Aether Vial

Throughout my Magic career, I have played many decks with Aether Vial. It is one of the cards I enjoy playing with the most. I played it when it was first printed in Affinity. I played it in Extended and Legacy Goblins. I played it in Merfolk and Death and Taxes. I've recently been playing it in Spirits and Humans. Fourteen years of playing this card and I thought I knew all there was to know about it.

I was wrong.

A 2004 era Goblins deck

This past week I've learned two things about the card that changed the way I think about it.

One-Drops with Aether Vial

The first piece of new information came from my favorite Magic player when I first started playing competitively, Jeff Cunningham. In his article about the top tier of Modern, he put forth a list with two copies of Thraben Inpsector in addition to the four copies each of Champion of the Parish and Noble Hierarch. In his words: "The Thraben Inspectors are included because I think standard builds of the deck are short on one-drops - this is because maximizing Aether Vial requires you to have another one-drop (besides itself) to play on Turn 2, and so it effectively doesn't count as a one-drop."

This seems fairly straight-forward and obvious, but felt like a revelation. Because Vial requires such a large portion of the deck to be creatures to be effective, the decks that play is are historically fairly aggressive. However many of these lists don't play more than four one-drops to vial in. Merfolk, Death and Taxes, Spirts, and even Legacy Goblins rarely play more than eight one-drops at most.  This is largely because the main strength of vial is in its repeated Sol Ring activations with two or three (or more) counters.

Humans plays a bit more aggressively than these other decks, and a card like Thalia's Lieutenant incentivises you to put as many creatures onto the battlefield before you deploy it. More one-drops in Humans is likely more correct than fewer. As Thraben Inspector also provides the late game card advantage you need to continue to take advantage of Aether Vial, its the perfect compliment one-drop.

Some notes here: Mutavault in Merfolk acts as a one-drop (or zero-drop) that makes the deck function with adequate aggression. Also the requirement for late game card drawing is likely why we are seeing the increased play of the card Horizon Canopy. Legacy DnT has Stoneforge Mystic and Recruiter of the Guard and therefore doesn't need as many copies.

With this knowledge, I played Humans at a PPTQ in Houston. I lost in the top 4 due to a poor mulligan decision, but overall I was very happy with the deck. It will be something I'll consider playing again in the future.

How many Aether Vial do you play?

The answer is obviously 4, right? Well, maybe not. Ondrej Strasky made the top 8 of GP Prague with a Bant Spirits deck sporting only 3 copies of Aether Vial.  It has been very interesting to look at the reasons behind the number.

Strasky's GP Prague Top 8 Decklist

The divide between UW Spirits with Aether Vial and Bant Spirits with Noble Hierarch has come down to a few key factors. Collected Company is a great card in conjunction with Spell Queller, but requires a bit more mana sources and a third color. Noble Hierarch solves those problems, but it is much more fragile than Aether Vial. You cannot keep one-land Hierarch hand with Spirits the same way you can keep one-land Vial hands. Also, the interaction between Phantasmal Image and Collected Company is not ideal, so you will have fewer instances of double Drogskol Captain in Bant despite what would seem to be more. 

I've preferred the UW version, largely because of my love of Vial. This Strasky version plays both Vial and Noble. In additon to Mausoleum Wanderer, the deck now has 11 solid turn one plays. The issue with running both is the amount of creatures required to play Collected Company.

The other Bant deck in the top 8 played 31 creatures. Frank Karsten set the minimum at about 22 creatures, though you clearly want as many as possible. What the Strasky list has decided on is that he wants 28 creatures (22 of which are non-Noble non-Image). With the requirements of 21 lands and 4 Path to Exile, that only leaves room for three Aether Vial. This also helps alleviate the problem of drawing multiple Vials when you don't need them.

One interesting thought: if the numbers you want are 21 land, 28 creatures, and 4 Company 4 Path, is the deck better at 3 Vials and 60 cards, or 4 Vials and 61 cards? Could this be a time to play more than 60 in order to get the right ratios for Collected Company? That will be something that may be worth looking into.

Old Dog, New Tricks

What this week has shown me is that you can still have success in Magic by questioning your assumptions about everything. I thought I knew it all about Vial, but I'm excited to try these new things in different decks. I had decided to focus on Humans since I felt it was a bit better than Spirits overall, but with the success of Spirits at the GP and these new innovations, I may return to Spell Queller and Co. for my upcoming PPTQs.

Thanks,

Ty

Cedric Phillips

Cedric Phillips recently had a bad day  During the time period between his first post about being in tears at the events of the day and the second post explaining his position, I found myself defending him in various discussions with other Magic players. I did my best to explain what I thought his position was to these people. I didn't want to put words in his mouth, but I had a good feeling I knew what he was getting at. He does a much better job explaining his position in the Facebook post than I did, but I don't think I was very far off.

It is okay to care.

Most discussion or thinking about the meaning of life will quickly find the conclusion that nothing matters once you are dead. Some despair at this notion, some use it to fuel their apathy. People like Cedric know that they can create their own meaning of life by caring about something and working to make things they care about better.

Caring isn't uncool. Caring is what's important. Thinking it is weak or uncool to cry when you have the experiences Cedric had is really missing the point. Either you have a warped view on masculinity or can't relate to caring. Think of something in your life that would make you this upset. That level of caring is how Cedric feels about MtG and the community. It is something I admire.

Many years back, someone asked me if I knew anyone that loved Magic more than I did. At the time, in a pre-streaming, pre-podcast, minimal-content world, it was hard for me to name any names. Certain writers and many pros seemed to sell how little they cared. I didn't know many players in my area who loved the game as much as I did. But in the years that followed, Magic exploded in popularity. The opportunities for those people who cared even more than I did made it so they could have full time jobs doing something they loved. I'm not nearly as passionate or as hard-working as Cedric and the others like him who have brought about this change, but I very much appreciate it.

Cedric loves to talk about how great the SCG Tour is at promoting its players to give them these opportunities. While I may not have always agreed with this, I can now speak from personal experience that they are outstanding at it by sharing this anecdote:

This past weekend, I played in the SCG Open in Fort Worth. My team was featured on camera during round four. I've since gone back and watched the coverage - part out of vanity, part curiosity, part looking for misplays. My name is shown as Timothy Thomason. This is how it appears in the DCI system (they require you to use legal name for some reason). When my match was on camera, Cedric didn't hesitate to call me Ty. This is a guy I've only met two or three times in my life. I don't have nearly a large enough profile for my preferred nickname to be common knowledge. In the middle of the match, I'm in no position to try to get them to use my preferred name, I have games to win. Cedric not only remembered my preferred name, but even remembered the story of my previous open win (which is now almost five years ago). Maybe he didn't know it immediately or had some background info researched before the match went live, but that still requires effort that he is not obligated to do.

I don't always agree with Cedric on everything (especially Milita Bugler), but I support him and his passion for the game. Having people like him in charge makes it easier for me to spend as much or as little time with the game as I'm inclined, knowing that it's always getting better.