Brewing with Samuel Leng
PLUS: BAH Humbug charity raffle, Tin Fins takes down the Duress Crew Fall Regional, and an off-site Premodern event at NA Eternal Weekend
Today, let’s wrap up Spice Paradise, highlight a charity event/raffle the NYC crew is putting on, and discuss the hot deck of the moment Tin Fins. First, some housekeeping: I’m now on Bluesky (and Threads)! Follow me there for more Premodern content and other nonsense.
Spice Paradise, my webcam league highlighting brews and lesser-seen decks, wrapped up at the end of the summer and you’re welcome to check out all the deck lists and deck photos here. In total, there were 28 players with about 120 unique decks played. I also joined the Monster of the Week podcast to discuss the league, give it a listen!
Huge congrats to Malfie for winning with his Welder Stax deck and to Conor Brown for being the people’s choice for favorite deck: Chrontamination. Hoping to run back a second season of Spice Paradise in early 2025, stay tuned…
I also wanted to highlight the participation prize given to Spice Paradise players: a Phyrexian Minion token illustrated by @ningentaiho, an artist who has worked with the Japanese Middle School community. This is the second in a series of limited run Premodern tokens I’ve collaborated with artists on (the first being an Angel/Soldier token). It’s really important to me to keep supporting artists while creating memorable and unique items for the Premodern community!
One of the Spice Paradise players (and runner-up), Samuel Leng, has been a long-time Premodern player and I was so impressed and entertained by their brews throughout the league that I had to ask them some questions!
Interview with Samuel Leng
BANDING: How did you get into Premodern?
Samuel Leng: The first time I had ever even heard about Premodern was in late 2018 seeing the 2nd Premodern Open being advertised through what I assume was one of the Old School 93-94 Facebook groups. With pretty much zero information on the format, I just put together my old extended R/U Tinker deck I used to play from memory with the expected changes as I could no longer play 4 Grim Monolith! I ended up with a first draft that was 60 cards so I took a quick picture and hoped for the best in trying to enter as I had seen it exactly a day late from the entry cutoff. I ended up making the top 8 where I beat Galen Lemei and the eventual champion Pedro Canali in the Swiss but I got run over 0-3 in the quarterfinals vs Jared Doucette but had a blast! It didn’t take long to join the monthlies and have been hooked on the format ever since.
I don’t even know what the Premodern Open is so you must be a Premodern old-timer! Do you play in-person as well with a local scene?
I am 100% online-only! I had plans to go to the past two Lobstercons but I ended up moving from the North-East last year and when I ended up moving back this year, it sold out in 2 days. The timing was just off but the event being that popular means we are safe for next year so hopefully 2025 is the year I get to finally go and meet everyone.
Over the course of the inaugural Spice Paradise league, you played twelve different decks (8 in the regular season, 4 in the playoffs)! That’s an impressive feat in brewing prowess. What’s your approach to brewing decks in Premodern?
I really like to pull from history when it comes to cool deck ideas. While the old Extended format isn’t the best parallel with different set and card legality, you can still get some good frameworks to work off of. The biggest examples of this was my week 1 deck PalinFlare; which is based off the first deck I ever played in a PTQ: Extended Heartbeat Desire and week 5 Containment+Squee which was an Extended deck that really preyed on the popular mono-red decks at the time. I really liked the week 5 deck’s sideboard plan. I just punted having Masticore instead of an extra Mageta the Lion and Morphling in my sideboard. The transformational sideboard strategy was meant to blank people’s Disenchant effects that I would assume they would side into but I ended up just drawing the Masticore in the sideboard games and lost to a Disenchant anyways.
Two of my decks were inspired from just random chats in the Discord. My finals deck, Ertai and the Togs was from a half-joking discussion about how much cool using an Auratog instead of a Seal of Cleansing for the Parallax combos would be and I ran with the idea from there. My week 8 deck, Timmy, Power Gamer was a discussion that was actually inspired by reactions to my week 1 PalinFlare deck and people wondering if Vernal Bloom can be more safely taken advantage of since Mana Flare is shared between both players. From there I realized that the cards Nature’s Lore and Skyshroud Claim bring Forests into play untapped so you can have a turn 3 Vernal Bloom and then turn that into a Verdant Force or something else far too big the next turn.
The Vernal Bloom deck, which you called “Timmy, Power Gamer” after the Unglued card, was actually one of my favorites of yours. I think it really highlighted that spice isn’t just limited to combos but sometimes you could just build a deck around awesome creatures. Do you remember how games with that deck went? Any changes you’d make to it?
