I must be dense - why is it funny that there are two explores?
It's a running gag in the MTG community where known cheater Alex Bertoncini was caught on camera playing 4 lands in one turn after casting two Explore. When asked what turn it was, he famously replied "Two Explore"
I'll get a play set of mother of Runes bc of the art. I'll pick back up Elspeth's when the value tanks but probably just regular versions bc of the art.
He has also been rather brash about it. He named at the very least his twitch channel two explore. They should just permanently ban him but they keep letting him back in so that he can keep cheating and get banned a few months later.
I must be dense - why is it funny that there are two explores?
It's a running gag in the MTG community where known cheater Alex Bertoncini was caught on camera playing 4 lands in one turn after casting two Explore. When asked what turn it was, he famously replied "Two Explore"
Meh... looks like I'll be getting it mostly just for the Planeswalkers. MoR is a decent money card, but it's not like it's Modern legal, and I'm not sure it would fit in any EDH decks I could come up with or would play. Coiled Oracle is likely to do me more good that MoR.
I was really hoping that Elspeth's deck would have Godsend, and Kiora's would have _both_ Whelming Wave and Quest for Ula's Temple (as well as the 4 creature types involved of course), due to my Vorthos side. At least Kiora got Whelming Wave. I suppose it sorta makes sense that she might not have the quest if we go by the assumption she later discovered 'Ula' is actually Ulamog.
Kiora's deck having accumulated knowledge (of course in a playset as that is one of those kind of cards) seems kinda crazy.
I'm such a Vorthos but the best part about it is Temple gives 2 colorless mana, so it aligns with none of the colors of the Theros gods to which Kiora showed no Devotion. How did we not guess this would be the land?
Probably because Karona is such a huge black hole of awful that we largely want to forget anything associated with her.
Which ironically, we get to do twice in the same product. Goodbye old decree of justice, goodbye temple of the lame god!
As far as the decks themselves are concerned, I am (unsurprisingly) drawn to Kiora's deck-
it seems fairly well made and like it could be a lot of fun,
but I might have to find a better opponent for her to duel.
In addition to being a flavor win, Temple of the False God also makes sense mechanically,
and Inkwell Leviathan is pretty much the best sea "monster" ever printed, so no issues there.
I'm a little annoyed that Kiora has a ramp sub-theme,
and yet they didn't reprint a number of quality ramp Commons
(Skyshroud Claim, Nature's Lore, Search for Tomorrow, Far Wanderings, Primal Growth).
Those wouldn't have increased the product value any noticeable amount,
but they would have been nice nonetheless.
Momir Vig, Simic Visionary
Melek, Izzet Paragon
Oona, Queen of the Fae
Bruna, Light of Alabaster
Gisela, Blade of Goldnight
Rhys the Redeemed
Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord
Sen Triplets
The Mimeoplasm WUBRGSliver OverlordGRBUW WUBRGSliver Hivelord(Superfriends)GRBUW
You can tell they made these bad on purpose after looking at the clash packs, but yeah the lack of stuff like simic duals is simply lazy design. Where is Aether mutation? I mean, the list goes on and on. These decks aren't just bad on purpose; it seems they are also lazily constructed, which is very odd considering how many obscure cards made it into this. Looking at you, Gustcloak savior.
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My favorite flavor text: Time of Heroes
Feel free to tell me yours!
Alright for everyone interested in playing the decks, I played a few matches on magic workstation. Here's my report on one game:
Kiora is on the play, but Elspeth gets the first creature out in Icatian Javelineers. Kiora casts Accumulated Knowledge at the end of the turn, then plays Coiling Oracle on her own turn, drawing a card. Elspeth cycles noble templar and the javelineers shoot the oracle before Eslpeth proceeds to her turn. Veteran swordsmith pumps the javelineers and it gets in for two. Kiora plays Lorescale Coatl and passes. Elspeth answers with Mother of Runes (mom), then swings with the javelineers again. Kiora doesn't block, but she does cast time to feed on mom gaining three life and going to 18. Elspeth double cycles secluded steeple and casts Kinsbaile Skirmisher, pumping the swordsmith. Kiora is at 14. She responses with a second coatl. Elspeth swings with team and Dictate of Heliod sends both coatl to the grave while leaving eslpeth’s team untouched. Kiora plays whelming wave to avoid lethal on the next turn and casts Kiora's follower after the wave goes to the grave. Sadly, Eslpeth doesn't need much time to rebuild as Captain of the watch comes down along with three 4/4 vigilance solider tokens. Kiora bought the time to play Temple of the false god and simic sky swallower, but things still look grim for the false god. Eslpeth replays Veteran swordsmith and three solider tokens attack. Kiora loses her follower and simic smacks a token down. The other token gets in for five and kiora is down to 5. Elspeth replays Icatian Javelineers as a 4/4 and passes. Kiora casts inkwell leviathan. Elspeth attacks with the two tokens and the javelineers. A celestial flare takes out the sky swallower. The leviathan eats a token and the javelineers put kiora at one. Kiora draws another island and scoops.
