Three qualifier tournaments are now in the books. There is only one more chance for players to qualify for the 2013 Classic League Invitational. Qualifier Tournament #4 starts on Monday, May 20th, and players must register by 11:59pm EDT Saturday May 18th. Dragon’s Maze cards will be legal for this tournament even though it is only 1 week after the online release of the set (this is due to a time conflict on my end and needing to finish before the Invitational, which is on July 20th). More information will be posted to ClassicQuarter.com shortly.
As for QT #3, it was an exciting event with a Top 4 consisting of all Magic Eternal clanmates! The finals pitted Montolio and his Metalworker Workshop deck against TheWilddog and his Delver Gush deck featuring Talrand, Sky Summoner. Video coverage of the finals can be found at the Clan Magic Eternal YouTube page.
Here is Montolio’s winning decklist:
Metalworker Shops by Montolio
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Montolio’s Workshop deck overpowered TheWilddog’s Delver Gush deck. In Game 1, a Turn 1 Metalworker led to a Turn 2 trio of Lodestone Golems. Game 2 was looking good for TheWilddog with an early Trygon Predator, but a Phyrexian Metamorph copying the Predator on the following turn allowed Montolio to get back into the game. A few turns later a Wurmcoil Engine backed up by a Tangle Wire sealed the deal.
I talked about Montolio’s deck in UTV #43, so I won’t go into much detail about his deck here. I did, however, talk with him after the tournament ended, and I was surprised to hear that some of his most surprising victories came via the Metalworker-Staff of Domination combo, including at least one match against Affinity. It just goes to show that anyone playing with Metalworkers should not, under any circumstance, maindeck any fewer than 2 Staffs in their deck. The “random” combo wins can actually occur more often than one expects!
As for the rest of the Top 8, here is the breakdown of decks:
Montolio – Metalworker Workshop
TheWilddog – Delver Gush
TheWoof2 – Affinity
bactgudz – Stax
ilsken – GG Oath
PhilipJFry – UR Standstill
Thorme – Izzet Delver w/ Guttersnipe
GainsBanding – Affinity
The Top 8 was quite diverse, featuring 5 distinct archetypes. The clear winner of the Top 8 was Mishra’s Workshop with a total of 16 appearances in the 8 decklists and an astounding 12 in the Top 4. Brainstorm managed to land 12 spots in the Top 8, but Workshop as a strategy is clearly dominating right now. Mishra’s Workshop is the best acceleration in the format, hands down. Without Power, other decks have an uphill battle to compete in Classic. I’m not sure that a banning or restriction is necessary, but I’ll dig more deeply into that in a little bit.
As for the tournament itself, here is a breakdown of the record of each archetype during the 6 Swiss rounds:
Oath: 17-12-1
Workshop: 12-6-1
Affinity: 11-4-3
Delver: 14-9-1
Rest in Peace/Helm-Line Combo: 8-7
UR Standstill: 4-1-1
Flashing Rectum Combo: 7-5
GWB Bears: 2-2
Misc. Combo: 7-18-1
Blue Control: 5-11-1
Dredge: 3-6-1
From these results, we can see 4 definitive Tier 1 decks: Oath, Affinity, Workshop, and Delver. There are many decks that are knocking on the door of Tier 1 status, but just a step behind such as UR Standstill (simply because only 1 player piloted the deck) and GWB Bears. The Flashing Rectum deck performed well overall, but considering how new the deck is, it remains to be seen how it would perform in future tournaments, especially if it’s piloted by less experienced players. To anyone that is interested in picking up this deck for QT #4, I suggest you start practicing immediately.
At the halfway point of QT #3, I highlighted some decks that I thought were lined up to continue to perform well. Amazingly, I missed the runner up deck, TheWilddog’s Delver Gush deck:
Delver Gush by TheWilddog
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There’s something about this deck that I like. Perhaps it’s because I was thinking the other day if there was a Gush-Fastbond-based deck that was playable with Talrand, Sky Summoner with a Delver of Secrets back-up plan. During the Winter Celebration in 2011/12, Naoto and others were having some success against Workshop decks with Delver and Gush-Fastbond. I was about to look into the deck archives on MTGO Academy when I realized TheWilddog already provided a template for me!
The recent printing of Talrand has not been fully explored in Classic yet, in my opinion. There have been some Vintage GushBond decks which have seen moderate success in the past few months. Obviously, Vintage benefits from the Power 9, but there are some areas to exploit what Classic gains over Vintage.
Brainstorm being unrestricted is clearly an upgrade over Vintage. Classic also gets a full set of Ponder as well. To make up for the acceleration of Moxen and Black Lotus, Lotus Cobra could be an effective way to fight off Workshop’s Spheres.
I’m going to start testing with this build and see how it goes:
Delver-Talrand Gush by enderfall
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In theory, the deck can attack from multiple angles. Clearly, the big draw of the deck is that it can combo out with Gush and Fastbond, but it can land an early Delver and play a little bit of a control game too. Another avenue to victory is to simply land a Talrand and cantrip your way to an army of 2/2 flying Drakes. The Sideboard is clearly a work in progress, but it has tools to fight off Workshop, Oath, and Dredge.
