Homebrew Pick of the Week: Breath of Malfegor

Since WoTC has been paying more attention to multiplayer interaction lately I thought it would be appropriate to highlight one of the more fun cards that made its debut as part of the Alara Reborn set. Without further ado I present: Breath of Malfegor



I know what you are thinking..OK maybe I don't but I know what I'm thinking..OK maybe I don't but you have to admit that this card is funny. Hitting each opponent for five damage in a multiplayer game is kinda ridiculous (and also slightly suicidal!). It's definitely not be the strongest card when you are looking for a good price-to-burn ratio in a one-on-one matchup. The ironic thing is that it's still more efficient than some older burn spells from back in the day when Magic made you pay dearly for your powerful spells. Yeah nobody really misses those days.. Anyway, there are plenty of ways to exploit this card in the standard multiplayer environment. My two-headed giant partner cracked one of these at the Alara Reborn pre-release and it evened up the field and helped us make up a lot of ground in more than a few matches!

Strengths:

- 5-5 Cost-Damage ratio

- Can hit more than one opponent in a multiplayer match

- Light coloration (only 2 out of the 5 mana in the cost are colored)

Weaknesses:

-Cost-Damage ratio is fair but not as efficient as others in standard

Ways to Abuse:

-Twincast it to deal ten damage to each opponent in a multiplayer match

- Cascade into it with Bituminous Blast for an explosive nine damage to one opponent and five to the rest.

Later this week I will post a decklist built around this card for my weekly "Hombrew Decklist". I'm thinking Grixis colors with "each player" hand destruction, some Twincasts, a few burn spells and a Malfegor or two. Should be an interesting deck and I am excited to try it out in my local multiplayer group.

(Picture and links provided by Wizards of the Coast inc.)

If I Was Going To Regionals...

Because I'm going to Disneyland this weekend (WOOT!) I will be unable to attend regionals. This is actually a relief because I'm nowhere close to having a deck tournament ready. If I weren't so lazy maybe I would be more dissapointed :P If I was going to go to regionals on Saturday I would most likely be playing either the Doran Lark deck from earlier this week or a Red/Green Aggro deck I've been working on that utilizes some new Alara Reborn cards such as: Bloodbraid Elf, Jund Hackblade, Violent Outburst, and Colossal Might. It has made the pair of colors much stronger and I filled the deck with cards that would compliment the hasty strategy that these cards encourage. The basic premise of the deck is to hit early and often and for as much damage as you can. It also lets you play multiple spells for a single cost by using cascade. It is a simple deck but it is fun to play because it is so blisteringly fast!

RG Aggro

Creatures:

4x Bloodbraid Elf
4x Jund Hackblade
4x Figure of Destiny
4x Rip-Clan Crasher
4x Hellspark Elemental
4x Boartusk Liege
4x Boggart Ram-Gang

Other Spells:

4x Incinerate
3x Colossal Might
4x Violent Outburst

Lands:

4 Forest
4 Fire-Lit Thicket
9 Mountain
4 Karplusan Forest
2 Treetop Village

Speed and stability are two very different things. The Sideboard that I'm working on is going to help make this decklist more stable against the current Meta. Though if it proves to be too unruly then I will probably go towards a Jund approach rather than just Red/Green. Please let me know what you think!

(Pictures and links provided by Wizards of the Coast Inc.)

Bear Down!

So I was bored and a little slap happy after trying to finish a paper for one of my classes this evening (or morning..whichever you prefer!) and I decided to make a blue/red "Bear Down!" deck in honor of the University of Arizona being so awesome...

Creatures:
4 Taurean Mauler
4 Mothdust Changeling
4 Fire-belly Changeling
4 Shapesharer
4 Amoeboid Changeling
4 Turtleshell Changeling
3 Changeling Beserker
1 Mistform Ultimus

Other Spells:
4 Wings of Velis Vel
4 Blades of Velis Vel

Lands:
10 Island
10 Mountain
4 Mutavault

The basic goal of this deck is to get as many bears into play as possible, buff the bears with spells and attack with the bears. A deck of this caliber needs no more explaination

PTQ Ravinity

Here is the decklist for the Ravinity deck I've chosen to run in this saturday's Pro Tour Qualifyier tournament in Mesa, Az:

Creatures:
4 Ornithopter
4 Arcbound Worker
4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Myr Enforcer
4 Frogmite
3 Master of Etherium

Non-Creature Artifacts:
4 Cranial Plating
4 Chromatic Star
4 Springleaf Drum

Other Spells:
4 Thoughtcast
3 Soul's Fire

Lands:
4 Ancient Den
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Vault of Whispers
4 Great Furnace
2 Blinkmoth Nexus

Sideboard:
3 Thoughtseize
3 Relic of Progenitus
3 Ethersworn Canonist
3 Ancient Grudge
2 Path to Exile
1 Krark-Clan Shaman

This is not by any means an original idea but I tailored the deck to fit my purposes and it is a blast to play!

EDH-ification

EDH or Elder Dragon Highlander is a form of constructed magic that my play group is getting involved in and its been pretty fun to think of deck ideas. Basically an EDH deck consists of a "General" creature which starts out the game removed from game and can play it any time you normally could as if it was in your hand. You can only put cards in your deck that share colors with your general. The other limitation on construction is that your deck must have a minimum of 100 Vintage-legal cards and cannot contain multiple copies of the same card (besides basic lands). If you play your general throughout the course of the game and it is killed, instead of putting it into your graveyard you remove it from game again. You can play it again once it has hit RFG but every time you do, the cost increases by two colorless. It leads to some interesting deck building strategies and some out of the box thinking! I threw together a mono white soldier deck with Akroma, Angel of Wrath as my General. I'm also toying with the idea of a blue/black deck with Circu, Dimir Lobotomist as the General or a Red/White/Green deck with Rith, the Awakener as the General. I will post a decklist or two tomorrow after Ive had a few hours of sleep and a few cups of coffee..