I'm not really complaining for myself as I have acquired most of the staple mythics (although my wife doesn't know how much I've really spent :). Just saying it for the budget players out there but as we've determined, those Opals aren't really needed and it brings the price down to a range that is affordable for most people.
The three super strong tribes do not fare well to a large number of cards including all mass removal.
To be able to fight these tribes we need to learn more about how they work. I'm going to be keeping track of the meta game for tribal from now onwards (this weekend), before it was this deck is too good that deck is too good has everyone forgotten Ranth's or AJ's Elementals they could beat these top decks.
I'm not going to suggest a way to keep them from dominating, yet. I want to see what the player base can think up to give them a chance first.
I don't know how often these tribes go 3-0 at the moment as I've not played for a while. But have no fear I'm watching.
It's essential for the god hand, but otherwise not very important. I think the god hand is plains mox opal memnite memnite hawk hawk quest for the holy relic.
You go plains, quest. Memnite memnite mox opal, tap opal for hawk, bounce opal, play opal, bounce memnite for hawk, replay memnite, use the quest, get argentum armor, hope opponent doesn't go plains condemn. If they don't, you just win by blowing up their land every turn.
Slivers won 3-0 2 weeks ago. I would allow goblins and merfolk to be played as parts of other tribes but not as goblins or merfolk if they have dual creature types.
You're suggesting not to ban the tribe, but don't suggest any way to keep the 3 super strong tribes from dominating.
I wouldn't complain to much about it including mox opal as from the deck pricing you can see it is still way under budget including opals.
4 Kor Duelist $1
4 Kor Outfitter $1
4 Kor Skyfisher $1
4 Ornithopter $0.60
4 Stoneforget Mystic $27.80 (was 5.95 just 2 days ago and rising fast)
4 Glint Hawk $1
4 Memnite $6 (1.49 for an uncommon is insanely high)
2 Adventuring Gear $0.50
2 Argentum Armor $2.70
2 Mox Opal $57.90
4 Quest for the Holy Relic $1
1 Sword of Body and Mind $8.25
1 Trusty Machete $0.10 (my version run the new axe)
3 Arid Mesa $29.85
3 Marsh Flats $25.29
14 Plains (see free bots lol)
Total deck cost = $163.99
Mox accounts for 35% of the cost and I already said I think 1 copy is enough.
Also, these are paper prices so it will be even cheaper than that considering the mesa's and flats are about half that cost online.
This deck is extremely budget, its about the cost of 2 freaking Jaces.
Not sure on sideboard costs or even card lists, Mine runs the following atm.
4 Luminarch Ascension
4 Leonin Arbitar (spelling)
3 Of the new legendary cat 2/4 guy, don't know name
2 Jinxed Idol
2 Open slots.
Edit: Prices taken from Capefeargames.com
Edit#2:
SB includes
4 Luminarch Ascension
3 Leonin Arbiter
3 Kemba, Kha Regent
2 Jinxed Idol
3 Kor Firewalker
And a simple click on a link in THIS article would have brought you to the Mark Rosewater's article (a wizards.com article) where you could have read:
-quote-
Mike has a number of amazing plays. My favorite happened in PT Paris. Mike is playing Pros Bloom (the first successful tournament combo deck). He realizes that he is dead in a turn and needs to have his combo go off to win. The problem is that Mike's only means to go off involves him removing his only win condition from the game. But this is before decklists were shared so he gambles that his opponent doesn't know that he only has one copy of the kill card (that card being Drain Life, most other versions of the deck played two or three). He removes his win condition from the game and starts going off. Then when he gets two thirds along the way, he just shows all the cards to his opponent and says, “Do I really need to go thought the motions?”
Mark Justice said “no” and conceded.
-quote-
You know, sometimes writers DO research and readers are just too lazy to check the linked sources.
Tricking someone into skipping their turn? What?? By having a stop in the opponent's upkeep? Weird. Who doesn't have a stop in the opponent's upkeep? You need one to be able to play instants at the right time sometimes. Whatever.. I didn't read the original posts, so maybe there's something valid there, but I see that as totally the F6-pressing player's fault. Same as if your opponent starts the game with a Leyline in play on your turn or if your opponent chooses to play last - it tells you right there on your screen what is happening and it's your fault if you skip your first turn.
Sir - that story (Long getting the concession from Justice in that manner) is NOT true. Please do your research; many of the players and coverage people at that t8 and in Paris are available. A simple e-mail to someone at WotC could have put you in touch with some of them.
Mike Long is so notorious that many urban legends have come about due to it. Some websites care enough to have fact checkers; some don't.
Otherwise, a good overview of possibilities; and even the THEORETICAL discussion of something like the fabled Justice concession would have been fine.
Yeah while we're at it, lets throw in Primeval Titan, Elspeth Tirel, Venser the Sojourner, Lotus Cobra, Mox Opal, and Vengevine. The return of 1000dollar.dec. UWGR. The manabase is screwed up but so what!! I hope it doesn't get to this point again. But after last season and the standard decks that cost almost as much as legacy decks, who knows what'll happen. As always, thanks for reading and commenting.
Yeah, it's a shame that a deck that is almost all budget friendly is running one of the most sought after mythics in the new set. Taking a look at some other decklists from states, there were plenty that did well without the Opal and others that only included 1 or 2 copies. When you have only 1 or 2 copies, you're not consistently counting on drawing it so I'm sure a cheap artifact like Chalice would be a suitable replacement. When you have a nuts opening draw with the Opal in hand, it can really accelerate you. Turn 1, Plains, Quest for Holy Relic, Memnite, Ornithopter, Mox Opal, Tap Mox for W, Bounce Orni with Glint Hawk, play Orni again. But those are really specific draws.
I've been meddling around with the WW quest deck as a someone I know just took it to states in Indiana. The version I'm testing only runs one mox and to be honest I'm thinking of cutting it. The deck has some serious power having tested 28 solitare matches this deck wins t4 about 75 percent of the time. Granted I realize this is all relative since I'm playing solitare, but the deck just reloads and having your creature killed after using it to pump quest isn't all that big of a deal. Also, the 4th stoneforge seems clumpy to me as I hate topdecking it sometimes.
And as you put it oh so well.......it's budget friendly.....maybe this is the new std RDW as far as budget is concerned.
I was playing in a FNM last week and got my Valakut Ramp deck crushed by this deck, he actually pulled off a t3 victory and did it on one land if my memory serves me correctly. Once armor gets equipped and starts destroying stuff it all but gg at that point.
Having not played either of the decks, I think I would like a version with more creatures as well. There are plenty of creatures that fit easily into the deck like Sea Gate Oracle, Vampire Hexmage, Gatekeeper of Malakir, Wurmcoil Engine, Molten Tail Masticore, Skinrender, etc which you could build accordingly to the metagame. Although UW is still a strong deck, U/B may be able to get there this season. Especially if the new Tezz ends up a strong card and is U/B colored as a lot of people have been speculating.
The Quest WW deck looks interesting and it seems to be very budget friendly. I'm wondering how critical the Opal Mox are to the deck. They only seem to be there as cheap artifacts to bounce with Glint Hawk and Kor Skyfisher. I wonder if they could be replaced with Everflowing Chalice to have a nearly Mythic-less option.
With Path to Exile and O-Ring gone, I really like UB Control now. The Elixir list from New York seems good, but I think there is still a good bit of room for tweaking it. There were some lists from States' winners that had a few more creatures and card draw in place of the Trinket Mage package that I like as well.
P1, P2 is definitely early enough to gamble on seeing more Hawks. Although no more showed up, so based on results your pick was fine.
I think your decision to take a green card at P1, P6 was right on the money, even though you didn't end up green.
Infantry Vet over Water Servant P3, P1 is defensible. I would have taken the Servant but I can see taking the Vet.
I agree on re-thinking Adept over Wild Griffin. Would have been nice if at least one of the Adepts had been a Griffin.
Thanks for the post!
perhaps you should just give 1 ticket to someone who wins with goblins/merfolk/slivers/rats. Anyone who places with a tribe that isn't above gets the full 3 tickets. That way the tribes are legal, but there's a real disincentive to play them.
I would just like to say that I have a lot more blocks in my settings than most players. I've gotten used to them being there and I like to be able to totally control when I play spells. Yes, this costs me extra time during matches, and I'm fine with that. I'm not trying to "trick" someone into skipping their own turn and I don't change my stops midgame.
I have a right to put my stops where I want them and not be accused of cheating. This is especially true when I don't change my stops except when I'm installing Magic Online on a new computer.
I really dislike unwritten rules and complaining about someone who brings a deck that is "too good".
If someone brings a killer deck to this event and it is perfectly legal, he should be rewarded for it. If that deck contains cards that are unbalanced, then ban those cards after the event or after a couple of events where they cause problems. Don't blame the players for bringing it if it's legal.
In my opinion, unwritten gentlemen's agreements are what is keeping a lot of players from playing in these events.
Who cares about losing one extra card when you're drawing extra cards all the time with Silvergill Adepts and Cold-Eyed Selkie.
It cost me two cards to counter your Wrath of God. That's terrible. But in the mean time I've gotten a Time Walk effect and countered possibly your only mass creature removal spell.
I don't own Force of Wills yet, so most of my experience is about playing against it, however I do own and use its red counterpart Pyrokinesis quite often, and it is very powerful in tribal. I can play around opposing counterspells. I can play around Daze. I can't play around Force of Will. It's just really good in decks like Merfolk that can generate card advantage each turn.
The main reason I can possibly see Force of Will being bad in Tribal is the fact that there aren't that many blue tribes. So, you pretty much need to play Merfolk, Faeries, Rogues, or Wizards to use it effectively.
I'm with whiffy on this. If you don't want certain tribes played, then simple disallow them.
By not banning merfolk and goblins, you are leaving too much to interpretation, which is fine, but then you can't get mad when someone's interpretation differs from your own.
So I can bring goblins, but only if I make the deck worse by not playing good goblins...okay. Where exactly is the line drawn? If I play with piledrivers is that too much? Matrons? Warchief/Chieftan? How bad does someone need to make a deck before it is acceptable to your unwritten gentlemen's agreement?
What if I bring Merfolk, but with counterspell in place of FoW? Is that enough to not invite the chagrin of the masses?
I find it distasteful that you would bash a player for aiming to win, when they followed the rules of your tournament. If you don't like what they brought, then its the rules that need to change.
Funny thing is. When I was new to Tribal. My first deck was a Chimera deck. So no, you dont just default to a top tribe.
I'm not really complaining for myself as I have acquired most of the staple mythics (although my wife doesn't know how much I've really spent :). Just saying it for the budget players out there but as we've determined, those Opals aren't really needed and it brings the price down to a range that is affordable for most people.
Also you need to consider the easiest way for new players to get into tribal is via the top tribes so they are staying for the long run.
The three super strong tribes do not fare well to a large number of cards including all mass removal.
To be able to fight these tribes we need to learn more about how they work. I'm going to be keeping track of the meta game for tribal from now onwards (this weekend), before it was this deck is too good that deck is too good has everyone forgotten Ranth's or AJ's Elementals they could beat these top decks.
I'm not going to suggest a way to keep them from dominating, yet. I want to see what the player base can think up to give them a chance first.
I don't know how often these tribes go 3-0 at the moment as I've not played for a while. But have no fear I'm watching.
"In my opinion, unwritten gentlemen's agreements are what is keeping a lot of players from playing in these events."
That agreement is no longer in affect from now onwards
It's essential for the god hand, but otherwise not very important. I think the god hand is plains mox opal memnite memnite hawk hawk quest for the holy relic.
You go plains, quest. Memnite memnite mox opal, tap opal for hawk, bounce opal, play opal, bounce memnite for hawk, replay memnite, use the quest, get argentum armor, hope opponent doesn't go plains condemn. If they don't, you just win by blowing up their land every turn.
Slivers won 3-0 2 weeks ago. I would allow goblins and merfolk to be played as parts of other tribes but not as goblins or merfolk if they have dual creature types.
You're suggesting not to ban the tribe, but don't suggest any way to keep the 3 super strong tribes from dominating.
I wouldn't complain to much about it including mox opal as from the deck pricing you can see it is still way under budget including opals.
4 Kor Duelist $1
4 Kor Outfitter $1
4 Kor Skyfisher $1
4 Ornithopter $0.60
4 Stoneforget Mystic $27.80 (was 5.95 just 2 days ago and rising fast)
4 Glint Hawk $1
4 Memnite $6 (1.49 for an uncommon is insanely high)
2 Adventuring Gear $0.50
2 Argentum Armor $2.70
2 Mox Opal $57.90
4 Quest for the Holy Relic $1
1 Sword of Body and Mind $8.25
1 Trusty Machete $0.10 (my version run the new axe)
3 Arid Mesa $29.85
3 Marsh Flats $25.29
14 Plains (see free bots lol)
Total deck cost = $163.99
Mox accounts for 35% of the cost and I already said I think 1 copy is enough.
Also, these are paper prices so it will be even cheaper than that considering the mesa's and flats are about half that cost online.
This deck is extremely budget, its about the cost of 2 freaking Jaces.
Not sure on sideboard costs or even card lists, Mine runs the following atm.
4 Luminarch Ascension
4 Leonin Arbitar (spelling)
3 Of the new legendary cat 2/4 guy, don't know name
2 Jinxed Idol
2 Open slots.
Edit: Prices taken from Capefeargames.com
Edit#2:
SB includes
4 Luminarch Ascension
3 Leonin Arbiter
3 Kemba, Kha Regent
2 Jinxed Idol
3 Kor Firewalker
Not sure Slivers ever placed 3-0 or won when it was knockout.. but i could be wrong
Rats have won but they not the power of the other 2 and can be beat
also Goblins and merfolk can be made without the power cards
I think you are being a little unfair with your suggestion
great article i love to see what's going on in the meta.
And a simple click on a link in THIS article would have brought you to the Mark Rosewater's article (a wizards.com article) where you could have read:
-quote-
Mike has a number of amazing plays. My favorite happened in PT Paris. Mike is playing Pros Bloom (the first successful tournament combo deck). He realizes that he is dead in a turn and needs to have his combo go off to win. The problem is that Mike's only means to go off involves him removing his only win condition from the game. But this is before decklists were shared so he gambles that his opponent doesn't know that he only has one copy of the kill card (that card being Drain Life, most other versions of the deck played two or three). He removes his win condition from the game and starts going off. Then when he gets two thirds along the way, he just shows all the cards to his opponent and says, “Do I really need to go thought the motions?”
Mark Justice said “no” and conceded.
-quote-
You know, sometimes writers DO research and readers are just too lazy to check the linked sources.
Tricking someone into skipping their turn? What?? By having a stop in the opponent's upkeep? Weird. Who doesn't have a stop in the opponent's upkeep? You need one to be able to play instants at the right time sometimes. Whatever.. I didn't read the original posts, so maybe there's something valid there, but I see that as totally the F6-pressing player's fault. Same as if your opponent starts the game with a Leyline in play on your turn or if your opponent chooses to play last - it tells you right there on your screen what is happening and it's your fault if you skip your first turn.
Sir - that story (Long getting the concession from Justice in that manner) is NOT true. Please do your research; many of the players and coverage people at that t8 and in Paris are available. A simple e-mail to someone at WotC could have put you in touch with some of them.
Mike Long is so notorious that many urban legends have come about due to it. Some websites care enough to have fact checkers; some don't.
Otherwise, a good overview of possibilities; and even the THEORETICAL discussion of something like the fabled Justice concession would have been fine.
Yeah while we're at it, lets throw in Primeval Titan, Elspeth Tirel, Venser the Sojourner, Lotus Cobra, Mox Opal, and Vengevine. The return of 1000dollar.dec. UWGR. The manabase is screwed up but so what!! I hope it doesn't get to this point again. But after last season and the standard decks that cost almost as much as legacy decks, who knows what'll happen. As always, thanks for reading and commenting.
Yeah, it's a shame that a deck that is almost all budget friendly is running one of the most sought after mythics in the new set. Taking a look at some other decklists from states, there were plenty that did well without the Opal and others that only included 1 or 2 copies. When you have only 1 or 2 copies, you're not consistently counting on drawing it so I'm sure a cheap artifact like Chalice would be a suitable replacement. When you have a nuts opening draw with the Opal in hand, it can really accelerate you. Turn 1, Plains, Quest for Holy Relic, Memnite, Ornithopter, Mox Opal, Tap Mox for W, Bounce Orni with Glint Hawk, play Orni again. But those are really specific draws.
I've been meddling around with the WW quest deck as a someone I know just took it to states in Indiana. The version I'm testing only runs one mox and to be honest I'm thinking of cutting it. The deck has some serious power having tested 28 solitare matches this deck wins t4 about 75 percent of the time. Granted I realize this is all relative since I'm playing solitare, but the deck just reloads and having your creature killed after using it to pump quest isn't all that big of a deal. Also, the 4th stoneforge seems clumpy to me as I hate topdecking it sometimes.
