Boros suffers from a lot of splash damage from everyone attempting to fight Caw-Blade. I played Boros from about December up through PT Paris, and immediately afterward. However, once people stopped playing traditional UW/UB control builds, Boros dropped like a rock.
Think about it, as a Boros player, what deck do you want to see across from you? Valakut is a cointoss, Vampires and CawBlade are poor matchups. And as TRG mentions above, there are some cards you simply cannot beat.
Edit: the list of cards that Boros basically packs it in to (besides the 2 Journey to Nowhere, but it's fair to say that the decks that pack these trumps are going to draw them more frequently than your JtN due to draw/manipulation)
Baneslayer
Inferno Titan
Primeval Titan
Gideon Jura (not even JtN helps here)
Avenger of Zenidkar
Vengevine
Phyrexian Crusader
(Lesser extent): Kor Firewalker
Also, a list of cards that you have more answers for (like Bolt) but absolutely have to have it immediately or else you probably lose:
Kalastria Highborn
Fauna Shaman
Anything carrying a Sword
I've tried putting a bloom deck together, and I've come to the conclusion that it needs cheaper card drawing. I've tried adding in Swans of Bryn Argoll and Savage Twister, changing your board sweep into cards in hand, with Death Grasp as the kill spell. Both of those x-spells have the benefit of being at least partly green or black for ease of use alongside cadaverous bloom.
I'm currently tapping black-black-and-colourless to cast a lot of Phyrexian Crusaders and let me tell you, Boros just packs to that guy. Any thoughts on decent answers? Ratchet Bomb just doesn't cut it. I guess Tumble Magnet is viable but seems weak when you can't abuse it (not that boros will keep you alive long). Hmmmm, maybe just answered my own question there. (you can tell I didn't pre-plan this post).
I keep decks for two formats that pay out different boosters to fuel draft sets. So, if I feel like playing core (which I haven't in ages), I'll play a few quick paupers. If its the current block ill play STD or EXT.
Regardless, Pauper 2-Mans fire consistently, but there just arent enough DE's. The lack of 8-Man's make it REAL difficult to go infinite off pauper on its own.
1) I covered this in a previous article that covered drafting. It discussed draft levels. 8-4s make for bigger swings and many accounts cant handle those swings.
2) Yeah, 2-Mans that pay SoM are great. People should stock up on their SoM as much as possible.
3) I'm doing that same thing right now, but its mostly a hoard until SoM cards go up next winter.
4) It sounds like a good way to build a collection but the time commitment to payout ratio is high which is why I have typically avoided them.
Regarding your question, I think the entire series so far kind of covers it. For starters, I would stop spending $100 to $200 at release time. I would try to make it so that you are self-sufficient enough so that money can go towards something else. Generally Speaking, what I do prior to release events is gather packs of the new expansion and build 5-6 3x New Set draft sets. I draft the crap out of those draft sets and through strategic selling during release events you can keep them stocked up while building your collection.
With each card, you are also talking about the opportunity lost on playing that card instead of something else. What are you going to remove from a deck to play LoA in it's place? Will that advance the game plan of the deck more than what you removed?
What 4 cards would you take out of Oath to play 4 Loa? If you play it singleton, relying on a tutor, why would you expend your precious tutors on that when you could instead get a combo piece (not to mention only demonic tutor is would likely result in being able to use LoA right away - the other tutors that could find it are card disadvantage and won't leave you with 7 cards in hand)
Like I said, it's fantastic in the control matchup, but those matchups are not frequent enough in the current meta to pack it in over some card that will give you a better matchup vs the other more likely decks.
The fact is that vintage lists are running colored mana artifacts (mox/black). So I guess the choice of running LoA in these conditions does not involve a comparable color screw probability. Classic is fast, but most part of acceleration stuff except petals & LED (which needs a specific playstyle) are colorless. This could be a reason. or not.
Just a couple things I thought I should add to this
1. I saw you mention that if you want queues to fire often go with Standard, Extended, or Block. I think Pauper should be included in this. The daily events nearly always fire on time, you will never wait more than a minute for a two man to fire, and the decks can be all be made with a low investment of 5-50 tickets. Add to a pretty decent metagame with multiple decks for each of the big subtypes of aggro, combo, and control and I think it's a good reccomendation.
