with it ,,v. ~_^


Ok, back on topic...  You all know that I love my Deadeye Control deck, and that will be my focus for the majority of Innistrad's stay in standard.  However, it's not like I want it to go stale on me.  Which brings me to today's post and why I rediscovered my budget love.  I was thinking about a deck I could just randomly throw together to have fun at a random FNM in November.  Since it was just to take a break from my main deck, I wasn't going to put too much time or effort (i.e. trading for pieces I needed).  What I came up with is...

Night Terrors:

Creatures: (20)
Duty-Bound Dead x4
Diregraf Ghoul x4
Butcher Ghoul x4
Blood Artist x4
Diregraf Captain x4
Grimgrin, Corpse-Born

Artifacts: (1)
Runechanter's Pike x1

Spells: (19)
Bone Splinters x3
Ghoulcaller's Chant x3
Altar's Reap x3
Spectral Flight x3
Murder x3
Forbidden Alchemy x3

Lands: (20)
Drowned Catacomb x1
Swamps and Islands x19

This deck actually had it's beginnings as my very first draft deck.  It was a DKA-IND-IND draft, where I ended up with a sic UB Zombie build that went Turn 1 Diregraf Ghoul/Gravecrawler, Turn 2 Spectral Flight... deal with this (and an Endless Ranks of the Dead for good measure).  The original intent behind this 60-card build was to top out the deck at a converted mana cost of 3, but the more I thought about it, the more I fell in love with a singleton Grimgrin, Corpse-Born.

One thing you may notice is the lack of Gravecrawler's.  Well, if you remember I said I was just throwing this together.  I don't have the Gravecrawler's.  Now, I know what you're thinking:  why Duty-Bound Dead though?  I wanted another one drop in black, and Hunted Ghoul was my first thought.  Awesome!  Another zombie!  Then my eyes fell on DBDead, and I started to think:  DBDead would do a better job of supporting the deck as opposed to filling the deck by not only mucking up the ground, but also pumping up my early turn attacker.  Would Gravecrawler's be better?  Most likely (they don't muck up the ground).  Would I love to have them in the deck?  Definitely.  Will I try and add a few?  Well, that's where we get to the interesting part of this post...

YOU are going to decide.  I am going to do something a little different.  I have a second deck I am going to discuss with you in a few seconds, and I want you to pick which one I focus on for my ABCDE's.  Which ever one is the most popular is the one I will discuss and tweak.  Simple as that.  If you pick the Night Terrors, Gravecrawler's would probably be my first choice in upgrading the deck as long as it stays a budget card (which it barely is right now.  More on this at the end though).  Before you snap pick that deck though, let's talk about it's competition...


Reani-Shrieker:

Creatures:
Mindshrieker x4
Bruna, Light of Alabaster x2
Archon of the Triumvirate x2
Drogskol Reaver x2

Spells:
Thought Scour x4
Mizzium Skin x4
Unburial Rites x4
Rise from the Grave x2
Righteous Authority x2
Unhallowed Pact

Artifacts:
Azorius Keyrune x4
Ring of Evos Isle x2

Lands:
TBD


Any horror director worth his salt will tell you that things you imagine are scarier than any monster that can be put on the screen.  Well this deck has the chance to prove it with another of my favorite, underrated cards from IND block: Mindshrieker.  At first, I saw this card as Jace's go to creature instead of an illusion (tell me you can't imagine how majestic it would look to see Jace launch a wave of blue magic at someone, have it form into a bird that buzzes over the person, clawing at his head, not doing any physical damage, and flying back over and landing on Jace's arm like a falconer and his pet).

The problem with that though is you are at the whim of your opponents deck, you never know what kind of card you are going to mill with it.  With THIS deck though, you have full control, and what better way to take advantage of all the high costed cards you want to mill with the bird than to reanimate them after they have pumped it up?


 And so, Reani-Shrieker was born.  Now, I will say right of the bat (and it may/should seem fairly obvious) that this deck is not nearly as "fine-tuned" as the Night Terrors, simply for the fact that I've had that deck assembled for a while now so I can use it at this week's FNM.  It will look more streamlined after I've had some more time to think about it.

My first pick for a reanimation target was Bruna, which also allowed me to tap into another form of reanimation, and include the aura that just screams "BRUNA!" for me: Righteous Authority.  Other possible targets that I am considering are Avacyn and Griselbrand, but again, that's up to you and the whim of the budget.




