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Messages - hotrodscott

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General Magic / Re: How budget do you consider budget for a 60 card deck?

« on: September 11, 2021, 01:30:17 am »

I think the challenger decks are a pretty good baseline for this... reasonably synergistic, fun to play and fit a theme more than the cheap starter decks. They're 30-ish. You could round it out with better cards and easily have a fun and decently competitive tabletop deck for $40-50. For Modern, that $100 mark is for reasonably competitive decks. I've got a modern homebrew that's like $60 on paper now (i think it was $25 when I built it) that won't win any tournaments, but it wins a lot of games. (Maybe .500 win rate, but has beaten a lot of expensive decks it shouldn't have and that makes it worth it :p) 8-whack prices have come down, so it looks like you could build that deck, (even with Goblin Guide in it) now for $75! (even the "budget version" MTGGoldfish did back in the day didn't have those and is crazy competitive!)

As far as Pauper, many of the tier decks are $50, so might as well go big! hahaha. The problem with going super cheap is that there are so many Pauper staples that are like $3 each that really do make a big difference. (lightning bolt, mutagenic growth etc.) You can build a decent decks for $25, but when you can get really strong decks for 2x that, it's hard to argue :p

Deck Reviews / Re: [Standard] BW Aristocrats

« on: February 07, 2020, 01:12:03 am »

I played a lot of BW aristocrats in this Standard prior to Theros coming out with a very similar list. I found I had a real hard time coming back if I got into a top deck situation on an empty board. Scry is good, but keep an eye on actual card draw. Also, forcing yourself into a top deck mode with 5 board wipes might not be optimal. Maybe split that up into some wipes and some targeted removal or more "dying matters" cards like Ayara? If you have Shepherd out, a board wipe could be game winning, but if not, it's a dead card (or worse.) Also, Orzhov Enforcer became one of my favorite 2-drops. Death touch is a great deterrent, and his creating a flying token when he dies allows for some cool combat tricks and adds extra death/etb triggers to feed "dying matters" cards. (ie, they swing with a big flyer, you sac OE and get the die triggers/food, then get ETB triggers for the token, block their flyer, probably killing your token, creating more die triggers but you take no damage and end up dealing at least a few and maybe drawing some cards based on your board state. That might be more valuable than discard, so take a look at fenlurker if you end up wanting to see more creatures more frequently. Again, Shepherd out could make Fenlurker pretty opressive though. I haven't played with plague crafter, but it seems like it might force you to sac something you care about (or itself) if you don't have a good board state so it might just be 3 mana untargeted removal. Maybe Ayara or Murderous Rider in that slot if it seems to not bring you joy when you see it in your hand

Looks fun! Can't wait to update my list with some of these new cards.

Deck Comments / Re: MonoW Aggro - Comments

« on: January 21, 2020, 11:52:03 pm »

I've been playing a similar list on Arena. Not running the owls and have more of the planeswalkers instead, but it's been really solid!

General Magic / Re: Show me your pauper brews!

« on: January 16, 2020, 06:29:08 pm »

Deck looks pretty awesome! Do you have enough to clog up the board v. aggro (stompy, elves, gobos, etc.) or life-gain to offset dmg to get you to your win-con? I see you have tendrils in the sideboard for that, maybe that or a main board Gray Merchant of Asphodel? I guess it's really dependent upon your meta. Should be easy enough to tune with playtesting. The bones are there!

General Magic / Re: Show me your pauper brews!

« on: January 16, 2020, 12:49:27 am »

I used to play pauper a ton and the two home brews I had the most fun with were mono red prowess (my pauper rendition of the Blistering Rage modern deck from MTG Goldfish) https://deckstats.net/decks/56090/469186-burness-mono-red-prowess-/en and my temur battle infect deck (your usual infect suspects there, but splashing red for a bunch of double strike effects) https://deckstats.net/decks/56090/503360-temur-battle-infect/en

Clearly, these need to be revisited as I haven't updated them since the Gitaxian Probe ban and there might be some nice, new additions that have come out in the last 3-4 years since I was playing with these. (Either Rite of Flame over the probes, or maybe something to deal with anything annoying in the meta these days.)

