We are now witnessing the greatest change in the Type 2 environment yet. Ice Age, Alliances and Serrated Arrows have rotated out, being replaced by Tempest. This is bound to cause a shift in the environment.

(1) Tempest Cards/Mechanics I think could influence the New Envrionment.

Jackal Pup - This card is to Sligh what Savannah Lions was to white. It has almost single handedly given us a need for StP again. The only viable StP replacement being Spirit Link (particularly good on a Jackal Pup IMO). early creature kill is now a necessity.

Buyback (Particularly Capsizre, Whispers of the Muse and Evincar's Justice.) - Buyback is excellent card advantage, the aforementioned three being especially dangerous in my opinion. All decks will need some way to deal with Buyback. Mana Depravation is the best way for a Weenie Horde, While Discard and Countermagic are the strongest choices for a control deck.

Shadow - I don't like Shadow, it doesn't really do much vs. Sligh (ooh 2 damage!) and this will initially make it a very weak special ability, especially since almost the shadowers are very vulnerable. Soltari Priests/monks could work in White Weenie (they aree nasty when Emp. Armured ok.)

Eladamri's Vineyard - Althouth this card will only have a minor influence upon the environment initlally, when you see it you must be prepared. as a consequance you should try to build a deck that can operate efficiently under a Vineyand (e.g. Ophidiians and Man-o-wars can be easily cast under a vineyard. Wildfire Emmisiary becomes R : +1/+0 etc...). Though this should NOT be done if it makes your deck less than optimally efficient against other decks.

Enchantments - Another important thing to consider I the new environment is the amount of threateing Enchantments. This makes Enchantment destruction much less of a luxury. Disks, Counters, Cloudchaser eagles and the like could all make cameo appearances for this purposes.

(2) How the Old Decks will fare.

Counterpost
GAINS Orim's Prayer, Spirit Mirror, Meditate, Puppet Strings, Dismiss
LOSES StP, Outpost, Icy, Force of Will, Thawing Glaciers
Ouch!!! This deck has been practically castrated. It could still work, 1st turn defence is a necessity, as a re 4 Gerrard's Wisdom. wrath is as strong as it ever was and late game this deck is in it's element. The main problem is the loss of Glaciers, this deck now will need some sort of card drawing engine to function (e.g. Emessi Tome)

Senor Stompy
GAINS Muscle Sliver, Rootalla, Pincher Beetles, Overrun
LOSES Spectral Bears, Heart of Yavimaya, Bounty of the Hunt
Senor Stompy loses it's bears... (Hearts and Bounties are easy to replace.) but all the ingerdients are still there. It could be a dominant force.

Buried Alive
LOSES Ashen Ghoul

Prosperity Bloom
GAINS Sudden Impact, Meditate, the Departure of FoW, the rules change for Abeyance
LOSES Uuuuh..... Hmmmmm.... Errrrrrr...... Flurble
This deck will be a solid contender. With the weakening of control decks Prosperity Bloom is stronger than ever. Lobotomy makes U/B the best deck to beat it up without a doubt, although Sligh is fast enough to ensure no more than a 50% win ration (I suggest Wall of roots in deck... It may give the extra time needed? Something to consider at least) A definite No 1 contender

Sligh
GAINS Mogg Fanatic, Jackal Pup, Fireslinger, Kindle, Rolling Thunder
LOSES Anarchy, Some versions used Death Spark
Sligh is soo quick. It is in my opinion going to be the dominant deck (prove me wrong) initially and will set the pace for all the other deck types. It can beat practically any deck with a good enough draw :¬(.
Goofy Gaea
GAINS Kindle, Puppet Strings?
LOSES Thawing Glaciers, StP
Goofy Gaea will still be a powerful deck type. The greatest loss will be Thawing Glaciers as with all control decks. Without it the use of Sylvan Library becomes difficult. However with Thran Tomes and Gaea's Blessings you may have enough to run the Library sucessfully.This deck has enough creature control to survive, but vs. Sligh Gerrard's Wisdon will be the key. The main problem this deck will need to overcome is buyback in 2 ways....
This deck has no obvious answer to buyback... Whispers will sting it undelievably. This deck has no obvious answer to the Mana Depravations weenie hordes will use to combat Buyback. Roy Williams (a friend who I am currently speaking to on the phone is blabbeering on that it won't work at all, he puts up a good argument, I hope he's wrong. PS He's called Sykikpurj on IRC, ask him why... or e-mail him at roywilliams@hotmail.com)

