The New Phyrexia Vintage Set Review
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So Many Insane Plays – The New Phyrexia Vintage Set Review The Phyrexians have arrived, and they seek to remake the orb of Mirrodin in their own image. Will they remake Vintage as well? Scars of Mirrodin block has proved to be a surprisingly worthy sequel to the original Mirrodin invasion. Scars of Mirrodin has been as potent as any set from the previous block, and Mirrodin Besieged brought with it more than a few serious playables. Before we delve into the final set in this important block, let’s recap Mirrodin Besieged. Mirrodin Besieged Recap Many cards from Mirrodin Besieged have seen play in Vintage tournament Top 8s. By far the most successful printing from Mirrodin Besieged – and this should surprise no one – is Blightsteel Colossus. In terms of Top 8 appearances, it has far and away surpassed everything else from the set, by a factor of two. There were 92 different decks with Blightsteel Colossus in them in Vintage Top 8s at the time of this writing. Ninety-two!! That makes Blightsteel the standout from the entire block, let alone the set. Phyrexian Revoker, Leonin Relic-Warder, Go for the Throat, Steel Sabotage, and Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas have also each appeared in Vintage Top 8s. Steel Sabotage has appeared 46 different top 8 decks, followed by Phyrexian Revoker at 21. Tezzeret and Leonin Relic-Warder have appeared in under a dozen, but they are still making the rounds. Phyrexian Revoker is becoming very popular in Workshop decks, especially MUD lists, for its ability to shut down Jace and Moxen alike. As of this writing, no other Mirrodin Besieged cards have appeared in Vintage Top 8s. But that may well change. We will have a much better understanding of how these cards are being used in a few months. Please consult the checklist at the end of this article for the updated Vintage checklist with Mirrodin Besieged included. New Phyrexia Set Review Before I begin my card by card analysis, I think it’s worthwhile to make some general comments about this set. Scars of Mirrodin, as a block, has introduced many Vintage playables into the Vintage format, and in many ways has changed it forever. Both Scars and Mirrodin Besieged have left their mark. But let’s be honest: New Phyrexia is probably, on the whole, the weakest Vintage set of the block. The average card in New Phyrexia is probably slightly overcosted, at least compared with the incredible efficiency of recent sets. And, pound for pound, it offers fewer Vintage playables than its sister sets. But New Phyrexia brings something new and fresh to Vintage. It brings a new dimension of play, a new angle of attack. Ever since Glasses of Urza was printed, players have struggled to strike a balance between information and overall card utility and purpose. Jester’s Cap pushed that question to the hilt, and this set poses it in the most striking terms. This set actually introduces cheap or free effects that have done what cards since the earliest sets have tried to do: generate information about your opponent’s hand, deck, and strategy. Cards like Gitaxian Probe, Surgical Extraction, and Praetor’s Grasp are each cards that will see play, in no small part, on account of this role. Information cuts both ways. Masters can squeeze every bit of information derived to maximize their playmaking and induce the opponents into traps, errors, and miscues. By the same token, the most skilled players need this information less, being able to read their opponents and perceive the situation more deeply. The value of knowing may not be as significant as it may be for someone who has less experience in the Vintage format. Aside from these more general issues of determining utility, there is a layer of play that New Phyrexian brings to Vintage – a dimension it either adds to or greatly expands: the surprise of being Probed, Extracted, or Grasped at just the right moment, or having your creature Dismembered. Free or nearly free spells are difficult to anticipate, let alone plan for. They strike without warning, and they will change, in subtle ways the way that Vintage is played. Surgical Extraction is so close to Extirpate, but miles, and miles away in terms of the kinds of game changing impact it will have when it strikes, if only because its free. New Phyrexia brings into Vintage something that is very old: free. What it does is tantalizingly offer these spells, which can have a tremendous strategic and tactical impact, at a price, of both the card slot and some life. All the while, it brings Vintage closer to an era in which information, and the manipulation of information, becomes more and more a part of the fabric of the