Premodern: Psychatog - Deck Tech & Sideboard Guide

Psychatog is a Brazilian classic. It may not be remembered that way by many, but the Combo-Control archetype has historical value in Brazil, as it was the deck that, in 2002, crowned Carlos Romão as the country's first Magic: The Gathering World Champion.

Now the archetype returns in Premodern, using the same core as Control but without the famous Upheaval combo that made the strategy famous in the past, replacing it with Gush as an extra-power boost.

Unlike other control decks in the format, Psychatog doesn't seek to lock down the game through locks and is more focused on drawing cards, filtering the top of the deck, trading resources at a favorable pace, and, when the opponent can no longer keep up, playing Psychatog to finish the game.

As a classic version of , we focus on cheap early-turn disruption with top filtering using Portent, Impulse, and Opt, seeking removal to deal with the board while preparing the setup for Psychatog to become a resilient and properly protected threat.

This version also features some "combos." The main one involves Gush, whose ability to return two Islands to the hand combines with our keycard to give Psychatog up to +6/+6 with a single play.

Maindeck

Psychatog is our win condition and transforms every card played during the game into more power on an empty board. In longer games, one or two attacks are usually enough to finish the match, and the number of interactions we use in the list provides fuel for it each turn.

Portent may seem like the Ponder we have at home, but it allows manipulating the top of your opponent's deck as well, creating small Tempo advantages that accumulate throughout the game and/or guarantee an unimpeded path for a Psychatog to attack.

Opt complements our cantrips and allows for slightly bolder keeps of one or two lands. It doesn't filter the top as well, but it does a decent job.

Unlike simpler cantrips, Impulse deepens the search for Psychatog at instant speed, or makes it possible to find the right answer by having a wider scope than other card selection effects.

Accumulated Knowledge is one of the best cards in the deck. From the second copy onwards, it creates card advantage and accumulates for each additional copy played, forcing the opponent to keep up with a pace of interaction and resources that they can't usually handle without targeted hate.

Gush does a little bit of everything we need: generates card advantage, guarantees land drops, ensures the functionality of Foil, and even operates as a pseudo-win combo alongside our key card.

Duress is a mandatory tool in the format to interact with most decks from the first turn, while also functioning as a safety tool to ensure that Psychatog will remain on the board after we play it.

Counterspell needs no introduction in a blue control archetype. Best stack answer available in the format.

Circular Logic interacts with our game plan, offers one mana protection alongside Psychatog, and will often work as well as Counterspell in interacting with the stack. It's not as good a card against Aggro, but it works exemplarily against slower or combo archetypes.

Foil interacts with Gush and feeds Psychatog while protecting it for free, being the closest thing we have to Force of Will in Premodern.

Smother deals with most early threats in the format, and higher mana costs don't usually pass through Counterspells, making it the ideal interaction for the archetype.

Powder Keg is the flexible answer against boards full of Elves, tokens, and low-cost permanents. Go Wide is one of our problems in Game 1, and it helps solve those archetypes with the same slot it uses to deal with cheap artifacts.

Polluted Delta and Underground River are obvious choices in a format with few untapped dual lands available, with Delta also contributing to our game plan.

Cephalid Coliseum becomes a pseudo-card advantage tool alongside Psychatog and also helps us find more answers if we have enough cards to draw and discard without exhausting our entire hand.

Sideboard

Hydroblast is the ideal answer against Sligh, Burn, and Goblins, aggressive red archetypes that often win the game on the race. Countering a spell for only one mana offers more breathing room to dominate the game with removal spells later.

We have few ways to deal with artifacts and enchantments once they've entered, so we included Annul as a stack interaction aimed at resolving Phyrexian Dreadnought, Tangle Wire, and other cards in that category.

Engineered Plague functions as a primary answer against go-wide decks, nominally Elves and Goblins, but can also be useful in games where opponents run many tokens of the same type.

Powder Keg complements the maindeck copies against go-wide decks.

Diabolic Edict is a timely response to decks with larger creatures like Reanimator and Oath of Druids.

Zombie Infestation offers an alternative win condition against decks that have too many removal spells to hold off with only Counterspells and discard spells, offering a go-wide strategy that works against targeted creature removals.

Haunting Echoes is useful in mirror matches and also against late-game Control decks like Standstill or traditional versions of Azorius Control, as well as being a useful tool in attrition games like The Rock or BW Control.

Goblins

IN

OUT

The priority is surviving the first few turns. Plague drastically reduces the pressure the opponent exerts, negating the combination of Goblin Lackey with Siege-Gang Commander, while Hydroblast efficiently trades and keeps the tempo in our favor.

Sligh

OUT

If you want to respect this matchup more, you can include two copies of Ivory Tower in the sideboard, because our main focus is to maintain life high enough and use our counterspells to hold off the Burn, but with only four win conditions, we risk giving the opponent too much time to recover.

The Rock

IN

OUT

Pernicious Deed is the most troublesome card here as it offers an easy way to "lock in" our win condition, so Annul is a useful side-in. If the opponent uses Deranged Hermit, it's possible to exchange Powder Keg for another copy of the remaining cards in the sideboard.

Mono Black Midrange

IN

OUT

Our opponent has several discard effects that hinder our ability to protect Psychatog from removal, but we also interact well enough to handle the pressure and play Haunting Echoes to remove their resources. Furthermore, the number of cantrips and card draws we have makes our topdeck better.

UW Control / Landstill

IN

OUT

Your biggest enemy is Decree of Justice, which cannot be countered and offers almost infinite blocking to Psychatog, which would justify keeping Powder Keg, but the disruption line + Haunting Echoes tends to be the passport to winning this matchup.

Elves

IN

OUT

We can't expect Circular Logic to do much against a Gaea's Cradle deck, so we need to attack the board as much as possible to reduce the opponent's resources and avoid infinite chump blocks.

Madness

IN

OUT

Echoes might seem like an odd choice considering Madness is a more aggressive archetype, but we tend to have enough trades to reach the point where we can cast the card and remove the opponent's resources.

Mono Blue Stiflenought

IN

OUT

Stiflenought has a faster clock than ours, with considerably higher mana efficiency and consistency, making prolonging the game a challenge: we need to be wary of the possibility of an early combo kill while also not playing defensively for too long, especially in post-sideboard games.

That's all for today!

If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment!

Thank you for reading!