2. If a person plans on playing a lot of 2-man queues, and they can afford it, I would reccomend trying to get into 2 constructed formats that pay out different pack types. For example, when bot buy on m11 was around 3.83 I was hitting a lot of pauper 2-man queues, as it was pretty close to a straight up bet for winning. Now that it is down to 3.34 I try to play queues paying out SOM, which became much more expensive with the release of besieged. As such, I avoid queues that pay out MBS, which is very low right now, and even you are playing Daily Events, is a big difference in value of winning 6 Besieged packs or 6 SOM packs if you plan on flipping them to bots after.
I did total miss the Azorious Chancery in affinity but I don't see why a 2/1 split would be better than 3 gifts in a format with no cranial spells. Yes I've seen plenty of red burn decks running Klien Fiend not say that I see it as a good choice though. The Green post decks are starting to look more like the one showed here from what I've seen.
Olaw you bring some good critizm to my attention. Now looking back I should have explained the rating system much better. I made the mistake that everyone knows what I am thinking. The one star on the WW deck is a mistake it should have had four stars. As far as the investment I might have let price influence that as well where I should have really done it on just reusability. Playability was suppose to mean more on the lines of how competitive the deck is. But rating on how easy/difficult it is to piolet would have been a nice catagorey to add as well.
Thanks for the comments again and I am glad that you guys enjoyed it and I would also like to add that I do welcome the critizm.
Yes, in those situations it's not going to have much of an impact on the board. It won't do much against Oath and Orchard T1, and it certainly won't help against Dredge, let alone a fast Lodestone Golem. But the thing is, how much would a fetch/dual/basic land helped in those situations, more? Granted, maybe Library over a basic/fetch/dual prevents you from casting Spell Pierce on the Oath, or casting Brainstorm into an answer for the Stax/Dredge MU. But that is easily worked around by simply choosing to play a different land in those specific situations. If you're playing against Stax/Dredge you should eventually come to realize that LoA on your first turn might not be the best course of action if you're holding a Spell Pierce or Brainstorm. Obviously, including a couple LoAs is going to decreases your percentage of having a specific color of mana when you might need it, but the question is is that decrease in percentage worth the risk for when your Oath opponent doesn't have a first turn Oath, and you need to build up card advantage to win a counter war?
Additionally, is it so terrible for Oath to play LoA? Vintage builds sometimes run it. I'm surprised it hasn't found a home as at least a singleton in the deck, since it can be easily tutored up for the control MUs.
Classic, by and large, is populated by fathers/husbands who place MTGO as a secondary or even tertiary priority. It's funny, but when I'm online on MTGO, I see people saying, "c'mon, I see Classic people online, join the DE!" The reality is, though, there's a world of difference between slipping a game in here and there and setting aside a block of 2-4 hrs for a DE.
Let's face it, the format is not a very friendly place to newcomers. Unlike Legacy, where the format is dominated by creature decks, Classic can see people jizz in your face turn 1-2. If you're a new player, that's hard to take. I have faced enough disgruntled "curious" players in the TP room that think their decks are kicking Casual Room ass and wanna try a harder game only to find out what a turn 1-2 and 3 sphere effect feels like. What I mean to say is, there is a mental barrier to entry and a high learning curve.
Lion's Eye Diamond's value is probably more fueled by Legacy than Classic and in Legacy it isn't going to be banned. Let your buying begin. ;)
I've been the only MBC deck the past few weeks. Jund and Naya have also been strong in past weeks. I've seen a couple Elves decks around, but I don't remember any making Top 4/8 yet though. It seems like a new deck pops up from week to week.
Nice article, Niabock. Hopefully it brings in more new faces.
I have full intentions of replying to your post but I want to afford myself the time to reply that it took you to write your post. I'll post whenever I have a few minutes.
Haha you were in a clan named after one of the legendary RPGS of all time (next to D&D). So full of awesome that. :p
My point wasn't really about multiplayer per se, but any niche format or just any format where the goals may not be to use the most expensive cards to win (in a somewhat cutthroat manner) but to win using Johnny tactics or Timmy flash. No matter the sensibility some of these players could easily contend on a pro level given the inclination. (Many judges fall into this category for example.)
We regularly see a few sharks in the TWL PREs (Because Legacy & Classic are basically broken formats if you take out sideboards.) You are more likely to see rogue designs in casual (but not necessarily intentionally so) because casual design tends to vary a lot in strength as well as imagination and $$$.
You know all those cards from the older sets you never see in top tier main format tourneys but are still expensive? That's because enough people value them casually that they maintain value outside of tourneys.
