Black-Blue-Red in IBC Justin Gary Ah... control. You either love it or hate it, and boy do I love it. Invasion Block Constructed is a great format with a slew of interesting decks, but almost all of them share one thing in common: they depend on creatures. This whole format seems to be about playing bears and protecting bears and to be perfectly honest, it leaves a bad taste in my mouth. But there is an alternative. Black-blue-red is one of the strongest control decks in IBC right now. This control deck uses cards like Fact or Fiction, Void, Lobotomy, and Yawgmoth's Agenda to shut an opponent completely out of the game. Since most versions of the deck run few, if any, creatures, great cards like Exclude, Repulse, and Flametongue Kavu will sit dead in your opponent's hand while you mop up what's left of their game with your ridiculous card-drawing power. Black-blue-red has been around since before Apocalypse entered the block and it made a reasonable showing at Pro Tour-Tokyo. The addition of Apocalypse has breathed new life into the deck by solving its two greatest problems - mana consistency and the early game. With Shivan Reef to smooth out the mana and Fire/Ice to deal with early threats, the black-blue-red player has a far greater chance of getting into the mid-late game, where the deck truly shines. Building black-blue-red is tricky because there are so many powerful cards to choose from. Let's look at a few decklists from the Top 8 of Grand Prix-Denver. The first is from Your Move Games superstar Darwin Kastle: Darwin Kastle Grand Prix-Denver Main Deck Sideboard 8 Island 5 Swamp 4 Salt Marsh 4 Urborg Volcano 4 Shivan Reef 1 Mountain 4 Fire 4 Recoil 4 Undermine 4 Exclude 4 Fact or Fiction 4 Lobotomy 4 Void 2 Urza's Rage 2 Yawgmoth's Agenda 2 Tsabo's Decree 4 Emblazoned Golem 4 Addle 4 Gainsay 2 Crosis's Charm 1 Urborg Shambler Darwin was the only black-blue-red mage in the Top 8 of Denver to use no creatures in his main deck, relying on the power of Urza's Rage and Yawgmoth's Agenda to finish off his opponents. Darwin went undefeated with this deck during the Swiss portion of GP-Denver, though he did have an unusually high number of draws (3 on Day 1). Other than being creature-free, there are several other interesting features of Kastle's deck. First one can't help but notice 4 copies of Lobotomy and Recoil in Darwin's deck (two cards that didn't even make the main deck of Alex Borteh or Sammy Batarseh's similar Top 8 deck lists) and no copies of the Apocalypse powerhouse card Prophetic Bolt. 4 Lobotomies maindeck gave Darwin a monstrous edge vs. other control decks, but wouldn't be as useful in a more aggressive field. Darwin built this deck knowing about his three Grand Prix byes, creating a metagame that justified the heavy anti-control build. I think that 4 Lobotomies are a bit excessive for a typical qualifier. Recoil is a good choice over Repulse in this deck because of its great interaction with Yawgmoth's Agenda. Black-blue-red has so much card drawing that once Agenda hits play, the black-blue-red player's hand quickly fills up and the discard effect of Recoil becomes much more useful then the card-draw effect of Repulse. In addition, the versatility of Recoil allows the deck to stall an opponent's mana development, to remove threatening permanents like Goblin Trenches or to bounce an Agenda when Agenda's disadvantage starts to outweigh its benefit. Next let's take a look at Alex Borteh's deck: Alex Borteh, Quarterfinalist "Wavy" Main Deck Sideboard 7 Island 4 Salt Marsh 4 Swamp 4 Shivan Reef 3 Urborg Volcano 2 Mountain 1 Crosis's Catacombs 4 Nightscape Familiar 2 Pyre Zombie 4 Fact or Fiction 4 Undermine 4 Exclude 3 Prophetic Bolt 3 Urza's Rage 3 Fire/Ice 3 Spite 2 Terminate 2 Void 1 Yawgmoth's Agenda 4 Gainsay 4 Ravenous Rats 3 Disrupt 2 Lobotomy 1 Void 1 Obliterate The most notable difference between Alex's deck and Darwin's deck is Alex's inclusion of creatures in the maindeck. Nightscape Familiar is incredible in this deck because it serves as a great early blocker and it reduces the cost of nearly all the powerhouse spells of the