Have you ever cast Storm Herd?
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| Concede? Neigh-ver! |
If you ever have, either in casual or Commander, you know
how awesome it feels. Flood the board
with 18, 67, or 900 1/1 Pegasus tokens!
Set yourself up for an awesome attack, an impregnable defense or a
Wrath-ed blowout! This risk, this
overextension of immense swarming numbers, is part of the main drive to play a
token deck. In my opinion, token decks
are their most fun when you’ve run out of table space, or you’re reduced to
representing them with dice or ripped up slips of score paper. Token decks are all about quantity over
quality, and the risk of playing into blowouts like Day of Judgment, Bonfire of
the Damned or Devastation Tide seem to be justified with the speed, consistency
and meta-attacking power of the token archetype.
For today’s deck, I was pondering over a recently-traded-for
set of Lingering Souls in my binder.
Most people that have been keeping up with Standard over the last few
months know that, earlier this year, B/W Tokens was a legitimate deck, seeing
the top tables frequently and providing powerful and inevitable consistency
while squashing the Delver monster with just half of this card. Lingering Souls
is still a great card, but it’s put on different hats, either as two (or four,
if you can) chump blockers or evasive attackers as opposed to the efficient
engine of the B/W Token machine.
Graveyard decks use it, control uses it, and most any other deck that
can play both halves will sleeve it up, too.
It’s the most expensive uncommon from its set, and its flexibility and presence
even in Eternal formats signifies its place among the most flexible of
Standard’s sorceries.
I considered resurrecting an aggro deck that orbited
Lingering Souls, but I wanted to take it a different direction than just B/W. I considered other token producers in
Standard as well as synergetic cards and their colors. Tokens were mostly supported by white, but
black and red each provided complementary cards. R/W Humans was a thing for a while, and
combined with more token producers and buffing effects, this deck could take on
a bit more of a midrange model of attack.
In an attempt to orchestrate the three-color wedge, I finally came to a
first draft of this deck.
Webber Tokens
Creatures (14)
3 Champion of the Parish
2 Kruin Striker
1 Skirsdag High Priest
2 Thraben Doomsayer
2 Hellrider
2 Angel of Jubilation
2 Geist-Honored Monk
Spells (23)
4 Gather the Townsfolk
3 Krenko’s Command
3 Intangible Virtue
4 Lingering Souls
3 Oblivion Ring
2 Fervor
2 Brimstone Volley
2 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
Lands (23)
4 Clifftop Retreat
3 Isolated Chapel
1 Dragonskull Summit
6 Plains
3 Mountain
2 Swamp
2 Evolving Wilds
1 Slayer’s Stronghold
1 Vault of the Archangel
Sideboard (15)
2 Smelt
3 Celestial Purge
3 Bonfire of the Damned
3 Safe Passage
4 Gut Shot
Deck Tech – Creatures
Champion of the Parish
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| I'd rather play Soul Warden, honestly. |
Kruin Striker
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| Akoum Battlesinger, is that you? |
Skirsdag High Priest
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| Oh, your Searing Spear doesn't exile? |
The High Priest, while synergetically a Human and cheap
enough to not disrupt the curve, makes combat very difficult for the
opponent. Either the opponent takes all
the damage or they block and kill one of my shrimpy tokens and suffer bringing
a 5/5 beater into play. All of my token
producing spells produce the two creatures the High Priest needs, so if this is
out, your opponent will have to make a tough choice if he decides to
block. Not to mention, with Intangible
Virtue, the High Priest can use your attacking fellows to make a dude without
sacrificing combat pressure.
Thraben Doomsayer
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| “Citizens of Thraben! If we continue on our path of aggression, a Day of Judgment will soon be on upon us!” |
Hellrider
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| “Behind an empty board swings a Hellrider for four.” – Grovthus, demon poet |
The Hellrider puts teeth on your tokens. Spending turns two and three making tokens
then casting this on turn four might just kill your opponent or leave them
mangled beyond repair. It can also shred
a planeswalker without using your combat damage step, which isn’t irrelevant in
a deck without much burn. This is a very
intimidating weapon with a lot of tokens, and by himself, he’s outstanding
too. His $2.00 price tag belies the
power of this little devil in the right deck.
