@Paul: Oust-ing your creatures is actually a very powerful play and that's the reason why Oust is a sorcery instead of an instant. For example Oust-ing your own Kitchen Finks while Bloodbraid Elf is in your hand is also very nice.
@JustSin: To be honest I was expecting a comment about Training Grounds. I'm sure there is some sick creature somewhere that will do some broken things with it. I'm just not sure which one(s).
@ArchGenius: Yes, RotE is a part of the ZEN Block in Block Constructed.
Wall of Blossoms can't be White because "draw a card" cantrip on permanents is Green and/or Blue. It's true that White is the home of the best defenders but that doesn't mean that you can give every kind of defender to it. MaRo recently said "Why then did we do it in white? Because at the time we were finding more ways to pump up white". For me, this isn't a very satisfactory answer.
Oh and you're right about Smite; it is definately a very nice combat trick. Wizards indeed pumped up White in this set.
First, this article bums me out cause I wrote a really great article on the economics of bots and trading and mythic prices that would have been a great follow-up to this article, but I lost the flashdrive that it was on. I think one of my students swiped it.
Second, that link your provided mentions the article in which Rosewater spoke his lies about how Mythics would work gives a great line when he mentions what Mythics would be. He says that they would planeswalkers, legends, and "epic" spells. Just a look at the first mythics from Shards would show that they kind of stuck to that, although I am not sure that Sphinx Sovereign is very epic. A look at the current mythics would indicate the non-epicness of some of them. Comet Storm is epic?
I am not sure how that statement was supposed to ease our fears. Looking at the planeswalkers in Lorwyn, most tourney decks were running 4x Garuuk and he wasn't mythic, but was still $30+ each. Making him MORE rare wouldn't lower the price or make him less playable.
My point is that why would anyone believe the lies spouted by Mark Rosewater? THis is the same guy who said that Birds of Paradise would no longer be put in core sets because they wanted to put in Llanowar Elves which would free up a rare slot. He made that announcement going into 9th edition. Birds then appeared in 10th and M10.
Well even I'll concede that Plow is better since it doesnt rely on attacking so can get rid of some troublesome creatures that just like to sit there, and I just realized my thoughts on card frame arent too important since i am running Bidding which uses the old frame. Well i have made some slight changes since writing this
-4 Condemn
+ 4 Swords to Plowshares
Obviously not having the 'Target Attacking' clause makes StP inarguably better.
-1 Sphinx Sovereign
+1 Sphinx of the Steel Wind
He is just flat better. Same mana cost but easier to cast with WUB instead of WUUB. Plus he is the freaking Akroma Sphinx
-4 Everflowing Chalice
+2 Dimir Signet
+2 Azorius Signet
The everflowing chalice was good don't get me wrong but because of the color needs in the deck the signet just work better. Especially when trying to hit UU turn 3 and then either WW or BB two turns later.
Running your list with the Icatians (instead of Soul Warden, since they are more aggresive I think) fairly successful now. However, I wasnt able to get my hands on any Unicorns. MTGOTraders never have them and I am new to MTGO so I don't know where else I could find them. Any tips?
Great article as usual. I think you get me thinking about strategies more than anyone else.
1) I don't think Wall of Omens is as out of color as you think it is. Drawing a card or a cantrip effect is an ability that has been applied to cards of all colors for a long time now. (Zap, Recover, Wall of Blossoms, Twitch, Bandage, etc) Drawing multiple cards is still a blue effect (black if it involves using life) but drawing just one card isn't. And white is supposed to be a defensive color and therefore get a good share of good defender cards.
2) Are they really going to combine ROE with Zendikar Block? I thought that they were going to have two separate block formats since ROE is mechanically different from Zendikar and is going to be drafted separately. I guess I'm really out of the loop on that one.
3) I think that Smite is going to be pretty good with the new standard. There are going to be a lot of Eldrazi tokens and walls lying around just looking of the opportunity to Smite something. Especially with Wall of Omens and Wall of Denial running around.
4) I disagree with you a bit on Consuming Vapors. It's good, but it's also slow and has a tendancy to hit things you might not want to hit, such as Eldrazi tokens, Bloodghast, Vengevine, Sprouting Thrinax.
In case you did not hear, after last weeks downtime Alara draft for the first 6 hours Alara draft where only requiring 2 tickets and not the packs. There were about 40-50 Alara 2tix nix pax drafts that fired in about 45 minuets that had just about the same players in all of them. The Alara drafts where promptly fixed after this.
Forked Bolt is surprisingly good in the set. I would have said no as it is a weaker version Arc Lightning but at 1 cost it can't be beat for dealing with a couple pesky elephant makers or other 1/1s or just a removal of a bear before it levels out of range. Not sure if it has any potential outside of limited though. Wall of white blossoms is definitely a nice card but I am not hugely thrilled with it. In particular it is far inferior in art to the original wall (in terms of colors, I dislike yellow in large amounts in a drawing that has lots of shadow.)
All is dust + Erzats Gnomes?
Also Oust vs your own Mulldrifter isn't a terrible play. Too bad it isn't doable at instant speed (without outside help anyway.)
Grats on the 3-0. Looks like there was a rare drafter at your table (but they were wise enough to leave the crap rares alone.) Grats on winning with bombs. (I admit I didn't watch the videos as I tend to not do that.)
Scourglass is a good change. The deck list you provide is very close to the current sphinges deck I am running. -1 Sphinx of Lost Truths, -2 summoners. Also on my deck list from the tourney runs Living Death not End. :D Also I still prefer Plow over Condemn because I am old fashioned, though Condemn might be better vs decks that put only a few guys out that I care about. Ideally Id put in a 2nd death (actually need 2 now since I sold mine off.)
at that point yes...im having a hard time though seeing a decklist beyond Abysall Persecutor, Momentous Fall, Maelstrom Pulse, maybe Putrid Leech...and at that point it almost seems like it would be easier just to modify jund rather than trying to build a new deck. Still not a bad idea though
Right, you don't want to kill the persecutor until you have won. But Momentous Fall is fine when played in response to removal on your 3/3 beast or Putrid Leech whereas Bone Splinters is poor in other situations. Consuming Vapors is one of the few black options that seems viable.
Trouble with Momentous Fall and Abyssal Persecutor is by the time you want to sac the Percy, you should have won the game already, so the card advantage is just win more.
I play Heroclix, a collectible miniature game and they upped the ante over mythic rares. Packs contain 5 figures, one is always a rare, the rest are common and uncommon. About 1 in every 3-4 packs contains a super rare figure. Above that are chase figures, in about 1 in every 20 packs. Luckily there are very playable figures among the commons, uncommons, and rares. They only made the chase figures incredibly powerful in one set, but after an outcry from the community chases are now just mainly fun or unique characters to collect.
I hope magic stops at Mythic Rare rarity. I guess Mythic Rare foils are like chases, but I've never been very interested in foils.
I think he's on target with his conclusion. The scenario I'm in with M10 is a good example in that I'd love to redeem a set (not for profit, just to have the physical cards) but I can't for one reason: Baneslayer Angel. I'll never crack one in draft and what's the point of paying 50 tickets in order to get a $50 card. Its easier and more ecconomical to just straight out buy paper Angels. I ebay'ed the three I needed for $115.
Now Zendikar was a different matter. The fetches at rare are expensive enough in papar and cheap enough online that the equation works out much better. But even still it was a hard choice because of the Cobra, Iona, Eldrazi Monument, etc. Given what I've won some auctions for in the last two weeks I lost money in the redemtion on those cards. Frankly they are worth more online than in paper.
Lol, well i didnt demand but i do think it looks cleaner. Overall I like the look of the deck, probably a little too pricey for me to try bt i can see the fun of it
I seem to still be running into a ton of 5 color Commanders. Interestingly, they aren't quite as powerful as they used to be. They used to all be combo/control, but now I tend to see de-powered 5 color good stuff decks. Don't know what led to the change. I was trying to avoid the combo/control route with this deck, and people are usually impressed with the variety of large creatures which makes it different, so that's good.
Actually, what I'm running into a lot of now that Saga is out are blue based decks trying to abuse Tolarian Academy. Good times.
Yeah, when a blue player casts an early Bribery against this deck, they're a little overwhelmed at first. Theft is a problem, but I haven't run into a truly dedicated theft deck that can overwhelm my number of threats yet. I'm trying to squeeze in a Privileged Position of my own. Also, there are a few methods of recursion in the deck, which are helpful for those opponents packing a ton of removal as well.
Thanks guys for the comments.
@Paul: Oust-ing your creatures is actually a very powerful play and that's the reason why Oust is a sorcery instead of an instant. For example Oust-ing your own Kitchen Finks while Bloodbraid Elf is in your hand is also very nice.
@JustSin: To be honest I was expecting a comment about Training Grounds. I'm sure there is some sick creature somewhere that will do some broken things with it. I'm just not sure which one(s).
@ArchGenius: Yes, RotE is a part of the ZEN Block in Block Constructed.
Wall of Blossoms can't be White because "draw a card" cantrip on permanents is Green and/or Blue. It's true that White is the home of the best defenders but that doesn't mean that you can give every kind of defender to it. MaRo recently said "Why then did we do it in white? Because at the time we were finding more ways to pump up white". For me, this isn't a very satisfactory answer.
Oh and you're right about Smite; it is definately a very nice combat trick. Wizards indeed pumped up White in this set.
Thanks again for the comments.
LE
Fun stuff. I had a pre-Alara sphinx tribal deck that used all those guys you list at the top except Petra Sphinx. It was goofy but fun.
the birds re-appearing probably had to do with the outrage of such a staple card not being in the core set for 9th
First, this article bums me out cause I wrote a really great article on the economics of bots and trading and mythic prices that would have been a great follow-up to this article, but I lost the flashdrive that it was on. I think one of my students swiped it.
Second, that link your provided mentions the article in which Rosewater spoke his lies about how Mythics would work gives a great line when he mentions what Mythics would be. He says that they would planeswalkers, legends, and "epic" spells. Just a look at the first mythics from Shards would show that they kind of stuck to that, although I am not sure that Sphinx Sovereign is very epic. A look at the current mythics would indicate the non-epicness of some of them. Comet Storm is epic?
I am not sure how that statement was supposed to ease our fears. Looking at the planeswalkers in Lorwyn, most tourney decks were running 4x Garuuk and he wasn't mythic, but was still $30+ each. Making him MORE rare wouldn't lower the price or make him less playable.
My point is that why would anyone believe the lies spouted by Mark Rosewater? THis is the same guy who said that Birds of Paradise would no longer be put in core sets because they wanted to put in Llanowar Elves which would free up a rare slot. He made that announcement going into 9th edition. Birds then appeared in 10th and M10.
Well even I'll concede that Plow is better since it doesnt rely on attacking so can get rid of some troublesome creatures that just like to sit there, and I just realized my thoughts on card frame arent too important since i am running Bidding which uses the old frame. Well i have made some slight changes since writing this
-4 Condemn
+ 4 Swords to Plowshares
Obviously not having the 'Target Attacking' clause makes StP inarguably better.
-1 Sphinx Sovereign
+1 Sphinx of the Steel Wind
He is just flat better. Same mana cost but easier to cast with WUB instead of WUUB. Plus he is the freaking Akroma Sphinx
-4 Everflowing Chalice
+2 Dimir Signet
+2 Azorius Signet
The everflowing chalice was good don't get me wrong but because of the color needs in the deck the signet just work better. Especially when trying to hit UU turn 3 and then either WW or BB two turns later.
Running your list with the Icatians (instead of Soul Warden, since they are more aggresive I think) fairly successful now. However, I wasnt able to get my hands on any Unicorns. MTGOTraders never have them and I am new to MTGO so I don't know where else I could find them. Any tips?
Great article as usual. I think you get me thinking about strategies more than anyone else.
1) I don't think Wall of Omens is as out of color as you think it is. Drawing a card or a cantrip effect is an ability that has been applied to cards of all colors for a long time now. (Zap, Recover, Wall of Blossoms, Twitch, Bandage, etc) Drawing multiple cards is still a blue effect (black if it involves using life) but drawing just one card isn't. And white is supposed to be a defensive color and therefore get a good share of good defender cards.
2) Are they really going to combine ROE with Zendikar Block? I thought that they were going to have two separate block formats since ROE is mechanically different from Zendikar and is going to be drafted separately. I guess I'm really out of the loop on that one.
3) I think that Smite is going to be pretty good with the new standard. There are going to be a lot of Eldrazi tokens and walls lying around just looking of the opportunity to Smite something. Especially with Wall of Omens and Wall of Denial running around.
4) I disagree with you a bit on Consuming Vapors. It's good, but it's also slow and has a tendancy to hit things you might not want to hit, such as Eldrazi tokens, Bloodghast, Vengevine, Sprouting Thrinax.
good stuff, but I'm a little disappointed to not see mention of at least Training Grounds, at worst it can be like a turn 3 casual combo win
Are we keeping you up?
In case you did not hear, after last weeks downtime Alara draft for the first 6 hours Alara draft where only requiring 2 tickets and not the packs. There were about 40-50 Alara 2tix nix pax drafts that fired in about 45 minuets that had just about the same players in all of them. The Alara drafts where promptly fixed after this.
Forked Bolt is surprisingly good in the set. I would have said no as it is a weaker version Arc Lightning but at 1 cost it can't be beat for dealing with a couple pesky elephant makers or other 1/1s or just a removal of a bear before it levels out of range. Not sure if it has any potential outside of limited though. Wall of white blossoms is definitely a nice card but I am not hugely thrilled with it. In particular it is far inferior in art to the original wall (in terms of colors, I dislike yellow in large amounts in a drawing that has lots of shadow.)
All is dust + Erzats Gnomes?
Also Oust vs your own Mulldrifter isn't a terrible play. Too bad it isn't doable at instant speed (without outside help anyway.)
Grats on the 3-0. Looks like there was a rare drafter at your table (but they were wise enough to leave the crap rares alone.) Grats on winning with bombs. (I admit I didn't watch the videos as I tend to not do that.)
Scourglass is a good change. The deck list you provide is very close to the current sphinges deck I am running. -1 Sphinx of Lost Truths, -2 summoners. Also on my deck list from the tourney runs Living Death not End. :D Also I still prefer Plow over Condemn because I am old fashioned, though Condemn might be better vs decks that put only a few guys out that I care about. Ideally Id put in a 2nd death (actually need 2 now since I sold mine off.)
at that point yes...im having a hard time though seeing a decklist beyond Abysall Persecutor, Momentous Fall, Maelstrom Pulse, maybe Putrid Leech...and at that point it almost seems like it would be easier just to modify jund rather than trying to build a new deck. Still not a bad idea though
Right, you don't want to kill the persecutor until you have won. But Momentous Fall is fine when played in response to removal on your 3/3 beast or Putrid Leech whereas Bone Splinters is poor in other situations. Consuming Vapors is one of the few black options that seems viable.
or bone splinters...whatever
yeah should just use bonesplitter and not go into other colors since green doesnt offer anything to an abyssal deck really
I have not met him online. I will have to seek him out one of these days or vice versa.
Trouble with Momentous Fall and Abyssal Persecutor is by the time you want to sac the Percy, you should have won the game already, so the card advantage is just win more.
I play Heroclix, a collectible miniature game and they upped the ante over mythic rares. Packs contain 5 figures, one is always a rare, the rest are common and uncommon. About 1 in every 3-4 packs contains a super rare figure. Above that are chase figures, in about 1 in every 20 packs. Luckily there are very playable figures among the commons, uncommons, and rares. They only made the chase figures incredibly powerful in one set, but after an outcry from the community chases are now just mainly fun or unique characters to collect.
I hope magic stops at Mythic Rare rarity. I guess Mythic Rare foils are like chases, but I've never been very interested in foils.
I think he's on target with his conclusion. The scenario I'm in with M10 is a good example in that I'd love to redeem a set (not for profit, just to have the physical cards) but I can't for one reason: Baneslayer Angel. I'll never crack one in draft and what's the point of paying 50 tickets in order to get a $50 card. Its easier and more ecconomical to just straight out buy paper Angels. I ebay'ed the three I needed for $115.
Now Zendikar was a different matter. The fetches at rare are expensive enough in papar and cheap enough online that the equation works out much better. But even still it was a hard choice because of the Cobra, Iona, Eldrazi Monument, etc. Given what I've won some auctions for in the last two weeks I lost money in the redemtion on those cards. Frankly they are worth more online than in paper.
Lol, well i didnt demand but i do think it looks cleaner. Overall I like the look of the deck, probably a little too pricey for me to try bt i can see the fun of it
I seem to still be running into a ton of 5 color Commanders. Interestingly, they aren't quite as powerful as they used to be. They used to all be combo/control, but now I tend to see de-powered 5 color good stuff decks. Don't know what led to the change. I was trying to avoid the combo/control route with this deck, and people are usually impressed with the variety of large creatures which makes it different, so that's good.
Actually, what I'm running into a lot of now that Saga is out are blue based decks trying to abuse Tolarian Academy. Good times.
Yeah, when a blue player casts an early Bribery against this deck, they're a little overwhelmed at first. Theft is a problem, but I haven't run into a truly dedicated theft deck that can overwhelm my number of threats yet. I'm trying to squeeze in a Privileged Position of my own. Also, there are a few methods of recursion in the deck, which are helpful for those opponents packing a ton of removal as well.