Tournament Report: Eternal Extravaganza 4 with Punishing Maverick, 6/18/16

I'd been looking forward to this event since it was first announced months ago. When the date for the U.S. Legacy GP was fixed to be the weekend immediately before EE4, at first I thought I would go to the GP instead. However, I settled on going to EE4 since it was only a ~5 hour drive away. As things happened, our group reached the hotel at 2AM after a 7 hour drive plagued with traffic and other mishaps. I wasn't as rested as I wanted but still arrived at the venue later that morning eager to put the Punishing Maverick deck I'd been honing for weeks to the test. The well-used, A/C-less hall coupled with 90 degree heat outside promised some level of discomfort, but everyone was happy to be there playing Legacy. The event had ~320 players so it was going to be the full 9 rounds. Here is the 75 I registered:

PUNISHING MAVERICK, 6/18/16
Creature Spells (20) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Deathrite Shaman 1x Birds of Paradise 1x Noble Hierarch 2x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 1x Scavenging Ooze 1x Scryb Ranger 1x Gaddock Teeg 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (15) 4x Swords to Plowshares 4x Green Sun's Zenith 3x Punishing Fire 1x Life from the Loam 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Sword of Fire and Ice
Lands (25) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 2x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Bayou 1x Plateau 1x Dryad Arbor 1x Forest 1x Plains 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Thespian's Stage 1x Dark Depths	SB: 3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben SB: 2x Surgical Extraction SB: 1x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Scavenging Ooze SB: 1x Crop Rotation SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Krosan Grip SB: 1x Garruk Relentless SB: 1x Fiery Justice

After testing without Dark Depths a little, I quickly went back to it and continue to maintain its a strong choice for most builds of Maverick. Another tweak I made in the manabase was dropping the Horizon Canopy for a basic Plains, which I've been satisfied with so far.

For the Equipment package, I decided to go with 2 SFM + Jitte + Sword despite my preference for 3 SFM + Jitte + Batterskull. I thought a Sword was better positioned against Miracles and Shardless and wasn't expecting a whole lot of Delver decks. Its also worth noting that Batterskull isn't the slam dunk it used to be against the predominant Grixis Delver game 1 now that maindeck Therapies have become common.

Round 1: UG Infect (0-2)
My opponent is a known Infect player, so I kept a hand on the play with a turn 2 Jitte. Jitte is quite strong against Infect and in game 1 they have no way of removing it. Unfortunately, my Jitte got countered by Force of Will. I realized I had overlooked a crucial component of my opening hand: Gaddock Teeg. Since my opponent led on Noble Hierarch I could not die on turn 2. Therefore, the superior play would have been to lead on Gaddock Teeg before casting Jitte, which at that point would be both Force and Daze proof. I would also have the mana to equip it the same turn and start attacking. As it turned out, I drew no more interaction and died pretty quickly.
Game 2 I had a solid interactive draw and felt poised to take over the game, but my opponent Brainstormed into Invigorate + Berserk to kill me with his last threat a turn before I could get Jitte going.

Round 2: Grixis Painter (2-0)
These games were pretty similar. My opponent was digging a lot with Top and cantrips but never seemed find what he needed in the face of my hodge-podge of creatures and removal.

Round 3: Esper Deathblade (2-1)
Game 1 was a grindfest and my opponent eventually got the better of it after landing Jace and protecting it for several turns.
Game 2 I blew up his hand with a Wasteland and quickly ended the game with Exalted beats.
Game 3 I was on a mulligan but could present a relatively quick Marit Lage that he wasn't able to answer.

Round 4: Death & Taxes (1-1)
I played too slowly and conservatively this round, resulting in a draw in turns despite me being overwhelmingly favored to win game 3.

Round 5: ANT (1-2)
Game 1 my opponent had to sweat it on Ad Nauseam flips after 2 life and 1 life, but found what he needed to get there.
Game 2 I mulliganed to a hand with a turn 2 Knight and a Wasteland as my only potential interaction. I managed to fade a turn 2 kill and destroyed both his lands.
Game 3 I had a promising mulligan to 5 with Mother into Revoker, but it was blown up by Dread of Night into Chain of Vapor into Tendrils for 20.

Round 6: Esper Control (2-0)
My opponent is someone I'm familiar with from Massachsetts. I know he's on an Esper Control brew (Planeswalkers, Painful Truths, Vindicates, no Stoneforge Mystic or True-Name Nemesis) that lines up very poorly against my deck based on our previous matches. This time is no different.

