Part Five, countering the opposition

Building a deck - Part Five, countering the opposition.

This is the fifth article in a series intended to help players build better decks. References may be made to the previous articles posted. The planned blocks are:

Part One, the basic structure. – posted
Part Two, choosing a region. – posted
Part Three, creating a strategy/theme. – posted
Part Four, going for efficiency. – posted
Part Five, countering the opposition. – current

Up to this point, the articles have emphasized keeping the deck to forty cards, choosing a region and a strategy, and a bit on making your deck efficient at accomplishing your desired goal. These things will not guarantee victory. Rather, every bit can help to this end. As for this article, it is intended to help you learn to find your own solutions to opposing decks by presenting some ideas on how to do it.

Most of your efforts to win games will actually be decided on how you use the deck in actual play. In fact, this also applies to defeating a variety of decks. With this in mind, the first thing I am going to recommend is to study the other regions/decks you expect to face. DeckTech would be a great source for this. Look at the Top Ten, and sift through the Advanced and/or Intermediate decks to find anything that might resemble what you are going to be up against. You will want to look at those with a good strategy section. And, while you are at it, look at decks that resemble your own. They might offer some ideas on how to handle certain situations.

It is a good idea to get together with other players and test your deck against these common situations (proxy if needed–as long as its not a tournament, this shouldn’t be a problem). It is entirely possible that just by learning how to play against these decks that you won’t really need to adjust your deck. As an example, Bograth has two different cards for direct creature discard–one spell and one creature. By simply changing the way you play, you can attempt to keep your creatures out of the range of The either of those two potential problems. If you keep your creatures around five or six energy, the Muck Vinoc shouldn’t be as big a problem since it can only target creatures with seven or more energy. At the same time, if you prevent the Bograth player from establishing their swarm, Muck Rain should also be a minimal threat since it counts the number of Bograth creatures they control. This doesn’t mean that their won’t be other just as valid threats in that same Bograth deck. Rather, this is demonstration of how you can adapt to certain threats without building a deck to handle each and every thing. Similar tactics can be learned and applied to a variety of decks and regions.

Now, in the previous articles, I mentioned that a good deck will often have a few extra slots for cards that are not really needed to achieve your central goal(s). This is not uncommon, and certainly opens up some slots within the forty cards to choose cards best suited for dealing with those one or two problems your deck can’t get around without specific assistance. In the decks I have built, this is sometimes as little as one card, or as many as nine. Most of the time, it has been three or four cards that are easily replaced. Play a few games with your deck, as this should help you determine which cards are not really needed. For example, maybe two copies of a certain card works just as well as three.

Once you’ve found your extras, you will need to assess just how to counter the problems your deck can’t seem to handle. I recommend you figure out where the opposing decks are weak, or what makes them strong against yours. Would a little direct discard rip through the problem? Maybe discarding energy instead? Are they dependent on their relics? Is there one piece of their combo that it can’t do without? If so, what is the best way to eliminate that piece, or weaken the combo? All of these questions, and more, can lead to a wide variety of answers. While I didn’t list everything, the second article in this series includes a summary of the various regions and some common weaknesses and strengths.

Now, before I forget, I am going to recommend your deck have two or three of the forty cards devoted to some sort of impact on opposing relics. Relic removal is the easiest way to deal with an opponent using any relic that can be specifically discarded. Now, relic removal/control becomes even more powerful when it relates to the central strategy/theme of your deck. For example, Beam of Light can add some more removal, while Shattershards adds a bit of energy discard in a deck, and the possibilities go on. So, your solution for relics may also serve as a part of the central deck without sacrificing extra slots to this task.

Often, the easiest way to deal with a problem is to exploit its weakness. Splashing in a few cards in that extra slot that play straight to their weaknesses can be devastating. This is especially useful if you find a card that works in your deck as a part of the central/secondary theme of your deck in addition to exploiting a weakness in an opposing deck. If it is efficient as well, even better. Many different decks share common weaknesses, so this can be a great way to go.

Another solution to deal with a problem, is to negate it. This is what cards such as Rayje’s Belt, Rayje’s Sword, and Inhibitor Band are commonly used for. Negating a problem can be effective, but may not solve all of it. It is frequently better to eliminate the problem than to negate it. Now, a card such as Rayje’s Belt may also offer your deck some benefit as well as negating opposing problems–especially if your deck uses a card with a downside the belt might eliminate. However, a final risk with cards that negate a problem is if it also negates something useful to you–if needed, play a few games to see if it is a bigger danger to you than it is to them.

The third way to deal with the problem is to try and patch up the matching weakness in your own deck. In many ways, using that extra slot or two in your deck to put in the one or two cards that fill in some major weakness in your deck can make a world of difference. Filling in the weakness in your deck makes it tougher for the opponent to deal with, and I recommend doing this combined with exploiting their weakness over simply negating a problem posed by your opponent’s deck whenever possible.

Actual solutions best suited to the deck can be a matter of speed and overall efficiency. Playing the new variant may help you discover whether the deck has gone forward or backwards in its progress. If the deck is only going backwards by splashing in something else for those extra cards, it may be necessary to focus on increasing the efficiency of the deck first, you may have chosen the wrong extras, or it could be the wrong approach to dealing with the problem. As you test the deck, try and throw it up against its problems more than once to find the best solution.

A deck that focuses on solving each and every problem it faces may end up with the same troubles as a deck that tries to do a little of everything and doesn’t focus on achieving any one goal. Splashing in too many cards can hinder the central theme/strategy of an otherwise good deck. This is part of why I recommend playing the deck and trying to discover how many extra cards it has. It is best to use these few card openings to deal with specific problems/weaknesses. Keeping a strong central theme and limited supporting themes can go a long ways in determining the outcome of a game.

So far, this article has presented some methods for the player to find their own solutions for the deck(s) they build. This should conclude my series about building a deck, based on a method I use. While I will leave you to find your own specific solutions to the problems you will encounter, I will finish by giving my personal solution(s) for Rayje’s Belt.

Okay, dealing with Rayje’s Belt....

First, and easiest, method is to save your relic discard for this one. This first solution works best if Rayje’s Belt is the biggest threat among the opposing relics–in other words, if it is the relic that puts the biggest damper in the overall plan. I can’t count the number of times I’ve seen the belt, then discarded it because I thought it was the only threat they had among their relics.

The second, and perhaps best, way is to present too many options. A good deck is frequently only slowed down by the belt. Defeating their magi will remove the belt just as easily as relic discard. If it can’t stop this from happening, then it really doesn’t matter if they have Rayje’s Belt in play or not. And, I’ve done this a number of times too.


On a personal note:
Rayje’s Belt isn’t in any of my decks. Someday, I might use it. And, in case you are wondering, I only list a small fraction of the decks I have used on DeckTech, though I do play all twelve main regions. I am better at some regions than others, which is to be expected.