Cascade – short history in Constructed pt. 1
When an average Magic player hears about Cascade mechanic he often thinks of two things: “Blodbraid Elf” and “broken”. I’m going to dwell a little bit in a past (and future!), and write a 2 part article about history of this absurd mechanic and the way it shaped Constructed formats all over the board.
Well, first, for those who lived in a barrel for the last couple of years, or those who was just recently introduced to this game, what is Cascade? Cascade is a mechanic first introduced in Alara Reborn back in 2009. It’s a triggered ability that can be featured on an instant, sorcery, enchantment or creature and reads as follows: “When you play this spell, remove cards from the top of your library from the game until you remove a nonland card whose converted mana cost is less than this spell’s converted mana cost. You may play that card without paying its mana cost. Then put all cards removed from the game this way that weren’t played on the bottom of your library in a random order.”
Yep, ladies and gentlemen, it plays cards for free. There actually was a meeting where someone stood up and said: playing cards for free sounds like a heck of a mechanic, we should definitely do it! It is so fun and random, players will never know what will they turn over and cast for free. This could possibly be our best idea ever! Or so they thought.
And that’s how the most broken mechanic since “affinity for artifacts” and the most unfun and unrandom magic ability was born.
Couple of next years it dominated in standard and was a pretty large force in extended (until they banned it). But it was abused in a totally different ways in those 2 formats. In standard there was notorious JUND decks who could cascade in a variety of different spells, but when every single one of them is powerful and game changing you simply don’t care what you’re going to turn over; and in extended Cascade proved to be a completely different and lethal animal – it ALWAYS cascaded into one and one spell only.
But today I’m going to write about Jund and it’s dominance. Bloodbraid Elf was the obvious winner of “the best cascade spell” contest, and Jund was the deck that used him the best.
This is the list that Simon Goertzen of Germany used to win Pro Tour San Diego:
2 Dragonskull Summit
4 Forest
2 Lavaclaw Reaches
3 Mountain
4 Raging Ravine
1 Rootbound Crag
4 Savage Lands
3 Swamp
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Bloodbraid Elf
3 Broodmate Dragon
4 Putrid Leech
3 Siege-Gang Commander
4 Sprouting Thrinax
2 Garruk Wildspeaker
4 Blightning
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Maelstrom Pulse
2 Rampant Growth
As you can see, Bloodbraid Elf can cascade into Putrid Leech, Sprouting Thrinax, Blightning, Lightning Bolt, Maelstrom Pulse or Rampanth Growth. So in the worst case scenario, for only 4 mana you get a 3/2 haste creature + search your deck for a land and put it onto the battlefield. Often best case: 3/2 haster + discard 2 cards + take 3 damage off the bat, all that for just 4 mana?!
Skill intensive card that is Bloodbraid Elf!
In that same tournament Luis Scott-Vargas made the history. He was the first player ever to record 17 straight wins in a row, until Simon Goertzen himself put a stop to that streak. And what did he play? Well, Bloodbraid Elf, of course! Not the jund but rather Naya deck. Here’s the list he played:
4 Arid Mesa
5 Forest
3 Misty Rainforest
2 Mountain
2 Plains
1 Raging Ravine
1 Rootbound Crag
1 Sejiri Steppe
2 Stirring Wildwood
1 Tectonic Edge
2 Terramorphic Expanse
2 Birds of Paradise
4 Bloodbraid Elf
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Ranger of Eos
1 Scute Mob
2 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Wild Nacatl
2 Ajani Vengeant
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
1 Basilisk Collar
1 Behemoth Sledge
3 Lightning Bolt
2 Oblivion Ring
1 Path to Exile
As you can see, there’s some nice Cascade tricks in here as well. Like Bloodbraid Elf into Stoneforge Mystic into Behemoth Sledge. Absurd.
No wonder Bloodbraid Elf decks dominated in standard just like Faeries before and Caw-Blade after. And all that thanks to Cascade.
Next time: 10 ways to cast a Hypergenesis!
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