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“You’re not going to cast it for its Overload cost?” CJ asks in surprise. “You’ve got enough mana.”
“Wait,” Mari says, putting one hand on the Angel. “Stop and think first. Why does that play make sense?”
CJ thinks for long enough that you can practically hear the gears grinding in his head. “Because,” he finally concludes, “if the Cyclonic Rift was overloaded, I’d return everything to my hand . . . and then I’d just re-cast the Urbis Protector for another Angel token.”
“Right,” Mari says. “This way, you’re left with just a 1/1 that won’t be able to make another 4/4 flyer without additional help.”
“But you’re still not blocking, right? Does my Kor Skyfisher still hit?”
You tick your life counter down to six. “Yeah,” you say, “the Skyfisher still gets through for two damage.”
You have to admit that you’re impressed. CJ’s tactics have improved a lot since Mari started to take a hand in his education. As it stands, you’re now doing a test run using the decks from your first Modern Masters 2017 booster draft. Mari has alternately been commenting, encouraging and cursing at CJ for the last fifteen minutes.
“Okay,” CJ says. “Second main phase. I’ll tap three to cast Sea Gate Oracle. It enters the battlefield, and I get to choose one of the top two cards of my library.”
“Yeah!” CJ cries, dropping a Deadeye Navigator onto his side of the board. “I’m pairing this with the Urbis Protector. Angel tokens, here we come!”
“Tap your lands,” Mari says absently. “Wait . . . how many lands do you have?”
“Ten, why?”
“So you only have one land left!”
“So?”
Mari sighs. “You’re supposed to try and wait till you have at least 2 mana open,” she explains. “That Navigator might win you the game. It’s not going to help if you leave it wide open to something like a Grisly Spectacle.”
CJ has second thoughts for only about two seconds. “Aw, that’s okay,” he says. “What are the chances that removal’s gonna come up? Besides, I’m at sixteen life!”
“I swear, CJ, you’re backsliding on me again.”
“Just chill, Mari,” CJ says. “Everything’ll be fine. I’ll pass the turn now.”
Mari glances at your hand as you pull a Phantasmal Image during your draw step. She pauses for a while, and then gets an extremely disgusted look on her face.
“You’ve got a really hard lesson coming, CJ,” she mutters. “And if I wasn’t your friend, I’d say that you completely deserve this one.”
It is the start of your first main phase. Defeat CJ before the beginning of his next combat phase.
You are at 6 life, with the following cards in play:
- Wingcrafter (paired with your Pit Keeper)
- Dregscape Zombie
- Pit Keeper (paired with your Wingcrafter)
- Vampire Aristocrat
- 4 Islands
- 4 Swamps
- Rakdos Guildgate
You have the following card in your hand:
You have the following creature cards in your graveyard:
You have not yet played a land this turn. You do not know the identities or order of any of the remaining cards in your library.
CJ is at 16 life and has no cards in his hand. He has the following cards in play:
- Kor Skyfisher (tapped)
- Sea Gate Oracle
- Wall of Frost
- Urbis Protector (paired with CJ’s Deadeye Navigator)
- Deadeye Navigator (paired with CJ’s Urbis Protector)
- 4 Plains (all tapped)
- 6 Islands (five tapped)
If you think you’ve got a great solution in mind, don’t put it in the comments! Instead, send it to puzzles@gatheringmagic.com with the subject line “Puzzle — A Matter of Taste” by 11:59 P.M. EST on Sunday, March 26, 2017. We’ll include the best ones in next week’s article along with the next puzzle!
Last Week’s Puzzle
Last week’s puzzle apparently stumped more than a few people. Correct solutions, however, were received from Norman Dean, Argon Gruber, Allen Smith, Addison Fox, Russell Jones, Hyman Rosen, Ryou Niji, Jonah Comstock, Aaron Golas, Dominic Chan, Gary So, Paul Seitz, and Eli and Will Clendenning. Honorable mentions go to Sean Dennehy, James Peterson, and Sander Rogiers, whose solutions came quite close.
“With only 7 mana and a handful of spells that qualify as removal in hand,” Addison Fox writes, “it's going to be difficult to deal 14 damage in one turn. If only we could get through with an attacker, then Blood Frenzy (even with its Oracle text) could help us out a lot. Luckily, we have two things going for us — Storm is one of the most broken mechanics ever printed, and Felicity's Helm of Awakening reduces the cost of all our spells by 
, giving us just enough to cast everything in our hand and then some.”
But exactly how do you get an attacker through Felicity’s wall of blockers? “We can clear out all the flying blockers with Volcanic Fallout plus Weaver of Lightning,” Allen Smith writes, “so it should be easy, right? Well, not quite:
- The problem is that Black Cat — now that it is equipped with Neurok Hoversail — is one of the creatures we have to get out of the way, which means we will have to discard a card at random.
- Since Blood Frenzy can only be used on attacking or blocking creatures, it has to be played during combat.
- Since we need a maximum storm count, Grapeshot has to be cast after Blood Frenzy. And since Grapeshot is a sorcery, that means we have to cast it during our second main phase, after Black Cat's death trigger has resolved.
- We need to cast all of our spells, so if we discard anything to Black Cat's trigger, we lose!
