Extended Oath deck
History of Oath of Druids in Extended 1999-2003
The Oath of Druids archetype grew in response to the metagame in early 1999. Memory Jar and High Tide were the decks that were dominating the Extended PTQs during winter of 1998-1999, known as Combo-Winter. From the playgroups of the University of Illinois, Mike Stuller suggested using Oath of Druids for creature control along with the Enlightened Tutor Silver Bullet concept. Utilizing the Silver Bullet Concept, the deck uses Enlightened Tutors to quickly find the enchantment or artifact to crush the particular opposing deck.
A single Arcane Laboratory would shut down combo. Oath of Druids trumped most creature strategies. If the opponent refused to play creatures, Mishra's Factory and the Conclave would beat down.
There were several Oath of Druids decklists online that utilized various creature configurations. I decided to go with Morphling/Triskellion/Feeder. One key ability was that each of these creatures could kill themselves if needed. The following deck made Top 8 without a swiss match loss at a 130 person PTQ where 5 of the 7 opposing decks were either High Tide or Memory Jar. The only loss was in the top 8 to High Tide.
At GP Kansas City, I used the following decklist. Bob Maher was watching me play some practice games with Adrian Sullivan. I shared my deck list with Bob and he changed 3 sideboard cards. I placed 33rd with an 8-4 record. Bob made top 8.
Later that year, Bob Maher took the following deck to win Pro Tour Chicago in one of the most exciting finals of all time against Brian Davis's Necropotence deck. [1]
Bob Maher later wins GP Seattle with the following decklist.
Around this time, a new Oath of Druids deck named Turbo-Land emerged created by Zvi Mowshowitz. This deck utilizes Oath of Druids to set up creature control. Exploration and Horn of Greed ensures card drawing. Eventually a situation is set up where Zvi can take infinite turns through recursion of Time Warp. Zvi played the following at the Master's in 2000. It was to become a major Oath of Druids archetype over the next several years.
For the next several years, Oath of Druids continued to be a major archetype in Extended. Eventually there was a major extended rotation, taking out everything prior to Tempest including the Dual Lands. Weatherlight left the format taking Gaea's Blessing. Krosan Reclamation became the standard recursion. Justin Gary won Pro Tour Houston with the following deck. Cognivore became the creature of choice.
The Turbo-Land Variant gave Zvi Mowshowitz a Grand Prix win in New Orleans. The single Battlefield Scrounger could quickly set up Time Warp recursion. With infinite turns and lots of mana on the board, Capsize would remove potential blockers and the Scrounger and Treetop Village would finish off the opponent.
The next major Extended event was at Pro-Tour New Orleans, Oct 31-Nov 2, 2003. Oath of Druids had a significant day 2 presence, but was edged out of the top 8 by Mana Severance/Belcher and Tinker. After New Orleans, the DCI took significant steps to reduce combos and any cards that limited player interaction. Oath of Druids became a casualty of the bannings in December of 2003.