So there you have it.  Now it is up to you.  Which deck would you rather see me evolve?  Or do you just want to see me evolve my Deadeye Control deck? Leave me a comment with the deck and any suggestions you have for that deck.  On the topic of suggestions, I am going to leave you with two criteria I will be basing my decisions on for whichever deck you decide on:

1) Price.  Obviously!  Each card should be no more than $10 (since different sites have different prices, this is somewhat flexible), hence why I called Gravecrawler barely acceptable.  I will mention that the closer the card is to $10, the less likely I will add it.  Lands do NOT count for this, but you probably won't be suggesting those anyway.

2) Availability.  I am TRADING for these cards.  I am not spending any actual cash on them.  As such, if I can't find them for trade, they won't be going in.  This is less likely to be a hindrance though, since I can usually find most cards on Pojo, the site I trade on.  You also don't know what the availability is for me, so this is more of a "if I don't use the card you suggested, don't think I ignored it" stipulation.  I will seriously consider each suggestion.

I'm going to leave you with one last comment on these decks I feel should be kept in mind: Gatecrash will have both Dimir (BU) and Orzhov (WB).  JUST SAYIN'.  I am really excited for both of these decks.  Now all that's left is for you to tell me which one to use.  Leave a comment or tweet me @NerdPop140.

Now, if you excuse me, I think I just heard a Bump in the Night...
-JT

[JT] CGC: Rotating Steel - UW Tempered Steel v2.0

Standard rotation can be a double-edged sword.  On the one hand, standard is the premiere M:tG format, so if you want to play at FNM-level tournaments and beyond, you will most likely have to have at least one standard deck at all times.  The problem is though that since standard is the flagship format, the value of cards that rock the format might be utter garbage in other formats.  Once the card rotates out, that value will plummet.  This is why I started playing budget decks.  I don't see the point in investing all of my money into cards that will eventually depreciate in value, especially since I only play standard for fun and focus on sealed play.

On the other hand, however, budget players like myself do get a form of a last laugh.  Remember when Seachrome Coast was $20+ a piece?  With rotation looming ever closer, I recently was able to pick up an entire play set for $20.  Remember how Sword of Feast and Famine and Sword of War and Peace were ~$35 and ~$40 a piece?  They're now down to ~$15.  Yes.  I only get about a month or so to use them, but do you want to know something?  I only play standard every other week or so anyway, and I only trade for them (not buy), because I am considering turning the deck into a Modern deck post-rotation.

So, speaking of the deck, here's the build I used tonight:

Creatures (25):
Riddlesmith x4
Treasure Mage x1
Spined Thopter x3
Porcelain Legionnaire x3
Grand Architect x4
Etched Champion x4
Phyrexian Metamorph x2
Steel Hellkite x2
Myr Battlesphere x2

Planeswalker (2):
Venser, the Sojourner x2

Spells (11):
Mox Opal
Vapor Snag x3
Dispatch x3
Tempered Steel x2
Sword of Feast and Famine
Sword of Body and Mind

Lands (22):
Seachrome Coast x4
Glacial Fortress x4
Buried Ruin x3
Inkmoth Nexus x3
Island x8

Side (15):
Stoic Rebuttal x2
Oblivion Ring x2
Flashfreeze x2
Celestial Purge x2
Redirect x3
Staff of Nin x2
Tormod's Crypt x2

If you recall from my previous deck discuss on v1.0, there were three things I considering when going into my retweaks: (1) removal of the Tempered Steel's all together.  (2) Blue Sun's Zenith alone just was not enough draw power, and (3) No turn 1 plays.  I addressed these concerns by:

(1) Swapping 2x Tempered Steel with 2x Phyrexian Metamorph.  The Metamorphs gave me more artifacts to make my Metalcraft live, as well as more versatility in what artifacts I have and how many of them are in the deck (in a sense).  They also play well with Venser.  I wanted to keep the other two Tempered Steels in though because I have too many artifact creatures to not.

(2)  I took out the two Blue Sun's Zenith's as well as the Unwinding Clock and a Treasure Mage for 4x Riddlesmith's.  These 2-drops alone help me rifle through the deck incredibly fast; much faster than the Zeniths.

