Vintage 101: US Eternal Weekend NA Vintage Championships 2019

by Joe Dyer // Nov 8, 2019

Howdy folks! It's time yet again for another edition of Vintage 101! I'm your host, Joe Dyer, and this week we are strapped in for the ride of a lifetime as we go over all there is to take away from the North American Vintage Championships held at Eternal Weekend 2019!

Of course, we will still be discussing the results from the Challenge last weekend as well (one that I played in myself and did very poorly in), some spice, and of course what we're currently working on.

Before we get into the meat of the article, I just want to give a shoutout to Mike Noble, Mark Hornung, and Randy Buehler for such a wonderful set of coverage for Vintage this weekend. It was heartwarming to hear my name a few times, and just generally awesome to watch when I couldn't make it to the event. Kudos to you guys for continuing to present an awesome event, and even bigger thanks to Nick Coss of Card Titan for providing an awesome event for Vintage / Legacy to flourish. You guys rock!

Eternal Weekend NA Vintage Championships 2019 Metagame Breakdown

Alright, so let's take a brief look first at the overall metagame of Vintage Champs 2019. I was pleased to get some help with this data by our good friend Jason Jaco. Do the man a solid and go read his own wrapup of this event along with a PDF of EVERY decklist from the event over at Eternal Central. Paper Vintage events are obviously far and few between that it is interesting to take a look at how the metagame is shaking out in paper.

One thing to note by this breakdown of 302 total players (after people who dropped before Round 1 or just didn't show) is that honestly as far as diversity is concerned this metagame actually doesn't look that bad. There's no clear dominant deck in the format, despite Oko Oath, Jeskai Arcanist, and Ravager Shops putting up big numbers (and only one of those archetypes managed to place a single deck in the Top 8 in the form of Jeskai Arcanist). One thing that is interesting is that the paper metagame is slowly starting to closely align to the Magic Online metagame, as seen in decks shown such as the RUG PO Storm and RUG Planeswalkers decks popularized by MTGO players Justin Gennari and Matt Murray respectively in addition to recent changes to decks like Ravager Shops including cards like Stonecoil Serpent. I attribute this shift to a few things. One, that more players are simply playing on Magic Online and are basing their deck choices on that, and Two, that more players are paying attention to the Magic Online metagame even if they don't play on the platform. This past year has had such a tumultuous number of printings for the format that not paying attention to what is going on puts you at a competitive disadvantage if your goal is to actually win this event.

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Regardless, Vintage does seem in a very good place right now, and the format seems fun. However... let's take a look at the picture that the current 2019 printed cards shows us. As we do this for the Challenge every week, I went ahead and crunched this data out of all 302 lists available to us from Jaco (THIS TOOK A WHILE!), and it is a very interesting amount of data to have.

One major takeaway from this event and this information is that Narset is EVERYWHERE. One thing about this card is that it has single handedly warped the format slightly around its very existence. Mirror matches for blue decks have devolved to being around resolving cards like Narset and to an extent cards like Dreadhorde Arcanist and Oko, Thief of Crowns. Speaking of Oko, he was in the Top 5 of the cards from 2019 in this list. Between all of the Oath decks and the other decks playing this card, Oko is looking like he is here to stay in all his Elk-Lord goodness. Force of Vigor also continues to be one of the more highly played 2019 era cards, as does Collector Ouphe.

For me, while Vintage may be healthy in diversity, there is some unhealthy nature in regards to certain cards. I would really like to see Narset, Parter of Veils eventually become restricted. The asymmetrical effect of the card and how it has warped the Xerox mirrors creates games where you simply cannot play Magic if your opponent resolves a Narset. It becomes impossible to provide counter play to this card, as it shuts off so much while also being a miniature Dig Through Time / Impulse effect. Currently however, this is the only card that's really on my list to look at for restrictions. Most of the other highly played cards like Force of Vigor and Collector Ouphe provide balancing effects to the format that helps keep Workshop based decks in check (and yet, somehow there are still 133 copies of Stonecoil Serpent here) and allows for interesting counter play vs various strategies such as Paradoxical Outcome based decks as well.

