One of the MTG decks I've been playing a lot is one I call "Mind Games." It's a mill deck, designed to stall out the opponent long enough for my various mill cards to pour their library into their graveyard and get me a win as they try to draw a card that isn't there.
The deck either works or it doesn't, of course, though that's true of any strategy. The thing that's unusual about it is that there's no amount of life gain or bulwark of defense that prevents this from working. When you play against me, you have a ticking clock - you've got to take me down before I can get my mill engine running at full steam.
What's ironic is that, from my perspective, it plays a lot like an aggro deck.
I have a very traditionally aggro Rakdos deck that I also play a lot (I call it "Rakdos Rager," as if I'm throwing the most debauched party.) With an aggro deck, at least of this style, you really focus in on two things: dealing damage quickly and removing obstacles to that damage.
So the RR deck is all about cheap, fast creatures that consistently hit, and then burn and removal spells to clear out creatures that might block. If the RR deck hasn't gotten the opponent down below 10 health by turn 5 or so, I'm in deep trouble, because there aren't a lot of things I can do once they start summoning powerful defenders.
Oddly, the mill deck works the same way - I laser-focus on milling them as much and as efficiently as possible, and I have a number of bounce, counterspells and "crowd control" spells to lock down or eliminate their aggressive strategies.
Just as you're racing against my clock, I'm racing to make sure that clock runs as fast as I can make it.
Good games tend to start with the powerful enchantments that I want out - Drowned Secrets causes you to mill a target (you) every time I cast a blue spell - it's a blue deck, so any spell I cast is a blue spell. Teferi's Tutelage is more consistent but less spectacular. In addition to letting me loot one card when it comes into play (draw a card, discard a card) it also mills the opponent for 2 each time I draw a card (including the one gained by looting.)
Both of these are wonderful to have multiples out, as the effect is multiplicatie. If I can get two Teferi's Tutelages out, it means every single turn I take, the opponent is milling 4 cards. With a 60 card deck, including their own draw, that's 5 cards a round, or a 12-turn clock (though naturally it takes a few turns to get up to that.)
Sage's Row Denizen is a creature I also have 4 of in the deck, and has a similar effect - when a creature comes into play, it mills the opponent for two. While this has the added benefit of a 2/3 body that can block smaller creatures, it's also more vulnerable, given how much more prevalent creature removal (and burn spells) are.
When the deck is firing on all engines, I have one or two copies of each of these. Then, when I cast something like Wall of Lost Thoughts, it's a blue spell, triggering Drowned Secrets, and it's a creature, triggering Sage's Row Denizen, and then it mills the opponent for 4 when it comes into play (and becomes a 4-toughness roadblock to enemy aggressors.)
What can make the deck frustrating is when the drawn cards don't quite line up. I've sometimes gotten things like the Wall early on, which is fine on its own, but on its own only does 4 cards. While the deck is, in theory, pretty good against defensive control decks, an Azorius deck with decent removal, or one with lots of flying creatures (like the pre-made one) can make it hard to hold off the assault. Frogify and liberal counterspells can help a bit with this, but it's not a very favorable matchup.
I have two copies of Ashiok, Dream Render, which can turn a potentially bad matchup against some graveyard-based Golgari deck into a total hoser, given that Ashiok not only mills, but exiles the entire graveyard after using their ability (I've definitely seen some Golgari players immediately concede upon using that ability.)
Anyway, I've been branching out, tinkering with my Dimir deck to make it work a little more like how I conceived it (fewer vampires, more removal and blue shenangians) and futzing with Orzhov and even an... Esper? That's WUB, right? An Esper Vampire deck that is only those colors so that I can include all the vampires I have.
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