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The Godfather

The Godfather

First of all I want to let it be known that this is not my deck. Well, I might be playing it sometime soon, but the original deck designer that gets credit is Rob Lawing. He is one of the eldest Magic players in Texas. He has been part of the gaming scene for years and it is cool to see him come up with something like this. he definitely turned some heads. Unfortunately he was playing with an untuned version. Rob being a good sport gave me permission to post his idea here and help try to tune his deck :) Here's the basic decklist:

The Godfather

3 Unmask
4 Vicious Hunger
4 Duress
4 Corrupt
3 Dark Suspicions
4 Dark Ritual
3 Persecute
4 Plague Spitter
4 Ensnaring Bridge
4 Grafted Skullcap
23 Swamp

Sideboard:
4 Phyrexian Scuta
3 Soul Feast
3 Tsabo's Decree
3 Slay
2 Cremate

(Just for the record, the following observations are from me watching Rob play the deck, not form personal experience with it. )

Spells:

Well, obviously this deck is all about Grafted Skullcap and Ensnaring Bridge. These two cards worked well before and they work well together now. Ensnaring Bridge also has some pretty good synergy with Unmask. I have also been looking for a good deck that has some Dark Suspicions. I had a problem with Persecute slightly. I felt like it was a little high on the discard end and cause a few mana problems being a cards that was harder to cast sometimes if you got stuck on mana. I think the deck could use a few Charcoal Diamonds to help with its mana situation.

Creatures:

The only creatures that this deck sports are Plague Spitters. I disagreed with this choice after reviewing it. I think you can only have the spitters clocked in full time if you have Soul Feast running full time also. Chimeric Idol might be a suitable replacement sense most of the spells in this deck are sorceries anyway.

Sideboard:

The sideboard most obviously was a lot of test stuff that is generally decent for the field. The only questionable thing was the presence of the Scuta in the board. I'm not exactly sure what purpose these guys served, but they may not be terrible anyway.

If I were to rebuild the deck to play in the near future, it would look something like this.

4 Unmask
4 Duress
3 Addle
4 Corrupt
4 Soul Feast
4 Dark Suspicions
4 Ensnaring Bridge
4 Grafted Skullcap
3 Snuff Out
3 Charcoal Diamond
18 Swamp
4 Rishadan Port
1 Dust Bowl

Sideboard:
1 Snuff Out
3 Tsabo's Decree
3 Slay
2 Cremate
4 Chimeric Idol
1 Addle
1 Thrashing Wumpus

I'm not sure if I like the new sideboard that much. I do think that having the main deck the way it is will help alleviate the bad mana draw. I think Snuff Out is great creature control also. I also like having Soul Feast main deck for more damage.

I also went up to four Dark Suspicions. I felt that this is definitely one of your largest win conditions, so having a full set of four full time is not bad. I also went up on Unmask. Addle also helps get rid of things like Story Circle and the like that may be bad for you. That's another reason I made sure to force idols into the board. It's not even a bad idea when your opponent gets rid of your idol, because that means your other threats (Ensnaring Bridge, Grafted Skullcap, and Dark Suspicions) get to hang around longer.

The main deck is also creatureless now. This is good and not good. It does make stuff that your opponent has first game pretty useless. Cards like Flametongue Kavu and Wrath of God are everywhere. Giving your opponent dead cards first game never hurts. I honestly would not mind finding a way to work in another Thrashing Wumpus or two some way with this deck though. Wumpus seems to have some very solid synergy with the other cards in this deck.

This deck is only in its first few days of being tested. It would be great to hear from everyone what they think about it. Also, I would love for everyone to play The Godfather and send me their results and ideas as to which cards to change. If I get a decent response from everyone, I will do a follow up article on The Godfather.

Unfortunately this new version may have too many mana sources. Whether this is the case or not remains to be seen. Only time will tell. I think this type of deck may turn out to be one of the few decks that can still survive as mono color in this multi colored existence of the game.

The Godfather is a very interesting deck though. Again, I want to thank Rob Lawing for his idea and beginning deck design.

Until next time, Have Fun!

DeQuan Watson
a.k.a. PowrDragn
PowrDragn@pojo.com

Biography

name: DeQuan Watson

    Many readers have gathered a lot of information about me through my
writings. For those of you that haven't though, this should tell you a
little more.

    I'm 23 years old and I own my own business. Well, more accurately I own a
game store. The Game Closet, my store is one of the premiere places to play
in the Texas. I play Magic on a pretty regular basis. I help people build
decks and teach the game to people multiple times a week. Owning a store is
neat, because it gives me another perspective to write my articles from. I
can usually tell what the average player likes and can judge some of the
tendencies of the average player a little better.

    However, I know a decent bit about pro level play as well. I myself have
played on the Pro Tour. I have multiple Top 8 finishes at Pro Tour
Qualifiers. I also have made Day Two at two Grand Prix tournaments. I was
also invited to the Event horizons Invitational last year. These are not
stellar achievements, but high enough to let you know I have my head on
straight when talking about the game. I also spend lots of time each week
talking to, e-mailing, or chatting with top level players. I get to see
their perspective on a lot of things as well. Between the two, I think I get
a good sense of balance of the game.

    Most importantly, I still enjoy the game for the sake of the game itself.
I like the time, the competition, and the general interaction of players. I
plan to be playing it until it goes away...if it ever does.

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