Old School MTG: Colorless Tournament Report

It's August. It's taken all year for the stars to align for me to play an Old School tournament. Thanks to The Horde for organizing the event!

When it works, it's a thing of beauty.

I've built and played a bunch of different Old School decks this year, but that was for casual games at home. For the tournament, I really wanted to give the colorless Tron deck another try. Last time I played it, at the Border Brawl, I had the great fortune of borrowing 4x Mishra's Workshop. This time, I played with Mana Vaults in those slots. It's possible that those slots should have been Fellwar Stones.

It went about as poorly as you'd expect.




Round 1 - Daniel on Ponza w/ Orgg!
In games 1 and 2, Daniel had land destruction turn after turn. I will say that having 29ish mana sources in the deck gave me a glimmer of hope here, but it wasn't much more than a glimmer. He beat me two games in a row. Orgg was the finisher both times. I don't enjoy losing, but if I'm going to lose, Orgg is a new way to do it.

0-1



Round 2 - Tanny on GWR w/ Birds, Apes, Elves, and Mana Flare
We played two games. I was able to find a way to win both times, but I was down to 9 in the first game and 4 in the second game. He had burn, so it felt like I was a topdeck away from losing. Tanny said that he was trying out the Mana Flare(s). In game 2, his Mana Flare is what put me over the top. Since I am essentially a big mana deck, giving me access to that much more mana meant that I was able to drop a couple of big threats followed by a Winter Orb and then ride it out.

1-1



Round 3 - Carson on UBR w/ Birds, Chains, Bolts, Serendibs, and Power
In game 1, I mulled to 5 and didn't do much much after that. Carson was able to beat me down with him ending at 17 life. In game 2, I decided to enable the "full sideboard." This time he was the one to mulligan to 5 and beat me anyway, ending at 7 life. There was some back and forth in the second game, but I wasn't able to stick a threat long enough to overpower him. He did let an Energy Flux slip out of his hand at one point - which would have totally wrecked me of course - but I was able to keep him off the three mana he needed to cast it. A combination of Strip Mine, Winter Orb, and pressuring him with creatures was enough to stop Energy Flux from coming down, but not enough to stop him from winning.

1-2



Round 4 - Jeremy on Pink Weenie w/ Land Tax and Armageddon
Jeremy smashed me for two games in a row with small creatures, bolts, disenchants, and 'geddon. I was able to stabilize in game 1 with me a 8 life and him at 4. He Wheeled into 3x Bolt and closed it out. In game 2, I had some threats out and was pulling ahead when he cast 'geddon and proceeded to beat me down from 26 to 0.

1-3

The tournament was 16 players total. I ended the day at 15th place.

In this configuration, the deck simply does not work without 'Shops. Too many times, my turn one was spent playing a Mana Vault and then cutting turns off the end as the damage built up from not being able to untap it. It gets progressively worse when you compare subsequent turns where a 'Shop would have simply untapped and allowed me to produce another threat. In one game against Tanny, I took 9 damage from my own Mana Vaults. Su-Chi is also a problem. Without enough places to sink the mana from it, the mana burn really adds up. In several games this tournament, I took 4 mana burn from Su-Chi and it cut off precocious turns at the end.

The Sideboard Plan

Swapping all of the top cards with all of the cards on the bottom changes the deck from aggro-focused to control-focused. Fun!

I'm enamored with the idea of a transformational sideboard. It's cool to switch modes entirely. The real reason is probably because I am terrible at sideboarding, so being able to swap out the entire thing saves me from having to think too hard about it. While I do think an artifact prison deck could work (especially if it ran White), I'm barely competent to play one version of my deck let alone two. Pulling this off would take a lot more practice.

Prizes and Swag

The organizer ended up winning the tournament and gave his prize to the guy that came in dead last (16th place). As I mentioned, I came in at 15th place. The store owner came in 3rd place and decided to give his prize to the next guy at the bottom. Me! I was able to pick up 2x Copy Artifact with my "winnings." Maybe my next tournament will have some color in my deck.

