School of Sligh-Kimes Edited/written by Frank S. Kusumoto - 4 Nov 1996. With Thanks to Paul Sligh, Arthur Kimes, Stefano Genestreti, Richard Hassell Jr. and Jay (Geeba) Schneider. The following is a compilation of writings from the magic strategy newsgroup and the mtg-l-strategy list. Originated - or at the very least popularized - by Paul Sligh, this deck made a splash at the Atlanta Pro-tourney by ending up in the final four. It lost to a Necro-Deck (but had beaten several to get there). I have added the ‘Kimes’ designation because of the extensive testing and writing that Arthur has done in contribution to this deck. The Sligh deck is an odd looking deck that utilizes many scoffed at cards - for good reason usually - but is illustrative of how a well designed mono-color deck can get by with slightly substandard cards by utilizing its color’s strengths (and a good sideboard). It is also instructive to see how the concepts of selective mana-denial and card advantage can be integrated successfully with the goal of killing your opponent quickly. In some ways I think this mirrors the successfulness of the four hymn Necro, which strives to do much the same. In essence, the Sligh deck is a mono-red weenie control deck, just as the many versions of the Necro deck were mono-black weenie control decks. It also illustrates how a deck that begins with an overall strategy, a plan if you will, can be competitive without a major expenditure of money (less than $60 w/sideboard). Encouraging reports have come in from all over the country - and the world - on the effectiveness of the Sligh deck in the tournament environment. The following decks and associated commentary are listed in chronological order to emphasize the historical and evolutionary aspects of this particular deck’s genesis and subsequent modifications. I do this in the hope this will more fully show how deck types have evolved and changed with the environment through the last 6 months. Please send comments, criticisms, and suggestions to fkusumot@ix.netcom.com Here’s the deck that started it all at the Atlanta Pro-Tourney - Note: This deck was constructed under the “5 of all current expansions” rule used in the pro-tourney. As such it is not optimized for Standard Type II play. (i.e., note Goblins of the Flarg plus Dwarves, not a good combo to play on yourself.) Orcish Librarian Deck, PT1 format, by Paul Sligh: Jun ‘96 2 Dwarven Trader 2 Goblin of the Flarg 4 Ironclaw Orcs 3 Dwarven Lt. 2 Orcish Librarian 2 Brothers of Fire 2 Orcish Artillery 2 Orcish Cannoneers 2 Dragon Whelp 4 Lightning Bolt 4 Incinerate 1 Fireball 1 Immolation 1 Shatter 1 Detonate 4 Brass Man 1 Black Vise 4 Strip Mine 4 Mishra's Factory 2 Dwarven Ruins 13 Mountain Sideboard 4 Mana Barbs 2 Serrated Arrow 1 Shatter 1 Detonate 1 Fireball 1 Meekstone 1 Zuran Orb 3 Active Volcano 1 An-Zerrin Ruins Concepts and observations on Sligh Deck w/Jay Schneider, July ‘96: The original Sligh deck, called “Geeba”, was created by Jay Schneider, using the following guidelines - Concept #1: The most important one. The Mana Curve. A true Sligh deck (and any good active deck) is optimized to use the mana curve that comes from playing one land per turn, and using ALL of it's mana on every turn. This is done using a "tiered" system. When you look at a Sligh deck you should see “slots”, not specific cards. Taking this approach Sligh looks like this: 1 mana slot: 9-13 2 mana slot: 6-8 3 mana slot: 3-5 4 mana slot: 1-3 X spell: 2-3 Lightning bolt (critter kills): 8-10 mana 23-26 15-17 of color In a deck designed to use it, it is highly effective to use all of your mana each turn. Think of how often Sligh's 1 casting cost critters do 5 - 10 points of damage before they are neutralized or dealt with. Concept #2: Card Advantage. It doesn't look like it but Sligh is built on card advantage. The key is selective card advantage. All of the cards in Sligh are effective by themselves. Sligh is very effective at killing all of an opponents creatures, thereby rendering creature support cards useless. Orcish Artillery represent the culmination of this principle, i.e. a useful card in and of itself that also gains card advantage if it’s special ability is used just once. Concept #3: How the attack progresses. First on the ground, which an opposing deck should eventually stop. Then in the air. If this attack is stopped then finish them off with direct damage. Other