Subject: Death by Spikes Date: Wed, 13 May 1998 09:42:53 -0600 From: "Cory Bradshaw" To: I originally built this deck just because I hated losing to SRB, but it did so well against so many other decks that a few of us in Calgary decided to play it at the Alberta Regionals a couple weeks ago. 4 Spike Feeder 4 Spike Soldier 4 Uktabi Orangutan 4 Birds of Paradise 3 Wall of Roots 3 Wall of Blossoms 3 Nekrataal 3 Bottle Gnomes 3 Living Death 3 Nevinyrral's Disk 3 Phyrexian Furnace 2 Corpse Dance 1 Fallen Angel 6 Swamps 9 Forests 2 Pine Barrens 1 Reflecting Pool 1 Volrath's Stronghold 1 Wasteland 1 Undiscovered Paradise Sideboard 3 Hall of Gemstone 3 Dread of Night 3 Scragnoth 2 Serrated Biskelion 2 Crypt Rats 2 Emerald Charm The deck performed fairly well, even though I saw no red for the entire tournament. In the six rounds of swiss I played 1 5CG, 2 WW, 1 W staunch/mistmoon, 1 pox, and 1 sylvan pursuit with maros for the kill, losing only to the Sylvan Pursuit in the last round. Two friends of mine also playing the same deck (except with harrows over birds) also made the top eight, so we considered it a fairly successful test of the deck. So the top 8 for the Edmonton regionals were: 1 Sylvan Pursuit 2 Counter-Sliver 3 Spikes (me) 4 or 5 Counter Hell 4 or 5 Shadow beatdown 6 Counter Hell 7 Spikes 8 Spikes So I ended up being paired against Jim Roy (eventual winner), who was playing the worst matchup for Spikes. Against straight counter you need a fast start in the first game, or hope for a turn 2 hall or an early scragnoth after sideboarding, neither of which happened to me. Anyway, after this I had to play another spike deck for the nationals slot and won basically because I had a wasteland and he didn't, decking him after 1 game that lasted about 1 1/2 hours. He kindly game me the match after that. As to playing the deck, as poor as you may think spikes are, they do mess with the opponent's blocking. With one or two spikes on the table you can basically kill anything that blocks. Also, in the late game you can corpse dance a spike out and transfer counters over after he blocks. Along with the dancing gnomes and dancing feeders, the soldiers become a 6/6 every turn when dancing, as they become 0/0 before being removed from the game. When using living death, remember that soldiers can kill themselves by removing counters in response to removing counters. And if you can, try and get your wall of blossoms killed first. Lastly, be careful when moving spikes. I read a regionals report where a guy managed to use his vineyard mana to move a spike from his feeder to itself when his opponent had a fanatic out. In the time between removing a spike and that spike resolving, anything can happen. If you remove a spike to make a soldier 4/4, and your opponent incinerates it, unless you have spikes to move, it's dead. And a 1/1 spike soldier can't remove a counter to become 2/2. If you have any questions or comments about this deck, feel free to email me at bradshac@cadvision.com Cory Bradshaw