[Deck] Angel Stompy

[Zilla]

INTRO:
The following is a project I've been working on since about a month before September's B/R changes. I never released the list, as I wanted to do a more thorough matchup analysis for it, which never happened due to the major changes to the format. The deck was exceedingly strong then, and it won me a Mana Drain in a local tournament, facing powerhouse opposition like MUD, Dragon, and Zilla Stompy.

With the B/R changes, the deck lost only one card, that being Skullclamp. It was a rather vital piece to the deck's strategy, as it was its sole draw engine. While I felt this loss could likely be compensated in the new format, my attention was turned to other projects during September and October, being that the original assumption by many (including myself) was that the available artifact accelleration was likely to give rise to a format dominated by combo, which is Angel Stompy's least favorite decktype to face.

Recent months of tournament data have proven the inaccuracy of this original assessment, and Ezrengel's Turbo-Angel thread reminded me that Angel Stompy might have some merit once more. I was still worried about the loss of Skullclamp, but Ezrengel's list was running Sword of Fire and Ice as an ostensible replacement, much like RG survival's solution to the same conundrum. I had doubts, but testing proved that the Sword was an excellent call. It is an absolute powerhouse in the deck, likely moreso than any other deck I've ever tested it in, including RG Survival. Not only did it help to shore up the deck's draw problem, but it provided more robustness to its creatures, a stronger game against RG Survival and Goblins, the ability to protect threats from Tradewind Bounce, and, most importantly, provided another means of creature destruction; one of my biggest concerns with the original build outside of the combo matchup. The reason that I say it is likely stronger in this build than in any other I've tested is because with 7 double-mana sources, the deck can commonly and consistently cast and equip a Sword by turn 3. Good times.

Inspired by ObFreely's assertion that Mask of Memory was a powerful draw engine for mono-white, I've been testing it as well, also to great effect. The deck currently runs 3 Swords and 3 Masks, giving it an insanely strong and consistent draw engine. It is not at all uncommon to outdraw control builds running the Intuition/AK engine with this build. Combined with massive draw, the deck's extreme threat density gives it a strong game against both control and aggro.

Lastly, because of the heavy slant towards broken artifacts and enchantments in the new format, the revised build, unlike its predecessor, is running maindecked Disenchants. Interestingly, despite what seem like a lot of changes, the deck plays nearly identically to the way it did before the B/R changes, and if anything it is more consistently brutal than before.

On to the decklist, then card analysis and matchups:

//NAME: UPDATED Legacy Angel Stompy (Current as of 6/10/06)
// Mana
16 Plains
4 Ancient Tomb
2 Chrome Mox
// Beats
4 Mother of Runes
2 Savannah Lions
4 Isamaru, Hound of Konda
4 Silver Knight
4 Soltari Priest
4 Exalted Angel
// Control & Draw
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Disenchant
2 Mask of Memory
2 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Sword of Fire and Ice
4 Parallax Wave
// Sideboard
SB: 3 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 4 Pithing Needle
SB: 2 Disenchant
SB: 2 Rule of Law
SB: 4 Armageddon



//NAME: Older Legacy Angel Stompy (Current as of 2/18/06)
// Mana
13 Plains
4 Ancient Tomb
3 Chrome Mox
3 Tithe
// Beats
4 Mother of Runes
4 Savannah Lions
1 Isamaru, Hound of Konda
4 Silver Knight
4 Soltari Priest
4 Exalted Angel
// Control & Draw
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Disenchant
2 Mask of Memory
3 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Sword of Fire and Ice
3 Parallax Wave
// Sideboard
SB: 3 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 4 Pithing Needle
SB: 2 Disenchant
SB: 2 Rule of Law
SB: 4 Armageddon


BASIC STRATEGY ANALYSIS:
At its very core, the deck plays like classic White Weenie in most regards: It has a very finely tuned curve, and plays an endless stream of efficiently costed threats with inherent protection or evasion abilities, until the opponent has been overwhelmed. Unlike Classic Weenie, it also has a very robust draw engine, and the ability to accelerate into real, game-ending threats in the first few turns, creating an often unrecoverable board position for the opponent as early as turn 4. This ideology is owed to JP Meyers' White Lightning concept. However, where his concept maindecks Armaggeddon and Tangle Wire, this concept replaces those control elements with a much more aggressive strategy, fundamentally more suited to the current Legacy metagame.


CARD CHOICES:

Manabase:

Plains: Yup, we need those.

