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General Magic / Re: Time Spiral Remastered

« il: Marzo 07, 2021, 05:26:12 pm »

Meh?

I was on a very long hiatus from the game during the time period the original block rolled out so don't have any experiences with the cards in either Draft or Standard so there's no nostalgia factor.  I guess I'm glad it's another way to get some needed reprints out there but I don't see myself buying that much of it.  Mostly I'm hoping that it gives me a shot at getting Sliver Legion at something less than a mortgage payment for my house.

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Commander Deck Reviews / Re: Lathril's Draining Empire

« il: Febbraio 13, 2021, 05:24:40 pm »

Like some of what I'm seeing here.  I'm also working on a Lathril build based more around trying to abuse the tap deal 10 ability and you've got a couple of cards in your list that I think I'm now going to have to try and find room for, especially Sanguine Bond.   I'm finding that I just can't have enough elves in the deck so almost any non-elf card can has a case for being cut just for that factor.  End-Raze Forerunners just doesn't do enough for the mana required so I think that's the easiest cut. 

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Commander Discussion / Re: Discard vs. Stax

« il: Gennaio 16, 2021, 08:39:16 pm »

I don't know that I can truly speak for my opponents on this as I haven't really had this conversation with many of them over the years nor have I played a lot of Stax against people to hear their random [unsolicited] reactions.

I personally would rather face Stax than discard.  Cards in hand = options and I at least feel there's a chance to be able to break out of soft locks where being hellbent for more than a turn usually means the discard player starts building up more discard spells/effects and if whatever I draw can't be used right that second, it's probably gone too.

I guess I'll answer the poll by considering myself the opponent?

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General Magic / Re: Kaldheim Spoilers

« il: Gennaio 02, 2021, 07:56:33 pm »

Why are there so many mechanics in this set?

• Foretell
• MDFCs
• Sagas
• Gods
• Boast
• Runes

And that's excluding the tribes (I believe there are 5?).

This seems kinda crazy, ngl. 3 of the mechanics are even new, not returning mechanics.

Each mechanic seems to do a good job of capturing the essence of Viking culture and mythology so the set should be simply oozing flavor but I'll admit that it does seem like a lot to try and reconcile from a game design pov.  I have to wonder how much design space each can be afforded?

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General Magic / Re: Kaldheim Spoilers

« il: Dicembre 18, 2020, 01:38:52 am »

Yeah, I am loving the alternate art cards. In particular, those borders are beautiful.

I'll second that.  These new alt art borders are right up there with the look of the Kaladesh Inventions imo.  Pretty much what I'd expect from a Norse themed set but it doesn't disappoint.

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Commander Discussion / Re: Commander Bucket List

« il: Dicembre 06, 2020, 05:44:51 pm »

'Goals' by deck, and not listing every deck, just the ones that have more than 'smash you' goals/win conditions.

Aminatou, the Fateshifter: uses top deck manipulation and blinking to set up mostly alternate win conditions

[X] Win thru milling out the table with Aminatou/Altar of the Brood/Felidar Guardian combo
[X] Win thru casting Approach of the Second Sun twice
[  ] Win thru Mechanized Production (have only played this deck once since adding this in)
[  ] Win thru Revel in Riches (I've gotten to seven treasures twice and was taken out both times because the table sensed Revel coming)
[  ] Win by stealing someone's commander with Hostage Taker and dealing enough 'commander' damage to take everyone else out.

Tasigur, the Golden Fang: lands matter that typically looks to power up either Torment of Hailfire or Villainous Wealth

[X] Kill the table with Torment of Hailfire
[  ] Kill the table with a crippling Villainous Wealth, but lots of bad luck with the card.  There's usually one more counter than I can deal with or oddly hit nothing/too little to seal the win.
[  ] Have every land in the deck in play.
[  ] Kill the table with zombie tokens created from Field of the Dead.  Haven't played the deck since adding so not sure how likely.