Angel of Jubilation
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| Best art in the set. |
This beautiful Angel is the flagship of the deck. Although the mana cost can be pretty steep,
she helps so much. She pumps my squad, she is herself evasive,
and she shuts down a large chunk of many opposing decks. She can’t be Dismembered, your guys can’t be
Gut Shotted, Falkenrath Aristocrat cannot protect herself, Birthing Pod becomes
a four mana brick, and Mono-Green Infect just crumples. She is at her strongest right now, as Pod and
Phyrexian mana spells sit at their peak of power. Resolving her feels awesome in this deck, and
every turn she sticks around, she presses victory.
Geist-Honored Monk
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| Cloudgoat Monk. |
Spells
Token Producers and Supporters – Gather the Townsfolk,
Krenko’s Command, Lingering Souls and Intangible Virtue
Each of the three producers provides the front line of this
deck. Krenko’s Commands are essentially
Gathers 5-7, and Lingering Souls are just amazingly efficient, counter resistant
producers. The Virtues’ role is
obvious. Nothing you’re not expecting
here, so let’s move along…
Removal Suite – Oblivion Ring and Brimstone Volley
A light five spells make up the entire removal of this deck. That’s not very much, I’d only ever
encounter one or two a game on average.
Frankly, though, part of removal’s job for an aggro deck is to press
aggression as opposed to dealing with a threat.
That’s why Vapor Snag is so good in Delver matchups. When I’m playing tokens, though, I bypass
their removal through sheer numbers,
not force. I don’t really need to bounce
or kill their team, as most of the time, I can have more than enough attackers
and more than enough blockers. Oblivion
Ring is there for those gotta-answer problems, like an oppressive enchantment,
planeswalker or artifact. Most of the
time the creatures won’t be the problem.
I don’t mind their creatures, as it provides a disincentive for global
Wrath effects. The ring is elegant,
flexible, and on-time removal when I need it.
Brimstone Volley serves a dual purpose, either as a finisher or as an
answer to a powerful creature. Tokens
tend to get themselves smitten here and there, and this simple instant can take
a quarter of their life for three mana.
If the pressure is on, it can just flat finish the job. Brimstone Volley has a good home here.
Fervor
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| The Rural Juror's Urban Fervor. |
This card signals I’m going elbow deep. Truthfully, though, as with many aggressive
decks, haste is always a welcome static ability. With the sorcery nature of this deck, giving
my creatures a bit of “instant” quality goes a long way. Casting a Kruin Striker and a token producer
and bashing with all of it is a huge
game. Resolving a Geist Honored Monk on
an empty board hits just as hard as a Thundermaw Hellkite and is harder to
completely block. I wanted to draw it,
but never more than one per game (even if it got destroyed), so I settled on
two. Having this out means your opponent
is going to want to be ready for a veritable charge of hasty tokens. With a Virtue out, combat will nearly always
be in your favor.
Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
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| The Man in Black…and white. |
Mana Base
This was the hardest part of creating this deck. Having three colors each play major roles was
a challenge, so I had to make sure I provided the right balance. White was clearly the main color, with red
right behind and black in the rear.
Thus, most lands, in one way or another, produce white, many produce red
and some produce black. Hitting it all
at the right point would be a challenge, too.
I only had room for two non-colored lands, and each was powerful enough
to be OK. The Stronghold could turn any
freshly played token or creature into a solid attacker and blocker, and the
Vault makes a deadly defense or a potent, life-swinging attack force.
Sideboard
The sideboard was surprisingly easy to craft once I knew
what I wanted to do with this deck.
Smelts are nice, cheap and narrow answers for the many artifacts that
plague Standard tables. Celestial Purge
is a ruthlessly efficient choice for dealing with the R/B Zombie squad as well
as tricky black planeswalkers or enchantments, like Liliana of the Dark Realms
or Curse of Death’s Hold. Bonfires
belong in the board for a mirror match or some other quantity-based creature
deck; the deck’s mana is tricky enough that I don’t think it’s the best thing I
can do on my turn, and being three colors with fairly limited fixing makes it
even harder to cast on the Miracle. Safe
Passage is a great anti-Bonfire card, and it helps make racing easier,
preventing a big attack from a two-color aggro deck, and it can blank a Mono
Green Infect attack that goes for the throat.
