Not really sure about that. Must be something with my computer, but I have no problems listening to stereo music with various applications and it comes out in stereo, but I'm still only hearing Keya. Also, I have had this problem one other time, but I usually don't have this problem with FftR
Thanks, I appreciate the understanding.
As i said it's not something that upset me and im sure that it's a very small number of your user base that has hearing issues such as mine but at least i suppose you now know we do exist :)
Turn up the volume on your left speaker. Failing that, playing it back mono should help. As Ranth noted below, it's in stereo: I accept the blame for this.
Understood. I accept responsibility for this: This is the first time I've been the one needed to upload the podcast. I'll make sure it doesn't occur again on my watch.
I've noticed this problem multiple times but never mentioned it because i figured it only affected me.
Guys technology is great an all and i realize it might be cool to put the feed out in stereo sound.
But some users such as myself happen to be deaf in one ear and thus when using headsets or have only one speaker ect that they will not hear half of the pod cast and outright shut it off.
Great points. I agree with you too, I even wrote while playing him, that I didn't like that deck cause of time issues! I COULD have posted the vid of the first game where I won on turn 4, but that wouldn't have been very different from the other vids where I was winning. I doubt anyone in my position, seeing a few minutes left, would be like, "...ok, here' you can win, I'll conceed cause you can't manage to play to time."
My Black Green Infect deck easily beats Tezz. I made the deck to beat Planeswalkers because I think its funny to beat people who spend $100 on a deck. And I don't use Glissa. The biggest mistake people make in Black Green is using Glissa and a lot of Artifacts. I use 4 artifacts, 2 Swords of Body and Mind 2 Sword of Feast and Famine, sideboarding in one or the other.
I also know what is in your basic decks, so I make sure I play 3 Memoricides in the main deck. I would either take out Stoic Rebuttal, or go immediately for the planeswalker. There is a green infect that kills tumble magnets, and the combo of inkmoth nexus + sword is always nice. My deck makes Tezz look like the overpriced bad card it is.
Tezz has only 2 good abilities, his third is useless. And an anti-artifact infect deck with only 4 artifacts means you will be too busy trying not to take on poison counters, and when I have my creatures out and you are running around with no planeswalkers, my Black Sun Zenith destroys what you have, while my Inkmoth Nexus or Skithiryx will be out soon.
Tezz is garbage. He is based around putting out cards that can't stop a fast deck, either infect, mono-white, or mono-red. Tezz just isn't fast enough. Then you make him 3 to get a 5/5, I'll block it, or deal direct damage. Planeswalkers are overrated if you are fast. Koth is still the best, and Tezz is garbage. Venser is annoying, but he takes too long to get out.
I can't watch your videos because I'm at work, but I still wanted to comment on the time issue.
Personally, I have mixed emotions about it. On one hand, if we were playing paper, I'd be calling a judge over to my opponent for stalling.
On the other hand, I've had many players, who are obviously playing in multiple events, waste my time only for me to watch myself lose with them having less than a minute on the clock.
If players play slow or play controlling decks or if they are multitasking events, they should expect to run out of time in some circumstances. Online time is 30 mins each player, whereas paper is 50 mins between both players. If you can't win online in your alloted time regardless of what your opponent is doing with f6, then so be it. Maybe you need to play faster or play a different deck.
Edit: The problem online faces is where you win game 1 and then time out, just like with paper you should earn the win in that case. The problem with that theory is that then stalling would be a huge issue.
I just don't understand players who time out because I've sat and watched and played countless CounterTop matches (which is like watching paint dry) and I've never seen one go to time online.
Agreed. But it was my game play that did it the other 5 times he and I played. It was my only out for a big PE win, so I took it. I'd feel stupid not doing so, unless wizards starts handing out 'boyscout' tokens that are worth much more than a windfall of boosters. I'm here to win.
I was in a SOMx3 draft once and I was playing against someone who had drafted both a Koth and Elspeth. The only way I could possibly win the match was to throw as many creatures as I could against him, and he was a little slow doing stuff, so I won the match with 5 life in the third game and his clock reached zero.
