Hey all, and welcome back to the deck garage.  After last week’s red deck and a string of Type II decks, I thought it might be about time to bust out a different format.  The e-mail I received this week was for a Type I White Weenie deck.  Below is the e-mail…

 

White Type 1 Deck

Lands:
16 Plains

Artifacts:
4 Cursed Totem
4 Empyrial Plate
4 Lightning Greaves

Creatures:
3 Dawn Elemental
2 Glittering Lion
4 Glittering Lynx
3 Soltari Priest
3 Soltari Monk
4 True Believer

Other Spells:
4 Disenchant
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Land Tax
1 Enlightened Tutor

Sideboard:
2 Extraplanar Lens
1 Goblin Charbelcher
2 Abolish
2 Ghostly Prison
2 Rule of Law
2 Serenity
2 Vengeful Dreams
2 Tormod's Crypt


All cards are preferably under $20 for four. I prefer to keep the shadow creatures.

I know there are better cards out there, its just hard for me to search all of them.  I'm trying to make an all around deck good for most of the common t1 decks.  It works decent so far against Affinity, Stasis, Stax, Elves, Goblins, Madness and Discard.  I'm not exactly sure though what
to add or take out to speed it up a bit.

Any help would be appreciated.  Thanks.

Jeff

 

It looks like Jeff is off to a great start.  He has about the right amount of land, he has a great grasp on the good non-creature spells that make the cut, and he has about the right amount of shadow creatures.

 

The biggest issues I am seeing are the choices of creatures.  In Type I, you have to be extremely fast, combo-oriented, or control-oriented.  Having a slow, steady beatdown deck will net you a loss almost every time.  Thus, the first card that I want to see go is Dawn Elemental.  The Elemental is a decent enough creature, but it just isn’t fast enough.

 

-3 Dawn Elemental

 

The next issue I saw was the Glittering Lynx and Glittering Lion.  There are two problems with these two creatures.  First, their ability isn’t really that hot since Jeff’s opponent can remove it with a small amount of mana.  Second, they aren’t big enough for their cost.  The Lion is a 2/2 for 2W, when the worst that Jeff should play is a 2/2 with first strike for two.  The Lynx is a 1/1 for W, while he could be playing a 2/1 for W.

 

-2 Glittering Lion

-4 Glittering Lynx

 

The last change I want to make to creatures is pulling True Believer.  I had a bit of trouble deciding that this card should go, but I finally settled on it on grounds that I can’t think of a lot of decks that Jeff needs to worry about that target their opponent with a lot of spells.

 

-4 True Believer

 

What do we sneak in to replace them, though?  The first card that came to mind was one of the best 1-drops ever printed – Mother of Runes.  She grants protection from any color that Jeff sees fit to any creatures that Jeff sees fit to give it to.  How is she not good?

 

+4 Mother of Runes

 

On the topic of 1-drops, one that always comes up when discussing White Weenie is Savannah Lions.  Again, I can’t really justify not running Savannah Lions in this deck, so…

 

+4 Savannah Lions

 

We need to be a little more aggressive though, so I thought about which slightly bigger creatures would fit well.  Considering that Jeff is running into Goblins, why not run *the* solution to Goblins – Silver Knight.  Goblins just have issues dealing with this guy, and they have ever since he came out. 

 

+4 Silver Knight

 

Since we are running Silver Knight, and we probably need a few more cards in the deck, why don’t we just add Black Knight in as well?  It can’t be horrible, and it will help counteract any suicide black decks that Jeff might run into.

 

+4 Black Knight

 

Finally, since there is a fair amount of graveyard manipulation roaming around, Madness, and Affinity, why not run the most recent addition to the White Weenie team – Samurai of the Pale Curtain.  With his second ability, he can give any Reanimation strategy, Madness, and Affinity headaches.

 

+4 Samurai of the Pale Curtain

 

Looking at non-creature spells, I don’t like Lightning Greaves in the least.  It is simply too slow for too little effect.  Jeff wants to play cards that directly result in damage or cards that remove his opponent’s threats.

 

-4 Lightning Greaves

 

Empyrial Plate goes under the Dawn Elemental category of “just too slow”.  It gives a great benefit, but Jeff has to sink four mana just to get it into play and on a creature.

 

-4 Empyrial Plate

 

Normally, I would be perfectly fine with running

 

What do we replace these two cards with, though?  The first card that jumped to mind was Armageddon.  It has been hanging out with White Weenie decks for a long, long time, and for a good reason.  White Weenie needs almost nothing to get rolling, and Armageddon makes sure that each player has almost nothing.

 

+3 Armageddon

 

Since Jeff wants to beef up his creatures with Empyrial Plate, why don’t we go a step further and put in Crusade?  It beefs all of his creatures up a bit, and it costs less to get rolling.

 

+4 Crusade

 

If any of you are keeping track, the count on the deck is 65 right now – a bit too much for my liking.  Looking over what we have, I think Cursed Totem can make a trip to the sideboard.  It is decent enough, but I’m not sure it belongs in the main deck.  We can probably also cut one copy of Land Tax, since it doesn’t seem too hot to draw more than one of those throughout the course of a game when you want to be dealing damage.

 

-4 Cursed Totem

-1 Land Tax

 

Turning our attention to the sideboard, there are a few cards that immediately jump out at me as out of place.  Extraplanar Lens doesn’t really need to be in the ‘board, since Jeff’s deck doesn’t have any business producing a ton of mana.

 

-2 Extraplanar Lens [SB]

 

Goblin Charbelcher also seems like a bizarre choice.  It might work OK in Jeff’s deck, but I don’t really think it deserves a slot over some of the cards Jeff could be playing.

 

-1 Goblin Charbelcher [SB]

 

Finally, I think Vengeful Dreams can be cut.  Jeff already has four Swords to Plowshares in his deck, as well as Mother of Runes to help him block any onslaught coming in his direction.

 

-2 Vengeful Dreams [SB]

 

I did say that Cursed Totem should hang out over in sideboard, so…

 

+3 Cursed Totem [SB]

 

To round out the last two slots, I think Jeff should add in a third copy of both Ghostly Prison and Rule of Law.  He doesn’t want to go down to a horde of Elves or Goblins, so both would be apt additions to his deck.

 

+1 Ghostly Prison [SB]

+1 Rule of Law [SB]

 

I think that about wraps up the work on Jeff’s deck; let’s see how it turned out.

CREATURES (26):

4 Black Knight
4 Mother of Runes
4 Samurai of the Pale Curtain
4 Savannah Lions

4 Silver Knight
3 Soltari Monk
3 Soltari Priest

NON-CREATURE SPELLS (19):

3 Armageddon

4 Crusade
4 Disenchant

1 Enlightened Tutor

3 Land Tax
4 Swords to Plowshares

 

LAND (16):

16 Plains

 

SIDEBOARD (15):
2 Abolish

3 Cursed Totem
3 Ghostly Prison
3 Rule of Law
2 Serenity
2 Tormod's Crypt

 

Hope that helps, Jeff, and good luck!

 

I’ll see y’all next week.

 

-Paul Hagan