Both are stupid powerful. Avacyn in particular- I'm not even sure how you beat her without a 9-mana Death Wind or a Banishing Stroke in common/uncommon land. My question is, if you open one of these in sealed, and you have the colors, do you play them? 8 mana is a LONG time to get to and there's almost no ramp in this set (again, common/uncommons here). But I am reading and hearing from you guys that games will be slow due to the lack of solid removal.
I think the answer is "yes, but maybe board it out versus aggro" but I would like to hear your opinons. Draft opinions are also welcome but they won't help me this Saturday, heh heh.
Bombs win matches in Sealed. I wouldn't board out either card, ever, in a Sealed match. I would be highly motivated to play their color if I opened either one. Griselbrand could even bring you back into a match with aggro with his Lifelinking defense.
Good luck with your packs. I hope you open both and play some BW conglomeration with impossible mana that can't cast either. JK.
In summation.....Star Trek wins a prolonged naval battle against superior, yet less technologically advanced, numbers, with Picard leading the assault, while Kirk takes your soul by laying out Solo and probably his manservant Chewy as well, before impregnating and ditching your Princess.
I agree with Crypt_Rat. Like I said in my other thread I want the games to be over before they can draw their bomb or cast their bomb. If I can get 3-5 guys on the board to your 1-3 and have the game over with 5+CMC cards in your hand, that's the best situation right? If I can get them in the graveyard by discarding and bringing them back I wouldn't WANT to play them.
I'm not saying that the games won't be long nor am I saying getting to 8 looks like it'll be hard. I've just been evaluating the way I play limited a lot recently and my two most notable FNM draft wins were G/W aggro and Naya Aggro just LAST FNM. I was able to kill them a turn or two before they were able to cast cards that would have set me back/let them block.
-Hope this isn't too off topic, but:
A lot of variance happens in limited, especially when it comes to your opening hand. You can't control how many lands are going to be in your opener, but you CAN control what the average CMC of spells will be by what you include in your deck. If you have more 1's and 2's than your opponent you may be able to keep your seven a lot more often than they are. If they don't do anything in the opening turns you have a huge advantage. I'd like to approach sealed the same way I approach drafting. Two aggro decks won the last sealed events at my shop and if the cards are there I'd want to go that route instead of playing an 8 coster, especially if I have to rely on it to win the game for me.
I'd play avacyn if I opened a pool which was good at stalling aggro. something like 2 angelic walls and some removal/tappers.
If I'm aggro, tho, I don't want to get to 8 mana.
I don't think I'd play griselbrand. Costing black mana in this set is a huge drawback, and the drawback only gets worse for every (B) in the mana cost.
The format may not be as slow as most people are predicting (I don't think it can be, when there are common draws that go Wingcrafter, Timberland Guide (attack for 2), Trusted Forcemage (have 2 3/3 fliers on turn 3, plus a 1/1 - a 5th turn goldfish win off three commons). That's Midnight Haunting/Travel Preparations level of busted.
But white and blue are both clearly intended to be defensive colors overall. Both colors have the tools they need to slow the game way down, and those tools are going to be put to use. Avacyn could be played effectively (being white) if the deck is built and played carefully. But 8-drops do not decide a big proportion of games you'll play. Most games with normal decks, you won't even hit 8 mana.
So the question isn't whether or not you can build a deck that can use Avacyn. The question is whether or not building a deck that needs to wait for an 8-drop to be effective is really your best option. And the answer is unclear. White wants the game to go late, but that is REALLY late. It's going to be a very unusual format if there's a color capable of slowing the game down that much, and not capable of doing anything else until the late game. Should be interesting to find out.
Griselbrand, on the other hand, is awful. Black lacks any tools to make the game go late, and actively wants to be aggressive. Griselbrand also requires a massive color investment that hardly any deck is going to be able to muster, ever. If mono-black control turns out to be a deck in this format, I'll eat my hat. This is a shame, because I think once in play, Grisel is a much more interesting card than Avacyn is.
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
I can't believe anyone is excited about this card. It is absolutely unplayable. I wouldn't even play her in LIMITED. Easily the worst walker printed since the green elf one. Absolutely terrible.
I suspect that I would run Avacyn. A lot of the commons are barely playable as is and without the ease of splashing, I suspect I'd prefer the rare 'I win' over 'ugh, not this crap'.
So, for those that wouldnt't run Avacyn, what about Gisela? 7 mana in 2 colors for a similarly winning effect. I have her about the same level as Avacyn, though more often I'm going more aggro with RW, so suspect she would be run less often.
Costing 7 instead of 8 is a lot easier to swallow with Gisela, and she does more or less win the game on the spot. I would certainly play her if I had the opportunity.
