Locations
“Yeah,” Summer says. “It had stuff like Dread Reaper and Archangel, but not much in the way of color-fixing. I traded out the Black cards for Red cards so that I could take advantage of things like Gauntlet of Might.”
“Or Mana Flare,” you add, glancing at the enchantment on her side of the table.
“Or Mana Flare,” she agrees. “But your deck also seems to have a theme.”
“Yeah. Christopher Moeller announced his retirement from Magic art last week. He’s been doing card art since Urza’s Saga, so it’s sad to see him go.”
“Isn’t he the person who did the Sphere cycle for the Odyssey set?”
“And a lot of other cards — enough to make a decent singleton control deck like this one. He even has some pieces in Amonkhet.”
“That’s a long time,” Summer says.
“Like I said, it’s sad to see him go. So . . . my Needle Specter blocks your Archangel?”
“Right. The No-Dachi gives first strike, so the Specter dies. You take four damage from my Granite Gargoyle and Utvara Scalper.”
“Okay, I’ll go to five life.”
“I’ll cast my Abbey Gargoyles and equip my No-Dachi to it, and that’ll be all for my turn.”
With no less than four flyers on the table, Summer’s clearly in the driver’s seat this game. In addition, you’ve already blown through some of your best removal spells, so it may be that your Moeller deck may need to get some reworking done.
That’s when you draw a Grim Discovery, and suddenly several possibilities come up. The Fortune Thief in your graveyard, for example, might buy you a few more turns . . . at least until Summer draws a Goblin Grenade or another Lightning Bolt.
Then you remember that Summer has a Mana Flare in play, which means that you have access to a lot of mana. And if the play that you have in mind works, perhaps Mr. Moeller will have a great start to his retirement after all.
It is the start of your first main phase. Defeat Summer before the beginning of her next combat phase.
You are at 5 life, with the following cards in play:
- Goblin Firebug
- Toshiro Umezawa
- Nekrataal
- Siege-Gang Commander
- 7 Swamps
- 2 Mountains
You have the following cards in your hand:
- Vampire's Bite
- Shower of Sparks
- Grim Discovery (drawn during your draw step this turn)
- Corpse Lunge
You have not yet played a land this turn. You do not know the identities or order of any of the remaining cards in your library.
You have the following cards in your graveyard:
Summer is at 10 life and has no cards in her hand. She has the following cards in play:
- Utvara Scalper (tapped, with Summer’s Indomitable Will attached)
- Yotian Soldier
- Granite Gargoyle (tapped)
- Abbey Gargoyles (with Summer’s No-Dachi attached)
- Archangel
- Mana Flare
- Sol Grail (choosing White)
- 7 Mountains (three tapped)
- 3 Plains (two tapped)
If you think you’ve got a great solution in mind, don’t put it in the comments! Instead, send it to puzzles@gatheringmagic.com with the subject line “Puzzle — The Two Christophers” by 11:59 P.M. EST on Sunday, April 30, 2017. We’ll include the best ones in next week’s article along with the next puzzle!
Last Week’s Puzzle
“There are no special tricks, and no real gimmicks to today's puzzle,” Greg Dreher writes.“You can make Phil lose up to 4 of his 9 life if you have four tapped creatures at the end of your turn, so that means you need to deal 5 damage in combat (or 6/7/8/9 damage, if you have to lose 1/2/3/4 creatures during that combat).
“You have four creatures that can attack, and Phil has two creatures that can block. It's a good thing the Unabridged Cube gave you an old card like Advance Scout; had you gotten a newer card that could only affect your own creatures, there would be no way to win this turn.”
“The key here is Advance Scout and its first-strike granting ability,” Luke Paulsen clarifies.“Normally it would be impossible for us to attack for enough damage to finish Phil off with Throne of the God-Pharaoh: Either our hand is empty when the damage is dealt and our blocked attackers die, or our hand isn't empty and our unblocked attackers won't deal enough combat damage thanks to Meishin, the Mind Cage. There's also the problem of how to get Azorius Chancery out of our hand in time for damage. But by giving Phil's blockers first strike, we can bend the rules and get the best of both worlds.”
