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Title: Zendikar Block Decks

Estimated Combo Cost: $0.00

Date Posted: Tue Jan/26/10 at 8:53pm

ghostfire86

Posts: 496
Joined: 04-Nov-09

Ive been returning to my home found only in tournements and wish to sit down to start a discussion on the subject above. I personally don't wish to talk about any of the past decks that are lingering around from last block such as Jund, and ect. Not all of these decks will be able to convert over easily into this new block set.

If you feel the need to post about one of the decks please re-read the top of the page marked SUBJECT.

Everyone has his or her own play style in the form of a deck that they like to play. Me personally, I like Board Control and Beatdown the best, which only explains my two signature decks that i play with in casual play (Deck #1:Gangrene, a Black/Green Creature Hate Deck, and Deck #2: Gaea's Revenge, Mono-Green Beatdown Deck).

With this being said I personally like the Vamp. Decks that have been coming out. They have a fast, steady pace structure that just seem to get worse for your opponent the futher the game is allowed to progress. Not to mention being mono-color you have less to worry about being land screwed when you have more of one but need the other. Between the creature removal options (Doomblade, Gatekeeper of Malakir, Kalitas, Vampire Nighthawk, and Feast of Blood), life gain (Vampire Nighthawk, Feast of Blood, Malakir Bloodwitch, Sorin Markov, Blood Tribute and Sanguine Bond), and other forms of hate for your opponent. I've seen nasty combos played out in this style of deck between the creature horde with Malakir Bloodwitch, Sorin Markov and any of the 10 or less life creatures, and Sanguine Bond played with Blood Tribute (Last option play but will bring down the biggest of players to their knees asking WHY? as they cry towards their homes.) Additional cards that i see potential for being added into this from the new worldwake set are Urge to Feed (Great play with Malakir Bloodwich in my opinion. Your opponent has just taken a big hit of life and you a gain, now he/she has to worry about a new problem) and Butcher of Malakir (nothing more than gravepact turned big flyer). Yes there are cards from this deck style that i have not brought up, say....Blood Seeker, but such cards speak well of themselves.

White Weenie......Sux in this format. Nuf said.

Burn is still alive and well. Strong as always, it is a great contender and hard to bypass with its direct approach to the format. Lightning Bolt is still in hardcore use for this structure giving the option of creature clearing or punishing your opponent. Three cards in paticular I believe make this deck though. First is the almighty Elemental Appeal. For 4 red mana you get a 7/1 trample, haste to direct like a mindless drown towards any direction of your choosing. It has the added bonus of the kicker of 5 to give that elemental +7/+0, but from past experience if you are playing hardcore burn and your opponent somehow manages to live long enough for you to see that 9th mana the game is already over for you. Unfortunatly this block set has not given any mana exceleration to acheive this fast enough with out splicing in green and ultimatley taking you away from a traditional burn. Second, Quest for pure flame is on the list. Everything you throw at your opponent is going to hit speeding this cards ability into a reality in no time. Double the damage dealt this turn......Elemental Appeal just became more realistic for that 14 damage you where looking for. Lastly, Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle is always a great last resort for burn. Burn decks traditionally hit hard fast but "Burn" through its resources very quickly. If you somehow become screwed drawing nothing but lands this offers you a chance to keep in the fight. A card that i would keep in consideration for prolonged creature use would have to be Bladetusk Boar dealing 3 damage to non red decks every attack phase. This is like having a lighting bolt every turn with the only purpose of making your opponent sweat. I can not think of how many times this one card saved me puting my opponents of the defensive. From worldwake Comet Storm (Shall I say the new Fireball) and Chain Reaction (Reds Answer to token decks) both come to mind as new power houses. Chain Reaction seems to more of a card suited for the sideboard to me and Comet Storm more for extended and legacy decks (takes considerable mana production to ignite a good blast).

Blue/Black/Green Mill I think believe will be strong on this block. Expecially with the upcoming addition to Jace. An easy trade for Mind Funeral, which will not be in block, I must say. Although against a green land pump Mind Funeral just devistates. M2010 seems to have kept Haunting Echoes so I do not forsee the use of any graveyard decks for the current near future. Echoes would just rape them and leave them bleeding in some gutter on the side of the street by itself. Hedron Crab just kills when used along side the fetch lands, Harrow, or Kahlni Heart Expedition. With the use of Traumatize, tomescour, and twincast cards will go quickly to the grave. Ponder has become the Sensei's Divining Top for this block giving the ability to stack your deck, or shuffle your deck and draw a card after (most likely for the one you need).

Any others that you can think of that will be staying or coming to block with potential?

Date Posted: Tue Jan/26/10 at 10:02pm

gericault5

Posts: 2788
Joined: 13-Oct-09

Man I wish my area did block I am so tired of Jund.

Anyway Vamps will rise more. And I thiink we will start seeing Green/red make a play, though it will have more focus on the Green fatties rather then burn. In fact I wouldn't be suprised to see mono green take a stand especially with that elepahant and elemental card. can't remember there names.

I wouldn't say white weenie has no place, granted its not the strongest archtype but with some of the new equipment and new kor it will get a rise especially with the lack of mass removal in the other colors.

One thing I think we will definitly see is Ally decks, especially UW. They offer some great sliveresque abilities but the ones offered in Zendikar made it impossible to get a solid curve with, Worldwake appears to have fixed that problem. not to mention they have some cool abilitys, I was actually planning to build a UW ally mill deck when the set comes out.

Also ghost, care to share your B/G deck, i'll be interested to see how you put it together, as i prefer to play B/G but i did not feel the colors meshed together with this block as they have in previous sets

[Edited by gericault5 on 26/Jan/10 at 10:58PM]

Date Posted: Wed Jan/27/10 at 6:49am

ghostfire86

Posts: 496
Joined: 04-Nov-09

My B/G deck is just for casual play and is not block by any means. Purely a creature hate deck, I built it for the purpose of 2H Giant (dragon...whatever it is called). Currently it is running:

Maelstrom Pulse, Punishment (crime) (Great card against affinity), Pernicious Deed, Tangle Asp, Lord of Extinction (At the moment this and Tangle Asp are the only creatures in the deck), Doomblade, Verdant Catacombs, Bayou, and Plague Boiler (Sitting in my sideboard just in case). Not everything but all i can off the top of my head. I have been considering Mortivore in here along side with the Abysal Persecutor (lord knows i have enough removal). In the end this deck will take out almost everything Artifact, Enchantment, Tokens, and Creature. I plays well as a support deck but games that i have played solo have taken up to 4 hours to complete, Opponent has no creatures and neither do i until LATE in the game. It is very one sided but I have fun with it.

I say White Weenie sux only due to the fact that i have as of yet seen it hold up to the Vamp Decks and the Burn Decks. Now it can get really mean really fast if you don't know what to take out to shut it down, but at this time I think three of the only cards that give it a slight edge at the moment is honor of the pure, Captain of the Watch, and Conqueror's Pledge. This is bringing us into the token department at the same time for horde/overrun deck mix. Marshal's Anthem seems nice but i am not sure if it will see play due to current construction and cost.

Yes i saw the Ally cards coming out of worldwake and think that they are due to hit hard with this new set. Friends of mine have tried with no success to build a good Ally Deck, but they still seem to be missing some key components. But I can understand why at the same time. Wizards had a article talking about how when they make a new mechanic they try not to go to deep with it. That is what they did with Ally's. Not to mention the fact I watched for a long time as people, including myself, tried to figure out and work the mechanics.

