the voice of resurgance puzzle isn't that hard - it's a(nother) good roadblock vs aggro. Outside of pillar of flame, the aggro deck is going to have to waste at least two attacks to deal with it and if you can surround the on-death token with a mana dork and a 3-drop then you have quite a respectable blocker to boot. It kind of does what centaur healer does but a turn earlier.
Thanks for pointing that out peppermint barry, that'll learn me to venture into rules territory :). I had thought the same ruling would apply for jarad as with cards like boneyard worm and tarmogoyf, but obviously it's different for */* creatures.
I've also noticed that I incorrectly describe sire of insanity as a 6/6 when he's a 6/4.
I beat him in round 1 with my control deck, and had he played you in Round 2 it would have been an unusually bad series of matchups for a combo player. The games where you stop the Living End plan and they beat down with Street Wraiths and Deadshot Minotaurs are usually the funniest.
Sadly, round 2 I was _scheduled_ to face a Living End deck, but my opponent never showed. :( I'd like to take the credit for that one, but honesty compels me otherwise.
I'll have some coverage of that specters deck in the Tribal article on Friday. Round 2 he played against Living End, and it appears capping a combo deck is pretty good :-)
yeah, I think I've realised what the main difference is - I've been only playing 1v1 atm, multiplayer just seems too daunting for someone who's never played the format or any sort of multiplayer mtg, so the value of those big bombs like thievery and primordial is drastically lower.
Oh, another card I found was flash of insight which again doesn't break the budget and can be really powerful. Flashing it back for x=5+ is not at all unreasonable and is a great way to dig.
Cool, because I ended up getting both Political Puppets and Devour for Power in a special deal Walmart had (it included an Archenemy deck and a New Phyrexia deck as well, but it was only the cards, no cases, no oversized commanders... Still happy for thirty bucks though). I tried both decks and preferred Political Puppets. Not a bad group hug and it is actually a nice shell to work with.
I kept the instant-speed ones because they work better with countermagic, which I feel is important. I had all the cantrips in before but I always felt that they didn't do enough when Talrand wasn't out on the field. They're never bad, but too often when I drew one I'd see them as unnecessary mana sinks just to find a card that actually does something. Great when Talrand is out, of course, but once that happens and I untap my lands then I don't really need a couple extra drakes to seal the game. Like I said though, they're never bad.
I'd only run big tapout cards that I feel are worth the risk. Basically they're bigger bombs than anything I think my opponents can play that turn. There's very little that can top, for example, Blatant Thievery. It's just that good. Also adds some flexibility to the deck when countermagic is hated on. You know, the dude who is running Teferi and Mana Web or the RG deck that absolutely hates countermagic.
Wash Out is a good catch. I wouldn't say it's better than devastation tide, they both have their ups and downs. I'd run both.
Glad you like the deck! It's a great format to have fun in!
Heh, well I'm basing my opinion on the fact that it was the only precon I bought and tried to play when they first came out, and I didn't have much luck with it. Of course, my opinion may be changed now after having played with the others. I'll give it the old college try, as the saying goes. Heavenly Inferno is up next tho.
I think with the gatekeepers the real test of skill will be knowing when to play it without benefit versus waiting. Sometimes the 2/4 body will be needed more than the effect long term.
Posting here too so I can rate. Also to reaffirm that Political Puppets is stronger than you'd think, so long as you get lucky with its terrible manabase.
Joshua, did you ever think about using Disqus? Seems to be spreading lately, and even if has some flaws, it's a good, dynamic commenting system that takes care of everything.
As Winter said, the thing about Mystics is that they are ALL Nomads (well, except for a couple taoists from Portal: Three Kingdoms, but anything that happened in that set is essentially non-canon, since it was seriously set in real-life China, for absurd PR reasons.) Therefore, the "magician" class of some races is Wizard (the more "civilized" white and blue choice), others have Shamans (the nature-oriented green and red, plus the less urban fringes of black), while a Nomad's magic-user is called a Mystic. Except the Nomad is a class already (they're all Humans), so essentially a Human who's born a Nomad can become a Mystic. If they'll bring back Nomads they would bring back Mystics as well, but I think it's probably bound to remain an Odyssey-only thing. As you pointed out, they didn't even bother to give the Mystic type to a more recent card with the word "mystic" in its name. I believe the reasoning is that every shamanic/monk type is somehow a "mystic", but these are specifically the Mystics from the Nomad tribes in the Odyssey storyline (sort of bedouins).
Theros is bound to have Gorgons for sure. It's Clash of the Titans-inspired. (So probably a big Kraken too.)
Pegasi share the same creature niche as Griffins (and in blue, Drakes): they're the common/uncommon flyers printed only for Limited purposes. And you're probably right, they're probably afraid that both them and Unicorns feel too "fantasty tales for little girls" to have a place in MTG (to the great disappointment of Leviathan's daughter!) In fact, Griffins replaced them in that Limited role almost entirely now.
