B/W Janky Junk

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Happy Tuesday MTG peeps,

You may recall yesterday's article about Commander 2013 pricing.  We were yattering last evening and decided that we would rather pick up some singles online from MTG Mint Card for some of our EDH stacks this Friday and then wait a few short weeks until the second print wave hits out local gaming store by which time, prices should hopefully correct downwards a titch which will allow us to grab one or more additional decks.

Anywhoos - today we want to talk about our play style for a moment.  We love to play under-used / under-appreciated cards in our strategies.  It's difficult to look at the hundreds of cards on our shelves, all perfectly standard-legal, and not use but a fraction of them.  To this end, we enjoy developing some interesting kitchen table games (like 'pile draft' where we draft from decksets of commons), or have casual pauper matches in order to better appreciate some of the cards in our collection.

Righto - onto today's topic - black 'n' white junk.  Perhaps not an apt description but one we could use as there are some questionable card choices or just outright jank which could serve better in another format - but perhaps not standard.  It was our aim to use a few cards which we rather liked but did not quite make the cut to popular standard.  Let's have a look . . .

Nothing totally weird just yet here - a cr@p ton of Orzhov goodies - High Priest of Penance, Sin Collector, Alms Beast, Desecration Demon, Obzedat and Blood Baron of Vizkopa.

Some of the non-creature spells - thoughtseize, Doom Blade, Devour Flesh, Read the Bones and Whip of Obzedat.

Now for some of the interactions we rather like.  First and foremost is to nullify the downside of lifelink provided to creatures blocking or blocked by Alms Beast with Erebos - not too shabby.

We also would love to get Gift of Immortality onto High Priest of Penance which essentially can nerf non-creature permanents all day long and keep coming back for more.

We are also thinking about the inclusion of Ethereal Armor (gawd we do like that card a lot) in this mix as well - perhaps giving a pump and (what some players forget about) first strike.  Giving that Alms Beast first strike will mean that you opponent may never get that extra life link.

We know this may never get to Top 8 at our local Friday Night Magic event but it does feel rather nice that we are using some of our cards we might not normally use by getting in some games at the kitchen table.

Got a deck you don't feel comfortable letting off its leash at your FNM?  Drop a line below in the comment thingy.
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