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Hot Momma
6.19.04
As fun as it is to just ramble on and on about
different things here weekly, I need to steer the
boat in a slightly different direction this week.
Pojo is known for people a reader friendly site.
The owner of Pojo has even gone out of his way to
cater to a ton of different games and give the
readers what they want.
Well, that hasn't stopped. My weekly mail and the
responses I get at tournaments let people know that
they enjoyed my writing. That's not enough though.
The great Pojosama has been receiving e-mails asking
for more decks and decklists. People want more on
the current decks and more hot decks. I can relate
to that.
What I've noticed in the past, is that reader
"wants" tend to flow in cycles. When writers seem
be getting tired of talking about the hot decks,
that's what readers want more of. The problem
though, is that writers get tired of stating the
same things that others have stated about the same
decks over and over again. Eventually, the writers
come around and start writing more about the
standard popular decks. Then the readers get
glutted with information on the same decks for a few
weeks. This is great if you are playing one of the
decks in question. Pretty boring and uninteresting
otherwise.
Regardless of the fact, Pojosama and I had a
discussion and I got an idea. Why not spend the
next few weeks working on decklist using cards from
Fifth Dawn. It will be something different and
should definitely spark some fun conversation. I'll
be willing to offer up some strategy as to how the
decks work against known/existing decks. I may
change up in the future and every other week, or
every third week, just work on a popular tournament
deck instead of giving you something new.
There are a couple of reasons for this. Knowledge
is power. Knowing how popular tournament decks work
will help you both play the decks well and beat the
decks regularly. Also, it keeps things from getting
stale. You can look forward to having something
thought provoking here.
So, after all this talk, I guess I've reached the
put up or shut up point. My only decision this week
was to give you either a new deck or just go over an
existing deck. Either way, the deck I post isn't
going to be legal for a few days. Four to be exact,
since the format changes to include Fifth Dawn on
Sunday. For those of you that are unaware, when
Magic sets release now, the sets become legal of the
20th day of that month in which they are released.
The 20th for us in on a Sunday this go 'round. This
means that most of us won't get to use the new decks
until next week.
Man, it's easy to get sidetracked. Anyway, I
decided to post a deck I featured here a while back
with some updates to include new cards. It was once
called Fiery Randors. But now, it's got a new
creature involved and is called, Hot Momma.
Hot Momma
2 Leonin Shikari
3 Auriok Champion
4 Savannah Lion
4 Silver Knight
4 White Knight
4 Shrapnel Blast
4 Raise the Alarm
4 Shock
2 Glorious Anthem
2 Chrome Mox
4 Bonesplitter
4 Isochron Scepter
4 City of Brass
4 Ancient Den
4 Great Furnace
7 Plains
Sideboard:
3 Shatter
3 Sulfuric Vortex
2 Scrabbling Claws
2 Second Sunrise
3 Wipe Clean
2 Purge
This deck has taken a turn for the better I
think. Previously, the deck included Skullclamp
and Leonin Skyhunter. Obviously, the Skullclamp
had to be removed with it being banned from
Standard and block Constructed play. The Leonin
Skyhunter was a tough call to pull. It was the
only creature with flying. However, the cards I
replaced each of these with made the ability to
fly, less important. There is now a fourth
Bonesplitter and two Leonin Shikari. The Shikari
help you take down blocking creatures as needed.
However, they are no good without equipment. So I
made sure to up the count to four Bonesplitter to
the two Leonin Shikari and it seems to work fine.
The new cards are also easier to cast.
Bonesplitter is one generic mana and Leonin
Shikari is one white and one generic. This
enables you to reliably get more creature onto the
board. The double white in the Leonin Skyhunter's
casting cost gave us just a few too many guys with
double white to play. Also, the Auriok Champion
combos well with Raise the Alarm when it is
Imprinted on an Isochron Scepter. She can also
make your City of Brass hurt less over the course
of the game. There are now four City of Brass as
well. Now that the life loss isn't as scary AND
the fact that Granulate will be getting played
quite a bit, they were much more welcome in the
deck.
So how does this fair against other decks out
there?
vs. White Weenie
This is probably the most awkward matchup and you
want to avoid this one like the plague. Yes, I'm
including white weenie on my list, because people
always seem tot try playing it and you will find
someone at your local tournament scene with it.
They have multiple creatures with protection from
red now, so your job pretty much becomes one of
killing off all the creatures without and then
throwing damage at the opponent as fast as
possible. If possible, use burn spells to kill
creatures before they get equipped up. The
sideboard doesn't offer much help outside of the
Shatters to destroy equipment.
vs. Astral Slide
This isn't so scary. The only bad times you'll
really have are the ones where you get a ton of
artifact lands out early and a vengeance goes
off. Depending on what version of Astral Slide
decks we are talking about here, you can side in
multiple things to smooth out the match. Sulfuric
Vortex (against Exalted Angel and Renewed Faith),
Wipe Clean (against Astral Slide and Lightning
Rift), and Second Sunrise (against Akroma's
Vengeance) are all good sideboard options.
