I miss playing Mage. Let’s face it, I had my chance at the World Championship a couple months ago to play Mage in the Classic portion, and I choked. I decided to play an “all-in” aggro deck with [Ringleader Kuma], which I still think is a good deck for the format, but it's not the class I want to be playing. At heart, I’m still the same kid that began playing the MMORPG many years ago as a Mage. Casting spells, kiting Rogues and Warriors around, controlling my opponents until they’re dead. Maybe you don’t feel as strongly as I do, but not having a traditional control deck in the format really sucks. Thankfully with the help of Crown of the Heavens I think we’re about to get all that back again!

I’m a deck builder at heart, and even though as I’m writing this I’m testing on Magic Workstation and talking to my team on Facebook before the Darkmoon Faire, I’m still thinking about decks that can be made in the new set. It’s really hard to stop, and today I want to talk about a few of the cards that are absolutely insane, some that I think people are underestimating, and I'd like to give you a rough draft at a possible Mage deck for the upcoming Core format using a bunch of these cards.

The first card I want to talk about is one that was previewed a while ago (it just so happens the biggest changes come from the first four cards William Brinkman gave us a sneak peak of back in early November), [Jeishal]. I used to complain that Alliance was not a playable faction months ago right before [Edwin VanCleef] and [Vanessa VanCleef] were printed. With the help of some other cards from the Dungeon Decks we’ll see at the Darkmoon Faire if Alliance is for real. However, if Alliance wasn’t a real faction before it is now because of [Jeishal]. This card alone is a reason to be playing Alliance, and should honestly should read, “When this ally enters play, destroy target [Etched Dragonbone Girdle]. When you destroy [Etched Dragonbone Girdle] shoot your opponent a sly smile, and draw a card joyfully.”

I know it destroys any opposing armor, but honestly you play this to crush the dragon decks. It is difficult for one to argue that [Etched Dragonbone Girdle] in combination with [Twilight Citadel] is not one of the best two card combos the game has seen in a Core format ever. [Jeishal] alone has a solid body, and will trade even on cards for the [Etched Dragonbone Gidle] if destroyed after just one activation. I cannot imagine [Etched Dragonbone Girdle] just dying off as an archtype, but [Jeishal] is definitely a way to stifle those decks and knock them down a few pegs, and I for one am quite pleased.

Considering other cards that we need a cost efficient answer to, [Devout Aurastone Hammer] and [Grand Crusader] are difficult cards to answer. The hammer especially can come online and accelerate out five cost allies before most decks have the ability to destroy it, thus leading to large and difficult hurdles to overcome. [Grand Crusader] has somewhat been figured out by people on how it can be defeated: kill their low cost allies, and have some sort of efficient removal for the actual ability itself. If your class cannot kill it, (hint hint Mage and Warlock that’s you) the [Miniature Voodoo Mask] is basically the stones. Without this card, I’m not sure Warlock and Mage are even a class. Priest on the other hand has [Oppress] and [Dispel Magic], so sharing the love for a better [Spell Suppression] seems like a solid deal to me.

People have caught on that this card is insane, because it stops Hammer, Girdle, and [Grand Crusader], but it also stops cards like [Aspect of the Wild], [Poison Tipped], [Chains of Ice]. The list goes on and on. It’s not like [Spell Suppression] in the fact that you can preemptively play the [Miniature Voodoo Mask] on a turn you have an extra resource in case you need to be playing on curve to turn off their biggest threat. I imagine in the coming months this card will be insane in Core, possibly even format defining, as it trumps every current “unfair” card. This card is what will drive control decks of the cloth variety for the next couple of years, and I for one am overjoyed, I’d get this before they become a chase rare of the set (d'oh! It appears this article's note came a tad late. -Mike).

The last of the early previews that really makes me want to play Mage again is [Overload]. Besides having a sweet name, this is exactly what Mage needed, a cheap answer to [Edwin VanCleef]. Yes, it doesn’t stop him once he’s in play, and Mage could still use a powerful AoE effect that is not [Ripple] or [Frost Nova]. There’s not much to really say about this card except that when your opponent holds two resources open now as a Mage you’ll have to try and deduce whether or not they have [Overload] or [Counterspell]. This card is no [Nether Fracture], it will not be format defining like [Miniature Voodoo Mask], but it is a good solid card, and means I don’t have to play four [Polymorph] just to beat [Mazu’kon] and [Dulvar, Hand of the Light].

The next is actually the reason I wanted to play Mage so badly, my preview card which if you haven’t seen.