Hey, you shouldn't stop doing this tribal researches! Go until 12-15 at least, I want to hear your comments about Homunculi, Hellions, Ouphes and Crabs! And Horses! How do they think an unridden horse is something worth fielding in a battlefield? (Then again, every animal can just become a humanoid race in the shape of that animal, which is a bit of a fraud to me, because saying that a Loxodon is an Elephant is like saying that every Human is an Ape.)
Hey, you might not see this comment but I thought I'd drop a line anyway. I had bookmarked this article as one to come back to when I felt like dabbling in commander, and I've now done that and am having fun exploring the format. A few comments on the deck itself. I think a few more of the 1 mana cantrips are in order, as they're the best way to start cranking out hoards of drakes while still leaving counter mana up. in the MTGO list you have posted, you actually include two of these (opt, telling time), but each are strictly worse than ponder and preordain. I'd probably run all 4 and then perhaps others like sleight of hand and serum visions too. being cantrips, these cards can *never* make your hand depleted and as long as you have some big card draw options to dig into you'll be fine. I also feel that some of the big "tapout" cards are a little bit ambitious. You basically always want to be keeping 3 mana up, so to play a 6 or 7 mana non-instant speed card, you need to have like 9+ mana available.
Oh, also wash out is well within budget and is teh NUTS in this deck :). Much better than devastation tide, especially if you've developed some early artifact mana.
Anyway, thanks for the deck; it gave me inspiration to get into the format :)
I think Blood Scrivener is a diamond in the rough at the moment. Much more potential than a "bad Bloodgift Demon." The key difference here is it doesn't simply trigger once per upkeep, but rather any time you would draw a card with no cards in hand. So you could start the turn with nothing in hand, draw 2 cards, play a land and then gitaxian probe and draw 2 cards. Play something else and maybe keep Remand in hand? Remand the opponent's spell, draw 2 cards... you see where this is going.
If a low-cost aggressive deck is out there that can abuse quick card draw // cantrips, blood scrivener could become a staple for that deck.
Just wanted to point out that I've been getting questions over on Reddit about this article, and you can see how I responded to them here:
http://www.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/comments/1e0grf/ars_arcanum_dragons_maz...
5 fireballs just for the Ninja Scroll reference.
God I hated those Vodalian Merfolk. Every pack had like 3 of them. And no one played merfolk. At least Order of the Ebon Hand was playable back then.
On paper - I think this may be the most skill intensive draft trio in mtgo history.
Thanks, this is very helpful. I was having a lot of trouble in some practice drafts and it is very hard to make sense of so much variation.
Voice is also an archetypical hate bear. Which fits a certain type of deck. I wouldn't be surprised to see it main decked in some lists.
the voice of resurgance puzzle isn't that hard - it's a(nother) good roadblock vs aggro. Outside of pillar of flame, the aggro deck is going to have to waste at least two attacks to deal with it and if you can surround the on-death token with a mana dork and a 3-drop then you have quite a respectable blocker to boot. It kind of does what centaur healer does but a turn earlier.
Thanks for pointing that out peppermint barry, that'll learn me to venture into rules territory :). I had thought the same ruling would apply for jarad as with cards like boneyard worm and tarmogoyf, but obviously it's different for */* creatures.
I've also noticed that I incorrectly describe sire of insanity as a 6/6 when he's a 6/4.
I beat him in round 1 with my control deck, and had he played you in Round 2 it would have been an unusually bad series of matchups for a combo player. The games where you stop the Living End plan and they beat down with Street Wraiths and Deadshot Minotaurs are usually the funniest.
Sadly, round 2 I was _scheduled_ to face a Living End deck, but my opponent never showed. :( I'd like to take the credit for that one, but honesty compels me otherwise.
I'll have some coverage of that specters deck in the Tribal article on Friday. Round 2 he played against Living End, and it appears capping a combo deck is pretty good :-)
Well I opened two of the mythic Hydra Friday, so...
The specters theme sounds like a deck right down my alley.
yeah, I think I've realised what the main difference is - I've been only playing 1v1 atm, multiplayer just seems too daunting for someone who's never played the format or any sort of multiplayer mtg, so the value of those big bombs like thievery and primordial is drastically lower.
Oh, another card I found was flash of insight which again doesn't break the budget and can be really powerful. Flashing it back for x=5+ is not at all unreasonable and is a great way to dig.
Cool, because I ended up getting both Political Puppets and Devour for Power in a special deal Walmart had (it included an Archenemy deck and a New Phyrexia deck as well, but it was only the cards, no cases, no oversized commanders... Still happy for thirty bucks though). I tried both decks and preferred Political Puppets. Not a bad group hug and it is actually a nice shell to work with.
I kept the instant-speed ones because they work better with countermagic, which I feel is important. I had all the cantrips in before but I always felt that they didn't do enough when Talrand wasn't out on the field. They're never bad, but too often when I drew one I'd see them as unnecessary mana sinks just to find a card that actually does something. Great when Talrand is out, of course, but once that happens and I untap my lands then I don't really need a couple extra drakes to seal the game. Like I said though, they're never bad.
