The crowds have shown up in force today for your local game store's "Creature Feature" tournament. The holiday promotion apparently raised interest from more than a few quarters because of its event rules, which have been written up near the store entrance:

You have to admit that you're having fun, though - and all you needed for a costume was a pair of cat ears, some plastic whiskers, and a little eyeliner. Sadly, your games have gone a bit too quickly for your taste, and you're now looking for an ongoing match to watch.

You spot a familiar face in the crowd and take a seat next to his table. Despite the grotesqueries of CJ's face paint, you can recognize him easily.

"So what are you supposed to be?" you ask.

"I'm a Horror," CJ says.

"You mean that paint job's horrible."

"Same thing," he shrugs.

"You're playing a Horror deck?" you ask, glancing at his cards. "Some of your stuff isn't quite on theme."

"It sounded a lot better in my head," CJ admits. "I was scrounging for cards toward the end. Stupid one-card limit."

You turn to CJ's opponent, who has apparently taken the "costume" thing a lot more seriously. Between the silk shirt, the leather belts, the velvet waistcoat, and the feathered hat, you could almost swear she just stepped out of a certain movie franchise.

You're studying her eyepatch when a glimmer of recognition comes up. "Octavia?" you ask.

"Arrr," she says, and smiles.

"You know each other?" CJ asks.

"Sure," you say. "We run into each other every now and then, usually when Octavia's dressed up for one reason or another. I can tell that it's her because she always looks absolutely phenomenal."

"Thank you," Octavia says.

"So you've got Horrors against Pirates?"

"And losing," CJ says. "Everything came together for Pirates in Ixalan block. I mean... I'm barely holding back most of her stuff, and it's been really tough for me to deal with her flyers."

"Especially with that Favorable Winds," you say, seeing the enchantment on Octavia's side of the table.

"That too," CJ groans. "I'm practically looking into the heart of darkness here: I'm at four life, and I can't afford to feed stuff to my Dross Hopper just for it to be able to block and regenerate each turn."

"I see what you mean," you say, although you have to admit a grudging respect for the lone copy of Horror of Horrors that CJ has somehow secured. "So if you're at four life, then Octavia's at...?"

"Thirteen," Octavia says. "But it's his turn."

You glance back at CJ in time to see him pull an Essence Flux off the top of his library. "Yeah," CJ says sourly. "I'm not sure how that's going to help."

"That's... not exactly a Horror card, is it?"

"Hello? Scrounging?"

"Right, right."

As CJ adds a +1/+1 counter to his Chasm Skulker, you consider his current situation. You'd like to help him out here, particularly as his track record with disadvantageous situations is, er... horrible at best. But at the same time, you don't want to interfere with their match just for the sake of making some speculative plays.

Still, that doesn't stop you from running some possible moves in your head...

It is the start of your first main phase. Defeat Octavia before the beginning of her next combat phase.

You are at 4 life, with the following cards in play:

• Thrummingbird
• Dross Hopper
• Chasm Skulker (with a +1/+1 counter on it)
• Faceless Butcher (exiling Octavia's Rishadan Brigand)
• Netherborn Phalanx
• Havengul Skaab
• Horror of Horrors
• Ichor Wellspring
• Dimir Cluestone
• 4 Islands
• 3 Swamps

You have the following card in your hand:

• Essence Flux

You have not yet played a land this turn. You still have a significant number of cards remaining in your library, but you know neither the identities nor the order of those cards.

Octavia at 13 life and has no cards in her hand. She has the following cards in play:

• Grasping Scoundrel (with Octavia's Sea Legs attached)
• Storm Fleet Aerialist (tapped, with a +1/+1 counter on it)
• Sailor of Means
• Fathom Fleet Boarder
• Crafty Cutpurse (with Octavia's Spidersilk Net attached)
• Deadeye Brawler
• Ramirez DePietro
• Favorable Winds
• 4 Island (three tapped)
• 3 Swamp (all 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 - House of Horrors" by 11:59 P.M. EST on Monday, October 29, 2018. We'll include the best ones in next week's article along with the next puzzle!

Last Week's Puzzle

Correct solutions to last week's puzzle were received from Addison Fox, Russell Jones, Hyman Rosen, Sean Patrick Keatley, Ryou Niji, Max Bernstein, Michael Feldman, zzo38, Matt Bocek, and David Arnold.

While the possibility of having three different draws was the focus of this puzzle, this was also a question of figuring out how to use each of Rakdos Charm's three modes. It is, in fact, possible to have three solutions that each use a different mode, as we'll see below.

Delirium probably has the most straightforward solution among the three: When your opponent's at eight life, you just need to cast it on an 8-power creature to win. Notably, Sphere of Grace won't help against Delirium here, since the creature targeted by Delirium is the one that deals the damage. Michael Feldman writes:

You need to get rid of Giant Caterpillar and Krosan Wayfarer before casting Rakdos Charm; otherwise your opponent can simply sacrifice them in response to your Delirium, changing Gorilla Titan back into a 4/4 and ruining your shot at the win. You'll also want to cast Delirium on Kaitou in response to his Preferred Selection trigger, or otherwise he might draw something that puts a stop to your plans.

"Among the three of our potential draws," Ryou Niji writes,"Delirium and Act of Treason are pretty similar: They both can make one of the opponent's creatures deal damage equal to its power to the opponent, one way or the other.

"Of course, we want to do that with Palladia-Mors, the Ruiner, which is currently the largest creature on the board, and has the best evasion for Act of Treason. However, both cards also target, and Palladia-Mors has hexproof until it deals damage - this is where the third mode on Rakdos Charm comes into play. Now, the one remaining problem is that we have too many creatures ourselves to survive it, but being a Black player, that is easy enough to fix."

"Even though Rakdos Charm is a Black spell," Addison Fox adds, "it causes each creature in play to deal 1 damage, so we are able to skirt Sphere of Grace since none of Kaitou's creatures are Black. Additionally, because we cause Palladia-Mors to deal 1 damage to Kaitou, we also remove its hexproof ability without having to get into combat with her, which is useful since we can't control how Kaitou blocks.

"First things first, we can't cast Rakdos Charm because it's symmetrical, and the number of creatures we control is currently higher than our life total. We can fix this:

Either way, we can now pay to steal the non-hexproof Palladia-Mors, the Ruiner, and go to combat for a lethal 6 damage.

It's worth noting that this approach works for Delirium as well: You can take the first four steps above to remove Palladia-Mors' hexproof ability (and bring your opponent to a maximum of 6 life), then cast Delirium on the Elder Dragon Legend during your opponent's upkeep.

Blades of Velis Vel, on the other hand, probably has the most complex solution. The problem here is that Blades prompts you to attack, but you need to allow for both Sphere of Grace and your opponent's blocking options at the same time. However, Hyman Rosen's analysis notes that it's possible for you to punch through for just enough damage:

Curiously, in addition to the possibility of having three different draws and using three different modes for Rakdos Charm... this also allows you to have Vial of Dragonfire deal damage to three different targets. That's more variation than you can shake a stick at.