[Shroud of the Archmage] is pretty much the [Flickers of the Past] of the future. Want to kill the opponent’s hero? Want to draw some cards? How about preventing opposing allies from attacking your hero? Even turning off Protector for a turn, this card truly does it all. I couldn’t believe it at first that a card did all this, it does attach to your hero, and everyone will be playing cards to kill abilities, but I still think this card is fantastic. It is definitely at its best in a control deck, one that desperately needs an versatile finisher, but you could try it in an ability-burn based deck. The only other downfall I can find on this card is that it requires that you exhaust your hero, meaning that if you do go Alliance you cannot use [Kadus Frosthand] effectively. Sadly, this leaves us with [High Magus Olvek] whose flip I have not been to impressed by in the past. I imagine with [Seeds of Their Demise] I can get over it, and at least the flip can be used on the opponent’s turn. If the new set offers up some sort of way to ready our hero multiple times in a turn (and I don’t mean with something silly like [Bottled Elements]) I might be tempted to test it out to see if it is worth the quicker kill when you have a [Shroud of the Archmage] attached. This card should really never be more than a three of in a deck because you can’t have more than one in play at a time, but in the deck I will share later it is almost essential to draw one in order to win the game so I went with three rather than two.

The last card that made my spicy little Mage number is [Nordrassil, the World Tree], because you can’t be a Control Mage without some healing. Without [Conjure Cinnamon Rolls], times are tough. Sure, [Bronze Warden] is great for healing, when you’re playing [Etched Dragonbone Girdle]. [Nordrassil, the World Tree] makes use of all those left over resources not used to interrupt opposing cards. Resource efficiency is something I stress a lot in my game, and maybe not enough when I’m building decks or writing articles, but I focus on it in my play. In a format like this that is so punishing, so quickly, and the threats increase in power greatly as you increase in cost, you need to try and make the most of each turn, and this location helps to do that. Not to mention if you ever have the ability to spend a resource each turn to charge it up, you could make an extra resource, which last I checked was basically drawing a card, something I’ll never pass up. I’ve heard people calling this location trash, and I cannot begin to understand why, the format is going to slow down slightly from what I am seeing. Every turn this card is in play you are grinding slowly ahead of the opponent, and it is great against both aggro decks and control decks.

So here’s the deck I’ve been referencing that these 5 cards from the new set make me want to play:

Hero: [High Magus Olvek]

Allies: 8

4 [Jeishal]

4 [Dulvar, Hand of the Light]

Abilties: 36

4 [Glaciate]

4 [Glacial Tomb]

3 [Fire Blast]

4 [Mana Agate]

2 [Polymorph]

4 [Ripple]

4 [Counterspell]

4 [Overload]

4 [Arcane Barrage]

3 [Shroud of the Archmage]

Equipment: 8

4 [Miniature Voodoo Mask]

4 [Melodious Slippers]

Locations: 4

4 [Nordrassil, the World Tree]

Quests: 4

4 [Seeds of Their Demise]

Remember this is a rough draft and there are things about this deck I still don’t like and want to change. First of all, I hate that I have to play cards like [Fire Blast] and [Polymorph] just because they are abilities and are good at dealing with allies. These slots needed to be cheap abilities so that [Melodious Slippers] could be triggered, and while we are neutralizing our opponent’s threats we are also drawing cards, fueling up for the end game. Another card that falls into this category is [Ripple], the only reason it is in the deck is because it is the best answer Mage has to [Edwin VanCleef]’s thug tokens. Problem is, the deck doesn’t really have a way to fight Edwin, which is a severe problem. [Overload] can interrupt him, but other than that, Mage could use a [Flamestrike] that didn’t cost seven. I’d even play [Ring of Frost] if it cost four and did its effect to all opposing allies, just because Untargetable is that big of a problem.

The other major problem the deck has is with weapons. [Frozen Nerves] costs way too much to be playing, and the [Miniature Voodoo Mask] doesn’t stop [Bloodied Arcanite Reaper] from eating a poor Mage alive. The best answer I found was just racing it with healing from [Dulvar, Hand of the Light], who is excellent. Thankfully, the entire set has yet to be seen, and that means there’s still plenty of cards to see. The new set truly looks awesome. This will allow us to build some sweet decks with some solid testing rather than speculating at first of what the metagame will be like this Mage deck.

I think this deck is pretty sweet, somewhat light on ways to actually kill the opponent, but with the help of maybe one or two more cards from Crown of the Heavens, I think you could see the Mage back on top like the days of [“Black Ice” Fizzlefreeze]. Let me know what you think of the deck in the forums, and I’ll be back with more sweet decks (and more importantly knowledge of the entire new set) in a couple of weeks!

-Corey