李天骑

Alas, Sixteen is not Twenty: Draco Explosion in Extended
Nicolas Labarre

Has anybody mentioned yet that January Extended might see the return of seemingly outdated decks? Funny, I thought I remembered reading that somewhere…

Anyway, it’s been common knowledge for about a month that Extended is no longer a degenerate format. Until someone manages to break it again, that is. In the meanwhile, it shall once again be a realistic possibility to win with decks that do not try to break every single established rule of the game (such as the importance of card-advantage, the one-land a turn limit and such). Interestingly enough, from what I’ve heard over the last few weeks, this has in fact already been the case even before the bannings, notably with the widespread success of Red Deck Wins (which indeed won most of the qualifiers in France). Nevertheless, people seem to be afraid of the possibilities suggested by this format shift. A few days ago Zvi dealt with the three consensus dominant archetypes to come: Red Deck Wins, Rock and Tog; while I’m tempted to add UG to this list, considering its past success in PTQs, I fully agree that these will dominate the second half of the season.

However, I also fully believe that the format offers a much broader range of viable decks, though most of them might have trouble dealing with a specific member of the quatuor. I already mentioned WW in a previous article, and in spite of the dubiousness with which the article was welcomed, I can’t think of any reason why it would not be good in that metagame. Alluren also comes to mind a one of the most important semi-underground archetypes, along with Suicide black, Reanimator or white-based Scepter decks.

Then, there are the truly underground decks. Need I mention I just love those?

Among them, and old favourite of mine can be found: Draco-Explosion.

A case could be made to demonstrate that this was only a negligible epiphenomena in a barely defined post-PT Houston environment, when Regis Lavoisier made top 8 in Reims. Of course, Sam Gommersal later reached top 16 at GP New-Orleans, but that was before Scourge, before Mirrodin, before the successive bannings… in other words, in a format that did not have much to do with Extended over the last 6 months. In his post-banning overview, Zvi summed up this opinion by stating that : “Draco’s opponents have better tools against it than they used to, and that should keep Draco second class”. Convincing isn’t it? Not quite so, though, when you remember that he was fresh out of a defeat at the PT against Regis Lavoisier, again playing the deck.

Regis finished in the top 64. Not a year ago, not even six months ago, but at PT New-Orleans, in what was arguably the most degenerate extended since the dual-land rotation. Let us have a look at his deck, shall we?

Draco Explosion Regis Lavoisier


2003 PT New Orleans - None Place

Format: Extended - Mirrodin

Main Deck
3 Draco

4 Accumulated Knowledge
4 Brainstorm
4 Counterspell
2 Cunning Wish
1 Earthquake
4 Erratic Explosion
1 Fact or Fiction
4 Fire/Ice
3 Intuition
3 Mana Leak
1 Mystical Tutor
3 Scroll Rack

1 Caldera Lake
2 Faerie Conclave
7 Island
1 Lonely Sandbar
4 Mountain
2 Polluted Delta
4 Shivan Reef
2 Wooded Foothills

SB
2 Cursed Totem
2 Fact or Fiction
1 Fault Line
2 Mana Short
1 Meltdown
1 Misdirection
3 Pyroclasm
1 Rack and Ruin
1 Shattering Pulse
1 Sonic Burst



Just to make sure no one is left behind: the deck aims at triggering an Erratic Explosion for 16 points at the opponent, by revealing a strategically situated Draco. Said Draco will have been put there thanks to either Brainstorm or Scroll Rack. In other words, this is a one-card combo that uses two other spells to set itself up.

Oh, you might have noticed that 16 is not exactly equal to 20. The basic theory is that in a format as fast as extended, most decks will naturally sacrifice a few life points in exchange for a better mana base, either through fetch or painlands. In case some of your most narrow-minded opponents actually cling to their remaining four life points (a Red deck wins player might be an example of so stubborn an attitude), you still have some tools to finish them, such as Earthquake, Fairy Conclaves, Fire/Ice or even a wished-for Sonic Burst.

