Breaking Block: Spoiling the Party with Ponza

This article was originally posted at TheStarkingtonPost.com. Thanks to Bill Stark for the exposure and the opportunity to bring the post back home. If you don’t know, Bill’s site is one of the best sources on line for news stories and editorial content about Magic.

Just had a quick deck idea I wanted to roll around before I got back to following up the previous post. If you read the title of this entry on your way here, you already probably figured out that I’m going to explore a Block Ponza variant. The efficacy of a deck like this depends in part on how much the format slows down and how much (blanked here) mass removal is going to be floating around. That said there’s plenty of excellent burn available, and even a red Wrath (Chain Reaction), providing a Big Red deck with plenty of options.

Breaking Block: Investing in AIG (All-In Green)

In an earlier post, I explored what I thought to be the most important axis of the new Zendikar block format, abundant high-quality mass removal. Today, I’m going to look at what I think is the second most important choke point: explosive mana. There are conservative ways to exercise curve jumping like Everflowing Chalice and Eldrazi Temple, and I looked at them in some of my earliest posts (here and here) because that is where I expect the best decks to settle.

But I’m not going to be conservative today. I’m going to present the most powerful piece of mana-bludgeoning I can devise. The exciting thing is, while I expect some hybrid conservatively-big-mana control deck to be the best performing big-mana deck, I wouldn’t be shocked if some All-in-Green iteration was a major player in the format. Green mana is on steroids this block, both in terms of power and incidental functionality, and the outputs for that mana are also wonderful. I previously noted that much of the green mana is creature based and vulnerable to the format’s mass removal.

The Deep End of the Pool – The Reality of an Eldrazi Endgame

Tonight I spent some time testing the UW control list from the previous post and learned the following:

The slowest, longest long-game axis of the Standard format will not be defined by manlands crashing through on empty boards after control has been established, but by this 6-8 card package: 4 Eldrazi Temple, 1 Eye of Ugin, 1 Ulamog/Kozilek/Emrakul. It’s possible that an extra Eye become necessary as the format adopts the package. It’s possible that you want 2 of the Eldrazi overlords. It’s also probable that the 15-drop becomes the finisher of choice as Path to Exile returns to vogue as the best answer for this Eye powered onslaught.

For Brian Kibler: Testing ‘All is Dust’ Tonight

Rough Draft:

UW Eldrazi Control

3 All is Dust
4 Wall of Omens
4 Everflowing Chalice
3 Treasure Hunt
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Sphinx of Lost Truths
2 Into the Roil
1 Day of Judgment
2 Wall of Denial
1 Martial Coup
1 Kiss of Amesha
1 Hindering Light
2 Negate
1 Mind Control
3 Flash Freeze
1 Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre
2 Path to Exile
4 Eldrazi Temple
1 Eye of Ugin
4 Celestial Colonnade
3 Halimar Depths
2 Sejiri Refuge
2 Marsh Flats
3 Plains
5 Island

Hardcasting Eldrazi

I attended GP Houston this weekend, and even though I only posted a 4-2-1 with Scapeshift Zoo, the juices are flowing again. The next round of relevant tournaments are Standard qualifiers for Pro Tour Amsterdam, so that’s what I’m going to be looking at for the near future.

Coming to the format with fresh eyes (I know Jund is good, but I don’t hate it yet), the first thing that strikes me is how awesome the mana ramp is right now. Saturday, Bdm asked me what officially-spoiled card excited me most. At the time, I said Joraga Treespeaker, but that’s only because I hadn’t seen Kozilek’s Predator yet. I’m pretty comfortable comparing this guy to Garruk Wildspeaker; it offers similar flexibility and slightly better defense, while providing a Veggies effect much more consistently and just a little less explosively. I know he doesn’t come equipped with Overrun, but if that’s the party you’re going to, his three warm bodies are more than welcome. Steve Sadin, in his column at dailymtg.com, predicted heavy block play for this card but was hesitant to vouch for it in standard. Personally, I have no doubts.