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Gatecrash Brews

“New Shockduals, New Decks”

I’ve been patiently waiting for Gatecrash ever since Return to Ravnica was confirmed to have shocklands.

Boros Humans

Ever since winning a draft on the back of double [card]Kessig Malcontents[/card] and a [card]Restoration Angel[/card] in an aggressive Boros Humans deck, I’ve been looking for the opportunity to channel my inner Rietzl. With the imminent printing of [card]Sacred Foundry[/card], that day might finally be here. Take a look at the following starting point:

[Deck title=”Boros Humans by Jay Lansdaal”]

[Creatures]
*4 Champion of the Parish
*4 Boros Elite
*3 Lightning Mauler
*4 Precinct Captain
*3 Kessig Malcontents
*2 Frontline Medic
*3 Silverblade Paladin
*2 Restoration Angel
[/Creatures]
[Spells]
*3 Boros Charm
*4 Gather the Townsfolk
*2 Faith’s Shield
*2 Gideon, Champion of Justice
*1 Aurelia’s Fury
[/Spells]
[Land]
*3 Cavern of Souls
*4 Clifftop Retreat
*3 Mountain
*8 Plains
*4 Sacred Foundry
*1 Slayers’ Stronghold
[/Land]
[Sideboard]
*1 Slayers’ Stronghold
*3 Rest in Peace
*2 Knight of Glory
*2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
*1 Frontline Medic
*1 Restoration Angel
*2 Zealous Conscripts
*1 Angelic Overseer
*2 Bonfire of the Damned

[/Sideboard]
[/Deck]

Doesn’t that get you excited? [card]Silverblade Paladin[/card] bonding with Gideon (activate first, then play the Paladin) over a cup of white-hot fury? [card]Kessig Malcontents[/card] burning opponents for five plus another five when [card]Restoration Angel[/card] comes out to play? Fried opponents everywhere!

In previous Human decks, [card]Champion of the Parish[/card] was frequently the best card in the deck. The difference between hands with a turn-one Champion and hands without was enormous. With a Champion, you were almost unbeatable on the play (as it was often followed by a [card]Gather the Townsfolk[/card] or [card]Mayor of Avabruck[/card], making it a [card]Wild Nacatl[/card] with growing potential), and still very hard to stop on the draw.

The problem was that you only had four Champions. [card]Doomed Traveler[/card] was doomed to deal a maximum of one damage per turn, and [card]Dryad Militant[/card] isn’t a human, so we had to turn to [card]Avacyn’s Pilgrim[/card], whose acceleration could make up for the drop in power. This made us have to play more green sources than we really wanted, though.

Thankfully, those days are over. Now, we have Boros Elite, which, while it is no [card]Champion of the Parish[/card], does a reasonable impression when combined with a [card]Gather the Townsfolk[/card] or a turn-two [card]Lightning Mauler[/card] followed by any creature the turn after. It is a little more fragile, as removal on your other creatures shrinks him, but, hey, when wasn’t removal good against creatures? If he was a Champion, that removal spell would’ve killed the Parish also, cutting your clock significantly.

Other Gatecrash inclusions are Gideon, Champion of Justice; Aurelia’s Fury; Boros Charm; and everyone’s favorite anti-[card]Syncopate[/card] tech: (“I didn’t thinksopate!” – Reuben Bresler) Frontline Medic. Gideon, Boros Charm and Medic help you survive against a plethora of removal and sweepers, letting the Legion stomp on your opponent regardless of halt orders from the Azorius lawmakers. Their verdict means nothing when a charming Boros gal or guy is the one who has to enforce it!

All these anti-removal options also mean that we can move [card]Thalia, Guardian of Thraben[/card], to the sideboard, as she doesn’t play very nice with our more expensive spells like Aurelia’s Fury. Aurelia’s Fury is an interesting card; part [card]Orim’s Chant[/card], part [card]Fireball[/card], and part [card]Feeling of Dread[/card], this all-purpose spell probably deserves more slots in the deck, but it is a tad expensive. For now I’ll start testing with just one.

Gruul Beatdown

Another deck that I have shelved until Gatecrash comes out is the following one:

[Deck title= “Gruul Beatdown by Jay Lansdaal”]

[Creatures]
*4 Arbor Elf
*4 Avacyn’s Pilgrim
*3 Flinthoof Boar
*4 Strangleroot Geist
*3 Borderland Ranger
*2 Huntmaster of the Fells
*2 Ghor-Clan Rampager
*3 Wolfir Silverheart
*2 Zealous Conscripts
[/Creatures]
[Spells]
*3 Mizzium Mortars
*1 Domri Rade
*2 Garruk Relentless
*3 Bonfire of the Damned
[/Spells]
[Lands]
*8 Forest
*4 Kessig Wolf Run
*4 Mountain
*4 Rootbound Crag
*4 Stomping Grounds
[/Lands]
[Sideboard]
*4 Pillar of Flame
*2 Hellraiser Goblin
*2 Triumph of Ferocity
*1 Huntmaster of the Fells
*1 Acidic Slime
*1 Silklash Spider
*2 Thragtusk
*1 Zealous Conscripts
*1 Devil’s Play
[/Sideboard]
[/Deck]