Both cards are strong enough that I would highly tailor my deck to being able to reliably cast them. Considering that Amass the Components and a number of cantrips in Blue, as well as Mad Prophet and Dangerous Gamble in Red are all commons, it would be reasonable o expect to see enough of your deck in a given game to hit 8 lands and there's a decent chance you'll draw into your bombs.
"You know Manningham's story of the burgher's wife who bade Dick Burbage to her bed after she had seen him in Richard III and how Shakespeare, overhearing, without more ado about nothing, took the cow by the horns and, when Burbage came knocking at the gate, answered from the capon's blankets: William the conqueror came before Richard III."
Will they draw you into the color if your sealed pool doesn't have much support for that color? Hopefully not.
Will you be splashing for them? Highly unlikely.
Will you play them if your sealed pool does have enough support? Maybe. For a given sealed deck, is Avacyn/Griselbrand better than your other choices for a 23rd card: affects the board a lot, but hard to cast; vs, say, a bad cheap creature who's easier to cast but affects the board very rarely--or an off color strong/bomb card that might require you to run a sketchier mana base?
I wouldn't run either in most decks. It's not that costing 8 rules them out absolutely - the trouble is that a card that costs 8 has to just WIN. Both are actually quite weak in those terms. Griselbrand's awesome ability probably can't be activated without dying and Avacyn's indestructibility power isn't going to be much good since if you do have any creatures left by that point they've apparently been doing fine at surviving by themselves.
So basically both are just huge flying creatures. Which is good, but not impressive enough to be worth 8.
(The decks I would run them in are those where my pool is weak enough that I need to get a bit lucky to win matches.)
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<Limited Clan>
I drew Griselbrand in the prerelease yesterday and ended up going 3-1, and I had him on the board in every match. I would say he was directly responsible for me winning my 3 matches, and losing one (Opponent took control of him, beat me to the face, and drew cards in order to keep tempo and win) However, in the games that I did win, I did not find an issue in being able to stall out with cards like Wandering Wolf and Gloom Surgeon until I had the mana to play him.
I did not get a chance to even see an Avacyn in the pool that I was in, but I would definetely say that in Limited, there are enough ways to keep pace in a game until you can get these guys out. And once you do, chances are you are going to win.
I drew Griselbrand in the prerelease yesterday and ended up going 3-1, and I had him on the board in every match. I would say he was directly responsible for me winning my 3 matches
Real data always beats speculation - good call on including him.
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<Limited Clan>
I think Griselbrand is better than Avacyn assuming you have a heavy black mana base as it is hard to lose the turn after you play him do to his lifelink. I saw a couple people die with Avacyn in play because their opponent could just attack into it with several guys. That said from what Ive seen any deck with enough black to cast Griselbrand is probably not great as that colour seems pretty weak. Saw very few swamps at the top tables this weekend.
Both are stupid powerful. Avacyn in particular- I'm not even sure how you beat her without a 9-mana Death Wind or a Banishing Stroke in common/uncommon land. My question is, if you open one of these in sealed, and you have the colors, do you play them? 8 mana is a LONG time to get to and there's almost no ramp in this set (again, common/uncommons here). But I am reading and hearing from you guys that games will be slow due to the lack of solid removal.
I think the answer is "yes, but maybe board it out versus aggro" but I would like to hear your opinons. Draft opinions are also welcome but they won't help me this Saturday, heh heh.
The Mist Raven - Nephalia Smuggler combo does the trick against Avacyn. The only real ramp is Vessel of Endless Rest, or maybe the red "ritual" card I can't think of the name of right now. 1R for R for each creature you control. White is strong in AVR, so opening an Avacyn you definitely at least consider it. 5WWW is a big commitment, and if you're going to have to splash a third color it's most likely off the table unless you pulled at least two of Abundant Growth, Borderland Ranger, Somberwald Sage, or Vessel of Endless Rest. Griselbrand is even worse in that regard. 4BBBB requires an all-in commitment to black, which honestly didn't get much in AVR. I think unless your black pool is just insanely strong you almost have to stay away from Griselbrand.
As an aside, at the pre-release yesterday, there WAS a kid who pulled Avacyn, Gisela, and Malignus, played all three and accidentally won 3 matches just off the sheer power of those. His loss was to a blue / green tempo deck with I think one rare in it and the Mist Raven / Nephalia Smuggler combo.
from 1st hand experience 8 drops are perfectly viable in sealed.
and to say avacyn doesnt pretty much end a game when she comes down is silly, same with griselbrand. if you untap with either of those and dont win the game you were way way way behind in the 1st place... especially with griselbrand considering he has life link..
I actually opened both in the two sealed events I did, one in each. I did not play Griselbrand, because despite having a fair number of black in my pool, the overall quality of the black just seems...blah. And putting together a blah deck just for one big late bomb seemed like a bad idea.