Round 7: Miracles (2-1)
Game 1 he gets Mentor + double Top going and I die to a swarm of Monks a turn before I can make Marit Lage to swing for lethal.
Game 2 on a mulligan I have a quick Marit Lage he can't answer.
Game 3 he has Top into Counterbalance, but I'm able to resolve Scryb Ranger and Stoneforge Mystic for Jitte after seeing a Mentor floating around. He gets aggressive with Mentor and I go down to 2 life, but Scryb Ranger + Jitte is able to decimate all his Monks. We end extra turns with no clear conclusion and I'm prepared to draw, but my opponent decides to concede and drop.

Round 8: Gw Cloudpost (0-2)
Once again I know what my opponent is on, and keep a hand with a potential turn 2 Knight. Unfortunately, no lands are fetched so my Deathrite Shaman-turned-Squire is unable to bring my hand together. Without another land I decide to spend my second turn Zenithing for Noble Hierarch only to have Thought-Knot Seer exile my Knight, totally blowing up my game plan. I was able to strap on both my Equipments to my Squire and get some pressure going, but he resolved Primeval Titan, with Glimmerposts and my Plow giving him enough time to resolve Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger.
Game 2 I have a mulligan with a Wasteland. I use it on his Ancient Tomb instead of Savannah, and  savagely topdeck my Loam next turn. I go after his tapped Cloudpost but get blown out by Crop Rotation. Oops. He resolves Rest in Peace on his next turn, and is quickly able to demonstrate an infinite turn loop.

At this point I am out of prize contention and in a zombie-like state from exhaustion so I drop.


Final Record: 4-3-1

While not the best result, I feel good about the deck, which was limited not by its power but by my poor play in several spots. Looking ahead, I am hoping to attend SCG Worcester in July. At this point I will probably just hold course and play some kind of Maverick deck.

Eternal Masters & Legacy Musings

Spoilers for the eagerly anticipated set Eternal Masters began in earnest this week, promising widespread reprints of rare and/or valuable Eternal staples. Its somewhat interesting that WotC decided to shine light on Eternal formats with this release, considering they have traditionally been rather laissez-faire about supporting and endorsing such formats. But here we are, and this set could prove to generate a huge amount of new interest in Eternal Magic.

While the Reserved List remains as inscrutable and immovable as ever, the vast majority of the Eternal cardpool is non-RL and subject to reprint in this kind of supplemental product. If these reprints bring down the price of entry to Legacy, the format will certainly see growth**. Many players are interested what Legacy has to offer, but consider it "too expensive". If you read the Magic hivemind that is r/magicTCG on Reddit, you would get the impression that this perceived expense makes Legacy an ultra-exclusive format no one can afford to play. This impression is simply false.

Lots of people play Legacy, though in the United States this is somewhat regionally biased towards major metropolitan areas. While Legacy players are on average older and have higher income, many are still of modest means, and are no better off than Standard or Modern players. These players are simply willing to pay the premium of entry for the great experience that is Legacy Magic. Most Magic players simply can't justify spending potentially thousands of dollars on cardboard, which I can honestly sympathize with.

However, there are a few points worth making in regards to the "Legacy is too expensive" argument:

• There are many Magic players who build multiple Tier 1-2 Modern decks or play a lot of Tier Standard over the course of several rotations. The investment put towards these efforts will often equal the cost of a Legacy deck. Players in this category could choose to make that investment in a Legacy deck instead. Legacy isn't too expensive for these players, they just choose to direct their Magic investment towards other formats and activities.

• There are several Legacy decks available that fit into many players' budgets, including Belcher, Burn, Dredge, Manaless Dredge, and Oops All Spells. These are all totally legitimate and competitive Legacy strategies. Of course, these strategies aren't appealing to everyone. But their existence means that its not Legacy as a format that is too expensive for many-its certain archetypes within the format that are.

• Perhaps most importantly, people need to realize that as great of an experience as Legacy is, no one is entitled to be able to play Legacy and WotC does not have a mandate to make Legacy more accessible. Legacy has been very healthy for years, and has actually become more popular over the last two years in particular, despite the persistence of the RL and general lack of reprints. If Eternal Masters hypothetically did not exist, I am confident that Legacy would continue to see gradual growth.

**To return to the point marked above, it is unclear if Eternal Masters will make Legacy significantly more affordable. As we learned with Modern Masters, limited print run reprints often don't actually decrease prices, since they stimulate increased demand that negates the increased supply. We already saw many RL cards spike after the EMA announcement, and whatever non-RL staples aren't in the set will probably also spike once the complete spoiler is out.