This deck was already very playable and did a decent job of crushing opponents with [card]Kessig Wolf Run[/card]. The issue was always the manabase. You had to mull a lot of hands because your [card]Arbor Elf[/card] did nothing or because of a lack of red mana and no [card]Borderland Ranger[/card] in your hand (but those few red spells were all present, you can count on that). Cutting down on [card]Kessig Wolf Run[/card] was not an option but neither was cutting basics. It didn’t work consistently—but when it did work, oh boy! So consider me thrilled with the inclusion of [card]Stomping Ground[/card]s: we go up on both green and red sources, and we get to keep all our [card]Kessig Wolf Run[/card]s!

Besides [card]Stomping Ground[/card]s, I included Ghor-Clan Rampager, an aggressively costed pump spell that can be drawn by our other maindeck Gatecrash inclusion, Domri Rade.

Domri Rade is an interesting planeswalker. He should be able to draw you a card a little less than 50% of the time, and like Garruk, it can function as a removal spell in a pinch. Also, if you look at the top of the deck and find one of your red burn spells, it gives you some valuable information, so make sure you activate this ability in your first main phase.

In the sideboard, we have two Hellraiser Goblins. Against decks with few creatures, you will want to send your team in every time regardless, and giving all your creatures haste is a fantastic ability. Remember that you can always tap your mana dorks before combat if you don’t want to send those in, and if you wait to play a guy after combat, it obviously won’t have to attack either.

I’m not certain [card]Flinthoof Boar[/card] has what it takes with only eight mountains and some [card]Borderland Ranger[/card]s, so those might have to become [card]Wolfir Avenger[/card]s, which makes you even better against cards like [card]Supreme Verdict[/card]. Perhaps Gruul Keyrune might even be good, as this deck can always use mana. I’m afraid the two toughness makes this less playable than I’d like, though.

Dimir Delver

Now, for those of you who are not all that into red aggressive strategies, I have another brew. Ever since playing with Staticaster Jund in Standard and the BUG deck in Modern, [card]Snapcaster Mage[/card] + discard spell has been one of my favorite things to do. Playing a bunch of discard spells and then a couple value creatures lets you take away an opponent’s relevant action and grind through the rest. It is also a way to punish all these aggro and midrange decks with a bunch of four- and five-drops. Without [card]Watery Grave[/card], though, the mana just didn’t support early black discard into blue-mana discard.

Here’s something we could try now:

[Deck title= “Dimir Delver by Jay Lansdaal”]

[Creatures]
*4 Delver of Secrets
*4 Invisible Stalker
*4 Snapcaster Mage
[/Creatures]
[Spells]
*3 Appetite for Brains
*1 Cremate
*2 Duress
*4 Thought Scour
*1 Tragic Slip
*2 Unsummon
*4 Dimir Charm
*1 Essence Scatter
*1 Negate
*2 Runechanter’s Pike
*2 Ultimate Price

*2 Liliana of the Veil
*2 Call of the Nightwing
[/Spells]
[Lands]
*2 Cavern of Souls
*4 Drowned Catacomb
*6 Island
*5 Swamp
*4 Watery Grave
[/Lands]
[Sideboard]
*2 Cremate
*2 Dispel
*1 Duress
*2 Mizzium Skin
*1 Tragic Slip
*1 Negate
*2 Spectral Flight
*2 Tribute to Hunger
*1 Liliana of the Veil
*1 Call of the Nightwing
[/Sideboard]
[/Deck]

This might look like a pile of random instants and sorceries, but that’s mostly because we don’t know what the metagame is going to look like. Are we trying to kill [card]Falkenrath Aristocrat[/card]s and [card]Predator Ooze[/card]s with [card]Tragic Slip[/card], Huntmasters and Syndic of Tithes with Dimir Charm, or [card]Thundermaw Hellkite[/card]s and [card]Restoration Angel[/card]s with [card]Ultimate Price[/card]?

This deck plays like the old Delver decks, but instead of countering anything relevant the opponent has, we make him discard it. With [card]Cavern of Souls[/card] around, this is a bit more reliable. In the mean time, we bounce or kill whatever our opponent does get onto the board, while killing him with Pike-equipped [card]Invisible Stalker[/card]s or [card]Delver of Secrets[/card].

