FNM Report 2-24-2012

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Happy Monday MTG peeps,

It is not very often that we stay for the full evening of Friday Night Magic as we unfortunately have some other obligations to attend to. Typically, we play the first two or perhaps three matches at our local WPN Games store, OMG! Games and Collectibles here in Barrie, Ontario and then have to take off. This last Friday was however an exception and we stayed until the bitter (approximately midnight) and took in the full 5 rounds of matches slinging our favourite new Magic the Gathering cards in our favourite format, standard constructed.

We are rather pleased that we did stay longer as not only did we finally get our paws on a Friday Night Magic foil promo card (this month is Despise) but also did not too badly in our matches against some of the club's very best players. We also collected an additional 15 Planeswalker Points for the evening. We went on to 5th place in a field of 32 players with 1 match loss and 4 wins with our W/B Token Deck.

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Our first match was against David N who won rather handily in two games with an Esper Control build. In both games, we were just trying to catch up after a series of counter spells. Having our 'anthem' enchantments blown up really did not help our cause at all either.

The second match was against Zach K, a new player who had just started playing. Zach was playing a Red Deck wins featuring Grim Lavamancer, Chandra's Phoenix, Stormblood Berserker, Volt Charge, Shrine of Burning Rage, andIncinerate. We were able to get past all the burn and field a small army of pumped up Human tokens thanks to Increasing Devotion which we also were able to cast again with flashback.

The third match, against Dan L was rather interesting. Dan is a great player and we love the home-brews he brings to game with. Unfortunately we can't really recall very well what he was playing but do think that after Dan fine tunes it, great things may be expected.

In the fourth match, we were pitted against Matt S who also fielded an Esper Control build. We did take the match in two but it was a very tight race in both games - the second one especially. We took the second game after we were able to stick four anthems (2 Intangible Virtues and 2 Honor of the Pures) in play followed by an Increasing Devotion.

For the fifth and last match, we were paired with Taylor W who had brought along a Mono-Green Aggro build featuring solid Mana-ramp, Young Wolf, Strangleroot Geist, Thrun, the Last Troll, and Vorapede. Taylor had just put the deck together earlier in the day and (thankfully) did not have an opportunity to tweak it against the ever evolving metagame. Had there been some Overrun trample spells in the mix we seriously think we would not have won.

Anwwhoos -stay tuned to MTG Realm - tomorrow, wel'll give a run down of the Esper Control archetype which are doing rather nicely at most casual and competitive circles.
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Also of note - Great news from MTG Mint Card - They have restocked singles on one of our favourite recent sets - CONFLUX ! This is the set which brought you such notable cards as Noble Hierarch, Knight of the Reliquary, Progenitus among others. Click on over before they sell out.
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Token Defence

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Happy Thursday MTG peeps,

For today's post, we wanted to yatter about what Magic the Gathering players may want to consider for inclusion in their standard constructed sideboards. More specifically, this post is really just us here at MTG Realm thinking aloud about what to do about the gaining popularity (at least in some casual / FNM circles) of white weenie or token-based decks.

Between Gather the Townsfolk / Increasing Devotion, Lingering Souls / Midnight Haunting, and other token generating spells, the skies (and ground) is anticipated to be filled with tokens. There will be Spirit, Human, Vampire, Wolf and Zombie tokens aplenty but players are likely to favour white based builds featuring tokens hoping to cash in on the double anthem effects of Intangible Virtue and Honor of the Pure. Sure, Sorin's first minus ability provides an unmoveable anthem effect curtesy of the emblem but the likely mix will be a black splash in an otherwise white deck.


Now, for the Haterade . . .

How to deal with this token mess is unpleasant, and even more so should they have mana open to activate the lifelink / deathtouch ability on their Vault of the Archangel. One way to deal with this that is already starting to see play is the use of Ratchet Bomb which will kill all tokens on the turn it comes down or Elesh Norn which will kill off anything they have with two toughness or less. Ms. Norn's buddy is the Innistrad curse, Curse of Death's Hold which may have a wider appeal as the same effect is not attached to a fragile and easily removed body.

Now since we're casual Magic the Gathering players here at MTG Realm, we will not baulk or take pause to consider some other fine and under appreciated cards to battle the token menance. Currently we're considering Choking Fumes to throw negative counters on their en masse alpha swing. Likewise, Marrow Shards and Corrosive Gale may prove of use. What we would really like to brew up is a strong effect with Arm with Aether while attempting to sneak several critters under the wire like Invisible Stalker or other unblockable / intimidate creatures. If you did not get this punchline, don't worry - tokens bounced back to their owner gets eaten by the same clothes dryer that has been eating our socks for years and will never come back. There of course is answers in red and we've been experimenting with a modified Tempered Steel build featuring Whipflare (I wip ma flare back 'n' forth). Lastly but certainly not exhaustively is Slagstorm, which if your are playing red should have in your side board at all times.


As the Token players start to adjust to these hater cards, they may become more reliant on those afore-mentioned anthem effects and hope to hold their token army together with toughness above Norn / Curse level. This is when you may want to consider Dark Ascension's Ray of Revelation. This two mana (one colourless and one white) instant will nerf any enchantment pumping their tokens and will come back for a flashback encore for just one green.

Anywhoos -
Tell us about your local meta-game - Has token decks taken off, and if so how are players defending against it ?
Use the comment thingy below.
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Also of note - the folks over at MTG Mint Card has cracked open a few more boxes of Innistrad and has now restocked. If you've been looking for that special hard-to-get sorcery or Planeswalker, drop by.
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