Alt PDC 1.06, The Format, The Decks, The Winners

1 Barren Moor
1 Compulsive Research
1 Death Denied
1 Deep Analysis
1 Dimir Aqueduct
1 Dimir Infiltrator
1 Dimir Signet
1 Exclude
1 Firebolt
1 Forgotten Cave
1 Incinerate
1 Innocent Blood
1 Izzet Boilerworks
1 Izzet Chronarch
1 Izzet Signet
1 Jilt
1 Last Gasp
1 Lightning Bolt
1 Lonely Sandbar
1 Man-o'-War
1 Ninja of the Deep Hours
1 Okiba-Gang Shinobi
1 Peel from Reality
1 Phyrexian Rager
1 Probe
1 Scrivener
1 Shred Memory
1 Skirk Marauder
6 Snow-Covered Island
4 Snow-Covered Mountain
5 Snow-Covered Swamp
1 Steamcore Weird
1 Stinkweed Imp
1 Terminate
1 Train of Thought
1 Grim Harvest
1 Ichor Slick
1 Looter il-Kor
1 Mulldrifter
1 Mystical Teachings
1 Rakdos Carnarium
1 Rakdos Signet
1 Shaper Parasite
1 Shimmering Grotto
1 Skred
1 Strangling Soot
1 Terramorphic Expanse
1 AEthersnipe

Sideboard
1 Cremate
1 Duress
1 Hydroblast
1 Nausea
1 Pyroblast
1 Reaping the Graves
1 Remove Soul
1 Skullsnatcher
1 Terror
1 Wrench Mind
1 Yamabushi's Storm
1 Chilling Shade
1 Dream Stalker
1 Faerie Trickery
1 Mindstab

Most of the decks spells gain card advantage: Exclude, Firebolt, Skirk Marauder and most of the decks other spells can slowly win the game by gaining control over the board and then bringing spells back. Parlor Tricks is especially good in singleton because of the lack of land destruction which has been a problem to Parlor Tricks in future extended. Furthermore Parlor tricks is a Kingritz deck (both because he made it and because it’s a board control deck that is vulnerable to counterspells and land destruction and little else) so it should be no surprise he came up with a second victory.

Next week is Look at me, I’m the DCI where PDCer’s have voted to ban the following cards. The number after the cards is the number of times people voted to ban the card.

Amrou Scout (1)
Blade of the Sixth Pride (1)
Chilling Shade (1)
Deathspore Thallid (1)
Empty the Warrens (3)
Errant Ephemeron (1)
Grim Harvest (1)
Momentary Blink (2)
Mystical Teachings (1)
Sinew Sliver (1)
Skred (1)
Sprout Swarm (1)

Almost all of the big decks are hurt by the bannings. Wanna run storm control? To bad because you can’t run Empty the Warrens. WW loses its best card Amrou Scout and also loses Sinew Sliver. Blade of the Sixth Pride which is normally not worth playing in WW now hurts because two of its other two drops got banned. Blinkdrifter loses Blink and Ephemeron. Mulldrifter inexplicably survived but how good will it be without it partners in crime Momentary Blink and Grim Harvest. Deathspore Thallid sprout spore should be plenty to eliminate Dreamspore Rock from contention. Skred and chilling shade were banned presumably because someone hates snow lands.

So what decks will still survive. RDW loses nothing to bannings and seems like a very powerful deck in this format. Foresee biased Tendrils seems like a solid deck (which can use everybody favorite evoker). On the other hand Hurriboy might run it over with sticks and stones which only loses Skred (for some builds). Kingritz who won the last two Alt PDC events claims that grapeshot combo can also be competitive although I’m dubious (still he won the last two events). And WW could survive post ban by adding Youthful Knight and Marshalling Cry and going back to 18 land. One positive thing for WW is that its current bad matchups are often crippled. So it might just win another tournament. It’s all up in the air going into Alt PDC 1.07.