My thoughts:
- The decks play very similarly to knights v. dragons, with white weenies on one side and ramp to large creatures on the other. Unlike that duel deck product though, there isn't anything holding Eslpeth back. While the knights were saddled with a partly green manabase, leading to color screw sometimes, Eslpeth has no such restrictions. As a matter of fact, her deck feels perfectly curved.
-Kiora doesn't have much in the way of permanent removal, but she does have enough bounce, card draw, and mana acceleration that she can stall until she draws a sea monster of some sort. The deck does this reliably, so there's no problem there.
-Unfortunately, said sea monsters don't appear to be strong enough to win the game on their own. In the reported game, Kiora cast two leviathans and a "mass removal" spell in whelming wave, but at no point did Eslpeth feel like it was in any real danger of losing the game. Given that ramp decks are suppose to start winning if they get their behemoths on the table, this is troubling. Kiora sets up the leviathans pretty well, but the sheer speed and force of Eslepth's assault puts into question whether that's even an endgame worth pursuing.
- As a result of this, the games often feel one sided. Out of 6 games, Eslpeth won 4 of them. In each of those 4 games, Eslpeth won in a convincing fashion; Eslpeth would still be around 20 life, a large team of creatures would be on the board, and Kiora just didn't have enough to hold off the attacks. Even when Kiora won, it still felt like Eslpeth could come back if given the time. Kiora doesn't have the luxury of time, even if she does cast her "finishers."
- Kiora seems to have a mini-theme of drawing cards and growing Lorescale Coatls. However, Kiora struggles to survive, negating any opportunity for the sub-theme to play a role. If Kiora draws an AK or a Coatl, she usually needs to cast her card drawing and chump with her coatl right away just to stay afloat.
Overall, Kiora's deck is flavorful and the concept of casting large sea monsters to victory is fun, even if there are a few flavor fails. Kiora is consistent and can reliably hit her game plan. However, her deck doesn't seem to have the sheer power to fight off a focused white weenie deck, even if and when she does cast her big creatures. On the other hand, Eslpeth's deck is very effective, but also very bland. Her deck is literally just a pile of soldiers from throughout magic's past, although the tribe is strong enough to prevail in most games. However, its notable that the white deck is more a solider deck rather than an Eslpeth deck.
I'd give the entire product a 6/10. Modifying Kiora and playing the decks against other duel decks might be a good idea. Just make sure you don't play the decks against one another. Eslpeth will win about 75% of the time.
So, Liliana remains the strongest DD to date followed closely by both of Elspeth decks (this is worse than EvT on removal but better on it's ability to go wide), then Garruk and Sorin closing the top 5.
Haven't posted in a while but I thought I should share my opinion on the deck lists. Firstly a bit disappointing that they went with white weenie again for Elsepth Deck. They could of played something else I feel. The decklists are solid if a bit uninspiring. They are at least thankfully miles better than the garbage that was Speed vs Cunning and I find them to be on pair with Jace vs Vraska. Sadly it seems wizards is more content to let these be simple and let their clash packs be the tournament ready ones.
But this whole thing of being simply makes some cards feel like really odd additions. The whole Gustcloak group mechanic is quite confusing for new players. The cards don't add anything interesting to the decks and are poorly over costed.Surrakar Banisher seems like an weird card for Kiora. Also its a pity they didn't include some of Simics more cooler cards like Gaea's Skyfolk or Drakewing Krasis. Scourge of Fleets does nothing for me, its least interesting of the big sea creatures and was in a intro deck so even less hoorah for it. Maybe I am just disappointed that they didn't include some of the more fancy and cool cards that I listed in my Blog (see signature below). Kiora feels like it lacks theme, where is the high tide for quick ramp or the thematic tidal wave. Why does the deck need 4! Accumulated Knowledge when Ior Ruin Expedition does the job and works with Kiora's ramp. UGH!
Again decent decks, probably would give them a 60% pass rate but just could of been more. Elspeth's deck is just way better than Kiora's sadly.
