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Main » Articles » Throwback, Extended Aggro!

Throwback, Extended Aggro!

Ben McDole
Posted on February 17, 2011
 Reddit

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 problematic. First, Extended decks are not all that much different from their Legacy brothers. Second, there are actually fewer Extended aggro decks than there are Legacy versions. While this would normally be something of a downer, we always look on the bright side! Really, this just means we can look at some homebrew decks a little earlier than expected. After all, who doesn’t like a good rogue deck?

Let’s kick things off with Red Deck Wins. Your typical Extended RDW build is a little burn-light compared to the Legacy variant, but offers some unique card choices. A recent PTQ-winning list looks something like:

"Extended Red Deck Wins (typical build)"

There are certainly some interesting card choices that can be improved upon. One card that screams to be included is Grim Lavamancer. Walking shock is too good to pass up, and shores up a lot of problematic control matches. It’s also worth noting that there are a few burn spells that may be included. Char and Incinerate will both be legal, as will Magus of the Scroll, for a little pseudo–Cursed Scroll action. I’m not sure if it is worth including more fetch lands or not, but the Onslaught fetches will certainly give us more reach with Lavamancer, and perhaps a color splash if Kor Firewalker gets big. Lava Spike and Flames of the Blood Hand are very tempting changes to make if the Volcanic Fallouts are not working in the main deck.

Though some of the cards are definitely metagame calls, I think that this list is an excellent Extended deck to begin with.

Next up we have a deck which is fairly unique to Extended: Green/White tokens. Tokens certainly come in both Green/White and Black/White varieties, but I’ll be featuring the Green/White version. This deck has definite surprise going for it and can sometimes win games out of nowhere. One of the more conventional lists I’ve seen looks like the following:

"Extended Green/White Tokens (typical build)"

One thing I will mention: I understand that Leyline of Sanctity is a solid metagame call, but I question if it is necessary in most cases. Shutting down Vendilion Clique and hand disruption can be important, but not necessarily at the cost of weakening the deck against other matchups. I also question the single Overrun, since that is another card that can simply win matches. It might be worth including a copy of Eldrazi Monument, as it could be devastating from underneath a hideaway land. Ajani Goldmane seems like if he goes unanswered then the game could be over rather quickly, another card that might need to be have the numbers bumped.

Next up we have Vengevine Naya, which can almost be described as a mid-range deck, but will fit our purposes just fine. Vengevine Naya serves a similar purpose to Zoo in the Legacy metagame. If we can get an unobstructed first few turns, the draw is explosive. Your typical Vengevine Naya list looks something like the following:

"Extended Vengevine Naya (typical build)"

The most obvious changes to be made are to the mana base. Shock lands and on-color fetches make a world of difference smoothing out what was an already stable mana base. Tarmogoyf is a creature we could also easily fit into this list, probably replacing the Figure of Destiny or a similarly smaller creature. Again, Grim Lavamancer could find a home as a nice Ranger of Eos target, having decent synergy with Fauna Shaman and providing some nice interactions with Basilisk Collar out of the board. Lavamancer could easily serve the same role as Cunning Sparkmage, just in a cheaper form. The possibilities for this deck with its toolbox shell are quite large.

Last, but not least, we have Faeries. I greatly dislike this deck, mostly because of the silly synergy and because every creature can be cast at instant speed. That being said, the deck needs to be mentioned. There are a few silly variants, with the exact numbers on discard and disruption and even Vendilion Clique varying greatly. Here is a recent PTQ-winning list:

"Extended Faeries (typical build)"

Faeries is such a linear strategy that I’m not entirely sure what we could do, aside from improving the mana. There could be an argument made for adding Go for the Throat in place of Agony Warp; however Agony Warp neuters two attackers at once, which could be crucial. Daze, of course, would be a sexy addition, giving the deck a little early-game reach, though the loss of tempo might be too much to overcome in such a turn-based list. Testing will let us know for sure!

There are two notable omissions that are tearing up Extended right now: Jund, and (sort of) Tempered Steel. Tempered Steel is more of "Affinity lite," and Jund is very much a mid-range deck. While there are certainly very fast draws Jund is capable of, I’d like to place it more accurately as being an aggro control deck, fitting in better in another article.

Last but not least, we have one of my favorites, Blue/Green Madness. U/G Madness rapidly got outclassed in Legacy, especially once Survival of the Fittest was banned. That being said, I think that a Throwback version could be a legitimate contender. One of the lists from when Madness was Extended-legal looked something like the following:

"Blue/Green Madness (typical build)"

There are clearly a few cards that need to be removed. Roar of the Wurm, Deep Analysis, and Chrome Mox are probably all ineffective, and are no longer necessary. Waterfront Bouncer provides another one-drop discard outlet and can make the Vengevines we will be adding quite active. Fauna Shaman would also fit nicely into this list, giving us discard and tutoring, a sexy blend of card advantage that is hard to come by. I feel like we need to find a way to incorporate Memnite to be able to trigger Vengevines with some regularity. All told, I think that Blue/Green Madness has more than a reasonable shot in the new format, and I am in fact making it my “project” deck for the upcoming gauntlet.

Well, that’s all I have for aggro for Throwback. Join me next week when I look at some of the pure control decks from Legacy and decide precisely what they’re missing. (I’ll give you a hint, it’s a lot!) Until next week, I hope you enjoy the lists. This format is exciting!

TAGS articles, casual, constructed, aggro, throwback, overextended

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