Between GP Reims 2003 and PT New-Orleans 2004, Regis only tweaked the main deck by one card: his previous version ran only 3 Erratics, and one more Cunning wish. For obvious reasons, though, the sideboard was radically altered to take care of a very different metagame. At first glance, this permanence might be mistaken for laziness on Regis’s part, were it not for his continued success. The better explanation is that the deck does not need to adapt. It functions as an archetypal UR control design, and there are very few cards powerful enough to be integrated in such a design, along with Accumulated Knowledge, Counterspell, Intuition and Fire/Ice. When Sam Gomersall played it, he replaced Cunning Wish with Fact or Fiction, and that was it. Consider this: you might actually replace the Explosions, Draco and some Scroll racks with Psychatogs and card drawers, and what you’d get would be pretty close to a classical Burning Tog deck.

So, what’s the point of not doing this swap? Basically, with Draco explo, you pretend to be a control player, and when you enter the mid-game, instead of tightening your grip on the game, you just win. That’s the theory, in any case. To a certain extent, this could be compared to Wake last summer: you could play control, but basically, all you wanted to do was survive until you got your combo (Wake and Decree in that case).

Are there alternative builds for the deck?

This is indeed an important question, since it would seem that Vampiric Tutor could be the best card for this deck: it allows you to get the Explosion, but also to put the Draco on top of your library. Such an approach is slightly problematic, however. Unless you try to maintain the general control outline of the deck, and find yourself hurting your mana-base just to upgrade your Intuitions, or you decide to take a more radical approach and go for the toolbox (and possibly Nightscape Familiar). However, in that case, it seems probable that you will be better served with a Scepter deck, such as the one Kibler and others used in Anaheim. This in turn implies other vulnerabilities (to Pernicious Deed, to Seal of Cleansing…). In other words, I believe that going for a hybrid build is not as good an idea as it might seem. Of course, you could also try the deck as an control black variant, with just a red splash for Explosion (since the combo does not need blue, after all), but for the moment, Counterspell and Brainstorm serve the deck better than Duress and Skeletal Scrying. The structural problem of Draco-explosion lies in the fact that while “efficient”, it just cannot be fast (and Chrome Mox is so bad with Scroll rack that it just isn’t an option), which means that you have to gain control of the game, if only for a short while. Vampiric Tutor builds would need to speed things up to take full advantage of the more efficient but also more costly tutoring ability, which would imply running such things as Talismans or Familiars and thus making you once more vulnerable to Pernicious Deed. With the deck already barely efficient enough to compete in an unknown field, that’s not a risk you should take.

While it is tempting to just re-use Regis list, it can be worthwhile to try and streamline it for the new metagame. At first glance, the deck loses to Psychatog after board, since they can probably set themselves up for a real control war. Game one can go either way, though, since they will very probably have dead cards, in the form of creature removal, and only as many hard counters as you. Scroll Rack is also better than Fact or fiction, since there are so few relevant cards on each side. In other words, this is not as bad as it may seem, especially if you consider that the deck has a lot of way to dodge the Tog player’s Duress.

This last remark, however, is especially relevant in the Rock matchup. Even more so since between their creature removals (I assume these will be found in most decks after January 1st), their next-to-useless Deeds and their irrelevant card-advantage, it is extremely hard for them to attack you, except with their discard. Basically, all you have to do is make sure they do not have too much early pressure (thus, Firing at their mana-producers is both satisfying and efficient) and relax. Oh, sure, they can gain some life. That’s cute. Just combo them again.

Red deck wins is harder. Fire/Ice is your best weapon, and it’s usually rather hard to lose if you play one of these early. Tapping a Firecat before it attacks gets you bonus points for style. The main problem here is to play around the mana-control elements in RDW (although Pillage and Tangle wire might leave the deck in the new format). To do so, you basically have to play a lot of basic/fetch lands and make sure you can draw enough of them early. Then, there is the additional problem of being able to actually deal the last four points before their creatures finish you. The match-up is not exactly bad, but it could be significantly improved, especially for game 2 and 3 (note that there isn’t much they can bring in against you).

Finally, UG is probably the worst of the four main match-ups. Realistically, you need to reach five mana, have a counter available and the whole combo set up to win this. That’s a lot to ask, especially if you consider that Fire/Ice isn’t nearly as effective as in most other match-ups, if your opponent is careful not to run his Wallas and Aquamoebas into them. Going first, it’s not that bad, but I really don’t see any way you can win this if they run Daze and win the die-roll. Fortunately, UG has lost much of its ground over the last months, and might have real problems with most Scepter decks.