Want to see other duel decks I made ? Check out my Blog ! Feel free to post advice or give topics for me to make duel decks out of. Check out the Theros Block Planeswalker Theme Duel Decks Elspeth, Xenagos, Ashok, Kiora, Ajani
Temple of the False God does make some sense since Kiora wants to ramp lands anyway, and Evolving Wilds would make sense with any Landfall cards she might have. I still suspect the validity of those decklists though. If pictures could be taken of the box, the decklist insert, and the cards themselves, I might be more convinced.
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MTGS Wikia Article about "New World Order"
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
PSA to everyone who keeps forgetting about the Reserved List:
You're on a website dedicated to talking about MtG. You're only a few keystrokes away from finding out what cards are on the Reserved List. You're also only a few keystrokes away from finding out why some cards on the Reserved List got foil printings in FtV, as Judge promos, or whatnot, as well as why that won't happen again. Stop doing this.
I'm such a Vorthos but the best part about it is Temple gives 2 colorless mana, so it aligns with none of the colors of the Theros gods to which Kiora showed no Devotion. How did we not guess this would be the land?
Probably because Karona is such a huge black hole of awful that we largely want to forget anything associated with her.
Which ironically, we get to do twice in the same product. Goodbye old decree of justice, goodbye temple of the lame god!
Haha there really are two cards that snub her out. She's an annoying commander too, good riddance. As good as that land was I never liked it until now.
I'm surprised Wizards hasn't put up an official spoiler on their site though. I wonder if they know someone already spoiled it To be fair Inkwell is like $3 card and when you're building EDH decks that are singleton, $3 here and there adds up - so it's nice to have him in here which saves me having to buy random singles of stuff. I can't wait to play Mother of Runes too. I have 2 EDH decks that will love her.
I'm getting 2 of these and trading like crazy with my friends for their:
Explore
Temple of the False god
Mother of Runes
Dictate of Heliod
Inkwell Leviathan
Scourge of Fleets
sure, the value is in the walkers, but theres a lot of good gems for EDH in here... and as a modern Death and Taxes player I am hoping for Icatian Javelineers finally gettin a proper modern border.
Scourge of Fleets does nothing for me, its least interesting of the big sea creatures and was in a intro deck so even less hoorah for it.
The scourge is actually the big monster I want to draw if I'm playing the decks against one another. The scourge actually does something when it comes into play. If you read over my game report, the simic sky swallower and the inkwell leviathan were nothing more than glorified blockers.
Scourge of Fleets is insane... He's basically a Cyclonic Rift for creatures when entering. As a Sea Monster EDH player, I'd even venture to say he's the best Sea Monster of them all. Yes, even more than Inkwell Leviathan. He affects the entire board but your own immediately - and I love the Basics Matter theme. Shroud is nice and all but clearing a board like that trumps anything IMO.
So the decklists are real. Huh. Guess I was wrong about the whole "no more than five pairs of nonlands" thing.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
MTGS Wikia Article about "New World Order"
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
PSA to everyone who keeps forgetting about the Reserved List:
You're on a website dedicated to talking about MtG. You're only a few keystrokes away from finding out what cards are on the Reserved List. You're also only a few keystrokes away from finding out why some cards on the Reserved List got foil printings in FtV, as Judge promos, or whatnot, as well as why that won't happen again. Stop doing this.
|| UW Jace, Vyn's Prodigy UW || UG Kenessos, Priest of Thassa (feat. Arixmethes) UG ||
Cards I still want to see created:
|| Olantin, Lost City || Pavios and Thanasis || Choryu ||
Custom Set
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1hu9uNBSUt92PwGhvexYlwFvsh6_SJBlEEIUV3H9_XyU/edit?usp=sharing
Here's the video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrXESPkyMQ8
I'll get a play set of mother of Runes bc of the art. I'll pick back up Elspeth's when the value tanks but probably just regular versions bc of the art.
lol That's one way to explore the rules.
|| UW Jace, Vyn's Prodigy UW || UG Kenessos, Priest of Thassa (feat. Arixmethes) UG ||
Cards I still want to see created:
|| Olantin, Lost City || Pavios and Thanasis || Choryu ||
The deck designs are not shocking, but More Mother of Runes is a good thing.
I was really hoping that Elspeth's deck would have Godsend, and Kiora's would have _both_ Whelming Wave and Quest for Ula's Temple (as well as the 4 creature types involved of course), due to my Vorthos side. At least Kiora got Whelming Wave. I suppose it sorta makes sense that she might not have the quest if we go by the assumption she later discovered 'Ula' is actually Ulamog.
Kiora's deck having accumulated knowledge (of course in a playset as that is one of those kind of cards) seems kinda crazy.
Feel free to tell me yours!
Which ironically, we get to do twice in the same product. Goodbye old decree of justice, goodbye temple of the lame god!
it seems fairly well made and like it could be a lot of fun,
but I might have to find a better opponent for her to duel.
In addition to being a flavor win, Temple of the False God also makes sense mechanically,
and Inkwell Leviathan is pretty much the best sea "monster" ever printed, so no issues there.
I'm a little annoyed that Kiora has a ramp sub-theme,
and yet they didn't reprint a number of quality ramp Commons
(Skyshroud Claim, Nature's Lore, Search for Tomorrow, Far Wanderings, Primal Growth).
Those wouldn't have increased the product value any noticeable amount,
but they would have been nice nonetheless.
It's also a little weird they didn't give her any Simic Growth Chamber, Thornwood Falls,
or even Simic Guildgate. Why not include a few of those Common duals?
Reprint Stasis!
Control needs more love.
EDH:
Momir Vig, Simic Visionary
Melek, Izzet Paragon
Oona, Queen of the Fae
Bruna, Light of Alabaster
Gisela, Blade of Goldnight
Rhys the Redeemed
Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord
Sen Triplets
The Mimeoplasm
WUBRGSliver OverlordGRBUW
WUBRGSliver Hivelord(Superfriends)GRBUW
Feel free to tell me yours!
Kiora is on the play, but Elspeth gets the first creature out in Icatian Javelineers. Kiora casts Accumulated Knowledge at the end of the turn, then plays Coiling Oracle on her own turn, drawing a card. Elspeth cycles noble templar and the javelineers shoot the oracle before Eslpeth proceeds to her turn. Veteran swordsmith pumps the javelineers and it gets in for two. Kiora plays Lorescale Coatl and passes. Elspeth answers with Mother of Runes (mom), then swings with the javelineers again. Kiora doesn't block, but she does cast time to feed on mom gaining three life and going to 18. Elspeth double cycles secluded steeple and casts Kinsbaile Skirmisher, pumping the swordsmith. Kiora is at 14. She responses with a second coatl. Elspeth swings with team and Dictate of Heliod sends both coatl to the grave while leaving eslpeth’s team untouched. Kiora plays whelming wave to avoid lethal on the next turn and casts Kiora's follower after the wave goes to the grave. Sadly, Eslpeth doesn't need much time to rebuild as Captain of the watch comes down along with three 4/4 vigilance solider tokens. Kiora bought the time to play Temple of the false god and simic sky swallower, but things still look grim for the false god. Eslpeth replays Veteran swordsmith and three solider tokens attack. Kiora loses her follower and simic smacks a token down. The other token gets in for five and kiora is down to 5. Elspeth replays Icatian Javelineers as a 4/4 and passes. Kiora casts inkwell leviathan. Elspeth attacks with the two tokens and the javelineers. A celestial flare takes out the sky swallower. The leviathan eats a token and the javelineers put kiora at one. Kiora draws another island and scoops.
My thoughts:
- The decks play very similarly to knights v. dragons, with white weenies on one side and ramp to large creatures on the other. Unlike that duel deck product though, there isn't anything holding Eslpeth back. While the knights were saddled with a partly green manabase, leading to color screw sometimes, Eslpeth has no such restrictions. As a matter of fact, her deck feels perfectly curved.
-Kiora doesn't have much in the way of permanent removal, but she does have enough bounce, card draw, and mana acceleration that she can stall until she draws a sea monster of some sort. The deck does this reliably, so there's no problem there.
-Unfortunately, said sea monsters don't appear to be strong enough to win the game on their own. In the reported game, Kiora cast two leviathans and a "mass removal" spell in whelming wave, but at no point did Eslpeth feel like it was in any real danger of losing the game. Given that ramp decks are suppose to start winning if they get their behemoths on the table, this is troubling. Kiora sets up the leviathans pretty well, but the sheer speed and force of Eslepth's assault puts into question whether that's even an endgame worth pursuing.
- As a result of this, the games often feel one sided. Out of 6 games, Eslpeth won 4 of them. In each of those 4 games, Eslpeth won in a convincing fashion; Eslpeth would still be around 20 life, a large team of creatures would be on the board, and Kiora just didn't have enough to hold off the attacks. Even when Kiora won, it still felt like Eslpeth could come back if given the time. Kiora doesn't have the luxury of time, even if she does cast her "finishers."