Time will tell if Wizards will actually move to restrict Narset, but I do hope it is something they are considering. I have spoken to plenty of Vintage players with an extreme dislike for the card, and the hopes that Mental Misstep being restricted might actually answer a card like Narset have been well dashed as that does not seem to be the case.

Vintage Championships 2019 - Top 8

The Top of this event was pretty wildly interesting to see, and held some cool surprises, one of which was the presence of the RUG Planeswalkers list created by our friend Matt Murray. Without further ado let's dive into that Top 8!

Deck Name Placing Player Name BUG Midrange 1st Joe Brennan Jeskai Arcanist 2nd Boston Schatteman 4C PO Storm 3rd-4th Justin Franks RUG PO Storm 3rd-4th Bryan Hockey RUG PO Storm 5th-8th Brian Coval RUG Planeswalkers 5th-8th Jeremy Pinter RUG Planeswalkers 5th-8th Ryan Eberhart Golos Shops 5th-8th Jody Keith

This Top 8 was fascinating, but it also reveals one very interesting fact about the format. Narset, Parter of Veils is everywhere all over this Top 8, and to a greater extent, the format. I can definitely understand there is a level of frustration with this card and the challenges it presents to the format overall. Seven out of Eight decks being purely blue Force of Will decks is not superb, even if there is a diversity in archetypes. I would like to see some more decks like Survival or Fastbond piles mixed in to make things a little more interesting in the long run.

Still, at the end of the day, one person has to bring home the trophy, and that person just so happened to be the incomparable Joe Brennan. Here is the man himself posing with his painting of Mox Elk.

Joe's list is very powerful and pulls no punches. The inclusion of Brazen Borrower in the list is excessively strong as well.

For those that are unaware of who Joe Brennan is, he is a very powerful Vintage player who has worked super hard and is well deserving of such a trophy. We got the chance to sit down with Joe (who doesn't use much technology) over the phone and talk about his big win.

In Second Place, we have the lone Jeskai Arcanist deck of the bunch piloted by Boston Schatteman!

Boston's list is very interesting, given that it gets to hinge very well on the power of Mystic Sanctuary. Boston showed off the strength of this card on coverage by casting Gush three times over the course of a game with it. Very powerful card indeed!

Going down the rest of the Top 8 we have Brian Coval with a RUG PO Storm deck that was designed originally by our good friend Justin Gennari! Brian had a lot to say about this deck, and we had a chance to sit down with him as well and talk about the deck and how the event went overall.

This list is very very powerful and it performed well on coverage all weekend for the most part, and also put up a second copy of the deck into the Top 8 under the piloting of Bryan Hockey. Managorger Hydra is one scary critter, and of course, the big talk of the town is the inclusions of Oko, Thief of Crowns. There were a lot of Elk on coverage this weekend, up to and including TWO separate instances of a Black Lotus being turned into an Elk, one of which was an Alpha printing (by Joe Brennan).

This card is very strong and was well represented across the Top 8 of the event. As noted before, we sat down with Brian a little to discuss about himself, about this deck, and about the event and format in general.

Two time Top 8 Vintage Champs, VSL competitor, you don’t really need much of an introduction here, Brian, but tell the folks at home a little bit about yourself regardless. How did you get into Magic, and to an extent Vintage?

I discovered Magic at summer camp in 1996, some of the counselors were into it and they’d let us use their cards to learn. When I got back to school in the fall I found out some of my friends also knew the game. By the summer of 1997 I had my own collection and decks to battle with at camp and we were off to the races.

I got into Vintage and Legacy at the same time. Around 2008 I realized the standard PTQ grind wasn’t for me, but I still like competitive Magic, so I just decided I’m an “eternal guy” now. I had never played either format, didn’t own a dual land, but I had a gut feeling that’s where I’d find my spot.

