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By: Lord Erman, Nafiz Erman
Mar 01 2011 11:33am
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ROGUE PLAY
Mirrodin at War
Part III

by Nafiz Erman

Hello dear readers and welcome back to Rogue Play. During the last two weeks, we examined the already existing strategies in SOM Block and talked about their future versions. In Mirrodin at War, Part I we talked about Koth Red and Architect Blue, and then last week in Mirrodin at War, Part II we went over Infect and two different types of  Control.

And this week we will finish the SOM Block discussion by mainly looking at some different Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas decks.

He is the main character of this week's show.

So.. Shall we start?

 

DECK #1
Tezz Control

One of my favorite strategies with Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas is to use him in a Control deck. This new Tezzeret came in the perfect color combination for a Control deck and I see no reason why not to use him as an element of Control.

So I will first start by adding four Sphere of the Suns' and four Ichor Wellsprings to the deck. The former will not only help me cast a Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas on turn three, but it will also help me fix my mana. And the letter is a nice and cheap way of drawing an extra card. And besides, both are very nice targets for Tezzeret during late game.

Also, by adding four of each of those cards, I make almost sure that I will get something out on turn two. Which in my opinion is also something important.

Then I will add four Tumble Magnets to the deck. There's nothing new I can tell you about this card, and adding four of it to this deck is the only logical thing to do.

So, we have now twelve targets for Tezzeret which also help me greatly even without having Tezzeret on table. I mean, when building a deck around a specific card, especially for SOM Block, I always think like this: What happens if I never draw that specific card? What happens if it gets hit by a Memoricide? Will the deck turn into a complete junk or will it continue to function? Of course it must continue to function and all the three cards I added so far have their own uses (other than turning into a 5/5 later).

Okay, Sphere of the Suns, Ichor Wellspring and Tumble Magnet. What other artifacts will we need in this deck? As I said just above, this deck must function even without Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas. And that means, we should have a Plan B. What happens if we cannot turn our Tumble Magnets into 5/5s? Yes, you guessed correctly. We must have other ways of winning. Which happen to be these:

Steel Hellkite Wurmcoil Engine

All three are excellent and they all have their own uses. In some cases the road to the opponent on the ground will be blocked, and in those cases we will need the Thopter. In some other cases we will need to gain life and in those cases our choice will be the Wurm. And in some cases we will be in need of blowing some certain things up (such as Elspeth and Venser), and in those cases our choice will be the Dragon.

"Our choice?"

Yes, we can choose between them because we are clever enough to add Treasure Mage to our deck.

Okay, now we know how we will finish the game. We have those three big artifact creatures and we have Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas who will constantly give us 5/5 beaters.

Beating with 5/5s... a very simple yet sufficient plan.

But the real question now is this: How will we stay alive? Surely those four Tumble Magnets won't be enough.

Of course they won't be and that's the reason why we have these in the deck too:

Grasp of Darkness

With these plus Tumble Magnet in deck, nothing can escape our wrath!

And finally, here's the list:

TEZZ CONTROL

26 Lands

4x Darkslick Shores
4x Inkmoth Nexus
9x Island
9x Swamp

5 Creatures

2x Treasure Mage
1x Wurmcoil Engine
1x Thopter Assembly
1x Steel Hellkite

29 Other Spells

4x Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
4x Stoic Rebuttal
4x Grasp of Darkness
4x Tumble Magnet
4x Sphere of the Suns
4x Ichor Wellspring
3x Black Sun's Zenith
2x Go for the Throat

15 Cards Sideboard

4x Steel Sabotage
3x Memoricide
2x Go for the Throat
2x Ratchet Bomb
2x Fuel for the Cause
2x Volition Reins

So yes, this is the deck. The sideboard is also full with useful cards. Memoricide, Volition Reins and Ratchet Bomb are old cards and we all know their uses. Memoricide is especially useful against Koth Red (naming Koth of the Hammer obviously) and other Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas decks. I even bring it in against Architect Blue because Volition Reins is quite boring.

Life without the fear of Volition Reins is quite nice.
Life without the fear of Venser is equally nice.

Fuel for the Cause comes in against  Control because in that match-up I need more counterspells than four Stoic Rebuttals and Steel Sabotage comes in against almost everything.

