{"ops":[{"insert":"Massimo is a combat deck disguised as a spellslinger deck—or maybe a spellslinger deck smuggled inside a bunch of tiny saboteurs. The central trick is to get cheap one-mana instants and sorceries into the graveyard, resolve Massimo, and then turn evasive creatures into "},{"attributes":{"bold":true},"insert":"loaded weapons"},{"insert":". Bilbo, Wraith, Looter il-Kor, Mercurial Spelldancer, Shoreline Looter, Silent Hallcreeper, Thada Adel, Invisible Stalker and friends aren't here primarily to beat people to death one point at a time; they're delivery systems. When one enters, Massimo exiles a spell from the graveyard and gives that creature a new combat-damage trigger. Once it connects, you copy the exiled card and cast it for free. Suddenly a harmless little unblockable idiot may be carrying Swords to Plowshares, Birthday Escape, Mutiny, False Peace, Suspend, Erode, Portent or—most frighteningly—Great Train Heist.\n\nThe really nasty layer is "},{"attributes":{"bold":true},"insert":"trigger multiplication"},{"insert":". Wraith already has double strike, so a Massimo payload on her fires once during first-strike damage and again during normal combat damage. Blade Historian, Berserkers' Onslaught and Akroma's Will can give that treatment to more of the army. Delney can double the granted trigger on your low-power carriers, while Wizard's Staff can make the equipped creature's triggered ability fire an additional time. That means a small evasive creature can stop behaving like a 1/1 and start behaving like a machine gun. Put the right pieces together and one Wraith attack can generate four copies of the same loaded spell. Akroma's Will is particularly vicious because it can simultaneously provide evasion, protection and double strike, turning what looked like a setup turn into a lethal combat out of nowhere.\n\n"},{"attributes":{"bold":true},"insert":"Great Train Heist is the deck's signature stunt."},{"insert":" Since its actual mana value is only one, Massimo can load it onto a creature, and you can still pay its Spree additional costs when you cast the copy. A successful hit can therefore untap the team and buy another combat. The truly ridiculous line arrives with "},{"attributes":{"bold":true},"insert":"Sword of Feast and Famine"},{"insert":": the Sword carrier connects, you stack its land-untap trigger ahead of the Massimo trigger, your lands untap, then you spend "},{"attributes":{"code":true},"insert":"{2}{R}"},{"insert":" on Great Train Heist to untap the creatures and create another combat. Connect again, untap the lands again, pay again, and keep going as long as the carrier continues to hit. It isn't some unrelated two-card combo jammed into the 99; Massimo, an evasive carrier, a loaded Great Train Heist, Sword, and enough lands all have to come together. That's exactly the kind of multi-piece Rube Goldberg murder device this deck wants.\n\nThe one-mana spell package is also where "},{"attributes":{"bold":true},"insert":"One Mana, No Peace"},{"insert":" gets mean rather than merely efficient. False Peace lets a successful attacker decide that somebody simply doesn't get combat next turn. Suspend repeatedly parks problematic creatures in exile. Mutiny weaponizes an opponent's own giant creatures against each other. Void Snare and Into the Flood Maw keep awkward permanents from sticking, while Erode, Path and Swords provide more permanent answers. Portent is wonderfully obnoxious: you can use it normally for selection or use repeated Massimo copies to inspect and ruin an opponent's upcoming draws while banking delayed draws for yourself. Rescue is another little piece of magician nonsense—it protects one of your permanents but can also pick up Mystic Sanctuary, letting you replay Sanctuary and recycle another important spell. Even Boon of Safety and Slip Out the Back aren't generic protection slots; they help preserve Massimo or a creature that may already be carrying a valuable spell.\n\nAnd the deck does eventually "},{"attributes":{"bold":true},"insert":"kill everybody"},{"insert":", rather than merely showing off. Fiery Inscription is the bridge between Massimo value and table-wide damage: every instant or sorcery copy you actually cast shocks every opponent, while its ETB starts the Ring temptation chain. Birthday Escape advances that chain while replacing itself, and a fully developed Ring turns one of your evasive creatures into an even nastier saboteur that loots on attack and eventually drains the entire table when it connects. Firebrand Archer provides another way for repeated Massimo casts to punish players you aren't attacking. Rising of the Day and Arena of Glory reduce the dangerous waiting period by giving fresh carriers haste. The end result is a deck that wins by making opponents continually misjudge innocuous creatures: the 1/1 they ignore becomes an unblockable spell turret, the double striker suddenly casts the same spell four times, somebody loses their next combat, somebody else's Dragon murders its own teammate, and then Sword plus Great Train Heist produces the moment where the table collectively realizes: "},{"attributes":{"bold":true},"insert":"“Ahhhh shit. The magician loaded the deck.”"},{"insert":"\n"}]}