Building a Better Bug

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jkarnes

7 February 2013

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Building a Better BUG

Overview

A while ago I put out an article for the community called "Preparation for States." In that article I reviewed every card that I believed would impact the format for standard going into an unknown metagame and having Scars of Mirrodin rotate out.

Surprisingly, I was met with a little bit of hostility for writing the article. People had posted things like, "This is just a giant list of cards. Where's the deck?" Other questions such as, "I thought this would go over deck building and stuff," surfaced as well.

Guess what? Part of building a competitive deck is making (and looking at) the giant list of cards. You don't think Woods, Woo, Vargas, and Chapin DON'T do it, do you? Of course they do. Part of the reason that they make these lists is because it lets them anticipate what's going to be good and what isn't. Take Thatcher Revolt for example. I'm pretty sure that the card gets a 1.5 on a rating of 5 because it's really not that great. It triggers ETB effects... but now it's rated at 2 because it also triggers Batallion.

Revisiting your list is important with each new release because new cards change the value of old cards. Strategies that were once not viable become questionable and possibly good. I'm not going to list all the cards in the format that are making waves in this article, nor am I going to list the new cards that I think will alter the format. This article is about building a championship deck, the process that goes into it, and the end results.

If you're simply looking for a decklist then I implore you: please don't waste your time here. Do not read this article because you will gain nothing from it. This has been written for Magic players who are looking to start building their own decks at the competitive level, not just netdeck and try to win through play. All the points I am bringing up here are applicable at any level of play from kitchen table Magic to the Pro Tour circuit.

The Current State of Standard

Even though Gatecrash has released we aren't going to scrap existing archetypes and trends. New concepts don't usually jump out in the first two weeks after release... aggro decks jump out in the first two weeks. Our current standard is a little different though.

We can be very sure that the current trend of playing Midrange style decks will continue. Skullcrack is a great card for disrupting the trend of Thragtusk... but unless you're holding more than one, the Restoration Angel antics will still put you far behind as the rush-aggro deck. I don't expect the trend of playing Thragtusks to change just because Skullcrack will be making its way into Red decks.

Jund hasn't been making a lot of 1st and 2nd place finishes, so it's safe to bet that the format has warped around enough to sort of exclude it in deckbuilding principles. We really need to be more prepared for decks running Restoration Angel. Zombies and straight RB agro are still making good finishes, and it's not uncommon to see Red Deck Wins take first place finishes on MTG:O. These are decks that we clearly need to be able to interact with if we expect to be competitive. The token strategy doesn't see a lot of top 4 finishes so it's fairly safe to assume that while the deck can be good, it isn't good enough for the highest levels of play (The worst matchups that Tokens have is against very aggressive red/black decks and Bonfire which both show up fairly regularly in RDW and Dark Naya respectively).

Control hasn't been doing well because the threats in the format are varied. Tamiyo is a nice Walker, but she doensn't have the support that Gideon Jura offered when he was still legal. Current variations of control usually slot into an Esper colorpie for Lingering Souls to stall while larger threats get online (like Sorin, Tamiyo, and Jace). There are good Walkers in the colorpie, but the faster decks tend to keep Control decks (which struggles against Cavern of Souls) down due to the lack of cheap instant removal and the Undying mechanic (in the case of the Zombie decks). Extort is most likely not going to be fast enough to make lifegain relevant against the decks it would matter against.

Realistically, fast decks will appreciate the fact that you're casting fewer spells due to the extort costs you're paying. Creatures with lifelink would serve the best roles as blockers, but most of them that exist are not very good or too expensive for what they do.Reanimation is still very much a real deck, if not more so with the big creatures of the set (Boros and Gruul's leaders) making very viable targets for Unburial Rites.

After going through all of this information we can come to some reasonable conclusions:

1. Our deck needs to be able to interact with creatures in some fashion as to avoid dying to quick aggro decks.
2. Our deck needs to have something dangerous to play in the midgame.
3. Our deck needs to have some way of interacting with the opponent's graveyard.
4. Our deck needs to counter noncreature spells.
5. Our deck must have an answer to Obzedat, Ghost Council (this one comes from experience).

So, now we go back to our giant list of cards and evaluate every card that fits one of these 5 roles.

Picking Cards for our Goals

Interacting with the Opponent's Creatures Blue and Black are the best colors in BUG's pie to interact with creatures through casting spells while Green provides us with a creature base to block with (if that's what we want to do). Most removal in the format right now is based on a creature's toughness or sacrifice effects because Murder doesn't see play. Creatures with butts greater than 2 and 3 provide us with the best chances of our creature living. Geist is still a very real creature and sees play in the Bant midrange decks as their threedrop creature. Our main goal is to interact with creatures early to avoid dying to rush agro decks so we're going to look at solutions that really help there:

We can go with a Tempo strategy by choosing to play spells like Simic Charm, Unsummon, and Crippling Chill. Silent Departure gets some value for being re-bought late in the game, but sits at sorcery speed. Alternatively we can go with a straight up "kill your dude" strategy featuring spells like Abrupt Decay, Devour Flesh, Dimir Charm, Murder, Tragic Slip, Tribute to Hunger, Victim of Night, and Ultimate Price. Bigger spells we can cast that just wipe out creatures include Mutilate and Cyclonic Rift.

