Pulse is climbing like crazy -- bought for 18 yesterday and when I went to bed it was at 20, woke up it was at 22, and now is at 24. I assume everyone is scrambling to acquire cards for the MOCS 2 Champs on Saturday and will be interesting to see if prices drop after the event.
This is a question I see a lot of people ask. The simple answer is: everything.
The long answer is: well, it depends on where you are. Let's take three hypothetical playgroups.
Group A plays casual, but most of them are just starting into the gaem at around the same time. The own mostly stuff that's in the current Standard, and most of those cards are common or uncommon or from theme decks. Any cards from outside of Standard were probably some cheap commons they snagged.
Group B plays casual, but they enjoy Extended and Classic. The card pool is more diverse, and it allows them to play more powerful decks.
Group C plays Freeform. They don't use Vanguards, but if it's a card and Online, they'll play 4x. They would play playsets of Tinker and Black Lotus if they were online, too.
Inside each of these groups, the people are happy. This is because each deck in each group has a comparable power level to another deck in the group, since they follow by the same constraints. This is how it works offline, and why the question of what casual is is brought up so much online. As the Groups begin to mingle in the Casual room, players from each Group begin to play each other.
Group A thinks Groups B and C aren't casual, because their decks don't follow Group A's contraints.
Group B thinks Group C isn't casual, because their decks don't follow Group B's contraints. Group B was also utterly bored with Group A, as Enormous Baloths and the like was just far too slow for Group B.
Group C was bored with both A and C. Their decks were just too slow and underpowered to give any real competition to players from Group C.
Are any of these Groups wrong? No. Each of them had come to expect a certain form of casual play within their own Groups, and projected this expectation onto casual play in general.
It was a while ago, but over at MTGS, a member proposed a Casual B/R list. It was torn apart by nearly every posted who visited it. The problem was that the OP included cards they don't like to face; cards that he didn't think were casual. People from other Groups not only play these cards, but enjoy them.
In conclusion:
Craw Wurms are casual.
Tinker is casual.
Counterspells are casual.
Lifegain is casual.
Land destruction is casual.
Mill is casual.
Tournament decks are casual.
Mono-green control decks are casual.
Everything is casual.
Throughout history there have been cases of theft being socially acceptable by people within a society, principally in cases where the theft is from outsiders. Indeed, it could be argued that the conquest of other nations, exacting tribute from them, Viking-style raids, colonisation, Ethnic Cleansing, slavery, annexation and so forth are all variants along the theme of socially acceptable theft.
It's a bit of a digression, but looking at the world in such terms is something most societies have been guilty of.
Nice job on getting people interested in 100cs. I had no interest before this article. I also glad that el_fake did the interview, as there is some valuable insight to gain. Great formatting as well. I can't wait for the control article on 100cs.
We have rules and conventions for a reason - regardless of the plurality of views, when people get together in a society a common ground needs to exist.
In MTGO there are some rules that people agree with following (as you said it yourself in the thread). People can certainly have their PoVs about certain stuff, and in some cases there isn't a "right" or "wrong", but most of the times anyone sufficiently rational can agree that it is or isn't against the rules (and in other more dubious cases, we sometimes get "rulings" from official sources on what "legal" interpretation we should be reading).
In the examples we given, while it is NOT against the rules to not report certain rules violations, the official ruling is that they appreciate it. As such, to those that try to look down on "tattling" (even when it should be clear that the players rigging the queues are effectively stealing from other players) are hardly in the "right". I believe in most modern societies, reporting thefts that you witness is legally compulsory, I believe (I welcome anyone more knowledgeable to chime in).
The same "it is effectively stealing" reasoning can be even more easily be transferred to abusing bots, at least in the most egregious examples. The fact that there is nothing to stop you doesn't mean it isn't against the rules (in this case, not even the rules of MTGO, but very likely the actual laws of the country in which you reside in).
I don't know of ANY society where stealing is not looked down upon (and there are societies where arguably more "out there" stuff is ok - maybe stuff like cannibalism?). If anyone knows of a society where stealing was not against their "laws" I'm actually interested; I don't have trouble imagining societies where reporting the crime itself is "optional" instead of compulsory, but I have trouble imagining a society where the crime itself isn't a crime :)
Finally, in the much less serious case of the "Casual Decks" room, there aren't any "Rules" about it, but I certainly interpret the name of the room itself (and the accompanying room called "Anything Goes") as a ruling that in the "Casual Decks" room, the *default* is not "Anything goes". As such, those that try to look down on complaints against people acting as if anything goes is the *default* in said room are hardly in the "right".