There are two cards I consider for the sideboard and one of them is Corrupted Conscience. Sometimes paying six mana for Volition Reins may be a problem and that one mana difference between those two cards, is sometimes huge. And the other card I'm considering for the sideboard may surprise some of you, because it's this one:

Rust Tick

So why do I think this is a nice card? Well, if you ever played only a few SOM Block games, you know that there are many problematic artifacts running around. The most common problem is Tumble Magnet and just because I play , there is only a few ways for me to destroy it. Or Mimic Vat. Or Wurmcoil Engine. If I fail to counter them, then all I can do is to wait for a Steel Hellkite or a Ratchet Bomb... and both are very slow and unreliable most of the time. And that's the reason why I believe Rust Tick could be a nice addition. I haven't tested it yet, but you can be sure that I will.

Okay that's the deck. But is it the only deck that can use Tezzeret effectively? Of course not. Just check this next one out.

 

DECK #2
Infect-ed Tezz

Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas is actually an evil man (or an evil robot rather). He uses any artifact for his evil agenda and that also includes those Phyrexian ones. And what do the Phyrexians do best? Oh yes, they infect first and then proliferate. And that's absolutely fine by Tezzeret.

But this is a different deck than the first one. In the first deck above, we were mainly using Tezzeret to turn our artifacts into 5/5 creatures. But this deck doesn't need any 5/5 creatures. This deck needs to have artifacts on table, because our main proliferate engine is Throne of Geth and that card demands artifacts to be sacrificed.

But before we proliferate, we must first add a few poison counters (even one would do). And that we will do either with Necropede or with Plague Myr or our manland Inkmoth Nexus, or with the mighty Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon.

And just after we add a bunch of poison counters, we will start to proliferate. We will use Contagion Clasp which will work both as a proliferate engine and as a removal. We will use Throne of Geth which will also help us adding more counters onto our Tumble Magnets and even Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas.

Oh and please allow me to warn you dear readers about one thing: This is by no means a slow deck. While testing the deck, I remember even ending games in two turns after Tezzeret comes down and turns either Inkmoth Nexus or Plague Myr into 5/5 infectors. Oh yes dear readers, the "add one poison counter and then proliferate nine times" plan is actually the least favorite plan of ours. While playing this deck, our main aim is to attack with 5/5 infectors or with Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon. Then we will use our Throne of Geth only once or twice. And the game will then end to our favor.

And in case you wonder, here's the list:

INFECT-ED TEZZ

25 Lands

4x Darkslick Shores
4x Inkmoth Nexus
10x Swamp
7x Island

11 Creatures

4x Necropede
4x Plague Myr
3x Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon

24 Other Spells

4x Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
4x Stoic Rebuttal
4x Contagion Clasp
3x Throne of Geth
3x Tumble Magnet
2x Black Sun's Zenith
2x Grasp of Darkness
2x Go for the Throat

15 Cards Sideboard

4x Phyrexian Crusader
3x Steel Sabotage
2x Ratchet Bomb
2x Memoricide
2x Grasp of Darkness
1x Contagion Engine
1x Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon

Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon

Before you ask: Yes, this deck does work!

I told you; the deck works!

Most of the time the first "bite" comes either from Necropede or Plague Myr. And then, even before the opponent understands what is going on, he reaches to seven or eight poison counters in no time. And finally Throne of Geth comes down and finishes the "hopeless" opponent.

You may wonder what I am doing with those four Phyrexian Crusaders in the sideboard. Actually their purpose is quite clear: I side them in against Koth Red and against  Control. Against Control he really turns into a savage beast and becomes my offense, and against Koth Red he becomes my defense... or sometimes vice versa.

I side in my extra removal against Infect, and side in Memoricide against Architect Blue (and name Volition Reins of course!).

And that dear readers, was one other way of using Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas in SOM Block Constructed. And are we finished? Of course not! Here's one other way of winning with him:

 

DECK #3
Forgemaster Tezz

Kuldotha Forgemaster has already started seeing some serious amount of play on the serious tournament scene. So why not in SOM Block too? Surely it is possible and now it's time to prove that to you. But of course there are so many questions we must first answer. Such as "What to tutor with the Forgemaster?". Or "What to sacrifice to the Forgemaster?". And finally "How to find those artifacts we will sacrifice to the Forgemaster, on time?"