Sadly I got beat pretty badly by JayL who then took that deck and went 4-0 in the monthly so there’s that i guess! There is probably a better creature suite I could be playing but I just wanted to try fun things I haven’t seen in a while. I can see it being pretty good vs more midrangey things but the biggest flaw is that the god draw is just a turn 4 Verdant Force after one or two mana neutral Skyshroud Claims.
Among the decks you played, which are you interested in developing further? Do you think any could have a reasonable chance of breaking through in the Premodern meta?
The Pebbles deck from the top 4 really surpassed my expectations of a deck. I can see decks like Replenish being tough with maindeck Seal of Cleansing but I feel like that’s something that could be tested and figured out. Tainted Pact is really good in a deck without 10+ of a basic land and making room for more discard could make it a contender. I checked tcdecks and couldn't find a single entry for Enduring Renewal which makes me think it might have more potential than we give it credit for.
Were there any brews you tried that you felt just didn’t come together as you wanted them to? Why not?
A lot of ideas never really made it off the ground and are in first draft hell but one card I really wanted to get to work was Limited Resources. I had ideas from standard land destruction and staying ahead in lands to lock your opponent out to trying a turboland strategy with Exploration and Summer Bloom to hit the 10 land max as fast as possible but I never ended up liking anything.
At the very start I really wanted to get something with Howling Mine and Black Vise/Iron Maiden. The idea of 7-8 Black Vise effects was really intriguing to me. I tried green for Storm Seeker, red for Sudden Impact and blue for Prosperity but nothing really made me happy. The concept did end up becoming my t8 deck More Vices, More Problems. Instead of Howling Mine, we go faster with Metalworker powering out a large Prosperity that draws you into Voltaic Key that you can use to do an even bigger Prosperity and draws you into the Black Vice effects you need to win.
The one idea I wish I could have figured out was a doozy. So, the baseline idea was to cast Necrologia with a Spellbook or Library of Leng in play and to use the life loss from the Necrologia to help trigger a Second Chance. The problem starts with the timing issue for the card only being during the discard phase so of course that leads me to Final Fortune. So, have Spellbook in play, go to the end step and cast Necologia for all but 1 life, hopefully drawing Final Fortune to take another turn and use those ~19 cards to win the game. (in case anyone can figure it out this is where I ended up.
The Necrologia and Second Chance interaction (or lack thereof due to timing) has occupied so much of my brain space over the years. So close! Like most people I’ve pondered playing Zombie Infestation with it but paying 18 life for nine 2/2s seems… just OK? Building off your inclusion of Elvish Spirit Guide, I wonder if we could do something with Crop Rotation to help fix some mana to cast Final Fortune that same turn too. I know Seismic Assault is another popular pick but something about playing that many lands and triple red casting cost makes me worried. Maybe we have a Necrologia November competition?
The answer might just be to try to kill the opponent on your end step to Necrologica into False Cure combo after enchanting one of their lands with Evil Presence and then Refreshing Rain/Invigorate :D
Any memorable plays/opponents/decks you faced in the league you want to share?
Arty, my first round opponent being beaten by Palinchron attacking for lethal damage after talking between games how funny it would be for me to win the game with my combo deck by attacking with Palinchron. My week 5 opponent for looking up his decklist to see if he had a maindeck disenchant for my Solitary Confinement + Squee lock and conceding when that wasn’t the case. Overall, my opponents were great and it was fun to see where people’s ideas were leading them. All in all this was a great event and it has led to me brewing far too many ideas than I could ever hope to test!
Outside of Spice Paradise, do you prefer to play your own creations or tuning more established lists? If the latter, what decks do you think have the most room for working with?
When it comes to the monthly I always do better when I play a stock deck with my own spin on things than a straight brew. I don’t play enough monthlies as I tend to be pretty busy but my best two finishes were with a red deck that was somewhat based on Shuhei Nakamura’s 2nd place deck from Pro Tour Columbus 2004 and my own interpretation of Blue storm where I splashed white for Sunscape Familiar. This was a while ago as I lost in the elimination rounds both times versus Pink Prison but I guess I should give them a shot again as I 100% cannot lose to Pink Prison in a monthly again.
Huge thanks to Samuel for his participation in Spice Paradise and for taking the time to walk through his thoughts!
BAH Humbug Charity Raffle
This Sunday, the NYC crew is hosting a charity event to support two great causes: The Chick Mission (which supports fertility preservation for women diagnosed with cancer) and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. The charity raffle is open to non-event participants, though shipping of the raffle items is only available within the U.S. In collaboration with legendary artist Donato Giancola, we’re offering four raffles:
Hand-painted Show and Tell artist proof by Donato Giancola — You can be the one to finally break Show and Tell in Premodern… and do it with style.
