FNM Fun! -Launching a Thaumaturge

Hey everyone welcome back for week #2 in my FNM article series. First, I want to thank everyone for all the positive responses to last weeks article. It's nice to know that everyone appreciates a more fun view on competitive decks! I have a buddy I play with who's favorite quote is "It's all about the fun factor" and you know what I think he's right. A lot of the time we get caught up in the competitive nature of this game and we all forget why we originally started playing. Because it was fun!

Ok, so lets talk a little bit about this weeks deck. I have been saying since the Journey pre-release that Launch the Fleet is a broken card. I have had huge arguments with people who think I am crazy but it won me 3 pre-releases that weekend and I stand by what I have said. So with that being said I also, like most of you realized that launch the fleet and battlefield thaumaturge are ridiculous together, if you can develop a board state that can abuse them! So I have been challenging my friends to take a whack at it!

This past week at FNM I played a more competitive Mono Red Aggro / Splashing Blue deck (We'll Discuss that next week) but my buddy put together the launch / thaumaturge combo deck and gave it a whirl and actually finished pretty solid at 3-1 in 5th place!

So let's look at the deck:

U/W Launch the Thaumaturge ---> by Conrad Tebbetts

Creatures

4x Phalanx Leader

4x Favored Hoplite

4x Battlefield Thaumaturge

3x Brimaz, King Of Oreskos

3x Battlewise Hoplite

2x Mindreaver

1x Ephara, God of the Polis

Spells

4x God's Willing

4x Ajani's Presance

4x Launch the Fleet

3x Dissolve

2x Azorius Charm

Land

4x Hallowed Fountain

4x Temple of Enlightenment

9x Plains

5x Island

Sideboard

3x Rapid Hybridization

2x Detention Sphere

2x Azorius Charm

2x Negate

2x Celestial Flare

1x Pithing Needle

1x Supreme Verdict

1x Cyclonic Rift

1x Imposing Sovereign

[/mtg_deck]

Deck seems pretty straight forward to me. Lots of small quick early drop heroic creatures that have fabulous interactions with each other. Brimaz is just the king of this deck as if he hits with even one leader heroic trigger going off he become pretty much impossible to remove without a kill spell. I'm not personally not sure I like mindreaver in this deck or even the Ephara and after looking at the game notes I think Conrad will agree. A couple of banishing lights (3) or detention sphere's would have been better options in my opinion.

Let's look at what Conrad originally thought his win conditions would be.

Win-Cons:

1. Overwhelm with Creatures, using Battlefield Thaumaturge and Launch the Fleet.
2. Overwhelm with Heroic Creatures, using Phalanx Leader to build Fatties.
3. Control with Mindreavers and Dissolves until lethal combat can be dealt.

Ok let's get into the matchups and see how they went.

Round 1:   Selesnya Aggro

Game 1 : The deck got stuck on 2 lands, and his opponent played voice of resurgence and fleecemane lion. Followed by a few more beat sticks and the deck just couldn't catch up.

Game 2: Conrad was forced to mull to  6 cards, he kept sub-optimal hand. Honestly I feel like this deck allows you to mull to 5 and still be ok. But I can understand not wanting to risk it. His opponent had a great draw and played 2 voice of resurgences back to back turns 2-3, they managed to strap on unflinching courage and the deck never had the chance to catch up.

Match: 0-1 Games: 0-2

MY NOTES:   This is the matchup where I feel those 3 main deck detention spheres shine. I also feel like mulling to 5 against a fast aggro deck was kind of a must. Rough way to start the tournament.

Round 2: B/W Humans

Game 1: The deck came out swinging. Led with Favored Hoplite, into Phalanx Leader, into Battlefield Thaumaturge, and Turn 4 Launch the Fleet, and then during combat targeting Leader with god's willing to pump spawned soldiers for 23 damage on turn 4.

Game 2: After board this was a much closer game, The two decks went back and forth trading off creatures for several turns, unfortunately his opponent drew a Gifts of Orzhov and with no Dissolve in hand he strapped it on a Cartel Aristocrat. A flyer with the ability to gain protection sealed the deal and we were on to game 3.

Game 3:  Was a virtual mirror image repeat of Game 1. The only Difference was that it materialized on turn 6 and not turn 4.

Match 1-1 Games 2-3

MY NOTES:  Again the game the deck lost in my opinion was due to not having the removal the deck needed to clear away a threat. I seriously feel after two rounds that this is what the deck is missing I feel like either D-Sphere's or last breaths would have been amazing in both round 1 or round 2's matchups.

Round 3: B/U Phenax Mill deck

Game 1: Mill has been rearing it's ugly head again lately. With a very aggro format more and more players seem to think that the mill deck my finally get there. I disagree with that and feel mill will always be a second tier strategy that gets lucky. Case in point this game.

Conrad kept a 1 creature and 4 spell hand. He then did not draw another creature for 3 turns. This coupled with being milled left the deck no chance to build a board state, never mind try and win game. So, Death by Mill.

Game 2: Deck came out fast and hard Hopelite into Brimaz, helps you to build up army. Then he dropped Thaumaturge, and finally drew the Launch the Fleet to finish things off and overwhelm his opponents defenders.

Game 3: This was a perfect example of how this deck just goes off. Turn 1 Favored Hoplite, Turn 2 Battlefield Thaumaturge, Turn 3 Brimaz, and Turn 5 Launch the fleet. Need the fleet one turn earlier to really hit the curve perfectly but man do I love a good Death by Kitties.

Match: 2-1 Games 4-4

MY NOTES:   The only thing I would have done different in this matchup is keeping that hand in game one. I feel in most of the current meta matchups (even if you don't know what your opponent is playing) you want creatures first not spells and relying on drawing them instead of starting with them is very risky.

Round 4: B/R Tribal Minotaurs

Game 1: The deck just rolled. Turn 1 Hoplite, Turn 2 Leader, Turn 3 Brimaz, Turn 4 Launch the fleet. Swing for game.

Game 2: So game two was just cute Conrad opened with 3 hoplites in his hand. He had cast all 3 by turn 2, then he added a Leader, played an ajani's presence and a gods willing and aggroed the good old minotaurs to death via heroic triggers!

Match 3-1 Games 6-4.

MY NOTES:  Honestly these games didn't go how I thought they would. I feel like minotaurs is a better aggro plan and they tend to hit really hard and fast and with this deck having hardly any removal I thought Conrad would have a hard time stabilizing against the hoard! With that being said I think we keep coming back to the same thing.... the deck needs a removal suite of some kind. Even if it's in the board.

ALL STARS:

Phalanx Leader & Launch the Fleet. These two cards together are crazy but put together with the other really good cards in the deck (Brimaz, Hoplite, Gods Willing) it is what really makes this deck roll.

Changes:

My suggestions to Conrad would be as follows:

Remove:   Dissolves, Mindreavers, Ephara, Azorius Charm.

Add: (3) Main Board Detention Sphere  

       (2) Spear of heliod

       (2) Fabled Hero - (THIS GUY IS NUTS IN A HEROIC SHELL)

One extra spot - you could use it for an additional of the above or leave Ephara.

Well that is going to wrap it up for this weeks article I hope you guys enjoyed it and I look forward to hearing your thoughts.

As always, Have FUN at FNM!

Rob

As always email/reply for any and all questions.

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