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I am impressed. This is the best article I've read/watched in a long time, maybe ever - and I definitely did not expect it. For someone like me, who hasn't followed extended much since the qualifier season several months ago, this was great information.

It looks like a lot of work went into the article, and it paid off. And special credit either to Mike for having a naturally clear voice, or to the audio editor for the videos, because the sound quality is excellent.

I would love to see something similar before every PT.

I'm a little suprised thier hasn't been any talk of Might of old Krosa as a replacement for Gaea's Might.

I must echo the sentiments, AMAZING ARTICLE! Quite possibly the best one ever. I'm speachless. Bravo.

Nice to see some time and thought put into this week's article.

Great article ! That’s a very thoughtful pre-PT analysis of the new Extended, and I don’t think we could ask for more. And the videos really add something ! I’ve never actually heard Flores’ voice before, nor seen any images of him besides his small columnist picture. Even if they were short, those few videos helped me get to know him a lot better.

I wish to bring up the Domain Zoo VS Zoo argument here. I don’t value Dark Confidant and Tribal Flames high enough in the current metagame for me to play Domain. Bob dies to every single removal spell in the format, and he also blows hard against beatdown strategies, which will assuredly take a greater portion of the field than last season. To play all five colors, as in Flores’ example build you need an almost 100% non-basic (and thus painful) manabase, which further weakens you in any aggro match-up, and makes you very vulnerable to Blood Moon and its Magus against All-In Red. There’s not even a single removal spell in his list than can kill a Magus : Tribal Flames does only 1 damage when he’s on the board. That said, Domain stays the better build against anything non-aggro, so the argument is far from closed. I think I would advocate it for pro-level tournaments since pros prefer control decks.

Zoo is my pet deck in the format at the moment. Playing only three colors allows me to put 5-6 basic lands in there to draw and fetch, which greatly reduces the pain and can save me from Blood Moon. Here’s my current list :

4 Kird Ape
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Watchwolf
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Figure of Destiny
2 Umezawa’s Jitte
4 Oblivion Ring
4 Lightning Helix
2 Seal of Fire
2 Tarfire
3 Incinerate
4 Molten Rain

4 Windswept Heath
4 Bloodstained Mire
4 Stomping Ground
3 Sacred Foundry
2 Temple Garden
3 Mountain
2 Plains
1 Forest

I’ve seen little discussion about replacing Vindicate by Oblivion Ring in Zoo, and that surprises me as it truly is the next best thing, and is plain better in a number of situations. For me, the fact that it is monowhite is a further incentive to stick to three colors.

Molten Rain is a real star here, too. For a deck that consistently puts 5-6 power worth of creatures on the board on turns one and two, being able to destroy a land on turn three means slowing down any possible answers allowing an additional turn of sick beats before, say, a Wrath of God.

I think you underestimate the power of graveyard removal, but that aside it was fun.

I hadn't actually seen All-In-Red, but it looks fun.