Pojo's Magic The Gathering news, tips, strategies and more!

Pojo's MTG
MTG Home
Message Board
News & Archives
Deck Garage
BMoor Dolf BeJoSe

Columnists
Paul's Perspective
Jeff Zandi
DeQuan Watson
Jordon Kronick
IQ
Aburame Shino
Rare Hunter
Tim Stoltzfus
WiCkEd
Judge Bill's Corner


Trading Card
Game

Card of the Day
Guide for Newbies
Decks to Beat
Featured Articles
Peasant Magic
Fan Tips
Tourney Reports


Other
Color Chart
Book Reviews
Online Play
MTG Links
Staff



 



BMoor's Magic The Gathering Deck Garage
MonoBlue Darn Karn
September 27, 2007

Hi BMoor, you've helped me out a couple of times with my Dragons, and Atog deck. So I was wondering if you wouldn't mine looking at this one too. It's an artifact deck with a blue for search and urza's lands for a quick play. I found myself without Blue mana alot, so my fabricates sit in my hand while my opponent whittles away my life. Also, I only put pact of Negation because my friends know I have a lot of things to screw them over, but they'll either burn it to oblivion or counter it while I'm tapped out. I use Mycosynth Lattice to turn everything into artifacts, then turn them into 0/0 artifacts with Karn's effect. Or I'll simply take them with Memnarch. It doesn't matter to me when my opponent is at their mercy.
 
Creatures: 17
Arcbound Crusher x2
Arcbound Worker x4

Arcum Dagson x1
Broodstar x1
Darksteel Colossus x1
Karn, Silver Golem x1
Memnarch x1
Mycosynth Golem x1
Myr Servitor x4
Vedalken Archmage x1
 
Artifacts: 14
Coalition Relic x2
Coldsteel Heart x3
Darksteel Forge x1
Energy Chamber x4
Gilded Lotus x1
Mycosynth Lattice x1
Quicksilver Fountain x1
Scultpting Steel x1
 
Instants/Sorceries: 9
Fabricate x4
Machinate x2
Pact of Negation x2
Reshape x1
 
Lands: 20
Cloudpost x4
Seat of the Synod x4
Urza's Mine x4
Urza's Powerplant x4
Urza's Tower x4

It's gratifying to see that I'm not the only one who liked Mirrodin block.
 
Some people said that blue and artifacts were just too powerful of a combination in Mirrodin block.  If that is the case, then why isn't this deck tapping into that alleged uber-power?  My first guess is the mana base.  You're supposed to run Cloudpost OR the Urza-tron, not both.  In your case, I'm voting for Cloudpost.  Take out the Urza lands, and add in 4 Vesuva (in conjunction with Cloudpost, they form a mana engine as powerful as the "Tron), and 8 Islands.  You're still a bit low on lands, but we'll find a few useless cards to pull to fix that.
 
Since we're starting on the mana first today, let's look at your mana rocks next.  I'd say none of these are optimal.  Coalition Relic is best when its 3-mana cost is less of a hindrance than its ability to produce all five colors.  Coldsteel Heart comes into play tapped, but is useful if you need snow mana.  And Gilded Lotus... just plain isn't that useful.  Heck, Ur-Golem's Eye was pushing it.  The Relic and Heart can each come out for four Mind Stone and one Academy Ruins.  The Mind Stones are best here, since they start tapping for Myr Servitors as easrly as turn two, and can be recycled when you no longer need them.  And the Academy Ruins, aside from being that extra land that should solve your mana problems, will also bring back any artifact you need to reuse.
 
Gilded Lotus, and also Quicksilver Fountain now that you've got real Islands, can become something else.  When I looked through the deck and saw Memnarch, I thought, "Are there any other artifacts that are better in a blue deck?"  The one I thought of was Proteus Staff.  And Proteus Staff works wonders here, because you've got a few singleton copies of big, powerful artifact creatures.  Proteus Staff can be invaluable at helping you find them.  If you can't get a Fabricate, or won't have enough mana for a while, you can use Proteus Staff to blink out one of your small dorks and hope that the first creature you hit is Darksteel Colossus or Mycosynth Golem, which will then come into play for free.  And if you happened to put one of those on top of your library with Academy Ruins, or leave it there when you saw it via Machinate, all the better!
 
Finally, I'm not sure Pact of Negation is what you want for a counterspell.  Yes, it's free, but five mana the next turn or you lose the game?  I'd say Assert Authority would work just as well if not better.  Or Override, if you still have problems getting [UU].
 
Well, that brings us to the end of another Deck Garage article, and it also leaves me in an interesting position.  You see, when I had to leave town a few weeks ago for family concerns, I asked the webmasters to take my E-mail address off the front page.  As it turns out, it's been gone ever since.  I only just noticed this last night, because the number of decks in my inbox had been dwindling while usually I can just match the rate at which they come in.
 
A side note: thank you very much to everyone who E-mailed me to wish me well and say how much they appreciate my work.  You'll be gratified to know that the issue-- my grandmother's failing health-- had in fact already cleared up by the time I got there, so I spent that week helping the family adjust and doing small errands for my grandfather.  I don't know how you still had my address, but I appreciate your regards.  It really makes me feel like I'm accomplishing something.
 
But at any rate, now I have only one deck left in my inbox, and it's an Elf deck.  Since the Lorwyn prerelease is on the horizon, and it promises a slew of Elf-theme cards, I'm just going to take the rest of the week off rather than fix an Elf deck mere days before a new influx of Elf cards are released.  While I'm gone, you can send your E-mails to me at bemore4096@yahoo.com, or you can send them to Mattedesa or Sean of course (hope they didn't get swamped while I was unreachable).  I'll be back probably on Tuesday or Wednesday.  In the meantime, I'll be at the UMass Boston prerelease on Saturday, getting cards autographed by Rebecca Guay and Cyril Van Der Haegen.  I'll be wearing my white Pojo.com T-shirt, so if you see me, feel free to say hello! 
 
Until next time, (or Saturday perhaps)
 
~BMoor
Copyright© 1998-2007 pojo.com
This site is not sponsored, endorsed, or otherwise affiliated with any of the companies or products featured on this site. This is not an Official Site.