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I haven't followed the competitive scene for years, but BGW was always one of my favorite color combinations because of the flavor behind its constituent parts and because Doran was a fun deck in TSP/LOR Standard. Now I'm seeing that Abzan is the current John Cena of wizard poker. Why is it hated or otherwise groaned at so much? On account of it's a really prevalent linear midrange deck that doesn't do much but throw cost-efficient fatties and spot removal at the problem until it dies?
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Aug 29, 2015 15:14
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I'm really digging the Dutch angles on these new mountains - it's a pretty simple and effective way of creating a sense of strange majesty, of poo poo getting real in a somewhat unsettling way. They're Michael Bay lands.
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Aug 30, 2015 20:15
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Can someone give me a quick rundown on what kind of design principles people are talking about when they mention NWO?
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Sep 2, 2015 19:59
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Ramos posted:Commons should be incredibly simple and straight forward, one or two simple abilities. Uncommons can be slightly more complex. Rares can be actually complex. Mythics can be off the walls weird. That's the gist of it. Ah, thanks - when did this go into place, out of curiosity? I ask because Vorapede, as an example, is only a couple years old but seems not very in line with that, being a French vanilla mythic and all.
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Sep 2, 2015 20:24
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Ultima66 posted:NWO only affects the complexity of cards printed at common and has no impact at all on anything else on the game at any other rarity. Well now I just don't know what to believe
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Sep 2, 2015 20:28
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Equilibrium posted:the shitstain that was ZEN-WWK limited I don't disagree with this when I look at it in the abstract, but I'll always have a soft spot for triple ZEN since it's the closest I've ever come to "solving" a format. I usually put up decent numbers at limited FNMs during the couple-year period around that, but I made bank off triple ZEN because it was so easy to prey on people who don't know anything about the format beyond the basic conventional wisdom. That wisdom tells us that Red (with its super-aggressive 2-drop men) was the strongest color and Green (with its slower, more defensive card pool) was the weakest - which is true! It's just that when you have like 6 people at the table going "Holy poo poo, Goblin Shortcutter in my first pack, I'mma pick it and live the dream", I could draft a G/X deck full of stalling and bombs that other people were passing because they wanted their curves to end at 4. Dumb poo poo like Grazing Gladehart did so much work for me in that format. Even like, Kraken Hatchling was something I pretty reliably maindecked. The statistics bore out my strategy too. I remember looking up the decklists for PTQ winners where the Top 8 format was triple ZEN draft. The color present in the most decks in the non-splash capacity? Green. The color present in the least? Red. And again, it's not like R/X aggro wasn't very strong in that format, it's just that sure enough, I'd look at the decklists of folks who washed out in the first round of these PTQ Top 8s and see a Red base desperately scrambling for 23 playables that just weren't there when everyone at the table had the same idea.
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Sep 7, 2015 22:50
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Wait Jackie Lee became a pro player and got hired by Wizards? That's awesome, good for her! I played at the same LGS as her maybe 5-6 years ago. Who are the most famous pros that y'all have happened to go to the same store as?
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Sep 13, 2015 18:28
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This is out of nowhere, but could someone please give a quick rundown of the story of Tarkir block? My understanding is that it starts out with these five wedge clans and extinct dragons, and it's a real shitshow, so Sarkhan goes back a thousand years and saves Ugin from Nicol Bolas, and that saves all the dragons, and then in the present day instead of the five clans we have five ally-color groups of dragon-worshippers... and it's also a real shitshow? Like, what actually got "better" or "worse" due to this new reality
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Sep 13, 2015 19:33
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GeneX posted:wizards marketing has concluded that everyone liked the clans a lot more Yeah from reading a bit about this, it seems like one of the cool things about having a wedge color identity is like take the Abzan who are W with some BG. So they've got a lot of the usual White stuff with strict adherence to order and regimentation and honor, and then plus Green that makes them more collectivist, but then Black also means they've got necromantic ancestor worship stuff going on! And then Dromoka shows up and bans the ancestor stuff so now they're just GW guys who like order and honor and the group and stuff.
