Welcome back, dear readers. Or maybe I should say, "Welcome back, dear Russell." Exams are finally over, and I'm left with a straight line to Nationals at the end of July and a slight detour to a PTQ in June. I feel obliged to back up my successful turn at National Qualifiers and see if I can't make it to Amsterdam or Chiba, and with that in mind I've roped my local compadres into testing. Fortunately the format is well developed by now and should remain fairly static for both tournaments, barring some bombshells in M11. Before I settle on a deck to play the first thing to do is get a firm grasp of the format, to see what the best decks are – whether I eventually decide to play one of those or play a deck that beats those, I need to know how they work and what makes each good in order to make an informed choice.

Imitation is the Sincerest Form of Flattery

Fortunately for me I don't have to figure out what the best decks are myself – we've just had 1900+ players battling to figure it out for me! Grand Prix: DC was just last weekend, and it produced some very solid results to work from. The decks I've been testing so far are as follows – read on to find out what's making up the gauntlet and my thoughts on each deck.

Turtenwald Jund

[cardlist]4 Dragonskull Summit

3 Forest

1 Lavaclaw Reaches

3 Mountain

4 Raging Ravine

4 Savage Lands

3 Swamp

4 Verdant Catacombs

4 Bloodbraid Elf

1 Broodmate Dragon

4 Putrid Leech

1 Siege-Gang Commander

4 Sprouting Thrinax

4 Bituminous Blast

4 Blightning

4 Lightning Bolt

4 Maelstrom Pulse

2 Sarkhan the Mad

2 Terminate

Sideboard

2 Doom Blade

4 Duress

4 Goblin Ruinblaster

1 Malakir Bloodwitch

2 Prophetic Prism

2 Pyroclasm[/cardlist]

This list is almost retro – 4 Bituminous Blast, 4 Bloodbraid Elf, 4 Putrid Leech, 4 Sprouting Thrinax, 4 Blightning, 4 Lightning Bolt, 4 Maelstrom Pulse, and not a Borderland Ranger, Plated Geopede or Explore to be found. I am really glad to see the return of Bituminous Blast as I like getting free wins, and the ridiculous cascade lotteries Blast offers can give you those. It could almost be a list from last year's Worlds, except for a few interesting new adoptions.

Manlands are standard by now, but the two Sarkhan the Mad are a big boost to the maindeck, letting you upgrade your crappy Thrinaxes and Bloodbraids into beefy dragons. I also got blown out from 16 playing UW against my friend Jason playing Jund, with a Broodmate attack followed by a postcombat Sarkhan using his ultimate ability. The other exciting innovation is the sideboard Prophetic Prisms which let you undo the damage of Spreading Seas, Jund's biggest enemy at the moment. Letting your Savage (Is)land tap for any colour again lets you play your difficult casting cost spells which is obviously huge. The bonus of drawing a card is more valuable to you than it is to the Seas decks as they have so many other ways to do it, and your cards are generally better one for one than theirs are.

What more is there to say about Jund that hasn't already been said? In testing it has decent matchups against all the other big decks, though tier 2 strategies like mono-red can still cause it trouble. There are more exotic variations you might like to look at like the heavy creature, Vengevine Jund that Brad Carpenter played to top 8 or the Royal Assassin sideboard tech of Joshua Wagner. While Jund has been derided as 'bland' in the past, as long as you accept that Bloodbraid Elf and Maelstrom Pulse are strong cards you're going to have to put up with this archetype. You might as well learn to love its subtle variations.

Vengevine Naya

[cardlist]1 Basilisk Collar

1 Behemoth Sledge

4 Bloodbraid Elf

4 Cunning Sparkmage

4 Knight Of The Reliquary

3 Lotus Cobra

4 Noble Hierarch

3 Ranger Of Eos

1 Scute Mob

2 Stoneforge Mystic

4 Vengevine

3 Wild Nacatl

5 Forest

2 Mountain

2 Plains

4 Arid Mesa

1 Evolving Wilds

3 Misty Rainforest

3 Raging Ravine

2 Stirring Wildwood

2 Sunpetal Grove

2 Terramorphic Expanse

Sideboard

1 Behemoth Sledge

2 Pithing Needle

2 Qasali Pridemage

3 Manabarbs

3 Oblivion Ring

4 Path To Exile[/cardlist]

I am a bit in love with this deck, Gavin Verhey's Nationals Qualifier version of Gerry T's design. I hadn't bought the hype on Vengevine before testing this, but if you can get the mythic green plant thing out of your graveyard after your opponent has Pulsed it you are usually pretty far ahead. Putting Vengevine in a deck with creatures is pretty obvious, and pretty damn effective – your Bloodbraids will hit a creature almost always, and your Rangers can fetch up not just boring dorks like Wild Nacatl but essentially fetch up any Vengevines in your yard. This deck also avoids the pitfall of Mythic, where you draw a stream of late game mana dorks and just die – two late Noble Hierarch or Lotus Cobra can also keep Vengevine coming back for more.

This deck also features Tom Ross' Cunning Sparkmage/Basilisk Collar combo from way back in San Diego, this time in the main deck. Sparkmage is seriously good against Mythic, wiping out their mana guys, and it singlehandedly crushes Polymorph – which is a pretty poor deck at the moment. Sparkmage also gives your attacks extra punch, letting Bloodbraid Elf or Nacatl take down Wall of Omens or clearing out Saprolings, Soldiers and Spawn clogging the other side of the board. Knight of the Reliquary does its usual toolbox thing, without the obligatory Sejiri Steppe, but it can boost itself into a massive beater or find you a Raging Ravine to help out the attacks. I would definitely advocate a single Bojuka Bog in the sideboard to bring in for the mirror, as it hits your opponents Vines and Knights. I've already had some ideas for tinkering with this deck, but as we are just trying to get a feel for the format it is best to stick with the established decks, as that is what other people are most likely to be playing.