Ancient Tomb, Chrome Mox: Broken mana accellerants, allowing for early resolution of Exalted Angels, Masks of Memory, Jittes, and Swords of Fire and Ice. Fundamentally important to the deck's ideology. Chrome Mox is particularly strong because of its synergy with Tithe and Armageddon, and because it allows you to play a turn 1 Morphed Angel or Sword of Fire and Ice.

Creatures:

Mother of Runes: Provides protection for your threats. A strong (and not atypical) play for this deck is turn 1 Mom, turn 2 Morph, turn 3 attack with Unmorphed Exalted Angel, with Mom backup. Very strong. Also, she can act as an infinite chump blocker against a lot of aggro opponents, by simply blocking and giving herself protection from the appropriate color in response.

Savannah Lions An evasive 1cc creature that rounds out the deck's mana curve. It's a very important inclusion, because aside from Mother of Runes, it's one of the deck's only first turn drops capable of equipping and attacking by turn 2, and Mother of Runes really wants to be playing defense, not offense. Theoretically, this slot can be Soltari Foot Soldier, Suntail Hawk, or Lantern Kami, but the extra power on the Lions can be important in racing control and in winning ground wars against other aggro.

Silver Knight: Insanely strong in this environment. Standalone defense against most weenie creature onslaughts, with Pro:Red making it highly resilient to removal. Shuts down Goblins' and Zilla Stompy's entire creature base single-handedly.

Soltari Priest: More Pro:Red, which as previously stated, is insanely strong in the current meta. Their inherent evasion provides excellent synergy with Mask of Memory and Sword of Fire and Ice, turning your 2cc investment into an unstoppable drawing/damage machine. So good.

In the original Angel Stompy build, this slot was reserved for Whipcorders. The biggest reason for this is because they allowed you to play a "bait and switch" game against control and burn, forcing them to guess whether or not you were playing a face down 'Corder or Angel on turn 2, and requiring them to answer it for fear that it's an Angel. While this strategy was strong, it is less so in the current format, particularly because Mana Drain is banned, which was another significant reason for running a high morph count. In the current format, Soltari Priests are certainly the better choice.

Exalted Angel: The deck's namesake, and one of the best creatures in the format. With your mana accelleration, you can have one of these babies attacking and gaining you massive board position as early as turn 3, often protected by Mother of Runes. Simply put, she commonly creates an unrecovable position for your opponent, and against most aggro, an early Angel = "I win."

Control & Draw:

Swords to Plowshares: Best creature removal in the game. Check.

Disenchant: With the high amount of artifact- and enchantment-based strategies in the current format (e.g., Crucible, Shackles, Chalice, Survival), there are very few matchups where maindecked Disenchants aren't going to be a good idea.

Mask of Memory: Explained in the intro. One of the deck's 3(!) card advantage engines, if you include Tithe. Has excellent synergy with your Tombs and Cities, often allowing you to attack with an equipped creature as early as turn 2. On a Soltari Priest, it's an extremely resilient draw engine.

Umezawa's Jitte: The best equipment ever printed. Singlehandedly wins games against aggro. It speeds up your clock, removes your opponent's threats, and provides additional lifegain when necessary. Particularly strong because, unlike Mask and Sword, you don't actually need to connect to benefit from its effect.

Sword of Fire and Ice: Also explained in the intro. More card advantage, as well as enhanced creature removal. Is insanely strong in the Goblins and RG Survival matchup, as well as in Burn and ATS. So very, very savage.

Parallax Wave: Provides mass creature removal of sorts, and allows you all kinds of interesting tricks. Not only can it rid you of pesky hard-to-remove creatures like Wild Mongrel, Psychatog and even Morphling (by responding to untargettability with Wave until they run out of mana), but it can be used to protect your own creatures from opposing removal by phasing them out in response to their being targeted. Wave is a very versatile form of removal and defense in a single package.

Sideboard:

Tormod's Crypt: A speedbump against Thresh, mainly, which is all you really need to stay competitive against them. Also good against Dredge Tog, Loam-based strategies, and Salavager Game.

Pithing Needle: Pithing Needle answers Landstill's Manlands, Goblins' Vials, and Survival's Survivals and Spore Frogs, among a great many other things. The Needle simply shores up a huge number of the deck's potential weaknesses.

Disenchant: Extreme redundancy for matchups which could otherwise be difficult. This includes but is not limited to ATS and Ravager Affinity.

Rule of Law: Bolsters your Solidarity/Tendrils matchups.

