Comments on: Building Blocks: BW Tokens

By: Phroggie

Phroggie — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 04:37:25 +0000

I totally agree on your comments about Mentor of the Meek. When he works, he’s amazing but he so rarely works, especially in a tournament level game. You’ve spent 3 mana and a card, which only works when you’re ahead already. His best purpose is to soak up the removal spell, to which you’d be better off with an imposing 2 drop you never really expect to work (like Skirsdag High Priest!). I’d imagine Thalia will be the key to this part of the deck when DKA arrives.

I’ve already starting seeing the B/W Tokens around the traps, likely it will become as common as the R/W Boros in anticipation of Dark Ascension. To blow my own trumpet (with no evidence because I don’t blog magic) I had a gut feeling W/B was going to be big for DKA because of Cloistered Youth – such a flavourful card that stuck out a bit different to rest of ISD… I felt it was going to be a key to the DKA themes.

I can commiserate a bit with @TERROl2, I’ve tried a few “netdecks” which won 100% on the video blogs, to struggle to scrap a 20% victory. With some decks I could tell it was more to do with just how I played it… decks that are heavy burn and removal never work for me, but creature and combo decks I “get” so much more. Think I’ll be giving this one a go, R/W Boros got boring quickly and most 2-player games quickly turned into a match up and luck/order of the draw… but I dare say this will follow a similar path

By: Anon1

Anon1 — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 17:54:00 +0000

Thanks for replying! Long time listener, first time caller. Hope to see more vids with this deck soon. Keep up with the awesome website!

By: Lee McLeod

Lee McLeod — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 17:02:19 +0000

@Anon1: The control matchups are significantly harder than the aggro ones. To beat planeswalkers, you basically have to have a Virtue and/or two or more Midnight Hauntings or Moan of the Unhallowed (to play around Liliana’s edict effect). You have to hope they don’t draw Sever (or you have a diverse token army) until you can play a five-drop or Keeper so that you aren’t super behind if they waste either your tokens or your Keeper/five-drop.

@Anon2: Skirsdag High Priest was in a few versions I tried. It did basically nothing. The first thing they’ll kill will always be High Priest because a Demon is so threatening, so it never gets to activate. Most versions with Skirsdag try to use Altar’s Reap and Mausoleum Guard to make it a little more effective to trigger morbid without them killing your Skirsdag, but that just dilutes the deck to make it more of a combo version, where the combo is making your deck less effective to get a Demon token out. Bloodline Keeper is mediocre, but can at least take over a game on its own, without additional help.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 14:57:33 +0000

What are your thoughts on running Skirsdag High Priest over the Bloodline Keeper? I know it’s toughness is risky but in conjunction with virtue it’s easier to pull off while maintaining some pressure.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 02:27:59 +0000

How does this deck beat garruk and liliana? I’ve been trying it out and doing well against everything but the deck that plays those with sever and blasphemous act.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 14:09:20 +0000

@OSUBeavBane: I agree with you, another land would be good for this deck. And Mentor is one of the weaker cards in the deck – it’s very mediocre in the “Gotta race ‘em” aggro mirrors, but gains a lot of value against control and Splinterfright where you have time to build up a board presence and you’re trying to stretch their removal thin. i’ve played versions with no mentors and lilianas, and versions with 25 land. Right now, I like the 25 land and Liliana version, as it’s a better card against control anyway, and isn’t dead vs Boros like Mentor basically is.

@TERROl2: i don’t really think you can afford to play Cages or Orbs maindeck both as 4-ofs. I certainly wouldn’t play Cage maindeck at all, as it’s useless against a bunch of decks that will just seek to beat you down (Boros, various Token decks), and you don’t want too many cards that dilute your plan of actually killing them.

By: TERROl2

TERROl2 — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 00:12:16 +0000

Man, you got lucky. I have been playing either the BW Liliana Token Deck, or BWg Liliana Garruk Token deck, and I go 2-0, but then run into a guy who is playing either RW and get’s his entire deck out by turn 4, or I run head first into URB Burning Vengeance, which destroy’s BW, or BRGu Control or BRUg control, which is just un-winnable for a BW deck.

I think you got a little lucky against W/G because Token W/G runs travelers amulets and he wasn’t, you didn’t run into the RU agriculture deck, and you didn’t play annoying control decks. You got good matchups against people who got slightly mana-screwed.

Either way, I already have my W/B/g ISD Block deck with DKA built, just need to get to the pre-release.

Either way, it’s
4x Sorin
4x Liliana
4x Grafdiggers Cage
4x Witchbane Orb

And you have your opponent controlled if you get the 3. out by turn 4 along with some sort of creature as a blocker like Doomed Traveler, and 1 removal spell, because Liliana is a removal spell herself.

But that there is a turn 5 win.