Deep Tracks: Nicol Bolas
by
John Messner // Jul 11, 2018
Hey folks, welcome to another edition of Deep Tracks! It's time to embark on the third leg of our exploration of the five Elder Dragons from Legends and Core Set 2019! So far, we’ve uncovered the potential strengths of Arcades and Chromium. Now it’s time to set our sights on the most powerful Dragon in the multiverse:
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Ah yes, the mighty
Nicol Bolas; one of the very few characters from
Magic: the Gathering that has actually spawned a Funk POP action figure!
A strange point to start on, I know. But as I type this very sentence, there is a six inch miniature
Nicol Bolas resting atop my fireplace mantle, staring down at me! So what is it about Nicol Bolas that has pushed Magic R&D to print more iterations of
this Elder Dragon than any other? Maybe Mark Rosewater is a really big fan of Grixis?! Whatever the case may be, every time Bolas makes a new appearance, there’s always a buzz in the air! And talk about Iconic... we've seen
Nicol Bolas appear in Planeswalker form multiple times throughout the years:
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Heck, we’ve even received a long list of cards over the course of Magics history that either reference, depict, and / or pay homage to Bolas. Here are a few examples:
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And if that’s not enough,
Nicol Bolas has even starred in his own supplemental
Magic product entitled
Archenemy: Nicol Bolas. This unique multiplayer variant pits three players (members of the Gatewatch) against one player serving the role of the Archenemy (Bolas)!
Needless to say,
Nicol Bolas has been around the block more than a few times! The funny thing is that each different card featuring
Nicol Bolas has a similarity: they’re really difficult to build a competitive deck around. And if we try, we’re basically forced into some kind of Grixis Control scheme. Granted,
Nicol Bolas always boasts over the top game-changing abilities as a typical characteristic. And there’s no doubt that just about anyone would be more than thrilled to have access to Bolas in a limited environment like Sealed Deck or Draft. But how do we put this Elder Dragon to use in a constructed format like Modern or Standard?
… The answer may be upon us! Without further delay, it’s time to once again welcome the king of Grixis Dragon lore back into the fold:
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Is that
baby Bolas represented on a flip-Walker card?! I really,
really love it! Bolas is back, but this new take on his design is different from previous offerings, and gives me hope that we can finally slide the Elder Dragon into I don’t know, dare I say... a Midrange deck? I always did like the flip-Walkers from
Magic Origins, and I think it’s brilliant that
Wizards has done the same for
Nicol Bolas. I am a little curious though; why weren’t all five of the
Core Set 2019 Elder Dragons designed this way? How sweet would that have been?
Speaking of
Core Set 2019, the set will be officially released to the public in just a few days, marking the fifth unique rendition of
Nicol Bolas to make an appearance in the realm of Standard. I’ve been working on some brews for Legacy, Modern, and yes, Standard too. But first, let’s start our celebration of Bolas with one of my favorite archetypes and a trip to the 90s…
Old School
Well, it’s nice to see we can pick up a playset of
Deep Spawn for under a dollar! Gotta love
Fallen Empires!
All joking aside, what we have here is an awe-inspiring tribute to
Magics past. Just gaze at the
power for a few minutes. I can’t help but marvel at Old School 93/94 brews. And look at that, it’s a Reanimator deck featuring the original
Nicol Bolas! Also, who would have figured that one of the most powerful graveyard enablers of all time would be in the form of… a Land card?
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There's just something about graveyard strategies that strikes a chord with me. And this Old School deck is a great representation of the rich history of Reanimator as an archetype. As for operating the deck, we have mana acceleration in the form of
Sol Ring, the five Moxes, and
Black Lotus. We've got over-costed reanimation targets like
Nicol Bolas and
Deep Spawn. And even
Triskelion and
Tetravus are solid recursive threats.
Bazaar of Baghdad,
Recall,
Wheel of Fortune, and
Mind Twist can serve as combo enablers. And then of course, we have our reanimation spells:
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If you're interested in learning more about Old School decks, check out the links section (below) for a full breakdown of this killer concoction as well as a treasure trove of valuable information about the format.
Legacy
Old School decks are always fun to discuss and easy to drool over. But when it comes to brewing up crazy decks with a little old school flare, I get my kicks playing Legacy! Here’s my ode to
Nicol Bolas:
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As far as the troublesome upkeep cost required for Bolas… we shrug it off! Both of our “cheat” spells will give
Nicol Bolas haste, but will also force us to sacrifice
Nicol Bolas at the end of our turn, meaning he won’t be around next upkeep anyway. On the surface I'm sure this seems like a downside. However, connecting once with Bolas can be devastating for the opponent, making them discard their entire grip!
I chose Griselbrand as our monster of choice to fill things out. And ideally, Griselbrand is the first threat we should be aiming to slam on the battlefield most games; our most reasonable path to victory is to attack once with Griselbrand, refill our hand with the Demon's card-draw ability, and then close things out on the next turn with another Griselbrand and Nicol Bolas. This may sound easy, but the deck actually needs some time to set things up before we start sneaking our big flying monsters into play. Therefore, I included a prison package to help slow things down a bit:
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Once we have our opponents resources on lockdown with some help from the likes of
Chalice of the Void and
Blood Moon, it's time to unload our Legendary creatures and bury the opponent with our aerial assault! Rounding out the deck I chose some staple mana acceleration cards like
Lotus Petal,
Simian Spirit Guide, and
Chrome Mox to assist in casting our prison pieces as early as turn one. And for the sideboard plan I gathered a solid group of hate cards and snuck in a couple additional
extra large creatures:
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If there was ever a perfect home for
Worldspine Wurm, it would be in a
Sneak Attack deck. We simply "cheat"
Worldspine Wurm into play, swing for fifteen points of damage, and then end the turn by tossing a few 5/5 Wurm tokens into play! And hey what's that? Watch out... big mama Emrakul incoming!!
Modern
When I started contemplating ways to incorporate
Nicol Bolas, the Ravager into a Modern deck, the first thing I decided is that I wanted to make sure we could flip the Elder Dragon into his Planeswalker form on a relatively consistent basis. Thankfully, we have access to a little gem from
Rise of the Eldrazi, which makes this dream a reality:
Thanks to
Training Grounds, we have a realistic path to harnessing
Nicol Bolas, the Arisen as early as turn five! To reiterate, with
Training Grounds on the battlefield, we have the possibility of curving a turn four
Nicol Bolas, the Ravager into a flip activation on the following turn. Some of you may be thinking that sounds a little slow for the Modern format, but we have some tricks up our sleeve to make sure we get there; the deck packs a diverse suite of interactive spells, including battle tested and proven staples like
Lightning Bolt,
Fatal Push,
Remand, and
Kolaghan's Command, to name a few.
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And you know, like, how could I build a blue Modern deck and not include ole "Snappy"?!
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In all seriousness,
Snapcaster Mage plays an important role in our gameplan. We'll want to be activating
Pack Rat and / or
Hazoret the Fervent as much as possible, and alongside
Tasigur, the Golden Fang,
Snapcaster Mage contributes nicely to squeezing every ounce of value out of our graveyard. The sideboard plan for Grixis Training Grounds reflects a similarly diverse range of hate cards as the Legacy Sneak Attack deck. I wanted to develop a flexible plan so we'd always feel prepared for any crazy deck that may be across the table. And yes, we're giving
Alpine Moon a couple slots to deal with pesky Tron decks!
Now that we've opened the gates for
Nicol Bolas, the Ravager in Modern, let's move onward and see what we can do with the Elder Dragon in Standard!
Standard
As much as I'd love to say otherwise, we just don't have
Training Grounds in Standard. But there's no need to fret; Standard isn't as "fast" as Modern. So, in theory we should be able to assemble a balanced deck that has the legs to enable a "natural"
Nicol Bolas, the Ravager activation! And I can't think of any better way to get there than with a good old-fashioned Midrange build:
I'm just going to say it — I miss
Thoughtseize in Standard. This may not be a popular opinion, but it's probably worth consideration. And although it may be a long time until we see the likes of
Thoughtseize in a Standard set again, we can at least try our best impersonation:
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When I think of Midrange strategies that include black, I almost always want a 1 CMC discard spell to open up a game with. And while
Divest isn't nearly as potent as a
Thoughtseize or
Inquisition of Kozilek, it suits us well here as a way to collect information and possibly strip our opponent of a key creature or artifact. Also, it should be no surprise that I included a full playset of
Duress in the sideboard to bring in versus Control decks.
The deck is a little light on creatures, at least by typical Midrange standards. But our primary goal is to get Bolas on the battlefield and turn the corner. With this in mind, I chose a couple energy based creatures that help us stabilize the board early, and then proceed to stretch the game out:
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With Standard rotation looming in the shadows, this will be our last hoorah with
Kaladesh block and the
busted energy mechanic. And we're sending our
Kaladesh friends off in style with two cornerstones of Grixis Energy,
Glint-Sleeve Siphoner and
Whirler Virtuoso! Of course we need some fuel for the tandum, so I've also included
Harnessed Lightning and
Aether Hub to provide a boost to our light energy sub theme.
The rest of the deck is defined by a mix of potent interaction such as
Vraska's Contempt and
Lightning Strike, and I got frisky with some light card filtering by using the freshly reprinted
Anticipate. I mentioned the upcoming Standard rotation already, but I'm bringing it up again because... I've saved the best for last: As we usher in the new
Core Set 2019 renditions of Nicol Bolas and the five Elder Dragons, we'll also be escorting some whispers of Bolas out the door:
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Dark Intimations... had all of us playing a guessing game during
Kaladesh block. But here we are mere months from saying farewell and
Dark Intimations has yet to fulfill its prophecy of Bolas dominance in Standard. Nonetheless, I included it in my brew, more out of respect than anything else. And just like
Dark Intimations, we'll soon be waving goodbye to
Hour of Devastation and
Nicol Bolas, God-Pharaoh. Like all the cards from
Kaladesh and
Amonkhet they'll become remnants of Standards past, but there's one thing we can be rest assured of:
Nicol Bolas isn't going anywhere anytime soon!
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Conclusion
Let's face it; when it comes to
Magic: the Gathering,
Nicol Bolas is the biggest, baddest, most powerful Dragon to ever grace itself upon the planes of the multiverse! And there's a strangely equal feeling of power when wielding a
Nicol Bolas card in the heat of battle! As challenging as Bolas was to build a deck around, it sure felt rewarding to put this Elder Dragon to the test and come out the other end with some viable concepts. And could there have been a better icon to honor in the midst of
Core Set 2019 release week? All hail Bolas! Join me next time as we continue or quest to unlock the secrets of the five Elder Dragons from
Legends and
Core Set 2019!
That'a a wrap for this installment of Deep Tracks. Let me know what you think! How else can we strengthen Grixis Training Grounds for Modern? Do you have any sweet Elder Dragon brews for the upcoming Standard season? What do you think about that eye-popping Old School decklist? As always, all comments are welcome, thank you so much for reading, and have a great one!
-John
Sources & related info: