That could be interesting, a Tsabo's Web land. Perhaps even use stifle technology. 'Whenever a player activates a non-mana ability of a land, you may sacrifice neowasteland, if you do counter that ability, destroy that land.
I want to sell it, I don't play the older eternal formats. the usual pattern with these things is that the price tanks when the initial flood hits the market then creeps back up over the next 4-6 weeks, so I'm holding on to mine. It's not only in classic that the card is played, it also sees play in legacy and vintage (which is coming to MTGO), so it should see long term play. The only issue is whether it'll be reprinted in Vintage Masters which is a real possibility, so I may try to sell before the announcement of what's in that (expected in early May).
I believe Assault Loam actually won one of the early GP's or other major Modern events back in early 2012. That list was Jund if I recall correctly, and had Liliana and Bob in it. It was sort of an evolution, in some respects, of the Punishing Jund decks, which disappeared when Punishing Fire was banned. And, I guess, a precursor of the Jund midrange decks of the Bloodbraid Elf era. But the versions with P-Fire and/or Seismic Assault always were brutal on creature aggro decks, so there might be space for Assault Loam to come back. If you didn't have to use TWO lands to kill a Deceiver Exarch, I would be more impressed with it, and it's also not great against all of Zoo's x/3 guys. That's where Boryborygmos's 3 damage is a definite improvement, but I don't think you'd have him in play in time to make a difference.
Anyhow, nice article. I don't think budget Modern white weenie decks are really my kind of thing, but I'll be sure to check out any interesting innovations you might have there.
Cool article, Rex. I really like your top 10 choices here.
There are lots of land options to fix mana base or accelerate with huge boost. But, in the end they are linear.
I totally agree with your general point that, land becomes more when it provides some extra abilities/effects.
Regarding to Wasteland: Wizards is still trying to find a good incarnation for Wasteland for Modern format. Tectonic Edge was the closest one so far, yet it is still not close enough. I wish that one day they would print a Wasteland variant for Modern with the following ability; 1 mana tap/ or tap: destroy target non basic land with a non-mana ability or effect.
It was more of a question than an assumption. I'm sure for the people who do it every time it didn't make a difference, but what I was wondering was if there were people who went for the 15 QPs and ended up spending more than they would have had they just bought a LED at the beginning of the season. Especially the people who fell short of the 15 QPs. It's possible that it's not true for anyone.
Personally, I think it's a mix. PW have always had a higher price tag regardless of their popularity. I think the reason they don't see play is because devotion strategies are popular, and most of the planes walkers don't add a whole lot to those strategies, except maybe Domri. Interesting observation, and thanks for reading!
A great read as usual, Psychobabble! That kind of "report" articles are always fun to read and imagine plenty of people were and will be in similar situations to yours considering the next promo is FoW, which means there's stuff to learn here.
Yankem, it's surprising for me that you consider grinding for QPs to lose value. When I play, I always expect to actually gain money off grinding.
I didn't want the list to be taken over by fast-mana and big-mana lands any more than I wanted it to be taken over by mana-fixers, because they're not very interesting to write about. If I'd only taken duals out of the mix, the Top 10 would have probably included Tolarian Academy, Gaea's Cradle, City of Traitors, Ancient Tomb, Cabal Coffers, Cloudpost, and the Urzatron lands, which is over half the list. I thought cards with utility beyond mana-production were more fun to read about.
edit: also Mishra's Workshop, which is one of the first that came to my mind when I was making this list, and a big part of the reason I wanted to exclude those kinds of lands from taking over the list, although it would have been one of the few that was at least marginally interesting to write about.
Curious why you deliberately set aside lands like Gaea's Cradle and Tolarian Academy? Sure they "just" generated a ton of mana, but both lead to completely ridiculous decks.
Nice change of pace PB. I like to hear you talk about playing just to accomplish it and not grind out value - out of the people who got the LED my guess is a number of them actually spent more tickets than if they had just bought one to start with, but I think for some, the feeling that you're getting for something for "free" even if you give up value to get there, is a good feeling.