We are a community (not quite a society) in MTGO, and in order for things to work we need rules, rulings and some enforcement. WotC provides those. Where there is an outright CoC violation, that is a clear cut case regardless of whoever interpretation. When there is actual theft, even if the MTGO rules don't specify anything, "real life" laws do. In cases where a *default* is being discussed, we need to look at what WotC says about the issue, and in the "Casual Decks" room, what they said (without having specific rules) is there are (at least) 2 rooms: one is called "Casual Decks", and the other is "Anything Goes" (then there are the others for more specific uses).
He somehow had 3x Mind Funeral, and the crap rare blue enchantment from Shards of Alara that puts cards into your GY whenever you cast a spell. Was maddening to lose that way.
Well Swans will see lots of play but its a rather fragile deck if you really know what you're up against. Runed Halo is one of the best answers but not by itself. You name Seismic assault but they still bring in Wickerbourgh Elder. It depends if you're maindecking Halo and against wich version you're playing. The one by PV , Calafel etc, didn't have any way to fight a game 1 Halo besides going for the dome with Swans and Bloodbraid, or Primal Command it to the top then shuffling your graveyard and the halo with it. But it was a 1 card threat only and if you pack in a couple of a trio of halos you should be fine, especially because by the time they can cast it you should have Cryptic Command avaiable. I'm not really a fan of Tezzeret in any non extended / classic deck but if it works for you dont change it just because people tell you to.
Well most versions play between 10 and 12 3mana cascade cards. So that means you're likely to have at least 1 in every 7 card hands you draw. Even if you stumble on a land drop, a 4th turn win in a field where Faeries and Counters are almost non existing is pretty quick.
I'm ok with playing White as a primary color, since it has tons of flyers. But I really just don't understand splashing Blue, specifically for card drawing. I mean, you have to hope you draw your Islands, just to be able to draw more. I think you would have been better served splashing your Shock, Guerrilla Tactics and Arcane Teachings (great on the 1/3 vigilance flyer).
The HyperCascade deck looks like a lot fun. The biggest problem is getting enough land early to get it off, and going or getting a cascade card in hand thus the need for the serum powder I guess.
I put it in as card drawing rather than for the stealing lands part (12 of your guys are druids). But as I said, I also added a Mirror Entity which makes it 13, and the Entity also allows you to turn all your guys into druids making it much easier to do the land-stealing bit.
It still has he same overall game plan so it's not really a different build. The only match I lost last night was vs 5cB because he brought in WoG in game 3 and I don't own Dauntless Escorts yet to be able to fight those off.
This article is awesome, and I greatly appreciate the amount of time you must spend to write an article like this. Your online metagame articles are one of my favorite magic articles on the internet. Keep up the great work!!!
icarodx: Safehold is fine, but he only protects himself. Bodyguard is able to protect your team- this is important to me as I am not running protection bears main.
Anon: I did not cover Shorecrasher Mimic decks because they haven't done well in the premier events.
I liked all the info, since I now have to evaluate how to combat the up-and-coming Swans menace with my Turbofog deck, which seems like it might be quite a pain considering the outrageous ammount of enchantment hate in their SB...
I'm looking at Runed Halo and Aura of Silence, any other recommendations?
(BTW, I'm the idiot purist who's playing the ORiginal Japanese version of the deck. I really think the TEzzeret win condition is a necessary evil. Also a whole lot of fun xD)
Thank you all for the comments. Clearly, Two colors I should have been considering Black and Red were the only two I didn't play. I obviously built the wrong deck and didn't farewell because of it. Although, there is some disagreement between what exactly to play with Black, Red, Green or Blue, we can all agree White doesn't cut it, and it should either be a focused two color deck, or splash with Blue for draw and fixing.
Pulse is climbing like crazy -- bought for 18 yesterday and when I went to bed it was at 20, woke up it was at 22, and now is at 24. I assume everyone is scrambling to acquire cards for the MOCS 2 Champs on Saturday and will be interesting to see if prices drop after the event.
This is a question I see a lot of people ask. The simple answer is: everything.
The long answer is: well, it depends on where you are. Let's take three hypothetical playgroups.
Group A plays casual, but most of them are just starting into the gaem at around the same time. The own mostly stuff that's in the current Standard, and most of those cards are common or uncommon or from theme decks. Any cards from outside of Standard were probably some cheap commons they snagged.
Group B plays casual, but they enjoy Extended and Classic. The card pool is more diverse, and it allows them to play more powerful decks.
