==IN THIS ISSUE...==
NJ Regionals: Where you should be this weekend!
Elder Dragon Highlander Tips: Deckbuilding tips, with guest contributor Vic Naqvi.
Magic's Big Changes: Mythic rares, smaller sets, precon-replacements, and planeswalkers in Alara!
The Islandhome Blog: Archives of all your favorite past issues! Relive all your favorite articles!
==THIS WEEK'S SCHEDULE==
Saturday: FNC Standard @ 1 PM
Saturday: NJ Regionals
==LAST WEEK==
==ELDER DRAGON HIGHLANDER TIPS==
One of the biggest myths about EDH is that you need every dual land under the sun in order to play. True, in a four or five color deck, you'll need a lot of mana fixing, and the best fixing will come from old-school and Ravnica dual lands. However, since EDH is a slower format and all nonbasic lands are restricted by default, dual lands aren't as important. Basic lands should actually take up a good portion of your manabase anyway, and any land that fixes mana will do. There's the comes-into-play-tapped duals from Invasion/8th Edition and Coldsnap, the tribal duals from Lorwyn, the bouncelands from Ravnica block, the Future Sight duals, the Shadowmoor filter-lands, and so on, all of which cost under $10!
Now for the fun stuff: Namely, the unfun stuff. You see, EDH is a format that's primarily about having fun. With the entire Vintage cardpool at your disposal, it's easy to build an abusive deck, even when every card is restricted. So there are some "rules of conduct" that all good EDH players follow. One of the biggest ones is "no mass land destruction". EDH is a format all about big spells with big effects, and it's also a much slower format than any other, so building up a board for ten turns only to lose everything to something like an Obliterate isn't fun. Mass LD spells aren't banned because it's hard to quantify what exactly is a "mass LD spell". Crucible of Worlds is banned in EDH specifically to discourage land destruction. Abusing Sundering Titan with things like Kiki-Jiki or Momentary Blink is frowned upon as well.
There are four cards that go in almost every EDH deck without question, no matter what the colors: Sol Ring, Sensei's Divining Top, Oblivion Stone, and Nevinyrral's Disk. I happen to know that Brothers Grim has a whole stack of Disks and Oblivion Stones for around $5 each (give or take), certainly a worthwhile investment to pick up one or two if you plan on playing EDH!
Infinite combos are another thing most players don't like. Painter's Servant and Grindstone is a fun combo that's bound to win a few Legacy and Vintage tournaments, but in EDH... not so fun. You want to show off your deck and your play skills, not win as quickly as possible. That's not to say all combos are bad! Remember at Worlds when Mark Rosewater smashed some kid for thousands of damage with a Chameleon Colossus? That's the kind of wacky "infinite" combos that are fun, and encouraged!
And here's a special treat for readers of Islandhome - our first guest article! Vic Naqvi is a L1 judge from Canada who introduced me to Elder Dragon Highlander, and like I mentioned last week, is always talking about his latest decks and giving me recaps of games he's played. I asked him to write something about deckbuilding tips for EDH newbies.
So you've been exposed to EDH and you're dying to make a deck. But before you go ahead and start doing something you've never done – going to the game store and BUYING junk rares, here's a few tips from a veteran EDH player on some things you should think about before building your deck.
What's my theme?
There's a huge impulse to just throw every fun/good card you have into your collection but sometimes you will find that it just doesn't work – your deck doesn't seem to have the 'glue' to hold it together.
Writers, and other creative types, often comment that having restrictions/guidelines placed on them serves to increase their creativity. EDH certainly lends to that- you're already restricted by the color(s) of your general- but figuring out what sort of theme/function your deck wants to do goes a long way towards putting together cards that work in harmony. One of the most popular themes in EDH is 'recursion' – it's also an important component of EDH deckbuilding, which I'll touch on later. Other themes could be 'enchantments', 'tokens', 'lots of comes into play effects', et cetera. Sometimes your general will point you in the right direction – Captain Sisay and Stonebrow are some of the most obvious examples.
Card advantage, card advantage, card advantage
EDH games tend to go long. Even those decks that specialize on beatdown (and yes it can be done) still have to take a single opponent to 0 from 40 life. Because of this, it simply isn't enough to be able to rely on the first 10-15 cards off your deck. You'll need a way to ensure that you're seeing and utilizing more of your cards as EDH games tend to turn into wars of attrition. Cards you thought you dealt with will somehow find their way back to play and terrorize you again.
It's not just card draw that you need to concern yourself with; even the monored decks that have to rely on a single Skullclamp and Jayemdae Tomes can find other avenues towards squeezing out the most from your cards. Comes-into-play effects like Flametongue Kavu, Duplicant, and Indrik Stomphowler give you a threat and an answer all in one package. Board sweepers like Oblivion Stone, Damnnation (or the infinitely better Decree of Pain) run rampant over the table, so you'll need to pack ways of refilling your hand or emptying your graveyard!