I personally have only qualified for the MOCS once, it was when RTR was first released and got there 100% on Sealed Events. I threw together a GW Block deck and scrubbed out of the actual MOCS 0-2, but it was still a pretty fun ride. I will be inclined to try this more when the actual MOCS returns, but if nothing else, when the promo is something like LED or FOW, it helps mitigate some of the cost of playing.
Lifebane Zombie is a great card, however the truth is you are only losing a creature, yes it is tough but that isn't enough to stop you most of the times (a.k.a , you're right, it is too slow in my experience),plus, you can use Hunt the Hunter or Time to Feed to deal with it(no protection). Thanks for reading!
There are many sideboard options you could use for this deck and Pithing Needle might be one to consider depending on the meta. I am still experimenting with the deck and I will try to develop it further on a second article. Thanks for reading!
An interesting to note that the answer cards to PWs are highly efficient (Hero's Downfall, Thoughtseize, Dreadbore, Detention Sphere, etc) while the PWs themselves are highly inefficient (save for Elsepth/Jace). It's harder to win with PWs now, they just don't stay around long enough to win you the game. It may just be this Standard environment where PWs are ineffiently priced due to the answer cards, or the norm and we're just overpaying for them anyway.
I don't think it's a miss, black mana is generated through death and decay, which is what originally they represented through the swamp (more because they wanted 5 different basic environments than anything else – "plains" is even sillier, if anything), but it can be even more aptly represented by other elements, like of course graveyards and everything that's hidden underground.
What Xger correctly questioned is what's in turn the big difference between Underground Sea and Underground River: the fact that Underground Sea counts as an "Island Swamp" (and so does Polluted Delta, in a way), while Underground River or any other UB land but Watery Grave don't.
That's just a game mechanic more or less randomly attached to the cards, at this point. Watery Grave and Drowned Catacomb are essentially the same thing, but one got the basic types, the other didn't, for no particular reason if not belonging to one cycle rather than to another (that's true of every mechanic: why specifically tapping into an Underground River is damaging, for instance?)
I think Magic really embraced the combo of underground and water meaning black and blue. After Underground Sea, they made Underground River, Darkwater Catacombs, Drowned Catacomb... So I feel like if it's a miss, they fully embraced that miss!
Bow requires a mana commitment and isn't much of a threat by itself. I definitely think the land count should be higher though for Disciple, minimum 22 lands and I think Mutavaults are necessary.
Very interesting interpretation of the flavor of lands.
However, I think the assumption you make about the duals and fetches, while understandable and partially supported, is debatable. I mean, yes, the original source of, say, blue mana is an island. And you're right that lands like Tundra or Polluted Delta have or search for the Island type specifically, which is different than just being blue mana providers. But the mana concept has evolved quickly. Everything associated with the color wheel provides the proper color of mana, or combinations thereof. Tolarian Academy produces blue mana because it produces knowledge. Phyrexian Tower produces black mana when you perform sacrifices to it. And so on.
So it stands to reason that even early on the idea was that an island is just one of the possible sources of blue mana, and the name "island" was used as a symbol of it. (After all, what does it even mean when a fetch "searches" for a land? They represent places, how and why do they morph into other places?)
Plus, in case of Polluted Delta, for instance, you ignored the fact that it's not a "generic" delta; it's a "polluted" one, hence the black energy, akin to what a swamp emanates, if not exactly the way a lagoon is formed (isn't it strange that they never used "lagoon" as a land name so far?)
I took the one that I won, bought 2 more for 50 per yesterday, and finished up the Belcher deck that top 4'd the SCG this past weekend.
Hoping to do the same with forces next month :D
Can't wait to play some vintage and more legacy!
Rishadan Port without the cost? No.
What about a tapping land: as long as ~ remains tapped, target land does not untap. You may choose not to untap ~ during your untap phase.
