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The Dictionary Deck-O-Pedia
This thread is designed as an easy, quick-reference guide to decks from all formats - online and paper, casual and competitive. Many of these entries simply provide a brief overview/history of the deck, a sample decklist or two, variants (where applicable), and sometimes basic matchup information. If you're looking for a more in-depth primer, please check to see if there are any links at the end of the mini-primer. These are not intended to be full, in-depth primers (though some of the entries go more in-depth than others).


First and Foremost: This thread is *NOT* a "Post your decklists here" thread. The DDOP is designed as an informative reference for successful, tournament-caliber, famous, or popular decks. I don't mean to sound harsh, but this isn't where you go to post the "Cool Sliver Deck" you play in your casual group or the deck you win with at your local FNM.


There are a few more guidelines that I would like to go through:
1. Please sign up to do one or more primers by posting in the thread, or by sending me a Private Message. This way, we can avoid having people do individual primers of the same deck... in the event that multiple primers of the same deck are recieved, I will either consolidate them into one primer, or I will take the more descriptive/accurate primer.
2. If you wish to submit a primer to a deck, send the primer to me in a Private Message. Even though I'll be linking to each decktype from the Index Post, I'd rather not have the thread unneccessarily long due to duplicate versions (sumbissions plus final versions) of each primer.
3. Please, for the love of all things holy (or all things unholy, if you prefer), USE AUTOCARD. I have neither the time nor the patience to edit each primer as it is sent to me. If you can take the time to do a decent primer on the deck, you can take the time to stick [card] tags on the decklists.
4. Updated 8-31-2006 -- Deck tag guidelines included: I would appreciate it if you could try to use the following format:
[sblock]Deckname
By (Insert YourName Here)


The Basics:

[sblock="The Decklist(s):"][deck=DECK NAME]Player/Accomplishments

LANDS (#):
List lands here

CREATURES (#):
List creatures here

OTHER SPELLS (#):
List other spells here

SIDEBOARD(#):
List sideboard cards here[/deck][/sblock]

Other Notes, Matchup Info, etc.:

Relevant Links:[/sblock]I'm really trying to get these formats standardized; I plan on going back and reformatting the older primeres to suit this format (as best as possible), and I'd rather not do additional mundane work that could easily have been averted.




Without further ado, I present to you the Dictionary Deck-O-Pedia. :)

Channelball
By Skankhair

The Basics:
Channelball is a combo deck from Magic's earliest days. Originally, you could use any number of copies of a card in your deck, and there was no deck minimum.
It won on turn 1. This made people cry.
Then Magic stopped having moronic rules (or rather, a lack of rules to keep the game from being moronic). The 4-of rule was created and the deck minimum became 40 cards (later raised to 60). But the [card]Channel[/card]/[card]Fireball[/card] combo still randomly won games, causing Channel to be banned from tournament play.

The Decklist:
[sblock]2 [card]Black Lotus[/card]
2 [card]Channel[/card]
2 [card]Fireball[/card]
2 [card]Mountain[/card][/sblock]

Other Notes, Matchup Info, etc.:
Channelball was never really a good deck after the 4-card rule and 40-card minimum came about, but it was still infamous, and it still made people mad. To this day, people think of Channelball when they think of turn 1 wins, even though the deck is a horrible example of a turn 1 win. People often refer to Type 1 as the format in which [card]Channel[/card] + [card]Fireball[/card] exists, even though the combo isn't viable in Type 1 at all, and wouldn't be even if the deck was allowed to run 4 [card]Channel[/card] and 4 [card]Black Lotus[/card].
Channelball may be a crappy deck using today's rules, but it remains an example of why we have the deckbuilding rules that we have.

Relevant Links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combo_deck (see Channelball)

Doomsday
By PipOC

The Basics:
Back in the day there was a combo deck called Doomsday, and it was powerful enough to go and get its bad self restricted. It was based around playing [card]Doomsday[/card] with two cards in hand, and getting a stack of the following:
[card]Timetwister[/card]
[card]Regrowth[/card]
[card]Black Lotus[/card]
[card]Lion's Eye Diamond[/card]
[card]Stroke of Genius[/card]
Of course, you had to have two cards in hand, or the combo wouldn't work.
To get the combo up and running, you play [card]Doomsday[/card], getting the aforementioned stack. You must have two cards in hand and 3 mana to do so. Pass the turn and draw into [card]Timetwister[/card]. Play it, leaving it as the only card left in your graveyard, and then play [card]Black Lotus[/card] and [card]Lion's Eye Diamond[/card]. Break (sacrifice) the [card]Black Lotus[/card] to play [card]Regrowth[/card], and in response to the [card]Regrowth[/card], break [card]Lion's Eye Diamond[/card] for blue mana. [card]Timetwister[/card] comes back into your hand and you have 4 mana, 3 with which to play the [card]Timetwister[/card], and 1 left over. Keep repeating this loop until you have enough mana to kill your opponent.

The Decklist:
[sblock=Original Doomsday:]Lands (18)
1 [card]Library of Alexandria[/card]
1 [card]Strip Mine[/card]
4 [card]City of Brass[/card]
2 [card]Reflecting Pool[/card]
4 [card]Gemstone Mine[/card]
4 [card]Underground Sea[/card]
2 [card]Bayou[/card]

Creatures (0)

Other Spells (41)
3 [card]Doomsday[/card]
3 [card]Dark Ritual[/card]
3 [card]vampiric Tutor[/card]
1 [card]Demonic Tutor[/card]
1 [card]Braingeyser[/card]
1 [card]Ancestral Recall[/card]
1 [card]Timetwister[/card]
1 [card]Time Walk[/card]
1 [card]Meditate[/card]
2 [card]Brainstorm[/card]
3 [card]Arcane Denial[/card]
2 [card]Mystical Tutor[/card]
2 [card]City of Solitude[/card]
1 [card]Fastbond[/card]
1 [card]Regrowth[/card]
1 [card]Wheel of Fortune[/card]
5 Moxen
3 [card]Lion's Eye Diamond[/card]
1 [card]Black Lotus[/card]
1 [card]Zuran Orb[/card]
2 [card]Abeyence[/card]
2 [card]Squanderd Resources[/card]

Sideboard:
2 [card]Abeyance[/card]
1 [card]City of Solitude[/card]
1 [card]Arcane Denial[/card]
4 [card]Pyroblast[/card]
3 [card]Hydroblast[/card]
4 [card]Barbed Sextant[/card][/sblock]
[sblock=Smmenen's SCG P9 II Doomsday:]Lands (14)
3 [card]Island[/card]
1 [card]Swamp[/card]
4 [card]Polluted Delta[/card]
2 [card]Flooded Strand[/card]
4 [card]Underground Sea[/card]

Creatures (0)

Other Spells (46)
4 [card]Doomsday[/card]
1 [card]Mox Sapphire[/card]
1 [card]Mox Jet[/card]
1 [card]Black Lotus[/card]
1 [card]Lotus Petal[/card]
1 [card]Lion's Eye Diamond[/card]
4 [card]Dark Ritual[/card]
2 [card]Cabal Ritual[/card]
1 [card]Chromatic Sphere[/card]
1 [card]Necropotence[/card]
1 [card]Yawgmoth's Will[/card]
1 [card]Timetwister[/card]
1 [card]Lim-Dul's Vault[/card]
1 [card]Gush[/card]
1 [card]Ancestral Recall[/card]
1 [card]Time Walk[/card]
1 [card]Mind's Desire[/card]
1 [card]Mystical Tutor[/card]
4 [card]Force of Will[/card]
1 [card]Hurkyl's Recall[/card]
4 [card]Brainstorm[/card]
4 [card]Duress[/card]
4 [card]Unmask[/card]
1 [card]Vampiric Tutor[/card]
1 [card]Demonic Tutor[/card]
1 [card]Tendrils of Agony[/card]
1 [card]Beacon of Destruction[/card]

Sideboard:
3 [card]Old Man of the Sea[/card]
3 [card]Back to Basics[/card]
3 [card]Energy Flux[/card]
3 [card]Defense Grid[/card]
2 [card]Null Rod[/card]
1 [card]Chain of Vapor[/card][/sblock]

Other Notes, Matchup Info, etc.:
After the bannings, nothing was to be heard of Doomsday for years.
Along comes September of 2004. The B/R announcement comes with a mild shock; [card]Doomsday[/card] is to be unrestricted, effective the 20th. Many teams begin working on breaking [card]Doomsday[/card] again. Many focus on the [card]Helm of Awakening[/card]/[card]Ancestral Recall[/card]/[card]Conjurers Bauble[/card]/[card]Disciple of the Vault[/card] combo. But, like many times before, Team Meandeck plans to break the mold. Early in october their stack is leaked:
[card]Ancestral Recall[/card]
[card]Black Lotus[/card]
[card]Dark Ritual[/card]
[card]Mind's Desire[/card]
[card]Beacon of Destruction[/card]
For this combo, play [card]Doomsday[/card] and pass the turn if you have [MANACOST]UB[/MANACOST] (UB). Play [card]Ancestral Recall[/card] into [card]Black Lotus[/card], [card]Dark Ritual[/card], and [card]Mind's Desire[/card], and then play [card]Dark Ritual[/card] and [card]Black Lotus[/card] to play [card]Mind's Desire[/card] with a Storm count of 4. 1 [card]Mind's Desire[/card] resolves revealing [card]Beacon of Destruction[/card], and then you play [card]Beacon of Destruction[/card], dealing 5 damage to your opponent, and shuffling it back in to be revealed by [card]Mind's Desire[/card] 3 more times.
Up to this point, the team had been planning to play the deck at SCG's Power Nine II, but since the stack had been leaked, only Steve Menendian played the deck. He went to top 8. Many people thought the deck would replace TPS, but because of the deck's fragility, it hasn't been used as often as expected..

Smmenen's deck also included another kill that didn't require passing the turn to the opponent and exposing itself to a possible topdeck answer. If you have a draw a spell in hand or a [card]Chromatic Sphere[/card] in play and you have enough mana to do it, you can use this stack (if you are using [card]Gush[/card], replace [card]Ancestral Recall[/card] with [card]Brainstorm[/card]):
[card]Ancestral Recall[/card]
[card]Black Lotus[/card]
[card]Lion's Eye Diamond[/card]
[card]Yawgmoth's Will[/card]
[card]Tendrils of Agony[/card]
Play the draw spell, play [card]Ancestral Recall[/card], play [card]Black Lotus[/card], and [card]Lion's Eye Diamond]LED[/card]. Play [card]Yawgmoth's Will[/card] and crack (sacrifice) [card=Lion's Eye Diamond]LED[/card] in response. Play [card]Black Lotus[/card] and [card=Lion's Eye Diamond]LED[/card], then replay the draw spell you used and play [card]Tendrils of Agony[/card] for the kill.
If you used [card]Gush[/card], play [card]Gush[/card] and [card]Brainstorm[/card], putting the two [card]Island[/card]s on top of your library. Play [card]Black Lotus[/card] and [card=Lion's Eye Diamond]LED[/card], play [card]Yawgmoth's Will[/card] and in responce break [card=Lion's Eye Diamond]LED[/card], replay LED and [card]Black Lotus[/card], and then play [card]Tendrils of Agony[/card] for the win.

Machine Head
By Skankhair

The Basics:
Machine Head is a Black/Red Aggro/control deck which Tom van de Logt drove to a first place finish in the Type 2 World Championship of 2001.
The deck uses early control then drops large beatdown creatures, often with the help of [card]Dark Ritual[/card]. This allows it to slow faster decks down, and then start playing bigger creatures than the other deck can handle.
This archtype never saw much play in other formats but remains a fan favorite of players who played T2 during its era.

The Decklist:
[sblock=Tom van De Logt’s Worlds 2001 1st Place Machine Head] Land (24):
6 [card]Swamp[/card]
6 [card]Mountain[/card]
4 [card]Sulfurous Springs[/card]
4 [card]Urborg Volcano[/card]
4 [card]Rishadan Port[/card]

Creatures (18):
4 [card]Plague Spitter[/card]
3 [card]Phyrexian Scuta[/card]
2 [card]Crypt Angel[/card]
3 [card]Skizzik[/card]
2 [card]Flametongue Kavu[/card]
4 [card]Blazing Specter[/card]

Other Spells (32):
4 [card]Dark Ritual[/card]
4 [card]Duress[/card]
3 [card]Vendetta[/card]
3 [card]Urza’s Rage[/card]
4 [card]Terminate[/card]

Sideboard (15):
1 [card]Crypt Angel[/card]
3 [card]Phyrexian Arena[/card]
3 [card]Addle[/card]
2 [card]Persecute[/card]
4 [card]Scoria Cat[/card]
1 [card]Flametongue Kavu[/card]
1 [card]Pyroclasm[/card][/sblock]

Relevant Links:
http://www.wizards.com/sideboard/articl … \450finals

Replenish
By Skankhair

The Basics:
Replenish uses cards like [card]Frantic Search[/card], [card]Careful Study[/card], and [card]Attunement[/card] to draw and discard a lot of cards, then [card]Replenish[/card] to put all of the discarded Enchantments into play at the same time.
The deck was popular in Urza's Block Constructed and in T2. When Masques came out, T2 Replenish picked up some neat tools in [card]Parallax Wave[/card] and [card]Parallax Tide[/card].
The classic win came from [card]Opalescence[/card], then using your army of Enchantments to attack for the win (controlling the board with the Parallax cards and stalling with [card]Energy Field[/card]). Later (in other formats) [card]Pandemonium[/card]/[card]Saproling Burst[/card] (Pandeburst) became the standard kill.

The Decklist:
[sblock=Tom van de Logt’s Worlds 2000 5th Place Replenish] Land (25):
8 Plains
9 Island
4 [card]Adarkar Wastes[/card]
4 [card]Rishadan Port[/card]

Spells (35):
4 [card]Replenish[/card]
4 [card]Opalescence[/card]
4 [card]Parallax Wave[/card]
3 [card]Parallax Tide[/card]
3 [card]Enlightened Tutor[/card]
1 [card]Seal of Cleansing[/card]
1 [card]Wrath of God[/card]
4 [card]Frantic Search[/card]
4 [card]Attunement[/card]
3 [card]Counterspell[/card]
1 [card]Energy Field[/card]
1 [card]Mystical Tutor[/card]
1 [card]Seal of Removal[/card]
1 [card]Sky Diamond[/card]

Sideboard (15):
3 [card]Erase[/card]
2 [card]Wrath of God[/card]
1 [card]Circle of Protection: Black[/card]
1 [card]Seal of Cleansing[/card]
2 [card]Lilting Refrain[/card]
2 [card]Submerge[/card]
2 [card]Daze[/card]
1 [card]Chill[/card]
1 [card]Cursed Totem[/card][/sblock]

Relevant Links:
http://www.wizards.com/magic/expert/wcd … d_logt.asp