It provides a nice blowout opportunity, so I gladly support this classic
inclusion. Gut Shots make up the only
sideboard playset, mainly for all the usual targets: mana dorks, Infect
creatures, unflipped Delvers and Snapcaster Mages.
It took me a while to tweak this deck like I wanted it, but
after settling on the spell counts, the mana base, and the sideboard, I played
it this past Tuesday at Something2Do’s Standard tournament. After I pulled out all of the token cards I
had for the corresponding creature types, I was ready to roll!
Round 1 – Dalton
(B/R Midrange)
Dalton
and I shuffled up and had some pleasant chit-chat; he’s a fairly new player,
freshly inducted earlier this year after Dark Ascension. With a friendly handshake, we started up.
I got a fairly piddly start, having to mulligan to six and
making the occasional duo of tokens. On
time, he resolved a Stuffy Doll.
Immediately I started counting creatures to see how much Blasphemous Act
would cost, eyeing my life total of 15.
If he had the Act, he’d just smash me.
I dropped an Intangible Virtue for my Lingering tokens and kept my
ground guys back. I waited for the
inevitable Blasphemous Act, but it never surfaced and I took game 1. In game 2, he had land trouble and my mana
base sung sweet nothings in my ear. I
curved very nicely and smashed with 8 power of Souls for three unanswered
turns.
1-0
Round 2 – Josh (U/B Tezzeret Post)
Josh, an experienced and confident player, kept me guessing
about his deck type. Keeping a snap six,
I was ready to go. Game 1 involved a bit
of Ichor Wellspring on his side and some tokens for me. He eventually cast Wurmcoil Engine and,
unable to find an Oblivion Ring, he killed me while sitting at a healthy 30+
life. In game 2, I decided to really go
on the offensive, getting sideways about every turn in the hopes he wouldn’t
draw what he needed. Although Ratchet
Bombs and Curse of Death’s Hold dispatched my tokens, a pair of Hellriders were
impossible to stop, launching us into game three. In the final game, I boarded in all my Purges
(which I hadn’t included, seeing no black or red permanents in game 1). I played Bonfires too, thinking burn might be
the only way to get him for those last few points. With Fervor down, I was getting aggressive
quickly, but he animated an Ichor Wellspring with Tezzeret’s -1 and plugged me
down at 5-point intervals. Although we
were racing, I was losing. As I landed
at 5 life, I thought carefully about casting my Thraben Doomsayer, who could
not only tap right away with Fervor, but was online with Fateful Hour. He had too much on defense, so I couldn’t
swing for lethal, so I just sat back. He
untapped and cast Black Sun Zenith for two, smiting my Doomsayer and each token
without killing his offense. I frowned
and extended the hand.
1-1
A good match, and one I would have had a fair amount of
difficulty beating. Ratchet Bomb being
recurred with Trading Post was a tough glass to chew.
Round 3 – Greg (B/W Zombie Angels)
Greg, a focused and experienced player as well, shuffled up
his stack quickly as we each hoped to avoid an X-2 finish. He got an exceptionally aggressive start,
going Gravecrawler into Diregraf Ghoul/Gravecrawler on turn 2, followed by a
pair of Geralf’s Messengers. I was
floored by turn 4. Game two brought in
Bonfires and Purges. I had a team of
Townsfolk ready to block his Gravecrawler on turn 2. Celestial Purge in my hand made me feel
secure. He had four mana and only a
freshly cast Messenger out and I topdecked a Bonfire. As I didn’t have Pillars or anything of the
sort, I figured I’d cast it now with the
Purge sitting in my hand. His
Messenger un-died, and he untapped, resolving and equipping a sideboarded Sword
of War and Peace. I literally could not have made a worse play if I tried. Two turns later, I was dead from a 6/5
unblockable, untargetable monster.
1-2
That was a terrible decision on my part, and it’s proof of
the danger of playing with miracles; you feel like you have to cast them on the
miracle to get value, but that is not the case; in fact, it’s not the case most
of the time.
Round 4 – Dakota (Frites)
Although now out of prize contention, I still had time for
one more match. Dakota was in the same
position as me; a 1-2 playing the last match for fun. Still kicking myself for my misplay (Greg and
my casual match afterward saw me beat the B/W Zombie deck time and time again),
Dakota and I shuffled up for our first game.
I got a nice, aggressive start and was able to put him away no-nonsense
within a few turns as he dug for an Elesh Norn.
In game two, he seemed to side in more creatures, and the plethora of
mana dorks garnered inclusion of all four Gut Shots. He had a tougher time finding what he needed,
and, after I smacked away a Solemn Simulacrum, I double Gut-Shotted away his
only remaining one and crashed in for the match.
2-2
MVP: Hellrider
This card pulled a massive amount of pressure with it. Haste and a couple tokens mean you’re
probably taking a third of their life at a whack, and they weren’t even
expecting it!
Sideboard MVP: Celestial Purge
Every deck I played had black cards in it, and this card is
an excellent answer to each of them. If
only I knew when to cast it…
LVP: The Mana Base
and Krenko’s Command
The mana base turned out to be my biggest opponent. The deck was far too greedy to reliably
support three colors at a moment’s notice.
I found myself using Evolving Wilds for white, my most included color,
just because of its overbearing weight.
In a couple games, a binned Lingering Souls or Sorin in-hand sat idle,
waiting for me to hit that black source.
Krenko’s Command was more of the same, and in nearly every match I
sideboarded it out first thing; I had eleven (that’s including Souls twice)
token-producing sorceries, so I just didn’t need #12-14.
Sideboard LVP: Bonfire of the Damned
This card can buy you a brand new computer game, a fancy
dinner for two plus tip or, roughly, a full tank of gas, but it can’t buy wins. Bonfire has been the underperformer in each
of my decks in which it’s played over the last little while, mainly because of
its intense mana commitment and its proclivity to overextension. Only in certain matchups does ripping a
Bonfire even matter, and most of the time I’d have the game anyway. I may have just played bad matchups for it
that night, but I would remove it while a third color still remains in any
capacity.
I wasn’t too pleased with the deck’s performance, as it was
weak to a lot of things, and I rarely had the sick blowout plays I was hoping
for. The grass is always greener, I
guess. Still, I don’t think this deck is
DOA, I just think it’s too unfocused.
Red and White were by far the strongest colors, and I could just splash
a black source or two for the Souls flashbacks (as that was by far the most
awesome use for a black mana in this deck).
I rebuilt the maindeck that night with a much narrower,
Boros-colored shell.
Out:
-1 Skirsdag High Priest
-2 Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
-1 Dragonskull Summit
-1 Vault of the Archangel
-1 Swamp
-1 Plains
In:
+1 Kruin Striker
+1 Oblivion Ring
+1 Brimstone Volley
+2 Chandra the Firebrand
+1 Mountain
+1 Evolving Wilds
I like Chandra better here because she’s easier to cast, she
can double up your token production, remove silly blockers, and she can ramp up
a Brimstone Volley for half your opponent’s life total so you can just win out
of nowhere. More of the good stuff, less
of the black. A third Evolving Wilds is
fine, as I only have the Champion to cast on turn one, so I can survey my hand
and plan ahead. In playtesting, the deck
plays much more smoothly, but I’m not sure if it’s better yet.
In the end, I know the deck’s concept could be supported by
Ravnica’s land fixing, but I’d be waiting for Gatecrash for two-thirds of it,
and, more importantly, I’m not sure the deck (or the pilot) is that good right
now. This deck survives completely
intact, minus sideboard, so that’s something.
For the rest of the format pre-rotation, though, I’ll be running a deck
that will nearly completely rotate,
at least functionally. I might
highlight in a couple weeks if I get a chance to play it in a tournament before rotation.
Next week, I’ll hope to provide you something special in
regards to our return to Ravnica, and beyond that, it’ll be time to preview the
best cards for Limited and Constructed from RTR.
Until then, don’t forget to untap!
- Matt H
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