To clarify my thinking, I try not to generalize too much about tactical plays. There are times when it is 100% right to play an instant even one with split second on your own turn. There are also times when the right play is to wait for your op to give priority, not knowing that they are walking into a split second response.
That falls into the case of bad playing. I was discussing rules. The game stops at every phase by default. Not putting a stop on it equals to the player automatically saying, "I pass priority" to their opponents.
If cracking a mass destruction permanent is crucial to me, you can bet I'll set every possible stop. When I don't, it's because I'm playing badly. It would be the same if I'm the Krosan Grip player and I forget to set a stop on their upkeep. (Except, if I was the Krosan Grip player, it would be a bad play for me to wait their turn at all, like I said. Wouldn't even see the reason to.)
You're forgetting the quirks of MTGO. Priority is automatically passed unless a stop is set. So, set a stop where they haven't prior to the ones they have, and you can take out the offending artifact or enchantment. When was the last time you saw a deed or disk player on mtgo set a stop in their own upkeep to prevent someone else getting a split second jump on them?
And they will still have priority before you as the active players, and will use it as soon as they untap it unless they're fools. Look, there's no way you can stop someone to crack a Pernicious Deed in another player's turn (short of a Stifle effect), unless they actively let you do it either by mistake or careless/overly optimistic strategy.
Split second needs priority to stop an activation. Meaning, like I said, you can't stop them to blow up a Pernicious (or Nevinyrral's Disk or whatever) unless you have priority before they do it, in which case they can't respond to the Grip. But if you wait until it's their turn, priority will go to them first, and unless they let you have it before activating (unlikely, since 90% of the times when one drops one of those effects, they want to use it asap, not wait and see what happens), Krosan Grip becomes useless.
And even the very turn they drop Pernicious and co. (of course not the Disk, since it'd be tapped), if they have the mana to activate it right away, you can't Grip it away, because they'll give priority to you only when it's a spell in the stack, therefore still not targetable by the Grip, then they'll get priority back immediately as the active player (rule 116.3b).
Against the Scepter, the only advantage of Krosan Grip vs. Naturalize when countermagic isn't involved is that Gripping the Scepter prevents them to activate it one last time. I'm a split second enthusiast in general, but experience more and more told me that most of the times isn't worth those 3 mana, especially considering Nature's Claim is 1 mana (which means in many builds I can cast it with the off-turn mana of a Wall of Roots, which sometimes the opponent doesn't even realize) and my builds are often very mana intensive elsewhere.
Mizzium Skin is definitely worth a look. Thanks for the advice!
A way to protect lands would really be great, though. Getting depleted on mana sources seems like the worst thing that can happen to you.
It's not Counterflux, but Hindering Touch also exists. I don't know that this deck puts enough pressure on to make Post go for an early Fissure without extra mana to force through the important copies, though.
Have you experimented with Mizzium Skin as the option of protecting your creatures against Post decks? It can make the creatures survive through Temporal Fissure and if you try the token approach it can save them also from Electrickery.
I wish Counterflux was available in pauper so we can use it to fight Fissure :).
As for my dogs deck... well Krosan Grip's handy for the things you mentioned and those are real threats. But also for stuff like Robin's Isocron Scepter which I have seen him playing with in every deck lately. I figured get out in front of that problem and it will go away. Unfortunately grip didn't pan out to be the bullet I needed vs my opponents so perhaps I shouldn't have stuck them in. By the way: Split Second negates the ability to respond to it. Which means you don't have to wait to use it on your turn. It is also quite effective in killing Sensei's Divining Top and other repeat activation artifacts if done at the right moment. (Hint: After your op taps it to draw a card is too late.)
I was not pleased with either of my Cats & Dogs decks. Neither performed well mulliganing all but 2 games out of the 8 I played, and double mulliganing twice. It really takes the fun out of the game when your deck throws you for a loop. That said, the blame for those bad draws is entirely in the realm of bad deck building and complete lack of testing. And that is one reason I stopped playing before. The inability to adequately prepare decks for the PRE means that unless my opponents also suffer from this problem I will lose and losing no matter what AJ may say is not fun for me. Not unless, there is at least a game there first.
Thanks for the feedback, dzejkej. I have been trying out some different plans to improve the deck's game against Post, specifically, as the land destruction suite just doesn't seem to be all that effective against the UR variety.
Shifting more toward an aggressive midrange approach helped me take game 1 a couple times, and using a board that includes 3 hydro and 4 pyroblasts instead of land destruction backed up my Matca Rioters and Festerhide Boars pretty well, but I'm not sure the improved game against UR Post is worth it for the decrease in effectiveness against Kiln Fiend and Mono Blue Post that accompanied. On the plus side, the presence of pyroblast in the board only improved the Delver matchup, which seems in your favor except when they get a hand that flips 2 or more delvers early and countains 2 hard counters.