That could be interesting, a Tsabo's Web land. Perhaps even use stifle technology. 'Whenever a player activates a non-mana ability of a land, you may sacrifice neowasteland, if you do counter that ability, destroy that land.
I want to sell it, I don't play the older eternal formats. the usual pattern with these things is that the price tanks when the initial flood hits the market then creeps back up over the next 4-6 weeks, so I'm holding on to mine. It's not only in classic that the card is played, it also sees play in legacy and vintage (which is coming to MTGO), so it should see long term play. The only issue is whether it'll be reprinted in Vintage Masters which is a real possibility, so I may try to sell before the announcement of what's in that (expected in early May).
No one knows for sure yet, but I would guess that if vintage eats up the player base official support for classic would drop off.
I believe Assault Loam actually won one of the early GP's or other major Modern events back in early 2012. That list was Jund if I recall correctly, and had Liliana and Bob in it. It was sort of an evolution, in some respects, of the Punishing Jund decks, which disappeared when Punishing Fire was banned. And, I guess, a precursor of the Jund midrange decks of the Bloodbraid Elf era. But the versions with P-Fire and/or Seismic Assault always were brutal on creature aggro decks, so there might be space for Assault Loam to come back. If you didn't have to use TWO lands to kill a Deceiver Exarch, I would be more impressed with it, and it's also not great against all of Zoo's x/3 guys. That's where Boryborygmos's 3 damage is a definite improvement, but I don't think you'd have him in play in time to make a difference.
Anyhow, nice article. I don't think budget Modern white weenie decks are really my kind of thing, but I'll be sure to check out any interesting innovations you might have there.
What will you do with your LED if you get it? Build a deck that runs one, or sell it? Is classic going away when vintage hits online?
Cool article, Rex. I really like your top 10 choices here.
There are lots of land options to fix mana base or accelerate with huge boost. But, in the end they are linear.
I totally agree with your general point that, land becomes more when it provides some extra abilities/effects.
Regarding to Wasteland: Wizards is still trying to find a good incarnation for Wasteland for Modern format. Tectonic Edge was the closest one so far, yet it is still not close enough. I wish that one day they would print a Wasteland variant for Modern with the following ability; 1 mana tap/ or tap: destroy target non basic land with a non-mana ability or effect.
It was more of a question than an assumption. I'm sure for the people who do it every time it didn't make a difference, but what I was wondering was if there were people who went for the 15 QPs and ended up spending more than they would have had they just bought a LED at the beginning of the season. Especially the people who fell short of the 15 QPs. It's possible that it's not true for anyone.
Personally, I think it's a mix. PW have always had a higher price tag regardless of their popularity. I think the reason they don't see play is because devotion strategies are popular, and most of the planes walkers don't add a whole lot to those strategies, except maybe Domri. Interesting observation, and thanks for reading!
A great read as usual, Psychobabble! That kind of "report" articles are always fun to read and imagine plenty of people were and will be in similar situations to yours considering the next promo is FoW, which means there's stuff to learn here.
Yankem, it's surprising for me that you consider grinding for QPs to lose value. When I play, I always expect to actually gain money off grinding.
I didn't want the list to be taken over by fast-mana and big-mana lands any more than I wanted it to be taken over by mana-fixers, because they're not very interesting to write about. If I'd only taken duals out of the mix, the Top 10 would have probably included Tolarian Academy, Gaea's Cradle, City of Traitors, Ancient Tomb, Cabal Coffers, Cloudpost, and the Urzatron lands, which is over half the list. I thought cards with utility beyond mana-production were more fun to read about.
edit: also Mishra's Workshop, which is one of the first that came to my mind when I was making this list, and a big part of the reason I wanted to exclude those kinds of lands from taking over the list, although it would have been one of the few that was at least marginally interesting to write about.
Curious why you deliberately set aside lands like Gaea's Cradle and Tolarian Academy? Sure they "just" generated a ton of mana, but both lead to completely ridiculous decks.
