Removal Advantage

Evasion





Resilience

Tyler Schroeder with his Red/Green Monsters deck beat Aaron Barich's Sultai Constrictor deck in a fast and furious 2-0 in the final game of the Memphis Grand Prix (Standard) February 25th. Let's break it down turn by turn to see what happened. Schroeder won the toss and started on the play.Turn 1: Schroeder plays Sheltered Thicket tapped.Turn 1: Barich plays Foul Orchard tapped.Turn 2: Schroeder plays Forest and casts Merfolk Branchwalker. It resolves and Explores. Earthshaker Khenra is revealed, Schroeder keeps it on top. Merfolk Branchwalker gets a +1/+1 counter.Turn 2: Barich plays a second Foul Orchard tapped and passes the turn.Turn 3: Schroeder plays Sheltered Thicket tapped and attacks with Merfolk Branchwalker. In response, Barich plays Fatal Push and destroys it.Turn 3: Barich plays Blooming Marsh (untapped) and casts Jadelight Ranger (Explore twice). In response, Schroeder plays Abrade and kills it with 2 Explore triggers on the stack. Trigger 1: Servant of the Conduit revealed and put in the graveyard. Trigger 2: Botanical Sanctum revealed (into Barich's hand).Turn 4: Schroeder plays Jadelight Ranger. Trigger 1: Merfolk Branchwalker revealed (graveyard). Trigger 2: Mountain (hand). Jadelight Ranger gets +1/+1 counter and Schroeder plays the Mountain.Turn 4: Barich plays Aether Hub and casts Bristling Hydra.Turn 5: Schroeder plays a Mountain and casts Glorybringer. He swings in and reduces Barich's life to 16.Turn 5: Barich swings with Bristling Hydra reducing Schroeder's life to 16. Plays Botanical Sanctum (tapped) and casts a second Bristling Hydra. Barich's Energy count is 7.Turn 6: Schroeder casts a second Glorybringer and swings in with both reducing Barich's life to 8.Board State:Turn 6: Barich plays Glint-Sleeve Siphoner (Energy count to 8). Plays Hashep Oasis and swings in with both Bristling Hydras. Schroeder blocks one of the Hydras and Barich pays 3 energy to plus up one of the Hydras. Schroeder's life drops to 12.Turn 7: Schroeder plays a Mountain and swings in with both Glorybringers. In response, Barich plays Vraska's Contempt, exiling one of them and giving him 2 life. After damage resolves, Barich's life is down to 6. Schroeder plays Earthshaker Khenra and Rekindling Phoenix.Board state:Turn 7: Barich pays 2 Energy (Glint-Sleeve Siphoner) and draws. Cycles Fetid Pools and swings in with both Hydras. Earthshaker Khenra blocks the Hydra with the +1/+1 counter on it and Rekindling Phoenix blocks the other. 1 Bristling Hydra dies and both the Earthshaker Khenra and the Rekindling Phoenix dies (token placed on the battlefield).Barich concedes.Game 2.Both mulligan to 6. Barich scrys and puts it on the bottom. Schroeder scrys and puts it on top.Turn 1: Barich plays Foul Orchard tapped.Turn 1: Schroeder plays Mountain.Turn 2: Barich plays Aether Hub and casts Winding Constrictor.Turn 2: Schroeder plays Rootbound Crag and casts Abrade, killing the Winding Constrictor.Turn 3: Barich plays Blooming Marsh and casts Walking Ballista with one +1/+1 counter on it.Turn 3: Schroeder plays a Mountain and casts Magma Spray on the Walking Ballista. In response, Barich plays Blossoming Defense on the Walking Ballista to protect it. Schroeder casts Merfolk Branchwalker. The Explore trigger reveals a Resilient Khenra (placed in graveyard). Merfolk Branchwalker gets a +1/+1 counter.Turn 4: Barich plays Servant of the Conduit (Energy count: 2).Turn 4: Tyler swings in with Merfolk Branchwalker. He plays a forest and casts Rekindling Phoenix.Turn 5: Barich plays Vraska's Contempt on the Rekindling Phoenix and plays a land.Turn 5: Schroeder plays Jadelight Ranger. In response, Barich removes a counter from Walking Ballista and kills it with 2 Explore triggers on the stack. Trigger 1 reveals a Merfolk Branchwalker (graveyard). Trigger 2 reveals a Mountain (put in hand). Schroeder plays a Mountain and swings in with Merfolk Branchwalker.Current life totals: Schroeder 19, Barich 16Turn 6: Barich untaps and passes turn.Turn 6: Schroeder casts Resilient Khenra and plusses up Merfolk Branchwalker. Schroeder swings in and reduces Barich's life to 11. Schroeder plays Pia Nalaar, which triggers upon entry to create a Thopter token.Turn 7: Barich plays Cartouche of Ambition on his