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Sep 13, 2015 19:50
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To be fair, the five broods do have somewhat unique looks, e.g. the bird looking Ojutais and the antler-ful Atarkas. I can look at a given dragon and maybe tell, without just using color cues, what brood a dragon is from. But I can also do that with Eldrazi, right, and they're still very obviously all Eldrazi.
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Sep 13, 2015 20:01
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Are there any free programs these days for testing out how a deck plays without dropping money or finding folks who are willing to playtest it with physical proxies? I think there was some poo poo called Apprentice when I was playing Standard 5-6 years ago?
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Sep 16, 2015 01:31
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In thinking about cards that get stronger as the format around them gets stronger (e.g. cards that care about graveyards or artifacts), I was wondering - what would you folks say is the strongest card from eternal formats that could be reprinted today with little competitive impact (other than perhaps lowering its price)?
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Sep 21, 2015 15:03
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Seeing the discussion of cards leaving standard a few pages back reminded me of the M15 cards with the "Designed by _______" notes, and how much the David Sirlin one made me laugh because it was the most David Sirlin thing imaginable
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Sep 23, 2015 19:01
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During the spoiler season for BFZ, folks were talking about Lotus Cobra and how they should reprint it at rare - that felt a little surprising to me, since putting it in the same Standard as fetches made it seem like less of "a mana dork" and more of "a guy who sends you to Magical Christmas Land repeatedly". Printing a Sylvan Caryatid at mythic would make no sense, sure, but I never had an issue with the Cobra. On that note, what would your guys' picks be for "least mythic-feeling mythic" they've printed?
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Sep 24, 2015 05:27
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Yeah I know, hence the past tense. Because fetches were there to help set up explosive plays, it felt like less of a standard mana dork that just helped you curve out. Sorry for the unclear wording, though! I was referring to how it felt appropriately mythic the first time around.
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Sep 24, 2015 05:42
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The Lord of Hats posted:I know it has uses, but you have to admit it doesn't feel very mythic. Like, Archangel's Light and Descent into Madness are both absolutely awful, but they at least have a bit of wow factor to them. I dunno, it was a completely unique (if narrow) effect at the time on a creature, wasn't it? Torrent Elemental kinda dampened it, but "this does something that very few other cards do" feels reasonably mythic to me.
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Sep 24, 2015 06:02
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I'm surprised the "least mythic-feeling mythic" didn't include that one French vanilla guy. And not like French vanilla how Akroma is French vanilla, but like, 3 keywords.
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Sep 24, 2015 15:17
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I downloaded Magic Duels on iOS but it seems to just be an app that tells me I'm not connected to the internet? Not the core gameplay I was expecting
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Sep 24, 2015 17:51
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Magic Duels seems to be back up on iOS, at least I think? It's no longer telling me to reconnect to the internet constantly. The available card pool seems like "Origins plus scattered commons from previous sets", so my best bet for a strong deck would be like, what, UR with Hangarbacks and a bunch of thopters?
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Sep 25, 2015 14:51
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Count Bleck posted:It's going to organize them by color. Because for the intents of non-game stuff, they're colored. Ghostfire gets organized with red cards and not artifacts right?
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Sep 25, 2015 17:32
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Random Magic Duels question: can I change my avatar with a deck that I made in the advanced deck builder, or am I stuck with this Assassins Creed looking motherfucker unless I use the deck wizard?
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Sep 28, 2015 02:14
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I recall playing something by Darwin Kastle called Epic like 6 years ago? Was it in a beta stage at that point, and it's now coming out of that with a significant rework?
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Sep 28, 2015 14:52
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Count Bleck posted:So Duels players, is this a good guide to follow for playing the game? Yes, as long as you take it as "here are a lot of synergies that make Perilous Myr a great 4-of in almost any deck that's some subset of Jund colors", rather than "here's an actual decklist". The "decklist" described in the video would be pretty awful since it's so heavy on sac outlets and comparatively light on sac targets, but the BG Evolutionary Leap list that I'm working toward definitely makes use of Myr Peligroso.