If we go with the Tempo strategy then we need to have overarching answers for our opponent's threats when they come back. We're not really disrupting our opponents' curve with tempo, just their clock. Garruk Relentless  ^Flip could kill anything with 3 toughness, or make 2/2 wolves forever which seems decent... but ultimately I would be more comfortable with a solution which is more permanent. The real problem with the permanent solution is that all our spells are conditional (with the exception of Mutilate).

For creatures which block really well we have Elusive Krais which doubles as an unblockable, big-butt, potentially big-power creature. While he doesn't have hexproof, he does put a clock on your opponent. He also can block Geralf's Messenger without triggering Undying which is kind of important. Augar of Bolas stil has a toughness of 3 and can cantrip a lot of the times he is played. He blocks well on the ground and will occasionally eat a removal spell. If we're playing Midrange, we don't really want the Augar because we'll be casting Farseek to get us closer to our 4 and 5 drops.So we're left with the choice of Tempo (which is better against ramp, reanimation, and rushdown) or Elimination (which is better against non-blue midrange decks). The format lends itself to more Midrange combat so the choice is fairly obvious. We will go with the elimination option and include a small sideboard package for tempo if necessary.

Cards We Probably Will Play: Abrupt Decay, Tragic Slip, Devour Flesh, Dimir Charm, Tribute to Hunger,

Ultimate Price, Snapcaster Mage, Thragtusk.

Something Dangerous for the Midgame The choice de'jour here is Thragtusk in our colorpie, but we also have some other really good options. We could play Desecration Demon at the four slot and use him as a very fast clock, we could play Mystic Genesis and get an attacker while simultaneously countering something, Bloodgift Demon is often overlooked but is a very good card, Bloodline Keeper  ^Flip throws down 2/2 flying tokens, Garruk Relentless  ^Flip poops out wolves forever and shoots down smaller creatures (with positive value because he becomes a nasty tutor effect). Clone is always the best creature on the field (and kills Giest on turn 4). Duskmantle Seer and Dungeon Geists are both flying threats that do something else while Evil Twin is Clone that kills its nonlegendary counterpart. Havengul Lich is very dangerous if we include tools like Prophetic Prisim in our deck to filter colors and allow us to cast from the opponent's GY.

Kessig Cagebreakers becomes an almost instant game over if we're playing a Mulch strategy, Increasing Savagery turns an earlier creature into a giant threat, Lazav, Dimir Mastermind is amazingly good, but the double color requirements make him slightly hard to cast on turn 3 and 4, Primordial Hydra is very good when its starting X value is 3.

Sturmgeist has been regarded as mostly a non-standard worthy card; however, when we're fighting against midrange decks a scaling flier can be devestating. Talrand, Sky Summoner is proportionately good to the number of instants and sorceries we play. Wolfir Silverheart sets up nicely for Prime Speaker Zegana, and Yeva, Nature's Herald has Flash and gives other green dudes Flash.

I've set the dangerous cards for the midgame up in blocks according to which effects are most likely to interact with each other favorably. Deciding which cards you want to use here comes down to metagame decisions and personal preference. I personally will be choosing Mystic Genesis, Evil Twin, and Lazav, Dimir Mastermind with Bloodgift Demon as a two.

Interact with the opponent's Graveyard The immediate pick for this segment of the strategy is Deathrite Shaman, but it's inherently flawed in that reanimation decks have access to Pillar of Flame which not only kills, but exiles, the Shaman. We could, in theory, go with some jank-tech and play Ground Seal on the argument that it cantrips... but it's a horrible argument (and costed at 2, which competes with Farseek at no advantage). So we're now looking at other options out of necessity. I understand that you can't always expect your opponent to have an answer to the Deathrite Shaman; however, when they're playing 4 Pillars, odds are good that they'll have one more often than not as they dig with Faithless Looting. Tormod's Crypt was reprinted in Magic 2013 so it's on the table as a choice. Grafdigger's Cage is the universal hose card for graveyards, but it also makes it impossible for permanents to enter play from the library which shuts down Farseek.

Cremate is an interesting choice because it takes place at instant speed and lets us draw a card. The only problem is that there has to be a card in the graveyard for us to target. Memory's Journey falls into this category as well but with no draw advantage... it can be flashed back though.

Vile Rebirth is a fairly technical decision that I believe might make it into the sideboard (and possibly the main deck) because most of the reason we're interacting with the graveyard is to exile creatures which could be reanimated. Taking away a creature from our opposition while making our own 2/2 is pretty solid.

Cards we will probably play: Deathrite Shaman, Vile Rebirth (sideboard), Tormod's Crypt (singleton in main with one extra side). Counter Non-Creature Spells BUG doesn't have any way to deal with Planeswalkers once they hit the board except through combat damage or bounce. We need to be able to counterspell our opponents' Sphinx's Revelation and Planeswalkers so that we don't just get blown out through incremental advantage on the other side of the board. There aren't many choices to be made here so we'll just dig right in to the cards.

Dissipate remains the king in the format because if it properly resolves, it eliminates the possibility of Flashback on applicable spells and reanimation targets for later. Hitting Unburial Rites with Dissipate is a great play, so we're going to need a couple of these at least. Cancel at the same CMC also is a hard counter for any given threat (except the uncounterables); however, with the format being how it is, we're not going to play a split of these in the main board until we can test how many CMC3 counterspells we really need.

Negate is a crowd favorite because it's aggressively costed at CMC3. It allows us to hit opposing counters, turn 3 enchantments if we're on the draw (which will be rare), and also Planeswalkers. In games 2 and 3 we are able to bluff our opponents with two open mana and a few cards in hand if we haven't plain or drawn a negate yet.

Mystic Genesis is something I'm excited about because it's another hard counter, and on the play, allows us to knock out turn 5 PW threats and make a creature at the same time. This counterspell is very powerful and is costed as such. It's kind of a "win more" card, but with the nature of Spinx's Revelation, it can end a control mirror in game one very quickly.Syncopate is also a very powerful counterspell, but only if we're going first, and only against early development. If the opponent is playing Ramp, you will have to Syncopate their Farseek otherwise Syncopate becomes worthless. I do not think we will be playing Syncopate because it's scalar and ramping midrange makes up too much of the metagame.

Something important to keep in mind when choosing these counterspells is that their main function is to counter threats to which we have no good (or no) answers to outside of the counters. You should only be using Dissipate on creatures that you can't afford to have enter play (like Thragtusk or a hardcast Griselbrand). Mystic Genesis is my choice for Thragtusks as we get out our own 5/5 and deny them 5 life. It also is a great spell to counter Angel of Serenity, but to do that we will typically need to destroy a Cavern of Souls.

Cards we will probably play: Dissipate, Negate, Mystic Genesis (in some number that probably isn't four).

Answering Obzedat, Ghost Council

This card will change the format in ways that can't aptly be predicted. Decks that will include it will probably include Cavern of Souls to stop the best answer for Obzedat (which is to counter it). Outside of a hard counter, Murder is probably your best shot at killing. Let's look at why.

Obzedat is immune to all sorcery speed removal because any competent player will have it exiled at their end step (not only because it makes it immune to sorcery speed removal, but it also reactivates the 4 life swing). We can't depend on Tragic Slip killing Obzedat because we can't be sure that we will kill anything on either side of the board (including ours). So the only things that really kill the Ghost Council are spells that do 5 damage to things and spells that straight up kill creatures. Victim of Night can reach Obzedat which is useful as can Rapid Hybridization (in addition to Murder). Playing Rapid Hybridization and leaving our opponent with a 3/3 isn't as nice as simply killing it for BB, but Hybridization kills any target. It grants us flexibility; however, it grants our opponent a 3/3. Most of the creatures we would cast Hybridization on are worse than a 3/3, so it's not an amazingly terrible trade for us... but it's not optimal. Trying to beat Obzedat with Tempo isn't going to work either. We need to kill the unholy menace or it's going to kill us. The two-point lifegain (really four on the first swing) is enough to make our job of killing our opponent hard enough without actually killing Obzedat that I believe it's actually just impossible to do. A Singleton Murder and Victim of Night will be sufficient enough maindeck against game 1 opponents until Obzedat picks up populatiry (at which point maindeck numbers will have to move around) to ensure that we probably have an answer to the ghostly menace in our first match.

Constructing the Main Deck

When we look at the full list of cards we want to play we see all of these cards: Victim of Night, Murder, Dissipate, Negate, Mystic Genesis, Farseek, Deathrite Shaman, Vile Rebirth (sideboard), Tormod's Crypt, Evil Twin, Bloodgift Demon, Thragtusk, Snapcaster Mage, Abrupt Decay, Tragic Slip, Devour Flesh, Dimir Charm, Tribute to Hunger, and Ultimate Price.

