In a similar deck, I've found that if you opt not to use Null Rods, Aether Vial is an excellent addition. It let's you keep some hands with only one land, which means a lower landcount can be used in addition to making your creaturs uncounterable as well as sneaking under a Trinisphere or Sphere of Resistance.

And yes, this deck needs Shrapnel Blast and to an extent, Fireblast to make sure those "Whoops, did you just died?"-hands to come up every once in a while.

Though the article explained only the most basic options for anyone playing with, or against Mana Drain, it does make for a good read. Brushing up the theories every now and then certainly doesn't hurt, and any article referring to new people within the T1 scene certainly must be encouraged.

May I suggest that the next article takes a further look into the #1 counterspell; Force of Will? A brief explanation for the reasons behind pitching the correct card to FoW would probably be appreciated - I see people taking this issue way too lightly all the time.

I think you've got an excellent point Ric. While I'd rather be burned on the stake before putting the card in Keeper, JP proved to be right - it does have it's place in Hulk, the other blue-based control deck.

On a similar topic, another card that goes into anything not running Mana Drain is Elvish Spirit Guide. I think it's recent rise is due to the amount of Trinisphere's thats been popping up since the arrival of Darksteel, and I'll make sure to pick up a playset of them should I ever feel like playing large green men or something comboesque anytime in the future.

Having a Dismantling Blow in the maindeck isn't a bad alternative at all if you expect Workshop Prison to show up in major numbers. I've found it to be a nice tutor target, since you don't always have the time to wish for a R&R or Disenchant or the like locked under a sphere or a smokestack. Though I've long since swapped it for another Cunning Wish, it's really comes down to wheter you like it or not. Anyone's Keeper is a personal build and adapted to suit one's metagame, not a be-all, set-in-stone type of deck.

You mentioned you feel your deck lacks some drawing power, and from the looks of it, I can only agree. Though having Fire/Ice or Brainstorm imprinted on a scepter is a blast to play with, it's inconsistency would probably warrant a second look before it deserves an inclusion. Since I swapped my 'chronics for a pair of Scryings, I've never missed them.  

Righty, I put together this monstrosity during the week and played with it to some quite frightening results:

Combo, step 1:
4 Bazaar
4 Buried Alive
4 Dragon
2 Ambassador

Combo, step 2:
4 Dance
4 Animate
2 Necromancy

Find:
1 Demonic
1 Vampiric
4 Spoils

Disruption:
4 Duress
4 Unmask

Speed mana:
4 Dark Ritual
1 Mox Jet
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Diamond
1 Chrome Mox
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Emerald
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt
9 Swamp

An essentially monoblack version inspired partially by cssamerican's build posted above, but also by tips from our local MaskNought-players. They wouldn't leave home without Unmasks in their binders, and after testing running it I must agree - Unmask is awesome in this deck:

- The deck aims to win on turn two. This is critical. You do not want to end up stalling. You have no Squees to abuse the Bazaar with, it's used mainly to drop a dragon in the yard and go off from there, not as a card advantage machine. Use Bazaars carefully.
- The deck is a whore for black mana. The presence of two sources of black mana that can be dropped turn one on the opening hand is basically what makes or breaks the desired turn two kill.
- Unmask fits into this just like it fitted into SpoilsMask. Tempo is everything, and Unmask is as cheap as it gets. I also like how it often turn Animates into must-counters, after ripping a hand of Swords or Stifles or the like.  

What are your opinion on this approach? Have you encountered problems with similar versions of all-or-nothing-Dragon? Are Unmask pure gold, or is it just me who has a skewed result?

While I believe a good tuned Storm-deck can still go off with some frightening stability as early as turn two in the hands of a good player, Dragon seems to me better fitted to do so since it really only involves getting a Bazaar/Compulsion in play and a Dragon in the 'yard to simply go off. While that will certainly make you run into Swords or the like and just die every now and then, I wonder if the option isn't worse - the plan to wait and be absolutely sure when you go off backfires too easily around here, mainly due to beforementioned pro-active solutions.

I will certainly put together some weird hybrid of the decks posted above and see what results I get. Spoils seems like a perfect fit in that deck. Also, someone mentioned that keeping Squee in the deck is quite useless since you don't want to see a long-game anyway. It's more of a "all-or-nothing"-approach, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's worse.

As for the matchup Workshop-prison vs Dragon, I really have no idea. That's another matchup that would seem to look better if your goal is to win ASAP before stuff like Smokestack come down and ruin your day.

About a week ago, Stockholm hosted a tournament to which some 30 or so people showed up. The prize was a Library, with an Alpha Demonic Tutor for second place. Now, what seemed strange was that a grand total of five people choose to play the Dragon-deck, but only one making it to the Top8. And he didn't even made it to the finals.

One of us Stockholm-players in particular have been tinkering with Dragon.dec more than any other. Marcus "Lomaw" Michel. I believe he's been in contact with DicemanX, and various other innovators about the deck, and until recently he played the commonly-seen UB/g-variant, featuring Xantid Swarms, Pernicious Deeds and Verdant Forces in various mixtures between the maindeck and sideboard. For this tournament however, he choose to dismiss the green splash altogether in favour of maindecked Abeyances and Orim's Chant's. His reasoning for the fundamental change was in short:

- Dragon hate have become more and more common. Nobody leaves home without a way to hose the combo, be it Crypts, Swords, Stifle's or Withered Wretches.
- While Swarms do the work against Swords and other similar hosers, the top decks here in Stockholm - Welder MUD and MaskNought - depends on permanents with activated abilities, Wretch and Crypt, to stop the Dragon-deck dead in it's tracks. Abeyance solves the problem to a large degree.

After the tournament, we discussed on the future of Dragon, and Marcus seemed quite depressed. He felt he had missed something along the way, that would put Dragon back as a top-tier deck. People had seen the change coming, and looked for pro-active answers for the Dragon such as Humility and Damping Matrix, to which even the UB/w-version had troubles with. We came to the conclusion that what Dragon needed was to return to it's roots. To overpower the opposition with brute speed and simply just win before any resistance can be made, before such bombs would be dropped on you. We tinkered with the idea, and it seemed like a basic UB-deck with a little modifications to the sideboard would be best suited to accomplish that goal.

For reference:

Lomaw's ''Back to the Roots'' Dragon Build:

// Mana (20) :
4 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
2 Scrubland
1 Gemstone Mine
1 Swamp
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Ruby
1 Black Lotus
1 Sol Ring
1 Mana Crypt

// Search (19) :
4 Intuition
4 Bazaar of Baghdad
4 Squee
3 Compulsion
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Time Walk
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor

// Combo (14) :
4 Worldgorger Dragon
3 Necromancy
2 Animate Dead
2 Dance of the Dead
1 Cunning Wish
1 Ambassador Laquatus

// Disruption (7) :
4 Force of Will
3 Duress

..With white goodness in the sideboard to justify the scrublands.

Now, I would like to ask you guys about your opinion. Is Dragon hosed out of the metagame? Should Dragon's goal be to build up it's board position to a point where it simply can't lose (And risk having a Humility dropped on you) or simply go for speed and attempt to win ASAP? (With the risk of losing the game should someone had topdecked a Swords)