Well, no one told you that it was going to be easy!

Okay let's start with the first of those questions. "What to tutor with the Forgemaster?". I wanted to start with this question because it is also the easiest one. Three different targets will be enough and I'm thinking of using Blightsteel Colossus, Wurmcoil Engine and Myr Battlesphere.

So the perfect plan is this: Find three unimportant artifacts, sacrifice them to the Forgemaster, get yourself a nice Blightsteel Colossus, wait for a turn and then attack with the Colossus and win.

How does that sound? "Impossible" you say? Ah please, don't be that pessimist dear readers!

Kuldotha Forgemaster

Okay, let's continue with answering the questions. The next one is this: "What to sacrifice to the Forgemaster?". Hmm this one's a bit tricky but I think a bunch of zero cost artifacts would be a nice start. You know, some Memnites, Mox Opals or maybe even one or two Chimeric Masses. At this point I must say that for some time I also considered Trinket Mage as an option (to get me those zero cost artifacts of course) but playtesting showed me that he isn't needed.

All I need is Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas, and with his help I get out everything I need. Which then answers the final question: "How to get those artifacts out on time?". I'm personally relying on Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas to do that. But if you can find one or two empty slots in your own version, then you should consider Trinket Mage as well.

Okay, I think it's now time to look at the finished list.

FORGEMASTER TEZZ

25 Lands

4x Inkmoth Nexus
4x Darkslick Shores
9x Swamp
8x Island

10 Creatures

4x Memnite
3x Kuldotha Forgemaster
1x Blightsteel Colossus
1x Wurmcoil Engine
1x Myr Battlesphere

25 Other Cards

4x Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
4x Stoic Rebuttal
4x Sphere of the Suns
4x Tumble Magnet
3x Mox Opal
3x Grasp of Darkness
2x Black Sun's Zenith
1x Chimeric Mass 

15 Cards Sideboard

3x Memoricide
3x Go for the Throat
3x Steel Sabotage
3x Volition Reins
3x Ratchet Bomb
 

Kuldotha Forgemaster 

I play three Kuldotha Forgemasters because... uhm... because I play four Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas! Tezzeret's job in this deck is to find me exactly the one artifact I need at that moment. Oh and one other note: During playtesting I also tried the new "Teferi for artifacts" called Shimmer Myr. The first results were even okay; I was getting it out at the end of my opponent's turn, untap and do mostly nothing, wait for his end of turn, play Kuldotha Forgemaster and untap and voila; a Blightsteel Colossus!

But he eventually went out mainly because of its casting cost. Paying is sometimes a problem and later I found out that this deck functions much better with those zero cost artifacts. So basically I get out a bunch of Memnites and Sphere of the Suns' first, play my Tumble Magnet and counter a few spells in between, then bring in Tezzeret and begin the show.

Of course there were (sadly not so few) times when this plan failed during testing. The Forgemaster is a real lightning rod and nobody wants you to untap with it. Everybody knows that you will be cheating a Blightsteel Colossus into play and that's the last thing they want to face. And that's one other reason why Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas is so useful. If Plan A fails (and it fails mostly), I always have the option to use Tezzeret's second ability. Mox Opal becomes a 5/5, Memnite becomes a 5/5, but the best thing is that Inkmoth Nexus also becomes a 5/5. And just because the opponent uses all his resources to prevent me from using Kuldotha Forgemaster, he eventually dies to one of those 5/5s!

 

WRAPPIN' UP TEZZERET

Okay dear readers, I think I showed you enough reasons why you should try Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas in SOM Block. No matter which version you try, don't forget that you will always have the best removal of the format with you. Grasp of Darkness, Go for the Throat, Tumble Magnet and Black Sun's Zenith make you truly invincible. With those cards clearing the path, Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas will have no difficulties whatsoever, finishing the game. Sometimes he will do that with his army of 5/5s, sometimes by infecting people and sometimes by combo-ing with Kuldotha Forgemaster.

