On the Grind – GW Overrun Update

May 7, 2009 |

by Jeremy Fuentes

I played in the Magic Online Championship Series this past weekend. However, unlike Josh Utter-beatings-Leyton, I didn't make Top 8. I was in contention up until Round 7 when the eventual winner knocked me out. The reason I'm writing this article though is because we played the same deck, and that same deck took three out of the Top 8 slots from this 350+ person event. Do I think the deck is still a top contender? Would I recommend this deck to you for Regionals or your upcoming PTQ? These questions will be answered soon enough"¦ but first, story time.

Rewind to two weeks before the tournament. After qualifying for the Season One Championship, my friend Kevan and I discuss what deck I should take. My criteria are simple. I want to play something that fits my play style (turning dudes sideways). I want to play something that isn't boring or slow or blue (no 5CC). I want to play something that can beat 5CC, while still having game against the rest of the expected field. (I hate playing against 5CC and even more so, 5C Planeswalkers. Even if I win, I still feel like I want to slit my wrists from the sheer boredom of it all.) Lastly, I want to play a deck that I feel could win the whole thing. Top 8 sounds like fun and all, but there's no point in making Top 8 if you don't win it all. There is no Worlds invite for second place"¦

Obviously, my deck choices at this point were extremely broad. Having been submerged in Extended for the past half-a-year, I hadn't the slightest idea of what was going on in Standard. I start out testing with the only Standard deck I have online (Kithkin), but I soon put the deck on the back burner as an absolute last resort. I wanted to try out stronger, more consistent options before I settled on the plain white weenie deck.

I venture on to try a mix of random decks. The testing process was very interesting. At first when we would try a deck, it would be awesome. We would see its power and strengths and all the reasons why the deck was tier one. The deck would always start out hot, but after a certain number of matches it would cool off and reveal its weaknesses and we would ditch it for another deck. This went on and on, back and forth between all the decks I could afford to play. I went from GW Overrun, to Chapin's Doran, to BG Elves, to Kowal's Boat Brew, to Duotianshi203's Boat Brew (the same maindeck that Top 8'ed the Championship event), not being 100% happy with any of them. I probably played Duo's Boat Brew the most out of all the decks I tested. He's the points leader in the Online Player of the Year Race and he plays the same deck in every Standard event and makes Top 8 almost all the time. The deck must be good, right? However, as with all the decks before his, I run into the same wall after the initial strong start.

Three days before the event and I am still completely lost. I run the gauntlet of decks through the Standard 2-man queues for weeks because the testing in the practice rooms is inconsistent at best. Hitting cold streak after cold streak, wall after wall, my MTGO tix account and my mental/emotional state are almost completely drained.

I take a break for a few days to recharge, but on Saturday night I still have no idea what to play. I come to the conclusion, that if I'm not going to be completely confident with a deck, I at least want to have fun playing it. So after being inspired by fellow countryman Manny Pacquiao knocking out Ricky Hatton in a dominatingly sad two-round beatdown, I took GW Overrun to the Saturday night Daily Event. Kevan and I joked that we should just switch decks right before the tournament so the deck I play would be the "hot" one. Oddly enough, after switching from RW Boat Brew, GW Overrun got hot and I Top 8'ed the Daily Event. If that wasn't a sign, I don't know what was. Here is the list I played in the Championship:

GW Overrun – Jeremy Fuentes

Sideboard

At the very least, I was confident I would have fun playing the deck. It almost sets up like a combo deck, in that if you get an Overrun in hand or under the Heights, all you need to do is figure out how many creatures you need on the board to win in one turn. You really have to plan your attacks and blocks thinking several turns ahead. Because of this, your life total should be considered another resource to manage, because if an attack wouldn't kill you and you needed a certain number of creatures to attack with an Overrun the next turn, you had to manage your blocks appropriately.

If you have a Garruk Wildspeaker in play, it adds another interesting element because you have to ask if you need the Overrun or do you want to set up some more guys? Ajani Goldmane is one of the strongest maindeck includes given that you generally need to take a few points off your opponent's life before an Overrun with a mini-army is lethal and Ajani helps set you up. Also, sometimes you can just win on the back of Ajani pumping your Spectral Procession army into a team of Serra Avengers. The Ranger of Antoine package was inspired by another list that I saw online. Being an "army in a can" (as Gerry T puts it), Ranger helps you reach the critical mass of creatures you need to make Overrun lethal. And last I checked, being able to fetch a Forge Tender in a red matchup is never a bad thing. Of the lists I tested, I felt this one was the best at accomplishing the plan overall.