Additionally with certain Nitch formats gaining tourney popularity (100cs for example and to a lesser extent commander) you will find quite a few players who burned out of the standard/ext grinds and who don't relish playing Legacy or Classic decks so they find other ways to be competitive. Lord Erman is such a character as is Marcus and Leviathan. And let's not forget AJ Impy who does not normally play in official tourneys except releases and instead rules Tribal and Kaleidoscope.
But then, lots of things are *viable*. But the days where you can assume that you can sit back on a full hand in a winning number of matchups is long gone. If every match up was Jacerator Mirror, 4x LoA would be the bomb. But you LoA isn't going to work when your opponent is beating on your head with Lodestone Golem on turn one, or when you need to mull into Dredge hate, or when you have to start playing immediately into a Orchard + Oath opening.
The card was stupendous when Zak Dolan and then the days of Keeper and then the days of BBS, but slowly and steadily, Vintage (and now Classic) Magic has passed by the concept that maindecked turn 1 LoA would be an advantageous play in most most matchups.
In the 8 player constructed standard queues I do not think I have ever seen one fire off, is there something i am missing or some time when people play these, i see the 2-mans firing all the time tho
Eon Hub helps out a bit more against Oath, and helps shut down the random Energy Flux. I didn't play any dredge hate in my list because I didn't anticipate anyone playing dredge this week.
I think Library of Alexandria is viable in the format. It should probably be in each Jacerator build.
Lion's Eye Diamond is hilarious because it's so good, but nobody wants to drop 70+ tickets on a card that should be restricted. (And is in Vintage)
You guys should all start playing pauper. Maybe if we are all doing it, I could finally get endless to play.
Boros suffers from a lot of splash damage from everyone attempting to fight Caw-Blade. I played Boros from about December up through PT Paris, and immediately afterward. However, once people stopped playing traditional UW/UB control builds, Boros dropped like a rock.
Think about it, as a Boros player, what deck do you want to see across from you? Valakut is a cointoss, Vampires and CawBlade are poor matchups. And as TRG mentions above, there are some cards you simply cannot beat.
Edit: the list of cards that Boros basically packs it in to (besides the 2 Journey to Nowhere, but it's fair to say that the decks that pack these trumps are going to draw them more frequently than your JtN due to draw/manipulation)
Baneslayer
Inferno Titan
Primeval Titan
Gideon Jura (not even JtN helps here)
Avenger of Zenidkar
Vengevine
Phyrexian Crusader
(Lesser extent): Kor Firewalker
Also, a list of cards that you have more answers for (like Bolt) but absolutely have to have it immediately or else you probably lose:
Kalastria Highborn
Fauna Shaman
Anything carrying a Sword
I've tried putting a bloom deck together, and I've come to the conclusion that it needs cheaper card drawing. I've tried adding in Swans of Bryn Argoll and Savage Twister, changing your board sweep into cards in hand, with Death Grasp as the kill spell. Both of those x-spells have the benefit of being at least partly green or black for ease of use alongside cadaverous bloom.
I'm currently tapping black-black-and-colourless to cast a lot of Phyrexian Crusaders and let me tell you, Boros just packs to that guy. Any thoughts on decent answers? Ratchet Bomb just doesn't cut it. I guess Tumble Magnet is viable but seems weak when you can't abuse it (not that boros will keep you alive long). Hmmmm, maybe just answered my own question there. (you can tell I didn't pre-plan this post).
Hello Again,
Another Solid Draft though the deck kind of drafted itself! Real bad luck about that Tezz, I can't believe WotC compensated you for that - wild!
Pick commentary:
Relic Warder over whatever you took.
Grasp > Ichorclaw even if you need bodies
Cur over Axe was right.
Good Job.
Hey Grappling,
I definitely recognize you from pauper queues.
I keep decks for two formats that pay out different boosters to fuel draft sets. So, if I feel like playing core (which I haven't in ages), I'll play a few quick paupers. If its the current block ill play STD or EXT.
Regardless, Pauper 2-Mans fire consistently, but there just arent enough DE's. The lack of 8-Man's make it REAL difficult to go infinite off pauper on its own.
Ok DJ I'll tackle your post now!
1) I covered this in a previous article that covered drafting. It discussed draft levels. 8-4s make for bigger swings and many accounts cant handle those swings.