Zedruu, the Greathearted: group hug deck that is low on win-cons or ways to pull 'combos' together

[  ] Kill someone with Zedruu after having swapped their life total with Axis of Mortality.  Its really the ultimate insult
[  ] Steal a Phage the Untouchable with Captivating Crew and then kill the table by hitting Phage with Fractured Identity  [have to convince someone to make a deck with Phage in it...]
[  ] Kill the table with Psychosis Crawler
[  ] Kill an opponent with the tokens soldiers from Akroan Horse
[  ] Kill an opponent with something spicy returned 'at random' with Wildfire Devils
[  ] End a game where each opponent has 3 or more creatures in play and all have bribery counters from Gwafa Hazid, Profiteer

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Commander Discussion / Re: Commander Bucket List

« il: Dicembre 04, 2020, 10:42:58 pm »

[  ] Kill the table with a Voltron Goat token

I would love to see a video of this happening.

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Commander Discussion / Re: Spark Double in Commander.

« il: Novembre 28, 2020, 11:28:08 pm »

Spark Double is a perfectly legit card but not every commander benefits that much from having a second copy in play.  I run it in my Atraxa Superfriends deck because doubling up Atraxa's proliferate trigger is exactly what the deck wants to be doing as well as having 15+ planeswalkers to copy.  But I feel it would be a suboptimal draw in my Tasigur deck because having a second copy of him doesn't result in doubling up his power, in fact the mana used to cast the Double is an activation of his ability wasted.  And while I do have 2 planeswalkers to copy, they're more for troubleshooting than win cons so I don't really need to make another copy.  Not being able to target opponents' creatures and planeswalkers is also a significant downside.  So for Tasigur, I think I'd be more likely to run Clever Impersonator or Phyrexian Metamorph for the flexibility [if I were to run a clone effect at all].

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Commander Discussion / Re: A Formula for Determining your Deck's Power Level

« il: Novembre 22, 2020, 05:59:02 pm »

Okay so I have a question that ties into this discussion. How would you rank the following things in terms of importance for rating deck power? Which are most important, which are least important?

Average CMC of deck
Combo potential
Draw power
Interaction
Land base
Mara ramp
Stax
Synergy
Tutors

I feel strongly the first four should be ordered: Combo Potential/Tutors/Draw Power/Mana Ramp

My reasoning being I think its well established that combo decks are the strongest in the format and become stronger the more competitively you play to the point it seems its the only thing being played in cEDH, so its the most important point in determining power level.  The ability to draw into combo pieces therefore determines how effective the combo potential is with quality [tutors] ranking above quantity [Draw Power] with mana ramp being what helps determines how quickly one can execute finding the combo and firing it off.

Next: Stax/Synergy/CMC

Not as sure on the order here.  Stax is important to slow down everything in the above tier.  Synergy to determine how much additional power and effectiveness your pieces have when played in conjunction, especially synergies that reduce casting cost I think.  Avg CMC mostly for determining how quickly you can get to the point of firing off multiple spells per turn though I'm not sure if we're talking printed CMC which most sites go by or the effective CMC that deck builders assume [delve and such being a thing].  I could see a case for any of these three points going in any order of 5/6/7.

Last two: Interaction/Land Base

Again, I feel either could be 8 or 9 but think both come at the end.  Interaction seems a necessary evil in the highest octane decks in case it becomes urgent to stop something *right now* but if you're faster at executing your game plan than everyone else, you probably didn't fire off a single removal spell.  Land base is probably mostly about playing shit that doesn't come into play tapped and that enough of it produces colors you need.  All basics with the correct mana ramp package probably doesn't suffer very much.

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Commander Discussion / Re: Using Sunbird's Invocation

« il: Novembre 20, 2020, 10:55:48 pm »

I've really only gotten good hits off Sunbird's Invocation when I pair it with something like Sylvan Library or Scroll Rack to control what I'm hitting but even then I didn't find it ultimately worth it to keep in decks. 

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Commander Discussion / Re: A Formula for Determining your Deck's Power Level

« il: Novembre 18, 2020, 07:45:43 pm »

I tried my hand at running a few of my decks through this formula and the exercise mainly served to remind me why I'm not in a profession that requires a ton of math....

After looking at the write-up then looking at my decklists, I'm not really sure how to quantify some cards.  Would I count a card like Muddle the Mixture twice for being a tutor and interaction? [It's in the deck as a tutor so I only counted it as such] Would most people consider Lim-Dul's Vault as a tutor? [I didn't in my 'calculations' but YMMV]  I guess I'd want to see an expanded list of examples in each category that were fringier inclusions to get a better idea of a baseline for each. 

