If a Mechanic is only as good as the tools he possesses then a Magic Player is only as good as the cards in his deck.

I think a lot of us can agree with that statement. The largest difference is a Mechanic can go to his toolbox and grab what ever he needs whenever he needs it. On the other hand we Magic players are forced to depend on our lonely draw to get us the card we need. In most cases we do things to maximize our probability or odds of getting the card we want. Today I want to talk to about another way to get what we need.

That concept is the "toolbox." A toolbox is a way to use a certain card to go and get whatever "tool" we may need. The easiest example that most people are familiar with is Diabolic Tutor. With 4 copies of Diabolic Tutor serving as a toolbox we can run multiple tools in our deck. Most tools are situational and so we only want to commit one slot to the card in our deck. However we don't want to be in the situation where we need the card and praying to top deck it. So we can put 4 Tutors in our deck with the one card. Now we have just increased our means to getting the card and decreased the chances of it being "dead" in our hand. It's the best of both worlds. We do have to commit 4 mana in resources for this flexibility but for many decks it's worth it.

Not all tools are situational. Rarely may you need a 6mm Allen wrench but you'll often need a Phillips head screwdriver. If you look an actual toolbox you're likely to see just one set of Allen wrenches but you'll find multiple Phillips heads. This can be true of decks as well. I've had many articles where I've proclaimed the value of running 4 of a card in every deck. With a good toolbox card you can run essentially 8 copies of a card. The 4 slots for the card itself and the 4 Diabolic Tutors the can get the card for you.

Of course there are decks where we land in between these two extremes within your toolbox. Sometimes because of other requirements like using the Burning Wish Toolbox to get Mind's Desire in TEPS (my favorite deck EVER). You had to have 1 copy of Mind's Desire in your Sideboard to Wish for it therefore making you go 4 Burning Wish with 3 Mind's Desire in your actual deck. Or maybe you feel 6 copies is enough so you running 4 Toolbox with 2 Targets. If your toolbox is only there to get one target you may want to use only 2 Toolboxes with 4 of your Target card also.

Specialized Toolbox

Diabolic Tutor probably represents the all inclusive Toolbox because it can retrieve any card you would want but most toolbox cards have specific requirements. Take Trinket Mage for example. Its tools are specialized to be only 1 or less casting cost artifacts. The trade off for going specialized allows a Tricket Mage toolbox to come in play for 1 less mana than Diabolic Tutor and gain a 2/2 body at the same time. In the right deck the restricted card selection isn't a much a liability as the potential gain. Remember the mage can get 0cc or Xcc artifacts as well. Look at an Extended Thoptor Sword list.

While we only run 2 Mages you can see the ton of choices we have once a Mage is played. You can get simple lands to fix you colors if needed with Seat of the Synod and Ancient Den. You can accelerate with a Chrome Mox if you chose but the real cool plays are the fact you have Chalice of the Void, Engineered Explosives, Pithing Needle and Tormod's Crypt available in game one. Each of those cards can potentially wreck an opponent's deck before they can bring in any threat/answers from their board.

The Specialized Toolbox is very playable as you can see. It's like having a set of tools that can only work on Porsche automobiles. While you can't work for everyone you can certainly charge a lot more for your work.

Variable Toolbox

Some Toolboxes are not as controllable. The card itself can force you to either limit your choices or allow your opponent to have voice in the matter. Using the same list above we see a very used example. Gifts Ungiven is like Diabolic Tutor in that it can get any card you want. In fact it goes beyond that getting any 4 cards you may want (as long as they're differently named). It has the same mana cost so it has to give something back for the extra cards. That something is giving your opponent a choice of what you get and what goes to the yard. At first thought many players would think that this would mean the two best cards would be goners and you would be stuck with the 3rd and 4th best choice. But once again in the right deck you can get the right 4 cards so you opponent has no real choice but to let you get the play you want.

Another way a toolbox can be variable is to have it based on unknown quantity. In the Gifts Ungiven example the unknown was what your opponents would choose but sometimes it's what your choices may be. Peer through Depths is currently a popular choice. While it will fetch you an instant or sorcery you just don't know what that Spell will be since you don't know the top cards of your library. Of course there are tricks that help you control the top of your library making Peer much stronger but then you start making the mana cost more equivalent to Diabolic Tutor.

My Favorite Toolbox

I currently run a deck that that uses more tools than you can shake a stick at. (Whatever that means).

Probably the best way to explain how I built this deck is to start at the finish line.

Or sometimes I'll use this Machine Gun to finish.

Or still some players prefer this.

Getting to any of these requires either a ton of mana or a good toolbox. Notice that these are all creature based combo's. That leads us to our signature Toolbox. Tooth and Nail serves at 7 mana as two Diabolics in one card as long as you are only fetching creatures. But for a measly two more mana it also plays them which is equivalent to two Dramatic Entrances but for any color creatures. Let's compare, using nine mana I can get 18 mana worth of spells from just one card. That's quite a toolbox. And by the way those two creatures probably win you the game.

Then we enter into how to generate that mana. Most players use cards like Expedition Map, Sylvan Scrying, and Reap and Sow to get either Cloudpost or the Urza lands. While these are all good Specialized Toolboxes I went a different route. My box is accessed by Drift of Phantoms. The transmute mechanic is a very useful toolbox ability. While extremely focused and specialized in the right deck it can also be very versatile for one less mana than Diabolic Tutor. In this deck the Drifts serve as copies 5,6,7, and 8 of multiple cards. All of them I want max possibilities of having on turn 3. Early Harvest, Heartbeat of Spring, Invoke the Firemind, and Maga, Traitor to Mortals all slip into the deck. This provides me with both Mana Acceleration and Alternate win conditions.

In order to maximize my chances of getting the Drifts which lead to mana to play Tooth and Nail I'll support with another toolbox. Weird Harvest is a good fetcher card like Tooth and Nail. While not nearly as powerful since it lacks the ability to put the creature in play it is insanely less expensive. For the same mana a Diabolic Tutor we can get two cards instead of just one. Sure our opponent gets some as well but I personally can deal with that.

To help generate basic mana faster I'll also use Rampant Growth and Sakura Tribe Elder. Notice that these cards both have a converted mana cost of 2 just like Weird Harvest. So I figure I can add another Transmuter with Muddle the Mixture.

That leaves us with this final Deck.

That's my toolbox list. Notice how almost every can search your library for something else. I'm probably going to add a single Omnath, Locus of Mana in the future. After all he's driftable.

For today's homework I would like you all to post your favorite toolbox card and the tool you most often get from it.

Also don't forget to attend a Prerelease near you and if you live near Pittsburg, Kansas attend the one at Asylum Anime!

Class Dismissed.