2) Yeah, 2-Mans that pay SoM are great. People should stock up on their SoM as much as possible.
3) I'm doing that same thing right now, but its mostly a hoard until SoM cards go up next winter.
4) It sounds like a good way to build a collection but the time commitment to payout ratio is high which is why I have typically avoided them.
Regarding your question, I think the entire series so far kind of covers it. For starters, I would stop spending $100 to $200 at release time. I would try to make it so that you are self-sufficient enough so that money can go towards something else. Generally Speaking, what I do prior to release events is gather packs of the new expansion and build 5-6 3x New Set draft sets. I draft the crap out of those draft sets and through strategic selling during release events you can keep them stocked up while building your collection.
With each card, you are also talking about the opportunity lost on playing that card instead of something else. What are you going to remove from a deck to play LoA in it's place? Will that advance the game plan of the deck more than what you removed?
What 4 cards would you take out of Oath to play 4 Loa? If you play it singleton, relying on a tutor, why would you expend your precious tutors on that when you could instead get a combo piece (not to mention only demonic tutor is would likely result in being able to use LoA right away - the other tutors that could find it are card disadvantage and won't leave you with 7 cards in hand)
Like I said, it's fantastic in the control matchup, but those matchups are not frequent enough in the current meta to pack it in over some card that will give you a better matchup vs the other more likely decks.
well done guys. Just go on with these good articles.
The fact is that vintage lists are running colored mana artifacts (mox/black). So I guess the choice of running LoA in these conditions does not involve a comparable color screw probability. Classic is fast, but most part of acceleration stuff except petals & LED (which needs a specific playstyle) are colorless. This could be a reason. or not.
Just a couple things I thought I should add to this
1. I saw you mention that if you want queues to fire often go with Standard, Extended, or Block. I think Pauper should be included in this. The daily events nearly always fire on time, you will never wait more than a minute for a two man to fire, and the decks can be all be made with a low investment of 5-50 tickets. Add to a pretty decent metagame with multiple decks for each of the big subtypes of aggro, combo, and control and I think it's a good reccomendation.
2. If a person plans on playing a lot of 2-man queues, and they can afford it, I would reccomend trying to get into 2 constructed formats that pay out different pack types. For example, when bot buy on m11 was around 3.83 I was hitting a lot of pauper 2-man queues, as it was pretty close to a straight up bet for winning. Now that it is down to 3.34 I try to play queues paying out SOM, which became much more expensive with the release of besieged. As such, I avoid queues that pay out MBS, which is very low right now, and even you are playing Daily Events, is a big difference in value of winning 6 Besieged packs or 6 SOM packs if you plan on flipping them to bots after.
First off thanks for the comments.
I did total miss the Azorious Chancery in affinity but I don't see why a 2/1 split would be better than 3 gifts in a format with no cranial spells. Yes I've seen plenty of red burn decks running Klien Fiend not say that I see it as a good choice though. The Green post decks are starting to look more like the one showed here from what I've seen.
Olaw you bring some good critizm to my attention. Now looking back I should have explained the rating system much better. I made the mistake that everyone knows what I am thinking. The one star on the WW deck is a mistake it should have had four stars. As far as the investment I might have let price influence that as well where I should have really done it on just reusability. Playability was suppose to mean more on the lines of how competitive the deck is. But rating on how easy/difficult it is to piolet would have been a nice catagorey to add as well.
Thanks for the comments again and I am glad that you guys enjoyed it and I would also like to add that I do welcome the critizm.
Google is how I got it :D
Ah no...I missed that. My apologies then.
The thing about LoA is this:
Yes, in those situations it's not going to have much of an impact on the board. It won't do much against Oath and Orchard T1, and it certainly won't help against Dredge, let alone a fast Lodestone Golem. But the thing is, how much would a fetch/dual/basic land helped in those situations, more? Granted, maybe Library over a basic/fetch/dual prevents you from casting Spell Pierce on the Oath, or casting Brainstorm into an answer for the Stax/Dredge MU. But that is easily worked around by simply choosing to play a different land in those specific situations. If you're playing against Stax/Dredge you should eventually come to realize that LoA on your first turn might not be the best course of action if you're holding a Spell Pierce or Brainstorm. Obviously, including a couple LoAs is going to decreases your percentage of having a specific color of mana when you might need it, but the question is is that decrease in percentage worth the risk for when your Oath opponent doesn't have a first turn Oath, and you need to build up card advantage to win a counter war?