Group C plays Freeform. They don't use Vanguards, but if it's a card and Online, they'll play 4x. They would play playsets of Tinker and Black Lotus if they were online, too.
Inside each of these groups, the people are happy. This is because each deck in each group has a comparable power level to another deck in the group, since they follow by the same constraints. This is how it works offline, and why the question of what casual is is brought up so much online. As the Groups begin to mingle in the Casual room, players from each Group begin to play each other.
Group A thinks Groups B and C aren't casual, because their decks don't follow Group A's contraints.
Group B thinks Group C isn't casual, because their decks don't follow Group B's contraints. Group B was also utterly bored with Group A, as Enormous Baloths and the like was just far too slow for Group B.
Group C was bored with both A and C. Their decks were just too slow and underpowered to give any real competition to players from Group C.
Are any of these Groups wrong? No. Each of them had come to expect a certain form of casual play within their own Groups, and projected this expectation onto casual play in general.
It was a while ago, but over at MTGS, a member proposed a Casual B/R list. It was torn apart by nearly every posted who visited it. The problem was that the OP included cards they don't like to face; cards that he didn't think were casual. People from other Groups not only play these cards, but enjoy them.
In conclusion:
Craw Wurms are casual.
Tinker is casual.
Counterspells are casual.
Lifegain is casual.
Land destruction is casual.
Mill is casual.
Tournament decks are casual.
Mono-green control decks are casual.
Everything is casual.
Great article, but even better title. Never thought I'd see Magic and South Pacific start to merge.
Throughout history there have been cases of theft being socially acceptable by people within a society, principally in cases where the theft is from outsiders. Indeed, it could be argued that the conquest of other nations, exacting tribute from them, Viking-style raids, colonisation, Ethnic Cleansing, slavery, annexation and so forth are all variants along the theme of socially acceptable theft.
It's a bit of a digression, but looking at the world in such terms is something most societies have been guilty of.
Nice job on getting people interested in 100cs. I had no interest before this article. I also glad that el_fake did the interview, as there is some valuable insight to gain. Great formatting as well. I can't wait for the control article on 100cs.
We have rules and conventions for a reason - regardless of the plurality of views, when people get together in a society a common ground needs to exist.
In MTGO there are some rules that people agree with following (as you said it yourself in the thread). People can certainly have their PoVs about certain stuff, and in some cases there isn't a "right" or "wrong", but most of the times anyone sufficiently rational can agree that it is or isn't against the rules (and in other more dubious cases, we sometimes get "rulings" from official sources on what "legal" interpretation we should be reading).
In the examples we given, while it is NOT against the rules to not report certain rules violations, the official ruling is that they appreciate it. As such, to those that try to look down on "tattling" (even when it should be clear that the players rigging the queues are effectively stealing from other players) are hardly in the "right". I believe in most modern societies, reporting thefts that you witness is legally compulsory, I believe (I welcome anyone more knowledgeable to chime in).
The same "it is effectively stealing" reasoning can be even more easily be transferred to abusing bots, at least in the most egregious examples. The fact that there is nothing to stop you doesn't mean it isn't against the rules (in this case, not even the rules of MTGO, but very likely the actual laws of the country in which you reside in).
I don't know of ANY society where stealing is not looked down upon (and there are societies where arguably more "out there" stuff is ok - maybe stuff like cannibalism?). If anyone knows of a society where stealing was not against their "laws" I'm actually interested; I don't have trouble imagining societies where reporting the crime itself is "optional" instead of compulsory, but I have trouble imagining a society where the crime itself isn't a crime :)
Finally, in the much less serious case of the "Casual Decks" room, there aren't any "Rules" about it, but I certainly interpret the name of the room itself (and the accompanying room called "Anything Goes") as a ruling that in the "Casual Decks" room, the *default* is not "Anything goes". As such, those that try to look down on complaints against people acting as if anything goes is the *default* in said room are hardly in the "right".
We are a community (not quite a society) in MTGO, and in order for things to work we need rules, rulings and some enforcement. WotC provides those. Where there is an outright CoC violation, that is a clear cut case regardless of whoever interpretation. When there is actual theft, even if the MTGO rules don't specify anything, "real life" laws do. In cases where a *default* is being discussed, we need to look at what WotC says about the issue, and in the "Casual Decks" room, what they said (without having specific rules) is there are (at least) 2 rooms: one is called "Casual Decks", and the other is "Anything Goes" (then there are the others for more specific uses).