And as you put it oh so well.......it's budget friendly.....maybe this is the new std RDW as far as budget is concerned.
I was playing in a FNM last week and got my Valakut Ramp deck crushed by this deck, he actually pulled off a t3 victory and did it on one land if my memory serves me correctly. Once armor gets equipped and starts destroying stuff it all but gg at that point.
Having not played either of the decks, I think I would like a version with more creatures as well. There are plenty of creatures that fit easily into the deck like Sea Gate Oracle, Vampire Hexmage, Gatekeeper of Malakir, Wurmcoil Engine, Molten Tail Masticore, Skinrender, etc which you could build accordingly to the metagame. Although UW is still a strong deck, U/B may be able to get there this season. Especially if the new Tezz ends up a strong card and is U/B colored as a lot of people have been speculating.
The Quest WW deck looks interesting and it seems to be very budget friendly. I'm wondering how critical the Opal Mox are to the deck. They only seem to be there as cheap artifacts to bounce with Glint Hawk and Kor Skyfisher. I wonder if they could be replaced with Everflowing Chalice to have a nearly Mythic-less option.
With Path to Exile and O-Ring gone, I really like UB Control now. The Elixir list from New York seems good, but I think there is still a good bit of room for tweaking it. There were some lists from States' winners that had a few more creatures and card draw in place of the Trinket Mage package that I like as well.
P1, P2 is definitely early enough to gamble on seeing more Hawks. Although no more showed up, so based on results your pick was fine.
I think your decision to take a green card at P1, P6 was right on the money, even though you didn't end up green.
Infantry Vet over Water Servant P3, P1 is defensible. I would have taken the Servant but I can see taking the Vet.
I agree on re-thinking Adept over Wild Griffin. Would have been nice if at least one of the Adepts had been a Griffin.
Thanks for the post!
perhaps you should just give 1 ticket to someone who wins with goblins/merfolk/slivers/rats. Anyone who places with a tribe that isn't above gets the full 3 tickets. That way the tribes are legal, but there's a real disincentive to play them.
I would just like to say that I have a lot more blocks in my settings than most players. I've gotten used to them being there and I like to be able to totally control when I play spells. Yes, this costs me extra time during matches, and I'm fine with that. I'm not trying to "trick" someone into skipping their own turn and I don't change my stops midgame.
I have a right to put my stops where I want them and not be accused of cheating. This is especially true when I don't change my stops except when I'm installing Magic Online on a new computer.
Thank you, I couldn't have said it better myself.
I really dislike unwritten rules and complaining about someone who brings a deck that is "too good".
If someone brings a killer deck to this event and it is perfectly legal, he should be rewarded for it. If that deck contains cards that are unbalanced, then ban those cards after the event or after a couple of events where they cause problems. Don't blame the players for bringing it if it's legal.
In my opinion, unwritten gentlemen's agreements are what is keeping a lot of players from playing in these events.
Who cares about losing one extra card when you're drawing extra cards all the time with Silvergill Adepts and Cold-Eyed Selkie.
It cost me two cards to counter your Wrath of God. That's terrible. But in the mean time I've gotten a Time Walk effect and countered possibly your only mass creature removal spell.
I don't own Force of Wills yet, so most of my experience is about playing against it, however I do own and use its red counterpart Pyrokinesis quite often, and it is very powerful in tribal. I can play around opposing counterspells. I can play around Daze. I can't play around Force of Will. It's just really good in decks like Merfolk that can generate card advantage each turn.
The main reason I can possibly see Force of Will being bad in Tribal is the fact that there aren't that many blue tribes. So, you pretty much need to play Merfolk, Faeries, Rogues, or Wizards to use it effectively.
I'm with whiffy on this. If you don't want certain tribes played, then simple disallow them.
By not banning merfolk and goblins, you are leaving too much to interpretation, which is fine, but then you can't get mad when someone's interpretation differs from your own.
So I can bring goblins, but only if I make the deck worse by not playing good goblins...okay. Where exactly is the line drawn? If I play with piledrivers is that too much? Matrons? Warchief/Chieftan? How bad does someone need to make a deck before it is acceptable to your unwritten gentlemen's agreement?
What if I bring Merfolk, but with counterspell in place of FoW? Is that enough to not invite the chagrin of the masses?
I find it distasteful that you would bash a player for aiming to win, when they followed the rules of your tournament. If you don't like what they brought, then its the rules that need to change.