I like the feel of the deck better when it is more focused on removal and abusing Grim Harvest, but the Matca Rioters version does seem quite good at beating three of the most popular decks (Affinity, Stompy, and Delver). It is still very much the underdog in all U(x) Post matchups.
Evincar's Justice is an interesting option, but it wouldn't work in the toolbox as it's a sorcery. I think it's probably just a little too slow.
As you pointed out, this deck is incredibly mana-intensive, which makes Cenn's Enlistment just not quite good enough.
Sprout Swarm is something I wanted to include, but felt I didn't necessarily need. It would be most helpful against aggro decks, which you already perform well against. Against Post, they either just counter it, or ignore it, capsizing your lands and eventually wiping your saproling swarm with electrickery.
Havenwood Wurm seems worth trying out. Getting the mana to cast him is not very hard in this deck. I currently have Festerhide Boar in place of the old Ingot Chewer to help close games faster, and he has worked out pretty well despite not being tutorable.
I've also given up on Resounding Thunder. There's no deck anymore against which cycling these is better than other options.
I think that particular line of argument doesn't always stand up however. If I spend 2 minutes checking prices 5 days a week for 6 weeks that's an "hour" I could have worked at McD. But I wouldn't have been able to do only 2 minutes a day. Those 2 minutes could have been waiting for an opponent to sideboard or waiting for a round to end. It also runs into the issue of whose time is worth what. An in demand lawyer would want 200/hours while an unemployable middle schooler or high schooler (so sub 16) would likely take anything.
I wasn't planning on doing any direct calculations in regards to time essentially for the reasons above. I would simply state the time I spent and let each person judge for themselves whether it was worth it.
The $30 was more an amount I was willing to put up from my own ticket supply. I could easily run a "theoritical" (if I spelled that right...) one with much higher limits but it would be in somes way questionable as I wouldn't know for certain whether the card would actually be purchased.
I guess any amount of dollars will do, but you need a counter-arguement when someone brings up the time consumption.
Say that you are able to triple the money to $90 in 5 hours (I do not know what you expect to do?). Then someone will just say that you could flip burgers in McD for 5 hours and earn more than those $60 (I dont know what McD pays, but you get the point). In Pete Jahn's speculation project he started with $300, but kept comparing time consumption to a McD job and McD won each time. But had he started with $3000 the picture would have been different.
The potential profit on $30 will never beat the time consumption.
Or how do you plan to factor in your time consumption?
I am planning on judiciously tracking the time spent so it can be factored into the overall conclusion, and this will include checking prices as over time even that will add up.
As for not investing just $30, what do you recommend?
I think with MMA it's a bit different. The only pack winner in phantom is 1st place in the single elimination and it costs 8 tickets if you don't have cube tickets.
When someone writes "but the fact that" then you can always be certain that whatever comes next is NOT a fact.
Remember that if you want to argue that speculation is profitable then you need to factor in your time consumption. To say that you can finance your hobby with time instead of money is not a valid arguement.
You may want to change the setup so that you do not just invest $30. Showing that prices are predictable and that speculation is profitable is not the same thing.
Great post xger. You always have very insightful things to say.
People complain about the cost of MTGO, but the fact that its fairly straightforward and predictable to invest on a bucket of cards based on the information you give in this article means that those who care to look into it can easily finance their hobby with time instead of money. Just following the suggestions you have given (and a few more, like that in Dan Horning's article) I have been able to easily build up a decent collection.
I think its quite interesting the psychology of how people value phantom drafts. In MTGO its so easy to sell and purchase cards that the way I see it, normal limited events can easily be compared to phantom events if you just deduct the EV of a pack from the cost of a pack. Unless you are freakishly lucky, its usually better, and definitely more consistent EV to play phantom events. If you really want to end up with some cards, do the following:
1) Put aside the difference in cost that you would have required to enter a non-phantom event.
2) Enter a phantom event
3) Enjoy your event
4) Go to MTGOTraders (or your preferred bot) and splurge on exactly the cards you want with the money you saved. There's your cards.
You save time since you don't have to sell, money, since you don't lose on the markup and if you didn't actually plan to sell the cards you open, then in this case, you get to keep exactly the cards you want. It just seems a win-win to me.
That version of Grixis is too blue for my taste, but it looks like a great contender in the game.
Good work on the articles and hosting.
I hope to enjoy more of your events in the near future.
Good to see MtG is still going in 20013. Have they banned Island yet?
This is what I was thinking too. There might be some other cards in MMA that are worth investing into. Clique, for example.
To clarify my thinking, I try not to generalize too much about tactical plays. There are times when it is 100% right to play an instant even one with split second on your own turn. There are also times when the right play is to wait for your op to give priority, not knowing that they are walking into a split second response.