What a mess! If we were to slot all of these cards as quads we would end up with (pre-lands mind you) a 62 card deck. Our goal wasn't to play Battle of Wits.dec so we need to figure out what cards we want to play in what numbers. Victim of Night we already decided would be a singleton (1), as well as Murder (2). I think we should test Dissipate at 3 from personal experience (5), Negate at 2 (7), and Mystic Genesis at 2 (9). Farseek is automatically 4 (13). Deathrite Shaman with no fetch lands or self-mill spells will slot at 2 (15). Tormod's Crypt will be included in the maindeck as a singleton unless zombies gets more aggressive (16). 3 Snapcaster Mage should be sufficient to rebuy our countermagic and removal spells (19). Four Thragtusks seems to be popular and because the creature is so efficient there's not a reason to disagree with that (23). I want two Evil Twins main with two in the side (25). I would like 3 Bloodgift Demons because unanswered, the card ends games very fast (even a turn of drawing an extra card is good in a deck that has no other ways of doing that) (28). Now we just need to flush our removal spells out with 2 Devour Flesh, 3 Tribute to Hunger, and 3 Abrupt Decays (34). In the remaining slots we will play Snapcaster Mage to 4 (35) and two instances of Forbidden Alchemy (37).

Land Grab

When we put together our lands we notice that there's a lot of emphasis on double black and blue with green as a singlecolor near splash. We want the land base to lean more heavily on the black and blue colors with green as an 8/9 symbol appearance so I have chosen to include the following:

1 Swamp, 1 Forest, 1 Island (to protect us from Ghost Quarter plays. 20 lands remain)
3 Breeding Pool, 3 Overgrown Tomb, 1 Hinterland Harbor and 1 Woodland Cemetery (for the 9 green symbols, 11 lands remain)
4 Watery Grave and 4 Drowned Catacomb (Emphasizing our requirement for Blue/Black, 3 lands remain).
At this point we are faced with a tough decision. We can play no utility lands and go straight for colors, or we can play three colorless lands that do something. This is acceptable because we don't have any one-drops and our most important two-drop is Farseek.

Every instinct in me is saying to play the utility lands, so I have opted to play 2 Nephalia Drownyards and a single Haunted Fengraf (0 lands remain. 60 cards in the main deck).

Why Haunted Fengraf? A lot of players wouldn't jump to the Fengraf in a competitive environment because it is A) Random, and B) One Use. I'm picking it because it does a few things that a regular Reclaim effect does not do:

1. It is Random. On this premise, most players won't have an answer to the effect because they have no clue what creature you're getting. They can proactively remove a creature from your Graveyard, but you will seldom pop the Fengraf and not get a creature.
2. It is a land and therefore generates mana. Putting in a Reclaim in this slot does not help us hit our 2 drops on time.
3. All of our creatures are good to get back. Rebuying Thragtusk in the late game is huge. Evil Twin will copy and probably kill the other side of the board. Bloodgift Demon seals the deal lategame if your opponent is on Hellbent (that means they're topdecking). Snapcaster Mage is a counterspell or kill spell. All of these things are good to have.

If I was forced to not play the Fengraf I would instead play one Cavern of Souls.

Building a Sideboard

We know that we want some Vile Rebirths in the sideboard, but that's 100% for the Zombie matchup. Three of these should really make the matchup in our favor. (3)
We need more Victim of Nights for the matchup of Obzedat. 2 should be sufficient (5).
I want another Mystic Genesis for the Sphinx's Revelation matchup (6).
To be safe against Geist of Saint Traft I'm including another Devour Flesh (7).
To beat aggresive red decks we're going to do something werid and play Gatecreeper Vine and Augur of Bolas at 2 each (11). These will take the place of Farseek.
We will also have Lotleth Troll in the Sideboard to kill the two toughness guys on turn three (because we want to force Regeneration and go two for one on cards) (15).

It's obvious based on the sideboard that I don't consider other midrange decks a threat. The main problems that we face are highly aggressive, fast, decks. My 8 card sideboard for them (more than 50% of the sideboard) should indicate just how much of a problem I feel they are. We really don't want our opponent to ever resolve Sphinx's Revelation, ergo the additional Genesis. Everything else is fairly well explained.

Vile Rebirth is the card that's the most flexible in the sideboard because it has the hardest conditions to satisfy. I could see this changing to additional Deathrite Shamans or some super-bizaro tech like Void Stalker, Elusive Krasis, or Grave Bramble.

How do you play this deck?

Unfortunately, I have exhausted the time I alloted myself in writing this article. I didn't even get to edit it as I would have hoped so I pray that the formatting, spelling, and all the little things that go into making something like this are correct. If I manage to find the time to playtest this deck against other decks in the format, I'll make sure to include an addendum on how well this deck functions as well as problematic matchups or things that didn't happen quite according to plan.

As always, please leave your two cents down in the comments.

Best of luck to you all,

jkarnes