Servant of the Conduit and directs the -1/-1 trigger to Schroeder's Thopter. Barich plays a Swamp and passes turn.Turn 7: Schroeder Eternalizes Resilient Khenra and plusses up Pia Nalaar. He attacks with both Pia Nalaar and Merfolk Branchwalker. Barich assigns no blockers and is reduced to 2 life.Board State:Turn 8: Barich draws and plays Bristling Hydra (Energy count: 4).Turn 8: Schroeder plays Earthshaker Khenra and attacks with all creatures.Barich concedes.Overall GameplayWith the presence of two decks that bring large unrelenting monsters to the fight, it was not surprising to see that deck that carried the cheapest and highest level of removal, the strongest evasion and the most resilient creatures to the fight won the day. Sultai Constrictor and R/G Monsters depend on getting large creatures out as quickly as possible. With both decks playing roughly the same number of creatures, removal, resilience and evasion would decide the game.Schroeder carried 9 removal spells in his mainboard with additional ones he could bring in from the sideboard for game 2. All of these were cheap instant spells that answered the majority of the threats in the field. One thing that has to be noted...his addition of Struggle/Survive as an answer for The Scarab God was interesting.The idea is for Struggle to kill The Scarab God and Survive to shuffle it into the player's library before the 'return to hand' trigger occurs. What I like about this in the mainboard is Struggle/Survive is good removal regardless of when it is played and it is cheap.Barich had only 4 pieces of removal in his mainboard and another 4 in his sideboard (all Fatal Push and Vraska's Contempt). In order for Sultai Constrictor to out pace R/G Monsters, it would have to establish a board presence quickly. Unfortunately, with all of his removal, Schroeder seemed to have answers to everything that Barich put on the battlefield in the early game. He didn't even find it necessary to exert his Glorybringers which would count as additional removal if he needed it.Barich's biggest creature (Verdurous Gearhulk) never made it out of the library nor did Hadana's Climb, which was one of the things that set his deck apart from other Constrictor decks. Schroeder's Glorybringers and Rekindling Phoenixes (at least one of them), were on the board both games. Not having answers for these two flying threats is what ultimately lost Barich game 1. In game 2, Barich had to deal with some bad draws while Schroeder's Earthshaker Khenra was presented in his final attack downing one of Barich's two chump blockers. Barich's deck didn't have very much evasion. It relied almost entirely on getting creatures on the board, protecting them, and getting enormous amounts of counters on them. Schroeder's creatures were ready to go as/is and brought evasion to the fight organically.Schroeder's creatures included three that could return from the grave. This effect ultimately decided the game. Rekindling Phoenix chump blocked and died in one game leaving a token that could be sacrificed allowing it to return to the battlefield with haste next turn. Resilient Khenra came back to buff a small 2/2 creature at the end of another game. And although it didn't come out in this game, Earthshaker Khenra could Eternalize as well. Compared to Barich's creatures that lived only once and considering that both players had the same number of creatures in their mainboard, this was a simple lesson in economics. Schroeder was ultimately investing less mana and getting more product.A note on bad luck.I think one of the most frustrating moments for Barich, he didn't show it...this is an assumption, was in Game 1, when he played his second Bristling Hydra. There is a moment where he was probably thinking that he had stabilizing the board. Unfortunately, this is answered Schroeder casting his second Glorybringer. That kind of onslaught is just hard to deal with under any circumstances. I think Barich did the best he could with the cards he was getting. He forced Schroeder to chump block at one point by the bluffed presentation of lethal damage. He was fearless under the enormous pressure of R/G Monsters. Schroeder played flawlessly as well and gave no opening for which Barich could take advantage.Your comments are welcomed.