I know its a cheap win, but when you are facing that and the one rare you drafted was Grindclock and it was one of the last cards I got, I'll take a clock win against that kind of drafted deck any day of the week.
In constructed games, you should beat your opponent. If you don't do it, it seems like a cheap win. It makes one feel like they aren't good enough to win and can only do it by wasting time and forcing your opponent to press OK every 10 seconds.
The only time a clock win is good is when you have a guy beat so badly he just wants to leave his computer on and make you wait 30 minutes. Then you know you just beat the guy and there is nothing he can do. That deserves a Mortal Kombat "FInish Him".
You misunderstand the intent of the clock.
It's there so games WILL come to an end. But using it to win is like infecting you opponents computer with malicious software.
He can't play (therefore win) anymore, but it's not you superior gameplay that did it.
That made my day DW :) I spent over 3 weeks on it, dabbling here/there. Like I said above, I really try and up the quality with each of my articles, as so many here seem to spit stuff out and grab their credits. If you want advice on article layout etc..., I wrote this a while back which covered just that topic:
Well, you have a lot more experience with the deck than I do, but I guess I don't quite see some of it the same way. I will say, Thermokarst being slow had NOTHING to do with Khalni Garden. Aside from slowness, I also found it rather irrelevant. I'll test more, I suppose.
How long did this take you to make? This is the best looking article I have seen on here. Every visual is nicely done. The information stuffed in here is massive, and having the videos makes seeing how the deck play a lot easier, well done sir well done. I looked it up, this deck costs less than 20 tix. This makes me want to splash up the norm of just a few graphics in the deck lists, and take it up to look like something on in a magazine.
KingRitz - Great observations. Hidden spiders are for MUC and WW variants..VERY needed, and far superior in testing to any archer tricks. The hornet sting is a valid card to choose, I just want as much 'bang for my buck' with regards to sideboard slots...and those hit a variety of decks.
Thermokarst isn't hard to cast at all, especially with ranger's help. Perhaps your feeling it is slow due to the Gardens. I don't like the gardens... they're more of a 'win more' card that slows the tempo dramatically. Of course there are cases one can make when topdecking one while holding a rancor is great, but we can argue that to death back/forth. Comes down to play style. Stompy is super aggro, and I played with gardens for months, always wishing they were just a forest, and less of them too! As many builds run 3. Timewalking yourself turn one for a 0/1 isn't great imo.
Re: affinity, I rarely lose that matchup. Fog is mvp for both this and goblins (As stated in article) so I feel other players "auto include" artifact hate cause they think they should...but in playtesting HUNDREDS of games...it's simply never needed.
I played a few games with the deck. It's definitely good against all the Post decks and Frantic Storm. Given your listed weaker matchups, though, and given that I also had some Affinity and Burn problems, I wonder about a few of the card choices (mostly in the sideboard).
For one thing, Hidden Spider doesn't seem terribly useful in matchups that matter. I'd rather have Gleeful Sabotage for Affinity and maybe MUC (kills Spire Golem and Serrated Arrows). I'd rather have a variety of cards including Scattershot Archer for Faeries. I assume Spider is also there for White Weenie?
Also, has anyone considered sideboarding Hornet Sting? Pointedly, you mention needing to use the Shinens to kill dangerous guys like Disciple of the Vault, Standard Bearer, and Familiars (including, presumably, Nightscape Familiar). Hornet Sting takes out each of these problem cards, no tricky business needed, for one mana. It also kills Sparksmith if Goblins doesn't have a pumper, and it kills Quirion Ranger in the mirror (seems important). Plus, it kills Faeries, and unlike many of the other solutions to Faeries it can surprise-blank a naked Spellstutter Sprite. I note that none of the above-shown Stompy decks tried this card.
Is there really enough reason not to turn like 2 of the Forests into Khalni Gardens? They're quite good with Rancor and Bonesplitter, and okay with the pump in general. They also help against black deck builds that rely on Innocent Blood/Diabolic Edict. The number of times that I have been slowed down by this change is quite small so far. You're already running more Forests than either other shown build of the deck.
Thermokarst, while it seems like it would be fantastic, has been hard for me to use quickly enough to be relevant, so far. Three mana is just a TON for this deck to hit by turn 3, and by turn 4 it's not that relevant. Frantic Storm and Post decks both seem like extremely positive matchups without it. It's sacrilege, of course, but what about cutting this from the board?
Moving on to less-likely changes, given all the pump in the deck, is Shinen really better than the half-priced Taunting Elf? I'd guess probably so, given Shinen's ability to handle 1/1's without pump, but has this been tested to see?
There were a few mistakes indeed. Feel free to point them out.
I sometimes dislike feedback like "coulda shoulda..." - simply because it never ends. At some point you need to post the article. I spent a TON of time doing this with graphics/vids etc.., trying to give a good face to a site that has, quite frankly, really low quality overall, and writers more concerned with credits than quality.
Just a small point of critisism: In watching a lot of the videos I noticed lots of significant play errors with the deck. As the point of the article is to inform people about the deck, you might want to point out the places where you made mistakes in the videos(we all make play mistakes, so no biggie there) so that people do not emulate the same errors.
Totally valid points. A friend of mine wanted me to leave that part out of this article, but it's what I did to win, so I felt it should be included. Time, like in chess, is a win. As I wrote, I won vs. that deck many, MANY times that very day - sure I would have loved to run him over, but it was my only out. If "time" wasn't a valid win, there wouldn't be a clock.
Well, it happened twice so far and sadly there isn't much to do about it. But the good news is that the Forgemaster still has targets to fetch in the deck and there is still the fact that Tezz can turn things into 5/5s.
I've also been hit twice by Memoricide in a game, one removed Forgemaster and the second Tezz, and I still managed to win.
Oh, and I also added Mindslaver to the sideboard which is devatating against any kind of Control deck.
Not really sure about that. Must be something with my computer, but I have no problems listening to stereo music with various applications and it comes out in stereo, but I'm still only hearing Keya. Also, I have had this problem one other time, but I usually don't have this problem with FftR
Thanks, I appreciate the understanding.
As i said it's not something that upset me and im sure that it's a very small number of your user base that has hearing issues such as mine but at least i suppose you now know we do exist :)
Turn up the volume on your left speaker. Failing that, playing it back mono should help. As Ranth noted below, it's in stereo: I accept the blame for this.
Understood. I accept responsibility for this: This is the first time I've been the one needed to upload the podcast. I'll make sure it doesn't occur again on my watch.
I've noticed this problem multiple times but never mentioned it because i figured it only affected me.
Guys technology is great an all and i realize it might be cool to put the feed out in stereo sound.
But some users such as myself happen to be deaf in one ear and thus when using headsets or have only one speaker ect that they will not hear half of the pod cast and outright shut it off.
Very interesting videos, I enjoyed them a lot. I find them really useful as I haven't had the time to rate the MBS cards for myself :)
Great points. I agree with you too, I even wrote while playing him, that I didn't like that deck cause of time issues! I COULD have posted the vid of the first game where I won on turn 4, but that wouldn't have been very different from the other vids where I was winning. I doubt anyone in my position, seeing a few minutes left, would be like, "...ok, here' you can win, I'll conceed cause you can't manage to play to time."
My Black Green Infect deck easily beats Tezz. I made the deck to beat Planeswalkers because I think its funny to beat people who spend $100 on a deck. And I don't use Glissa. The biggest mistake people make in Black Green is using Glissa and a lot of Artifacts. I use 4 artifacts, 2 Swords of Body and Mind 2 Sword of Feast and Famine, sideboarding in one or the other.
I also know what is in your basic decks, so I make sure I play 3 Memoricides in the main deck. I would either take out Stoic Rebuttal, or go immediately for the planeswalker. There is a green infect that kills tumble magnets, and the combo of inkmoth nexus + sword is always nice. My deck makes Tezz look like the overpriced bad card it is.
Tezz has only 2 good abilities, his third is useless. And an anti-artifact infect deck with only 4 artifacts means you will be too busy trying not to take on poison counters, and when I have my creatures out and you are running around with no planeswalkers, my Black Sun Zenith destroys what you have, while my Inkmoth Nexus or Skithiryx will be out soon.