Big Blue
GAINS Meditate, Whispers of the Muse, Time Ebb, Capsize
LOSES Force of Will, Thawing Glaciers
Big Blue is slow to say the least. Without force of will Red can easily overtake it and kill it rapidly. I think that sligh will obviate this deck until the metagame shifts. 4 Hydroblast 4 Chill anyone???

Maroskin
GAINS Soltari Priest, Soltari Monk, Winds of Rath
LOSES StP, Kjeldoran Outpost
The Soltari's are nice. It has an advantage over Saligh in the form of Protection from red. It can kill very rapidly. No StP hurts and helps (No more plowing my Falcons) 'geddon too makes this deck a natural against buyback. Blue decks though, with Capsize, Man-o-war and Time Ebb are problematic. No Icies, and very crucially No Serrated Arrows

5 Colour Black
GAINS Cloudchaser Eagle, Kindle, various other stuff that suits your tastes.
LOSES StP
Powerful, poseses the Mana Depravation to beat Buyback, has some nice weenies. Doesn't like wasteland though.

Green 5 Colour
GAINS Very Little
LOSES StP
1 word, wasteland. Sligh kills this deck totally.

Counterhammer
GAINS Kindle, Whispers of The Muse, Meditate, Reflecting Pool, Caldera Lake
LOSES Thawing Glaciers, Force of Will
the loss of Glaciers is very very painful for this deck. Hampering Hammer loops. It still has power though, just that slower versions lose to red. Sumu has a future I think.....

(3) MiViLite

A comparison can easily be drawn with the MiViLite environment. Just 5th edition and Tempest make it different. So naturally several MiViLite decks/Concepts may transfer over. The main difference is that these decks will need to be faster in the new environment and the metagame will be different.

Ertog

This deck has the advantage of speed and large, cheap creatures. With all it's little Monsters it should be able to out critter Sligh and has the speed to evade the renewed necessity for StP. It can easily use Worbs and has access to superior creatures than it does in MiViLite. Living Death is a nice card but is a little to costly for my liking. "Use rituals instead of lands" Says Roy (use a squeaky voice and remember he looks like Hanson).

Ophidibastard

This is basically a smaller big blue, while Big Blue is slow this deck possesses sufficient speed to work against the new speed decks. Although I would personally splash another colour into it such as Black or Red to give it superior capabilities. At least it doesn't have FoW.

Prosperity Bloom

You know how I feel

Sandsipoise

Sandsipoise is a fast lock deck, but not quite fast enough. green and red can race it to the kill, blue can counter critical elements and Red/White can take out permanants like therre's no tommorrow Prospybloom is just plain better. Ghost Town works well in it though. :¬) "Therre's more Prot white and Untargettablility though, like Black Knights ands Pincher beetles." says Roy

(4) New Decks

I'm not really sure, but here's some Ideas of decks that haven't been popular for a while or decks that needed cards that weren't around which could make an impact
Aluren - Recycle. Yes it;s a nice (fragile) combo... but you nver know :P
U/B control It has a lot of new control and is ery strong against Prosperity Bloom
Living Death Someone's gonna build a deck around this card....

Oh well that's all I could think of.

if I left something out or my opinions differ from yours... screw you!! On second though e-mail me at alexmurison@hotmail.com, also to complain to Roy for his comments, you have his e-mail address.

Starring

AlexMurison
(MadEntity on IRC)

Co-Starring
Roy Williams
(SykikPurj on IRC)