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Deep into your Battle for Zendikar Booster Draft match, you were still trying to figure out what your opponent’s deck was supposed to do.
It was only when you realized that your deck was swiftly running out of cards that you finally figured out her plan. By that time, however, Ursula had built up a substantial creature base, and you’ve been forced to play defense in order to keep your library from being eaten. Not that that’s helped much: Ursula has two Benthic Infiltrators, and they’re making a meal out of you.
With three cards left in your library on Ursula’s turn, you find yourself with an Encircling Fissure in your hand. This gives you some great prospects: If Ursula attacks with all of her creatures, you can prevent the damage and then go for an alpha strike on your next turn. If Ursula attacks with only her Infiltrators, you can prevent the damage and give yourself an additional creature for the breakthrough next turn.
Ursula then completely blindsides you by declining to attack at all. Maybe she grew suspicious, or maybe she figures that she can wait things out for one more turn. Whatever the reason, you know perfectly well that you have only one more draw . . . after which Ursula’s Benthic Infiltrators will finish off the rest of your library.
You try to remember what cards you haven’t drawn yet in order to see whether you should concede. Then it hits you: If you play this carefully enough, the cards in your library shouldn’t matter at all.
“End my turn,” Ursula says. “Anything in response?”
Ursula has just declared the end of her turn; you may still cast spells or activate abilities in response. Defeat Ursula before the start of her next turn.
You are at 5 life with the following cards in play:
You have the following cards in your hand:
You have exactly three cards remaining in your library. Their identities are not relevant to your plans.
Ursula is at 6 life and has no cards in her hand. She has the following cards in play:
- Sludge Crawler
- Benthic Infiltrator
- Benthic Infiltrator
- Dominator Drone
- Mind Raker
- Kozilek's Channeler
- 5 Islands
- 6 Swamps
If you think you have a great solution in mind, don’t put it in the comments! Instead, send it to puzzles at gatheringmagic dot com with the subject line “Puzzle — Indigestion”. We’ll include the best ones in next week’s article along with the next puzzle!
Last Week’s Puzzle:
Ikeno apologizes for the above gaffe, but we can assure him that it doesn’t cause any problems with us. After all, we can still win the game even if the Behemoth is in play!
Correct solutions were received from Russell Jones, Aaron Golas, Sanjay Saith, David Robinson, Norman Dean, Quadrangolo Tetra, Andrew Muravskyi, Charles Davis, Buck Bratager, Sebastian De Villa, Aaron Fine, Vik Patel, Paul Reilly, Sam Krause, Martin Bobovsky, Maarten Wybaillie, and Matthew Harvey.
Sanjay Saith writes: “Based on the fact that the opponent has five creatures—of which you can remove a maximum of two (assuming he doesn't sac them to Bane of Bala Ged)—and you have a maximum of four attacking creatures—two of which only have 2 power—you need to cast Infuse with the Elements to give trample, which means you need to get rid of Void Winnower.”
The problem with that idea, of course, lies in actually getting rid of an 11/9 creature. As it turns out, you’ll need to use both of your removal spells to do so . . . which leads to a second problem: Would you be able to make it through the rest of Ikeno’s blockers afterward?
Matthew Harvey goes over the initial steps as follows:
- Play Forest. Landfall triggers on Akoum Stonewaker, pay
to make a 3/1 red Elemental token with haste and trample. - Pay to cast Call the Scions to make two 1/1 Eldrazi Scion tokens.
- Pay to cast Outnumber targeting Void Winnower. We control six creatures, so Outnumber deals 6 damage to Void Winnower.
- Pay to cast Unnatural Aggression targeting your Elemental token and Void Winnower. Our Elemental token dies, and Void Winnower is dealt 3 more damage and dies. We can now even all we want.
- Combat: Attack with Akoum Stonewaker (2/1), Void Attendant (2/3), and Bane of Bala Ged (7/5). Bane of Bala Ged's attack trigger causes Ikeno to exile two permanents. Their choice doesn't matter, as they will more than likely just be lands.
- With the Void Winnower gone, you now have three attackers facing off against four blockers. But the fact that you can now cast Infuse with the Elements for as much as a +3/+3 bonus (as well as the trample ability) makes a world of difference.