Armageddon: Improves your control matchup, but its strongest function is as an additional tool against Solidarity, allowing you a second means of disrupting their win, in conjunction with Rule of Law.


CARDS NOT CHOSEN:

Enlightened Tutor: Yup. I know the question is on your minds. Testing with Tutors was not positive at all. First, it is inherent card and tempo disadvantage, which this deck hates. Second, all of the threats you'd use it to search for you want in multiples, meaning that replacing some of them with Tutor isn't a strong strategy. Third, with as many card advantage engines already available, you typically see at least one of whatever you'd be searching for relatively early in the game. Tutor is a no-go. Don't ask.


MATCHUP ANALYSIS:

Goblin Sligh: Basically a bye. Goblins can win one in maybe ten matches against you, and that basically requires a turn 1 Lackey > turn 2 SGC draw, assuming you don't have an StP in your opening 7. The 8 Pro:Red creatures and 2-3 SoFIs, along with the lifegain from Angel and Jitte make this matchup extremely strong.

Burn: A strong matchup. The Burn player is forced into a tough position, being forced to choose between killing off your threats and aiming burn at your dome. If they neglect your threats, you can race them consistently. With 8 Pro:Red threats, as well as 2-3 SoFI and the lifegain provided by Angel, this is a tough match for the Burn player to win. In theory, you could run Pariah in the board for an essential bye against this matchup, but it's already so positive it's likely not worth the space it would take up in the SB.

Ravager: A good matchup. Your high threat and removal contingent combined with their relative lack of removal means that you've got a strong ability to win a ground war against them. Swords to Plowshares, Disenchant, Parallax Wave, and Null Rod from the board make for a positive matchup here.

UG Madness: A good matchup. You have a much denser threatbase than they do, and plenty of removal for their threats. Sword of Fire and Ice allows for added protection and removal. Combined with Swords to Plowshares and Parallax Wave, they rarely keep threats on the table long enough to matter. Because of their almost complete lack of removal, a single significant threat resolved on your side of the table can easily be ridden to victory.

Wayfarer White Weenie: A very good matchup. This is essentially a mirror match, except you're faster, have higher threat density, more removal, and bigger threats.

Pox/Poxicide/MBC: Untested. I'll update with results when I have them. Note, however, that if Mono-Black's track record of suckitude against aggro holds true, this matchup should be positive in the extreme.

RG Survival: A positive matchup. Because the vast majority of RG's removal is red-based, your creature base is extremely resilient to their removal. The only potential non-red removal they might be running is Masticore and/or Duplicant. Testing has shown that Masticore typically hits the table too late to really make a difference, and can be removed with Swords, Disenchant, or Parallax Wave. Duplicant is the other removal, and it only answers a single one of your overwhelmingly dense threats. RG Survival has classically had a weakness to fat creatures like Exalted Angel, and this is to your advantage. Further, Sword of Fire and Ice is a house in this matchup, protecting even more of your threats from their removal, and concurrently removing their own threats. Svg.

ATS: Not thoroughly tested. Early results seem positive. A lot of what was said in the RG matchup applies here. Besides packing maindecked answers to Survival, your speed, high threat count, and high removal contingent are all strong assets here. Sword of Fire and Ice is particluarly strong here, as it grants protection from Tradewind bounce, assuming your opponent lives long enough to resolve one.

Landstill: A difficult matchup. This matchup is rather draw dependent, and depends somewhat on the Landstill build you're facing. It's not uncommon to outdraw them, thus overwhelming their counter defense with threats is not overly difficult. Maindeck Sealt provides some defense against Disk, and is added removal against their threatbase. Parallax Wave can also protect your threats from Disk, by phasing them out in response to Disk activation. Decree of Justice from the board allows you to effectively dodge Standstill, and in fact makes it a liability for them to cast it. Armageddon is strong here as well, for obvious reasons. Overall, you have a variety of viable strategies against the Landstill opponent.

BBS: Not thoroughly tested. I'll update with results when I have them. Note that I have a feeling a lot of what was said in the Landstill matchup analysis likely applies here as well.

Burning Tog: Somewhat limited testing here, but early results look positive. You have plenty of removal for their Nightscape Familiars and Togs, and their FtKs are rather subpar because of your high Pro:Red count. SoFI is a beating and a half. It's not overly difficult to outdraw them and simply overwhelm them with threats.

