Magic Menagerie makes another of its sporadic appearances in honor of PDCMagic.com’s debut. This time my focus shifts back to Future Extended, where we have recently seen multiple successes by mono-color decks. What advantages and disadvantages do these decks have over more common multi-color decks? How are these advantages and disadvantages different in Future Extended than they are in Standard, where mono-color decks are rarely seen? Find those answers and more inside, as I break down what makes a mono-color deck tick!
Future Extended is home to several mana hungry, bounceland-loving, top heavy, multi-colored decks – namely Cogs and Stripes and Orzhov Blink. These decks take the best cards from three and sometimes even four colors, pack them into one deck with a shaky mana base, and overwhelm the opponent with sheer power. This seems like a good idea, right? It is the mantra of numerous high-profile Magic players to “play the best cards.” Mixing and matching the best cards from multiple colors puts puts this mantra into practice – and, more often than not, it works! Having that much power in the hands of one player provides them with incredible power as well as amazing resiliency. Yet, it does leave them with vulnerabilities: resource denial in the form of counterspells (Mana Tithe and Rune Snag) or land destruction (Stone Rain and Mwonvuli Acid-Moss) can ruin a three-color deck’s day.
Enter the mono-color deck. This is as pure as Magic gets – just throw in a stack of basic lands and you’re good to go. No debating on bounceland and Terramorphic Expanse counts. Deck purity (whatever that means) may be satisfying enough for some, but what advantages does the mono-color deck bring to competitive PDC tournaments? Fortunately for all of us, recent Future Extended events have demonstrated specific traits that give mono-color decks a leg up on the competition.
SPEED
Xtra Crispy is fast; its blazing speed is not diluted by a white splash for Momentary Blink or unnecessary pump spells like Fortify (that sit useless in hand if the board is empty, which happens often with Xtra Crispy). Make no mistake, I think Boros aggro will shine some day in Future Extended, but adding white (or any other color) to a deck like Xtra Crispy contradicts the deck’s core strategy of unrelenting and ruthless aggression. Stompy’s speed, on the other hand, comes in the form of pressure. Stompy drops threats from turn one and simply does not stop. Creature after creature eventually wear the opponent down. Adding another color to a mono-green Stompy deck shifts the entire deck’s strategy. This is not necessarily the wrong choice (depending on the metagame), but it does negate the mono-green advantage of speed via constant pressure.
POWER
Wait a minute … didn’t I already say that multi-color decks are so potent because they “overwhelm the opponent with sheer power?” Yes … yes, I did. Now, I am going to say that mono-color decks can have the edge in overall deck power, as they never have to worry about having the right mana sources in play. In essence, mono-color decks can overpower multi-colored decks simply because a mono-color deck can actually play all of its cards, while a multi-color deck might be stuck on one black source, making a Grim Harvest engine (to cite one common example) impossible to get going. The power of multi-color decks is dependent on amount and type of mana, while the power of mono-color decks is only dependent on the amount.
CONSISTENCY
Truthfully, both of the above traits (Speed and Power) could have been lumped under one category: consistency. This is the attribute that sets mono-color decks apart from their multi-color brethren. Cogs and Stripes can act like a different deck in every round – that is part of what makes it so strong. The opponent has no idea what is coming next. This tendency, however, can be hard for the deck pilot, who cannot rely on their deck to give them the same answers and/or threats every game, making it harder to plan tactically during a game. Blue Beats is going to consistently drop evasive creatures and consistently (with the help of Trinket Mage) get a Bonesplitter into play, turning those creatures into evasive beatsticks. Therefore, the Blue Beats player knows what to expect from his or her deck each and every round, and can easily plan accordingly.
DISADVANTAGES OF MONO-COLOR
Surprise! Mono-color decks have disadvantages, too. In fact, some have been touched on above. Opponents often know a deck’s capabilites from the outset when it is a single color. They know that mono-blue probably means a lack of reach, while mono-green isn’t going to have many ways to stop your plans. In smaller formats, mono-color can also mean using suboptimal cards to avoid splashing for a second color. In Future Extended and Classic, this is not a big problem, as the card pools are much larger. Still, even with these larger card pools, certain mono-color decks are more susceptible to the “autoloss:” an entirely unwinnable matchup. Xtra Crispy simply cannot defeat Orzhov Blink. Stompy is probably going to lose to red-based control, due to its reliance on ground pounders. Unless the mono-color deck’s pilot has a superb sideboard, that’s just the way it is. For this reason, mono-color decks are often great choices for very specific metagames. When Orzhov Blink was nowhere to be seen early in this Future Extended season, Xtra Crispy found itself a game away from a gold medal, earning four medals overall.
TIME SPIRAL
The Time Spiral Block, specifically Planar Chaos, bent the rules of what a single color can do. Blue gained access to aggressive creatures (Infiltrator il-Kor) and spot removal (Piracy Charm), white was given both proactive (Mana Tithe) and reactive (Sunlance) control cards, and green suddenly possessed card drawing on a scale never before seen in the Pauper Deck Challenge. Piracy Charm is one of the reasons for MUC’s resurgence in Classic, while the wide array of aggressive blue creatures has led to tournament victories by Blue Beats in Standard and, most recently, Future Extended. Not since the Mirrodin Block has Pauper Magic seen such a drastic shift in the capabilities of each color. Lorwyn seems to have continued this trend, with cards like Moonglove Extract and Paperfin Rascal bending the rules of what certain colors can and cannot do. As long as this continues, mono-color decks will only become more powerful and versatile.
