Subject: U/G/R deck
Date: Wed, 15 Jul 1998 16:18:53 -0400
From: Gabriel N Perdue <GNPerdue@JHU.EDU>

Howdy.

        I posted this deck afew days ago and so far I have gotten no
analysis.  (I'm not sure why...I consider it to be at least a mildly
interesting deck.)  I'm posting it again because I would REALLY like a
little input on it.
        At any rate, I've played very little type II since Ice Age
dropped; so I don't have a great feel for the field.  Just bear with me
if some of these choices seem a little odd.

The deck itself: Blue/Green/Red

        Artifacts:
                2 x Bottle Gnome

        Blue (24):
                2 x Man O' War
                4 x Tradewind Rider
                2 x Counterspell
                2 x Forbid
                4 x Mana Leak
                4 x Impulse
                4 x Mana Breach
                2 x Propaganda

        Green (12):
                4 x Birds of Paradise
                2 x Uktabi Orangutan
                4 x Wall of Blossoms
                2 x Burgeoning

        Red:
                2 x Firestorm

        Land (20):
                4 x Forest
                4 x Gemstone Mine
                6 x Island
                4 x Quicksand
                2 x Reflecting Pool

        Sideboard:
                1 x Phyrexian Furnace
                2 x Dismiss
                4 x Hydroblast
                2 x Uktabi Orangutan
                2 x Gaea's Blessing
                4 x Elephant Grass

        Total Count: 60/15

Some brief notes on how I'd like it to run:
        The key card here is Mana Breach.  I've never seen it in a deck
listing anywhere and I've never heard anyone talk about (which probably
means it's unplayable) so I'm hoping for a small bit of surprise while
using it.  The idea is to use Mana Breach to screw with my opponent while
I hopefully establish a Tradewind lock.  Forbid, Firestorm, and Burgeoning
all combo nicely with the breach in that they give me a way to flush the
extra land out of my hand.  Of course, it helps my opponent's Firestorms
as well, but that's one of the reasons I have hydroblast on my sideboard
instead of Chill.
        The decks I'm most worried about beating me are: fast mono-red,
fast mono-black, an oath of druids deck, and solid blue (which is too bad
for me since all of these seem popular). The first three concern me
because I don't think they care if I screw their mana, and blue concerns
me because it could likely win a counterspell war.

The points of construction I question the most are:
        - Wall of Roots maybe instead of Wall of Blossoms?  It would
provide similar defense against red and would be a mana source, but
drawing cards is sooo nice (especially since I have so little card drawing
capability in this deck in general).
        - Propaganda in the main deck?  It's a dead card against
creatureless decks (hopefully I would Impulse past it or feed it to a
Firestorm or a Forbid) and I'm probably going to lose the first game to
speedy shadow black anyways (before I can side in the Elephant Grass).
        - Is my mana count too low (maybe pull Propaganda for City of
Brass)?
        - The Phyrexian Furnace is in the sideboard to help me stop
recursion, but is it enough to be worthwhile?
        - I've done some playtesting with it and I've noticed that Seismic
Assault will really hurt this deck (for obvious reasons) and Cursed Scroll
is absolutely murder (every match I test aginst Sligh and Suicide Black
results in Scroll death if I can't lock them down quickly enough). Should
I move a couple of creatures (maybe Bottle Gnomes) to the sideboard to
make room for four Uktabi Orangutan in the main deck?  Any suggestions for
the Assault?  (Does anyone think it will be prevalent?)

        Well, that about does it.  I would really appreciate any comments,
suggestions, etc.

                                                pax
                                                Gabe