Assuming I did the math correctly, the decks I sampled all came in at just over a 5 to just shy of a 7 with Kess the lone exception at just over 10 which probably isn't how far off from where I've considered them. 

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Commander Discussion / Re: Favorite group-hug cards

« il: Novembre 17, 2020, 06:22:42 pm »

For me, it's because of how tiring it gets to play against group hug. I've found that they king make at the beginning of the game and just make it impossible for the 2 unfortunate players.

... but most of my experiences are with Zedruu & Kynaios and Tiro of Meletis decks that readily admit they have no win condition. How they enjoy the game, I'll never know.

I'll have to plead sort of guilty to this.  I have a Zedruu deck that is mostly a 'kingmaker' deck but I do have a Psychosis Crawler in there that could plausibly win me the game once the card draw is flowing.  However, I'm not there to pick one person to win at the expense of others, more to make sure that interesting things happen and no one had a game where they couldn't play.  To help with this, probably my two favorite cards in the deck are Victory Chimes and Spectral Searchlight so anyone struggling with mana can get enough of a boost to get going.  Dawnbreak Reclaimer has been useful to help others recover from a boardwipe so they're not just spinning their wheels in topdeck mode.  I like the +1 on Jace Beleren as well so people have cards to play.  I'm also playing the Jeskai 'Offering' cards in there as well.

And I enjoy playing this style of deck because there are times where I'm not feeling particularly competitive but want to play Magic.  It lets me play Magic more on cruise control and just relax some. 

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Commander Discussion / Re: Commander Legends: deck updates and new decks

« il: Novembre 06, 2020, 11:20:52 pm »

I don't really see any new commanders that make me want to build a fresh, new deck but there are definitely things that will make their ways into existing decks:

Armored Skyhunter will likely find a home in my Arahbo, Roar of the World deck.
Laboratory Drudge and Tormod, the Desecrated may both go into Grimgrin mill
Hullbreacher for Kess
Sengir, the Dark Baron for Olivia Voldaren which is quickly becoming vampiric legendary tribal
Opposition Agent for Aminatou
Any number of the Mardu familiars could see use in Zurgo
Rograkh, Son of Rohgahh for Winota
Kodama of the East Tree for Xenagos
Anara, Wolvid Familiar for Ghired
Thalisse, Reverent Medium for Teysa Karlov
May try out Elvish Doomsayer in The Haunt of Hightower
Plus any copies of Battlebond land cycle 2.0 will get snapped up pretty quickly.

And for reprints, Three Visits likely to replace a more expensive ramp spell in multiple decks

I will find a home for Nevinyrral, Urborg Tyrant, just not sure where yet.  Probably Atraxa though [which may or may not also get Tevesh Szat, Doom of Fools]

I have to say, after all of the hype, at the moment, I'm fairly let down regarding this set.  Unfairly, I really wanted more cards like Ghost of Ramirez DePietro.  While it's awesome finally getting cards for characters from way back that we've waited a very long time for, I was most excited for getting updates to a lot of the crappy old Legends from pre-Kamigawa block to make more playable cards. 

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Commander Discussion / Re: Commander Legends Spoilers

« il: Novembre 01, 2020, 10:28:10 pm »

For Slurrk, the All-Consuming I'm interested in the fact it doesn't specify creatures YOU control, just that creatures with +1/+1 counters get more.

This could also just be a translation error.

I see two instances of あなたがコントロール in the text [though its hard for me to read clearly on the screen] which I think is 'you control' though Sly could probably say with far more certainty. 

The other non-legendary ooze has the kanji for 'mud' in its name but combined with the other kanji, not sure how that changes the meaning.  Best I could come up with [again, hard for me to read on the screen] is some combination of mud/muck/mire and pile/heap.  My Japanese is kind of a 1.7 out of 10 though so I'm probably just sticking my foot in it by posting anything.

EDIT: Spelling

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Commander Discussion / Re: How to know your done with your EDH deck

« il: Ottobre 28, 2020, 01:59:11 am »

That it has a hundred cards and I don't want to throw the whole thing against the wall usually tells me I'm done the first draft.