Tezz is garbage. He is based around putting out cards that can't stop a fast deck, either infect, mono-white, or mono-red. Tezz just isn't fast enough. Then you make him 3 to get a 5/5, I'll block it, or deal direct damage. Planeswalkers are overrated if you are fast. Koth is still the best, and Tezz is garbage. Venser is annoying, but he takes too long to get out.
I can't watch your videos because I'm at work, but I still wanted to comment on the time issue.
Personally, I have mixed emotions about it. On one hand, if we were playing paper, I'd be calling a judge over to my opponent for stalling.
On the other hand, I've had many players, who are obviously playing in multiple events, waste my time only for me to watch myself lose with them having less than a minute on the clock.
If players play slow or play controlling decks or if they are multitasking events, they should expect to run out of time in some circumstances. Online time is 30 mins each player, whereas paper is 50 mins between both players. If you can't win online in your alloted time regardless of what your opponent is doing with f6, then so be it. Maybe you need to play faster or play a different deck.
Edit: The problem online faces is where you win game 1 and then time out, just like with paper you should earn the win in that case. The problem with that theory is that then stalling would be a huge issue.
I just don't understand players who time out because I've sat and watched and played countless CounterTop matches (which is like watching paint dry) and I've never seen one go to time online.
Agreed. But it was my game play that did it the other 5 times he and I played. It was my only out for a big PE win, so I took it. I'd feel stupid not doing so, unless wizards starts handing out 'boyscout' tokens that are worth much more than a windfall of boosters. I'm here to win.
I was in a SOMx3 draft once and I was playing against someone who had drafted both a Koth and Elspeth. The only way I could possibly win the match was to throw as many creatures as I could against him, and he was a little slow doing stuff, so I won the match with 5 life in the third game and his clock reached zero.
I know its a cheap win, but when you are facing that and the one rare you drafted was Grindclock and it was one of the last cards I got, I'll take a clock win against that kind of drafted deck any day of the week.
In constructed games, you should beat your opponent. If you don't do it, it seems like a cheap win. It makes one feel like they aren't good enough to win and can only do it by wasting time and forcing your opponent to press OK every 10 seconds.
The only time a clock win is good is when you have a guy beat so badly he just wants to leave his computer on and make you wait 30 minutes. Then you know you just beat the guy and there is nothing he can do. That deserves a Mortal Kombat "FInish Him".
I don't hear AJ at all.
You misunderstand the intent of the clock.
It's there so games WILL come to an end. But using it to win is like infecting you opponents computer with malicious software.
He can't play (therefore win) anymore, but it's not you superior gameplay that did it.
That made my day DW :) I spent over 3 weeks on it, dabbling here/there. Like I said above, I really try and up the quality with each of my articles, as so many here seem to spit stuff out and grab their credits. If you want advice on article layout etc..., I wrote this a while back which covered just that topic:
http://puremtgo.com/articles/playwright
Thanks again for the nice words!
Without running 4x Spreading Seas in the sideboard, you are correct. So guess what I did to my sideboard online?
I've only tested against one match online with seas sb and I lost 1-2. But, pretty sure I had to mull to 5 one of those games.
I'm still testing online, so we will see how the Valakut matchup fairs in the longrun.
Well, you have a lot more experience with the deck than I do, but I guess I don't quite see some of it the same way. I will say, Thermokarst being slow had NOTHING to do with Khalni Garden. Aside from slowness, I also found it rather irrelevant. I'll test more, I suppose.
How long did this take you to make? This is the best looking article I have seen on here. Every visual is nicely done. The information stuffed in here is massive, and having the videos makes seeing how the deck play a lot easier, well done sir well done. I looked it up, this deck costs less than 20 tix. This makes me want to splash up the norm of just a few graphics in the deck lists, and take it up to look like something on in a magazine.
~DW
KingRitz - Great observations. Hidden spiders are for MUC and WW variants..VERY needed, and far superior in testing to any archer tricks. The hornet sting is a valid card to choose, I just want as much 'bang for my buck' with regards to sideboard slots...and those hit a variety of decks.
