The Walking Dead
This tournament report will cover the three tournaments that I played in: an FNM, a Grand Prix Trial for Richmond, and GP Richmond. I won't cover every match, just the more important ones that show off the deck's synergies and weaknesses.
The FNM:
This was the debut for my new version of The Walking Dead without the green and with Haakon. The first match I want to go over was against RWU control. This is a generally favorable matchup for my list. While RWU control has loads of creature removal, most of my creatures recur back into play over and over.
The diversity of creatures shows why it can overcome removal. The bread and butter of removal for RWU is Bolt, Lightning Helix, and Path to Exile. Do you see the problem? Unless the removal is used perfectly, my creatures will be hard to remove and kill.
Good removal spells that typical work against any creature. Except vs The Walking Dead
Gravecrawler and Bloodghast need to be pathed or else they'll come back. Bolts and helixes won't work. Dark Confidants need to be Helixed. If they get pathed or bolted that's one less path for Gravecrawler, Bloodghast, or Haakon and one less bolt against Stromgald Crusader.
Speaking of him, Stromgald Crusader is really tough for RWU control to handle. He was originally a sideboard card against Rest in Peace. With no maindeck way to kill a Rest in Peace (and only 2 Engineered Explosives in the sideboard) I originally thought the deck might be unplayable due to graveyard hate. But, Mike Bonkarooni saved the day. He suggested that rather than try to have an anti-anti-graveyard strategy (like blowing up the Rest in Peace), why not attack the white decks on a level they aren't prepared for (protection from white)? He tested so well that I slotted him as a 4 of in the maindeck.
The best tech attacks the opponent in a way he wasn't aware of.
My match against RWU went pretty favorably for me. In game 1, my creatures overwhelmed him because his removal was ineffective as I described above. For game 2, I sided out 2 Dark Blasts and 2 Nameless Inversions because RWU has almost no creatures and put in 4 Thoughtseizes. In that game, he was able to stabilize with an Anger of the Gods and Sphinx's Revelation and grind out the victory. Game 3 left us both stuck on two lands for a couple of turns after we each mulliganed to 6. This highly favors me since I don't need many lands. I Thoughtseized his Anger of the Gods early and was able to resolve a Faithless Looting to find my third land drop and over run him with creatures.
The other match from the FNM that I'll mention was in the finals against a Bogle hexproof deck. I knew he was on Bogles before the match and he had no idea what I was on. Ahhh...the fruits of brewing. I knew that pre-sideboard my only chance was to get a Liliana out and make him sacrifice his hexproof guy. So, I mulliganed and mulliganed all the way down to 3. No Liliana. Oh well. I made sure he wasn't land or creature screwed and then scooped. On the plus side, he still had no idea what I was on.
Where are you?!?!
For game 2, I sided in 4 Thoughtseizes and 2 Engineered Explosives and took out 2 Darkblasts, 3 Nameless Inversions, and 1 Haakon. This time the shoe was on the other foot. He had to mulligan to 5 and I Thoughtseized his only creature away. This is one of the reasons I'm not too big on Bogles...it can lose to itself very easily. In game 3 I got a god draw of Liliana, Thoughtseize, Engineered Explosives, 2 Gravecrawler and 2 land. All my removal could interact with his creatures and the Gravecrawlers would put him on a quick clock. This made me 5-0 and the champion of the FNM.
Grand Prix Trial:
This tournament lasted 5 rounds then cut to top 8. I went 4-0-1 in the swiss portion and was feeling great. My deck hadn't lost a match yet! I could have went 3-0-2 and still made top 8 but I wouldn't have been the top seed like I was at 4-0-1. I made this mistake at another GPT a month earlier and lost in the top 4 in game 3 by one turn. Because I was on the draw. Because I intentionally drew to go 3-0-2. From then on, I vowed to not be satisfied with simply making the top 8. Especially in a GPT where there is virtually no 2nd place. 1st place gets the byes and 2nd place gets about the same prize as 29th place.
Interestingly enough, after 9 rounds of the FNM and GPT, I only ever got the Haakon plus nameless inversion combo to go off. I thought it'd be more common than that but it really wasn't.
Unfortunately, this wasn't that common of a combo.
In the top 8 round I played against Tron first. ICK! Wasn't that supposed to be a bad list in the post-Deathrite world? Tron has both maindeck sweepers and graveyard with Pyroclasm and Relic of Progenitus. There is a problem with them though. They need to be played in the right order and at the right time, otherwise my creatures will be back in play before Relic can exile them.
Both good vs zombies but they need to be played in the right order.
I drew a very aggressive opening in game 1. Turn 1 (on the play of course) I had a Bloodghast and Faithless Looting which drew another Bloodghast. Discarding two Bloodghasts almost feels like cheating. He was able to Pyroclasm them away later but was incapable of exiling them. I ran him over for the win.
Game 2, he was on the play and drew a natural Tron. Not too much to see there. He killed me mercilessly.