You won last year on a Paradoxical Outcome based deck, did that influence your deck decision for Vintage Champs this year as well? Was there anything you think you would change about the list going forward?

Kind of. I did not play PO this year because I won with it last year, but I did choose it again for the same reasons. Paper Vintage is a special treat a couple times per year. When I get the chance to play it, I want to do something broken. Likewise I understand that other people feel the same way, so I want Force of Will in my deck. I was on Oko Oath until I tried Justin Gennari’s RUG PO list. The deck has a ton of smart choices and hot tech in it. The main deck is a well-oiled machine, the sideboard maps out smoothly, it felt amazing. The results speak for themselves, putting 2 into Top 8.

The most broken deck with Force of Will, for the second year in a row, is still PO.

Walk us a little bit through your day in the Swiss and also the Quarterfinals match. Was there anything that stuck out in particular? Any sick plays or fun things you saw?

This might sound awful, but the swiss was a cakewalk this year. I mean that purely as a compliment to Justin’s deckbuilding, not as a brag.

My most-broken-with-FoW deck choice heuristic paid off immediately. My first 2 rounds I played against GP champion/SCG champion/Storm god Cyrus Corman-Gill and had a 2018 finals rematch against Nam Tran. I won both die rolls and went absolutely nuts on them since neither had FoW.

I ran over Esper hate-bear Xerox and RUG Xerox with the Managorger Hydras out of the board. I got another freebie against Survival, since they don’t play FoW.

The only match I was concerned I might lose during the swiss was against 4C PO in round 4. I got Brainstorm-locked on turn 3, but my hand was full of counterspells and my opponent couldn’t get through them until I had worked through the Brainstorm and was developing again.

My quarterfinal match was against the deck’s worst matchup in the format. Xerox is excellent against PO because they have lots of Narsets and Pyroblasts, and your plan is to draw tons of cards with a blue spell. Your plan is to switch to Hydra beat down after sideboard and ignore those potent hate cards. The non-white Xerox decks can’t remove a hydra once it gets out of Bolt range, but Jeskai has Swords to Plowshares.

My game 3 was a heartbreaker. I was 1 Hydra attack away from lethal. We ended up in a spot that I win if I have 1 more land to protect my Time Walk with Flusterstorm or if he has 1 less land so he can’t trigger Mystic Sanctuary. But neither of those were the case. Looking back with perfect hindsight I could have flashed in a no-value Snapcaster add 3 power to the board, I could have spewed my Lotus into his Lavinia for a Hydra trigger. I was playing to have gas in the tank if he answered Hydra, but maybe I should have just dumped it all out there. He stabilized at 5 life, it’s possible the all-in line would have gotten it done.

How do you feel about the format post-restrictions?

I love all the restrictions. Vintage is in the best place it’s been in years. Narset should be restricted too, I’m confident she’ll get there sooner than later. Especially after dominating this EW. There were 7 blue decks in the top 8, featuring 19 Narsets and zero Jace, the Mind Sculptor. That’s a sign of something off-balance.

Do you have any further plans with the format? Run it back next year and try for a third Top 8?

I have Eternal Weekend Europe coming up over Christmas week this year. That gives me an extra crack at another painting sooner than normal. And yes it is my plan to keep grinding the format. Eternal Weekend has been my Superbowl since its inception, and I’ve put up a top 8 in the last 3 consecutive years. I’m hungry for more. I’d really like to add a Legacy painting to my wall.

Before we let you go, is there anyone you want to give a shout out to for this weekend? Anything else you want to mention?

Shout out to Joe Brennan of course. It’s a lot easier to lose a title to someone who deserves it in every facet. Justin F. for his top 4 run, he designed the deck I won with last year and we had some chats about how to build PO leading up to this event. Another shout to Justin Gennari who is a great Vintage streamer who everyone should watch. Friend/occasional teammate Adam Vincik for his Legacy top 4.

And my personal plugs: Thanks to Clubhouse Cards (@CardsPGH) for keeping me on the road getting these opportunities. I share my thoughts on all the eternal formats publicly on Twitter @BoshNRoll and at www.youtube.com/c/BoshNRoll. Check it out!

Thanks for joining us, Brian! Congratulations again on the finish and never forget that you are indeed awesome!

It was great to have Brian able to join us to talk about the format a little bit. Things have definitely felt pretty great in the format, but as Brian shares my concern about Narset, it is definitely a slippery slope.

Moving on to the rest of the Top 8, we have Ryan Eberhart playing a powerful RUG Planeswalkers list that was designed by our good friend Matt Murray (ChubbyRain).

This deck has a ton of power behind it. Between Wrenn and Six, Oko, Narset, and Mystic Sanctuary enabling all kinds of shenanigans, this deck is insane enough that it also put up a second list in the Top 8 being piloted by Jeremy Pinter.

Finally, the last archetype in the Top 8 was Golos Shops piloted by none other than Jody Keith!

Jody's deck looked pretty sweet on camera, utilizing a more prison strategy over the traditional aggressive ways of playing Shops.

All in all, congratulations again to all of the Top 8 competitors! Amazing feats and so many insane plays to be had by all!

Vintage Champs Budget Prize

As I've talked about before on here, the top "Budget" entry of the event gets an additional prize because they're playing a "Budget" deck. Now, what I mean here by "Budget" is that the deck does not contain any Power 9, Library of Alexandria, Mishra's Workshop, or Bazaar of Baghdad. This is how Eternal Weekend determines if a deck is budget or not.

The Top Budget entry this year just so happened to be a friend of mine! His name is Patrick Humfleet, and he not only won the Top Budget Prize, but he also placed 24th in the event overall! This is a very good record for a deck not playing any Power or those insanely powerful lands. The deck he was playing was essentially a Legacy Green/White Dark Depths combo list. Let's take a look!

We got a chance to sit down with Patrick to talk about his event and about playing for the budget prize!

First of all, introduce yourself to the folks at home. How did you get into Magic and furthermore what drove you to Vintage?

I am Patrick Humfleet, a Michigan player best known locally for playing uncommon decks or builds to take opponents by surprise. I was introduced to Magic by my older brother with the 7th edition starter kit and Fifth Dawn, in awe of the power of Thorn Elemental and Suncrusher for the couple months we tried playing. After a long break, I started playing again around Khans of Tarkir with the prodding of new college friends. I started playing competitively in Modern around 2016 and slowly started shifting to Legacy in 2018, which is my main format currently. Vintage was always a far-off format that seemed beyond my reach, but I loved catching streams as I could to see how design mistakes could balance each other out in the most unlikely ways. I always wanted to try playing with and against the most powerful cards ever made, but never had an opportunity until I scheduled this trip to Eternal Weekend for Legacy.

Congratulations on your placing in 24th with the top Budget list at Vintage Champs! The decklist looks really sweet. What led you to deciding upon this archetype?

Land based strategies have been my wheelhouse since I started attending events, usually revolving around ramp packages, AKA Valakut. When I learned about the un-restriction of Fastbond, it was the first time a Vintage deck called to me. It didn’t exist yet, but I knew what I would play if I ever had the chance. Being that I had zero clue about how Vintage worked, I followed the iterations of Ziasbond to see everything meshed together and what it was targeting.

On a whim, I asked my travel group if there were Dark Depths and Wastelands to borrow and mentioned Tabernacle, and found I could borrow all of them for Vintage. I started sifting through some Ziasbond lists, consulted Vintage 101 articles, and picking your brain for ideas (thank you again for the suggestions) to make a budget list work. In the end, it came together as G-Depths splash Enlightened Tutor and Experimental Frenzy. Tutor was to increase the consistency of landing Fastbond, with a bonus of finding Courser or Frenzy to be able to grind out longer games. As I am completely without artifacts, Collector Ouphe serves to rebalance the games against full power lists.