- Kiora seems to have a mini-theme of drawing cards and growing Lorescale Coatls. However, Kiora struggles to survive, negating any opportunity for the sub-theme to play a role. If Kiora draws an AK or a Coatl, she usually needs to cast her card drawing and chump with her coatl right away just to stay afloat.
Overall, Kiora's deck is flavorful and the concept of casting large sea monsters to victory is fun, even if there are a few flavor fails. Kiora is consistent and can reliably hit her game plan. However, her deck doesn't seem to have the sheer power to fight off a focused white weenie deck, even if and when she does cast her big creatures. On the other hand, Eslpeth's deck is very effective, but also very bland. Her deck is literally just a pile of soldiers from throughout magic's past, although the tribe is strong enough to prevail in most games. However, its notable that the white deck is more a solider deck rather than an Eslpeth deck.
I'd give the entire product a 6/10. Modifying Kiora and playing the decks against other duel decks might be a good idea. Just make sure you don't play the decks against one another. Eslpeth will win about 75% of the time.
Genuinely surprised that WotC put a full four Accumulated Knowledge in there.
Value is there in just the Planeswalkers at least, so that's cool.
But this whole thing of being simply makes some cards feel like really odd additions. The whole Gustcloak group mechanic is quite confusing for new players. The cards don't add anything interesting to the decks and are poorly over costed.Surrakar Banisher seems like an weird card for Kiora. Also its a pity they didn't include some of Simics more cooler cards like Gaea's Skyfolk or Drakewing Krasis. Scourge of Fleets does nothing for me, its least interesting of the big sea creatures and was in a intro deck so even less hoorah for it. Maybe I am just disappointed that they didn't include some of the more fancy and cool cards that I listed in my Blog (see signature below). Kiora feels like it lacks theme, where is the high tide for quick ramp or the thematic tidal wave. Why does the deck need 4! Accumulated Knowledge when Ior Ruin Expedition does the job and works with Kiora's ramp. UGH!
Again decent decks, probably would give them a 60% pass rate but just could of been more. Elspeth's deck is just way better than Kiora's sadly.
Decks used- GGarruk vs LilianaB, WElsepth vs TezzeretU, WGKnights vs DragonsR
WGRAjani vs BolasRUB, WUVenser vs KothR, RUIzzet vs GolgariGB.
WBSorin vs TibaltBR, WRHeros vs Monsters RG
Want to see other duel decks I made ? Check out my Blog ! Feel free to post advice or give topics for me to make duel decks out of. Check out the Theros Block Planeswalker Theme Duel Decks Elspeth, Xenagos, Ashok, Kiora, Ajani
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
Haha there really are two cards that snub her out. She's an annoying commander too, good riddance. As good as that land was I never liked it until now.
I'm surprised Wizards hasn't put up an official spoiler on their site though. I wonder if they know someone already spoiled it To be fair Inkwell is like $3 card and when you're building EDH decks that are singleton, $3 here and there adds up - so it's nice to have him in here which saves me having to buy random singles of stuff. I can't wait to play Mother of Runes too. I have 2 EDH decks that will love her.
I'm getting 2 of these and trading like crazy with my friends for their:
Explore
Temple of the False god
Mother of Runes
Dictate of Heliod
Inkwell Leviathan
Scourge of Fleets
Love those cards
|| UW Jace, Vyn's Prodigy UW || UG Kenessos, Priest of Thassa (feat. Arixmethes) UG ||
Cards I still want to see created:
|| Olantin, Lost City || Pavios and Thanasis || Choryu ||
I like the new art for Explore.
The scourge is actually the big monster I want to draw if I'm playing the decks against one another. The scourge actually does something when it comes into play. If you read over my game report, the simic sky swallower and the inkwell leviathan were nothing more than glorified blockers.
|| UW Jace, Vyn's Prodigy UW || UG Kenessos, Priest of Thassa (feat. Arixmethes) UG ||
Cards I still want to see created:
|| Olantin, Lost City || Pavios and Thanasis || Choryu ||
Every time I read a comment about "Well if this card had card draw/trample/haste/indestructible/hexproof/life gain...", I think "You're missing the point." They're armchair developer comments that fail to take into account the card's role in the greater Limited and Standard environment. No, it may not be as good as whatever card you're comparing it to. There's a reason for that. Not every burn spell is Lightning Bolt, nor does it need to be or should be.
+1 to the love for new Temple of the False God concept.