concepts: No color problems. Fast but steadily increasing pressure (a result of the tiered progression.) ManaBarbs are the sideboard answer to (almost) everything. Artifact Damage, i.e., the Brass Men, plink away through COP:Red, thus providing a colorless source of damage. Mishra’s Factories have the same advantage. With the current heavy use of mass creature destruction Factories provide a hedge. Current Alliances Sligh is still evolving but has at least 2-3 Thawing Glaciers - they go in the one slot. It totally changes your mana curve but if you analyze it you can build the deck to work with the square wave that Glaciers provide. The Thawing Glaciers also give you card advantage, thus strengthening Concept #2. Pillage works well, a stone rain and shatter rolled into one, which makes it the red counterpart to to a Disenchant. Using exactly two Orcish Librarians came about through trial and error. One criticism of the deck is that it is hosed by COP:Red. Besides the use of Artifact damage sources and Manabarbs, another common solution to the COP is the siege. Attack with waves every turn, don't let them use their mana and eventually draw more critters than they have mana. One of the more entertaining aspects of Sligh is the looks on opponents faces as they die to a Orc or a Dwarf. In the many of my games with the Sligh deck people look at it and give me advise on how to improve it. (Adding white, bigger creatures etc.) Also, don’t expect to get much respect with this deck (the first time around). Comments such as “I shouldn't have lost to this, My deck always beats this deck...” etc., will abound. Orcish Captains are a great card for the deck (they kill a Serra 1 in 4). In earlier incarnations Atogs were a good creature choice. In non-alpha restricted tourney Alpha Orcish Artillery are doom. With 4 Pillage and a strip you get strong L/D. Also they make great combos with everything. ---------- The next deck, modified for Standard Type II play has been played by Arthur Kimes of Hollywood, CA with great success in the Arena and Tournament play. Originally constructed in August of ‘96, it was particularly effective with the four Strip mines and two pillages at inducing mana problems in opposing decks. This deck, it’s various offspring, and good play, helped Arthur along his way into the top #100 ranked DCI players. Arthur’s Sligh Deck (v2.2) Sep ‘96 2 Gorilla Shaman 3 Ironclaw Orcs 2 Orcish Librarian 3 Dwarven Soldier 2 Brothers of Fire 4 Orcish Artillery 2 Storm Shaman 1 Sabretooth Tiger 2 Dragon Whelp 4 Incinerate 4 Lightning Bolt 1 Death Spark 2 Pillage 1 Brass Man 1 Walking Wall 1 Lodestone Bauble 1 Black Vise 3 Mishra's Factory 2 Thawing Glaciers 4 Strip Mine 2 Dwarven Ruins 15 Mountain Sideboard 2 Meekstone 1 Serrated Arrows 1 Tormod's Crypt 2 Winter Orb 1 Zuran Orb 4 Manabarbs 2 Pillage 2 Anarchy Arthur has taken this deck to the final four and beyond in many smaller tourneys at the ‘Slam Pit’ and to the round of eight at Costa Mesa (tough single elim, 106 ppl). Observations on Arthur’s Sligh deck w/Arthur Kimes, early September ‘96: This Sligh deck is a mono-red weenie control deck. The first component of the deck is its offensive overload, i.e. 26 weenies (more than most White Weenie decks!). and a complementary dose of Direct Damage (DD), 8 bolts, plus a Death Spark. Six of the Weenies have reusable direct damage, bringingthe count up to 15 sources of DD, almost one quarter of the deck. The second component, Land Destruction (LD) (4 Strips plus 2 Pillage), is used for quick wins against opponents who are slightly mana-screwed - that is, to give them a MAJOR mana screw - to deny one color vs. multi-color decks and to kill dangerous specialty lands (Kjeldoran Outpost, Thawing Glaciers, etc.). The manabarbs in the sideboard are the answer to COP:Red and 100 other questions. ("What do you do against ...." "Play a ManaBarb"). Specifically, they also work against Millstones, pump-knights, Nev's Disk, Wrath of God, StormBind, Jayemdae Tomes, Jalum Tomes, Conversion, Justice, Infernal Darkness, Disrupting Sceptres, etc. - anything that requires continous mana expenditure. They are massively disruptive. Lack of Combos plus mono-color equals VERY consistent performance in tournaments. Lack of Combos also means that the deck has good resistance to early Hymns and Stupors. Yes, 2 or 3 of them early will hurt, but they'll hurt this deck less than many other