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Sep 28, 2015 15:26
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I find myself really enjoying Magic Duels, in part because the format is so low-power that interesting poo poo like Evolutionary Leap Rock has room to breathe without getting murdered instantly by massive slabs of value. Is this what Block Constructed formats are like?
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Sep 29, 2015 15:16
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Yeah I'd probably enjoy the hell out of Pauper since building and playing with a Common Cube is some of the most fun I've ever had with Magic. Are there any good midrange / aggro-control builds for Pauper, preferably ones that lean on synergy and simple card advantage engines? Those tend to be my favorite decks, provided they're not the only viable decks in the format.
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Sep 29, 2015 15:42
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It seems like a sign of the creature-focused times that a lot of recent mechanics meant to make a certain type of card matter have done so by attaching that card type to creatures. Enchantments matter? We got enchantment creatures Lands matter? Awaken can make them into creatures Non-creature spells matter? We got creatures that get bigger when you play them And I like smashing creatures into stuff. My favorite standard deck to play has been Eldrazi Green. But it feels weird for combo and permission decks to be mostly relegated to eternal formats. What do I contrast my cool creatures against?
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Oct 7, 2015 19:42
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Skyl3lazer posted:Smaller, or, perhaps, larger creatures. Hmm. Eldrazi Green had both small and large creatures. A pickle.
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Oct 7, 2015 20:03
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Barry Shitpeas posted:Singing Bell Strike is a Johnny card; Fact or Fiction is more like what you describe. The ultimate Spike card is Sensei's Divining Top, because every time I activate it I can furrow my brow and stare at the cards for a minute straight, demonstrating how deep and strategic my thought process is. My favorite card from the Star Wars thing is the Carbonite one, the Pacifism/Persuasion thing. I'd love to see something like that get printed for real.
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Oct 22, 2015 00:27
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Can someone go into a bit of detail on why triple Zendikar is considered such an awful format? Is it primarily that there was one super-dominant archetype and if you wanted to win you either had to be in that archetype or be the 1-2 people at the table specifically drafting to hose that archetype? Cause that on its own is a legit as hell reason (even if I did really enjoy being that 1 person), but I want to make sure I'm not missing anything - e.g. it seems like there are several interdependent but distinct reasons why triple Avacyn Restored was bad.
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Oct 23, 2015 15:09
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Madmarker posted:This card really screwed things up since it was a common: Chill la Chill is spot on in that it was a ridiculous troll format, both from the perspective of the 2-drop punchman decks frustrating the typical understanding of what a good limited deck looks like, and also from the perspective of decks that would be laughably bad in any other format but hosed the 2-drop punchman decks. Plated Geopede was absurd, but the faces on nerds when they realized they'd have to invest additional resources to get it past a Kraken Hatchling were wonderful. And like, it's not like those resources didn't exist in abundance (Goblin Shortcutter, any removal, etc.), but the complete breakdown of limited card evaluation was real fun for a bit. I probably would've ended up hating it just as much as everyone else if I'd played much longer than I did.
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Oct 23, 2015 15:25
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The first draft I ever did was triple Planar Chaos and I drafted the most ridiculous WR Rescue-187 deck possible. It just churned out value at an alarming rate and won on turn 6 with a dominant board position. It took me several subsequent drafts to realize that decks like those weren't the norm.
