Subject: Two War College Questions Date: Wed, 3 Dec 1997 13:48:27 -0500 From: "Eric Hixson" Rob, First, I find your War College column and the application/explanation of Sun Tsu's principles to Magic very informative and enjoyable. Thanks mucho. My questions are kinda related to Control vs. Aggro. I am a newer player to Magic, but have absorbed much of the theory. In addition to my own concoctions, I've built and played several of the popular control and weenie tournament decks just to see for myself what makes the good decks work. In my limited experience, it seems that the control decks all rely on a bit more luck than the critter-based decks, in that if your key control cards or combo(s) don't get out fast enough, a weenie horde will run you over. All this is in line with the previous postings about aggro vs. control. The key point I want to make, however, is that the weenie decks don't seem to need any luck at all. The critters come on fast no matter how bad your draws are. Don't have enough land? Big deal, you can still get a critter out. Too much land? Heck, that just means you can get even more critters out. Critters can do their thing turn after turn, but a Counterspell, Impulse, Dissipate, however useful in particular situations, are used once and that's it. In general, it seems that critters offer the best overall mana efficiency. The weenie decks seem to call for lots of decision making about whether to block, sacrifice, play a critter yet or not--but they never have me saying: "Oh man, I'm stuck...I sure hope I draw a soon or I'm cooked." I wonder if there are overall statistics for the percentage of creature-based-deck wins versus non-creature-based-deck wins? Sure, in T2 right now control is very strong. And it's my understanding that Blue was very strong over the last period as well. But with luck seemingly a larger factor when playing control, is it really stronger in the long run? That may seem a scrub question, but I'm curious. I've also noticed when play testing a Senor Stompy or, say, Slemr's winning 1997 deck (the black weenie with Necrataals and lots of time control splashed in) against a Steel Curtain or Capsize Disk that even when the control decks get their locks or slowdowns in early, the weenie decks can still duke it out pretty good, ending in a close game, if not still winning despite the early lock/slowdown. By contrast, if the control decks don't get their tricks into play quick, they are often crushed outright by the critter-based decks. In my earlier, idiot-scrub stages of magic playing (now I'm just a dumb scrub), I would gleefully add lots of cool artifacts and global/local enchantments to my decks to guarantee some "monster critters." naturally, these decks fell apart against decks that were more solidly critter-based, or against ones that were designed well regardless of whether they were leaning towards aggro or control. Nowadays I feel safer building mostly critter-based decks when designing my own, and by and large they do okay, but I still find myself wishing I could squeeze in more enchantments or burn or counter magic than I know is good for me, because so many non-critter cards seem so cool. I see in the good tournament decks and workshop decks here on the dojo that non-creature cards are used to good effect even in the creature-based decks, especially the 5CG, 4CW, and so on. Slemr's 1997 winning deck, in particular, uses them (and some critter abilities) to very good effect for time control. Yet the deck is basically a black weenie deck. My impression so far is that a deck that is fast and creature-based, with an intelligent and cohesive splash of non-creature cards, should have a statistically significant advantage over control-type decks or burn-type decks that don't use many critters. What do you think? Are there guidelines for determining a good mix of creature and non-creature spells? Are there categories of non-creature spells that are the best complement to a creature-based strategy, such as Slemr's time control or the more obvious creature enhancements like Bad Moons and local enchantments? Does Sun Tsu have anything to say that bears on the subject? Seems like this would be analogous to troop support and supply issues or armor/weaponry to enhance troops. Thanks, -Eric