Shadowfist Deck: Two Doctors by Braz King

Home > Decks > Decks: Two Doctors (Origins 2010 Comrades in Arms tournament winner)
[posted 3 Sep 2010]

Posted with permission. Thanks Braz! Also appears in Inner Kingdom Update Vol.1, Issue 1.

Braz King won the Origins 2010 Comrades In Arms (multiplayer, constructed, 23 cards sharing a designator - in this case, "Paradox") tournament with this deck.

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Foundations - 12
5 Arcane Scientist *
1 Mathemagician
4 Purist Initiate
1 Symphonic Disciples
1 True Believer

FUCs - 1
1 Paradox *

Welterweights - 0

Hitters - 11
5 Impossible Men *
2 Isomorphic Spirit *
2 Paradox Beast *
2 Primus *

Monsters - 0

The Juice - 5
1 Entropy Tap
3 Pocket Demon
1 Quantum Sorcery

Freebies - 6
1 Farseeing Rice Grains
5 Whispers in the Dark

Upgrades - 11
3 Discerning Fire (sorry!)
1 Living Legend
1 Material Transcendence
1 Paradigm Recoding 
2 Paradox Divination *
2 Shattering Fire
1 Sword of the Master

Sites - 4
2 Paradox Archives *
2 Paradox Garden *

FSSs - 12	
1 Ancient Stone Arch 
2 Arctic Fortress
2 Coral Reef
2 Disco (cheese!)
1 Endless Corridor
1 Gambling House (more cheese!)
1 Golden Mile
1 Puzzle Garden
1 Whirlpool of Blood

This deck ramps a bit slowly due to the essential 2-cost "Paradox" foundations: Paradox Garden and Arcane Scientist. They aren't there because they're great 2-cost foundations. Early game I look for an 8 body site and foundations, often having to wait until turn 3 to play a second 2-cost foundation to get the resources needed. Occasionally I get lucky and draw 2 1-cost foundations in the first or second turn. Usually it takes about 5 turns before I can do much.

I was lucky to draw Coral Reefs on turn 1 in the two rounds that I won. I also played the one copy of Far Seeing Rice Grains in those games as well, showing how important it is for a deck with expensive foundations and chaff to have effective card cycling. :)

The Whispers in the Dark are the early game defence against speedy opponents. If I manage to draw an Arctic Fortress as the first site I'm pretty comfortable that it isn't going to be taken too quickly. Because I only have two states that I play on my own Characters, one of which gives the subject CHAR's ability, I don't mind if the Fortresses get seized. With the inclusion of more 'quality' offensive states in the game in recent sets I've found Arctic Fortress increasingly valuable.

When the deck gets rolling it is the Impossible Men that give it the best chance to win. It has pseudo-evasion and pseudo-site, state and edge cancelling. When I managed to have two Impossible Men attacking together, it was pretty awesome. :) The Impossible Men often help prevent at least some interceptions and then Whispers in the Dark and Shattering Fire help punch through. The addition of Endless Corridor for Origins showed me its amazing compatibility with this deck. I only got it in play once, but was able to use it with the Impossible Men and Whispers to great effect on the attack. Repeating a phrase oft heard at Origins "I need more Endless Corridors in this deck". :)

Discerning Fire is a controversial card in CiA, but in the Origins 2010 tournament I only played it once. Many players are diversifying their characters or building in anti-Discerning Fire tricks, which is great. But it is a nice card to have for defence in a deck with otherwise very little reactive defence.

The Paradox Beast is a great surprise attacker because it exceeds cost-fighting expectations. I like to play it when the table is relatively open and grab a site that was assumed to be safe due to its body. The Paradox Archives nicely mitigate the Beast's hand size drawback.

Primus is a character I rarely use in constructed play but at this tournament I was able to play him twice at critical points to shut down an opponent's events and win the round. As this deck has no other event defence at all, Primus proved his worth!

Paradox and Paradox Divination are truly only in the deck to make it format legal and have never been played.

I never had an opportunity where I needed to play Material Transcendence or Paradigm Recoding during the tournament, which surprised me. I'd like to try the deck in a competitive situation again to see if that was just a fluke.

The greatest pleasure in this deck is winning games using a silly designator that nobody expects.

[writeup by Braz King]

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