deck. In addition, Nightscape Familiar provides a solid answer to this deck's greatest fear: Blurred Mongoose. The power of the Familiar has to be weighed against the fact that by playing with any creatures, you enable your opponent's Flametongue Kavus, Excludes, and Repulses. Also, while Alex's deck clearly has a better early game than Darwin's deck, Alex's deck has a shakier mana supply. Attempting to maximize the effectiveness of Pyre Zombie while still assuring the ability to cast a turn 3 Undermine is not easy. The key to black-blue-red is to survive the early game while dropping lands every turn until the powerhouse cards at 4 mana and 5 mana can start to take control of the game. So, let's look at the deck by casting cost. At two mana, Fire/Ice is just too much of a bargain to pass up. In my experience, this is the weakest card in the deck as far as raw power goes, but it is necessary to survive the early game. Other cards like Nightscape Familiar, Ravenous Rats, Terminate, and Evasive Action can fill out the 2 casting cost slot if need be, but no more than a few of these cards should be main deck unless you expect a very aggressive field. At 3 casting cost, we start to see some more power. Undermine and Exclude are no-brainers. Powerful countermagic with benefits are at the heart of this deck's power. I like Recoil over Repulse for reasons mentioned above and a few Urza's Rages provide solid early creature control and an uncounterable win mechanism in the late game. At 4 mana, Fact or Fiction comes online and, if it resolves, will practically guarantee a smooth progression into the late game. A few Lobotomies and a Spite/Malice give the deck a lot of versatility and power at this casting cost. Being able to threaten a control deck with Lobotomy will make them think twice about countering your end of turn Fact or Fiction. Since it is not a permanent, Lobotomy is the only early threat card that cannot be dealt with later in the game with any of the great reactive cards in the environment such as Vindicate, Terminate, Void, etc. Since it has the ability to remove a key element of an opponent's strategy, he or she will have to think twice before tapping out. 5 mana is where the fun really begins. Void, Prophetic Bolt, and Yawgmoth's Agenda are all among the most powerful cards in the format. Once the deck starts casting these, it will gain control of the game very quickly. Here is how I would build the deck now: Main Deck Sideboard 4 Salt Marsh 4 Urborg Volcano 4 Shivan Reef 8 Islands 5 Swamps 1 Mountain 4 Fire/Ice 4 Exclude 4 Undermine 4 Recoil 4 Fact or Fiction 3 Lobotomy 1 Spite/Malice 4 Void 2 Yawgmoth's Agenda 1 Tsabo's Decree 1 Prophetic Bolt 2 Urza's Rage 4 Ravenous Rats 4 Emblazoned Golem 4 Gainsay 1 Urborg Shambler 1 Lobotomy 1 Repulse This build of the deck accepts the fact that red-green aggression is a bad matchup that you are unlikely to beat game one. The maindeck is tuned to beat the rest of the field that doesn't have the clock that red-green does. Against control decks, use Recoil and Ice to shut down those hard-to-cast counters before casting a Lobotomy or Fact or Fiction. With 26 land, you will be able to gain the mana advantage in the late game and thus abuse Agenda and Rage better than your opponent. Against red-green, bring in the beasts after sideboard. Ravenous Rats provide an amazing 2 drop answer to all of red-green's aggression (especially the hated Mongoose), and Emblazoned Golem is huge and versatile. The creatures in the sideboard are also particularly useful if you are running low on time in games 2 and 3. The most important recommendation I have is an all too obvious one. Playtest, playtest, playtest! Get an idea of your local field and your own play style. With so many power cards in these colors, it's hard to be strictly "wrong" in your choices. Keep in mind the trade off between speed and power and decide how many of the slightly weaker early game cards you want in place of the mana-heavy power cards. Good luck in the qualifiers and please feel free to email me with questions or comments at justin.gary@dartmouth.edu.