Our week of madness begins!

We all love a trier and history is full of tales of brave folks doing mad things in a last ditch attempt to steal victory. Whether it’s a bunch of Greeks in a Wooden Horse, an African madman driving a herd of Elephants over a mountain range, some guys blowing trumpets at the walls of Jericho or even some farmers hiring a handful of cowboys or was that samurai? The point is, if it hadn’t worked, and let’s not pretend for a second that a million other fatally flawed plans didn’t, we’d never have heard of it. Conversely as they did succeed (even if only in the movies ) the modern world has such a soft spot for death defying feats of heroic lunacy, that these stories are immortalised. (usually by making movies)

So my friends in honour of the brave 300 we are going to investigate the world of do or die last ditch, million to one shots and general lunacy in the world of Magic...  Most times these decks and combos will do nothing, but fizzle out feebly, make you swear profusely and look like an idiot... but sometimes just sometimes... the little blue touch paper will ignite and your opponent will be able to do nothing but stare open mouthed as you utterly devastate his plans with what can best be described as a wooden horse and some trumpets...  

We’re going to look at some crazy combos and decks for Legacy, Extended, EDH and not one, but 2 standard decks and one for them is brand new...

Today we’re going to have a look at Legacy and tomorrow we’ll look at Extended and then we’ll have a crack at standard for the weekend..
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So to our first deck and this one is the perfect example of what we’re talking about. Two parts jank 50c rare, one part combo ramp and one part madscience.  This is a legacy deck like no other, it has 4 cards that cost more than $1 and whilst they are pretty expensive they are by no means bank breakers. I won’t bore you with the whole deck, but the combo is pure cheek.   

This is the infamous Krark’s Thumb One Turn kill combo... (Now we mentioned on the blog that we’d offer a prize for anyone who guessed it, no one did, but we did get an alternative idea which was along the right line and would kind of still count from Brian Leahy...so well done to you sir) We’ll tell you Brian’s idea in a second, but here’s the combo we had in mind...

You will need the god hand (But hey his is legacy and who doesn’t... plus if you had the money you could probably make this more stable)

So this is it...

1 Chrome Mox (about $15/20)

1 Krark’s Thumb

1 Mountain

1 pyretic ritual

1 seething song

1 (any) red spell

1 Game of Chaos

If you go first and your opponent isn’t playing blue (and force of will... and has it in his opening hand... and you’re not seriously unlucky) you’ve won...

How?  Well imprint the mox with (any) red spell... lay the mountain... tap both for the ritual... use the 3 mana for seething song you can now play both Krark’s thumb and the Game of Chaos and all you have to do to win is flip and win FIVE coin flips and because of Krark’s Thumb you basically have 10 chances to do it...  Because Game of Chaos goes up geometrically it works like this...

1^st  flip - they lose 1 - you gain 1 (19 v’s 21)

2^nd flip- they lose 2 – yiou gain 2(17 v’s 23)

3d flip – they lose 4 – you gain 4 (13 v’s 27

4^th flip –they lose 8 – you gain 8 (7 v’s 33)

5^th flip they lose 16 – you gain 16 (-9 v’s 39) of course if you lose the flip here you’re probably in trouble)

So there you have it. A cheap as chips (potential) first turn kill. I’m not for a second suggesting that you take this along to the world championships, but next time your beardy mate wants to play in a legacy tournament ask to borrow his chrome moxes (it can probably be done with mox opal too or perhaps some fancy lands) and hit the local traders 50p box in search of a Krark’s thumb or two...  You might not win any games, but you’ll have a blast and just maybe... yeah... just maybe...

Oh and before we forget, we got to say thanks to Brian for suggesting Mana Clash as an alternative. It could technically work too, but it would take at least 20 flips and maybe more and the chances of that happening, even with Krark’s thumb, are just a little too low...

If you want my exact Krark’s thumb decklist send me an email... but there are some great cards out there so If you just want to potter along on your own here are some suggestions to look out for... Planar Claos, Goblin bomb, Chance encounter ( imagine these last two with proliferate ) Bottle of Sulieman, Goblin Assassin (put in goblin assault too) and my favourite... Fiery Gambit (awesome card)   

Tomorrow we’re going to look at Extended.  It’s another nasty tricky combo deck and once again it’s great when it works and pants when it doesn’t... So what’s the plan this time?  Well there are less combo pieces but once again we’ll give you a teaser... How can you play a Titan, give it haste and double strike and wipe your opponent’s board all on turn three? And you can’t use any mirrors, cobras, polymorphs, pipers oh and you can’t use green at all...  

One final note of caution.... We recommend this deck as a casual or fun deck, but if you do take it to a tournament remember this very important rule...

You are not allowed to have any money on the table at any time (like a coin)  so use a coin that isn't legal tender.... (I use a french frank ...:if you think I'm being too cautious imagine you've just beaten a legacy player who has been playing foir 2o years and whose desk is worth £5000 and knows every rule... he;s gonna know this rule too and all he has to call a judge and pont at tjhe coin on the table... Would you really blame them? )

 

And yes we know its not guarenteed, but it also doesn't cost 2 grand...

The Good news about mythics...

Now I do like Magic and I do respect the boys and girls in R&D I mean they must have such a headache making sure that what they do doesn’t break the system. Of course sometimes cards slip through the net that are stupidly overpowered and I can imagine their faces when on Monday morning the boss drags them all into a meeting to ask them exactly what they were thinking when they let Lotus Cobra out of the building.. My point is, they can’t get everything right and its fun when you find one of their gaps.

 Like the first time you realise that Soliton and Heavy Arbalest is an AK47 and Liquimetal coating and revoke existence is a doomsday laser.  There are other gaps too, not everything can be a mythic and they must spend weeks trying to get that right, but would anyone play a Mox opal over a Steel Overseer or an Archdruid or even a Trinket Mage? I played a 12 player draft recently and opened an Opal. I passed it and 12 turns later I got it back. 

The thing is, I do think Mythics have their place. They artificially inflate their own price and thus devalue normal rares. You can pick up a Birds oF Paradise for £4/$6 these days and that has got to be a record and which would you rather have in your deck?  Having said that kids all it will take for Mox Opal to become the most played card in standard is for Wizards to suddenly think it’s a good idea to bring artifact lands back. 

We are at Adventures in the Meta are looking forward to Mirridon Besieged and shall be making some educated guesses and total punts as to what we might see in the new set very soon, feel free to send in your suggestions and watch this space...

Pssssst.... Pentavus










that was a complete punt but if the R%D boys & girls are watching... please bring back pentavus....