Recursion
That lynchpin enchantment or artifact that's holding your deck together will most likely be marked for death. Even if you do throw up a field of protection effects, an Oblivion Stone will undo all your hard work. You'll need ways of getting your stuff back.
Green has it the easiest with the must-include Eternal Witness, along with Genesis, Regrowth, Restock, Recollect, and other Re-cards. Recurring Nightmare in Black has been banned but by no means are you left wanting for reanimation, as Phyrexian Reclamation, Corpse Dance, Coffin Queen, Doomed Necromancer and Oversold Cemetery are all excellent picks. White's no slouch in the recursion department either, with Karmic Guide a perennial favorite, along with the new kid on the block Reveillark. Treasure Hunter and Auramancer let you get back the non-creature stuff.
Blue and Red, well you'll have to dig a little deeper to find recursion but it's hiding in there somewhere. Half the fun of EDH deckbuilding is the discovery of new niche cards.
Interactivity
Putting in those powerful creatures, sorceries and artifacts are all good and well, but when the last piece of your opponent's infinite life/damage/creature combo clicks into place and you're staring at your fist full of Wraths and Fireballs you'll wish you had some instants.
Don't skimp on this. Putting Vedalken Orrery in your deck is a good start, but it's only 1 card, and it helps to be able to Sudden Death an opponent's Kiki-Jiki before it gets to go off with a Pestermite in play.
DO NOT ignore the graveyard either. As mentioned before, recursion is a big stategy in this format, and you will get Yosei or Mindslaver locked out of the blue. Stonecloaker, Withered Wretch, and Nezumi Graverobber are all excellent utility cards. Loaming Shaman and Primal Command get the job done in green. Again, red and blue will have to look towards artifacts like Phyrexian Furnace and Scrabbling Claws for their graveyard control.
Mana is not an afterthought
There's a huge impulse when your deck is near completion to 'just squeeze in one more card' and cut an extra two or three land. Don't do this. Your manabase is very important in EDH, more so than in 60 card constructed. You will get left behind very quickly especially with the popularity of green in this format. To that end, try to have at least 45 mana sources in your deck. 38 lands and 7 pieces of acceleration is a fine way to break it down, but it all depends on when your deck is doing what – do you want to accelerate to from 2 to 4 or 3 to 5? The casting cost of your general and its importance in your deck's strategy is a big contributing factor towards this. Since EDH is top-heavy you'll also want to ensure that you're hitting your first 5 land drops at the least.
So what's the metagame going to be like at Regionals? Elves, Faeries, Merfolk, and Reveillark will certainly be the most popular choices, probably in close to that order as well. The five-color "Quick N' Toast" deck will be popular too, since it's new and exciting... but like most new and exciting decks, half the people who bring it to Regionals won't know how to play it. My advice would be to stick with a deck, or at least an archetype, you know well. Have you been performing well with a deck at local standard tournaments? Well then there's no reason to change it, except for a few metagame choices, especially in the sideboard. Big tournaments are the wrong time to start playing a new deck!
I'll be judging Regionals, not playing in it (not that it'll make any less people ask me what deck I'm playing) so most of my Regionals advice is judge-related stuff.
- Get there early so you can fill out a decklist without rushing. Filling out a decklist incorrectly such as forgetting a card carries a game loss penalty, so you don't want to be scrambling to do it last minute!
- Have all the cards for your deck with you! I see lots of players showing up at big events missing vital cards for their deck, and then buying them from vendors or trading for them from other players at way too high prices. Don't get ripped off, bring your cards with you!
- Play smart - don't forget you're playing in "the big leagues", not a local tournament. While most things these days are Cautions at Regular REL, Regionals is a Competitive level event. Drawing Extra Cards is the big one, and it's a Game Loss at Regionals.
- Check your sleeves! At a big tournament, especially in the NY/NJ area, having any kind of art on your sleeves is a bad idea. Head judges are allowed to disallow sleeves at their discretion, and I happen to know that the L3 judge who will most likely be the HJ of the NJ Regionals doesn't like sleeves with any markings on the back. Plain-colored sleeves are the best bet; I recommend either KMCs (which should be purchasable from vendors at the event) or Dragonshields (ditto, and are also available at Brothers Grim). Buying new sleeves to play in a big tournament is always a good idea, and when you do buy them, make sure they don't have any defects or anything that would make them marked.
- Keep your belongings with you at all times! Looking away from your trade binder, even for a few seconds, can be disasterous. Sadly card theft at big tournaments is an issue, but if you keep your bags and such in your sight at all times, you'll be safe.