Additionally, is it so terrible for Oath to play LoA? Vintage builds sometimes run it. I'm surprised it hasn't found a home as at least a singleton in the deck, since it can be easily tutored up for the control MUs.
Food for thought.
"Where are you guys?"
Classic, by and large, is populated by fathers/husbands who place MTGO as a secondary or even tertiary priority. It's funny, but when I'm online on MTGO, I see people saying, "c'mon, I see Classic people online, join the DE!" The reality is, though, there's a world of difference between slipping a game in here and there and setting aside a block of 2-4 hrs for a DE.
Let's face it, the format is not a very friendly place to newcomers. Unlike Legacy, where the format is dominated by creature decks, Classic can see people jizz in your face turn 1-2. If you're a new player, that's hard to take. I have faced enough disgruntled "curious" players in the TP room that think their decks are kicking Casual Room ass and wanna try a harder game only to find out what a turn 1-2 and 3 sphere effect feels like. What I mean to say is, there is a mental barrier to entry and a high learning curve.
Lion's Eye Diamond's value is probably more fueled by Legacy than Classic and in Legacy it isn't going to be banned. Let your buying begin. ;)
I've been the only MBC deck the past few weeks. Jund and Naya have also been strong in past weeks. I've seen a couple Elves decks around, but I don't remember any making Top 4/8 yet though. It seems like a new deck pops up from week to week.
Nice article, Niabock. Hopefully it brings in more new faces.
It wasn't antagonism. Didn't you see the smiley face?
Hey DJ,
I have full intentions of replying to your post but I want to afford myself the time to reply that it took you to write your post. I'll post whenever I have a few minutes.
TRG
Do you really think it is merely quibbling and not discussing? Greyes your antagonism does get old. Find a new hobby perhaps?
Haha you were in a clan named after one of the legendary RPGS of all time (next to D&D). So full of awesome that. :p
My point wasn't really about multiplayer per se, but any niche format or just any format where the goals may not be to use the most expensive cards to win (in a somewhat cutthroat manner) but to win using Johnny tactics or Timmy flash. No matter the sensibility some of these players could easily contend on a pro level given the inclination. (Many judges fall into this category for example.)
We regularly see a few sharks in the TWL PREs (Because Legacy & Classic are basically broken formats if you take out sideboards.) You are more likely to see rogue designs in casual (but not necessarily intentionally so) because casual design tends to vary a lot in strength as well as imagination and $$$.
You know all those cards from the older sets you never see in top tier main format tourneys but are still expensive? That's because enough people value them casually that they maintain value outside of tourneys.
Additionally with certain Nitch formats gaining tourney popularity (100cs for example and to a lesser extent commander) you will find quite a few players who burned out of the standard/ext grinds and who don't relish playing Legacy or Classic decks so they find other ways to be competitive. Lord Erman is such a character as is Marcus and Leviathan. And let's not forget AJ Impy who does not normally play in official tourneys except releases and instead rules Tribal and Kaleidoscope.
But then, lots of things are *viable*. But the days where you can assume that you can sit back on a full hand in a winning number of matchups is long gone. If every match up was Jacerator Mirror, 4x LoA would be the bomb. But you LoA isn't going to work when your opponent is beating on your head with Lodestone Golem on turn one, or when you need to mull into Dredge hate, or when you have to start playing immediately into a Orchard + Oath opening.
The card was stupendous when Zak Dolan and then the days of Keeper and then the days of BBS, but slowly and steadily, Vintage (and now Classic) Magic has passed by the concept that maindecked turn 1 LoA would be an advantageous play in most most matchups.
Paul and his same ol' casual/competitive quibbling. Never gets old. =)
Standard 8-Man's fire all the time (at every time of day) - very very consistently.
In the 8 player constructed standard queues I do not think I have ever seen one fire off, is there something i am missing or some time when people play these, i see the 2-mans firing all the time tho
Eon Hub helps out a bit more against Oath, and helps shut down the random Energy Flux. I didn't play any dredge hate in my list because I didn't anticipate anyone playing dredge this week.
I think Library of Alexandria is viable in the format. It should probably be in each Jacerator build.
Lion's Eye Diamond is hilarious because it's so good, but nobody wants to drop 70+ tickets on a card that should be restricted. (And is in Vintage)
You guys should all start playing pauper. Maybe if we are all doing it, I could finally get endless to play.
Thanks again - great listen as always.