decks. It's still a fight, not a rout. Most of this deck can function with 3 mana or less in play. Sligh's original deck was even thriftier. Being able to get your game going and to disrupt the opponents game even during a mild mana screw allows you to save game after game that more mana-intensive decks lose. The sideboard is mostly devoted to fighting other deck STYLES, not other colors. So those clever Sleights and Hacks that get sideboaded in before game 2 turn into wasted cards - Anarchy’s notwithstanding. Four Orcish Artillery are essential in a Necro heavy environment. Three Anarchy's in the sideboard because of the recent infestation of mono-white White Weenie - thanks’s to the World Champion deck. Tormod's Crypt in the sideboard because of a recent trend towards Graveyard manipulation - Krovikian Horror's, Ivory Gargoyles and such. Notes from Arthur on how a Sligh deck deals with: 1. Permission decks: Cast a lot of spells. There shouldn't be combos in the deck so if the permission player doesn't counter the Orcish Gunner because he plans to save the counter for the Spirit Link he's in for a surprise. Control Magics aren't scary - what creature in the deck is WORTH stealing? Even the best attacker, the Dragon Whelp, can't be pumped unless he's playing Red also. What's the must counter spell? After sideboarding I bring in Winter Orbs against Permission decks - and probably Manabarbs. It's tough to pay UU and 2 life to counter an Ironclaw. And if he counters the 'barbs then the 'claw hits the table. 2. White Weenie decks: Bolt the first strikers then attack. Don't worry if his blockers can kill your attackers if his blockers also die. Trading creatures one for one is just fine, you have more creatures than the majority of WW decks. He'll run out before you. And your gunners and Brothers of fire are REUSABLE weenie killers - all of his are one shot deals. Thus you will gain card advantage. Beware the Wrath of God though, playing more than three creatures against any opponent is dangerous. 3. Necro Bolt the hyppies. Bolt the orders if he holds them back for blocking. Play Orcish Gunners and watch him cry. Attack with weenies. Don't play too many creatures at once (2 or 3 is fine) unless you have 2 spells which will nail a disk in your hand (and a lot of other cards which will make it unlikely that a Hymn will get both of them). Side in the Manabarbs after the first game - look at their face when you play one. Ghostlike... The Sligh decks that I've played have between 14 and 16 ways to kill an Hypnotic Specter. Hymns hurt but the combo-less nature of the deck means a Hymn just gives him card advantage - he doesn't get the bonus of disrupting your combos as well. A good Necro player will take out his Necropotences for something more worthwhile after the first game - look for Contagions and Terrors/Banishings. In this though, you have already won half the game, by forcing the Necro player to forego a card central to his strategy. 4. Land Destruction (LD): LD shouldn't be a problem with most of your attacking creatures costing 2 and 3 mana. Thawing Glaciers and Lodestone baubles (standard in my version) make LD a very difficult strategy to pull off. And of course, you can counter with your own LD, which will scare the bejeezus out the LD player (LD’s worst enemy is LD). Against LD, don’t play more than two creatures at a time. LD decks are usually prepared for weenie hordes, and will sideboard heavily after the first game. 5. Ehrnamggedon: Bolt the elves. Pillage and strip the white mana. If he gets a lot of plains out then work on the green instead. Hold back some land. If all he has out is an Ernie and you have 3 Ironclaws, he's not going to attack and he's not going to 'geddon either. Side in the Meekstones. 6. Ehrnham and Burn'em You have more creatures than he has bolts. Side in all your meekstones. Don't cast them until after the Ernie (or whatever) is tapped. Concentrate your LD on the Green mana - he's not going to beat you with just bolts. 