I went 2-2 and only drew Avacyn 4 times in 10 games. I played her in 3 and in the one I didn't, I won despite not being able to play her because my opponent weakened his deck to try and combat her, adding discard effects that caused me to ditch extra lands, but otherwise not really hindering my secondary strategy all that much. The other 3 times I drew her, I played her. 2 of those times, my opponent looked at a clogged up boardstate, thought about any answers they could draw and immediately scooped. The third time, my opponent forgot she made everything indestructable, sent his team at me and slapped his forehead after I declared all of my blockers and pointed out that my guys don't die.
So my experience with AVR sealed is that it is possible to get a pool that stalls the board, even against dedicated aggro decks, and if you do, you should not hesitate to play Avacyn. The combination of 8/8, Vigilant and Flying may not end the game immediately, but it really shouldn't take more than 2 turns. And the mass indestructability really requires a few special cards in someone's deck to be able to deal with her.
I pulled a Griselbrand but the rest of my black sucked like crazy. There would have been maybe 3 other black cards that I would have run. I did run into Avacyn 3 times though and well...I didn't win the games when she made an appearance:) To be fair though, both of those games that Avacyn was played, one guy had the 3 mana human and the other had that angel that reduces the cost of other angels.
But big nasty creatures like that can do make a showing somewhat regular in limited. Shoot, for INN, I casted that 13 zombie spell 3 times thoughout the tourny and would have been able to flash it back on one occasion.
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I think the answer is "yes, but maybe board it out versus aggro" but I would like to hear your opinons. Draft opinions are also welcome but they won't help me this Saturday, heh heh.
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Good luck with your packs. I hope you open both and play some BW conglomeration with impossible mana that can't cast either. JK.
Older Magic as a Board Game: Panglacial Wurm , Mill
I'm not saying that the games won't be long nor am I saying getting to 8 looks like it'll be hard. I've just been evaluating the way I play limited a lot recently and my two most notable FNM draft wins were G/W aggro and Naya Aggro just LAST FNM. I was able to kill them a turn or two before they were able to cast cards that would have set me back/let them block.
-Hope this isn't too off topic, but:
A lot of variance happens in limited, especially when it comes to your opening hand. You can't control how many lands are going to be in your opener, but you CAN control what the average CMC of spells will be by what you include in your deck. If you have more 1's and 2's than your opponent you may be able to keep your seven a lot more often than they are. If they don't do anything in the opening turns you have a huge advantage. I'd like to approach sealed the same way I approach drafting. Two aggro decks won the last sealed events at my shop and if the cards are there I'd want to go that route instead of playing an 8 coster, especially if I have to rely on it to win the game for me.
JAMMIT DIM! I'm a DOCTOR not a DECKBUILDER!
If I'm aggro, tho, I don't want to get to 8 mana.
I don't think I'd play griselbrand. Costing black mana in this set is a huge drawback, and the drawback only gets worse for every (B) in the mana cost.
Older Magic as a Board Game: Panglacial Wurm , Mill
But white and blue are both clearly intended to be defensive colors overall. Both colors have the tools they need to slow the game way down, and those tools are going to be put to use. Avacyn could be played effectively (being white) if the deck is built and played carefully. But 8-drops do not decide a big proportion of games you'll play. Most games with normal decks, you won't even hit 8 mana.
So the question isn't whether or not you can build a deck that can use Avacyn. The question is whether or not building a deck that needs to wait for an 8-drop to be effective is really your best option. And the answer is unclear. White wants the game to go late, but that is REALLY late. It's going to be a very unusual format if there's a color capable of slowing the game down that much, and not capable of doing anything else until the late game. Should be interesting to find out.
Griselbrand, on the other hand, is awful. Black lacks any tools to make the game go late, and actively wants to be aggressive. Griselbrand also requires a massive color investment that hardly any deck is going to be able to muster, ever. If mono-black control turns out to be a deck in this format, I'll eat my hat. This is a shame, because I think once in play, Grisel is a much more interesting card than Avacyn is.
So, for those that wouldnt't run Avacyn, what about Gisela? 7 mana in 2 colors for a similarly winning effect. I have her about the same level as Avacyn, though more often I'm going more aggro with RW, so suspect she would be run less often.
:symu::symr: Melek WheelStorm
:symw::symg: Trostani Enchantress (updated 6/5)
:symg::symr::symu: Unexpected Results.dec
Thada Adel Stax WIP
Pity we can't cheat them into play this set (Unburial rites).
~M
JAMMIT DIM! I'm a DOCTOR not a DECKBUILDER!
Will they draw you into the color if your sealed pool doesn't have much support for that color? Hopefully not.