Knowing this, it becomes possible to try and improve the deck. Owing to RDW current’s popularity, I would suggest to remove the two awkward lands, the Lair and the Lonely Sandbar. While both are useful, they make you vulnerable to both Wasteland and Dust bowl in a somewhat unnecessary fashion. Then, it makes sense to go up to four Scroll Rack. While they’re not exactly exciting against really agressive strategies, they are your most efficient weapon against Tog, Rock and pretty much every deck that does not plan to have got rid of you by turn four. In my experience, it is much more efficient and important that the lone Fact or Fiction (besides, I’d probably run a Deep Analysis over this one).

The next question is whether to keep the Wishes in. I would suggest that they are not really necessary if you manage to deal with Isochron Scepter. Most of the other permanents I can think of are either irrelevant or just not annoying enough to warrant using the ever-precious main deck space. Running a Boomerang you can tutor for (adding one or two copies of Mystical Tutor, obviously) is a possibility, but you could also possibly run some copies of Stifle. Unfortunately, while this last possibility has its charms, both weakens you significantly against classical Tog and Rock. The Wishes are clumsy, but they get the work done. However, two doesn’t sound really good to me. I’d rather be running three and justify and dedicated sideboard or alternatively only one, with two Mystical Tutors, as an emergency access to a generic sideboard. For now, I’d go with the three Wishes, cutting an Erratic Explosion to do so.

Finally, you could consider swapping Mana Leak for Force Spike. If you expect a lot of RDW and UG, by all means do. Right now, I think you’re more likely to encounter Tog and Rock, but that may change very quickly. Too bad you can’t find enough room to play all these counters, but then again, if you want to play a real control game, just go with Tog.

Having streamlined the maindeck a little, let us direct our attention to the sideboard. The problem here is that most of the efficient answers, such as Chill and Defense Grid hurt you as well. A few Wish target will also take up some space, and that’s another constraint:

-Misdirection
-Chain of Vapor
-Shattering Pulse (probably the best artifact removal available, and you’ll need one to stop the Scepter)
-Fact or Fiction
-Sonic Burst (16+4?)
-Mana Short

That leaves 9 spots. I would suggest running a couple of Future Sight. Basically, these are must-counter for any control deck, and they just win the game against Rock. For the PTQ season, that seems worth two slots. Of course, the Sight is especially good in this deck, since it also indicates the exact moment when you need to use your Explosion, while interacting nicely with Scroll rack.

Pyroclasm is a must. Use four.

Have you noticed the Cursed Totems in Regis’s decklist? Well, that’s a good way to cripple UG beyond recognition. However, you might want to improve the number of versatile sideboard cards available. In that case, I’d suggest running two more Chain of Vapors.

One last spot? Probably Fault Line, then. While the card is terrible on its own (for current Extended, that is; it used to be quite good in Urza Block Constructed), nothing is more frustrating than to lose a game to a random creature with your Wishes only getting bounce and card-drawers.

Thwart, Dominate, more Mana Shorts, Teiferi’s response, a full set of Submerge… there are many more cards you might want to fit in, but for the moment, I’d go with these 15.

Overall, that gives us:

Draco Explosion

Nicolas Labarre

Format: Extended - Mirrodin

Main Deck

3 Draco

4 Accumulated Knowledge
4 Brainstorm
4 Counterspell
3 Cunning Wish
1 Earthquake
3 Erratic Explosion
4 Fire/Ice
2 Intuition
3 Mana Leak
2 Mystical Tutor
4 Scroll Rack

2 Faerie Conclave
9 Island
4 Mountain
2 Polluted Delta
4 Shivan Reef
2 Wooded Foothills

SB
3 Chain of Vapor
1 Fact or Fiction
2 Fault Line
2 Future Sight
1 Mana Short
1 Misdirection
4 Pyroclasm
1 Sonic Burst



I wouldn’t say Draco-Explosion is THE deck to play right now in a PTQ, especially if you don’t have any practice with it. However, as long as it retains its surprise factor, this seems to be a viable archetype, as shown by its renewed performances over the last year. At the very least, it’s a deck I would not mind playing if I were to try and qualify for Kobe.

- Nicolas Labarre

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