Walk us through a little bit of your event and how things went throughout the day. Any highlights of your event? Any truly insane plays?

The day started with frantically sleeving up the deck after arriving at the hall, because I had not only forgotten inner sleeves, my outer sleeves were noticeably different shades. I get to round one, incredibly nervous to actually play the deck against someone for the first time, and my opponent never shows up. With a pseudo bye, I take the hour to reset, watch some matches to know what to expect, and laugh off my nerves to get going for real.

The day had a lot of ups and a few downs. My round 2 Ziasbond opponent was very friendly and talked through the games afterwards for how everything lined up. Round 3, I was given the dredge tutorial after I forgot they run Force of Will in game 1 and kept a hand without LD game 2. I apparently learned my lesson well with the later dredge rounds going the other way. My favorite play on the day was recycling my Bog with Loam and Wasteland to soft lock dredge with Tabernacle to completely close the door. My favorite opponent was in Round 9, as we were both tired and slap-happy. The match was just a fun way to close out the day.

Overall, my matchups were Ziasbond (1-0), Dredge (2-1), White Eldrazi (0-1), Shops (1-0), Survival (1-0), and Jeskai (1-0).

How did the room feel competing with a deck that had no Power, no Bazaars/Workshops?

It was a very odd feeling, honestly. In all of my matches, I knew going in I should be at a disadvantage from the start, but only once actually felt helpless. The heavy land destruction package lines up well against the decks relying on Bazaar/Workshop, slowing them down enough to 20/20 them. The Ouphes gave me chances to punish land light hands and steal some games. The utility lands I packed lined up incredibly well in my match-ups, with Bog sealing games throughout the day. White Eldrazi with turn 1 Chalice was the most helpless I felt, as the creatures were just bigger and Eldrazi Displacer locked off Marit Lage.

The way pairings fell were well in my favor that day. I never faced Storm or Oath, both of which can present huge issues for my build. My entire plan is just to race and hope Veil of Summer can buy a turn. I knew there were decks that I could only hope to cheese out, but lucked out on not finding them.

Overall, how was your Eternal Weekend experience?

Hands down: best MTG experience I have ever had. Most of my opponents were great to talk with, and all of them courteous throughout. I got to meet all the people I had been talking with online for months beforehand. There were so many great games to watch and players to talk with every day. I got to see two friends make top 16 and another top 8 in Legacy. On top of all this, I had my best ever placing in a large event. I can’t wait to come back again next year.

Thanks for joining us, never forget that you are indeed awesome! Is there anything final you’d like to say, and anywhere people can find you on social media?

Huge shoutout to the Nerdbirds! I quite literally could not have played this event without their help. The MTG community is actually just amazing.

I can be found as stormthief248 in various Discord servers, MTGO, and Twitter (I don’t post, but I’ll answer messages).

Team Serious Represents Vintage Champs!

My good friends in Team Serious went to Eternal Weekend and represented the team well this year, with several of the crew sitting at X-0, X-1 in late rounds. However, it was our Events Coordinator Rajah James who went the extra nine and managed to place 16th (going 7-2 in matches) playing a deck that is very powerful and awesome to watch: Ziasbond.

Rajah even managed to get on camera during Round 7, but sadly ran afoul of Ziasbond's worst matchup in BUG Midrange. Still, it was awesome to see my friend on camera and enjoy the awesome that is Ziasbond! Let's take a look at Rajah's list.

We even got a chance to sit down with Rajah as well and talk about his thoughts on the format and what led him to play Ziasbond this weekend!

Rajah, first of all introduce yourself to everyone at home. How did you get into Magic, and what drives you to Vintage?

I started back in 94. We lived in Iceland on a NATO base which is now closed. I got into D&D with a group of friends there. I remember we got everything mail order and the magazines also had Magic stuff. I don’t remember who got Magic cards first but we all ordered from some mail order company. I don’t really remember playing anything but group games at that time. It was a blast. Revised starters is what we had to start.