Belcher: Not an overly positive matchup, but not an overly difficult one either. Results here are heavily build and draw dependent. Attack their manabase with Swords (Birds) and Seals (Moxen, Petals, etc.), and remove Welders with Swords as well. Bring in Null Rod and True Believer games 2 and 3 and you have a reasonably strong shot at winning.

Solidarity: Not good. By far and away the deck's worst matchup. Do whatever you can to resolve a Rule of Law or Armageddon games 2 and 3 and you might win. Maybe. If you see a high concentration of High Tide combo in your meta, you should either choose a different deck, dedicate 8 slots to the SB, and possibly splash blue for maindecked Meddling Mage. All things considered, it's probably not worth damaging your other matchups just to attempt to win this one with any degree of consistency.


QUICK AND DIRTY TOURNAMENT REPORT:
I wrote (and never released) this report shortly after using Angel Stompy to win a Mana Drain pre-September 1. While not all of it is applicable to the current build, it at least provides a basic idea of how the deck plays out against various archetypes.

Round 1: UG Madness - Robert (Unregged) 2-0

Game 1: 2 unmorphed Angels attacking by turn 4, one of them Skullclamped. Quick game.

Game 2: 3 StP's deal with early Madness outlets, 2 Parallax Waves hold off the rest of his threats while my own finish the job.

Record: 1-0-0

Round 2: Welder MUD - Bret (LinkXwing) 0-2

Game 1: No land in opening hand. Mull to 6, keep a decent 1 land hand for fear of mulling too low. He gets his lock on early and I draw no more land.

Game 2: Identical to game 1, including the draws and mulls, except he has double Workshop to lock me down even faster.

Record: 1-1-0

Round 3: Hulk - August (Setnakt) 2-0

Game 1: He manages to resolve a Tog and keep it on the table after Deeding away my early threats. I resolve a Parallax Wave to keep the Tog off my back for awhile, and he's forced to use his Wish for Naturalize. A cycled Decree gives me a few chump blockers to stay in the game until he can find another Wish for Berserk. Hardcast Decree for 4 looks like it will seal the deal. He has Predict and AK in hand, with no AK's in the yard. He knows he has to dig aggressively for Deed or lose next turn. He opts to cast a blind Predict, arbitrarily naming Impulse. He reveals a Deed. If he'd AK'ed instead, he likely would have won this game. Hindsight aside, I think he made the right play.

Game 2: An amusing game. Turn 1 I cast Mom and a Crypt, which gets FoWned. Turn 2 I cast a morph, he Drains. It's a Whipcorder. Turn 3 I cast a morph, he Drains. It's a Whipcorder. Turn 4 I cast a morph, he Drains. It's a Whipcorder. Turn 5 I hardcast Eternal Dragon, He FoWns it. Turn 6 recursion of Dragon, turn 7 recast it. The game ends shortly thereafter.

Record: 2-1-0

Round 4: Angel Stompy - Max (Frogboy) ID

Frogx0r and I ID, giving us both a strong chance at Top 4. Besides, we're playing literally identical decks. The mirror would have sucked.

2-1-1

Round 5: Zilla Stompy - Don (AngryTroll) 2-0

Game 1: Angel Stompy does that thing it's supposed to do against Zilla Stompy - resolve an early Silver Knight to hold off the opposing threats, and ride its other threats to victory. The game ended with me at 3 life.

Game 2: See game 1. I ended at 2 life. Close games.

3-1-1

Top 4: Welder MUD - Bret (LinkXwing) 2-1

Game 1: I actually draw a hand with lands in it this time. Good times. An early Savannah Lions goes all the way.

Game 2: It takes awhile, but he gets his lock on.

Game 3: A long, drawn out game, and very very close at the end. I manage to survive an opposing board containing Karn, a Trinisphere, Crucible with Wasteland recursion, Triskelion, and Chalice set at 1. Barely.

Finals: Zilla Stompy - Lewis (?) 2-1

Game 1: Angel Stompy does the double Silver Knight thing.

Game 2: My early threats are kinda weak. He manages to burn me out before I can get any real solid threats online.

Game 3: Turn 1 Mother of Runes survives to turn 2. Turn 2 StP a Lavamancer. Turn 3 Parallax Wave away Birds and Ape. Turn 4 hardcast Angel. It's a quick game from there.


CONCLUSION:
Not much to say here. This is basically a consistent, incredibly strong aggro option with good game against the majority of the top decks in the format. It has high threat density, answers to essentially any threat it might face, and a solid draw engine. As long as combo remains relatively weak in the format, this deck deserves strong consideration.