2005)

Hello again my fellow Magic dorks. I’m back with another deck for everyone to check out. This is one of those rares decks I build that can be used in Chaos games just as well as in standard duels. This is my Blocking Nazi deck (No blocks for you! Come back one year!). Can you figure out the basic idea? I recently completely revamped the deck, so I’m going to give you both versions, before and after, and you tell me what you think. Here’s the original:

Creatures
2: Escape Artist
1: Ferropede
4: Cephalid Pathmage
3: Phantom Warrior
3: Covert Operative
1: Tornado Elemental
2: Thorn Elemental
2: Tidal Kraken

Pump
4: Giant Growth
4: Echoing Courage
1: Might of Oaks
1: Stand Together
1: Decree of Savagery
1: Sword of Fire and Ice

Utility
3: Isochron Scepter
2: Teferi’s Puzzle Box
2: Moment’s Peace
1: Coastal Piracy
2: Counterspell
2: Naturalize

Land
11: Forest
11: Island

The original idea for the deck centered on the instant-speed creature pump and creatures that couldn’t be blocked. Put a Giant Growth on a Stick for fun and profit. Throw down 2 Cephalid Pathmages and put Echoing Courage on the Stick for dirty fun. To insure I had lots of instants and land in hand, I threw in the Puzzle Boxes for cycling through the deck. There were also other utility spells thrown in for use with the Scepter if necessary – Moment’s Peace, Counterspell, and Naturalize. The Might of Oaks was a nice sudden kill, as was the Decree. On the creature side of things, I had unblockable creatures ranging from teeny-tiny little dudes to the ones that make my opponents fall all over themselves to eliminate. There’s something about a Thorn Elemental that just makes people uncomfortable, even though he’s not exactly unblockable. The Tornado Elemental was there for flying control and more pseudo-unblockability.

The main problem with this deck was consistency. Sometimes it would kill and kill beautifully. Attacking with a weenie Escape Artist (1/1) and transforming him into the Houdini Colossus with 2 Giant Growths and a Might of Oaks (14/14) just makes me all warm and fuzzy inside. Other times it would just kinda sit there and look like a small kitten trying to be menacing. It just didn’t work. If I couldn’t get a Scepter or a Puzzle Box, the deck would just pick away at opponents’ life totals until they realized I was there and proceeded to swat me down like an annoying fly. This all changed when I opened my box of Betrayers and saw 2 cards. Shuko, the Bonesplitter’s little brother, caused my brain to tingle a little bit. Umezawa’s Jitte caused my head to explode with possibilities. Here was an equipment that provided FREE creature pump! After brainstorming for a few minutes (and going through a bunch of cards to see what would work) this is what I came up with:

Creatures
1: Metathran Soldier
2: Escape Artist
2: Ferropede
3: Cephalid Pathmage
3: Phantom Warrior
2: Covert Operative
2: Tornado Elemental
2: Thorn Elemental
2: Tidal Kraken
1: Sakiko, Mother of Summer
1: Genesis
2: Forgotten Ancient

Pump
1: Rancor
1: Decree of Savagery
1: Sword of Fire and Ice
1: Sword of Light and Shadow
2: Shuko
2: Bonesplitter
1: Cranial Plating
1: Umezawa’s Jitte
1: Loxodon Warhammer
1: Banshee’s Blade
1: Fireshrieker

Utility
2: Moment’s Peace
2: Coastal Piracy
1: Reminisce
1: Sway of the Stars

Land
11: Forest
11: Island

This new deck works amazingly better and generally faster than the original. Instead of relying on instant-speed until-end-of-turn pump, I just decided to go for the pseudo-permanent pump of equipment, Rancor, and +1/+1 counters. Now, instead of throwing mana into pumping up my guys every single turn, I can throw that mana into putting down new unblockable creatures or equipment. And now, a quick explanation of my choices (the main one being that it’s what I had available):

Shuko and Bonesplitter – nice and cheap and effective

Cranial Plating – guaranteed to be at least a Shuko or Bonesplitter, probably more

Swords, Banshee’s Blade, Warhammer – Do you even need to ask? With their damage triggers, they do great things

Umezawa’s Jitte – Talk about all purpose! This thing provides basically FREE creature pump, creature elimination, and even a touch of life gain. How can you not like it?

Fireshrieker – effectively double any creature’s power, plus get double duty out of the Swords, Warhammers, Banshee’s Blades, and Jittes

Forgotten Ancient – Mr. Babycakes is ridiculous here. Free +1/+1 counters on any creature you want? Make your Thorn Elemental even more vicious or your Metathran Soldier an actual threat, whatever you like.

So the new plan is simple. Throw out unblockable creatures, throw out equipment, attach to creatures, attack. Since this deck is no longer centered on instants, the Puzzle boxes are gone. Coastal Piracy now lets me dig for the cards I need. The really fun new twist is the addition of Sakiko, Mother of Summer. Once she’s in play, you can basically do anything you want after your attack for virtually free (depending on the size of your attack force). You can move around equipment, play your big nasties, or hard cast that Decree of Savagery after a suitably large attack. It kind of defeats the purpose of the Decree being an instant, but you get my point. She can also be used to float enough mana to cast a Sway the Stars and have mana left over to cast any creatures you may get in your new opening hand.

There is one other trick available. Invariably, in a big multiplayer Chaos game of Magic, someone will end up with a great big nasty thing that they want to use to crush someone’s skull. What if you had the ability “Sacrifice a creature: Target player loses the game”? Well, when the huge creature shows up, you actually have it. The Cephalid Pathmage can be sacrificed to make said scary creature unblockable once the attack has been declared. Then if you’re really dirty you’ll roll over at the guy who just killed the hapless bystander and destroy his face with lots of well-equipped invisible guys.

As for the rest of the deck, I decided to throw in some recursion since I really didn’t have that many creatures available. Genesis can be used as a blocker or even an attacker to get him in the graveyard, and then you can begin bringing back one creature a turn for as long as you can keep it up. In case some of your more valuable equipments and whatnot get trashed, you can always Reminisce and get them back at some point. Moment’s Peace is there to save your skin, as always.

I hope you enjoyed this little slice of my brain. This deck has always been fun to play, whether it worked or not, so I can’t wait to get more playing time in on the new version. If you have any ideas or comments, check out the forum link at the bottom of the page. Until next time, enjoy creating a Houdini Colossus or two!

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