Magic 2014: Deadwalker's Deck Breakdown

Today's post is a guest post brought to you by Anthony Landrum (@formerruling on Twitter) of the blog rulsrants.blogspot.com.

Magic the Gathering 2014 - Deadwalkers Deck

Deadwalkers Deck Video Walkthrough

I play the Deadwalker’s deck in a more aggro style with a lot of the lower cost drops. The ideal is for me to flood the battlefield with nice little zombies and by turn 3 and 4 pumping them, giving them deathtouch, and just running over the opponent with a little removal and control tactics as backup.  I’m going to discuss my choices sectioned by mana cost as it is very important in this constructed format to develop a nice lower mana curve due to the deadly speed of some decks, namely Avacyn’s Glory, which is the deck to beat in this game right now.  

Mana Cost 1-3: 

I run almost all of the creatures in this mana range as they are all bodies to be pumped by later drops. There is some debate about Fleshbag but I don’t see it as being too situational as long as they have creatures because you are always at least getting +1 field presence over them. Doom Blade is fast effective removal but is a dead card in the mirror or against two of the popular second tier decks so I’ve been cutting one out for a Sign in Blood. I do not run Bloodghast simply because it is a Vampire and thus just an extremely weaker version of Gravecrawler here due to not being modified by other cards. For spells I don’t run Quest but I think it is a nice card and a Flashed 5/5 Zombie can be a great asset. I’m not saying it will not find its way in.  Vial as removal is playing 2 cards to destroy 1 dude; Vial is to keep big threats from attacking in but it just doesn’t work out much in this format. Exhume is too situational without cards that throw bombs in your graveyard. Shrivel is token removal which might be mildly relevant in the format if it were Instant speed.  Staff and Soul Bleed are just bad cards all around.  Death Cloud is good in 2HG, but not in 1v1 format.  I will discuss Grim Return later.  

Mana Cost 4-5: 

The 4 drops in the deck are all tide-turners and are very important to the tempo.  Warchief conducts the pain train! Reaver is still a good card, but I’ve had a change of heart on him since the video. I have been subbing in Grim to lower the mana curve a bit and it’s a nice card to play with. I put in Grave Pact because it changes who is in control of the battlefield.  It punishes their combat choices and removal choices.  Endless Ranks is what they call a “win more” condition in 1v1 (I might run in 2HG), that is you have to already be winning for it to do anything and stay winning in the board presence race or it does nothing. The rest of the 4 pack are great removal. I do not run any of the few poor 5 drops the deck has.  

Mana Cost  6+:  

I allowed myself a maximum of 3 cards that cost 6 as “game enders” if the game happened to go long. Mikaeus pumps and allows you to smash in with everything recklessly (and has added bonus vs. Avacyn’s Glory). Corrupt can break their defenses and go straight up top to win. Grave Titan is just a great card they have to answer or they suffer.  Because of how infrequently you actually reach land drop 6 and have one of these available I might cut to just 2 of these though.  Anything over mana cost 6 is just too big to play. One notable exception is Demon of Death's Gate which can come out as early as turn 3 if you pay the alternative cost. I do not run it because the risk caused by its cost is just too high in this deck and format. When you win with it sure it feels epic, but 99% of the time it is dead space in your hand or worse you pay 6 life and 4 cards to cry over an unsummon.  

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Deck Tech - How Many Lands Should I Use In A 60 Card MtG Deck?

Deck Tech - Helping You To Build Stronger Magic The Gathering Play Decks

MtG Mana Mouse Pad

How Many Lands Should You Use For A 60 Card Magic Deck?

Having the proper amount of land in your Magic the Gathering play deck can greatly help to prevent problems with not getting enough land (Mana Screwed), getting too much land (Mana Flooded), or the wrong color lands (Color Starved).  Nothing can fully prevent land / mana issues from happening occasionally, but having a proper land to card ratio for your Magic deck will be a major factor in limiting those mana problems.

How Many Lands To Use In A 60 Card Deck?