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Oct 23, 2015 17:03
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Count Bleck posted:Why is this an Ally In Zendikar, "Ally" loosely meant "someone in an adventuring party" In Battle for Zendikar, "Ally" loosely means "someone working in a concerted way to take Zendikar back from the Eldrazi" Why yes, both of these are incredibly broad
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Oct 23, 2015 22:01
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Some friends and I are making terrible tribal decks for creature types that don't actually have any tribal effects. Pigs are wonderful creatures, so I chose Boar. The rules are that it either has to have the chosen creature type (no Changelings), or clearly depict the chosen creature type in its art. Here's what I've got so far: 4x Brindle Shoat 1G 4x Flinthoof Boar 1G 4x Gristleback 2G 4x Boartusk Liege 1(RG)(RG)(RG) 4x Festerhide Boar 3G 4x Zhur-Taa Swine 3RG 4x Krosan Tusker 5GG 4x Boar Umbra 2G I can fill out the rest with some weak boars, but I figure it's worth asking if there are any neat non-creature spells that have boars in their art. Surely there's some combat trick, or perhaps an Overrun effect, with a boar in there somewhere. Anyone have any ideas?
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Nov 2, 2015 02:20
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Sarcastro posted:That would be a hilarious and awesome way of dealing with community-ruining asses, though. They should do this. I heard that some MOBA, I think maybe DotA 2, dealt with these guys by queuing them with each other, so if you rage too much you get locked in a petulant hell dimension Olothreutes posted:Perhaps Thragtusk is close enough to a boar? He has the tusks, just curly ones. Sadly I don't think so - he's got some cool tusks, but his snout isn't flat like a pig's. Thank you for all the boar help, folks! I think the final list is gonna end up something like the following: 4x Brindle Shoat 1G 4x Flinthoof Boar 1G 4x Gristleback 2G 4x Boartusk Liege 1(RG)(RG)(RG) 4x Festerhide Boar 3G 3x Zhur-Taa Swine 3RG 2x Krosan Tusker 5GG 4x Boar Umbra 2G 3x Ferocious Charge 2G 3x Wildsize 2G 2x Predatory Rampage 3GG 16x Forest 7x Mountain Looks like I can put together the whole thing for about $25, I'm very okay with that.
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Nov 2, 2015 15:33
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It also makes sense that like, okay, there are plenty of formats where I can draft an aggressive RG deck even if it won't have the specific mechanics and flow of a Werewolves build. But this is my one chance to do ridiculous graveyard shenanigans and actually end up with a top-tier draft deck, so why wouldn't I take it if it looks open
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Nov 2, 2015 16:05
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Orange Fluffy Sheep posted:He's totally gonna be the UG experience counters legend because there's a necromancer with a green skull that's being more GB and no one else is vaguely UG. Also because he's got 'Progress' in his name and the blue Phyrexians are called the Progress Engine.
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Nov 3, 2015 02:29
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Sickening posted:Woo is suspended from Channel Fireball. Everyone got what they wanted. Travis Woo did not get what he wanted since he was suspended from Channel Fireball, and Holocaust victims did not get what they wanted since they were killed during the Holocaust, and have you considered that these two parties might be more similar than we give them credit for? [fans a playset of Honored Hierarchs thoughtfully]
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Nov 4, 2015 21:23
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Lieutenant Centaur posted:Ignore it and move on with your life and worry about actual things that actually matter like going to work, paying your bills, etc. There will always be retards like this. If I stopped and got mad and wanted to start a crusade about all the stupid stuff that people do daily nothing would ever get done. Like, are you going through some rough times right now wherein calling a Holocaust denier "bad" is so taxing that it wipes out your last energy and keeps you from getting anything done Because if so, get well soon, friend
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Nov 4, 2015 22:03
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Lieutenant Centaur posted:I think you're missing the point. I mean I'm being willfully obtuse because I'm making fun of you, but it's kinda weird that you keep framing it as people wasting energy and dropping everything they're doing when I'm pretty sure most of the people who are upset at Woo have done so by... making a few posts? Which is what we'd be doing anyway to kill time at work or whatnot
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Nov 4, 2015 22:15
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| # ¿ May 21, 2024 03:31 |
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So Honored Hierarch is bad because it's pretty much gonna do nothing unless you drop it turn 1 and they drop nothing turn 1 (or turn 1 and turn 2, if they're on the play), right?
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Nov 4, 2015 22:22
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