Sunday, May 11, 2008

Draw-Go

Aggro is boring.

Combo and Control are where it's at.

I proxied a High Tide deck with the classic Palinchron/High Tide combo. It went through several revisions, first being U/W/G for Mirari's Wake, which can substitute for High Tide, then another involving Clone, eventually it became dominantly U, splashing W for just 2 Sunscape Familiars. I considered Meddling Mages at one point, but decided in favour of Solemn Simulacrum for mana acceleration and card advantage. Kind of silly to have 4 times more W producing lands than actual white cards. I've only play tested it against Titanium (it's been improved) once, and I'm going to leave the performance of both decks as a surprise, but suffice to say, they are pretty beastly right now.

I only found the real decklist afterwards. Circa 1998, before the banning of Time Spiral.

It makes my version look like child's play.

Notice that it has only 1 Palinchron and no tutors for it. That's because Palinchron is only the kill mechanism, Time Spiral/High Tide is the real combo. I had Turnabouts and Frantic Searches in one revision of my own deck, but realized it's pretty much useless without Time Spiral and went with more efficient card engines instead. That deck showcases the true power of Saga's "free" cards.

How does it work? I imagine the order of operation to be pretty much tutor/draw High Tide and the tutor/draw Time Spiral, then play High Tide followed by Time Spiral.

Realize that resolving a Time Spiral in that deck is pretty much equivalent to resolving a Mind's Desire, storm for 6, in any other deck. It just goes off!

With the untap mechanism, there's going to be an huge surplus of mana, which is then used to play more card draw, using Turnabout to resupply when the mana runs low or chaining into more Time Spirals and High Tides. Eventually Stroke of Genius will be drawn, either before or after Palinchron. If the former, Stroke turns all the raw mana into massive card advantage ensuring that Palinchron will be drawn. At which point you perform the infinite combo, and Stroke of Genius your opponent for 60, they lose.

All the while your spells are backed up by Counterspell/Force of Will.

Deadly.

No comments: