Burnt Weave

This weekend, I played Badtothebone. I debated my Arderial and Underneath decks, even Naroom, but I settled for Weave in the end. Magam Flamesmith would start off things by playing a Ithapher, Diomant, and an Arbolit. This promised ill times for a creature dependant deck. As it was, I started with Taisa, so that first turn of pain would be absorbed by the Uwamar he starts with. With two Drowl, Tropical Jumbor, and a Three Leaf Clover to go with the Uwamar, Taisa was off to a good start. Magam Flamesmith didn't last long at all. Now, it would up to Good Ol' Ashgar. With Gorgle's Glasses left in the hand from the Flamesmith, Boomstick and Scroll of Fire would setup a good thing for Cald. Brushfire, Quor, and Arbolit would round out his opening turn. Taisa put up the good fight, but Cald was gaining steam. However, I do admit to at least one probable mistake at this point. I drew all my Uwamars early on and used them up instead of saving them for Kesia and Gia yet to come. Well, Kesia would face Ashgar next. She would use Brushfire from the discard pile to combo with Pody to finish off a Cald creature. Vuryip and Lascinth would round off the creatures for the turn. With her flute and a Three Leaf Clover, she wasn't doing too bad at all. Kesia even got to the point she could/should have finished off Good Ol' Ashgar. However, her attacking creature was blasted by his effect using Smoke Trap. Now, I argued that it was too late to stop the attack, and they felt it would. Anyways, we settled the debate for the time being by going with the judgement that was not in my favor, or that Smoke Trap would cancel the attack (see note at end of this blog). Perhaps my next mistake was sacking the creature to an Aritex at this point. However, my Weave deck is an aggressive Weave deck and I couldn't stand the thought that I had a non-Uwamar in play that just couldn't attack like I wanted. Oh well, I should've remembered Kesia's Flute and started transferring the energy away. I didn't do that. Anyways, the Aritex combo at this point wasn't a total waste anyways. The Three Leaf Clover made sure of that. As Ashgar continued to build a strong number of beneficial relics, it would be up to Gia to take a try at things. Taking a gamble, I figured that the Ergar in play depicted above was the only creature that could attack me. Sawgrass could get it, only if it attacked. With my third Aritex in the hand, I figured that the gamble was worth it. While I took a little more damage than I had anticipated, I did have enough to use the Aritex combo even after the Sawgrass. While this left me creatureless another turn, I wasn't too worried. Despite all the relics you see in the picture, a lot of Cald's work was being done by creatures with some spells up to this point. So, I was thinking that the Ergar was my deadliest threat out there. Oh well. Live and learn. Good Ol' Ashgar would show that he had a number of spells in hand that could work on Gia using Abraxin's Crown in play. Gia went down in a somewhat embarrasing loss. I was tempted for just a moment to build a Weave deck that was up-to-date with stuff like Weave Path and so forth, but I chose in the end to stick to my original Weave. The deck has certain sentimental value. Plus, it's fine with me if my Weave deck isn't the best thing out there. Quite a change at the end of the game from the beginning. See, I had used my first Aritex with Taisa while Taisa had a good build of creatures. I had actually told my wife that since Weave was traditionally weak against Cald, it would be bad indeed if Taisa took the game by storm. So, with a good comeback by Good Ol' Ashgar, I do believe Badtothebone deserved this win.

Note: Badtothebone would post the question of the Smoke Trap with Good Ol' Ashgar's effect on the CCG Workshop forums. The answer they got actually stated that since the attack was already begun in order to trigger Ashgar's effect, Smoke Trap would NOT stop the attack already in progress. So, if the creatures survived like mine had, it would still hit Ashgar for the attack in question.