The new ability that i really like is the multi kicker. I was a fan of it when kicker first came out in good old Invasion Block and still today I LOVE IT. Becuase of this I Really want to see R/W control hit the scene and trust me it will. Dear god Wizards is putting out a pre-con deck that is R/W for Worldwake (I think they are calling it Rapid Fire). Two best cards for this construct that come to mind is Day of Judgment and Skitter of Lizards. Kill the board and then hit hard the same or next turn with a OOber Sized Creature depending on your opponents deck and play style. Again if this hits you will be seeing Arid Mesa in full force along with at least two copies of Luminarch Ascension in every deck of this style i think. Control helps negate damage (tick off your opponent) and get you counters faster.

I REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY want to see Red's Apocalypse reprinted in this set. If land is so important to its mechanics, then it would only suite the block to have better ANTI-land cards in its structure. Right now i am not seeing it at all. Hell where is the spreading algae? Should be in every core set dang it. Crucible of Worlds would seem ok for this set but in truth see no current need for it in a block construction if Wizards was to reprint it ever again.

[Edited by ghostfire86 on 27/Jan/10 at 7:13AM]

Date Posted: Wed Jan/27/10 at 9:39pm

ghostfire86

Posts: 496
Joined: 04-Nov-09

What, Gericault and myself are the only tournement players on the site. I highly doubt this to be fact. Threads like this one can only help those who wish to play constructed block tournements. Bounce ideas from one another and get a better overview of decks that one has not seen or a different version of one being played from a different area.

If not, then I will drop the thread and not talk about tournements.

Date Posted: Fri Jan/29/10 at 9:20am

flagshippredator

Posts: 101
Joined: 22-Dec-09

Since we're only talking about block, it would seem that Vampires are a lot like White Weenie... It's not very good. The best vamp, was printed in M10 (Nocturnus) while the best removal was also printed in Shards block (Path and Purge) so to say that one is better then the other in just block is not that great.

While I'm not a big fan of white weenie, it seems that it can't stand up to burn... yet. When World wake is released in a couple weeks, White will be more ready to go against the burn. The pro-red living dragon's claw will have something to say against burn.

I think the best Zendikar block deck would be something of the White-Green Variety. Using Oracle of Mul dia, Harrow, and Heart Expedition to put lands into play really fast. Using Land fall cards, you can pretty much play tokens, and then with the mana acceleration, you can play board wipes with no problem. Ontop of that, with the new Manlands coming out in Worldwake, this will almost definitely be a viable deck in block and in standard as well.

Date Posted: Fri Jan/29/10 at 10:27am

ghostfire86

Posts: 496
Joined: 04-Nov-09

Currently in my area Vamp is by far one of the top best decks and all the cards being used are within block, no shards needed. Vamps as a weenie deck.....I'll give you that, but by far the better. Wizards for some strange reason gave the vamps a great balance within M10 and zendakar. Thats very odd to me to have the core and first set do such a thing unless they drop it within the next set. Wizards did not do this, instead they are adding power to vamp decks with Worldwake. Take a look at the spoiler and it is as plane as day.

Currently as stated prior (I believe) white weenie has yet to make a foot hold in standing against burn, vamp, and horde decks. Mill i think is the only deck type that i have seen current white weenie have much success against. White Weenie will make a foot hold here soon with worldwake with the use of token cards. It will get mean and fast. White also does offer a great bases for control in my belief with the set but you have to become crafty and splice with another color. Yes it does not have path anymore in this format but it can turn the gain very quickly. Safe Passage was a card people i know snubbed their noses at until i took out all the trample and deathtouch creatures with this card. Journey to Nowhere is no Path but is an awesome removal card all together. You take what you can get from the block. Personally if I had to choose from path to exile and another white removal i would choose swords to plowshare everytime. If you wish to argue over better cards it is pointless with the subject being block. You take what you can get and construct from such. White still has mass removal with day of judgment anyways.

Currently with the mechanics of this block Green is going to be good in anydeck with almost no draw backs. So I will not even touch this subject with all due respect.

Red is going to be interesting, whether it is mono or spliced (any color would work really).

Blue will ultimately end up being Ally I think.

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