In my opinion, he is clearly the best planeswalker in the format; and by far. I mean, we all did a lot of "wow!"s and "omg!"s when we first saw Koth of the Hammer. Now please compare him to Tezzeret and you'll understand what I mean.

 

OTHER DECKS
Are there any?

Tezzeret decks are new but they all are Tier-1 now. And is there any other new deck that can compete with the already existing archetypes? Well, there is actually one and I'm seeing it more and more every day. That deck is a  Rock deck that uses these cards:

Perilous Myr

The idea here is quite simple: You play your Mortapod and equip your Perilous Myr with it. Then, while Glissa is on table, you sacrifice your Perilous Myr using Mortarpod's gametext and hopefully kill a creature, and then retrieve it back with Glissa.

Mana fixing and mana ramping is done with Sphere of the Suns, the new Sakura-Tribe Elder variant called Viridian Emissary and with Horizon Spellbomb. Genesis Wave and Green Sun's Zenith are also in the deck. These are all what Green is doing in this deck and Black gives it removal. Grasp of Darkness, Skinrender and Go for the Throat all are present. The finisher by the way, is either Wurmcoil Engine or a surprising Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon.

And finally, artifact removal is done by Viridian Corrupter and Sylvok Replica which are in the main deck and with Creeping Corrosion that comes from the sideboard.

All in all I can say that this is a very nice deck but after playing against it several times in 2mans, I can clearly say that it is not "quite there" yet. Glissa the Traitor is the key card of this deck and if you can get rid of her (and you get rid of her most of the times), that Mortarpod - Perilous Myr combo becomes only a one-time-shot.

Fighting the new Glissa deck.

I'm not sure what the final set of the block will give to this deck or how it will evolve and change with the current card pool. But in my opinion it is currently a Tier-1,5 deck at best.

 

NEXT WEEK ON ROGUE PLAY
BYOS Season Three Wrap Up, Part IV

After three weeks of SOM Block talk and two weeks of set review before that SOM Block talk, I'm finally returning to the PRE scene. BYOS Season Three has already ended and next week I will show you what has happened in the last quarter of the season. Four weeks mean four tournaments, a lot of different decks, a lot of original and not-so-original ideas, and a good amount of tournament report. Who played what? Which decks won? And most importantly, how did the season end? Oh and among those things, how well did I do in the final quarter?

All will be in next week's article.

And as always, thanks for reading.

See you online
Nafiz Erman, aka Lord Erman

8 Comments

Great article as usual. I by Raddman at Tue, 03/01/2011 - 11:55
Raddman's picture
5

Great article as usual. I just finished building the Standard version of Forgemaster. The only problem I see with your list is that you have no way to put Blightsteel into your library if you draw it. The standard list uses Jace to solve that problem. I realize this is block so Jace isn't going to work obv. Has this been an issue for you thus far?

Well, it happened twice so by Lord Erman at Tue, 03/01/2011 - 15:39
Lord Erman's picture

Well, it happened twice so far and sadly there isn't much to do about it. But the good news is that the Forgemaster still has targets to fetch in the deck and there is still the fact that Tezz can turn things into 5/5s.

I've also been hit twice by Memoricide in a game, one removed Forgemaster and the second Tezz, and I still managed to win.

Oh, and I also added Mindslaver to the sideboard which is devatating against any kind of Control deck.

LE

I've been eyeing the Rock by ArchGenius at Tue, 03/01/2011 - 11:58
ArchGenius's picture
4

I've been eyeing the Rock deck after I was experimenting along similar lines. What I want to know is with Ezuri, Renegade Leader isn't being played with Viridian Emissary and Glissa the Traitor. Regenerating Glissa can be huge and the overrun ability seems to be game breaking.

B/G Beats Tezz by JBK at Tue, 03/01/2011 - 18:39
JBK's picture

My Black Green Infect deck easily beats Tezz. I made the deck to beat Planeswalkers because I think its funny to beat people who spend $100 on a deck. And I don't use Glissa. The biggest mistake people make in Black Green is using Glissa and a lot of Artifacts. I use 4 artifacts, 2 Swords of Body and Mind 2 Sword of Feast and Famine, sideboarding in one or the other.

