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Commander Chop Shop – Diaochan Will Smite You!

Ben McDole — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 07:00:07 +0000

Artful beauty? Ben McDole cranks the art and beauty up to... eleven. Turning a Godo deck into Diaochan.

Commander Chop Shop – Savra Is a Machine Gun!

Ben McDole — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 08:17:25 +0000

Another week, another Commander deck in need of Ben's help. This week Ben tackles a Savra deck with just $40 to spend.

Chop Shop #4 – Possession Is Ten-Tenths of the Law

Ben McDole — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 07:00:15 +0000

This week Ben takes on a Sygg, River Cutthroat with a budget of just $20. What changes can he make?

Commander Chop Shop #3 – Nicol Bolas Isn’t a Dragon . . .

Ben McDole — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 06:00:44 +0000

This week Ben McDole works over a true Elder Dragon deck of the biggest baddest most evil dude at the table. That can be only one bad mofo.

Commander Chop Shop #2 – Teysa, the Silent Killer

Ben McDole — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 06:00:25 +0000

Week #2 of Commander Chop Shop is up, this week from among the submissions Ben tackles a Teysa EDH build with a $60 budget.

Commander Chop Shop – Grimgrin

Ben McDole — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 04:39:04 +0000

Ben McDole returns to regular Commander writing with a new series, a deck doctor solely for Commander, this is: Commander Chop Shop.

Pentagram—Really Old School

Ben McDole — Thu, 12 May 2011 06:28:39 +0000

For those of you not in the know, Pentagram is an old variation of multiplayer where each person uses a deck of a single color. Players sit in a circle with their colored decks in the same configuration as the color wheel on the back of a Magic card. The players to your immediate left [...]

End of an Era

Ben McDole — Thu, 05 May 2011 05:59:54 +0000

Before I dive into precisely what the title of this article means, I want to talk a little bit about Overextended—or "Throwback," as we've been calling it. The response to the most recent Throwback article was, shall we say, underwhelming, and as such the tournament is being put on silent mode. Note that this does [...]

Throwback Tourney Rd 1 Deck Lists

Ben McDole — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 06:00:21 +0000

So, in the past two weeks, I have made a discovery: Tournaments are difficult to run. Not so much in a logical sense; as far as that goes, I've run much larger tournaments than the bracket I proposed, but more in the time sense. Everyone started out very excited to run the new format, only [...]

Time to Make Glorious Battle

Ben McDole — Thu, 07 Apr 2011 06:19:52 +0000

Last week, Trick added a poll to the article to see where this series should go, or if the series should even continue. I'm quite happy to say that the responses were greatly in favor of continuing to develop Throwback! The winning choice was for us to create a tournament and smash the decks against [...]

Throwback’s Extended Inspired Combo Decks

Ben McDole — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 06:00:11 +0000

This article refers to the unofficial format called "Throwback," also sometimes called "Overextended." It refers to an Eternal format that includes sets from Mercadian Masques forward, and is still in its infancy — Ben explores how the format should be shaped. See his previous articles for more on this new, budding format. I must confess [...]

Throwback Combo, My Favorite!

Ben McDole — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 06:00:04 +0000

I'll go ahead and say it: I love combo. It might be the mathematician in me, but looking at the intricacy of a deck and trying to fit the pieces together has always appealed to me much more than "creature smash." Maybe this is why I like Legacy so much; it's the place where combo [...]

Extended Control in Throwback

Ben McDole — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 07:00:43 +0000

When we last left, we had listed the control decks in Legacy, with the word control apparently hotly debated. I had lumped the mid-range decks in with the control decks. While I will concede that they are certainly not control in the purest sense of the word, they do fit better in that category than [...]

Control in Throwback

Ben McDole — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 07:00:53 +0000

This week, we are going to be approaching things slightly differently. In the weeks prior, I have first explored Legacy, then, in a separate article, explored Extended. This week, I believe the best option is to look at the two formats simultaneously. Any deck that ends up being control in the new Throwback environment is [...]

Throwback, Extended Aggro!

Ben McDole — Thu, 17 Feb 2011 08:31:54 +0000

Having taken a nice look at the aggro decks featured in Legacy, this week we take a look at the decks from Extended, with a few other homebrews thrown in. My original inclination for this week was to simply look at the Extended decks and break apart possible additions. However, this ended up being slightly [...]