7. Stormbind: Stormbind is a good card against Sligh decks but I've won a lot of games where the opponent has a Stormbind out (and nothing else but land). I just keep playing x/2 and x/1 creatures until he's emptied his hand - I even attack with Mishra's to draw more cards from his hand. Then I drop a Whelp or Storm Shaman and he's in trouble. The lowly Brassman and Walking Wall is especially annoying to the Stormbinder. It's important to keep playing creatures against Stormbind otherwise he can save up his cards and hit YOU with them. Manabarbs work against Stormbind. But I usually wind up siding other cards against decks that use Stormbind - such as meekstones. Decks that have Stormbind usually have big critters too. European Sligh Sep ‘96 As modified and played by Stefano Genestreti, this deck came in 2nd at the European PT qualifier. 2 Gorilla Shaman 4 Ironclaw Orcs 2 Dwarven Soldier 2 Orcish Librarian 2 Orcish Artillery 2 Storm Shaman 1 Brothers of Fire 1 Sabertooth Tiger 1 Dragon Whelp 1 Marton Stromgald 4 Lightning Bolt 4 Incinerate 2 Death Spark 1 Fireball 1 Orcish Oriflamme 2 Pillage 1 Jokulhaups 1 Walking Wall 2 Brass Man 1 Black Vise 4 Strip Mine 4 Mishra's Factory 2 Dwarven Ruins 14 Mountain total: 61 cards Sideboard: 4 Manabarbs 3 Meekstone 1 Zuran Orb 2 Pillage 2 Wnter Orb 1 Primitive Justice 1 Detonate 1 Serrated Arrows This is a solid example of a Sligh deck. The Orcish Oriflamme and Marton Stromgald are weaker but viable choices for the main deck. The use of Jokulhaups as a reset button was useful to Stefano in at least one match, and is a reasonable variant choice. DENVER SLIGH (Post DCI - Oct ‘96 Restrictions) Oct ‘96 4 Goblin Balloon Brigade 3 Gorilla Shaman 4 Ironclaw Orcs 2 Dwarven Lt. 2 Orcish Librarian 4 Orcish Artillery 1 Orcish Cannoneer 1 Ball Lightning 2 Dragon Whelp 4 Lightning Bolts 4 Incinerate 3 Guerrilla Tactics 2 Fireballs 2 Pillage 1 Shatter 1 Primitive Justice 1 Black Vise 1 Strip Mine 2 Dwarven Ruins 2 Mishra’s Factory 15 Mountain Total: 61 cards Sideboard: 2 Pillage 2 Meekstone 1 Serrated Arrows 2 Anarchy 4 Manabarbs 4 REB Many people only realize what this deck does after the second game. Most people do not take it seriously, and figure anybody playing it is a newbie (after all, who plays with Ironclaws and Dwarven Lieutenants?), that is their mistake... and I believe it works to the advantage of the Sligh player in a great many situations. IMO, the deck works just like a R/G weenie deck, but without the mana screws. Simply clear the opposition, and pound with weenies. The Orcish librarian is brutally effective, and often is killed over a whelp in the second or third game. Certainly this deck can be easily hosed - any deck can - but the decks that can hose it are not often in the final 8. It brutalizes Necro and U/W decks. This version has taken 1st twice in it’s two outings at small tourney’s. Some design/sideboard considerations: No Enchantments, one artifact in main deck. This usually equals dead cards in the opponents hand. That usually changes after sideboarding (Manabarbs, Meekstone, Arrows) and will knock some opponents for a second loop. Guerrilla Tactics usually come out of the main deck, along with one Dwarven Lt. and a fireball for an average switch of 5 cards. The Orcish Artillery are key in creating a one to many card advantage, along with the Fireballs, Gorilla Shamans, and Primitive Justice. The Manabarbs, as noted above, are quite effective against many deck types, if only for two more points of damage as disenchant bait (if they left the disenchants in - that is). "Red Heat" - Sligh T1.5, by Richard Hassell Jr. Oct ‘96 2 Gorilla Shaman 4 Ironclaw Orcs 2 Orchish Librarian 3 Orchish Artilery 2 Orchish Cannoneers 2 Storm Shaman 2 Brothers of Fire 4 Lightning Bolt 4 Incinerate 4 Guerilla Tactics 2 Death Spark 4 Pillage 4 Strip Mine 4 Mishra's Factory 1 Thawing Glaciers 16 Mountains Richard played this deck in a Type 1.5 tournament and won. Surprisingly enough, this deck was TII legal just the month before he made it (pre-Strip Mine restriciton). The tourney was 16 person, single elimination. As you can see, Richard went a little bit heavier into Land Destruction and burn spells than a stock Sligh, and that seemed to help his deck quite a lot. ------------ Now that Mirage is here and tourney legal expect to see the Sligh deck evolve again. The Goblin Tinkerer is a big win, the Dwarven Miner and the Goblin Soothsayer look good, and the torch, hammer, and elite infantry may also find their spots in the Sligh deck. Goblin Scouts are also a strong possibility, as is Builder’s Bane. Time marches on. With thanks to Rob Hahn for his Schools of Magic and the high standard it has set. Comments, suggestions and criticisms are all welcome and should be directed to: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com