However, it's possible to bring in Scrabbling
Claws against versions that include Eternal
Witness. I would sideboard out, two scepters,
Chrome Mox and probably the Bonesplitters, since
we know they will have Damping Matrix in some way,
shape, or form.
vs. Goblins
This matchup should be good for you. You've got
lots of first striking and protection from red
creatures. You've also got Scrabbling Claws in
the sideboard. This is simply about outracing
their deck. This game should be over before
someone gets a crazy bidding off.
vs. Affinity
This is a tough one. First game I might have to
give the edge to the affinity deck unless Hot
Momma gets a crazy draw. In theory, you can
produce as much damage at they can, almost as
fast. The problem is that they can get a few more
spells for free, which forces your hand a bit in
the first game. After sideboard, you get Shatter
and Purge which are both excellent cards in the
matchup. Also, don't forget that you can load up
either of these on a scepter and slowly wipe away
their board.
vs. Elf & Nail
Honestly, I have no idea how this one turns out.
I'd have to give the edge to Elf & Nail almost
three to one. Using Wipe Clean to get rid of
Vernal Bloom could be key out of the Sideboard,
but that's the best you've got. However, I'm not
sure how much of a threat E&N is without
Skullclamp anymore.
vs. Blue/White Control
The biggest problem hear is that the deck hasn't
been hot for so long, that no one knows what
version is the best at the moment. You have to
cast creatures sparingly. Only drop a few out and
use your Shock and Shrapnel Blast wisely to keep
their creatures out of the way. This forces them
to play Wrath of God and Akroma's Vengeance when
YOU want them to. Sulfuric Vortex, Shatter, and
Second Sunrise are all great in this matchup. I
might still give the edge to U/W in this matchup
though.
Some other cards to consider include Pulse of the
Forge, Pulse of the Fields, Dwarven Blastminer and
even Worship. Sword of Fire and Ice and Sword of
Light and Shadow were even options. None of these
cards were bad, it was just hard to find space for
some of these cards when the deck is so
aggressive. Experiment with it. Play around with
it. Let me know what you think.
And that my friends, as they say, is that.
On to standard weekly business.
Here is a really good Bad Play of the week from
YCBurninator. It's a bit of a two for one
special:
Well, with Darksteel out and most people
knowing many of the Mirrodin cards by sight alone,
you would think that people would think out their
plays more... but one of my M:tG buddies proved me
wrong. Twice, he has made some of the sloppiest
moves I've seen. The first time he was playing
against an odd green variant, running artifact
lands, etc. The opponent had a Tree of Tales out
with a Fertile Ground attached, helping him to
smooth out all his mana quite easily. So what
does my friend do? He plays Naturalize to stop
the mana production... on the Fertile Ground! The
opponent just looked at him blankly and asked "Are
you sure?". My buddy just said "Yup" and went on
playing until about 5 turns later when he realized
what he'd done.
In a similar experience, the same friend was playing a game where the opponent was again running artifact lands, but he was getting beaten down by a Diving Griffon equipped with a Loxodon Warhammer. The opponent had only about 4 mana, 2 of which were Great Furnaces. So my friend, once again, plays an echoing ruin... on the Loxodon Warhammer. And if this weren't bad enough, HE had a Loxodon Warhammer out as well that he didn't realize, so instead of destroying half of the opponents lands, he instead destroys their equipment, and one of his own as well. Well, just thought that these were kinda funny, so I thought I'd send them in. Thanks!
My card of the week is Krark-Clan Ironworks. No
real reason honestly. The cards just so good that
I figured I bring even MORE attention tot he
greatness of this card. Expect to see quite a few
combos with this card involved in the very near
future. Heck, I even started to think about what
to do with this thing in extended play yet.
My tip of the week is simple this week as well.
Read. Read a lot. As I said earlier, knowledge
is power. The more you know about the decks out
there and what's going on, the better off you'll
be. Even just reading regular strategy and
metagame articles will help you become a better
player. The general understanding of how things
work and what makes things what they are is very
key. Every little bit you know (even about the
tournament procedures) will make your playing
experiences much easier and more enjoyable.
Well, it looks like that's it from my end of the
world.
Until next time,
DeQuan Watson
a.k.a. PowrDragn
PowrDragn at pojo dot com
PowrDragon on IRC
PowrDragn on City of Heroes - Champion Server
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