“There are a few possible ways to win,” Norman Dean writes, “but they all start with the same two steps:
- Tap two Plains and cast Gossamer Chains.
- Move to combat. Attack with all your creatures.
“From here, it depends on how Phil blocks, but between combat damage and the Throne of the God-Pharaoh's ability, you should be able to finish him this turn.”
Ryou Niji explains that there are four distinct scenarios that might take place at this point. “The opponent only has two blockers,” Ryou says, “and we can use Advance Scout to give both of them first strike . . . and 0 power due to Meishin, the Mind Cage. We have four attackers, so he has to let at least two through.”
- If Phil lets Stitchwing Skaab and Barrenton Cragtreads through:
- Have Phil’s blockers deal zero first strike damage.
- Pay
to cast Gift of Tusks and Lithomancer's Focus on Barrenton Cragtreads. We have one card (Azorius Chancery) in our hand, so our attackers are 2/1 and 4/5, dealing 6 damage during normal combat damage. - The Throne of the God-Pharaoh triggers (for 4 life), which finishes off our opponent.
- If Phil blocks Barrenton Cragtreads, but lets Stitchwing Skaab through:
- Before first strike damage, pay to cast Gift of Tusks and Lithomancer's Focus on our unblocked 1/1 attacker. (The reason for this is that that unblocked attacker may be Advance Scout, which has first strike naturally. This removes its first strike ability and allows it to deal normal combat damage.)
- That means that Phil’s blockers will deal 2 first strike damage and may kill a 1/1 attacker. However, Barrenton Cragtreads will survive.
- We have one card (Azorius Chancery) in our hand, so our attackers are 2/1 and 4/5, dealing 6 damage during normal combat damage.
- We end up with at least three tapped creatures in our end step for Throne to finish off our opponent.
- If Phil blocks Stitchwing Skaab, but lets Barrenton Cragtreads through:
- Before first strike damage, Pay to cast only Gift of Tusks on our unblocked 1/1 attacker. (If this is Advance Scout, this removes its first strike ability.)
- That means that Phil’s blockers will deal 1first strike damage. This kills Stitchwing Skaab and possibly our other 1/1 attacker.
- Pay , and discard Azorius Chancery and Lithomancer's Focus to return Stitchwing Skaab to the battlefield (conveniently tapped). This empties our hand in the process.
- Both our attackers are now 3/3 creatures, dealing 6 damage during normal combat damage.
- Two tapped attackers plus Stitchwing Skaab are enough for Throne to finish off our opponent.
- If Phil blocks both Stitchwing Skaab and Barrenton Cragtreads:
- Before first strike damage, pay to cast Gift of Tusks and Lithomancer's Focus on any of our unblocked creatures.
- That means that Phil’s blockers will deal 2 first strike damage. This kills Stitchwing Skaab.
- After first strike damage, return Gossamer Chains to our hand targeting the unblocked creature that is not currently an Elephant.
- Pay , and discard Azorius Chancery and Gossamer Chains to return Stitchwing Skaab to the battlefield (conveniently tapped). This empties our hand in the process.
- We now only have one 5/5 Elephant to deal normal combat damage, but all our four creatures are on the battlefield tapped, one way or another.
- As usual, Throne finishes off the opponent.
“I originally thought I only needed two lines: one for the opponent not blocking both 3-power creatures and one for the opponent doing so,” Ryou notes.“As it turns out, Advance Scout having first strike really messes things up, and I needed not one but two extra lines to fix the problem! As is, all four lines are necessary.”
“This one had lots of nasty little ‘gotchas’ after the initial insight,” Luke adds.“Trying to pump Advance Scout doesn't quite work because it natively has first strike, but fortunately you can get around that. It also takes a bit of thought to see that you can always afford to activate Gossamer Chains targeting one of your own unblocked creatures.”