We also had a player join us who was on vacation from New York Sisters of the Flame and brought some swag with him from that group. Thank you! And thank you to the Horde for bringing sweet swag. Check out that mox slap bracelet. We signed cards per the usual. I ended up with a Channel and a Horde Swamp. I have it on good authority that the Horde Swamp is a limited edition 1/100. ;)

Pictures from the Event

Ben and Me

Ben in the Clubhouse. The store was clean and nice, with plenty of room at the tables.

Me with Paul (DeSilva)

Ben. Intense.

Reading out the results!

Ben w/ a cool planeswalker mural

Oathbreaker: Colorless Ugin, the Ineffable / All Is Dust

A couple of years ago, I went all in on Colorless cards. Robots! There's something about artifacts that always lit me up. I still scroll to the bottom when spoilers come out for a new set just so I can see the sweet new colorless cards first.

Thanks to MTG Arena, I've had the opportunity to play with the new sets as they come out. It's easy to jump into a game online and playing down in the silver bracket means that I can jam janky decks without ruining someone else's day. I've even been able to play a full colorless deck in Standard!



The metal army can grow quickly and is backed up by a couple of different versions of Karn, Ugin, and Mystic Forge. That's quite a Magic card!



One thing that I don't like about Old School is that I don't get to play with the new cards. It's a double-edged sword. Not having new cards enter the card pool means that there are boundaries. Good cards continue to be good. The metagame can develop in different directions, but not so wildly that I can't adapt a few sideboard cards and still have a chance. Those are all good things for someone that doesn't have the time to play often. The downside is that I can't play with the new cards!

My weekly gaming group doesn't play competitive Magic. They don't play Old School. They play a lot of different games, including Magic. But it's casual. Commander was always too time-consuming for this group. Magic is something we play while we are setting up another game. Or waiting for a game to finish. It's a quick game we play between other things. So, we decided to give the Oathbreaker format a try.

Since I am into colorless cards, this felt like the perfect opportunity to put together a budget Ugin, the Ineffable / All Is Dust deck. Nothing in the deck is more than a dollar or two except Ugin and Dust. Most cards are well under a dollar. The format bans a lot of the fast mana. But you get access to a planeswalker as your Oathbreaker and a signature spell that you can cast only if you have your Oathbreaker in play.



The one-two punch of Ugin and All is Dust works well. The games play out quickly, which meets the criteria for my gaming group. And, the focus on the planeswaker makes for interesting play patterns. The smaller decks at 60 cards compared to 100 cards for Commander also makes the deckbuilding more accessible. If you haven't given Oathbreaker a try, War of the Spark gave us a lot of new planeswalkers at reasonable prices. Give it a try!

Old School MTG: Breaking the Icy out of Prison

It's liberated!

I've never had the singular pleasure of breaking a card out of a tombstone. That is, not until today.

My wife gifted me with some eBay credit, which I immediately turned into a sweet Beta Icy Manipulator. She knows me so well! It was slabbed and graded as a 6. I figured I was doing the world a favor by breaking it out to play with. I mean, it's a 6.

Since I've never done this before, I fired up youtube for a tutorial. I watched quite a few of tutorials until I ran across this one. This guy seems uber-confident.

I didn't have exactly the same tool(s) he used, but I found something similar.

Dirty screwdriver? Check. Dirty pruning shears? Double-check.

The process was relatively easy. At no point did I feel like the card was at risk for damage. Just keep the first cut up in the corner, away from the card itself.

Take that "6."

It made a satisfying crunching sound, like breaking an old piece of hard plastic. I suppose that's not surprising. Debris did shoot off a bit, so plan for that. Make sure someone isn't standing at eye level watching you. Use a piece of paper or point it against something and keep it close to the surface. It's also probably a good idea to put on eye protection.

Next, wedge the screwdriver in along the top edge and start to slowly pry it up. The case will begin to separate along the edges where it is welded. It makes a crazy cracking sound.

The card itself was sealed on all four sides in a plastic sleeve. I used scissors to cut the top edge carefully. I had to cut fairly close to the card to actually break the seal. Just pay attention to not cut the card. Hold it against a dark or light background (depending on the color of the card border) to create contrast.

There it is, in all its double-sleeved glory. Ready to play.

I always avoided buying slabbed cards because I didn't want to risk damaging them to get them out. After this experience, I would 100% buy another slabbed card and feel comfortable going through this process to break it free.