MONO-COLOR DECKS IN ACTION
At UPDC 2.04, black was the color of the hour. Four players showed up with Mono-Black Control decks: two were discard-heavy, one ran a transmute engine, and the other featured a more aggressive strategy. Results were far from spectacular, but two players eked out Top 8 finishes: eegag with Amensia and ShadezzOfHades with Mono-Black Rats.
AMNESIA (DISCARD-HEAVY MBC)
eegag, Top 8, UPDC 2.04
2 Echoing Decay
2 Last Gasp
4 Phyrexian Rager
4 Rend Flesh
21 Swamp
3 Wrench Mind
4 Augur of Skulls
4 Gathan Raiders
2 Grim Harvest
3 Mournwhelk
3 Prismatic Lens
2 Rakdos Carnarium
3 Strangling Soot
3 Tendrils of Corruption
Sideboard
2 Echoing Decay
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Wail of the Nim
1 Wrench Mind
4 Wrecking Ball
The idea of this deck is to force the opponent into topdeck mode, and then take out any threats they drop from that point on. Unfortunately, many of the cards were too slow or useless in certain matchups. Amnesia was also prone to suffer from floods of discard or removal. One possibly remedy is the addition of more creatures to the deck, giving it time to draw into the right cards.
MONO-BLACK RATS
ShadezzOfHades, Top 4, UPDC 2.04
1 Sadistic Augermage
2 Vampire Bats
4 Chittering Rats
3 Dross Golem
3 Last Gasp
3 Okiba-Gang Shinobi
4 Ravenous Rats
24 Swamp
2 Grave Scrabbler
4 Grim Harvest
2 Mournwhelk
4 Tendrils of Corruption
4 Thieving Sprite
Sideboard
3 Echoing Decay
1 Last Gasp
3 Skullsnatcher
1 Terror
4 Augur of Skulls
2 Delirium Skeins
1 Mournwhelk
ShadezzOfHades’ deck featured just that: a higher creature count making it more aggressive yet retaining a disruptive element with Ravenous Rats and Chittering Rats. Dross Golem and Vampire Bats also gave it evasion that was key to both enabling Ninjutsu and forcing through points of damage – something that Amnesia lacked.
Both decks suffer the same weaknesses: enchantment-heavy decks like Nightwalker or Orzhov, Flashback decks that feature Teachings and Think Twice, and decks that thrive on getting stuff back from the graveyard. Discard has its limits, especially in a format with Dredge, Izzet Chronarch, Death Denied, and Grim Harvest. However, one deck was able to truly exploit the mono-color advantages of speed, power, and consistency.
Mono-Black Rats was entirely black, without even a minute splash for Strangling Soot’s Flashback cost. Amnesia, on the other hand, ran both Strangling Soot and Gathan Raiders (supported by Rakdos Carnarium and Prismatic Lens). These inclusions made the deck more susceptible to land destruction and residual artifact hate (such as Icefall). Eegag also found himself unable to hardcast a Gathan Raiders in the late game. Instead, he played it for its morph cost and subsequently lost it to Last Gasp or even Echoing Decay. Which version was better? Mono-Black Rats defeated Amnesia in the second round, and made it further in the elimination rounds. I’d say that, for the time being, the answer to that question is quite clear.
For those who have made the jump from Standard to Future Extended in the Pauper Deck Challenge, the amount of successful single-color decks may come as a surprise. In Standard, black has not had enough good removal, red has lacked the necessary combination of aggressive creatures and burn, and green could not find the right mix of beaters and growth. Future Extended’s wider card pool eliminates those concerns, and creates an environment where mono-color decks are not only viable, but can also be an advantageous alternative to multicolor “good stuff” decks. Mono-Black Control, Xtra Crispy, Stompy, and Blue Beats have all placed in the Top 4 of a Future Extended tournament – with the latter two decks capturing one win a piece. Are you tired of being color screwed by your three-color deck or losing tons of tempo to early bouncelands? Look no further than mono-color in Future Extended.
Unfortunately, this makes it harder for me to play ponza as it only encourages more players to try mono-color decks, even though, nice article eegag!
Well, there’s always bouncelands, but even they seem hideously underplayed.
above was yours truly, oops!
Bouncelands aren’t ridiculously underplayed. They are played in just about every multicolor deck. However, one of their big problems is the horrible loss in tempo if they are destroyed, especially if this happens in the early game.
That is far from a “big” problem compared to the other 95% of the time when they function as two cards in one.
good read Big E.
krosan: LD doesnt have to cut off a color or hit bounce to work, holding a mono color deck to 3 lands still reduces its options.
@TGD: Actually, it is one of their big problems. I never said it was a big problem, I said it is one of their big problems, meaning of the issues with bouncelands, land destruction is one of its worse problems. (If that makes any sense at all)
THIS IS NOT A BLACK CARD.
Farking hilarious.
We’ll see if anyone at UPDC takes this advice…