Blue White

[cardlist]2 Arid Mesa

4 Celestial Colonnade

4 Glacial Fortress

7 Island

5 Plains

2 Sejiri Refuge

2 Tectonic Edge

4 Baneslayer Angel

4 Wall of Omens

3 Day of Judgment

2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

2 Everflowing Chalice

2 Gideon Jura

3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

1 Martial Coup

2 Mind Spring

3 Oblivion Ring

4 Path to Exile

4 Spreading Seas

Sideboard

2 Celestial Purge

1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

1 Jace Beleren

3 Kor Firewalker

1 Kor Sanctifiers

1 Martial Coup

4 Negate

1 Oblivion Ring

1 Sphinx of Lost Truths[/cardlist]

Brad Nelson's GP winning deck is the latest iteration of the successful UW strategy – leaving the counterspells in the sideboard and maxing out on awesome threats, including 4 Baneslayers main. It seems like Baneslayers bounce in and out of sideboards depending on the alignment of the planets, but I would build assuming your opponents have them for game one. There is nothing terribly new about Brad's build, it is a very solid deck albeit one that costs an absolute fortune to put together. Anyone playing this deck is going to be pretty serious about their cards – whether or not they have the playskill to back it up is another question.

Super Friends is more of a variation on this deck than anything else, and unless your metagame is particularly heavy with that deck I would focus on testing against UW, as the matches are going to play out fairly similarly. If you are a particular dog to Ajani Vengeant, like I expect Grixis will be, it may be worth testing against Super Friends especially but to aggro decks they are going to play very similarly.

Sovereign Mythic

[cardlist]4 Celestial Colonnade

4 Forest

2 Island

4 Misty Rainforest

2 Plains

2 Sejiri Steppe

1 Stirring Wildwood

2 Sunpetal Grove

4 Verdant Catacombs

4 Baneslayer Angel

4 Birds of Paradise

4 Dauntless Escort

4 Knight of the Reliquary

4 Lotus Cobra

4 Noble Hierarch

4 Sovereigns of Lost Alara

2 Eldrazi Conscription

2 Gideon Jura

3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Sideboard

3 Kor Firewalker

4 Negate

2 Oblivion Ring

2 Path to Exile

2 Qasali Pridemage

2 Sphinx of Jwar Isle[/cardlist]

This deck I have minimal testing time with, and so far I'm not a fan. It plays all the best threats like Junk and old style Bant as well as the timmy-riffic Eldrazi Conscription, but between the 20 lands (excluding manlands) and the 12 mana guys with almost no card draw, this deck just seems to run out of steam way too fast if its initial assault is stifled. Naya plays a lot of mana guys as well, but with Vengevines to return they can serve a purpose whenever you draw them. That said my Team Oz teammates have put in a lot of time with the deck and I will be sure to ask them to convince me otherwise.

The Best of the Rest

The four decks above are the most important ones to be testing to beat, but they are far from the full extent of the format. Red Deck Wins is the next most important one to test against, as I expect a lot of the more cash-strapped players to be playing it. Pat Chapin and PVDdR both have lists floating around but the important thing to be aware of is the Devastating Summons/Goblin Bushwhacker synergy – this deck can just kill you out of nowhere, and I saw UW get taken from 18-0 in one turn against an RDW opponent with an empty board, and turn 3 and 4 kills are entirely possible with a good draw.

Grixis is certainly worth looking at and I will give it a whirl over the next week. While Cruel Ultimatum is not what it once was, Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker is near and dear to my heart after my recent success, and Grixis is able to play some of the best cards in the format – Spreading Seas, Blightning, Earthquake, and Jace, the Mind Sculptor. As far as decks with Jace go, this is even reasonably 'budget' (beyond that obnoxious $300 playset). The biggest question for Grixis is if it can deal with early Putrid Leech, Goblin Guide, Vengevines and so forth without access to Wall of Omens and other white defensive cards.

Vampires and Polymorph are virtually non-decks at this point – Vampires still can't beat Jund reliably, and it is not doing as-good things as the other decks. Polymorph sometimes just does nothing, and even when it does something it has to fight through instant speed removal, counterspells and permanent-based removal to actually attack with Emrakul. Turbofog is in the same boat as long as you have a legendary Eldrazi somewhere in your 75 – their best tactic is to beat you game one and then time out game 2, and unless you are one of these oddballs just stay out of the draw bracket and you shouldn't run into them. Other rogue maybe-decks like Brilliant Ultimatum, Valakut Combo and Eldrazi tokens you should be aware of, but not really prepare for – you can't win them all, and you are far more likely to hit a string of Jund opponents where your practice will serve you well.

Playing the Field

So, what purpose do these decks serve, now that they're prepared in the testing gauntlet? They are the bar against which all other decks are to be measured – if someone thinks they have some hot new tech, it is easy enough to find out how good it is – bash it against Jund, UW, Naya or Mythic for a half-dozen games, and if you come out feeling good the idea might be worth exploring. If you just get crushed by a stream of Blightnings or Vengevines, it's time to go back to the drawing board. If none of the rogue concoctions measure up it's time to suck it up and play someone else's baby. At this early stage I'm quite partial to Vengevine Naya, and I'll be running the gauntlet with it over the next week as well as finding some time to try out some wacky decks. Check in next week for a testing progress report, and let me know what you particularly want to see in the comments!