Thermokarst isn't hard to cast at all, especially with ranger's help. Perhaps your feeling it is slow due to the Gardens. I don't like the gardens... they're more of a 'win more' card that slows the tempo dramatically. Of course there are cases one can make when topdecking one while holding a rancor is great, but we can argue that to death back/forth. Comes down to play style. Stompy is super aggro, and I played with gardens for months, always wishing they were just a forest, and less of them too! As many builds run 3. Timewalking yourself turn one for a 0/1 isn't great imo.
Re: affinity, I rarely lose that matchup. Fog is mvp for both this and goblins (As stated in article) so I feel other players "auto include" artifact hate cause they think they should...but in playtesting HUNDREDS of games...it's simply never needed.
I played a few games with the deck. It's definitely good against all the Post decks and Frantic Storm. Given your listed weaker matchups, though, and given that I also had some Affinity and Burn problems, I wonder about a few of the card choices (mostly in the sideboard).
For one thing, Hidden Spider doesn't seem terribly useful in matchups that matter. I'd rather have Gleeful Sabotage for Affinity and maybe MUC (kills Spire Golem and Serrated Arrows). I'd rather have a variety of cards including Scattershot Archer for Faeries. I assume Spider is also there for White Weenie?
Also, has anyone considered sideboarding Hornet Sting? Pointedly, you mention needing to use the Shinens to kill dangerous guys like Disciple of the Vault, Standard Bearer, and Familiars (including, presumably, Nightscape Familiar). Hornet Sting takes out each of these problem cards, no tricky business needed, for one mana. It also kills Sparksmith if Goblins doesn't have a pumper, and it kills Quirion Ranger in the mirror (seems important). Plus, it kills Faeries, and unlike many of the other solutions to Faeries it can surprise-blank a naked Spellstutter Sprite. I note that none of the above-shown Stompy decks tried this card.
Is there really enough reason not to turn like 2 of the Forests into Khalni Gardens? They're quite good with Rancor and Bonesplitter, and okay with the pump in general. They also help against black deck builds that rely on Innocent Blood/Diabolic Edict. The number of times that I have been slowed down by this change is quite small so far. You're already running more Forests than either other shown build of the deck.
Thermokarst, while it seems like it would be fantastic, has been hard for me to use quickly enough to be relevant, so far. Three mana is just a TON for this deck to hit by turn 3, and by turn 4 it's not that relevant. Frantic Storm and Post decks both seem like extremely positive matchups without it. It's sacrilege, of course, but what about cutting this from the board?
Moving on to less-likely changes, given all the pump in the deck, is Shinen really better than the half-priced Taunting Elf? I'd guess probably so, given Shinen's ability to handle 1/1's without pump, but has this been tested to see?
i liked your deck (koth's new home) but i dont think it has any chance against valakut.
There were a few mistakes indeed. Feel free to point them out.
I sometimes dislike feedback like "coulda shoulda..." - simply because it never ends. At some point you need to post the article. I spent a TON of time doing this with graphics/vids etc.., trying to give a good face to a site that has, quite frankly, really low quality overall, and writers more concerned with credits than quality.
Just a small point of critisism: In watching a lot of the videos I noticed lots of significant play errors with the deck. As the point of the article is to inform people about the deck, you might want to point out the places where you made mistakes in the videos(we all make play mistakes, so no biggie there) so that people do not emulate the same errors.
Totally valid points. A friend of mine wanted me to leave that part out of this article, but it's what I did to win, so I felt it should be included. Time, like in chess, is a win. As I wrote, I won vs. that deck many, MANY times that very day - sure I would have loved to run him over, but it was my only out. If "time" wasn't a valid win, there wouldn't be a clock.
I am definitely plannign on getting those cards, i just didnt have them at this time. O-Stone for sure and probably Disk as well.
Well, it happened twice so far and sadly there isn't much to do about it. But the good news is that the Forgemaster still has targets to fetch in the deck and there is still the fact that Tezz can turn things into 5/5s.
I've also been hit twice by Memoricide in a game, one removed Forgemaster and the second Tezz, and I still managed to win.
Oh, and I also added Mindslaver to the sideboard which is devatating against any kind of Control deck.
LE