Neither will probably win you any tournaments, but on MTGO they would frequently catch people. "nice glass cannon a-hole, see you next game..." then rage quits on the game 2 when they see the T1 kiln fiend :p) Both struggled with MBC, but could usually race tron or delver or any of the other big meta decks back then.

Other infect builds (Mono G) will be more consistent with the pauper mana base, but folks don't generally expect the trample Temur Battle Rage gives you, so if you wait until you can one shot them, they don't see it coming and can't do much to stop it if you keep up protection.

Deck Comments / Re: Enraged Dinosaurs - Comments

« on: December 05, 2019, 05:07:01 pm »

hahaha, played this deck on MTGO last night. So much fun!!!

Deck Reviews / Re: [Pauper] Mono Green Infect

« on: November 25, 2019, 09:33:41 pm »

I used to play a very similar list quite a bit on MTGO. I don't think I've ever seen as many instant scoops or smack talk as when you drop a T1 glistener elf!

Vines of vastwood is a great card for protection/pump if you find apostle's blessing isn't enough. Gitaxian probe is nice as well to see if they have removal and/or to dig for another pump. (I picked them up for cheap when they got banned in modern

) Have fun with it!

Deck Reviews / [Pioneer] Whackers

« on: November 15, 2019, 06:09:10 am »

Whackers

Tried to morph a modern 8 whack shell to Pioneer. Soooo much fun!! Usually over by T4. Torbran on top of a bunch of goblins is just broken! hahaha

It's not quite as explosive as 8-whack, but unlike 8 whack, this one seems to hang in there if the game goes longer. Chainwhirler after Torbran is cool! I had one where they gummed up the board and I had a legion loyalist and Torbran out on T4, played a Rabblemaster and surged in a Bushwacker on T5 to hit for a lethal 16 through a blocker! Hahaha

Deck Reviews / [Standard] Murder of Ravens (Aristocrats)

« on: October 19, 2019, 05:54:34 am »

Murder of Ravens (Aristocrats)

So much fun! You basically don't ever plan to attack, you just wall up with a bunch of creatures that deliver value when something dies and then drain the opponent out by sacking them at the right times. With just a couple of extra cards out, you can get 3-4 damage on the opponent's turn every time with the cauldron familiar combo and draw lots of cards. A bunch of the creatures have deathtouch, so the opponent is afraid to attack, and once you get Revenge of Ravens out, go-wide strategies like Field of the Dead zombies don't work, because they can't attack you without dying.

This deck is good at jamming up the board until you can get a Revenge of Ravens out.

Strategy tips:

Once you have a Witch's oven and Cauldron familiar out (or Ayara, First of Locthwain) wait until their end step to sack and replay the cat or sack a Dreadhorde Invasion zombie, that way, you have them untapped most the time to be able to respond to the opponent. If they attack with something that's going to hurt, block with a creature and then sack it and replay it (cat) or get a food token. If you have a food token, you can play a cat later at instant speed as a surprise blocker or a point or two or three of burn damage with Ayara, First of Locthwain or Corpse Knight out.

Cruel Celebrant is a removal magnet, so if you have an Oven or Araya out, try to keep them untapped to be able to sack as much as you can while their removal is on the stack, that way, you can get all of the death triggers (even the one from her dying.) So often times, You gain 2-3 life, they take 2-3 damage and you get a food token. (Then you can add insult to injury by replaying a familiar for more damage etc.)

A fun trick is if they're swinging in with a flyer is to sac an Orzhov Enforcer to spawn the flying token on their attack step. Between the death triggers on the enforcer and the ETB trigger on the token and then the death triggers on the token, it can often be a 6 point life swing and you get a card in the process when they thought they had an easy attack.

You basically only attack if they have an empty board on turn 2 after you played a 1 drop, or if you have an Order of Midnight (it can't block, so you just swing and maybe sack it if they have a blocker that would kill it.) On Alter Fate, you generally want to return a Cruel Celebrant or Ayara, First of Locthwain.

