"Midweek Magic 2017 #9 - So this is what being an Archenemy feels like."

"Midweek Magic 2017 #9 - So this is what being an Archenemy feels like."

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr.MD

The first time I tried my hands at Archenemy I found myself very excited. I was about to face off against 4 people though , which according to Ram was already 1 player too many for a regular Archenemy session. It was his idea that I take the reigns of the scheme cards after all. All of my opponents sat across me from a high pantry table and I could clearly see every one's battlefield conditions.

Archenemy is a variation of Magic that allows you to employ your regular 60 card deck with the inclusion of another set of cards called Schemes. After your draw phase you simply reveal a scheme from a scheme pile and you are able to take advantage of the scheme. We are using the first set of Archenemy cards and I am looking forward to the Nicol Bolas themed cards. These cards were designed to even the playing field for you and so you have cards that lets you take extra turns , destroy creatures or lands , copy existing artifacts. You get the idea. All cards let you have an unfair advantage should you draw them at the right time.

For my first drive as an Archenemy I decided on using my currently most powerful deck , The Sultai Super friends. The Sultai are villains after all and it even has Tasigur , the Golden Banana and Dragonlord Silumgar in it for added flavor.

Right off the bat when I started dropping lands , Ram and Pao who are my most consistent opponents instantly recognized the Opulent Palace and knew where I was headed with this deck. They have faced the deck enough times to know that I have ample mass removal in Damnation and Black Sun's Zenith and once the multitude of Planeswalkers come into play one by one they knew that they would in in serious trouble.

I must admit though that for a deck that has green in it my deck is a rather slow one with a lot of tapped lands coming in. And as bad luck would have it the first 2 schemes that I enacted were duds. The first one was a mass removal spell that mass removed nothing and the other one allowed me to copy an artifact which gave me a very powerful....Mana Rock!(My own sarcasm kills me)

Of course my schemes failed and after wiping the board twice my opponents were able to rally for my downfall which leads me to the conclusion that it was never in my cards to be a villain. I would be a very bumbling villain if I were. Or Sablay as we would say in tagalog.

Oh well. It was time to look forward to being a regular heroic Magic player next week.