Hey all, I'm back. I haven't written in a while, for a few reasons. The foremost being that I simply haven't done many drafts recently, and I'm super ready for Dark Ascension to infuse new life into the draft format, so I can get back on the horse and write some more articles detailing the new or expanded archetypes. Secondly, a lot of my time recently has been devoted to getting these little suckers:

 

So, a lot of my recent MTGO time has been put towards Block. But I haven't written about current Block Constructed here because I'm writing and recording videos biweekly over at MTGOAcademy.com and didn't want to step on toes by providing service on the same content twice. But I love Block! And with Dark Ascension coming out, Block will be shaken up heavily. So today I'm going to speculate a bit on some cards spoiled so far, and how they could fit into the format.

 

 

Let's tart with the big daddy of the set here. Sorin will be one of the most defining cards from Dark AScension. It's just super powerful! On the surface, he's very good - a planeswalker that can protect itself and has a back-breaking ultimate. But he fits in perfectly to an already powerful deck in Block - BW Tokens. I have been playing BW recently in queues and a couple dailies, and the deck has impressed me - with just Innistrad! Now BW tokens looks like the best deck in Block, and I haven't even seen all the cards yet! BW tokens currently excels at getting card advantage while beating down - Intangible Virtue and flashback cards (Moan of the Unhallowed, Sever the Bloodline) allow them that. The only weakness of the deck was how slow it could be. The deck plays 12 4-drops with more in the board, simply due to lack of options. Now we have Raise the Alarm and a flashback Midnight Haunting? AND Sorin? Sign me up, please!

Preliminary decklist:

 

 

 

Next let's talk about tribal. There are four tribal lords in the set - one for each of the 'monster' tribes in Innistrad. While I'm not sure about the Spirit and Zombie one, I do like Immerwolf and Stromkirk Captain. With the absurd amount of tokens in the format now, it seems very hard to connect with your vampires, which needs to happen, since they are basically all Sliths. But, first strike is huge for giving you an edge in combat. Enough to make vampires a viable deck? I'm not sure, since it could just end up that you'll need a Captain to be competitive in a game. Otherwise, giant, vigilant tokens will probably be making your bloodsuckers quite sad.

 

 

Immerwolf and his vampire buddies, on the other hand, are real exciting this time around. Setting aside Immerwolf himself for the moment, the new werewolves finally give a deckbuilder enough options without resorting to the Innistrad-only method of "Well, let's start will all the werewolves. Cut Tormented Pariah. And since we're short on creatures to play with, let's just call it a day." Now you have multiple 1 and 2 drops, and about thirty 3/2s for 3R. But now, Immerwolf? It makes you werewolves insane! The human side generally sucks, but the werewolf side is always awesome. I would probably play a 1RG 2/2 that just stopped my werewolves from flipping. But this one also serves as an anthem for your creatures! I think werewolves has a big shot at competing with BW tokens with its giant monster synergy.

 

 

 

 

There are a few more decks that get a new breath of life from Dark Ascension - Burning Vengeance and Splinterfright decks, which you'll see the following:

 

 

I like Burning Vengeance a lot, though I will admit it falls behind fast in just about every game, and has to claw its way back. So usually, you need to be heavy in removal. I'm not sure how good Secrets of the Dead is - I want to play a singleton to test it, but I have a feeling that just playing Vengeances will be better (since your cards already flashback anyway for an extra card - how many can you possibly need?). I'm actually very excited by Evolving Wilds for this reason - playing Sever the Bloodline has always been risky because of the bad mana in block. But with a Swamp and Altar of the Lost, I'm sure you can try and get away with it!

 

 

No Think Twice! I hate that card; it doesn't do anything the first time you cast it; you're just paying 2 mana to get the card you would've drawn otherwise. The second time, it at least digs you a card deep and shocks something, but that's a lot of work. I'd rather be playing cheaper cards, like Thought Scour and Faithless Looting. Looting in particular costs 2 mana, digs through the deck, but is technically card disadvantage. Don't worry about it. You're discarding cards with flashback or useless cards, and later you can flash it back to shock something AND put more cards in your graveyard. It's like the Desperate Ravings vs Think Twice argument, but now you don't even have to play both anyway due to lack of flashback cards - you just play better Think Twices. A similar reason is why I only play 3 Forbidden Alchemy - Alchemy is great, but slow. I would like to play more, but with all the aggressive decks in Block, I don't think I can just spend time durdling around and assembling the cards I would like to have in my hand.

 

I wanted to fit in Rolling Temblors somewhere in the maindeck, but it wasn't to be. I'm not even sure if it's good once Dark Ascension releases anyway - it only hits Spiders and not the scads of flying tokens I expect will become popular. 

 

This list is rather conservative - I didn't try to fit in any super off-color flashback cards that Altar of the Lost would help me play. I just don't know how stable this current manabase is, much less one that tries to play all five colors. 

 

and for Splinterfright...

 

 

The Splinterfright deck was one of my favorites in Block, but has become less and less my favorite as time goes on. And it's only because the deck takes so long to win. You have extremely long games with this deck. The deck is still fine, if a bit in need of defense from removal spells, but Dark Ascension gives it a few gems. For one, Tracker's Instincts lets you play (Dream Twists) that dig as much, but also give you a creature. And Ghoultree is a nice extra win condition for those stupid Boneyard Wurms that no one likes. 

 

 

 

This list is very similar to my pre-Ascension list, but with a few exceptions. First, we don't have to play Boneyard Wurm and Dream Twist any more! Yay! Boneyard Wurm is quickly replaced by Ghoultree. While not actually the same card, they serve a functional same purpose, with Ghoultree being slightly better because it gives you more giant guys for a cheap cost. I was not super impressed with wurm because it's just a dead card in your hand a lot of the time when you don't have outlets. Ghoultree can at least cost 5ish mana and do something, whereas Boneyard Wurm would be a 2/2 in that situation. Not very exciting. 

Dream Twist, on the other hand, was hard to cut. But Tracker's Instinct is just better. For one, it gives you a card, which is nice. It also digs deeper - 8 cards instead of 6. Yes, it costs more, but since it gives you a measureable effect, I think that it's just worth it to play over Dream Twist.

I have Screeching Skaabs (1 in the maindeck, 3 in the board) as blockers against aggro, hoping to make a few trades in the early game when I otherwise just don't do anything. They might be horrible; I don't know. 

 

Now, note that these decks are highly reactive, and I don't know what kind of metagame there will be after Dark Ascension. So my lists will be far from perfect. But it is looking to be a good one, full of diversity, and I can't wait for February 22nd, when MTGO gets to have Dark Ascension as well.

 

In closing, here's some silly decklists that I think are horrible, but looks really fun.

 

 

And adorable Curse deck. I assume that once you assemble Voltron (Curse of Thirst + Curse of Bloodletting), you "quickly" run away with the game. The bad thing is that Wizards made nearly every curse cost 5 mana, which is horribly for winning in any decent amount of time. Thus, you have a full playset of Warden of the Wall - both for defense and for mana acceleration, as well as tons of three mana removal - Brimstone Volley and (fires of Undeath). I'll probably play this deck a bunch, hoping to get a win. when i get one, I'll disassemble this awful concoction. IN BEFORE WITCHBANE ORB (which this deck will never, ever beat). 

 

I also want to build some form of mill deck in this format, but I don't think there are enough efficient mill cards. Also, the mill deck probably won't beat any other deck except for Dredge. So there's that. 

 

Still looking forward to Dark Ascension! Only a ...month... away!

 

Contact me:

 

Gard on MTGO

@Gardevi on Twitter