Game 3 was a classic battle of my mana flood to his mana screw. He mulliganed to 5 (similar to Bogles, which is why I don't like either of the decks) and got stuck with 2 Tron pieces. I had 4 power on board and was beating slowly. I Thoughtseized him and he revealed a Karns, 2 Wurmcoils, and a Chromatic Star. Since I was incapable of eliminating a big drop from his hand, I chose the Chromatic Star so he could could cycle and dig for the last Tron piece. It was a gamble, but one that I really had no choice to take. He wound up hard casting casting a Wurmcoil the turn before I could swing in for lethal. Then I topdecked a bolt and added it to the other one in my hand to burn him to death. I got lucky on two accounts, him getting mana screwed and me topdecking burn. But, I made my own luck by being on the play that game. If I was on the draw, I would have lost. I think there's a very important moral to be learn from earning the right to play in the top 8.
One turn too slow.
I won the next round vs RWU Splinter Twin and faced my my friend and fellow car traveller Abel in the finals. It was cool to face him off in the finals but we also knew it would be an awkward car ride home. He was on a modified Ajundi list. He basically switched the Deathrites out for Kitchen Finks and tinkered around with the mana and a one or two other cards. It was still a powerful deck post Deathrite banning and I'm actually surprised to not see more of it.
Unfortunately for Abel, I knew this was a really bad match for him. The whole motivation for The Walking Dead was to beat the old Jund decks that were atop of the old metagame. All of his Inquisitions, Thoughtseizes, and Lilianas are useless against me. Each game was a long grind fest but he really had no chance of outlasting me. I had won two byes and my brew was 12-0-1 in sanctioned events. Time to run it at the GP.
GP Richmond:
Well, this is where the story goes astray. I had earned two byes and then played against a Merfolk deck. Nameless Inversion does wonders against that deck. Removing all creature types just makes it an instant kill spell for any merfolk. I went to 3-0 and was slated to play LSV when something odd happened. For those that didn't attend the GP, the massive player pool was divided into three pools: Green, white, and pink. An odd glitch caused LSV to be entered into both the green and white pools and was paired up against me and another player. By chance, he showed up to the other match instead and the judges effectively awarded me a bye. Whoo Hoo! Actually, I would have rather played LSV...just for the story. Even though I most likely would have lost.
Who invited this to the party?
Oh good...round 5 of the GP pitted me against Melira Pod. Of all the decks that I brewed post-bannings, The Walking Dead has put up the best fight against it. Game 1 I got combo'd off on pretty quickly and naturally drawn. Unfun.
Game 2 was much better. It was a true grind fest and I was able to get the Haakon plus Nameless Inversion engine running. After I machine gunned all his his guys down I was able to swing in for the win. That was twice in 14 matches I was able to pull it off. In game 3 I saw some tech from Melira Pod that I didn't really see too much of before the Deathrite, but definitely much more since: Thrun. I assume he comes in against control matchups, but my deck really has no way to deal with him except Liliana sacrifice ability. That's only if Thrun is their only creature too. Thrun is some good tech I couldn't handle.
At 4-1, I played against a B/G rock deck. I knew Jund was a good matchup for me and I figured this should be as well. But, a flood and a screw later I'm sitting at 4-2. Such is Magic.
My final match shows where this deck really is weak and needs some work before getting played again. I played the Amulet of Vigor/Titan combo deck. I don't really think I can win game 1 against it. I stated in my previous article that I purposely removed the targeted discard from my deck based on the old metagame. These odd combo decks (like Amulet or Ad Nauseam) were a much more significant portion of the meta than they were before.
For game 2 I sided out the Dark Blasts, Grim Lavamancer, and Nameless Inversions for Thoughtseizes and Rakdos Charms. I was able to get a turn 1 Thoughtseize and turn 3 Liliana in game 2 to lock him out pretty quickly. But in game 3 he was able to combo off on turn 4 even after I Thoughtseized him twice. He had to get super lucky to do it, however when I am a virtual lock to lose game 1 it's going to be tough to expect to win the match consistently. With that, I was 4-3 and out of contention for Day 2.
Overall, I really do like the deck. The metagame isn't well positioned for it now, though. I can no longer afford to have no targeted discard in the maindeck. Melira Pod represents a very tough obstacle. Even though my deck is geared towards value and recursion, that deck can go toe to toe with me with both and still threaten an instant combo win. I am capable of beating it, but not consistently enough to warrant it at another GP or PTQ. Perhaps once the metagame shakes out a little more and shifts I can dust this deck off I try it again.
Speaking of losing to Melira Pod, next week I'll go over brewing with a deck that I've never lost with against Melira Pod. I'll go over ways to attack the Pod decks and my general opinions and observations of it's two archetypes.
Even given how few times you pulled off the Haakon/Nameless Inversion synergy, was it powerful enough in your experience to keep it in as a removal engine?
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