Honestly, I am cautious to treat the potential growth of Legacy heralded by Eternal Masters as a net positive for its community and play experience. An unpopular truth is that the relative exclusivity of Legacy does in fact make it a more enjoyable experience than other formats for myself and many others. Since most Legacy players have spent a lot of money on the format out of choice, no one gets salty or upset about others playing expensive decks, which I have observed in other formats. Legacy won't put you on the Pro Tour-you play it because you love it. No one is willing to spend that kind of money unless they are passionate about Magic and Legacy. Naturally, this excludes many low to mid-level grinders, who are often the most unpleasant category of player. I have played Standard, Modern, and Legacy from the local to GP level, and with this experience have concluded that Legacy players are the most mature, courteous, interesting, and enjoyable to play a card game with on average.

On the positive side, I will be very pleased if Eternal Masters turns out to be a great thing for Legacy and proves these fears baseless. Its entirely possible that some time from now, people will look at Legacy as the Pre-Eternal Masters era and the Post-Eternal Masters era. While I don't plan on buying any of the sealed product or even singles, its been very satisfying to see this set of Eternal all-stars come together, and I look forward to that continuing next week.

Update: A few hours after publishing this post the full spoiler was dropped. Guess I don't have to wait until next week, whooo!

DECK: Punishing Maverick, 5/22/16

I have a few bigger events coming up this Summer and I'm strongly considering playing some kind of Punishing Maverick deck, so I've been playing the it extensively for the last few weeks. I tried to come up with a build that had game against Miracles, Shardless BUG, Lands, and Eldrazi. This pile was the result:

Creature Spells

Noncreature Spells

Lands

Sideboard

Imgur Album w/ full-size images

The list felt pretty good overall. I'm still on the fence about whether Deathrite Shaman should be played in Punishing Maverick. I do often miss the cleaner manabase of a pure Naya version with a basic Plains, and the intermittent mana production of Deathrite Shaman can sometimes be a liability in a deck that wants to make a lot of mana. However, Deathrite's sheer versatility as a hedge against random stuff can't be ignored and is probably best for a large, unknown meta. 

Keep on Punishing

While not a well known Legacy player, Fabian Goerzgen has a quietly impressive resume including two Legacy GP Top 8's and one BoM Top 8. No matter where you see his name, the deck next to it remains unchanged: Punishing Maverick.

This archetype is clearly a labor of love for Goerzgen, who has played it for longer than I've played competitive Magic and twice as long as I've played Legacy. Its a crazy amount of time to invest in one archetype from my insignificant perspective. Punishing Maverick hasn't been a top-tier strategy for years now, yet Goerzgen isn't just playing the deck-he's continuously putting up strong finishes with it.

The latest was at last weekend's 400+ player MKM Legacy Series event in Frankfurt, where Goerzgen split Top 8 with this list:

PUNISHING MAVERICK, 5/15/16
Creature Spells (21) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Deathrite Shaman 1x Birds of Paradise 1x Noble Hierarch 3x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Scavenging Ooze 1x Qasali Pridemage 1x Gaddock Teeg 4x Knight of the Reliquary 1x Aven Mindcensor	Noncreature Spells (13) 4x Swords to Plowshares 4x Green Sun's Zenith 3x Punishing Fire 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Batterskull
Lands (26) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 2x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Bayou 1x Plateau 1x Dryad Arbor 1x Forest 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Horizon Canopy 1x Maze of Ith 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Thespian's Stage 1x Dark Depths	SB: 2x Enlightened Tutor SB: 2x Choke SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Tormod's Crypt SB: 1x Pithing Needle SB: 1x Null Rod SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker SB: 1x Moat SB: 1x Engineered Plague SB: 1x Sylvan Library

Most of the comments I read regarding this list around the internet were quite amusing, permeated by a general misunderstanding of how the deck works and how it could be successful. Their confusion is somewhat understandable: the deck looks more or less like a relic from 2011.

Goerzgen truly demonstrates that experience is one of the most important ingredients of success in Legacy. No matter what the archetype is, if you love it and invest the time and effort in learning its intricacies, you can perform well with it at the highest level. This is a lesson all Legacy players can take to heart.

Check out my Punishing Maverick primer to read more about the archetype and see Goerzgen's past lists.

DECK: Burning Wish Loam, 5/6/2016

I played Aggro Loam with Burning Wish at FNM last night. I have sworn off playing this deck multiple times, but the allure of Burning Wish and Devastating Dreams proved too strong yet again.

Lands

Noncreature Spells

Creature Spells

Sideboard

Imgur Album with full-size images

I put the deck together in a bit of a hurry so there were a few mistaken card choices-the Windswept Heath was supposed to be a 3rd Grove, and the 2nd G. Teeg in the sideboard was supposed to be the 3rd Canonist.