I never owned Power back then but we all read Scrye and Inquest magazine, so we knew what a Black Lotus was. I got into Vintage via proxy paper events with Team Serious Opens. I love Vintage because of the power level and the insane plays. I like that it is the one format that you can play all cards in.

You ended up on Ziasbond this weekend as your weapon of choice, placing 16th. Big congrats on that placing and for representing Team Serious! How did the deck feel all weekend and was there anything you might consider changing going forward?

Yes the deck was great to me all day. Before the event, I had some considerations for the main deck ‘flex’ slot as determined through testing. I had settled on Karakas in the slot and it proved to be a good choice, helping to win my Oath match up.

If BUG continues to dominate, the deck may not be as viable. As shown in my feature match, Deathrite Shaman alone can really mess with the deck’s lines. Blast Zone could be an option moving forward in addition to other cards that protect the graveyard.

Walk us through your event a little. Were there any sick plays that stood out? Anything crazy or fun that happened?

My matchups were very favorable through the first 5 rounds, and I was able to take what I was given and convert those.

In my match round 4 vs. Oath, I was able to land an early Karakas, as well keep him off Oath and Forbidden Orchard, and able to land a Sphere. At some point he was finally able to land Orchard, and then Oath.

He resolved his Oath and began revealing cards...Niv-Mizzet was the second to last card in his library. He had already cast Gaea's Blessing so it was in the yard. I had Loam in my graveyard and I read his card to confirm that the draw is not optional. He conceded G1.

G2 was similar except of course he is on the Blazing Archon plan. This time his Oath goes to seventh from the bottom. I have active Glacial Chasm and ability to pay for some turns, then copy it with Thespian's Stage. Crazy Oath activations!

In my round against PO, in both games I won, I had to go for the Crucible / Fastbond / Bazaar / Strip plan because the window was open and I had assembled it. In G3, he had made a Blightsteel Colossus and passed.

Against PO, the combo pieces are thinned to make room for SB options. With only 1 Glacial Chasm in the deck, I needed to hit Loams to really dig it out. Both times, I found the Chasm to finish the combo out with 3 or less life.

How did you feel about the format this weekend, especially in the paper metagame?

I was surprised at the lack of Ravager aggro, but that is anecdotal of course; I faced zero Shops opponents of any kind. I faced Dredge twice, which probably is correct?

Overall the meta felt fine. Judging by the decks I faced in the earlier rounds, there is definitely still a budget / casual contingent at Eternal Weekend that will play the one deck they have or their pet deck.

You were given the chance to talk a little bit on camera about #Unrestrict20, can you give us a little bit of a lowdown on that for those that didn’t get to see it?

Ha, sure. The hashtag is a joke but not a joke. Like I said before, I like Vintage because you get to play all the cards. A big reason I chose to play a Fastbond combo deck is because I am afraid of louder voices getting it restricted again; maybe I wouldn’t have a chance to play it at EW 2020.

So #Unrestrict20 is taking that idea to the next level. If a card isn’t a tutor, then maybe it is fine? Maybe if we unrestrict a bunch of things at the same time, it will all just be fine, like Mr. Burns’ Germ Door?

And if not, we can just fix it, right? Here’s the current list that we’d like to see unrestricted (but only simultaneously)

With Karn being the first card on the “watch” list because it semi-violates the main tenet of #Unrestrict20 which, loosely stated is, “Everything’s OK except tutors”. It is only included because of the sideboard building requirements to utilize the “tutor” portion of the card.

Is there anything else you’d like to say before we have to go? Any social media links or props you want to throw out?

#1000Percent #TeamSerious

Thanks to everyone who reached out and offered support or congratulations. Thanks to everyone on the team for the inspiration and for having me on.

BOAM!

Thanks for joining us, my friend! Never forget that you are awesome and congrats again on such a killer placing!