(3)  While they were not intended for this, 3x Inkmoth Nexus's allows for a turn 1 play at least part of the time.  They were originally intended to be three more artifacts to activate Metalcraft that just so happened to fit into my mana base instead of my spell base.  The Nexi are another reason I was set on leaving in a few of the Tempered Steels.

Among the other adjustments I made were the inclusion of two swords.  Why only two?  And why THOSE two?  Because they're the only ones I have ; P

So how did it perform?  Round one I played... Boros (RW).  That's about all I can say from it.  I won 2-0 and never really saw anything come together for the deck.  I want to say it was some kind of ultra aggressive build, but I poisoned him before he was able to really get anything going.  The highlight of this match was in game two, he sided in Combusts, and took out all my early guys.  He even Day of Judgment'ed me when all I had was a lone Etched Champion.  He did that to keep me with no creatures (except twin Nexi) so that he could drop a Thundermaw Hellkite that would not get caught in the DoJ crossfire.  The Hellkite (sadly for my opponent) didn't even see the battlefield because of the Flashfreeze in my hand.




















 Round two was against suicide-black zombies, which just out raced me, resulting in a 0-2 loss.  Now, I love this deck.  Maybe not this particular build, but the archetype in general.  If there was anything I took away from the match, though, it was my biggest misplay of the night.  He Killing Wave'ed for 1 with three Blood Artist on the field (two copies via Phyrexian Metamorph).  I had two creatures, and rather than just paying the two life to keep both of them, I kept one... and promptly lost 3 life for the other one thanks to the Artists -_-.

Round three I lost 0-2 to Red Deck Wins.  He just kept burning my creatures before I could activate Etched Champion's Metalcraft.  That in addition to the mana flood I was in game one, and just out racing me in game two was just the end of me.

Round four was such a disappointment.  Don't get me wrong; I won the match.  Just not how I should have.  I was playing against RG Werewolves (not sure if it was a Wolf Run or not.  I didn't see much in the way of ramp though), and game one I won pretty much outright: bouncing his transformed wolves and crashing with a Porcelain Legionnaire with Tempered Steel out.  Game two, I was not able to keep my Champions metalcrafted long enough to survive against the (what felt like) suite of Ancient Grudges he had for me.  He was two turns away from finishing me off for a game three when my opponent looks at his watch and saws "Awe crap.  I scoop."  Apparently, he had a date and was just forfeiting the match to me.  It felt terrible because that was not how I wanted to win, especially when we were having such a great match.

So, at the end of it, I ended up 2-2, with three packs in prizes (maybe four, but I left before round four was over on the condition that if my ranking went up high enough after everyone reports, I will just get my fourth pack next week).  One contained a Liliana of the Veil.  So hey.  I'm happy.  I have a few things to consider for the next time I run the deck, the biggest of which breaks my heart (ironically).  Venser has not been doing me any good.  On paper he looks great and can do all kinds of stuff with my deck.  In execution though, I haven't cast Venser in any of the eight matches I have played with this deck.  I think it is time for him to go.  We'll see though. 

There you have it.  I think I might possibly get one more standard FNM in with this deck before Return to Ravnica hits and Scars of Mirrodin block (I.e. my entire deck) rotates out.  Speaking of which, as you all know (or at least I am assuming if you are reading this, you know) PAX this past weekend marked the start of RtR previews.  I've seen some really cool things so far (and a few things that pissed me off a little more than they should have), and I think I will be sticking with the Azorius guild in standard as I have from the very beginning.  The question will come down to what kind of deck though? 

I have a quasi-Delver build in mind.  Yes yes... I know I ranted against Delver and that's what made me play the deck you see above.  I did, however, state that I had a build in mind that I would not mind trying.  It's still in the planning stages, but I might give it a try once I see the rest of RtR.  Perhaps I'll have you choose the deck I use.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have some forms I need to fill out and send off to it's honor, Isperia.

-JT

[JT] CGC: Eroding Metal - Budget UW Tempered Steel Deck Discuss

I.  HATE.  Delver of Secrets.  The card is done to death and back in every format that he is legal.  I understand that he is powerful.  Hell!  He even fits in with a play style I really like (hit early and then control the tempo from then on out).  I even have a build in mind with him in it that I wouldn't mind trying out.  However, when it comes right down to it, I just don't think he is fun to play; so I don't!  I prefer limited play, so when I play standard, it's for fun.  If the deck isn't fun, I won't play it.  Two weeks ago I was scrambling to build a standard deck since I didn't know what format FNM would be, and ended up with a UW Delver build that I was just dreading (imagine how happy I was when I found it it was draft week).  I knew I needed to come up with something new to use; which brings me to this week's deck: UW Tempered Steel.