Martin Wybaillie breaks the logic down as follows:
Looking at the 1, 2, 5, and 6 toughness across from us, we notice that Ikeno can only satisfy the first requirement. 14 toughness is reached, but spacing it out 3, 3, and 8 is impossible. So regardless of how Ikeno blocks, there will be a creature that will be lethal after Infusing it.
Another way of looking at it comes from Russell Jones’ submission:
- If Bane of Bala Ged is single-blocked by anything, it has no more than 6 toughness in front of it. In that case, make it the target of Infuse with the Elements and pump it to 10/8, for at least 4 trample damage.
- Otherwise, at least one of Akoum Stonewaker or Void Attendant will either be unblocked or single-blocked by a 1- or 2-toughness creature. Pumping it will therefore increase it to 5 power and allow it to trample over for at least 3 damage.
Additionally, Sebastian De Villa points out something interesting: You can still win the game even if you wait till after blockers are declared to play your instants. Sebastian’s reasoning is below:
- Start by attacking with four creatures: Akoum Stonewaker (2/1), the Elemental token (3/1), Void Attendant (2/3), and Bane of Bala Ged (7/5).
- The Elemental token and Bane of Bala Ged must be blocked by at least one creature each, as they represent lethal damage.
- At least one of the other two creatures (Akoum Stonewaker and Void Attendant) must be blocked, as together they represent lethal damage. The other creature may remain unblocked as there are no pump spells in my colors in this format that have odd converted mana costs.
- Spells that Ikeno could play around at this point are Outnumber, Complete Disregard, Grave Birthing, Natural Connection, Unnatural Aggression, Stonefury and Turn Against.
- Grave Birthing, Natural Connection, and Turn Against are not relevant at this point because all attackers have been declared.
- The Elemental token becomes the focus here for Ikeno, as removal spells on his blocker(s) for that creature could mean lethal damage to him due to trample damage.
- To play around Outnumber, Ikeno has to block the Elemental with a creature that has a toughness greater than 6—which means Void Winnower only, or Deathless Behemoth and any other creature. Ikeno then blocks the rest of my attackers with at least one creature each.
- To play around Complete Disregard, Ikeno has to block the Elemental with a creature that has a power greater than 3. Which means Void Winnower or Deathless Behemoth only or a double-block with any two creatures. Ikeno then blocks the rest of my attackers with at least one creature each.
- To play around Unnatural Aggression, Ikeno has to block the Elemental with a creature that has a toughness greater than 7 (because of my Bane of Bala Ged). Which means Void Winnower only or a double-block with any two creatures. Ikeno then blocks the rest of my attackers with at least one creature each.
- To play around Stonefury, Ikeno has to double-block the Elemental with any two creatures. Ikeno then blocks the rest of my attackers with at least one creature each.
- To play around two of the four spells above, Ikeno has to triple-block the Elemental with any three creatures. Ikeno then blocks the Bane of Bala Ged with a creature, blocks either Void Attendant or Akoum Stonewaker with another creature, and leaves the other unblocked.
- Ikeno cannot play around three of the four spells above, as he would have to quadruple-block the Elemental token. This would allow at least two of my creatures to remain unblocked and deal lethal damage.
- Ikeno’s best option is to triple-block the Elemental with any three creatures and then block the Bane of Bala Ged and one of the 2-power attacking creatures (Void Attendant or Akoum Stonewaker) with his remaining two blockers. The other 2-power attacking creature remains unblocked.
From this point, you can remove Void Winnower and play Infuse with the Elements as expected.
“It's worth noting that you still have one Forest untapped at the end,” Aaron Golas adds, “which means this solution would have worked even if you didn't have Call the Scions. Instead of making two Eldrazi Scions by tapping three Forests to cast the sorcery, wait until Bane of Bala Ged's pseudo-annihilator trigger resolves; then, tap four Forests and process whatever two permanents Ikeno exiles to activate Void Attendant's ability twice.”
“Once again,” Quadrangolo Tetra remarks, “our opponent using instant-speed spells and abilities in his own main phase spells his doom. Retreat to Coralhelm's landfall trigger would have made it impossible for us to win if timed correctly.”