The Gathering

While playing Magic is a big part of the Eternal Weekend experience, the gathering of friends and community is the biggest and best reason to attend this event. Earlier this week I asked for some screenshots of some great moments from the weekend. Here are some of the awesome things I was sent and saw.

This thing was the "Most Creative" prize at the Eternal Central Old School Event held at EW! Insane craftsmanship!

"Moments before the antlers sprouted from his forehead, Mike flashed his last humanoid expression: terror." - Zias

I'm pretty sure those aren't supposed to be used as coasters...

Kevin Cron sent me this, and I'm not sure what's going on here, but I like it.

AVERT YOUR EYES. THAT POOR EMERALD!

Okay, who cast Sinkhole on the Convention Center, seriously?!

Vintage Challenge 11/2

We had yet another Vintage Challenge on Magic Online while everyone was at Eternal Weekend. I attempted my hand at this myself, sadly going 0-4 drop from the event as I could just not cobble together a cohesive gameplan. I attribute a lot of this to personal anxiety and the level of my play. It simply just wasn't my day. I did end up playing Risen RUG (Elementals) and I really enjoy the deck a ton, just had a lot of play issues.

Regardless, the community around me is a great support system for things like this, and I greatly appreciate the Vintage Streamer's Discord for hearing me rant. You're all great.

Let's take a look at the Top 8 of this event, shall we?

Deck Name Placing MTGO Username DPS 1st CWS RUG PO Storm 2nd Condescend Dredge 3rd Lord_Beerus DPS 4th KauffJ Grixis Thieves Storm 5th Bedell Oko Oath 6th Miharu_Fuyumiya Dredge 7th JMD037 Dredge 8th OptionParalysis

This seems like an interesting Top 8, given that there was a lot of people missing that usually shows up in these events. There were still 60 players however, so not quite that bad! The winner of this event was CWS on Dark Petition Storm!

This is pretty much close to the lists that Cyrus Corman-Gill has been playing around, with cutting Library of Alexandria from the list (which is honestly a smart decision, Library hasn't been great in DPS in a long while), and no Pyroblast in the list as well. Seems to be working well enough!

Further down the Top 8, a very powerful wizard named Bedell came and slain many foes (myself included) on a Storm build that also plays some Grixis Thieves action as well!

This deck is really cool and very powerful! Congrats to Bedell on such an interesting shell!

Also in the Top 8, OptionParalysis opted to show up with Dredge playing a full TWELVE Force effects between the main and side!

Further down the Top 32, not one to let SamuraiFunn have alll the.... fun... AnarchistAbe showed up with Eric's Crab Shack!

Now let's take a look at the current year cards in this Challenge. We've got a lot of Elks abound in this Top 32, so that in of itself is pretty interesting! In addition, our good friend Matt Murray continues to provide excellent data analysis as well that you should check out!

It is certainly interesting to look at how this data ebbs and flows as time goes on every week. Vintage is changing week in and week out on Magic Online, making it interesting to keep up with.

The Spice Corner

Zias decided to hit us up with another sweet decklist based on Ziasbond! We're calling it Ziasbond 2: Ziasbond Harder!

Wrapping Up

That's all the time we have this week folks! What a crazy week and a crazy wrapup to Eternal Weekend! Again I want to thank everyone out there for their support of this column. I really felt the love this year, and I love being able to bring you guys more and more Vintage content!

As always, you can reach me on Twitter, Twitch, YouTube, and Patreon! I also just this past week released Episode Two of "The Bazaar of Moxology" entitled "Ziasboundin'" featuring the incomparably awesome Zias himself talking about how he got into Magic, and about the creation of Ziasbond as an archetype.

Next week we're going to spend some time talking about one of the decks that showed up at Eternal Weekend and absolutely surprised everyone by how awesome it was, and that's RUG Planeswalkers! We're gonna get Wrenn and Six'ed!

Until next time, KEEP CASTING MOXEN!