“If we are lucky enough to choose Black Cat’s discard,” Ryou Niji notes, “we are home free: We have 7 damage from our flyer, 2 from Volcanic Fallout, and 5 from Grapeshot. Of course, we have no such luck, and we must find some reliable way to protect our finisher spell that wants to be cast last, without getting it discarded at random to Black Cat. It turns out that ‘under Mesmeric Fiend’ is a great hiding place for our Storm spell.”
“What follows,” Hyman Rosen writes, “is a delicate dance of timing to make everything happen in the right order:
- For
, cast Graceful Reprieve targeting Mesmeric Fiend. (Storm count: 1) - Weaver of Lightning triggers, targeting Vampire Nighthawk. Vampire Nighthawk takes 1 damage.
- For
, cast Crackling Club on Weaver of Lightning. (Storm count: 2) - Weaver of Lightning becomes 2/4.
- For , cast Ethereal Armor on Black Cat. (Storm count: 3)
- Black Cat becomes 4/4.
- Attack with Voice of Truth.
- For , cast Blood Frenzy on Voice of Truth. (Storm count: 4)
- Weaver of Lightning triggers, targeting Mesmeric Fiend. Mesmeric Fiend takes 1 damage and dies.
- Graceful Reprieve triggers, and Mesmeric Fiend triggers.
- Mesmeric Fiend’s trigger resolves, and Volcanic Fallout returns to our hand.
- Before Graceful Reprieve’s ability resolves, for , cast Volcanic Fallout. (Storm count: 5)
- Weaver of Lightning triggers targeting Black Cat. Black Cat takes 1 damage.
- Felicity activates Cackling Imp targeting us. We lose 1 life, going to 4.
- For
, Felicity activates Screeching Harpy. Screeching Harpy regenerates and taps. - Volcanic Fallout resolves. We take 2 damage and go to 2 life. Felicity takes 2 damage and goes to 12 life.Black Cat takes 2 more damage.Vampire Nighthawk and Cackling Imp die.
- Graceful Reprieve’s ability resolves. Mesmeric Fiend returns to the battlefield.
- Mesmeric Fiend triggers.Felicity must exile our Grapeshot, which is the only card in our hand.
- Blood Frenzy resolves. Voice of Truth becomes 6/5.
It’s particularly notable that you’re the player who controls the delayed triggered ability from Graceful Reprieve. When Mesmeric Fiend and Graceful Reprieve both trigger from the Fiend’s death, their abilities are put on the stack in Active Player / Non-Active Player (APNAP) order, and Mesmeric Fiend’s leaves-play ability will resolve first.
- Sacrifice Crackling Club targeting Mesmeric Fiend.
- Due to state-based abilities, Black Cat becomes a 3/3 with 3 damage, and dies. Black Cat triggers, but we have no cards in hand to discard.
- Crackling Club resolves. Mesmeric Fiend takes 1 damage and dies.
- Mesmeric Fiend triggers.Grapeshot returns to our hand.
- Felicity now has no creature that can block Voice of Truth.She takes 6 combat damage and goes to 6 life.
- During our second main phase, for {R}, cast Grapeshot targeting Felicity.
- Weaver of Lightning triggers once, but its damage doesn’t matter.
- Grapeshot’s storm ability triggers. Copy Grapeshot five times, all targeting Felicity.
- Felicity takes 6 damage and dies.
“I thought there was a very straightforward solution to this puzzle,” Allen admits, “until I realized that Protection from White on Voice of Truth was actually relevant: It prevents you from putting Ethereal Armor onto it! Realizing that Ethereal Armor couldn't be used on my own flier helped me have the breakthrough I needed to get to the actual solution.”
On the other hand, Norman Dean points out that there’s an alternative that doesn’t require you to “hide” anything under Mesmeric Fiend. It does involve suiting up Black Cat with Ethereal Armor, though:
- Tap a Mountain and cast Crackling Club on Voice of Truth (3/5). (Storm count: 1)
- Tap a Plains and cast Ethereal Armor on Felicity's Black Cat (4/4, since you control two enchantments). (Storm Count: 2)
- Tap a Plains and cast Graceful Reprieve targeting Weaver of Lightning. Weaver's ability triggers; deal 1 damage to the Mesmeric Fiend. Volcanic Fallout is returned to your hand. (Storm Count: 3)
- Tap two Mountains and cast Volcanic Fallout. We go to 3 life and Felicity goes to 12 life.
- Weaver of Lightning triggers; deal 1 damage to Vampire Nighthawk.
- Vampire Nighthawk, Cackling Imp, and Screeching Harpy all die. Felicity can regenerate the Harpy, but it will be tapped.She can also ping us with the Imp, but it won't matter.
- Black Cat is a 4/4 with 2 damage on it. (Storm Count: 4)
- Tap a Mountain and cast Grapeshot. Target Felicity with the original and all four copies, for a total of 5 damage. She goes to 7 life. Weaver of Lightning triggers only from the original spell; deal 1 damage to the Cat, which now has 3 damage.
- Attack with Voice of Truth. Before blockers are declared, tap the Stone Quarry and cast Blood Frenzy on the Voice, making it a 7/5. Weaver triggers; deal 1 final point of damage to Black Cat. The Cat dies, but you have no cards left to discard.
- Felicity is at 7 life and has no blockers for your 7-power flyer.