format. We are arriving at a moment in which using this information to generate meaningful strategic advantages is merely the first level of mastery. Gently pushing the opponents into making mistakes, inducing and seducing the opponent into game shifting blunders, is the profound upshot of New Phyrexia, and the area of rich potential for the Vintage master. The Chancellors: Chancellor of the Annex, Chancellor of the Spires, Chancellor of the Dross, Chancellor of the Forge, Chancellor of the Tangle In 2004, Wizards crossed a very important design bridge: they created a card that does something before the game actually begins. That card, of course, is Serum Powder, and was printed in Darksteel. They continued to explore this design space with Leylines from Guildpact and then Gemstone Caverns from Time Spiral. Wizards returned with another cycle of (mostly) new Leylines for Magic 2011, indicating a willingness to continue to print these type of effects. With this cycle of cards, these new Chancellors, Wizards continues to mine this unique – and potentially important -- design space, although perhaps too apprehensively or hesitantly. Each of the Chancellors is overcosted, not just for the effect, but for the body. None of them is castable by conventional means in Vintage. And the effects, in each case, are quite marginal and timid: Mana Tithe, Elvish Spirit Guide, Raging Goblin, Siphon Soul, Glimpse the Unthinkable (more or less). The cost, in each case then, is not mana, but deck space and the opportunity cost of a dead draw after the opening hand. I don’t fault Wizards for being cautious in developing these kinds of effects. Producing too many pre- game effects can be dangerous. Vintage games are compressed into fewer turns compared to most Magical formats, and so these effects are potentially very important here. Leyline of the Void is among the most played cards in the entire Vintage format, usually in the top 5, and sometimes just behind Force of Will. Serum Powder sees substantial play as well. Leyline of Singularity and Leyline of Sanctity have also seen Vintage play. Gemstone Caverns has also appeared in Vintage Top 8s before. The Siphon Soul Chancellor is pretty clearly unplayable, as that is the least useful potential effect. At least a Raging Goblin token can be used for a variety of other purposes, from Gaea’s Cradle to Diabolic Intent, among others. I don’t think Raging Goblin Chancellor is playable either, but it at least offers interactions that are theoretically useful. The Glimpse the Unthinkable Chancellor has an effect that is not only marginal, but potentially very dangerous. If you were to do this to the opponent you might actually give your opponent a tremendous advantage. You wouldn’t want your opponent to open the game with Bazaar of Baghdad or Goblin Welder after you apply this effect. Perhaps most importantly, decking remains a viable Vintage win condition, but each such victory condition in the format does so in one fell swoop rather than through over time. The three main examples are Jace, the Mind Sculptor’s ultimate, Helm of Obedience with Leyline of the Void in play, or activating Grindstone with Painter’s Servant in play. What that means is that this effect is pretty worthless unless you can also somehow get the guy into play, which seems unlikely. These three Chancellors seem the least playable. That leaves two possibilities. Mana Tithe Chancellor is a potentially potent effect, generating tempo and other advantages. However, this advantage is in large measure negated by simple awareness of it. It’s like telling your opponent you have Daze. They’ll just play around it. Still, the tempo advantage is meaningful, but I don’t think it nearly compensates for the cost of having to run this card. This card would be most effective, I would imagine, in a deck where having it in your opening hand is not a tremendous disadvantage, such as in a Dredge deck. But Dredge decks already have so many excellent options that I don’t think this is worth the space in your maindeck 60. And it almost certainly isn’t worth the precious sideboard space, slots reserved for the post-board war. Elvish Spirit Guide Chancellor actually strikes me as the most playable of the cycle. Elvish Spirit Guide is a powerful effect that sees play in a range of archetypes, from Beats to Belcher. This is yet another way to generate a free mana on your first turn. But, the reduced versatility – the inability to use this as a beater, to use it in subsequent turns, or to even use it to play Myr Superion – make it too narrow to consider it even remotely Vintage playable. If it appears anywhere, I would expect to see it in RG Belcher, where it can be used to play Tinder Wall or cast Manamorphose.