In future I will consider cutting a Tarmogoyf and Green Sun's Zenith out of the maindeck for a Scavenging Ooze and the 4th Abrupt Decay. In the sideboard, I'm still unsure of the right mix of hatebears to have and may throw in Thalia. The slightly toned-back 10 sorcery Wishboard felt good and will probably remain the same. 

DECK: Punishing Jund, 4/29/16

I played Punishing Jund at FNM last night. Link to Imgur album with full-size images can be found below.

Creature Spells

Noncreature Spells

Lands

Sideboard

Imgur Album w/ full-size images

Deck Tech: 4C Aggro Loam with Burning Wish

          

Introduction
Aggro Loam is a land and graveyard-centric midrange deck that essentially revolves around Life from the Loam and Mox Diamond. Aggro Loam has existed in Legacy for a long time and has assumed many different forms over the years. This is a version that first appeared throughout 2013 in the hands of Jeff Hoogland, its principal developer. Hoogland's style of list was characterized by utilizing Chalice of the Void, White and Black splashes for Knight of the Reliquary and Abrupt Decay, and a full Burning Wish package. These characteristics were rarely all found together in an Aggro Loam deck before, but Hoogland was able to weave them together to achieve several strong tournament results and leave a lasting impact on the archetype.



Deck Theory
At its core, Aggro Loam is designed to utilize Mox Diamond to "cheat" on mana in order to cast powerful spells while using cards like Life from the Loam to generate advantage. Life from the Loam negates the "downside" of Mox Diamond while conveniently synergizing with Wasteland, one of the most powerful cards in the format. There are a host of other "lands and graveyards" matter cards that can be abused in this shell, not to mention powerful two-mana spells that can be cast on the first turn with Mox Diamond.

Hoogland placed at Star City Games events with several very similar lists. Here is one of Hoogland's lists, which earned a Quarterfinals finish at the SCG Invitational in July, 2013:

4C AGGRO LOAM, 7/29/13
Creature Spells (7) 2x Tarmogoyf 1x Gaddock Teeg 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (27) 4x Mox Diamond 4x Chalice of the Void 2x Sylvan Library 2x Green Sun's Zenith 3x Life from the Loam 4x Burning Wish 3x Abrupt Decay 3x Punishing Fire 2x Devastating Dreams
Lands (26) 4x Wooded Foothills 2x Taiga 1x Badlands 1x Bayou 1x Savannah 1x Dryad Arbor 1x Forest 2x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Horizon Canopy 2x Tranquil Thicket 2x Forgotten Cave 1x Bojuka Bog 1x Nantuko Monastery 1x Maze of Ith 1x Karakas 4x Wasteland	SB: 3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Chainer's Edict SB: 1x Devastating Dreams SB: 1x Dreadbore SB: 1x Life from the Loam SB: 1x Maelstrom Pulse SB: 1x Massacre SB: 1x Perish SB: 1x Shattering Spree SB: 1x Slaughter Games SB: 1x Thoughtseize

Hoogland's style of list may appear jumbled at first, but is actually finely tuned and packs an excellent suite of support cards for the archetype.

• Chalice has seen ebbs and flows of use in Aggro Loam, but Hoogland opted to play the full amount. Chalice slots quite naturally into Aggro Loam as it can be cast on the first turn and the deck's own key spells cost 2 or 3 mana. Since Chalice is typically set to 1, it generally prohibits playing 1 mana spells of your own and thereby informs many deckbuilding decisions. 

      
          

• One strategy that has perennially appeared in Aggro Loam is to accelerate into a large creature such as Terravore, Countryside Crusher, or Tarmogoyf, or Knight of the Reliquary, and follow it up with a Devastating Dreams. 

• Hoogland has incorporated this strategy with Knight of the Reliquary and Tarmogoyf as the large creatures of choice. Knight is excellent in a Loam shell, which can grow it to a large size and supports a toolbox of utility lands like Maze of Ith, Bojuka Bog, Nantuko Monastery (surprisingly effective against control decks in particular!) and Karakas very well.

          

• Ideally, Devastating Dreams functions as both a Wrath of God and Armageddon by destroying all your opponent's creatures and lands, leaving you with a huge threat in play to close out the game in short order. 

• Devastating Dreams can still be a truly devastating play even without a big creature on the field, and with access to Loam and Sylvan Library, the deck is capable of recovering from the self-inflicted damage of Dreams better than most.

    

• Cycling lands provide something to do on turn 1, and can generate card advantage in conjunction with Life from the Loam later in the game.