I also know what is in your basic decks, so I make sure I play 3 Memoricides in the main deck. I would either take out Stoic Rebuttal, or go immediately for the planeswalker. There is a green infect that kills tumble magnets, and the combo of inkmoth nexus + sword is always nice. My deck makes Tezz look like the overpriced bad card it is.

Tezz has only 2 good abilities, his third is useless. And an anti-artifact infect deck with only 4 artifacts means you will be too busy trying not to take on poison counters, and when I have my creatures out and you are running around with no planeswalkers, my Black Sun Zenith destroys what you have, while my Inkmoth Nexus or Skithiryx will be out soon.

Tezz is garbage. He is based around putting out cards that can't stop a fast deck, either infect, mono-white, or mono-red. Tezz just isn't fast enough. Then you make him 3 to get a 5/5, I'll block it, or deal direct damage. Planeswalkers are overrated if you are fast. Koth is still the best, and Tezz is garbage. Venser is annoying, but he takes too long to get out.

derp by Dream at Wed, 03/02/2011 - 06:10
Dream's picture

>Tezz is garbage. He is based around putting out cards that can't stop a fast deck

Cool retarded troll, bro. 5/10, I responded.

He is based around drawing you artifacts (such as tumble magnet and ratchet bomb, which shut down aggro) and making your artifacts into 5/5's (that aggro decks can't beat.)

He's actually extremely powerful, and all recent tournament results (both Standard and Block) confirm that. Anything that compares favorably to Jace the Mind Sculptor needs a long hard look, granted he's more narrow, but the power is there.

I'll be honest this would be by ShardFenix at Wed, 03/02/2011 - 09:17
ShardFenix's picture

I'll be honest this would be a 5-star comment if it wasnt such obvious trolling. Look once this magical infect deck starts winning whole events and we see veritable truth on mtg.com, we will conceed your point that tezz is garbage. Until then, fat chance.

Fine, but I'm no troll by JBK at Wed, 03/02/2011 - 13:18
JBK's picture

I have been tweeking my deck each day and have been playing all planeswalker decks. I wont try it out in a tournament until it plays a mono-red deck because mono-red is the best deck out there. And I have been playing since Beta. Well I didn't play at Beta, my dad bought me cards, I was only 6. But I have been in the game for a while, and there I know one thing. If people are basing their decks around artifacts, then I keep it simple and build an anti-artifact deck. There are more than enough cards.

The only reason you don't see my deck played is because of the Sylvok Replica/Mortapod combo with Glissa. I am basically playing mono-black infect with anti-artifact green.

This isn't like when I quit the game years ago. There just aren't enough counterspells. Back in the day, there were at least 4 separate kinds of counterspells. Like Regular 2 mana counterspell, Thwart, those kinds. Now a days other than stoic rebuttal, there is no counterspell for my deck that doesn't have artifacts (other than 2-4 swords). And using Memoricide in the main deck, I know what you are playing as soon as the first mana.

I play SOM block only, so its different if you play Standard. I'm not a troll. I just think that Tezz is overrated and he's easily beaten. You will see black green decks soon, but people need to stop playing Glissa. Just because you have them from the promo and its black and green doesn't mean you have to put it in a deck.

And also have you seen the times (EST) for the SOM block tournaments? Its like 7am and 12am or something like that. If I take some adderall I would love to be up all night playing in a tournament. Otherwise I would love to use my deck in a QP game, but at a reasonable time.

Dude, I'm glad you have a by Lord Erman at Thu, 03/03/2011 - 02:13
Lord Erman's picture

Dude, I'm glad you have a nice deck and that you can beat planeswalkers easily and all. But saying Tezzeret is garbage... well, that's not something one would say if he's playing since Beta.

Tezzeret is currently being played at the highest level in all the formats he's legal in, from block to legacy, and even this fact alone shows that he's a little bit(!) more than garbage.

Oh and having Memoricide in the maindeck is no way a guarantee that you will win against any deck; Tezzeret decks or anything else. As I said above, I've lost both Forgemaster AND Tezz in a game to Memoricide, but still managed to win. And there were games in which I hit the opponent's win condition with it but still lost the game. No one is naive enough to build decks that will fall apart if the main engine gets Memoricide-d. There's always a Plan B.

LE