NPH Event Decks

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Happy Friday MTG peeps,

Here in Canada-Land, it is the Victoria Day weekend. This is a statutory weekend (the last Monday) on or before May 24 which celebrates the late monarch's birthday (who was born on 5/24/1819). Custom for celebrating the Queen's birthday here in this country may have started in Toronto, Ontario in 1854 when 5,000 denizens of that fair city emptied out of the bars / pubs and hoisted a glass in the general direction of Vicky.

Anywhoos - how is MTG Realm celebrating? We'll be heading to London to hook up with some friends 'n' family and hopefully get the Friday Night Magic event at World's Away downtown - it is obligatory to play a few games of Magic for any weekend to be successful.

Righto - onto the post.

You may recall last month when we posted about the New Phyrexia Event decks. These 60-card decks come with a 15-card sideboard and are perfect for use in Standard play tournaments like Friday Night Magic or Game Day celebrations. They also come with a Spindown life counter and a reusable card box. Please note: The event decks being created for New Phyrexia will be released on June 10, 2011. We had been very impressed with the previous event deck offerings from Wizards of the Coast and these new ones also deliver the same excellence as before. Let's have a look at the NPH Event Deck lists . . .


Rot from Within (mono-green)
Main Deck : 60 cards

23 land cards : 22 Forest, 1 Inkmoth Nexus

19 creature cards : 1 Blight Mamba, 4 Glistener Elf, 2 Ichorclaw Myr, 4 Overgrown Battlement, 2 Putrefax, 3 Rot Wolf, 3 Viridian Corrupter

18 other spell cards : 4 Carrion Call, 1 Contagion Clasp, 1 Green Sun's Zenith, 4 Groundswell, 4 Mutagenic Growth, 4 Primal Bellow

15 sideboard cards : 3 Contagion Clasp, 1 Melira, Sylvok Outcast, 2 Obstinate Baloth, 1 Pistus Strike, 3 Trigon of Infestation, 2 Unnatural Predation, 2 Vines of Vastwood, 1 Viridian Corrupter

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War of Attrition (mono-white)
Main Deck : 60 cards

23 land cards : 2 Dread Statuary, 21 Plains

23 creature cards : 4 Elite Vanguard, 1 Kemba, Kha Regent, 2 Kor Duelist, 4 Leonin Relic-Warder, 4 Leonin Skyhunter, 1 Mirran Crusader, 4 Porcelain Legionnaire, 1 Puresteel Paladin, 2 Stoneforge Mystic

14 other spell cards : 1 Apostle's Blessing, 1 Bonehoard, 1 Darksteel Axe, 4 Flayer Husk, 4 Journey to Nowhere, 1 Sickleslicer, 1 Skinwing, 1 Sword of Vengeance

15 sideboard cards : 1 Apostle's Blessing, 2 Arrest, 3 Celestial Purge, 1 Kor Duelist, 4 Kor Firewalker, 4 Revoke Existence
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The manufacturer's suggested retail price for each of these are $25 but good luck to you picking a deck up for this - giving the decent value of the cards in the rare slots, we expect these decks to sell for more.

Both these decks are a great choice for casual gaming (battling each other at the kitchen table) or taking them to Friday Night Magic where they would likely give a good showing against some of the other popular builds in the meta-game at the moment. The winner of the two is almost without a doubt the white 'War of Attrition' - the green 'Rot from Within' build, although satisfactory, does not quite deliver on the wow factor. This of course is easily remedied with your tweaking. We definitely give these decks a thumbs up and recommend you reserve yours in June before they are all gone.

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We always intersted to see where the meta-game may be going - one certain method is seeing what the pros are playing - you can check out the latest standard constructed hot decks from the recent SCG Open Series Orlando event. Another method is looking at what singles experienced the most price rise - here, from MTG Mint Card are the Top 10 Price Rise cards :

Spellskite, Splinter Twin, Sword of War and Peace, Batterskull, Marsh Flats, Blade of the Bloodchief, Stoneforge Mystic, Spellskite , Oracle of Mul Daya, Tempered Steel
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