          

• Green Sun's Zenith is a nice addition that can function as a turn 1 play (which the deck is a bit light on due to a lack of 1 mana spells) fetching Dryad Arbor, scale to fetch a Knight of the Reliquary in the late game, and even enable a small toolbox of utility creatures like Gaddock Teeg.

• Gaddock Teeg functions as a game 1 anti-combo card to complement Chalice, which is facilitated by Green Sun's Zenith. While often boarded out, it offers a tutorable defense against combo strategies which can beat Chalice on 1 or Karakas.

• Burning Wish is interesting technology for a Loam deck. It is essentially used as a tool for increasing consistency in a deck that can suffer from disjointed draws by granting you the ability to "draw" from  a selection of cards in your sideboard when you cast it. One potential downside of this is being unable to Wish for a card and cast it the same turn since you have to pay an extra 2 mana, but a deck with Mox Diamond and Loam is well suited to create a mana advantage that enables this.

• Another advantage of the Wishboard is it lets you keep a copy of Loam insulated from effects like Surgical Extraction. Devastating Dreams is a card that is situational in nature, so it too benefits from having a copy to choose from out of the Wishboard rather than just more in the maindeck.

          

• Outside of Dreams and Loam, the Wishboard presents a suite of options that can be grouped into two main categories: removal and combo hate. 

• Removal should be mostly self-explainatory, and is intended to offer outs to a variety of scenarios and permanent types.

• The two principal combo hate cards are Thoughtseize and Slaughter Games. You won't always have a Chalice out, so Thoughtseize can be a great option to buy time before landing more impactful hate. Slaughter Games has a very strong effect, but is generally prohibitive to cast in Legacy due to the fact that it costs 4 mana. This deck is capable of casting it on turn 2!

• Some newer cards that could have a home in the Wishboard include Toxic Deluge and Council's Judgment, and Collective Brutality.

     

• The non-Wish portion of the sideboard consists exclusively of more hatebears to fight combo decks. Resolving any of them on turn 1 with a Mox is backbreaking against many combo decks.

• Dark Confidant is a fantastic card advantage engine in a Loam deck, which has a low average CMC and is happy to improve draw quality by drawing a lot of cards. Hoogland eventually removed it from his deck, likely because it plays poorly with Devastating Dreams.

         

• Aside from specialized Wish targets, Abrupt Decay is the primary reason to splash Black as one of the best removal spells in Legacy.

• While ignored until now, the Punishing Fire + Grove of the Burnwillows engine is yet another powerful aspect of the deck that plays very well with Knight of the Reliquary and Loam.

     

          

     

• The rest of the manabase consists of a mix of dual lands (Taiga being the most important) and one basic Forest tied together by Wooded Foothills.

Conclusion & Other Resources
Unfortunately, development on this interesting take on Aggro Loam has mostly stagnated since early 2014 when Hoogland quit the deck after over a year of playing it. Additionally, Niklas Kronberger developed a new Aggro Loam variant that took down the Bazaar of Moxen main event in May 2014. Kronberger's version has since become established as the dominant one, and has experienced much success since then. However, I would argue that Hoogland's version was crucial in establishing many choices that Niklas was able to build on, and thus still serves as the foundation of the modern Aggro Loam archetype. Hoogland's version is more complex than Kronberger's , but the versatility it offers is unparalleled, and I believe it can still be relevant today.

More decklists:

Mike Pawliuk, Top8 @ Face to Face Games 1K, Toronto (7/18/2015, 40 players)

Roberto Oliveira, 3rd @ #SuperlegacyRS, Brazil (12/7/2014, 37 players)

Daniel Rassiner, 2nd @ Knight Ware Legacy, Los Angeles (1/12/2014, 34 players)

Kurt Crane, 8th @ Star City Games Open Cincinnati (9/1/2013, 277 players)

Jeff Hoogland, 9th-16th @ Star City Games Open Cincinnati (9/1/2013, 277 players)

Jeff Hoogland, 9th-16th @ Star City Games Open Columbus (6/16/2013)

Jeff Hoogland 2nd @ Star City Games Open Milwaukee (4/14/2013, 279 players)

Jeff Hoogland, 3rd @ Star City Games Open Atlanta (4/7/2013, 320 players)


Videos

Hoogland VS BUG Delver, Milawaukee Quarterfinal

Hoogland VS Merfolk, Milawaukee Semifinal

Hoogland VS Sneak & Show, Milawaukee Final

Hoogland VS Esper Deathblade, Invitational 

Hoogland VS Punishing Jund, Atlanta

Kurt Crane VS Shardless BUG, Cincinnati

Kurt Crane VS Belcher, Cincinnati


Other

Here is an article Jeff wrote for SCG about the deck.