Will you be splashing for them? Highly unlikely.
Will you play them if your sealed pool does have enough support? Maybe. For a given sealed deck, is Avacyn/Griselbrand better than your other choices for a 23rd card: affects the board a lot, but hard to cast; vs, say, a bad cheap creature who's easier to cast but affects the board very rarely--or an off color strong/bomb card that might require you to run a sketchier mana base?
So basically both are just huge flying creatures. Which is good, but not impressive enough to be worth 8.
(The decks I would run them in are those where my pool is weak enough that I need to get a bit lucky to win matches.)
(I'm on on this site much anymore. If you want to get in touch it's probably best to email me: dom@heffalumps.org)
Forum Awards: Best Writer 2005, Best Limited Strategist 2005-2012
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<Limited Clan>
I'd like to hear your take on the speed of the set and your general thoughts overall.
JAMMIT DIM! I'm a DOCTOR not a DECKBUILDER!
That said, I'm still not running him.
Older Magic as a Board Game: Panglacial Wurm , Mill
I drew Griselbrand in the prerelease yesterday and ended up going 3-1, and I had him on the board in every match. I would say he was directly responsible for me winning my 3 matches, and losing one (Opponent took control of him, beat me to the face, and drew cards in order to keep tempo and win) However, in the games that I did win, I did not find an issue in being able to stall out with cards like Wandering Wolf and Gloom Surgeon until I had the mana to play him.
I did not get a chance to even see an Avacyn in the pool that I was in, but I would definetely say that in Limited, there are enough ways to keep pace in a game until you can get these guys out. And once you do, chances are you are going to win.
Real data always beats speculation - good call on including him.
(I'm on on this site much anymore. If you want to get in touch it's probably best to email me: dom@heffalumps.org)
Forum Awards: Best Writer 2005, Best Limited Strategist 2005-2012
5CB PotM - June 2005, November 2005, February 2006, April 2008, May 2008, Feb 2009
MTGSalvation Articles: 1-20, plus guest appearance on MTGCast #86!
<Limited Clan>
The Mist Raven - Nephalia Smuggler combo does the trick against Avacyn. The only real ramp is Vessel of Endless Rest, or maybe the red "ritual" card I can't think of the name of right now. 1R for R for each creature you control. White is strong in AVR, so opening an Avacyn you definitely at least consider it. 5WWW is a big commitment, and if you're going to have to splash a third color it's most likely off the table unless you pulled at least two of Abundant Growth, Borderland Ranger, Somberwald Sage, or Vessel of Endless Rest. Griselbrand is even worse in that regard. 4BBBB requires an all-in commitment to black, which honestly didn't get much in AVR. I think unless your black pool is just insanely strong you almost have to stay away from Griselbrand.
As an aside, at the pre-release yesterday, there WAS a kid who pulled Avacyn, Gisela, and Malignus, played all three and accidentally won 3 matches just off the sheer power of those. His loss was to a blue / green tempo deck with I think one rare in it and the Mist Raven / Nephalia Smuggler combo.
and to say avacyn doesnt pretty much end a game when she comes down is silly, same with griselbrand. if you untap with either of those and dont win the game you were way way way behind in the 1st place... especially with griselbrand considering he has life link..
The pool in which I opened Avacyn, however, demanded that I play white. I had 2 Angelic Wall, a Goldnight Redeemer, 2 Seraph of Dawn, a Spectral Gateguards, Voice of the Provinces, Captain of the Mists Elgaud Shieldmate, Mist Raven, Nephalia Smuggler and a variety of blinky combat tricks and splashed for 2 Pillar of Flame.
I went 2-2 and only drew Avacyn 4 times in 10 games. I played her in 3 and in the one I didn't, I won despite not being able to play her because my opponent weakened his deck to try and combat her, adding discard effects that caused me to ditch extra lands, but otherwise not really hindering my secondary strategy all that much. The other 3 times I drew her, I played her. 2 of those times, my opponent looked at a clogged up boardstate, thought about any answers they could draw and immediately scooped. The third time, my opponent forgot she made everything indestructable, sent his team at me and slapped his forehead after I declared all of my blockers and pointed out that my guys don't die.
So my experience with AVR sealed is that it is possible to get a pool that stalls the board, even against dedicated aggro decks, and if you do, you should not hesitate to play Avacyn. The combination of 8/8, Vigilant and Flying may not end the game immediately, but it really shouldn't take more than 2 turns. And the mass indestructability really requires a few special cards in someone's deck to be able to deal with her.
But big nasty creatures like that can do make a showing somewhat regular in limited. Shoot, for INN, I casted that 13 zombie spell 3 times thoughout the tourny and would have been able to flash it back on one occasion.