Signed Island playmat by Donato Giancola — What better feeling could there be than spreading this out on the table and then telling your opponent: “Mountain, Jackal Pup”?
Set of 20x shadow signed Islands — This Island artwork from Urza’s Saga led many players to Top 8 performances at Lobstercon and the European Championship… you could be next!
Set of 100x Deckade sleeves (two drawings) — These cheeky sleeves appeared on the North American Championship stream several times and honor one of Magic’s most prolific and innovative writers and deckbuilders.
If you’d like to participate in the charity raffle, please head here. Your support is very much appreciated! Let’s show how the Premodern community can give back to those in need.
Deck of the Moment: Tin Fins
Nick Balzano took down the 71-player Duress Crew Fall Regional over the weekend with an innovative take on the Shallow Ghoul combo. More commonly seen in a Hermit Druid shell with a Stiflenought backup plan, Balzano’s list went all-in on the combo and maximized on speed and disruption to cast Buried Alive to bin two Krosan Cloudscrapers and a Sutured Ghoul on top, followed by a Shallow Grave. Although others have tried this type of strategy before, no other lists I’ve seen have the level of tuning and elegance as Balzano’s, nor as much success. A huge congrats to Balzano for his accomplishment and beautiful deck building. A few highlights:
Why Krosan Cloudscraper over Phyrexian Dreadnought? When Balzano shared his list in the Premodern Discord in April, I suggested that Phyrexian Dreadnought could be a neat way to mislead his opponents to bring in artifact destruction (which doesn’t interact with his win condition). I loved his answer: his sideboard game plan often involved bringing in Defense Grid, Null Rod, or Cursed Totem and he didn’t want to give his opponent an extra reason to bring in artifact destruction.
Is the Premodern meta sleeping on graveyard hate? It’s possible… and one of the reasons why Balzano said he thought his deck was well-positioned.
How fast is the deck? About two or three turns is all it can take. Balzano estimated that turn one kills could happen slightly less than 10% of the time (one happened on stream in the finals).
Does the color black need help in Premodern? I don’t think so. Recent innovative decks have shown a lot of promise, including Iggy Pop, Horror Stompy, Dance Academy, Smelly Pits, and of course, Guilty Oath.
Check out the rest of the Top 16 from the event, which also featured an amazing Big Mono Green Stompy deck. You can catch the VOD here.
Content
🍻🗓️ The Rochester Royals are hosting an off-site Premodern event at North America Eternal Weekend on Friday, November 22 at 6pm at Penn Brewery. Proxy friendly and winner receives a stamped City of Brass!
🧌🏆 Flippi Böhm joins the Monster of the Week podcast to discuss how he was able to defend his crown at this year’s Dutch Nationals with his signature deck, UW Flippi
Böhm also wrote a tournament report for the day with his thoughts on deck selection and matches
You can also catch the VOD of the event on Wak-Wak (but watch it soon as it may disappear)
👺📜 Peter Smits, along with assistance from L10, wrote an excellent primer on Goblins for The Well of Knowledge
🃏👨🍳 David Williams, of Magic, poker, and cooking fame, joined the All Tings Considered podcast to run through his first time at Lobstercon and the joy of Magic: The Gathering. One of my favorite podcast episodes in a long time. The banter between Williams and Bryan Manolakos is peak and the sheer enthusiasm they both have for the game is contagious.
🧝🏴☠️ Romario Vidal unleashed two great videos recently, one with Trinity Elves and another with Pirates
🛋️📋 2 Cabal Therapists are back with Ivan Von Lennep’s run with Enchantress at the European Championship
🦐📚 Heavy Play features the finals of September’s Portland monthly between Mono U Stiflenought and GW Terra Oath
🛝⛰️ The Jank Tank showcases two fun decks: Astral Rift vs. RUG Passage
😡🔥 BrightsDays shares a matchup of classic decks: UG Madness vs. RG Fires
🐘🐍 Panoptikontraband discusses why 10 Land Stompy is the most charming deck in Premodern. Easily one of the decks that is always considered “the hero” in a matchup.
🧝♂️🧝♀️ Fpawlusz showcases Elves on MTGO, a deck that has seen lots of different innovations in the past few months
🧚🌊 David Gleicher writes about his semifinalist finish with Mono U Sea Stompy in the recent Middle School webcam league… to have Sea Drake and Cloud Pirates in Premodern, if only!
Amazing brews! Squee Prison... what a painfully slow, prison-control mishmash of cards—I adore it!