That falls into the case of bad playing. I was discussing rules. The game stops at every phase by default. Not putting a stop on it equals to the player automatically saying, "I pass priority" to their opponents.
If cracking a mass destruction permanent is crucial to me, you can bet I'll set every possible stop. When I don't, it's because I'm playing badly. It would be the same if I'm the Krosan Grip player and I forget to set a stop on their upkeep. (Except, if I was the Krosan Grip player, it would be a bad play for me to wait their turn at all, like I said. Wouldn't even see the reason to.)
You're forgetting the quirks of MTGO. Priority is automatically passed unless a stop is set. So, set a stop where they haven't prior to the ones they have, and you can take out the offending artifact or enchantment. When was the last time you saw a deed or disk player on mtgo set a stop in their own upkeep to prevent someone else getting a split second jump on them?
And they will still have priority before you as the active players, and will use it as soon as they untap it unless they're fools. Look, there's no way you can stop someone to crack a Pernicious Deed in another player's turn (short of a Stifle effect), unless they actively let you do it either by mistake or careless/overly optimistic strategy.
If you wait until it's their turn, you put a stop in their upkeep.
This seems a little like a pointless argument as you asked a question and I answered it. Regardless of priority rules questions.
Split second needs priority to stop an activation. Meaning, like I said, you can't stop them to blow up a Pernicious (or Nevinyrral's Disk or whatever) unless you have priority before they do it, in which case they can't respond to the Grip. But if you wait until it's their turn, priority will go to them first, and unless they let you have it before activating (unlikely, since 90% of the times when one drops one of those effects, they want to use it asap, not wait and see what happens), Krosan Grip becomes useless.
And even the very turn they drop Pernicious and co. (of course not the Disk, since it'd be tapped), if they have the mana to activate it right away, you can't Grip it away, because they'll give priority to you only when it's a spell in the stack, therefore still not targetable by the Grip, then they'll get priority back immediately as the active player (rule 116.3b).
Against the Scepter, the only advantage of Krosan Grip vs. Naturalize when countermagic isn't involved is that Gripping the Scepter prevents them to activate it one last time. I'm a split second enthusiast in general, but experience more and more told me that most of the times isn't worth those 3 mana, especially considering Nature's Claim is 1 mana (which means in many builds I can cast it with the off-turn mana of a Wall of Roots, which sometimes the opponent doesn't even realize) and my builds are often very mana intensive elsewhere.
Mizzium Skin is definitely worth a look. Thanks for the advice!
A way to protect lands would really be great, though. Getting depleted on mana sources seems like the worst thing that can happen to you.
It's not Counterflux, but Hindering Touch also exists. I don't know that this deck puts enough pressure on to make Post go for an early Fissure without extra mana to force through the important copies, though.
Have you experimented with Mizzium Skin as the option of protecting your creatures against Post decks? It can make the creatures survive through Temporal Fissure and if you try the token approach it can save them also from Electrickery.
I wish Counterflux was available in pauper so we can use it to fight Fissure :).
If you dont think the argument stands up, then no need to worry about it. But you might end up preaching to the choir instead of convincing skeptics.
AJ, is as I wrote a few moons ago, a living legend in the game. Thanks for bringing that to light again. :D http://puremtgo.com/articles/magical-legends-players-profile-ajimpy for those who wish a refresher.
As for my dogs deck... well Krosan Grip's handy for the things you mentioned and those are real threats. But also for stuff like Robin's Isocron Scepter which I have seen him playing with in every deck lately. I figured get out in front of that problem and it will go away. Unfortunately grip didn't pan out to be the bullet I needed vs my opponents so perhaps I shouldn't have stuck them in. By the way: Split Second negates the ability to respond to it. Which means you don't have to wait to use it on your turn. It is also quite effective in killing Sensei's Divining Top and other repeat activation artifacts if done at the right moment. (Hint: After your op taps it to draw a card is too late.)
I was not pleased with either of my Cats & Dogs decks. Neither performed well mulliganing all but 2 games out of the 8 I played, and double mulliganing twice. It really takes the fun out of the game when your deck throws you for a loop. That said, the blame for those bad draws is entirely in the realm of bad deck building and complete lack of testing. And that is one reason I stopped playing before. The inability to adequately prepare decks for the PRE means that unless my opponents also suffer from this problem I will lose and losing no matter what AJ may say is not fun for me. Not unless, there is at least a game there first.
Thanks for the feedback, dzejkej. I have been trying out some different plans to improve the deck's game against Post, specifically, as the land destruction suite just doesn't seem to be all that effective against the UR variety.