P.S. - If anyone wants to go to Regionals and doesn't have a ride, I'm looking for one or two more people to carpool with! We'll be leaving from FNC at about 6:30 AM, so you'll have to wake up early on a Saturday, but the intensity will be worth it! You will have to pay for part of the gas and tolls, of course.
The first big change is that there's a new level of rarity called "Mythic". Those of you playing back in Time Spiral might remember the "Timeshifted" rarity which included cards from older sets, reprinted so they were Standard legal again. Mythic rares won't be in every pack like Timeshifted cards were, though - they'll be in approximately one out of every eight packs. Wizards has promised these mythic rares won't be "staple" rares like duals or powerful tournament-worthy cards though, for the most part. Instead they'll be things like planeswalkers (yes, Shards of Alara is confirmed to have at least one planeswalker), legendary creatures, and so on. Regular rares are going to be more common than they used to be, and mythic rares probably won't be as hard to find as they sound.
Sets are going to be smaller too. Shards of Alara is a big set, but it'll only have 229 cards. Lorwyn had 281! Wizards wants fewer cards so that players aren't overwhelmed by a massive cardpool in Standard, especially with four sets being released every year. Even 11th Edition will only have about 229 cards in it, the smallest of any core set ever!
Finally, preconstructed decks aren't going to be the same anymore. Instead of the usual 60-card deck and a foil basic land, they'll have 40 cards, a foil rare, and a booster pack. The idea is that new players will buy one of these and use it as a basis for building their own deck instead of playing with what they're given. The hilarity of buying a precon and playing with it in a tournament won't be there anymore, but it'll get new players used to building a deck instead of playing with a premade list... and that can only be a good thing.
==RULES CORNER==
A. Yes you can. Understanding priority is tricky, but the key is that both players have to pass priority without taking any action for a step to end. Saying "Declare attackers?" means "I'm moving to my Beginning of Combat Step and passing priority to you." If your opponent takes no action, you move to your Declare Attackers step, where you immediately declare and tap your attacking creatures before you get priority again. But your opponent did take an action - he played a Cryptic Command! He passes priority, you pass priority, and the Command resolves, tapping your creatures, and then you (being the active player) get priority. You can then activate your Treetop Villages and attack with them.
Q. There's an instant and a land (not the same card) in each graveyard, so my opponent's Tarmogoyf is a 2/3. If I hit it with a Nameless Inversion, why doesn't it die?
A. It's difficult to understand why a 2/3 creature that gets +3/-3 doesn't die unless you know when exactly state-based effects are checked. Once Nameless Inversion starts resolving, the Goyf gets +3/-3 and becomes a 5/0. However, state-based effects - for example the one that says a creature with less than 1 toughness is put into its owner's graveyard - don't check until a player would get priority. But no one has priority, since the Nameless Inversion is still resolving. So as the last part of the spell resolving, Nameless Inversion is put into its owner's graveyard. Tarmogoyf now sees a Tribal spell in the graveyard and has its power and toughness increased by 1, so it's a 6/1. Then state-based effects are checked, and since the Goyf has more than 0 toughness, it sticks around to beat face. Interestingly, the only time a Nameless Inversion will kill a Tarmogoyf is when nothing else is in a graveyard.
Q. Can I do anything on my turn before I untap?
A. Questions regarding doing things during the untap step have been trickling in more than usual. The answer to all of them is that players can't play anything during the untap step; the only things that happens during that step are things phasing in and out and untapping permanents. Even if an ability were to trigger during the untap step (such as Hollowsage), those triggered abilities wait until the next time a player would get priority - usually the upkeep step - to be put onto the stack.
==THE ISLANDHOME BLOG==
==UPCOMING EVENTS==
Gray Matter is hosting the regionals for our area in the basement of St. Matthew the Apostle church in Edison, NJ. The format is Standard constructed, and I'll have more details as I hear about them. I'll be judging it, so I'll find out ahead of time what's going to happen with Grim and FNC that weekend. Directions can be found here, but don't use Google Maps - you WILL get lost.
June 7th - August 31st: PTQ Season for PT Berlin
The next PTQ season starts this summer, and it's going to be Lorwyn Block Constructed! Lorwyn block will consist of Lorwyn, Morningtide, and Shadowmoor. Eventide won't be available during the beginning of the PTQ season, but will be legal before it ends.
PTQs in our general area this season:
- 6/21 - Philadelphia, PA
- 6/28 - Edison, NJ
- 8/9 - Philadelphia, PA
- 8/16 - New York, NY
- 8/30 - Edison, NJ
- 8/30 - Hartford, CT
- 8/31 - Rochester, NY
A Post-Regionals Report
More EDH stuff!
Another interview (probably).
Brothers Grim
1244 Middle Country Rd.
Selden, NY 11784
Phone: 698-2805
Website: www.brgim.com
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Phone: 470-7984
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