Psychatogs and Enforcers Brian Kibler Saturday, February 16, 2002 If you've been following the buzz about Standard on the internet lately, you're likely sick of the seemingly unending tide of articles about Psychatog decks and their apparent dominance of the San Diego Masters. This din is anything but unwarranted, however - Psychatog decks made up a full fifty percent of the Masters metagame, with three in the top four, two in the finals, and one, piloted by the infamous Ryan Fuller, taking home the title. These tremendous results bring with them a tremendous number of questions. Should you play Finkels and Familiars, or just Psychatogs? Upheaval or no? Aether Burst? Probe? And the biggest question of all - what beats this seemingly dominant deck? The answer to this last question may be found, perhaps, in that disregarded non-Tog deck in San Diego's Top 4, piloted by Brian Hegstad and designed by yours truly. Hegstad defeated Ben Klauser's Psychatog deck in the quarterfinals before losing a close three game match to eventual champion Ryan Fuller in the semis, with mana difficulties on Brian's part playing a major role in both games he lost. My bias in the matter is clear, but it is my opinion that the Enforcer deck is perhaps the top contender to steal the coveted standard crown - the brightest lighthouse of hope amidst the sea of Psychatogs. Brian Hegstad Main Deck Sideboard 4 Adarkar Wastes 3 Brushland 4 Coastal Tower 7 Island 2 Sungrass Prairie 3 Yavimaya Coast 4 Mystic Enforcer 3 Absorb 4 Counterspell 3 Disrupt 4 Fact or Fiction 3 Memory Lapse 3 Opt 4 Peek 2 Predict 4 Repulse 3 Wrath of God 2 Aura Mutation 4 Call of the Herd 4 Meddling Mage 2 Questing Phelddagrif 3 Wild Mongrel The Enforcer deck was initially designed as an experiment in abusing the new threshold mechanic. Shortly before the State Championships, I put together a deck including the full spectrum of cantrips, from the omnipresent Opt and Repulse to the less commonly seen Peek and Predict, as well as the then-unheralded creature that I was certain would turn out to be one of the big "sleeper" cards in Odyssey - Mystic Enforcer. Initial testing returned promising results against the decks that were popular at the time (primarily modeled after the Invitational decks), in large part due to sheer power of Wrath of God in a creature-heavy format as well as the total inability of many decks to ever remove a Mystic Enforcer once it entered play. In fact, one of my favorite playtest moments came against a copy of Finkel's invitational deck when my opponent played out a pair of Infiltrators to my Enforcer, and he kept attacking and drawing cards, but had nothing in his entire deck to remove the enormous pro-black flier, and the game was over in a few quick attack phases. Playtesting turned up similar results almost across the board. The game plan against most decks was merely to stall their early offense until I could play a Mystic Enforcer and race - and against all but the most aggressive decks, races are something 6/6 fliers generally win. With these initial results, Ben Rubin chose to play a variant of the deck in the California State Championships, while I decided I'd rather put my proverbial money where my mouth is and play a version of my Invitational deck with the changes I'd suggested in this article. After States, I was even more excited about the Enforcer deck than before. Despite Ben's relatively unimpressive results, I became increasingly convinced that the Enforcer deck stood to thrive in the metagame that emerged in the wake of the State Championships. With u-g-r decks such as Jon Sonne's Snaketongue or my own Flashback/Opposition deck posting the highest numbers at States, it appeared that a deck with heavy control elements and a win condition resilient against damage-based removal stood to thrive in the new environment. Enter Psychatog - and Enforcer. The similarities between these two decks may not be immediately apparent, but the fundamental strategy behind the two is almost identical. Ryan Fuller Main Deck Sideboard 4 Cephalid Coliseum 9 Island 4 Salt Marsh 2 Swamp 4 Underground River 4 Psychatog 4 Counterspell 4 Fact or Fiction 2 Force Spike 1 Gainsay 4 Memory Lapse 4 Peek 4 Predict 3 Repulse 3 Undermine 4 Aether Burst 3 Disrupt 1 Divert 1 Force Spike 1 Gainsay 3 Hibernation 2 Lobotomy 4 Slay The most important difference between the Psychatog deck and the Enforcer deck is the victory condition - Atog or Nomad Mystic. While this may seem self evident, it really impacts both the individual card choices in the decks as well as how one plays each of them. Because the Enforcer deck relies heavily on reaching threshold, it includes more cantrip cards, playing all three of Opt, Peek, and Predict, while most Tog decks ran only Opt (though Fuller chose to run the more unorthodox selection of Peek and Predict, neglecting Opt entirely). Psychatog itself is very effective at blocking in the early game, but because one cannot rely upon Psychatog entirely for quick defense, the Tog decks generally played some other assortment of early game counters or bounce, such as Force Spike in the Godzilla version or Aether Burst in Fuller's deck. Mystic Enforcer, on the other hand, takes time to become an enormous and unkillable dragon, and isn't as effective at blocking in the meantime. Enter Wrath of God, the oldest and most efficient form of mass creature removal in the business, which singlehandedly makes additional anti-creature measures somewhat unnecessary. The threat of dying to a creature swarm is greatly reduced when one can make god angry at will. Besides being quite capable of dealing with creatures, these two decks shine in the control game by virtue of the sheer efficiency of their spells. Compare, for instance, the Enforcer deck to the popular Snaketongue deck. Which of these decks is going to win in a counter war over an important spell? Where Snaketongue has Mystic Snake, Enforcer has Absorb. Where Snaketongue has Syncopate, Enforcer has Memory Lapse. The same holds true for the Psychatog deck - the more efficient countermagic is of utmost importance in winning counter wars. Equally if not more important is the spells that are being fought over. Perhaps the most dangerous spell the Snaketongue deck can hope to resolve is Fact or Fiction - which, while clearly powerful, isn't nearly as imminently dangerous as a creature that has the potential to end the game in a few quick attacks. There you have it - efficiency and raw power, a recipe for success in any format. But