If you are buying these cards to actually play with them, breaking them out of a slab is an option. Watch the guy in the video for a tutorial, gather your tools, and then take your time and free the cards!

Old School MTG: Revisiting Mono-Red Atog

I'm going to make this simple for you: I want you to hit me as hard as you can.

It's July. That means it's time for something hot. How about Fireballs and Lightning Bolts?

Earlier this year, I played a red Atog deck with Urza lands but I didn't like how it all worked out. So, I decided to try a version with no Urza lands to more reliably cast the red spells off Mountains. There's still an unfair amount of ramp in this build, so the artifact beatdown squad still shows up to the party early. Which is nice.

I'm not getting many games in, but I did have the chance to play a few casual games with Ben at a LGS in the next town over. We invited the local Old School group from Portland and someone even showed up!

Nick (Left), Ben (Right)

Ben, super-pumped about his hand as he faces down the alien.

I did not dish out any Shivan beats (boo), but I did get to drop some Atog bombs. There's nothing quite like swinging with two aliens and watching the other guy try to figure out how to block to not die to a big board sacrifice.

What I keep coming back to is just how much better Workshops would make these decks. I'm just a simple guy, I guess. With the dual lands put up on the shelf, I'm jamming mono-colored decks that lean heavily on artifacts. A land that taps for three artifact-only many every turn would be fantastic. Who knew!?

The Horde is putting on another tournament within driving distance. It's scheduled for late in August. I'm not sure what deck I'm going to bring, but it's almost certainly going to be jam-packed with artifacts. I'm considering something with a transformational sideboard. Stay spicy.

Old School MTG: Wu Winter Prison

***Update: 6/22/2019 - It's fitting that I'm just noticing now (in Summer) that I didn't actually push the "publish" button on this back in Winter. Doh! As I recall, this deck made for some very long games. In several games, I held on turn after turn by bouncing the threat with the Time Elemental until I topdecked enough answers to turn the tide.

As we kick off another year, I plan to explore the old school format by building a new deck each month. I expect some cards will show up in a lot of decks, but the goal is to build a deck with a different theme or a different method of executing a theme every month. I'll play the same deck through the entire month and then switch it up to something new when the month ends. Twelve months, twelve decks.

For January, it seems appropriate to build a deck that features Winter Orb. White with a splash of Blue makes for a great prison deck that pushes the theme of a soul-crushing winter, covered in ice and snow. The main win condition is the icy hand of the old winter gods closing around you as the last remaining embers of the fire die out. And robots. Because, if there's anything I love to jam in Old School, it's robots.

Old School MTG: Half-Year Recap

A reanimated Shivan Dragon with two Howling Mines? I'll take it!

It's June!

That means I'm about halfway through my plan to build and play a new Old School deck every month for the year.

Digging deep into my collection, I've been able to build all kinds of different decks with different play patterns during the first half of the year. But a couple of things are clear. Robots are the bees knees. I want to play aggressively. And, splashing colors is for tournament play.

Robots are the bees knees.

In Old School Magic, there's a handful of creatures at each casting cost that are relatively easy to evaluate in the small card pool. Shivan Dragon, for example, at 6cmc (4RR) compares to Tetravus at 6cmc (all colorless). They both fly. But the Dragon is 5/5 and has firebreathing for the same cost. It's also not an artifact, so it dodges an entire class of removal spells (Disenchant, Shatter, etc.).



In many cases, playing out a Shivan is going to be more directly powerful than playing out a Tetravus. But the robot has all these neat little tricks! It has cool synergy with Tawnos' Coffin, Hell's Caretaker, Priest of Yawgmoth, Sage of Lat-Nam, and more. It can make a wall of flying blockers to buy you time. Plus, I think it looks neat. It rings all my bells. Same with Triskelion. The amount of synergies with that guy is amazing. On top of that, Juggernaut and Su-Chi both have great power-to-mana ratios. Throw in a Clockwork Avian and Jade Statue or two and you've got an entire deck of robots, ready to rumble, no matter what color you are playing.

I want to play aggressively.