Nice change of pace PB. I like to hear you talk about playing just to accomplish it and not grind out value - out of the people who got the LED my guess is a number of them actually spent more tickets than if they had just bought one to start with, but I think for some, the feeling that you're getting for something for "free" even if you give up value to get there, is a good feeling.
I personally have only qualified for the MOCS once, it was when RTR was first released and got there 100% on Sealed Events. I threw together a GW Block deck and scrubbed out of the actual MOCS 0-2, but it was still a pretty fun ride. I will be inclined to try this more when the actual MOCS returns, but if nothing else, when the promo is something like LED or FOW, it helps mitigate some of the cost of playing.
Great job!!
Lifebane Zombie is a great card, however the truth is you are only losing a creature, yes it is tough but that isn't enough to stop you most of the times (a.k.a , you're right, it is too slow in my experience),plus, you can use Hunt the Hunter or Time to Feed to deal with it(no protection). Thanks for reading!
There are many sideboard options you could use for this deck and Pithing Needle might be one to consider depending on the meta. I am still experimenting with the deck and I will try to develop it further on a second article. Thanks for reading!
An interesting to note that the answer cards to PWs are highly efficient (Hero's Downfall, Thoughtseize, Dreadbore, Detention Sphere, etc) while the PWs themselves are highly inefficient (save for Elsepth/Jace). It's harder to win with PWs now, they just don't stay around long enough to win you the game. It may just be this Standard environment where PWs are ineffiently priced due to the answer cards, or the norm and we're just overpaying for them anyway.
I don't think it's a miss, black mana is generated through death and decay, which is what originally they represented through the swamp (more because they wanted 5 different basic environments than anything else – "plains" is even sillier, if anything), but it can be even more aptly represented by other elements, like of course graveyards and everything that's hidden underground.
What Xger correctly questioned is what's in turn the big difference between Underground Sea and Underground River: the fact that Underground Sea counts as an "Island Swamp" (and so does Polluted Delta, in a way), while Underground River or any other UB land but Watery Grave don't.
That's just a game mechanic more or less randomly attached to the cards, at this point. Watery Grave and Drowned Catacomb are essentially the same thing, but one got the basic types, the other didn't, for no particular reason if not belonging to one cycle rather than to another (that's true of every mechanic: why specifically tapping into an Underground River is damaging, for instance?)
I think Magic really embraced the combo of underground and water meaning black and blue. After Underground Sea, they made Underground River, Darkwater Catacombs, Drowned Catacomb... So I feel like if it's a miss, they fully embraced that miss!
Lifebane Zombie is also a hate card against green decks, but it might be too slow against this deck. Still, it is a hate card.
Bow requires a mana commitment and isn't much of a threat by itself. I definitely think the land count should be higher though for Disciple, minimum 22 lands and I think Mutavaults are necessary.
Wouldn't 2 pithing needles in side be good against planeswalkers?
Also, isn't 4cc for N. Disciple a bit high?? Would Bow of N. be better at 3cc?
Very interesting interpretation of the flavor of lands.
However, I think the assumption you make about the duals and fetches, while understandable and partially supported, is debatable. I mean, yes, the original source of, say, blue mana is an island. And you're right that lands like Tundra or Polluted Delta have or search for the Island type specifically, which is different than just being blue mana providers. But the mana concept has evolved quickly. Everything associated with the color wheel provides the proper color of mana, or combinations thereof. Tolarian Academy produces blue mana because it produces knowledge. Phyrexian Tower produces black mana when you perform sacrifices to it. And so on.
So it stands to reason that even early on the idea was that an island is just one of the possible sources of blue mana, and the name "island" was used as a symbol of it. (After all, what does it even mean when a fetch "searches" for a land? They represent places, how and why do they morph into other places?)
Plus, in case of Polluted Delta, for instance, you ignored the fact that it's not a "generic" delta; it's a "polluted" one, hence the black energy, akin to what a swamp emanates, if not exactly the way a lagoon is formed (isn't it strange that they never used "lagoon" as a land name so far?)
Looking forward to the rest!