The tournament started at the buttcrack of 8 in the morning (for those of you who know me, that is way too early). After mulling to five in Game Three, I fail to draw my fourth mana source over several long turns to play Wrath of God and I lose an extremely close Round One to Kithkin. Scared that the deck has cooled off, I bounce back winning five consecutive rounds in a row against GW Overrun, BG Elves, Faeries, GW Beats, and BG Elves. During this span, I'm only forced to play one Game Three. My play is pretty tight overall and I feel good about my chances at this point. The outlook is good until I play Tomy_Vercety, the eventual winner of the tournament. After losing a very close, overconfident Game One, I dominate him Game Two. Tomy has the absolute nuts in Game Three and I lose the match. With two losses and pretty bad tiebreaks, I'm pretty much out of contention for Top 8. I lose the next round to another close mirror match, but pull out a win against RB Blightning, ending 6-3 to make Top 64 (43rd to be exact) and earn some packs. I'll be the first to admit I got lucky on the "picking a deck that could win the whole thing" criteria, as I picked the deck solely on fun factor and raw Timmy power. As lucky as Tomy got against me, winning the whole thing requires more than a fun/ lucky deck.

Here is Tomy's list for reference:

GW Overrun – Tomy_Vercety MTGO Championship Season 1 (1st Place)

Sideboard

The main difference between our lists is the inclusion of Wilt-Leaf Liege and Steward of Valeron. Combined with Kitchen Finks, Wilt-Leaf Liege allows you to curve out into a pretty strong beatdown plan and use Overrun as more of a backup or Plan 1-A. While Birds gives you more chance to hit Spectral on Turn three, Steward provides beatdown plus acceleration capabilities and allows you to hit your Four and Five drops the same turn that Birds would. Also, an important thing to note is that Steward provides the same acceleration as Birds if you are forced to play a Treetop Village on Turn one.

With Alara Reborn now in full effect, I would recommend Tomy's list as the one to test with over mine. If the early results are any indicator, BW Tokens with Zealous Persecution is going to be a powerhouse in this format. Not only does Zealous Persecution wreck the mirror and cripple Faeries, but it completely wipes out GW's tokens as well. However, Steward of Valeron doesn't die to Zealous Persecution like Birds of Paradise does. More importantly, Wilt-Leaf Liege provides an addition Anthem effect that would save your token army in the event of Persecution.

Though Dauntless Escort doesn't help your army survive Zealous Persecution, he does help it survive just about everything else (including your own Martial Coup! Here's to living the dream) and should definitely be included in the sideboard if not in the maindeck over Elvish Visionary.

Also as I mentioned in a previous article, I think Sigil Captain would be interesting to test. If we're not playing for a turn two Spectral Procession, we could play Sigil Captain on turn three via Steward, play a huge Cloudgoat Ranger on turn four and bash in for 30 trampling damage on turn five with Overrun. The downside is when we draw the Captain after we've already played our Cloudgoat or Spectral, he's a clunky four mana 3/3.

Other than those two, I don't feel that Alara Reborn adds much to the already overstocked GW Overrun list. If opposing Glorious Anthems or Pithing Needles annoy you, you could give Qasali Pridemage a shot in the SB. Knight of New Alara only pumps gold guys, so he's out. Knotvine Paladin likely fits a straight beatdown or exalted plan better than the team attack strategy we're running, so he's out too. If anything Alara Reborn changes the way the deck is constructed. As if we weren't scared of instant speed board sweepers before, right? The updated list I will be testing is as follows:

GW Overrun -Updated

Sideboard

I still don't think having eight come into play tapped lands is good, so I split the difference on the Treetop Villages. I added a Forest instead of a Reflecting Pool to help alleviate some of the damage from Anathemancer. The SB isn't 100% set in stone. Wrath of God is good whenever you're behind against any type of creature deck. Bloodbraid Elf is getting popular also, so board sweep might be nice to have. Martial Coup is basically Wraths number four and five here, but they come with a bonus at times. Cloudthresher comes in not only against Faeries, but also any deck that runs Spectral Procession. Pollen Lullaby is mainly for the mirror, but can also help against quick swarm decks like Kithkin or even against BW Tokens. Guttural Response is obviously for Cryptic Command, but you can try Vexing Shusher or Eyes of the Wisent if you have an inclination towards any of those. Also, Primal Command is a very strong card, especially if you expect a lot of red or mill decks in your metagame. Another option to try against control is Elspeth, as she helps in post board sweep recovery. Again, I don't think I can really say what SB configuration is the best because it will largely depend on your own personal comfort and what you expect your metagame to be.

Tomy Vercety's win undeniably puts this deck on the radar as one to beat, if not at least watch out for. I can't say enough how fun I think the deck is to play, and now that it's been proven as a competitor, I'm not against recommending it for anyone to play. Just make sure you get in a lot of testing against control and against the mirror because those are some of the toughest matchups. I hope you enjoyed this article. Until next time, I hope your Cloudgoat Rangers stick and your Overruns resolve.

Peace

Jeremy Fuentes

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