[Side note: as I was wrapping up this article, Wizards announced that Regrowth would be unrestricted in Vintage. There is a slight chance that Regrowth makes an impact in Vintage as it will make chaining Gushes much easier. That said, for Classic purposes, Regrowth is not a viable card without the Power 9 (more specifically Time Walk, Ancestral Recall, and Black Lotus) available to abuse]
Another Top 8 deck that I failed to point out at the midway point was PhilipJFry’s UR Standstill deck:
UR Standstill by PhilipJFry
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If there is a single control deck that I would actually consider playing right now to win a tournament, it’s Standstill. The results speak for themselves. Every other “Control” Deck right now performed woefully in QT #3, continuing a long trend in Classic.
PhilipJFry’s deck looks pretty good. I’m surprised by the lack of Brainstorm, but I suppose it’s not quite as useful in Standstill decks that don’t have a significant amount of fetch lands. The 3 Engineered Explosives are quite nice, though they don’t have much effect on cards with casting costs 3 or above, due to the color limitations of the deck. Admittedly, this is a small percentage of the permanents in Classic these days, but it does miss quite a few targets in Workshops and a few 3-Drop creatures, namely Trygon Predator and Vendilion Clique.
The 2 maindeck Mindbreak Traps are a nice touch. PhilipJFry even threw in a Misdirection for more value plays on the stack. These are critical components when your opponent decides to break the Standstill stalemate.
Bannings or Restrictions?
With the B&R coming out this week, is there anything that should be considered for Classic? The B&R list for Classic has been unchanged since the release of Masters Edition 4, which seems like an eternity ago. When you consider that the changes reflected the new cards added to the pool instead of changes based upon results, it seems like even longer.
It is understandable that Wizards has not made any changes to the B&R list in over 2 years… even if they were to have completely ignored the format, nothing has really been oppressive to the point that changes needed to be made. That being said, Workshop has been a Tier 1 deck ever since it was released on MTGO. While there have been periods where the deck was not the most dominant, it has consistently preformed well above average for the better part of 2 years.
I wouldn’t really consider anything for banning/restricting, but the fact that there is no possible way for a true “Control” deck besides Standstill to survive in Classic right now, it may be time for WotC to finally consider making a move. Since online Vintage is expected to arrive sometime before the end of this year, I doubt anything will actually happen, but if I were to consider a single card to be either banned or restricted, I would have to believe that Lodestone Golem could be safely restricted. More often than not, a Turn 1 Lodestone is essentially an automatic victory, especially on the play. Having a sphere and win condition all in one, could be considered too much for a format like Classic. With the format being in the state it’s currently in (i.e. – counting the days until Vintage arrives), there could be valid argument to making such a sweeping change in order to freshen the format for its last days.
Looking Ahead to QT #4
Judging from the results of QT #3, I’m pretty sure what deck I will be choosing to play in QT #4. I’ll be playing either Oath or Workshop. I know for a fact that I won’t be playing a control deck, though Standstill is appealing. The only thing that might push me away from my choice would be if my Delver Gush deck sets the Tournament Practice room on fire, though I’m not optimistic of that happening.
I suppose people will target Workshop, considering its powerful showing in QT #3, but there really hasn’t been a good answer to Workshop decks yet. Montolio was able to beat Affinity twice during the tournament, so it’s not even a guarantee that strategy is going to be as successful as it once was. Maybe people will bring more Ancient Grudges, Steel Sabotages, or Nature’s Claims, but spot removal was never that good against Workshop in the past. Hurkyl’s Recall is a strong card against Workshop and Affinity, but only a few decks can utilize it to its full advantage.
From what I’ve seen of Dragon’s Maze, there don’t appear to be any cards spoiled that would drastically change the Classic metagame and its slant towards Workshops. I’ll have a more thorough review of the set in my next article.
I leave with one final question to my readers: Would you make any changes to the Classic B&R list, and if so, what would you change?
enderfall
Clan Magic Eternal
Follow me on Twitter @enderfall
Yeah, they can restrict Library and Oath
While I am sure most folks will disagree with me, my opinion is the format is actually very balanced right now with a variety of different decks to choose from and I think no changes are better than more restrictions. However, I do think we should UN-restrict cards. I would consider (I have not done significant playtesting on the results) UN-restricting these: Balance, Fastbond, Necro and Wheel of Fortune. By UN-restricting cards the meta might get shaken up significantly to a point where you need control and blue control takes over, but if that doesn’t happen then I would try UN-restricting some of those cards.
@Mitch – Interesting… Oath is one of the only real strategies that can fight off Workshop. Would you suggest restricting Oath in addition to Lodestone?
@thewoof2 – Balance would certainly help to eliminate Affinity, though I don’t think that is something we want to do. Balance nerfs all creature decks, but doesn’t really do anything to Workshop (at least, anything more than a StP or Bolt already does). Fastbond is pretty dangerous too, though Misstep is a natural predator to some broken shenanigans. That said, unrestricted Fastbond might lead to a 2 deck format… Gush and Workshop. I’m not sure that’s what we want either. Necro might be safe, but pre-ME4, that was THE dominant deck in Classic. Workshop might be enough to hold off Storm decks however. Wheel is probably fine… no one really uses it anyway.
Fair enough Scott. Maybe start by unrestricting wheel and seeing if it has any impact. I am a firm believer that more restrictions/bannings in a format that is already very diverse (as you pointed out by the top 8) is a bad move. There are certainly many cards in the arsenal to deal with artifacts and I see no indication by results over the past, say 1 year, to suggest any moves. Granted classic DE’s never fire so it is hard to get any true indication of the format.