I'd only run big tapout cards that I feel are worth the risk. Basically they're bigger bombs than anything I think my opponents can play that turn. There's very little that can top, for example, Blatant Thievery. It's just that good. Also adds some flexibility to the deck when countermagic is hated on. You know, the dude who is running Teferi and Mana Web or the RG deck that absolutely hates countermagic.
Wash Out is a good catch. I wouldn't say it's better than devastation tide, they both have their ups and downs. I'd run both.
Glad you like the deck! It's a great format to have fun in!
Heh, well I'm basing my opinion on the fact that it was the only precon I bought and tried to play when they first came out, and I didn't have much luck with it. Of course, my opinion may be changed now after having played with the others. I'll give it the old college try, as the saying goes. Heavenly Inferno is up next tho.
Disqus is something I have noticed, I'll pitch it to jam and see if he can do something with it. Thanks!
I think with the gatekeepers the real test of skill will be knowing when to play it without benefit versus waiting. Sometimes the 2/4 body will be needed more than the effect long term.
Posting here too so I can rate. Also to reaffirm that Political Puppets is stronger than you'd think, so long as you get lucky with its terrible manabase.
Joshua, did you ever think about using Disqus? Seems to be spreading lately, and even if has some flaws, it's a good, dynamic commenting system that takes care of everything.
As Winter said, the thing about Mystics is that they are ALL Nomads (well, except for a couple taoists from Portal: Three Kingdoms, but anything that happened in that set is essentially non-canon, since it was seriously set in real-life China, for absurd PR reasons.) Therefore, the "magician" class of some races is Wizard (the more "civilized" white and blue choice), others have Shamans (the nature-oriented green and red, plus the less urban fringes of black), while a Nomad's magic-user is called a Mystic. Except the Nomad is a class already (they're all Humans), so essentially a Human who's born a Nomad can become a Mystic. If they'll bring back Nomads they would bring back Mystics as well, but I think it's probably bound to remain an Odyssey-only thing. As you pointed out, they didn't even bother to give the Mystic type to a more recent card with the word "mystic" in its name. I believe the reasoning is that every shamanic/monk type is somehow a "mystic", but these are specifically the Mystics from the Nomad tribes in the Odyssey storyline (sort of bedouins).
Theros is bound to have Gorgons for sure. It's Clash of the Titans-inspired. (So probably a big Kraken too.)
Pegasi share the same creature niche as Griffins (and in blue, Drakes): they're the common/uncommon flyers printed only for Limited purposes. And you're probably right, they're probably afraid that both them and Unicorns feel too "fantasty tales for little girls" to have a place in MTG (to the great disappointment of Leviathan's daughter!) In fact, Griffins replaced them in that Limited role almost entirely now.
Hey, you shouldn't stop doing this tribal researches! Go until 12-15 at least, I want to hear your comments about Homunculi, Hellions, Ouphes and Crabs! And Horses! How do they think an unridden horse is something worth fielding in a battlefield? (Then again, every animal can just become a humanoid race in the shape of that animal, which is a bit of a fraud to me, because saying that a Loxodon is an Elephant is like saying that every Human is an Ape.)
I never thought of you as a sea slug! That changes everything!
Good to stumbled upon here. I learned something new now. - YOR Health
Hey, you might not see this comment but I thought I'd drop a line anyway. I had bookmarked this article as one to come back to when I felt like dabbling in commander, and I've now done that and am having fun exploring the format. A few comments on the deck itself. I think a few more of the 1 mana cantrips are in order, as they're the best way to start cranking out hoards of drakes while still leaving counter mana up. in the MTGO list you have posted, you actually include two of these (opt, telling time), but each are strictly worse than ponder and preordain. I'd probably run all 4 and then perhaps others like sleight of hand and serum visions too. being cantrips, these cards can *never* make your hand depleted and as long as you have some big card draw options to dig into you'll be fine. I also feel that some of the big "tapout" cards are a little bit ambitious. You basically always want to be keeping 3 mana up, so to play a 6 or 7 mana non-instant speed card, you need to have like 9+ mana available.
Oh, also wash out is well within budget and is teh NUTS in this deck :). Much better than devastation tide, especially if you've developed some early artifact mana.
Anyway, thanks for the deck; it gave me inspiration to get into the format :)
This game is really interesting. I really enjoyed it. - YOR Health
I think Blood Scrivener is a diamond in the rough at the moment. Much more potential than a "bad Bloodgift Demon." The key difference here is it doesn't simply trigger once per upkeep, but rather any time you would draw a card with no cards in hand. So you could start the turn with nothing in hand, draw 2 cards, play a land and then gitaxian probe and draw 2 cards. Play something else and maybe keep Remand in hand? Remand the opponent's spell, draw 2 cards... you see where this is going.
If a low-cost aggressive deck is out there that can abuse quick card draw // cantrips, blood scrivener could become a staple for that deck.