white weenie - atlantic
IDEAS AND DIFFERENCES?
Game 1 is pure aggro, with 25 white creatures plus the 4 factories and 6 anthem effects. Curve tops out at 3 and we try to gain some soft card advantage by shaving a bit of removal and mana (only 17 white sources counting plains and lotus, with 3 each of disenchant and swords). The game plan is mostly linear – need to curve out with multiple threats and keep the pressure on their life total. Two white sources are sufficient to keep a hand with creature drops lined up. First strike and banding help win combat even if they manage to stick a larger creature, especially with Crusade/Army, Javelineers, and pump knights. The sideboard has the 4th Swords and Disenchant, along with other powerful removals (dust to dust, bottle, maze, balance, etc.) so we can shift gears to a more midrange approach based on the matchup and what we expect them to take in. Land Tax and Geddon also live in the board for an additional CA engine and another angle of attack against control, mazes, disco troll, etc.​
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The aggressive posture before sideboard is a bit more extreme than many versions. I do think White Weenie has great flexibility, but I prefer to go all-out before my opponent knows what they’re up against, and then shift gears with powerful removal and less of a go-wide plan in games 2-3. This build also plays full sets of some of the more traditional SWE White Weenie elements like Crusade and Thunder Spirit, as opposed to the Pendelhaven/Maze/Blacksmith type approach (which I also play and enjoy). These cards are susceptible to Disenchant and Bolt but when unanswered they are very powerful, especially in combination. If we’re curving out properly, we can often pressure the opponent to use their removal on early threats – bolt a knight and disenchant a factory, for instance -- and then win the game with a Spirit plus Crusade or similar.
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MEMORIES OF PLAYING IT?
Basically, any time I get to use banding. Especially when Maze and Army of Allah get involved – we can do all sorts of tricks, even in between first strike and regular combat damage. The mirror and mono-green are probably
Tim Atwood's list
CREATURES
2 Benaligh Hero
4 Icatian Javelineers
2 Mesa Pegasus
4 Order of Leitbur
1 Preacher
4 Savannah Lions
4 Thunder Spirit
4 White Knight
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SPELLS
2 Army of Allah
1 Black Lotus
1 Chaos Orb
4 Crusade
3 Disenchant
1 Mox Pearl
3 Swords to Plowshares
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LANDS
4 Mishra's Factory
15 Plains
1 Strip Mine
the most interesting combat math (one of my favorite matches involved a lengthy standoff of Javelineers vs. Killer Bees and Wyluli Wolves).
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MATCHUPS?
It’s usually a bit of an uphill battle against fully powered decks, but where they have a higher ceiling, we have a higher floor. The consistency will frequently get us there vs. control if they stumble on mana or removal. Board wipes are tough but we have decent resilience to Abyss with 8 pro-black creatures and the factories. And Blacksmiths can come in to supplement the fliers vs. Earthquake (and Falling Star).
Most matchups are pretty interactive, even solitaire stuff like Twiddlevault or Reanimator, especially after sideboard with our removal options. Gloom is tough to beat but not super common in fully powered metas. Trike is also rough but we have lots of artifact hate, and can play around it to some extent with Crusades and 2-toughness creatures.
Order of the Ebon Hand (and to a lesser extent Black Knight) is another problem for us. Mazes and Factories can help, along with some sideboard options like Aeolipile, Balance, Wrath, or even Holy Light. If they don’t have non-black blockers we can sometimes win the race with our own knights though.
Midrangey UBR decks give us a lot of trouble. The combination of the CA they get from Hymns and blue power, plus the multicolored removal and threats to get around our protection, and resilient roadblocks like Trolls and Orders, can make for a long day. Sometimes we can stay low to the ground and outrace them, and/or use Geddon to shut down their development (and regeneration).
SIDEBOARD SUGGESTIONS?
As mentioned above, the shift to a more midrange plan is often my approach. I like to supplement the fourth Swords and Disenchant with CA-generating removal like Dust to Dust, Balance, Bottle, and Geddon. Land Tax and even LOA can be helpful in grindier matchups, especially on the draw. Depending on the meta, there are lots of additional creature answers in the form of Maze, Blacksmith, Aeolipile, Spirit Link, King Suleiman, Wrath, Holy Light, Pendelhaven, and more Preachers... and then we have some of the strongest color hosers in COPs and Karma etc. Really the biggest challenge is narrowing it down to 15!
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source: Tim Atwood - New England Old School
picture: @oldschoolmtg