The short answer is 24.  If you have no clue what you are doing, go with 24 lands in your 60 card deck.  There are many factors that can figure into adjusting your land ratio, but a common starting place is 24 lands.  You will learn the most about whether you have the proper amount of land and the proper mix, by simply playing with the deck.  As you play your Magic deck, you will better be able to tell whether you have too much, too few, or the wrong mix of lands in your deck.  

Here are some factors to consider when adjusting the amount of land for your deck:

1. Mono or Multicolored Deck? - Is your deck all one color?  If you are running a single color, you can get away with few lands in your deck, because you will never be colored screwed.  On the opposing end, if you are running more than 2 colors, you may want to have a few extra lands in your deck.
2. Mana Fixers - Mana Fixers are cards that allow you to pull out lands out of your deck.  These can include fetch lands (the lands that produce no mana and just tap and sacrifice to go hunt a land and put it into play tapped), spells that allow you to pull lands out of your deck and either into your hand or on the play field, or creatures that give you the ability to pull out lands as well.  The more colors you have in your deck, the more important it becomes to have these mana fixers in your deck to help pull out the colors that you need.
3. Casting Costs Of Your Deck's Cards - If you are running a speed weenie deck that doesn't take much to cast anything in your deck, you can drop the number of lands in your deck significantly.  I've seen decks run plenty efficient on as low as 18 lands, but nothing in the deck cost over 3-4 casting cost and the deck was a single color.  I wouldn't go down below 22 lands without a deck that includes creatures that provide mana as well.  On the other end, if you are running a deck with a lot of high casting cost spells or are using a lot of spells that require 3-4 mana of a specific color within their casting costs, you may want to add extra lands in to lower the risk of getting stuck with a hand of cards you can't even cast.

• So as a rule of thumb I would go with 24 lands in a deck.
• If the deck is all one color, take out 1 land.
• If the majority of your spells are over 3-4 costing cost, add a land or 2 (especially if multi colored and large casting costs).
• If you are playing with multiple creatures that produce mana and have multiple mana fixers, then take out 1-2 lands.
• Never go below 20 in a single color or 22 in a multi-colored deck.
• Playtest your deck with practice hand draws until it starts to feel right.
• Continually adjust your amount of land and color ratio as you play until you feel it is perfect.

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My Favorite Deck From Magic 2013 DotP

Magic 2013 Duels of the Planeswalkers - My Favorite Deck

Just the other day on Twitter, @formerruling requested that I "do some deck guides so we can see what ya run".  Well Anthony, I'm still in the process of working on unlocking all of the extra cards for the Magic 2014 release of the game, so I don't have any fully completed decks yet.  So I will take this opportunity to show you my top deck from the Magic 2013 Duels of the Planeswalkers for iPad.

You can also follow me on Twitter - @mtghelper

Reader Request For Deck Guides

My Top Magic 2013 Deck - Grim Procession

I absolutely love the versatility, speed, and harassing nature of the Grim Procession deck, which was added in the last deck expansion pack for Magic 2013.  The combination of flying creatures, lifelink, creature removal, and creatures that return to the board more than once was perfect for the aggressive style of play I prefer.  There are also plenty of opportunities for trickery and surprises, which I also really enjoy.

Magic 2013 Deck - Grim Procession

Grim Procession

63 Cards - Yes, I was still trying to find 2-3 more cards to remove from this deck to slim it down to the recommended minimum 60 card deck for constructed decks.  I love each and every one of these creatures, so I was still working on tweaking which ones to remove when Magic 2014 released.

Lands

• 11 Swamp
• 11 Plains
• 4 Terramorphic Expanse

Creatures

• 3 Doomed Traveller
• 2 Mourning Thrull
• 2 Orzhov Guildmage
• 2 Restless Apparition
• 2 Vampire Nighthawk
• 3 Bloodhunter Bat
• 2 Falkenrath Noble
• 1 Ghost Council of Orzhova
• 1 Keening Banshee
• 2 Voracious Hatchling
• 1 Angel of Flight Alabaster
• 2 Bloodgift Demon
• 1 Deathbringer Liege
• 1 Divinity of Pride
• 1 Ob Nixilis, the Fallen

Spells

• 2 Zealous Persecution
• 4 Pillory of the Sleepless
• 4 Unmake
• 1 Vindicate

Notable Ommissions:

Stillmoon Cavalier

• Stillmoon Cavalier - While pretty nice and very versatile, I'm not going to run this in my deck because I only have the 2 Zealous Persecution to remove the Stillmoon Cavalier should it be controlled by an opponent.  And given the popularity of the Jace Milling decks, I saw plenty of Control Magic and Clone, as well as Rise from the Grave in black decks.  And I definately do NOT want a Stillmoon Cavalier to appear on my opponents side because it can really hurt this deck, so I left it out of mine.
• Damnation - With this deck, I am the aggressor.  I come out too fast and too strong for Damnation to be very useful.  It usually just sat in my hand and never got cast.
• Any of the 6+ converted casting cost cards - These are just far too large of a cost for the speed of the deck I was after.  My goal was to have you already dead or very near death before these would even be cast and useful.

Discussion

Which 3 cards would you remove from this Grim Procession deck in order to get it down to the 60 card deck minimum without sacrificing synergy or speed?

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MtG Deck Tech: How Many Cards Should I Use In My Deck?

MtG Deck Tech 

"How Many Cards Should You Use In A MtG Deck?"

One of the most basic necessities of Magic the Gathering is building your play deck.  Whether you are playing tabletop Magic, Magic 2014 Duels of The Planeswalkers, or Magic on iPad or another tablet, you still have to tweak and tune your play deck to make it competitive.  This starts with the first lesson on Deck Size.

There are 2 minimum deck requirements depending on what format of MtG you are choosing to play.

Constructed Format - In the Constructed format you build your deck from your card pool of cards you own, or in the case of Magic 2014 Duels of the Planeswalkers, from the base deck of cards and the cards you have unlocked for possible addition to your deck.  This format has a minimum requirement of 60 cards per deck.

Sealed / Draft Formats - In the Sealed and Draft formats you are only allowed to use cards from the provided packs allowed for the event.  In the Sealed deck format you only use what you open in your own packs. In draft format you open a pack, pick a single card out, then pass that pack to the player next to you and continue picking one card from each pack passed to you.  There is no Draft format in Magic 2014 Duels of the Planeswalkers, but the 2014 edition of the game did just add the Sealed format to the game.  In both Sealed and Draft formats you have a minimum requirement of 40 cards.

Choosing The Correct Amount Of Cards For Your Magic Deck

Regardless of which format you are playing in, you should always use the bare minimum of cards required to build your play deck.  That means no more than 60 cards for a normal Constructed deck and no more than 40 cards for a Sealed or Draft format deck.  

Why only use the bare minimum of cards for your deck?

You only want to use the bare minimum requirement for MtG deck size because of two simple concepts - Consistency & Probabilty  When building a deck to be competitive, you want the slimmest, most efficient, leanest deck possible so that it will perform consistently.  The more cards you add to a deck, the less efficient and less consistent it will become.  

Having a slim deck means that you have a better chance (or Probability) of drawing a nice opening hand, better chance to prevent getting mana screwed (not having enough lands to cast your spells), and a better chance at drawing what you need when you need it!  The more cards you add into your deck the less probability you will have of drawing what you need, thus your deck will suffer from what I like to call "Deck Bloat".  You deck is bloated when it has more cards than needed to run consistently as your deck probability suffers.

So remember when building or tweaking your deck - Run Slimmer & Run Stronger!

If you are playing on Magic 2013 or Magic 2014 Duels of the Planeswalkers, the game is set up to automatically bloat your deck!  As you unlock cards they are automatically added to your deck, so be aware and slim that deck back down to 60 as you unlock new cards.

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