even beyond these fundamental advantages, the particular card choices in the Enforcer deck help give it an even bigger edge on the field. One of the most surprising cards in the deck, not in terms of its presence (as it is a cantrip and contributes to the threshold plan) but in terms of its numbers is Peek. Most control decks up to this point have played Opt exclusively, giving the nod to the marginally improved card selectivity it provides. In the Enforcer deck - and, similarly, in Ryan Fuller's Psychatog deck - Peek can serve a much more important role. Particularly with the new floor rule that allows players to take notes during a match, Peek provides for the ability to play correctly based on the information gleaned about your opponent's hand. In the Enforcer deck, this information is hardly incidental. Knowing how many counters your opponent has access to can allow you to plan your mana management and when you can cast your threats without fear. Knowing that your opponent has no Urza's Rage or Flametongue Kavu lets you slam down an Enforcer pre-threshold without any worries that it will come to an untimely death, and getting an idea of what threats your opponent has in hand lets you know when its safe to start the four turn death march with a flying Enforcer, and when you need to hold back to block. All of this, and I haven't even mentioned what is perhaps Peek's biggest advantage - after sideboarding, your Meddling Mages are absolutely devastating with perfect knowledge of your opponent's hand. Indeed, it's often these little things - like playing a full complement of Peeks while skimping on the Opts - that sets a well-tuned deck apart from the field. In fact, it is entirely likely that Brian Hegstad's loss in the semifinals was due almost entirely to my failure to update the deck's mana base despite knowledge of the metagame. The two Sungrass Prairies in the deck's land mix were there almost exclusively because against very aggressive decks, such as g-r beatdown, it is absolutely imperative to have access to non-pain white and green mana to play Mystic Enforcer and Wrath of God without taking damage. In a control-heavy field, these same filter lands are exponentially worse, as they cannot produce blue mana nor the single white mana used for Absorb. When drawn in multiples, they can drastically reduce one's ability to win important counter wars, as Hegstad experienced in games two and three of the semifinals. With this in mind, and yet still giving a nod to the need for non-pain colored mana against aggressive decks, it is likely that one of the Prairies ought to be replaced with a single copy of Treva's Ruins. Additionally, the amount of green mana in the deck was in large part due to particular sideboard cards (i.e. Call of the Herd) that were most effective in the first few turns of the game, and due to their removal (as I will discuss below), it is likely that a Yavimaya Coast could be removed for a basic island without disrupting the mana base. As for other alterations to the deck that ought to be made in the wake of the Masters, I would not suggest altering the main deck any further than the land switched mentioned above. The sideboard, however, could stand to undergo some major alterations. With Psychatog the control deck of choice in the format, the Call of the Herds in the sideboard become much less effective, and likely ought to be removed. Meddling Mage, however, has more than earned his keep, and if it were legal I'd probably sideboard about eight of Pikula's ugly mug. Wild Mongrels, as well, ought to hit the curb, as they were included as a last minute anti-Finkel, anti-Balancing Act choice that wasn't nearly as effective as hoped. Questing Phelddagrif is very powerful against u-g-r and g-r decks, providing a large body that can't be effectively killed by Flametongue Kavu to help the Enforcers to get their job done. The Aura Mutations are there against Battle of Wits and Opposition decks - neither of which has a huge presence in the current environment, but each of which poses a significant enough threat to the Enforcer deck as to warrant the inclusion. With the Mongrels and Calls removed, however, this still leaves a great deal of room in the sideboard. Cards which I have considered for addition include Gainsay and the fourth Disrupt for control matchups, as well as Hobble, Dodecapod, and Compost. The first two cards are rather obvious, whereas the latter three require a bit more explanation. Hobble is a good answer to Shadowmage Infiltrators and Psychatogs, both nullifying them from attacking and allowing your Meddling Mages to continue their beats. It is also a solid card against creature decks in general, eliminating an attacker as a cantrip. Dodecapod is very powerful against the Balancing Act deck, as if they ever Act with less cards in hand than you, you get a 5/5 attacker into play for free - hardly a bad deal. Compost is useful against Psychatog decks, giving you an extra card every time they Duress or Undermine or the like, as well as clearly having potent applications in the future if Torment's bias toward black has the impact upon Constructed that R&D intends. Other interesting sideboard cards to consider if this turns out to be the case - or if you just really want to beat down Psychatog decks - are Llanowar Knight and Mystic Crusader. While they are tough on the mana and may possibly require an overhaul of the land base to be able to play them consistently in the early game, they are very potent attackers against Tog decks, slipping past Jonny Magic and Psychatog alike, as well as blocking the latter indefinitely. And if Nantuko Shades and their cohorts become popular, they'll certainly be quite handy to have available to get in the way until big daddy Enforcer can mop things up. The biggest problem card to come out of Torment for the Enforcer deck is likely to prove to be Chainer's Edict, which provides a cheap, non-targeted form of black removal that can kill even the biggest of Nomad Mystics - or Atogs. Will aggressive black decks be able to overthrow the King and crown prince of Standard by the sheer power of Chainer's word? Only time will tell how the new set will shake up Standard. Will the Enforcer deck be the best deck in the environment? Perhaps, or perhaps not. Whatever impact Torment will have on the Standard format, it seems likely that in the big push toward black, it's got to be pretty nice to have a pro-black dragon on your side. As always, questions and comments are welcome at majesk@aol.com.