I had a mono-U Grand Architect build that I used a few weeks ago that was honestly one of the most fun decks I had ever piloted.  Why I dismantled it I have no idea.  For the second go around I decided to add in some W and Tempered Steel.  Here is the build I took to FNM tonight:

Creatures (21): 
Treasure Mage x2 
Spined Thopter x4 
Porcelain Legionnaire x3 
Grand Architect x4 
Etched Champion x4  
Steel Hellkite x2 
Myr Battlesphere x2

Planeswalker (2): 
Venser, the Sojourner x2

Spells (15): 
Vapor Snag x4 
Dispatch x4 
Tempered Steel x4 
Blue Sun's Zenith x2 
Unwinding Clock x1

Lands (22): 
Seachrome Coast x4 
Glacial Fortress x4 
Buried Ruin x3
Island x11

Side (15):  
Stoic Rebuttal x2 
Oblivion Ring x2 
Flashfreeze x2 
Celestial Purge x2 
Sword of Body and Mind
Redirect x2 
Staff of Nin x2 
Tormod's Crypt x2

As the title of this post suggest, it is a budget build.  Since I only play standard for fun, I don't want to dump a lot of money into high priced cards.  If I can get my hands on them through trading, then sure; I will use it, but I will not go out of my way for them.  That's why there are no Wurmcoil Engines or Swords besides the BaM in the side (although having three Etched Champions on the field, each with a different sword, sounds SO bad ass when I imagine the image).

One of the things I love about this deck is it utilizes my favorite planeswalker, Venser, for a few shenanigans with Treasure Mage and Myr Battlesphere.  This is a very big point for me when it comes to play this deck.  With rotation coming up soon, this is the last time I will get to use these cards in standard.  I'm 99% sure this will be my deck until rotation.  I just love it that much, but how did it perform?



IT GOT DESTROYED!!!! XD  Haha.  In round 1, I made a few misplays and ended up losing to a 5-color re-animator.   Round 2 I faced Wolf Run Ramp and just could not get out my acceleration before he did.  Round 3 I had the bye, and round 4 I just got overwhelmed by BR Vamps.  Obviously I am going back to the drawing board on this one.

Here are my thoughts going into the adjustments...

1)  I might remove the Tempered Steel's all together.  This will free up room for a few other artifacts.  Perhaps a few Phyrexian Metamoph's if I can get a hold of them.  I might try and keep the W in the deck without the Steel's anyway for Venser and Dispatch.

-4 Tempered Steel
+2 Phyrexian Metamoprh
+2 Oblivion Ring

maybe?  This also allows for more Venser shenaniganery, and honestly, who doesn't like that?

2) The Blue Sun's Zenith's do not feel like enough draw power by themselves.  I will be trying to get up to four copies of Riddlesmith into the deck.  They were there in the mono-U version, and you can just rifle through your deck with it.  The Buried Ruins help get back any artifacts you loot away as well.

3) I have NO turn 1 play.  Vedalken Certarch or Spellbombs would change this.  The Certarch helps with the Grand Architect as well.  Turn 3 Steel Hellkite sounds DELICIOUS!  Memnite's would also help this as well.

There are other things, but those are the first three points I want to tackle.

So there you have it.  This was my Tempered Steel version 1.0.  Once I make changes and get another chance to test it, I will bring you another CGC with version 2.0.  I think I am going to make this a little project and see just how far I can bring this deck before it rotates out.  Naturally I'll bring you guys along for the ride.  I would LOVE to hear your thoughts and suggestions.  Nothing gets me more amped up than having really good discussions about decks, so please, give me every critique and criticism you have on this.

Now if you'll excuse me,  I need to go and work on adapting this into an EDH deck as well...

...What's that you say?  How can I make this into an EDH deck without a legendary creature (without using Hanna, Ship's Navigator)?  Well I am not going to tell you, but I will say to watch out later this week for a new project I am tackling for the CGC where I can turn this Tempered Steel deck into an EDH deck.  I'll give you a little hint how this is possible though...

-JT


*All card arts from Gatherer.



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