The first part is scheduled to start on Monday.
It will go over the decks that had no rare restrictions.
The fan voting will also happen during that week.
The Monday after next, I plan on having the Budget decks up and ready to vote on.
196 decks is a LOT of stuff to for 2 peeps to go through, but you guys did an excellent job!
Another great article.
BTW, Dark Depths can be triggered with 5 mana (and a Aether Snap.....)
I lost to Mind_Funeral.dec in an ACR draft!
He somehow had 3x Mind Funeral, and the crap rare blue enchantment from Shards of Alara that puts cards into your GY whenever you cast a spell. Was maddening to lose that way.
Is there any timeframe on when the community judging portion will begin?
Very nice article. It already has my deckbuilding mind thinking.
You mentioned how Jund Hackblade turns on Woodlurker Mimic. I think it's interesting that each of the blades interact with one of the mimics.
I can definitely see some possibilities there. Esper Stormblade looks like another good target for Edge of the Divinity...
this is a great article...is very usefull,your T2 annalys are usefull.
Well Swans will see lots of play but its a rather fragile deck if you really know what you're up against. Runed Halo is one of the best answers but not by itself. You name Seismic assault but they still bring in Wickerbourgh Elder. It depends if you're maindecking Halo and against wich version you're playing. The one by PV , Calafel etc, didn't have any way to fight a game 1 Halo besides going for the dome with Swans and Bloodbraid, or Primal Command it to the top then shuffling your graveyard and the halo with it. But it was a 1 card threat only and if you pack in a couple of a trio of halos you should be fine, especially because by the time they can cast it you should have Cryptic Command avaiable. I'm not really a fan of Tezzeret in any non extended / classic deck but if it works for you dont change it just because people tell you to.
Well most versions play between 10 and 12 3mana cascade cards. So that means you're likely to have at least 1 in every 7 card hands you draw. Even if you stumble on a land drop, a 4th turn win in a field where Faeries and Counters are almost non existing is pretty quick.
I'm ok with playing White as a primary color, since it has tons of flyers. But I really just don't understand splashing Blue, specifically for card drawing. I mean, you have to hope you draw your Islands, just to be able to draw more. I think you would have been better served splashing your Shock, Guerrilla Tactics and Arcane Teachings (great on the 1/3 vigilance flyer).
The HyperCascade deck looks like a lot fun. The biggest problem is getting enough land early to get it off, and going or getting a cascade card in hand thus the need for the serum powder I guess.
I put it in as card drawing rather than for the stealing lands part (12 of your guys are druids). But as I said, I also added a Mirror Entity which makes it 13, and the Entity also allows you to turn all your guys into druids making it much easier to do the land-stealing bit.
It still has he same overall game plan so it's not really a different build. The only match I lost last night was vs 5cB because he brought in WoG in game 3 and I don't own Dauntless Escorts yet to be able to fight those off.
This article is awesome, and I greatly appreciate the amount of time you must spend to write an article like this. Your online metagame articles are one of my favorite magic articles on the internet. Keep up the great work!!!
icarodx: Safehold is fine, but he only protects himself. Bodyguard is able to protect your team- this is important to me as I am not running protection bears main.
Anon: I did not cover Shorecrasher Mimic decks because they haven't done well in the premier events.
-Alex
I liked all the info, since I now have to evaluate how to combat the up-and-coming Swans menace with my Turbofog deck, which seems like it might be quite a pain considering the outrageous ammount of enchantment hate in their SB...
I'm looking at Runed Halo and Aura of Silence, any other recommendations?
(BTW, I'm the idiot purist who's playing the ORiginal Japanese version of the deck. I really think the TEzzeret win condition is a necessary evil. Also a whole lot of fun xD)
hahah told you no one in the good ole U.S. is calling it omlettes
Most excellent. Thanks for the link and the well written article :)
Thank you all for the comments. Clearly, Two colors I should have been considering Black and Red were the only two I didn't play. I obviously built the wrong deck and didn't farewell because of it. Although, there is some disagreement between what exactly to play with Black, Red, Green or Blue, we can all agree White doesn't cut it, and it should either be a focused two color deck, or splash with Blue for draw and fixing.
I'll leave here the links for the matches and they you can go and see by yourself:
Match #1 - Game 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxpnc-ROoZw
Match #1 - Game 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxFrfmxw8E4
Match #1 - Game 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRRrG59HdQs
Fun article Alex really enjoyed the whole Alex/magic the early years :). The other variation not covered of course was U/G Mimic/Favor.