New cards that I included besides [card]Watery Grave[/card] are Call of the Nightwing and Dimir Charm. Call of the Nightwing, in combination with an [card]Invisible Stalker[/card], is like a [card]Bitterblossom[/card] that makes your opponent lose life, giving you all the chump blockers you need or providing a slowly growing, flying attack force. Dimir Charm will most often be used to set up our [card]Delver of Secrets[/card] or kill a creature, but it might counter a [card]Terminus[/card] here and there too.

Ghosts, Angels, and Zombies

The last decks I want to show you guys are first drafts that use Obzedat, Ghost Council. Obzedat is a hard-to-kill finisher, which can fit both in aggressive decks as a curve topper and in a control deck as the finisher of choice. I am not sure if the mana can support Obzedat in an aggressive strategy, but if it can, the deck might look something like this:

[Deck title= “GAZ (Ghosts, Angels, and Zombies) by Jay Lansdaal”]

[Creatures]
*4 Gravecrawler
*4 Diregraf Ghoul
*3 Thrull Parasite
*4 Syndic of Tithes
*4 Geralf’s Messenger
*2 Frontline Medic
*3 Restoration Angel
*2 Sublime Archangel
*3 Obzedat, Ghost Council
[/Creatures]
[Spells]
*1 Tragic Slip
*3 Victim of Night
*2 Gideon, Champion of Justice
[/Spells]
[Lands]
*4 Cavern of Souls
*4 Godless Shrine
*4 Isolated Chapel
*4 Orzhov Guildgate
*1 Plains
*7 Swamp
[/Lands]
[Sideboard]
*3 Appetite for Brains
*2 Tragic Slip
*3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
*1 Frontline Medic
*1 Intrepid Hero
*2 Oblivion Ring
*3 Vampire Nighthawk
[/Sideboard]
[/Deck]

This deck is modeled after the current BR Dragon Zombie strategies, with Obzedat taking the place of [card]Thundermaw Hellkite[/card], and the Angels and Gideon filling in for [card]Hellrider[/card]s and [card]Falkenrath Aristocrat[/card]. We get to use the Orzhov extort ability off of Syndic of Tithes and Thrull Parasite, which also happen to combine very well with [card]Geralf’s Messenger[/card]. Extort seems very good here; because of the weird mana “curve” these Zombie decks have, extort can fill some gaps and also deal the last few points in the late game.

This deck will also finally let us reliably blink [card]Geralf’s Messenger[/card] with a [card]Restoration Angel[/card], which everybody has been dreaming about ever since [card]Birthing Pod[/card] Zombies was a deck.

Another attempt at an Obzedat deck would be this one:

[Deck title= “Dark Realms Control by Jay Lansdaal”]

[Creatures]
*3 Vampire Nighthawk
*1 Alms Beast
*2 Obzedat, Ghost Council
[/Creatures]
[Spells]
*3 Tragic Slip
*4 Sign in Blood
*2 Ultimate Price
*1 Victim of Night
*2 Oblivion Ring
*3 Orzhov Keyrune
*1 Gideon, Champion of Justice
*4 Liliana of the Dark Realms
*4 Mutilate
*2 Curse of Death’s Hold
*3 Staff of Nin
*1 Rakdos’s Return
[/Spells]
[Lands]
*4 Blood Crypt
*4 Godless Shrine
*4 Isolated Chapel
*1 Orzhov Guildgate
*11 Swamp
[/Lands]
[Sideboard]
*3 Appetite for Brains
*2 Basilica Guards
*2 Intrepid Hero
*1 Oblivion Ring
*1 Vampire Nighthawk
*1 Alms Beast
*3 Slaughter Games
*2 Rakdos’s Return
[/Sideboard]
[/Deck]

Based on Micheal Flores’s Liliana Control deck, this deck uses Obzedat as its hard-to-kill finisher. We still have [card]Blood Crypt[/card]s main to help with the sideboarded games against control decks. While we might not have [card]Farseek[/card]s, we have [card]Liliana of the Dark Realms[/card] to fetch them out of our deck too.

This deck aims to kill all the opposing creatures, and then sweep in for the kill with Obzedat, Gideon, or Alms Beast. If you opponent doesn’t have any creatures (left), this four-mana 6/6 is lethal in a few hits. Combined with a [card]Sign in Blood[/card], he kills in three turns. You can also fetch a [card]Blood Crypt[/card] before ultimating Liliana to burn your opponent out with the one-of [card]Rakdos’s Return[/card].

After sideboard, Basilica Guard combines with your Nighthawks to keep aggressive opponents at bay while gaining you life, and the extra [card]Rakdos’s Return[/card]s and [card]Slaughter Games[/card] try to cripple your control opponents.

I hope these decks give you some ideas to start brewing with. To the Simic mages: don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten you, but I need some more time before I can show you what this Simic mage is brewing!

Good luck and have fun,

Jay Lansdaal
iLansdaal on Twitter and MTGO

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