Shifting more toward an aggressive midrange approach helped me take game 1 a couple times, and using a board that includes 3 hydro and 4 pyroblasts instead of land destruction backed up my Matca Rioters and Festerhide Boars pretty well, but I'm not sure the improved game against UR Post is worth it for the decrease in effectiveness against Kiln Fiend and Mono Blue Post that accompanied. On the plus side, the presence of pyroblast in the board only improved the Delver matchup, which seems in your favor except when they get a hand that flips 2 or more delvers early and countains 2 hard counters.
I like the feel of the deck better when it is more focused on removal and abusing Grim Harvest, but the Matca Rioters version does seem quite good at beating three of the most popular decks (Affinity, Stompy, and Delver). It is still very much the underdog in all U(x) Post matchups.
Evincar's Justice is an interesting option, but it wouldn't work in the toolbox as it's a sorcery. I think it's probably just a little too slow.
As you pointed out, this deck is incredibly mana-intensive, which makes Cenn's Enlistment just not quite good enough.
Sprout Swarm is something I wanted to include, but felt I didn't necessarily need. It would be most helpful against aggro decks, which you already perform well against. Against Post, they either just counter it, or ignore it, capsizing your lands and eventually wiping your saproling swarm with electrickery.
Havenwood Wurm seems worth trying out. Getting the mana to cast him is not very hard in this deck. I currently have Festerhide Boar in place of the old Ingot Chewer to help close games faster, and he has worked out pretty well despite not being tutorable.
I've also given up on Resounding Thunder. There's no deck anymore against which cycling these is better than other options.
I think that particular line of argument doesn't always stand up however. If I spend 2 minutes checking prices 5 days a week for 6 weeks that's an "hour" I could have worked at McD. But I wouldn't have been able to do only 2 minutes a day. Those 2 minutes could have been waiting for an opponent to sideboard or waiting for a round to end. It also runs into the issue of whose time is worth what. An in demand lawyer would want 200/hours while an unemployable middle schooler or high schooler (so sub 16) would likely take anything.
I wasn't planning on doing any direct calculations in regards to time essentially for the reasons above. I would simply state the time I spent and let each person judge for themselves whether it was worth it.
The $30 was more an amount I was willing to put up from my own ticket supply. I could easily run a "theoritical" (if I spelled that right...) one with much higher limits but it would be in somes way questionable as I wouldn't know for certain whether the card would actually be purchased.
I guess any amount of dollars will do, but you need a counter-arguement when someone brings up the time consumption.
Say that you are able to triple the money to $90 in 5 hours (I do not know what you expect to do?). Then someone will just say that you could flip burgers in McD for 5 hours and earn more than those $60 (I dont know what McD pays, but you get the point). In Pete Jahn's speculation project he started with $300, but kept comparing time consumption to a McD job and McD won each time. But had he started with $3000 the picture would have been different.
The potential profit on $30 will never beat the time consumption.
Or how do you plan to factor in your time consumption?
I am planning on judiciously tracking the time spent so it can be factored into the overall conclusion, and this will include checking prices as over time even that will add up.
As for not investing just $30, what do you recommend?
I think with MMA it's a bit different. The only pack winner in phantom is 1st place in the single elimination and it costs 8 tickets if you don't have cube tickets.
When someone writes "but the fact that" then you can always be certain that whatever comes next is NOT a fact.
Remember that if you want to argue that speculation is profitable then you need to factor in your time consumption. To say that you can finance your hobby with time instead of money is not a valid arguement.
You may want to change the setup so that you do not just invest $30. Showing that prices are predictable and that speculation is profitable is not the same thing.
if you are looking into low money high profit card, i would go with path to exile and kitchen finks.
both around march will go up in price around march to get to a good ammount
Pete, thanks for keeping up with SotP.
Nice to see one oldtimer who hasn't fallen out ;)
Great post xger. You always have very insightful things to say.
People complain about the cost of MTGO, but the fact that its fairly straightforward and predictable to invest on a bucket of cards based on the information you give in this article means that those who care to look into it can easily finance their hobby with time instead of money. Just following the suggestions you have given (and a few more, like that in Dan Horning's article) I have been able to easily build up a decent collection.
Keep up the good work!
I think its quite interesting the psychology of how people value phantom drafts. In MTGO its so easy to sell and purchase cards that the way I see it, normal limited events can easily be compared to phantom events if you just deduct the EV of a pack from the cost of a pack. Unless you are freakishly lucky, its usually better, and definitely more consistent EV to play phantom events. If you really want to end up with some cards, do the following:
1) Put aside the difference in cost that you would have required to enter a non-phantom event.
2) Enter a phantom event
3) Enjoy your event
4) Go to MTGOTraders (or your preferred bot) and splurge on exactly the cards you want with the money you saved. There's your cards.
You save time since you don't have to sell, money, since you don't lose on the markup and if you didn't actually plan to sell the cards you open, then in this case, you get to keep exactly the cards you want. It just seems a win-win to me.