Dreadhorde Invasion might seem weird here, but if you have Ayara out, you get an ETB drain on every turn and you can sack it on every turn for a card (and probably a Cruel Celebrant/Corpse Knight trigger.)

Board wipes are common, so if you're getting wiped, you'll want to sack as much as you can ahead of time for value. Don't worry about sacking a cauldron familiar, go for things that don't have death triggers (you'll get them anyway) If you do it right, you should have a couple of creatures right back on the board and a few cards, so you can generally rebuild pretty fast and they take a lot of damage from all of the triggers, so it's painful for them to do!

What's next:

Right now, I'm splitting Murderous Rider and Mortify for removal as one is great for planeswalkers (and has a good lifegain blocker) while the other takes out Cavalcade of Calamity (or other annoying enchantments) or Torbran, Thane of Red Fell. As the meta gels, I might go one over the other. I really enjoy the sack fodder Dreadhorde Invasion provides, but if it comes down to it, that's what I'm pulling and adding another Midnight Reaper for card draw and more Murderous Riders.

Have fun with it!!

Deck Reviews / Re: [Standard] bw lifegain

« on: October 09, 2019, 02:54:05 am »

Thanks! And thanks for the tip on Murderous Rider. I left Mortify in there for now to deal with of cavalcade of calamity. (I built this pre-rotation when that thing was all over the place.) If the meta shifts away from that, that's a great swap! Being able to hit a planeswalker (oko) seems more important now than calamity. (lifegain offsets calamity pretty well on it's own, but I ultimate Ajani a lot with this deck, and calamity keeps me off of the 35 needed for that.)

Played another event and won 6 games in the recent arena "win every card in standard" challenge. Both losses that knocked me out were to Golos Gates. :-/ (I did beat it once though! I had a hawk, 2 celebrants, a bloodthirsty arielist and the cauldron familiar/oven combo online. The arielist was getting huge with me sacking the familiar on their turn with the celebrants online. They eventually found their Giant board wipe and cleared the board, but with all of the celebrant triggers stacked up, they ended up with one life, so recasting the Cauldron Familiar won me the game

)

Deck Reviews / Re: [Standard] bw lifegain

« on: October 08, 2019, 10:49:07 pm »

Revision 7

Added/removed cards:
-3 Ayara, First of Locthwain
+4 Bloodthirsty Aerialist

Changed amounts:
-1 Teysa Karlov

Deck Reviews / Re: [Modern] Ouch

« on: October 02, 2019, 06:54:16 am »

I made a similar modern crossover calamity deck: https://deckstats.net/decks/56090/1399833-calamity-rdw/en and played about 15 games with it. As entropize said, legion loyalist and legion warboss are amazing in there! If you're going modern, lightning bolt is better than skewer in just about every way (albeit more expensive) It's always one mana and instant speed. I pulled in goblin grenade over the shocks as a good finisher. Chainwhirler is a great sideboard card to wipe out blockers that are keeping you from attacking, but doesn't trigger calamity, so you would get potentially 2x the damage by playing 3 one-power one-drops and getting calamity triggers over playing Chainwhirler. (Lots of hasty 1-drops in modern, so no need to wait for sleeping sickness either. It would be 4x the damage if they had haste!) Spear spewer is another that doesn't trigger calamity. It deals one dmg, but doesn't trigger. If you play torbran, thane of red fell, spear spewer gets much, much better though!

It's super fun deck archetype and has won a lot of games! You'll have fun with it! I was also playing the standard version that's everywhere and felt a little guilty, so I quit playing it (and developing my modern one as well) but it's a ton of fun. I was thinking about going down the spitfires I'm running and going more goblin storm style with token generators (or young pyromancer) but it's tons of fun as is! I never regretted seeing a Chandra pop up. 4x all the way! You almost always want to mulligan if you don't have a calamity or at the very least a light up the stage and a scorch spitter or footlight fiend (deals dmg even if it gets killed) to trigger it to dig for one.