Naya Hexproof

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Happy Saturday MTG peeps,

We are freshly returned from the Friday Night Magic event last evening at OMG! Games here in Barrie, Ontario.  As spring break is wrapping up this week, attendance was only slightly deminished with a field of 36 players.  As with most gaming stores around the world, popular decks are approximately reflected to that of the winning decklists from Magic: the Gathering Online.  Mono-Black (and mon-blue devotion to a lesser extent), Esper Control, Jund Monsters, and a variety of others.  

We took along a Naya (green / white / red) Hexproof or 'auras' decklist, whose strategy employs as the name suggests, slapping strong auras on hexproof creatures.  Although we did not make Top 8 with 3 wins and 2 losses, we do feel that with a few fine adjustments (perhaps a card or two from MTG Mint Card), we can break through.

Here's the list as it stood yesterday.  Starting off with the auras you want to enchant your creatures with, there are full booksets of four each for -
• Chained to the Rocks (removal)
• Ethereal Armor (buffs)
• Madcap Skills (buff and conditional evasion)
• Unflinching Courage (lifelink 'n' trample)

Creatures can be a little less straight forward with regards to choices - 
• Gladecover Scout and Witchstalker are definitely essential and a four-of by default.
• There is a two / two split with Voice of Resurgence and Fleecemane Lion which may be adjusted via sideboard.
• The local meta-game requires additional punch through and a deckset of Ghor-Clan Rampager fits this role and is used mostly for it's Bloodrush ability

Other spells included -
• A deckset of Boros Charm, whose flexibility provides additional pump, protection from board sweepers and a nice ping for 4 damage which won two matches last night.
• Just two (other two in sideboard) of Selesnya Charm which can exile the new 'god' cards, provide pump / trample or a surprise blocker.  This card was sided-out most games for Mizzium Mortars.

Lastly, the mana-base to make it all run - 
4 forest, 1 plains, 4 Temple Garden, 4 Stomping Ground, 4 Sacred Foundry, 3 Temple of Triumph, and 2 Temple of Abandon.  We thought the scry-lands were decent and helped reduce bad draws.

Not altogether bad and we think there is room for improvement - your constructive criticism is most welcome!

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Theros GW Enchant

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Happy Tuesday MTG peeps,

We wanted to yatter to you a bit about Theros Game Day last weekend.  We took a Selesnya green white aggro build with us and lost quite decidedly, which was odd as it did so well at the Friday Night Magic event just the week before.  What we did see at the card shop was a metric ton of devotion strategies, mostly blue and white.  We also saw a lot of white soldier tokens via Elspeth, Sun's Champion and blue Elemental tokens via Master of Waves.  Thank goodness that anthems like Intangible Virtue is no longer standard legal.

 










We did appreciate our inclusion of the hexproof Witchstalker and the pro-blue Mistcutter Hydra, but wish we had addressed the increased numbers of Planeswalkers and those irritating tokens.  No worries, we fiddled a bit and made some room in the sideboard.  We also are now thinking of putting more of a hexproof aura slant on this with Nylea, that Green god card and Heliod, the white one to help boost the enchantment count for our Ethereal Armor - we might order a few extra cards from MTG Mint Card in a week or two.  Anywhoos - here's the build as it stands today . . .
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Firstly, we would like to grab another Loxodon Smiter, Voice of Resurgence and Temple Garden, but we would rather make rent and eat.  After a few weeks of this iteration, we may include the green and white gods and may even consider Oath of Ancient Wood.
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 Sideboard for our local meta-game right now addresses the biggest threats presented by all those blue and white builds, their Planeswalkers and token producers.  Anywhoos - it's a lovely work in progress.

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