I always gravitated to the control role. My guess is because the games felt more like a puzzle. With control, you are engaged in a way that forces you to consider all the nooks and crannies of how things will play out. There's ample room for bluffing. The control role asks you to engage with the game. But now, I just want to slam creatures into the red zone and burn things.



Why the switch? Probably because I don't get to play that often. Slamming into the red zone is either going to work or it's not. Sure, there are still combat tricks to know. There's still understanding when to play into the board, when to hold back, and how to calculate a lethal attack while planning for tricks and the swing back. But it feels like it's more forgiving. And even if that is an illusion, it's a quicker turn most of the time. A lot of the decisions are focused on the combat step and getting the math right.

Splashing colors is for tournament play.

I'm all for people building decks the way they want to. I wouldn't want someone telling me the "right way" to build my decks. What I'm saying is that I find myself saying, "Of course I need to splash black for Mind Twist and Demonic Tutor." Or, "Of course I need to splash blue for Ancestral Recall." We all know there are powerful cards in this format, so powerful that it is likely "right" to splash a color just to run them. And other than Blood Moon, there's little reason not to splash for those spells. They are that good.

There's nothing wrong with splashing for powerful spells. What I find is that they take up slots for other, more interesting cards. They water down a theme. They make decks have similar play patterns. They minimize my enjoyment of the game.

For the last half of the year, I'm going to put the Dual Lands on the shelf and play mono-colored decks. If I'm playing a mono-black deck, then sure, I'll put Mind Twist and Demonic Tutor on the table. But if I'm playing a mono-red deck, I'm not going to put in 4x Badlands and 4x City of Brass just to splash two black spells. This will give me a chance to explore more themes in the individual colors without decks taking on a "sameness" that I've noticed in the first part of the year.

The few Old School tournaments I've been to have been competitive. Maybe it's a hallmark of American Magic in general, but those of us in the Old School scene around here seem happy to bring it when there's $20 of store credit on the line. It means that if you show up to something advertised as a "tournament," expect competition. If you show up to something advertised as a "get together," people are more willing to play with a lower tier casual deck.



I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that there are some decks with more than one color, but where it's an integral part of making the deck work. I'm thinking of decks like Lich/Mirror where casting Healing Salve or activating Dark Heart of the Wood with Lich in play is what makes the deck tick. Those decks are great. I'm talking about decks that are otherwise all one color but then splash one or two other colors only to jam in a handful of powerful spells.

Old School MTG: Mono-U Tron

I really, really want to make Tron work in Old School. I've tried a couple of variations this year, but the Old School Tron decks suffer from three things:

1) Every Eternal Central deck has access to 4x Strip Mine and 4x Mishra's Factory.

This isn't a problem, per se, but giving up access to your own Strips and Factories to jam in 12x other colorless lands is an unreasonable trade-off. Too many games in this format come down to who has the most Factories on the table. Going in with less than the full list is asking for trouble. On top of that, going in with a set of lands that only "combo" when a you get a particular set of three in play is a problem when facing off against that many Strips.

2) The Tron lands eat up too many slots that could be colored mana sources.

The only deck where I haven't had a problem with this is the all colorless (Mono Brown) deck that uses the Tron lands in place of the colored lands. Otherwise, I'm coming up with 8-10 colored mana sources in the list. And that's with me trimming Strips and Factories (Problem #1). Even with dancing around double-colored mana-cost spells, it's relatively easy to either not draw colored mana sources or to get pushed out of a color in a game.

3) This format has limited deck manipulation and tutoring.

This isn't like Modern Tron where you have several ways to filter or search for the missing pieces. You need to draw Tron naturally. And even then, it's not like your turn 3 hay-maker is Karn. It's not. You are looking at a turn 3 Triskelion. Not bad, but not usually game-ending. And other than X-spells, there isn't much to do with all that mana.

With all that said, I still played some fun games with Mono-U Tron. The play pattern is similar to a slower Tron variant in other formats, where you play the control role, take advantage with a sweeper, and then drop a beater into an empty board and protect it for the win. Occasionally, when you draw Tron naturally, you can take the aggressive role and start throwing out threats early on the curve and then use permission to keep your opponent from putting up a defense.

Here's Chris, Mind Bombing me with Reanimator.