shadowhamster@hotmail.com

Subject: Pariah Strategies

Okay, here we have one of the most overlooked type 1 cards...easily!

Pariah:2W, Enchant Creature:
Redirect to target creature all damage dealt to you.

Now, all by itself, I would like to note that this is a just MEAN creature 
destruction/hold off technique card making your opponent choose for you.  
Your opponent just played an avatar of woe?  Pariah it!  Your opponent just 
played a royal ass-assin?  Pariah it!  Your opponent just layed a juzam 
Djinn?  You guessed it.  Pariah it!  If your opponent wants to hurt you, 
they will have to kill the monster with pariah.  Either by using valuable 
cards in their hand or by attacking, wasting a turn, and going with the 
redirected damage.  All damage that turn goes to the monster that turn!  It 
doesn't die officially til the end of combat!

That just starts are fun however.  IMHO Pariah wasn't reprinted for 8th 
simply for the fact that is so much harder to combo now.  I really would 
have loved seeing this over several other cards, but ah well.  Now on to 
that promised type 2 goodness.

Pariah is one of the best defense cards, because it is an offense for a 
defense and it's in white:  The color made to defend.  Their are two mixed 
colored decks you would want to center pariah around.  White/blue, you don't 
do crap! decks, and white/black bringers of pestilence deck.

The strategy of the white/blue is nasty.  by grabbing certian enchantments 
you shut them down, using counterspells on the side.  Basically a search 
type deck, it just gets NASTY!!!  The question goes up, why not play 
straight permission, or permission burn.  Or even Permission/hand 
disruption.  Easy, white/blue pariah shut down aims at making you 
invulnerable...less things for you to worry about, and most of the cards you 
need for it are easy to get.

Cho-manno revolutionary, 2WW/ Summon Legend-Negate all damage dealt to 
Cho-manno revolutionary.a

Inviolability, 1W/Enchant Creature-Negate all damage dealt to enchanted 
creature.

Either one of these works to make you nigh invulnerable.  Worst of all, your 
playing permission-for the most part burn doesn't matter,  Big creatures 
don't matter, most things that hurt you,  you guessed it, don't matter.  The 
only things you need to concern yourself with are flying creatures, creature 
destruction, and enchantment destruction.  By saving your counterspells for 
these things, your invulnerable, so are your creatures, and your opponent is 
open for your offensive specialty, Flying...

A 'You don't do crap!' deck looks like this-
Lands:24
12 Islands
12 Plains


Creatures:20
4 Serra Angel
2 Cho-manno Revolutionary
4 Wall of Glare
3 Academy Rector
2 Morphling


Spells:20
4 Counterspell
2 Rewind
4 Mana Leak
2 forbid
4 pariah
4 inviolability

AS you can see, once the flying onslaught begins, your opponent has more 
important things to worry about than a little thing like you being immune to 
damage.  On top of that, you can simplify things much by placing 
inviolability and pariah on a morphling...then all you have to work on is an 
evil laugh!

Now, this deck may look mean, and I like it...but my favorite deck is next.  
A little white and black number I like to call...

'Bringers of Pestilence':

This deck centers around making yourself invulnerable on multiple levels, 
while killing your opponent through other sources.  Some of the biggest 
being these guys:

Sleeper Agent: B/ Summon Minion(3/3)-When Sleeper Agent comes into play, 
target opponent gets control of it.
During your upkeep Sleeper Agent deals 2 damage to you(controller)

Pestilence:2BB/ Enchantment-B:Pestilence deals 1 damage to each creature and 
each player.
If there are no creatures in play, sacrifice pestilence.

Now, these cards can hurt you...that's why we have:

Treacherous Link:1B/Enchant Creature-Redirect all damage dealt to creature, 
to creatures controller.

Darkest Hour:B/Enchantment-All creatures are black

Light of day 2WW/Enchantment-Black creatures cannot attack or block.

As you can see this is a cluster deck:

'Bringers of Pestilence':

Land:22
11-swamps
10-plains
01-Serra's Sanctum

Creatures:16
4-Sleeper Agents
3-Academy Rectors
3-Monk Idealist
4-Wall of Glare
2-Cho-Manno Revolutionary

Spells:24
3-Darkest Hour
2-Light of day
4-Treacherous Link
4-Inviolability
4-Pariah
2-Enlightened Tutor
3-Pestilence
2-Replenish

So...the strategy here is to keep playing enchantments.  Your opponent will 
probably destroy SOME, but will have trouble killing 'em all.  Especially 
since you have Monk Idealist, and Replenish running around.
If they manage to kill a combo or two, then they are only delaying the 
inevitable.

William Greeson